vRRitti.com, providing sentiency

…according to an open letter from the two European lawmakers. This is not the first call for a boycott of Dutch products. At the beginning of December, President Traian Basescu went shopping in a Bucharest hypermarket and told reporters when leaving that he tried to avoid buying Dutch vegetables, adding that “I think we shouldn’t buy Dutch vegetables.”

“We believe the Dutch government should get a very clear message from the 100 million European citizens who have exactly the same rights as the Dutch citizens,” the MEPs say.

They call for a boycott of Dutch products in all 12 states that became EU members after 2004. “We need to give a united signal to the Dutch government and the radical party whose extremist actions are tolerated. We must show the Netherlands that it needs us just as much as we need to belong to Europe,” Bodu and Saryusz-Wolski explain.

The two MEPs then make a list of Dutch products that should be ignored “until this party (PVV) becomes politically isolated” – Shell, Heineken, Dove, TNT, Amstel, Lipton, Rexona, Knorr, Axe, Wolters Kluwer, Tom Tom and others.

Extremism and discrimination are not dead

The two European lawmakers say they feel insulted and even threatened by the Dutch Freedom Party’s attitude. PVV launched a website where the Dutch can complain about Eastern-European citizens. The move gave birth to heated debates across Europe. The Dutch PM refused to delimit himself from this anti-immigrant move.

“For almost half a century we lived, most of us, far from Western Europe and its democratic values. When the EU opened wide its arms and welcomed us, in 2004 or in 2007, after huge efforts on the path to integration, we thought we would never feel left out, that we will be part of a big family with which to share the same values and the good and the bad things,” the two also write.

They also say that the PVV has managed “to remind us of the fact extremism and discrimination based on citizenship did not die in the Europe of 2012, they are actually more and more virulent and accepted at the level of a European government.”

Absolutely clueless Dutch Prime Minister: ‘It’s not my fault if people feel insulted because of the Freedom party’s complaint center’
http://vrritti.com/2012/02/14/absolutely-clueless-dutch-prime-minister-its-not-my-fault-if-people-feel-insulted-because-of-the-freedom-partys-complaint-center/

Alex Swartsel, who has worked for several Democratic senators and campaigns, is the new director of global policy. Brian Cohen, who has worked in the Justice Department and for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, is the new director for external state government affairs.

Lauren Pastarnack, who has worked on the Senate Judiciary Committee, is the new director of government affairs. And Kate Bedingfield, who joins the MPAA from the White House Communications Office, is the new director of strategic communications. 

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120216/14555317783/mpaa-hires-four-ex-federal-government-employees-including-one-ice-another-white-house.shtml