Just before eight, I switched on the TV to watch the news.
One of the first things I read was "Assault on Pim Fortuyn".
Just a little later, I heard how he was murdered in cold
blood in Hilversum when he returned to his car from a
radio interview. This is the first political murder in
the Netherlands.
(follow-up)
Signing
This afternoon, I went to the offices of my new employer
to sign a contract. I will start working on the 15th
of this month, which will be election day as well.
Then I went to the town hall in the city to sign
the condolence register for Pim Fortuyn, who was
brutaly murdered yesterday. I find both signatures
of the same importance.
Volkert van der G.
The suspect on the murder on Pim Fortuyn appears
to be some one fighting for the freedom of animals.
He works with
Milieu Offensief (Environment Offensive).
On the website of Animal Freedom an
interview with him is given.
No continuation
I received an email, which implied that there will
be no continuation of
former employer for the simple
reason that the customers after many negotiations
have decided not to support it.
At this point it also would not have been possible
anymore, because almost all software engineers (including me)
for the client are no longer available.
Chestnut plant
The chestnut plant that I
thought was not going to make it, started to grow in a
strange way again. As you can see here on
this picture.
I wonder how it is going to develop.
This evening, Annabel and I went to
the Chinese taka-away to get one portion of "Nasi Goreng Speciaal".
As usual, Annabel went outside to play. She came back telling
that she had found a little chestnut plant under the big
chestnut tree. And indeed, when I went to check her findings,
it was indeed a little chestnut tree. Later, when we walked
away, we found another two. All three of them were smaller
than the ones we have at home. I think it is also a different
kind of chestnut tree.
Two years after the disaster
This morning, while driving home, I saw a flag
at half-mast. Thinking that it was the 12th,
I wondered what might be the reason why that flag
was at half-mast. Then at home, when I watched the
news, I suddenly realized that it was indeed the
13th, and that it was now 2 years ago
that Enschede was struck by the
fire-works disaster. Around half past four the
bells were rang for five minutes. To be honest, I
did not hear it. They are still working on clearing
the disaster area, and only bits by bits are released.
Last month the main road through the area was opened
again. Some houses at the border have been rebuild.
(follow-up)
(And now for something completely different:)
In the past weeks, I have worked on a
very simple tool for creating C++ based Object-Oriented persistent
store based on the concept op Memory Mapped Files. Windows
allows you to open a file as if it were inside the memory
of your program. (This functionality is also widely used
by the operating system itself.) I decided to make
the source available
under GNU General Public License.
I have to give credits to Suneido for
giving me the initial ideas.
(See here for an example of usage.)
Election day
Around half past seven, I went to vote for
Li-Xia and myself. We are in electoral district 4 "Zwolle", in the
electoral subdistrict 615, where the voting is done at "Mediant
Helmerzijde" located at "Broekheurnering 1050". The number of
Li-Xia's voting card was 456 and the number on mine was 457.
We were the 13th and 14th person to vote.
Today it is a very strange voting day, overshadowed by the
brutal murder on Pim
Fortuyn the political leader of the LPF. Now that he is
gone the rest of his party is divided among itself. Which
does not make it a good party to vote on. At the same time,
many people felt simpaty with the ideas of Pim Fortuyn and
wanted to express their resistement against the current
government by voting on him. Some people may even vote on
the LPF as a means to express their condolence with the
death of Pim Fortuyn.
The outcome of the voting was unexpected, but on the
other hand also to be expected. Our parlement has 150
positions. The LPF got 26 of these, but they did not
become the largest part. The Christian Democrats got
43 positions. The two big losers are the labour party
and the liberal party. Both got 23 positions. Also
the third party that was part of the goverment until
now, lost significant.
Some other change, that was not given attention in the
media is the fact that the two small Christian parties lost
25% of their positions. They went from eight back to
six positions. Especially, for one of the two, this
is remarkable, for it has been on three positions for
many years in a row. (On May 25,
I discovered that
they actually got more votes than last time, and that
their loss is caused by the fact that much more people
went to vote.) I guess some of them have voted
for the Christian Democrats, maybe because they are
against the LPF.
It is rather clear that the Christian Democrats
will be first asked for form a new goverment. To do
this, they will have to form a coalition with at least
two other parties to get enough votes. They can turn
right, forming a coalition with the LPF and the
Liberal party. But the LPF does not seems to be a
very stable party, and the Liberal party is among the
big losers. Or they can turn left, making a coalition
with some of the left wing parties. Such a coalition
would require the labour party, the biggest loser.
Which makes it even a more unlikely possibility.
Some weeks ago, it was already clear that the
Christian Democrats were going to play a key role
in determining the next government, and that they
would have some good combinations to chose from.
Now it looks like there is not really much good
to chose for, especially, because there has been such
a dramatic change. Some politicians have been saying
that we will have elections soon again, maybe event
within a year. This will be a real test case for
Jan Peter Balkenende, the leader of the Christian
Democrats.
Fennel and liquorice
The afternoon, I had some fennel and liquorice tea made
by Zonnatura.
Yet another chestnut in the garden has started to grow. Now
we have two in the garden and three in home that are growing.
The formation of the new cabinet is not going smooth.
The liberal party has announced that they rather not
would like to be part of the new cabinet. The leader of
the LPF has declared that the Christian Democrats owe
them a dept of honour, because according to him, they
got so many votes because of Pim Fortuyn, which implies
that they want to have an equal share of the power although
they are smaller. The problem is that amongh the party
members there are not many with the right experience for
becoming a minister or secretary of state.
The formation of the new cabinet
(Cont'd)
The leader of the LPF (Lijst Pim Fortuyn), Mat Herben, want
to have something to say about who will be the new prime
minister. He feels that the LPF has this rights, because
he thinks that the Christian democrats owe some votes to
the rise of his party. This is what he yesterday said during
the television show Barend en Van Dorp. He also thinks
that the liberal party should be allowed to join in. He said
that Hans Wiegel (a well known liberal) has a slight preference
over Jan Peter Balkenende, the leader of the Christian democrats.
Why would Mat Herben have a preference for a prime minister from
a party that lost many votes compared to one that won many?
It might be the case that the Christian Democrats won some
votes because of the LPF, but it is clear that they only could
have done this because of the clear leadership of Jan Peter
Balkenende. Could it be, that Mat Herben does not like devoted
christians, because he is an active member of the freemasonry,
as is appearent from
an
announcement of an open-day
and a
short explaination written by himself.
Although freemasonry claims to be not a religion and
not to exclude Christianity in the first place, the sites
Ex-Masons for Jesus and
Saints Alive seem to argue for the opposite.
(follow-up)
The Christian Democrats have said that they are willing to form
a coalition with the LPF. The liberal party has said that they
prefer a minority cabinet that they would support. But in a sense
that is a ridiculous proposition. Because in the situation of a
minority cabinate with a party supporting that, that party gets
too much power, because it can veto every decision of the cabinet.
Accident
Some people from my church bring a visit to the Ukraine about
twice a year and take a lot of goods with them. One of the
persons they visit there, recently moved to a poorer area of
the city. He felt that God had called him to live there, to
preach the gospel to the poor. Yesterday, during our cell group
meetings, we heard that he and some of his family members were
involved in tragic car accident.
He had broken his leg with an open wound. Some woman in his
family had her nose and forehead fragmented. The driver of the
car was still lying in coma in the hospital. Of course,
accidents happen every day, but we were quite impressed by this
news. During our time of intercession at the end of the evening,
our attention was brought to some other forms of suffering in
our midst. The world is full with suffering.
Millennium Falcon
Some people tried to build a
a life-size Millennium Falcon
in someones back-yard.
The formation of the new cabinet
(Cont'd)
You always have to be careful about what you conclude.
Last Tuesday, I suggested that Mat Herber
might not like Jan Pieter Balkenende. However, today, he
said in an interview he has a great trust in Jan Peter
Balkenende, and has a preference for him as the next
prime minister. (Last Tuesday, he still had a slight
preference for Hans Wiegel. Apparently Hans Wiegel is
no longer an option.)
In the same interview, he said that his party should
be granted five of the fifteen ministers, and that he
likes to give the ministers for the departments of
justice, education and healthcare. These are three
very important departments. However, compared to their
share in the coalition they would only have right for
four ministers. He argues that the prime-minister counts
for two. But even in that case, the LPF would only
have right for 4.47 minister positions. Furthermore,
he also wants five minister positions for the liberal
party. That would mean that they would get ten of
the fifteen minister positions, compared to only five
for the Christian Democrats, while they together only
make 53.8% of the coalition. (It should be noted, that
the liberals lost a lot of votes, while the Christian
Democrats made a big come-back.) Even if you count the
prime-minister as two, their share of the coalition is
62.5%. To do justice to the victory of the Christian
Democrats they should get at least six minister positions
(including the prime minister). The suggestion that
Mat Herben made, again seems to imply that he seeks
support from the liberals rather from the Christian
Democrats.
(follow-up)
Mat Herben
Today, there was a short documentary about Mat Herben on
Dutch television. He lives in Lintschoten, which is close
to Woerden were I grew
up. If he was born in Lintschoten, it is likely he attended
the same high-school that I attended. The documentary also
told that he is Roman-Catholic and that he one day with
Yvonne van Gerp visited the pope. He also often wrote some
column for a Roman-Catholic life-style magazine. In the
documentary he also was open about his freemasonry
membership. He depicted it as a place of free and open
discussion, not as a secret organization. We even got a
glimse of the meeting room with the eye in the triangle.
(Yes, the same symbol you find on the US dollar bills.)
Furthermore, he made a statement that Pim Fortuyn was against
the same sex-marriage (although
he himself was gay), and that for him it also was not needed.
He did not have trouble with sex outside marriages, as it
has become common practice nowadays.
I think that if he would read my suggestion that he is having
troubles with devoted christians, his first reaction will
be that that is nonsense, and that he regards all people
as equal (as is being thought by the freemasonry). But on
the other hand, I think he will condemn some of the ideas
found in conservative (protestant) Christian circles as being
too intolerant.
I furthermore, think that he will have problems with the fact
that the Bible states that there is only road to salvation,
and that is through Jesus Christ.
What Roman-Catholisme and freemasonry have in common is that
in both traditions symbols and rituals play an important role.
However, it should be noted that many of these symbols and
rituals are from a pagan background and not based on the Bible.
It is also remarkable that in both traditions symbols are said
to be just symbols, e.g., refering to some higher invisble truth.
Yet on the other hand, these symbols have become so important,
that it seems impossible to do away with them. They almost have
replaced the higher thing. It looks like they have become objects
of worship themselves.
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