Dutch PM Mark Rutte sees off election threat of Geert Wilders

[brooklynite]

Last edited Thu Mar 16, 2017, 08:10 AM - Edit history (1)

Source: The Guardian

The Dutch prime minister, Mark Rutte, has seen off a challenge from the anti-Islam populist Geert Wilders to claim a resounding victory in parliamentary elections widely seen as a test for resurgent nationalism before other key European polls.

With nearly 95% of votes counted and no further significant changes expected, Rutte’s centre-right, liberal VVD was assured of 33 MPs, by far the largest party in the 150-seat Dutch parliament, the national news agency ANP said.

Wilders’ Freedom party (PVV) looked certain to finish second, but a long way behind on 20 seats, just ahead of the Christian Democrat CDA and liberal-progressive D66, which both ended third with 19 seats.

“Our message to the Netherlands – that we will hold our course, and keep this country safe, stable and prosperous – got through,” Rutte told a cheering crowd of supporters at the VVD’s election night party.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/15/pm-mark-rutte-set-to-beat-geert-wilders-in-dutch-election

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Expected Results:

VVD: 33 (-8)
Freedom: 20 (+5)
Christian Democrats: 19 (+6)
D66: 19 (+7)
Green: 14 (+10)
Socialist: 14 (-1)
Labour: 9 (-29)
Christen Union: 5 (0)
Party for the Animals: 5 (+3)
50Plus: 4 (+2)
DENK: 3 (+3)
Calvinist: 3 (0)
Forum for Democracy: 2 (+2)


Coalition Scenarios:

VVD / Christian Democrats / D66 / Christian Union: 76/150 seats
VVD / Christian Democrats / D66 / Labour: 80/150 seats
VVD / Christian Democrats / D66 / Green or Socialist: 85/150 seats

[rurallib]

1. good to hear

[Sherman A1]

2. Very good and also

to hear of the high voter turnout for the election.

[rurallib]

3. Plus they were hand counted

what a concept!
Maybe we should try that!

[47of74]

5. And fuck Steve King for supporting him too.

[dalton99a]

13. +1

[Sunlei]

4. I read 80% voters turn out to defeat the "Dutch trump"

wish USA had an 80% turnout, I think our turn out is always around 50%.

[SoCalNative]

6. The Dutch do their elections right

Polls are open in the entire country from 7AM to 9PM. You also are not limited to going to one polling location. You can vote at any polling place within the municipality in which you reside. In addition to the normal polling places (gov't buildings, schools, churches) they also set up polling places at all of the train stations.

[brooklynite]

7. National voting is possible with you're not voting for a district representative.

[lagomorph777]

8. Analysts are saying that Trump has scared the Europeans away from electing crazies

So I guess we are serving some useful purpose, as a negative example.

[nycbos]

9. Brexit might have had a similar effect.

[lagomorph777]

10. Yes, but apparently not sufficient to scare us away from Agent Orange.

Assuming you believe the election results, which I do not.

[nycbos]

11. Well three million more people voted for Hillary.

Unfortunately most Americans probably never heard of Brexit.

[lagomorph777]

12. I do believe the 3 million part.

I also believe they were legal voters.

And yeah, Brexit does seem to draw blanks when I mention it in 'murika.

[Kashkakat v.2.0]

14. Too bad so sad - guess their vote-flipping malware needs some work nt

[TheFrenchRazor]

15. i heard they just went to hand counted paper ballots before this election; seriously.

if our dem leaders in this country don't do something about entirely hackable voting machines, we're going to keep on losing, no matter how many more votes we actually get.

[mountain grammy]

16. Our fascists are worse than their fascists.

Their fascists are xenophobic and racist, but wouldn't dream of dismantling the socialist health care system.
Our fascists want everyone to suffer.