Alas, poor Europe, I knew it well. A continent of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. Where be your gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs? Your flashes of merriment?

Germany recently held its Bundestag (parliamentary) elections last weekend. Unsurprisingly, the Social Democrats — currently in control — did abysmally, obtaining only 16.4% of the votes, and thus Chancellor Olaf Scholz is on his way out. The Christian Democrats, led by Friedrich Merz, obtained 28.5% of the votes cast; the largest number but not a majority, which means that Merz’s party will have to form a coalition with one or more of the other parties’ representatives.

Equally unsurprising — at least to anyone paying attention — the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, party, led by Alice Weidel, came in second, with more than 20% of the votes cast.

Germans are beyond frustrated with the levels of migration into their country, particularly from Muslim nations in the Middle East and North Africa, and the corresponding increases in crime and violence.

Recent high-profile crimes in Germany have only increased public outrage.

Given that background and the groundswell of support for AfD this year, one would think that Merz and his Christian Democrats would be eager to work with Weidel’s party to reach a majority in the German parliament. But Merz has made it clear that he has no such intention, preferring instead to unite with the weakened Social Democrats, whose policies German voters just resoundingly rejected.

In this respect, regrettably, Germany is following in the footsteps of England and France, whose citizens are thoroughly fed up with the problems caused by unfettered migration, as well as oppressive regulations and globalist power grabs.

England voted to leave the European Union (“Brexit”)in 2016, but its citizens have suffered through a series of feckless prime ministers, none of whom have been willing to do what’s necessary to give the country the political and economic sovereignty its citizens are demanding.

When France held its own parliamentary elections last year, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party — which ran on a platform of eliminating mass migration and restoring peace and order to France’s major cities — was denounced as “far-right” and fascist. It gained a significant number of seats but was blocked from taking power when French President Emmanuel Macron’s “centrist” Renaissance party and several left-wing factions agreed to withdraw certain candidates to avoid further splitting the vote.

Europe is slowly committing suicide. And yet in country after country, the so-called centrists are scrambling to retain power, to find some way to appease and distract irate citizens, while proceeding merrily along their present path to destruction.

Germans will soon discover what millions of the British and French have realized: that you cannot “moderate” your way back to sanity when the forces aligned against you are hell-bent on your destruction.

European countries have imported millions of people from countries whose values and cultures are completely antithetical to that of Western civilization. Their energy production, economic expansion and agricultural capacity are being throttled by absurd regulations intended to ameliorate “climate change” and fulfill pipe dreams like “net zero” and “15-minute cities.” Their governments fail to protect their own citizens from crime but seem to have no problem accommodating violent and misogynistic conduct by immigrants from other countries.

Even where the populist party wins elections, it is a struggle to effectuate the will of the public.

Far too many of Europe’s political leaders are in denial about the dangers their own countries are facing. It remains to be seen whether they will find the political will to reverse course before the Europe we’ve all known is reduced to a skeleton of its former self.