IMMIGRATION WATCH

I don't seem to be able to help myself. I have started yet another blog -- called Immigration Watch. The topic is such a red-hot one that I felt I should do more in that field. I have in the past put up a lot about immigration on PC Watch but it is not really a good fit there. I am not sure as yet whether I will be posting daily to the new blog but I suspect so. I already have a fair bit up.

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Absurdity about Israel in "The Economist" magazine

Post lifted from American Thinker. I myself like "The Economist" -- but only on economics. Economics is certainly inevitably bound up with politics but foreign policy is just way outside their field of expertise

We have in the past noted that The Economist magazine has a typically European elitist view toward America (particularly in its ridicule of  Christians). The editors also have a very biased view towards Israel. The current issue has yet another editorial that advocates Israel and the world "break bread" with Hamas and reach a deal with the Hamas-led "government".

The Economist did take note that Hamas has refused to abide by the three major principles of the Road Map that the Palestinians had previously agreed to do, to wit: recognize Israel's right to exist, renounce terror and violence, and agree to abide by previous agreements.  Despite these failures, the editorial board writes that the Road Map principles should be ignored and that it is time to soften economic pressure and negotiate statehood for the Palestinians. The last line of the piece  says it all about the philosophy of the magazine:

"It will be hard, but this is a better way to win the argument against Hamas than the past year's vain efforts to make the Palestinians jump through verbal hoops they have come to consider humiliating".

Got that? Recognizing Israel's right to exist, forswearing violence, and abiding by past agreements and promises are considered "humiliating" by the magazine.

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ELSEWHERE

Cuba hasn't changed: "Political and academic soothsayers insist that change (for the better) looms in Cuba. With Fidel Castro's incapacitation, and his "pragmatic" brother, Raul, at the helm the process is ratcheting forward inexorably, we're told... In fact, Raul Castro recently took Cuba's version of Lavrenti Beria out of mothballs and assigned him one of the regime's most powerful positions: minister of Communications and Technology--Cuba's Joseph Goebbels. Ramiro Valdez is the gentleman's name, and he served for decades as head of Cuba's KGB and STASI trained secret police. Everyone conversant with Cuban history knows him as the most repressive and sadistic figure on the island, except for Raul Castro himself. In fact, those who read the samizdats smuggled out of Cuba by her courageous underground reporter Carlos Serpa knows that since the succession in August, forty of Cuba's human Rights activists and reporters (including Serpa himself) have been jailed or severely beaten by mobs of the regime's plainclothes hoodlums and sadists, Raul Castro's version of Hitler's early S.A. More significantly, more such mobs are being trained and deployed throughout Cuba as I write. Cuba is as essentially totalitarian today as ever"

Costly British red tape: "The burden of red tape on British business has hit a record of nearly 56 billion pounds and shows no sign of slowing, according to figures to be published this week. The British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), which compiles its "burdens barometer" on a regular basis, says the cumulative cost of regulation on British business is now 55.6 billion. A year ago that burden was 44.8 billion, revised figures reveal, implying an increase in red tape of more than o10 billion in the past 12 months. The BCC said the increase was particularly disappointing in light of the government's pledge to make 2006 the "year of delivery" on cutting red tape."

British jails waking up to Islamic problem: "The security services are conducting background checks on imams who provide religious and pastoral care in jails. The vetting, part of the effort to prevent inmates from being radicalised, is in addition to the routine counter-terrorism checks conducted by the Prison Service and a further check by the Criminal Records Bureau. A growing number of imams are being appointed to work either full or part time at prisons in England and Wales. The checks are in response to concerns that prisons may be an ideal environment for al-Qaeda operatives to radicalise and recruit young people. Another measure aimed at countering extremism is that all imams working in jails must speak English. In addition, prison authorities are spending thousands of pounds translating all texts from Arabic to English to ensure that they do not contain hidden messages. It is understood that all Arabic books, including the Koran, are subject to this vetting. The shoe bomber Richard Reid, the son of two non-Muslims, converted to violent jihadism after being radicalised at Feltham Young Offender Institution in West London."

Ebay must stop sales of stolen goods: "In fiction his enemies are evil wizards and magical beasts, but Harry Potter's latest adversary is a real corporation with a turnover of more than 2 billion. J. K. Rowling, Harry's creator, is suing the online auction hosting service eBay after unscrupulous sellers used the Indian version of the website to sell unauthorised versions of her books. Rowling is not the first person to sue the website for breach of copyright, but she has won a unique victory by obtaining an injunction that prohibits eBay from listing illegal copies of her work. The court order is a setback for eBay because it is the first time the company has been obliged to police its sellers' auctions for copyrighted material. Ebay, which is also fighting similar complaints by Tiffany in New York and Christian Dior Couture in Paris, denies that it is responsible for the auctions its users conduct on its website, and claims that it is impractical for it to vet every sale. The injunction presents difficulties for eBay, whether it succeeds or fails in policing its users' sales. If the company is able to remove all sales of electronic copies of Harry Potter books then other brands will demand similar treatment when their rights are infringed by sellers. If it fails, it will be in contempt of court."

The Left-voter's craving to be looked after is immature: "It is a basic tenet of maturation to discover that all that glitters is not gold. Every nickel spent for "security" must be taken from one person and chipped away at by each bureaucracy along the way. Not only are bureaucratic means unjustifiable, the end (security) is a pipe dream. Calling something secure (e.g., "Social Security") does not make it so. In fact, it practically ensures the equal and opposite outcome as we now witness with the crumbling and evaporation of social safety nets. When we become completely responsible for ourselves, everything changes. We can no longer identify with other "victims" of life who want to be taken care of with the guns of government pointed at our neighbors. We begin to identify with mature people who take complete responsibility for their experience of life and realize that those guns are being pointed at us too. We begin to see that freedom is essential to the pursuit one's own happiness and the irrational desire for security, even though it once glimmered brightly, becomes too costly when measured up against liberty - the Hope Diamond of human existence - invaluable and only obtainable at the greatest cost, the loss of your illusions.

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

The kneejerk response of the Green/Left to people who challenge them is to say that the challenger is in the pay of "Big Oil", "Big Business", "Big Pharma", "Exxon-Mobil", "The Pioneer Fund" or some other entity that they see, in their childish way, as a boogeyman. So I think it might be useful for me to point out that I have NEVER received one cent from anybody by way of support for what I write. As a retired person, I live entirely on my own investments. I do not work for anybody and I am not beholden to anybody.

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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