#1
"Because of the recent tragic events and the sensitivities involved, the Cambridge Film Festival has regretfully decided to cancel the screenings of Paradise Now," the festival said in a statement.
That "regretfully" makes this fall just a wee bit short of "getting it", I'm afraid...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/17/2005 13:50 Comments ||
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#3
They don't have to like it, they just have to get it.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
07/17/2005 15:20 Comments ||
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#4
yeah "regretfully"
sounds like they are playing both sides
Posted by: Jan ||
07/17/2005 16:54 Comments ||
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#5
naw...it's simply cowardice displayed differently. Now they're afraid people won't understand and will get angry. The appeasment they're used to is cowardice of a different kind.
Defeating terrorism, the Prime Minister explained in a robust speech yesterday, means arguing against "the terrorists' politics and their perversion of religious faith". He is right. The trouble is that the Government has so far not shown much inclination to tackle the fundamentalist preachers whose hate-filled sermons incubate suicide bombings.
The Bill on religious hatred, presently being forced through Parliament, is not directed at curbing preachers who call for the killing of unbelievers or Muslim apostates, or who exalt suicide bombers. If anything, that Bill will simply provide greater protection for the fanatics: they will claim that anyone who accuses them of spreading murderous venom is "inciting hatred" of their vision of Islam.
In the wake of the murder of at least 55 people in London, the Home Office has drafted new legislation that it says will curb the excesses of the Muslim preachers who inspire young men to kill others by killing themselves. There is, however, legislation already on the statute book - incitement to murder, for example, is a crime - which could be used against the preachers who try to justify the killing of innocent people.
This newspaper, which is extremely reluctant to endorse curbs on freedom of speech and of association, may yet be persuaded that the Government is right to consider further restrictions in order to protect our security. But in the first instance, what is required is the aggressive enforcement of the laws that we already have.
The fear of being branded "Islamophobic" or "racist" has prevented chief constables from cracking down on the fanatics. Moderate imams have complained that they have called the police to disperse fanatics attempting to attract young Muslims outside their places of worship - only to discover that the police either do not bother to turn up, or do not take any action. That reluctance has provided space for the fanatics to flourish.
The Home Office has also been far too tolerant of fanatics who, by glorifying violence and suicide bombing, abuse the Government's generosity in granting them the right to live in Britain. By far the majority of the Islamic fundamentalist "scholars" here who preach hatred of Britain and "justify" the murder of its citizens are foreign-born; many of them are here because they have been granted asylum from persecution in their native countries.
These men - they include preachers such as Omar Bakri Mohammed and Hani al-Siba'i - have forfeited their right to stay in Britain by their support for the murder of its people. They should be deported back to the countries from which they have fled. The Government would have to negotiate an opt-out from the Human Rights Convention so as to be able to take that step, but can anyone seriously doubt that it is both necessary and merited?
We are at a moment of unparalleled consensus, both among the political class and the people of Britain: there is a collective desire to take action to defeat the people who murdered 55 people in London and three British soldiers in Iraq yesterday.
But the moment will not last, and we will soon be back to the pettiness of politics as usual. The measures the Government takes now must be capable of retaining public support once the present mood has passed. Proper enforcement of the laws that have stood the test of time is more likely to do that than any rushed new laws.
The Guardian newspaper is refusing to sack one of its staff reporters despite confirming that he is a member of one of Britain's most extreme Islamist groups.
Dilpazier Aslam, who has been allowed to report on the London bombings from Leeds and was also given space to write a column in last Wednesday's edition of The Guardian, is a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, a radical world organisation which seeks to form a global Islamic state regulated by sharia law.
It is understood that staff at The Guardian were unaware that Mr Aslam was a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir until allegations surfaced on "The Daily Ablution", a blog run by Scott Burgess. Speculation is mounting that it may have been a sting by Hizb ut-Tahrir to infiltrate the mainstream media.
Late on Friday The Guardian released a statement to The Independent on Sunday saying: "Dilpazier Aslam is a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, an organisation which is legal in this country. We are keeping the matter under review." The paper refused to comment further.
So it's 'legal', so's the BNP, but I don't guess that many of them will get a job at The Guardian
In 2001 Mr Aslam wrote in the group's in-house journal, Khilafah, that: "The establishment of Khilafah [an Islamic state] is our only solution, to fight fire with fire, the state of Israel versus the Khilafah State".
Incitement to violence anyone?
The day after it was revealed that the London bombers were British, Mr Aslam wrote a column in which he billed himself as "a Yorkshire lad born and bred".
I read excerpts in the article linked above - revolting
In the piece, he suggested that second- and third-generation British Muslims were prepared to "rock the boat" and that agitation against British foreign policy would build up "till it can be contained no more".
Just a 'little' further and it's incitement to violence
At the end of the piece readers were not told that Mr Aslam was a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, only that he was a "trainee journalist". Though Hizb ut-Tahrir is a legal organisation in this country, the group is outlawed in nearly every other country it operates in, including Germany and Holland. It is thought to have between 2,000 and 3,000 members in the UK.
Speaking for the Muslim Council of Britain, Mr Inayat Bunglawala said: "For a party which claims it is open, you'd think this person would have disclosed his affiliations."
Mr Bunglawala added: "The Guardian has a better record in giving space to minority voices but [by employing a Hizb ut-Tahrir member] it exacerbates the idea that this is a mainstream Muslim voice," he added.
Sources in The Guardian said that Mr Aslam was employed to increase ethnic diversity within the newsroom under The Guardian's one-year traineeship scheme.
Well that's a big win for affirmative action...
One source said: "There was a feeling that we genuinely wanted more diversity, and like all national newspapers we were still a bit 'pale and male' so we were keen to recruit from different backgrounds."
'pale and male' - I have nothing but contempt for the 'source'
In 1994 Richard Gott, a veteran Guardian journalist, resigned as literary editor after he was unmasked as a former KGB spy. He admitted meeting the Russians and going on expenses-paid trips, but denied taking money. Last night The Independent on Sunday was unable to contact Mr Aslam for comment.
So they've been doing it for a while then...
How utterly pathetic.
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
07/17/2005 10:09 Comments ||
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#2
besides being 'pale and male', the Guardian is basically 70% full of old line socialists, people who were pro-Soviet until about 1991 (or even later), antisemites masking as antizionists
Security officials will not say on how many previous occasions Islamic terrorists have attempted attacks in Britain, but last week Lord Stevens, the former Metropolitan police commissioner, said there had been eight foiled plots in London in three years.
Among plots and attempts known are:
A suspected plot last year to attack the London Underground with sarin gas. There was a suggestion that this attack might also have included a separate âdirty bombâ using chemical and radiological waste mixed with conventional explosives.
In an earlier case, terrorists were said to be plotting a car bomb attack against nightclubs in Soho or in a car park beneath a prestigious London hotel.
The so-called ricin plot in which suspects were alleged to have been preparing to place the deadly poison in jars of beauty cream or contaminating tooth brushes and other products.
Kamel Bourgass, a failed Algerian asylum seeker, was jailed for 15 years for his part in that plot earlier this year. He was also jailed for life for killing a policeman during his arrest at a flat in Manchester.
Two years ago MI5 warned the cabinet that there might be an attack at Heathrow airport, possibly involving surface-to-air missiles fired at a departing or arriving passenger aircraft.
In 2000 a man was convicted for plotting an explosion against an unspecified target. Last year a number of men were arrested after police learnt of an apparent plot to bomb Old Trafford, the Manchester United stadium. They were released without charge.
Unconfirmed reports have suggested Al-Qaeda cells had considered flying hijacked aircraft into skyscrapers in Canary Wharf in East London. One terror suspect was also thought to have been planning to hijack a plane and fly it into Londonâs American embassy.
In autumn 2002, David Blunkett, then the home secretary, was forced to deny a story that terrorists planned to launch a chemical weapons attack on the Underground.
#1
Sounds like plots by Blair to keep himself in office so he can keep Bush in office and thereby keep Karl Rove in office. Diabolical!
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/17/2005 10:12 Comments ||
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#2
It's important to note that the Moslem terrorist plots against the UK started before 9/11, before the liberation of Afghanistan, and before the liberation of Iraq.
Our other war is to foil the leftist plots to blame the West for Moslem terrorism. It takes a while, but we need to wear them down by pointing out the facts. My relatives and friends have gone through a remarkable transformation in the last 4 years, from thinking that surely I was exaggerating to spontaneously telling their own friends and relatives about taqiya, jihad, sharia, dar-al-harb, and blaming Moslems for what Moslems do. Only one friend told me she didn't want to hear about the positives of liberating Iraq, about one year ago --so she's no longer a friend, nor an acquaintance.
The uneasy truce inside the Labour Party over the London bombings ended last night as an ex-cabinet minister and left-wing Labour MPs linked the attacks with the war in Iraq. Left-wing Labour MPs said they would use a conference in London today to pile the pressure on Tony Blair to hasten the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq. And Clare Short, the former cabinet minister and full-time nutter, said in a television interview to be broadcast tomorrow that she "had no doubt" that the bombings were connected to the Iraqi conflict.
We have no doubts that you're a looney, Clare.
Ms Short said the anti-terror legislation being planned by Mr Blair would act as a recruiting sergeant for the terrorists. She said it was wrong that Muslims should grow up in Britain willing to contemplate killing innocent civilians, but coupled her condemnation of the bombing with criticism of British foreign policy. "Some of the voices that have been coming from the Government that talk as though this is all evil, and that everything we do is fine, when in fact we are implicated in the slaughter of large numbers of civilians in Iraq and supporting a Middle East policy that for the Palestinians creates this sense of double standards - that feeds anger," she said in a recorded interview for GMTV.
"It's all our fault, and the rest of you should slit your wrists in shame," she added.
John McDonnell, chairman of the 500-strong Labour Representation Committee, which is staging the one-day conference, will lead calls for Britain to pull troops out of Iraq. He will tell the Prime Minister: "Please do not try to tell us that the war in Iraq played no part. This assertion is simply intellectually unsustainable. Now is the time to prevent further violence by renouncing violent solutions ourselves.
"If we appease them maybe they'll leave us alone," he stated.
"For as long as Britain remains in occupation of Iraq, the terrorist recruiters will have the argument they seek to attract more susceptible young recruits to bomb teams. Britain must withdraw now."
Downing Street has published a list of al-Qa'ida attacks on the West from the first World Trade Centre bombing in 1993, to show that they started before the Iraq war. But a member of the left-wing Campaign Group said: "We are going to set the cat among the pigeons. No Labour MP has uttered a word about Iraq since the bombings, but they have to be seen in context.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/17/2005 00:24 ||
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#1
Send a car from the MOD around for Short. Put her on a plane to Iraq and turn her out in the Sunni triangle. Let her die for her own imagined sins and be done with her. Do the same for any other commie loonLabor back bencher that dares speak of this matter again.
#4
logic and timelines have no place in their argument - it's all about self-hate of their society's success (but narcissism about their own selves) and romanticism about those who would kill everything good
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/17/2005 9:38 Comments ||
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#5
Well said Frank. Add 10 pages to that and you got a grant.
As the death toll in the London bombings rose to 55 and police finally removed the mangled wreckage of the No. 30 bus from Tavistock Square, the battle for the âhearts and mindsâ of young British Muslims started in earnest with Prime Minister Tony Blair firing the first salvo at a Labour Party national policy conference yesterday morning. âWhat we are confronting here is an evil ideology,â he told delegates. âIt is not a clash of civilizations â all civilized people, Muslim or other, feel revulsion at it. But it is a global struggle and it is a battle of ideas, hearts and minds, both within Islam and outside it. This is the battle that must be won, a battle not just about the terrorist methods but their views. Not just their barbaric acts, but their barbaric ideas. Not only what they do but what they think and the thinking they would impose on others. This ideology and the violence that is inherent in it did not start a few years ago in response to a particular policy. Over the past 12 years, Al-Qaeda and its associates have attacked 26 countries, killed thousands of people, many of them Muslims. They have networks in virtually every major country and thousands of fellow travelers. They are well-financed.â
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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Not sure we covered this one. Hat tip to the Daily Demarche.
In what is being characterized as international blackmail, the former foreign minister of Mexico has told a Senate committee his nation will not cooperate with the U.S. on border-security issues unless a number of immigration-related action is taken â including amnesty for illegal aliens.
On Tuesday, former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda told a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing: "No border security is possible without Mexican cooperation" and "there can be no cooperation [from the Mexican government] without some sort of immigration reform package."
According to a report by the Federation for American Immigration Reform, or FAIR, Castaneda, now a professor at New York University, went on to describe immigration reform as amnesty for all Mexicans living illegally in the U.S., the admission of some 5 million additional Mexican citizens to the U.S. over the next 10 years, and massive increases in U.S. aid to that country. The official said if such reform is enacted, Mexico would offer "tough" but "non-coercive" assistance in the effort to prevent terrorists from entering the U.S. via Mexico.
"Jorge Castaneda is not some obscure voice from Mexico's distant political past," commented Dan Stein, president of FAIR. "He served as foreign minister in the current Mexican administration. It is imperative that the Fox government issue a formal repudiation of Castaneda's remarks and assure the American public that their cooperation in the war against terrorism will not come at the price of extortion."
Stein hammered the senators on the committee for not challenging Castaneda during his testimony. "When anyone, much less a former foreign minister of a supposedly friendly nation, comes before a committee of the United States Senate and issues ultimatums and thinly veiled threats against the United States, one would expect outrage and condemnation from members of Congress. Instead, we got meek acquiescence or deafening silence from the members who were present," said Stein. "If the government of Mexico is not prepared to join us in this struggle, without conditions, then they cannot claim to be an ally and our government must view them as such. Allies do not engage in extortion."
Jorge old boy, if this is a challenge ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/17/2005 00:14 ||
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#1
Time to end NAFTA as it currently stands.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
07/17/2005 0:48 Comments ||
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#2
How about we annex a 1-mile wide strip all along the border (either side, I'm not picky), build a fence at the the north and south edges, and install automatic weapons that fire at anthing their IR sensors pick up every 50 feet or so? I reckon that would greatly reduce our "immigration" problem.
#3
"there can be no cooperation [from the Mexican government] without some sort of immigration reform package."
All right, here's an appropriate immigration reform package: Every single Mexican illegal caught on U.S. soil, regardless of how long they have been here, will be deported, along with their immediate families no questions asked, regardless of birthplace, and all property they have come into ownership of will be confiscated and sold off. No hearings, no appeals, no court challenges. Workplaces will be raided, home improvement store parking lots will be raided, and known Mexican illegal hangouts will be raided. The border with Mexico will be promptly sealed off, and anyone attempting to cross without official approval is subject to being met with deadly force. Remittances to Mexico from legal residents will have imposed on them a surcharge of 10%. Proceeds from the selling off of property/possessions and the remittance surcharge help pay for the new "reforms".
#4
Let's add to that a little, BaR: ALL illegals who arrive(d) in this country by crossing our southern border will be returned to Mexico, along with their families, etc. Mexico has abetted the porousity of our border, let them bear the entire cost of the burden they created.
#6
Or, we finish what we started in 1848 and just annex Mexico. Then they'll need no foreign ministers. They and their ultra corrupt fellow politicians will be moved to suitable locations for final determination. A cell suitably furnished like Saddam's. Meanwhile the economy of Mexico will be set up to actually grow without the blood sucking kleptocrats who maintain power by driving their own impoverish citizens out of the county just seeking to make a living.
On the other hand, just one terrorist act this side of the border traced to Mexico and the border gets shut tight, both ways. Tourist industry kiss your ass good bye. Whatcha going to do with all those unemployed and no structural ability to really reform your xenophobic Mexican constitution and economy? Via and Zapata knew. Couldn't happen to nicer people.
#7
This does sound like a particularly stupid piece of rhetoric.
I can see why people are pissed off in this post!
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
07/17/2005 9:40 Comments ||
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#8
Tony - you don't know the half of it...
close the border- raid the employers. Feds? Do your f&^king jobs!
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/17/2005 9:51 Comments ||
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#9
We could take a page from China:
"You'll miss Mexico City more than we'll miss your illegals."
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/17/2005 9:51 Comments ||
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#10
Bomb! I agree with you all the way. Give the illeagls 6 months to clear out and then start.
Also send those who knowingly hire illegals (all the way up to CEOs) and those officals of local governments who knowingly aid them (with sainctuary laws) to Mexico as well.
Seal the border and drop NAFTA. This guy has just declared that mexico is *not* or ally (but then most of us already knew that).
#11
"I can see why people are pissed off in this post!"
Tony, it's like Frank said: that ain't the half of it. People here are becoming more and more dissatisfied over a growing list of issues that aren't being dealt with in ways that make any apparent sense.
Our borders with Mexico and Canada leak like sieves-- so much so, that for all practical purposes they may as well not exist. Why? WHY???? Is there some damn reason, for cryin' out loud, why we're not making even a small effort to control the flood tide of illegals crossing into this country? If there is, I'd like to hear it; but all we get from the Administration is silence-- and platitudes.
We've known since Day One-- September 11, 2001-- that Saudi Arabia is the premier source of the Islamic extremism we're fighting. Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers were Saudis. The Saudis fund the mosques and madrassas where that shit breeds, and as far as I can see, absolutely nothing is being done to shut them down. Hell, even the Dutch are doing more than we are. Why? WHY????
Furthermore, we've got nearly a sixth of a million U.S. troops stationed in Iraq, armed to the teeth with the world's deadliest weapons, right smack-dab next door to Saudi Arabia. I had expected-- and hoped-- that part of the reason those troops were sent over there was to start making life very, VERY uncomfortable for the Forces of Evil. But what do we get? Pictures of Abdullah and Bush holding hands (yechhh!) at the ranch in Crawford. Why? WHY????
For that matter, why is the Baathist regime in Syria still standing?
And why, oh WHY, are the Mad Mullahs still running things in Iran??? What the fuck are we doing???
(OK, that's enough for now; don't want to emulate Howard Beale...)
And that's just for starters.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/17/2005 10:46 Comments ||
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#12
On Tuesday, former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda told a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing: "No border security is possible without Mexican cooperation" and "there can be no cooperation [from the Mexican government] without some sort of immigration reform package."
I strongly urge Senor Casteneda to commune with the shade of Black Jack Pershing on that subject.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
07/17/2005 11:01 Comments ||
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#13
Dave D - Better now? Lol! Fine rant, hitting those high spots - the ones rubbed raw.
I also want to thank the Moonbat Jorge Castaneda. As with his ilk, the patriotic residents of Moonbatia, he is so self-absorbed that he doesn't realize that the mere act of opening his mouth serves the forces of reason, not his own. This arrogance is characterized best as a permanent case of foot-in-mouth. The gift that keeps on giving.
While our elected representatives, top to bottom, seek cover from addressing this issue, the Moonbatia spokespeople blithely and impulsively strip it away - and keep the issue front and center. Thanks, morons, mucho apreció!
#14
On to a more practical solution. The problem here is that the US government is trying to deal with the Mexican government. That will never work with *anything*. A better alternative would be to *pay* Mexicans for fingering non-Hispanic illegals. From $50 to $50,000, we can afford to be extra generous. Of course, NONE OF THIS COULD WORK UNLESS THE INS ACTUALLY KEEPS THE NON-HISPANICS THEY CATCH!!! Gaa. "Catch and release" has got to be the STUPIDEST idea I've heard in a dozen years. Why the HELL can't they put them in tent cities, like Sheriff Joe Arpaio does up in Maricopa County?
#15
"Why the HELL can't they put them in tent cities, like Sheriff Joe Arpaio does up in Maricopa County?"
I've wondered that, myself, but I realized that, at the rate they're coming, we'd have the world's largest internment camp in fairly short order. We don't want them in either case, illegals getting through or as prisoners. Catch and release is, indeed, stupid, but so is any other measure that doesn't simply stop them cold, utterly preventing them from crossing illegally.
Gonna have to wall it off - and I mean a wall that can't be climbed or cut through or breached by anything less than a major military operation.
Same up North, too.
The Friendship Fences. Catchy.
Then comes beefed up maritime interdiction, since the land border manpower requirements will plummet and they'll be forced to take to the water.
#16
Of course some will argue tunneling and air. The first is not difficult to prevent if sensors are put in place - breaches are easily detected, Israel managed it when they gave back the Sinai and created a new southern line of defense in the Negev - with sound and IR sensors - and the second is easy to prevent if the radar surveillance gaps are filled - such as with the static balloons already proposed.
#19
Ok, stepping up to the crease here (cricketing term! :) to put a slightly different perspective on this. I may well get some things wrong here, so bear with me...
Look at it from the PoV of supply and demand: there is a constant supply of illegals because there is a constant demand for their labour. Kill the demand, and although you'll not kill the supply, it will certainly diminish. Kill the demand by punitively fining companies that hire illegals.
That won't stop the flood, but it may turn it into a trickle - then look at the ideas put forward by Phil and Azcat, after all, Mexico is really taking the piss regarding NAFTA.
As for the situation with the Saudis Dave, I just am at a loss there - a few years or so back, when .com first announced his 40km of 'Republic of Eastern Arabia' solution, I though 'yup, gonna happen', then it was 'hmmm, could happen', then 'nope, not gonna happen'. I like to think that when GW has holding Abdullahs hand he was saying something like 'this is just for the cameras asswipe, just remember about those D5's targetted on Mecca and Medina...', but that's just me I guess.
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
07/17/2005 12:16 Comments ||
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#20
Everytime a Mexican "diplomat" tries to interfere in US politics -- say, by showing up at some meeting on the question of what to do about illegal immigration -- PNG their asses.
I'm sick of us acting like the rest of the world has a right to tell us how to live.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/17/2005 12:19 Comments ||
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#21
The demand is for a supply of nearly slave labor who will work for much less then mimimum wage. This way the elite can exploit hire illegals to babysit their spawn, do their yardwork, etc... However we can lower the demand by enforcing the existing laws against employing illegals....
Good point about the lack of assets. Perhaps we need to size some of the assets of those who employ or support the illegals? Do you think Walmart will hire illegals if they may face a few million-dollar fine or if the CEO will be found personally financially responsible for the deportion of those illegals found as his employees?
#22
Mexico wants to play games, seal the border. We can't trust on their help we have to make sure ourselves. If that leads to an economic crisis and revolution in Mexico so be it.
#23
Tony, the problem is not a lack of means: it is a complete, utter lack of will. I can only surmise that too many people are making far too much money off the enormous influx of dirt-cheap labor, for there to be any political will to solve the problem.
If we wanted to shut down this Mexican civilian invasion, we could: what you suggested-- punitively fining companies that hire illegals-- is but one solution among many. Imprisoning the executives of those companies is another. Cutting off Federal funds to states that allow illegals to collect welfare is another, and the list could go on and on. And in the extreme, we could always station troops on the border with orders to shoot to kill-- and let the corpses rot in the desert sun.
So it's not a lack of means-- it's a lack of will.
"I like to think that when GW has holding Abdullahs hand he was saying something like 'this is just for the cameras asswipe, just remember about those D5's targetted on Mecca and Medina...', but that's just me I guess."
The time has long, long passed when I could console myself with such fantasies. I have seen absolutely zero evidence that we're doing anything whatsoever about Saudi Arabia-- anything at all.
Last year I donated the maximum allowed by law-- $2,000-- to Bush's re-election campaign, as well as $250 to the Swiftboat Vets and another $500 to John Thune's senate campaign (to get rid of that treasonous little prick Tom Daschle). At the time, I would have done anything to ensure Bush's re-election because I was convinced our nation's survival depended on it.
Anymore, though, I sometimes wondered why the hell I even bothered to vote.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/17/2005 12:45 Comments ||
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#24
Tony(UK) et al, excellent points. Crafting a law that would target top-down, CEO's and Boards of Directors (heh, free-riding scum is another term that fits), would certainly have a major impact.
Observations:
But that begs the question and illuminates the problem: The US Congress. They are the problem, essentially, because they lack the backbone to do what needs to be done. I've heard the Bush-bashing, as if he's the only one at fault, yet he has hired trainloads of new Border Control agents - and he knows there is not the political will behind this, yet. So he's only acting half-assed... but he's doing more than 98% of the Congress.
The INS suffers from the holdover Moonbats of Camelot-II that refuse to actually do their jobs and bitch about the Minutemen, instead - these are also real culprits here. Same as in most of our other Govt Agencies and institutions.
Re: Congress - If people would stop re-electing assholes and think bigger, about America, not just about the pork he/she brings home, then we could solve many problems. Our political system has a chronic disease:
What have you done for me lately? / What have you done for me lately?
That's us, folks, sending the same lame spineless hacks back over and over again.
Our indigenous Moonbats explain part of their voter support - but only part. The rest is up to us. Throw the losers out. Make it a priority to do to these losers what was done to Daschle, wherever possible. Sure, the Pelosis are "safe", but if we weed out every vulnerable fuckwit, things will indeed get better.
#26
Seriously, I think that this particular statement needs a response.
Close the border for ONE week. SERIOUSLY. Deploy whatever military assets are needed.
IF anyone tries to cross... _especially_ if they're just some poor schmuck trying to get by...
we deport them. By airplane. To the Mexican border with Honduras.
Give them a nice in-flight meal on their way, and tell them they'll be allowed to make a living again, with the chance that their children won't be hungry, when the High and Mighty like Jorge Castaneda stop picking a fight with the US on their behalf.
Illegal immigration to the US is big business in Mexico. We've got to make damn clear that they just broke their goddamn dinner plate.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
07/17/2005 13:13 Comments ||
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#27
Great comments, people! Dave D's rant probably speaks for us all in terms of frustration at the obvious lack of will and focus in dealing with illegals. It is apparent that enough interests across party lines benefit by having illegals streaming into this country, so nothing will be done by Congress or the President. The kicker is here that if some incident happens that is really serious and horrific, and is shown to be tied to this benign neglect of our laws by the President and/or Congress. the administration would fall. The consequences would then surely outweigh the political gain of ignoring the illegal problem.
Hey, remember some time ago that I wrote the letter to Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski about John Bolton and illegals? Well, I got a reply. I will skip the Bolton part, but the reply on the illegals part is that she voted on getting more Border Patrol agents. That was about it.
The comment on the lack of will is right friggin on. The only way that the problem will be solved and our survival as a nation has a chance is for the people to assert their will. Congressmen (especially Republicans) that take strong stands against illegal aliens are treated like lepers by the Administration. The Minutemen are a start. There needs to be some serious housecleaning. And the gov't types do not know how to use a broom.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/17/2005 13:51 Comments ||
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#28
The former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda is a regular contributor to the editorial pages of thw LA Times, as PD said he is a Moonbat of Moonbats.
I too am fed up, when I have to fight my way through The grocery store checkout, WalMart, Kmart and the liquor store through the herds of them somethings, it's totally, and completely, totally fucked. This isn't some racist rant, between 20 of them there isn't one word of english spoken, they are illegals not Californians. They are totally below the radar of these GD politicans, they never see them where they go, they never see them where these millionares hang out are, These elites make sure they have their vision tuned so Mexicans are invisible to them. These mojados are taking skilled jobs that US citizens will do. How about oilfield construction? Thats not unskilled labor, I can name plenty more. This invasion is willfully aided by these politicians. What Carl Rove said to some reporter is more pressing to the news media (guess who watches their kids and cleans their house) than a invasion of our country. (Look a Wookie!)
We have the means to stop this, what is lacked is a political will on the parts of the elites. Guess who is getting screwed again by whom? Yea SOSDD.
#31
I too am fed up, when I have to fight my way through The grocery store checkout, WalMart, Kmart and the liquor store through the herds of them somethings, it's totally, and completely, totally fucked.
When it's becoming a law-and-order problem in rural Indiana, it's gone beyond fucked.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/17/2005 15:54 Comments ||
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#32
"When it's becoming a law-and-order problem in rural Indiana, it's gone beyond fucked."
Yup, they're hosing the Heartland.
A friend in Iowa tells me that much of Marshalltown (small city in the middle of the state) is a no-go area at night because of Hispanic gangs. So are parts of Des Moines. Large hog farms, and meat-packing plants, bring in the Mexican illegals for the cheap labor-- and the citizenry ends up bearing the crushing burden of social services and law enforcement.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/17/2005 16:02 Comments ||
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#33
Yes we need to close the border. Lots of great comments here. punitively fining companies that hire illegals-- is but one solution among many. Imprisoning the executives of those companies is another. Cutting off Federal funds to states that allow illegals to collect welfare is another. Nice comment Dave D.
We need to enforce these principles. This has been ongoing, but now with the threat of OTM's crossing our borders it's escalated the need to act now, and not be so passive.
Tancredo has been fighting the fight here in Colorado, and surprisingly it seems like an uphill battle. That if you harbor these views, you're "politcally incorrect".
These illegals are very nice people often times when face to face with them. I would like to see them come in the legal way though, have we forgotten that route?
Posted by: Jan ||
07/17/2005 16:15 Comments ||
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#34
Yeah, Tancredo's trying; but I'm not surprized that it's an uphill battle. I think we've got a "perfect storm" here-- a fatal synergy between politically-correct, multi-culti, anything-goes hyper-tolerance on the one hand, and sheer, naked corporate greed on the other.
And if we're not careful, it's gonna kill us.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/17/2005 16:26 Comments ||
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#35
RICO the executives of any company employing illegals. Its one thing to take a company to court, it's another when you take everything the suits own and then wait for them to process to get it back. That will tighten the noose faster than any other action and you don't need more legislation or personnel on the border. Pour encourager les autres.
#36
kinda reminds me of apologizing instead of asking permission
Posted by: Jan ||
07/17/2005 16:57 Comments ||
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#37
The demand is for a supply of nearly slave labor who will work for much less then minimum wage.
That's not exactly the bulk of the issue. Litigation, workman's comp, minimum wage, taxation, etc., etc., etc. The regulatory and direct & indirect financial burdens imposed on businesses in the United States by the multilayer federal / state / local regulatory state are simply more than many businesses can bear. Since those costs cannot be cut businesses cut corners where they can and often the biggest line-item on the budget is labor.
The net effect is that as the burdens imposed on business by government escalate an ever-larger portion of our economy is forced underground (hires illegal labor, does strictly off-the-books cash business, etc.) or offshore. Globalization and competition from low or no-duty imported goods increases the pace of process. As more businesses fall off the tax roles larger burdens are levied on those who remain and the cost of compliance with ever-increasing regulation being the final quantum that eventually drives businesses underground or offshore.
Think about it: Youâre a farmer in Californiaâs central valley. You own a bit of land thatâs been in the family for over a century from which youâve (barely) been able to eke out a living. Every year your taxes ratchet up. Every year the nanny-state heaps more costly regulations on you. Every employee you hire is a ticking time bomb because as many today seem to be looking for a nice lawsuit on which to retire as are actually looking for a job (illegals typically donât present this problem). Every year the cost of workmanâs comp expands. Every year the prices for your crops go down because of foreign competition while your cost of production rises. You reach a breaking point, what do you do? Sell to a developer? Hold out until the bitter end after creditors force judgment sales of the family farm? Walk away? Hire illegals who present a lower cost structure so you can hang on a few more years?
We really are killing the goose that laid the golden egg and the crying shame is that most of us have no idea how or why it's happening. Illegal immigration is driven more by the high costs imposed on business by our nanny-state than by greed on the part of small business owners who hire the bulk of illegals (and yes, it's the SMALL BUSINESS folks who will be hurt the most if we follow many of the suggestions above).
That which we call a "moonbat," by any other name, is just as batty.
America's homegrown terrorists, the Aryan Nations, have allied themselves with the Islamic jihadists. I don't want to link to their vile website, but here are excerpts from the statement that is on their front page now:
There has been a little misunderstanding as to what our perspective is as far as an alliance with Islamic Jihadeen, and our own Phinehas Priests. There are some out there who would like to imply that we are now an Islamic Fundamentalist Organization, and this is erroneous, our Organization is not for the support of any religion, however based on the history of the Aryan Nations, the rules and conduct are based on Biblical Law, and the general views of the bulk of this organization is the acceptance of Aryan Messianic Identity, or other forms of what is called âChristian Identityâ in most circles....
Further, seeing the errors of the past, we have taken this approach with alliances to Islamic adherents, because we find their standards of morality to be nearly analogous to our own, and their resolve to uproot and destroy the fallen tree of the Garden, the satanic âjewâ, to also be analogous to our own desires and devotion. In this sense, Islam is our ally, and the 1500 cults all claiming to be âChristianâ are our opposition, as they have chosen to worship the image [jews] of the beast [satan] as prophesied within the Holy Scriptures for the non-elect, the condemned of Yahweh, the rejects of Israel. Islam has not been dishonored as much by âjewâish incursion, therefore Islamic Jihadeen have safeguarded the purity of the very instinct for self preservation for which we hold the most vociferous esteem.
Wonder if all those people carrying 'round the "Bush=Hitler" and "Israel=Nazis" signs realize that they've allied themselves with people who actually would consider being compared to Hitler or Nazis a compliment? If so, do they care?
Posted by: Mike ||
07/17/2005 08:37 ||
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From Jihad Unspun, an article by Abid Mustafa, political analyst who specializes in Muslim affairs
The present obsession of some Muslim countries on which countries should occupy a seat in the expanded UN Security Council is misdirected. .... Besides the plan to expand the Security Council, the new reforms advocate the use of pre-emptive strikes and include an open-ended definition on terrorism. The proposals are meant to be debated by the General Assembly later this year, but so far the discussions have revolved around the expansion of the Security Council.
The inclusion of pre-emptive strikes and a loose definition on terrorism will enable western powers to legally justify punitive actions against Muslim countries that pose a threat to their interests. The threat does not have to be real, only perceived. This will preserve westâs domination over Muslims lands within the ambit of international law. Since its inception in 1945, the UN has been used by the great powers especially America to cement their hegemony all over the world. No people have suffered more at the hands of the UN then the Muslim Ummah. The west used the UN to carve up Muslim land such as the separation of Bangladesh from Pakistan, dismemberment of Bosnia and the division of Indonesia.
Furthermore, the UN has been used by the west to plunge a dagger deep into the heart of the Ummah by creating Israel and supporting its existence by issuing resolutions in her favor. The UN has also played the instrumental role in isolating Muslims from each other by imposing sanctions on Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Iran and Afghanistan. The UN has also been used by the west to justify the invasion of Somalia, and the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.
Given the UNâs criminal record against the Muslim world, its hostile plans for the future and its inability to restrain American hegemony, it beggars belief why the rulers of the Muslim world blindly submit to the UN and hold it in such great esteem. Any sane ruler with a modicum of common sense should have realized by now that severing ties with the UN would give them a better chance of fighting western imperialism. ....
The only source of protection from the aggression of western powers and their instruments of terrorism such as the UN lie in the emergence of a powerful Islamic State. ....
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
07/17/2005 13:47 ||
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#1
Mikey's posting something from JI? What will he think of next?
#7
the UN has been used by the west to plunge a dagger deep into the heart of the Ummah by creating Israel
The very fact that Jews exist is an affront to muslims everywhere. some frikkin religion.
The inclusion of pre-emptive strikes and a loose definition on terrorism will enable western powers to legally justify punitive actions against Muslim countries that pose a threat to their interests.
if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck . . .
From The Council on Foreign Relations, prepared by Lionel Beehner, staff writer
----- What's the status of Iraq's various militia groups?
Despite repeated U.S. requests for them to disband, Iraq's various ethnic and sectarian militias continue to exist, and in some cases, are on a path to being recognized as part of Iraq's security apparatus. On June 8, for example, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani praised an Iran-trained Shiite militia known as the Badr Organization and the Kurdish peshmerga security force. ....
-----
What are the various militia groups in Iraq?
They vary, experts say. There are a growing number of small, homegrown, paramilitary-style brigades being formed by local tribes, religious leaders, and political parties. Some battle Iraq's largely Sunni insurgency alongside official Interior and Defense ministry troops; others operate without official assistance or sanction. The larger, more established militias, such as the Badr Organization and peshmerga, are tied to Iraq's leading political parties, organized along sectarian lines, and enforce order in their respective regions. ....
-----
Who are the peshmerga?
They are a Kurdish liberation army whose name translates literally to "those who face death." Elements of the force, whose roots stretch back to the 1920s ..... The peshmerga is now believed to comprise some 100,000 troops, and serves as the primary security force for the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq. .....
-----
What is the Badr Organization?
It is the Iranian-trained wing of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), the largest Shiite party in Iraq. During the U.S.-led occupation government's crackdown on militia groups in 2003, the 10,000-strong militia changed its name from the Badr Brigade to the Badr Organization of Reconstruction and Development and pledged to disarm. The group, however, has reportedly remained armed, and today operates mainly in Shiite-controlled southern Iraq, where a number of regional governments are dominated by SCIRI representatives. One of Badr's recent offshoots is a feared, elite commando unit linked to the Iraqi Interior Ministry called the Wolf Brigade. Sunni leaders have recently accused the Badr Organization of revenge killings against Sunni clerics and unlawful kidnappings.
-----
The article continues with answers to these questions (and others):
What other Shiite militia groups are there?
What is the Wolf Brigade?
Are there any Sunni-led commando units?
Are the militia sanctioned by Iraq's government?
Why does the Iraqi government support some militias?
What is the U.S. view of the militias?
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
07/17/2005 16:26 ||
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The Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) called on Saturday for resolving the conflict between the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) and the Islamic Resistance Movement (HAMAS). In a press release, DFLP said that Israel is the only beneficiary from these acts that will damage Palestinian resistance and unity in the face of Israeli aggressions. Through understanding and dialogue, added the release, all internal conflicts and disagreements can be resolved to confront attempts to judaize Jerusalem, mistreatment of the Palestinians, building of the Separation Wall and Israel's withdrawal from Gaza.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:09 ||
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KABUL - US-led coalition forces said on Saturday they had released 20 suspected Taleban detainees from Bagram airbase, the main military base in the war-torn Afghanistan. The US militaryâs spokeswoman in Afghanistan Cindy Moore said the release was part of a government-backed Takhim-e-Solh â âStrengthening Peaceâ - programme which offered an amnesty to former Taleban insurgents who agree to renounce violence.
Plus we've wrung 'em dry.
Moore said, additional detainees would be released from Bagram next on Saturday. Located 50 kilometres north of Kabul, where hundreds of the suspected Taleban are under custody, Bagram is the main US military base in war-torn Afghanistan. Last Saturday, the US military released 76 detainees, also from Bagram.
A total of 199 detainees accepted participation in the programme. The first group of 57 was released July 2. The rest will be released soon, officials said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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Iraq's prosecution of insurgents is getting a helping hand from U.S. Army lawyers who were schooled in Louisiana, the only state that also has courts rooted in the French legal system that allows judges to act as inquisitors.
One of the lawyers, Capt. Dan Stigall, said he found similarities between the two systems as soon as he opened an Iraqi law book. "It was interesting to open it up and say, 'Gosh, we do share so much,'" said Stigall, who earned his law degree at Louisiana State University and spent six months working with Iraq's courts last year.
Louisiana is the only U.S. state with a legal system based on French-style "civil law," which gives more discretion to judges and relies less on precedents than so-called "common law," the Anglo-American foundation of the other states' systems. The differences appear subtle to non-lawyers, but legal experts say a background in Louisiana law helps an American lawyer in dealing with Iraqi judges, who take the lead role in questioning witnesses at criminal trials. "I think it's a tremendous advantage," said Christopher L. Blakesley, a civil law expert who taught at LSU's law school for 20 years and is now at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
Another bonus: The judges were pleased and surprised to work with Americans who have an understanding of Iraq's system of justice.
"It showed we were making an effort to bring in someone who understood the true basis for their law. There was the sense that it would show respect for the underpinnings of their legal system," said Lt. Col. Bernard McLaughlin, a Louisiana-trained lawyer in the state's National Guard who led the first eight-member American team that oversaw the prosecutions of insurgents.
McLaughlin, a mediator in civilian life, was succeeded in overseeing the prosecutions by another Louisiana National Guard member and civilian prosecutor, Lt. Col. Gary Nunn, who was succeeded by yet another Louisiana prosecutor, and a Louisiana judge is lined up to take the job after him. McLaughlin assisted in the development of the Central Criminal Court, an institution created by U.S. forces but staffed by Iraqi judges and lawyers. The American prosecutors work with soldiers to collect evidence and give testimony, which is then handed over to Iraqi prosecutors.
The court was created, McLaughlin said, to prosecute insurgent fighters because the military was concerned that Iraq's provincial courts would be influenced by anti-Americanism and be more likely to acquit those guilty of attacks.
Since the Central Criminal Court was created in 2003, 532 suspects have been tried on charges such as murder and assault of American forces, with 348 convictions, most of them for possession of illegal weapons. Higher-profile suspects, such as Saddam Hussein, are tried in a separate Iraqi tribunal. A highlight for the legal staff was the conviction in May of an Iraqi accused of using a roadside bomb to kill Staff Sgt. Henry E. Irizarry, a New Yorker who was attached to a Louisiana National Guard unit. It was the second time the court found a suspect guilty of murder in the death of an American soldier. The suspect, Ziyad Hassan, received a 15-year prison sentence.
Louisiana lawyers are a logical choice for such work because they've been trained in all the basics of both civil law and common law. "There's frankly no place outside Louisiana in this country where that's taught," Blakesley said. The students have that requirement even though the traces of civil law in Louisiana's system have been diluted since it was created in 1804, influenced by cases from federal courts and from other state courts. The former French and Spanish colony did away with the inquisitorial system of criminal trials â in which the judge questions all witnesses and suspects â after it became a state, in 1812. It now has the adversarial, prosecution-versus-defense system that all other states have.
But civil law remains in Louisiana's noncriminal courts, which deal with lawsuits between individuals and companies. That means the state's lawyers are familiar with some fundamental aspects of Iraqi's legal system, including what's known as "legal custom" â the idea that a judge's ruling will never be based on a single precedent, but on a body of rulings.
"In America, one decision from the high court is binding on all other courts. In Iraq, it would take a series of decisions to create a custom," Blakesley said. "A common law lawyer would not have a clue about that." Italy, on the other hand, is migrating from Civil, or Napoleonic, Law, towards Common Law for an odd reason: Perry Mason re-runs. The vast majority know more about Common Law from watching TV then they do about Civil Law. Ironically, this will be of major benefit to Italy in the long run, as Common Law is very conducive to business, unlike the burdensome Civil Law that impedes most of the rest of Europe, save Britain.
President Mahmoud Abbas has warned Palestinians against violating law and order in the Palestinian territories.
Kinda late for that, isn't it? You've already built your Emma Goldman culture...
Abbas addressed a speech last night to the Palestinian people after the Gaza Strip witnessed armed confrontation in the last two days between Hamas fighters and Palestinian security and police forces. âWe are not going to allow the terrorizing of residents and we will not deal lightly with those who try to challenge and violate the rule of law. We will prosecute all those who violated the law and attacked out property,â said Abbas in a televised speech.
"We're gonna start any time now. Just you wait and see... You're really gonna get it!"
Abbas called on all the Palestinian factions to respect the Palestinian Authority (PA), be committed to its rule as well as to the period of calmness that was declared and accepted last March in Cairo. Abbas in his speech was very critical of Hamas, accusing it of undermining the Palestinian national interests and preventing Israel from implementing its plan to withdraw from Gaza. âWe are determined to end the status of anarchy, chaos and security deterioration, and we are carrying out measures and actions that would devote law and discipline,â said Abbas in his speech. He slammed Palestinian groups, mainly Hamas and Islamic Jihad, for continuing bomb attacks and firing rockets at Israel and at Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip in violation of the truce. Abbas also described firing rockets as âabsurdist actions that just bring our people disaster and severe harmâ. Abbas held Israel completely responsible for the current escalation of violence.
Ow! My head just spun around 360 degrees!
âWe asserted that we would never be dragged into a civil war, where I explained this in Damascus to Hamas leaders as well as other factions and partiesâ leaders,â Abbas said. He added that during his meetings with leaders of the Palestinian factions and parties in Damascus last week, âwe reiterated the commitments of self-control and restraint and not to respond to the Israeli provocations. But the surprising thing is that one faction is using a double policy: On one hand it says it is committed to the calmness and discipline and on the other practicing completely opposite actions that aim to weaken the Palestinian Authority and break its strength.â
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
President Mahmoud Abbas has warned Palestinians against violating law and order in the Palestinian territories.
Got a stick to wield? No? Yer talkin' outta yer ass then.
#3
He slammed Palestinian groups, mainly Hamas and Islamic Jihad, for continuing bomb attacks and firing rockets at Israel and at Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip in violation of the truce. Abbas also described firing rockets as âabsurdist actions that just bring our people disaster and severe harmâ. . . . [and] held Israel completely responsible for the current escalation of violence.
The unfortunate thing is that after all that painful motion, you are back just where you started from, rather like the "peace process". Poor Fred. Poor Israelis. Can't add 'Poor Paleos' since that well of sympathy ran dry somewhere around the time their brave freedom fighters tossed an old crippled man in a wheelchair off a cruise ship.
Seriously, in the history of the world, has there ever been a people more dedicated to acting against their own self interest than the Palestinians?
#7
Actually they are acting in their self-interest. The Paleo-Arabs believe that their divine mission on Earth and ticket to Heaven is to murder all Jews. What higher purpose could they have?
BAGHDAD: The US command on Saturday announced charges against 11 US soldiers for assaulting detainees. In a statement Saturday, the US military said the charges against the 11 troops, who were not identified, were filed Wednesday following a complaint by another soldier that "other soldiers had allegedly assaulted some suspected terrorists." "None of the insurgents required medical treatment for injuries related to the alleged assault," the statement added.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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The Supreme Court does not have jurisdiction to hear the reference against the Hasba Bill, Qasi Hussain Ahmed, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) president and Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) chief, told reporters on Saturday. Nevertheless, he said, the MMA would fulfil legal requirements and plead its case in the apex court.
âThe dissolution of the NWFP Assembly will lead to an uncontrollable situation in the province, for which the entire responsibility will rest on the federal government,â he said. He said that dissolving the NWFP Assembly under the pretext of the Hasba Bill would amount to hostility against the state. He said the people of the NWFP had a deep commitment to Islam and believed in the leadership of clerics.
âIf dissolving their elected government and assembly provokes them, nobody will be able to control them,â Qazi said. âWe are not against going to courts, but in the present situation where half of the Supreme Court judges are under oath to the Constitution while the remaining half have taken oath under (President General) Pervez Musharrafâs Legal Framework Order, there is a discord,â he said.
Qazi said that in principle, the Supreme Court had no jurisdiction over the case but âwe will find a way out of this situation imposed upon us by the governmentâ. Qazi said the Hasba Bill was in accordance with the requirements of the Constitution. âFollowing the billâs return from the governor and the Council of Islamic Ideology, opinions were sought for two years from the public and experts, hence there is no justification to opposing the bill.â
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
I once had a proctologist who looked at me like that. Doowwwnnn fido.
Posted by: Captain America ||
07/17/2005 0:52 Comments ||
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#2
...I keep tellin' you guys, that's James Randi explaining why Uri Geller's a fraud.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
07/17/2005 10:58 Comments ||
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Cairo: The Egyptian opposition has baulked at suggestions by a US official concerning direct support to political parties from Washington, reported a local newspaper. During his just-concluded visit to Egypt, US Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick said a programme for grooming party cadres, launched by the State Department, was part of the Greater Middle East Initiative, reported independent newspaper Al Masri Al Youm. âI suspect over the course of both the presidential and parliamentary elections, there will be questions raised, challenges ... thatâs the way a democratic process is formed.â
The initiative is a US plan to widen political and socio-economic reforms in the region, the paper added. The paper, however, quoted some opposition activists as saying that they might accept US support if offered through the Egyptian Government. Zoellick said on Thursday that political change was taking shape in Egypt and the world would watch closely September's first contested presidential polls. "I feel there is change here, politically and economically," he told a Cairo press conference as he wrapped up a two-day visit in Egypt.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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The grand imam of Egypt's Al Azhar Mosque, the Sunni world's most prestigious seat of learning, called on the people of Iraq to unite to rid the country of terrorists and urged other countries to help. "The Iraqis, men, women, children and elderly people should unite and work solidly together to chase those evil terrorists everywhere until Iraq's land is purged of their filth and viciousness," Mohammad Saeed Tantawi said in a statement on Thursday. "All other countries and individuals should extend help to Iraq to enable its people to exterminate those wantons and despots," Tantawi said.
The statement included 10 items explaining "the pillars of Islam" that deal with religious, ideological and political issues supporting Tantawi's ideas, with excerpts from the Holy Quran to support his points. Islam does not differentiate between people, whatever their origin, Tantawi argued, in what is one of the strongest condemnations of the violence plaguing Iraq since the end of the US-led invasion in May 2003. "Chasing these criminals determinedly and steadily until finishing them off is a duty of everyone, be it a ruler or anybody else and anyone who shelters them is considered partner to their crimes," Tantawi said. The grand imam said the most heinous crimes committed by those "corrupt on earth ... is the killing of innocent people, kidnapping honest people and then killing them in a savage way."
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
I guess that after the kidnapping of the Egyptian diplomat the govt put some pressure on this guy.
However it took a week after the kidnapping before he had his statement together -- obviously he wasn't planning to issue something like this.
#4
OK, good. Even if belated, good. Now how much circulation is this going to get?
Maybe he'll repeat it later. And who knows, maybe even extend it beyond Iraq. We can always hope, though I'm not holding my breath.
Posted by: James ||
07/17/2005 13:14 Comments ||
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#5
As long as the top of his speech didn't have something like
The Islamic Bank of Development (IBD) has pledged $84 million to assist the overwhelmingly Muslim northwestern African country of Niger to integrate more than a half-million students enrolled at Islamic schools into the national education system. "Two systems have developed since colonization and independence, completely separate from one another: the formal French school and the informal Qurâanic schools," Khalil Enahaoui, regional coordinator for the IBD program, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported on Saturday, July 16. "Our goal is to bring these two together by emphasizing bilingual, Franco-Arabic teaching."
With more than 50,000 locations, Islamic schools have attracted thousands of students across Niger. These schools, traditionally free of charge and with flexible schedules more suited to children working in the fields, have long constituted an essential way of learning for much of the population of this country, one of the poorest on earth. Faced with only 7,600 formal schools and an illiteracy rate cresting above 84 percent nationwide, Niger is in the first year of an ambitious decade-long education plan that aims to boost literacy and numeracy and create a stable and most of all employable population.
Enahaoui suggested that the influence of these schools reached far beyond basic literacy. "If we leave the Islamic schools to develop wildly, we won't be able to control them," he said. "Pushing these schools out to the edge of society only radicalizes students and teachers and feeds prejudices and assumptions. To ignore these schools is to sow the seeds of violence and ignorance."
Posted by: Fred ||
07/17/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
In "the overwhelmingly Muslim northwestern African country of Niger" there is "an illiteracy rate cresting above 84 percent nationwide".
More evidence that the moon-god religion is anti-reason. Moslems can't even be bothered to learn to read. What purpose would that serve? the only true word is that of the Koran. Why would anyone want to read any other book?
#3
Dunno, but if you look at the per capita GDP ranking of the world's nations in the CIA World Factbook you find nearly all of the non-oil-rich Islamic countries dead last on the list.
I think I read somewhere that the combined GDP of all the Islamic countries, excluding oil revenues, is about equal to the GDP of Denmark (or one of those mid-sized European nations, at any rate). But I can't remember where I saw that.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/17/2005 15:48 Comments ||
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Dave D
I think I read somewhere that the combined GDP of all the Islamic countries, excluding oil revenues, is about equal to the GDP of Denmark
In that case it is only 1.5 times the GDP of... Israel
#5
educated muslims are harder to brainwash - they have other opportunities. Note I said harder, not impossible. The uneducated are good for fodder, little else
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/17/2005 21:13 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
As the death toll in the London bombings rose to 55 and police finally removed the mangled wreckage of the No. 30 bus from Tavistock Square, the battle for the âhearts and mindsâ of young British Muslims started in earnest with Prime Minister Tony Blair firing the first salvo at a Labour Party national policy conference yesterday morning. âWhat we are confronting here is an evil ideology,â he told delegates. âIt is not a clash of civilizations â all civilized people, Muslim or other, feel revulsion at it. But it is a global struggle and it is a battle of ideas, hearts and minds, both within Islam and outside it. This is the battle that must be won, a battle not just about the terrorist methods but their views. Not just their barbaric acts, but their barbaric ideas. Not only what they do but what they think and the thinking they would impose on others. This ideology and the violence that is inherent in it did not start a few years ago in response to a particular policy. Over the past 12 years, Al-Qaeda and its associates have attacked 26 countries, killed thousands of people, many of them Muslims. They have networks in virtually every major country and thousands of fellow travelers. They are well-financed.â
America's homegrown terrorists, the Aryan Nations, have allied themselves with the Islamic jihadists. I don't want to link to their vile website, but here are excerpts from the statement that is on their front page now:
President Mahmoud Abbas has warned Palestinians against violating law and order in the Palestinian territories.
The Supreme Court does not have jurisdiction to hear the reference against the Hasba Bill, Qasi Hussain Ahmed, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) president and Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) chief, told reporters on Saturday. Nevertheless, he said, the MMA would fulfil legal requirements and plead its case in the apex court.
The grand imam of Egypt's Al Azhar Mosque, the Sunni world's most prestigious seat of learning, called on the people of Iraq to unite to rid the country of terrorists and urged other countries to help. "The Iraqis, men, women, children and elderly people should unite and work solidly together to chase those evil terrorists everywhere until Iraq's land is purged of their filth and viciousness," Mohammad Saeed Tantawi said in a statement on Thursday. "All other countries and individuals should extend help to Iraq to enable its people to exterminate those wantons and despots," Tantawi said.
"Two systems have developed since colonization and independence, completely separate from one another: the formal French school and the informal Qurâanic schools," Khalil Enahaoui, regional coordinator for the IBD program, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported on Saturday, July 16. "Our goal is to bring these two together by emphasizing bilingual, Franco-Arabic teaching."
