A Simple Observation, with some Complex Thoughts

       A while back I had a conversation with a young liberal who questioned me when I said I wondered if the socialist countries of that Mr. Sanders is fond of using as a model of how we should be would remain as gleaming beacons when their populations were not as homogeneous as they have been.  Would the social benefits continue, would the economy continue as it had been, how would they coupe with the influx of middle eastern refugees? 

Today there is this article Washington Post: Denmark, a Social Welfare Utopia, Takes a Nasty Turn on Refugees.

The Washington Post blames the “far right” as the problem of the government prosecuting its citizens for human trafficking when they help refugees reach Sweden.  Just as my young friend did when he said I was voicing the concerns of the right wing racists and was therefore being racist myself.  But let’s think about this for a moment.  The far right or far left are clear minorities in any self-governing society.  The majority of the population may lean one way or another, but they are for the most part moderate.  Wanting only to live their lives in relative comfort, care for their families, and not be bothered by the extremes.

How then does a far right party like the Danish Peoples Party gain control of the government? 

Is it because there is some inherent racist bent to the population or is it because the moderate voices have been shouted down by the extremes and the people react to the fear that their society, the one they have grown up in and want to continue, will be destroyed by the sudden pressure of tens of thousands of displaced persons who must be clothed, housed and fed?  When the one side voices this concern, and the other side dismisses it as unworthy of discussion who then do the moderates side with?

For me, one of the interesting aspects of the Danish example is the current government is using laws written by the previous liberal governments to prosecute its citizens.  The whole issue of human trafficking, while not new, was brought to the forefront by those who want it to stop, for it is slavery pure and simple. In this they are right.  Here we have a case where those on the left want to do the “right thing,” but in so doing violate the laws they helped write, for no law is perfectly written to anticipate every eventuality.

It appears to me, an interested bystander, that the left’s desire to open the gates of their countries to vast numbers of middle eastern refugees with a significantly different culture, will have a long term negative affect on the social discourse and no amount of belittlement by the liberal media will persuade those impacted by those choices differently.  It will only change once the moderates realize the government has moved too far to the right and the pendulum begins to swing back, but even then these societies will never be exactly what they were when Mr. Sander’s cited them as models of what we in America should be.