Less than a year ago, the newly-elected leftist Prime Minister of Iceland, Johanna Sigurdardottir, declared: “Our time has come.” But now, following the first nationwide referendum since national independence was established in 1944, the people of Iceland appear to be telling that same government: “Your time has past.”

As documented previously for JBS.org, the economic meltdown in Iceland has been marked by certain parallels to that which was witnessed in the United States. A particularly glaring parallel was that both nations, caught up in the understandable panic of watching the implosion of their respective economies, decided to “throw the bums out” and elected politicians who promised change. In both nations, the “candidates of change” have taken a bad situation and have made it incomprehensibly worse.

For the Icelanders, this “change” has included the government agreeing to hold the entire nation responsible for the folly of private investors in the UK and the Netherlands, who lost a great deal of money when their risky investments in IceSave (part of the Landsbanki, which was privatized in 2003) were lost in the economic cataclysm of 2008. Meanwhile, the Leftwing government pursued a reckless course of fast-track EU membership which a very clear majority of the people do not want. (Why, some might ask, did Icelanders strive for decades to free themselves from Danish rule only to submit to a far worse foreign domination under the European Union only a few decades later?)

When the prime minister’s coalition forced through the legislation which would have hobbled the nation with an Icesave ‘bailout’ which the people could never reasonably hope to repay (€48,000 — roughly $66,000 — per household) the people appealed directly to the president on January 2 of this year, demanding that he not sign the legislation. That action by the president brought the issue to a national referendum.

Over a month ago, I wrote a brief update for The New American on the work of the Icelandic organization, InDefence, to resist the current government’s pro-EU, pro-Icesave bailout agenda. It was abundantly clear in January that a substantial portion of the Icelandic population was angry about the actions which the coalition government was taking in their name. As I wrote at that time,

A certain parallel between the efforts of InDefence and the “tea parties” in the United States is obvious. In both the United States and in Iceland, a significant issue at present is the role that the people will play in shaping the future of their respective nations. Clearly, a significant portion of the population in both nations are not content to simply acquiesce to the plans of the ruling parties; they recognize the danger that such financial recklessness poses to their futures as free peoples. In both situations, the future may rest with the ability of concerned citizens to help educate their fellow citizens and coordinate their response to the elites who are leading their nations into very uncertain futures.

However, while the future of the “tea party” movement seems uncertain, and is in danger of allowing itself to be diverted into tangential issues, or subverted by those who want to blunt its entire message, the Icelanders have, with a stunning unanimity, rejected the core agenda of the current government. When the votes in the March 6 referendum were counted, 93.2 percent of voters rejected the coalition government’s plan. As reported at Icenews.is:

With final numbers now released in all voting districts, the resounding ‘no’ vote is official.

Nationwide, 144,231 people voted of the roughly 230,000 registered voters. 2,599 (1.8 percent) of them voted to accept December’s Icesave repayment plan and 134,397 (93.2 percent) voted to reject it. The overall turnout was 62.7 percent of registered voters.

The final outcome of the referendum was delayed by the results which have only just been released from the Northeast Iceland voting district, as bad weather had been preventing voting slips being flown to Akureyri from Grimsey island. With the inclusion of the 32 votes from Grimsey, the Northeastern numbers are as follows: 58.28 percent of the district’s 28,587 voters turned out to cast their ballots. 329 voted yes, 15,667 voted no, 899 ballots were empty and 52 were invalid.

The implications for the leftwing coalition are obvious: Johanna Sigurdardottir’s government has lost any semblance of legitimacy. The Icesave deal is at the very heart of her government’s agenda, and the people have utterly denounced that agenda. (With only 2,599 votes in the entire nation in support of the coalition’s action, this presumably means that not only could the members of parliament not deliver the support of their constituencies, they probably couldn’t even count on their extended families to support them.)

The 62.7 percent turnout is also an overwhelming statistic, and yet the prime minister was still in denial just a few days ago. According to Agence France-Presse:

Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir, whose leftwing government risks repercussions if the Icesave deal it championed is rejected, insisted Friday new talks after the referendum would likely lead to a better deal, rendering Saturday's vote "meaningless."

She said she saw no reason to go to the ballot box.

To state the facet of the obvious reply: If the president’s veto and the national referendum force a new round of talks which leads to a “better deal” for Iceland, then clearly the whole course of action has been far from “meaningless.” But the deeper meaning which the coalition government is thus far ignoring is the popular rejection of the coalition government and its agenda.

Rt. Rev. James Heiser has served as Pastor of Salem Lutheran Church in Malone, Texas, while maintaining his responsibilities as publisher of Repristination Press, which he established in 1993 to publish academic and popular theological books to serve the Lutheran Church.  Heiser has also served since 2005 as the Dean of Missions for The Augustana Ministerium and in 2006 was called to serve as Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Diocese of North America (ELDoNA). An advocate of manned space exploration, Heiser serves on the Steering Committee of the Mars Society. His publications include two books; The Office of the Ministry in N. Hunnius' Epitome Credendorum (1996) and A Shining City on a Higher Hill: Christianity and the Next New World (2006), as well as dozens of journal articles and book reviews.

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rprew

March 08, 2010

72.201.107.33

Votes: +4

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Just remember... the socialists ALWAYS get a second chance! And a third, and a fourth, and a...

Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir, ..., insisted Friday new talks after the referendum would likely lead to a better deal, rendering Saturday's vote "meaningless."

Typical of the socialistic one-world mentality, "no" never means "no", even if it is a resounding, deafening, unequivocal "NO!". It just means "not yet". If 2% of the registered voters had turned out and 50% + 1 (2/3 of which showed signs ballot tampering) of them had said "yes", the it would meant a resounding victory for the socialists!

Larry Brown

March 08, 2010

209.40.77.108

Votes: +2

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Remember that...

Socialism is the poison that kills nations.

Still Free

March 08, 2010

64.12.117.9

Votes: +5

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And also remember that ...

"The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing."

~~Edmund Burke 1728-1797

DDW

March 08, 2010

173.57.11.190

Votes: +0

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Well

This is a bit encouraging. If, however, people really are catching on and waking up, the left-wing "liberals"/socialists will probably become nasty.

SmarterThanYou

March 11, 2010

132.156.89.40

Votes: -2

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Actually...

You commenters clearly don't know the difference between socialism and conservativism, since making the public pay for a mistake made by private industry is an awfully un-socialist thing to do (even though the PM is a member of a socialist political party, that doesn't make everything she does "socialist").

I'm not defending socialism (although the country with the highest standard of living - and also one of the richest countries - in the world, Norway, is, so there is an argument to be made), I just think its important to know what you are talking about before you get all passionnate and preachy, since sentimental drivel doesn't work as well as facts with an intelligent audience.

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