Our Main Stream Media as a Partisan Force

The picture to the right shows the cover of last months Newsweek editions, as distrubuted around the world and here at home. (click to see larger image). Thanks to the following link from Tammy Bruce, we are shown, once again:

The Two Faces of Newsweek

As you can see, the covers that were published overseas were very different from the cover they published for us here at home, and the content of the articles also. Tammy points out:

In the event you're wondering if the Establishment Media, entities like Newsweek, for example, have an agenda to make America look bad to the world (while not sharing their intentions with us), wonder no more.

One of the better examples of the conscious effort to undermine this nation comes from last month via the cover Newsweek chose to sell in America, versus the cover they used in Europe, Asia and Latin America. For their October 2nd issue, America was given an idyllic and serene cover featuring photographer Annie Liebovitz surrounded by a bunch of children. The rest of the world, however, was given the face of a Taliban terrorist, replete with grenade launcher and the dramatic statement headline, "Losing Afghanistan."

And we wonder why the rest of the world has such a horrible attitude. Because the American Establishment Media leads them into it and feeds on it. [...]

Tammy also reports that the Department of Defense took issue with Newsweek's bias, and requested a column to "rebut some of the more sensational charges." To see their response, visit her post via the link above.

This is hardly a first for Newsweek, which has a history of publishing anti-American covers and articles overseas, where they know it will sell lots of copies. Meanwhile at home, they serve up Hollywood gossip or other pop-culture tripe for the home edition.

Newsweek is not the only one, and the blatant bias in our MSM has become so commonplace, it too often goes unchallenged. Neal Boortz today links to an excellent article by Thomas Sowell, who gives us many examples of this bias in action:

In part four of his 'Cast of Characters' series, Thomas Sowell points out that the mainstream media no longer report the news or even observe it.  He says they are now political partisans... and he points to example after example where the media's anti-Republican slant has been exposed.

With mid-term elections comming up tommorow, one can only wonder if the predictions by the MSM of large Republican losses are real news reporting, or partisan attempts to manipulate the election outcome. Boortz also mentioned today, that statistically, it would not be an unusual circumstance:

First of all ... let's be clear on this.  If the Republicans lose control of the House in tomorrow's election it will by no means be an unusual circumstance.  It will be quite normal, actually.  Last week Charles Krauthammer pointed out that since World War II a two-term president has lost an average of 29 seats in the House and six in the Senate in his sixth-year midterm elections.  If the Republicans were to lose both the House and the Senate tomorrow it would be business as usual.

That still doesn't make it right. [...]

And unfortunately, a victory for the Democrats will embolden our enemies:

[...] Be absolutely certain of one thing. A Democrat takeover of the House will be seen by Islamic terrorists everywhere as a great victory for them and a stunning defeat of their nemeses George W. Bush. A Democrat victory will make the Islamic fascist not only stronger, but bolder. They will gain legitimacy where there was doubt, and support where there was indifference. In the end, we will pay a price.

Sooner or later Islamic fascists will be defeated. They must be. A Democrat victory tomorrow will make that victory more costly and longer in coming. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) The War is about so much more than Iraq, and if we lose or back out now, it can be 100 times worse later on. So much hangs on this, and either way it turns out, it won't be smooth sailing ahead. But trying to avoid the inevitable, that which will not avoid US, which seems to be what the Democrats are doing, could make things so much worse in the long run.

I've voted already, by mail. Now it's wait and see.
     

Two Visions, and the Fork in the Road

This is a fun graphic of the Democrat's Foreign policy (appeasement), but there is even more at stake in this election. There has been much talk in the media of Republicans not voting, to punish the Grand Old Party. Many Republican's are unhappy about certain issues (myself included). But if not voting is meant to reform a party, which party needs the most reforming? Each party is offering a vision, and yet one of those parties is more willing to debate their vision. Here's an excerpt from an article on that subject at Real Clear Politics:

The Democratic Party Adds Nothing to the National Debate
by Robert Tracinski.

[...] A loss for the Democratic Party in November's election would be a crushing blow. If they lose when every short-term political trend was in their favor, everyone will see it as a public repudiation of the Democratic Party. I advocate this outcome, not because I think it will cause soul-searching and a change of policies within the left--though that may well be the short-term result--but simply because the decay of the left is the long-term trend of the past three decades, and we should do everything we can to hasten it.

The more the left fades from the scene, the more the national political debate will be a debate within the right. The American system is not friendly to monolithic one-party rule. The moment one party begins to dominate, it tends to split apart along its internal fault lines. The more the Republicans dominate American politics, therefore, the more intensely they will debate among themselves--precisely the kinds of debates I have described above.

I can't guarantee that such a debate would produce the best result--I would like to see the emergence of a small-government, pro-immigration, pro-war, secular right--but I can guarantee that such a debate would be more interesting and much more productive than the debate we're having with the left right now. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) Trancinski gives many more examples in this article. Democrats like to say the Republican Party is fractured and divided, but actually, all the real debate on issues has moved there. The Democrats are more interested in posturing than debating, and they seem more and more intolerant of dissent within their own party. The way they turned on one of their own, Joe Lieberman, is a good example.


The Democrats have been great at alienating and cutting out members of their own party. But I fear that isn't the only cutting they are willing to do:


This poster was quite popular with Dems after the last presidential election. "It's only a joke" you might well argue. Yet often many a truth is spoken in jest. Even as a joke, it is expressing a sentiment, which I've long heard expressed in the Democratic Party.

I lived among San Francisco Democrats for 23 years. They often expressed a desire for the city to seceed from the USA, and become part of some "enlightened" country like France or Cuba. They often expressed the opinion that the Republican Party needed to be gotten rid of, because the Dems felt no one should oppose them and their "progressive" [socialist] agenda. (for many of these elitists, the US Constitution is expendable, too).

I fear the San Francisco Democrats, who used to be the lunatic fringe of the party, are now the dominant force, or at least a very large contingent, in them Democratic party. They seem willing to cross any line, or redraw lines, to get the power they want. Would they even slice and dice our borders, to get their slice of socialism? Consider this campaign flyer being distributed by the Dallas, TX Democrat Party:



Of course, they would rather have the whole pie, than just a slice, and they have ideas about how to get it, too. There are Democrats all over the USA who are pushing to give the vote to people who are not citizens, even if they are here illegally. That has been done in Europe, and we can see the results. And if that's not enough, Hillary Clinton wants to give the vote back to convicted felons. The Dems seem willing to do ANYTHING to to get back into power. That would be their slogan, if they were honest. Appealing to the the majority of EXISTING American voters doesn't seem to be a priority for them anymore. Perhaps it's because they know that the the existing majority of Americans don't want the Dem's socialist vision of America? And while they persue that agenda, more immediate and pressing dangers are ignored.


Neither party is perfect, but each has a different vision, and one is more open to debate than the other. The Republican Party is where all the intellegent debate is happening nowadays; and they aren't pushing a socialist agenda. Yes, there is room for improvement in The Grand Old Party too, which is why I am putting my vote and my efforts with them. The Democrats are travelling down the same road to destruction as Europe, and I will not follow them there.


Related Links:

WHERE'S NANCY? HIDING, THAT'S WHERE
I'll bet the Dems wish they could hide John Kerry, too.


Republican Rockstars
LMC shows us some "stars" in the Republican party, and why she thinks they are worth voting for. Also worth visiting, is her article: Top 10 Reasons To Vote Democrat on November 7th.



4 Out of 5 Terrorists Agree: Vote Democrat
And what does the 5th one want? Tammy Bruce tells us the truth.

     

Is Europe Nancy Pelosi’s America?

When I lived in San Francisco, it seemed that it's inhabitants worshiped Europe. When America sent troops in to Iraq, I heard many San Franciscan's complain that they wanted the city to seceed from the US, and become part of France. They believed that "enlightened" Europe, with it's socialism, large government, extensive welfare state and appeasement politics, was far superior to anything the USA had to offer.

San Francisco is Nancy Pelosi's home base. Her constituents elected her because she represents their views. So could it be that the ideal of America she holds, is the same one her constituents hold; a big government, socialist welfare-state America?

Paul Belien of the Brussels Journal looks at exactly that question. He is currently visiting in the United States. He was in the Los Angeles area for Halloween, and made some interesting observations in his latest article:

A Recipe for Defeat: Europe is Pelosi’s America

I am in Los Angeles at the moment, and do not have the opportunity to write about events in Europe as much as I would like to. I will not be back in Brussels until 12 November. Over here in the U.S. all attention is focused on the upcoming elections. There is a possibility that the Democrats will become the majority in the House of Representatives and that Nancy Pelosi, the California Liberal, will become the next Speaker of the House. I was in West Hollywood on Halloween. A friend described this area as one third retiree, one third Russian and one third gay. Sounds a bit like Europe to me.

The gays take every opportunity to dress up. Consequently Halloween has become a gay festival in LA. The first people I met when leaving the hotel were a group of men dressed up as ballerinas. This is Pelosi Land.

Is this how Muslims see Europeans?

Americans can already see what their country’s future will be if they vote for Pelosi and her band. They only need to watch Europe. That is what America will be like 20 years from now if the Liberals succeed in turning the U.S. into a European-style welfare state. The latter is the cause of all Europe’s problems. It has led to secularization, because people who are catered for from the cradle to the grave no longer need God. It has led to the immigration debacle, because Europe has attracted welfare immigrants who only come for the benefits and not to contribute to the host country’s wealth creation. It has led to the loss of the citizens’ ability to care for themselves, because they expect everything from the state.

However, the current American elections are relevant for Europe, too. If they lead to the American withdrawal from Iraq, Europe will face a widespread intifada. The withdrawal will be perceived as a defeat of the West and the Muslim “youths” in Europe’s cities will become even more arrogant. They utterly despise the Europeans, whom they perceive (not entirely without reason) to be men dressed up as ballerinas, and they hate America because it fights back. In a world ruled by men who only understand the language of power it is better to be hated than despised. If America withdraws the Islamist fanatics will despise America for it. They will take this as a sign that the West has been defeated and that the world is theirs. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) Europe is mired in socialism, weakened by it's welfare state, dominated by multiculturalism, political correctness and appeasement, and on a path of self-extinction. Yet Pelosi and the majority of Democrats seem to think Europeans are setting an example we should be following.

I agree with Paul Belien; it is a recipe for defeat. Let's not go there. If you still have doubts, read the rest of Paul's article, about what Europe is facing now.


Related Links:

For men in Europe and America who like to wear ballerina costumes, and think that Christians are just too horrible to tolerate, I would ask you to consider these links:

Killing gay men is OK, says British imam
Fundamentalist Muslims make conservative Christians look like liberals in comparison.

Will Europe become Eurabia?
In this article, Mona Charen refers to gay author Bruce Bawer's book: "While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within". Bruce and his lover moved to Europe to get away from American Fundamentalist Christians. But in Europe, they discovered something far worse. He offers some unique insights from personal experience.
     

Preparing Children for Martyrdom

Imagine if the icons of our children's TV programing, like Barney or Big Bird, were used to teach children how wonderful it is to grow up to be a suicide martyr:

Rise and shine, kiddies!
Sing along with me:

Let’s get up and make the bed,
Get dressed and tie our shoes!
Eat our groats and brush our teeth
And then go kill the Jews!

Shahada time! Shahada time!
No greater goal have I!
I’ll blow myself to little bits
And make Crusaders die!



OK, the Barney graphic and the song is a satire, of Palestinian TV for children. But unfortunately, the reality of their TV isn't too far from this.

Baron Bodissey at the Gates of Vienna blog reviews the Google Video version of the documentary “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West”.

Here is an excerpt from his post, Death Cult Kids:

[...] One of the prominent themes the movie focuses on is the depraved indoctrination of children into the Palestinian death cult. There were numerous clips taken from Palestinian television in which small children — one is three years old — talk excitedly about killing the Jews and becoming martyrs for Allah. In one such example, the little girl shown at right is shouting about martyrdom in what looks like a classroom, under the encouragement of a teacher.

When the camera pulls back from her at the end of her recitation, you can see the grotesquely incongruous cartoon figures of Minnie Mouse and Daisy Duck, among others, on a wall in the background.

I don’t know about you, but that really gives me the creeps — to take the familiar icons of the nurseries of the West and use them as a backdrop for the indoctrination of children into the Islamic suicide-murder cult: Can you think of anything fouler than that?

I assume that Porky and Curious George and the other apes and pigs of the cartoon world were not included in the little jihadists’ school pantheon. But it made me wonder who else may be on that wall…

(bold emphasis mine) There's more, it's shocking. In a society where this is normal, what kind of adults to you think it produces? Cartoon rioters? The whole article is worth reading.

Unfortunately this kind of teaching for kids is not just limited to Palestinian TV. In a future post, we'll have a look at Children's TV in the rest of the Islamic World. It explains a lot.


Related Links:

Kids' talking animal calls for massacre
Palestinian TV features chick who advocates killing with AK-47s

Children raised in a murder-suicide culture
     

What Democrats REALLY think of our Military

I remember seeing leftist actress Jeannie Garfalo being interviewed on TV, when she was told about this picture, which had recently appeared in the MSM. She got angry and said it was a lie! Even she couldn't believe it was true.

But it was. I was living in San Francisco at the time, where the banner was proudly displayed. People in other parts of the country were shocked, but in San Francisco, the majority of people seemed to think it was normal and reasonable, and they coundn't understand the reaction of the rest of the country. It was about that time that we decided we no longer wanted to live in San Francisco, and decided to move back to America.

I wouldn't say that the above banner represents all Democrats, but I am concerned that the "San Francisco Democrat" attitude of contempt towards our military has indeed spread to a majority of the current Democrat Party. It's an attitude that was expressed by John Kerry recently.


Neal Boortz calls Kerry "The Poodle" because: 1) He is an appeaser like the French, and 2) He is a "kept" pet, a rich woman's lap-dog. Neal has some great commentary this morning concerning Kerry's comments about our men and women serving in Iraq, and the Democrats generally:

[...] Do we hang the sins of John Kerry around the necks of all Democrats? Well, let me ask you. Did you hear of one single Democrat .. just one .. anywhere .. stepping forward to repudiate what Kerry said? Maybe some Democrat did, but I sure as hell haven't heard anything about it. Have you? A Democrat congressional candidate in Iowa has gone so far as to say Kerry's words were "inappropriate." Hardly an apology .. but he did ask Kerry to cancel a planned campaign visit to his district.

In other words ... these gutless wonders who just love to tell us how much they truly do support our troops won't even stand up to be heard when our soldiers are slandered by this rich woman's boy toy. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) That's what really bothers me. Kerry's words don't surprise me. But the Democrats generally haven't been quick to criticize him much. I think that's because many of them have a long history of hating the US military. Democrat Presidents Carter and Clinton both weakened the US military. The Dems have the history of being the anti-war party, and too often that translates into being anti-military generally.

I remember in San Francisco, listening to Democrats complain about how the Democrat Party has to "pretend" to care about the troops, in order to put a good face on the anti-war movement. Working as waiter, I overheard many of them discussing over dinner, how they hoped as many of our troops as possible would be killed, so that Bush would not be re-elected. A typical comment:

"Most Americans are so stupid, they will only learn that war is wrong when their children start coming home in body bags. The more of our troops that get killed, the better".

Then you would see those same people at anti-war, "support our troops" candle light vigils... laughing and smiling and joking. The press always made sure to take photos of the candles, not the laughing and smiling.

I remember when the DNC had their national convention in San Francisco. That year the ticket was for Mondale/Ferraro. People were wearing buttons that said "Fritz 'n Tits". At that convention, there was concern among some Democrats, who were worried that their party was in danger of being taken over by the "San Francisco Democrats", who they considered to be the lunatic fringe of their party. Well sad to say, I think their worst fears have come true.


How Democrats "Support our troops"

This picture is typical of the kind I see on websites and blogs by anti-war Democrats:


Does it not reflect the sentiments expressed by John Kerry? Is this how they "support our troops"? I'm sure we will start hearing some more comments from some of the Democrats in the comming days, criticizing Kerry's remarks. But they, as a party, have hardly been falling over themselves in a hurry to speak up for our military personnel. Why would they? Look what they did to Joe Lieberman, one of their own.

Whatever Kerry says he meant to say, the fact is he insulted our troops, and the Democrats didn't exactly rush forward to defend them. No matter how they try to spin it now, it's too little, too late. We know what they really think.
     

Scary Democrats: a Horror on the Way?

Hat tip to Michelle Malkin for the photo.

Ok, sKerry is an easy target. Even without the Photoshop make-over, he tends to look like a haunted tree. But scarier still, are his comments lately about the people serving in our armed forces. He can claim he meant something else, but I fear he said what many prominent Democrats really believe.

And on the theme of scary Democrats, Michelle (dressed as Elvira) has a video tour of some scary Democrats, and a glimpse of what we can expect from them if they come to positions of power after the next election. Truely frightful:

Democrat Halloween Horrorfest


Related Links:

Kerry Troop Opinion Timeline

The Kerry Meltdown

[...] Yeah, the repercussions of him being an ungrateful, arrogant elitist is everyone else's fault but his. he will not apologize, and he should. If he doesn't it will get bigger and bigger, giving the Republicans a Godsend of a distraction within a week of the election. [...]

Yep!
     

France Prepares for November 1st Riots

France has had an ongoing slow riot since the riots that began last year at this time. During this past year, over 100 cars PER DAY are burned, and an average of 15 attacks per day occur on police and emergency services. Now attacks have begun on buses, with 3 buses burned around Paris, and one recently in Marseille, has left a 26 year old French woman badly burned and near death.

There have been "controls" put on Media reporting, in the hopes that the lack of coverage would discourage more violence. It seemed to work for a while, but now the violence is escalating again, regardless of the coverage or lack therof.

Some blogs that have reported on this:


Gateway Pundit:
After Protest March For Jobs, Youths Torch Buses in Paris
With photos, and a video link.

Atlas Shrugs:
FRANCE: Muslims Set Bus Aflame
Has links and updates to include more buses, and a map.


No Pasaran:
French government springs into action
About the bus attack in Marseille.

Paul Belien from the Brussels Journal makes the following report for PoliticsCentral.com:

France Prepares 50,000 Riot Police for Muslim Attacks

As America prepares for Halloween, France is girding for a wave of attacks from Muslim youths—a reprise of the deadly French riots of last year.

A leaked French intelligence report warns that during the first week of November, a school holiday (Nov. 1 or All Saint’s Day), Muslim riots could convulse the country.

On Monday, Le Figaro, the leading center-right newspaper in the country, quoted a confidential report written by the Renseignements Généraux (RG), the French equivalent of the FBI. The 17-page RG report, dated 11 October, states that the root causes of last year’s riots are still in place. The authorities are especially concerned with All Saints Day when “many urban youths are left to their own and have more time to cause unrest.”

Not that France has been a peace since last year’s riots. In the past few weeks alone, several policemen were ambushed by youths who seemed intent on killing them. In response, the French Interior Ministry asked the police to keep a low profile and not to show themselves in the Muslim suburbs in order to avoid tension.

Since appeasement alone is not a strategy. French authorities are keeping a force of some 50,000 riot police in permanent stand-by. [...]

The left likes to spin the Muslim rioting and destruction as a purely economic and anti-racist reaction to French injustice. Certainly, the lack of job opportunities in France is very real. The irony of this accusation comming from the left is, that the lack of opportunities is largely due to France's rigid socialism and inflexible labor unions.

To dismiss the Muslim element entirely would be foolish, though it's hard to say where one begins and the other ends. Even if this were mostly about job opportunities, it could easily escalate into something more, and perhaps it already has.

France has been insisting that Turkey recognise their role in the 1915 Armenian Genocide, before they are allowed to joiin the EU. This has made Turks and other Muslims very angry. Within two days of passing legislation in France making it a crime to deny the Armenian Genocide, a memorial shrine to the Armenian Genocide in Paris was destroyed. The escalation of rioting may be a part of this. The rioting is also extending to Brussels, where fireman are being ambushed.

November 1st will be a date to watch.


Related article:



From Paul Belien at the Brussels Journal:
Muslims in the French Army

Last year I read somewhere that 15% of the French army consists of Muslim soldiers and that this is the reason why the French authorities do not have the army restore law and order in the Muslim suburbs. So far, I have not been able to find confirmation of this figure in official statistics. In September 2005, the Institut français des relations internationales (French Institute for International Relations, IFRI) published a report stating that 10 to 20% of the army is of immigrant origin, most of them North African. “Their loyalty is continuously questioned,” Christophe Bertossi of IFRI said.

Other countries (the Netherlands, Austria,...) also worry about radical Muslims in the military.

The photo is of Chirac inspecting the troops, on Bastille Day. Isn't that pink an interesting choice of hat color for a military uniform? I hope their riot police look a bit more formidable.


Related Link:

The Enigma Known as France
     

Sharia Law in Minnesota?

Hat tip to Cox and Forkum for the cartoon. You can read their related commentary and links about it HERE. Here is one of their excerpts, from the Star Tribune: Airport taxi flap about alcohol has deeper significance by Katherine Kersten. (via Little Green Footballs)

The taxi controversy at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport has caught the nation's attention. But the dispute may go deeper than the quandary over whether to accommodate Somali Muslim cabdrivers who refuse to carry passengers carrying alcohol. Behind the scenes, a struggle for power and religious authority is apparently playing out. ...

When I asked Patrick Hogan, Metropolitan Airports Commission spokesman, for his explanation, he forwarded a fatwa, or religious edict, that the MAC had received. The fatwa proclaims that "Islamic jurisprudence" prohibits taxi drivers from carrying passengers with alcohol, "because it involves cooperating in sin according to the Islam."

The fatwa, dated June 6, 2006, was issued by the "fatwa department" of the Muslim American Society, Minnesota chapter, and signed by society officials.

The society is mediating the conflict between the cab drivers and the MAC. That seems odd, since the society itself clearly has a stake in the controversy's outcome.

How did the MAC connect with the society? "The Minnesota Department of Human Rights recommended them to us to help us figure out how to handle this problem," Hogan said. ...

What is the Muslim American Society? In September 2004 the Chicago Tribune published an investigative article. The society was incorporated in 1993, the paper reported, and is the name under which the U.S. branch of the Muslim Brotherhood operates.

The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Egypt in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna. The Tribune described the Brotherhood as "the world's most influential Islamic fundamentalist group."Because of its hard-line beliefs, the U.S. Brotherhood has been an increasingly divisive force within Islam in America, fueling the often bitter struggle between moderate and conservative Muslims," the paper reported.

The international Muslim Brotherhood "preaches that religion and politics cannot be separated and that governments eventually should be Islamic," according to the Tribune. U.S. members emphasize that they follow American laws, but want people here to convert to Islam so that one day a majority will support a society governed by Islamic law.

(bold emphasis mine) They can take their fatwa and shove it. Sideways. And whose brilliant idea was it to allow them mediate in a dispute where they clearly had a biased interest in the outcome? Has multiculturalism and political correctness cowed us to the point where we are afraid to even question such obvious manipulation?

I'm completely against ANY attempts to introduce Sharia law, in any form, here in the USA. It's completely incompatible with a free democratic society, and those who want it need to go back to the countries they came from. The Cox & Forkum site has more links on this topic.


Related Links:

Muslim Deception and our Government and Media

...what does respect mean? When I visit a mosque, I show my respect by taking off my shoes. I follow the customs, just as I do in a church, synagogue or other holy place. But if a believer demands that I, as a nonbeliever, observe his taboos in the public domain, he is not asking for my respect, but for my submission. And that is incompatible with a secular democracy...

The truth about Sharia based societies

...Sharia societies are inferior in art, science, innovation, business and the standard of living of their peoples — not to mention their appalling lack of humor about these matters. They really do not have too much to offer in these areas, and the foundational cause is their bizarre idea that a seventh century book, properly interpreted, is a sufficient guide to not only spiritual, but worldly and governmental affairs...

Sharia Law is Politically Correct;
Pope Benedict Isn't

... Political Correctness has made it impossible to deal with Sharia Law, which is all the more reason to put an end to the PC nonsense. Political Correctness was a term first coined by conservatives, as an INSULT to describe unthinking people who blindly followed political views in order to be "correct" with the "IN crowd", without fully understanding those views and thinking them through to their logical consequences...

The Nazi roots of the Muslim Brotherhood
Not figuratively, but literally.


Islamism's actual NAZI history
More details, with historical photos.

     

Anti-Christian Multiculturalists in the West

This photo is from a Muslim website. Does Multiculturalism encourage this kind of thing? It often sides with it, against Christianity. Why? Could it be that Multiculturalism is really just anti-Christian/Judaism masquerading as "tolerance"?

Fjordman at the Brussels Journal has a look at Multiculturalism and it's antagonism towards Western religion in his article:

Thou Shalt Hate Christianity and Judaism

As a non-religious person, but still one that acknowledges and respects the impact of Judeo-Christian thinking on Western culture, I havewarned against naïve Christian compassion related to Muslim immigration, as well as a disturbing tendency among too many Christian organizations to ally themselves with Muslims, for "religious values" and against Israel. But frankly, the most useful allies Muslims have in the West more often than not tend to be found among the non-religious crowd.

A number of executives and star presenters at the British Broadcasting Corporation admitted what critics already knew: The BBC is dominated by Left-leaning liberals who are anti-American and biased against Christianity, but sensitive to the feelings of Muslims. Former BBC business editor Jeff Randall said he complained to a very senior news executive about the BBC's pro-Multicultural stance, but was given the reply: "The BBC is not neutral in Multiculturalism: it believes in it and it promotes it."

The anti-Christian element seems to be a trait shared by Multiculturalists in all Western countries. [...]

The aticle goes on to give examples of this trait at work, and even how European Multicuturalists are in complete denial about the nature of Islamic attacks on Christians and Jews. An example, "multicutluralist" Mr. Hylland Eriksen, who attacks Christian concerns regarding events in Europe:

[...] In a newspaper essay co-authored by Eriksen, he states that: "Is he [Anfindsen] asking us to once again repeat the obvious in that the murder of Theo van Gogh, various acts of terrorism and death threats against newspaper editors have nothing to do with Islam?"

Nothing to do with Islam? Really?

Mohammed Bouyeri, born in Amsterdam of Moroccan parents, killed Theo van Gogh as he was cycling in Amsterdam on Nov. 2, 2004, shooting and stabbing before slashing his throat and pinning a note to his body with a knife. "I did what I did purely out my beliefs," he told judges while clutching a Koran. "I want you to know that I acted out of conviction and not that I took his life because he was Dutch or because I was Moroccan," but because he believed van Gogh insulted Islam in his film criticizing the treatment of Muslim women.

So a peaceful Christian is accused of having a dark, secret agenda, while a Muslim murderer who brags openly about his Islamic motivations has nothing to do with Islam? Needless to say, Mr. Hylland Eriksen is also rather anti-Israeli. Christians and Jews are bad, Muslims are "misunderstood." This confirms my thesis that Political Correctness is a hate ideology disguised as "tolerance." It is based upon hate against anything considered Western and a desire to eradicate this.

The First Commandment of Multiculturalism is: Thou shalt hate Christianity and Judaism. Multiculturalists also hate nation states, and they even hate the Enlightenment, by insisting that non-Western cultures should be above scrutiny.

It is sometimes claimed that Islam is a "European" or Western religion. Ironically, we can test this by using "cosmopolitan Multiculturalists" such as Mr. Hylland Eriksen. They hate everything that's seen as Western and they like Islam, precisely because it's anti-Western. [...]

Precisely indeed! When terrorists and murderers themselves proclaim their Islamic beliefs as their motive, and it's then refuted by multiculturalists, something is seriously wrong... with the multicuturalists.

Fjordman goes on to make a case for secular support for tolerant relgions, and sites authors Lee Harris and Theodore Dalrymple:

[...] Dalrymple also believes that "Discipline without freedom leads to misery, but freedom without discipline leads to chaos, shallowness, and misery of another kind," alluding to the total lack of freedom in Islam, but also to the seeming lack of direction in the West.

I agree with Harris and Dalrymple: As long as there is separation between religion and state, those of us who don't have any religious belief should prefer religions which tend to create reasonable and prosperous communities. Our traditional Judeo-Christian religions have proven this capability. Islam never has, and probably never will. As Australia's Cardinal George Pell says, "some seculars are so deeply anti-Christian, that anyone opposed to Christianity is seen as their ally. That could be one of the most spectacularly disastrous miscalculations in history." [...]

This also helps explain the strong alliance between Western leftists and Fundamentalist Muslims. Both hate Western religion and values, but for different reasons and motives.

I don't call myself a Christian, but I do recognise Christianity and Judaism as the cornerstones of Western civilization, and value the culture that has arisen from them. I like living in a Christian culture, and know it is worth defending. Multiculturalism believes and does exactly the opposite.


Related Links:

Law and Order waning in Europe?

Political Correctness and Multiculturalism:
The New Tools of "Stealth" Socialism?
     

Scary Computer Trick

Computer Pwnage

Got the link to this from Nealz Nuze today. I fell for a version of this trick once, it IS scary because you are concentrating on some stupid game when "it" happens, and it's so unexpected. This video is of some of the most dramatic reactions posted on YouTube.

I felt sorry for the little boy, he was too young to do that trick on. But the adults were all fair game. But not for people with weak hearts!

March of the Emperor

It's a funny video clip of a commercial for a French Pay Television channel. It involves the movie "March of the Penguins" (which in France, has the title "March of the Emperor").


Like much of French humor, it involves a misunderstanding.


Here is a link to the clip:       March of the Emperor

There are some other funny ads too, like the ones for "Bento Kronen" and "Bunker Shoes". Have a look around.

Hat tip to Neal Boortz for the link, I discovered the site via his link to the "Bento Kronen" commercial.
     

The Enigma Known as France

I think the French have quite a reputation of being "difficult", and not just with us. I think they tend to be difficult with everyone, even each other. And trying to pin them down on an issue can be seemingly impossible at times.

I've been reading about events in France with great interest, because they have so many problems and difficulties, with many more looming ahead. It's tempting to predict disaster, yet I get the impression that it's rather impossible to predict just WHAT they might do next. The following is a selection of things I've been reading about France:


A great deal has been said about Europe turning into Eurabia, and France has often been said to be the center point of this transformation. It's often spoken of as some sort of terrible, accidental mistake that the French have simply somehow allowed to happen. But what if the concept of Eurabia is not accidental, but actually a very deliberate, intentional policy plan of the French? Fjordman at the Brussels Journal explores this idea in depth, and below is an excerpt from his article:

The Eurabia Code, Part I

[...] What follows is a brief outline of the thesis put forward by writer Bat Ye’or in her book “Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis.” My information is based on her book (which should be read in full). In addition I have drawn from some of her articles and interviews. I republish the information with her blessing, but this summary is completely my own.

In an interview with Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Bat Ye’or explained how French President Charles de Gaulle, disappointed by the loss of the French colonies in Africa and the Middle East as well as with France’s waning influence in the international arena, decided in the 1960’s to create a strategic alliance with the Arab and Muslim world to compete with the dominance of the United States and the Soviet Union.

“This is a matter of a total transformation of Europe, which is the result of an intentional policy,” said Bat Ye’or. “We are now heading towards a total change in Europe, which will be more and more Islamicized and will become a political satellite of the Arab and Muslim world. The European leaders have decided on an alliance with the Arab world, through which they have committed to accept the Arab and Muslim approach toward the United States and Israel. This is not only with respect to foreign policy, but also on issues engaging European society from within, such as immigration, the integration of the immigrants and the idea that Islam is part of Europe.”

“Europe is under a constant threat of terror. Terror is a way of applying pressure on the European countries to surrender constantly to the Arab representatives’ demands. They demand, for example, that Europe always speak out for the Palestinians and against Israel.”

Thus, the Eurabian project became an enlarged vision of the anti-American Gaullist policy dependent upon the formation of a Euro-Arab entity hostile to American influence. It facilitated European ambitions to maintain important spheres of influence in the former European colonies, while opening huge markets for European products in the Arab world, especially in oil-producing countries, in order to secure supplies of petroleum and natural gas to Europe. In addition, it would make the Mediterranean a Euro-Arab inland sea by favoring Muslim immigration and promoting Multiculturalism with a strong Islamic presence in Europe.

The use of the term “Eurabia” was first introduced in the mid-1970s, as the title of a journal edited by the President of the Association for Franco-Arab Solidarity, Lucien Bitterlein, and published collaboratively by the Groupe d'Etudes sur le Moyen-Orient (Geneva), France-Pays Arabes (Paris), and the Middle East International (London). Their articles called for common Euro-Arab positions at every level. These concrete proposals were not the musings of isolated theorists; instead they put forth concrete policy decisions conceived in conjunction with, and actualized by, European state leaders and European Parliamentarians. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) Fjordman maintains that while the European press talks endlessly about 9-11 conspiracies that claim WE blew up the WTC ourselves, they have nothing to say about the conspiracy of Eurabia, which is easily documemnted and factual. France as the leader of this movement, has a facinating history with the Arab world, going back to Napoleon, some of which is examined here also.

This article is long and detailed, and the first installment of a series of articles. It goes a long way in explaining how Europe has gotten to where it is today, their complex relationship with the Middle East, and it's ensuing anti-Americanism, and the pivotal role of France in all of this.




Why Is France Soft on Iran?

The recent divergence in US and French policies with regard to Iran should come as little surprise, given French President Jacques Chirac’s policy that France’s “relations with the United States will never be submissive.” Yet The Independent has posited that France ’s change of mind may in fact be connected with the presence of French peacekeepers in Lebanon – that is to say within range of Iran’s military proxy, Hezbollah. There may be some truth to that assertion, but it is perhaps more instructive to look at France’s Iran policy over the last few decades, the better to round out the context.

In the 1980s, France sided with Iraq during its conflict with Iran, with severe consequences. Between February and September of 1986, seven separate bomb attacks were carried out within France, killing 10 and wounding 152, with each attack accompanied by demands to release five Iranian prisoners. Four years later, these prisoners were indeed pardoned by François Mitterand, despite domestic opposition to the move. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) This is a short article, but it does explain a lot about France's uneasy relationship with Iran.


This photo is from a June 2003 article about an Iranian Cult/Terrorist group in France, whose members began setting themselves on fire in protest:

France investigates Iran exiles

[...] An examining magistrate ordered the members of the Iranian People's Mujahedeen (MKO) movement to be investigated for "conspiring with a terrorist organisation", judicial officials said.

They were among 17 detained Iranian opposition supporters - including MKO leader Maryam Rajavi - who appeared before anti-terrorist judges in Paris.

About 200 people from the MKO were arrested in a crackdown by French police over recent days. The 17 held in detention were being questioned over alleged plans to attack Iranian embassies across Europe.

Security around the court was heavy in case supporters of the group tried to set themselves alight - as happened several times last week. [...]

This photo of an Iranian woman who set herself on fire is just so horrible. When you think of "the streets of Paris", this is hardly the image that first comes to mind. I guess this is a reminder that France ain't what it used to be?

More common in France are the nightly "car-b-ques":


This photo is from last year's Ramadan Riots. The rioting stopped because the French and Belgium governments ordered the police to stop providing information on the rioting. I believe that policy may still be in effect; there have been attempts to start large scale rioting again this year, but without the media coverage, they fizzled out. Yet vandalism and attacks on Jews and the police continue. This year, the average so far for car burnings in France is 112 cars per day, and other violence continues:

[...] The figures are stark. An average of 112 cars a day have been torched across France so far this year and there have been 15 attacks a day on police and emergency services. Nearly 3,000 police officers have been injured in clashes this year. Officers have been badly injured in four ambushes in the Paris outskirts since September. Some police talk of open war with youths who are bent on more than vandalism. [...]

With all the car-b-ques, the French auto industry must be experiencing brisk sales. I'll bet auto insurance has gone way up.





And in true French fashion, just when you start to think they are completely hopeless and spineless, they go and do something upity, politically incorrect and in-your-face. The lastest scandle, is that the French are rudely jabbing their finger in Turkey's eye, by insisting that they recognise the Armenian Holocaust:

French against Turks: Talking about Armenian Genocide

... more recently, it became visible that the Turkish genocide issue was not only angering the French government but it was an identifiable issue upon which the French were pushing for Turkish EU-access membership to be granted – i.e. ‘the Turkish should be pushed to admit the Armenian genocide, and if they refuse, then they shall forfeit a place as an EU-member state’. The opposing French Socialist Party – which pushed through the legislation – held that the bill protects and rewards the Armenians in exile from a country that still refuses to accept the atrocity. Then, on 30 September, in a visit to Yerevan, the French President confirmed his position: “Should Turkey recognize the genocide of Armenia to join the EU? … I believe so. Each country grows by acknowledging the dramas and errors of its past. … Can one say that Germany which has deeply acknowledged the holocaust, has as a result lost credit? It has grown.”

I subsequently reported on how France had been left alone on this position since other EU-member states seemed ready to treat Turkey softly on this issue – I also speculated, quite rightly, that this would have detrimental diplomatic relations with the Turkish government, by arguing: “It might also be thought that Chirac could not afford to push the condition too far, since it may bring substantial damage to Franco-Turk relations before Turkey has even begun to attempt its progress towards European harmonization.” Now, that problematic tension has evolved, it is clear enough for us all to see the aggravation caused, illustrating both bilateral and multilateral tensions. [...]

Turkey has legal restrictions forbidding anyone to claim there was an Armenian Holocaust. France has just passed a bill that does the opposite, forbidding people to claim that the Armenian Holocaust didn't happen. Now France is pushing to force Turkey to own up to the Armenian Genoicde, if they want to join the EU.

I don't think anyone should be passing laws to forbid anyone from discussing anything. Nor am I a supporter of the EU. Yet France is being rather bold, challenging Turkey on this issue while the rest of Europe seemed content to let it slide. Once again, the French are being difficult... and I must say, it's much more fun when they do it to someone else, instead of us, for a change. ;-)

     

What would Reagan do, faced with global Jihad?

I have often wondered how President Reagan would have handled a situation like we face now with Islamic Jihadism. In the following article, Joshua Trevino addresses this very question. Here are some excerpts:

How Reagan Would Handle Islamism

[...] Reagan’s genius was to recall the American people, and to a lesser extent the West, to the need to proceed from the premises of our Founders: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as the inalienable rights of man, and government as existing merely to secure their just exercise. One did not win arguments with Communism when accepting Communist starting-points for those arguments. They led inevitably to the Communist end, and appeals to humanity were steamrolled by appeals to inexorable logic.

In dealing with Islamism in the present day, we make the very error that Reagan eschewed with the Communists. We proceed from Islamist premises — namely, that Islam is inherently peaceful; that it is inherently sane; that it is inherently just; and that it is a welcome and benign participant in our post-modern public square. [...]

I agree. When you start off with a faulty premis like that, everything that comes from it will fail, because it is not based on truth, on REALITY.



Reagan understood that you must not challenge an opponent on false terms. To argue with lies as if they are real is pointless. You have to start with the truth, or you are lost.

The article goes on to point out how we are seeing the left trying to "soften" and manipulate the truth towards appeasment now, just at they did with Communism in Reagan's day:

[...] There is not an exact parallel here with the state of discourse in the Communist era, but there is parallel enough. Certainly few outside the Communist nations were hunted and killed for merely denigrating Marx or Lenin. But there was a long-running campaign of dissuasion, especially in western Europe and amongst the American elites, directed against those with the bad form to be too anti-Communist. The excuses given for being soft on the horrors of Communism varied from era to era: there was a need to support the Popular Front; there was a need to stay united against the facists; the Soviets sacrificed so much in the war; we have to focus upon our own (American) sins; and the top two — the original intent was noble, and we must not alienate the moderates. In these last, we see an exact parallel with the apologists for Islam and Islamism today. We perform kowtow to the founding mythos of our opponents, and we indulge in the fantasy that some adherents of jihad and Islamism are more palatable than others. [...]

How often are we told that we need to be more understanding, and to reach out to "moderate" Muslims? But how moderate is ANYONE who advocates Jihad? And shouldn't genuinely moderate Muslims be reaching out to US?



I think some of the genuinely moderate Muslims do, but they are largely ignored by the MSM, in favor of terrorist supporters like CAIR, who pose as moderates and lobby with foreign money to advance their hidden agenda.

The article goes on to suggest that we believe "moderates" should resist tyrants, not realizing that many of those we consider moderates, may actually believe that WE are the tyrants to be resisted, as their religion instructs them to do. We support them in that belief, when, because of multiculturalism, moral relativism and political correctness, we continually assume that their positions are equal to ours and worthy of equal respect:

[...] Like Milton’s Satan who would rather rule in hell than serve in heaven, the average Muslim whom we face abroad much prefers some manner of shari’a (to which Williams refers as a dissuading factor) to the humiliation of life on the terms of the irreligious, secular West. We cannot hold this against them: they have the integrity of their faith, and it is their choice. But it does not follow from this that we must credit them with moral equality to ourselves — assuming we have a moral standing worthy of the name — and it does not follow from this that because they have integrity, that they are good. The answer for us infidels is not respect — beyond that due the individual with his inalienable rights — but frankness even at the cost of disrespect, and exclusion of the foe’s ideas and ideologues from our public square till a general sanity among them prevails.

The ill-kept secret of Communism to which the elites adhered was that it was in its origins a squalid, murderous creed. Its founder was a moral leper, and its heroes were savages are surely as any pre-modern tribesman. It took a brave survivor of the Soviet Union’s concentration camp system, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, to state this truth plainly and irrefutably — and it took Ronald Reagan to make it policy, and enact it as the will of the American people. That is the lesson of Reagan’s war for ours. In a contest of ideas, truth and victory are inseparable companions. We only delay the latter in eschewing the former. We may call it politeness, or respect, or strategy: but it looks like defeat.

(bold emphasis mine) Indeed! The entire article is worth reading, it's not long, and well worth your time.



Related Links:

Totalitarian Twins:
Tweedledee and Tweedle dum
Further evidence that Communism and Islamism, while not exactly identical ideologies, still share enough similarities that would make Reagan's approach to dealing with Communism equally effective against Islamism.

From Ohmyrus at Faithfreedom.org:
The Left and Islam: Tweedledee and Tweedle dum

[...] Islamists see the Islamic state much the same way as Communists see the Communist Utopia - a Shangri-la world where their idea of justice prevail.

That neither has attained their respective goals does not deter them. For both, it is a matter of faith. Faith is belief in something that is not proven. In fact, the available evidence is that both Communist and Islamic Utopias do not work. All attempts in establishing them failed. The Soviet experiment failed. Instead of providing justice and prosperity, it created a sick economy, which required cruelty and oppression to sustain. For the Islamists, Afghanistan under the Taliban is as close as one can get to the Islamists' ideal state. The result is hell on earth, not heaven. [...]

The article goes on to compare the many ways in which these two thought systems are similar, even though one believes in God, and the other does not. In fact, the Communists disbelief in God is perhaps their biggest weakness in dealing with Islam. Communists believe that when their utopia is established, any belief in God will just fade away. It is their "blind spot" when dealing with Islam. The article concludes that Iran is the perfect example of what happens to Communists who ally themselves with Islamic fundamentalists; they're slaughtered.


Do we need a "Star Wars" strategy for Islam?
This is an earlier post of mine, which compares Reagan's "Star Wars" strategy for precipitating the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, with our situation with Islamism today. Islamism is in many ways on shakey ground, and if we stand up to it and challenge it, unrelentingly, instead of appeasing and encouraging it, we could end up with a similar result to what Reagan achieved with his "Star Wars" strategy and attitude.
     

Islam Fails Muslims by Impeding Democracy and Economic Development

Here is an interesting article by Ohmyrus at Faithfreedom.org that takes a detailed look at the interaction between Islam, Democracy and economic development. It examines several of the main reasons why the combination is difficult at best, and more often, impossible. Here is an excerpt:

Will Muslim Immigration destroy western democracy?

[...] When we talk of democracy, we don't mean just one man one vote. It also must include freedom of speech and freedom to choose one's religion. But according to shariah law, it is death for blasphemy and apostasy. Thus once again, Islam is in conflict with the basic tenets of democracy. That is why Bush's project to transplant democracy to the Middle East is so difficult if not impossible.

So far, we have only looked at how Islam works in theory. How does it work in practice? Lets take a look at the empirical evidence. Of the 55 Muslim majority countries (not counting the Palestinian territory), only 5 are rated as Free by Freedom House. The rest are rated as Partly Free (24 countries) and Not Free (26 countries). That is a poor record. Islam has obviously produced a culture in which it is hard for democracy to take root.

The more Muslims seek to imitate Prophet Mohammed, the harder it is for democracy to function. He was after all a medieval ruler. (The British should be grateful that Henry VIII did not declare himself a Prophet and start a new religion, instead of simply breaking with Rome. Otherwise, they would have similar problems. Unfortunately for Muslims, Prophet Mohammed is seen as the perfect man and role model. Imagine the problems the British will have if they take Henry VIII as the role model.)

Yet western countries are admitting Muslim immigrants whose religious beliefs are not compatible with democracy and whose actual track record in adhering to the basic tenets of democracy is poor. Obviously, the more Muslims there are in a population that gives each person one vote, the more the country will be like what we have in an average Muslim majority country.

Western democracy is at the moment still viable but the Muslim minority is growing fast with its higher birth rate. Already, one quarter of French children are Muslim. By the end of this century, Europeans might be majority Muslim and speaking Arabic. Unless Muslims acquire new values and abandon old ones, democracy will not be viable at some point. But so far, Muslims are not assimilating or acquiring new values that make a liberal democracy possible. A survey taken in Britain for example shows that 40% of Muslims there want Shariah Law. (3) Another survey showed that only one quarter of British Muslims regard Britain as their country. As expected their primary loyalty is to the Muslim Ummah.



I predict that as the Muslim minority grows, social tensions will also grow. Ascerbating the tensions will be the economic disparity between Muslims and non-Muslims. This can be seen in a survey done by Essex University. (5) The survey states that Pakistanis and Bangla Deshis (who are mostly Muslims) are easily the poorest people in the UK with high levels of unemployment and large families.

It should be noted that Indians and Chinese have earnings on par with whites. Thus the under-achievement of Muslims in the UK cannot be due to racial discrimination. After all, the successful Indians (who are mostly Hindus) are racially very similar to Pakistanis and Bangla Deshis.

As I argued in my earlier articles, such as 'How Islam failed Muslims', Islam has impeded the progress of Muslims (8). I argued that Islam is a warrior's religion designed to facilitate Arab imperialism. While it can still produce brave warriors, it cannot produce the sort of people needed for a modern society.

Thus, the culture that Islam produces not only makes it difficult for democracy to work but also impedes economic development. As Muslim leaders like Dr Mahathir Mohammed and Pervez Musharaff have acknowledged, Muslims are amongst the most backwards people in the world (6). This would not be so bad if Muslims are prepared to assimilate and adopt new values. But from the surveys I cited, it appears that so far they are not willing to do that. [...]

There is more to the article, it's a very honest and IMO non-judgmental look at the situation using observable facts. It ends with a great quote from Winston Churchill, who warned that no stronger retrograde force existed in the world than Islam.

What is to be done about it? For starters, we can stop the multicutlural nonsense that demeans our own culture while exalting and encouraging their "sharia law" totalitarianism at the expense of our democracy. We can stop exibiting a "dhimmi" attitude which only encourages them to be more demaning and violent. And perhaps most importantly, we need to recognize the alliance between the western socialist left and the Islamic extremists. Both have totalitarian goals, and while they may aim for different ends, they seek the same path to power.



I see radical Muslims as a symptom of our own weakness; they have been the same for centuries. The only reason they are so bold today, is the same one that made them bold in centuries past: it's because they see us as weak. Socialism and it's useful tools of Multiculturalism and political correctness have helped greatly to bring this about, and make it possible to continue and worsen. Extending liberal tolerance to the completely intolerant is suicide. Europe is ahead of us on this path, and we would do well to learn from their mistakes.



Related Links:

Socialism in Islamic hands: a tool to make the present world order unworkable

How Islam Failed Muslims
     

Socialism in Islamic hands: a tool to make the present world order unworkable

Socialism has plenty of dangers inherent to it in it's own right. But what if it were infiltrated and used by a third party, one with no interest in using Socialism as a stepping stone to Communism, but as a stepping stone to an Islamic Sharia-law state? Recent election results in European countries indicate this may be happening on a larger scale than anyone imagined, as Socialist parties there make large gains by running Muslim candidates to gain Islamic votes.

From Fjordman at the Bussels Journal:
Why Muslim Immigration is a Threat to Western Democracy

I have warned earlier, especially (in the essay Electing a New People: The Leftist-Islamic Alliance), against Islamic infiltration of Leftist parties in the West, most recently demonstrated in Belgium, and the threat this poses to Western democracy. This is part of the reason why I advocate containment of the Islamic world and an end to Muslim immigration. Pundit Ohmyrus makes some of the same observations. But there is also another way in which Muslim immigration threatens our Western society.

He quotes Lee Harris, who gets to the crux of it:

“Jihad has demonstrated an astonishing adaptability to different historical and material conditions. Yet the secret of the success of the Arab bands lay less in their own warlike qualities than in the weakness and decadence of the empires they overthrew. […] The jihadists are not interested in winning in our sense of the word. They can succeed simply by making the present world order unworkable, by creating conditions in which politics-as-usual is no longer an option, forcing upon the West the option either of giving in to their demands or descending into anarchy and chaos.

(bold emphasis mine) Recent elections in Europe where Muslims have infiltrated the left, give them the tools to achieve these ends.

Muslims can thus undermine Western democracy in two ways: By massive immigration and infiltration of established, especially Socialist, parties until they can be turned to serve the Islamic agenda, or by simply creating a climate of fear and distrust that gradually makes the democratic system unworkable. In Western Europe right now, they are making significant headway on both accounts.

Socialism and Islamic Sharia law both have no need for individual freedom or real democracy. They can cooperate in that goal, but ultimately they would diverge, and the stronger one would consume the other. And I would say that Socialism is not the stronger of the two.


Related Links:


Here We Go Again
Ramadan violence, attacks on French police officers, escalating attacks on Jews... sounds like "making the Democratic system unworkable" to me. And the Socialists, working with the Muslims, are doing their part to make it all possible.

Will Muslim Immigration destroy Western Democracy?
A detailed look at Islams miserable track record with democracy, and it's persistant clashes with democratic societies.

Socialists, Multiculturalists and "trust levels"
Socialists who are willing to do ANYTHING to win elections; Multiculturalists who do not understand the nature of Islam; and very different cultural worldviews in European and Middle Eastern cultures regarding issues of trust, are all helping in different ways to make the Western democratic system unworkable... so it can be replaced with something else.
     

Socialists, Multiculturalists and "trust levels"

Europe's Socialist parties have increasingly been making large gains in elections with the help of Musilm immigrants. But there is concern, even among Socialists, that Muslims are simply infiltrating Europe's Socialist parties, until they can be turned to serve the Islamic agenda. Could this be true?

Belgian and Dutch Parties Try to Put Genie Back in the Bottle

[...] In Antwerp the immigrants are now demanding an alderman’s post in the city government, which consists of the mayor and ten aldermen. In Brussels the Parti Socialiste (PS) is embarrassed at the election of Murat Denizli as a Socialist councilor. Denizli is a hardright Turkish extremist belonging to the Grey Wolves. In the Netherlands political parties are facing serious problems with Turkish candidates who refuse to acknowledge the 1915 Armenian genocide. [...]

Yesterday the Brussels newspaper Le Soir ran a front page article about the problems in the important Brussels borough of Schaarbeek. The paper says it had been widely known for three months that a member of the Turkish Grey Wolves was a Socialist candidate there. (It should be noted, however, that Le Soir, the largest paper in Brussels, failed to disclose this to its readers until yesterday, well after the elections.) The election of Murat Denizli, Le Soir says, has led to “open warfare and an identity crisis” within the PS because the Grey Wolves are know to be “ultra-nationalist, racist, anti-European.”

Denizli was introduced on the PS list by the Schaarbeek PS leader Laurette Onkelinx, who is also the Belgian vice prime minister and minister of Justice. Schaarbeek PS members told Le Soir that last April the local section of the PS had rejected the list of candidates which included Denizli and “other immigrants adhering to rather religious and conservative Muslim values.” Onkelinx, however, demanded that the candidates be accepted because “they are popular and the party had to win the elections at any price.” Today it bothers many traditional indigenous Socialists who failed to get elected that the party sold out to the immigrant hard-right and the Islamists. “The end justified the means,” one of them told Le Soir. They are condemning a multilingual electoral campaign which was conducted partly in Turkish and Arab and during which Socialists visited mosques to attract voters and held “ambiguous speeches denying the Armenian genocide.” “Whenever one of the Belgo-Belgians [the indigenous Belgians] complained he was told off for being a racist.” [...]

Looks like the socialists will do anything to grab power. But what will happen when it's time to pay the piper, even if they don't like the sharia tune?


Tribes in Europe and the Disappearance of Trust

2006 will go down in European history as the year when Muslims as a group became a dominant factor in elections. The demographics indicated this long ago, but it still came as a surprise to many multiculturalists that Muslims tend to vote primarily along ethnic lines: Muslims vote for Muslim candidates, even if the political parties give the latter almost unelectable places on the list of candidates. As a consequence the Muslim candidates got elected to the detriment of indigenous politicians. Party leaders, who used to be able to get those candidates elected which the leadership favoured, have been taken by surprise by Turks voting only for Turks and Moroccans voting exclusively for Moroccans. The parties that put Muslim candidates forward are being “cannibalized” from the inside. They risk being taken over by radical Muslims. This is what is happening to the Socialist parties in Belgium and the Netherlands.

The article proceeds to take an in depth look at trust levels, how they are formed and how they work, in European culture, and in the Middle East. There are some striking differences. Europeans tend not to trust clans or family, as much as they do the Nation-State, their fellow citizens and the rule of law.

[...] Why does trust matter? The Western societies we know would grind to a halt if we did not trust authorities, such as courts, the police, tax inspectors, to uphold the rule of law rather than take a decision based on kinship. We would not invest in or work for companies which decide about the promotion of employees or product prices on the basis of kinship rather than merit or price. We would not send our children to school if we did not believe children would be treated equally, with no favored treatment for relatives of the teachers. [...]

All this is quite different in the Muslim world or in Africa, where traditionally no nation states have existed to protect individual citizens. In such societies individuals inevitably have to fall back on their clan for protection. In the case of Islam there is another trust layer apart from the clan: the Umma, which is the community of all Muslims. Islam teaches extreme (by current Western standards) allegiance of believers to the Umma, and hence the trust profile of Muslims is unique : the individual is relatively unimportant compared to the clan or the community of believers, there is very high trust in the family and clan, very low trust in fellow citizens of the same nation and relatively high trust in fellow Muslims, wherever they are in the world. The latter helps explain why Jihad, conquests by Islam, has been so successful throughout history, and why it is so difficult for democracy and the rule of law to take root in Muslim countries. Such fundamental cultural traits have taken centuries to shape and do not change easily. [...]

While in the Muslim world, there is not complete agreement about interpretation of the Koran and the practice of Islam, there are core beliefs that transend the differences in sects. It's not hard to understand how competing sects could still cooperate against infidel outsiders who are not a part of the Umma. It's not hard to understand why members of the Umma would embrace an opposition party they disagree with in a host country, to simply use it for their own purposes.


Can it happen in the USA?


As the left in Europe embraces sharia Jihadists in their grab for power, one has to wonder if we are not seeing the same thing happening in the US, with our own Democratic Party. Their "talking points" often mesh so well with the video taped messages the terrorists keep making. And now, the Democrats may even succeed in electing the first Muslim Congressman in the US, Keith Ellison, even though he receives financial support and other kinds of aid from a self-identified supporter of Hamas:

Will Dems Embrace Candidate Backed by CAIR?

[...] Democratic credentials on national security could be undermined if they fail to denounce a candidate closely allied with someone that a senior Democrat described as having "intimate connections to Hamas."

Known for months has been that Ellison was involved in the 1990's with the Nation of Islam, which even he now concedes is racist and anti-Semitic. In a letter of apology to the local Jewish community, Ellison claimed that he was never a member of the NOI and thus didn't realize until later the organization's ugly ideology. But according to press accounts at the time, Ellison served as NOI spokesman at a 1997 public hearing where he defended--in his own words--"the truth" of a government official's supposed comment that "Jews are the most racist white people.".

Only learned recently and far more troubling is Ellison's seemingly tight connection with Nihad Awad, co-founder of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), whom he met almost two decades ago at the University of Minnesota.

Ellison's campaign obviously has downplayed the affiliation with Awad. But here are the facts: Awad headlined a fundraiser last month that the campaign estimates netted $15,000 to $20,000, and in July, and it appears that CAIR's co-founder bundled contributions totaling just over $10,000. (The campaign issued a terse denial on the latter point, though it refused to explain away overwhelming evidence to the contrary.) The campaign has gone so far as to suggest that Awad did all this without having any contact with someone he's known since the late 1980's.

The Democrat's supporters have taken a different tack. Rather than defend Awad or downplay his connections to the candidate, Ellison partisans have attempted to paint attacks on the candidate as overtly partisan or even bigoted. A Minneapolis Star Tribune columnist, for example, recently suggested that Ellison is under attack solely for being Muslim. [...]

Just as in Europe, if you question what a Muslim does, the left calls you a racist, which is supposed to stun you into silent submission.

I say, lets not do that. Lets not be cowed by leftists using the race card. Lets learn something from Europe's mistakes. Questions need to be asked.

Ellison's campaign, and the Democrats, needs to be watched closely.


Related Links:

Muslims help Socialists make big gains in recent Belgian elections

SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF BELGIUM

Internet, talk radio blamed for 'anti-Muslim violence'
Terrorist front group CAIR is at work again. When you can't deny the message, attack the messenger.