The Danger of Fantasy in International Affairs: Palestine

Excerpt from a post by Shrink Wrapped

On occasion I have written about the danger that arises when international affairs are governed more by fantasy than reality.  My first post on the subject looked at the way in which the National fantasies (myths) in the West and within the Islamic world dovetailed in such a way as to guarantee misunderstanding and make the feared Clash of Civilizations more likely.  In my second post on the subject, I discussed the UN, a paean to fantasy in international affairs, and suggested that the anxiety that would ensue for people once they recognized the reality of the disaster that the UN has become, was sufficient cause for them to cling to the fantasy that the UN offered a way to minimize the danger of a break down in the international order.

Related to both of these posts is the idea that the source of much of the Arab and Muslim discontent with the West relates to the Palestinian and Arab conflict with Israel.  The fantasy structure includes the idea that there is a pool of support among the Palestinians and among Arabs in general that would support a two state solution with Israel, if only the Israelis would remove the terrible weight of oppressive occupation from the backs of the poor, benighted, essentially innocent Palestinians.  In one form or another, this fantasy animates much of the international community's approach to the situation; it also animates much of the media coverage of the Middle East.

The front page of the New York Times today contains no stories about the Palestinians and a search of the Times site reveals no mention of Hamas or Fatah.  A search on Google news for "Hamas" and "Fatah" brings up a front page with a number of stories from several days ago, but no stories linked from major Western news organizations today.  The top story is from Ha'aretz two days ago: Despite violations, Hamas-Fatah cease-fire holds. 

We have become inured to stories proclaiming the maintenance of Palestinian truces punctuated by attacks against Israelis several times a day, attacks typically ignored by the Western press, but here we see the template applied to inter-Palestinian clashes.  In fact, last night and this morning, the fighting in Palestine has been particularly vicious....

At this moment the Palestinians are engaged in a civil war; the goal of the war is to control all of the largess that the world continues to heap upon the Palestinians and maintain the dream, fantasy, and desire to destroy Israel.  Nothing out of Gaza or the West Bank gives any reason to question the goals of Fatah or Hamas (or Hezbollah for that matter) yet the International Community behaves as if their fantasy reflects reality.  Many more Israelis will die, and the Palestinians will continue to live in squalor amid a sea of violence and corruption, in order to satisfy everyone's fantasies.  Ultimately, only the Palestinians can decide who represents them, a question that will be resolved via the gun, and then, and only then, can questions of war and peace be addressed. 

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ELSEWHERE



The clenched fist is of course the traditional symbol of Communism -- for good reason: Leftists are full of anger and hate. Marx himself hated just about everybody -- including the workers and including his own mother.

Amazing Israeli tolerance: "Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has given permission for Jordan to build a large minaret adjacent to a mosque on the Temple Mount to call Muslims to prayer at the holy site, WND has learned. The minaret will stand at a site on the Mount where Jewish groups here had petitioned to build a synagogue. A minaret is a tower usually attached to a mosque from which Muslims are called to the five Islamic daily prayers."

ACLU as traitors: "Discussing the arrest warrants a German court had issued that day for 13 CIA agents in connection with the kidnapping of German citizen Khaled El-Masri and his lawsuit against former CIA Director George Tenet and others, filed with the help of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Bill O'Reilly asked CBS News terrorism analyst Michael Scheuer on the January 31 edition of Fox News' The O'Reillly Factor: "Do you think these people are traitors, the ACLU? Are they putting us all in danger?" Scheuer replied that "they have a right to their opinion" but asserted, "[T]hey're very lucky that most Americans are willing to fight to protect their ability to denigrate America." O'Reilly then stated that the ACLU "go[es] beyond that" and that, actually, "they put us in danger." Scheuer agreed, saying: "Oh, I think they do. I think that's certainly true, sir." Scheuer, a former CIA analyst, was head of the CIA's Osama bin Laden unit during the Clinton administration."

Let's hope this is true: "A prize-winning Iranian nuclear scientist has died in mysterious circumstances, according to Radio Farda, which is funded by the US State Department and broadcasts to Iran. An intelligence source suggested that Ardeshire Hassanpour, 44, a nuclear physicist, had been assassinated by Mossad, the Israeli security service. Hassanpour worked at a plant in Isfahan where uranium hexafluoride gas is produced. The gas is needed to enrich uranium in another plant at Natanz which has become the focus of concerns that Iran may be developing nuclear weapons."



Obnoxious Soros says America needs to be "De-Nazified": "Senator Barack Obama might want to tell George Soros to shut up, now that the Hungarian-born billionaire has equated the George W. Bush administration with the Third Reich. Soros, who spent $26 million trying to beat Bush two years ago, is a key supporter of the media-darling Illinois Democrat's presidential campaign. But last week at Davos, Soros made folks like Gwyneth Paltrow and Sean Penn look downright patriotic. After asserting that the United States is recognizing the error it made in Iraq, Soros said, "To what extent it recognizes the mistake will determine its future." He went on to say that Turkey and Japan are still hurt by a reluctance to admit to dark parts of their history, and contrasted that reluctance to Germany's rejection of its Nazi-era past. "America needs to follow the policies it has introduced in Germany," Soros said. "We have to go through a certain de-Nazification process."

National Guard forced to run: "A recent standoff between National Guardsmen and heavily armed outlaws along the Mexican border has rattled some troops and raised questions about the rules of engagement for soldiers who were sent to the border in what was supposed to be a backup role. Six to eight gunmen -- possibly heading for Mexico with drug money -- approached a group of Tennessee National Guard troops at an overnight observation post Jan. 3 on the U.S. side of the Arizona-Mexico border. No one fired a shot, and the confrontation ended when American troops retreated to contact the Border Patrol."

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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CHRISTIANS UNDER MUSLIM RULE: BETHLEHEM & BEYOND

Post lifted from Daniel Mandel

The situation of Christians in the Muslim Middle East, as I have outlined earlier, continues to deteriorate, not least within the Palestinian Authority. To Khaled Abu Toameh's earlier account of the depopulating of Bethlehem's Christian community can be added his more recent piece describing their ongoing plight as a minority of 15% in a city in which they were once a majority. As Toameh reports, incidents include fire-bombing of Christian homes, theft of lands, and physical violence and intimidation of those Christians brave enough to complain or seek redress. Further bleak details also emerge in Elizabeth Day's account.

More general analysis of the Christian predicament in the region comes from the Spiegel Online and Zlatica Hoke, the latter including some little-known details regarding Israeli Christians, a rare exception to the trend of Middle Eastern Christian demographic collapse, demoralization and emigration.

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Obnoxious Penance "Scoop" Outrages Catholics

Post below excerpted from Newsbusters

How far will reporters go to get a juicy story: How low will they go? How many rules will they break? How many sacred cows will they make into hamburger? Reporter Riccardo Bocca of L'Espresso is attracting worldwide attention from Catholic media outlets and bloggers. Bocca stealthily visited confessionals at 24 Catholic churches in Rome, Turin, Naples, Milan and Palermo, and lied to each priest he visited, manufacturing false confessions for various sins. He said he wanted to show the disparity between what the church teaches and what priests do. Would they conform to Catholic teaching or slip out of orthodoxy to show sympathy? Bocca found priests who would step away from orthodoxy, although not on abortion.

Fox News explained that the official Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, was furious: "Shame! There is no other word to express our distress toward an operation that was disgusting, worthless, disrespectful and particularly offensive," the Vatican's paper said in an editorial headlined "Fake confessions in search of a shameful scoop." (Philip Pullella at Reuters also had a story.) I can't imagine even many "secular progressive" reporters finding it ethical to lie your face off in a supposedly sacred ritual.

Catholic blogger Mark Shea headlined his post From our "Take Off 50 IQ Points Whenever the Press Talks about Religion" File. His take is just as sharp as the headline:

So some jackass reporter goes around to different churches, lies about various sins and ethical conundrums in the confessional, gets 24 different pieces of advice from 24 priests and then compares them to what he calls the "official teaching" of the Church. Then he writes a "Gotcha" article which proves that priests are not computers dispensing dogmatic formulae, but shepherds who, within their varying abilities and limits, try to mercifully help struggling people do the best they can in living up the admittedly hard ideals of the Faith. Of course, he doesn't realize that's what he proves. He *thinks* he's proving that the Catholic Faith is crap, which shows what a jackass he is.

He also proves that he is a liar and a jerk, not to mention a blasphemer. I generally think it unwise to try to learn the truth about plumbing from liars, much less the truth about something weighty like a religion. I also think it unwise to try to learn the Catholic faith from people who neither understand nor believe it.

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ELSEWHERE

Judge rejects bid to make Simpson return book money: "A US judge has dismissed a lawsuit against O.J. Simpson over an advance the ex-football star and actor was paid for his scrapped, hypothetical book about the murders of his ex-wife and her friend. But the father of murder victim Ron Goldman intends to pursue his case in state court. US District Judge Manuel Real ruled yesterday that he had no jurisdiction in the dispute between Fred Goldman and Simpson over the reported $US1 million ($1.3 million) advance he was paid for the controversial book If I Did It.... Simpson was acquitted of the June 12, 1994, murders. A civil jury found him liable for the deaths in 1997 and ordered him to pay $US33.5 million in damages to the murder victims' families. Little of that judgment has been collected and Simpson has vowed never to pay voluntarily."

Brits flocking to the anti-immigration British National Party: "Success breeds success and we have enjoyed a great deal of success over the last 12 months! Election triumphs and legal victories have helped raise our profile and brought many new members into our ranks and this deluge of new blood combined with the most impressive renewal rates we have ever had, has caused a bottleneck in membership processing. The workload of the membership team has increased due to the changeover to the fairer rolling membership system and the introduction of a 2 month lapsed membership deadline, which caused an increase in the volume of enquiries to the department checking on the progress of applications, well before the 4 week grace period requested, in last months' BN. This has now pushed the processing time back even further."

U.S. Communists say terrorism doesn't kill enough people: "The Fox Television Network series "24" is an incredibly brazen example of the ultra-right-wing's use of that medium to spread fear to win support for its political agenda and for President Bush.... MSNBC commentator Keith Oberman rightly described "24" as "naked brainwashing." All people of good will, of course, oppose terrorism. The Communist Party USA has often pointed out that terrorism substitutes individual acts of violence for the mass action essential for real progressive change... Terrorism is a political tactic that should indeed cause all of us great concern. Unfortunately, "24" is an attempt to use fear, propaganda and lies to conceal the real perpetrators of terror, the ultra-right and George W. Bush."

Air strike targets senior al Qaida leaders in Iraq: "Coalition Forces targeted the leadership of an al-Qaida in Iraq related vehicle-borne improvised explosives devices network Friday during an airstrike operation near Arab Jabour. Intelligence reports indicated that this network is responsible for a large and devastating number of VBIED attacks in the Baghdad area. They are also responsible for IED and sniper attacks conducted against the Iraqi people and Iraqi and Coalition Forces. Coalition Forces believe that key terrorist leaders were killed during the airstrike. Results are still being assessed at this time. It is believed that several members of the VBIED cell, in addition to the targeted leadership, were present at the meeting place immediately prior to the airstrike"

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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SOME STRAIGHT THINKING FROM A U.S. SOLDIER IN IRAQ

A few excerpts from Sgt Jeffers for those who have not seen it already:

It is absolutely sickening to me to think our country has come to this. Why are we so obsessed with the bad news? Why will people stop at nothing to be against this war, no matter how much evidence of the good we've done is thrown in their face? When is the last time CNN or MSNBC or CBS reported the opening of schools and hospitals in Iraq? Or the leaders of terror cells being detained or killed? It's all happening, but people will not let up their hatred of President Bush. They will ignore the good news, because it just might show people that Bush was right.

America has lost its will to fight. It has lost its will to defend what is right and just in the world. The crazy thing of it all is that the American people have not even been asked to sacrifice a single thing. It's not like World War II, where people rationed food and turned in cars to be made into metal for tanks. The American people have not been asked to sacrifice anything. Unless you are in the military or the family member of a servicemember, its life as usual...the war doesn't affect you.

But it affects us. And when it is over and the troops come home and they try to piece together what's left of them after their service...where will the detractors be then? Where will the Cindy Sheehans be to comfort and talk to soldiers and help them sort out the last couple years of their lives, most of which have been spent dodging death and wading through the deaths of their friends? They will be where they always are, somewhere far away, where the horrors of the world can't touch them. Somewhere where they can complain about things they will never experience in their lifetime; things that the young men and women of America have willingly taken upon their shoulders.

We are the hope of the Iraqi people. They want what everyone else wants in life: safety, security, somewhere to call home. They want a country that is safe to raise their children in. Not a place where their children will be abducted, raped and murdered if they do not comply with the terrorists demands. They want to live on, rebuild and prosper. And America has given them the opportunity, but only if we stay true to the cause and see it to its end. But the country must unite in this endeavor...we cannot place the burden on our military alone. We must all stand up and fight, whether in uniform or not. And supporting us is more than sticking yellow ribbon stickers on your cars. It's supporting our President, our troops and our cause.

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NO WONDER THE FRENCH HATE AMERICA

An excerpt below from Jon Hall

Why do the French still celebrate Bastille Day? How can they even remember it without shame? It's not as though the French Revolution ushered in anything lasting, or that there weren't other French revolutions to follow.

Since the U.S. installed its first government, the French have had a monarchy, 5 republics, 2 empires, 3 restorations of the monarchy (including a Bourbon and an Orleanist), the Reign of Terror, various periods of anarchy, the Nazi-collaborationist puppet state of Vichy, and now the E.U., which the French feel that with their wealth of experience they are entitled to lead. A mere 10 years after the storming of the Bastille and 7 years after the founding of the First Republic, the French were back to dictatorship with Napoleon I. (If only the French Revolution had "swept across" France.)

Compare this sorry history to that of America: We've had one continuous government under the same constitution since 1789. We even held elections during the Civil War. Yet, many in the American elite think we should look to Europe, and in particular France, for guidance on how to run our affairs. This is mind-blowing, considering that the most cataclysmic events of the last century started in Europe.

Of all the major nations of Europe, France is the least deserving of emulation. France has been in decline since Waterloo, and has not been a great nation since 1871, when they lost the Franco-Prussian War and had to cede the Alsace-Lorraine over to the Germans. Wasn't it Walker Percy who said that Pascal (1623-62) was the last sane French intellectual? The frogs have not been well-led since Charles Martel repelled the invading Muslim hordes at the Battle of Tours in 732. The U.S. bailed out France repeatedly in the 20th century and they have never forgiven us for it.

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New priorities, not new prosecutors: "Buchanan took office six days before the attacks of Sept., 11, 2001 ... United flight 93 actually crashed to the ground in her district. One would think that might motivate a law enforcement official to devote all of her time and resources to protecting the country from future terrorist attacks. Instead, Buchanan has gone after bong sellers, pornographers, Dr. Rottschaefer, and, if you need another example, a couple of retired veterans who exaggerated their military experience. With that kind of record, you might guess that Mary Beth Buchanan was among those U.S. attorneys let go last week. You'd be wrong. In fact, late last year, she was promoted."

NYT in trouble: "Why do I feel so happy? The New York Times is writing off $814.4 million of the value of its New England newspapers. This catastrophic meltdown was presaged by a dreadful drop in quality. Need evidence? Try a search over at the Times site for the phrase "disastrous war." That's one of the Times' pathetic and oft-used catch-phrases that demonstrates a distinct lack of quality and creativity. The Times' mission of derailing the war effort relies upon a monotonic drumbeat of defeat. Reusing the same anti-American phrases for months and years on end has turned out to be a wonderful predictor of the paper's business results."

Paul Krugman On Useless U.S. Ethanol Subsidies: "Paul Krugman may be a left-liberal and so I very often disagree with him, but he is right on the mark when pointing out the irrationality of U.S. ethanol policy, which will do little or nothing to reduce oil consumption, while costing the U.S. economy far more than alternative policies to reduce oil consumption. The source of this irrational policy is the parasitical U.S. farm lobby which both the Republican and Democratic establishment panders to. What could be added to Krugman's piece is that the reason Brazilian ethanol isn't used instead of the far more costly U.S. ethanol, is the fact that the U.S. congress, led by Senatar Barack Obama has slapped punitive tariffs on it."

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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LEFTIST HATRED OF THE TROOPS COMING OUT

There has been a lot of outrage about a prominent Leftist columnist calling the U.S. armed forces "mercenaries". The reaction below is lifted from the NRO Blog. In a twisted sort of a way, though, maybe the columnist was right, at least from his point of view. Leftists don't see themselves as part of America so the U.S. troops are in fact fighting for another country from their point of view -- which is the definition of a mercenary.

I think we're witnessing a very public meltdown over on WashingtonPost.com. Earlier today William Arkin published a new post responding to those who took issue with his characterization of U.S. troops as bloodthirsty and ignorant mercenaries. But while the post can still be found by following the direct link, it has vanished from Arkin's home page. Did someone at the Post direct him to take it down? Or did he himself have second thoughts about certain passages, like this one:

These men and women [in the military] are not fighting for money with little regard for the nation. The situation might be much worse than that: Evidently, far too many in uniform believe that they are the one true nation. They hide behind the constitution and the flag and then spew an anti-Democrat, anti-liberal, anti-journalism, anti-dissent, and anti-citizen message that reflects a certain contempt for the American people.

The best reaction so far is John's from OpFor: "If there is a war that's unwinnable, it's the war on this type of horrid ignorance."

Ace has a good question too: "Since Arkin asserts that the troops should not be allowed to influence the public's opinion on the war, and since the entire left demands that anyone supporting the war become a troop himself — has the left pretty much created a Catch-22 by which any and all support for the war is illegitimate?"

Allah has some related audio that you've got to hear to believe. Arkin's piece represents a turning point — "baby killer" coming back into vogue. How tragic.

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ELSEWHERE

It's a start: "The Bush administration yesterday proposed ending farm subsidies for an estimated 80,000 wealthy individuals as part of a broad plan that would close loopholes and cut traditional farm programs by $4.5 billion over the next 10 years. The proposal unveiled by Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns was the administration's opening move in what will be a lengthy tug of war with Congress over a new multi-year farm bill. The current bill, one of the most generous to farmers in history, expires Sept. 30. Debate on the new legislation comes at a time of major changes in agriculture. Booming demand from new ethanol plants has pushed corn prices to near-record levels. At the same time, U.S. trade partners are threatening retaliation unless the United States curbs crop subsidies that are said to promote overproduction here and low prices for farmers abroad."

The writing's on the wall for Iran: "The Bush administration rejected any reports that it planned to attack Saddam Hussein as 'urban legends.' The same language is now being used over the possibility of US action against Iran. But when the US is joined by the Saudis and the Israelis and their powerful supporters in Washington, it spells danger -- as the Soviets learned in Afghanistan and the Iranians in their war with Iraq."

Bush "spoiling for a fight" with Iran: "US officials in Baghdad and Washington are expected to unveil a secret intelligence 'dossier' this week detailing evidence of Iran's alleged complicity in attacks on American troops in Iraq. The move, uncomfortably echoing Downing Street's dossier debacle in the run-up to the 2003 Iraq invasion, is one more sign that the Bush administration is building a case for war."

"Price gouging" is essential and humane: ""Recently, Anderson Cooper and one of his correspondents, Gary Tuchman, condemned price gouging in New Orleans as if they were reporting an inherently unjust practice that no reasonable person would accept. So, once again, it needs explaining why price gouging is not only not bad, but is essential to the welfare of everyone involved. Without it, people don't get the essential goods they need after disasters. Free markets here are humane and necessary."

CA: Bid to outlaw spanking stirs emotions: "Leigh Bailey will never forget the day her daughter, then 2, pulled her small hand away and darted into a busy street. Brakes screeched. Bailey ran to her. Then came the consequence. 'I got her back to the sidewalk, I took her over my knee and spanked her and said, 'Don't ever, ever do that again!'' The Berkeley mother of two said that was one of very few times she has spanked her children. 'To keep my daughter safe,' she explained, 'I had to make sure she knew it was wrong and dangerous.' But was what Bailey did equally wrong? The emotional debate over spanking reignited in California when Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Sally Lieber, D-Mountain View, said she plans to introduce a bill this week outlawing anyone from swatting children age 3 and younger. Violators could face up to a year in jail or a $1,000 fine."

Another setup for Wendy's? "A Nashville man is suing Wendy's Restaurant, saying there was human blood on a straw he used from the company's store at 719 Thompson Lane. William Hoover is seeking unspecified damages in a Jan. 24 lawsuit that was filed in Davidson County Circuit Court by his attorney, Harry W. Miller III. A call has been placed to the company's headquarters in Dublin, Ohio seeking comment. According to the lawsuit, Hoover noticed a red substance on the end of the straw after he drank a Frosty shake-style beverage from the restaurant. ... Hoover had the substance tested, and it turned out to be human blood, the lawsuit states."

It's not the yen, it's the mileage : "Ford Motor Co.'s announcement last week that it lost a record $12.75 billion in 2006 will tempt the new Democratic Congress to come to the rescue of Detroit's Big Three automakers. General Motors and DaimlerChrysler are also expected to announce SUV-sized losses for 2006, further revving the engine for congressional action. Momentum is already building to make Japanese and other foreign-owned automakers the scapegoats for what ails Detroit. Just after the November elections, Big Three executives met with President Bush to complain about 'unfair' competition from Japan. ... Despite its pleas, Detroit's woes are homegrown, not created abroad."

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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IRAN WOBBLING?

Is the Khomeinist leadership preparing to retreat from confrontation over Tehran's nuclear ambitions? Until recently, the answer was an emphatic "No." According to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, such retreat would limit Islamic sovereignty by giving the United Nations a veto on Iran's energy policy. But now Tehran is trying to forestall the passage of a second, and presumably tougher, resolution by the Security Council in March.

Several versions of the presumed Iranian initiative are in circulation. Former President Muhammad Khatami presented one to American and European personalities on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos last week. In this scheme, Tehran is prepared to comply with the Security Council demand to suspend uranium enrichment - as part of a diplomatic package. In this plan, an arbitration group would inspect and assess Iran's nuclear program, reporting back after six months. The group would include the five permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany, and India on behalf of the nonaligned movement. During the six months in question, the Islamic Republic would suspend enrichment of uranium. In exchange, the Security Council would postpone its March session on the issue and would suspend the sanctions it already approved. Tehran would also insist on an undertaking from the United States not to take military action against Iran. There are other signs that Tehran is trying to cool things down:

* It has not carried out its threat of suspending relations with countries that voted for sanctions, nor has it organized demonstrations by the usual suspects around the embassies of those nations.

* The regime has shown uncharacteristic timidity on the issue of its senior Revolutionary Guard commanders and intelligence officers who were arrested and are being interrogated by U.S. forces in Iraq.

* The Islamic Republic did not vote against a resolution passed by the U.N. General Assembly last week condemning the denial of the Holocaust. (This was an indirect correction for Ahmadinejad, who re-launched the Holocaust-denial debate last year.)

"We hear a moderate message from Tehran," says a senior British official. "And that in a tone we had not heard since Ahmadinejad [became president]." That at least part of the Khomeinist leadership might want ways to defuse the situation is not surprising. The sanctions, though nothing more than a gentle rap on the knuckles, have already started to bite - with a disproportionate psychological impact on some players in the Iranian economy. Iranian businessmen see the measures as a kind of aperitif for a deadlier main course to be served later.

The Iranian currency, the rial, is showing the jitters as never before. Thousands of contracts remain frozen, pending the outcome of the crisis. If current trends continue, hundreds of thousands of Iranian workers may be thrown out of work within months.

The plummeting of oil prices has also done its bit. Over the past year, the Islamic Republic has seen oil revenues decline by almost 20 percent - even as Ahmadinejad's largesse, designed to bribe his constituency, has pushed public expenditure to an all-time high. In recent months, the government has been unable to pay the salaries and bonuses of some employees, including teachers, on time.

The perception that the Bush administration may be preparing military action has sent shivers down the spines of many mullahs and Revolutionary Guard commanders who account for a good part of the wealthy elite.

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Why they are smashing online gambling: ""Government taxes your winnings at the casino and it taxes the profits of the casino. If you win the governments gets some. If the casino wins the government gets some. They are the protection racket of the Mafia writ large with one difference -- the Mafia took less. But online gambling is another matter entirely. The damn casino doesn't physically exist anywhere. It is an online entity. It may be a company registered in some primitive place with low taxes like Switzerland. The people who provide the service of gambling are being allowed to keep most of what they earn. And that is what drives greedy politicians into such a frenzy."

Wealth and economic freedom go hand in hand: ""Why are some countries rich and others poor? For more than a decade, the Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal have carefully examined the evidence. Every year, for the Index of Economic Freedom, they sift through data on everything from inflation to imports, from tariffs to trade -- and they do it for every country. And one big-picture message about poverty and wealth consistently shines through, year after year: Wealth and economic freedom go hand in hand, says Rebecca Hagelin, a vice president of the Heritage Foundation."

Moscow: Mayor calls gay parade "Satanic": "Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov said Monday he would never allow a gay parade to take place in Moscow despite pressure from the West. 'Last year, Moscow came under unprecedented pressure to sanction the gay parade, which can be described in no other way than as Satanic,' Luzhkov said at the 15th Christmas educational readings in the Kremlin Palace 'We did not let the parade take place then, and we are not going to allow it in the future,' said Luzhkov who has been in office since 1992. The conservative 70-year-old mayor of the Russian capital also banned Portuguese bullfights in Moscow in 2001 for their violence and did not let the St. Petersburg-based rock group Leningrad perform in the city because of their explicit lyrics."

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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THERE IS NOW AN INDEPENDENT STATE OF PALESTINE. CELEBRATE!

Most Arab States are pretty nasty places and the new Palestine is certainly no exception

In the world of international diplomacy few issues receive more wall-to-wall support than the notion that it is essential to establish a Palestinian state. Leaders worldwide are so busy speaking of how essential it is for a State of Palestine to be founded that none of them seems to have noticed that it already exists. This state was officially founded in the summer of 2005, when Israel removed its military forces and civilian population from the Gaza Strip and so established the first wholly independent Palestinian state in history. Israel's destruction of four Israeli communities in Northern Samaria and curtailment of its military operations in the area set the conditions for statehood in that area as well.

And so it is that as statesmen and activists worldwide loudly proclaim their commitment to establishing the sovereign State of Palestine, they miss the fact that Palestine exists. And it is a nightmare. In the State of Palestine 88 percent of the public feels insecure. Perhaps the other 12 percent are members of the multitude of regular and irregular militias. For in the State of Palestine the ratio of police/militiamen/men-under-arms to civilians is higher than in any other country on earth.

In the State of Palestine, two-year-olds are killed and no one cares. Children are woken up in the middle of the night and murdered in front of their parents. Worshipers in mosques are gunned down by terrorists who attend competing mosques. And no one cares. No international human rights groups publish reports calling for an end to the slaughter. No UN body condemns anyone or sends a fact-finding mission to investigate the murders.

In the State of Palestine, women are stripped naked and forced to march in the streets to humiliate their husbands. Ambulances are stopped on the way to hospitals and wounded are shot in cold blood. Terrorists enter operating rooms in hospitals and unplug patients from life-support machines. In the State of Palestine, people are kidnapped from their homes in broad daylight and in front of the television cameras. This is the case because the kidnappers themselves are cameramen. Indeed, their commanders often run television stations. And because terror commanders run television stations in the State of Palestine, it should not be surprising that they bomb the competition's television stations.

Much more here

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Hamas: 'Attack is legitimate resistance'

This story refers to a jihad martyrdom attack in an Israeli bakery. And of course this response is predictable. Everything Hamas does is legitimate. Every step Israel takes in response is illegitimate. Once you grasp that simple rule, you're ready for prime time, or a job at Reuters.

From the Jerusalem Post, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

A Hamas spokesman defended Monday's suicide bombing in Eilat as legitimate "resistance" against Israel.

Fawzi Barhoum called the attack a "natural response" to IDF policies in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as its ongoing boycott of the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority government. "So long as there is occupation, resistance is legitimate," he said.

More here

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"Allah on 480 occasions in the Holy Koran extols Muslims to wage jihad. We only fulfil God's orders"

Fjordman sends us this item, along with this comment: "These Taliban people must suffer from Islamophobia or something, since they believe there are numerous calls for violent Jihad in the Koran." Indeed. Note Baitullah Mehsud's words: "Then we will attack them in the US and Britain until they either accept Islam or agree to pay jazia (a tax in Islam for non-Muslims living in an Islamic state)."

But try asking a self-proclaimed moderate leader in America about whether or not the Qur'an really calls on Muslims to wage war against non-Muslims and subjugate them, imposing a tax upon them. He will either not give you a straight answer or call you an "Islamophobe," or both.

More here

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Progressive Jewish Thought and the New Anti-Semitism

Excerpt from a post by Democracy Project

As if to prove the point of the essay by Alvin H. Rosenfeld, “Progressive Jewish Thought and the New Anti-Semitism” published by the American Jewish Committee, that favorite cage liner The New York Times looses its theater critic, Patricia Cohen, to poop on it.

She exposes her colors in her first sentence.

The American Jewish Committee, an ardent defender of Israel, is known for speaking out against anti-Semitism, but this conservative advocacy group has recently stirred up a bitter and emotional debate with a new target: liberal Jews.

Only a left-winged bird of a feather like Patricia Cohen can call the American Jewish Committee “conservative.” And, only the self-deluded can call leftist extremists "liberal." ....

So, what does Patricia Cohen bring to her review of Alvin Rosenfeld’s essay? She devotes most of her report to leftist extremists' self-justifications for attacking Israel. She doesn’t, however, quote Israel critic Tony Judt's inane, “Israel today is bad for the Jews.” She doesn’t reflect on the use by these critics of words like “apartheid,” “racism,” “colonialism,” and “ethnic cleansing” to describe Israel. As Rosenfeld shows:

These descriptors have become part of the standard discourse among “progressive” American Jews, who seem to take for granted that the historical record shows Israel to be an aggressor state guilty of sins comparable to those of Hendrik Verwoerd’s South Africa and Hitler’s Germany.

As Rosenfeld points out:

The true end point of these views is not just to force the Israelis out of the territories they have occupied since 1967, but to force an end to the Jewish state itself.

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM VERSUS GROUP FREEDOM

Rather unusually for him, Francis Fukuyama makes some reasonable points in the excerpts below

Modern identity politics springs from a hole in the political theory underlying liberal democracy. That hole is liberalism's silence about the place and significance of groups. The line of modern political theory that begins with Machiavelli and continues through Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau and the American founding fathers understands the issue of political freedom as one that pits the state against individuals rather than groups. Hobbes and Locke, for example, argue that human beings possess natural rights as individuals in the state of nature - rights that can be secured only through a social contract that prevents one individual's pursuit of self-interest from harming others.

Modern liberalism arose in good measure in reaction to the wars of religion that raged in Europe after the Reformation. Liberalism established the principle of religious tolerance: the idea that religious goals could not be pursued in the public sphere in a way that restricted the religious freedom of other sects or churches. (The actual separation of church and state was never fully achieved in many modern European democracies.) But while modern liberalism clearly established the principle that state power should not be used to impose religious belief on individuals, it left unanswered the question of whether individual freedom could conflict with the rights of people to uphold a certain religious tradition.

Freedom, understood not as the freedom of individuals but of cultural or religious or ethnic groups to protect their group identities, was not seen as a central issue by the American founders, perhaps because the new settlers were relatively homogeneous. In the words of John Jay (in the second Federalist Paper): "A people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles."

Multiculturalism - not just as tolerance of cultural diversity but as the demand for legal recognition of the rights of racial, religious or cultural groups - has now become established in virtually all modern liberal democracies. Politics over the past generation has been consumed with controversies over affirmative action for African Americans, bilingualism and gay marriage, driven by formerly marginalised groups that demand recognition not just of their rights as individuals but also of their rights as members of groups. And the United States' Lockean tradition of individual rights has meant that these efforts to assert group rights have been tremendously controversial - more so than in modern Europe.

Modern liberal societies in Europe and North America tend to have weak identities; many celebrate their own pluralism and multiculturalism, arguing in effect that their identity is to have no identity. Yet the fact is that national identity still exists in all contemporary liberal democracies.

In Europe after the second world war there was a strong commitment to creating a "post-national" European identity. But despite the progress that has been made in forging a strong European Union, the continent's identity remains something that comes from the head rather than the heart.

But many Europeans also feel ambivalent about national identity. The formative experience for modern European political consciousness is the two world wars, which Europeans tend to blame on nationalism. Yet Europe's old national identities continue to linger. People still have a strong sense of what it means to be British or French or Dutch or Italian, even if it is not politically correct to affirm these identities too strongly. And national identities in Europe, compared with those in the Americas, remain more ethnically based. So while all European countries have the same commitment to formal political citizenship equality as America, it is harder to turn that into felt equality of citizenship because of the continuing force of ethnic allegiance.

The old multicultural model has not been a big success in countries such as the Netherlands and Britain and needs to be replaced by more energetic efforts to integrate non-western populations into a common liberal culture. The old multicultural model was based on group recognition and group rights. Out of a misplaced sense of respect for cultural differences - and imperial guilt - it ceded too much authority to cultural communities to define rules of behaviour for their own members.

Liberalism cannot be based on group rights because not all groups uphold liberal values. The civilisation of the European enlightenment, of which contemporary liberal democracy is the heir, cannot be culturally neutral since liberal societies have their own values regarding the equal worth and dignity of individuals.

Cultures that do not accept these premises do not deserve equal protection in a liberal democracy. Members of immigrant communities and their offspring deserve to be treated equally as individuals, not as members of cultural communities. There is no reason for a Muslim girl to be treated differently under the law from a Christian or Jewish one, whatever the feelings of her relatives.

Multiculturalism, as it was originally conceived in Canada, America and Europe, was in some sense a "game at the end of history". That is, cultural diversity was seen as a kind of ornament to liberal pluralism that would provide ethnic food, colourful dress and traces of distinctive historical traditions to societies often seen as numbingly conformist and homogeneous. Cultural diversity was something to be practised largely in the private sphere, where it would not lead to any serious violations of individual rights or otherwise challenge the essentially liberal social order.

By contrast, some contemporary Muslim communities (and those of other religions) are making demands for group rights that simply cannot be squared with liberal principles of individual equality. These demands include special exemptions from the family law that applies to everyone else in the society, the right to exclude non-Muslims from certain types of public events, or the right to challenge free speech in the name of religious offence (as with the Danish cartoons incident).

In some more extreme cases Muslim communities have expressed ambitions to challenge the secular character of the political order as a whole. This clearly intrudes on the rights of other individuals in the society and pushes cultural autonomy well beyond the private sphere.

Asking Muslims (and other religions) to give up group rights is much more difficult in Europe than in the United States, however, because many European countries have corporatist traditions that continue to respect communal rights and fail to separate church and state. The existence of state-funded Christian and Jewish schools in many European countries makes it hard to argue in principle against state-supported religious education for Muslims.

In Germany the state collects taxes on behalf of Protestant and Catholic churches and distributes revenues to church-related schools. Even France, with its strong republican tradition, has not been consistent on this issue. After the French revolution's anti-clerical campaign, Napoleon restored the role of religion in education and used a corporatist approach to manage church-state relations.

These islands of corporatism where European states continue to recognise communal rights were not controversial prior to the arrival of large Muslim communities. Most European societies had become thoroughly secular so these religious holdovers seemed quite harmless. But they are obstacles to the maintenance of a wall of separation between religion and state. If Europe is to establish the liberal principle of a pluralism based on individuals rather than groups, then it must address these corporatist institutions inherited from the past.

Source

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ELSEWHERE

Best-seller: "The holy scripture of Islam - the Quran - has become the top selling book in Denmark one year after the blasphemous caricature crisis shook up the Danish society and the Muslim world, the Munich-based Focus news magazine reported Monday. The Quran was ranked second during the important Christmas book sales period. Buyers of the Quran include many young Muslims who grew up in Denmark but do not speak Arabic".

Australia. Muslim leader advocates war with non-Muslims: "A speaker at a conference in Sydney's south-west says a revolution or a civil war may be necessary in order to create an Islamic state, or caliphate. The meeting has been organised by the controversial Muslim group Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is banned in several countries overseas. A number of politicians have called for the group to be banned here. One of today's speakers, Ashraf Doureihi, told the audience action needs to be taken to ensure an Islamic state is created. "It is important... [to move] collectively in the Muslim world to demand this change from such influential people in our lands, even if it means spilling onto the streets to create a revolution or staging a military coup," he said. Hizb ut-Tahrir spokesman Wassim Doureihi has told the audience a number of speakers will address the meeting today and discuss ways of establishing an Islamic super-state. "As we were here today, what is at stake is not just the destiny of the Muslim world but indeed the whole of mankind," he said.

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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OBAMA: A DELIBERATE AND SYSTEMATIC LIAR

His book is a tissue of lies -- a fairytale masquerading as truth. But truth never has mattered to the Left, of course

It is a classic story of the American dream made real: an impoverished Kenyan goatherd rising to become a brilliant Harvard-educated economist. On the way he fights racial prejudice at home and corruption at work, survives the heartbreak of a broken relationship and, despite it all, leads the fight to rid Africa of its colonial legacy. This extraordinary story is told by US Presidential hopeful Barack Obama as he recalls the life of the man who inspired him to political success - his father.....

Yet an investigation by The Mail on Sunday has revealed that, for all Mr Obama's reputation for straight talking and the compelling narrative of his recollections, they are largely myth. We have discovered that his father was not just a deeply flawed individual but an abusive bigamist and an egomaniac, whose life was ruined not by racism or corruption but his own weaknesses. And, devastatingly, the testimony has come from Mr Obama's own relatives and family friends....

Barack Obama Snr started life with the advantage of being able to read and write, but he also felt a profound sense of injustice. His father was a cook for British settlers in Kenya, who demeaningly called him their 'personal boy'. Grandfather Obama sent his son to a missionary school but after completing his education, the youth could find little work except goatherding in his remote village of Nyangoma Kogela, in the roadless hills of Western Kenya. At 18, he married a girl called Kezia. But Obama Snr was more interested in politics and economics than his family and his political leanings had been brought to the notice of leaders of the Kenyan Independence movement. He was put forward for an American-sponsored scholarship in economics, with the idea being that he would eventually use his Western-honed skills in the new Kenya. At the age of 23 he headed for university in Hawaii, leaving behind the pregnant Kezia and their baby son.

Relatives say he was already a slick womaniser and, once in Honolulu, he promptly persuaded a fellow student called Ann - a naive 18-year-old white girl - to marry him. Barack Jnr was born in August, 1961. Two years later, Obama Snr was on the move again. He was accepted at Harvard, and left his little boy and wife behind when he moved to the exclusive east coast university....

Mr Obama Jnr claims that racism on both sides of the family destroyed the marriage between his mother and father... In fact Ann divorced her husband after she discovered his bigamous double life. She remarried and moved to Indonesia with young Barack and her new husband, an oil company manager.

Obama Snr was forced to return to Kenya, where he fathered two more children by Kezia. He was eventually hired as a top civil servant in the fledgling government of Jomo Kenyatta - and married yet again. Now prosperous with a flashy car and good salary, his third wife was an American-born teacher called Ruth, whom he had met at Harvard while still legally married to both Kezia and Ann, and who followed him to Africa...

It is alleged that Ruth finally left him after he repeatedly flew into whisky-fuelled rages, beating her brutally. Friends say drinking blighted his life - he lost both his legs while driving under the influence and also lost his job. However, this was no bar to his womanising: he sired a son, his eighth child, by yet another woman and continued to come home drunk. He was about to marry her when he finally died in yet another drunken crash when Obama was 21....

In his book, he attempts to put the best face on it. His father, he writes, lost his civil service job after campaigning against corrupt African politicians who had 'taken the place of the white colonials'. One of Obama Snr's former drinking partners, Kenyan writer Philip Ochieng Ochieng says, however, that his friend's downfall was his weak character. "Although charming, generous and extraordinarily clever, Obama Snr was also imperious, cruel and given to boasting about his brain and his wealth," he said. "He was excessively fond of Scotch. He had fallen into the habit of going home drunk every night. His boasting proved his undoing and left him without a job, plunged him into prolonged poverty and dangerously wounded his ego."

Much more here.

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ELSEWHERE

I have just put up on my Marx blog a new collection of quotes from Marx and his early followers. They openly avow terrorism and mass murder. What the Soviets and other Communists did was exactly what they said they would do. We ignore warnings -- such as those now coming from many Muslim leaders -- at our peril. And note that the many professors who to this day like Marxism could not be unaware of how hate-filled Marx was. It would appear to be precisely that which they like.

Mad Methodist Democrat: "A bid by a Nebraska lawmaker to expand underage drinking restrictions to include alcohol consumed in church has drawn criticism from Catholics who say it will infringe on religious rights. Democratic State Sen. Lowen Kruse has introduced a bill that would eliminate two provisions to Nebraska's underage drinking law which allow minors to drink alcohol in their own homes or at places of worship during religious ceremonies."

A small start: "The Quebec village of Herouxville, 1300 inhabitants, has formally banned this week the stoning of women, face veils, female genital mutilation, or throwing acid at unveiled women's faces, reports Montreal daily La Presse.... The nature of the Herouxville bans suggests however that local politicians had Quebec Muslims in mind, though not a single Muslim or member of any religious or ethnic minority calls Herouxville home. But referring to Quebec's policy of encouraging immigrants to settle outside Montreal, Drouin says it was important to inform potential immigrants of the villages cultural norms: "We must ensure that people who come here want to live as we do", he told La Presse, "The Muslims who wanted to impose Sharia, had they known that we do not stone women here, maybe they would not have come". Along with the bans, the Herouxville document states that Christmas trees are a Quebec tradition, that swimming pools are mixed, and that pork meat and beef are displayed on the same shelves. Asked whether he fears being labeled a racist, Drouin answers: "We are not racists, we are explaining our culture".

Some economic history: "Sustained economic growth of even 1% per year was not a reality until the 19th century, and sustained economic growth of 2-3% was not a reality until the last 50 years. Putting it in historical perspective, it makes the recent obsession with "income inequality" kind of inconsequential. It could be a lot worse, and was a lot worse throughout human history, for the average person. And complaining about income inequality in a country like the US where per capita GDP is about $42,000, must seem very strange to those in the rest of the world where per capita GDP is only $7500. Kind of like members of an exclusive, private country club complaining about differences in income between the "rich" and "super-rich" member of that club?"

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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

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What are the best novels about politics?

Post below lifted from Tyler Cowen. I think I would have put The Last Hurrah and All the King's Men somewhere on the list. Tyler is obviously a classical fiend. I am too but I think the modern world also has its wisdom. I think the two novels I have listed tell you more about American politics than all the sociologists and political scientists put together

Queried here, I will simplify and make it books, period, but restrict it to fiction, not counting philosophy.  My list of five:

1. Shakespeare's Henriad, a no-brainer at #1, if you count it as more than one book it still should take up as many slots as it needs.  Psychology is primary and stands above politics, and libertinism is by no means unrelated to power.

2. Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels, vanity, pride, and self-deception are the keys to understanding political behavior, plus Swift shows an understanding of "the rules of the game."

3. Montesquieu, Persian Letters, yikes, have you ever seen that Monty Python skit "Summarize Proust"?

4. Sophocles, Antigone, the claims of the family vs. the claims of the state continue to plague Iraq and many other places.

5. Homer's Odyssey and Iliad, the former is not just a good tale but also a profound comparative study of regimes, the latter is the brutal truths of war.

Interestingly none of these are proper novels.  I read Kafka's The Trial as more about theology than worldly affairs.  As for politics as a profession, the source from The Economist recommends "Primary Colors", C.P. Snow's "The Corridors of Power", and "All the King's Men".

It is less fruitful and less fun to guess at the best novels about business and economics, perhaps because the relevant truths seem banal in a fictional context.

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ELSEWHERE



Credibility: "According to the New York Times, President Bush and Vice President Cheney “have done grievous harm to the credibility of the Oval Office and the country.” Perhaps so, but by being so blatantly partisan in its political coverage, the Times has done grievous harm to its own credibility and to the profession of journalism. Does the Times not see this?"

Media hostility: "President George W. Bush's father accused the news media of "personal animosity" toward his son and said he found the criticism so unrelenting he sometimes talked back to his television set. "It's one thing to have an adversarial ... relationship -- hard-hitting journalism -- it's another when the journalists' rhetoric goes beyond skepticism and goes over the line into overt, unrelenting hostility and personal animosity," former President George Bush said. The elder Bush, the 41st U.S. president, had a relatively collegial relationship with the press but things turned sour during his losing 1992 re-election campaign. He got so fed up with media coverage that supporters at the time circulated hats with the slogan "Annoy the Media -- Re-Elect Bush."

Air America Can't Even Pull Listeners In Santa Cruz: "Pretty telling when liberal radio can't even pull listeners in one of the most liberal cities in America. Al Franken, Randi Rhodes and Sam Seeder - articulate liberal pundits - don't sell well, even in Santa Cruz. The trio are part of the nationally syndicated Air America, which was dropped from Santa Cruz radio station KOMY 1340 AM on Thursday and replaced with music from the 1950s, `60s and `70s. The left-leaning radio network, aimed at taking on Rush Limbaugh and other conservative talk shows, debuted on Central Coast airwaves in July 2005, but local advertisers never bought in, station owner Michael Zwerling said. "We didn't sell a single ad in a year and a half," Zwerling said Thursday. "I thought liberal radio would work as a viable advertising business in the most liberal town in America. I was wrong" Santa Cruz isn't the only place Air America has problems. The network is struggling nationwide and filed for bankruptcy four months ago."

IRS can't even collect taxes from government employees: "Internal Revenue Service documents show that the government is still trying to recover nearly $2.8 billion in back taxes from over 450,000 active and retired federal government employees who failed to file tax returns or pay taxes, or some 3.3 percent of the federal bureaucracy. Spreadsheets obtained by Washington, D.C., radio station WTOP under the Freedom of Information Act show that hundreds of thousands of government employees failed to file a tax return for the 2005 tax year.... The United States Postal Service was the agency with the highest level of noncompliance, while the Treasury Department had the lowest level. IRS agents can be fired if they fail to pay taxes. But, an IRS spokesman told WTOP, it's no easier to collect from the bureaucrats as it is from the rest of us. Indeed, the IRS can hardly get a handle around the tax noncompliance issue, and has been reduced to prosecuting high-profile people who they allege have failed to pay taxes owed, such as Wesley Snipes."

Immigration Benefit 'Equivalent to a Mars bar a Month': "New figures out today reveal that, on the Government's own figures, the benefit to each member of the native population of the UK from immigration is worth about 4p a week - or less than the equivalent of a small Mars bar a month. In an analysis of a series of reports on the economic impact of immigration on the UK think-tank Migrationwatch has found that overall the much vaunted contribution of immigrants to the economy is very slight indeed - a finding that coincides with the results of major studies around the world."

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

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

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

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason -- Details here and here

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