Hope For Sweden?

Sweden and the Netherlands seemed to be in a race as to which national identity would disappear first, its socialist handout policies overwhelmed by an unchecked wave of unassimilated muslim immigrants, against which nobody could speak in a stifling PC atmosphere.

But perhaps there is hope for Sweden, though this is just the first step.

In a totally surprise outcome today, the ruling socialist party is suddenly out after 12 years!

Swedish opposition ousts government
STOCKHOLM, Sweden - A center-right opposition vowing to streamline Sweden's famed welfare state ousted the Social Democratic government in a close parliamentary election Sunday, ending 12 years of leftist rule in the Nordic nation.

Prime Minister Goran Persson, who had governed for 10 years, conceded defeat and said his Cabinet would resign after the Social Democratic Party's worst election result in decades.

With 99.7 percent of districts counted, the four-party opposition alliance led by Fredrik Reinfeldt had 48.1 percent of the votes, compared with 46.2 percent for the Social Democrats and their two supporting parties.

"It was team work that helped us win," Reinfeldt said in a victory speech to jubilant supporters in downtown Stockholm.

Persson said Sweden's social model — a market economy blended with a high-tax welfare state — was at stake in the election. But the opposition led by Reinfeldt's Moderate Party insisted it would not dismantle the system but help it survive by promoting jobs over welfare handouts.

The results showed the Moderates with 26.1 percent, a strong gain from 2002 when it won only 15 percent of the vote. After taking over the party leadership in 2003, Reinfeldt, 41, steered the party toward the center by toning down its conservative polices.

"We dared to challenge ourselves, we dared to admit our faults," Reinfeldt said. "That renewal has not just begun, it will continue into the future."

Final official results were expected Wednesday, but were unlikely to change the outcome.

The Social Democrats had only 35.3 percent, which if confirmed would be the party's worst showing in parliamentary elections since 1914.

Leftists defeated, by wafer-thin margins, in Mexico and now Sweden.

It was thought by many that their handout policies would buy votes; that too many people would be afraid of losing their slice of the pie through any "reform":

Sweden is a small country. The 9 million inhabitants do not constitute more than 0.14% of the world’s population. The immigrant population amounts to just over 2 million, or 22% of the entire population....

Approximately 5,310,000 or 59% of the population belong to the fit-for-work age group 20-64. Of these approx. 4,050,000 are working. More than a million people do not work; that is, either they have not got a job, are studying, are unable to work, are sick, disabled or just “damn lazy”. Why work when the benefit per day is just $10-15 lower than the work wage?
...
340,000 immigrants have such poor knowledge of Swedish that they find it impossible to function fullly in society. 20,000 of those who have come to Sweden the last 20 years have such serious reading/writing difficulties that they should be considered as illiterates. Less than half of those who have been granted residence permits start their free (but not yet(!) compulsory) course in Swedish for Immigrants (SFI ) within a year. 40% of the SFI-pupils are shirking the Swedish language training.
...
The sitting Swedish Social Democratic Government tries to remain in power by appealing to all recipients of public welfare (with Swedish as well as with foreign background). With the prominent help of their supporting two sects, the Greens and the Lefts, they are fleecing the working Swedes to maintain a big sponging immigrant population. Swedish society can probably be fleeced at least for another one or two voting periods. Generous welfare benefits attract more and more people and when the share of the idle population grows big enough, the tax burden for the remaining work-force must make working become unprofitable. Hopefully this will soon happen and cause the system to collapse.

Happened earlier than expected.

Now, let's see what they do.