Over the past few years, this community has given a helping hand and opened their arms to the new arrivals from Somalia. In return, many of these refugees have given Shelbyville the finger. What did we expect?
When I began researching this story about the Somalis, I knew it would be controversial. We were aware that many in Shelbyville were having serious concerns about hundreds of Sunni Muslims moving here. Talk that was promptly stopped by allegations of racism.
But as I began to talk with officials and others about our new neighbors, I was stunned by the reaction. Practically every person I spoke with locally said they had done everything possible to help out the refugees in adjusting to their new home and were treated very badly in return.
On the other hand, some I contacted for background on this story seemed to be so blinded by political correctness that they would excuse any behavior, no matter how upsetting or disruptive, as "part of their culture." It's an easy comparison to make: look at the skin color of the two disagreeing groups. The whites are always wrong.
Did anyone involved in integrating these folks into American society stop to think that many in the heartland of America might not share this overly optimistic and myopic view of cultural diversity? They knew it quite well, and as a matter of fact, vexing middle America with disruptive cultures is all part of the big plan.
Unfortunately, the feelings and views of the communities the Somalis move to are almost never taken into account. Indeed, they are expected to simply keep their mouths shut and accept the newcomers without question. Those who protest are labeled racists by the various groups involved in resettling the refugees.
Posted by: gromky ||
01/01/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
The church groups who sponsored the Hmungs in the '80s didn't do Wisconsin and Minnestoa any favors either.
#2
I live in a town that has been invaded with 6,000 Somalis. They spawned 700 babies last year. Most of them do not work. The local government and news media do not allow a word of protest without branding the commenter "racist." Most people are intimidated beyond belief.
#4
#1: The church groups who sponsored the Hmungs in the '80s didn't do Wisconsin and Minnestoa any favors either.
Posted by: Cheaderhead|| 2008-01-01 01:31 ||Comments Top||
The "favor" was done years previously when the Hmung fought along side US Special Forces advisors in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Had the Hmung remained in Southeast Asia they would be totally extinct today. If we can save the Northern Spotted Owl, why not the Hmung? I'm not big on forced diversity or the mania of multi-culturalism, but I say suck it up Wisconsin and Minnesota for the staunchly anti-communist Hmung. Actually, you've got a lot in common with them. They love deer hunting and ice fishing.
#6
My niece teaches Somalis and Sudanese students in a politically-correct liberal town and is appalled by the male aggressiveness and disrespect for female authority. They require special tutors to teach them English enough to meet "No Child Left Behind" standards at taxpayer expense, must accomodate with special prayer rooms, segregated classes, and dismissal from other standard school policies. Muslim mothers do not work even if they had any skills or education to do so and expect food and other needs to be met, as some have been in UN refugee camps and culturally dependent upon handouts. Their children run wild and are unsupervised, expecting the "village" to do so. They are appalled when they are charged with child neglect and any enforcement of our laws counterproductive if the parents of such large families are incarcerated. Bin Laden couldn't have planned any better.
Last weekend after returning to my office from the television studios of a major network where I had done a brief segment on the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons, I turned on CNN to watch their coverage of the Bhutto assassination's aftermath. Sen. Hillary Clinton was telling Wolf Blitzer that she didn't think "the Pakistani government at this time under President Musharraf has any credibility at all."
She then said something that betrayed a serious lack of knowledge about Pakistan and called her own credibility on the subject into serious question.
"If President Musharraf wishes to stand for election," she told Blitzer, "then he should abide by the same rules that every other candidate will have to follow."
"If President Musharraf wishes to stand for election," she told Blitzer, "then he should abide by the same rules that every other candidate will have to follow."
My immediate reaction was: "Did I hear that correctly?"
As a Pakistan analyst, I know for a fact that Pervez Musharraf doesn't wish to stand for election any time soon. The upcoming elections are for the next parliament. Musharraf was just elected president of Pakistan, overwhelmingly, by popularly elected electors on Oct. 6. He's just begun his five-year term as the president of the country. Why would he ever want to run for one seat in parliament? It wouldn't make sense. However, I checked the transcript of the interview later. That's exactly what she said.
My next reaction was: "Maybe she misspoke. Candidates do a lot of interviews. Not every sentence comes out the way they want it to." After all, Sen. Clinton is a candidate who is running claiming big-time foreign policy knowledge and experience that she says her closest opponents in the Democratic Primary don't have.
Pakistan? A nuclear power? A front-line ally in the war on terror? A country that's been in the news an awful lot in the past few months? "C'mon," I told myself. "A candidate with all of those advisors has got to know at least the basics about Pakistan's political system."
No such luck. Sunday morning, ABC's This Week ran an interview George Stephanopoulos had done with Sen. Clinton on Friday. The interview produced this gem:
Referring to a possible delay in the elections, Sen. Clinton said:
"I think it will be very difficult to have a real election. You know, Nawaz Sharif (leader of the PML-N, an opposition party) has said he's not going to compete. The PPP is in disarray with Benazir's assassination. He (President Pervez Musharraf) could be the only person on the ballot. I don't think that's a real election."
And then it hit me: Sen. Clinton really didn't know that the upcoming elections were for individual seats in Pakistan's parliament. She actually believed that Bhutto, Nawaz and Musharraf would be facing off as individual candidates for leadership of the country in the upcoming elections.
Sen. Clinton didn't know that Nawaz Sharif isn't allowed to run for office in Pakistan because of a felony conviction. She didn't know that President Musharraf won't be on the ballot because he's already been elected. Sen. Clinton, a candidate for the leadership of the free world, apparently doesn't know the first thing about the country referred to by some as "the most dangerous place on earth."
Thomas Houlahan is the director of the Military Assessment Program at the Center for Security and Science.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/01/2008 10:06 ||
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For the past 20 years, the Media Research Center has been compiling its list of notable quotables. The quotes, from prominent members of the mainstream news media, provide a clear window into the leftist mindset that pervades most of America's large news organizations. At the end of the year, the center (helped by a panel of judges) chooses the best examples. As usual, this year's crop reveals the media's perennial contempt for all things conservative. Actually, the winners more or less explain themselves. (The full set of winners and finalists can be found at the center's Web site, mrc.org.) Happy New Year!
Dynamic Duo Award for Idolizing Bill and Hillary
"When I watched [former President Bill Clinton] at Mrs. King's funeral, I just have never seen anything like it . . . There are times when he sounds like Jesus in the temple. I mean, amazing ability to transcend ethnicity - race, we call it, it's really ethnicity - in this country and, and speak to us all in this amazingly primordial way." - Chris Matthews, MSNBC's "Hardball" Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
01/01/2008 10:06 ||
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#1
I was disappointed to see that they gave so many of their awards to the Old Biddy Show.
#4
Bright Pebbles, the usual suspects will continue the same type of idiocy even if the Dems hold the presidency and all houses. As we learned in the 90's, though, the idiocy will have a new name ... policy.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
01/01/2008 23:47 Comments ||
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Last fall, to mark the 60th year of national independence, the government of India and the Confederation of Indian Industry launched a public-relations blitz in New York to coincide with the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations. Glitzy society dinners, corporate powwows, giant screens in Times Square, and colorful advertisements at bus shelters and atop taxis flaunted the emblems of the new India: skinny supermodels, well-heeled shoppers, and hi-tech entrepreneurs.
It seems only yesterday that India was more likely to be associated with images of snake charmers in teeming bazaars and mendicants in squalid cities. If the old India brought to mind the leathern visage of Mother Teresa, for the new India it is the perfectly groomed Aishwarya Rai, a former Miss World. A country that once attracted Western charities and dharma bums now beckons to CEOs hoping to shore up the bottom line.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: john frum ||
01/01/2008 08:58 ||
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#1
Is India an ally? If espousing moronic socialism and moronic socialist rhetoric for most of the last fifty years meant India is not an ally then neither are Britain, Germany, Canada, etc. etc.
The fact India is still largely poor is similarly irrelevant to the argument (though not to its misguided socialism).
India's strength relative to China also a moot point. There are probably no allies of the United States as militarily and economically powerful as China with the possible exception of Japan.
If producing leftist academics means India is not an ally of the United States then the United States is not an ally of the United States.
Finally, the fact our current problems arise at least as much from Deobandism as Wahhabism ignores the fact the Indian government more than any other government on earth has had to confront - and has for the most part successfully confronted - Deobandism. This being Hitchen's and Krauthammer's point.
Sadanand Dhume may have accomplished an ok if plodding introduction to contemporary India for people who know nothing about India but he has in no way addressed the question posed in the title of his essay.
#2
The big question is will India move forward, or will it regress into Socialist tribalism with the Marxist-Muslim collectivists pushing it in that direction.
#3
Wrong question. India *should* be an ally. The correct question is how to get there from here.
There are only 4 countries actively fighting "Islamic extremism" (redundant, yes, but we must observe the niceties): US, Russia, Israel and India. The more cooperation we have amongst ourselves the better. Pity about Russia. Oh well.
Indias defence sector is today facing one of the grimmest times since the debacle of 1962. Many will infer that it is because India is a democracy governed by the rule of law and not a totalitarian regime. It could be, let us first have a look at the facts.
On July 10, A K Antony, the Defence Minister, announced that the 155-mm artillery guns fielded by Bofors and Israels Soltam had not met the Armys parameters during field trials. The government had decided to refloat a global tender.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: john frum ||
01/01/2008 07:38 ||
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#1
155-mm 52-calibre guns
[nitpick]
That should read 52-calibres. Describes length of barrel in relation its calibre, e.g. barrel length is 52 times the calibre.
[/nitpick]
Always the smarmy geek!
Posted by: Almost Anonymous5839 ||
01/01/2008 11:38 Comments ||
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Benazir Bhutto's assassination in the Pakistani garrison town of Rawalpindi has resulted in media frenzy in India the likes of which we have seldom seen before. We are witnessing a process that may even end up in her canonisation as a martyr who died bringing democracy to Pakistan and a new era of brotherhood and friendship with India.
Shakespeare seems to have got it all wrong when he wrote: 'The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones.' In life it seems that it's just the other way around. A very good case in point is the lamentation among our media elite, especially the ones who were her contemporaries at Oxford. Others such as the noisy fellow who went to the other major English university and some who might have met her while doing their jobs as media-persons have begun claiming a friendship with her that we will now never be able to confirm. While we must feel sorry for her as a mother, a wife, and even as a friend and be shocked at the manner of her dying, we must also bear in mind her record as prime minister and her record of hostility towards India.
A recollection of some of this would set right the balance somewhat. First and foremost is the fact that it was her government, and at her specific instance, that gave Osama bin Laden shelter in the NWFP and then inserted in Afghanistan after the Taliban took over. It was her government that fostered the Taliban, a creation of her interior minister, Maj Gen Nasarullah Babar, and with a little bit of help from Britain's SIS, armed them and launched them on the regime in Kabul. We must not also forget her record in setting up Gulbuddin Hekmatyar as a mujahideen leader, a warlord whose trail of sadism and cruelty has not been matched by anyone else in Afghanistan.
She was also the prime minister who gave the ISI the go-ahead to wage jihad on India. She was the one who exhorted the Pakistan trained and financed terrorists to 'jag-jag mo-mo han-han' Jagmohan the then governor of Jammu and Kashmir, with an explicit chopping motion of the right hand across the open left palm. She was the one who shrieked 'Azadi-azadi' from across the LOC and extended Zia-ul-Haq's doctrine of death by a thousand cuts to Kashmir. Only, she wanted to greatly reduce the number of cuts. And lastly, we must not forget that she was the one who personally delivered the CDs bearing AQ Khan's nuclear bomb design to the North Koreans who in turn gave her country the medium range missiles which they now flaunt as Ghazni and Ghori, both Afghan towns whose sole contributions to history was two particularly rapacious and cruel raiders by the name Muhammad.
If this was the record of her behavior towards India, her record as prime minister vis-a-vis her own country was just as bad. She and her husband stole over $1.5 billion from Pakistan and she was facing prosecution in Switzerland at the time of her death. Her 320 acre estate in Sussex stands like a Taj Mahal as her tribute to her love for easy money and the good life. Talking about the good life, the bill for Evian water from France during her second term as prime minister totted up to a neat $6 million. It is said that she even bathed in Evian water!
Benazir Bhutto got two chances at leading Pakistan, not because of her English pals from her Oxford days, but because of her American pals at Harvard and later in the South Asia divisions of the US State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency. She could tell master from poodle. Her visits to Washington were important events in the lives of her Harvard friends not just because of the warmth of her company and the fond recollections of her wit and intelligence, but more because of the great gifts of carpets and onyx that she generously parceled out.
The shrewd woman she was, I don't think she wasted her money on her Oxford pals, English and some Indians. Pinky, as she was known to her American friends and handlers, knew what won enduring friendships in Washington. Jawaharlal Nehru once said that what came between good relations between India and America was that they not only wanted to choose your friends but also your enemies. Benazir Bhutto was quite willing to let the Americans do just that. That, after all, was a small price to pay to be able to bathe in Evian water.
#1
Thank you for publishing this. In the end, Shakespeare will be right, this is what she and her husband will be remembered for. Just like Imelda Marcos will be remembered for her shoes, she will be remembered for bathing in Evian.
This was the best summary of her reign that I have read to date.
Let the Harvard and State Dept minions mourn her death, because her legacy, this legacy, will be their own.
#2
Yes, thank you. It is amazing the number of people around here who just see 'a woman leader of a major country, killed for her beliefs of freedom and equality'.
I try to tell them otherwise but they won't hear anything outside of perception - going to print this off and circulate since they don't listen to little ol me.
The Syrian leadership will not be able to win the battle of returning to Lebanon whether through disruption of the presidential elections, or through the destabilization of the country and pushing it towards chaos and internal fighting, or through the use of different methods of intimidation or scare tactics , and will not go unpunished by the international community . The international community headed by the United States and France are determined to stand up for Lebanon and confront the regime of President Bashar al-Assad .The confrontation is focused on three main points:
1- Exposing Syrias negative and disruptive role in the Lebanese arena. President Nicolas Sarkozy of France and his aides possess detailed information on the role of Syria and its allies blocking the election of Gen. Michel Suleiman as President of the Republic.
2- . Accusing the Syrian regime of violating international law and relevant Security Council resolutions, which call for free presidential elections in accordance with the Constitution and which require all States to respect Lebanon's independence, sovereignty and non-interference in its internal affairs.
3- Imposition of sanctions and other penalties against Syrian regime. These sanctions could have a very negative effect on the regime both internal and external
Syria according to a reliable European diplomatic source is trying to force through its Hezbollah-led allies in Lebanon preconditions on General Suleiman before his election to weaken his position as a new president . Syria wants him to arrive to Baabda handcuffed , according to the source and this is something Suleiman , the anti-Syrian majority and the Christian community headed by Patriarch Boutros Sfeir refuse to accept.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
01/01/2008 10:08 ||
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#1
"Why is Syria blocking Lebanon presidential election?"
Because they can?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
01/01/2008 18:22 Comments ||
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It is not possible to predict what happened in the year of grace, 2007. For that is the sort of thing for which we must always wait. The most important events generally escape the contemporary notice not only of journalists, but of everyone else.
To take the obvious example, we will not know, for many years yet, what person of world-wide significance may have been born this year. Some president or prime minister who becomes a household name; some missionary or pope to be venerated in centuries to come; some artist who will change the way everyone sees; some scientist who changes everything we know; some philosopher who changes the way we know it. Some monster on the scale of Hitler or Mao, whose henchmen will slaughter millions. Or some historian who may come to show how the unlikely year, 2007 -- the year of his own birth, by some embarrassing coincidence -- was in fact a hinge-point in the history of the planet. We have no idea, and yet, that little baby is living and breathing as I write, and the road lies open before him. Or, her.
We do not even have a reliable record of the important people who died this year. For many of the most impressive men and women of history were unknown when they died, except to a small circle, if even to them. They lived before their time -- if the life of fame is any life at all. Had there been newspapers many centuries ago, we would consult their archived pages in vain for their obituaries. We may often consult the archived pages of existing newspapers to find little or nothing about the events remembered in history -- as almost anyone presented with a copy of a newspaper printed on the day of his own birth can attest. The life of Christ Himself passed by, without anyone in Rome noticing. In Rome, mind: a city that would be Christ's for many centuries. . . .
Posted by: Mike ||
01/01/2008 00:50 ||
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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.
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.
Last weekend after returning to my office from the television studios of a major network where I had done a brief segment on the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons, I turned on CNN to watch their coverage of the Bhutto assassination's aftermath. Sen. Hillary Clinton was telling Wolf Blitzer that she didn't think "the Pakistani government at this time under President Musharraf has any credibility at all."
