Anders Breivik's Roots in Right-Wing Populism

[pampango]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,776413,00.html

He was a prolific contributor to extremist blogs and had ties to right-wing populists: The murderer from Norway did not, it would seem, come out of nowhere. Rather, he had found an ideological home among those seeking to cleanse Europe of Islam and multi-culturalism. They are seeking to distance themselves.

But the right wing sees it as a "conservative catastrophe" primarily because of the danger that blame might extend from Breivik to the extremist scene itself. Indeed, wherever Breivik left his digital calling card in recent years, he hardly stood out from the crowd of similar missives. "What he writes," reads an offering on Politically Incorrect, "are largely things that could be found in this forum... Whether Breivik suffered from a psychological illness that has since become worse is not known to us."

Such blogs provide a window into a strange scene: pro-Western, exceedingly pro-American and friendly to Israel -- but extremely anti-Muslim, aggressively Christian and openly hostile to everything which is liberal, leftist, multi-cultural or internationalist. It is a "patriotic-nationalist" scene which detests the Nazis but is sympathetic -- to the point of maintaining informal contacts -- to the Tea Party Movement in the US, to the right-wing populist Freedom Party of Austria, to the right-wing football fan group known as the Casuals and to the stridently anti-Muslim English Defence League.

Nothing is as important to the far-right as establishing a respectable presence throughout Europe. Members see themselves as "anti-Jihad," a counter balance. They are striving for attention in the media, on the streets and in parliaments. Breivik himself was engaged in Norway's right-wing party the Fremskrittspartiet, or the Progress Party. They must be relieved that he left the party early on.

[malaise]

1. He's an RW lunatic

They own him and he owns them.