The joys of multiculturalism

We think of Amsterdam as that free-wheeling European city that is soft on drugs, filled with gays, open prostitution, soft-drug cafes, and multicultural benevolence. The picture is surely a gay travel brochure. The reality is somewhat different. Compare this (New York Times-owned) International Herald-Tribune travelogue with a few facts.

Amsterdam, a thriving port of 750,000 people, has always had a cultural and racial mix, but never at today's ratio: Almost half its residents are of non-Western descent, a majority of them Muslims.

Much of that is the emigration of a white middle class. Some 32% in one poll wanted to leave. It get's worse:

According to NIDI, more than 112,000 people left the Netherlands last year, compared with 90,000 who entered the country, prompting the research bureau to start studying emigration in January.

It's worrisome even to other countries.

It's a re-enactment of the profound pessimism found in Eastern Europe under communism. Except the Dutch can vote with their feet and are doing so.