The Walloons are "SHIT" according to Flemish football fans

French daily Le Monde reports that the Belgian Soccer Federation has ruled that fans may chant "Walloons are shit!" (Les Wallons, c'est du caca).
Despite the fact that Flemish fans chanted in French to further piss off the Walloon team, the chant is "playful and teasing," federation officials argue, not "hurtful or injurious." Who says those sneaky Flemish can't speak French if they want to.

Actually, I occasionally watch some Belgian football....or soccer as we Americans call it, and I think the Belgian Soccer Federation could eliminate the racism, and just adopt the slogan that all Belgian football is shit "Le football belge, c'est du caca!" .....problem solved

BRUSSELS (AFP) – A row has broken out in Belgium after French-speaking politicians criticised the country's football federation for not sanctioning a Flemish club whose fans chanted anti-Walloon abuse.
Supporters of Genk in the Flemish-speaking north of the bilingual country made derogatory comments about their Walloon (Francophone) counterparts during a league match with Tubize from the south. Continue reading Yahoo Sports

Belgians are nothing but slow-witted frite eaters

France takes a condescending, affectionate approach to its small neighbour. The butt of jokes, Belgians are seen as slow-witted frites eaters with a creative genius that produced Art Nouveau, Hergé, the father of Tintin, and entertainers who move to France when they make it.

The latest of these is Cécile de France, one of the cinema's hottest young stars [pictured above]. Otherwise, Belgium is Brussels, the French-speaking seat of the European bureacracy and source of many French ills.

Watching the mess in Georgia, we should not get too smug about breakaway provinces on the fringe of central Asia. An ugly struggle for ethnic separation is brewing only an hour's train trip north from Paris......in Belgium.

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A Belgian Politician with a drinking problem...now that's a new one!

Drunken Walloon sports minister spotted at Olympics

Walloon Sports Minister Michel Daerden was spotted drunk in the stands while watching the tennis and hockey events in Beijing.

Michel Daerden is in Beijing to support the Belgian athletes but appears to be over enthusiastic in his cheering efforts as he was spotted drunk in the stands for the tennis and hockey events.

Daerden went to Beijing to watch the tennis doubles' match of Olivier Rochus and Steve Darcis against the Argentineans David Nalbandian and Guillermo Cañas.Daerden, apparently drunk in the stands, was very loud, and this reportedly disturbed David Nalbandian. "Hey you there, you don't know the rules of tennis, do you," shouted the Argentine tennis player to the Belgian spectator.

Daerden was reportedly also drunk when he was encouraging the Belgian hockey team from the stands. "Michel Daerden really has a drinking problem, everyone knows it," said Flemish Sports Minister Bert Anciaux in a reaction to the incident.

"But he is not the only one. Others keep it under wraps. People in politics drink a lot.""It irritates me that the excessive alcohol is seen as normal and is accepted so readily," said Bert Anciaux to the daily Het Laatste Nieuws.

It's time for Belgium to call it quits..

Belgium is a little country sandwiched between France and Holland. It disappears periodically, whenever Germany goes on a shopping expedition for territory.

It was, in short, a Petri dish in which where the EU concocted its formula for the new Empire of many and diverse nations living within a large and happy federal state. So confident were the Eurocrats of their coming success that they made Brussels their capital on the assumption that everything else would just fall into place. WRONG!

If Belgium goes the way of the dodo, then so may the EU. And would that be such a bad thing? Those Eurocrats have been ramming their nonsensical legislation down throats for decades now with an incredible sense of determination and destiny. And as the Irish recently found out, these are not people who take no for an answer. FUNNY VIDEO EXPLANATION

What is Belgium actually for?

It is of no strategic value to anyone, and should no longer be sustained artificially
To paraphrase Rene Magritte, one of the few unquestionably famous Belgians, 'Ceci n'est pas une nation'. As the slow dissolution of their state continues, even Francophone Belgians, hitherto champions of the status quo, are casting around for alternatives. A poll in Le Soir suggests that 49 per cent of Walloons favour incorporation into France, up from 22 per cent at the end of last year.
The Flemish, for their part, tend to see Belgium as a mechanism for taking their taxes and subsidising the Walloons. (They are wrong: it is a mechanism for taking their taxes and subsidising the most bloated public sector in Europe. Ordinary Walloons do just as badly out of the racket as they do.)

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Belgium is not a model to follow

Belgium's linguistic communities pay a high price for sticking together, resorting to fudges that range from the silly to the destructive. Put like that, you can see Belgium's new government not as a relief, but as an awful warning. A political union hatched together by a fractious elite, and answerable only to itself, is not a model for anybody to follow. STORY IN THE ECONOMIST

Belgium has a new government!

Belgium has a new Federal Government today. King Albert has sworn in the new five party administration. This afternoon Prime Minister Yves Leterme will deliver his government’s policy statement in Parliament.
Here's a picture of the motley crew, somebody help us!
"the only merit of this government is that it is a government " (Het Nieuwsblad)

George Bush's popularity ratings would be sky high in Belgium!

George Bush's popularity rating would look pretty good in Belgium, where an opinion poll for the daily La Libre Belgique showed that 54 percent of the north and 92 percent of the south did not trust the new Belgian prime minister.

Belgium Political Crisis Ends With New Government. Belgium's rival parties say they have agreed to a new government, ending months of deadlock over demands for greater autonomy by the Dutch-speaking part of the country.

The deal for a coalition government was reached by five Belgian political parties representing not only political differences - between the left and the right - but the key split between those from Francophone Wallonia and Dutch-speaking Flanders.

Belgium gets a government this week

AFTER nine months, Belgium finally gets a proper government on Thursday. (Let me know how that works out) Guy Verhofstadt, prime minister since 1999, will make way for Yves Leterme and a new five-party coalition.

The deal will lead to a further weakening of Belgium's federal state in favour of regional governments, an unpopular decision in the poorer, Francophone south, where some of them might actually have to get a job to get paid.

Here's another "Only in Belgium"

On one hand you have the 4 stooges promoting investment in Belgium..., on the other, they are regulating national treasures to death.

They make the best chips in the world. But the traditional huts that sell perfect pomme frites in public squares and car parks across Belgium are battling against death by overregulation. STORY IN THE TIMES

Ever greater demands to account for hygiene, stock and staff have led to the numbers of genuine street frietkots tumbling from 5,000 to around 1,200 over the past two decades.

What color is the sky in their world? "ONLY IN BELGIUM"

PM Guy Verhofstadt, flanked by Belgium's regional Premiers on Monday launched the promotion campaign "Only in Belgium". I'm sorry to break it to these guys....but that phrase is already in use. It usually follows any number of jokes about this country.
The idea is to sell Belgium as an investment country abroad. Probably because even the Belgians are smart enough to invest somewhere else.

The campaign is necessary because the political bickering at home in recent months has damaged our reputation. (or exposed it...) Flemish Premier Kris Peeters insisted that we should leave times of complaining behind us and strive for excellence.
When people talk about Belgium we should seize the opportunity to promote our stabile and booming open economy our leaders say.
Don't you just love it when politicians have shit coming out of both sides of their mouth?

Belgian 'wise men' strike breakthrough devolution deal

My...lets throw flowers at ourselves and we shall be known as the Committee of Wise Men! It's been my experience that a wise man in Belgium must be an expat or a tourist.

Eight Belgian elder statesmen reached a breakthrough deal on further devolution early on Monday that could end eight months of political deadlock and lead to formation of a new government within a month. Under the deal reached early on Monday, the interim five-party government would try to transfer a series of minor powers to the regions and pursue measures to strengthen cooperation between the regions. STORY

Man gets booted from Bruge cafe for being Jewish, but can't file a complaint unless it's in Flemish!

In one of those only in Belgium stories, some more of that good old European Tolerance thats constantly preached to you......The Mayor of the Belgian city of Bruges has asked for an inquiry after an American Jewish tourist was ousted from a café restaurant because he was wearing a kippa or skullcap.

Later, an officer indicated that a complaint can only be registered in Flemish and not in English, adding erroneously that Belgian law doesn’t foresee the anti-Semitic offense. STORY

Original link in Dutch from De Standard

Loser to Lead Belgium's Interim Government

After a meeting with King Albert II, Guy Verhofstadt, left, the liberal ousted by voters in June, accepted the job of forming and leading an interim government because of the ”gravity of the situation in which our country finds itself.” But he said he did not want to remain in power beyond March. Mr. Verhofstadt, who had been prime minister since 1999, conceded defeat after the June election but has stayed on because the conservatives who won proved unable to form a coalition.

On Saturday, thousands of trade unionists took to the streets in Brussels, complaining about the political stalemate and rising food and fuel prices.

Belgium created a social welfare system in which the unions are related to one specific political party and it is the unions which pay the jobless peoples support payments.

The medicare and health insurance system payments are also executed by organisations related each to one political party. For this "work", the health insurance organisations and the unions receive an administration "commission" of 7%.

Do you think the unions want to stop this? The Walloon jobless bring an enormous income to the unions. The Flemish unions, which are Socialist at heart, would lose serious financial income in an independent Flanders.

They are the champions of the status quo.

Belgian workers can't get to strike, because of another strike.

The three largest trade unions in Belgium called a demonstration in Brussels Saturday to highlight the problem of diminishing purchasing power, in favour of maintaining a strong, federal social security system, and more tax equity.

Some 20,000 people are demonstrating. The organisers expected more, but say that thousands were unable to make it to Brussels due to a rail strike called by the independent trade union OVS.
So let me get this straight....some strikers can't make it to the strike becuase other strikers are on strike. I can definitly see why we should pay more taxes for these people to get more benefits.
If it wasn't Belgium.....you couldn't make it up!
STORY

Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a Belgian Politician. But I repeat myself”

Belgium's Wallonian Media Minister Fadila Laanen has described an attack against the French-speaking broadcaster RTBF as "horrendous and unacceptable".On Saturday, the head of Belgium's Flemish Christian Democrats, Yves Leterme, blamed his failure to form a cabinet on the Wallonian broadcaster RTBF and the French-speaking political parties.

He compared the French-speaking broadcaster to the Rwandan radio station RTLM, which broadcast vitriolic attacks against Tutsis during the 1994 genocide. Mr Leterme was angry about a report by the Wallonian broadcaster over his failure to form a cabinet after 175 days. Six months after the Belgian parliamentary elections, Mr Leterme was forced to hand over his position as cabinet mediator to his political rival, outgoing Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt.

Today marks six months without a new government and the prospects of a solution appear dim despite the return of the outgoing prime minister to the political scene and the population's growing impatience.

Meanwhile, public anger is growing over the political establishment's seemingly interminable quarrels. Belgium's three main unions are due to step up the pressure next Saturday when they are scheduled to hold a demonstration to call on a new government to tackle problems such as eroding purchasing power.

After six months, Belgium still stuck

Pierre Mertens on Belgium's disenchantment

The Belgian novelist Pierre Mertens investigates the roots of the crisis that Belgium is going through, deprived of a government for six months. "Belgium doesn't love itself anymore. It has never loved itself enough. A certain masochism has always gnawed it from the inside.

The country's tendency for self-mockery, while reflecting its sense of humour and a lack of arrogance, also feeds its suicidal tendency. Now it is literally disenchanted. It is still as unique and inventive as ever, but less fraternal.

This is a pity. Its mixed blood, its bastardization even, makes it a metaphor for the whole of Europe, a metonymy, a microcosmic part of a whole. It is a laboratory that people from all over come to visit in order to decipher the secret of an improbable, paradoxical model, an irreplaceable legacy. ... What would be the point in the country setting fire to itself ? A country in its likeness would only have to be invented right away." READ LEMONDE

Same old Shit!

Yesterday, the Brussels newspaper De Standaard reports that Verhofstadt is about to form another government of Liberals and Socialists. This coalition will have 75 of the 150 seats in the Federal Chamber of Representatives, though only 32 of the 88 Flemish seats. Flanders again, will not get what it is entitled to. In Belgium, elections have no consequences. The majority never gets what it votes for.

What is the pattern in one part of Brussels has become the pattern in EU, too. Two years ago the electorates in the Netherlands and France rejected the EU Constitution. The Eurocrats in Brussels simply continue as if the French and Dutch electorates have never objected.

Belgians are hugging in Leuven

On Wednesday some 400 Flemish and Francophone students hugged each other on the square in Leuven as a show of solidarity between the country's two main communities.

One of the organisers said that they didn't want to promote political ideas, just wanted to send a positive and warm signal in times of crisis. The hug-in was staged under the slogan "Belgians are hugging" and was organised to show support for solidarity between the majority Flemish and minority Francophone communities in Belgium.

The students also called on people to sign the trade union petition in favour of solidarity between Belgians.

Everybody taking part got a free pint of lager......ahhhh, the lengths college students will go to for some free beer. The more things change, the more they stay the same!

35,000 demonstrate for Belgian unity

35,000 Belgians demonstrated in Brussels Sunday against the inability to form a government and against arguments between the linguistic communities. The initiative came from a civil servant in Liege who started a petition demanding that the politicians focus on the 'real' problems in the country.

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