Obama Hearts Sweden

Further Update: Links about Södertälje:

AINA
Christen im Nordirak & im Tur Abdin
Free Copts
Christians of Iraq


Update: A reader supplies this interesting information about Södertälje:

Regarding your story today on the Mayor of Södertälje, it might help if you pointed out to your readers this:

Actually the town of Södertälje has fared so well because the immigrants there are mostly Christian Assyrians/Syriacs that are fleeing Islamic persecution from Iraq/Turkey etc. Demographically the town is probably something like 70% Christian Syriacs. These people share common religious beliefs as the west and are not there to cause trouble. If the town was 70% Muslim I think we would have a completely different story here.

Back in February Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt of Sweden endorsed Barack Hussein Obama for President of the United States. He looked into Obama’s heart, and what he found there seemed so similar to his own party’s policies that he had no choice but to get behind B. Hussein.

It’s a bit, shall we say, inappropriate for the head of an elected government to make campaign endorsements for a candidate and party of a different country.

But leave that little indelicacy aside for a moment, and consider the fact that Barack Hussein Obama (and certain members of the United States Congress) have returned the favor by expressing their admiration for Sweden’s immigration policies.

Ah, yes — Sweden the Model.

And all this just after the Swedish MSM has begun a public debate about the wisdom of the country’s current immigration practices. What had been hitherto all but unsayable is now out in the open, and ordinary Swedes — who know all too well that the light of Multiculturalism has failed — can read in their newspapers actual heresy, journalists questioning the rationale behind mass importation of Third World immigrants into the country.

And now the American lawmakers choose this particular historical moment to admire Södertälje.

Great timing, guys.

From The Local:

US Congress praises Södertälje mayor

Södertälje mayor Anders Lago received praise while in Washington this week from US presidential candidate Barak [sic] Obama and other members of congress for how well his city has handled its influx of Iraqi refugees.

Lago had a chance to speak with Obama on Tuesday ahead of the Swedish mayor’s scheduled appearance on Capitol Hill Thursday to discuss the Iraqi refugee crisis.

“He said word for word that he was ashamed that the United States didn’t take greater responsibility for Iraqi refugees. Then he praised Sweden and Södertälje for how we’ve dealt with the issue,” Lago told the TT news agency.

Södertälje, a town of 80,000 residents, has taken in more Iraqi refugees that the United States and Canada combined, a fact which has come to light in several US media recently, and the motivation behind Lago’s invitation to testify before the Congressional panel.

“The senators posed questions about how we in Södertälje can take in so many Iraqi refugees,” he told the news agency TT.

How can Södertälje take in so many Muslim refugees?

Did it never occur to the esteemed gentlemen from the United States Congress that it might be because the Swedes are fools, or deluded, or on crack, or some combination of all three?

No, it must be because they are morally superior to the rest of us. ’Twas ever thus.
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Joining Lago at the hearing organized by the US Helskinki [sic] Commission were representatives from the US government responsible for refugee issues, as well as the Washington director of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

“I explained that Sweden will continue to have a generous asylum policy and that we need immigration, but I also discussed the difficulties with arranging housing, employment, and schooling when so many refugees come at the same time,” said Lago.

Not to mention the difficulties with restraining the newcomers from stealing, mugging, raping, attacking ambulance drivers, and burning schools. But now is not the time to discuss such trivial concerns.

The Helsinki Commission is US government agency that monitors human rights and security issues of concern to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and includes members from the US Senate, and the House of Representatives, and US government agencies.

According to Lago, the senators were impressed that Sweden had taken in more refugees than the United States.

“They promised during the hearing to try to increase the number of refugees received to 12,000 this year,” he said.

You hear that, Sweden? You don’t have enough Multiculture, so more is on the way!

Sweden received around 19,000 asylum seekers from Iraq last year.

Although Obama was not a member of the US Helsinki Commission, Lagos’s thoughts returned to his meeting earlier in the week with the senator from Illinois, whom Lagos calls his “favourite candidate”.

“He even tried to pronounce ‘Södertälje’,” said Lago.

It looks like Obama and the EU are going to get along just fine. He and Blair and Fogh and Barroso can gather in the gilded palaces of Brussels and Strasbourg and set the world to rights.

Oh, by the way — I can pronounce “Södertälje”. Does that mean I get to be President, too?


Hat tip: TB.