News below sea level

Recent background checks of PVV MPs are turning up their unseemly pasts. PVV MP Joram van Klaveren had been arrested for drunk driving; MP Marcial Hernandez was detained for head-butting somebody during a drunken bar fight; PVV party spokesman, Hero Brinkman, was cited for punching a bartender when drunk and speeding through police drunk-driving checkpoint; MP Jhim van Bemmel admitted to falsifying documents; MP James Sharpe was forced to resign his Parliamentary seat because his company, which ran a Hungarian internet dating website, was fined for misleading clients by featuring photos of models instead of the real women interested in finding dates; and finally, MP Eric Lucassen, while serving in the Dutch military, was convicted of having sexual relations with two 17 year-old female soldiers, and later, in civilian life, was repeatedly cited for threatening his neighbours, including throwing a bucket of water on a 72 year-old man, damaging the man’s hearing aid, and urinating in a neighbour’s mailbox.

Elsewhere, the government continued to wield its budgetary knife, with the Dutch Ministry of Defence announcing major job cuts: 10,000 jobs will be cut from the military sector, which currently employs 48,000 soldiers and 21,000 civil servants. The government also announced it would abolish the 1.3 percent tax break offered to investment funds that invest in environmentally-friendly ‘green’ projects. Meanwhile, the PVV Freedom Party, no friend of the nation’s cultural institutions, is demanding the VAT rate on theatre tickets be raised from 6 to 19 percent. Rightwing Wilders calls theatre-going a “leftwing hobby”.
Researchers at the University Medical Centre St. Radboud have discovered a common genetic defect in mentally disabled people whose parents are otherwise healthy. The defect, which affects brain development, is thought to occur in the father’s sperm when DNA is copied. In other news, two sailors were lost at sea when their tug boat capsized in Hoek van Holland harbour. The heavy rains that fell a few weekends ago have been measured: 90 litres of rain fell per square metre from Friday to Sunday. Recently released Dutch crime figures show a shocking increase in robberies and decrease in the likelihood of the thieves being caught and convicted. Some 3000 robberies are committed in the Netherlands annually. A recent national report on patient safety found that the deaths of some 2000 patients per year in Dutch hospitals could be avoided. Similarly, research at Amsterdam’s Academic Medical Centre found that if doctors use a systematic checklist prior to operations the number of deaths fell from 1.5 percent to 0.7 percent, thus saving 3500 patient lives per year. Questions on this checklist include: “Is this the right patient here on the operating table?” Squatters in Holland rejoiced after a court ruling found that a new Dutch anti-squatting law violates the European Treaty on Human Rights. And finally, Saint Nicolas arrived in the Netherlands last week ahead of the biggest Dutch holiday celebration, Sinterklaas, on 5 December. But this wouldn’t be Holland without order, and hence the Netherlands Standards Authority issued guidelines aimed at “a proper and orderly” celebration of Sinterklaas, including the proviso that the candies St Nicolas’ helpers throw to passersby should be “thrown in an arc and from safe distances to avoid injuring children.”

Er zijn maar weinig jongens die voor een kleuterklas willen staan of verpleger willen worden. Omgekeerd willen weinig meisjes het leger in. Dat ligt niet aan het beroep, maar aan de stereotypen die jongeren voor ogen hebben als ze hun beroepskeuze maken, aldus twee Amerikaanse onderzoekers in de New York Times.

Volgens hen zie je hetzelfde effect wanneer je naar politieke voorkeur kijkt. Linkse jongeren willen meestal geen militair of agent worden en conservatieve jongeren ambiëren geen baan als professor.

Het is in de Verenigde Staten een heet hangijzer dat Amerikaanse hoogleraren zichzelf veelal ‘liberaal’ noemen. Maar liefst 43 procent doet dat, tegenover veertien procent in de gehele beroepsbevolking. Slechts een klein groepje van negen procent noemt zichzelf ‘conservatief’, terwijl dat in de gehele beroepsbevolking twintig procent is. De rest heet ‘gematigd’.