GOOD STUFF FROM THE LATEST CITY JOURNAL

Theodore Dalrymple thinks backwardness and aggression is built into Islam: "the problem begins with Islam's failure to make a distinction between church and state. Unlike Christianity.. Islam was from its inception both church and state, one and indivisible, with no possible distinction between temporal and religious authority... In the West, the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment ... liberated individual men to think for themselves, and thus set in motion an unprecedented and still unstoppable material advancement. Islam, with no separate, secular sphere where inquiry could flourish free from the claims of religion, if only for technical purposes, was hopelessly left behind: as, several centuries later, it still is. The indivisibility of any aspect of life from any other in Islam is a source of strength, but also of fragility and weakness, for individuals as well as for polities. Where all conduct, all custom, has a religious sanction and justification, any change is a threat to the whole system of belief. Certainty that their way of life is the right one thus coexists with fear that the whole edifice-intellectual and political- will come tumbling down if it is tampered with in any way. Intransigence is a defense against doubt and makes living on terms of true equality with others who do not share the creed impossible."

Dalrymple also has an article on the complete collapse of any sexual morality among the British working class. Sexually active girls aged 11 seem to be seen as normal.

The conflict between privacy and the intelligence-gathering needed for national security: "The privocrats only grudgingly acknowledge that terrorism exists, and they never concede that a gain in the public good may justify a concession in "privacy." Their operating principle can only be formulated as: no use of computer data or technology anywhere at any time for national defense, if there's the slightest possibility that a rogue use of that technology will offend someone's sense of privacy.

VD Hanson thinks the USA has brought Islamic attacks on itself by being too weak in its response to the many attacks BEFORE 9/11: "in the decade since 1991 the Middle East saw us as a great power that neither could nor would use its strength to advance its ideas-that lacked even the intellectual confidence to argue for our civilization before the likes of a tenth-century monarchy. The autocratic Arab world neither respects nor fears a democratic United States, because it rightly senses that we often talk in principled terms but rarely are willing to invest the time, blood, and treasure to match such rhetoric with concrete action".

Kay Hymowitz says America's youth are returning to traditional values: "Yessiree, family values are hot! Capitalism is cool! Seven-grain bread is so yesterday, and red meat is back! Wave away the colored smoke of the Jackson family circus, Paris Hilton, and the antics of San Francisco, and you can see how Americans have been self-correcting from a decades-long experiment with "alternative values" ... During the last ten years, most of the miserable trends in crime, divorce, illegitimacy, drug use, and the like that we saw in the decades after 1965 either turned around or stalled. Today Americans are consciously, deliberately embracing ideas about sex, marriage, children, and the American dream that are coalescing into a viable-though admittedly much altered-sort of bourgeois normality. What is emerging is a vital, optimistic, family-centered, entrepreneurial, and yes, morally thoughtful, citizenry."

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An excellent summary of American "liberalism" from Keith Burgess-Jackson: "Please keep in mind that I was a liberal for a long time. I know the liberal mentality and tactics. Liberals have no shame. They're unfulfilled totalitarians. Their only goal, despite their declared concern for the disadvantaged, is power. Think about it. If liberals truly cared about the disadvantaged, as they say they do, they'd dispose of their wealth. There are enough wealthy liberals in this country to feed, clothe, shelter, and medicate every poor person. Don't hold your breath waiting for this to happen. The Kennedys are still wealthy, aren't they? John Kerry is more than happy to take advantage of the Heinz fortune. Liberals insist on forcing others to pay for their hare-brained social-engineering schemes. This suggests that they're driven by envy and spite, not benevolence".

Interesting that even a heavily biased Leftist author is arguing that U.S. "liberalism" was optimistic and forward looking under the Kennedys but that it now is dark and gloomy. He says that conservatives are the new optimists. (But then again Kennedy was pretty conservative in many ways!)

Arab Fascists: "O'Rourke told his audience that the Ba'athists were, quite simply, fascists--and that "the purpose of fascism is to turn people into a mob". A mob, of course, will eagerly do the unspeakable, things no individual would dream of doing. Hence Fallujah."

I have not been following the media brouhaha about Justic Scalia "ordering" the erasure of a tape but Peg Kaplan has the goods.

Individual Thoughts has a lot of good posts up. He deserves more readers.

My recipe for today is another Thai favourite. Thais have a brilliant cuisine. This is stir-fried chicken with wood fungus! It tastes as good as it sounds bad. See here.

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

America is engaged in a titanic struggle with hate. The American Left hate America, much of Europe hates America and, most of all, the Islamic fundamentalists hate America. Fortunately America is -- in every sense -- the world's strongest country.

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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ABORTION

Abortion realities "In my four pregnancies - the first of which ended in a traumatic five-month miscarriage, the last three of which resulted in gorgeous, healthy children - I always felt, right from the start, that this was someone else taking up residence within me. Never did I imagine this was "my body" or my property to dispose of as I wished. Equally, it was not my husband's. This was not abstract Life, with a capital L; this was someone else's fragile and vulnerable life, growing slowly. The terrible grief I felt at the miscarriage was not because my body had evacuated a waste product, but because I mourned a human spirit never to be incarnated, who would never be, never know this world. And when my living children were born, I was overwhelmed not only by their beauty, but also by their otherness. They were not me, and never had been, from the very moment of their conception."

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Comment from a reader: "I don't know if you had a chance to see the Condi Rice testimony this week. I thought the Democrats' treatment of her was rather revealing. Ms Rice is an extremely accomplished person - at one time she was the youngest Provost of Stanford University, and she worked in the previous Bush administration as a Soviet expert. She is intelligent, eloquent, attractive, modest, and a strong advocate for her positions. She is at this moment the most powerful black woman in the world, and to my knowledge has not gotten anything via affirmative action. I would have thought that the Democrat left would view her as an example of exactly the kind of people they hoped would emerge from the black community after they forced down the barriers of discrimination. Instead, they attacked her credibility. Cartoonists mocked her. It demonstrated vividly that Leftists really don't care about black people, or any of the other groups they claim to champion. They are only tools the Left uses to gain and hold power".

Gutless Bishop: "Democrat John Kerry -- a pro-choice Catholic whose abortion views have prompted some Catholic leaders to say they want to bar him from Communion -- yesterday received the sacrament during Easter Mass in Boston. ... St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke and Nebraska Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz say they'd refuse Communion to Kerry. Boston Archbishop Sean O'Malley has said all pro-choice officials should voluntarily 'refrain' from Communion but has refused to comment on Kerry specifically." Not a patch on Thomas a Beckett.

Falluja: "The United States last night robustly defended its controversial siege of Falluja which has cost the lives of more than 600 people over the past week, by claiming most of those who died were militants picked off with precision by US marines.

Leftist racism: "another form of not-so-crypto-racism: the tendency of Western liberals to lower the moral bar for Palestinians and others in the Middle East. How else can we explain the dearth of speechless outrage in the face of recent events? When Fallujah erupts, when "insurgents" (read: savages) threaten to burn innocent people alive, the response in the New York Times is an op-ed sneering at the administration"

Revel: "The anti-American cult provides its legions of drooling adherents with the crucial element of any faith: the illusion of meaning in an otherwise meaningless existence. That priceless psychological salve, in this case, is the comforting delusion that, no matter how hypocritical, backward, bigoted, ignorant, corrupt or cowardly the cult's followers might otherwise be, at least they are better than those awful Americans..... Thirty-four years ago, Revel was "astonished by evidence that everything Europeans were saying about the US was false"; sadly, this situation has not changed in the slightest in the intervening time".

Aside from their Iraq policy, the Australian Labor party does seem to be moving rightwards. First, they defied the soft line on illegal immigration passionately espoused by their own Left-wing. Second, Labor has made an unexpected "about face" on the failed organization for blacks that it itself created. And now the femocrats are losing out in favour of families.

Socialized medicine again: "Up to 55 per cent of patients needing admission to emergency departments are being forced to wait more than eight hours for a hospital bed, new figures show." Fortunately, Australia has a large private medical system as well.

Dick McDonald has just put up a lot of good posts. I liked this one on the advantages of federalism: "The minute Tiger Woods turned pro, he moved from California to Florida. Only the blind won't recognize that rather than pay California income tax of $10 Million per year, why not move to Florida that doesn't impose any income tax?" In Australia a similar thing happened. My home State of Queensland abolished inheritance taxes. Result? Elderly Australians flocked here. Upshot? The other States had to abolish their inheritance taxes too!

My recipe for today is a Thai classic: Larb moo. It is their version of savoury pork mince. Simple, quick and tasty. See here.

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

America is engaged in a titanic struggle with hate. The American Left hate America, much of Europe hates America and, most of all, the Islamic fundamentalists hate America. Fortunately America is -- in every sense -- the world's strongest country.

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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SOME HISTORY

Interesting historical comment from a reader: "Europe is startlingly different from the rest of the world when it comes to intellectual and social development. It is not that it "got lucky" once with Britain's industrial revolution. It has repeatedly developed structures and ideas which have not existed elsewhere. We find this in the intellectual and political ideas of classical Greece, the Roman Republic and Empire, the papacy, the Renaissance, the Reformation, Parliamentary government, the enlightenment and the industrial and scientific revolutions".

Maturin sees Napoleon as a kind of early Stalin: "Yes, I do agree with Maturin. Buonaparte did France -a country that he hated as a youth- very great harm indeed, not only because he brought about the death of vast numbers of Frenchmen, far more than even Louis XIV, but because he left the country with a curiously vulgar notion of glory, which Louis did not. I do not think he restored French national identity at all, but superimposed upon it a trashy chauvinism that is still sadly active"

Ludwig von Mises writing in 1944 on Marxism and Nazism: "The Nazis have not only imitated the Bolshevist tactics of seizing power. They have copied much more. They have imported from Russia the one-party system and the privileged role of this party and its members in public life; the paramount position of the secret police; the organization of affiliated parties abroad which are employed in fighting their domestic governments and in sabotage and espionage, assisted by public funds and the protection of the diplomatic and consular service; the administrative execution and imprisonment of political adversaries; concentration camps; the punishment inflicted on the families of exiles; the methods of propaganda. They have borrowed from the Marxians even such absurdities as the mode of address, party comrade (Parteigenosse), derived from the Marxian comrade (Genosse), and the use of a military terminology for all items of civil and economic life. The question is not in which respects both systems are alike but in which they differ..."

V.D. Hanson on General Patton in World War II: "D'Este was too much the scholar not to see that beneath Patton's repugnant crudity there was both talent and, in the end, humanity- and a tactical genius that simply overshadowed Eisenhower's and Bradley's combined... Sixty years later, however, it is hard to see as all that crazy Patton's claim that World War II had started to save Eastern Europe from autocracy, and had ended by consigning it to autocracy."

Steve Sailer points out that farm labour organiser Cesar Chavez has been adopted as a hero by pro-illegal immigration lobby in the US. Yet in fact Chavez was opposed to illegals at both a philosophical and practical level. ""Cesar Chavez, a labor leader intent on protecting union membership, was as effective a surrogate for the INS as ever existed. Indeed, Chavez and the United Farm Workers Union he headed routinely reported, to the INS, for deportation, suspected illegal immigrants who served as strikebreakers or refused to unionize.""

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An amazing email from a reader here about the "energy vampires" at UCLA. It shows that Leftism is just deadly to any intellectual or academic standards -- not to mention common-sense. I guess Leftists never have been very good at distinguishing fantasy from reality.

Further to my mention yesterday of Killington, Vermont -- where a whole town wants to leave a high tax State -- Interested Participant has a post on the same subject. He notes that the citizens in Killington are primarily East Coast "liberals" who believe in income redistribution, just as long as it's not their income that's being redistributed!

Jeff Jacoby summarizes what the current post mortem into the 9/11 events shows: "Everyone got it wrong before 9/11". It would take a Leftist not to see that.

Now that the "antisemitic" characterization of THAT movie seems to have worn thin, the criticism that one hears most at the moment seems to be that it is "sado-masochistic". A reader comments: "My guess is that the "S-M" accusation is actually someone's idea of what they think is a clever bit of conservative-Christian baiting. The clever-dick movie critics must think that calling something "S-M" will shock conservative Christians or suburban mums & dads away from seeing Mel's movie. As if they read movie reviews anyhow."

I have just put up here a selection of Chris Brand's most recent postings. From them, one gathers that there does seem to have been a real awakening in Britain -- even on the Left -- about the big problems being caused there by hordes of unassimilating and mostly illegal Muslim immigrants. Rather amazingly, multiculturalism is now being officially disowned, in fact. The awakening is very late in the day -- as is usual for the British -- but if words are transformed into action soon, some return to the previous quality of life in Britain may be possible. To see all of Chris's recent postings, go to the BOTTOM of his page here.

My recipe for today is for Vietnamese lemon chicken. It is NOTHING like Chinese lemon chicken -- it is miles better in my view. Despite the proliferation of Vietnamese restaurants, you will rarely find it there. Perhaps they keep the best for themselves. It is quick to cook, too. See here.

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

********************************

The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

America is engaged in a titanic struggle with hate. The American Left hate America, much of Europe hates America and, most of all, the Islamic fundamentalists hate America. Fortunately America is -- in every sense -- the world's strongest country.

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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YET MORE ECONOMICS

Federalism fights taxes:"Ronald Reagan said people vote with their feet. They choose to live where there is more freedom. This was most striking when he pointed to those fleeing communism in Cuba and the old Soviet Union. But Reagan also pointed to taxpayers moving from state to state for more economic freedom. And he was right. There has been significant migration to states without an income tax, for example. But have you ever heard of a whole town wanting to move? Welcome to Killington, Vermont."

Unfair distribution "Last week a woman ranted at me about the unequal and unfair distribution of wealth in this country. Her attitude is widely held. There are several errors in logic contained in this lament... In a way we are lucky to have lived through the century that saw such monumental foolishness exposed for what it is. Too bad some slow witted folks still don't get it."

Lord Bauer was right: "It is tempting to think that aid can be targeted to countries with good policies and have a positive impact. However, once we recognize that all aid is political, since it is government-to-government assistance, we should not be surprised that it has either no effect on development or a negative effect. Moreover, the World Bank continues to give substantial aid to countries with poor policies."

Globalization and free trade "Freedom of trade is really a very simple concept. Each individual should be at liberty to buy from and sell to whomever he wishes on mutually agreed-upon terms. Whether the partners to this trade live next door to each other or are separated by thousands of miles should make absolutely no difference to the logic of the idea."

Ignoring the fear-mongering about outsourcing: "From the way some people talk in this political season, you'd think all the good jobs are being shipped to India, leaving nothing for Americans to do but flip hamburgers and shine shoes. Don't expect to hear sensible talk about economics in an election year. It doesn't fit into sound bites."

Last week, Senate Democrats successfully filibustered the nation's most important anti-poverty measure -- welfare reform. It is thus Democrats who are effectively opposed to lifting people out of poverty and, in the process, make insulting assumptions about minorities, particularly minority women. The success of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act is now so well-established that its liberal doubters are increasingly pathetic flat-earthers. Welfare rolls nationwide have fallen by roughly 60 percent since the mid-1990s.

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A recent show on "Dateline NBC" called "Pattern of Suspicion" (summarized here by the Left-leaning Seattle PI) repeated the old allegations that "driving while black" is an offence in the eyes of American police. Former police officer Mike Tremoglie is something of an expert on that allegation and he emailed them as follows: "Your report - like the issue itself - was replete with fallacies and deceptions. For example, you extensively interviewed David Harris. However, you did not identify that Mr. Harris claims to be the leading authority about racial profiling YET HAS SAID HIMSELF, *** "I lack the kind of systematically gathered and analyzed data anyone making such a statement would prefer to have. This is because virtually no one . has ever kept comprehensive statistics on who police stop . there may be race-neutral explanations for the statistical pattern (racial disparity in traffic stops)" *** Since this did not comport with your preconceived notions you did not report this. As I said I have written about this issue and would be glad to provide you with more information. However, given the prejudicial tone of your report and the fact that you have a history of contrived and staged reporting ( i.e. your reports about GM gas tanks, tractor trailer drivers, and loggers in Idaho just to name a few) I do not think that is likely."

The State will protect you: "A grade 1 girl was sent home with her father just hours after he knocked her to the ground at her Brisbane school. Teachers, parents and students watched as the man struck the girl, believed to be aged five. Several blows to the face and head drove the child to the ground. A witness said the man then picked her up and hit her again. The attack was at St Edward's Catholic school at Daisy Hill in Brisbane's south on Tuesday morning. Alerted by a teacher and at least two parents who saw the incident, the school's principal Mike Norris notified the Department of Family Services and police.After interviewing the child, her father and Mr Norris, authorities ruled it was safe for her to go home that afternoon. The decision to allow the child to return to her father so soon after the attack has outraged child protection workers"

The libertarian solution -- a private army emerges in Iraq "Under assault by insurgents and unable to rely on U.S. and coalition troops for intelligence or help under duress, private security firms in Iraq have begun to band together in the past 48 hours, organizing what may effectively be the largest private army in the world, with its own rescue teams and pooled, sensitive intelligence. Many of the firms were hired by the U.S. government to protect its employees in Iraq."

An interesting comment from a reader noting that GWB's national security staff in the run-up to 9/11 were mostly holdovers from the Clinton presidency.

My recipe today is for one of my favourite foods: Spanish Paella. It takes a bit of time to cook but it is worth it. See here.

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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Dick McDonald has picked up on a good point from Condoleezza Rice's recent 9/11 testimony. She pointed out that it took many years for America to become fully democratic -- i.e. a place that treated blacks as people -- so it was absurd to expect an overnight transformation to mature democracy in Iraq.

MORE ECONOMICS

The socialist love of the State still flourishes: "A famous theory about taxes has it that wealth belongs to society and taxation merely determines how much of it the citizenry may use. This is what is argued in The Myth of Ownership by co-authors Thomas Nagel and Liam Murphy (Oxford, 2002). You and I do not own even our labor. It belongs to society and government is in charge of telling what we get to use and what remains in its coffers. According to this socialist view of wealth, there are no private property rights at all, only government grants."

There is a most illuminating and very fully referenced article here about the "Dickensian" British factory system of the 19th century and how it "abused" child labour. Economic historian Bill Hutt shows that the accounts of the system we almost always hear come from its opponents -- the romantics and do-gooders of the day. And that more objective evidence is readily available that shows factory work to have been the preferred employment of the day -- as it was "lighter" (less physically demanding) and better paid than the main alternative then available -- agricultural labour. And the health of factory workers was at least no worse than that of the general community at the time.

Icelandic blogger Willy Sutton has a good lesson in pictorial economics up. It takes a little while to load all the pictures but they certainly educate

Outsourcing is a natural force in the free market "Free markets provide what the great economic historian Joseph Schumpeter called a process of 'creative destruction.' Always dynamic, always progressive, free markets constantly generate new products, new jobs, and new wealth on the foundations of earlier creations. In the end, they replace these earlier creations. Free markets propel society forward."

Corruption: "To put it in very simple words, countries that have a free market policy are the least corrupt, whereas countries that are dependant on government are the most corrupt. This then is the simple truth about corruption. ... The government is not the solution for corruption, but it is definitely the precursor of corruption."

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Is there anything John Kerry won't say? "Democrat John Kerry said yesterday that if he is elected president, he will not let government programs outside of security and education grow beyond the rate of inflation. Kerry pledged to abide by spending caps, even if it means cutting some of his own campaign promises and existing government programs."

Australian Labor Party leader Mark Latham has really blotted his copybook by calling for Australia to do a Spain and withdraw its troops from Iraq. Not only is the Australian public generally against it but so are many Leftists. Even such rabid Leftists as Margo Kingston are now urging Latham to keep the troops in: "I don't know about you, but when I saw Latham say we had to bring our 850 troops home after June 30 "to defend Australia" I was disgusted. Pure populism it was, and I thought Australians would see through it big time, which they have.... Is Latham really saying the danger to Australia is so acute that we need 850 troops to join the 51,0000 troops stationed in Australia? That's scare mongering at its worst. As Howard rightly said speaking to his motion in the House of Representatives today that troops should not be withdrawn before the job is done, that would mean hauling back our troops from East Timor and the Solomons too. Stupid. .... But we did invade, and we're there now trying to secure the peace, a vital task for the West to stop Iraq being over run by al Qaeda and company."

With a film about the Alamo just released, the WSJ reminds us of the point that the Left would seemingly like us to forget: "Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, in the inclusive view, is a neutral figure, even though he set himself up as a military dictator after being elected president of Mexico in 1833 and jailed those who peaceably petitioned to protest his violations of the 1824 constitution. And then there was his brutal putting down of the rebellion in Texas. Lest we forget, the rebels who captured San Antonio and the Alamo against superior forces were trying to separate themselves from Santa Anna's dictatorship. His efforts to curtail-- if not obliterate-- trade, immigration and democracy are what sparked the rebellion in the first place.

See here for a typical Leftist bleat about "poverty" being the cause of Islamic terrorism -- together with a pointed reply from one of my readers.

A good last word on Spain: "Climaxing over three centuries of defeat and decline on the world stage, Spaniards bowed to terrorism when they voted. Americans are considerably less likely to make that choice".

The wicked one has an idea that Texans should like.

Today's recipe is for Parsee Pillau. Forget fried rice. Forget steamed rice. This is the best rice. Goes well with any Indian food. See here.

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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SOME ECONOMICS

"The number of people filing new claims for unemployment benefits dropped last week to the lowest level in more than three years" -- and that's only part of the good news: "It turns out that since last May, when all of the president's tax cuts finally got implemented, the payroll survey finds 675,000 new jobs. Here's the kicker- that's the pessimistic survey; the one that tends to miss new start-ups because it's based on established businesses. The other one, the household survey, shows an increase since last spring's tax cut of almost 800,000 new jobs. Some "jobless recovery", huh?"

Globalization fights high taxes: "In a competitive global economy, the United States cannot continue to ignore the mounting costs of doing business at home. Other countries are liberalizing their economies, providing a more business-friendly environment. Ireland is a perfect example of a tax-friendly country. The government reduced its corporate tax rate from 16 percent to 12.5 percent in 2003, well below the EU average rate of 30 percent and lower than the 35 percent federal rate in the United States."

Marginal Revolution points out that the NY Times has started to talk some common sense about trying to impose international child labour standards: "It's appalling that Abakr, like tens of millions of other children abroad, is working instead of attending school. But prohibiting child labor wouldn't do him any good, for there's no school in the area for him to attend.... And that's the problem when Americans get on their high horses about child labor, without understanding the cruel third world economics that cause it."

Overlooked factor in oil hike: Falling dollar: "Gasoline and heating-oil prices in the US are at an all-time high and rising. But it may surprise Americans to learn that in Europe, they've essentially remained steady. Why the cost difference? Experts have a lot of good reasons to explain it, among them unrest in the Middle East, gas-guzzling cars, and greed among oil-producing nations. But there is another culprit that is being ignored and that is making the problem far, far worse in the US: the decline in the value of the dollar."

There is a rather depressing article here about the vast damage FDR's "New Deal" did to the American economy in the 1930s. What made the "Great" depression "great"? Why did it last so much longer than previous depressions? Mainly it was the anti-business economic interventions of FDR and his Congressional allies. FDR was of course a great admirer of his fellow Leftist economic bungler, Benito Mussolini.

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More glories of socialized medicine: Sharon Brophy was just 34 when she died waiting for treatment in Campbelltown Hospital emergency department. The hospital's records say that Ms Brophy arrived at 1pm and was assessed by a triage nurse. However, another patient who arrived at 1pm says that Ms Brophy was already there. The same witness says that some time before 1.30pm Ms Brophy had approached the receptionist and said something like: "I feel really, really sick, can I please see a doctor?" When Ms Brophy was told she would have to wait longer, as emergency patients were being treated, she replied that she was going to be sick and went into the nearby toilet. By Mrs Madden's account, at 2pm a woman with a toddler walked into the waiting room from another part of the hospital and went into the toilet. "She came out and told the receptionist there was a woman collapsed in the toilet. That's when everybody came running out of emergency." Brigitte Ashford ... also heard Ms Brophy approach the receptionist for help. "She said, 'Please I feel really sick, I feel like I'm going to pass out, can I have somewhere to lie down.' She [the receptionist] just said, 'You wait your turn'."

If you have not seen it already, this letter from a soldier in the middle of the current Iraqi strife is a much-needed corrective to what the sensationalist media are telling us -- as is his earlier backgrounder on what is going on. Where do the mainstream media tell us: "Every day the Iraqi people stream out into the streets to cheer and wave at us as we drive by. When I'm on a foot patrol, walking among a crowd, countless people thank us -- repeatedly"?

It looks like Israel is beginning to use the Muslim horror of pigs to good advantage. Putting lard (pig fat) on buses could mean an end to bus bombings. "Though the pig is considered a defiled animal strictly forbidden in Jewish dietary laws, the Muslims forbid any contact with the animal. Any contact with the pig is punishable by denial of entry to paradise."

Carnival of the Vanities is up again with a big range of selected readiing

My recipe for today is an old Australian country recipe for rabbit pie. See here. As Mrs Beeton nearly said: "First catch your rabbit..."

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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FROM BROOKES NEWS

Getting it right on recessions and the 'wealth effect' If anyone wants the real explanation for our housing boom they need look no further than the Reserve Bank of Australia's monetary aggregates that show M1 rising from 81,943 in January 1996 to 162,135 in January 2004.
They Kill Only Jews It's illogical to try and negotiate with a culture of people who, in large part, have become 'killing machines.' At the very least, they believe in a creed of evil and death.
Bunny Champers takes on Professor Krugman over terrorism During the whole ten years of Clinton's presidency Wankerman -- or is it Krugman -- never once attacked Clinton for not tackling bin Laden, Saddam or the Taliban, despite the number of terrorist attacks against the US.
Reporter does hit job on Condi Rice The leftwing Marian Wilkinson, Washington correspondent for the Sydney Morning Herald (aka The Saddam Times), has dropped any pretence at objectivity to become a media mouthpiece for the Democrats.
Washington Post lefties try to stitch up Condi Rice Leftwing journalists are worse than hyenas when they think they smell Republican blood. Dana Milbank and Walter Pincus of the Washington Post wrote as if there was something unusual if not sinister in Condi Rice's refusal to testify in front of the 9/11 commission.
Pincus and Milbank: the low-down on two Washington Post Bush-hating reporters During the Clinton years walter Pincus was consider to a mouthpiece for NSA adviser Sandy Berger who was also a former China lobbyist. Pincus' was wife also a Clinton Administration official. On two occasions Pincus was given time off by the Washington Post to work for J. W. Fulbright.

Details here

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The French connived at genocide! How surprising for a nation with such a high moral tone! "Rwanda's President Paul Kagame launched a new attack on Paris in a speech to mark the genocide's 10th anniversary. He accused the French of arming and training the extremist Hutu government in power in 1994 and of being aware that they intended to commit genocide".

Air America, the new liberal talk radio network, is sending minorities to the back of the bus. The network, owned by former Democratic National Committee executive Mark Walsh, debuted March 31. Ironically, the three radio stations broadcasting Air America's programs were all stations with formats featuring black and Hispanic culture. By preempting black and Hispanic cultural programs to promote their own ideology, Air America is very much in concert with the liberal policy of using minorities for their own purposes.... Now instead of communicating the needs and concerns of minorities they communicate the needs and concerns of rich white people. Instead of employing minorities they employ white liberals -- about 90% of Air America's hosts are white people.

"I suppose it would be considered lacking in nuance to nuke the Sunni Triangle. But so goes the unanimous vote around my household - and I'm betting millions of others - in the aftermath of what forevermore will be remembered simply as "Fallujah" ... If we were but creatures like those zoo animals we witnessed gleefully jumping up and down after stomping, dragging, dismembering and hanging the charred remains of American civilians whose only crime was to try to help them".

Econometricians have discovered that racially diverse areas are more crime prone: "The results from my econometric analysis confirm the predictions of my industrial organization theory of racial competition. The theory suggests that diversity increases both inter and intra-racial crime as racial groups compete."

There are some pretty amazing quotes from animal liberationists over at Mosaic. Here's one: ""The life of an ant and the life of my child should be granted equal consideration."

Arlene Peck: "Europeans aren't just after Israel, they're after the USA too. They know you don't negotiate with people whose only reason for living is killing. Yet, terrorism is terrorism, everywhere in the world. Except of course, when it happens in Israel. Then, it s reported as "incidents"... the Jewish State is fighting a real, honest-to-goodness war.... I think, however, that we in the United States are finally beginning to realize that Israel's problem is now a global one."

Iraq's new constitution is a gem: "IF I were a terrorist interested in Iraqi affairs, I would certainly reach for the plastique after reading Iraq's interim constitution because it would make me feel insecure, if not desperate."

Dick McDonald has bitten the bullet and started his own blog. It is early days yet but he already has some good reading up. He hasn't mastered hyperlinks yet but he is working on it.

The wicked one has put a lot of jokes up lately.

My recipe for today is for a salad with a difference: Parsee Kachumbar (onion salad). It goes well with any Indian food but particularly well with Parsee Dhansak -- for which I also gave the recipe recently. See here.

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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"OUTSOURCING" AND FREE TRADE

Is the attack on "Outsourcing" Leftist racism?: "Media bias is sometimes found not only in what makes it into print but also what doesn't. This is evident in the campaign theme of "outsourcing." There probably isn't a Democratic politician who hasn't used the term to attack President Bush, and this has resulted in a flurry of news stories about the subject. But in all the media coverage, have you heard anyone refer to outsourcing as a "racial code word"? For the uninitiated, racial code words are words politicians (usually Republicans) are accused of using to supposedly help them win votes by raising whites' fears of minorities. ... To the extent that outsourcing is a racial code word, the code isn't all that secretive. An organization calling itself Make America Work For Us, which is affiliated with the 527 group Media Fund, is running an attack ad that begins, "During the past three years, it's true that George W. Bush has created more jobs. Unfortunately, they were created in places like China." As the commercial proceeds, the camera pans out to reveal a factory covered with Chinese symbols. One can only imagine the outrage that would occur if a conservative group had run such an ad."

Call center employees replaced by lower-wage workers in India don't "deserve" to lose their jobs. But that does not mean they have a right to keep them, any more than candle makers had a right to block electric lighting or blacksmiths had a right to prevent the introduction of the automobile. In all of these cases, the need to make a profit in the face of competition drove people to produce better goods or services or to produce them more cheaply. The upshot of this process has been lower prices, higher productivity and a standard of living unparalleled in history. Economic progress requires a constant shifting of resources to their most productive uses

Fighting back on outsourcing: "What has been seriously lacking in the outsourcing debate thus far is hard data. Now, at last, we are starting to get some serious studies with good numbers. They paint a very different picture of the outsourcing phenomenon ..Global Insight found that the total number of jobs lost to IT outsourcing last year was only 104,000; this amounts to just 2.8 percent of IT jobs in the United States. A much larger number were lost due to unrelated factors, including the collapse of the dot-com boom in 2000, the recession, and rising productivity. The most important finding of the Global Insight study is that the cost savings from outsourcing don't just flow into higher corporate profits. They contribute significantly to higher output in the United States, which leads to job increases elsewhere in the economy"

The hot-button issue for the Democratic Party this year is "outsourcing," the latest political euphemism that seeks to stigmatize companies voting with their feet and escaping high taxes and onerous regulations that drive up the cost of labor, increase the cost of capital and drive down rates of return on investment... The enemy of American jobs is not Japan, India or China, but rather stupid policy made in Washington, D.C. Therefore, a more apt metaphor is "refugee CEOs" who are fleeing punitive government policies that hurt both capital and labor.

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John Leo points out that the recent activities of The Anti-Defamation League (the best-known American Jewish organization) include support for abortion and gay rights, backing the effort to remove Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore from the bench in the Ten Commandments case, and opposing school vouchers in Washington, D.C. One might also note its role as a critic of THAT Christian film and conclude that organized American Jewry just does not know what side it's bread is buttered on -- considering that conservative Christians are the bedrock of America's support for Israel and considering that many Leftists are once again openly antisemitic (as they were in Hitler's day). John Leo goes on to point out however that the ADL is only one example of a special interest group that has drifted Left over time. I guess that a narrow mental focus just IS Leftist.

There is a good summary here of what a treasure the world has in Israel.

It's only a "lie" if a Republican says it: "When John Kerry says he supports the Kyoto Treaty even though he voted for a bill that declared the United States would never ever ratify it, that doesn't mean he's a 'liar,' it just means that ... well, to be honest, I haven't a clue what it means. You better to take it up with him."

There's no mystery why there are so few male teachers. Take this case. A male teacher was sacked because of accusations of sexual impropriety even though a court agreed that there was no evidence of impropriety. Who would want to risk entering a system as unjust as that?

Today's recipe is a simple way to make a hearty meal of chili con carne. See here.

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH and POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH

********************************

The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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NEW BLOG

A lot of the postings I have put up recently concern Greenie issues so I have decided to give such postings a blog of their own. You can find it here. Greens and Leftists have a lot in common in that they both want to use the power of the state for pervasive and irrational interference with other people's lives. Neither gives a damn for individual liberty. But their motivations differ. Where the Leftist ideologue's main aim is to make himself look warm and wise and wonderful (in the absence of any real claims in that direction) Greenie ideologues are frank misanthropists. They hate and despise people and are not slow to say so. The Leftist by contrast at least keeps up a pretence about caring for other people. As the old summary of Leftist thought says: "I love humanity. It's just people I can't stand". So the two types of would-be tyrant do deserve separate consideration.



SOME "FORGOTTEN" HISTORY

Amusing: Richard Wolin's book, The Seduction of Unreason appears to be a good critique of postmodernist irrationality but he makes his book politically correct by noting -- correctly -- that in the 1930s what we now call postmodernism was primarily a Fascist doctrine. So he says that postmodernism is "Rightist" too, you see: It is not only a mental confusion of the Left. The fact that Fascism was a development of Marxism and that Hitler was a socialist seem to be "forgotten" by Wolin. It would indeed be surprising if a Rightist philosophy suddenly became the guiding light of the Left but no such thing has happened. "Postmodern" thinking has ALWAYS been a Leftist escape-hatch from reality. Although both Marxism and Fascism may be long dead in most people's minds, both are variants of socialism and both still flourish among Leftist intellectuals -- not that they are honest about it, of course.

There is an interesting article on the "forgotten" George Schuyler in Policy Review. Schuyler was an astringent black conservative writer and satirist who ridiculed the claim that black art was distinctive: "Schuyler argued that black artists in America were equally as diverse as white artists, and that to expect a uniform style or subject matter was as insulting as the stereotypes that were being rejected." He was also a conservative within the NAACP who fought that organisation's socialist ways from within". Called one of the great anti-communist writers of the 20th century, he has now largely been airbrushed from the historical record for not conforming to black victimhood.

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Wow! The New York Times has really goofed again. Have they got a second Jayson Blair? In this story about Australia's tough stance against illegal immigration their fact-checking seems to be non-existent. They say that Australia "turned away a leaking refugee boat called the Tampa". What a laugh! The Tampa was a well-found Norwegian container ship. And only the NYT thinks it was leaking! They also say of Australia's policy: "many Australians say the price has been too high and the damage to Australia's image incalculable". So how many is "many"? I guess 20 people out of Australia's 20 million would be "many" to some. The Australian electorate certainly gave its conservative government a crashing election win over the policy. And as far as other countries are concerned, from what I have seen, almost anybody who has heard of it envies Australia's tough policy. And the "prominent Sydney lawyer" they quote is of course a well-known Leftist advocate for the illegal immigrants concerned. The whole article is sheer propaganda that would do Dr. Goebbels proud.

Capitalism has been good to China From 1978 to 2002, the average annual per-person income rose from $190 to $960. It's probably now above $1,000. (The U.S. figure: about $36,000.) Life expectancy increased from 61.7 years in 1970 to 71 in 2002. Adult illiteracy fell from 37 percent in 1978 to less than 17 percent in 1999. Infant mortality dropped from 41 per 1,000 live births in 1978 to 30 in 1999 (the U.S. rate: about seven).

I mentioned a couple of books about China on 4th. Samizdata has an extended review of another distressing book about China under Communism: Hungry Ghosts: Mao's Secret Famine. The details of the three year famine unleashed by Mao's "Great Leap Forward" are truly horrifying. Mao undoubtedly has the distinction of being history's biggest mass-murderer. But it was all for "the people", of course.

The wicked one has some amusing stories about technophobes.

I have just posted here the latest observations from Chris Brand about the apparent dawning of sanity about immigration in Britain.

My recipe for today is for Dhansak -- the classical dish of the Parsees (India's most affluent minority). It definitely is high-class food in every way. This recipe is for the real thing -- not the undistinguished curry that is trotted out under that name in some Indian restaurants. See here.

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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