It's a pity, he was a good agent. He proudly represented a European liberalism that was tolerant to the point of boorishness towards minorities, but intolerant to the point of intransigence towards opponents of the liberal dogma. Mr Rutte has been at the European Council table since 2010, for almost as long as Viktor Orban, with only a few months' discrepancy and - just like Hungary's prime minister - he, too, was leading his fourth consecutive government. But the similarities end here. Mr Rutte's cabinets were often shaky, and his third government collapsed because of a rule of law dispute (a case of hanging the hangman!) over the payment of family allowances. But the Dutch prime minister - another emblematic representative of Benelux liberalism, along with the recently retired Belgian MEP Guy Verhofstadt - survived.

For us, Hungarians, Mr Rutte was the face of a liberal society that we know and feel that we do not want to live in. Many of us like to get away to Amsterdam for a weekend - it has great museums and tulip fields, for example - and we also get a sense of what a developed country we have arrived in. But on the airplane going back home, we also take note of what we don't want to see imposed: mass immigration, the elevation of sexual minorities by culture-warriors instead of a polite, civilized but quiet open-mindedness, the tolerance of drug use and the literal showcasing of representatives of the "oldest profession" on Earth. We would also refuse to allow far-left extremists or Islamists to carry out targeted political assassinations in broad daylight on the open streets, as happened in the Netherlands in the 2000s, which has been a scene of growing migration-induced tensions for decades.

However, the new hope of the Dutch right, the most popular party in the country at the moment, is the Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB), which came first in the spring provincial elections with 19% of the vote. BBB is an anti-elitist force in the Dutch countryside and a vehement opponent of the excesses of the European Commission and the European Parliament, something that we, Hungarians, also know all too well. The diametric contrast between Hungary and the Netherlands also implies that the Budapest epigone of Mr Rutte's lanky, bicycle-loving character is waiting in the opposition - or, more precisely, the mayor's chair - to see if the political winds will start to blow in his favor. It's just that, as we mentioned above, what happens to drive windmills in the Netherlands appears a little out of place and touch here.

Cover photo: Failed Dutch PM Mark Rutte (Photo:MTI/EPA-ANP/Phil Nijhuis)