Gastauteur

Een gastbijdrage van Huib Riethof. Dit stuk werd met toestemming overgenomen van zijn persoonlijke weblog.

March 26, 2011, Mr. Wilders continued (see first part) his remarkable horror story in front of a Roman public by referring to ideas first espoused by Edward Gibbon, a great 18th century British historian, whose “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” (1776-1789, 6 vol.) was a first exhaustive study into the fragility of empires.

Inevitably, Wilders (or his ghost writer, for Mr. Wilders did not study at a University) concentrates on a 402 AD (or 401 or 405 AD) event. Some Germanic [and Slavic, HR] peoples crossed the Rhine river and started an invasion into the Roman Gaul lands. Which leads, finally, to plundering of the City of Rome in 406 AD (or 410 AD).

Gibbon’s source is Jerome in Bethlehem, who was observing from a large distance in space and time what had happened to the Western part of the Roman Empire. The event is not central to Edward Gibbon’s theory about the way and causes of the Roman downfall. But Jerome was one of the few written sources he could access. Historiography has much progressed since then. But Mr. Wilders needed a source to underline his anti-islamic world vision and his idée-fixe about Christian supremacy.

Een gastbijdrage van Huib Riethof. Dit stuk werd met toestemming overgenomen van zijn persoonlijke weblog.

March 25 (26), Mr. Geert Wilders, Dutch MP and leader of an authoritarian movement (no membership, one leader), called the ‘Freedom Party’ (PVV), spoke at a meeting in Rome, Italy.

In addition to what Mr. Wilders will have to say himself about his actual position and perspectives in Holland and elsewhere, we’d like to mention, that his hosts (the Italian Magna Carta Foundation) are closely linked to media tycoon and much criticized populist head of Government Silvio Berlusconi as well as to the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). The AEI, as is well known, are under neo-conservative influence.

But, actually, neither the AEI, nor the main neocon publication (The Weekly Standard, Washington DC) seem to be much in favor of a crusade against Islam as such. The US Neoconservatives consider religion, Christian or not, as an efficient disciplining tool for the masses.

That is, why AEI and WS scarcely mention the Dutch verbal crusader against Islam. They prefer a more subtle approach.

GWIFA failure

Wilders is trying to establish an international federation of anti-Islam movements. He has already a name for it: ‘Geert Wilders International Freedom Association’ (GWIFA). GWIFA should be established in the US. But, alas for him, large egos like Robert Spencer, Pamela Geller and Daniel Pipes, are not in a mood to leave the stage and put up a wooden shoe loon as their mascot.