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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: quehubo who wrote (69719)	5/31/2008 2:04:27 PM
From: Dale Baker	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543273

Contrary to what happens in Europe, this nation assimilates people of all cultures. I lived in Amsterdam from 2002-2004 and spent lots of time on the trams with Muslim schoolkids, many in traditional dress and... ...they all spoke Dutch. All the time. People who don't spend time in Europe rely on anecdotes and occasional flare-ups to draw bombastic conclusions. The Netherlands have been a tolerant integrator of immigrants for centuries, with bumps along the way. Obviously Theo Van Gogh was one of those, but that was one isolated incident, far far from the norm. I also visited London right after the 2005 subway bombings. Many if not most of the small shops, Internet cafes and restaurants were owned and run by people of South Asian or Middle Eastern origin. And we didn't have a single problem with anybody anywhere the entire time. Beware sweeping generalizations based on scant evidence. Some European countries have had problems, but I seem to recall a couple of minor flare-ups in the US in the 1960's. We got over it and so will they once the first generation of locally born Muslims goes through the usual assimilation.