An important part of doing politics consists of giving the impression that. For example, standing up for something or someone. This includes lyrics that include concepts such as ‘fight hard’, ‘smelly best’, ‘I say what I think’ and, with no exception, ‘we’re going to take a serious look at that’. There are sometimes accompanying films of interventions that sizzle with indignation; rarely is it told that these beaches in powerlessness and go out like a candle. It is not always necessarily the intention that an angry intervention actually leads to something more than: see me, I feel your pain, I express your pain, it is of no use to you because I do not choose things here unnecessarily complicate it by taking care of your wishes and needs, but see.
Naturally, the thoughts immediately go to Thierry Baudet, who has built his empire entirely on giving the impression that he is actually working for his allowance as a member of parliament. That he is making serious efforts to get something for his supporters in parliament, while after all these years of glaring failure you can rest assured that they were framed, all those wretched who believed that their votes and donations had been spent effectively and efficiently .
Baudet is not alone; everyone at some point reverts to giving the impression that. Tuesday it was Pieter Heerma’s turn. The coalition parties are repairing a decade and a half of overdue maintenance with regard to nitrogen, this has led to some commotion among the CDA supporters, so the CDA leader was forced to make noises that suggest a strong distancing, in the hope that the supporters she should.
And so it was possible that Heerma was producing a cloud of words on Tuesday, giving the very impression that the nitrogen plans are not acceptable to the CDA. Or, well: the goal of substantially less nitrogen precipitation is. Heerma is concerned with ‘the way in which’.
The latter aroused surprise to reporter Yvonne Hofs, because ‘the way in which’ the provinces, which have to implement the nitrogen policy, is actually free: agricultural activities can be reduced, with miraculous super-innovations, with farmers in a different way, and provinces will continue to do so. in close consultation with the entire peasantry. So Heerma was protesting against a phantom. He did so in full consciousness, because creating impressions is not about reality, but about cultivating the illusion of alliance.
Being very preoccupied with giving the impression that it promotes nonsense. Take the general tax cut on energy. It was supposed to give the impression that the state is helping poor people who are hardest hit by rising prices, but in practice it means that the vast majority of the discount flows to the richest people.
The exact same thing happened with the additional AOW increase recently enforced by the opposition, which was supposed to give the impression that poor elderly people had been ‘fought’. When I remarked a while ago in a subordinate clause that a general additional increase in the state pension is nonsensical and will largely benefit rich elderly people who do not need it, there were so many indignant reactions from pensioners with a lot of time and a lot of stationery, that you already knew at the time: once successfully created, there is nothing you can do about it.