Seriously, what is the point of defending Europe? Well, maybe to defend the Louvre and some monuments to a once-great culture?
I can’t think of many other reasons, now that the continent has descended once-again into the 1930s-style of fascism (no, not the Nazis of the late thirties and 40s, but more Mussolini-style fascism).
Elections are being canceled, censorship is running amok, people are getting arrested for speaking, and now the most popular party in Germany is on the edge of getting banned because it threatens the power of the German elite.
Recent polls show AfD as the single most popular party in Germany. As John Hart Ely used to say, this looks very much like an attempt by AfD’s partisan rivals to close off “the channels of political change.” https://t.co/4NceO6hsFR pic.twitter.com/BPnfEV0nvX
— Adrian Vermeule (@Vermeullarmine) May 2, 2025
There is no doubt that the AfD is, indeed, a major challenger to the established political consensus of the transnational elite, just as Marine LePen and other populist leaders who are getting crushed around Europe. But that challenge to the consensus is not to the political order itself, but to the policies that Europeans have been opposing for years. The AfD is popular not because they are threatening democracy, but because they are trying to give a democratic voice to people who object to the increasingly self-destructive and anti-democratic elite.
The German intelligence service has designated AfD as an extremist organization. pic.twitter.com/BKIZLg2JcF
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) May 2, 2025
As usual, when the hoi polloi disagree with the elites, the elites abuse their power to silence them. This has been a consistent theme throughout the once-liberal West, up to and including the United States, which has the most robust political system of any liberal democracy. That’s why the Biden administration outsourced to Europeans the suppression of American voices as much as they could, financing through USAID censorship organizations and buying journalists in other countries.
🚨BREAKING: German intelligence has designated the AfD party an “extremist organisation” and “threat” to democracy
This comes a week after they became the biggest party in Germany.
The establishment is shook… pic.twitter.com/oV9YnyZDzu
— Inevitable West (@Inevitablewest) May 2, 2025
Designating any group as “domestic extremist” makes suppression much easier, opening up even extrajudicial sanctions and empowering the government to exclude not just groups, but opinions from the public square.
The AfD’s great sin is opposing open borders, which is hardly an extreme position even within the EU. The Nordic countries are working to deport or even pay migrants to leave, and Eastern European countries are working hard to close their borders, even forgoing EU subsidies in some cases.
Vice President @JDVance is right: the greatest threat to Europe comes from within. In March, a court in Romania blocked the candidacy of the presidential frontrunner. A few weeks later a court convicted its presidential front-runner of an alleged crime to disqualify her. https://t.co/b4tKf1avfB
— Michael Shellenberger (@shellenberger) May 2, 2025
Europe’s democratic “norms” are weak, at best. Only Great Britain has a longstanding history of stable democratic governance, and many explicit legal and constitutional limits do not buttress its institutions. The “Rights of Englishmen” are backed by history and norms, and less so by law. This is why people can be and are getting arrested for speech or even silent prayer.
The German government censors its political enemies. Here’s the proof: https://t.co/pnLQMepoyq
— Michael Shellenberger (@shellenberger) May 2, 2025
The Germans’ case for limiting speech and opinions is backed by a historical fear of a return to Nazism, which is understandable. It is also counterproductive, because Nazism flourished because of the perception that democracy failed. The German government is failing again and resorting to suppressing dissent to maintain power.
That will not end well. A “democratic” government that is deindustrializing, increasing costs, flooding the country with unwelcome migrants, and now suppressing citizens’ right to dissent and correct course will inspire, not suppress, extremism. The AfD is the democratic opposition to a failing elite; suppression of democratic dissent will only create a non-democratic dissenting group.
Germany already has created a new Stasi–an intelligence community that identifies and labels dissenters as threats to the state–and created a police unit to seek out and silence people for posting memes and sentiments that are unapproved by the government. Now they are on the threshold of banning the democratic expression of any dissent at all from the current policy consensus.
France is banning political candidates. Romania was forced to do the same. The EU is punishing Hungary for its political leadership. And all these countries are rounding up or intimidating people who are speaking up. And they are using their regulatory power to silence Americans and bully American social media companies to suppress information they dislike.
Remind me again why we consider these people our allies?
