George Will writes increduously of the Democrats' inane attacks on Wal-Mart. First, some facts:
The median household income of Wal-Mart shoppers is under $40,000. Wal-Mart, the most prodigious job-creator in the history of the private sector in this galaxy, has almost as many employees (1.3 million) as the U.S. military has uniformed personnel. A McKinsey company study concluded that Wal-Mart accounted for 13 percent of the nation's productivity gains in the second half of the 1990s, which probably made Wal-Mart about as important as the Federal Reserve in holding down inflation . By lowering consumer prices, Wal-Mart costs about 50 retail jobs among competitors for every 100 jobs Wal-Mart creates. Wal-Mart and its effects save shoppers more than $200 billion a year, dwarfing such government programs as food stamps ($28.6 billion) and the earned-income tax credit ($34.6 billion).
Now Will hits his grand slam:
Liberals think their campaign against Wal-Mart is a way of introducing the subject of class into America's political argument, and they are more correct than they understand. Their campaign is liberalism as condescension. It is a philosophic repugnance toward markets because consumer sovereignty results in the masses making messes. Liberals, aghast, see the choices Americans make with their dollars and their ballots, and announce - yes, announce - that Americans are sorely in need of more supervision by . . . liberals.
I hope that the Republicans turn a spotlight during the upcoming campaign season on this war by the liberal elite against the American people. I wrote a post a few weeks back on some possible rationale for this left wing anti-Wal-Mart hate fest, and a lot of it boils down to the facts listed above. The reality that Wal-Mart has a more positive effect on the economy, and especially on the lower to lower-middle classes, than all of their precious government programs is simply too much for the left to bear. So rather than re-think some of their core principles, the folks that laughably label themselves as "progressive" would rather destroy a free-market enterprise that (perhaps inadvertantly) helps society than reshape government programs that...do absolutely nothing.
When liberals' presidential nominees consistently fail to carry Kansas, liberals do not rush to read a book titled "What's the Matter With Liberals' Nominees?" No, the book they turned into a best-seller is titled "What's the Matter With Kansas?" Notice a pattern?
It is never the left, or their outmoded ideas, you see...it is always us, we fail to understand, we fail to see what is right and good for us, and if only we had the strong but benign hand of our liberal betters to guide us...
วันพฤหัสบดี, กันยายน 14, 2549
วันพุธ, กันยายน 13, 2549
Air America to go Silent?
So the only thing lower than George Bush's approval numbers are Air America's ratings, or so I hear...multiple reports coming out that the "progressive" network has progressed right into a wall - liberal blog Think Progress:
Air America Radio will announce a major restructuring on Friday, which is expected to include a bankruptcy filing, three independent sources have told ThinkProgress.
Air America could remain on the air under the deal, but significant personnel changes are already in the works. Sources say five Air America employees were laid off yesterday...
And how's this for typical head-in-the sand liberalism:
The right wing is sure to seize on Air America’s financial woes as a sign that progressive talk radio is unpopular . In fact, Air America succeeded at creating something that didn’t exist: the progressive talk radio format. That format is now established and strong and will continue with or without Air America....
Radio and TV in the United States is the ultimate example of popular and capitalistic democracy. When people like a particular program, they obviously listen to/watch it, ratings increase, and advertiser revenue follows. If am item of programming is uninteresting, or offensive, people do not tune in, ratings stay low and advertisers search for other venues to sell their wares. Once programming is running at a monetary loss due to lack of interest and becomes unprofitable, it is usually cancelled, and different programming takes its place.
Get it? Nobody cares, nobody is listening, nobody wants to advertise or associate their product with Air America, and hence the project is an intellectual and financial failure (read Michelle Malkin's posts detailing the crumbling of Air America here). American Capitalism being what it is, I find it unlikely that someone will try to duplicate a failed project of this type. And this is why the left is so big on public broadcasting -there is no marketplace for their decrepit ideas, so they rely on taxpayer funding to pimp their unpopular ideology...
Alas, The Radio Equalizer reports a not a sequal, but more of a nasty spin-off, may be in the works:
If Air America isn't able to continue its programming, it opens the door for new feminist talk radio network GreenStone Media to take over some, or perhaps many, of its stations. As we've reported exclusively, GreenStone, founded by Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem, has gradually begun to take over Air America's physical operations in New York City.
Great! Another leftist feminist outlet where successful conservative women like Condaleeza Rice can be ignored (or mocked), and baby-booming bra burners can Bush-bash and pine away for the day when women were slaves in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein and his hell-spawns ran rape camps in Iraq....
Buh-bye, Randi and Al! Based on your numbers, you won't be missed by many...
Air America Radio will announce a major restructuring on Friday, which is expected to include a bankruptcy filing, three independent sources have told ThinkProgress.
Air America could remain on the air under the deal, but significant personnel changes are already in the works. Sources say five Air America employees were laid off yesterday...
And how's this for typical head-in-the sand liberalism:
The right wing is sure to seize on Air America’s financial woes as a sign that progressive talk radio is unpopular . In fact, Air America succeeded at creating something that didn’t exist: the progressive talk radio format. That format is now established and strong and will continue with or without Air America....
Radio and TV in the United States is the ultimate example of popular and capitalistic democracy. When people like a particular program, they obviously listen to/watch it, ratings increase, and advertiser revenue follows. If am item of programming is uninteresting, or offensive, people do not tune in, ratings stay low and advertisers search for other venues to sell their wares. Once programming is running at a monetary loss due to lack of interest and becomes unprofitable, it is usually cancelled, and different programming takes its place.
Get it? Nobody cares, nobody is listening, nobody wants to advertise or associate their product with Air America, and hence the project is an intellectual and financial failure (read Michelle Malkin's posts detailing the crumbling of Air America here). American Capitalism being what it is, I find it unlikely that someone will try to duplicate a failed project of this type. And this is why the left is so big on public broadcasting -there is no marketplace for their decrepit ideas, so they rely on taxpayer funding to pimp their unpopular ideology...
Alas, The Radio Equalizer reports a not a sequal, but more of a nasty spin-off, may be in the works:
If Air America isn't able to continue its programming, it opens the door for new feminist talk radio network GreenStone Media to take over some, or perhaps many, of its stations. As we've reported exclusively, GreenStone, founded by Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem, has gradually begun to take over Air America's physical operations in New York City.
Great! Another leftist feminist outlet where successful conservative women like Condaleeza Rice can be ignored (or mocked), and baby-booming bra burners can Bush-bash and pine away for the day when women were slaves in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein and his hell-spawns ran rape camps in Iraq....
Buh-bye, Randi and Al! Based on your numbers, you won't be missed by many...
วันอังคาร, กันยายน 12, 2549
New Jersey Democrats Spit on National Security
Considering that many of the 9/11 hijackers spent time living in New Jersey, and two of the hijacked planes took off from Newark, one would think the state would be sensitive to the security concerns of the country, and of its citizens.
Nope.
Instead, the Democratic machine controlling New Jersey is fighting to overturn some of the security measures that have kept us free from attack for five years. The state attorney general is challenging the federal government on the wiretap issue:
New Jersey has the right to obtain information about a federal domestic surveillance program because that program is no longer a secret, the state argued in response to federal efforts to quash its investigation.
The Justice Department wants to throw "an impenetrable cloak insulating the federal government's domestic surveillance activities from all judicial scrutiny," acting New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram said yesterday.
New Jersey prosecutors subpoenaed 10 phone companies in May because of suspicion that state consumer-protection laws may have been violated if phone companies were turning over records to the National Security Agency.
The federal government sued the New Jersey attorney general's office in federal court June 14, claiming compliance with the state's subpoenas or even acknowledging the existence of such a program would threaten national security.
The state in its response, filed late Friday, argued: "There is no secret for the state secret privilege to protect."
So private companies are complying with national requests to protect New Jersey's (and the nation's) security, and what happens? A grandstanding Democratic AG makes a politically motivated attempt to shut it down by issuing subpoenas to further expose the program. I guess it is OK to fly planes into buildings, argues New Jersey, if the price of stopping them involves any type of electronic survailance. Hey, those Americans forced to jump from the 100th floor of the World trade Center on 9/11 at least died with their civil liberties somewhat intact, right? Methinks they woudl rather be alive with their loved ones, but the state of New Jersey knows better...
There is no one, NO ONE, in New Jersey who supports the state's actions here, save for the far left and Democratic toadies trying to make a name for themselves on the bodies of future dead Americans. It is bad enough that disgraced former Governor James McGreevey placed his gay lover in charge of the state's security; now the state is trying furiously to undo federal measures to protect the country simply because it chafes against their liberal agenda.
With Jon Corzine as the Don Capo of the state, there is no doubt that this action is being taken with his approval. And where does Bob Menendez stand on this? Anyone in the Jersey media have the guts to ask, or are they too busy fawning over his calls for the United States to surrender Iraq to al-Qaeda?
New Jersey continues to be a joke; but what did my mom always say? "It's only funny until someone gets hurt!".
How many will die in the next terror assault launched from New Jersey, executed while our so-called leaders fought to prevent its exposure?
Nope.
Instead, the Democratic machine controlling New Jersey is fighting to overturn some of the security measures that have kept us free from attack for five years. The state attorney general is challenging the federal government on the wiretap issue:
New Jersey has the right to obtain information about a federal domestic surveillance program because that program is no longer a secret, the state argued in response to federal efforts to quash its investigation.
The Justice Department wants to throw "an impenetrable cloak insulating the federal government's domestic surveillance activities from all judicial scrutiny," acting New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram said yesterday.
New Jersey prosecutors subpoenaed 10 phone companies in May because of suspicion that state consumer-protection laws may have been violated if phone companies were turning over records to the National Security Agency.
The federal government sued the New Jersey attorney general's office in federal court June 14, claiming compliance with the state's subpoenas or even acknowledging the existence of such a program would threaten national security.
The state in its response, filed late Friday, argued: "There is no secret for the state secret privilege to protect."
So private companies are complying with national requests to protect New Jersey's (and the nation's) security, and what happens? A grandstanding Democratic AG makes a politically motivated attempt to shut it down by issuing subpoenas to further expose the program. I guess it is OK to fly planes into buildings, argues New Jersey, if the price of stopping them involves any type of electronic survailance. Hey, those Americans forced to jump from the 100th floor of the World trade Center on 9/11 at least died with their civil liberties somewhat intact, right? Methinks they woudl rather be alive with their loved ones, but the state of New Jersey knows better...
There is no one, NO ONE, in New Jersey who supports the state's actions here, save for the far left and Democratic toadies trying to make a name for themselves on the bodies of future dead Americans. It is bad enough that disgraced former Governor James McGreevey placed his gay lover in charge of the state's security; now the state is trying furiously to undo federal measures to protect the country simply because it chafes against their liberal agenda.
With Jon Corzine as the Don Capo of the state, there is no doubt that this action is being taken with his approval. And where does Bob Menendez stand on this? Anyone in the Jersey media have the guts to ask, or are they too busy fawning over his calls for the United States to surrender Iraq to al-Qaeda?
New Jersey continues to be a joke; but what did my mom always say? "It's only funny until someone gets hurt!".
How many will die in the next terror assault launched from New Jersey, executed while our so-called leaders fought to prevent its exposure?
วันจันทร์, กันยายน 11, 2549
They Don't Show The Pictures Anymore....
...So I will:
Never Forget; never let the media equivilate Gitmo or Abu Ghraib with the horror that was unleashed upon us on September 11th, 2001. Will our generation be forced to keep the memory of that day alive (not unlike the burden carried by the dwindling survivors of the Holocaust), in a world that so badly wants to forget?
I will do my part; I swear it. I was there; I will never forget, nor allow it to be forgotten...
UPDATE: Charles Johnson asks that we bear witness; I concur.
Re-live the fog of the opening minutes of a war at Hot Air.
I 'm sorry I had the sound up for these videos; they are haunting, terrifying...
วันอาทิตย์, กันยายน 10, 2549
How Dare They!
Headline and teaser sentence in today's WaPo:
GOP Plans to Get Personal
Republicans aim to limit election losses with renewed attacks on Democratic candidates.
How dare those dirty Republicans fight back against our attacks? When Democrats point out that all Republicans are racist, corrupt war-mongers, the wing-nuts are required to sit still, smile dumbly, and agree! Arguing issues, pointing out our foibles, and exposing the alleged weakness of our candidates is just unfair campaigning, that's all!
Really....if we Democrats lose this time, it proves that Rove and his fascist comrades must be fixing the elections! I mean, we're right about everything - just read the New York Times, or the Washington Post! C'mon, look at today's Post - here's a story about how much Bush is hated overseas (and that's only the headline; the article is really about all the cool stuff that Democratic pollster Mark Mellman found out!), and here's another one that claims even evangelicals are turning on him! You cannot find even one positive word about President Bush in the whole darned Washington Post - doesn't that tell you something???
Yet the Republicans refuse to lie down and die quietly - look at poor Senator Robert Menedez in New Jersey; obviously the federal probe of his finances are politically motivated; you know Cheney is pulling the strings somewhere! There is no way an incumbant Democrat can be behind in the polls in a blue state - see, the fix is already in! And doing nasty things like informing voters in Wisconsin that a Democratic candidate (Dr. Steve Kagen) has sued over 80 patients - c'mon, who needs useless facts like that, when we all we need to know is that "Bush lied"??
Which reminds me, why is ABC wasting valuable airtime on the "Road to 9/11" when we already know that the Bush Administration launched the attacks in order to wage war for oil? If they weren't so deep in the pocket of the fascist Right, ABC would instead be airng a documentary on Hillary Clinton - now that's something all Americans (that I know, anyway) would love to watch!
Well ! I can't wait for the Michael Moore movie on this election to come out...!
GOP Plans to Get Personal
Republicans aim to limit election losses with renewed attacks on Democratic candidates.
How dare those dirty Republicans fight back against our attacks? When Democrats point out that all Republicans are racist, corrupt war-mongers, the wing-nuts are required to sit still, smile dumbly, and agree! Arguing issues, pointing out our foibles, and exposing the alleged weakness of our candidates is just unfair campaigning, that's all!
Really....if we Democrats lose this time, it proves that Rove and his fascist comrades must be fixing the elections! I mean, we're right about everything - just read the New York Times, or the Washington Post! C'mon, look at today's Post - here's a story about how much Bush is hated overseas (and that's only the headline; the article is really about all the cool stuff that Democratic pollster Mark Mellman found out!), and here's another one that claims even evangelicals are turning on him! You cannot find even one positive word about President Bush in the whole darned Washington Post - doesn't that tell you something???
Yet the Republicans refuse to lie down and die quietly - look at poor Senator Robert Menedez in New Jersey; obviously the federal probe of his finances are politically motivated; you know Cheney is pulling the strings somewhere! There is no way an incumbant Democrat can be behind in the polls in a blue state - see, the fix is already in! And doing nasty things like informing voters in Wisconsin that a Democratic candidate (Dr. Steve Kagen) has sued over 80 patients - c'mon, who needs useless facts like that, when we all we need to know is that "Bush lied"??
Which reminds me, why is ABC wasting valuable airtime on the "Road to 9/11" when we already know that the Bush Administration launched the attacks in order to wage war for oil? If they weren't so deep in the pocket of the fascist Right, ABC would instead be airng a documentary on Hillary Clinton - now that's something all Americans (that I know, anyway) would love to watch!
Well ! I can't wait for the Michael Moore movie on this election to come out...!
วันเสาร์, กันยายน 09, 2549
New Jersey's Misery, Part One...
...of what will become more than an occasional series. Parkway Rest Stop channels Enlighten New Jersey nicely:
The state of the State is horrible.
Free-spending, tax raising democrats, their loyal tax-taking democrat-voting minions, and government corruption at all levels that has made our state a national joke have resulted in what I fear to be an economic doomsday for this state.
Enlighten New Jersey points out:
Since Democrats took control of Trenton in 2002, state spending and taxes have increased by 35 percent and debt has ballooned by a whopping 214 percent. New Jersey's population has grown by less two percent, while the number of state government workers has increased by more than 20 percent. The increase in all public-sector jobs in New Jersey has been increasing at the rate of 9 percent .
I have lost count of how many young, educated people I know who have left Jersey because they simply cannot afford to live here.
As I have said before, the only hope I see is to vote every single state, county and local incumbent politician out of office...
The corruption "at all levels" is the worst problem; some of the run-ins I have had with some of the township police (and their court systems) are reminiscent of the nastiest tales told out of third-world banana republics. Currently, incumbent Senator Robert Menendez, appointed by Governer Jon Corzine to his seat, is the latest New Jersey pol to find himself in hot ethical water - via Fausta:
Federal investigators have subpoenaed records of a rental deal between U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez and a non-profit agency in Union City, launching a criminal investigation that is sure to rock New Jersey's hotly contested Senate race...
...The action comes two weeks after The Star-Ledger reported that Menendez collected over $300,000 from the organization over a nine-year period while he represented Hudson County in the U.S. House of Representatives. During that period, he also helped the agency win millions of dollars in federal funding.
How bad is it? Menendez, running as an anti-war Democrat in an anti-war blue state with a $7.5 million dollar war chest, is running behind challenger Tom Kean Jr. But he's just another Dem in Denial:
"It's a competitive race only because of my opponent's surname," Menendez said last week over coffee and eggs at one of his state's trademark diners.
Uh, OK Bob, if that makes you feel better...meanwhile, the party must feel pretty desperate to play the race card in early September:
Others think Menendez's surname -- and the state's growing ethnic mix -- may be factors, too. "I'll be blunt. It's not a nice thing to say about New Jersey, but being a Latino may be costing him in some parts of the state," says David Rebovich, a political scientist at Rider University. That view is shared in this diverse community, part of a congressional district Menendez represented for 13 years before joining the Senate in January.
You want to vote Kean because you thing Menendez is just another corrupt Jersey Dem? NO, it is because you are a filthy racist, that's why! So cleanse your guilt, and get your ass in the voting booth and pull the lever with the "D" next to it, or else we'll tell everybody what darkness lies within your soul!
I don't believe this type of psychological bullying is gonna fly in Jersey this year....
Enlighten has more Menendez lies here...
And you thought I was kidding when I used the phrase "third world" to describe this state? The Washington Post tells how New Jersey Democrats are trying to use thugs to silence Kean's message:
When Kean tried to make an anti-Menendez speech on June 1, inmates from the Democratic-controlled county jail suddenly fired up noisy lawn mowers and weed-whackers to cut grass that had been trimmed a few days earlier...
Pathetic.
The state of the State is horrible.
Free-spending, tax raising democrats, their loyal tax-taking democrat-voting minions, and government corruption at all levels that has made our state a national joke have resulted in what I fear to be an economic doomsday for this state.
Enlighten New Jersey points out:
Since Democrats took control of Trenton in 2002, state spending and taxes have increased by 35 percent and debt has ballooned by a whopping 214 percent. New Jersey's population has grown by less two percent, while the number of state government workers has increased by more than 20 percent. The increase in all public-sector jobs in New Jersey has been increasing at the rate of 9 percent .
I have lost count of how many young, educated people I know who have left Jersey because they simply cannot afford to live here.
As I have said before, the only hope I see is to vote every single state, county and local incumbent politician out of office...
The corruption "at all levels" is the worst problem; some of the run-ins I have had with some of the township police (and their court systems) are reminiscent of the nastiest tales told out of third-world banana republics. Currently, incumbent Senator Robert Menendez, appointed by Governer Jon Corzine to his seat, is the latest New Jersey pol to find himself in hot ethical water - via Fausta:
Federal investigators have subpoenaed records of a rental deal between U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez and a non-profit agency in Union City, launching a criminal investigation that is sure to rock New Jersey's hotly contested Senate race...
...The action comes two weeks after The Star-Ledger reported that Menendez collected over $300,000 from the organization over a nine-year period while he represented Hudson County in the U.S. House of Representatives. During that period, he also helped the agency win millions of dollars in federal funding.
How bad is it? Menendez, running as an anti-war Democrat in an anti-war blue state with a $7.5 million dollar war chest, is running behind challenger Tom Kean Jr. But he's just another Dem in Denial:
"It's a competitive race only because of my opponent's surname," Menendez said last week over coffee and eggs at one of his state's trademark diners.
Uh, OK Bob, if that makes you feel better...meanwhile, the party must feel pretty desperate to play the race card in early September:
Others think Menendez's surname -- and the state's growing ethnic mix -- may be factors, too. "I'll be blunt. It's not a nice thing to say about New Jersey, but being a Latino may be costing him in some parts of the state," says David Rebovich, a political scientist at Rider University. That view is shared in this diverse community, part of a congressional district Menendez represented for 13 years before joining the Senate in January.
You want to vote Kean because you thing Menendez is just another corrupt Jersey Dem? NO, it is because you are a filthy racist, that's why! So cleanse your guilt, and get your ass in the voting booth and pull the lever with the "D" next to it, or else we'll tell everybody what darkness lies within your soul!
I don't believe this type of psychological bullying is gonna fly in Jersey this year....
Enlighten has more Menendez lies here...
And you thought I was kidding when I used the phrase "third world" to describe this state? The Washington Post tells how New Jersey Democrats are trying to use thugs to silence Kean's message:
When Kean tried to make an anti-Menendez speech on June 1, inmates from the Democratic-controlled county jail suddenly fired up noisy lawn mowers and weed-whackers to cut grass that had been trimmed a few days earlier...
Pathetic.
Granny Exercises Second Amendment Rights w/.357 Magnum!
From today's New York Daily News:
A pistol-packing Harlem granny turned the tables on a robber yesterday, busting out her registered .357 magnum and shooting the mugger in the elbow - while riding in her motorized scooter, cops said.
Feisty Mar
garet Johnson, 57, who has a dislocated hip and a herniated disk, was heading out for target practice about 3 p.m. when a career criminal came up behind her and went for her necklaces, sources said.
"There's not much to it," she said later. "Somebody tried to mug me, and I shot him."
The thief "walked past her, and came around and choked her," said Johnson's pal, Lynnell Bunce, 40. "He was going for her jewelry, and he got it. He didn't say anything - until she shot him."
Then the man cursed and fled from the scene outside 470 Lenox Ave., where the victim has lived for decades, Bunce said.
"I'm very tired. It was very scary," Johnson said as she later entered her building in her three-wheeled scooter with scratches on her neck and left hand. "I've had a very long day."
Police followed the trail of the wounded man's blood to a McDonald's restaurant not far from Johnson's building and arrested 45-year-old Deron Johnson, an ex-con with nine robbery arrests who is no relation to the victim, sources said.
He was in stable condition at Harlem Hospital last night, and charges were pending against him. The jewelry was recovered, officials said.
Margaret Johnson has a premises permit for the gun, a police source said, meaning she is allowed to keep the pistol in her home and transport it to a firing range.
Now, if the Democrats had their druthers, the likes of Ms. Johnson would never be allowed to be armed; she would just have to sit in her wheelchair and be mugged and assaulted by a nine-time felon with good grace, that's all. She would then be endowed with the liberal's highest honor, the status of "victim", and be shuttled into some taxpayer-funded victim recovery program. And of course, the lifelong thug who saw fit to prey on what he thought was an easy mark would get off the hook with a light slap on the tush - after all, aren't his crimes truly society's fault?
Let's see how the anti-gun nuts try to spin this one....
A pistol-packing Harlem granny turned the tables on a robber yesterday, busting out her registered .357 magnum and shooting the mugger in the elbow - while riding in her motorized scooter, cops said.
Feisty Mar
garet Johnson, 57, who has a dislocated hip and a herniated disk, was heading out for target practice about 3 p.m. when a career criminal came up behind her and went for her necklaces, sources said."There's not much to it," she said later. "Somebody tried to mug me, and I shot him."
The thief "walked past her, and came around and choked her," said Johnson's pal, Lynnell Bunce, 40. "He was going for her jewelry, and he got it. He didn't say anything - until she shot him."
Then the man cursed and fled from the scene outside 470 Lenox Ave., where the victim has lived for decades, Bunce said.
"I'm very tired. It was very scary," Johnson said as she later entered her building in her three-wheeled scooter with scratches on her neck and left hand. "I've had a very long day."
Police followed the trail of the wounded man's blood to a McDonald's restaurant not far from Johnson's building and arrested 45-year-old Deron Johnson, an ex-con with nine robbery arrests who is no relation to the victim, sources said.
He was in stable condition at Harlem Hospital last night, and charges were pending against him. The jewelry was recovered, officials said.
Margaret Johnson has a premises permit for the gun, a police source said, meaning she is allowed to keep the pistol in her home and transport it to a firing range.
Now, if the Democrats had their druthers, the likes of Ms. Johnson would never be allowed to be armed; she would just have to sit in her wheelchair and be mugged and assaulted by a nine-time felon with good grace, that's all. She would then be endowed with the liberal's highest honor, the status of "victim", and be shuttled into some taxpayer-funded victim recovery program. And of course, the lifelong thug who saw fit to prey on what he thought was an easy mark would get off the hook with a light slap on the tush - after all, aren't his crimes truly society's fault?
Let's see how the anti-gun nuts try to spin this one....
วันพฤหัสบดี, กันยายน 07, 2549
Democrats Demand Moratorium on Free Speech !
So you thought I was exaggerating on Tuesday when I reported on how liberal pressure groups were using legal means to silence scientists who dared offer views that contradicted those of the Democratic Party?
Well, here's two more examples of this "progressive" tactic...first, see below, where the headline really says it all:
Democrats urge ABC to withdraw 9/11 movie
Amid an election-year debate over who can best defend America, U.S. congressional Democrats urged ABC on Thursday to cancel a TV miniseries about the September 11 attacks that is critical of former Democratic President Bill Clinton and his top aides.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada denounced the five-hour television movie, set to air in two parts on Sunday and Monday nights, as "a work of fiction."
Reid and other leading Senate Democrats wrote to Robert Iger, president and CEO of ABC's corporate parent, the Walt Disney Co., urging him to "cancel this factually inaccurate and deeply misguided program."
You know, I can't seem to recall any prominent Democrats writing CBS and demanding they disown a report, proven demonstrably false, about a certain President's service in the National Guard. And that was what, two weeks before an election? Ah, the stench of Democratic double-standards can even permeate the thick air over New Jersey...
...Not to mention their elitism. Reid urges ABC to cancel the miniseries becuase us average Americans are just too stupid to be allowed to watch the program and form our own judgement. I guess 'ol Reid at the very least is smart enough not to believe the media's guarentees of a Democratic Senate majority in November, 'cause that old dog certainly seems scared about something - the truth, perhaps?
And in Missouri (a beautiful state, where I sojurned for a year or so), Democratic Senate candidate Clare McCaskill has resorted to race-baiting in a desperate attempt to wrest away Jim Talent's Senate seat:
McCaskill said she would remind people that "George Bush let people die on rooftops in New Orleans because they were poor and because they were black."
Reported by blogger Pub Def, check out the vicious comment by our lovely "progressives" at his site - all types of hate heaped upon a man for simply reporting what he heard, reporting the truth. Now if he was a Republican reporting on insensitive comments at a right-wing pow-wow, the media would be hailing him as a "whistleblower", as a "hero"...instead, we get:
... it is definitely disappointing for you to come into a strategic, elected Democratic Officials meeting and report slanted, slanderous, false, inflamatory, poorly conveyed, poorly edited information from a meeting on a public website without the express permission of anyone that attended the meeting.
No, actually, that's what a good reporter does - again, if it was executed within a Republican "strategy meeting", there would be kudos all around.
...if anyone deserves shame it's Claire's staff for allowing a member of the media/blogger into an event that they wanted to keep private.
Yup! Can't have your stategy of race-splitting going public! That's way worse than a "progressive" candidate planning to racially divide a city that has some serious fault lines as it is! And of course, the local media, such as the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, are all over it...with deafening silence . Silence, as always, is assent...
And finally - Distraction Alert! - I couldn't help but notice this little teaser in the P-Dispatch; kinda says it all about the parties' philosophies:
Talent, McCaskill take parallel stance, voice divergent solutions on immigration
U.S. Sen. Jim Talent proposes more border security; state Auditor Claire McCaskill focuses on punishing employers.
Indeed.
Well, here's two more examples of this "progressive" tactic...first, see below, where the headline really says it all:
Democrats urge ABC to withdraw 9/11 movie
Amid an election-year debate over who can best defend America, U.S. congressional Democrats urged ABC on Thursday to cancel a TV miniseries about the September 11 attacks that is critical of former Democratic President Bill Clinton and his top aides.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada denounced the five-hour television movie, set to air in two parts on Sunday and Monday nights, as "a work of fiction."
Reid and other leading Senate Democrats wrote to Robert Iger, president and CEO of ABC's corporate parent, the Walt Disney Co., urging him to "cancel this factually inaccurate and deeply misguided program."
You know, I can't seem to recall any prominent Democrats writing CBS and demanding they disown a report, proven demonstrably false, about a certain President's service in the National Guard. And that was what, two weeks before an election? Ah, the stench of Democratic double-standards can even permeate the thick air over New Jersey...
...Not to mention their elitism. Reid urges ABC to cancel the miniseries becuase us average Americans are just too stupid to be allowed to watch the program and form our own judgement. I guess 'ol Reid at the very least is smart enough not to believe the media's guarentees of a Democratic Senate majority in November, 'cause that old dog certainly seems scared about something - the truth, perhaps?
And in Missouri (a beautiful state, where I sojurned for a year or so), Democratic Senate candidate Clare McCaskill has resorted to race-baiting in a desperate attempt to wrest away Jim Talent's Senate seat:
McCaskill said she would remind people that "George Bush let people die on rooftops in New Orleans because they were poor and because they were black."
Reported by blogger Pub Def, check out the vicious comment by our lovely "progressives" at his site - all types of hate heaped upon a man for simply reporting what he heard, reporting the truth. Now if he was a Republican reporting on insensitive comments at a right-wing pow-wow, the media would be hailing him as a "whistleblower", as a "hero"...instead, we get:
... it is definitely disappointing for you to come into a strategic, elected Democratic Officials meeting and report slanted, slanderous, false, inflamatory, poorly conveyed, poorly edited information from a meeting on a public website without the express permission of anyone that attended the meeting.
No, actually, that's what a good reporter does - again, if it was executed within a Republican "strategy meeting", there would be kudos all around.
...if anyone deserves shame it's Claire's staff for allowing a member of the media/blogger into an event that they wanted to keep private.
Yup! Can't have your stategy of race-splitting going public! That's way worse than a "progressive" candidate planning to racially divide a city that has some serious fault lines as it is! And of course, the local media, such as the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, are all over it...with deafening silence . Silence, as always, is assent...
And finally - Distraction Alert! - I couldn't help but notice this little teaser in the P-Dispatch; kinda says it all about the parties' philosophies:
Talent, McCaskill take parallel stance, voice divergent solutions on immigration
U.S. Sen. Jim Talent proposes more border security; state Auditor Claire McCaskill focuses on punishing employers.
Indeed.
วันพุธ, กันยายน 06, 2549
The EU, Gearing Up for War ?
Both DEBKA and the Brussels Journal seem pretty sure that the military buildup going on in and around Lebanon by EU forces are not to enforce the infamous U.N. Resolution 1701 (the cease-fire between Hezbollah and Israel), but instead are there as a precurser to a preemptive strike by the West against Iran.
First, we'll report from the belly of the EU beast, via the Brussels Journal:
On 3rd September, London’s Sunday Times speculated that Israel has been planning a war against Iran and Syria, following the recent bout of conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon...
Tel Aviv can be guaranteed to find confident partners in both America and Europe, if a pre-emptive defence strategy were to be initiated against Tehran....
If the tensions do rise against Iran, Israel can be confident to find support of its military actions through a variety of independent nations, whether they move with or without the UN. Since Tehran appears to not be declaring its intentions for nuclear enrichment, Europe, the US and the UN must go by the rule of past experience: assume the worst case scenario. Israel can justify its actions simply by demonstrating that Iran has directly declared to wipe Zionist Israel clean off the map on more than one occasion and “we all know” that it is covertly brewing nuclear weapon capabilities behind the backs of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Although Europe would back Israel, through the channels of the EU, it could only offer a retarded defence force, likely to be accompanied by a major domestic interest in preventing further aggravation of a Euro-born Arab electorate.
I simply cannot agree with the B-Journal; after all, didn't European support for Israel's battle against Hezbollah deteriorate within the first15 minutes? If I recall, as soon as the first Israeli shells crashed into enemy bunkers, the European leadership was whining about "disproportionate response"; while the anti-Semitic press on the Continent was more than happy to file as many false stories of Israeli atrocities that could be fit within the day's margins. How could they endorse a pre-emptive military strike against Iran, who have done nothing except employ their Allah-given right to nuclear energy?
And yet, the Israeli military/intelligence blog DEBKA endorses much of the above, and claims that the EU is already on war footing:
The extraordinary buildup of European naval and military strength in and around Lebanon’s shores is way out of proportion for the task the European contingents of expanded UNIFIL have undertaken: to create a buffer between Israel and Hizballah.
Close investigation by DEBKAfile’s military and intelligence sources discloses that “Lebanese security” and peacemaking is not the object of the exercise. It is linked to the general anticipation of a military clash between the United States and Israel, on one side, and Iran and possibly Syria on the other, some time from now until November .
This expectation has brought together the greatest sea and air armada Europe has ever assembled at any point on earth since World War II: two carriers with 75 fighter-bombers, spy planes and helicopters on their decks; 15 warships of various types – 7 French, 5 Italian, 2-3 Green, 3-5 German, and five American; thousands of Marines – French, Italian and German, as well as 1,800 US Marines.
It is improbably billed as support for a mere 7,000 European soldiers who are deployed in Lebanon...
DEBKA claims the logistical equiptment is alreay in place:
From France’s nuclear-powered 38,000-ton Charles De Gaulle carrier, 40 Rafale M fighter craft whose range is 3,340 km can take off at intervals of 30 seconds. The ship also carries three E-2C Hawkeye surveillance craft. The combat control center of the French carrier can handle 2,000 simultaneous targets. The carrier leads a task fore of 7 warships carrying 2,800 French Marines.
Charles De Gaulle is also a floating logistics center operating water desalination plants for 15,000 men and enough food to feed an army for 90 days.
I still don't buy it. Why not send the De Gaulle; it's not as if the French navy may be urgently called to battle elsewhere...and who's to say that France is not intending to more forcefully step into a possible renewed Israeli-Lebanese conflict, given their longstanding colonial roots in that nation? Could their final dhimmitude be achieved by deploying the French armed forces against Israel?
As much as I wish that the United States and Europe could come together again to fight a common foe, I cannot see the picture that the Brussels Journal and DEBKA are painting. Wishful thinking can make one see things that are not there; alas, it is more likely that one would see the De Gaulle turning astern and steaming back to France at the first sign of combat, as opposed to actually entering the fray...
UPDATE: I don't know if this adds anything to the debate, but here goes:
Most French and Americans would support military action against Iran as a last resort if other means fail to stop it acquiring nuclear weapons, a major transatlantic opinion survey showed on Wednesday.
...when asked what should happen if non-military measures failed to stop Tehran acquiring atomic weapons, 53 percent of Americans and 43 percent of Europeans supported taking military action rather than accepting a nuclear Iran.
In France, the figure was 54 percent . In Germany, 40 percent supported military action but 46 percent said it would be better to let Iran acquire nuclear arms.
First, we'll report from the belly of the EU beast, via the Brussels Journal:
On 3rd September, London’s Sunday Times speculated that Israel has been planning a war against Iran and Syria, following the recent bout of conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon...
Tel Aviv can be guaranteed to find confident partners in both America and Europe, if a pre-emptive defence strategy were to be initiated against Tehran....
If the tensions do rise against Iran, Israel can be confident to find support of its military actions through a variety of independent nations, whether they move with or without the UN. Since Tehran appears to not be declaring its intentions for nuclear enrichment, Europe, the US and the UN must go by the rule of past experience: assume the worst case scenario. Israel can justify its actions simply by demonstrating that Iran has directly declared to wipe Zionist Israel clean off the map on more than one occasion and “we all know” that it is covertly brewing nuclear weapon capabilities behind the backs of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Although Europe would back Israel, through the channels of the EU, it could only offer a retarded defence force, likely to be accompanied by a major domestic interest in preventing further aggravation of a Euro-born Arab electorate.
I simply cannot agree with the B-Journal; after all, didn't European support for Israel's battle against Hezbollah deteriorate within the first15 minutes? If I recall, as soon as the first Israeli shells crashed into enemy bunkers, the European leadership was whining about "disproportionate response"; while the anti-Semitic press on the Continent was more than happy to file as many false stories of Israeli atrocities that could be fit within the day's margins. How could they endorse a pre-emptive military strike against Iran, who have done nothing except employ their Allah-given right to nuclear energy?
And yet, the Israeli military/intelligence blog DEBKA endorses much of the above, and claims that the EU is already on war footing:
The extraordinary buildup of European naval and military strength in and around Lebanon’s shores is way out of proportion for the task the European contingents of expanded UNIFIL have undertaken: to create a buffer between Israel and Hizballah.
Close investigation by DEBKAfile’s military and intelligence sources discloses that “Lebanese security” and peacemaking is not the object of the exercise. It is linked to the general anticipation of a military clash between the United States and Israel, on one side, and Iran and possibly Syria on the other, some time from now until November .
This expectation has brought together the greatest sea and air armada Europe has ever assembled at any point on earth since World War II: two carriers with 75 fighter-bombers, spy planes and helicopters on their decks; 15 warships of various types – 7 French, 5 Italian, 2-3 Green, 3-5 German, and five American; thousands of Marines – French, Italian and German, as well as 1,800 US Marines.
It is improbably billed as support for a mere 7,000 European soldiers who are deployed in Lebanon...
DEBKA claims the logistical equiptment is alreay in place:
From France’s nuclear-powered 38,000-ton Charles De Gaulle carrier, 40 Rafale M fighter craft whose range is 3,340 km can take off at intervals of 30 seconds. The ship also carries three E-2C Hawkeye surveillance craft. The combat control center of the French carrier can handle 2,000 simultaneous targets. The carrier leads a task fore of 7 warships carrying 2,800 French Marines.
Charles De Gaulle is also a floating logistics center operating water desalination plants for 15,000 men and enough food to feed an army for 90 days.
I still don't buy it. Why not send the De Gaulle; it's not as if the French navy may be urgently called to battle elsewhere...and who's to say that France is not intending to more forcefully step into a possible renewed Israeli-Lebanese conflict, given their longstanding colonial roots in that nation? Could their final dhimmitude be achieved by deploying the French armed forces against Israel?
As much as I wish that the United States and Europe could come together again to fight a common foe, I cannot see the picture that the Brussels Journal and DEBKA are painting. Wishful thinking can make one see things that are not there; alas, it is more likely that one would see the De Gaulle turning astern and steaming back to France at the first sign of combat, as opposed to actually entering the fray...
UPDATE: I don't know if this adds anything to the debate, but here goes:
Most French and Americans would support military action against Iran as a last resort if other means fail to stop it acquiring nuclear weapons, a major transatlantic opinion survey showed on Wednesday.
...when asked what should happen if non-military measures failed to stop Tehran acquiring atomic weapons, 53 percent of Americans and 43 percent of Europeans supported taking military action rather than accepting a nuclear Iran.
In France, the figure was 54 percent . In Germany, 40 percent supported military action but 46 percent said it would be better to let Iran acquire nuclear arms.
วันอังคาร, กันยายน 05, 2549
The Left Criminalizes Scientific Debate !
The always-entertaining, ever-opinionated Bitch Girls point us to this little article in the Boston Globe (of all places!) where an "inconvienent truth" is exposed: Liberal pressure groups are attempting to criminalize opinions that are not in lockstep with their own.
No hyperbole, I swear, read the article by Alex Beam:
Speech codes are rare in the industrialized, Western democracies. In Germany and Austria, for instance, it is forbidden to proselytize Nazi ideology or trivialize the Holocaust. Given those countries' recent histories, that is a restraint on free expression we can live with.
More curious are our own taboos on the subject of global warming. I sat in a roomful of journalists 10 years ago while Stanford climatologist Stephen Schneider lectured us on a big problem in our profession: soliciting opposing points of view. In the debate over climate change, Schneider said, there simply was no legitimate opposing view to the scientific consensus that man - made carbon emissions drive global warming. To suggest or report otherwise, he said, was irresponsible.
Indeed. I attended a week's worth of lectures on global warming at the Chautauqua Institution last month. Al Gore delivered the kickoff lecture, and, 10 years later, he reiterated Schneider's directive. There is no science on the other side, Gore inveighed, more than once. Again, the same message: If you hear tales of doubt, ignore them. They are simply untrue.
Is the left's facts and arguementation in the global warming debate so thin, and so bereft of logic and facts, that it cannot withstand questioning? Apparently so:
Here's the kind of information the ``scientific consensus" types don't want you to read. MIT's Alfred P. Sloan professor of meteorology Richard Lindzen recently complained about the ``shrill alarmism" of Gore's movie ``An Inconvenient Truth." Lindzen acknowledges that global warming is real, and he acknowledges that increased carbon emissions might be causing the warming -- but they also might not.
``We do not understand the natural internal variability of climate change" is one of Lindzen's many heresies, along with such zingers as ``the Arctic was as warm or warmer in 1940," ``the evidence so far suggests that the Greenland ice sheet is actually growing on average," and ``Alpine glaciers have been retreating since the early 19th century, and were advancing for several centuries before that. Since about 1970, many of the glaciers have stopped retreating and some are now advancing again. And, frankly, we don't know why."
YES, WE DO KNOW WHY! IT IS BECAUSE MIDLE AMERICA IS DRIVING SUV'S INSTEAD OF HYBRIDS, LIVING IN HOUSES IN THE SUBURBS INSTEAD OF APARTMENTS IN THE CITY, AND RUNNING THEIR AIR-CONDITIONING WHILE RELAXING INSIDE INSTEAD OF GETTING THEIR FRESH AIR ON THE FIRE ESCAPE LIKE GOOD PROLETARIANS! And no, it has nothing to do with your liberal betters flying around in private jets or blocking renewable energy sources (like wind farms ) that might disturb our vistas!
And if you dare mouth off like our friend the good MIT scientist, we'll come after you, even if the facts are on your side:
While vacationing in Canada, I spotted a newspaper story that I hadn't seen in the United States. For no apparent reason, the state of California, Environmental Defense, and the Natural Resources Defense Council have dragged Lindzen and about 15 other global- warming skeptics into a lawsuit over auto- emissions standards. California et al . have asked the auto companies to cough up any and all communications they have had with Lindzen and his colleagues, whose research has been cited in court documents.
``This is the criminalization of opposition to global warming," says Lindzen, who adds he has never communicated with the auto companies involved in the lawsuit. Of course Lindzen isn't a fake scientist, he's an inconvenient scientist. No wonder you're not supposed to listen to him.
This is scary stuff, and since this politicalization of science and squashing of dissenting scientific debate is being perpetrated by the liberal elite, you will see no mention of it in the American media. Remember also, that silence is consent...
Can you imagine what will happen if, come November, Congress is put in the hands of ideologues like Nancy Pelosi and Charles Rangel? Expect the weight of the law to come down behind these radical eco-groups like Enviornmental Defense, and watch as scientific fact becomes decreed, and non-debateable, as per the prevailing political winds of the far-left wing of the Democratic Party...
No hyperbole, I swear, read the article by Alex Beam:
Speech codes are rare in the industrialized, Western democracies. In Germany and Austria, for instance, it is forbidden to proselytize Nazi ideology or trivialize the Holocaust. Given those countries' recent histories, that is a restraint on free expression we can live with.
More curious are our own taboos on the subject of global warming. I sat in a roomful of journalists 10 years ago while Stanford climatologist Stephen Schneider lectured us on a big problem in our profession: soliciting opposing points of view. In the debate over climate change, Schneider said, there simply was no legitimate opposing view to the scientific consensus that man - made carbon emissions drive global warming. To suggest or report otherwise, he said, was irresponsible.
Indeed. I attended a week's worth of lectures on global warming at the Chautauqua Institution last month. Al Gore delivered the kickoff lecture, and, 10 years later, he reiterated Schneider's directive. There is no science on the other side, Gore inveighed, more than once. Again, the same message: If you hear tales of doubt, ignore them. They are simply untrue.
Is the left's facts and arguementation in the global warming debate so thin, and so bereft of logic and facts, that it cannot withstand questioning? Apparently so:
Here's the kind of information the ``scientific consensus" types don't want you to read. MIT's Alfred P. Sloan professor of meteorology Richard Lindzen recently complained about the ``shrill alarmism" of Gore's movie ``An Inconvenient Truth." Lindzen acknowledges that global warming is real, and he acknowledges that increased carbon emissions might be causing the warming -- but they also might not.
``We do not understand the natural internal variability of climate change" is one of Lindzen's many heresies, along with such zingers as ``the Arctic was as warm or warmer in 1940," ``the evidence so far suggests that the Greenland ice sheet is actually growing on average," and ``Alpine glaciers have been retreating since the early 19th century, and were advancing for several centuries before that. Since about 1970, many of the glaciers have stopped retreating and some are now advancing again. And, frankly, we don't know why."
YES, WE DO KNOW WHY! IT IS BECAUSE MIDLE AMERICA IS DRIVING SUV'S INSTEAD OF HYBRIDS, LIVING IN HOUSES IN THE SUBURBS INSTEAD OF APARTMENTS IN THE CITY, AND RUNNING THEIR AIR-CONDITIONING WHILE RELAXING INSIDE INSTEAD OF GETTING THEIR FRESH AIR ON THE FIRE ESCAPE LIKE GOOD PROLETARIANS! And no, it has nothing to do with your liberal betters flying around in private jets or blocking renewable energy sources (like wind farms ) that might disturb our vistas!
And if you dare mouth off like our friend the good MIT scientist, we'll come after you, even if the facts are on your side:
While vacationing in Canada, I spotted a newspaper story that I hadn't seen in the United States. For no apparent reason, the state of California, Environmental Defense, and the Natural Resources Defense Council have dragged Lindzen and about 15 other global- warming skeptics into a lawsuit over auto- emissions standards. California et al . have asked the auto companies to cough up any and all communications they have had with Lindzen and his colleagues, whose research has been cited in court documents.
``This is the criminalization of opposition to global warming," says Lindzen, who adds he has never communicated with the auto companies involved in the lawsuit. Of course Lindzen isn't a fake scientist, he's an inconvenient scientist. No wonder you're not supposed to listen to him.
This is scary stuff, and since this politicalization of science and squashing of dissenting scientific debate is being perpetrated by the liberal elite, you will see no mention of it in the American media. Remember also, that silence is consent...
Can you imagine what will happen if, come November, Congress is put in the hands of ideologues like Nancy Pelosi and Charles Rangel? Expect the weight of the law to come down behind these radical eco-groups like Enviornmental Defense, and watch as scientific fact becomes decreed, and non-debateable, as per the prevailing political winds of the far-left wing of the Democratic Party...
วันจันทร์, กันยายน 04, 2549
Only at The Corner can someone make a legitimate case that one can tie the untimely death of crocodile hunter Steve Irwin by a stingray to the threat of Islamist terrorism:
...most Americans probably are not in imminent danger of death by stingray. But I do wonder if Irwin, having taken risks so oftten in the past, having cheated death on so many occasions, may not have gradually become over-confident in the face of danger. Nations, as much as individuals are susceptible to such thinking.
Kissinger said – I wish I could find the exact quote – that past victories can lead to defeat because those past victories can appear to have been inevitable.
I worry that because Americans proved equal to the task of defeating the Axis is the 1940s, and because the Communists lost the Cold War, too many of us have come to think we will of course defeat the Militant Islamists or the Islamo-Fascists or Radical Jihadis or whatever term you prefer. But the outcome of those other pastwars was not inevitable. Nor is the outcome of this one. Every stingray is a very real and present danger.
Crikey.
...most Americans probably are not in imminent danger of death by stingray. But I do wonder if Irwin, having taken risks so oftten in the past, having cheated death on so many occasions, may not have gradually become over-confident in the face of danger. Nations, as much as individuals are susceptible to such thinking.
Kissinger said – I wish I could find the exact quote – that past victories can lead to defeat because those past victories can appear to have been inevitable.
I worry that because Americans proved equal to the task of defeating the Axis is the 1940s, and because the Communists lost the Cold War, too many of us have come to think we will of course defeat the Militant Islamists or the Islamo-Fascists or Radical Jihadis or whatever term you prefer. But the outcome of those other pastwars was not inevitable. Nor is the outcome of this one. Every stingray is a very real and present danger.
Crikey.
Green is Good? Not in a Blue State !
Yeah, we hear all the time from the holier-than-thou blue-staters how they are saving the enviornment by, well, I guess, paying lip service to saving the enviornment because when it comes time to actually, you know, do something, they're the first to bail:
When farmer Greg Bryant first heard about plans for windmills along a swath of mountain ridges in this northeastern Vermont hamlet, he was all for it. The idea of tapping a plentiful natural resource for power was appealing.
Now he's dead set against it, one of many people here who fear the prospect of 400-foot tall windmills sprouting from the tops of picturesque mountains.
For a state that normally prizes environmental initiatives, the debate over wind power poses a thorny dilemma. Eager to embrace clean energy but leery about spoiling views, some communities are putting up stiff opposition to plans for new wind projects.
So enviornmentalism is great, as long as someone else has to suffer for it. God forbid their views should be changed a bit - better to spill blood for oil than put a windmill on a mountaintop, I guess.
And here's the doublespeak statement of the day:
"It's a reflection of the deep environmental consciousness of this state," said environmentalist Bill McKibben, an author who has written about global warming.
If preventing a renewable energy resource from being erected is somehow a sign of an even more pure shade of Green, than a two-SUV guy like myself must have the deepest enviornmental consciousness in the whole state of New Jersey! Wow!! Who knew??
Compare to Iowa, which may have voted Kerry but is a very pale, pale blue:
Northern Iowa could have one of the nation's largest wind farms by 2008. Iowa Winds LLC wants to build a 200- to 300-megawatt farm covering about 40,000 acres in Franklin County.
"It's something new and renewable," said Amber Schwarck, a spokeswoman for the Iowa Falls-based company. "It's great for national security, so we can start depending on ourselves and the wind."
If the county approves the project, construction would start next spring and take about a year, said Franklin County Supervisor Michael Nolte.
"It's not very often you have someone who wants to make a $200 million investment in the county," he said. "That's a huge investment. It's just a win-win for the county."
Geez, aren't those northeasterners in Vermont so much smarter, greener, and damn patriotic than you or I (or the good folk of Iowa?). After all, they knew enough to block virtually the same exact project...
Read here how Ted Kennedy blocks renewable energy in his district, and here to see how the Democratic dumb*sses who run New Jersey sentenced a profitable, green enterprise to death via a "blue ribbon panel"...
When farmer Greg Bryant first heard about plans for windmills along a swath of mountain ridges in this northeastern Vermont hamlet, he was all for it. The idea of tapping a plentiful natural resource for power was appealing.
Now he's dead set against it, one of many people here who fear the prospect of 400-foot tall windmills sprouting from the tops of picturesque mountains.
For a state that normally prizes environmental initiatives, the debate over wind power poses a thorny dilemma. Eager to embrace clean energy but leery about spoiling views, some communities are putting up stiff opposition to plans for new wind projects.
So enviornmentalism is great, as long as someone else has to suffer for it. God forbid their views should be changed a bit - better to spill blood for oil than put a windmill on a mountaintop, I guess.
And here's the doublespeak statement of the day:
"It's a reflection of the deep environmental consciousness of this state," said environmentalist Bill McKibben, an author who has written about global warming.
If preventing a renewable energy resource from being erected is somehow a sign of an even more pure shade of Green, than a two-SUV guy like myself must have the deepest enviornmental consciousness in the whole state of New Jersey! Wow!! Who knew??
Compare to Iowa, which may have voted Kerry but is a very pale, pale blue:
Northern Iowa could have one of the nation's largest wind farms by 2008. Iowa Winds LLC wants to build a 200- to 300-megawatt farm covering about 40,000 acres in Franklin County.
"It's something new and renewable," said Amber Schwarck, a spokeswoman for the Iowa Falls-based company. "It's great for national security, so we can start depending on ourselves and the wind."
If the county approves the project, construction would start next spring and take about a year, said Franklin County Supervisor Michael Nolte.
"It's not very often you have someone who wants to make a $200 million investment in the county," he said. "That's a huge investment. It's just a win-win for the county."
Geez, aren't those northeasterners in Vermont so much smarter, greener, and damn patriotic than you or I (or the good folk of Iowa?). After all, they knew enough to block virtually the same exact project...
Read here how Ted Kennedy blocks renewable energy in his district, and here to see how the Democratic dumb*sses who run New Jersey sentenced a profitable, green enterprise to death via a "blue ribbon panel"...
วันอาทิตย์, กันยายน 03, 2549
Peace with Persia?
As twisted as the MSM is today, it is no surprise to find some grains of truth buried in the Travel section. The Washington Post's Steve Knipp does a little meet and greet with the people of Iran, and it is enough to make one put down their gun and wipe a tear from their eye:
Everywhere I went -- from the traffic-choked streets of Tehran in the north to the dusty desert town of Yazd in central Iran, to the elegant cultural centers of Isfahan and Shiraz -- I was overwhelmed by the warmth and, dare I say it, pro-Americanism of the people I met.
Ponder the irony of that last statement for a moment. While much of the rest of the world seems to be holding their collective noses at us Americans, in Iran people were literally crossing the road to shake an American's hand and say hello. Who knew?
Hmmm.....Could it be that those whom still live under tyranny appreciate the strength of the Great Satan more than those ingrates who have lived under our protection for a generation? The more one reads of Knipp's article, the more one understands that the Mullahs and their theocratic thugocracy have the innocents of this good nation in a chokehold. Over two-thirds of Iran's population are under 30 - and like the folks behind the Iron Curtain twenty years ago, more than anything they want blue jeans, MTV, and the freedom to live the American Way. And they are trying to let us know:
During my visit, I could not pause on a street corner for more than 30 seconds without someone coming up and shyly asking if they could help. Discovering that they had an American in their midst, they would often insist on walking me to my destination...
When told I was a reporter, college kids asked me to tell Americans: "Please know this: We are not Saudi Arabia. We are not Iraq. We are not Yemen. Please tell them we are not the same as these places!" In fact, Islam came late to the Persia party. The Persian empire boasted a rich civilization several centuries before Arab invaders swept in from the west.
Ah, that religion of peace. Still enslaving the women, by the way - they know they need to keep their betters down:
What astonished me the most about Iran were its women. I met and spoke with scores of them from all parts of the country. And everywhere they were wonderful: vivid, bold, articulate in several languages, politically astute and audaciously outward-looking. While some men demurred, the women weren't afraid to voice opinions about anything under the sun.
But socially, Iran's women still live under Islamic edicts: They must wear the hijab when leaving the house, and they cannot normally associate with any male who is not their father, brother or son, or shake hands with a man. Despite these restrictions, they manage to remain utterly feminine. They are keen on bright lipsticks, nail polish and eye shadow. And they have a passion for imported handbags and shoes.
Has their ever been a government less representative of their people? Getting Ahmadinejad and his crew out of power without resorting to deadly force is like trying to extract the yolk without cracking the egg, yet allowing him to stay in charge, subjegating the good Persian people while feverently working on a second Holocaust is no answer either.
Ironically, it is probably swift economic sanctions that will force an uprising quicker than any military option, yet Europe would rather stare lovingly into Ahmadinejad's eyes, helpless and unwilling to act, than team with the United States for an effective regimen of sanctions that would force the Mullah's hand early.
The imposition of sanctions by the West now could prevent a slaughter down the road, along with hostilities and resentments that could last for another quarter-century. Yet the UN and EU would rather treat with Ahmadinejad, hoping to declare "peace in our time" with this madman (see "Fascism, the UN's infatuation with", here).
It didn't work last century, and it will not work now.
Update: The UN comtinues to kiss his *ss; and Ahmadinejad continues to spit venom:
The U.N. chief got little satisfaction Sunday at the close of his trip to Tehran, snubbed by Iran's leader over international demands to stop enriching uranium and ignored in warnings not to incite hatred by questioning the Holocaust.
In a provocative move on the final day of Kofi Annan's two-day visit, Iran announced it would host a conference to examine what it called exaggerations about the Holocaust, during which more than 6 million Jews were killed by the Nazis.
All that's missing is the brush mustache....
Everywhere I went -- from the traffic-choked streets of Tehran in the north to the dusty desert town of Yazd in central Iran, to the elegant cultural centers of Isfahan and Shiraz -- I was overwhelmed by the warmth and, dare I say it, pro-Americanism of the people I met.
Ponder the irony of that last statement for a moment. While much of the rest of the world seems to be holding their collective noses at us Americans, in Iran people were literally crossing the road to shake an American's hand and say hello. Who knew?
Hmmm.....Could it be that those whom still live under tyranny appreciate the strength of the Great Satan more than those ingrates who have lived under our protection for a generation? The more one reads of Knipp's article, the more one understands that the Mullahs and their theocratic thugocracy have the innocents of this good nation in a chokehold. Over two-thirds of Iran's population are under 30 - and like the folks behind the Iron Curtain twenty years ago, more than anything they want blue jeans, MTV, and the freedom to live the American Way. And they are trying to let us know:
During my visit, I could not pause on a street corner for more than 30 seconds without someone coming up and shyly asking if they could help. Discovering that they had an American in their midst, they would often insist on walking me to my destination...
When told I was a reporter, college kids asked me to tell Americans: "Please know this: We are not Saudi Arabia. We are not Iraq. We are not Yemen. Please tell them we are not the same as these places!" In fact, Islam came late to the Persia party. The Persian empire boasted a rich civilization several centuries before Arab invaders swept in from the west.
Ah, that religion of peace. Still enslaving the women, by the way - they know they need to keep their betters down:
What astonished me the most about Iran were its women. I met and spoke with scores of them from all parts of the country. And everywhere they were wonderful: vivid, bold, articulate in several languages, politically astute and audaciously outward-looking. While some men demurred, the women weren't afraid to voice opinions about anything under the sun.
But socially, Iran's women still live under Islamic edicts: They must wear the hijab when leaving the house, and they cannot normally associate with any male who is not their father, brother or son, or shake hands with a man. Despite these restrictions, they manage to remain utterly feminine. They are keen on bright lipsticks, nail polish and eye shadow. And they have a passion for imported handbags and shoes.
Has their ever been a government less representative of their people? Getting Ahmadinejad and his crew out of power without resorting to deadly force is like trying to extract the yolk without cracking the egg, yet allowing him to stay in charge, subjegating the good Persian people while feverently working on a second Holocaust is no answer either.
Ironically, it is probably swift economic sanctions that will force an uprising quicker than any military option, yet Europe would rather stare lovingly into Ahmadinejad's eyes, helpless and unwilling to act, than team with the United States for an effective regimen of sanctions that would force the Mullah's hand early.
The imposition of sanctions by the West now could prevent a slaughter down the road, along with hostilities and resentments that could last for another quarter-century. Yet the UN and EU would rather treat with Ahmadinejad, hoping to declare "peace in our time" with this madman (see "Fascism, the UN's infatuation with", here).
It didn't work last century, and it will not work now.
Update: The UN comtinues to kiss his *ss; and Ahmadinejad continues to spit venom:
The U.N. chief got little satisfaction Sunday at the close of his trip to Tehran, snubbed by Iran's leader over international demands to stop enriching uranium and ignored in warnings not to incite hatred by questioning the Holocaust.
In a provocative move on the final day of Kofi Annan's two-day visit, Iran announced it would host a conference to examine what it called exaggerations about the Holocaust, during which more than 6 million Jews were killed by the Nazis.
All that's missing is the brush mustache....
Accomodating Genocide, Aiding Fascism
It is long past time that Western nations of democratic foundations and good conscious leave the United Nations. This fetid organization has been compromised by its darkest elements and has been subverted to work their will. Terrorist nations form the backbone of its "Human Rights" panels, efforts to halt genocide are thwarted by those who would profit from its completion, and resolutions aimed at improving upon Hitler's "final solution" are introduced on a daily basis.
Two items to illustrate the evil that the UN perpetuates - first, from today's Washington Post:
In the face of ongoing genocide in Darfur, the international community's failure to accept the "responsibility to protect" (that's United Nations language, officially adopted) innocent civilian lives has taken its last, abject form. The National Islamic Front (NIF) regime in Khartoum, made up of the very men who have for more than three years orchestrated the systematic destruction of Darfur's African tribal populations, has been told directly and unambiguously that there will be no U.N. peacemaking force without its consent.
In the revealing words of British U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, Khartoum's agreement to U.N. deployment "is quite crucial" to taking any meaningful action....
In short, the international community has conferred upon the genocidaires the power to veto deployment of the very force that might halt an accelerating slide toward catastrophic human destruction.
Imagine the result if the National Socialist Party of Germany had to be asked permission before German Jews could be protected. Well, we see it now in Darfur, where the regime in Khartoum has been given a green light to slaugher its way through the population until their program of ethnic cleansing is complete. Maybe then the UN will issue a strongly worded letter of disapproval...
But what if one wanted to fight back against their oppressors, whether it be the genociders listed above, or Israel finally having enough of being shelled by Hezbollah, or even the United states disabling the regime in Afghanistan that launched the attacks on 9/11? Well, can you believe the UN has found that the right to survive is not found in "international law" (whatever in hell that is)? You see, the UN must not only give a free hand to genocidal maniacs, it now additionally serves to tie the hands of those whom would fight back...from Arms and the Law:
[From] A report (pdf format) submitted by Barbara Frey, Special Rapporteur, whatever that is, to the UN Human Rights Councils's Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, whatever that is....
"20. Self-defence is a widely recognized, yet legally proscribed, exception to the universal duty to respect the right to life of others. Self-defence is a basis for exemption from criminal responsibility that can be raised by any State agent or non-State actor. Self-defence is sometimes designated as a “right”. There is inadequate legal support for such an interpretation. Self-defence is more properly characterized as a means of protecting the right to life and, as such, a basis for avoiding responsibility for violating the rights of another.
21. No international human right of self-defence is expressly set forth in the primary sources of international law: treaties, customary law, or general principles.
So to defend yourself from an attack by a foreign nation (or individual militias, terrorist organizations, etc.) can cause you to run afoul of the UN's interpetation of international law. In fact, if I understand the above correctly, the brave Americans who retook Flight 93 on 9/11 and prevented another mass slaughter actually violated the civil rights of the Islamic fascists who had hijacked it in the first place!
Via this unintelligable game of moral twister, the UN has effectively tied the hands of anyone who might want to fight the rising tide of fascism in our world today - Israel is guilty for fighting back against Hezbollah and Hamas, the US is guilty for fighting back against al-Qaeda, and in the case of Iran, no sanctions can be placed without the permission of other terrorist nations and any preemptive attack against this country publicly gearing up for a self-declared second Holocaust would be a violation of their human rights as well.
Quite subtly, and not without purpose, the UN has cleared the way for evil to survive, grow, and flourish, while making any attempt to stop it a crime. Heads we lose, tails we lose, as the enemies of civilization walk through the dark halls of the United Nations laughing and flipping their two-headed coin....
But the only crime, as I stated at the outset, is for nations of honest values and good conscious to act in the name of this hateful organization.
Let us leave its rotting corpse to those whom live on carrion, and let the world's democratic nations form a new organization, where leaders freely elected by their peoples can form a common security and empower the values of personal liberty. Yes, it may push some adversarial situations into the open, but what is the choice? To endorse Iran's nuclear program? To allow the genocide in Darfur? To vote for the elimination of Israel? To turn our value system so upside-down that it becomes Orwellian, and otherwise inapplicable? Here, on the 67th anniversary of WWII, are we setting the table to allow the monsters to feed again?
No. Best to leave the United Nations now, before we catch their sickening disease...
Two items to illustrate the evil that the UN perpetuates - first, from today's Washington Post:
In the face of ongoing genocide in Darfur, the international community's failure to accept the "responsibility to protect" (that's United Nations language, officially adopted) innocent civilian lives has taken its last, abject form. The National Islamic Front (NIF) regime in Khartoum, made up of the very men who have for more than three years orchestrated the systematic destruction of Darfur's African tribal populations, has been told directly and unambiguously that there will be no U.N. peacemaking force without its consent.
In the revealing words of British U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, Khartoum's agreement to U.N. deployment "is quite crucial" to taking any meaningful action....
In short, the international community has conferred upon the genocidaires the power to veto deployment of the very force that might halt an accelerating slide toward catastrophic human destruction.
Imagine the result if the National Socialist Party of Germany had to be asked permission before German Jews could be protected. Well, we see it now in Darfur, where the regime in Khartoum has been given a green light to slaugher its way through the population until their program of ethnic cleansing is complete. Maybe then the UN will issue a strongly worded letter of disapproval...
But what if one wanted to fight back against their oppressors, whether it be the genociders listed above, or Israel finally having enough of being shelled by Hezbollah, or even the United states disabling the regime in Afghanistan that launched the attacks on 9/11? Well, can you believe the UN has found that the right to survive is not found in "international law" (whatever in hell that is)? You see, the UN must not only give a free hand to genocidal maniacs, it now additionally serves to tie the hands of those whom would fight back...from Arms and the Law:
[From] A report (pdf format) submitted by Barbara Frey, Special Rapporteur, whatever that is, to the UN Human Rights Councils's Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, whatever that is....
"20. Self-defence is a widely recognized, yet legally proscribed, exception to the universal duty to respect the right to life of others. Self-defence is a basis for exemption from criminal responsibility that can be raised by any State agent or non-State actor. Self-defence is sometimes designated as a “right”. There is inadequate legal support for such an interpretation. Self-defence is more properly characterized as a means of protecting the right to life and, as such, a basis for avoiding responsibility for violating the rights of another.
21. No international human right of self-defence is expressly set forth in the primary sources of international law: treaties, customary law, or general principles.
So to defend yourself from an attack by a foreign nation (or individual militias, terrorist organizations, etc.) can cause you to run afoul of the UN's interpetation of international law. In fact, if I understand the above correctly, the brave Americans who retook Flight 93 on 9/11 and prevented another mass slaughter actually violated the civil rights of the Islamic fascists who had hijacked it in the first place!
Via this unintelligable game of moral twister, the UN has effectively tied the hands of anyone who might want to fight the rising tide of fascism in our world today - Israel is guilty for fighting back against Hezbollah and Hamas, the US is guilty for fighting back against al-Qaeda, and in the case of Iran, no sanctions can be placed without the permission of other terrorist nations and any preemptive attack against this country publicly gearing up for a self-declared second Holocaust would be a violation of their human rights as well.
Quite subtly, and not without purpose, the UN has cleared the way for evil to survive, grow, and flourish, while making any attempt to stop it a crime. Heads we lose, tails we lose, as the enemies of civilization walk through the dark halls of the United Nations laughing and flipping their two-headed coin....
But the only crime, as I stated at the outset, is for nations of honest values and good conscious to act in the name of this hateful organization.
Let us leave its rotting corpse to those whom live on carrion, and let the world's democratic nations form a new organization, where leaders freely elected by their peoples can form a common security and empower the values of personal liberty. Yes, it may push some adversarial situations into the open, but what is the choice? To endorse Iran's nuclear program? To allow the genocide in Darfur? To vote for the elimination of Israel? To turn our value system so upside-down that it becomes Orwellian, and otherwise inapplicable? Here, on the 67th anniversary of WWII, are we setting the table to allow the monsters to feed again?
No. Best to leave the United Nations now, before we catch their sickening disease...
วันศุกร์, กันยายน 01, 2549
"The Banality of Evil" - 21st Century Version
What is it with Belgium? For decades, it had a reputation for being Europe's most boring country. Perhaps we simply didn't know it: Recent stories emerging from the home of the EU's "capital" reveal that it's also one of the continent's creepiest and weirdest places...
Here's one recent revelation, from the Brussels Journal:
The Belgian authorities have destroyed archives and records relating to the persecution and deportation of Jews in Belgium in the 1930s and 1940s. Some of this happened as recently as the late 1990s. This was revealed during hearings in the Belgian Senate last Spring. Though the Senate report dates from 4 May the Belgian press has not yet mentioned the affair. The Senate report says that “documents about the period 1930-1950 have been destroyed on a massive scale.”
The systematic destructions of the records of police and judiciary from the 1930s and ’40s happened chiefly in Brussels and Wallonia, the French-speaking south of Belgium.
French, huh? Shocked, I am!
Are we rewriting the past to justify the present? Fausta directs us to this release from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, exposing the perfidity of Brussels:
In a letter to the IFJ General Secretary, Aidan White, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre's Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, noted that "your camouflage for terror has already borne fruit: your Brussels neighbour, La Libre Belgique, in its op ed of 25 July entitled 'C'est le sionisme qui mène à la guerre' (It is Zionism which leads to war), has blatantly endorsed Iranian President Ahmadinejad, Hizbollah's commander and bankroller, 'to wipe the State of Israel off the map'".
The letter continued, "the newspaper goes beyond legitimate criticism of Israeli policy, maliciously crossing the red lines of civilized press discourse: In distorting quotes from Jewish protagonists of Zionism as the only national liberation movement of the Middle East, La Libre Belgique states that 'the founding doctrine of Zionism was racism and colonialism… the people of Israel, as a superior people and the modern continuation of the Chosen People… Israel in the Middle East is the apartheid South Africa of southern Africa - a Euro-American colony'".
Now check out the "final solution" proposed by this Belgian daily, and you may see why so many records of Belgium's complicity in the Holocaust are suddenly disappearing:
'We were shocked to hear the Iranian President say that Israel should be wiped off the map. It would, however, surely be the only solution to see the State of Israel disappear, politically of course. … The policy of 'two peoples, two States', the policy of the partition of Palestine on a political and ethnic basis, is a policy of apartheid that will never bring peace. Let us return to what was always, until Oslo, the project of the PLO…'"
Appropriate that these remarks should be published in a paper centered in the home of the European Union. Which brings me to the title of this post...
The concept of the banality of evil came into prominence following the publication of Hannah Arendt's 1963 book Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, which was based on the trial of Adolph Eichmann in Jerusalem. Arendt's thesis was that people who carry out unspeakable crimes, like Eichmann, a top administrator in the machinery of the Nazi death camps, may not be crazy fanatics at all, but rather ordinary individuals who simply accept the premises of their state and participate in any ongoing enterprise with the energy of good bureaucrats.
And what is the EU, besides a bureaucratic enterprise? It issues decrees with the force of law that affect the minutia of the day-to-day life of the average European. And their subjects (not citizens; citizens vote for their representation) dutifully do what they are told; with no thought of dissent or rebellion.
So when the EU finally issues the order that declares the Jews of Europe to be "persona non grata" and regretfully declares that they must be turned out, there is no doubt that the people of Europe will willingly oblige, with no thought as to the morality of their actions. Nor will they offer any type of spirited defense after the job is done.
After all, that is the banality of evil.
And that is exactly what is unfolding in Brussels as we speak.
We recognize the evil that we vowed never to allow again, yet we do nothing (in Brussels or Iran) to stop its cancerous growth. America screams on the top of its lungs, and Europe offers nothing but a shrug, and shambles toward the abyss, again.
Nothing changes in this wretched, blood-stained continent....
Here's one recent revelation, from the Brussels Journal:
The Belgian authorities have destroyed archives and records relating to the persecution and deportation of Jews in Belgium in the 1930s and 1940s. Some of this happened as recently as the late 1990s. This was revealed during hearings in the Belgian Senate last Spring. Though the Senate report dates from 4 May the Belgian press has not yet mentioned the affair. The Senate report says that “documents about the period 1930-1950 have been destroyed on a massive scale.”
The systematic destructions of the records of police and judiciary from the 1930s and ’40s happened chiefly in Brussels and Wallonia, the French-speaking south of Belgium.
French, huh? Shocked, I am!
Are we rewriting the past to justify the present? Fausta directs us to this release from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, exposing the perfidity of Brussels:
In a letter to the IFJ General Secretary, Aidan White, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre's Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, noted that "your camouflage for terror has already borne fruit: your Brussels neighbour, La Libre Belgique, in its op ed of 25 July entitled 'C'est le sionisme qui mène à la guerre' (It is Zionism which leads to war), has blatantly endorsed Iranian President Ahmadinejad, Hizbollah's commander and bankroller, 'to wipe the State of Israel off the map'".
The letter continued, "the newspaper goes beyond legitimate criticism of Israeli policy, maliciously crossing the red lines of civilized press discourse: In distorting quotes from Jewish protagonists of Zionism as the only national liberation movement of the Middle East, La Libre Belgique states that 'the founding doctrine of Zionism was racism and colonialism… the people of Israel, as a superior people and the modern continuation of the Chosen People… Israel in the Middle East is the apartheid South Africa of southern Africa - a Euro-American colony'".
Now check out the "final solution" proposed by this Belgian daily, and you may see why so many records of Belgium's complicity in the Holocaust are suddenly disappearing:
'We were shocked to hear the Iranian President say that Israel should be wiped off the map. It would, however, surely be the only solution to see the State of Israel disappear, politically of course. … The policy of 'two peoples, two States', the policy of the partition of Palestine on a political and ethnic basis, is a policy of apartheid that will never bring peace. Let us return to what was always, until Oslo, the project of the PLO…'"
Appropriate that these remarks should be published in a paper centered in the home of the European Union. Which brings me to the title of this post...
The concept of the banality of evil came into prominence following the publication of Hannah Arendt's 1963 book Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, which was based on the trial of Adolph Eichmann in Jerusalem. Arendt's thesis was that people who carry out unspeakable crimes, like Eichmann, a top administrator in the machinery of the Nazi death camps, may not be crazy fanatics at all, but rather ordinary individuals who simply accept the premises of their state and participate in any ongoing enterprise with the energy of good bureaucrats.
And what is the EU, besides a bureaucratic enterprise? It issues decrees with the force of law that affect the minutia of the day-to-day life of the average European. And their subjects (not citizens; citizens vote for their representation) dutifully do what they are told; with no thought of dissent or rebellion.
So when the EU finally issues the order that declares the Jews of Europe to be "persona non grata" and regretfully declares that they must be turned out, there is no doubt that the people of Europe will willingly oblige, with no thought as to the morality of their actions. Nor will they offer any type of spirited defense after the job is done.
After all, that is the banality of evil.
And that is exactly what is unfolding in Brussels as we speak.
We recognize the evil that we vowed never to allow again, yet we do nothing (in Brussels or Iran) to stop its cancerous growth. America screams on the top of its lungs, and Europe offers nothing but a shrug, and shambles toward the abyss, again.
Nothing changes in this wretched, blood-stained continent....
วันพฤหัสบดี, สิงหาคม 31, 2549
Media Attempts to Thwart Aristotle !
The Anchoress, quite brilliantly, explains quite clearly why the mainstream media refuses to call a thing what it is:
I know that somewhere in the minds of these movers and shakers they think they are protecting Muslims-in-general from reactionary prejudice, distrust and bias from us unruly, racist, mouth-breathing Americans (because we went nuts and burned down mosques after 9/11, right? We took to the streets and rampaged and lynched anyone named Abdul back then, right?) but the truth is, by their incessant downplaying, their knee-jerk move to protect-and-explain perps like this, they’re just making some people very resentful, and in the end, I think that’s going to do more to foment prejudice and bias, distrust and hate toward decent Muslim persons than would simply acknowledging the fact that when these Fundamentalists DO this crap, it is what it is - an act of aggression, hate and terror - and not some “mistake” that can be cooed away.
The MSM is trying to overturn one of Aristotle's basic laws of reality:
Everything that exists has a specific nature. Each entity exists as something in particular and it has characteristics that are a part of what it is...
To have an identity means to have a single identity; an object cannot have two identities. A tree cannot be a telephone, and a dog cannot be a cat. Each entity exists as something specific, its identity is particular, and it cannot exist as something else...
The concept of identity is important because it makes explicit that reality has a definite nature.
-A is A: Aristotle's Law of Identity
In Aristotle’s words, "A is A". It means that a thing is itself and no other thing. It means that a thing has a specific nature and no other nature. It means simply that there are no contradictions in reality.
An Islamist shooting up a school full of girls is not an "isolated incident"; nor is a Muslim fundamentalist running down Jews on the street practicing some run-of-the-mill "road rage". It is Muslim terrorism here at home, plain and simple. But our elite media knows we cannot handle the truth, so they keep telling us "no, don't believe the evidence of your eyes, for you see, A is B."
But a thing is what it is, and claiming "A" is "B" does not make it "B". The media is trying to go against one of the primary principles of human philosophy and human thought, indeed trying to change the very nature of reality itself, in order to push an agenda.
But Aristotle, and the American people, are pushing back. Becuase knowing what a thing is, is basic to human survival. Reality cannot be undone; survival instincts cannot be surpressed...and this may lead to the flashback that the Anchoress seems to be predicting.
In Ayn Rand's epic novel Atlas Shrugged (a thousand-page philosophical treaty which sets out to prove Aristotle's theorem), the denial of reality by the world's leadership causes an eventual mass breakdown of society, as those whom argue that "A" is actually "B" are rendered helpless when the reality of moral choices and economic imperatives can no longer be ignored. Does the media face a similar fate? Is it destined to be undone, to be broken into little shrieking pieces, when the truths they are so desperately hiding finally, undeniably, break lose from their cage?
I know that somewhere in the minds of these movers and shakers they think they are protecting Muslims-in-general from reactionary prejudice, distrust and bias from us unruly, racist, mouth-breathing Americans (because we went nuts and burned down mosques after 9/11, right? We took to the streets and rampaged and lynched anyone named Abdul back then, right?) but the truth is, by their incessant downplaying, their knee-jerk move to protect-and-explain perps like this, they’re just making some people very resentful, and in the end, I think that’s going to do more to foment prejudice and bias, distrust and hate toward decent Muslim persons than would simply acknowledging the fact that when these Fundamentalists DO this crap, it is what it is - an act of aggression, hate and terror - and not some “mistake” that can be cooed away.
The MSM is trying to overturn one of Aristotle's basic laws of reality:
Everything that exists has a specific nature. Each entity exists as something in particular and it has characteristics that are a part of what it is...
To have an identity means to have a single identity; an object cannot have two identities. A tree cannot be a telephone, and a dog cannot be a cat. Each entity exists as something specific, its identity is particular, and it cannot exist as something else...
The concept of identity is important because it makes explicit that reality has a definite nature.
-A is A: Aristotle's Law of Identity
In Aristotle’s words, "A is A". It means that a thing is itself and no other thing. It means that a thing has a specific nature and no other nature. It means simply that there are no contradictions in reality.
An Islamist shooting up a school full of girls is not an "isolated incident"; nor is a Muslim fundamentalist running down Jews on the street practicing some run-of-the-mill "road rage". It is Muslim terrorism here at home, plain and simple. But our elite media knows we cannot handle the truth, so they keep telling us "no, don't believe the evidence of your eyes, for you see, A is B."
But a thing is what it is, and claiming "A" is "B" does not make it "B". The media is trying to go against one of the primary principles of human philosophy and human thought, indeed trying to change the very nature of reality itself, in order to push an agenda.
But Aristotle, and the American people, are pushing back. Becuase knowing what a thing is, is basic to human survival. Reality cannot be undone; survival instincts cannot be surpressed...and this may lead to the flashback that the Anchoress seems to be predicting.
In Ayn Rand's epic novel Atlas Shrugged (a thousand-page philosophical treaty which sets out to prove Aristotle's theorem), the denial of reality by the world's leadership causes an eventual mass breakdown of society, as those whom argue that "A" is actually "B" are rendered helpless when the reality of moral choices and economic imperatives can no longer be ignored. Does the media face a similar fate? Is it destined to be undone, to be broken into little shrieking pieces, when the truths they are so desperately hiding finally, undeniably, break lose from their cage?
Rand would shrug...
วันจันทร์, สิงหาคม 28, 2549
Liberal Hypocrisy On Display!
The Democratic Party's obsession with bringing down Wal-Mart has always reeked of electoral vote-counting and donation-gathering, with nary a principle in sight. Why in the world would these champions of the downtrodden (more on that later) try to bring down a chain that employs hundreds of thousands, and provides goods and services at a deep discount rate?
First, a few facts from Sebastian Mallory in today's Washington Post:
The nation's most successful retailer, which has seized the opportunities created by globalization to boost the buying power of ordinary Americans, is now seen as too toxic to touch...
...the idea that Wal-Mart pays below-market wages is false. Otherwise nobody would work there...
Hillary Clinton and Sen. John Kerry have attacked Wal-Mart for offering health coverage to too few workers. But Kerry's former economic adviser, Jason Furman of New York University, concluded in a paper last year that Wal-Mart's health benefits are about as generous as those of comparable employers...
...According to a paper for the National Bureau of Economic Research by Jerry Hausman and Ephraim Leibtag, neither of whom received funding from Wal-Mart, big-box stores led by Wal-Mart reduce families' food bills by one-fourth. Because Wal-Mart's price-cutting also has a big impact on the non-food stuff it peddles, it saves U.S. consumers upward of $200 billion a year, making it a larger booster of family welfare than the federal government's $33 billion food-stamp program.
How can centrist Democrats respond to that? By beating up Wal-Mart and forcing it to focus on public relations rather than opening new stores, Democrats are harming the poor Americans they claim to speak for.
So why beat up on Wal-Mart?
- The Democrats are in favor of maintaining and increasing the government's public assistance programs. With Wal-Mart's pricing policies making government hand-outs less necessary, the left loses a key rallying point. So re-create it by destroying the private institutions that are aiding the poor by demonizing them as (gasp!) "capitalists"!
-The more folk that are employed, the less that are in need of unemployment and welfare benefits. So convince folks that working for minimum wage is more embarrassing than not working at all, and tell them to just sit there and wait, while collecting welfare, because eventually that six-figure corporate job is going to fall right off of a tree. Ignore the fact that nothing helps you get a better job than having...a first job to begin with. Roll out Al Sharpton to impress the media and distract from the facts.
-Elitism - it's OK for you and I to have a DVD player in every room, but give the poor an opportunity to buy one for $39.95? No, the Democrats know better, you need that money for the "basics", and besides, they're made in China!
-Simple head-counting - if the poor move up the ladder, they might start to vote Republican! So shut down Wal-Mart, put thousands of gainfully employed citizens on the public dole, and keep them voting for the Democratic programs that they will need to survive...and God forbid we lose the (primarily white) Union vote! They represent 15% of the country, you know! Better for them to stay in the fold, and if the poor must remain so, well...so?
- Straw Man Theorem - The Democrats know they have zero credibility on the key issue to the American voter, the War on Terror. So they take on a foe they believe they can knock down - Wal-Mart! - and try to convince the rest of us dupes that a discount retailer is of more danger to the American way of life than Islamofascist terrorists.
Am I being cynical? No more than the big shots in the Democratic party who line up to destroy the dreams of the innocent so that they may survive in office a few more years...
And speaking of liberal hypocrites, I cannot help but present E.J. Dionne's twisting of history:
At its best, liberalism is about the defense of the underdog, of minority rights, of social justice, of active but restrained government, of civil liberties, of openness and tolerance.
In their own defense, those who still admit to being liberals would argue that the very fact that they have stood up for minority rights -- including, heroically, for civil rights in the 1960s -- made them unpopular, sometimes with a majority of the country.
I'll let Random Observations take 'ol EJ apart:
Liberalism, in my experience, is simply the claim to these positions.
Defending the underdog? Israel is a lone democracy, surrounded by a vast sea of people who want to destroy her. Where is the defense of that 'underdog' now? For thirty or more years, the black community has embraced 'liberal' ideas and faithfully elected Democratic leaders. How have they been helped? (The black family continues to dissolve.) And what about women in Islamic countries? Or Christians in China? Or Bahaiis in Iran? Or democratic activists in Cuba? Where is the concern?
Attempts at an in-depth examination of whether 'liberal' policies help or hurt underdogs, in my experience, generally provoke at best indifference, and at worst, anger.
When will EJ admit that being a liberal is never having to say "I've been mistaken"?
First, a few facts from Sebastian Mallory in today's Washington Post:
The nation's most successful retailer, which has seized the opportunities created by globalization to boost the buying power of ordinary Americans, is now seen as too toxic to touch...
...the idea that Wal-Mart pays below-market wages is false. Otherwise nobody would work there...
Hillary Clinton and Sen. John Kerry have attacked Wal-Mart for offering health coverage to too few workers. But Kerry's former economic adviser, Jason Furman of New York University, concluded in a paper last year that Wal-Mart's health benefits are about as generous as those of comparable employers...
...According to a paper for the National Bureau of Economic Research by Jerry Hausman and Ephraim Leibtag, neither of whom received funding from Wal-Mart, big-box stores led by Wal-Mart reduce families' food bills by one-fourth. Because Wal-Mart's price-cutting also has a big impact on the non-food stuff it peddles, it saves U.S. consumers upward of $200 billion a year, making it a larger booster of family welfare than the federal government's $33 billion food-stamp program.
How can centrist Democrats respond to that? By beating up Wal-Mart and forcing it to focus on public relations rather than opening new stores, Democrats are harming the poor Americans they claim to speak for.
So why beat up on Wal-Mart?
- The Democrats are in favor of maintaining and increasing the government's public assistance programs. With Wal-Mart's pricing policies making government hand-outs less necessary, the left loses a key rallying point. So re-create it by destroying the private institutions that are aiding the poor by demonizing them as (gasp!) "capitalists"!
-The more folk that are employed, the less that are in need of unemployment and welfare benefits. So convince folks that working for minimum wage is more embarrassing than not working at all, and tell them to just sit there and wait, while collecting welfare, because eventually that six-figure corporate job is going to fall right off of a tree. Ignore the fact that nothing helps you get a better job than having...a first job to begin with. Roll out Al Sharpton to impress the media and distract from the facts.
-Elitism - it's OK for you and I to have a DVD player in every room, but give the poor an opportunity to buy one for $39.95? No, the Democrats know better, you need that money for the "basics", and besides, they're made in China!
-Simple head-counting - if the poor move up the ladder, they might start to vote Republican! So shut down Wal-Mart, put thousands of gainfully employed citizens on the public dole, and keep them voting for the Democratic programs that they will need to survive...and God forbid we lose the (primarily white) Union vote! They represent 15% of the country, you know! Better for them to stay in the fold, and if the poor must remain so, well...so?
- Straw Man Theorem - The Democrats know they have zero credibility on the key issue to the American voter, the War on Terror. So they take on a foe they believe they can knock down - Wal-Mart! - and try to convince the rest of us dupes that a discount retailer is of more danger to the American way of life than Islamofascist terrorists.
Am I being cynical? No more than the big shots in the Democratic party who line up to destroy the dreams of the innocent so that they may survive in office a few more years...
And speaking of liberal hypocrites, I cannot help but present E.J. Dionne's twisting of history:
At its best, liberalism is about the defense of the underdog, of minority rights, of social justice, of active but restrained government, of civil liberties, of openness and tolerance.
In their own defense, those who still admit to being liberals would argue that the very fact that they have stood up for minority rights -- including, heroically, for civil rights in the 1960s -- made them unpopular, sometimes with a majority of the country.
I'll let Random Observations take 'ol EJ apart:
Liberalism, in my experience, is simply the claim to these positions.
Defending the underdog? Israel is a lone democracy, surrounded by a vast sea of people who want to destroy her. Where is the defense of that 'underdog' now? For thirty or more years, the black community has embraced 'liberal' ideas and faithfully elected Democratic leaders. How have they been helped? (The black family continues to dissolve.) And what about women in Islamic countries? Or Christians in China? Or Bahaiis in Iran? Or democratic activists in Cuba? Where is the concern?
Attempts at an in-depth examination of whether 'liberal' policies help or hurt underdogs, in my experience, generally provoke at best indifference, and at worst, anger.
When will EJ admit that being a liberal is never having to say "I've been mistaken"?
วันอาทิตย์, สิงหาคม 27, 2549
Islam, At Gunpoint...
A note to all whom decry a "clash of civilizations", or claim that we are fighting "terrorists", but NOT Muslims...what do you call it when civilians are kidnapped, abused, and forced to convert to Islam under penalty of death?
Two Fox News journalists held for 13 days in the Gaza Strip were released Sunday after they were shown on a videotape saying they converted to Islam.
The two journalists, American Steve Centanni, 60, and New Zealand cameraman Olaf Wiig, 36, "have liberated themselves" by converting to Islam, according to the statement accompanying a videotape from a group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades.
It gets uglier...
Centanni recounted how he and Wiig were pulled out of their car on August 14 and taken at gunpoint into another car. The kidnappers blindfolded them and handcuffed their hands behind their backs with plastic ties. They were then transferred to another car and driven to a building that they later learned was a garage.
"We were pushed down onto the dirt-covered concrete floor and we were forced to life face down with our handcuffs on," Centanni said.
"Olaf was in the same room with me. Our shoulders were wrenched back, very painful."
Both of the men were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint, Centanni said.
"We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," Centanni told FOX News. "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it, but it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns, and we didn't know what the hell was going on."
Hot Air has some video, incidentally..
Now I'm not going to jump on Mr. Centanni, who has obviously been through a horrific ordeal. But as one of his first statements was -
“Don’t get me wrong, I have the highest respect for Islam..."
- well, I hope he was not of sound mind when that statement was made; otherwise the impression left is that one can be held hostages by ahderants to a religious belief, forced to convert to said belief, and then willfully embrace that belief afterward.
Hmmm, perhaps what the entire West needs is two weeks face down in the dirt to discover our love of the Koran....and don't think that little tidbit will escape the adherants of Allah. From View to the Right:
The kidnappers did not force Centanni and Wiig to convert to Islam because the kidnappers are “fascists” who “hate our freedoms.” They forced them to convert to Islam because they are Muslims who believe in Islam. Yes, Islam tells them to hate our freedoms. But the primary thing is the belief in Islam, not the hate of our freedoms. How can we successfully fight an enemy whose existence we don’t even recognize?
Moreover, such forced conversions are exactly what Muslims have been imposing on non-Muslims for the last 1,400 years, through jihad war, razzias (raids), kidnapping, slavery, conquest, and dhimmitude. In reply, the Muslims insist that they don’t force people to convert. Rather, as Sayyid Qutb argues, jihad war is waged to bring people under (divinely led) Islamic rule, thereby freeing them (freeing them from their false human will, that is) to choose Islam freely. What Muslims call “freedom” is what we call compulsion. In fear of being killed, and in hopes of being released, Steve Centanni agreed to convert to Islam. The choice was not what we would call a free one. But now, having become a Muslim and so transformed himself, he can’t take it back, even though the gun is no longer pointed at his head. And so he loves Big Brother—I mean, he has the “highest respect” for Islam.
Again, I'll wait until Centanni sees a psychiatrist before I bash him personally...but the post above brings another fear to the forefront - are we fighting against Islamic Fascists, or the Muslim religion as a whole? We have often spoke of the myth of the moderate Muslim; one that every politician and leader claims exists yet cannot ever be seen/heard decrying the terrorism, kidnappings, murder and general mayhem that is carried out in their name. If the moderate Muslim does not exists, then we are faced not only with armed Islamists that are attempting to bring the world under a 7th century Caliphate, but a Muslim civilian population worldwide that supports this turn of events.
Perhaps this is why Islamic terror plots grow so freely in England, Canada, and all over the Middle East - because the average Muslim believes these murderers are actually acting within the dictates of their religion. Or perhaps terrorists are simply the "armed wing" of the Muslim religion, if I may borrow the MSM lexicon applied to the likes of Hamas and Hezbollah.
But it is thought like these, I guess, that qualify me as a wing-nut...from one of View's comments:
...if someone said that Muslims are violent because they are followers of a religion that commands violence as a sacred obligation, he would be certified, not as an expert, but as an extremist.
Will the wall of political correctness blind us to what awaits us as Muslim militancy grows stronger, emboldened by its small victories, all under the watchful eye of future world leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ?
Two Fox News journalists held for 13 days in the Gaza Strip were released Sunday after they were shown on a videotape saying they converted to Islam.
The two journalists, American Steve Centanni, 60, and New Zealand cameraman Olaf Wiig, 36, "have liberated themselves" by converting to Islam, according to the statement accompanying a videotape from a group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades.
It gets uglier...
Centanni recounted how he and Wiig were pulled out of their car on August 14 and taken at gunpoint into another car. The kidnappers blindfolded them and handcuffed their hands behind their backs with plastic ties. They were then transferred to another car and driven to a building that they later learned was a garage.
"We were pushed down onto the dirt-covered concrete floor and we were forced to life face down with our handcuffs on," Centanni said.
"Olaf was in the same room with me. Our shoulders were wrenched back, very painful."
Both of the men were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint, Centanni said.
"We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," Centanni told FOX News. "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it, but it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns, and we didn't know what the hell was going on."
Hot Air has some video, incidentally..
Now I'm not going to jump on Mr. Centanni, who has obviously been through a horrific ordeal. But as one of his first statements was -
“Don’t get me wrong, I have the highest respect for Islam..."
- well, I hope he was not of sound mind when that statement was made; otherwise the impression left is that one can be held hostages by ahderants to a religious belief, forced to convert to said belief, and then willfully embrace that belief afterward.
Hmmm, perhaps what the entire West needs is two weeks face down in the dirt to discover our love of the Koran....and don't think that little tidbit will escape the adherants of Allah. From View to the Right:
The kidnappers did not force Centanni and Wiig to convert to Islam because the kidnappers are “fascists” who “hate our freedoms.” They forced them to convert to Islam because they are Muslims who believe in Islam. Yes, Islam tells them to hate our freedoms. But the primary thing is the belief in Islam, not the hate of our freedoms. How can we successfully fight an enemy whose existence we don’t even recognize?
Moreover, such forced conversions are exactly what Muslims have been imposing on non-Muslims for the last 1,400 years, through jihad war, razzias (raids), kidnapping, slavery, conquest, and dhimmitude. In reply, the Muslims insist that they don’t force people to convert. Rather, as Sayyid Qutb argues, jihad war is waged to bring people under (divinely led) Islamic rule, thereby freeing them (freeing them from their false human will, that is) to choose Islam freely. What Muslims call “freedom” is what we call compulsion. In fear of being killed, and in hopes of being released, Steve Centanni agreed to convert to Islam. The choice was not what we would call a free one. But now, having become a Muslim and so transformed himself, he can’t take it back, even though the gun is no longer pointed at his head. And so he loves Big Brother—I mean, he has the “highest respect” for Islam.
Again, I'll wait until Centanni sees a psychiatrist before I bash him personally...but the post above brings another fear to the forefront - are we fighting against Islamic Fascists, or the Muslim religion as a whole? We have often spoke of the myth of the moderate Muslim; one that every politician and leader claims exists yet cannot ever be seen/heard decrying the terrorism, kidnappings, murder and general mayhem that is carried out in their name. If the moderate Muslim does not exists, then we are faced not only with armed Islamists that are attempting to bring the world under a 7th century Caliphate, but a Muslim civilian population worldwide that supports this turn of events.
Perhaps this is why Islamic terror plots grow so freely in England, Canada, and all over the Middle East - because the average Muslim believes these murderers are actually acting within the dictates of their religion. Or perhaps terrorists are simply the "armed wing" of the Muslim religion, if I may borrow the MSM lexicon applied to the likes of Hamas and Hezbollah.
But it is thought like these, I guess, that qualify me as a wing-nut...from one of View's comments:
...if someone said that Muslims are violent because they are followers of a religion that commands violence as a sacred obligation, he would be certified, not as an expert, but as an extremist.
Will the wall of political correctness blind us to what awaits us as Muslim militancy grows stronger, emboldened by its small victories, all under the watchful eye of future world leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ?
วันเสาร์, สิงหาคม 26, 2549
Immigration Debate Hits Europe
In the United States, it is taken as matter-of-fact that anyone who is against open-borders immigration is a racist, hate-filled, wing-nut whom doesn't respect the liberal values that allowed him/her to become an American in the first place. Is the left going to tar Europeans with the same brush? From the Brussels Journal:
The key findings on the public’s view of immigration were as follows:
1. How much do you agree or disagree with the following statement?‘Immigration is generally good for Britain’
Agree: 43%
Disagree: 45%
Neither: 10%
Don’t know: 2%
2. Should laws on immigration be relaxed, kept same, made tougher, or don’t know?
Relaxed: 6%
Kept same: 17%
Made tougher: 75%
Don’t know: 2%
3. Should the government set a strict limit on the number of immigrants allowed into Britain each year?
Yes: 77%
No: 21%
Don’t know: 2%
Granted, the U.S. debate is centered on illegal immigration by (primarily) Mexicans and the hardships thus imposed on taxpayer-provided services. In England, it it mostly about Muslim immigrants, and their inability (or lack of desire) to take on British norms and values. The British political class points a finger at Whitey while grudgingly admitting that this whole multiculturalism theology can now be discussed without charges being filed:
"There are white Britons who do not feel comfortable with change. They see the shops and restaurants in their town centres changing. They see their neighbourhoods becoming more diverse. Detached from the benefits of those changes, they begin to believe the stories about ethnic minorities getting special treatment, and to develop a resentment, a sense of grievance," she [Ruth Kelly, the communities secretary] said.
"We have moved from a period of uniform consensus on the value of multiculturalism to one where we can encourage that debate by questioning whether it is encouraging separateness."
Italy is facing some of the same problems - the New York Times reports, although finding facts between their bias is getting more and more difficult:
BRESCIA, Italy, Aug. 23 — A series of unrelated killings here this month has pushed this elegant city to the center of a national debate on the challenges of immigration and cultural integration.
The trigger was the gruesome killing on Aug. 11 of Hina Saleem, a 20-year-old woman whose family moved here from Pakistan and who was found buried, with her throat slit, in the garden of her family home in a small town about 12 miles north of Brescia.
A few days after Ms. Saleem’s body was found, a young Italian woman was found dead in a Brescia church. A Sri Lankan immigrant who assisted the priest has been arrested in the case.
On Aug. 21, an immigrant from Morocco was arrested and charged with killing a notable painter here, and this week a Pakistani man was knifed to death during what appears to have been a robbery.
The result has been a round of anti-immigrant talk....
Of course, the Times points to class elitism and racism, since multiculturalism is next to Godliness in their hallowed halls:
Some residents of this wealthy provincial capital east of Milan, in one of Italy’s most industrialized areas, have been venting their anger to the news media.
“The mayor tells us we have to live with them, but the immigrants don’t reciprocate, and this isn’t their city,” said Gloria Gatta, the owner of a cafe on the Via San Faustino, a street lined with shops catering to the neighborhood’s growing African and Asian population.
Things in Brescia have gotten so bad, she said, that “people are afraid to go out after dark.”
“People used to be more tolerant; they used to be less allergic to seeing someone from a different race,” said Sajid Shah, the founder of the Muhammadiah association, which is building in Brescia what will be the second-biggest mosque in Italy.
Well, while in America we still stick to doctrine (at least for the time being - note here how over 1/3 of American Hispanics believe in denying services to illegals - God bless the melting pot!), it seems as if in Europe this misguided liberal social experiment is finally about to be examined. I wish those in the forefront luck, as the multicultural elite are getting out their tar brushes ready to smear those who dare challenge the faith...
The key findings on the public’s view of immigration were as follows:
1. How much do you agree or disagree with the following statement?‘Immigration is generally good for Britain’
Agree: 43%
Disagree: 45%
Neither: 10%
Don’t know: 2%
2. Should laws on immigration be relaxed, kept same, made tougher, or don’t know?
Relaxed: 6%
Kept same: 17%
Made tougher: 75%
Don’t know: 2%
3. Should the government set a strict limit on the number of immigrants allowed into Britain each year?
Yes: 77%
No: 21%
Don’t know: 2%
Granted, the U.S. debate is centered on illegal immigration by (primarily) Mexicans and the hardships thus imposed on taxpayer-provided services. In England, it it mostly about Muslim immigrants, and their inability (or lack of desire) to take on British norms and values. The British political class points a finger at Whitey while grudgingly admitting that this whole multiculturalism theology can now be discussed without charges being filed:
"There are white Britons who do not feel comfortable with change. They see the shops and restaurants in their town centres changing. They see their neighbourhoods becoming more diverse. Detached from the benefits of those changes, they begin to believe the stories about ethnic minorities getting special treatment, and to develop a resentment, a sense of grievance," she [Ruth Kelly, the communities secretary] said.
"We have moved from a period of uniform consensus on the value of multiculturalism to one where we can encourage that debate by questioning whether it is encouraging separateness."
Italy is facing some of the same problems - the New York Times reports, although finding facts between their bias is getting more and more difficult:
BRESCIA, Italy, Aug. 23 — A series of unrelated killings here this month has pushed this elegant city to the center of a national debate on the challenges of immigration and cultural integration.
The trigger was the gruesome killing on Aug. 11 of Hina Saleem, a 20-year-old woman whose family moved here from Pakistan and who was found buried, with her throat slit, in the garden of her family home in a small town about 12 miles north of Brescia.
A few days after Ms. Saleem’s body was found, a young Italian woman was found dead in a Brescia church. A Sri Lankan immigrant who assisted the priest has been arrested in the case.
On Aug. 21, an immigrant from Morocco was arrested and charged with killing a notable painter here, and this week a Pakistani man was knifed to death during what appears to have been a robbery.
The result has been a round of anti-immigrant talk....
Of course, the Times points to class elitism and racism, since multiculturalism is next to Godliness in their hallowed halls:
Some residents of this wealthy provincial capital east of Milan, in one of Italy’s most industrialized areas, have been venting their anger to the news media.
“The mayor tells us we have to live with them, but the immigrants don’t reciprocate, and this isn’t their city,” said Gloria Gatta, the owner of a cafe on the Via San Faustino, a street lined with shops catering to the neighborhood’s growing African and Asian population.
Things in Brescia have gotten so bad, she said, that “people are afraid to go out after dark.”
“People used to be more tolerant; they used to be less allergic to seeing someone from a different race,” said Sajid Shah, the founder of the Muhammadiah association, which is building in Brescia what will be the second-biggest mosque in Italy.
Well, while in America we still stick to doctrine (at least for the time being - note here how over 1/3 of American Hispanics believe in denying services to illegals - God bless the melting pot!), it seems as if in Europe this misguided liberal social experiment is finally about to be examined. I wish those in the forefront luck, as the multicultural elite are getting out their tar brushes ready to smear those who dare challenge the faith...
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