OneUnited Bank Received Special Treatment Beyond What Was Disclosed
From the moment Boston-based OneUnited Bank began seeking a federal bailout in the summer of 2008, it received special treatment that went beyond what the Treasury Department or the bank and its political supporters have previously disclosed.
Congress adjusted the law and regulators broke with customary practices, despite an explicit internal warning that the bank was in financial trouble. Among other exceptions, the bank was allowed to count as part of its capital $12 million in federal bailout money — before the aid arrived.
OneUnited was the only bank to receive all of these considerations among the 707 recipients of money from the Troubled Assets Relief Program, according to documents and interviews.
A close look at how OneUnited — which is now at the center of an ethics investigation involving Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) — won bailout money shows how the Treasury Department, federal regulators and another influential lawmaker helped it despite its record of bad investments and extravagant spending.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Warning! U.S. Economy ‘Just Like Argentina’
Corsi suggests Dems working on Value Added Tax, nationalization of retirement dollars
MIAMI — The United States’ economy is “just like Argentina in its final days of thrashing around before the financial collapse,” according to New York Times best-selling author Jerome Corsi, a senior staff writer for WND and a speaker at this weekend’s “Taking America Back Conference” at the Doral Resort.
[…]
“This is not a recession,” he said. “This is NOT a recession. It’s not a depression. This is what globalism looks like. This is the result of decades of the Democrats and GOP alike pursuing another Marxist dream.
“The bureaucrats will make sure the government employees will make twice what you do. The government salaries now are twice private employees’,” he said. “But no government employee can be paid unless the money first is stolen from you.”
[…]
He said the Obama administration already knows the nation effectively is bankrupt, and after the November election likely will insist on a plan to force individuals to buy government debt through their retirement accounts, and the creation of a Value Added Tax, a government surcharge that is added at each level of a product’s manufacture and sale.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
City Plans to Bill Pastor for Security Around Planned Quran Burning
Orlando, Florida (CNN) — The city of Gainesville, Florida, plans to send a bill estimated at more than $180,000 to Pastor Terry Jones for security costs surrounding his controversial threat to burn Qurans on the anniversary of the September, 11, 2001, attacks, a police spokeswoman said Friday.
Police agencies spent more than a month working on security plans to ensure the community surrounding Jones’ Dove World Outreach Center — the planned site of the burning — was safe, according to Gainesville police spokeswoman Cpl. Tscharna Senn.
Jones also told authorities he received numerous death threats because of the planned protest, which he called off amid increasing pressure from world leaders.
The Gainesville Police Department said it spent more than $100,000 while the Alachua County Sheriff’s Office spent an estimated $80,000 during the weekend of the planned demonstration.
“We have 286 sworn officers and almost everyone was working either at the Dove Center or at other soft targets,” Senn said. “Unless you were sick or injured you were working” the day the burning was to take place.
Officers secured malls in the region, the University of Florida’s football stadium and areas around the church in the days leading up to the planned event.
Jones said Friday that the church was “not aware that we would be billed for security.”
“If we had known this in advance, then we would have refused to have security,” he said.
Some have accused authorities of over preparing.
“It’s easy to say we over prepared but if something horrible had happened we would have been criticized for being unprepared,” Senn said.
The planned burning prompted demonstrations by Muslims around the world this week, including Iran, Afghanistan, Somalia and India.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Michigan: $10,000 Reward in Koran Burning Case
The East Lansing Police Department is seeking the publics help to find who is responsible for burning and desecrating a Koran. The incident happened on September 11. It was found at the front door of the Islamic Center of East Lansing.
The department is offering $10,000 for any information that would lead to the identification and prosecution of those responsible for this act.
Those with information are asked to call Det. Sherief Fadly at 517-319-6814.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Texas Hammers EPA on Science of Global Warming
In legal briefs, attorney general says science is unreliable.
Essentially putting global warming science on trial, Texas officials on Thursday expanded their arguments in a lawsuit meant to prevent the federal regulation of greenhouse gases.
In motions submitted Thursday to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott accused the federal Environmental Protection Agency of relying on faulty science for its proposals to regulate greenhouse gases.
The briefs build on a federal suit filed in February by Texas and other states against the EPA, which in December issued an endangerment finding that carbon dioxide emissions threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Unions Find Members Slow to Rally Behind Democrats
The Democrats will depend on labor unions — the shock troops of their political campaigns — to offset two new developments this election cycle: Tea Party enthusiasm and corporations’ ability to spend unlimited amounts thanks to a Supreme Court ruling.
Labor leaders, alarmed at a possible Republican takeover of one or both houses of Congress, promise to devote a record amount of money and manpower to helping Democrats stave off disaster. But political analysts, and union leaders themselves, say that their efforts may not be enough because union members, like other important parts of the Democratic base, are not feeling particularly enthusiastic about the party — a reality that, in turn, further dampens the Democrats’ chances of holding onto their Congressional majorities.
[…]
A.F.L.-C.I.O. leaders say that they will spend around $50 million on races in 26 states and that unions already have 1,500 full-time campaign workers on the ground. The service employees have budgeted $44 million for the election, while other unions will spend tens of millions of dollars more. All told, labor strategists say their ground troops will make more than 10 million phone calls to members’ homes, distribute millions of fliers at workplaces and knock on millions of doors.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
16-Year-Old Alex Hayes Killed in Hit-and-Run — Samira Mohamed Daoud Charged With Drunk Driving, Possession of a Stolen Vehicle and Many More
Woman charged in one of three hit-and-runs in court Saturday
Three killed in separate accidents; 40-year-old suspect lost licence before for impaired driving
OTTAWA — After three separate hit-and-run accidents left three different people dead within 90 minutes of Ottawa overnight Thursday, two people have been arrested and charged with impaired driving — with one appearing in court Satuday — while police hunt for the third.
In Ottawa, a 40-year-old woman made an brief court appearance Saturday morning. She was in court after a teen riding a bicycle was struck and killed by a vehicle Thursday.
Samira Mohamed Daoud will next appear by video on Sept. 17.
Daoud was dressed in a blue top, had her hair in a bun, and appeared tired. Previous to Saturday’s court appearance, Daoud had already lost her licence for impaired driving.
The charges against Samira Mohamed Daoud include criminal negligence causing death, failing to stop at the scene of an accident, drunk driving and possession of a stolen vehicle.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Britain Goes Halal… But No-One Tells the Public: How Famous Institutions Serve Ritually Slaughtered Meat With No Warning
Some of Britain’s most revered institutions are serving up halal meat to diners — without their knowledge.
A Mail on Sunday investigation — which will alarm anyone concerned about animal cruelty — has revealed that schools, hospitals, pubs and famous sporting venues such as Ascot and Twickenham are controversially serving up meat slaughtered in accordance with strict Islamic law to unwitting members of the public.
All the beef, chicken and lamb sold to fans at Wembley has secretly been prepared in accordance with sharia law, while Cheltenham College, which boasts of its ‘strong Christian ethos’, is one of several top public schools which also serves halal chicken to pupils without informing them.
Even Britain’s biggest hotel and restaurant group Whitbread, which owns the Beefeater and Brewers Fayre chains, among many others, has admitted that more than three-quarters of its poultry is halal.
Animal welfare campaigners have long called for a ban on the traditional Islamic way of preparing meat — which involves killing animals by drawing a knife across their throats, without stunning them first — saying it is cruel and causes unnecessary pain.
But a spokesman for Twickenham, which sells only halal chicken despite not advertising the fact, insisted that the lack of transparency ‘had never been an issue’ and said: ‘Our consideration is more for those who want halal, to ensure they get it.’
The extent of halal meat consumption was revealed as the Pope, on his first visit to Britain, emphasised the need to preserve traditional Christian customs.
He indicated that long-held values were being eroded and that ordinary people and institutions should strive to protect them.
Animal rights group Viva!, whose supporters include Heather Mills, and Joanna Lumley, said in a statement: ‘Other practices which may be undertaken for religious reasons, such as polygamy or the stoning of adulterers, are not permitted in the UK.
‘Religious freedom does not override other moral considerations and the suffering caused by this form of slaughter is so severe that it cannot be allowed to prevent action be taken. Consumers can do their bit by boycotting places that persist in selling meat from unstunned animals.’
An RSPCA spokesman added: ‘The public have a right to know how their meat is produced. Many people are extremely concerned about animal welfare. What The Mail on Sunday has discovered shows that people are not being kept informed.
‘The key to a more humane death for these animals is that they are stunned before slaughter.’
However sharia law expressly forbids knocking the animal out with a bolt gun, as is usual in British slaughterhouses.
Instead, it must be sentient when its throat is cut, and the blood allowed to drip from the carcass while the slaughterman recites a religious phrase in praise of Allah.
Halal meat is being served across Britain, even in areas with a very small Muslim population.
Other institutions secretly serving up meat that is halal — or ‘permissible’ — include Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust and one of London’s biggest NHS Trusts, Guy’s and St Thomas’. A spokesman for the London hospitals admitted: ‘The only way people using the canteen would know they were eating halal chicken would be if they asked a member of staff directly.’
Britain’s Muslim community is exempt from regulations which require animals to be stunned before death, as is kosher meat prepared for the Jewish market.
Conservative MP Andrew Rosindell, secretary of the Associate Parliamentary Group for Animal Welfare, said: ‘I don’t object to people of different religious groups being catered for but it’s not something that should be imposed on everybody else.
‘The vast majority of people in this country would not want meat of this origin. The outlets have a duty to let their customers know because some will object very strongly, not least because of the animal welfare implications of halal.’
Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the National Secular Society, said: ‘We suspected that meat killed by the halal and kosher methods was being used for general consumption but we never imagined it was so widespread.
‘It is disgraceful that people aren’t being told if the food they are being served is from meat that has not been stunned prior to slaughter.’
Whitbread, which also owns Table Table restaurants, Costa Coffee shops and Premier Inn hotels, admitted last night that 80 per cent of the chicken it served comes from halal poultry suppliers, including some in Muslim-dominated Turkey.
A Whitbread spokesman said: ‘We don’t specify halal as a requirement in our procurement. We base our decision on quality and price. It just turns out that we source that amount of chicken from suppliers that happen to be halal.
‘It is not mentioned on any of our menus because we don’t think there is customer demand for that information. But if people started asking then we would definitely provide it.’
Rival operator Mitchells & Butlers, which owns the Harvester, Browns and Toby Carvery restaurant chains, as well as pub chains All Bar One and O’Neill’s was even more opaque about the source of its meats. A spokesman said it had a ‘broad range of suppliers’ but declined to specify how many of these were halal-certified.
Ascot racecourse said it was easier to store and cook only type of meat. ‘All our chicken is halal. This is not advertised as the menus are kept as simple as possible,’ said a spokesman.
Cheltenham College boarding school in Gloucestershire admitted: ‘We have not sent a letter, nor is there any note on menus that informs parents and pupils that the chicken served in the canteen is mostly halal.’
Marlborough College, in Wiltshire, admitted that while halal chicken is usually only served to Muslims, it had ‘occasionally’ served it to all pupils. The school refused to say whether parents and pupils had been informed of this.
A Football Association spokesman confirmed: ‘All the beef, chicken and lamb sold at Wembley Stadium is halal which means a large proportion of the meat on offer to our customers falls into this category. Pork, which is forbidden to Muslims, is also served at the stadium.
In 2003 government advisory body, the Farm Animal Welfare Council, published a report which declared that the halal method of killing ‘would inevitably trigger a barrage of sensory information to the brain in a sensible [conscious] animal’.
Experts who contributed to the report concluded that ‘such a massive injury would result in very significant pain and distress in the period before insensibility supervenes’.
Muslim leaders insist that animal welfare measures are observed during slaughter. Guidelines issued by the Islamic Cultural Centre in London state that ‘no stress or discomfort’ should be inflicted on the animal and that the knife must be sharp and clean.
More than 40 million cattle, calves and sheep and more than 850 million poultry are slaughtered every year in Britain.
The vast majority are stunned before slaughter but UK law allows the Jewish and Muslim communities to kill animals by religious methods without any form of stunning.
A number of requirements have been put in place, however, in an attempt to reduce animal suffering.
The rules state that the throat must be cut with one rapid, uninterrupted movement of the knife. Both carotid arteries and both jugular veins must be severed.
In addition, the knife must be inspected before each animal is slaughtered to ensure that it is of sufficient size and sharpness.
But welfare campaigners say the rules are not enough.
The Government’s independent advisory body, the Farm Animal Welfare Council, says sheep may lose consciousness within five to seven seconds of the cut.
But research has shown that some calves remain brain-responsive for up to two minutes. This is because the carotid arteries can contract after the cut has been made, effectively sealing the severed ends and maintaining blood pressure in the brain.
The RSPCA says all meat produced from animals that have not been stunned before slaughter should be clearly labelled so that it can be easily identified by consumers.
Sharia law states that the abattoir involved in the process must be under the ‘close and constant supervision’ of an Islamic religious organisation.
Under these rules, the cut must be made to the right side of the neck by cutting the two carotids, the two jugulars, the windpipe and the gullet, but without breaking the spinal cord.
The carcass must empty of blood and a specific time should be allowed until the animal ceases to move before the next stage of the production process — de-skinning and removing the internal organs — may begin.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Crooks Behind Britain’s Biggest Tax Fraud Given 10 More Years in Prison for Failing to Pay Back £184 Million
Syed Ahmed, 37, and Shakeel Ahmad, 38, were part of a 21-strong gang who brought luxury houses and sports cars with the proceeds of a £37.5 million pound VAT sting.
They were sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment in 2007 for their part in the “missing trader” VAT con, in which they cheated the system through the import and export of computer parts.
A judge ordered them to re-pay crime profits of £92.3 million each by September but the pair missed the deadline and on Thursday, they were told they must serve an additional ten years behind bars, HM Revenue and Customs said.
The £184.6 million is the largest ever confiscation order issued by the UK courts. It was made in July.
Richard Meadows, assistant director of criminal investigations for HMRC, said:
“This will send the strongest message yet to criminals that they cannot hide, even in prison, from our actions to reclaim their criminal profits.
“We are determined that this money will be restored to the nation’s finances in what is the largest confiscation order ever secured in the UK.
“Their prison sentences now total 34 years and they will still have to re-pay the outstanding confiscation order.”
Ahmad, from Middlesex, and Ahmed, from Slough, Berkshire led the complex VAT scam over a number of years.
They used the money to fund a lavish lifestyle, buying multi-million pound properties in and around London, alongside flashy cars including a Ferrari.
The confiscation order was based on assets bought and owned by the mob, including two blocks of flats in Dubai worth £80million called the Royal Oceanic Tower and the Yacht Bay Tower.
They also owned a £4.5million luxury apartment in Knightsbridge, West London, a £2million Harrow home, a £1.5million place in Iver Heath, Bucks, and a £500,000 riverside flat in Battersea, South London.
The crooked gang owned high-powered cars, including a Ferrari 360 Modena convertible and a Mercedes 500CL.
Ahmed and Ahmad were behind MST Associates (UK) Ltd, in Uxbridge, West London, and ran a “missing trader” VAT fraud.
The firm imported computer processing units from Europe — mostly Ireland — VAT free.
They would then be sold on more cheaply, but with VAT added, through a chain of companies involved in the plot and sham invoices would be issued.
Once the goods had been sold on a number of times, they would be exported back to the EU.
The exporter would then claim a VAT credit from Revenue and Customs for the tax paid on the purchase of the goods.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Cyprus: Out of Wedlock Births Quadruple in a Decade
(ANSAmed) — NICOSIA, SEPTEMBER 13 — An EU report into marriage, birth and government spending trends has revealed Cyprus has the highest marriage rate, the second lowest percentage of births out of wedlock, and the smallest healthcare budget.
The Eurostat report, released last week, shows that despite having the second fewest children born outside of marriage, after Greece, the percentage quadrupled between 1998 and 2008.
In 1990, the report says, just 0.7% of births were out of wedlock in Cyprus, compared to an EU average of 17.4%. By 1998 out of wedlock births rose to 2.1%, compared with 25% for the EU. By 2008, out of wedlock childbirths rose fourfold to 8.9%.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
France: Bettencourt; Le Monde Accuses Elysee, Which Denies
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, SEPTEMBER 13 — The Elysée Palace ‘totally’ denies the claims made by newspaper Le Monde, which today on its front page denounces the “violation” of the law on confidentiality of journalistic sources by the presidency of the Republic and announces an immediate report. According to Le Monde, France’s intelligence agency has been used to discover who leaked information to the newspaper’s reporters in the Bettencourt affair.
“The Elysée Palace totally denies the Le Monde allegations and the presidency of the Republic confirms that it did not give any instruction whatsoever to any agency”, said the presidency in a short statement to France Presse.
Le Monde claims in its opening article that “in order to identify the source of the information that appeared in our newspaper regarding the Woerth-Bettencourt affair and to try and end this leak to the press concerning the investigation, the Elysée Palace used methods in July that are in direct violation of the law on confidentiality of sources”.
The same newspaper also printed an editorial on its front page with the title ‘Le Monde, the Elysée and freedom of information’: “Le Monde”, it reads, “cannot allow this violation of confidentiality of sources, for its own sake and for the sake of those who consider this law from 1881 in the 2010 version an increase of legitimacy recognised to reporters.
This concern over civic transparency justifies our report to the public prosecutor’s office, to make sure that freedom of press is strictly respected in this case and in others”.
According to a reconstruction, the Elysée Palace decided to use the intelligence services to find the “mole” after an article published on July 18-19, with the title ‘Patrice de Maistre creates problems for Woerth couple’. Several transcripts of the arrest of de Maistre, who manages the possessions of L’Oreal heir Liliane Bettencourt, were quoted in the article. De Maistre mentioned, among other things, the circumstances in which Florence Woerth, wife of the Labour Minister, was hired by Clymene, the company that managed the heir’s wealth. This testimony showed several inconsistencies with the reconstruction of these event made by Woerth.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Hitler’s Unfulfilled Dream of a New York in Flames
Even before World War II, Nazi strategists came up with a number of plans to strike New York City — whether with super missiles, kamikaze pilots, long-range bombers or secret agents. Some were ambitious and some were foolish, but all of them failed.
[…]
The teams had been sent to America to blow up railroad bridges, power plants and tunnels, to paralyze industrial facilities vital to the American war effort and to demoralize the American civilian population. One historian has dubbed it “the most daring sabotage plans in history.” But it turned out to be a major headache for their German superiors. The German agents blew their cover after a mere two days in the field, and prompted the FBI to launch its largest manhunt to date.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Police Seize €1.5 Bln in Suspected ‘Mafia Assets’
Palermo, 14 Sept. (AKI) — Italian police on Tuesday impounded 1.5 billion euros in assets from a Sicilian businessman involved in renewable energy who is suspected of having ties with the mafia. It was the country’s biggest property seizure in the war it has declared against organised crime networks like the Sicilian Cosa Nostra and the Camorra from Naples.
“It was (Italy’s) biggest seizure of assets,” Italian interior minister Roberto Maroni said in a television interview on “Mattino Cinque”, a breakfast show on media-tycoon prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s Canale 5.
Anti-mafia authorities have opened probes into alleged mafia money laundering operations in Italy’s renewable energy.
Anti-mafia police from Trapani on Tuesday seized the property belonging Vito Nicastri, a businessman based in the Sicilian province of Trapani. Nicastri had been arrested for alleged fraud in the solar and wind energy sector.
Investigators say he has ties to mafia fugitive Matteo Messina Denaro.
Maroni on 15 August said Italy in around a year had seized suspected mafia assets worth 15 billion euros.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: School’s Back With Fewer Lesson Hours and Limit on Absences
One thousand classes fail to comply with 30% cap on immigrant students
ROME — Secondary education has had a makeover. Latin has disappeared from the curriculum for scientific secondary schools while classical institutes have less geography and more mathematics. The 30% cap on non-Italian students in each class has turned out to be a damp squib. Few students have been moved and a thousand classes have exemptions. But there are also timetable reductions, badges for students and automatic failure for more than 50 days’ absence. Today is the first day of the school year, bringing lots of new developments and plenty of old problems, from teachers who have been on short-term contracts for years to overcrowded classrooms, missing principals and non-compliant buildings.
NEW SECONDARY SCHOOLS — The reform starts in first-year classes, involving almost 600,000 students, while other years will follow the old curriculum. There are now only six courses of study, the previous 365 experimental courses having been eliminated. Scientific secondary school remain the most popular with 115,000 enrolments, three times the number for classical schools. Human sciences schools, which replace the old teacher-training institutes, have attracted 27,000 students. Taken together, music and dance institutes have just over a thousand students, filling all the places available. The magnetic card distributed to many secondary-school students two years ago can be used to record arrivals and departures but the decision will be left up to individual schools.
SUBJECTS — The disappearance of Latin from scientific schools, and the precedence for mathematics over geography at classical institutes, are not the only changes. All courses of study will devote more teaching hours to science, physics and mathematics, always the Achilles heel of Italian students. Developments will be monitored to see whether this solves the problem or whether a new approach is required. Foreign languages also get a boost and are compulsory in all five years of secondary education. In the final year, one subject will be taught in English, a method already trialled in various schools. Across the curriculum, the total number of class hours per week falls, for example from 36 to 32 in technical and professional institutes. The duration of lessons in all secondary schools has been extended from 50 minutes to 60.
LIMIT ON NON-ITALIANS — The cap on foreigners has been applied for the first time. No class will be able to have more than 30% non-Italians. Education minister Mariastella Gelmini, who has often said that the limit is necessary to integrate youngsters from other countries, signed the circular following rejection of the Northern League’s proposal of “insertion classes” for non-Italians struggling with the language. But what does the cap mean in practice? Very little. First, the minister explained that non-Italians born in Italy, or who speak Italian well, are not included in the 30%. She then said that classes could obtain permission to exceed the limit in particularly difficult circumstances. Just under a thousand exemptions have been granted, mainly to schools in Lombardy, Lazio, Tuscany and Lazio. In the end, partly because of staff cuts, few students have been moved to comply with the limit while classes that exceed it continue to do so. It shows that all too often politicians talk about school but real school is rather different.
OVERCROWDED CLASSES — Legally, the maximum number of students per class should be 25 but the limit can be waived if it is not possible to form another class. In other words, the limit exists only in theory. It has always been exceeded but with staff cuts in recent years, the situation has deteriorated. The record is held by a technical school in Genoa with a class of 38 students. However, it is too soon to say how far overcrowding has increased generally. At the beginning of the school year, students are usually moved from class to class to ease the worst situations.
UNFILLED POSTS — Unfilled teaching posts are another chronic problem that has worsened this year…
Lorenzo Salvia
English translation by Giles Watson
www.watson.it
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Culture Minister Snubs Tarantino as an ‘Elitist Snob’
Venice, 17 Sept. (AKI) — The “elitist” taste of American movie director and jury president of this year’s Venice Film Festival Quentin Tarantino has prompted the Italy’s government to play a larger role in choosing the Venice Film Festival’s jury, said Italian culture minister Sandro Bondi.
“Tarantino is the expression of an elitist, relativist and snobbish culture that takes no account of popular taste and feelings,” Bondi said in an interview with the magazine Panarama released on Friday.
“His vision influences his critical judgements, even about foreign films,” he said.
Sofia Coppola’s “Somewhere,” the slow introspective story of a Hollywood actor’s emptiness on Saturday took Venice’s top prize, the Golden Lion.
Monte Hellman, Tarantino’s executive director of his 1992 debut film, “Reservoir Dogs”, also won an award for his body of work.
“Since the funds are the state’s, from now on we want to get involved in the selection of jury members,” Bondi said.
The festival’s budget this year was 12 million euros, including 7 million from the Italian government.
It’s not the first time Bondi has made headlines on the international film festival circuit nor has he been shy about publicly criticising what he considers inaccessible art.
In May he snubbed France’s Cannes Film Festival because it screened the controversial Italian film “Draquila: Italy Trembles” that satirises prime minister Silvio Berlusconi and his government’s response to last year’s devastating earthquake in L’Aquila.
In a 2008 interview with Italian women’s magazine Grazia Bondi admitted that he finds contemporary art puzzling.
“It’s really difficult for me to find beauty in contemporary art. If I visit a show, like many people I pretend to understand. But sincerely, I don’t understand,” he said.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Brusca Probed for Money Laundering
Ex-Mafia head could be thrown out of protection programme
(ANSA) — Palermo, September 17 — Jailed Mafia boss and informant Giovanni Brusca is under investigation for money laundering and attempted extortion, judicial sources said Friday.
Brusca, 53, serving life for the 1992 murder of anti-Mafia judge Giovanni Falcone, has turned state’s evidence but police now believe his family has continued using his ill-gotten gains on his orders.
Police on Friday raided premises about a dozen premises belonging to relatives and acquaintances in Palermo, Rome, Milan, Chieti and Rovigo after wiretaps revealed Brusca still held millions of euros in disguised properties and was using them for illicit purposes.
They found some 200,000 euros in the home of Brusca’s wife.
In the other searches, investigators said they had turned up “important” documents.
As well as illegally putting his money in other persons’ names and laundering cash, Brusca is accused of attempted extortion.
He reportedly wrote a letter to an acquaintance asking for “a favour” and threatening him if he didn’t come through.
“I’ll bust your head,” the ex-Cosa Nostra boss is said to have written.
Brusca is in danger of being thrown out of the witness protection programme, judicial sources said.
He is set to be questioned by anti-Mafia prosecutors in his cell on Friday afternoon. Brusca is not the first top mafioso to revert to crime after being admitted to the state’s witness protection system.
Others include Totuccio Contorno and Balduccio Di Maggio.
Brusca was arrested in May 1996.
At the time, he was reckoned to be the acting military head of Cosa Nostra, after the January 1993 arrest of Toto’ ‘The Beast’ Riina and with overlord Bernardo Provenzano, eventually arrested in 2006, still in the shadows.
As well as for the massive bombing that killed Falcone, his wife and three bodyguards, Brusca is also serving life for ordering the murder of the 12-year-old son of an informant.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Roma: France and EU Clash Over Repatriation Measures
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, SEPTEMBER 16 — Tension is still high between France and the EU with reference to the measures that France is implementing to repatriate Roma people.
Today, during the European summit in Brussels, the French president had a harsh exchange of views with the head of the European executive, Jose’ Manuel Barroso. This did not induce Sarkozy to retrace his steps, and in commenting on the controversial policy on Roma people France reasserted that it will continue to dismantle illegal campsites on French soil. Sarkozy stated that “France acted and will continue to act in the spirit of the European directive”, and specified that in any event dismantling activities will concern “all illegal camps”, no matter what the nationality, origin and ethnicity of the camp residents.
Sarkozy also said that German chancellor Angela Merkel stated that she will also dismantle illegal campsites in Germany. He stated “We will see: I am ready to support Merkel”. Nicolas Sarkozy also commented on the harsh attack against France by EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding. Statements which, he stated, “shocked the feelings of all my countrymen”.
Responding to the press, Barroso commented about Reding’s statements that “It is true that we heard exaggerated comments: yesterday commissioner Reding acknowledged it, I think others should do the same”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: 100 Lances Kill Bull in Popular Fiesta
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, SEPTEMBER 14 — Platanito was the name of the 550-kilo bull killed today by the pikes of dozens of lancers on horseback (among which a woman, for the first time) who had previously hounded the animal around the streets of the town of Tordesillas (Valladolid). The episode occurred during the town’s Toro de la Vega competition, the controversial ‘fiesta’ that this year has once again led to violent protest from environmental organisations. The rider who won the prize for delivering the fatal blow to the animal, whose agony lasted 12 minutes, was 26-year old Marcos Rodriguez from Tordesillas, who was declared the winner by the town’s mayor, Maria del Milagro Zarzuelo, at the end of the event, which was attended by an audience of 35,000 and had only one victim: Platanito.
The traditional bull festival in the town in the Castilla y Leon region has, as ever, been condemned by animal rights groups, who have demanded the abolition of a ‘barbaric tradition’ that dates back to the 14th century. The event involves riders on horseback pursuing a bull, who is struck by hundreds of lances, pushing it into a pine forest on the other side of the River Duero, where the animal inevitably meets its end. Defenders of the questionable spectacle, which local authorities describe as “an event of national cultural interest”, say that the animal does not suffer.
But the event’s many detractors, first among them the animal rights associations such as Igualdad Animal or El Refugio, as well as many of the town’s inhabitants, have branded it “savage torture, worthy of the Black Spain of 200 years ago”. The chair of El Refugio, Nancho Paunero, has written to Prime Minister Zapatero, asking for the abolition of “such a cruel spectacle”, as part of the framework of laws protecting animals, which the government is committed to approving during the current term.
To counter the initiative by animal rights groups, the pro-bullfighters of Unidad Regionalista de Castilla y Leon made an appeal to the local population on the eve of the event, calling for mobilisation “in defence of the taurine fiesta and of the traditions of the community” at the end of October. In a statement, they also demanded “the right of the town to celebrate its own patron saint’s fiesta in peace”, without the presence “of foreigners who come to insult and slander Tordesillas”. Last year, a video from the environmentalist association Igualdad Animal, in which the torture and the agony of the Tordesillas bull was filmed, was seen around the world.
“I think that the town experiences the tradition peacefully and with respect,” said the mayor, “the same respect that we demand for ourselves. The competition cannot be made bloodless, as this would mean not killing the bull, and this would no longer make the event a fiesta,” he added. The town paid 7,500 euros for the torture and butchery of Platanito. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Muslim Plot to Kill Pope
ISLAMIC terrorists disguised as street cleaners allegedly hatched an audacious plot to blow up the Pope.
The threatened attack was foiled at the 11th hour after police raided a cleaning depot in London as the suspects prepared to start their shift yesterday.
Last night six men — all believed to be North Africans aged between 26 and 50 — were being questioned by detectives.
Five suspects were detained at the cleaning depot and the sixth was held at his home yesterday afternoon.
Searches were being carried out at 10 addresses across the capital and police seized computers, mobile phones and other items.
Pope Benedict XVI was said to have remained “totally calm” when he was informed about the threat yesterday morning.
A £1.5million ring of steel has been put in place for the first official Papal visit to Britain and security procedures were immediately reviewed but the Pontiff’s schedule continued as planned.
It is feared plotters with links to Al Qaeda planned “a double blow to the infidel” by assassinating the head of the Roman Catholic church and slaughtering hundreds of pilgrims and well-wishers.
The suspected plot was smashed after Scotland Yard officers swooped on the depot in Marylebone, central London, at 5.45am after a tip-off just hours earlier.
A security source said last night: “We had to act and arrest them. We had reasonable grounds to suspect they would carry out an attack.
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Twisted Values of the Noisy Bigots
For a country that prides itself on religious tolerance, this has been a shaming week.
Thanks to the BBC and a noisy cabal of self-important atheists and Catholic-haters, we have been subjected to wall-to-wall attacks on the Pope and his Church.
Leading this vicious anti-Christian charge were Stephen Fry — who seems to get smugger by the day — and Richard Dawkins, who described Pope Benedict XVI as a ‘leering old villain in a frock . . . whose preaching is responsible for the deaths of countless Aids victims in Africa.’
Put aside for one moment the sheer crudeness of this personal abuse, and imagine the outrage if the world’s most senior Imam was accused of being a leer ing criminal who encouraged the spread of sexually transmitted disease.
Yet, in a case of breathtaking double standards, the Left is given airtime to attack the Pope — and by implication 42 million Christians in this country.
[…]
But, then, for decades now, Christians in Britain have been made to feel their faith is not just unfashionable, but shaming and ignorant.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
EU-Morocco: Brussels, First Approval for Fish and Agriculture
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, SEPTEMBER 16 — The European Commission authorised the EU/Morocco trade agreement project for the fisheries and agricultural sectors. The agreement must now be examined by the European Council and Parliament.
Brussels stated that the agreement promises advantages for one of main European exports, processed agricultural products, which are meant to be gradually and fully deregulated in the next decade. Pasta products are not included.
As regards agricultural products, Morocco will allow the immediate deregulation of 45% of the value of imported products from the EU, before passing to 70% over the next decade. Full deregulation is instead provided for fruit and vegetables, food preserves, milk and cheese products, oleaginous plants (except for fava beans, sweet almonds, apples and tomato pasts, which will be subject to tariffs) and cereals (except for common and durum wheat and derivatives). The European Union responded to this opening by allowing the immediate deregulation of 55% of Moroccan imports. Improvements over concession in the fruit and vegetable sector (80% of EU imports) accounted for sensitive situations. Production calendars thus remain unchanged for tomatoes, strawberries, zucchini, pickles, garlic and clementines, where concessions were granted in the form of tariff quotas. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Egyptian Muslim Radicals Fabricated Story of Priest’s Wife Conversion
By Mary Abdelmassih
(AINA) — After the return of the missing priest’s wife to her family by State Security on July 23, Egyptian radicals sheikhs have spread rumors that she converted to Islam, exploiting the issue for an outright smear campaign against the Coptic Church and its Pope Shenouda III. The sheikhs paint an image of “Their suffering Muslim sister in a monastery where she is tortured for having chosen to convert to Islam.”
Camelia Shehata, wife of Father Tedaos Samaan, priest at St. Georges Church in Deir Mawas, Minya Governorate, disappeared on July 19, resulting in Coptic demonstrations against State Security for refusing to help her husband find her (AINA 7-23-2010). Father Tedaos accused a Muslim teacher working with her in the same school of being behind her abduction in order to force her conversion to Islam. After 5 days of Coptic sit-ins and the intervention of members of parliament, State Security found her and handed her back to her family.
According to the official version by State Security, Camilia had a row with her husband and left home, staying with one of her relatives in Cairo. The Church kept silent as usual, as per a tacit agreement with Security not to discuss abduction cases.
What re-ignited the “Camilia Affair” a few days later was a video on the Islamist website “Observatory of the Islamic Resistance to Christianizing” which gave a different story. Influential Salafi sheikh Abu Yehya, from Samalut, who is known for his paid activities in procuring Christians for conversion to Islam, said that Camilia fled her marital home and went to him to convert to Islam. He claimed that Camilia had proclaimed the shahada, or declaration of Muslim faith, 18 months earlier and has secretly studied the Koran. Allegedly he traveled with her to Cairo and went to Al-Azhar to register her conversion officially, however, they were delayed there until the police arrived and arrested them both.
The website showed Camilia clad in a veil but this was disputed by various Coptic organizations, who claim the photo was reworked in Photoshop, in a similar fashion to photos of Marilyn Monroe and Angelina Jolie, who are portrayed wearing veils, though they have never worn them.
This story was taken up by other Salafi radical sheikhs who appeared on Islamic TV channels, after adding to it that the church was imprisoning Camilia in one of the Coptic monasteries in Ain Shams (there are none there), where she was given mind altering drugs “until she became insane” according to Sheikh el-Howeiny.
The media joined in the smear campaign against the Church, accompanied by Muslim demonstrations outside mosques during Ramadan in Cairo and Alexandria against the Coptic Patriarch and Church and the infidel Christians, demanding that Camilia, as a Muslim, should be “freed from her captivity in the Coptic monasteries, to practice Islam” and calls for her appearance in public.
Previously Pope Shenouda had confirmed that Camilia never converted to Islam, and no one had the right to know where she is.
There were also calls for Muslim siege of the Coptic Patriarchate in Cairo to force her freedom. Islamist lawyers started filing cases against the church to subject the monasteries to inspection either because they keep ammunition there, or for keeping Christian women who have converted to Islam. Khalil said that Muslims are known “to fabricate a mountain of lies and end up believing them.”
To the surprise of many, Camilia appeared on September 8, in an 11-minute video published on the website of the Egyptian daily El-Youm7, which had one of its reporters present during the shooting of the video, and who confirmed the authenticity of the video.
Camilia said that “she is a Christian with all her heart”, denying rumors about her conversion to Islam, adding “I’m talking to you in full freedom and without any pressure or intimidation. I am appearing in order to defend my husband, my child, my church and my religion which is Christianity.” She denied having been subjected to torture, brainwashing or being detained in a monastery or church. “This is illogical because the Church teaches us to love, but I assure you that I am in a safe and pleasant place.”
Camilia stressed the Church does not force anyone to stay in or enter into Christianity; it gives no electric shocks, drugs for hallucination or engages in brainwashing, as was rumored. She refused to talk about her personal life, stressing that what happened between her and her husband is personal and no one has the right to interfere in it, also only her husband has the right to look for her, and no one else is entitled to do so or demand her return.
This did not put an end to the sheikhs demands of seeing her in person, “because the woman who appeared on the video is not Camelia but a “double” of her, according to Zoghby, another Sheikh. A website dedicated to her said the woman who appeared in the video had a different front tooth and her eyebrows were thicker.
On September 9, for the first time on official Egyptian TV stations, State Security sources confirmed that Camilia Shehata was the one who appeared on the video.
Sheikh Saeed Amer, Chairman of the Committee of Declaration of Islam at Al-Azhar, stepped-in and denied that Camilia ever came there or that her case came before him.
After this information became known, Muslim lawyer Nizar Gorab filed a complaint to the Prosecutor General against Abu Yehya for inciting sectarian strife by fabricating false stories, reported AlArabiya.net on September 11. Ghorab had previously championed Camilia’s case by approaching the UN Human Right Council, the EU and Human Rights Watch, asking for her release as she was held against her will and deprived of becoming a Muslim by the authorities, which is against her rights to religious freedom.
Observers believe this crisis is spiraling out of control despite efforts to contain it.
Coptic activist Magdi Khalil believes that “Egypt is on the verge of chaos and change of regime and there is a plan for Copts to pay the price of this predicted chaos, by directing the surplus violence, hate and barbarism towards them.”
Nearly 500 Muslims demonstrated in front of Amr Ibn-el-Ass Mosque in old Cairo on their Eid-Feast on September 10 calling on President Mubarak to “free Camilia.” They chanted “If Camilia is still OK, then why have you used a double for her?” They distributed computer CDs with her story.
On September 13, an association called the “Front of Al-Azhar Scholars,” which has been banned in Egypt and operates from Kuwait, issued a statement on its website calling for the boycott of Coptic businesses, professionals and schools “After the church became a source of Egyptian intimidation and terrorism to the State and the Nation.”
Magdy Khalil said that the main players in the forthcoming chaos in Egypt is an interaction between political and Salafi Islam, a large portion of State Security who are radicalized and who want to direct violence towards the Copts and not the Regime. “Saudi Arabia is the main funder of what is happening to the Copts in Egypt,” he said.
He believes that those players who fabricated the Camilia story will surely fabricate new ones, aiming at agitating and “heating up” the Muslim street and creating mounting chaos. “When the real chaos takes place, they will go into the field to destroy, loot and kill the Copts.”
| — Hat tip: Mary Abdelmassih | [Return to headlines] |
Raft of Command Appointments in Military
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, SEPTEMBER 17 — A raft of nominations has been approved for commanding positions in the country’s armed forces (the Tsahal) on the eve of the Yom Kippur celebrations. According to a communique’ from the Defence Department, the appointments were agreed between Minister Ehud Barak and the retiring head of Chiefs of Command, General Gaby Ashkenazi, whose replacement — who takes office in February next — will be General Yoav Galant, named at the start of this month.
The new appointees are linked to that of Galant, although the fact that their nomination has come before he takes command comes as a bit of a surprise.
Among the big names are that of General Tal Russo at the command of the highly sensitive Southern front, the one that has up to now been in Galant’s hands e from where the bloody Cast Lead offensive against Hamas militias in the Gaza Strip during December 2008 and January 2009 had been launched. Russo will in turn be replaced by General Yaakov Ayash form the Operational Directorate of the Chief of Staff, while a further change of guard affects the similarly sensitive head of military intelligence, where General Aviv Kochavi will take over from veteran Amos Yadlin.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Mother of Baby Dumped in a Plane Toilet Bin Claims She Was Raped by Her Employer
A Philippine woman who gave birth to a baby on a flight from the Middle East and then left him in the rubbish bin on the plane said she was raped by her employer, a politician who has spoken to the woman said today.
The baby was found by a security guard at Manila’s airport last Sunday in a bag of rubbish unloaded from a Gulf Air flight from Bahrain.
The bag apparently came from a toilet on the Gulf Air jet which flew to the Philippines from Saudi Arabia.
Lani Mercado, a member of the Philippine House of Representatives, said she met the mother, who told her that she had been raped by her employer while working as a maid in Qatar.
She became pregnant and her employer’s wife forced her to return home.
Ms Mercado said the woman managed to hide her pregnancy and board a flight.
‘She had labour pains in the plane. Then she gave birth.’
She said the woman, who is married and has two children, told her she abandoned the baby because she was afraid of what her family would say.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Turkish Exporters Interested in Arab Countries
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, SEPTEMBER 17 — Turkish exporters have focused on Arab countries and Turkic republics in the recent years due to Turkey’s developing commercial ties with these countries, as Anatolia news agency reports today. Dogan Narin, chairman of Turkish-Arab Businessmen’s Association, said that the association had been working to boost social, cultural and economic relations with 22 Arab countries as well as Turkic republics.
Narin said Turkey was now making 25% of total exports to Arab countries and Turkic republics. Trade with Arab countries helped the country weather global economic crisis more easily, he said adding that Turkey’s exports to those countries reached USD 16 billion and imports from them were USD 8 billion between January and July 2010. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
The Russian Orthodox Church Calls for Same Legal Status as Catholics in Ireland
Patriarch Kirill spoke at a meeting in Moscow with Irish President McAleese. Orthodox parishes in Ireland are registered as “charitable organisations”. The request in line with the Orthodox Patriarchate policy of strengthening its presence abroad.
Moscow (AsiaNews) — The Moscow Patriarchate has asked Dublin to change the status of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ireland and make it similar to that of Catholics, no longer as a “charitable organization”, but a Church in every respect. The request, which affects 1,500 people, was made on 8 September during a meeting in Moscow between Irish President Mary McAleese and Patriarch Kirill. It was the first state visit to the Russian Federation for McAleese.
“His Holiness raised the issue of granting the Russian Orthodox Church a similar status to that of the Catholic Church in Ireland. This is a very important goal,” stated Fr. Georgy Zavershinsky, head of communications for External Relations Department of the Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. The priest explained that tRussian Orthodox parishes in many Western countries are registered as charitable communities, similar to other small communities or sects. Besides Ireland, this is also the case in Britain.
Patriarch Kirill spoke of the situation of Orthodox parishes in Ireland: “In general, in the twentieth century there were several waves of emigration from the Soviet Union, and the people established themselves in Western countries, including Ireland. When I talk of these people, I refer not only to citizens of the Russian Federation, but also to the Moscow Patriarchate and the Church of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova. Taken together, many of them now live in Ireland where we have five parishes, and some are very active (eg, Dublin).
The president promised to start bilateral consultations between ministers to discuss the issue and if necessary between the premier of the two countries. Today the Russian Orthodox Church in Ireland has about 1500 faithful, out of a total population of 4,150,000 inhabitants.
The words of Kirill confirm the policy initiated by the successor of Alexius II towards a strong promotion and strengthening of the presence of the Russian Orthodox Church abroad, from China to the Caribbean, throughout south-east Asia and Europe. Of note, however, that in Russia the Catholic Church is not recognized among the four official religions (Orthodox, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist) which enjoy a privileged status.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia: Ex-Minister Questioned in Sarong Scandal
Jakarta, 16 Sept. (AKI/Jakarta Post) — Former Indonesian social service minister Bachtiar Chamsyah underwent questioning at the Corruption Eradication Commission Thursday in connection with alleged graft in procurement of sarongs between 2006 and 2008.
“The questioning was related to sarongs procurement. I answered several questions related to my assets as previously announced,” he said after questioning.
Bactiar denied any wrongdoing and claimed that in the procurement project he had issued a policy which complied with the law.
“I gave my disposition to the secretariat general, asking him to execute the procurement according to the existing rules. But, the details were not my business,” he continued.
Bachtiar is implicated in three corruption cases during his tenure at the ministry.
The commission arrested Bachtiar on 5 Aug. due to alleged corruption in the procurement of sewing machines and the importation of cattle between 2004 and 2006, which was estimated to have caused the state Rp 27.6 billion (2.4 million euros) in losses.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Mao’s Great Leap Forward ‘Killed 45 Million in Four Years’
Mao Zedong, founder of the People’s Republic of China, qualifies as the greatest mass murderer in world history, an expert who had unprecedented access to official Communist Party archives said yesterday.
Speaking at The Independent Woodstock Literary Festival, Frank Dikötter, a Hong Kong-based historian, said he found that during the time that Mao was enforcing the Great Leap Forward in 1958, in an effort to catch up with the economy of the Western world, he was responsible for overseeing “one of the worst catastrophes the world has ever known”.
Mr Dikötter, who has been studying Chinese rural history from 1958 to 1962, when the nation was facing a famine, compared the systematic torture, brutality, starvation and killing of Chinese peasants to the Second World War in its magnitude. At least 45 million people were worked, starved or beaten to death in China over these four years; the worldwide death toll of the Second World War was 55 million.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Aborigines Sue Bolt Over Racial Writings
HERALD Sun columnist Andrew Bolt is being sued under the Racial Vilification Act by a group of Aborigines led by 73-year-old activist Pat Eatock over two columns he wrote last year.
In the first column, published under the headline ‘‘It’s so hip to be black’’ in the paper on April 15, 2009, and on his blog under the headline ‘‘White is the new black’’, Bolt enumerated a list of light or white-skinned people who identified themselves as Aboriginal, and suggested their choosing to do so was proof of ‘‘a whole new fashion in academia, the arts and professional activism’’.
He added that ‘‘for many of these fair Aborigines, the choice to be Aboriginal can seem almost arbitrary and intensely political’’.
Pat Eatock was one of those identified. She is acting on behalf of at least six others.
On August 21, 2009, Bolt revisited the topic in a column headlined ‘‘White fellas in the black’’, in which he derided the granting of an award for Aboriginal artists to white-skinned painter Danie Mellor and an indigenous scholarship to white-skinned academic Mark McMillan.
According to the statement of claim lodged in the Federal Court on September 7, law firm Holding Redlich is acting on behalf of a group who ‘‘by a combination of descent, self-identification and communal recognition are, and are recognised under law as, Aboriginal persons’’.
The document also states that the applicants ‘‘were offended, insulted, humiliated or intimidated’’ by Bolt’s writings.
Financial damages are not being sought, but the group has asked for an order restraining Bolt and the Herald Sun from publishing any material containing ‘‘substantially similar’’ content in the future, and for the removal of the two columns from the website.
‘‘We see this as a really important case,’’ said Joel Zyngier, an employment and discrimination lawyer at Holding Redlich, which is running the case pro bono.
‘‘We see it as clarifying the issue of identity — who gets to say who is and who is not Aboriginal. Essentially, the articles by Bolt have challenged people’s identity. He’s basically arguing that the people he identified are white people pretending they’re black so they can access public benefits.’’
Bolt’s first column pointedly stated he was not making any such claim, though the sincerity of that statement has been questioned.
‘‘I’m not saying any of those I’ve named chose to be Aboriginal for anything but the most heartfelt and honest of reasons,’’ he wrote in the piece published in April 2009. ‘‘I certainly don’t accuse them of opportunism, even if full-blood Aborigines may wonder how such fair people can claim to be one of them and, in some cases, take black jobs. I’m saying only that this self-identification as Aboriginal strikes me as self-obsessed, and driven more by politics than by any racial reality.’’
Liberty Victoria president Michael Pearce, SC, said his organisation had concerns about the potential impact on freedom of speech.
‘‘It is easy to imagine that it caused offence and hurt to the people against whom it was directed. However, hurt and offence are caused by all sorts of speech all the time.
‘‘It would be impossible to proscribe all speech which causes hurt and offence.’’
Although the action seeks to prevent Bolt from expressing such views again, Mr Zyngier is adamant it is not an attempt to impose a gag order on the columnist.
‘‘We’re not seeking to make this a case about freedom of speech, because it’s not,’’ he said. ‘‘The issue is essentially about whether or not other people can define identity, and in particular Aboriginal identity, based on how you look.
The matter is listed for a determination hearing on September 29.
| — Hat tip: Nilk | [Return to headlines] |
Zimbabwe: Mugabe’s Darkest Secret: An £800bn Blood Diamond Mine He’s Running With China’s Red Army
Across a remote tract of southern Africa, naturally fortified by mountains and patrolled by hundreds of soldiers with dogs trained to tear intruders apart, teams of mining experts are hard at work.
Yet they are not speakers of Shona, the native language of this land on the border between Zimbabwe and Mozambique. No, thousands of miles from home, under a broiling African sun, these slim, pale-skinned figures are members of the Chinese military.
Working alongside henchmen from one of Africa’s most murderous regimes — headed by Robert Mugabe — the Chinese are here to oversee Beijing’s investment in the world’s most controversial commodity: blood diamonds.
High-ranking officials of China’s People’s Liberation Army, they have been striving to escape detection for their role in this blood-thirsty — but hugely lucrative — trade.
For here, carved out of the African bush, is a runway big enough for huge cargo planes. There is also sophisticated radar equipment, a fully-operational control tower and comfortable barracks for the Chinese officials overseeing the entire operation.
[…]
The reason for the secrecy became apparent during an undercover investigation at the fields, where I found conclusive evidence of collusion between China and Mugabe. In an official — but highly-confidential — agreement between the two countries, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army and Mugabe’s military chiefs are plundering this diamond find, believed to be the biggest in the history of the world and worth an estimated £800 billion.
So vast are the riches that diamond experts believe the gems from Marange — in a country of less than ten million people — could account for more than a quarter of all diamonds mined around the globe, and could even trigger a massive slump in diamond prices if the stones come on the market and cause a glut.
Not that the people of Zimbabwe will see any of these riches. Instead, in return for the gems, the Chinese are paying Mugabe’s thugs in guns and ammunition, ensuring his regime can stay in power despite international condemnation of his atrocities.
The two countries — both with appalling human-rights records — are involved in a vile scramble for loot at Marange, and there is clear evidence that Mugabe and his generals are also personally stealing millions from the trade.
Secret documents obtained by the Mail reveal that the company given the rights to the diamond fields — called Mbada Diamond Company — is fronted by Mugabe’s trusted former personal helicopter pilot, with Chinese military officials as silent partners.
[…]
For, while Mugabe insists these diamonds will be for benefit of his people, the truth is they are already being used to fund a war chest designed to keep him and his generals in power, while millions more are siphoned into their personal accounts. That much was made clear to me during a chilling conversation I had as night fell this week near the diamond fields.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Moratorium on Muslim Immigrants?
Radical solution to homeland insecurity stirs controversy at conference
A proposal on how to stop the spread of Islam in the U.S., suggested from the floor at WND’s “Taking America Back” conference in Miami, Fla., stirred a rousing response from the audience but received an even more impassioned reply from the platform.
“I propose a moratorium on Islamic immigration and mosque construction in the U.S.,” an unidentified attendee suggested during a panel discussion on Islam, “until the Quran is scrubbed of its passages that are incompatible with our Constitution.”
The audience responded in spontaneous applause.
But the panel on stage gave a surprising response that quickly made the audience rethink its enthusiasm.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Political Scientist Hamed Abdel-Samad: ‘Islam is Like a Drug’
In a SPIEGEL interview, Egyptian-German political scientist Hamed Abdel-Samad talks about his childhood as the son of an imam in Egypt, why he thinks Islam is a danger to society and his theories about the inevitable decline of the Muslim world.
SPIEGEL: Mr. Abdel-Samad, Germany is currently a divided country because of the controversial author Thilo Sarrazin, whose new book “Germany Does Itself In” has triggered a heated debate on immigration and the willingness of Muslims to integrate into German society. Are you part of the pro- or anti-Sarrazin faction?
Hamed Abdel-Samad: Neither.
SPIEGEL: Have you discovered the happy medium in the integration debate? Or are you trying to avoid offending both your German friends and your fellow Muslims?
Abdel-Samad: I don’t like the nature of this debate at all. Some are standing in judgment over Sarrazin while others are cheering him on without further reflection. Sarrazin has become a lightning rod for everything. Whether he is seen a hero or a scapegoat, Sarrazin has unintentionally become the friend of the idle and the clueless. All failings and accusations can now be addressed to one person: Superman Sarrazin.
SPIEGEL: Are you saying that Sarrazin and his theories are overrated?
Abdel-Samad: I’m against Sarrazin’s expulsion from the SPD (the center-left Social Democratic Party, which has started proceedings to expel Sarrazin), and I believe that an open debate over integration in Germany is desperately needed. But his conclusions don’t do us any good, because they’re outdated. Germany isn’t doing itself in, but it is changing through immigration, and that’s a good thing. We should talk about the problems of living side by side, the failings of immigrants and what needs to be done for them.
SPIEGEL: And Sarrazin, the provocateur, is preventing this from happening with his theories on biology and race?
Abdel-Samad: He certainly isn’t promoting it. It doesn’t help us resolve the impasse of integration. You can see what’s happening at the moment, the way people are becoming entrenched. A CDU (the center-right Christian Democratic Union) politician keeps emphasizing, again and again, that foreigners should learn how to speak German properly. An SPD politician, after having condemned Sarrazin’s statements, is listing examples of successful integration. A Turkish idealist will sing the Green Party’s multicultural hymn. Meanwhile, a furious critic of Islam tries to pin the blame for all Germany’s problems on the Turks.
SPIEGEL: You’re referring to Turkish-German sociologist Necla Kelek, who enthusiastically introduced Sarrazin’s book at its official launch.
Abdel-Samad: Thilo Sarrazin is merely the proof that we have a problem. He is the messenger, and his message is that a tense culture of controversy prevails here. We have scaremongering, apologetics and hypersensitivity.
SPIEGEL: Should we have pretended that Sarrazin’s book didn’t exist?
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Students Booted for Giving Teachers Krispy Kremes
Legal team explains principal wants ‘Christian’ acts halted
A New Mexico school principal who has demanded that a team of students cease their “Christian” acts has suspended three after they gave fresh Krispy Kreme doughnuts with Bible verses to their teachers, according to a complaint from a legal team.
“Some teachers are worried about their students giving them bullets, and this school suspends students over a Bible verse,” said Mathew Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel and dean of the Liberty University School of Law.
“These students are living their Christian beliefs by showing kindness,” he continued. “It is outrageous that the Roswell school officials are mean to these students solely because they are hostile to their Christian faith.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
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