Europe Rouses From Its Slumber

Since World War II, and even more since the fall of Communism in Europe, European nations have increasingly given more power to a central government (the European Union).  This drive towards more Europe and less Germany, less Britain, less France, etc. has eroded national cultural distinctions, not to mention national sovereignty.  But some in Europe are starting to wake up to this threat.  There is the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party in Germany and the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) in Great Britain, both of which propose to one degree or another a scaling back of the national powers given up to the EU, if not the outright departure from the EU.  And then there's the Patriotische Europäer gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes (Pegida) movement (Patriotic Europeans against the Izlamization of the West). 

If one were to believe the main stream media or political leaders like Angela Merkel, Pegida is made up of a bunch of racist neo-Nazis.  Concerns about one's culture being eroded and swallowed up by immigrants who refuse to integrate into the national culture, immigrants who share no common bond (either historically or regiously) to the dominant culture does not make one racist.  What it does mean is that certain Europeans are starting to grow some balls and stand up to their own "democratic" totalitarian governments.  Let the proverbial balls continue to grow, and may they be steel balls.