Germany Heading for Four More Years of Pro-EU, Open-Door Migration Policies

by Soeren Kern • September 8, 2017 at 5:00 am

The policy positions of Merkel and Schulz on key issues are virtually identical: Both candidates are committed to strengthening the European Union, maintaining open-door immigration policies, pursuing multiculturalism and quashing dissent from the so-called far right.
Merkel and Schulz both agree that there should be no upper limit on the number of migrants entering Germany.
Merkel's grand coalition backed a law that would penalize social media giants, including Facebook, Google and Twitter, with fines of €50 million ($60 million) if they fail to remove offending content from their platforms within 24 hours. Observers say the law is aimed at silencing critics of Merkel's open-door migration policy.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel (right) and her main election opponent, Martin Schulz (left), whose policy positions on key issues are virtually identical. (Image source: European Parliament/Flickr)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), is on track win a fourth term in office after polls confirmed she won the first and only televised debate with her main election opponent, Martin Schulz, leader of the Social Democratic Union Party (SDP).

A survey for the public broadcaster ARD showed that 55% of viewers thought Merkel was the "more convincing" candidate during the debate, which took place on September 3; only 35% said Schulz came out ahead.

Many observers agreed that Schulz failed to leverage the debate to revive his flagging campaign, while others noted that Schulz's positions on many issues are virtually indistinguishable from those held by Merkel.

Rainald Becker, an ARD commentator, described the debate as, "More a duet than a duel."

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The Latest Victim of the Campus Hate Industry

by Bruce Bawer • September 8, 2017 at 4:00 am

"All men are trash." — Esme Allman.
Allman is a young woman who, although a student at one of the finest universities on earth, considers herself to be a multiply oppressed victim and who sees the world around her as swarming with oppressors. She has been so well-schooled in the idea that whites are always the oppressors and dark-skinned people always the victims that when she sees a fellow British subject rooting for his own nation's side in a war against jihadists, her first and only thought is to brand him an "Islamophobe" -- this, even though the enemy in that war are men who would force her into a burka or consider her, as an infidel, deserving of rape and/or death.
So it is that Robbie Travers, whose only offense is believing in freedom and opposing a totalitarian ideology, has found himself in hot water -- a real victim of a mentality that is all about power and dogma even as its pretends to be devoted to "dignity and respect" for all.

Robbie Travers. (Image source: Robbie Travers Facebook page)

Robbie Travers is a 21-year-old law student at the University of Edinburgh and an articulate, insightful contributor to Gatestone as well as other websites. In his essays, he has illuminated the topsy-turvy values that dominate contemporary British political discourse – as exemplified by the refusal of the Speaker of the House of Commons to invite President Trump to address Parliament and the refusal of Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn to ban Al Qaeda from Britain as a terrorist organization.

Now, Travers has become the victim of the very forces about which he has written. In April, after the US Air Force carried out a successful anti-ISIS action, he posted a comment on Facebook:

"Excellent news that the US administration and Trump ordered an accurate strike on an Isis network of tunnels in Afghanistan. I'm glad we could bring these barbarians a step closer to collecting their 72 virgins."

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