Hi there, !
Today Wed 08/11/2010 Tue 08/10/2010 Mon 08/09/2010 Sun 08/08/2010 Sat 08/07/2010 Fri 08/06/2010 Thu 08/05/2010 Archives
Rantburg
531692 articles and 1855967 comments are archived on Rantburg.

Today: 72 articles and 231 comments as of 12:37.
Post a news link    Post your own article   
Area: WoT Operations    WoT Background    Non-WoT        Politix   
60 killed in triple bombing in Basra
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
Page 4: Opinion
7 00:00 JosephMendiola [1] 
16 00:00 OldSpook [1] 
0 [1] 
0 [1] 
0 [] 
4 00:00 HammerHead [] 
1 00:00 Phosing Big Foot3926 [] 
Page 1: WoT Operations
2 00:00 SteveS [2]
9 00:00 CrazyFool [2]
3 00:00 miscellaneous []
3 00:00 Jack is Back! [1]
0 [2]
3 00:00 Parabellum [1]
0 []
0 [1]
0 []
0 [1]
5 00:00 tu3031 []
0 []
0 []
4 00:00 Shipman []
0 []
0 []
0 [2]
1 00:00 Swanimote [1]
1 00:00 Redneck Jim []
0 []
2 00:00 miscellaneous [1]
0 [5]
0 [1]
1 00:00 Glenmore []
Page 2: WoT Background
0 [2]
1 00:00 chris [1]
2 00:00 miscellaneous [1]
2 00:00 miscellaneous [1]
2 00:00 Besoeker [2]
0 [1]
2 00:00 badanov []
1 00:00 Free Radical []
2 00:00 Besoeker []
3 00:00 SteveS []
5 00:00 miscellaneous []
2 00:00 JohnQC []
2 00:00 miscellaneous []
9 00:00 JosephMendiola []
3 00:00 JosephMendiola []
2 00:00 Thing From Snowy Mountain []
2 00:00 chris [1]
1 00:00 Anguper Hupomosing9418 []
8 00:00 rwv []
5 00:00 JohnQC []
1 00:00 JohnQC []
28 00:00 OldSpook []
0 []
5 00:00 Clyde Ulamp8999 []
0 []
Page 3: Non-WoT
4 00:00 Charles []
0 [1]
2 00:00 tu3031 [2]
1 00:00 Besoeker []
1 00:00 Goodluck []
5 00:00 Barbara Skolaut [1]
2 00:00 Bright Pebbles [1]
9 00:00 Dale []
6 00:00 Barbara Skolaut []
0 [1]
2 00:00 Pappy [1]
1 00:00 Redneck Jim [1]
Page 6: Politix
15 00:00 Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo) []
5 00:00 tu3031 [1]
11 00:00 Asymmetrical Triangulation [1]
17 00:00 Hellfish []
Caribbean-Latin America
Kass: Let Them Eat Cake!
John Kass of the Chicago Tribune takes a sympathetic look at the First Lady's recently concluded vacation to Spain.
And if the first lady wants to take her daughter and her friends to Spain and spend her own money, how dare anyone rip her for it?
Agreed. Unfair to criticize a wealthy woman for wanting to treat her daughter to a once in a lifetime vacation...
There are many legitimate issues for which the Obama White House can be criticized. But ripping on the first lady for taking a vacation to Spain is just plain wrong.
Agreed.
Yes, the government picks up the tab for her security and the presidential jet. But we'd pay that tab if she returned to Chicago. So relax.
The problem isn't the trip. It's the logistical tail she brought her and her husband's current policy ripping rich folks for their profligate ways. Turnabout is fair play.
Many of you know that I'm no fan of the Obama liberal big-government politics. I like President Barack Obama personally. It's his politics that drive me crazy.
I got five bucks that sez you voted for him, John.
So every time the White House hints at more federal taxes and regulations -- policies that frighten business away from hiring unemployed workers who are desperate for jobs -- I've got to do something to calm my nerves.
Try drinking heavily, John.
So I smoke a couple bowls of Hopium trimmed from the smiling Obama Chia Head sitting on my desk, and everything's all right.
Very revealing, John.
But Michelle isn't going to raise the national debt by going to Spain. No one is going to lose their job. The Spaniards seem to like her. And what's wrong with Spain anyway?
No, but Mrs. Obama is adding to it in her own little way..
Where do you want her to take a vacation, Wisconsin Dells like the rest of us?
Grand Lake in Oklahoma is lovely this time of year. Great fishing, okay nightlife.
There's nothing wrong with the Dells. Some Chicago politicians go to Aruba for the casinos. Mayor Richard Daley might go on an exotic trip with his developer buddy, Michael Marchese.
Wipe drool from your chin, John...
But working families vacation at the Dells. And I can't picture Michelle's wealthy entourage squeezing into a Paul Bunyan for the lumberjack breakfast before spending the day at a go-kart track.
Aside from the nutbusting security, what would it hurt?
Some pundits shrieked that they should have gone to California, because it's just as nice as Spain. California as nice as Spain?

Oh, shut up.

In California, do they have free-range pigs that eat nothing but special golden acorns until their flesh gets buttery, forming the foundation of the exquisite ham known as jamon serrano?

In California do they serve earthenware bowls of tiny baby eels, called anguilas, delicately sauteed with virgin olive oil, garlic and a touch of red pepper flakes?
You have a point, John, but California has several air hubs all that stuff can be flown in.
Has California ever won the World Cup? Of course not.
No, but they recently acquired Hello Kiffin.
I wish I could afford Spain as well, but I'm not going to criticize our first lady because her husband made several million on his two autobiographies before he turned 47.
Nice rhetorical juke, John. Irrelevant, but nice.
"The bottom line is that optics matter," sniffed a Republican political strategist on CBS. "… At a time when we're seeing 9.6 percent unemployment, 70,000 jobs lost this month, people losing their homes, and it doesn't convey that she senses the plight of working families."

Yes, optics do matter. It's not that Mrs. Obama didn't consider those optics. But the daughter wanted Spain. So vamanos, chiquita.
Very impressive. Way to dismiss a legitimate criticism. By ignoring it. The same as with the rest of your media buddies.
If I were president and my boys wanted to go to Spain and watch soccer games, then on to England, France, Germany, Greece and Turkey, guess what?

I'd send them. And you'd send your kids where they wished, if you had the money.
I'd tell them to bring back some nice photos. But that's just me, John.
A few years ago, every time President George W. Bush or first lady Laura Bush appeared to have even a smidgen of fun, the network news would juxtapose their smiles against some heartbreaking account of impoverished Americans eating road kill to survive another winter.
Way to go. Very impressive. You suck as a polemicist, but you don't need that, do you? Just by ignoring the fact that during W's time we had a relatively tame US government in near full employment, you can actually make a point.
So I suppose much of this Marie Antoinette business is a reaction to all that liberal media bias against Republican presidents. The bias has been evident for decades, and it's one reason why networks and many newspapers have lost viewers and readers.
Wrong John. TV networks and newspapers have lost customers because of the internet. And conservatism is an easier sell.
But Republican Party pundits are now acting exactly like the Democratic water carriers they once whined about.
True. Except the republican have an actual point to make about oversized government spending, exemplified by the First Lady.
They want to paint a portrait of Michelle telling her peasants to eat cake if they can't find bread.

But the real picture is that it's none of our business that a mom with a lot of cash wanted to take her daughter to Spain.
I don't mnow many moms with a multimillion dollar logistical tail, do you, John?
So let them eat ham.
How about canned tuna? ( Sorry: O-club reference. )
Posted by: badanov || 08/08/2010 11:25 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Now this is weird. Every time I think of Mrs. Obama I get the, "Let Them Eat Cake," saying running through my head. I didn't know some one else shared that thought.
Posted by: miscellaneous || 08/08/2010 12:36 Comments || Top||

#2  Here's a clue John, you poor sheltered upper-crust twit: Its called LEADERSHIP. Lead by example. Something innate to anyone that's held a military leadership position. "Follow Me" isn't a motto, its a way of life.

We call on our president to be a leader. And guess what? Family matters. The old saying goes "The hardest job in the Army is Army Wife". Like any military wife knows, the commander's wife is part of the team, like it or not. She has to help set the example in public.

And that is where the Obamas fail - basic leadership.

Its becoming mpore and more apparent that he's simply a glib pol from the Chicago machine who is far above his competence, and she's a power hungry social climber with all the grace of a Klingon.

She is the Marie Antoinette to his Jimmy Carter.

Side note: how can this guy be so blind to the obvious issue of personal leadership? Is the "upper crust" and press really that isolated from real life? If so, its time to tear them down, forcefully if needed. They are becoming a clear and present danger to the Republic and liberty.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/08/2010 12:44 Comments || Top||

#3  Side note: how can this guy be so blind to the obvious issue of personal leadership?

Because 'leadership' has been deconstructed into an evil artifact of 'false class consciousness?'
(Ask Lopt- she is way better at explaining how our socialist ruling-class looks at these things.)

Is the "upper crust" and press really that isolated from real life?

That would be 'yes.' Too many examples to mention...
Posted by: Free Radical || 08/08/2010 13:47 Comments || Top||

#4  Um, guys? Read this again, remembering that he doesn't like Bambi or Bambi's policies much.

I think Mr. Kass is very imaginatively sticking it to Mrs. Bambi.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 08/08/2010 14:10 Comments || Top||

#5  At my last private-sector gig, the place was going slow spiral Tango-Uniform. Multiple layoffs (Gawd, I got tired of the "you are the best of the best" speaches the day after each one, but I digress.), pay cuts, etc. Yet the CFO had the Obamasense of arriving at work one day in a brand new Porche 911.

Imagine the surprise of us "best of the best" when the damn thing got keyed......
Posted by: Uncle Phester || 08/08/2010 14:39 Comments || Top||

#6  speaches....er, speeches....was thinking about how in the pits the gig was......
Posted by: Uncle Phester || 08/08/2010 14:42 Comments || Top||

#7  Barb, I respectfully disagree - honestly it sounds like he is making excuses for them since they have money they can do as they wish -- he gets his digs in about HOW Obama made the money but does not attack the central "wrongness" of the action in the context of being the primary leader in the US Government. It smells of typical Country Club types defending their own against us rabble, the Sam's Club types.

Again, I think he misses the most salient point: a leaders family IS part and parcel of the team; and their behavior alters the effectiveness of the leadership.

Marie Antoinette was an enabler of Louis XVI, and she deserved the guillotine.

Michelle Antoinette, (knowingly or not) is setting herself and Obumble up the same way, except there is no guillotine waiting (at least not yet).
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/08/2010 15:23 Comments || Top||

#8  TO clarify:

And if the first lady wants to take her daughter and her friends to Spain and spend her own money, how dare anyone rip her for it?
[Agreed. Unfair to criticize a wealthy woman for wanting to treat her daughter to a once in a lifetime vacation.]


Dead wrong. If you are Joe Stock holder, then yeah take a vacation, whatever. When you are the leader and your people are hurting, you have to do the right things, even if it means you have to tell the wife and kids "No". THAT is the part of leadership that the original author does not get. There are times when your position demands things that may have you sacrifice personal gratification for the greater good. And that's where it is NOT OK for a rich woman to take a "once in a lifetime vacation".

Just like a division commander's wife doesn't go on a Disneyland vacation when her husband's brigades are deployed in combat (and her husband usually doesn't spend time at the golf course if he is serious about his unit).

Its piss poor leadership, and destructive.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/08/2010 15:38 Comments || Top||

#9  Or perhaps Im missing the /irony tags...
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/08/2010 15:40 Comments || Top||

#10  OS, destructive is part of the plan.
Posted by: Hellfish || 08/08/2010 18:23 Comments || Top||

#11  I am constantly amazed that people assign a bad execution of good intentions - "obama really loves the US he just has a weird view of economics" or "he's a bad leader because he sends his family friends on this vacation" or "doesn't he realize he plays too much golf and takes too much time off?"

This is who he is. He does not love your America. He is doing all he can to push his agenda and reward his allies which he hopes him to push his anti-American agenda forward. He's not an idiot - he's against all this country stands for.

Once you look at it this way he makes a lot more sense.
Posted by: Hellfish || 08/08/2010 18:28 Comments || Top||

#12  Compare the column Mr. Kass wrote with the one Joe Klein of Newsweek would have written had Laura Bush taken her daughters on the same exact trip in the summer of 2006.
Posted by: Steve White || 08/08/2010 19:58 Comments || Top||

#13  Let them eat cake. That is what Mrs. O told the advisors when she told them that she was going to Spain and leaving her husband behind on his birthday. Hey, she can do whatever she wants, including telling him, "Later!" on his birthday.
Posted by: Martini || 08/08/2010 20:19 Comments || Top||

#14  OldSpook, Fred, you need to read some of John Kass's previous columns, readily available on the Chicago Tribune web site. You really blew it in your fisking and comments. You are 180 degrees wrong on Kass.
Posted by: Ebbese Ebbump8799 || 08/08/2010 20:25 Comments || Top||

#15  Fred and OS has nothing to do with this fisking. It was this writer.
Posted by: badanov || 08/08/2010 20:33 Comments || Top||

#16  Like I said, its possible I missed the /irony tag someplace in there in the original piece. But honestly, there are tons better criticism that can be made, which was my point - its a far more fundamental defect in the Obamas and typical elites that the "elites" themselves seem unable to comprehend.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/08/2010 21:01 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
China: What Goes Around, Comes Around
Posted by: miscellaneous || 08/08/2010 12:58 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  the Chinese are avid students of their own history

Bully for them.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/08/2010 14:03 Comments || Top||

#2  "the Chinese are avid students of their own history"

Mao's version, or the actual one?

"[T]here is much corruption in the government, the military and even the universities. This has created a growing number of unhappy [citizens], and they have a lot of unemployed (often because of corruption) college graduates, and people who are cheated and exploited by corrupt officials on a regular basis, talking about change."

Well, I think the Chinese do drink a lot of tea....
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 08/08/2010 14:29 Comments || Top||

#3  Right on Barb Skolaut. Saddam did the same and look how his military did. O is doing the same thing. They put people in place that can't make the whole system work. They hire or appoint those who may have no skill but have family, friend or payoff connection.I don't understand why the riots, real estate collapse and many other problems are not covered on China. Toxic asset problem is far worse than ours had been. Over built complexes that sit empty now. They print money as needed but that it will come home to roost. Now I'll read the news post.
Posted by: Dale || 08/08/2010 15:54 Comments || Top||

#4  Spot on as HDYL said. This is good reporting of the truth. Russia is the real power. Only if they can hold it together but with all the different peoples and Islam moving in that will be difficult. I would not want Russia strong in this world as they will always be causing trouble.
Posted by: Dale || 08/08/2010 16:02 Comments || Top||

#5  Real estate bubble here it is;

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,709688,00.html

Posted by: Dale || 08/08/2010 16:07 Comments || Top||

#6  The only thing that keeps quality up among counterfeiters is the domestic market, which will stop buying if the fake is absolute crap.

Ridiculous. The only no no is making products that hurt people (quickly, as opposed to lead poisoning which is slow). That's bad for business, and as such it is quickly and reliably punished.
Posted by: Iblis || 08/08/2010 16:24 Comments || Top||

#7  ION CATHAY, CHINESE MILITARY FORUM > CHINA'S "BRAIN DRAIN" DILEMMA: ELITE EMIGRATION. Highly educated + trained Industry, Techs, + Business Chin desire to leave China for better international propsects, whilst only 25% of Chin students overseas choose to return back to China.

* PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > CHINA OPPOSES VIETNAM'S ACCUSATIONS ON ISLANDS [South China Sea].

* SAME > CHINA BUILDS ITS FIRST ANTI-CARRIER ASBM BASE [Guandong Province in SE China for DF-21C ASBMS + possibly future new DF-21D's].

ARTIC = CHINA has declared the disputed SOUTH CHINA SEAS [SCS] to be in its "Core Interest", + Chin State Medias are proclaiming or describing the SCS to be sovereign CHINESE TERRITORY.

* WMF > CHINESE CPLA EXPERT DAI XU: DESPITE THE END OF THE US-SOVIET COLD WAR THE US ONLY INCREASED ITS EFFORTS TO ISOLATE, CONTAIN CHINA WITHIN THE NATURAL BARRIERS OF THE "FIRST ISLAND CHAIN". RISING CHINA IS GEOPOL UNEASY DESPITE RECOGNIZING ITS NEED TO RESTORE ITS ANCIENT OR HISTORICAL ACCESS INTO THE PACIFIC + INDIAN OCEANS. THE WESTERN PACIFIC/WESTPAC AS THE DECISIVE "PSYCHOLOGICAL SYMBOL" OF THE US-CHINA GLOBAL STRUGGLE. POST-COLD WAR RUSSIA AS ALLY OF THE US TO DEFEAT CHINA.

* WMF > CHINA'S DIPLOMATIC ACTIONS VEE THE "CHEONAN" AFFAIR/MIL INCIDENT SUGGESTS IT MAY BE WILLING TO ALLOW THE US TO TRY ITS HAND AT ENDING THE PERENNIAL IDEOLOGICAL CONFLICT, ETC. BETWEEN NORTH + SOUTH KOREA.

* WMF > VIETNAM IS GOING THE WAY OF ISLAMIST IRAN: MIL-INFERIOR VIETNAM DESIRES TO SECRETLY DEV POTENT NUCLEAR WEAPONS IN ORDER TO CHALLENGE, RECOVER THE SOUTH CHINA SEAS ISLANDS FROM CHINA. US-Viet nuclear deal.

* YOUNG ACTIVE-DUTY VIETNAMESE MIL OFFICER: THE INTEGRATION OR UNIFICATION OF VIETNAM + CHINA INTO ONE COUNTRY MAY BE A GOOD THING FOR BOTH COUNTRIES. SINO-VIET RESOURCES + REFORMS-SHARING, + THE END TO THE SINO-VIET DISPUTE OER THE SOUTH CHINA SEAS.

Read, CHINA = BEIJING would control or dominate because Chin is larger + Nuclear.

* WMF > VIETNAMESE SOCIALISM, NATIONALISM + ECON SOVEREIGNTY CANNOT BE SEPARATE FROM THAT OF CHINA. THE SUCCESS OR FAILURES OF VIETNAM'S
"THREE PRIORITES" OF ECON DEV/MODERNIZATION, PEACEFUL EVOLUTION, + DEFENSE OF NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY + INTERESTS [South China Seas] IS CLOSELY LINKED TO CHINA'S SECURITY.

* WMF > THE US PLAN IS TO DESTABILIZE AND DISMEMBER CHINA + ASIA: THE DAY AFTER US MISSLE DEFENSE PROVES IT IS ABLE TO EFFECTIVELY BLOCK OR DESTROY AN ENEMY'S NUCLEAR ICBM ATTACK(S) WILL HERALD/MARK THE BEGINNING OF THE BREAKUP OF CHINA + ASIA.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/08/2010 22:21 Comments || Top||


Economy
When it Comes to Free & Reduced Mortgages, it Took Me Like 5 Years to Pay for My Honeymoon
Back before I started working at Reason, when I was in graduate school and broker than Amtrak, my soon-to-be wife (and, alas, now ex) and I splurged for about 10 weeks of pre- and post-wedding travel, here and abroad. We financed the fun via credit cards and it took us, all told, five or more years to pay off the goddamned balance. (And don't even get me started on the cost of our wedding, which we paid for too.) The thought of not paying it off never crossed our minds, even though we literally had no disposable income once the trip ended. We kept switching the balance to new cards that offered free or low-interest transfers and carried the debt until we both started working full-time and threw that particular monkey off our backs.

I mention this because that's how credit is supposed to work: You buy something with somebody else's money and then you pay them back, typically with interest. The risk you take in borrowing helps you to make a wise decision (my elongated honeymoon might not qualify as such but fuck it, you're only young once and only horrifyingly in debt about six or 10 times in your life).

And chew on this: The more you borrow, the harder you work because suddenly you're on the hook for all sorts of shit that needs to be paid for or it will be taken away from you. I call that The Flintstone Model of Capitalism. Contra Max Weber, who thought capitalism was based in protestant thrift and accumulation of savings, Fred works hards because it's the easiest way for him to get a cave jam-packed with modern appliances, a pedal-powered automobile, and slabs of bronto ribs so freaking excessive they flip said car. He's not breaking rocks at the quarry every day for the fun of it. It pays the bills that keeps the lights on. Check it out: As soon as the whistle blows, he slides off the dinosaur's back and hustles home to take the family and friends out to the movies and a meal. I'm betting Fred and Wilma were up to their bearskins in debt and it clarified their priorities just fine. It's not complicated: If you don't pay your bills, the goods stop coming. That's pretty much the basis for vast amounts of economic activity and exchange.

Unless you're talking about the goddamned housing market, where for whatever reason, the government is absolutely convinced that every idiot who bought big just as the market tanked should be bailed out. And that everybody who rents really wants/needs to buy buy buy (it's always a good time to buy a house!). And that the answer to a government-enabled economic crash based on a bubblicious housing market propped up by free and reduced government mortgage subsidies is...more of the same. It's like economic homeopathy and about as effective as inoculating yourself from lead poisoning by...eating lead.

Reuters' James Pethokoukis yesterday reported on the glimmerings of a massive August surprise, in which the Obama administration would simply write off billions of dollars in underwater mortgages. Treasury spokesfolks have said that ain't gonna happen, which is good to hear. But Pethokoukis reports on another possible action: A Morgan Stanley economist has floated before a Senate committee the idea of creating a new "stimulus" by loosening refinance rules for the 37 million government-backed mortgages, which would allow underwater homeowners, unemployed homeowners, and credit-unworthy homeowners to lower their payments, thereby stimulatin' the economy by putting more moolah in the pockets of these dummies rather than the pockets of the banks and GSEs.

The logic is that with the government already on the hook for these loans, there’s nothing to lose from dispensing with any creditworthiness criteria for refinancing. The median interest rate on the mortgages concerned is 5.75 percent. These loans, the thinking goes, could be refinanced to around 4.50 percent. The 125 basis-point reduction would leave a borrower with a typical $200,000 mortgage better off to the tune of $2,500 a year. If, as Morgan Stanley guesstimates, half the affected homeowners took advantage of this, they would collectively have an extra $46 billion a year burning a hole in their pockets.

As Pethokoukis notes, this is a foolish idea for at least a few reasons. Such as:

One problem is that the government has already tried to streamline the refinancing process with little success. Another is figuring out who would pay any associated fees. But most importantly, the whole idea seems like a deliberate re-creation of the super-cheap credit and lax lending standards that led to the financial crisis in the first place. That’s counter to the White House message that America needs a “new foundation” built on fiscal prudence.

He also cautions that as the Dems' prospects deteriorate even more before the midterms, anything is possible. Or even probable.

And let's face it, Obama was never credible, even when he first took office and started yammering on about how "Tomorrow We Scrimp, But Tonight We Spend Like There's No Tomorrow." Bonus memory from January 2009: The great Wash Post headline, "Stimulus aside, Obama vows future budget restraint."

If only. I like to look toward the future, but one thing that seems to have gone missing from even the recent past (much less prehistoric Bedrock) is the sense that, with apologies to Spider-man, with great debt comes great responsibility to pay it back. Or even any responsibility to pay it back. Jesus H. Christ, the whole point of flop sweat when you sign a housing contract or a car loan or a student loan is that you know you're signing on for a potential world of hurt. The minute you stop thinking about that is the minute you start making really goddamned stupid decisions.

You get one bailout too many - that includes car companies and Wall Street banktards along with home buyers who stretched like Plastic Man to move into that dream house on an ancient Indian burial ground - and suddenly you start feeling really pissed that you have to pay for anything.

Which is no way to restart an economy.

Take it away Fred
Posted by: Beavis || 08/08/2010 10:34 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:


Europe
Jihad of the word erupts in Denmark yet again
By Melanie Phillips

A chilling development in Denmark illustrates just how ‘hate speech’ laws, which were introduced by deluded western liberals, are being used to stifle and criminalise the expression of legitimate opinion and essential debate -- the prerequisite of a liberal society. Lars Hedegaard is president of Denmark’s International Free Press Society, which is devoted to fighting to preserve freedom of expression -- particularly against the threat from radical Islam to shut it down on the spurious grounds of ‘Islamophobia’. The inevitable has now happened: as Nathaniel Sugarman writes at The Legal Project, Hedegaard finds himself facing prosecution for ‘racism’ over remarks he has made about Islam.

There is however a ray of light for Denmark: it seems that the Justice Minister is now considering amending the hate speech laws on the grounds that they could be misused to restrict free speech. If so, this would underscore Denmark's general reputation for robustness in defence of its core civilisational values. It's a reputation which has nevertheless taken a knock from its adoption of these illiberal hate crime laws in the first place -- but remember the heroic Jyllands-Posten, whose staff found themselves under a death sentence for publishing the Mohammed cartoons.

However, the possible amendment of Denmark's hate laws is scant consolation for other western countries, with the UN having decided to criminalise all criticism of sharia law, as reported here. Until and unless western liberals finally understand that radical Islamists are not a minority whose human rights need to be defended but are instead a mortal threat to human rights which must be defeated -- and crucially, that the UN is the vehicle of Islamist oppression and must in turn be fought by all who care about human rights -- the light of freedom will continue to be extinguished in the West.
Posted by: ryuge || 08/08/2010 10:12 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


''Radical State: How Jihad Is Winning Over Democracy in the West.''
Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC || 08/08/2010 09:10 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Well too bad that those who should fear radical Islam most will remain silent until it's too late; e.g. NOW is good at hammering corporate America for wages parity and gays for marriage rights, but neither dare utter criticism of that will eventually bury them.
Posted by: HammerHead || 08/08/2010 9:31 Comments || Top||

#2  Well too bad that those who should fear radical Islam most will remain silent until it's too late

You mean like that NYC idiot Mayor Bloomberg who thinks we have to be kind and gentle towards those who want to build a monument of conquest and dominance on the 911 site; the one who tears up at the mention of islamics to whom he wants to give away the keys of the city. Those who think that islam is a religion of peace and tolerance and not one of murder, lying, and terror? You mean the PC crowd who are far left loons and useful tools of our own homegrown terrorists like Ayers and friends.
Posted by: JohnQC || 08/08/2010 10:42 Comments || Top||

#3  They'se simply hoping the croc' eats them last.....
Posted by: Uncle Phester || 08/08/2010 14:45 Comments || Top||

#4  John QC: Yeah, Bloomberg makes Neville Chamberlain look like Errol Flynn. Schwarzenegger too who has never utter a cautionary word about radical Islam either...maybe too busy lamenting he ever came up with the girlie-man coinage.
Posted by: HammerHead || 08/08/2010 16:46 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Further Travels Of Imam Feisal
While debate rages over plans for an Islamic center in Lower Manhattan, the imam behind this project, Feisal Abdul Rauf, is not available to answer questions in New York. Since locating the absent Rauf last week in Malaysia, I have now discovered that he's about to embark on a nearly month-long swing through the Middle East, with plans to visit Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain and Qatar.

Not that I learned this from Rauf, whose Malaysian office staff told me by phone on Tuesday that "All media requests have to go through his office in New York." Nor did his New York colleagues simply volunteer information about his imminent trip to the Middle East. It took a series of phone calls and questions to eke it out of them, starting with a vague reply from a staffer who then tried to backtrack with a message that, retroactively, her remark was "completely off the record."

Ultimately, in response to repeated questions, a member of Rauf's New York Cordoba Initiative foundation e-mailed me Friday, saying that Rauf's trip to the Middle East, "in the near future," will be hosted by the U.S. government as part of an outreach program to "bring the message of moderation, peace and understanding."

At the State Department, which presumably will be spending taxpayer money on Rauf's tour, I have yet to receive confirmation or any other information about his program, despite three days of my repeated requests by phone and e-mail. Apparently it is taking a while for State's Bureau of Public Diplomacy to get "clearance" to release any details of this particular public outreach effort, though Rauf's wife says it has been in the works for months.

All this comes at a moment when Rauf and his partners in New York are preparing to raise $100 million to build a 13-story Islamic center and mosque near Ground Zero. A Manhattan Landmarks committee gave the necessary approval on Aug. 3 to tear down the old Burlington Coat Factory building already purchased for $4.85 million by a real estate developer partnering with Rauf. That building is so close to Ground Zero that on the morning of the Sept. 11 attacks parts of one of the hijacked planes damaged its roof. On that lot, the Islamic center project is now cleared to roll forward, once the money rolls in.
Posted by: tipper || 08/08/2010 11:25 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:


Terror Networks
Islamic Group theorist: al-Qaeda ideology in state of decline
[Maghrebia] The emergence of al-Qaeda-affiliated groups in the Arabian Peninsula and North Africa raised questions about the effectiveness of ideological revisions announced by many armed Islamist groups that have renounced violence in recent years.

Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb are two new organizations that have drawn new young recruits into their ranks in recent years, despite revisions by groups such as the Islamic Group in Egypt and the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) that prohibited the use of violence.

Dr. Nageh Ibrahim, the ideological theorist of the Islamic Group in Egypt and a member of its Shura Council, said the revisions have been slow to reach the new generation of al-Qaeda recruits.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred || 08/08/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda

#1  I don't see any page 4 .
Posted by: Phosing Big Foot3926 || 08/08/2010 16:01 Comments || Top||



Who's in the News
43[untagged]
5Govt of Iran
3Hamas
2Global Jihad
2Govt of Pakistan
2al-Qaeda
2al-Qaeda in Arabia
2Hezbollah
2Islamic State of Iraq
2Taliban
1Palestinian Authority
1Hizb-i-Islami-Hekmatyar
1Thai Insurgency
1Jemaah Islamiyah
1Commies
1al-Shabaab
1al-Qaeda in North Africa

Bookmark
E-Mail Me

The Classics
The O Club
Rantburg Store
The Bloids
The Never-ending Story
Thugburg
Gulf War I
The Way We Were
Bio

Merry-Go-Blog











On Sale now!


A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.

Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.

Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has dominated Mexico for six years.
Click here for more information

Meet the Mods
In no particular order...
Steve White
Seafarious
tu3031
badanov
sherry
ryuge
GolfBravoUSMC
Bright Pebbles
trailing wife
Gloria
Fred
Besoeker
Glenmore
Frank G
3dc
Skidmark

Two weeks of WOT
Sun 2010-08-08
  60 killed in triple bombing in Basra
Sat 2010-08-07
  10 Medical Aid Workers Murdered Near Kabul
Fri 2010-08-06
  Tamaulipas: Car Bomb Explodes at State Police HQ
Thu 2010-08-05
  Chief of Frontier Constabulary rubbed out in suicide attack
Wed 2010-08-04
  Hezbollah accuses Israel of killing Rafik Hariri
Tue 2010-08-03
  Two Lebanese soldiers killed in clash with IDF on northern border
Mon 2010-08-02
  Five rockets slam into Israeli resort
Sun 2010-08-01
  Assad wants Hariri tribunal closed
Sat 2010-07-31
  Three Kenyans charged over Kampala bomb attacks
Fri 2010-07-30
  20 Bad Guys Die in Gun Battle in Sonora
Thu 2010-07-29
  Federal judge guts Arizona immigration law
Wed 2010-07-28
  Houthis capture 200 Yemeni soldiers: Official
Tue 2010-07-27
  Afghan Forces Re-capture Barg-e-Matal District
Mon 2010-07-26
  Taliban Capture Barg-e-Matal District in Nooristan
Sun 2010-07-25
  N Korea declares 'sacred war' on US, South

Better than the average link...



Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
174.129.190.10
Help keep the Burg running! Paypal:
WoT Operations (24)    WoT Background (25)    Non-WoT (12)    (0)    Politix (4)