There is no housing shortage in Sweden, only a shortage of rented housing. The part of the housing market that is strictly regulated.
by C G Holm

You might read about the ”housing shortage”. But there is no housing shortage, only a shortage of rented housing, as the CEO of Stena Fastigheter (one of the major owners of housing for rent in Sweden) Christel Darvik, said at a seminar in December. Single houses and condos/coops are not regulated, and thus there is no shortage. The balance between supply and demand is managed by the pricing mechanism and the free market, and to a limited extent of construction of new housing.
The shortage of housing for rent cannot be corrected by construction of new housing, as is the major theme in the political discussion on the problem. New construction only corresponds to one or two per cent of the total stock. The only valid solution is improved use of the existing housing stock.

Not long time ago the Arctic Ocean was ice free!
by Sven Enberg

The climate varies. With or without doomsday prophecies. One of the major threats today seem to be an ice-free Arctic Ocean. Which we actually had not more than 7 000 years ago. With no emissions of fossil fuels. And mankind survived that catastrophe. The past 10 000 years are an interglacial period. An interglacial usually is 10 000–12 000 years, followed by a new ice age for some 100 000 years. The passing from an ice age to an interglacial and vice versa might take a couple of thousand years. Don’t worry about the global warming, but about the coming ice age.

Was Catrin da Costa a victim of a serial killer?
by Patrik Nyberg

Catrin da Costa was murdered in 1984. Main witnesses against the two doctors that were acquitted from the charges of having murdered the prostitute were the ex-wife of one of the doctors, who claimed that the couples’ one year old daughter had told the mother that she had seen her dad cut up the body at the forensic clinic of the Karolinska University Hospital (where the other doctor worked). The other main witness was a photo shop owner who claimed that she had seen the pictures of a cut up body, developed by her shop on behalf of one of the doctors. In the acquittal the court said that there was no proof that the doctors had killed da Costa, but in the sentence the court said that the cutting up of the body was proved, although that crime had passed the time limit. The doctors’ licenses of practice was revoked and when they appealed against the sentence they were denied to appeal, because they were acquitted. The lives of the doctors have been destroyed and they have tried all legal measures to get their licenses back and damages paid – in vain. They were for a long time even denied the DNA test of remnants on a towel found with the dead body. When finally they had the test made one of the hairs found was da Costa’s and the other was none of the doctor’s. After also the murder had passed the time limit, the doctors were refused to make a DNA test of other suspects in the case, in spite of the fact that there are two suspects (deceased by now) that could be tested. The reason? Probably that the Swedish judicial system does not want another proof of its fallibility.

The failure of the government’s anti-regulation measures
by Fredrik Runebert

Before the election of 2006 the Centre-Right Alliance promised to decrease the volume of regulations for business by 25 per cent during the following four years. When this wasn’t achieved, the period was extended until 2012. Now we can see that the decrease was 7 not 25 per cent. Within the area of taxation the regulations have actually increased. The Comptroller and Auditor General has studied what has happened, and Contra reports.

Vladimir Putin: A study in ruthless power
by Tommy Hansson

A typical example of Vladimir Putin’s use of power is the reaction against the US Magnitskiy law. The Putin regime banned, at the end of December, all US adoptions of Russian children. The victims of the measures are primarily the Russian kids that have to stay in orphanages instead of getting loving parents.

Are Europeans ashamed of their Christian background?
by Britt Louise Körninger

Are Europeans ashamed of their Christian background? Shouldn’t westerners be proud of their cultural background and Christian heritage? The ideas that once built the wealth and freedom of the Western world. Today, the only time we use our cultural heritage seem to be at baptisms, marriages and burials. The flow of refugees from other parts of the world to the Western world has never been bigger. Once the US received religious refugees from Europe, but no one has to flee from the US to secure his or her rights. Why are people fleeing from communism, socialism, Hinduism or islam? Why do these refugees want the West to adapt to what they have fled from? Do we really want to have these systems running in the Western world?

China expanding in the South China Sea
by C G Holm

The South China Sea is situated south of China, east of Vietnam and west of the Philippines. There are a lot of small islands that never have been inhabited, but now six countries fight for control in order to secure fishing rights and oil exploration rights. China uses its superior firepower to extend its control far away from the Chinese mainland, while Vietnam and the Philippines have US support for their claim on the same territory.

SS batallion in Luleå, Sweden
by David Stavenheim

Early in the morning of October 4 1940 a fully equipped SS battalion landed in Luleå, a port in the north of Sweden. It was transferred by rail to Narvik in Norway. 1030 German soldiers hade gone with the ship Isar from Germany to Luleå, escorted by the Swedish navy through Swedish minefields. Much has been said on the transfer of the Engelbrecht Division from Norway to Finland in 1941. But almost nothing is known in Sweden about the transfer of the Kirkenes battalion in 1940.