Tuesday - April 07, 2009

EVERY HOMEOWNER’S NIGHTMARE. HOME INVASION BY VIOLENT GANG. A CLOCKWORK ORANGE FEAR.

As the saying goes, when seconds count the police are only minutes away.  Maybe that should be ‘hours away’ in the UK?

I used to think A Clockwork Orange was a violent fantasy.  Now it seems inevitable.  The rule of law is nearly dead there.
A Comment left by Guido at BMEWS

The following article, written by the homeowner is a long one. As a rule with something this long I copy part of it and direct you to the rest if interested.
But this is one of a couple that will be posted and I am including all of it. It’s pretty scary and fortunately this family came out of it in one piece.
As I read this I could but think, as many of you will no doubt, it could have been over in seconds had the homeowner been armed.

Due to a rash of stabbings and home invasions and general mayhem, the laws here have finally conceded a person’s right to defend home and family.
I don’t know how far that “right” extends however.

Just to give you an idea of the mindset of this populace, while many over the last few weeks have written in favor of gun ownership, most still have their heads well buried in the sand.  They say things like, “Oh please let us not go the route of America.” “No Guns” they cry ignoring the fact the thugs and brutes ARE armed themselves and care nothing for little things like, law and order.  Worse yet is that the thugs enjoy hurting. They get off on it.
It is rare indeed to find a home robbery where even after the owner is tied up and helpless to stop a robbery, that the thieves leave without beating up the helpless owner.  And heaven help the family with women involved and especially young girls.  You get the picture.

PLEASE read every damn word of this.  It isn’t often I ask that of BMEWS.

Every homeowner’s nightmare: A mother describes the terrifying night seven burglars tried to smash into her family home.

Last updated at 3:32 PM on 07th April 2009

Just before 11pm on a perfectly ordinary Sunday night four weeks ago, I locked the front door, turned off the lights and went upstairs.

My husband, Laurence, was in bed, our eight-year-old daughter, Rosa, and five-year-old son, Louis, were fast asleep and our tree-lined road in a middle-class suburb of North London seemed as safe and quiet as it always did.

Three hours later, just before 2am, Laurence leapt out of bed and tore downstairs, roaring like an animal. Immediately awake and aware we were in danger, I followed him, to find two masked men standing in our hall. It was everybody’s nightmare.

Without a word, the men walked out of the front door - which they had smashed open - and my husband locked it behind them with the only bolt still working.

For a moment, we thought that was the end of an almost surreal experience. Seconds later, we realised it was just the start.

The men weren’t alone, and they were in no hurry to leave.

Outside our house was a gang of seven or eight hooded men, probably in their late teens, wearing balaclavas. Fired up to the point of frenzy, possibly on drugs, they began smashing through the glass panels of our front door with iron bars and bricks, egging each other on.

The locks were already broken from when they’d first gained entry and soon the one remaining bolt, which Laurence had just secured, was smashed off.

All that was holding the door was my husband, a kind and gentle solicitor of 5ft 8in.

I stood behind him, shouting at them to leave, as Laurence pushed against what was left of our door to keep them out.

Glass was shattering all around him as an iron bar smashed through the door panels, missing his head by inches each time it came through the door.

The gang were already making enough noise to wake up several neighbours, and it dawned on me that being caught by the police wasn’t an outcome they seemed frightened by.

My husband yelled at me to call the police, but I didn’t want to leave him alone to face the mass of bodies that were throwing themselves at our door. All I could see of their masked faces was the hatred in their eyes.

Being seen by their peers to be chased out of the house by a middle-aged man in pyjama bottoms must have been unthinkable, and they were clearly bent on revenge.

Shouting ‘We’re gonna get you, you bastard’, they started inflicting as much violence and terror as they could.

At that moment, I was convinced nothing could stop them getting into our hall - and I had no doubts that if and when they did, they would set about Laurence with those bars and bricks and smash his skull. He was fighting for our lives.

My next thought was that if he couldn’t keep them out, what would these men do if they found me and our children defenceless upstairs?

After a minute or so - which, believe me, feels like an hour when someone is smashing your front door in - I rushed upstairs to call 999, convinced that I needed to be between those men and our children as it could only be seconds before my husband would be battered to the ground in our hallway.

As I listened to the operator slowly spelling out my address for the second time, I remember noticing how calm my voice sounded when I said: ‘I can’t stay on the phone to you. They’re breaking the door down now and he can’t possibly hold them off much longer.’

I heard my eight-year-old daughter, her voice shaking with fear, calling ‘Mummy . . .’ from her bedroom.

Still sounding bizarrely calm, I tried to reassure her: ‘I’ll come to you as soon as I can, darling, I just need to finish speaking to the police.’

Then I started imagining what I’d do if they killed Laurence. Surely he couldn’t still be fending them off.

How was I going to get downstairs to see if he was still alive without our daughter following me down and seeing him or his body?

In the next minute or so, while I was still on the phone to the police, the men gave up their assault and ran off - I’m still not sure why, perhaps because they knew neighbours would have called 999 and it could only be a matter of seconds before the police turned up.

Moments later, I could hear Laurence talking to the neighbours who had come out to see if we were all right.

Within seven minutes of my 999 call, two young female police officers arrived - one turned out to be 23 and the other was little over five foot.

For a moment, I was almost thankful they’d turned up after the gang had left and not before. Would they have been safe to get out of their squad car?

Our neighbours certainly hadn’t dared to come out while the yobs were still there - and I don’t blame them for a second. Confronting a gang like that wasn’t a risk I’d advocate taking.

When the policewomen arrived, the two young WPCs looked at us apologetically and with embarrassment as they began to receive repeated requests via their radios to leave us to attend to other incidents. It was clear the police were woefully under-staffed that night.

I was still feeling detached as I hugged my daughter, who was shaking uncontrollably, and listened as one of the WPCs explained into her radio: ‘This is not an ordinary burglary. It’s aggravated burglary and the house is a crime scene. We cannot leave these people - they’re terrified.’

Disbelievingly, I stared at our hallway, strewn with broken glass and bricks, as she explained that there should have been 30 police officers on duty in our area that night, but they were down to 15 and there was no budget for overtime.

They asked my husband if he’d fallen out with anyone recently. ‘Those aren’t the sort of circles I mix in,’ he explained quietly. ‘If I fell out with someone, they wouldn’t invite us to their dinner parties for a while.’

After almost an hour, one of the WPCs left to attend another incident. With broken windows and the bare remnants of our front door, there was no way of securing the house so, because the gang had threatened to return, the younger WPC stayed with us.

Laurence, miraculously unharmed bar a few minor cuts, was in a trance-like state and asked if we’d mind if he went to bed. He was oblivious to the blood and glass fragments that covered his head, body and feet. I suggested he have a shower first.

Thankfully, our son had slept through the violence, so I was able to put our daughter to bed and managed to cuddle her back to sleep while I tried to make sense of what had happened.

Laurence’s motorbike and our estate car were parked in the drive, and it struck me that the gang must have wanted the keys.

But the level of violence was beyond belief. Our ordinary terrace four-bedroom house in a suburban street was neither rough nor grand. It seemed an unlikely location for an extraordinary act of random violence.

As I soothed my daughter to sleep, the magnitude of what Laurence had done to protect us began to dawn on me. He is no macho have-a-go hero, but when our lives depended on it, he turned out to be so very brave.

I also knew we had been lucky, and I was aware of how easily the ordeal might have ended differently.

I didn’t want to leave the young WPC downstairs on her own, so I went back down to sit with her.

In the darkest hours between Sunday night and Monday morning, I listened to the numerous incidents coming through on her radio. There were two stabbings and a rape in our borough alone.

Forensics were also under-staffed that night. Because our house was a crime scene, I couldn’t clear up until someone had checked for fingerprints and run DNA tests on the blood on our door, some of which might have belonged to the gang, but no one was available.

The routine seemed all too familiar to the WPC, as she negotiated for a neighbouring borough to send over someone.

At 6.30am, a man came to bolt metal sheets on to our windows and door, and the WPC and man from forensics left.

When my five-year-old son woke up at 7am and wanted breakfast, I carried him downstairs and explained that someone had tried to steal Daddy’s motorbike.

The hall was dark because of the metal hoardings, the floor was littered with glass fragments and an iron bar in a police evidence bag was sitting on the table.

While the children ate their cereal, Laurence removed the bricks that had been thrown through the windows. I told him that what he’d done that night was the bravest thing I’d ever seen, but he insisted bravery had nothing to do with it.

‘I had no choice,’ he said. ‘There was never a decision to make. All I knew was that I had to keep them on the other side of that door.

‘The alternative was far, far worse. Can you imagine what they could have done to us?’

My husband isn’t the sort of man who readily tells me how much he loves me or comes home with flowers but, as he held me tightly that morning, I doubt any woman has ever felt more loved.

Both still in a state of shock, we felt dazed and detached rather than relieved or traumatised.

Laurence went to work as usual and I took the children to school before I could clear up, organise new locks, emergency glass and an alarm system.

Later that day, I began to wonder if I was deluding myself that we’d all survived the ordeal. I had to stop myself from phoning Laurence’s office and the school to check I really did have a husband at work and two children at school.

That afternoon, Laurence returned from work as two detectives from CID arrived. But they asked very few questions and by the time they’d left, Laurence and I realised the chances of any of the gang being caught were slim. Four weeks later, there have been no arrests. The blood tests for DNA still aren’t back from forensics.

Meanwhile, we are still trying to piece together the information to make some sense of what happened that night.

Local police told me that the gang had been on a spree that night and there had been other incidents nearby. Some neighbours told us they’d seen seven figures, another had counted eight.

Two neighbours had heard men shout ‘Get back in there and get the keys off the f***er’, so it seems likely they wanted keys to our car parked outside.

We’ll never have all the answers, but we know we were horribly unlucky the gang happened to pass our house that night. And we were lucky that, ostensibly, we are all right. But the experience has changed us.

My daughter Rosa talked about what happened for the first couple of days.

She repeated the information that she had found comforting. ‘I knew from the breaking glass that people were trying to get in, so I cuddled my duvet really tightly,’ she told me.

‘To block out the horrible noises, I kept saying to myself “Mummy will come to me as soon as she can - Mummy will come to me as soon as she can.” ‘

In some ways, she seems to have moved on from what happened in the same way she would after reading a book or watching a film.

In fiction, bad things happen but if you do the right things, it’s all right in the end and everyone lives happily ever after. So too in life, she thinks. For the moment, at least.

Having not talked about it for a fortnight or so, last night in bed she asked me why ‘bad people want to hurt children, kill people and steal things’. I told her that was a very good question and I’d been thinking about it a lot, too.

I’m waiting for her to ask me whether the police have caught the men who came that night. I’m not sure how I’ll answer that question.

Louis is finding night-times difficult, too. He dreams of ‘angry monsters who cut through buildings and people’s necks with sharp things as high as the sky’ and wakes up soaked in sweat with his heart pounding.

I find the nights hard, and lie awake analysing every sound. Is it inside the house or outside? Is it familiar or not? Is my son having another nightmare?

The scenes from that night still replay in my mind like a horror movie and I can’t help but wonder what does have to happen to people to make them capable of such hatred and violence.

I wouldn’t have blamed Laurence if he’d given up or run up the stairs after me. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t love him any less, although I suppose you never really know. But I do know that what happened that night has made me love him more.

For a week or two, I was so pleased he was still alive that I didn’t mind his socks on the floor, the unfinished washing up or even the snoring. Now, as normality slowly resumes, he jokes that being a hero didn’t last long.

I still see him differently, though. I know that when I needed him, he did what all husbands and fathers hope they’ll do - but fear they won’t.

He used every ounce of himself to stop our children’s lives becoming a tragedy. And I will always be grateful for that.

THE DAILY MAIL

Posted by peiper     on 04/07/2009 at 10:26 AM   
Filed Under: • Crime • Daily Life • Self-Defense • UK •  
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The world’s youngest terror suspect… ready to blow himself up at the age of 11.

I had a few things lined up of some interest and especially prompted by some comments made by BMEWS readers. But I got side tracked with this story.

This young fellow is just one more reason why frankly I’m not moved when I read about kids over there biting the dust. Way I see it, the fewer of em, the less to breed.  Catch em young. Dry up the gene pool.

War is hell, ain’t it? 

No, I am not a compassionate conservative.

By Debra Killalea
Last updated at 11:54 AM on 07th April 2009

A would-be suicide bomber aged 11 has been arrested alongside Taliban fighters.

Known only as Abdullah, the youngster was caught crossing the mountains from Pakisrtan’s tribal region into Afghanistan wearing a jacket packed with explosives.

Police say he is the youngest terror recruit they have ever come across. Abdullah has also become Afghanistan’s youngest prisoner but he is still being held at a top security prison in the capital, Kabul.

Originally from Peshawar in Pakistan, Abudullah was training to be a suicide bomber and had learned the principles of jihad - holy war - at the religious school in Pakistan where he was taught.

Abdullah was interviewed by ITV News’s International Editor Bill Neely, who wrote about the visit in the Mirror.

Mr Neely said he was shocked at the picture of innocence before him.

‘I’d been told I would meet a youth who had been arrested with a group of Taliban fighters – but I didn’t expect the picture of apparent innocence that confronted me,’ he said.

‘I watched this little boy speak, his high-pitched voice so innocent, pouring out the detail of an adventure he had clearly relished.’

Abdullah’s younger brother Amin, 10, is also a student at the same school.

Mr Neely said Abdullah’s days were spent reading the Koran and his evenings were taken up learning how to load weapons and how foreigners came to Muslim lands to kill them.

Abdullah told the journalist, his favourite weapon of choice was the Kalashnikov because he found the trigger of the pistol hard to pull.

When Mr Neely asked the 11-year-old how felt about becoming a suicide bomber he said he knew he ‘would end up in pieces.’

He also said he knew the difference between suicide and sacrifice and that he wanted to kill non-Muslims when he grew up ‘so they can’t come to our homes and kill us.’

It is not yet clear what authorities will do with the boy but it is likely he will be returned back to his religious school.

BOY BOMBER

I surely do hope that’s a misprint. They’re gonna what? Return him to the place he has been indoctrinated at?

Posted by peiper     on 04/07/2009 at 09:39 AM   
Filed Under: • RoPMA • Terrorists • War On Terror • War-Stories •  
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nothing from me today

I’ve got family business to attend to today, so I’ll be out for the whole day.

Oh, and a small update on the gun shopping thing: I’ve found what I want, but I can’t find any. At this point I’m shopping online; the pistol that I would like to buy has been on the market for at least 13 years now, but they are sold out everywhere, and every gun shop and online retailer says the same thing: “They’re apportioned. Which means we will only get X of them this year, and those are already sold.” Son of a gun. Literally! Were I the gun company, I’d be running the damn factory 24-7 with guaranteed sales like that. 

Posted by Drew458     on 04/07/2009 at 08:50 AM   
Filed Under: • Daily Life •  
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Don’t Take The Brown Acid

Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver and his wife Jools are celebrating after their third daughter Petal Blossom Rainbow was born in the early hours of yesterday morning.

The baby girl, weighing in at 6lb 10oz joins the equally florally-named Poppy Honey and Daisy Boo.

Oliver said: “We’re both really happy. She doesn’t know what she’s let herself in for.”

Earlier this week the chef cooked for the leaders of the G20 nations during their summit in London. He arrived at the Portland hospital, in central London, earlier this morning.

A family friend said: “Jamie and Jools are both completely smitten with Petal already and Jamie is looking forward to two weeks paternity leave to spend quality time with his four beautiful girls, including Jools.

I believe in giving your children every possible advantage if you can. But is this name an advantage, or an albatross made from lead?

Probably it’s meaningless in this day and age, when kids are all being given the strangest made-up names. Well, certain kids from certain areas in certain countries, certainly. And maybe that’s better than what we saw a few years back, when every young girl in America seemed to be named Heather, and a few years later when her little sister was named Britny. [hey, spelling these days is optional!]

I’m glad the child is healthy, and I wish both parents the best of luck. But I’d still like to give the parents a modest whack with the old clue bat.

Posted by Drew458     on 04/07/2009 at 08:41 AM   
Filed Under: • Miscellaneous •  
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   Monday - April 06, 2009

Binghamton Update

Looks like Dedicated Dad’s comment was spot on ... police response to the scene was immediate, but then they just stood around for an hour with their thumbs up. How many victims bled out in that hour? We will never know unless the coroner’s reports are published.

People are calling for an investigation, top officials say “there was nothing we could do” but blogger The Purple Center isn’t buying it. And at this point, I don’t think I am either.

Purple cross links to one of his earlier posts that questions the timing, and therein our own long-writing Turtler is utterly schooled by a commenter who leaves an ENTIRE BOOK as a comment; it’s at least 200 paragraphs long. Holy cow!

Posted by Drew458     on 04/06/2009 at 01:52 PM   
Filed Under: • Crime • Guns and Gun Control •  
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SARKOZY OF FRANCE TO OBAMA OF USA.  KEEP YER FREEKIN NOSE OUT OF OUR BUSINESS.

From The Times
April 6, 2009
Leave Turkey’s bid to join EU to us, Nicolas Sarkozy warns Barack Obama

David Charter in Prague
The love-in between Nicolas Sarkozy and Barack Obama proved short-lived after the French President warned his US counterpart yesterday to keep his nose out of the issue of Turkey’s membership of the European Union.

President Obama used his first EU-US summit, on the eve of his visit to Turkey, to encourage European leaders to embrace the Muslim country and “anchor it in Europe”. However, Mr Sarkozy, a long-standing opponent of full membership for Turkey, rebuffed the US leader in language that seemed to sour the revival of Franco-US relations.

Support for Turkey in joining the EU, a process that it began formally in 2005 and hopes to complete before 2020, has long been an American foreign policy goal.

Mr Obama, who flew to Turkey last night, clearly wanted to leave on a positive note. He told EU leaders: “The United States and Europe must approach Muslims as our friends, neighbours and partners in fighting injustice, intolerance and violence.

“Moving forward towards Turkish membership in the EU would be an important signal of your commitment to this agenda and ensure that we continue to anchor Turkey firmly in Europe.”

Mr Sarkozy, who has talked of offering Turkey a privileged partnership rather than membership, did not wait to hit back. “I have been working hand in hand with President Obama but when it comes to the European Union it is up to member states of the European Union to decide [on membership],” Mr Sarkozy said in an interview on French television. “I have always been opposed to this entry and I remain opposed,” he added.

His comments laid bare the continuing EU split over Turkish membership, with France and Austria openly opposed and deep reservations in Germany and the Netherlands. Turkey would become the most populous EU country and Germany in particular is said to have concerns about the shift in power that this would cause, with the largest number of MEPs coming from Turkey, along with strong voting rights in European Council decisions.

José Manuel Barroso, the European Commission President, sought to paper over the cracks as he welcomed Mr Obama’s comments. “We have started a process of negotiations with Turkey for membership of the European Union and that was a unanimous decision of the European Union, all 27 member states,” Mr Barroso said.

“Of course we have to go on with the negotiations and at the end, we have to see if Turkey is ready to join and if the European Union is ready to integrate Turkey.”

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish Prime Minister, reiterated his country’s desire to join the EU when he visited Brussels this year.

Olli Rehn, the EU Enlargement Commissioner, called last week on Turkey to renew its focus on reforms to meet Union entry criteria for democracy and workers’ rights. “The pace of negotiations depends on the pace and intensity of the reforms in your country,” he said.

The Turkish press said yesterday that the country had secured concessions for dropping its objections to Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Danish Prime Minister, becoming the next Nato Secretary-General.

Ankara had argued that Mr Rasmussen was not suitable because he did not offer an apology for cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad published in a Danish newspaper in 2005, which led to violent demonstations across the Muslim world. Turkey expects to secure several key Nato posts, including that of assistant secretary-general.

Mr Rasmussen insisted in the Danish media yesterday that he had not sacrificed his defence of freedom of expression in order to secure Turkey’s support of his nomination.

Turkey also objected to the hosting by a Danish satellite of a Kurdish television channel that is regarded by Ankara as a mouthpiece of the outlawed PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party). Speaking to the Danish daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten, Mr Rasmussen added: “If it can be proven that Roj TV is participating in terrorist activities, then we will do what we can to close the television station . . . within the framework of what Danish legislation allows.”

SARKOZY

Posted by peiper     on 04/06/2009 at 11:15 AM   
Filed Under: • EUro-peons • Obama, The One •  
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What’s this?  No arms? No legs?  Oh, sorry. You aren’t handicapped enough for any aid.

It’s all this guys fault I wanna say that before you read this article.

Born the wrong color. White.
Not a member of a protected religion.
Not a homosexual.
Not a criminal
Not an illegal immigrant

Jeez, what the heck is it with this trouble maker?

Story has a better ending then it did a beginning though. At first they actually did tell the guy he was “not disabled enough.”

A man born without hands or legs was told by his council that he did not qualify for help putting his bins out.

Last Updated: 2:29PM BST 06 Apr 2009

Wheelchair-bound Robert Moores claims a council worker said his household was “not disabled enough” for the assisted collection scheme.

However his able-bodied wife Angela is also unable to move the bins because of a back injury.

Mr Moores, who uses artificial legs from the knee downwards, asked Blackpool Council in Lancashire if he could have assisted collection.

“I’ve got no hands and no legs which is why I can’t physically put the bins out,” he said.

“Up until now the binmen have just done it for me, but they told me to apply for official assistance. “When I went to the council to ask, they turned round and said I wasn’t disabled enough.

“But I can’t put the bins out and my wife has got a bad back so she can’t do it either. “I even went to the town hall to show them what I was like, but they told me the same.” The couple, who have three children aged six, 13 and 14, received their wheelie bins about eight months ago.

Mrs Moores said: “If I start lifting heavy things my back gets worse. I have three children and Robert to look after so I can’t risk injuring myself.

“I am his full-time carer so if I got laid up I don’t know what we would do. “There would be no-one to look after the family. There is a step outside so it is very difficult to lift a heavy bin down.” Blackpool Council says when Mr Moores originally applied for the assisted collection service, he did not inform them his wife was also physically unable to move the bins. Householders who are disabled or elderly can apply for the assisted collection service and will be visited for an assessment.

But they do not qualify if there is an able-bodied person living at the address who can put the bins out. If someone qualifies for assisted collection, it means the binmen can go on to their property to collect the bin for emptying, before returning it. Julian Kearsley, Blackpool Council’s executive director for business services, said: “When we visited Mr and Mrs Moores to see if they were eligible for the assisted collection we asked if there were any physical reasons why Mrs Moores couldn’t take the bin out.

“We were not informed of any reason why she couldn’t.” Now, though, the authority has made a U-turn and the Moores will receive assisted collection.

“We understand some people are unable to wheel their bins out for collection and will happily provide a service to help them,” Mr Kearsley added.

“Since becoming aware of the fact that she has a bad back we were happy to reassess our decision and they are now eligible for the assisted collection.”

BINMAN

Just an afterthought.  These bins have wheels and can be rolled. Surely kids 13 and 14 can handle that.  I don’t know.  Brother and I used to cart out those old corrugated metal trash bins in the old days. They were shorter of course. One on each side with a handle.  Trash back then picked up every week but nothing separated as these days. These new bins they have here though even with wheels can get heavy especially when loaded with two weeks worth of newspapers as is in our case.

Posted by peiper     on 04/06/2009 at 09:58 AM   
Filed Under: • Outrageous • Stoopid-People • UK •  
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President Barack Obama rejects allegations that US at war with Islam .

President Barack Obama has declared that “the United States is not and will never be at war with Islam” and spoken of his
“deep appreciation for the Islamic faith” in a speech to Turkey’s parliament.

by Toby Harnden in Ankara
Last Updated: 2:49PM BST 06 Apr 2009

“So let me say this as clearly as I can: the United States is not and will never be at war with Islam,” he said.

Many Americans “have lived in a Muslim-majority country – I know, because I am one of them” Obama, on the first stop of a two-day trip to Turkey, his first as president to a Muslim country, said earlier that the U.S. and Turkey can forge a “model partnership"that bridges the religious and cultural divide between the western world and the predominantly Muslim east.

The US leader was introduced to the parliament as “Barack Hussein Obama”

In a speech that celebrated the cultural ties and shared history between American and Turkey, Obama said their alliance has made the world “more secure.” He pledged to give U.S. support to combat the “terrorist activities” of the Kurdish separatist movement, the PKK, winning applause from lawmakers. The U.S. is prepared to be a partner to help work through the issue of Armenian massacres in 1915, and “strongly supports” Turkish membership of the European Union, Obama said.

Whoa Kemo Sabe. Hold the phone there. What?  Who are you to encourage (I’m asking as tho he will read this. lol) their joining the eu?
Now Sarkozy of France has issued a statement critical of BO and claiming he has no business making comments on internal euro affairs.
That’s really rich considering Sarko and wife and most in Europe have been sticking their collective noses in our back yard at Gitmo.

“Our partnership with the Muslim world is critical,” he said.

President Obama urged Turkey to speed up liberal reforms aimed at bringing the Muslim country into the European Union.

Obama said during a speech before parliament that Turkey had made progress on freedom of expression and minority rights for ethnic Kurds, but said Ankara should press on with reforms.

Turkish entry talks with the EU have been held up by European concerns over human rights, a perceived lack of progress on reforms, and by a long territorial dispute with EU member Cyprus.

TELEGRAPH

Posted by peiper     on 04/06/2009 at 09:21 AM   
Filed Under: • Obama, The One • RoPMA •  
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Somali pirates hijack British-owned cargo ship.

Well here we go again troops.

Somali pirates hijack British-owned cargo ship

By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 2:40 PM on 06th April 2009

A 32,000-tonne British-owned cargo ship was seized by Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden today.

The 183m-long Malaspina Castle, which was built in 1981, is Italian-operated and flies a Panamanian flag.

The attack took place despite a stepping up of naval patrols in the area following a spate of pirate incidents in recent weeks.

The EU’s Horn of Africa maritime security centre, based in Northwood, north west London, said: ‘A 32,000 tonne UK-owned and Italian-operated bulk carrier was hijacked early this morning in the Gulf of Aden.

‘Few details are known at this stage, but the mixed-nationality crew are believed to be safe.’

The Foreign Office said it was looking into the matter which is also being monitored by the London-based International Maritime Organisation (IMO).

Taiwanese ship the MV Win Far 161 was also seized today near an island in the Seychelles - the second attack in that area within a week.

The seizure of the Malaspina Castle was immediately condemned by the UK ship masters’ union Nautilus, which has long urged governments to take stronger action to deter piracy.

Nautilus assistant general secretary Mark Dickinson said today: “Over the last 10 years, most governments have not really done very much about this.

‘More recently they have been motivated to act and there is an EU naval co-ordination force patrolling off the Gulf of Aden.’

He went on: ‘I’m not sure that this is going to be a long-term thing and I’m also worried that the pirates will start seizing ships well away from the areas being patrolled.

‘In Somalia, piracy is like a big, successful industry and the authorities there need to act. The pirates are treated like local heroes. People look up to them and girls want to marry them. They are seen by some locals as good people but they are ruthless.’

An IMO spokesman said the IMO had raised the matter of piracy with the UN Security Council and that East African countries had signed an agreement to work together to try to beat the problem.

There was no word on the nationalities or numbers of crew on board the two vessels or the exact time of the attacks.

Analysts say the pirates have moved many of their operations out of the Gulf of Aden, which is heavily patrolled by naval warships from countries as diverse as China, the United States, France and India.

Instead, they are attacking off the east African coast, targeting ships coming out of the Mozambican channel.

The multimillion-dollar ransoms are a rare source of cash in Somalia, where nearly half the population is dependent on food aid and clan-based militias are tearing the country apart.

The lawless Horn of Africa nation has not had a functioning government since 1991.

PIRATES

Posted by peiper     on 04/06/2009 at 09:01 AM   
Filed Under: • Pirates, aarrgh! • UK •  
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UN: Speak No Ill Of Islam .

UN: Speak No Ill Of Islam … Or Else

Canada Free Press 03 April 2009
By Bob Parks

These are truly amazing times we live in. We have our own government seizing businesses and dictating how much people should get paid, if the government doesn’t fire them. We have our own government giving the word “spending” a catastrophic new meaning. We have our own government acting like fascist thugs, squelching opposition on the floor of the House and Senate, and now we have the United Nations dictating what free speech will be from now on.

In a crushing blow to the freedom of speech worldwide, the United Nations Human Rights Council last Thursday approved a resolution calling upon member states to provide legal “protection against acts of hatred, discrimination, intimidation and coercion resulting from defamation of religions and incitement to religious hatred in general.”

In other words….

While the resolution speaks of religion in general, the proposal came from Pakistan and had the backing of the powerful 57-government Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the UN’s largest voting bloc – so it was clear that Islam was the only religion the drafters of the resolution had in mind. This is underscored by the fact that Muslim states have worked energetically to make “Islamophobia” the focus of Durban II — the UN’s upcoming second World Conference on Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance. A draft declaration declares that “defamation of Islam” should be a criminal offense, even when it takes place under the “pretext” of “freedom of expression, counter terrorism or national security.”

In other words, if the OIC and the drafters of the Durban declaration get their way, any honest examination of how jihadists use Islamic texts and teachings to make recruits will be illegal. So not only does this herald the death of free speech, but it also leaves us mute and defenseless before the advancing global jihad.

The ramifications here in America are unclear, but if I were to write something that was critical of murderous thugs who may have just blown up a market, killing dozens of people (and were Muslims), would I be contacted by the United Nations and charged with a crime?

Would the United States, blowing off our First Amendment, attempt to enforce this new rule?

Very interesting times indeed.

Bob Parks is a is a member/writer of the National Advisory Council of Project 21, Senior Writer for the New Media Journal, VP of Marketing and Media Relations for the New Media Alliance. Bob’s websites are Black & Right and youtube.com/BlackAndRight

THE UN AND ISLAM

Posted by peiper     on 04/06/2009 at 08:08 AM   
Filed Under: • Religion • United-Nations •  
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Gang kicked dog in air and threatened to do same to owner.  The streets, the parks ,,,

The walks in front of your house are no longer yours to freely and safely use. If they ever were. But even less so now then ever.
And I suppose I should include your own driveway in the above list of things Brits no longer own.

This isn’t a recent story but I just came across it.  It’s just another in a very long line of examples of the defenseless nature of the people here.

Gang kicked dog in air and threatened to do same to owner
Lisa Kenyon
Accrington Observer

A DOG was viciously attacked by a gang of youths while walking through Milnshaw Park, Accrington, with its owner.

William Townsley, 66, was walking his 14-year-old partially-blind Cairn terrier Snoopy through the park at around 1pm on Monday.

RECOVERING from their ordeal ... William and Joyce Townsley with Snoopy, who was attacked while on a walk in the park.

As he was passing the children’s play area, William said a group of around 18 Asian youths racially abused him, shouting obscenities before kicking the defenseless dog in the face and ribs.

William, of Devonshire Street, Accrington, said: “I could hear them shouting racial obscenities but I ignored them at first and carried on walking towards the old tennis courts.

“As I turned around to shout Snoopy, a couple of the gang, who had broken off from the rest, kicked him in the ribs and then in the face before running back to their friends.

“I thought he was dead. The poor dog had been kicked into the air and was just lying on its side.

“As I walked off I could hear them shouting: ‘Carry on, we’ll do to you what we did to the dog’. I was in fear of my life.”

William said he picked his pet up and cradled it in his arms before making his way to the nearby Asda store to call for help.

He added: “I was so shaken up I could hardly talk. The woman I spoke to at Asda said Snoopy was the fourth animal to be attacked up there.”

William said he waited at the store for an hour for a police officer to arrive but then had to leave to get Snoopy to the vets. On his return home he contacted the police again and was assured someone would visit him soon. However, he was still awaiting a response.

Inspector Dave Mangan at Accrington Police Station confirmed the crime had been reported and apologised for the delay in dealing with it.

He said: “After the initial call was logged, another job came in with a high priority and the patrol had to be deployed there. Because we didn’t have a mobile number, we were unable to contact Mr Townsley

“We understand that to this man it was an important call, but unfortunately we don’t have limitless resources and we had to prioritise. We would like to be able to send someone to every crime as soon as it happens but it is not always possible.”

DOG

Can you just imagine how totally defenseless and hurt Mr. Townsley must have felt? Don’t be too critical of this old guy. There have already been countless beatings and killings of innocent people doing no more then walking home from a store or thru a park or as in this case, walking your dog in a park.  Another valid reason for armed citizens.  It won’t happen here of course.

Posted by peiper     on 04/06/2009 at 07:19 AM   
Filed Under: • Crime • Daily Life • UK •  
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   Sunday - April 05, 2009

Word To The Wise

When ordering Thai food to take out, when you know it’s going to sit around for a while and then have to be reheated, order everything 1 heat level less than what you usually get. There’s just something about it, maybe the spices take a while to emerge, but Thai food seems to get hotter with a bit of aging.

I ordered 3 dishes to go. The last time I was there I ordered things Medium and Hot, but I had to have the waiter bring over the spice rack. So this time I ordered everything Hot. And I emphasized HOT, because the guy who took the order kept saying “Mild? You want it mild?”. Big mistake.

At least I now know why the turban was invented: it’s a big bath towel to absorb the gallons of sweat that come leaping out of your head when you eat rice, pork, and vegetables flavored with lava.

Oh. My. God. I feel like I’m wearing napalm lipstick. I don’t dare use the bathroom.

But the stuff tastes sooo good!!

Posted by Drew458     on 04/05/2009 at 09:23 PM   
Filed Under: • Humor •  
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   Saturday - April 04, 2009

All Hail The One!

A Real Miss-siah

Posted by Drew458     on 04/04/2009 at 02:24 PM   
Filed Under: • Obama, The One •  
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The international act of posturing was pointless; A ‘new world order’ is simply fantasy

So says Simon Heffer of The Telegraph.

Nothin’ for me to say for once.

G20: A ‘new world order’ is simply fantasy
The international act of posturing was pointless; because despite having caused the problem, the political class had none of the requisite skills to sort it out.

By Simon Heffer
Last Updated: 6:26PM BST 03 Apr 2009

Barack Obama and Gordon Brown: Don’t trust these guys with your trillions Photo: PA

Those who thought that Dr Goebbels came to an end on a stretch of waste ground in Berlin in 1945 have been forced to think again. The piece of theatre that concluded in London on Thursday was one of the great confidence tricks of our lifetimes.

Just getting the 20 most important heads of government on the planet together in one place and not being unpleasant about each other was, we must concede, something of an achievement. But it won’t make a blind bit of difference to the world’s economy.

Nor, I imagine, will it have any effect on the result of the next general election. In the months ahead, as thousands more people go on to the dole every week, more businesses go under and confidence continues to seep out of a system wrecked by politicians, few will link in their minds the words “Gordon Brown” and “triumph”. I have long thought that our Prime Minister was around the bend and off the deep end. His fantasy press conference at the end of the G20, with his grandiloquent (and preposterous) claim to have founded a “new world order”, confirmed it.

(wording changed at the italics to put it in American terms rather then English)

As I wrote here a few weeks ago, this international act of posturing was pointless; because despite having caused the problem, the political class had none of the requisite skills to sort it out. It also seems that some great issues have been fudged. Is the New World Order in favour of a new fiscal stimulus or not? It pains me to say so, but I have been impressed by the Germans (with the French hanging on to their coat-tails) holding out against recklessly pumping money into the economy as Mr Obama and, to a lesser extent, our own Government have done.

Perhaps it is as well for them that this summit was not held a couple of months later, for when the rioting starts on mainland Europe with the advent of warm weather, and no devaluation of the euro is possible to stop the haemorrhage of jobs, such firm principles might be harder to maintain.

And what is this nonsense about an “agreement” to curb the salaries of bankers? No one has yet satisfactorily explained to me how the salaries of bankers, other than causing justifiable offence to shareholders in failed banks, have anything to do with an economic crisis caused by a conscious decision on behalf of several big governments to expand the supply of money, and to stop proper regulation of banks. Of course, when a bunch of politicians turns up for a party, none of them is going to suggest that there is any political fault behind it, but the G20 took scapegoating indecently far.

Capitalism is not too important to be left to capitalists. It has to be left to them. Politicians simply do not understand. They are contaminated by a desire to redistribute, and to regulate, to keep large constituencies of non-productive voters happy. No politician has been more ruined by this, or caused more ruin, than Mr Brown: and this week he was still at it. In his drivelling speech on “morality” on Tuesday (the absurdity of which would have been exceeded only by Lord Rumba of Rio delivering it) he castigated people for taking risks. Capitalism is based on risk.

The reward for risk is profit. The punishment for bad risk should be bankruptcy. Mr Brown wishes to avoid all such extremes, which is why he rails against capitalists, and bails out pointless banks with our money. Let him bask in his “triumph” while he can, for he is very near the end of the plank.

Roosevelt’s New Deal failed because it hindered people from helping themselves. This welfarist event this week risks making the same mistake on an international scale, with its £1 trillion slush fund for wrecked economies. The politicians have left the stage, thank God. Now let us hope they stay off it for as long as possible, and let the people who can sort out this mess get on with doing so – whatever the risk entailed.

SIMON HEFFER

“it hindered people from helping themselves” ??

Better to confess ignorance and learn then be quiet and remain ignorant. I’m not certain I understand that last line.
Perhaps mistaken but I was under the impression that he had works projects and managed to put many to work.
While I had read criticism of his policies I thought they were simply made by political enemies who’d disagree no matter what he proposed.
Or at least that’s what I’d been led to understand.  Apparently I have it wrong.  ?

Posted by peiper     on 04/04/2009 at 09:59 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics • Editorials • International •  
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