PJ Media

Excellent result. This is not about the Dutch ‘getting a spine,’ though. Not at all. It is about testing a case according to the law of the land. In Dutch law, as in that of many juresdictions, freedom of speech is guaranteed within the law of the land. Since one of their early amendments to THEIR constitution is that all people must be treated equally, it is quite consistent that you can not advocate race hatred, or hatred of a group because of their religion. Thus, it may be reasonable for a higher court judge to instruct a lower court to test whether Wilders has broken the law. He has advocated a tax on Muslim headgear which he referred to as ‘head rags’. He advocates banning the Koran from Dutch territory, calling it a nazi book. He seems something of an extremist. If the court prosecutors having reluctantly brought the case and have now made it clear that they consider there is no evidence that he advocated race hatred (a specific crime in Holland and most of Europe – not so surprising after the events in Germany of seventy years ago) so much the better.

By the way, people who are sentenced for transgressing the constitutional right to be treated equally in Holland, mostly get only a small fine. Looking at the custom and practise of court cases there, nobody goes to Prison, even if they do stand on the street and advocate hatred of Jews or Muslims or black people. Wilders was never going to prison for making hot headed speeches. Not a chance. If he had set up some kind of death squad and conspired to harm people, that would be a different matter.

Euro Tony