Racism VS Equal Treatment at UC Berkeley

That's the point of the "racist" bake sale:

Pay-by-race bake sale at UC Berkeley still on, student Republican group says

(CNN) -- It's meant to be racist, and it's meant to be discriminatory.

And the controversial "Increase Diversity Bake Sale" hosted by the Berkeley College Republicans is still on, the club's president said, despite "grossly misguided comments" and threats aimed at supporters of the University of California, Berkeley, student group.

During the sale, scheduled for Tuesday, baked goods will be sold to white men for $2, Asian men for $1.50, Latino men for $1, black men for 75 cents and Native American men for 25 cents. All women will get 25 cents off those prices.

The bake sale is meant to draw attention to pending legislation that would allow California universities to consider race, gender, ethnicity and national origin during the admissions process.

Student defends 'race' bake sale Bake sale prices based on race
"We agree that the event is inherently racist, but that is the point," BCR President Shawn Lewis wrote in response to upheaval over the bake sale. "It is no more racist than giving an individual an advantage in college admissions based solely on their race (or) gender."

Similar events have been held at other colleges across the country, generally organized by college Republican groups. In some cases -- such as at Berkeley -- the plan sparked controversy and protests.

[...]

But the bake sale is intended to be a direct, "physical counterpoint" to an ASUC-sponsored phone bank -- also scheduled for Tuesday -- during which students will be encouraged to call Gov. Jerry Brown's office to support the legislation, Lewis said. The ASUC has endorsed the legislation, SB 185.

[...]

Loomba, the student government president, said she is concerned about students potentially feeling ostracized due to the bake sale.

"I have heard that from numerous students who have said this makes students feel unwelcome on campus," she said. "For that reason alone, we should think about what events we have on campus."

Loomba described the situation as a "campus climate issue."

"UC Berkeley stands for a place where everyone -- regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation -- should feel inclusive," she said. "I think they should be able to express their opinion, but keep that value in mind." [...]

If Loomba means what she said, then shouldn't the University be treating all the students the same regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation? Duh?

I guess some people are just "more equal" than others. Too ironic!
     

A sneak preview of our own future?

The London Riots? Lets hope not, although there are many uncomfortable parallels. Is it just a mater of degree at this point? See what you think:

Thomas Sowell, Social Degeneration

Someone at long last has had the courage to tell the plain, honest truth about race.

After mobs of young blacks rampaged through Philadelphia committing violence -- as similar mobs have rampaged through Chicago, Denver, Milwaukee and other places -- Philadelphia's black mayor, Michael A. Nutter, ordered a police crackdown and lashed out at the whole lifestyle of those who did such things.

"Pull up your pants and buy a belt 'cause no one wants to see your underwear or the crack of your butt," he said. "If you walk into somebody's office with your hair uncombed and a pick in the back, and your shoes untied, and your pants half down, tattoos up and down your arms and on your neck, and you wonder why somebody won't hire you? They don't hire you 'cause you look like you're crazy," the mayor said. He added: "You have damaged your own race."

While this might seem like it is just plain common sense, what Mayor Nutter said undermines a whole vision of the world that has brought fame, fortune and power to race hustlers in politics, the media and academia.

[...]

In the United States, despite the higher poverty level among blacks than among whites, the poverty rate among black married couples has been in single digits since 1994. The disparities within the black community are huge, both in behavior and in outcomes.

Nevertheless, the dogma persists that differences between groups can only be due to the way others treat them or to differences in the way others perceive them in "stereotypes."

All around the country, people in politics and the media have been tip-toeing around the fact that violent attacks by blacks on whites in public places are racially motivated, even when the attackers themselves use anti-white invective and mock the victims they leave lying on the streets bleeding.

This is not something to ignore or excuse. It is something to be stopped. Mayor Michael Nutter of Philadelphia seems to be the first to openly recognize this.

This needs to be done for the sake of both black and white Americans -- and even for the sake of the hoodlums. They have set out on a path that leads only downward for themselves.

Thomas Sowell, Social Degeneration Part 2

Although much of the media have their antennae out to pick up anything that might be construed as racism against blacks, they resolutely ignore even the most blatant racism by blacks against others.

That includes a pattern of violent attacks on whites in public places in Chicago, Denver, New York, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Kansas City, as well as blacks in schools beating up Asian classmates -- for years -- in New York and Philadelphia.

These attacks have been accompanied by explicitly racist statements by the attackers, so it is not a question of having to figure out what the motivation is. There has also been rioting and looting by these young hoodlums.

Yet blacks have no monopoly on these ugly and malicious episodes. Remarkably similar things are being done by lower-class whites in England. Anybody reading "Life at the Bottom" by Theodore Dalrymple will recognize the same barbaric and self-destructive patterns among people with the same attitudes, even though their skin color is different.

Anyone reading today's headline stories about young hoodlums turning the streets of London into scenes of shattered and burning chaos, complete with violence, will discover the down side of the brotherhood of man.

While the history and the races are different, what is the same in both countries are the social policies and social attitudes long promoted by the intelligentsia and welfare state politicians.

A recent study in England found 352,000 households in which nobody had ever worked. Moreover, two-thirds of the adults in those households said that they didn't want to work. As in America, such people feel both "entitled" and aggrieved.

In both countries, those who have achieved less have been taught by the educational system, by the media and by politicians on the left that they have a grievance against those who have achieved more. As in the United States, they feel a fierce sense of resentment against strangers who have done nothing to them, and lash out violently against those strangers.

During the riots, looting and violence in England, a young woman was quoted as saying that this showed "the rich" and the police that "we can do whatever we want." Among the things done during these riots was forcing apparently prosperous looking people to strip naked in the streets. [...]

Thomas Sowell, Social Degeneration: Part 3

[...] With all the damage that was done by these rioters, both to cities and to the whole fabric of British society, it is very unlikely that most of the people who were arrested will be sentenced to jail. Only 7 percent of people convicted of crime in England are actually put behind bars.

"Alternatives to incarceration" are in vogue among the politically correct elites in England, just as in the United States. But in Britain those elites have had much more clout for a much longer time. And they have done much more damage.

Nevertheless, our own politically correct elites are pointing us in the same direction. A headline in the New York Times shows the same politically correct mindset in the United States: "London Riots Put Spotlight on Troubled, Unemployed Youths in Britain." There is not a speck of evidence that the rioters and looters are troubled -- unless you engage in circular reasoning and say that they must have been troubled to do the things they did.

In reality, like other rioters on both sides of the Atlantic they are often exultant in their violence and happy to be returning home with stolen designer clothes and upscale electronic devices.

In both England and in the United States, whole generations have been fed a steady diet of grievances and resentment against society, and especially against others who are more prosperous than they are. They get this in their schools, on television, on campuses and in the movies. Nothing is their own fault. It is all "society's" fault. [...]

Read'em all. We are often told by the elites, that we need to learn from other countries how to do things better. Sowell ends up saying that in this case, perhaps we need to learn what NOT to do, to learn from their mistakes.
     

Rand Paul's goofs. Confusion?

This first article looks at Rand's goofs, which are fixable. Live and learn. The second article deals with his remarks, which were really just dealing with an age old question that has been asked many times before, and will continue to be asked: "How much government interference is a good thing?" I found both articles thoughtful reading.

A Learning Moment: Deconstructing Rand's National Debut

If you have followed me for some time then you know that what drives me is arming the freedom movement with the tools, skills, and experience necessary to drive political success. That is one of the reasons that this is such an exciting moment.

The Rand Paul primary campaign has been an exercise in message discipline, image control, and managerial competence that should be broadly admired and studied within the movement. It also makes the last week somewhat puzzling, but does provide some important lessons for aspiring political strategists and campaign staffers. [...]

And the author goes on to explain those lessons, point by point. It's good stuff. And fortunately, there is evidence that Rand Paul's campaign is learning them.

Is Rand Paul a racist? The following author says no, he's just asking the age-old question, but people are spinning it for their own Partisan reasons. But the author also gives a thoughtful examination of the question, and why it continues to be so important.

What's behind Rand Paul's confusion

[...] We do, after all, allow government to say that murder is unacceptable -- in private and public spaces. On lesser issues (Are mustaches acceptable? Can men wear purple tights? What political party do you belong to?) most Americans think it's none of the government's business what happens in a private home or private business.

But on race, as on murder, since the 1964 Civil Rights Act, most Americans have agreed that the issue is important -- more than important, foundational -- enough that the government can and should regulate what happens in the private sphere.

Imagine how things might have looked if we hadn't decided that. If, like the 14th Amendment, the 1964 Civil Rights Act had covered only state action, then bus companies, airlines, restaurants, employers and landlords across America could still be discriminating on the basis of race.

Libertarians -- and this is a serious, sophisticated argument -- say that the market can and would correct for this. They say that customers would shun, say, restaurants and hotels and national brands that discriminated on the basis of race and that eventually those bigoted operations would go out of business.

The libertarians' point is that there's no need, in fact it's inappropriate, for the government to get involved. But the fact is the market didn't correct for widespread and pervasive discrimination of this kind in the Jim Crow era. On the contrary, it flourished widely in America for 100 years after the Civil War.

It was this failure that drove the civil rights revolution. And the rationale for the federal government's long reach into what happened at private accommodations such as lunch counters made perfect sense at the time.

Does that rationale still apply today -- nearly five decades after passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and two years into the presidency of the first black president, Barack Obama?

I think most Americans would say it does, that racial equality is important enough to who and what we are as a nation that the long arm of government should reach into the private realm and bar discrimination there -- just as it bars murder

Of course, libertarians have every right to disagree with that. That they do doesn't make them racists. Poor, befuddled Paul couldn't seem to figure out if he did or didn't agree (although he later said that he would have voted for the Civil Rights Act). But what his cartoon controversy underscores is the complexity of the issue.

Yes, many Americans, including me, think the government is overreaching now -- badly overreaching.

But as all government all the time is not the answer, so no government ever is surely just as wrong.

How to find the right balance? That is going to be the challenge of our era. [...]

     

Interracial dating: was attack a "hate" crime?

Father wants son's beating treated as a hate crime

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Brian Milligan Sr. believes his son's race triggered a brutal attack on the streets of Buffalo, New York.

Armed with a chunk of concrete, several assailants beat Brian Milligan Jr. on the back of the head on August 18, leaving a 3-inch gash. They kicked him in the face, breaking his jaw.

Bloodied and bruised, the 18-year-old managed to walk five blocks to his grandmother's house before being rushed to the hospital.

Milligan's father believes several African-Americans beat his son, who is white, because he is dating an African-American woman. He wants police to treat the beating as a hate crime. He also has criticized what he calls a deafening silence from the community, police and the national media.

"If this was a black guy who was beaten by a group of white guys for dating a white girl, people would be up in arms," he said. "There's a double standard."

Buffalo police believe a group of about 10 to 15 African-American men attacked Milligan late at night, police spokesman Mike DeGeorge said. Police have made no arrests and are still investigating the motive, he said.

Milligan Sr. says he believes the attackers are the same "neighborhood guys" who threatened his son and his African-American girlfriend because of their interracial relationship. [...]

Follow the link and look at the pictures. Mulligan is seriously injured. Read the rest of the article. Mulligan's girlfriend has also been harassed and threatened for dating a white man.

[...] The story has touched a nerve with several members of Buffalo's African-American community, including a local pastor who leads a predominantly black church in Buffalo.

"At first, it didn't affect me the way that it would have if I heard it was a black teen attacked," said the Rev. Darius Pridgen, who spent years fighting for civil rights for African-Americans.

"But after I saw his father on TV pleading with the community to find the assailants, I decided I had to go after the people who beat this kid."

Pridgen said he felt that the community has turned a collective blind eye to the beating. So he gave a fire-and-brimstone sermon at the True Baptist Church on a Sunday after the attack, appealing to his congregation to help find the culprits.

"He didn't deserve to be beaten this way," Pridgen recalled saying at the service. "If you believe this, put your hands together."

If it was a black teen, Pridgen said, "We would have been protesting with flags and everything else."

Rod Watson also addressed the issue in his column in the Buffalo News. Watson, who is black, pointed out that interracial marriages are nearly 10 times higher than they were in 1960, according to U.S. Census data, but still those couples have a tough time being accepted by society.

"If blacks in Buffalo in 2009 are acting like whites in Selma in 1959, this society has big problems, despite electing a president who is himself the product of an interracial union," Watson said.

Judy Milligan, a community activist and Brian Milligan Jr.'s great-aunt, said she has been overwhelmed with support from her friends, both black and white.

Mary Woods, a member of Buffalo's African-American community, reached out to Milligan to offer her support.

"I don't care what color you are, when something like this happens, justice must be served," Woods said. "There had to be someone who saw something, and they should come forward." [...]

Thank God for sane, kind people.

I don't like the idea of "hate" crimes, because when does an attack like this NOT involve hate? Hate is hate, no matter the color of the person it's directed at. Most people understand that at a common sense level.
     

A "movement" for anti-racist whites?

Apparently. Sandy Banks of the LA Times takes a close look:

Where whiteness meets race
The Alliance of White Anti-Racists Everywhere -- yes it's real -- tackles the notion of white privilege and white people's responsibility to challenge racism, but can it help move people beyond race?

The Alliance of White Anti-Racists Everywhere was fired up at its conference in downtown Los Angeles last month.

"Reject the Hate in '08" was their rally cry at the UCLA Downtown Labor Center near MacArthur Park.

"White privilege," one speaker said, "is the enemy of equality."

"We have to maintain our activism," warned another, "and not let whiteness overtake us."

The crowd -- mostly young and white, with a hippie vibe -- applauded as the small corps of self-described "anti-racist whites" tried to introduce them to their hidden racist ways. The peasant skirts, political T-shirts and revolutionary cries made me feel like I'd wandered back in time, into a radical chic salon.

But I clapped too, because it was nice to hear white people talk publicly, bluntly, about race. And not pretend to be colorblind.

Welcome to the Brave New World. But don't judge this article by the opening excerpt. I've resisted the temptation to print extensive excerpts, because none of them could represent the article sufficiently; this piece goes all over the place, like an amusement park ride. Just when you think it you know where it's going, it jerks you in another direction. By the time you're finished, you feel like the author; you are grateful to give it a rest. It's not a long article, but it IS interesting, for it shows us how we got here, and where we might be going.

Oh Brave New World, with such people in it!
     

"Yes We Can!" becomes "Oui, nous pouvons!"

Has Obama's victory underscored racism in France? Some are saying yes:

French elites brandish anti-racist manifesto

PARIS – Inspired by Barack Obama, the French first lady and other leading figures say it's high time for France to stamp out racism and shake up a white political and social elite that smacks of colonial times.

A manifesto published Sunday — subtitled "Oui, nous pouvons!", the French translation of Obama's campaign slogan "Yes, we can!" — urges affirmative action-like policies and other steps to turn French ideals of equality into reality for millions of blacks, Arabs and other alienated minorities.

"Our prejudices are insidious," Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, a singer and wife of President Nicolas Sarkozy, said in an interview with the Journal du Dimanche newspaper, which published the manifesto. She said she hoped the "Obama effect" would reshape French society.

Nations across Europe rejoiced over Obama's victory, seeing it as a triumph for American democracy and a world weary of President George W. Bush. But Obama's election also illustrated an uncomfortable truth: how far European countries with big minority populations have to go getting nonwhites into positions of power.

[...]

The manifesto calls for affirmative action policies like those the United States used years ago to encourage greater minority representation in the workplace and in universities.

Sarkozy has suggested affirmative action for France, but later backed away from the idea since it goes against France's ideals of egalitarianism, which dictate that the country not classify its citizens according to race. This idea that everyone is just "French" means there are no census or other national figures calculating how big the country's minority groups are.

The manifesto urges term limits to make way for more minority candidates, and presses the government to improve schools in working-class neighborhoods. [...]

They have been talking the talk. Perhaps now they will have to walk the walk. Sarkozy's new wife, Italian singer-model Carla Bruni certainly seems to think so. She's quoted extensively throughout the article.

One large obstacle to affirmative action in socialist France has been the very powerful labor unions. They currently represent the white population. Will they change to allow more jobs to be created, or will they force older members to take early retirement? Or will they resist all change? It will be interesting to see what happens.
     

Crime, Knives & Muticulturalism in Great Britain

I always suspected that banning guns would lead to an increase in knife crimes. Well here's the proof. From A. Millar at the Brussels Journal:

Knife Crime; Britain’s Shame

Violent crime has doubled since Labour came to power a decade ago. Stabbings and assault in Britain are now common, if not daily occurrences; at night city centers are generally regarded as no-go areas; “feral” youths and gangs loitering the streets – often drunk on cheap alcohol – make many people too afraid to go for a walk on a summer evening.

Every week yields up plenty of reasons why people have good reason to be scared in modern Britain. On Saturday evening 60-year old Stan Dixon, a former soldier, was attacked by youths, for asking them not to swear in front of a woman. He died yesterday in hospital. 17 teenagers have been murdered in London alone this year. The latest victim, 16 year-old Ben Kinsella, was killed on Sunday night. On Tuesday Dee Willis, a 28 year-old woman, was stabbed to death by a female attacker in south-east London. Today, the country woke up to reports of the extremely brutal and apparently motiveless murder of two French exchange students, Laurent Bonomo and Gabriel Ferez (both 23). The two men had been playing computer games at Mr. Bonomo’s apartment in New Cross, south-east London, on Sunday night, when they were attacked, gagged, tortured (suffering nearly 250 stab wounds between them), and their bodies set on fire. [...]

The rest of the article talks about how the police are ineffective and no longer respected by the public, and the public's growing protest over these crimes. The full article also has many embedded links.

Another article at the Brussels Journal, by John Laughland, makes reference to a protest march in response to one of the recent stabbings, in the context that multiculturalism in Britain isn't working:

What Is a Nation?

[...] Immigrants are told that they must choose to conform or choose to leave, while Britons generally are told that their nation is constituted essentially by values. But has recent experience shown that, in fact, the inculcation of a single set of values cannot create cohesion in multiracial soceities?

My thoughts on these matters have been stimulated by recent photographs of a large crowd of youngsters demonstrating against the murder of their friend, Ben Kinsella, stabbed to death in the streets of London ten days ago. There has been an explosion of knife crime in London, which is itself partly the consequence of a rise in knife culture among principally black gangs, and partly of the catastrophic collapse in policing and in social cohesion generally. As in many Western societies, ordinary people in Britain no longer respect the police and the police themselves hardly invite it. In my street in London, everyone knew the local shopkeepers but no one knew the local policeman because they were never anywhere to be seen. When they tried to investigate petty crime (such as the theft of my bike, which they did only under intense pressure from me, exerted over a period of many months) they typically found that people they questioned refused even to give their name.

The photographs of the demonstration are remarkable for the fact that almost every youngster in it is white. This is a rare sight in London, especially in the East End where immigration is particularly high. It strongly suggests that decades of preaching about inter-racial tolerance have failed to make people in Britain unite across the racial divide. Now, it is obvious that a street demonstration by group of youngsters outraged and saddened by a senseless murder is not a nation. But since I absolutely rule out the possibility that this group of white people actively chose to exclude blacks from their public meeting, their unspoken choice – their instinct – to rally together reveals a good deal about the nature of human action. It reveals, in particular, that choice and forms of behaviour are, in fact, partly determined by ethnicity – very often without people being aware of it. [...]

I excerpted this portion as it relates to one of the recent knife crimes. Read the whole article if you wish to learn more about Britain's struggle with multiculturalism and immigrant assimilation.
     

When you can't debate, restrict your opponent

This is what the left does all the time. They can't advance their ideas through debate because they won't hold up to scrutiny. So they try to control the terms of the debate, to prevent their opponent from actually debating. Rich Lowry at Townhall.com gives us a perfect example of this, with Obama's campaign:

The Obama Rules

[...] After his blowout win in North Carolina last week, Obama turned to framing the rules of the general election ahead, warning in his victory speech of "efforts to distract us." The chief distracter happens to be the man standing between Obama and the White House, John McCain, who will "use the very same playbook that his side has used time after time in election after election."

[...]

Forget "bitter"; Obama must believe that most Americans suffer from an attention-deficit disorder so crippling that they can't concentrate on their own interests or values.

Obama has an acute self-interest in so diagnosing the American electorate. His campaign knows he's vulnerable to the charge of being an elitist liberal. Unable to argue the facts, it wants to argue the law -- defining his weaknesses as off-limits.

The campaign can succeed in imposing these rules on the race only if the news media cooperate.

[...]

Here are the Obama rules in detail: He can't be called a "liberal" ("the same names and labels they pin on everyone," as Obama puts it); his toughness on the war on terror can't be questioned ("attempts to play on our fears"); his extreme positions on social issues can't be exposed ("the same efforts to distract us from the issues that affect our lives" and "turn us against each other"); and his Chicago background too is off-limits ("pouncing on every gaffe and association and fake controversy"). Besides that, it should be a freewheeling and spirited campaign.

Democrats always want cultural issues not to matter because they are on the least-popular side of many of them, and want patriotic symbols like the Pledge of Allegiance and flag pins to be irrelevant when they can't manage to nominate presidential candidates who wholeheartedly embrace them (which shouldn't be that difficult). As for "fear" and "division," they are vaporous pejoratives that can be applied to any warning of negative consequences of a given policy or any political position that doesn't command 100 percent assent. In his North Carolina speech, Obama said the Iraq War "has not made us safer," and that McCain's ideas are "out of touch" with "American values." How fearfully divisive. [...]

Lowry goes on to say that we could take these rules by Obama in good faith, if Obama also applied them to the way the talks about John McCain. But does Obama follow his own rules? Or do they only apply to John McCain and Republicans? Read the whole thing and find out.

Extremists deplore the threat of humor

From A. Millar at the Brussels Journal:

Modern Britain: No Laughing Matter

[...] Political correctness has cowed society and politics, and trodden down common sense and humor. Unlike the defiant, bawdy Brit of the past, today he thinks before he speaks, running through the list of forbidden words, and making sure not to let one slip. And so much now is taboo. The English Democrats Party is under investigation for racism, for using the term, “tartan tax,” a student was arrested for calling a police horse “gay,” and, if you need to see the proof of such extreme “politically correct” intolerance, a Youtube video showing a young man being arrested for singing, “I’d rather wear a turban” (deemed racist by the arresting officer), can be seen here.

A common language is one of the traditional, defining marks of a nation, and the criminalization of words will have a very profound consequence for the British. Though rarely acknowledged as such, humor is another defining mark, and one that makes use of the nation’s language in particular ways that relies on the audience having a good general knowledge of culture, history, and politics. Notably, Voltaire once commented that tragedies could be translated from one tongue to another, but that comedies could not. Anyone wishing to grasp the English comedy would need to, “spend three years in London, to make yourself master of the English tongue, and to frequent the playhouse every night,” he suggested.

Political correctness has changed British politics and society, the latter of which has been famed for its ability to laugh at itself – an ability that has certainly helped to keep it free and democratic. Extremists – whether of the fascist, politically correct, or Islamic type – are united in their suspicion – even rejection – of humor. Humor shows them for what they really are. [...]

The article goes on to give more examples. The author laments that things that are solemn court cases now, would have been laughed at as material for a comedy sketch 10 years ago. It would have been inconceivable that such things would be taken seriously with the force of law. What has happened in that 10 years? I explored that question in a prior post:

Can political correctness destroy a nation?

The question is important, if only to prevent it from ever happening here. I watch with interest, and horror, as it continues to unfold there.
     

Can political correctness destroy a nation?

Great Britain is a good contemporary example. For years, creeping political correctness has been making inroads there, much as it has here in the USA. But over the last several years it's gotten really ugly and scary.

From A. Millar at the Brussels Journal:

Forty Years On: Sleepwalking Toward the Tiber’s Edge

[...] History repeats itself, yes; but history does not repeat itself as we might expect. Today, we are obsessively fighting the last war. Everyone’s enemy is a “racist” and a “fascist.” These terms are invoked by the far-Left, Jack Straw, David Cameron, and even the B.N.P., to describe their opponents. Yet at the same time we see an extreme ideology spilling out from politics and becoming increasing absorbed by the judiciary, police, schools, local councils, etc., all against the common sense of the public. And we also see a rapidly expanding Islamic militancy, occasionally becoming linked to public figures such as Ken Livingstone, and, consequently, accepted by the public.

Free speech – which has been so horribly eroded in Britain – was meant to guard against extremism and the persecution of both individuals and larger groups because of the establishment of some dubious ideology. Today, it would appear, that prosecutions for hate speech are based not on what is said but who is speaking. Protests in support of al-Qaeda are deemed free speech, as is downloading terrorist material and discussing the validity and possibility of carrying out terrorist attacks. Similarly, as think tanks such as the Centre for Social Cohesion and CIVITAS have said, Britain’s governmental and judicial establishments have failed to tackle honor crime, with police, councils, and teachers afraid of being branded racist if they make any attempt.

[...]

Today we are faced with a “multiculturalism” that has eroded British culture and the constant drumbeat of racial “equality” that treats people not as human beings but mere racial blocks. As Rageh Omaar has said in an op-ed piece on Powell’s so-called “Rivers of Blood” speech for The Daily Mail, “Instead of multi-culturalism, we are getting tribalisation,”

[...}

We have reached a point, then, at which racially or culturally distinct ghettos – the unfortunate results of long-term multiculturalism – are mirrored at both lower and higher levels of government and party politics. Moreover, if some young Muslims are surfing the net, and finding inspiration in al-Qaeda and websites peddling Islamic radicalism, so too do we see a similar phenomenon at government level, with, for example, Livingstone now having gained the support of suicide bombing apologist Dr Azzam Tamimi – which he has not rejected. It is remarkable to think that not only Muslims, but Muslim extremists, are now playing an important, if not decisive, role in British politics. Yet, it is not difficult to imagine that Britain fifty years from now will have a political reality not entirely unlike that of Lebanon’s today. We must hope that it does not take the same sort of upheaval – such as Powell predicted for a multicultural Britain – to get there, but such a hope seems to be fading. Two thirds of the residents of Britain now believe immigration will lead to violence. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) The article gives many examples of how even the mere accusation of "racism" is used with the force of law to stifle free speech and debate on a multitude of issues, at every level of society.

As "identity politics" grows stronger, so does political correctness and it's concomitant restrictions on free speech. When it dominates as a political force, assimilation stops, and "multiculturalism" becomes more like "tribalism", dividing people and destroying a unifying national identity. This weakens the people as a whole, and is the first step in conquering and controlling them.

Am I mistaken, or did this really start to get very bad in Britain in 1997, when they passed a law making private ownership of handguns illegal for citizens? Crime went up by two thirds, and everything else seemed to start going to shit real fast. If that ever happens in the USA, I believe it will be the beginning of the end.

An unarmed population is completely dependent on government for protection, and must live to serve the government, instead of the government existing to serve them. Read the whole article for the horrific details; there is a lesson in it for us all.


Related Links:

Political Correctness — The Revenge of Marxism

Did Tony Blair advance a "Culture of Lies"?

What is the Nature of Multiculturalism?

Our Culture, What’s Left Of It


About British gun laws:

England and Gun Control --- Moral Decline of an Empire

RESULTS ARE IN ON BRITISH GUN LAWS

Britain’s Gun-Control Folly
     

Black Churches: The Bitter VS the Optimistic

Obama's "God Damn America" church has got a lot of attention lately, and has some people asking more questions about black churches generally. How many of them are the bitter "God Damn America" kind, and how many are more positive and optimistic? Does one type actually shun the message of MLK? John Blake at CNN.com compares the two kinds; you decide.

Modern black church shuns King's message

[...] Prosperity ministers preach that God rewards the faithful with wealth and spiritual power. Prosperity pastors such as Bishop T.D. Jakes have become the most popular preachers in the black church. They've also become brands. They've built megachurches and business empires with the prosperity message.

Black prophetic pastors rarely fill the pews like other pastors, though, because their message is so inflammatory, says Edward Wheeler, a church historian. Prophetic pastors like the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the former pastor for Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, often enrage people because they proclaim God's judgment on nations, he says.

"It's dangerous to be prophetic," said Wheeler, who is also president of the Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis, Indiana.

"I don't know many prophetic preachers who are driving big cars and living very comfortably. You don't generally build huge churches by making folks uncomfortable on Sunday morning," he said.

[...]

Black prosperity preachers say their message is not based on greed, though, but self-help.

Bishop Paul Morton, senior pastor of Greater St. Stephens Full Gospel Church in New Orleans, Louisiana, says that teaching black people better money management is the "next dimension" of King's ministry.

"The Bible said that the poor we will always have with us," he said. "It's up to us to bring ourselves out of the curse of poverty."

Morton was the only black prosperity preacher contacted who agreed to talk about King's ministry. Many of the black church's most popular prosperity preachers -- the Rev. Creflo Dollar of Atlanta, Georgia; the Rev. Fred Price of Los Angeles, California; and Bishop Keith Butler of Detroit, Michigan -- all declined.

Jakes, the most popular prosperity preacher (he made the cover of Time magazine in 2001), declined to talk as well. He did, however, address his views on social justice in August on "Religion & Ethics," a PBS news program.

"I'm not against marching," Jakes said. "But in the '60s, the challenge of the black church was to march. And there are times now perhaps that we may need to march. But there's more facing us than social justice. There's personal responsibility, motivating and equipping people to live the best lives that they can." [...]

(bold emphasis mine) It's not surprising that optimistic prosperity churches attract more people than angry political churches. I think most people look to their churches for inspiration and practical help, more than political organizing.

The article talks about MLK and the fights (often literally!) in the church at that time. But what I find ironic is, that while MLK had his militant side, he also talked about integration. And yet, many of the angry black churches seem to be about black separatism, and are about separating themselves from society around them and even condemning it. Where is the integration, the joining?

There's a lot to be said for optimism, and for counting your blessings and being grateful. Anger has it's place in life too, but it needs to be moderated and balanced with other things, not put at the head of the table, or at the lead of the parade of life. The prosperity churches, all things considered, seem more well rounded in that regard.
     

Obama supporters agree: "God Damn America"

Gallup Daily: Obama Edges Ahead of Clinton

PRINCETON, NJ -- Barack Obama has quickly made up the deficit he faced with Hillary Clinton earlier this week, with the latest Gallup Poll Daily tracking update on Democratic presidential nomination preferences showing 48% of Democratic voters favoring Obama and 45% Clinton.


Obama's campaign clearly suffered in recent days from negative press, mostly centering around his association with the controversial Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Perhaps as a result, Clinton moved into the lead in Gallup's Wednesday release, covering March 16-18 polling. But Obama has now edged back ahead of Clinton due to a strong showing for him in Friday night's polling, perhaps in response to the endorsement he received from well-respected New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a former rival for the nomination. (To view the complete trend since Jan. 2, 2008, click here.)

Both Democrats have inched closer to John McCain in the latest update on registered voters' general election preferences. McCain holds just a two percentage point edge over both -- 46% to 44% over Obama and 47% to 45% over Clinton. [...]

If the polls are to be believed, the anti-American beliefs expounded by Obama's church, and his controversial comments about race, are no cause for concern whatsoever, as those who support Obama most likely share those beliefs.

It would almost be funny if McCain loses due to a lack of support from the religious right, who then end up with Obama and the religious Wright instead.


Related Links:

Obama's speech      Race and politics      The Obama Bargain
     

Obama's Grandmother "problem"? ...

Looks like the white grandmother gets thrown under the bus once more:

Obama trashing his grandmother again?

The link above is to Michelle Malkin. You can follow it to find out more about his latest remark about his white grandmother, who raised him.

He seems to want to equate his grandmothers fears of black men on the street, expressed privately to family members, as being the same thing as Jeremiah Wright's racist public sermons at a powerful and politically active Chicago Church. He wouldn't reject grandma, so why reject Wright too?

But Wright is a much more public figure, and we certainly hear more from and about him than we do of grandma Dunham. In fact, some say she is hidden away in Hawaii.


This article by Andy Martin at NewsMax, from March 2007, asks questions about why we don't see his white grandmother, and why a step-grandmother from his father's side of the family in Kenya is promoted as his granny instead:

Free Obama's White Grandmother

CHICAGO -- If anyone else running for president locked his granny away and refused to allow her to be seen, would the media complain? You betcha.

But America's media have supinely allowed Barry Obama to pretend he has no white relatives. He has paraded his step-grandmother in Kenya, who never saw him until the 1980s, as his "granny," and locked the grandmother who actually raised him away in a closet.

Now, the Chicago Tribune reports "the Obama campaign declined to make [his white grandmother] available."

Is she sick? Not apparently. Bedridden? Hospitalized? Not apparently. She is the "Prisoner of Obama," and of Obama's racist myth that he is "Black" and not "Black and White."

What a disgrace.

And like whimpering puppies the media do not protest, complain or demand access.

Free Granny Madelyn Dunham [Obama]!

Barack Obama is one of the most racist politicians in America today. And we let him get away with it. We are afraid to confront Obama's reality, so we pretend that reality is not there, even though it is staring us in the face. Anyone remember "Miss Lillian?" Or Barbara Bush? Or Bill Clinton's mom, drinking, gambling card-playing gal that she was?

Noone else but Obama could get away with pretending that his paternal grandfather's second or third or fourth wife was his "granny" when she wasn't. [...]

Great photo, but is the lady even his real granny?

But the "segregation" of Madelyn Dunham, Obama's white grandmother, and only real grandmother, has to be one of the cruelest and most mendacious political kidnappings this nation has ever seen.

Mrs. Dunham lives alone in the same apartment where she has lived for many years. Thus, it is reasonable to assume she is not incapacitated or an invalid.

Granny Dunham told the New York Times she was not well enough to speak, but in reality the Obama campaign maintains Stalinist "control" over potential interviewees. Obama's minions tried to control access to Obama's friend who was recently released from prison. Since he became a candidate for U.S. Senator, Obama has locked his white relative away in his racist closet. [...]

Well I imagine she IS pretty old, and perhaps not up to the publicity. Though as the article points out, old age hasn't stopped a slew of other grannies of presidential hopefuls. And if she doesn't want to talk, doesn't she have friends or relatives that do? At the very least, there probably IS a story here, even if none of those involved want to talk about it.

I'm not saying that if she were interviewed, that she wouldn't agree with him or support him. She may agree with him completely, but has anyone even really tried to find out what she thinks? It's the lack of questioning, the deference to the Obama campaign by so-called journalists, that I find disquieting. Why isn't he treated like any other candidate?

Clinton likes to keep her mom out of the spotlight too, but she's not totally invisible; she appears in public with Hillary sometimes, and she once did an interview with Oprah. And while I'm not fond of Clinton, I have to admit I don't think she's ever thrown her mom under a bus.


Related Links:

More on Obama’s White Grandmother

Obama Paints White Grandmother as a Racist

Barack Obama: My Grandmother Is the "Typical White Person"
     

About Chickens coming home to roost...

There's been a lot of talk about Obama's chickens coming home. But are they? If so, how many? While the gallup poll shows a dip for Obama, it's not big.

I can remember a time when something like this would have sunk a politician pretty quickly. It may yet sink Obama, but it sure isn't happening quickly, which makes me wonder if it will happen at all. How many Americans think like Obama, or have other reasons to support him regardless? From Gallup.com:

Gallup Daily: Clinton Moves Into Lead Over Obama

PRINCETON, NJ -- New Gallup Poll Daily tracking finds Hillary Clinton with a 49% to 42% lead over Barack Obama in national Democratic voters' presidential nomination preference.


This is the first time Clinton has held a statistically significant lead in over a month. She last led Obama in Feb. 7-9 polling, just after the Super Tuesday primaries. Since then, the two candidates have usually been in a statistical tie, but Obama has held a lead in several of the polls, most recently in March 11-13 polling.

Obama's campaign has been plagued by controversial remarks made by his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Obama delivered a major speech on race Tuesday to try to move beyond the controversy. The initial indications are that the speech has not halted Clinton's gaining momentum, as she led by a similar margin in Tuesday night's polling as compared to Monday night's polling.

John McCain may be benefiting in the short-term from the highly charged Democratic race. He holds a statistically significant lead over Obama, 47% to 43%, in registered voters' preferences for the general presidential election. That is the first time any of the candidates has held a statistically significant lead since Gallup Poll Daily tracking began reporting on the general election race last week. McCain's 48% to 45% advantage over Clinton is not statistically significant, but it is the first time he has had an edge over her in Gallup Poll Daily tracking. -- Jeff Jones

To see more about McCain's lead, you can follow the link for more graphs and details. This is good news for Republicans, but it's still early in the race, and no one can assume anything at this point.

In Obama's speech yesterday, he threw his grandmother under the bus, and then insisted he must not completely distance himself from Jeremiah Wright, defending the racist demogogue, even though Obama himself has insisted that other candidates disassociate themselves completely from people who have been accused of being racist. It would seem that Obama believes that only white people can be racist.

It doesn't make a lot of sense in my world, but for many people, it apparently does. Is Political Correctness trumping common sense? Let's hope not.

As for chicken's coming home to roost... for years I've listened to leftists like Jeremiah Wright preach that 9-11 was America's chicken's coming home to roost, because we DESERVED it. I see it a little differently. I think it WAS our chickens coming home, but not because we deserved it. These chickens were about our weakness and unwillingness to defend ourselves and hold our ground, which had consequences. Jimmy Carter opened the door for this, and for decades since Islamists have been launching attacks on us, which we have repeatedly ignored. Each time we failed to respond, it encouraged them to think we were weak and to try harder with each new attack, right up to 9-11.

Since the crusades centuries ago, the Western world has staved off attacks by Muslim Extremists by being strong. Militant Islamists have only returned to attacking us now because they see us as weak and vulnerable, unwilling to fight.

It's a war whether we want it or not. I know which side I'm on, and it's not the side of leftist's like Wright or the Democrats who support him.


Related Links:

Obama's Speech

Steele on Obama: The Great "Bargainer"

Obama Seeks to Bridge Racial Divide Among Democrats
     

Racism & Nazis, Americans & Europeans

There has been a row going on between the "Little Green Footballs" blog and the "Brussels Journal" blog. In short, it seems the former has questioned the latter's affiliation with certain political groups in Europe, and now there are accusations of racism and Nazi affiliation being hurled about, regarding the latter's positions on Islamic immigration in Europe.

I'm not going to jump into the fray, or summarize it here. It looks to me like a falling out between secular and religious conservatives, who agree on many things but also disagree on many others. Now that insults have been hurled, both sides seem to be overreacting, and in their defensiveness each is perhaps tending to oversimplify the views of the other side?

I've often enjoyed Fjordman's articles at the Brussels Journal. He's often written about the abuse of political correctness and Multiculturalism in Europe, and how they are too often used by the political Left as weapons to stifle debate and silence opposition.

Fjordman has written a post about the tiff between the two blogs. If you want to read about it, he has links to LGF too. He also makes some interesting observations about political correctness and racism in the USA. An excerpt:

Little Green Footballs and Racism in the United States

[...] It is a disturbing testimony to the fact that hating whites, still the majority in the USA, is OK, indeed encouraged, in American colleges. In the Religion of Peace?: Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn’t, Robert Spencer quotes “Rachel,” a white American student, who spoke these words to American Indian professor Dr. David Yeagley in 2001: “Look, Dr. Yeagley, I don’t see anything about my culture to be proud of. It’s all nothing. My race is just nothing.... Look at your culture. Look at American Indian tradition. Now I think that’s really great. You have something to be proud of. My culture is nothing.”

As Yeagley observed, “The Cheyenne people have a saying: A nation is never conquered until the hearts of its women are on the ground… When Rachel denounced her people, she did it with the serene self-confidence of a High Priestess reciting a liturgy. She said it without fear of criticism or censure. And she received none. The other students listened in silence, their eyes moving timidly back and forth between me and Rachel, as if unsure which of us constituted a higher authority… Who had conquered Rachel’s people? What had led her to disrespect them? Why did she behave like a woman of a defeated tribe?”

Well, my answer to that would be: Americans have been bombarded with accusations of racism, almost exclusively against the European-derived majority, for decades. If I may be so bold as to say so, that’s what I really see when I look at the hysterical overreaction on part of Little Green Footballs regarding “white racism” in Europe, despite the fact that people of European descent are probably among the least racist people on the planet right now.

LGFers base their world-view on the existence of a moderate Islam, which doesn’t exist, and on the existence of a large and rabid network of neo-Nazis in Europe, which also doesn’t exist. Neo-Nazi groups are generally quite marginal, for the very simple reason that people don’t like them. I agree that they should be watched, but they are far down the list of enemies of freedom right now, behind Muslims, Leftists and the European Union. The only theoretical reason why even a fraction of Europeans would embrace real extremist groups would be if they have their backs against the wall and everybody else has abandoned them, which is exactly what we’re trying to avoid. [...]

There's more on his discussion with Charles, and there are lots of links embedded links too. I think it's fine that Charles at LGF asks questions about European political groups; Europe does have an actual Nazi history after all. But how about less political correctness, and more honest discussion about the FACTS?

At any rate I'd like to see this row stop. It's needlessly attracting the attention of groups like CAIR, who are using it to advance their own agendas.


Related Links:

Dr. David Yeagley's website:
www.badeagle.com

And comming to a school near you: the latest edicts from the Thought Police:
There goes the neighborhood

     

Are you ready for the Thought Police?

Your very thoughts could be a crime. Do you understand what you need to know to avoid punishment for your thoughts? Take this quiz and find out:

'Hate Crimes' And Double Standards