June 30, 2010
A little consistency, please
Kate Macmillan calls for a little consistency.
Just not too much consistency.
I'm disappointed in you. When it's middle class men educated in Pakistani madrassas near a high security zone, you're all in for profiling.
But when it's middle class men educated in Canadian universities near a high security zone, the rules become different.
A little consistency, please.
I couldn't agree more. When 19 guys who looks like Mike Brock retask commercial airliners as cruise missiles, I say we profile them. Especially when Canada's police services start profiling guys who have, in point of fact, already retasked commercial airliners as cruise missiles.
A little consistency, Kate.
The "Anti-Capitalist" Left
In one image.
From the comments.
Unrepentant and happy
Another sharia court takes a beating from authentic feminists. If Western feminists had any balls, they would be out there beating sharia supporters in Canada.
Their grouse, the maulvis — Maulana Moosa Rizvi, Maulana Asghar and Maulana Sadiq — were bribed by their husbands for issuing a one-sided divorce decree. "Beating up these guys was such a relief I just can’t tell (...dil ko kitna sukoon mila hai in logon ko peet kar... bataa nahin sakti hoon)," Nishat told [Times of India].
Now curious if the usual pussies in the Canadian male leftosphere will take me to task for advocating violence.
Dutch oil spill response ships could suck 99% of oil from the Gulf
But can't get approved, because the Environmental Protection Agency demands 99.9985% purity.
Details at the link.
Pamela Gorman for U.S. Congress
Via Hot Air.
For example, on energy.
June 29, 2010
What?
Police admit no five-metre rule existed on the security fence law.
F*cking excuse me?
Civil libertarians were fuming after hearing Friday that the Ontario cabinet gave police the power to stop and search anyone coming within five metres of the G20 fences in Toronto for a one week period.
However, the Ministry of Community Safety says all the cabinet did was update the law that governs entry to such things as court houses to include specific areas inside the G20 fences — not outside.
A ministry spokeswoman says the change was about property, not police powers, and did not include any mention of a zone five metres outside the G20 security perimeter.
When asked Tuesday if there actually was a five-metre rule given the ministry's clarification, Chief Bill Blair smiled and said, “No, but I was trying to keep the criminals out.
That's it. I quit Canada.
A point of clarification: I defended the use of the 1939 Public Works Protection Act. Since it turns out Toronto's Chief of Police can enforce imaginary applications of the statute, I needn't have bothered. That makes me the asshole (with my apologies for the [now Bowdlerized] vulgarity, I am at my wit's end).
Round up ready: The Black Bloc recruitment line starts here.
Blazing Cat Fur: "Chief Bill Blair A Lying Asshole". Arnie's comments thread is going to get lively.
Five Feet of Fury: "Congratulations to Toronto's top cop, for guaranteeing that the next event of this kind in the city gets 10x the protesters -- made up of newly radicalized, cynical and pissed off citizens."
New moon July 12th
Not terribly surprising if you think about it. Who else could protect Iran's nuclear sites from the Israeli air force? I joke, I joke.
It is more likely this is the result of a normal change-over between carrier groups than preparation for military action. Though I admit the possibility President Kick Ass has decided it is time to appease the American public for a change. If so, mark your calendars for the first of Sha'ban 1431.
Rorschach wept
The President's signature is reminiscent of something.
June 28, 2010
June 27, 2010
The police are beating journalists
Real journalists. With ID.
Flea readers from hither and yon may not have heard of Steve Paikin. He is the real deal. If he says it happened, it happened.
As he was being taken away, Mr. Paikin said he saw another journalist, Jesse Rosenfeld, a contributor to the Guardian website, showing his identification to two police officers. At that point, according to Mr. Paikin, each of them took one of Mr. Rosenfeld’s arm as a third police officer, wearing a t-shirt and shorts, punched the reporter in the stomach. After Mr. Rosenfeld fell to the ground, the third officer jabbed an elbow into his back. Mr. Paikin said."
Mr. Harper. Please stop this now.
Update June 28: I am not certain when I will be posting today. Suffice to say there is a conversation going on about this incident and the underlying principles involved. The police have a difficult - frankly, thankless - job to do but what Paikin describes is unacceptable. Some of the most conservative voices in the country are very concerned today.
Five Feet of Fury
Toronto police have made their first big mistake of the weekend.
They tried to intimidate Kathy Shaidle.*
Famous last words: "Guys I'm going to be on a website".
* Arnie also strikes me as a formidable man. But let's face facts. The female of the species is more deadlier than the male.
The new normal
Scenes from the incident and the aftermath.
The police would like a word: G20 Black Bloc vandals - Have info? Call Police 416-808-2222 or Anon @18002228477
Some people have jobs: "We had to evacuate our store. So we're just leaving and it's pretty f-ed up."
Warning, jaywalking features.
And now your moment of zen: A physics lesson.
Update: The Toronto Sun is keeping an updated G20 timeline for Sunday, June 27. I am curious about the mass arrest of 70 people from a University of Toronto student union building at 10am.
The lastest as I update this post: "12:03 p.m. — Second round of clashes between cops and activists underway. Several journalists roughed up. Cops batons drawn and were rushing protesters. Bikes on the road."
Update: Square Mile Wife links to CTV footage of the mob on Yonge Street. A number of Mannequin-Canadians are injured.
We may usefullly generalize from this observation.
Enemy maneuvres
John Thompson didn’t think the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty would sink so low as to try to disrupt the passage of Canadian war dead.
They did.
The Anarchists and Trots lunged out of Allen Gardens up on Carleton and made a fast march towards Yonge Street, getting as far as College and Yonge with baseball bats and the occasional slingshot firing ball bearings (I overheard a police radio talking about molotov cocktails, too). In short, they got within about 150 metres of the Coroner’s Office just as the motorcade was arriving. The timing was not accidental.
Thompson makes his case at the link.
Jonathan Quayle Higgins III: I Love Riots
Quite possibly the best band name ever.
Anarchists burning police cars and looking for a fight
Intestinal blockage passes for irony: "This is what democracy looks like! That is what a police state looks like!"
PintoPonyProductions reports - They are actually attacking people who are taking pictures: "Camera is not expression. It is part of the spectacle."
These Guy Debord references make for a better class of riot.
Torontopia reports - Toronto G20 - Yonge Street trashed: "Yonge Street was trashed by anarchists during the big G20 protest march. I didn't see any looting, just smashed windows."
This is a masterpiece of détourné flânerie (oops, had Debord on the brain). The running commentary on the specific targets of this Afternoon of Broken Glass is particularly cogent.
Toronto mounted police: "Thank you for your cooperation!"
I have a love/hate relationship with Canadian etiquette. I mean, there is a time and a place.
Note the peace-rioters broke a window at Remington's, a gay bar on Yonge Street. Normally this sort of thing would be described as a "hate crime". But then the Left is untroubled by consistency of conscience.
That said: "Bell was trashed. Can't say I feel too bad." Testify, brother.
Sacrilege: They trashed Tim Horton's at College and Yonge (end of the above video).
Citizen journalism continues: "The thing is obviously the police were not around here. The police were down by the business district protecting the leaders of the G20 and not the retail on Yonge Street. Some people took advantage of that to trash downtown Toronto."
And then: Jay Currie has pics from the G20 protest.
So these would be your working class anarchists eh?
And via Jay, Mark Steyn.
Finally, via Mark, Kate McMillan.
June 26, 2010
Your rights, should you choose to neglect them
There is a minor to do in Canada over the status of a security fence separating G20 participants from lumpen Toronto, particularly in light of a regulatory change affording police broader latitude to stop and identify anyone approaching the barrier (within 5m of the barrier, to be precise).
Take vaguely right of centre Canadian blogger Jay Currie, writing:
Hark at the peevish voice of outraged moderation.*
A minor problem. The Charter of Rights has not been suspended. The security fence has been designated a public work under the 1939 Public Works Protection Act and, much like, say, the perimeter fence of a hydro-electric facility, is subject to more stringent policing. No law has been changed or enacted. This is a regulatory change made by the Ontario Cabinet following a request by Toronto's chief of police for clarification of police powers and responsibilities during the G20 summit. This seems entirely reasonable to me.
It is entirely reasonable for the police to have the authority to protect the summit security perimeter and entirely reasonable for the Ontario government to provide that authority under existing law.
What is not reasonable is to assume Canadians have any rights to speak of, Charter or no Charter. Provided it can maintain the confidence of Parliament, the government of the day can do precisely what it likes. This is Canada, not the United States. The Charter of Rights has not been suspended. The Charter of Rights is valueless.
* Hey, when was the last time I slagged Jay's opinions? I am gunning for a sidebar quote here.
Syllogism
Major premise: The internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II was brutal, manifestly unjust and racist.
Minor premise: Japanese-Americans have not engaged in any siginificant terrorist activity against the United States since the War.
Conclusion: Even when treated with brutal injustice and racism, loyal American citizens are not provoked into terrorist acts.
Corollary: People who claim terrorists are driven to violent action by injustice are wrong. People who claim their acts of terror were forced by injustice (real, imagined or contrived) are liars.
An alternative hypothesis: Somewhere between internment, two atomic bombs and the United States Marine Corps, the Japanese got the message.
The realignment of the spheres
Japan is set to negotiate a nuclear energy deal with India.
Sadly, related: The Chinese are desperate to live abroad, just not in England if possible.
Hanzel und Gretyl: Scheissmessiah
Hat tip to Barbarian Steve.
June 25, 2010
People who have jobs and have showered today
Our moral superiors
A Spanish "green energy" company answers criticism by mailing an unassembled bomb.
Says Calzada: "Before opening it, I called [Thermotechnic] to know what was inside … they answered, it was their answer to my energy pieces."
Dr. Calzada contacted a terrorism expert to handle the package. The expert first performed a scan of the package, then opened it in front of a journalist, Dr. Calzada, and a private security expert.
The terrorism consultant said he had seen this before: "This time you receive unconnected pieces. Next time it can explode in your hands."
Update June 27 2010: It turns out the package did not contain a disassembled bomb. Only something that looked very much like a bomb to an X-ray.
Free IQ test
Crack Shack or Mansion?
Can you tell the difference between a crack shack and a Vancouver, BC mansion listed for one or two million dollars? Find out!
Japanese Relocation (1942)
Because the subject came up again, the view of the American government at the time. Healthful nourishing food for all!
Background: A review of Michelle Malkin's In Defense Of Internment.
While I am going overboard for history: My Japan (1945).
June 24, 2010
A thought experiment
Remember how everyone was really embarrassed about interment? After all "They weren't enemies. They were us"* (via Binky).
Imagine for a moment, if there really were a huge group of people living in your country, and I mean millions, who were from a country your country was at war with.
And what if these people really hated your country and everything it stood for and was about, even though they were living in it and enjoying its protections and a great deal of financial support. Who worked night and day to destroy it. Who protested every time your country won a victory over their place of origin. Who advocated and sometimes committed horrible acts of violence against your people.
The rest of this conjecture at the link.
* Such is conventional wisdom. But then the closest we will ever come to knowing how things might have gone differently is the live social experiment we have chosen to live with now.
June 23, 2010
Methane explosion/tsunami mega-disaster
Time to reconsider Florida real estate (via Gates of Vienna).
The counter-revolution has begun
In Doncaster. I won't spoil the details for you.
The rest of The Telegraph's Mayor Peter Davies update at the link.
Dave Henson: At Least We're Not As Bad As France
Hat tip to the Sister of the Flea.
Meanwhile, in North Korea: Kim Jong-il blamed for North Korea's foolish World Cup tactics.
June 22, 2010
We keep warning you and you won't listen
Up to 300 volatile young men from an East London Mosque reportedly attacked police and (white) members of the public on the Whitechapel high street this Sunday afternoon (hat tip to Square Mile Wife).
Not to worry. It didn't happen, was an act of desperation and we deserved it anyway. Just giving you the heads up on lamestream media reporting of the incident; assuming, of course, it doesn't just vanish down the memory hole.
But it did happen and it will happen again. The longer Her Majesty's government allows riot and disorder to rule the street the more likely a second English civil war.
Also: A report on the day from EDL Whitechapel. Some time ago I made a proposal to explore counter-insurgency operations in London. To my knowledge, it was ignored.
Never again, they lied
On the one hand: Mark Steyn writes from Tangiers, once home to a Jewish community hundreds of thousands strong.
Point any of this out to the Left and it triggers apoplectic rage. Satan has them.
On the other hand: Shelby Steele on the consolations of hatred.
And the quickest cover for inferiority is hatred. The problem is not me; it is them. And in my victimization I enjoy a moral and human grandiosity—no matter how smart and modern my enemy is, I have the innocence that defines victims. I may be poor but my hands are clean. Even my backwardness and poverty only reflect a moral superiority, while my enemy's wealth proves his inhumanity.
In other words, my hatred is my self-esteem.
What will they cut off next?
Iran keeps abreast of its commitment to feminism.
You could write a parody where Western feminists march in the streets to defend Iran's government. But you would have to call it "Reality".
The pregnant pope
Peter Stanford: "Mystery of the pregnant pope: new film reopens one of the Vatican's most enduring wounds."
Ahem.
For a Church that still treats women as second-class citizens, it is a source of considerable embarrassment and will once again raise the question of whether Pope Joan, as she is called in medieval chronicles, really did exist.
My comment, seeing as The Daily Mail chose not to publish it.
I can think of at least one religion that really does treat women as second-class citizens. It appears in your paper all the time but you Daily Mail cowards will never describe it as such. Much easier to publish cheap anti-Catholic bigotry secure in the knowledge the Pope will not order your heads hacked off on YouTube.
I can only assume The Daily Mail comments editor agrees with me.
Update: Oh, so now they publish it. Let's see how my memory matches up to what I wrote the first time.
I can think of at least one religion regularly mentioned in this paper which really does treat women as second-class citizens. Not that you Daily Mail cowards will tell the truth about it. Much easier to make cheap, bigoted anti-Catholic remarks knowing the Pope will not order your heads chopped off.
Kylie Minogue: All the Lovers
Hat tip to Jeff.
Related: "Kylie Minogue gives the French a suitably raunchy performance in a daring slashed-to-the-hip dress." Images and video at the link.
June 21, 2010
June 19, 2010
The queen of denial
Not everyone is happy Angelina Jolie may play Cleopatra.
Because they are racist.
'Honestly, I don't care how full Angelina Jolie's lips are, how many African children she adopts, or how bronzed her skin will become for the film, I firmly believe this role should have gone to a black woman.'
Small problem. Cleopatra VII Philopator was Greek. Well, Macedonian. After almost three centuries of Ptolemaic rule in Egypt, she was the first of her line to bother to learn Egyptian.
Which is all by the by as the Egyptians were not "black" and, with one dynastic exception, neither were their pharaohs.
The bust (above) is a likeness of Cleopatra carved in her own lifetime. Compare that profile to her likeness on her coinage and I believe you will agree it is probably accurate. She wasn't Angelina Jolie - or Elizabeth Taylor, for that matter - but she was "white".
Family values
Christopher Hitchens: A very silly man gives a very sinister speech.
...
We have known for a long time that Prince Charles' empty sails are so rigged as to be swelled by any passing waft or breeze of crankiness and cant. He fell for the fake anthropologist Laurens van der Post. He was bowled over by the charms of homeopathic medicine. He has been believably reported as saying that plants do better if you talk to them in a soothing and encouraging way. But this latest departure promotes him from an advocate of harmless nonsense to positively sinister nonsense.
We don't need another Thatcher. We need another Bloody Mary.
Spiderbait: Black Betty
I have decided to name my astral battle zeppelin Black Betty.
June 18, 2010
We do not cherry-pick our consciences
John, who wore blue-tinted sunglasses, told the audience those cancellations "ain't gonna stop me from playing here, baby."
Recent cancellations by the Pixies and Elvis Costello, who cited Israeli government policies, have added to Israel's growing sense of isolation. John swiped at those artists, saying, "We do not cherry-pick our consciences," before hitting the opening chords of his 1972 hit "Crocodile Rock."
Ladies and gentlemen, the incomparable Elton John.
Dystopianism triumphant
The Left intends to destroy all social bonds that might provide a refuge from a total relationship between an individuated person and an all encompassing State. First the church and the family, now friendship must be destroyed for the Left to win.
"If I have ever seen pure evil, it is this."
Via Blazing Cat Fur.
E pluribus bellum
I do not read The Economist anymore but I think Charlemagne's observation is worth filing away for future rhetorical ends. By some measures, Europe is more diverse than America.
From which a reasonable person might conclude a currency union was not going to work, let alone the political union for which a currency union was the fig leaf. Old Europe might have been worse but it is now becoming obvious that worse was better.
For the love of God, remember Weimar
Shelomo Alfassa asks Michael Bloomberg a question. The context makes for a depressing glimpse into the thinking of the progressive establishment among American Jews.
Marx would have described it as a farce.
Bloomberg's response at the link.
Maxim Hometown Hotties: Hotties shooting guns
I am not going to insult your intelligence with some half assed excuse for posting this. I am just going to go ahead and press "publish".
Abney Park: Herr Drosselmeyer's Doll
For cheering up Germans today somehow.
June 17, 2010
The Axis of Awesome: 4 Chords
Hat tip to the Sister of the Flea.
Green fuels
Jonah Goldberg argues for the green fuels of the future: oil and coal.
While we are on the subject: Europeans, our moral and intellectual superiors.
Justin Taffinder of New Orleans was not amused.
"We're not small people. We're human beings. They're no greater than us. We don't bow down to them. We don't pray to them," Taffinder said.
Semantics update: BP Chair apologizes, he meant “little people“.
Over at the Village Voice, Jen Doll cleared it up for Svanberg: “Oh BP, when will you learn? It’s not small people, it’s Little People! Jeez.”
Caddyshack - Chevy Chase shares his wisdom
For anyone considering college.
June 16, 2010
Surrender is victory
The Most Effective Zombie Survival Plan: Become one.
My Zombie Survival Plan is just as simple: become undead.
Long time Flea readers will understand the metaphor. Expect more along these lines in the twilight of the West.
Stephen Harper for Israel, against the NDP
"I have never in my life been so proud to be Canadian as I was the moment I watched this clip."
June 15, 2010
Tallest Mountain to Deepest Ocean Trench
A handy infographic by way of visually grasping something of what is at play with the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Also, the relative height of Toronto's CN Tower.
Also: While I am banging on about literacy, I should point out I demand the return of Latin to the curriculum.
Pedagogically related: From the overnight open thread at Ace of Spades HQ:
Gradually and suddenly
Christopher Caldwell considers the incroyable possibility the French may cut welfare. He begins with an anecdote.
M. Soubie and his colleagues asked the relevant ministers and business leaders which particular reform projects had lit the powder keg. To their great surprise, they discovered that no such projects existed. All it had taken was a phrase, a passing mention in a speech by M. Juppé about reforming the health service, to unleash one of the most spectacular clashes of the last 30 years.
This is why France’s welfare state has always been as unreformable as it is unsustainable.
The next big thing
Reform being the enemy of revolution, radical leftists plan to use the banking crisis to their own ends. They may have belatedly noticed their Messiah has thus far been better at inspiring Tea Parties, the real blue-collar grass-roots of America. Time to organize some spontaneous resistance!
Booth is an old hand at leftist astro-turfing operations. She's a disciple of Saul Alinsky and she founded the Midwest Academy, a training institute for radical community organizers. "Alinsky is to community organizing as Freud is to psychoanalysis," she has been quoted saying.
Too bad for this lot. The revolutionaries are already on the streets. They call themselves a Tea Party.
Gather Your Armies
Hot Air: Alabama campaign ad of the day. Observations at the link.
"Now look at us."
Directly related: Via Kathy.
June 14, 2010
The war on malaise
J.E. Dyer writes on Jimmy Carter and American malaise thirty years later. The following passage which struck me in particular. The comparison between pacifism and nihilism is obvious once it is pointed out.
Neuromancer at long last
(Canadian) Vincenzo Natali is set to direct a film adaptation of (Canadian) William Gibson's Neuromancer.
Spoilers aside, I am happy to explain the ending of the novel to anyone who still doesn't get it. No Geddy Lee required, promise.
Related: No word if Sasha Grey is to reprise her role as Molly Millions.
June 12, 2010
A glimpse into the heart of the totalitarian impulse
Israel, Nipissing, Mike Harris; it’s all the same to vengeful leftwingers: Barbara Kay.
This is Canada.
Via Blazing Cat Fur.
Video of PAK FA T-50 fighter jet 2nd test flight
Toys for Boys Related: The Ducati Desmosedici RR.
June 11, 2010
Where credit is due
Kudos to France as it leads Europe with a ban on Hamas TV. That said, we should not need hate laws to tell us not to broadcast enemy propaganda in time of war. Yet another small victory wrapped in evidence of decline.
Al-Aksa TV has produced a children’s show with a warlike Mickey Mouse character urging children to wage holy war against the US and Israel. In March, the US Treasury Department designated Al-Aksa a “global terrorist entity.”
Details at the link.
Related: Hungarian lawmakers have passed a bill equating Communist era crimes to the Holocaust and banned denying it under threat of imprisonment.
I confess some satisfaction at the thought of bringing charges against a variety of academics and apparatchiks under this legislation. Starting with human rights commissars.
Now off to find out if Hungarians claim international standing for the law and, if so, whether they will accept whole mailing lists of denialists. I am thinking there are whole sections of the American Anthropological Association that need to stand trial.
George W. Bush's 2010 Inaugural Address on Facebook
For everyone who has forgotten what a feminist looks like.
Lady Gaga: Alejandro
As a completist, I feel obligated despite poor reviews. I am watching it as I type these words but I gather it is a bit try-hard. I don't know. I like it so far with the snow and the snappy uniforms, etc (definitely nsfw; hat tip to Jeff for keeping me in the loop).
Update: Five minutes in and we are doing the "controversial" religious imagery. Not holding my breath for a burqa. But we get this is an homage to Madonna, right?
June 10, 2010
Sowing the wind
British troops risk being infected with HIV as Taliban fighters are hiding contaminated needles with their bombs.
Ace:
It has come to the attention of the Jewish Defence League of Canada
Toronto: JDL protest to confront Lies, Hate & Proxies of Hamas
It has come to the attention of the Jewish Defence League of Canada that HAMAS supporters will hold a HateFest against Israel at OISE, Thursday June 10 at 7:00 pm. The information below came from a pro HAMAS web site. The JDL is asking all lovers of freedom to join us in our protest against lies, hate and proxies of HAMAS. Join us as we wave Israeli and Canadian flags.
For more information:
Call us at 416-736-7000 or go online www.jdl-canada.com
Thursday June 10, 2010
7:00 pm
Steelworkers Hall
24 Cecil Street
(Hat tip to Blazing Cat Fur for the formatting)
Carl Douglas: Kung Fu Fighting
Because the rest of the news is a bit depressing.
June 09, 2010
Shin-Qof-Tzadei
Now the Canadian Jewish Congress has decided sticks and stones may break our bones but names will never hurt us, I figure this List of ethnic slurs should come in handy.
Because Canadians should all be able to communicate sympathetically with all their new neighbours. For example, blondes.
a pejorative term, mostly in North America, for a non-Jewish woman. Derived from the Hebrew root Shin-Qof-Tzadei, meaning loathsome or abomination. Most commonly used to refer to a non-Jewish woman who is dating or married to a Jewish man.
With this in hand, I can focus on my own human rights advocacy for people with British accents in the orginal Star Wars franchise.
Now to repost the following.
Na cui, Na cui
“I don’t think the Chinese even know what they shouting,” Schmitz told the paper.
Good thing too. In Canada they could end up in front of a human rights tribunal.
...
The skirmishes reportedly began on one of the first days of the expo, which runs from May 1 to October 31. On that day a long line of people, including some in wheelchairs, became enraged with delays and began tearing flowers out of the ground and throwing them at the pavilion.
Some shouted "na cui, na cui," which the paper said was Chinese for “Nazi, Nazi,” Schmitz confirmed.
Also: Stereotypes are bad, m'kay?!
The New Media breeds gladiators
I found Mark Steyn's piece on reaction to the abrupt retirement of Helen Thomas upsetting to read. So you should probably read it too if you haven't.
The entire Western world should be ashamed.
But read Doctor Zero on the same subject. We have things to be proud of as well.
There was no oil company more politically correct, or more politically connected than BP
The board should be shot for the "Beyond Petroleum" thing if nothing else.
It's not graft when Democrats do it at the link.
Yves Klein: Blue Women Art (1962)
As I lay stretched upon the beach of Nice, I began to feel hatred for birds which flew back and forth across my blue sky, cloudless sky, because they tried to bore holes in my greatest and most beautiful work.
- Yves Klein
Also: International Klein Blue (IKB).
June 08, 2010
Life among the ruins getting you down?
Some fantastic signs at a Russian anti-anti-Israel demo.
Update: These were not shopped, btw. Nationalist Russian Israelis mock Leftist rally in Tel Aviv.
Spread love everywhere you go
Pending a reliable Iron Dome or some such, I could not agree more with Jay Currie's suggestion (please, not a solution) for the Gaza problem: Complete disengagement from Hamas. Let the Egyptians handle their border crossing as they will and let disproportionate force be the response to any aggression from the Gaza strip.
If you want to see real poverty, real squalor, just let Gaza fend for itself under Hamas.
Frankly, I cannot see why Israel has hung on so long. As to the rockets and such like from Hamas; a good thick wall, missile interceptors and a policy of ten random howitzer shells for every rocket launched with the option of air strikes would surely school the Palis faster than the “blockade”.
The key to this scenario is, of course, out of the question. With the possible exception of Red China, there isn't a government on earth prepared to defend its sovereignty with such clear sighted realism. Check Jay's comments for Kateland's all too plausible interpretation of a more likely outcome of Israeli disengagement.
More worrying still: Jay Nordlinger. Follow the link if you have ever taken the Montrealer.
Janissaries
Daniel Greenfield makes a blunt observation: Every major war the United States has fought since Vietnam has been a proxy war for Muslims.
It is only common sense to say that people who act like slaves, are slaves.
The analogy is far from perfect. If the West provides Jannissary slave warriors for the sheiks then we should expect to take over their figurative-Ottoman Empire presently. Hardly the worst case scenario.
Jannissaries of the world unite; you have nothing to lose (they already cut of your nuts)!
The root of the problem
If we could mandate Economics 101 for every college or university qualification, we could go a long way toward addressing the problems of civilization (via Hot Air).
Follow the link for the gory details. Seriously, these people should be disenfranchised.
Can't change mind, won't change subject
If people are prepared to pay $175 dollars for a telephone course telling them the world is ending and they need to form armed bands of weirdos, they could save at least a hundred bucks - and the dangerous energy costs of a telephone call - by reading the Flea every day.
Anyone with a Peak Oil fanatic in their life has grappled with the etiquette of the Facebook unfriend button. I am certain for many the whole topic can be a drag. For me it is just one apocalyptic scenario among many and far from the bleakest.
Pro tip: Peak Oil friends are a simple way of adding to your Zombie Survival Plan without tipping your hand.
She added, “I was ready to move out to the country and be an organic farmer, but I learned that’s not the way to do it. You need a community.”
Whereas for the low, low price of $75 dollars, Mrs. Wilkerson, I can hook you up with a global network community of armed collapsitarians. It isn't all about the oil for us, Mrs. Wilkerson, but you will be able to say as much about peak oil or whatever you want and nobody will be able to stop you from hitting the "publish" button.
My tip jar button is in the sidebar. Resist the monoculture!
Politics is a serious business, one must not lower the tone unduly
Margaret Thatcher: "This is an ex-parrot!"
Via AoSHQ.
June 07, 2010
Al Reuters again
Vlad Tepes catches out Reuters once again manipulating the news it is supposed to report.
Please go look and forward the link everywhere.
While the truth is putting on its shoes: An alternative to after the fact truth telling.
Fund a Turkish-language documentary on the Armenian genocide, upload it to YouTube
Update: Yid With Lid has more examples of Reuters fauxtography and the Gaza Flotilla.
One quibble: Not terrorism, jihad.
Violent potential and instrumental physicality
Joel Kotkin argues white, working-class of England offers a potential warning to the United States regarding the future of white, blue-collar America (via A&L Daily).
London, notes the LSE's Tony Travers, is becoming "a First World core surrounded by what seems to be going from a second to a Third World population." This bifurcation appears to be a reversion back to the class conflicts that initially drove so many to traditionally more mobile societies, such as the U.S., Australia and Canada.
Except this time, we have run out of new worlds we can escape to.
Consider if you will the Left's technical term for young men with violent potential and instrumental physicality: Revolutionary army. I expect for the "Labour" party none of this was intentional. It was just bread and circuses for the mob and the wholesale importation of voting blocs with the next election as the only horizon.
But for the community organizers on the Left it could very well be a revolutionary army was the whole idea all along. If so, I do not believe it is not going to work out the way they planned.
Closely related: The children of middle class intellectuals also stage revolutions. Not to worry though. Back in the day this would have meant engineers and such, people capable of assessing the world as it is and responding accordingly, people capable of organizing themselves and others (if only to smuggle box-cutters onto the plane).
Try imagining a revolution run by cultural studies students and despair.
But bubbles burst when people catch on, and there's some evidence that people are beginning to catch on.
Tea Party member stuns crowd
June 06, 2010
Someone is going to take the hit
Having learned the lesson of its ally North Korea, the junta in Burma is said to be developing atomic weapons.
The Myanmar generals' atomic quest appears to have been inspired by ally North Korea, which can now attack its southern neighbor and flout international law, as its nuclear deterrent keeps it safe from retaliation.
Nuclear armed America and England suffer mass casualty attacks sponsored as acts of religious war by the Arabs and we do next to nothing to "Saudi" Arabia. The Arabs certainly never thought twice that Mecca and Medina would be destroyed on September 12, 2001; they were handing out candies in the street. Iran took British sailors hostage and our atomic weapons provided no deterrent whatsoever. It is a list going back to Carter with Iran and yet America's nuclear deterrent has never entered into Persian calculations. South Korea could have the bomb and I doubt it would trouble the sleep of a single North Korean general.
Because everyone knows we all too civilized peoples won't use them.
By contrast, hand the North Koreans or any number of other crazies the bomb and it is all the excuse the Left ever needed to get on its knees.
We have demonstrated we are not prepared to do what it takes to stop our enemies from acquiring nuclear weapons. At some point, somebody is going to have to take the hit. The only question is whether it is to be their cities or our cities (though, increasingly, this too is becoming a distinction without a difference).
No
Charles Moore almost gets it.
Things could have been so different if Israel had set the stage.
But... no. To a specific sort of mind, the Crucifixion is all the "justification" one needs to hate Israel and the Jews. As to the English, we are still apologizing to a Celtic fringe for having turned up (invited, I might add) to protect them from Picts and all sorts. One and a half thousand years ago.
It isn't the "narrative"; it is our hearts and, ultimately, our lives. If we cannot harden our hearts against the things we need to do to defend ourselves, we are going to lose so much more than the plot. No enquiry, no reason, no accounting of the facts, will change the minds of anyone who was paying attention to the story before it unfolded. They had all already long made up their minds.
To argue the kiillings were unintended by the Israelis is more foolish than futile. The Turks and the Arabs and their Christian slaves know the deaths were no accident. They staged this. These deaths were by their design. These deaths were no accident, they were intended.
Update: Get thee to The Jawa Report. The images are worth a thousand words about Muslim brotherly love.
And while we are on the subject: We need to do something about CTV News. They are worse than the CBC.
Suddenly we like ourselves more
Ethan Perlson says even Israel's leftists are wrapping themselves in the flag. This is one of the few genuinely heartening pieces of news I have heard in some time.
At the protest there were “straights, gays, Russians, Ethiopians, and even French tourists,” said Gene Epshteyn, 35. “Ninety-nine percent of the people there were secular. This was not a right-wing rally. It was average everyday Israelis who’ve had enough.”
June 05, 2010
Athenians and Visigoths
The late Neil Postman wrote a commencement address should the opportunity to give one arise. It never did.
The address survives, however, as Postman's open source gift to posterity should you ever need to deliver a commencement address yourself.
Now, the point I want to make is that the Athenians and the Visigoths still survive, and they do so through us and the ways in which we conduct our lives. All around us—in this hall, in this community, in our city—there are people whose way of looking at the world reflects the way of the Athenians, and there are people whose way is the way of the Visigoths. I do not mean, of course, that our modern-day Athenians roam abstractedly through the streets reciting poetry and philosophy, or that the modern-day Visigoths are killers. I mean that to be an Athenian or a Visigoth is to organize your life around a set of values. An Athenian is an idea. And a Visigoth is an idea.
It is a thing of beauty, the rest at the link. Not that I blame the Visigoths for the Dark Ages, mind you (via Steynite 412).
Dear University Alumni Office
Posted to Seattle Craigslist. There may be an opportunity here.
If we can convince a generation their Leftist educators have lied to them, stolen their history and left them with no practical or philosophical preparation for the working world - let alone their citizenship - then a generation's "march through the institutions" could be reversed at a stroke. All we have to do is convince this new generation of the truth. And if they don't believe us now, their search for work upon graduation should go some way toward making our argument.
Take this opportunity and the reality of budgetary constraints and we could finish the job. Close every "studies" department and - tenure or no tenure - everyone involved can be left to fend for themselves in the private sector.
I'm sorry to hear that the university's $750 million endowment has fallen in value to $500 million because of the recession and because your bank died. I'm also sorry to hear that you're dealing with declining enrollment due to the fact that middle-class families are no longer willing or able to bet their homes on a $45,000-a-year higher education for their children. I really am.
So, what I want to know is, why are you wasting money on glossy fundraising brochures full of meaningless synonyms for the word "Excellence"? And, why are you sending them to ME? Yes, I know that I got a master's degree at your fine institution, but that master's degree hasn't done jack shit for me since I got it! I have been unemployed for the past TWO YEARS and I am now a professional resume-submitter, sending out dozens of resumes a month to employers, and the degree I received in your hallowed halls is at the TOP OF IT and it doesn't do a fucking thing.
You know, maybe if you wanted a little bit of money from me (and these days you'd get about $3) maybe you should send me a fancy color brochure admitting your role in the bubble economics that got us all in to this mess.
For example, since 1987, higher education expenses have gone up 450 percent, while personal income in this country has gone up 87 percent, making tuition IMPOSSIBLE to afford without special financing. But, during this time, you were thriving because people could come up with the cash in two ways:
1. Get a home equity loan and use the inflated value of their house to pay for their kid to get drunk and/or raped at your school and then lose the house when the market crashed.
2. Get a federal loan.
HAD IT OCCURRED TO YOU THAT NEITHER OF THESE SOURCES OF MONEY ACTUALLY EXIST? THAT IT WAS BEING MANUFACTURED BECAUSE YOU MADE PEOPLE THINK THAT ONE OF YOUR DEGREES WAS NECESSARY TO CLIMB TO THE TOP OF THE BUBBLE?
Oh yes, federal loans. I've got $40,000 of those, which are in "forebearance" right now because I'm unemployed, meaning that the feds are paying the interest for a while, which is convenient for me, but not for our government which is now owned by China. You know, the idea behind federal loans was that it would allow more students to attend your university, not let you INFLATE your tuition to obscene levels! I mean, what the fuck were you spending the $16,000 per semester on, anyway? I was in a public policy program, so that meant we got to sit in classrooms and listen to Professor God up at the front of the lecture hall glorify Himself and Creation as He saw it and talk about how much smarter he was than anyone else and how much he'd learned at MIT and the RAND Corporation.
Really, that's about all you did for us -- gave us a lecture hall, gave us an arrogant bastard to listen to, and gave us a room full of computers we could use sometimes, and you gave us a degree that employers look at and say "This guy knows how to write reports. Amusing." And I will be paying for this privilege until I am 51 years old.
So I'm sorry that the economy's been rough on you. Maybe, if you wanted to save a little money, you could stop printing and sending brochures to my parents' house (oh yeah, that's where I live because I can't afford rent on ANYTHING). And, maybe I'll donate a little bit of money to you in 2030, when I get the loans for your imaginary education PAID OFF!
Note how the writer demands the university explain "what the fuck were you spending the $16,000 per semester on, anyway?" Note how the writer never paused to ask the same question before paying it.
Consider too the ambitions of this "public policy" student to direct the rest of our lives should the right government sinecure ever provide the chance.
We could retake civilization if we could spread the knowledge of Economics 101.
June 04, 2010
Mavi Marmara to Israeli Navy: "We're helping Arabs go against the US, don't forget 9/11 guys"
"Shut up, go back to Auschwitz!"
Remember: The Left believe they are the good guys. These are their friends.
In the early hours of the May 31st 2010, IDF soldiers boarded the ships of the "Free Gaza" Flotilla, after the ships refused to redirect their course. Aboard the Mavi Marmara, the soldiers encountered serious violence when, in a pre-planned attack, the activists on board attempted to lynch the soldiers with knives, metal rods and stole two of their guns. As a result 7 soldiers were injured and 9 demonstrators were killed.
For more information please go to: http://www.idfspokesperson.com
Update: Welcome Mark Steyn readers via NRO.
Now, the unedited radio transmission between the Gaza Flotilla and the Israeli Navy. Chilling.
In the early hours of the May 31st 2010, IDF soldiers boarded the ships of the "Free Gaza" Flotilla, after the ships refused to redirect their course. Aboard the Mavi Marmara, the soldiers encountered serious violence when, in a pre-planned attack, the activists on board attempted to lynch the soldiers with knives, metal rods and stole two of their guns. As a result 7 soldiers were injured and 9 demonstrators were killed.
For more information please go to: http://www.idfspokesperson.com.
See, this is why women aren't in charge of sports
Also, when women threaten violence in the presence of an opposing opinion it is "cute". Especially when they have been taught to offer violence, pouting and lip-quivering outrage instead of a reasoned argument to the contrary supported by evidence.
Do not agree to go quietly, into the ovens, or into the sea
David Warren makes a number of observations about the demonization of Israel, including the following passage.
Here he is expressing not so much my worst fears as my worst certainties.
It is amazing to me that there are still "liberals" like this, even within Israel. I have actually met people who live a few hundred metres from the front line with an enemy sworn to exterminate them; who think the "road to peace" can be paved with unilateral Israeli concessions. They embody my worst fears for the West at large: that even in the face of extinction, our own "progressive" types will continue to demand the appeasement of our mortal enemies.
Existentially related: The Canada-Israel Committee kindly forwarded a link to some "facts beyond the spin" suggesting the scope of Israel's aid to Gaza. For example:
The facts are both a testament both to the misinformation underlying most public discussion of recent events and to the extraordinary generosity of Israel.
But to my mind these facts are primarily a testament to doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Mazel tov
"Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak today visited the military base of Atlit (Haifa) to congratulate the members of the navy commando that carried out the raid on the Turkish ship carrying pro-Palestinian activists."
It is true here too. It is just that between us and harm lie two great oceans and the United States Marine Corps.
June 03, 2010
The narrative
Raymond Pritchett (Galrahn) anticipates the narrative of the second flotilla.
The battlefield off the coast of Israel is in the information space, not the Mediterranean Sea.
I think this is exactly right; the rest of the argument is at the link. I had not made the connection between this corsair propaganda and the USS Liberty, yet more evidence the Left is a sink-hole of wilful ignorance, anti-Semitism and conspiracy theory.
The third time's the charm: Flotilla passenger: "I want to be a shahid ('martyr')".
Evidence is nice. A flaming oil slick would have been more effective and less controversial.
Next time we'll use more force
Someone gets it.
"We boarded the ship and were attacked as if it was a war," the officer said. "That will mean that we will have to come prepared in the future as if it was a war."
June 02, 2010
The Netherlands exposes the hypocrisy the Turk
Watch this first. It predates the current fracas but remains entirely on point. Vlad Tepes:
Fancy restaurants and Olympic-size pools
Tom Gross: What the media won’t report about Gaza.
But the mainstream liberal international media won’t report on any of this. Playing the manipulative game of the BBC is easy: if we had their vast taxpayer funded resources, we too could produce reports about parts of London, Manchester and Glasgow and make it look as though there is a humanitarian catastrophe throughout the UK.
Well said, though in fairness there is a humanitarian catastrophe underway in the UK. It could take a reverse armada to sort the problem.
What if they held a war and nobody came
Turkey's ally Iran invades Iraq. Nobody cares.
June 01, 2010
Israeli Navy Soldier describes the violent mob aboard Mavi Marmara
This is all well and good but the sane people are already convinced and the Jew haters would not believe you if the Messiah himself swore on a stack of Bibles. Note too if you serve in the IDF you must conceal your identity for fear of your well-being and that of your family. But the pirates about the Mavi Marmara will be celebrated as heroes, rewarded with plaudits and tenure, instead of fearing for their lives before they hang from the yardarm.
As ye sow.
If not now, when?: Here's a thought, Israel: Start treating this as the war it is, not an exercise in who can feel good about himself.
Turkish war crimes
Vlad Tepes: "Please go to this site and look at a series of photos of a protest which puts a rather stunningly clear perspective on this mornings flotilla event. Remember, these boats where sent by Turkey as part of a propaganda campaign against Israel."
Free Kurdistan. Free Cyprus. Remember the Armenian Holocaust (it is particularly moving to witness Israelis mark the genocide of Armenians by this name).