I have a feeling left(ish) media in the US are trying to gain more right(ish) leaders / the whole US media landscape is moving right. Could also be that more Trump-aligned media is looking for international ‘news’ to deflect from national news. Both are speculations obviously i don’t know either.

I disagree, even though this is illegal fireworks they are manipulated to do damage and intimidate people. The recent laws banning a lot of firework has to do with how it is used by criminals, not the other way around.

1000+ a year now, few years back it was maybe half. I can also imagine the damage per explosion is increasing, but not sure.

Another Dutchy here, Russia has been suspected of both spionage and sabotage here and there also in The Netherlands but haven’t heard them being tied to any of these explosions. These explosions have been a problem for 10+ years. The amount of explosions has increased over time and the problem is only getting bigger. Russia might feel inspired or use this method to hide their involvement, but it in general those two problems have their own source.

Not sure why this particular news story was worth writing / sharing, but the article highlights an example of a real problem in the Netherlands and likely in other places. Once you build a building it will likely be there for a very long term, so a lot of effort goes into planning it well. This also means it has to go through procedures where people can object to plans and this can lead to very long delays. There are also cases where people object only looking for financial reward in exchange for dropping their objections. In this case the court ruled in favor of the planners, but especially when it rules in favor of the residents that are already there this can throw out years of work planning for a specific site.

The national government is looking to shorten these procedures, for example by not allowing someone to object to a judge ruling about the objection. This is not necessarily a good thing, but considering The Netherlands is one of the most densily populated countries in the world, NIMBY is a serious problem because there is a backyard everywhere.

Not only did they save the building, but also save the taxpayers the high cost of reconstruction. Incredible building.

and the French service LeChat

Not sure if I would or would not like to vote on a cat if possible.

AFAIK it’s not all promoting of vpns that prohibited now, so as long as you don’t mention you can use it to get around age verification you should be fine.

I read that too, can’t for the life of me follow that. Does he say the Dutch welcome and tolerate terrorism because of the rallies in support of Palestine? If so, how and who do these people terrorise? Not saying there is no anti-semitism in the Netherlands but of all the terror attacks I have heard about in the Netherlands exactly 0 were welcomed or tolerated and also 0 were targeted to Jews.

Guess Switzerland still likes Nazi gold

Dear Earth:

Could we start having people who regulate have an understanding of what they regulate, please?

Fixed it.

The pixels just left the building

I am not german so i don’t know either, but Russia doesn’t have enough influence to force people to believe their stories. I believe even people who agree with Putin from a political point of view understand his invasion wasn’t called for. They know Zelensky isn’t a nazi. Even if they buy the story of NATO having expanded too far east they are often not against being in NATO for example. It is interesting there seems to be a difference in how the party leaders treat Russia and how their voters view Russia.

What i think matters most is not what they think but rather how much they care. Their nationalism comes from a need to care for themselves first, it’s a kind of egoism that i think is rooted in a falsely perceived threat (There are no houses/jobs, because foreigners took them. The taxes are too high because there are too many lazy people living off benefits. There is no good healthcare/education because CEO’s earn too much)*. These threats they perceive are much bigger problems, so they can’t afford to worry about that that war in Ukraine. They will say it’s not really our business anyway, we shouldn’t meddle with foreign affairs. Let the Russians deal with this.

* before i get dogpiled, i’m not saying that it isn’t a problem if there is a lack of housing and jobs, there are high taxes and health care and education are unaffordable; my point is they see an enemy that cause these issues intentionally and they need to fight that enemy (foreigners/lazy people/CEO’s).

European far-right are similar to republicans in Russia’s eyes. We cannot know how much money and influence there is between Russia and them but it is clear that they are the side Russia supports. Obviously it is entire possible that a far-right party isn’t financially or otherwise supported by Russia, but even if they are not at all, the party will have a similar views of the world.

You fly over and you see these windmills all over the place, ruining your beautiful fields and valleys and killing your birds

Better get ourselves some beautiful oil spills instead, much better for the view and also better for the wildlife! /s

In the Netherlands there is an (i believe) voluntary questionnaire now. Guess if you don’t answer it they couldn’t care less you’re not joining cuz they have no room for unmotivated people and if you return it they could give you a call because the military establishment is woke enough to let everyone participate. I like this because in war being skilled isn’t useful if you aren’t motivated to fight and being ‘weak’ (read female, disabled, gay, whatever) isn’t as dangerous because a part of those minorities have gotten serious training because they wanted to be trained and are willing to pick up arms.

Have to admit i dont have one either unfortunately

I am not sure why you believe sinking ships is the only possible solution, but i’m not going to argue about it

I meant better not sinking oil ships

Better not though

I’m sceptical, I would like Britain to have close ties with EU but I expect they won’t be willing to make many concessions despite wanting all the benefits.