Conservative Process Leads To Conservative Results

A classically conservative statement excerpted from Democracy Project below. See the original for links

Conservatism is not about transitory results or means. Conservatism is about process. As I wrote yesterday, conservatism requires that we "move forward based on solid evidence, means, plans, purpose, and competence." When one has that process, the results that merit survival will survive. That is essentially conservative governance. It entails more the avoidance of poor choices than, even, the making of good ones. It recognizes that grand designs are most often not so grand, as they fail to encompass the very diversity of legitimate means and ends of a democratic and free society, particularly one so large and vibrant as ours, and instead stifle individuals' circumstances and, thus, the adaptation and ingenuity upon which continued personal and national success depends.

Mark is correct to point at the Internet as an embodiment of that civic discussion, serving to remind otherwise imperious legislators. Ed is correct to bemoan the extent of intrusion into our daily affairs by such legislators and seek their reversal. Mark and Ed are invaluable resources in those struggles. Both, however, miss that it is process that matters more than results. Rich Lowry, of National Review, reminds us that, "Now, there is really no such thing as an "inside game" anymore, since bloggers make sure it gets "outside." Both the right and the left will take advantage of this, for good and ill policy ends. But it's clearly an enhancement of democracy."

Conservatives, and America, can survive the openness of democracy, and rise with it even when disagreements or disappointments occur. We can't survive the absence of democracy, which rests upon and is bereft without an informed and active citizenry and an open process. This past week was a triumph for democratic process, which is what is most beneficial to conservatives and which we should care most about. The results may not always be consistent with a conservative's desires, but they will have been arrived at in a conservative way -- meaning respectful of true diversity as the well-spring of progress, compared to the stultification, and in totalitarian extremes the bloody repression, from imposition of self-serving and grand designs.

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ELSEWHERE

Bush is shrinking the deficit too fast: "Darn you, George Bush. Bloomberg reported that the federal budget deficit is shrinking so fast that there is a shortage of government debt: "That's because the unexpected surge in tax receipts may pare the budget deficit by 39 percent to $150 billion this fiscal year, causing a relative scarcity of four-week, three-month and six-month bills. The result is the biggest bull market for Treasury bills since the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 drove investors to the safety of the securities. This is driving down the interest that taxpayers have to pay, Bloomberg reported"

More Ted Kennedy dishonesty: "Mr. Kennedy is responsible for our immigration mess more than any other human being on the planet. But last night he was on ABC News complaining that the borders are porous! That is unmitigated gall. Who has been the most powerful Senator on immigration for four decades? Who has left the door open, with malice aforethought, to change American democraphics? Who has surely blocked enforcement more than anyone else? For Ted Kennedy to spin the defeat of the Senate immigration bill as a defeat for border enforcement shows the same lack of conscience that we saw displayed in the case of Mary Jo Kopechne, so many years ago. It is high time for the people of Massachussetts to throw out Kerry and Kennedy, and start from scratch. They can't possibly do any worse. With leaders like this, it is no wonder the Democrat Party has adopted American defeat in the war on terror as its overriding foreign policy goal."

The peasants are revolting: "The liberal media cannot believe that the immigration bill was defeated by people concerned about little things like mass violations of our sovereignty and rewarding law-breakers. It just has to be racism on the part of the unwashed... Steve Gilbert of Sweetness & Light, with one of the best eyes for photography on the web, caught the Los Angeles Times in full sneer mode a couple of days ago. Today, he caught the Washington Post blaming small town Americans from places "where men take their sons deer hunting and moms call out to one another in the supermarket in cheerful Southern drawls... [and] the highways leading out of the city have been colonized by the usual sprawl of Home Depot, PetSmart and OfficeMax big-box stores...." Once again, liberals who fashion themselves good people for their concern over the little guy can't help displaying their disdain for those who shop at Wal-Mart."

Leftist denial of reality in full spate: "When he was in office and responsible for protecting us, Al Gore was absent from the war on terror. As Vice President, he was part of an administration that failed to respond to the first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993; that cut and ran when al-Qaeda ambushed US Army Rangers in Mogadishu; that called for regime change in Iraq when Saddam expelled the UN weapons inspectors but then failed to remove Saddam or to get him to allow the UN inspectors back in; that failed to respond to the murder of US troops in Saudi Arabia or the attack on an American warship in Yemen; that reacted to the blowing up two US embassies in Africa by firing missiles at an aspirin factory in the Sudan and empty tents in Afghanistan; that refused to kill or capture Osama Bin Laden when it had a dozen chances to do so; and that did not put in place simple airport security measures, its own task force recommended, that would have prevented 9/11.... Yet, it is characteristic of Gore's myopic arrogance that he would wag his finger at the Bush administration for its failure to anticipate the 9/11 attack."

Church destroyed in Gaza, Gaza's Christians fear for their lives: "Christians living in Gaza City on Monday appealed to the international community to protect them against increased attacks by Muslim extremists. Many Christians said they were prepared to leave the Gaza Strip as soon as the border crossings are reopened. The appeal came following a series of attacks on a Christian school and church in Gaza City over the past few days. Father Manuel Musalam, leader of the small Latin community in the Gaza Strip, said masked gunmen torched and looted the Rosary Sisters School and the Latin Church. "The masked gunmen used rocket-propelled grenades to storm the main entrances of the school and church," he said. "Then they destroyed almost everything inside, including the Cross, the Holy Book, computers and other equipment." Musalam expressed outrage over the burning of copies of the Bible, noting that the gunmen destroyed all the Crosses inside the church and school. "Those who did these awful things have no respect for Christian-Muslim relations," he said."

Note from a Marine in Iraq: "As I'm sure most of you are aware, a planned dual car bomb attack was foiled in the early morning hours (EST) in downtown London. I'm watching FoxNews/SkyNews on AFN here and it's horrible to watch. Two car bombs (here in Iraq we call them "suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices" or SVBIEDs... pronounced "ess-vee-bid") in different blocks of the city. They were only foiled by the vigilance of an ambulance crew and alert police. God bless those who turned up on-scene here and defused the bomb and saved possibly scores or hundreds of innocent lives. The parallels between the attempted attack in London and SVBIED attacks in Iraq are striking. Parking a vehicle loaded with explosives near crowded civilian population areas, not to achieve a tactical victory but solely to strike fear into the hearts of the innocent. It happens frequently and its biggest effect is to highlight the inhumanity of these monsters who deliberately and repeatedly target people just trying to go about their daily lives. One might hope this is the last attack we'll see like this -- anywhere -- but it is doubtful."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

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".

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The Salman Rushdie lesson was not learnt

Excerpt from Mark Steyn

So many of our problems with Iran today arise from not doing anything about our problems with Iran yesterday. Men like Ayatollah Khomeini despised pan-Arab nationalists like Nasser who attempted to impose a local variant of Marxism on the Muslim world. Khomeini figured: Why import the false ideologies of a failing civilization? Doesn't it make more sense to export Islamism to the dying West?

And, for a guy dismissed by most of us as crazy, Khomeini made a lot of sense. The Rushdie fatwa established the ground rules: The side that means it gets away with it. Mobs marched through Britain calling for the murder of a British subject - and, as a matter of policy on the grounds of multicultural sensitivity, the British police shrugged and looked the other way.

One reader in England recalled one demonstration at which he asked a constable why the "Muslim community leaders" weren't being arrested for incitement to murder. The officer told him to "f--- off, or I'll arrest you." Genuine "moderate Muslims" were cowed into silence, and pseudo-moderate Muslims triangulated with artful evasiveness. Sir Iqbal Sacranie, who went on to become leader of the most prominent British Muslim lobby group, mused about the Rushdie fatwa: "Death is perhaps too easy."

In 1989 Salman Rushdie went into hiding under the protection of the British police. A decade later he decided he did not wish to live his life like that and emerged from seclusion to live a more or less normal life. He learned the biggest lesson of all - how easy it is to be forced into the shadows. That's what's happening in the free world incrementally every day, with every itsy-bitsy nothing concession to groups who take offense at everything and demand the right to kill you for every offense. Across two decades, what happened to Rushdie has metastasized, in part because of the weak response in those first months. "Death is perhaps too easy"? Maybe. But slow societal suicide is easier still.

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The very strange "American Conservative Union"

David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union (ACU), has been moving, along with several other paleo-conservatives like Dinesh D'Souza, towards a partnership with Saudi-funded, pro-Hamas institutions. A forewarning was the appointment of Grover Norquist to the ACU board. A second forewarning was the appointment of Suhail Khan to the ACU board.

Then Tuesday, David Keene joined United for Peace and Justice, the ACLU, the Communist Party-USA, as a speaker in the "Day of Action to Restore Law and Justice" to:

"call on Congress to restore habeas corpus, fix the Military Commissions Act, end torture and rendition and restore our constitutional rights. Activists from all fifty states will gather at Upper Senate Park on June 26, 2007 and deliver tens of thousands of signatures to Congress, urging the restoration of our rights."

Source

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ELSEWHERE

Immigration amnesty bill killed by protests from the people: "Ding dong, the bill is dead. I confess that right now I feel kind of overwhelmed by happy emotion. I've participated in democracy in the best, most hopeful way. In the past I've made phone calls for candidates. I've contributed money and gone to meetings. I'm on my town's Republican Committee. But, doing my small part to fight a bad piece of legislation, and witnessing on-line my fellow citizens doing theirs, is one of the most wonderful experiences I've ever had. Has there every been a moment in American history to match this one, when all the force of professional government has been stymied by a determined citizenry? There has been much talk in recent years comparing the invention of the internet with the invention of the printing press on freedom and government. It may still not be strictly true, but the comparison now has greater validity."

The destruction of Israel: look who's okay with it: "Congressman Mike Pence (R-Indiana) has been a stalwart supporter of the American-Israel alliance. He recently introduced an amendment to the foreign aid bill that would prohibit groups that deny Israel's right to exist from receiving American (taxpayer dollar) foreign aid. The amendment passed 390-30. Of the 30 members of Congress who have no problem with giving money to groups that advocate and plan for the destruction of Israel, 27 of them were Democrats."

Baghdad Christians: “It was a kind of genocide killing”: "The 70 houses of this tiny village spring from the treeless, arid plain here in the northern tip of Iraq with the uniformity of an army camp. Built over the past four years of war, they house Christian refugees from some of Baghdad’s most dangerous neighborhoods: Dora, New Baghdad and Mashtel. There the residents did not know one another, busy with their city lives. Now a barber, a bank manager, a news anchor and an electrician are comrades in the misery of flight. “We saw everything a human can see,” said Majida Hamo, a mother of four who came from Mashtel recently. “It was a kind of genocide killing.” “We were saying to Jesus, ‘See us and save us.’ ” The Iraqi exodus is one of the largest displacements in the Middle East since the creation of Israel in 1948. Many have fled to Jordan and Syria, countries where Arabic is spoken. Others have stayed within Iraq’s borders, moving into the largely peaceful Kurdish north, which is more foreign to them than neighboring countries because the main language is Kurdish, not their native Arabic."

Honour killings now coming to America: "A Bucks County father was accused of going to extremes to break-up his daughter's romance. Police said the father and his son tried to kidnap her fiance by beating him up and tossing him into a sport utility vehicle. "The victim advised me that his fiancee's family was trying to kill him, drag him into a car and take him somewhere, where he believed he was going to be killed," Webber said. Webber said the alleged victim told him his fiancee's family was upset the two had moved in together. He said there were cultural differences and that's why 48-year-old Mohd Nasher and his son 20-year-old Mohammed Nasher were allegedly gunning for the fiance. "The father and son came in, grabbed our victim, pulled him outside, began choking and beating him. Drug him into the back of a Ford Explorer and that's where they advised him that they were going to take him somewhere. He jumped out the other side window in fear for his life and as he went to run away the father told him, 'I'm going to find you and I'm going to shoot you.' The son went and grabbed a bat and went to chase after him," Webber said"

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

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".

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More pseudo-psychology with the same old pseudo "findings"

Newsweek has just given a big plug to a book called "The Political Brain" (by Drew Westen of Emory University) that purports to tell Democrats how to win elections. The writer of the review does not know the difference between "discreet" and "discrete" so the intellectual level to be expected is not high -- and so it turns out. Note the paragraph below . It combines very old news with a bald-faced assertion:

"When voters are hooked up to brain-imaging devices while watching candidates, it is emotion circuits and not the rational frontal lobes that are most engaged. When voters assess who won a campaign debate, they almost always choose the candidate they liked better beforehand. The rationality circuit "isn't typically open for business when partisans are thinking about things that matter to them," Westen notes. Yet "this is the part of the brain to which Democrats typically target their appeals."

So emotions matter in politics! Give the writer a cookie! But what is the proof for the second assertion -- that Democrats target their appeals to rationality? As far as I can tell it is the opposite. For instance, "All men are equal" may be emotionally satisfying but it has no status as a fact.

Hot Air and Ace have some further comments.

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BUSH HAS LOST IT

Post lifted from Gates of Vienna. See the original for links

President Bush gave a speech this morning at a Wahhabist mosque called the Islamic Center of Washington DC. I listened to most of it on C-Span streaming video, and it was about what you'd expect, a mixture of boilerplate and outreach and platitudes and dhimmitude. It was too dispiriting to write much about.

However - one of the things he mentioned was a future "democratic Palestine, living side-by-side with Israel in peace".

What planet is he living on? What has he been smoking? The only democracy that will ever come to "Palestine" is the democracy of AK-47s and homemade bombs. The only peace that "Palestine" will ever allow Israel is the peace of the grave.

President Bush is either being stupid, or cynical, or is saying something he knows is not true for reasons of statecraft that are too arcane and subtle for an ignorant boob like me to understand.

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ELSEWHERE



There is some good information here about how Democrat hero FDR worsened the Great Depression by his ignorant "New Deal" policies.

Norway winks at barbarism: "For many years it has been speculated that Norwegian-Somali girls are circumcised when they go back to their homeland on the summer holiday. NRK can now document for the first time that women who work in circumcision confirm that to a great extent they circumcise girls who live in Western Europe. And not least: they say that Norwegian-Somali parents are good customers - every summer - after school ends in Norway. Parents from Norway are among those who pay best. The price for circumcising a girl is 150 kroner. Since January 1st, 1996, it is illegal to circumcise girls in Norway. It is also forbidden for people living in Norway to circumcise their daughters abroad. Breaking the law could lead up to 8 years in jail. But nobody has ever been indicted or convicted for this in Norway."

Israel: A Hotbed Of... Investment : "You might think that Israel's continuing strife with the Palestinians would be a red flag for investors. Yet amid escalating violence, many of the country's companies are thriving, pushing the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange to record levels. Even the takeover of the Gaza Strip by the Islamist Hamas movement in mid-June hasn't slowed the momentum. The TA 25 index is up by 21% this year, reaching an all-time high on June 17. The market's strength is a sign of how well Israel has been able to protect its economy from the crisis. A big part of Israel's recent economic success is due to improved security. Suicide attacks have dropped sharply, largely the result of imposing walls and fences that separate Israel from Gaza and the West Bank. Nearly six years after the start of the second intifada, shoppers are feeling safer and are out in force, helping to push annual growth to 5% for the fourth straight year."

Another innocent turnip farmer is gunned down after his release from Gitmo: "Two men, who were on Russia's wanted list as suspected members of illegal armed groups, were killed in a special operation near the central mosque in downtown Nalchik, the capital city of the Russian North Caucasus republic of Kabardino- Balkaria, a local law enforcement source told Interfax. One of those killed might be Ruslan Odizhev, a former Guantanamo base prisoner, the source said."

Rice calls Hamas 'resistance movement': "U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice twice referred to Hamas as a "resistance movement" during a meeting with reporters from the New York Daily News earlier this month, but the newspaper did not report her remarks, WND has learned. Rice's interview is transcribed in full on the State Department website. Rice's statements mark the second documented time in recent months she called Hamas a "resistance movement" during unscripted chats with journalists".

Only 400,000? And many of their relatives are undoubtedly in the USA: "About 400,000 Mexican police officers are under investigation by the Attorney General's Office for corruption and suspected links to organized crime, La Jornada reported June 26, citing government sources. Most of the officers are from Nuevo Leon, Sonora, Baja California, Guerrero, Michoacan, Mexico and the federal district"

Obama's church: "A very liberal and fast declining United Church of Christ (UCC) celebrated its 50th birthday, with rousing speeches from Senator Barack Obama and PBS commentator Bill Moyers, both of whom are UCC members. Both speakers fingered the "Religious Right" as a threat to American democracy. Moyers specifically warned against the Institute on Religion and Democracy for supposedly attempting to disrupt the UCC. Neither speaker offered any criticisms that might apply particularly to their left-leaning UCC audience. The 1.2-million-member UCC has lost nearly one million members over the last 40 years. Its decline has accelerated since its formal endorsement of same-sex "marriage" two years ago."

Vote early and vote often still applies: "A Washington State woman thought that voter registration requirements were too lax so she signed up her dog to vote. Her dog Duncan voted in 3 elections and signed each time with a paw print before officials caught on."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

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".

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Police run riot in Arkansas

Despicable acts of police brutality appear to have been committed on Go Skateboarding Day by the Hot Springs, Arkansas Police Department. Young skateboarders were choked and knocked around for skateboarding. Video of the incident here. After you watch it, help flood their phone lines and email their police chief with complaints regarding the main policeman involved, Officer Joey Williams. Data: Hot Springs Arkansas Police Department, Phone: (501) 321-6789, Fax: (501) 321-6708, Chief of Police, Bobby Southard, 641 Malvern Avenue.

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Brookes News Update

Why the Democrats' tax program could send the US economy South: One only has to reflect on the damage the Hoover-Roosevelt tax increases inflicted on the US economy to realise how destructive the Democrats' policy on taxation and spending really is
Can expectations neutralise the side effects of loose monetary policy: According to the Austrian Business Cycle Theory the artificial lowering of interest rates leads to a misallocation of resources because businesses undertake capital projects that prior to the lowering of interest rates weren't considered as viable. This misallocation of resources is commonly described as an economic boom
Australian economy: Government confusion about productivity, growth and jobs: Despite the Government's glee over an OECD report that falling productivity was caused by falling unemployment, it is ignoring that one pillar of its labour market reform policy promised increasing productivity. For years Brookesnews has been pointing out that productivity would fall when unemployment fell while our so-called `new right' promised the opposite. So what really happened?
Stock market troubles and Macbeth's witches: The recent erratic behaviour of China's stock market has exposed the inability of market analysts to explain what is really happening. This inability can be a severe wealth hazard
Iraqi and British troops launched a successful strike at Iranian secret cell: Why is the news about always bad? Is because our `objective' journalists are deliberately spiking stories that involve economic progress and Coalition victories? This article will help put the war in perspective by telling you things our journalist keep to themselves
An Open Letter to Norway's Foreign Minister: Who would have thought that in the first decade of the 21st rabid anti-Semitism would be sweeping through Europe? It is now clear that even in this day and age hatred of Jews is just bubbling below the surface of Europe's urbane veneer. We now have Gruppenfuehrer Jonas Gahrs Store, - aka Norway's Foreign Minister - parroting neo-Nazi Jew-hatred. Thank God I live in Australia - a real liberal country
NBC's Tourism pitch for Castro: How nice and sophisticated: Andrea Mitchell and Matt lauer defending Castro, a tyrant who tortures and murders children, who allows for the sexual humiliation of women and who keeps political prisoners in the most barbarous conditions. Perhaps that's really why the left love him. He's doing what they secretly wish they could do
Anti-Semitism: Israel's weakest Link: Anti-Semitism is the world's most enduring hatred - and it's back. Leftwing British academics and journalists launched a vicious assault on Jews that even Goebbels would have admired. And what did these paragons of tolerance use to justify their hatred of Jews? Islamic terrorist propaganda. There is no doubt about - anti-Semites are utter scum Israel and Gaza: one or four states solution
There is no difference between Hamas, Fatah or any other so-called Palestinian terror group: They all want the same thing - the extermination of every Jew on the planet

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ELSEWHERE

BBC employs Hamas member: "Despite Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) opposition and per the request of the BBC, the coordinator of government activities allowed a Hamas member who works for the BBC to enter the Gaza Strip last week to assist in efforts to release kidnapped journalist Alan Johnston. Defense officials told The Jerusalem Post that a week ago, a request came from the BBC asking that a Palestinian employee of the news company who is believed to be a close associate of senior Hamas officials be allowed to enter Gaza."

Running the airport gauntlet: "A few months after 9/11, my wife and I passed through an airport on the way to some destination that escapes me now and that I would probably have preferred skipping anyway. At the gate, the security guards pulled a pretty teenage girl aside for some obviously excessive extra attention. My wife and I hung back from the boarding line to keep an eye on the guards and the girl they were fondling. We weren't subtle either. The guards let the girl board after a few minutes of attention and a couple of glances in our direction. I haven't seen anything so egregious since then, but the intrusive and pointless security procedures always grate on my nerves. My wife knows when to take a tight grip on my arm to forestall an eruption when we're being herded like cattle through the metal detectors. I've mellowed over the years, however, and there's little chance of me staging a pointless confrontation with some TSA goon unless I suddenly develop a hankering for a body-cavity search. It could be worse, I keep telling myself."

Comment on the hypocritical British boycotters of Israel: "The PACBI boycotters and their UCU fellow travellers would deny to Jews the rights that they upholds for other, comparable peoples. They adhere to the principle of national self-determination, except in the Jews' case. They affirm international law, except in Israel's case. They are outraged by the Jewish nature of the State of Israel, but are untroubled (say) by the Islamic nature of Iran or of Saudi Arabia. They regard Zionism as uniquely pernicious, rather than as merely another nationalism (just as earlier generations of anti-Semites regarded Jewish capitalists as uniquely pernicious, rather than merely as members of the capitalist class). They are indifferent to Jewish suffering, while being sensitive to the suffering of non-Jews. They dismiss anti-Semitism as a phantasm exploited by Jews to pursue their own goals."

The Radical Evil Of The Palestinian Arab Population: "Ah, the fabled Palestinian people. The Palestinian people, who simply want "a better life." The Palestinian people, who, President George W. Bush has repeatedly informed us, "long for a society in which they can raise their children in peace and hope." The Palestinian people, who support, fund and execute suicide bombings. The Palestinian people, who dress their toddlers in bomb belts and then take family snapshots. The Palestinian people, who cheered on September 11 as the World Trade Center towers fell. The Palestinian people, who followed terrorist extraordinaire Yasser Arafat, supported Saddam Hussein, shredded the blooming rose that was once Christian Lebanon, and almost toppled the Western-friendly Jordanian monarchy. The Palestinian people, who destroy relics on the Temple Mount, openly call for the destruction of the state of Israel, ally with Syria and Iran, and elect Hamas. The Palestinian people, who teach their children that the Holocaust is a fairy tale, and that Jews routinely poison Palestinian candy. The Palestinian people, who stage injuries in order to solicit Western media sympathy, and then roar madly as they hold up their hands, red with the blood of murdered Israeli soldiers.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here.

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".

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Obama condones antisemitism

While many Christians, notably the evangelical community, are deeply supportive of Israel, the leaders of a few Christian church groups in America have issued anti-Israel resolutions over the last few years. These are often established groups that are politically liberal (and often have become so secular that they are suffering a decline in membership). The anti-Israel Resolutions are typically one-sided and blame Israel for the problems of the Palestinians....

Among these churches is one that does not fit the mold of established liberal Protestant groups: the United Church of Christ (UCC). The UCC, primarily an African-American denomination, has taken a pronounced lead in anti-Israel invective. So pronounced that a broad coalition of major Jewish groups has publicly rebuked (usually these types of disagreements are not aired publicly) the United Church of Christ for its unbalanced treatment of Israel. The coalition noted that the UCC failed to mention Israeli peace overtures, Palestinian rejection of those overtures, and the "brutal Palestinian campaigns of terror aimed at innocent Israeli children and families".

It so happens that aspiring Presidential candidate Barack Obama is a prominent - almost certainly the most prominent - member of the United Church of Christ. Obama has made political hay from emphasizing the role that his church and his faith have played in his life and career. He has credited his Pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, for being his inspiration and spiritual mentor.

But now that Obama is in the midst of his political campaign and raising money and support from prominent Jews among many others, he has tried to bury this relationship, because Wright's philosophy and teachings have a very pronounced anti-Israel bias and are divisive on the issue of black-white relations in America. These views of Obama's church would have significant political repercussions for Obama, if they were more widely known. Even Pastor Wright recognizes that this history would be a problem, noting that he has been temporarily shunted aside because his views and relationship with Obama would hurt Obama's image....

This past Saturday, Obama spoke to a group of 300 delegates at the United Church of Christ state convention in Iowa. He delivered his usual bromides, including an attack on the "Christian Right." He did not mention Israel or the controversial anti-Israel positions that the United Church of Christ has taken. Not a word. Here is a man who preaches tolerance and the coming together of people, a man whose voice is a powerful instrument and can be used to heal wounds. He chose to remain silent about the bias within his own church.

More here

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ELSEWHERE

For what interest it may have, there is an example here (or here) of an idiotic credit-card offer from American Express. I am not sure whether I should condemn them for their negligence or give them credit for trying.

China has blocked blogspot again but China Hand is keeping on blogging. There is a mirror of his blog that IS readable in China here.

I have for some time had up on the web reproductions of original Nazi posters that show how Leftist Nazism was (See here or here). I also have up some similar information on Nazism in the Netherlands during the period of Nazi control there. I have just added to the information on the Netherlands a reproduction of a 1941 official Dutch newspaper announcement that was sent to me by a reader who actually had his birth announcement in the same issue of the newspaper. The official newspaper announcement could just as well have been Soviet as Nazi. See here or here

One Leftist who still likes Hitler: "You could argue that even the world's worst fascist dictators at least meant well. They honestly thought were doing good things for their countries by suppressing blacks/eliminating Jews/eradicating free enterprise/repressing individual thought/killing off rivals/invading neighbors, etc. [The Huffington Poster who wrote that is Peter Mehlman, one of the Hollywood Left]

NYT says it's all Israel's fault: "Here he blames Israel and America for the failure of the Palestinians and the rise of Hamas. How does Israel in particular play into this dynamic? By "bombing Gaza last summer (in retaliation for the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers), a move that further weakened Abbas and his Fatah party". Feldman does not even deign to report the fact that Israel had completely removed itself from Gaza, turning it over to the Palestinians, lock, stock, and barrel. Nor does he mention that any bombing attacks against Gaza were not acts of "retaliation" ( a word with pejorative connotations), but were meant to suppress the thousands of missiles launched into Israel from the Gaza that were meant to terrorize, maim and kill Israelis. His wording makes it seem as if Israel were engaging in collective punishment and was indiscriminate in its targeting. In fact, Israel exposes its pilots to greater danger by trying to be very precise and deliberate in its targeting-only aiming to stop the terrorist and focusing on minimizing the damage while trying its utmost to minimize civilian casualties. He did not even mention these endless rounds of rocket attacks; not a single word."

Unusual sense for San Francisco: "Citing environmental concerns, Mayor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order prohibiting city departments from buying bottled water. In a decision announced yesterday, Newsom says the ban will go into effect July first and extend to all city and county water coolers by December first. A spokesman for the San Francisco public utilities commission says Newsom's decision will save tax payer money and combat global warming."

African brains less active: "Slow wave activity (SWA), a stable trait dependent marker of the intensity of non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep, is lower in young healthy African-Americans compared to Caucasians who were matched for age, gender and body weight, according to recent research. Dr. Esra Tasali and colleagues at the University of Chicago collected overnight polysomnographic data from 12 African-Americans and 12 Caucasians, none of whom had any sleep complaints or disorders. The authors found that African-Americans had markedly lower SWA as compared to Caucasians."

Economic ignorance often goes with economic arrogance: "Interview with Bryan Caplan, author of The Myth of the Rational Voter. Caplan: "I[f] people were merely ignorant about economics, I wouldn't be worried. After all, if you never studied a subject, we'd expect you just to be agnostic about it. The real problem is that people have strong opinions about economics even though they've never studied it -- and their strong opinions tend to be the opposite of what you'd learn in an economics class. As you indicate, I identify four main ways that people's beliefs about economics tend to go wrong. I call them anti-market bias, anti-foreign bias, make-work bias, and pessimistic bias."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here.

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".

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Baltic beacon of economic sanity

Anyone interested in seeing first-hand what a simple and fair tax system can help accomplish should visit Estonia. After gaining independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, the little Baltic country first tried its luck with the kind of progressive tax system so popular in the West. Productive people were punished with higher tax rates, and savings and investments - the lifeblood of future prosperity - were subject to double-taxation. Not surprisingly, Estonia did not prosper. To be fair, the tax system was just one of many problems plaguing the nation. But it was ironic that Estonia hindered its economic recovery from communist enslavement by using a fiscal regime - progressive taxation - advocated by Karl Marx. No less ironic is the fact that most capitalist economies have adopted that counterproductive taxation model as well.

Seeking a new approach to jump-start its economy, Estonia adopted a 26% flat tax in 1994 and never looked back. Combined with other free-market reforms, the flat tax has helped Estonia become one of the world's fastest-growing economies. Tallinn is now a boom town, filled with expensive cars, elegant shops, trendy restaurants and new construction. Estonia's system is not a completely pure version of the flat tax model. But it is remarkably free from distortions, exemptions, loopholes and penalties. The flat rate applies to both personal income and business income. And since one of the key principles of a flat tax is that income should be taxed only once, there is no death tax, no wealth tax and no double-taxation of savings or dividends.

With such a simple and fair tax system, it is hardly surprising that Estonia is now the Baltic Tiger, growing faster than every other post-Soviet economy. In the last six years, growth has averaged nearly 9%. And that's after adjusting for inflation.

More here

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Brookes News Update

Getting it right on recessions and the 'wealth effect': I honestly cannot think of a single conservative commentator who recognizes the fundamental role money supply plays in the so-called boom-and-bust cycle. This failure to understand the power of money can have devastating consequences for an economy
Utility, means-ends and consumer choices: Contrary to mainstream thinking the Menger-Mises framework shows that it is the importance of various ends that determine the selection of goods by individuals. The means-end framework also shows that the prices of goods are not set mechanically by some kind of supply demand curves but by goal seeking individuals
US recession and technology: another economic fallacy: When every so-called technological breakthrough and invention immediately attracts investment think of the South Sea Bubble. John Stuart Mill sadly remarked that these booms left many businessmen and eager investors "to repent at leisure". And that was written about 178 years ago
Economic growth is under attack by greens: The two great power cults of the last century were Marxism and Nazism. Between them they probably killed some 150 million people. Another power cult has now emerged and it's called green movement and it has already killed millions of Third World peasants
Yeah, the Media are the Message - A Lying, Stinking, Deceitful One: The American media are the most powerful force on Earth. They can make the world hate George Bush and love the tragedies that are Jimmy Carter and Billy Clinton. They can hide the story of Muslims killing 2 million Christians in the Sudan in the 90s and displacing millions of "Black" Muslims in Sudan's Darfur
I'm suing gayHarmony: It looks like homosexual militants are getting nastier and nastier: attacking the right of free speech, free association, freedom of religion - and even attacking those who want stronger laws against sexually molesting children
Does a fall in the US saving rate point to troubles ahead?: According to US Government data the personal savings rate stood at negative 1.3 per cent in April against a negative rate of 0.7 per cent in February. This was the 25th consecutive negative savings rate. Do these figures presage trouble for the US economy?

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ELSEWHERE



Paul Krugman has recently drawn attention to the fact that people in at least some European countries are now on average taller than Americans. He couples that with the undoubted fact that severe nutritional deficits stunt growth and concludes that Americans must be doing something wrong -- with a bony finger pointed at McDonalds, of course. That is pretty hilarious, however. Far from suffering from hunger, Americans are clearly OVER-nourished, as their waistlines attest. One thing Krugman would appear to be ignoring is the large number of people now living in America from South of the Rio Grande. Nobody denies that they are often short (See above) and must hence drive down the average American height. I looked at the issue in more depth three years ago.

More daring Danes: "Today is Midsummer's Day - Saint Hans' Day in Denmark - and the traditional Danish midsummer custom is to burn an effigy of a witch in order to banish evil from the country and ensure the good fortune of the people in the coming year. This year there's going to be a slight variation on the usual ritual. According to SIAD, a previously secret group is planning to burn an effigy of Mohammed instead of a witch, to symbolize the need to rid Western Europe of a new kind of evil. Tomorrow the group will release a video of tonight's Midsummer bonfire."

It is our traditions and customs that have made us rich: "Douglass North's economics looks at the formal rules and informal norms that affect economic behavior. As I pointed out in the previous essay, North refers to these rules and norms as institutions. (This use of the term "institutions" differs somewhat from ordinary language, where we tend to use institutions to refer to tangible enterprises, such as universities or hospitals.) Institutions change slowly. They are conditioned on the past and on other institutions. Therefore, when better outcomes depend on institutional improvement, the challenge is much more difficult than is assumed in standard economics.

There is a new lot of postings by Chris Brand just up. Chris notes that the British "Conservatives" are now to the Left of Labour in many ways.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here.

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".

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THE SOURCE OF MUSLIM HATRED

Here's why much of the region is so unhinged - and it's not because of our policy in Palestine or our efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. First, thanks to Western inventions and Chinese manufactured goods, Middle Easterners can now access the non-Muslim world cheaply and vicariously. To millions of Muslims, the planet appears - on the Internet, DVDs and satellite television - to be growing rich as most of their world stays poor. Second, the Middle East either will not or cannot make the changes necessary to catch up with what they see in the rest of the world. Tribalism - loyalty only to kin rather than to society at large - impedes merit and thus progress. So does gender apartheid. Who knows how many would-be Margaret Thatchers or Sandra Day O'Connors remain veiled in the kitchen?

Religious fundamentalism translates into rote prayers in madrassas while those outside the Middle East master science and engineering. Without a transparent capitalist system - antithetical to both sharia (Muslim law) and state-run economies - initiative is never rewarded. Corruption is.

Meanwhile, mere discussion in much of the region of what is wrong can mean execution by a militia, government thug or religious vigilante. So, Middle Easterners are left with the old frustration of wanting the good life of Western society but lacking either the ability or willingness to change the status quo to get it. Instead, we get monotonous scapegoating. Blaming America or Israel - "Those sneaky Jews did it!" - has become a regional pastime.

And after the multifarious failures of Yasser Arafat, the Assads in Syria, Muammar Gaddafi, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Saddam Hussein and other corrupt autocrats, many have, predictably, retreated to fundamentalist extremism. Almost daily, some fundamentalist claims that the killing of Westerners is justified - because of a cartoon, a Papal paragraph or, most recently, British knighthood awarded to novelist Salman Rushdie. The terrorism of Osama bin Laden, Hamas, Hezbollah and the Taliban is as much about nihilist rage as it is about blackmailing Western governments to grant concessions.

Source

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ELSEWHERE

Britain gives up control of its own foreign policy: "While Blair left Brussels insisting he had preserved Britain's control over its foreign policy, the small print of the treaty prepares the way for a powerful new EU diplomatic service with ambassadors worldwide. They will report to a "high representative" who will be vice-president of the European commission and will chair meetings of EU foreign ministers. The treaty commits the EU to a "common foreign and security policy". Member states must support the policy "actively and unreservedly, in the spirit of loyalty and mutual solidarity". They are barred from taking any action -- such as launching military strikes or declaring war -- that could damage the EU's standing. Downing Street said an annex to the treaty ensured it would not affect foreign policy. But opposition politicians said the annex was a "declaration" rather than a legally binding "protocol". They demanded the treaty be put to a referendum."

Gentleman Fred: "In the battle for the women's vote, Fred Thompson has a secret weapon against Hillary Clinton - the legions of former girlfriends who still adore him and who want him to be president. The Hollywood actor and former Tennessee senator racked up an impressive list of conquests during his swinging bachelor days in the 1990s, but he appears to have achieved the impossible and kept their friendship and respect. Lorrie Morgan, a country singer who dated Thompson and considered marrying him in the mid1990s, told The Sunday Times: "I couldn't think of a bad word to say about Fred if somebody put a gun to my head. "Fred is a perfect example of chivalry. He's the kind of man little girls dream about marrying, who opens doors for you, lights your cigarettes, helps you on with your coat, buys wonderful gifts. It's every woman's fantasy."

The British airforce is still relying on the military version of the De Havilland Comet -- the first passenger jet ever flown (in 1952): "The station commander of a Nimrod spyplane that exploded over Afghanistan warned a year earlier that an "unexpected failure" was likely with a similar ageing plane already 10 years past its out-of-service date. The comments were made in August 2005 at the end of an internal report into a leak of superheated air in the bomb bay of a Nimrod. In the report, an unnamed group captain says the leak was "a particular concern as the ageing Nimrod MR2 is extended beyond its original out-of-service date" of 1995. The leak of the hot air was not the first time there had been an unforeseen failure of a piece of equipment on board a Nimrod "in recent months" as a direct result of the aircraft's age, he added." [OK: I know the B52 has been going since 1955]

The brave Taliban "freedom fighters": "A group of girls returning home from school in Afghanistan's Logar province recently did not for a moment expect what lay ahead. As they walked down a dirt track, insurgents sprang out of the parched farms and began firing on them. Some of them fled into the farm, but two girls, one aged 13, the other 10, were killed in the ambush. Three of their friends were wounded. ... In the past 13 months, 226 schools, many run from tents, have been burnt down by the insurgents. A total of 110 teachers and students have been killed in incidents of indirect violence and another 52 wounded, officials say."

Gaza got what it voted for: "There's an old saying cynics invoke whenever complaints arise about the shoddy state of our public life: You get the politicians you vote for. Someone should tell that to the Palestinians. Last week, the Sword of Islam conquered the Gaza strip, that miserable stretch of land that will be made all the more miserable now that religious fascists rule the roost. If any lesson can be learned about the Arab-Israeli conflict these past few weeks, it's that Palestinian terrorists are just as happy to kill their fellow Palestinians as they are those perfidious Jews. But before the world sheds a collective tear on behalf of the Palestinians - a people who have received more foreign aid, per capita, than Europeans under the Marshall Plan - we ought to remember that they brought this horror upon themselves. In January 2006, Hamas overwhelmingly won the Palestinian legislative election, taking 56 percent of the seats in the legislature."

NYT digging dirt on Murdoch: "The New York Times is currently undertaking a major news investigation, led by managing editor Jill Abramson, into News Corp.'s business dealings throughout the world, according to a source with knowledge of the project. Currently, Ms. Abramson is working outside of the newsroom, recovering from injuries sustained during a traffic accident last month. But, as she told The Observer in an e-mail on May 26, executive editor Bill Keller has kept her quite busy. 'Bill has asked me to lead an investigative project for the next month, which I'll mainly do from home,' Ms. Abramson wrote at the time."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here.

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".

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ISRAELI VERSATILITY TURNS EVEN WAR INTO AN ASSET

The writer of the excerpts below has tried to turn it into a "Hate-Israel" piece but the facts marshalled are in fact another wonderful Gideon story -- of how high human quality can grab triumph from a much more numerous enemy. SCA has a fisking of the pathetic anti-Israel component in the article, mostly not reproduced below

Gaza in the hands of Hamas, with masked militants sitting in the president's chair; the West Bank on the edge; Israeli army camps hastily assembled in the Golan Heights; a spy satellite over Iran and Syria; war with Hizbullah a hair trigger away; a scandal-plagued political class facing a total loss of public faith. At a glance, things aren't going well for Israel. But here's a puzzle: why, in the midst of such chaos and carnage, is the Israeli economy booming like it's 1999, with a roaring stock market and growth rates nearing China's?

Israel's economy isn't booming despite the political chaos that devours the headlines but because of it. This phase of development dates back to the mid-90s, when the country was in the vanguard of the information revolution - the most tech-dependent economy in the world. After the dotcom bubble burst in 2000, Israel's economy was devastated, facing its worst year since 1953. Then came 9/11, and suddenly new profit vistas opened up for any company that claimed it could spot terrorists in crowds, seal borders from attack, and extract confessions from closed-mouthed prisoners.

Within three years, large parts of Israel's tech economy had been radically repurposed. Put in Friedmanesque terms, Israel went from inventing the networking tools of the "flat world" to selling fences to an apartheid planet. Many of the country's most successful entrepreneurs are using Israel's status as a fortressed state, surrounded by furious enemies, as a kind of 24-hour-a-day showroom, a living example of how to enjoy relative safety amid constant war. And the reason Israel is now enjoying supergrowth is that those companies are busily exporting that model to the world.

Discussions of Israel's military trade usually focus on the flow of weapons into the country - US-made Caterpillar bulldozers used to destroy homes in the West Bank, and British companies supplying parts for F-16s. Overlooked is Israel's huge and expanding export business. Israel now sends $1.2bn in "defence" products to the United States - up dramatically from $270m in 1999. In 2006, Israel exported $3.4bn in defence products - well over a billion more than it received in American military aid. That makes Israel the fourth largest arms dealer in the world, overtaking Britain.

Much of this growth has been in the so-called homeland security sector. Before 9/11 homeland security barely existed as an industry. By the end of this year, Israeli exports in the sector will reach $1.2bn, an increase of 20%. The key products and services are hi-tech fences, unmanned drones, biometric IDs, video and audio surveillance gear, air passenger profiling and prisoner interrogation systems - precisely the tools and technologies Israel has used to lock in the occupied territories.

Next week, the most established of these companies will travel to Europe for the Paris Air Show, the arms industry's equivalent of Fashion Week. One of the Israeli companies exhibiting is Suspect Detection Systems (SDS), which will be showcasing its Cogito1002, a white, sci-fi-looking security kiosk that asks air travellers to answer a series of computer-generated questions, tailored to their country of origin, while they hold their hand on a "biofeedback" sensor. The device reads the body's reactions to the questions, and certain responses flag the passenger as "suspect". Like hundreds of other Israeli security start-ups, SDS boasts that it was founded by veterans of Israel's secret police and that its products were road-tested on Palestinians. Not only has the company tried out the biofeedback terminals at a West Bank checkpoint, it claims the "concept is supported and enhanced by knowledge acquired and assimilated from the analysis of thousands of case studies related to suicide bombers in Israel".

Another star of the Paris Air Show will be Israeli defence giant Elbit, which plans to showcase its Hermes 450 and 900 unmanned air vehicles. As recently as last month, according to press reports, Israel used the drones on bombing missions in Gaza. Once tested in the territories, they are exported abroad: the Hermes has already been used at the Arizona-Mexico border; Cogito1002 terminals are being auditioned at an unnamed American airport; and Elbit - also one of the companies behind Israel's "security barrier" - has set up a deal with Boeing to construct the Department of Homeland Security's $2.5bn "virtual" border fence around the US.

Source.

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Vast Israeli inventivesness in the civil sector too

Sat-nav and voicemail are just two of the technologies born in a country approximately the size of Wales

Think of technological innovators and you think of Japan, Korea, the United States. Possibly Germany. You probably don't think of Israel. But you should - Israel produces more innovative ideas and new start-up companies than almost any other country in the world. Every time you send a text, or power up your sat-nav system to plan your route, you're using a piece of kit that has its roots in Israel. Not bad going for somewhere roughly the size of Wales, with a population of seven million, and which didn't even exist as a nation state 60 years ago.

In 2005, venture capital investment in Israel was US$1.34 billion - Britain, by comparison, has almost ten times the population but less than twice the venture-capital investment. This is due in part to the Israeli government, which contributes heavily towards funding start-up companies, and which has, for the past 10 years, run a venture-capital fund through the office of the chief scientist. It believed that if it kick-started funding domestically, foreign capital would follow.

The risk paid off: a Morgan Stanley report published in January showed that foreign capital flows to Israel rose from $3.2 billion in 2002 to $11.6 billion in 2005, and then to a massive $23.4 billion just a year later. There are 75 Israeli companies on the Nasdaq, more than from any other country except the US.

The reasons for Israel's success in the technology arena are complex [Rubbish! It's just another example of the power of IQ]. Cultural, social and political factors all play a role, as does the investment ploughed into the country's military, and the training and expertise acquired by Israelis through compulsory national service.

Ronen Saffer, chief technology officer at Telmap, a digital navigation company founded in Israel, blames fruit. "There's only so much you can do with oranges," he says. "We produced all we could out of those in the 1960s and 1970s, then we had to come up with something else in order to make a living." Telmap is the epitome of this new approach - it provides mapping software for the likes of AOL, Ericsson, Palm, Nokia and BlackBerry. Helen Davis, author of Israel in the World: Changing Lives Through Innovation, agrees. "There's no alternative. There are no natural resources at all, except what is between the ears of the country's people. That is Israel's only raw resource." .....

Many of the technologies used all over the world today were either invented or developed further in Israel, or by Israeli companies. From voice components developed for combat systems, an Israeli company called Efrat Systems created voicemail; eventually it became Comverse, one of the largest voicemail companies in the world today.

Instant messaging, an application used by millions today, came from a small Israeli business called Mirabilis, which developed a project called ICQ ("I seek you"). Vardi was the founder investor of Mirabilis, while his son was one of the three jobless youngsters who started the company. Less than two years after its formation, it was bought by AOL, which wanted ICQ. The instant-messaging craze was largely born out of this deal.

Unsurprisingly, much of this technology has its roots in the military, which focuses on developing cutting-edge hardware and software. Israel operates a system of compulsory military service, and students are cherry-picked by the military from high schools across the country in order to match conscripts to the roles that best utilise their talents.

Roy Timor-Rousso, vice president for product marketing at Fring, a VOIP company (VOIP allows you to make phone calls over the internet via services such as Skype) that has its roots in Israel, says: "The military can pick who it wants. A lot of young, very talented Israelis go through special units where they are exposed to a lot of responsibility, trained and given the top military technologies early on in their careers, while they are still creative."

Telmap's Ronen Saffer says that the military research and development budget has been responsible for developing things such as GPS, maps and communications technology. The people involved in creating these tools of war have had the foresight to understand their potential as everyday applications, and have gone about tweaking the technology for the mass consumer market upon being demobbed from the services.

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Another example of NYT deception here. This time by carefully selected images.

There's a link here to "Indoctrinate U" -- the film about Leftist bias in U.S. colleges and universities. You may not see it in a movie theatre near you. They will only have time for Michael Moore's latest bit of fact-free nastiness. The site does however have a way for you to request a local screening so that may do some good.

NYT slowly going broke: "Like some robber baron capitalist of yore, the New York Times is telling the remaining full price readers of its print product that they will pay more and get less, the same message it has been sending advertisers for years. But far from a sign of strength, this move is an indicator that the slow motion business collapse of the New York Times Company may be picking up its pace."

Duke 3 Want Nifong In Jail: "Beleaguered and disbarred former District Attorney Mike Nifong, who prosecuted the Duke University lacrosse rape case, could wind up in jail if a motion is granted asking that criminal charges be filed against him, FOX News has learned. The three Duke lacrosse players falsely accused of rape by a stripper plan to file the motion Friday against the ex-Durham County district attorney who built the case against them. If the motion asking for criminal sanctions against Nifong is granted, the prosecutor could land in prison. The players, who have been exonerated, are also asking for financial reimbursement."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here.

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".

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'Live and let live' is a foreign idea to the Left

Excerpt from Ted Nugent

Especially here in the great Republic of Texas, a smiling, drooling preference for succulent, protein-rich, nutritious backstrap over aromatic mesquite coals is as American and natural and right as Mom, apple pie and the flag. It's beautiful, really. But a culture war rages against such universal, self-evident truths. It would be laughable if it were not so deranged. Some weirdos actually are on a crusade to outlaw the consumption of flesh.

I have musical touring associates who have been fired from their jobs with ex-Beatle Paul McCartney for sneaking a hamburger. You heard that right. Fired for eating meat by an animal-rights maniac, hard-core vegan bass player. The entire agenda of the gazillion-dollar-financed joke known as PETA literally is dedicated to outlawing meat.

Neither I, nor any hunter or meat eater on the planet, has any desire whatsoever to influence any vegetarian's choice of diet or to force them to eat meat. We are the friendly, tolerant Americans. This is but one of many issues that represent the line drawn in the sand between liberals and conservatives.

Our own intrepid opinion editor at the Trib, my friend John Young, doesn't want to simply make the choice to be unarmed and helpless for himself. He has again recently insisted that you and I must also comply with his soulless condition of unarmed helplessness in "gun-free zones." Nobody from our side wants to force anybody to have a gun or defend themselves. It is us, the conservatives, who are for individual choice.

As for the American left: One hears the words of Mao Tse-Tung come broiling out of the mouths of its heroes, when Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton et al unflinchingly push for "redistribution of wealth." Central Texas' own Chet Edwards has the audacity to support taxing the after-tax life savings of American families following the death of a loved one. The unfair, un-American, unconstitutional death tax literally destroys mom-and-pop businesses across the land. Think about it.

The wall that once symbolized communism is down, yet some still want to give it a shot. Dear God in heaven, help us.

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ELSEWHERE

Charlie Foxtrot has a most graphic example of how the media manipulate the news.

Obama's macaca moment (or it would be if the media played it the same way it played Senator Allen): "'Obama Just Got Less 'Brown' Friendly,' reads the Indian American blog Sepia Mutiny. The US-India Political Action Community, having elicited one tepid pseudo-apology from the Barack Obama campaign, then demanded an acceptably contrite expression of contrition. Barack Obama's macaca moment is hardly the campaign killer that George Allen's proved to be, but the spectacle of a Kenyan Kansan would-be president deflecting criticism from pro-trade Indian Americans is at least more interesting. Last week, Obama's campaign sent out a not-for-attribution memo to media professionals, slamming Hillary Clinton for courting Indians and the Indian American Community. The dossier, delicately titled 'Hillary Clinton (D-Punjabs)'s Personal Financial and Political Ties to India,' suggests that Clinton's pro-trade, pro-India proclivities will compromise her commitment to Americans. It's Lou Dobbs-level rhetoric, straight from the platitudinous fluff-factory known as the Barack Obama Campaign. Obama has since apologized for the memo, calling it a 'screw-up on the part of our research team.'"

At Wal-Mart, a Back Door Into Banking : "Wal-Mart said yesterday that it would rapidly expand the financial services offered in its vast network of stores, extending the reach of its retailing empire into its shoppers' wallets and the traditional turf of the American banking industry. Over the next year, the company plans to introduce a prepaid debit card, intended for low-income consumers, and install money centers - which currently offer check cashing, bill paying and money order services - into at least 1,000 stores, up from 225 now. The moves are seen as a precursor to even wider offerings, like mortgages and home equity loans, which could turn Wal-Mart into a significant force in the banking world... The introduction of such services is something of an end run around the federal government, which was considering Wal-Mart's application to open a bank last year when the retailer withdrew its bid. The new products, like the prepaid debit card, will be offered through third-party partners, allowing Wal-Mart to sell banklike services without a government license. Given Wal-Mart's penchant for squeezing costs out of every business it enters - from changing oil to dispensing prescription drugs - the move is expected to jolt the financial services industry.... Analysts said there was ample evidence that Wal-Mart would lower the costs of banking in the United States. The chain has already cut the cost of cashing checks by 50 percent, and its financial services saved customers $245 million last year, according to company executives.

Bibi not losing focus on Iran: "Opposition leader and Likud Chairman Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday will embark for the U.S. on a visit aimed at increasing financial sanctions against Iran to get it to drop its nuclear program. During his visit, Netanyahu is slated to meet a New York State financial official, asking him to withdraw or freeze hundreds of millions of dollars the state pension funds have invested in Iran. Netanyahu will then arrive in Washington where he will meet for talks on the Iranian issue with Vice President Dick Cheney, Democratic Party presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton, and Republican Party presidential hopeful Fred Thompson. The Likud chairman was recently involved in Florida's State assembly's passing a law sanctioning investments in Iran."

Brits lose another al Qaeda suspect after turning him loose with a "control order" : "A suspected Al Qaeda recruiting sergeant is on the loose in Britain after becoming the seventh control order suspect to abscond. The Iraqi asylum seeker, a follower of dead Al Qaeda warlord Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, vanished from his home on Monday. His disappearance leaves the policy of using control orders to monitor terror suspects in tatters. A minister admitted that the orders cannot prevent "determined" suspects escaping. The missing man is alleged to have been part of a six-man recruitment team sent to Britain by Al Qaeda in Iraq to enlist volunteers to join attacks on British and U.S. troops serving there. He managed to gain a foothold here by claiming to be fleeing persecution in Iraq."

Scottish nationalism peeping out: "This, apparently, is the beginning of Scotland and Northern Ireland becoming a force or, maybe, two forces in the world: asking for more money from the poor benighted English taxpayer. It is at times like this that I begin to appreciate the arguments in favour of an English parliament, though I remain at heart a Unionist. Anyway, so far Alex Salmond, temporary leader of the Scottish Assembly (his share of the vote is considerably less than overwhelming) has not said anything of any interest on his ideas for foreign policy, beyond pointing out that the Nordic countries have an alliance and it has a certain clout in the world. Of course, the Nordic countries pay for their own alliances and diplomatic services. One assumes that is at the heart of this and subsequent statements. Scotland wants its own diplomatic service and its own negotiators. Who will pay for this? Need you ask?"

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here.

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".

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