Tuesday - December 19, 2006

On Being A Babysitter

What’s amazing is that I agree with Mr. Patteron’s editorial in the NY TIMES below. The idea that President Bush’s concept of promoting democracy and freedom in the Middle East is a liberal one is almost laughable though. Liberals and Conservatives have that one thing in common. The only difference between the two is that Liberals tend to think of freedom as that happy state of being able to do whatever one wants without any responsibility for one’s actions and the libertine attitude of “anything goes.”

Therein lies the reason why democracy will probably fail in the Middle East. Some people just aren’t wired correctly to be able to handle it. These people need a strong authoritative figure in charge to keep them from going over the edge. Yes, I’m referring to Liberals ... also to most of the Arabs and Persians in the Middle East and Asia. Their minds aren’t capable of handling freedom of expression, religion or tolerance of others without someone making sure they do it. Think of them as children. They need parents.

Saddam Hussein was a bad parent. So was the Ayatollah Khomeini. Osama Bin Laden wants to be a parent of the new caliphate but has already proven to be an abusive parent. On the flip side of the coin, Liberals in the West have had no parent to look up to for guidance for ages. Witness the almost glorification of Bill Clinton and (gasp!) Jimmy Carter. The Liberal establishment here in America has been perfectly willing to sit at “daddy’s” feet and worship their every word, no matter how wrong or deluded they were. Bill Clinton was a bad parent. Jimmy Carter was ... obviously adopted.

Yes, President Bush is a good man for thinking that the people of the Middle East deserve a chance at freedom and democracy. It is indeed a high-minded, liberal concept ... but are they ready for it? The Liberals in the West obviously aren’t ready for it. They have made that clear with demands for “gay marriage”, homosexuals in the military, struggling to remove religion from public view, imposing socialism and nanny states and finally, rigorously demanding politically correct speech from everyone. Too much freedom and no responsibility are traits of the neo-liberal today. Calling it “progressive” is a laughable disguise.

So, can the concept of personal freedom and democracy be introduced into the Middle East? Maybe, but first we have to learn how to teach people to handle it responsibly. A good place to start is with the Liberals in the West. If we can’t train them to behave rationally and accept responsibly for their actions, how can we expect the average man or woman in the Middle East to do the same?

After all, if we can’t keep our “children” here in the West from trashing the house, how can we expect to do the same with someone else’s children in Syria, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, etc.? Our own children are pampered, wild and reckless in their demands. The neighbor’s children are merely wild and reckless. Both are decidedly intent on trashing the sandbox, are easily offended and seem intent on breaking all the rules. As good parents, maybe we need to start administering the discipline that is called for. The “children”, both here in the West and in the Middle East are in dire need of adult supervision. The only question is ... where do we start first?

[موسليم] الناس حمقاء بشكل لا يصدّق الذي يحتاج أن يكون ضربت على الرأس إلى أن يقرّر هم أن يتصرّف [رأيشنلّي]. إن أنّ لا يعمل ، سيتمّ سيف إلى العنق [جوست س ولّ].

God’s Gift?
-- By ORLANDO PATTERSON
_{(NY TIMES EDITORIAL) - December 19, 2006}

One of the more disquieting aspects of the Iraqi occupation is that the president’s final rationale for it is a cherished, though groundless, liberal belief about freedom. As we now know, the war was motivated less by any real evidence of Iraqi involvement with terrorism than by the neoconservatives’ belief that they could stabilize the Middle East by spreading freedom there. Their erroneous assumption was a relic from the liberal past: the doctrine that freedom is a natural part of the human condition.

A disastrously simple-minded argument followed from this: that because freedom is instinctively “written in the hearts” of all peoples, all that is required for its spontaneous flowering in a country that has known only tyranny is the forceful removal of the tyrant and his party.

Once President Bush was beguiled by this argument he began to sound like a late-blooming schoolboy who had just discovered John Locke, the 17th-century founder of liberalism. In his second inaugural speech, Mr. Bush declared “complete confidence in the eventual triumph of freedom ... because freedom is the permanent hope of mankind, the hunger in dark places, the longing of the soul.” Later an Arab-American audience was told, “No matter what your faith, freedom is God’s gift to every person in every nation.” Another speech more explicitly laid out the neoconservative agenda: “We believe that freedom can advance and change lives in the greater Middle East.”

A basic flaw in the approach of the president and his neoliberal (a k a neoconservative) advisers was their failure to distinguish Western beliefs about freedom from those critical features of it that non-Western peoples were likely to embrace.

Those of us who cherish liberty hold as part of the rhetoric that it is “written in our heart,” an essential part of our humanity. It is among the first civic lessons that we teach our children. But such legitimizing rhetoric should not blind us to the fact that freedom is neither instinctive nor universally desired, and that most of the world’s peoples have found so little need to express it that their indigenous languages did not even have a word for it before Western contact. It is, instead, a distinctive product of Western civilization, crafted through the centuries from its contingent social and political struggles and secular reflections, as well as its religious doctrines and conflicts.

Acknowledging the Western social origins of freedom in no way implies that we abandon the effort to make it universal. We do so, however, not at the point of a gun but by persuasion — through diplomacy, intercultural conversation and public reason, encouraged, where necessary, with material incentives. From this can emerge a global regime wherein freedom is embraced as the best norm and practice for private life and government.

Just such a conversation has been under way since the first signing, in 1948, of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights at the United Nations. Several Asian nations — some, like China, rather cynically, and others, like Singapore, with more robust reasoning — have vigorously contested elements of the culture of freedom, especially its individualism, on the grounds that it is inconsistent with the more communal focus of their own cultures. The doctrine of freedom, however, with its own rich communitarian heritage, can easily disarm and even co-opt such arguments.

The good news is that freedom has been steadily carrying the day: nearly all nations now at least proclaim universal human rights as an ideal, though many are yet to put their constitutional commitments to practice. Freedom House’s data show the share of the world’s genuinely free countries increasing from 25 to 46 percent between 1975 and 2005.

The bad news is Iraq. Apart from the horrible toll in American and Iraqi lives, two disastrous consequences seem likely to follow from this debacle. One is the possibility that, by the time America extricates itself, most Iraqis and other Middle Easterners will have come to identify freedom with chaos, deprivation and national humiliation. The other is that most Americans will become so disgusted with foreign engagements that a new insularism will be forced on their leaders in which the last thing that voters would wish to hear is any talk about the global promotion of freedom, whatever “God’s gift” and the “longing of the soul.”

Posted by The Skipper     on 12/19/2006 at 10:24 AM   
Filed Under: • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists • Editorials • Iraq • Middle-East •  
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   Monday - December 18, 2006

IslamoNazi

_{Jeff Koterba - Omaha World Herald}

Ahmadinejad Opponents Leading Elections
_{TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - December 18, 2006, 12:44 PM EST}

Opponents of hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took an early lead in key races in Iran’s local elections, according to partial results announced Monday, with moderate conservatives winning control of councils across the country.

If the final results hold—especially in the bellwether capital, Tehran—it will be an embarrassment to Ahmadinejad, whose anti-Israeli rhetoric and unyielding position on Iran’s nuclear program have provoked condemnation in the West and moves toward sanctions at the U.N. Security Council.

The incomplete results announced by the Interior Ministry suggested that the winners were mostly moderate conservatives opposed to the hardline president, rather than reformists.

However, reformists, who want to bring a measure of liberalism to Iranian society and improve the country’s relationship with the West, were quick to proclaim victory.

“Early results show that Mr. Ahmadinejad’s list has suffered a decisive defeat nationwide,” the Islamic Iran Participation Front, the largest reformist party, said in a statement. “It is a big ‘no’ to the government’s authoritarian and inefficient methods.”

The pro-reformist newspaper Etemad-e-Melli said in an editorial: “The most important message of Friday’s vote was that the people have chosen moderation and rejected extremism.”

A freelance Iranian journalist of reformist sympathies, Iraj Jamshidi, described the vote as “a blow to Ahmadinejad,” who was elected in June 2005. “After a year, Iranians have seen the consequences of the extremist policies employed by Ahmadinejad. Now, they have said a big ‘no’ to him,” said Jamshidi. In the key race for Tehran, candidates supporting Mayor Mohammed Bagher Qalibaf, a moderate conservative opposed to the president, had taken the lead.

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Posted by The Skipper     on 12/18/2006 at 02:52 AM   
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   Friday - December 15, 2006

Surrender?

_{John Trever - The Albuquerque Journal}

Surrender By Any Other Name...
-- by Ann Coulter
(HUMAN EVENTS ONLINE)

How did we go from winning the war in Iraq to losing overnight? Was this decided by the same committee that changed “Peking” to “Beijing”?

These word changes are a fortiori evidence that liberals are part of a conspiracy. On what date did “horrible” and “actress” vanish from the English language to be replaced with “horrific” and “actor”? Who decided that? (Meanwhile, I’m still writing “Puff Daddy” in my nightly dream journal when everybody else has started calling him “Diddy.")

When did “B.C.” (before Christ) and “A.D.” (anno Domini, “in the year of the Lord") get replaced with “BCE” (before the common era) and “CE” (common era)? “Withdrawal” is “redeployment,” “liberal” is “progressive,” and “traitorous” is “patriotic.”

These new linguistic conventions—like going from “winning” to “losing” in Iraq—simply spread like an invisible bacterial invasion.

To be sure, last month the Democrats did win a narrow majority in Congress for the first time in more than a decade. And it cannot be denied that for the past 50 years, Democrats have orchestrated humiliating foreign policy defeats for America. So it is understandable that some might interpret their midterm gains as a mandate for another humiliating defeat.

But that’s not what the Democrats told Americans when they were running for office. To the contrary, they claimed to be gun-totin’ hawks. A shockingly high number of Democratic candidates this year actually fought in wars. And not just the war on poverty, either—real wars, against men with guns.

It was a specific plan of Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Rep. Rahm Emanuel to fake out the voters by recruiting anti-war veterans to run against Republicans. (And when did “chairman” become “chair”?)

To the credit of the voters—especially the American Legion and VFW—the Democrats didn’t fool enough Americans to even match the average midterm gains for the party out of power.

But the point is: You can’t run as a phony patriot and then claim your victory is a mandate for surrender. That would be like awarding yourself undeserved Purple Hearts and then pretending to throw them over the White House wall in protest. No, that’s not fair—nothing could be as contemptible as throwing someone else’s medals on the ground in protest.

Is it the report of the “Iraq Surrender Group” that suddenly caused everyone to say we’re losing?

The ISG report was about what you’d expect if the ladies from “The View” were asked to come up with a victory plan for Iraq. We need to ask Syria to tell Hamas to stop calling for the destruction of Israel. Duh! “Dear Hamas, Do you like killing Jews, or do you LIKE killing Jews? Check yes or no.”

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Posted by The Skipper     on 12/15/2006 at 09:54 AM   
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   Friday - December 01, 2006

Why We Fight

How can anyone (especially those of a Liberal persuasion) be so dead-set against killing animals for their fur, driving SUV’s that guzzle gas and so determined to save the caribou in the ANWR and fight for women’s rights in the workplace ... turn a blind eye and allow atrocities like this to happen on a daily basis? That has puzzled me for some time.

Here in America, the pampered, self-righteous Leftists are angry about EVERYTHING and are damn determinied to preach and press for equal rights and non-discrimination - yet they seem perfectly happy ignoring crap like this around the world.

How can a society call itself “civilized” if it allows a group in its midst to practice disembowelment and murder of individuals whose only crime was “teaching girls to read”? Where are the “human shields” who could be trying to put a stop to this kind of barbaric behavior? Do they only have time to protect mass murderers like Saddam Hussein from US troops?

Disembowelled, Then Torn Apart: The Price Of Daring To Teach Girls
_{Ghazni, Afghanistan (INDEPENDENT - UK) - 29 November 2006}

The gunmen came at night to drag Mohammed Halim away from his home, in front of his crying children and his wife begging for mercy.

The 46-year-old schoolteacher tried to reassure his family that he would return safely. But his life was over, he was part-disembowelled and then torn apart with his arms and legs tied to motorbikes, the remains put on display as a warning to others against defying Taliban orders to stop educating girls.

Mr Halim was one of four teachers killed in rapid succession by the Islamists at Ghazni, a strategic point on the routes from Kabul to the south and east which has become the scene of fierce clashes between the Taliban and US and Afghan forces.

The day we arrived, an Afghan policemen and eight insurgents died during an ambush in an outlying village. Rockets were found, primed to be fired into Ghazni City during a visit by the American ambassador a few days previously.

But, as in the rest of Afghanistan, it is the civilians who are bearing the brunt of this conflict. At the village of Qara Bagh, the family of Mr Halim are distraught and terrified. His cousin, Ahmed Gul, shook his head: “They killed him like an animal. No, no. We do not kill animals like that, it would be haram. They took away a father and a husband, they had no pity. We are all very worried. Please go now, you see those men standing over there? They are watching. It is dangerous for you, and for us.”

Fatima Mushtaq, the director of education at Ghazni, has had repeated death threats, the notorious “night letters”. Her gender, as well as her refusal to send girls home from school, has made her a particular source of hatred for Islamist zealots.

“I think they killed him that way to frighten us, otherwise why make a man suffer so much? Mohammed Halim and his family were good friends of ours and we are very, very upset by what has happened. He came to me when the threats first began and asked what he should do. I told him to move somewhere safe. I think he was trying to arrange that when they came and took him,” she said.

The threats against Ms Mushtaq also extend to her husband, Sayyid Abdul, and their eight children. “When the first letters arrived, I tried to hide them from my husband,” she said. “But then he found the next few. He said we must stand together. We talked, and we decided that we must tell the children. So that they can be prepared, but it is not a good way for them to grow up.”

Ms Mushtaq is familiar with the ways of the Taliban. During their rule she and her sister ran secret schools for girls at their home. The Taliban beat them for teaching the girls algebra.

Posted by The Skipper     on 12/01/2006 at 01:54 AM   
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   Wednesday - November 29, 2006

On This Day In History

¹ IN THE BEGINNING, there was chaos, sand and camels. And the United Nations said “LET THERE BE A PARTITION”. And lo, the Jews were to be separated from the Arabs and each would govern his own and peace would be created in the region.

² But on the next day, Satan approached the Arabs and said unto them “Why settle for half when you can have all? I will show you how.” And Satan enjoined the Arabs living in the region to wait until the dark of night and then leave their homes and hide in the desert while the warriors of the surrounding Arab nations crushed the sons of Abraham.

³ It was to come to pass that the evil plan was destined to fail for the twelve tribes of Judea had been warned by an angel of the Lord and were prepared for the Arab invaders who were sorely beaten and even thrashed by the hand of God on the next day.

⁴ And when the dust of the conflagration had settled the Arab armies were smashed and the Arabs who had livedd in the region were forced to flee and condemned to wander the Earth in poverty and shame as their Arab brethren turned their backs on them and refused them succor.

⁵ From that day forward, the desert bloomed with gardens and the sons of Abraham were fruitful in the land God had promised them in the Covenant.

⁶ But after time the United Nations became known to the world as a useless, corrupt and ineffectual entity and the Arabs licked their wounds and plotted secretly to destroy that land which God had summoned His people to.

ASSEMBLY VOTES PALESTINE PARTITION; MARGIN IS 33 TO 13;
ARABS WALK OUT; ARANHA HAILS WORK AS SESSION ENDS
(NEW YORK TIMES) - November 29, 1947

The United Nations General Assembly approved yesterday a proposal to partition Palestine into two states, one Arab and the other Jewish, that are to become fully independent by Oct.1. The vote was 33 to 13 with two abstentions and one delegation, the Siamese, absent.

The decision was primarily a result of the fact that the delegations of the United States and the Soviet Union, which were at loggerheads on every other important issue before the Assembly, stood together on partition. Andrei A. Gromyko and Herschel V. Johnson both urged the Assembly yesterday not to agree to further delay but to vote for partition at once.

The Assembly disregarded last minute Arab efforts to effect a compromise. Although the votes of a dozen or more delegations see-sawed to the last, supporters of partition had two votes more than the required two-thirds majority, or a margin of three.

The roll-call vote was as follows: For (33) - Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Costa Rica, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, France, Guatemala, Haiti, Iceland, Liberia, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Peru Philippines, Poland, Sweden, Ukraine, South Africa, Uruguay, the Soviet Union, the United States, Venezuela, White Russia.

Against (13) - Afghanistan, Cuba, Egypt, Greece, India, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, Yemen.

Abstentions (10) - Argentina, Chile, China, Colombia, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Honduras, Mexico, United Kingdom, Yugoslavia.

Absent (1) - Siam.

All other questions before the Assembly were disposed of a week ago, and it ended its second regular session at 6:57 P.M. after farewell speeches by Dr. Oswaldo Aranha, its President, and Trygve Lie, the Secretary General. The Assembly’s third regular session is to open in a European capital on Sept. 21.

The vote on partition was taken at 5:35 P. M. Representatives of Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Yemen, four of the six Arab member states, announced that they would not be bound by the Assembly’s decision and walked determinedly out of the Assembly Hall at Flushing Meadow. The Egyptian and Lebanese delegates were silent but walked out, too.

Sir Alexander Cadogan, representative of Britain, which is to terminate the League of Nations mandate over Palestine and withdraw all British troops by Aug. 1, made a brief statement after the vote. He requested the United Nations Palestine Commission to establish contact with the British Government about the date of its arrival in Palestine and the coordination of its plans with the withdrawal of British troops.

The United Nations commission which will be responsible to the Security Council in the event that the Arabs carry out their threats to fight rather than agree to partition, will be composed of representatives of Bolivia, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Panama and the Philippines.

This state, which is understood to have the backing of the United States, was proposed by Dr. Aranha and approved without opposition after the Arab delegates had walked out.

The commission, as proposed by the partition subcommittee, of the Assembly’s Ad Hoc Committee on Palestine, was to have been composed of Denmark, Guatemala, Iceland, Poland, and Uruguay, but the question was left to the Assembly because of United States opposition.

The Assembly, without discussion, also approved an appropriation of $2,000,000 for the expenses of the commission, which will take over authority in Palestine after the British terminate the mandate and will then transfer it to the “shadow governments” of the two states.

The walkout of the Arab delegates was taken as a clear indication that the Palestinian Arabs would have nothing to do with the Assembly’s decision. The British have emphasized repeatedly that British troops could not be used to impose a settlement not acceptable to both Jews and Arabs, and the partition plan does not provide outside military force to keep order.

Instead, it provides for the establishment of armed militia by the two nascent states to keep internal order and that any threats to peace by the neighboring Arab states are to be referred to the Security Council.

The Assembly decided Friday to take a recess of twenty-four hours to give the Arabs time to submit a comprise proposal, but this turned out to be what Mr. Johnson called a mere resurrection of the proposal for a federal Palestine, which had been recommended by a minority of the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine.

The resolution to return the entire question to the Ad Hoc Committee on Palestine, introduced by Mostafa Adl, the representative of Iran, would furthermore have directed the committee to take into account the last-minute Arab proposal.

A simple procedural resolution returning the question to the committee would have had precedence over the partition proposal, but Dr. Aranha, after considerable reflection, ruled that the extraneous provisions barred it from being treated as a procedural motion and that it could not be voted on until after the Assembly’s decision on partition.

Camille Chamoun, the Lebanese representative, tried to meet Dr. Aranha’s ruling by demanding that the committee vote first on the eleven principles on the future government of Palestine, which had been approved unanimously by the Special Committee on Palestine last summer.

Mr. Chamoun remarked that the resolution before the Assembly did not mention these principles, but Dr. Aranha replied that they were covered by the plan substituted by the Palestine committee, to which the Assembly’s resolution will give effect, and rejected the final Arab attempt to postpone a decision.

Dr. Alfonso Lopez, the Colombian representative, who on Friday had submitted a complicated proposal that, among other things, would have returned the question to the committee, had arranged with another delegate to make a simple proposal to recommit. However, the delegate, sensing the mood of the Assembly, remained silent and Dr. Aranha called for the decisive vote.

The United States delegation played its part in persuading the delegate in question not to present the motion for recommittal, and supporters of partition agreed that, after long hesitation, it had sincerely done its best to obtain Assembly approval of partition.

It was still difficult to account for the fact that Greece, which otherwise followed United States leadership throughout the long Assembly, voted against partition and that some Latin American countries abstained.

Britain, which brought the Palestine question before the Assembly last March, abstained on all votes in the Palestine committee and in poling on the issue in the Assembly.

It was expected that had the Assembly failed to reach a decision the United States would have asked Britain to stay on in Palestine. Sir Alexander’s statement after the decision was taken was welcomed as being more cooperative than previous ones. It was generally expected that the United States and Britain would now agree on a working arrangement to facilitate the commission’s work.

The Arab delegates, particularly after the vote, referred bitterly to the “heavy pressure” exerted on other delegations. Other delegates interpreted these complaints as attacks on the United States.

The Syrian representatives led this attack. Faris el-Khoury, in a statement before the vote, charged that the proportion of Jews to the rest of the population in the United States was 1 to 30. Jews were trying to “intimidate the United Nations ... and hiss the speakers here,” which, he said was “proof that they are dominating here.”

This assertion drew hisses from the gallery, and Dr. Aranha pounded his gavel for order.

A few minutes before the Assembly convened Arab spokesmen announced that they had drawn up a new six-point program in twenty-four hours of conferences. The program involved this formula:

(1) A federal independent state of Palestine shall be created not later than Aug. 1, 1949.

(2) The Government of Palestine shall be constituted on a federal basis and shall include a federal government and governments for Arab and Jewish countries.

(3) Boundaries of the cantons will be fixed so as to include a federal basis and shall include a federal government and governments for Arab and Jewish countries.

(4) The population of Palestine shall elect by universal, direct suffrage a Constituent Assembly, which shall draft the Constitution of the future federated state of Palestine. The Constituent Assembly shall be composed of all elements of the population in proportion to the number of their respective citizens.

(5) The Constituent Assembly, in defining the attributes of the federated government of Palestine as well as of its legislative and judiciary organs and the attributes of the governments of the cantons and of the relation of the governments of these cantons with the federal government, shall draw its inspiration chiefly from the principles of the Constitution of the United States as well as from the organization of laws in the states of the United States.

(6) The Constitution will provide, among other things, for protection of the holy places, liberty of access to visit the holy places and freedom of religion as well as safeguarding of the rights of religious establishments of all nationalities in Palestine.

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/29/2006 at 12:53 PM   
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   Tuesday - November 28, 2006

Most Ridiculous Item Of The Day (so far)

What next? China to host international dog show? Russia to host free market capitalist conference? France to host international conference on war strategies? Sweden to host international African heritage month? PUH-LEEZE!

I have finally decided that I must have fallen down the rabbit hatch sometime around 1989 and the world I knew has disappeared. I am surrounded by Cheshire cats and leprechauns and barking mad idiots. How do I get off this planet and back to where things make sense?

I am a stranger in a strange land. Can you grok?

Iran To Host Holocaust Conference
_{(BREITBART) - Nov 28 6:20 AM US/Eastern}

Iran, which disputes that Jews were slaughtered by the Nazis, is to hold a conference next month to allow historians to clarify “hidden angles” of the Holocaust, the foreign ministry has revealed.

The December 11 and 12 international gathering aims to “create opportunities ... for a suitable scientific research so the hidden and unhidden angles of this most important political issue of the 20th century become more transparent,” said a statement on the Iranian foreign ministry’s website.

Iran’s fiercely anti-Israeli regime is supportive of so-called Holocaust revisionists, who maintain that the systematic slaughter by the Nazis of mainland Europe’s Jews and other groups during World War II was either invented or exaggerated.

The event is organized by the ministry’s Institute for Political and International Studies (IPIS) which has called on researchers and lecturers to take part in the conference.

The gathering, titled “Study of Holocaust: A Global Perspective”, has been scheduled to coincide with international Human Rights Day on December 10, it said. “This conference fully respects the Jewish religion and is away from politicization and propaganda,” the statement said.

Topics include “anti-Semitism, Nazism and Zionism: collaboration or animosity; the concept of Holocaust and its roots; views of revisionists; denial or admittance of gas chambers,” it added.

“The laws against those who deny Holocaust and killing of the Palestinians,” are also to be discussed. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has prompted international anger by dismissing the Holocaust as a “myth” used to justify the creation of Israel.

In mid-August, Tehran staged an international contest of cartoons on the Holocaust, in response to the publication in Western papers last September of controversial caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed.

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/28/2006 at 01:36 PM   
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   Thursday - November 23, 2006

Under The Burkha

Filthy little buggers! The dirty little wogs in the Middle East only have two things on their tiny little pea-brains at all times: killing and screwing. No sheep or goat is safe over there. Now the little creeps are bugging dressing rooms and gyms with hidden cameras to satisfy their lust. Is it any wonder they’re totally nuts?

I say we nuke the main cities, grab the oil wells and live happily ever after. They’ll probably be so busy surfing porn sites and spanking the monkey they won’t even notice when the bombs fall. It gives a whole new meaning to the phrase “did the Earth move for you too?” Mheh-heh-he-he-he ....

_{(P.S. I found the picture to go with the news article below by Googling “Iran porn”. You wouldn’t believe some of the crap that popped up. The web sites are all in Arabic or Farsi but the pictures are clearly understood. Nuke ‘em, Danno!)}

Spy Camera Warning For Iran Women
_{IRAN (BBC) - Friday, 24 November 2006, 00:26 GMT}

Women are being warned that they may be being filmed. Iranian women have been warned to be on the look-out for cameras hidden in places where they undress, such as fitting rooms, gyms and swimming pools.

The chief of Iran’s police, Esmail Ahmadi Miqadam, said some shop owners were fitting spy cameras themselves. Iranian authorities want to stop a wave of secretly-filmed pornographic DVDs hitting markets and internet sites.

A soap opera star faces a possible lashing after a private film allegedly showing her having sex was circulated. Popular television actress Zahra Amir Ebhrahimi has denied it is her shown in the film, Britain’s Guardian newspaper said.

She said a vengeful ex-fiancé had faked the film, the newspaper reported. The country’s strict morality laws prohibit sex outside marriage. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has been championing a drive to banish unwanted Western cultural influences from Iran.

Last year, Western and “indecent” music was banned from state-run TV and radio stations. Correspondents say the release of pornographic DVDs of privately-filmed events is a growing trend in Iran.

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/23/2006 at 10:18 PM   
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   Tuesday - November 21, 2006

Quote Of The Day

“We don’t have a Jewish state here. We have Sodom and Gomorrah here!”

-- Moshe Gafni, ultra-Orthodox Israeli lawmaker

Israel Orders Gay Marriage Recognition
_{JERUSALEM (AP) - November 21, 2006, 10:37 AM EST}

In a landmark ruling, Israel’s Supreme Court ordered the government Tuesday to recognize same-sex marriages performed abroad. The lone dissenter on the seven-judge panel was an observant Jew, highlighting the controversy the decision immediately touched off among ultra-Orthodox Jews and other conservative groups in Israel.

Efforts by Israel’s gay community to win approval for same-sex marriage, a key issue in the U.S. and Europe, face a major obstacle because Israel’s religious authorities have a monopoly over marriage and divorce.

Yossi Ben-Ari and Laurent Schuman were married in Canada after that country legalized same-sex marriage in 2003. Determined after a 21-year partnership to enjoy all the privileges of a married couple in Israel, they were among five couples who petitioned the Supreme Court to have their marriage registered here, too.

Moshe Negbi, a legal expert, said the court’s decision is mostly symbolic because gay couples in Israel already had many of the rights of heterosexual partnerships. The significant changes are that they will now get the same tax breaks as a married couple and be able to adopt children, Negbi said. Israeli law stipulates a couple must be married to adopt a child.

“The marriages of same-sex couples who marry in places like Canada where the law recognizes such marriages, will also be recognized in Israel, and they will be registered as married here,” Negbi said.

Civil marriages cannot be performed in Israel because of the rabbinate’s monopoly on family law. But couples married in civil ceremonies abroad have all the rights of a married couple, and their marriages are registered here. The court uses the term “register” instead of “recognition” to avoid religious criticism of the ruling, Negbi said.

“The court says that now, not only heterosexuals, but homosexuals, too, can have civil marriages,” Negbi added. The word game did not pacify the ultra-Orthodox community, which was infuriated by the ruling.

- More ...

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/21/2006 at 03:11 PM   
Filed Under: • Middle-East •  
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   Thursday - November 16, 2006

Meanwhile ….

Ground, she movin’ under me.
Tidal waves out on the sea.
Sulphur smoke up in the sky.
Pretty soon we learn to fly

Let me hear you, now
I don’t know, I don’t know
where I’m a gonna go
when the volcano blow.

  Jimmy Buffett “Volcano”

_{Michael Ramirez - Investors Business Daily}

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/16/2006 at 01:02 PM   
Filed Under: • Middle-East •  
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   Thursday - November 09, 2006

Reaction From The Middle East

AP is reporting on Arab reaction to Tuesday’s election in ”Arabs React To U.S. Election Results.” It’s pretty much what you’d expect from that region.  Here is a sample ....

Israel:

“Israelis perceive the Iranian threat as imminent,” said Prof. Menahem Blondheim of Hebrew University. “Without political support at home and in his party and among American public, a decisive military or diplomatic move against Iran seems less and less likely.”

Egypt:

“I was really thrilled when I learned that the Democrats won in Congress,” said Mohammed Ali, a Cairo auto parts salesman. “They are far better than the Republicans led by Bush, who destroyed everything everywhere. Look at Iraq, Palestine and Lebanon.”

Syria:

“President Bush is no longer acceptable worldwide,” said Suleiman Hadad, a lawmaker in Syria, whose autocratic government has been shunned by the U.S.

Jordan:

“We are delighted that the American voters have at least disassociated themselves from these dangerous policies,” newspaper editor Nabil al-Sharif said.

Gaza:

“Our experience is whether it is Democrats or Republicans, we don’t see much difference when it comes to dealing with Israel,” said Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat.

Dubai:

“The problem for Arabs now is, an American withdrawal could be a security disaster for the entire region,” said Mustafa Alani, an Iraqi analyst for the Gulf Research Center in Dubai.

Iran:

Iranian state television said in a commentary that the Republicans suffered losses because of “Bush’s wrong strategy in the Middle East” as well as “financial corruption in the United States.”

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/09/2006 at 06:04 AM   
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   Tuesday - November 07, 2006

Euro-Peon Pussies

See the picture below? Those are Palestinian boys carrying signs protesting the death sentence of their hero ... Saddam Hussein. He is their hero because Saddam was paying out $25,000 to the families of all Palestinian suicide bombers. Their dirtbag parents and religious leaders took the money and sent their sons and daughters into Israel with explosives strapped on tight ... in much the same manner that you send your kids off to school every day - except your kids don’t blow themselves up. For money. From a mass murderer.

Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, speaking to reporters on Monday, said he opposed the death penalty for Mr. Hussein, joining several other European leaders and European Union officials who announced their opposition to the sentence. When pressed by reporters, Mr. Blair spoke of his longstanding opposition to capital punishment. He said he did not intend to protest the sentence, and condemned Mr. Hussein’s brutality.

European leaders insisted that the viciousness of the actions of which Mr. Hussein was found guilty had not changed their view that state-sponsored killing was wrong. Some warned that executing Mr. Hussein would only worsen the sectarian bloodshed in Iraq.

The Associated Press quoted Terry Davis, secretary general of the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly, as saying: “A country ravaged by violence and death does not need more violence, and especially not a state-orchestrated execution. Saddam Hussein is a criminal and should not be allowed to become a martyr.” Amnesty International said Sunday that it “deplored” Mr. Hussein’s sentence, describing the proceedings as “deeply flawed and unfair.”

-- NY TIMES, November 6 - “Many Oppose Death Penalty for Hussein”

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/07/2006 at 03:02 AM   
Filed Under: • EUro-peons • Iraq • Middle-East •  
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   Thursday - October 05, 2006

Rules Of Engagement

Posted by The Skipper     on 10/05/2006 at 01:55 PM   
Filed Under: • EUro-peons • Middle-East •  
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   Wednesday - October 04, 2006

Collaborators

We haven’t picked on the Fwench in a while. It’s time to pay a visit to Lebanon and Iran and see what the Frogs are up to. Not surprisingly, Robert Tracinski finds the Fwench up to their usual tricks ...

It’s Not a World War Until…
-by Robert Tracinski, The Intellectual Activist

The joke going around the Internet is that it’s not a World War until France surrenders. But I disagree. I think it’s not really a World War until the French become collaborators—a moment that has now fully arrived.

TIA Daily reader Jonathan Cargan sent me a story about an Iranian attempt to draft the French into a scheme in which French technicians would help enrich uranium inside Iran for use by the Iranians—a scheme that, sadly, sounds like one the French might embrace.

Meanwhile, TIA Daily reader Erik Driessens sent me the link below (from DEBKAfile, a site run by folks with lots of contacts within Israeli intelligence), which provides photos of French “peacekeepers” in Lebanon blocking Israeli tanks to keep them from attacking Hezbollah fighters who had just raided an Israeli armory. The French are now acting as allies of Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“French Tanks Obstruct Israeli Tanks over Suspected Hizballah Robbery of Israeli Weapons Store,” DEBKAfile, October 3

The south Lebanese village of Merwahin was the stage Thursday, Sept, 28 of the first near-showdown between UN and Israeli forces. DEBKAfile publishes here the first photo of an encounter between 4 French Leclerc and at least 5 Israeli Merkava tanks in that Lebanese village.

Despite the photographic evidence, Israel officially denies the incident. DEBKAfile reports the French force sought to prevent the Israeli unit from combing through the Hizballah-dominated village in search of the raiders who crossed into Israel and broke into the IDF’s Kibbutz Shomera arms store last week. They made off with a large quantity of side-arms, anti-tank weapons, LAU rockets, and hundreds of combat grenades, which the Israeli force was determined to recover.

Posted by The Skipper     on 10/04/2006 at 12:05 PM   
Filed Under: • EUro-peons • Middle-East •  
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   Tuesday - October 03, 2006

Hijack!

Turkish Jet Hijackers Surrender
_{(BBC) - Tuesday, 3 October 2006, 20:03 GMT 21:03 UK}

Two men who hijacked a Turkish airliner flying from Tirana to Istanbul have surrendered after the Boeing 737 landed at Brindisi in southern Italy. The motive for their action is unclear, with conflicting reports of either a protest against the Pope or an attempt to seek asylum in Italy. Reports say Italian fighter planes forced the airliner to land.

All the Turkish Airlines plane’s 107 passengers - including beauty contest entrants - are said to be unhurt. The hijackers were reported to have been protesting against the Pope’s planned visit to Turkey in November. However, confirming the surrender, Brindisi Police Chief Salvatore De Paolis told Reuters news agency that the two men wanted political asylum.

A Greek defence official who spoke to Reuters said the plane had entered Greek air space at 1758 (1458 GMT) and four Greek fighters had been scrambled to escort it. The Italian air force in turn sent up two F-16s to intercept the plane, and reportedly forced it to land. Both hijackers are said by Turkish media to be Turks. Candan Karlitekin, chairman of Turkish Airlines’ board of directors, said no-one had been hurt and the hijackers had apparently not threatened passengers.

Asked if the hijacking was a protest against the papal visit, Mr Karliteken told Turkish TV channel NTV: “The cockpit was told that it was a protest of this nature.” A speech by Pope Benedict XVI, in which he quoted a 14th-Century Byzantine emperor who had suggested a link between Islam and violence, sparked angry protests in Turkey and other mainly Muslim countries last month.

But Turkish television later said one of the hijackers had converted to Christianity and was a conscientious objector, Reuters reports. It said he had sent a letter to the Pope in late August, asking for his help to avoid compulsory military service in Turkey. It quoted the letter as reading: “I am a Christian and I do not want to serve in a Muslim army.”

 
 
 
Contestants in an international beauty pageant, Globe International 2006, were among the passengers, according to the Albanian event’s press spokesman. Miss India, Miss Singapore, Miss Malaysia and Miss Philippines were on the flight, the spokesman told the BBC’s Asian Network.

Posted by The Skipper     on 10/03/2006 at 03:36 PM   
Filed Under: • Middle-East • Odd-Strange • Terrorists •  
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