Germany’s EU Commissioner Oettinger: ‘Deficit Sinners’ Flags Should Fly at Half-Mast’
Greece should be forced to fly its EU flags at half-mast in shame, Oettinger said.
With the debt crisis in Greece spiralling out of control, German EU Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger suggested some radical solutions on Friday. Not only should EU officials take over tax collection for the ‘obviously ineffective’ Greeks, but ‘deficit sinner’ countries should be made to fly their flags at half mast.
Greece clearly needs help escaping from its financial quagmire, according to German European Union Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger. In fact, the EU should consider using some “unconventional” methods to increase motivation among Greek officials for solving the country’s problems, he told daily Bild on Friday.
“There has been the suggestion too of flying the flags of deficit sinners at half mast in front of EU buildings,” the member of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrats told the paper. “It would just be a symbol, but would still be a big deterrent.”
Another tactic for pulling the debt-stricken country out of crisis could be replacing “the obviously ineffective administrators” there, he added. Because Greek officials have failed at collecting outstanding taxes and selling state-owned assets as planned, Oettinger alleged, experts from other EU nations should be sent in to do their jobs instead. “They could operate without concern for resistance and end the inefficiency,” he told Bild.
After all: “Those who demand solidarity from the other countries must also be prepared to give up partial responsibility for a certain time.”
Talk of EU Exclusion
As pressure from other euro-zone nations to avoid debt default grows, Greece’s efforts at achieving promised reforms and fiscal goals have faltered .. The country received its first €110-billion bailout a year and a half ago after pledging new austerity measures and other changes, but improvements have been hindered by deep-seated corruption, structural problems and public resistance.
Last week the “troika” of inspectors from the EU, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank left Greece early after putting a stop to talks on paying the next aid tranche because the country had failed to achieve reforms.
Meanwhile a growing chorus of politicians in other EU countries, including senior-level German lawmakers, are now openly discussing the taboo of excluding Greece from the euro zone.
But Oettinger warned against such a move. “That would divide Europe and would be a disastrous signal,” he told Bild. “Then investors and markets wouldn’t trust us at all anymore for the future.”
| — Hat tip: Rembrandt | [Return to headlines] |
Greece: Clashes Between Police and Protesters in Thessoloniki
(AGI) Thessaloniki — Clashes between police and anti-austerity protesters are underway in Greece’s second city Thessaloniki.
Police have made use of tear-gas. There are seven thousand police officers to control about 20 thousand demonstrators.
Approximately seventy persons have been arrested.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Milan Shares Slump on ECB Resignation
Bond spread soars to 370 against German bund
(ANSA) — Milan, September 9 — Milan stocks slumped nearly 5% and Italian bond spreads soared on Friday after the resignation of top German official Juergen Stark from the board of the European Central Bank.
Milan stocks fell 4.93% to close at 14,020 points after the ECB announced the resignation of the board member.
The 10-year Italian bond spread against the German bund rose to 370 points forcing a parliamentary budget committee to abandon its consideration of the government’s 54-billion-euro austerity package late Friday.
The spread between Spanish bonds and the German bund also remained high on Friday, with Spain’s spread at 338 points, 32 points below Italy.
In market trading, shares in Italy’s largest bank Unicredit slid 8.22% and other banks including Banco Popolare and Intesa SanPaolo also suffered heavy losses.
Stark informed ECB President Jean Claude Trichet he would have to cut short his term on the board, due to expire in May 2014, because of personal reasons, the bank said. He will remain on the board until a successor is appointed.
But some media reports suggested the German official quit early because he disagreed with the bank’s policy of buying Italian and other eurozone government bonds to counter the debt crisis. After the announcement, House Budget Committee Chairman Giancarlo Giorgetti said 400 amendments to the government’s austerity package were inadmissible.
Pier Paolo Baretta from the opposition Democratic Party demanded an urgent “political evaluation of the crisis in the markets”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Madrid and Rome — Two Sorts of Crisis
La Vanguardia, Barcelona
One bows to rigorous demands from Germany and the ECB, the other dithers, entangled in its political games. Spain and Italy, however, both play a crucial role for the future of the single currency.
Enric Juliana
In September 1996 a diplomatic incident ruffled feathers between Spain and Italy. A few days after the annual meeting between the governments of both countries, which was held that year in Valencia, Jose Maria Aznar revealed to the Financial Times that the Italian Prime Minister, Romano Prodi, had suggested to him that Spain and Italy jointly delay joining the currency union in order to be able to meet with less suffering all round the three conditions of the Treaty of Maastricht: low inflation, a maximum deficit of three percent and a public debt ceiling of 60 percent of GDP.
In his characteristic tone, Aznar told the FT that Spain was in perfect shape and need not wait for anyone. Prodi, overwhelmed by the austerity policy imposed on Italy by the Convergence Programme, was left with no choice but to deny those statements and tighten the screws with the extraordinary and unpopular ‘euro tax’. In 1997, Italy crossed the threshold of Maastricht (with Helmut Kohl turning a blind eye where public debt was concerned), and after a few months, Prodi lost his majority in Parliament. The Italians went back to their big-spending dreams, and businessman Silvio Berlusconi tempted them onwards.
Fast-forward to September 2011, and the two countries are back on a collision course over the euro. Spain is just getting underway with an accelerated reform of its Constitution while Italy is skulking about a labyrinthine approval of its adjustment plan, of which three versions have been drafted in recent weeks against a backdrop of immense political turmoil and a robust union response. The Italians were served notice this summer through the Corriere della Sera of the specific requirements set out by the European Central Bank. In Spain, meanwhile, the government continues to deny that a letter has arrived in Madrid from the ECB threatening intervention. But this letter is indeed there in the in-box.
Italy is putting up stiffer resistance
Spain is easier to bring to heel than Italy, and we’re seeing evidence of that these days. Despite Spain’s inveterate pride, the country does whip into line when things turn serious. Spain is a less complicated country than Italy, unions are not very strong and the 15-M movement is a rebellion without direction — a spasmodic outbreak. Elections are on the horizon, too. A cycle is drawing to a close, and José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is determined somehow to salvage his place in the history books. Feeling vulnerable during this disaster that’s overtaken the PSOE, and knowing what stuff the far right is made of, he has decided to protect himself.
Italy is putting up stiffer resistance to the ECB, falling back on the catenaccio system in football that stresses defence. Italy is the land of cities, of family businesses, unions, societies that are more or less secret, and acquired rights. Its economy is more self-contained. There is little foreign penetration into industry and banking and public debt is concentrated in domestic saving books. Berlusconi is on the way out, but no alternative to him is marching over the horizon just yet. Italy moves to its own rhythm, and a precipitous collapse of its internal balances could be catastrophic for Europe. The South of Italy is a tinderbox. Remember the 2008 movie Gomorrah? The Germans know the film, and that’s why they regard a little iron discipline for the Iberian Peninsula as absolutely essential. And that helps to explain some of the pressure on Spanish Parliamentarians to reform the Constitution with some alacrity.
Translated from the Spanish by Anton Baer
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
No Cuts to MPs’ Benefits in Italy’s Austerity Package
(AGI)Rome — Budget Committee gave red light to opposition’s amendments to reintroduce 50% cuts to members of parliament’s benefits. Also Lega Nord, who had issued an amendment, joined themajority vote and rejecting its own proposal. The first version, drafted in the lower house, of the austerity measures envisaged cuts to MPs benefits which were harsher than those of the text passed by the Senate.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
OECD: Italy: OECD Forecasts Stagnant Italian Economy
Sharp year-end slowdown across G7 countries
(ANSA) — Rome, September 8 — Growth in Italy has reached a standstill, with the OECD estimating on Thursday that in the third quarter Italian GDP will fall by 0.1% and will rise in the fourth by 0.1%.
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development forecast for Italy falls below the average growth estimate in G7 countries for the same quarters, which is +1.6% and +0.2%.
“With respect to three months back the growth scenario looks much worse, one would say that growth is stagnating,” said OECD chief economist Pier Carlo Padoan. “We are witnessing a growth slowdown across OECD countries”.
Among the largest European countries, Germany would be hit especially hard. It is expected to have a GDP of +2.6% in the third but would dip by 1.4% in the fourth quarter.
The OECD figure measures growth on an annualised quarterly rate and the Paris-based organisation puts the margin of error at about one and half percentage points, which is abnormally high due to instability in the markets.
The forecast came a day after the International Monetary Fund cut its growth forecast for Italy for 2012 from 0.7% to 0.5% but left its GDP growth forecast for 2011 unchanged at 0.8%.
The Italian government has said the economy will grow by 1.1% this year and 1.3% next but an anonymous government source told the Reuters news agency earlier this week it would be hard to hit those targets.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Yes, Virginia, There is a Gender Gap
Yes, Virginia, there is a gender gap. In fact, there are two gender gaps: one bad and one good.
The bad gender gap is that the biggest losers in the Obama economy are men rather than women, a fact that is bad for men, for families, for the federal deficit and debt problems, and for the health of the U.S. economy. Men have lost twice as many jobs as women.
The 9.1 percent unemployment figure is not a good measure of the problem. The most important factor is that 20 percent of American men (one in five) are not in the workforce.
Those 20 percent are not all included in the unemployment figure. Some have just dropped out of the count and are no longer looking for a job, maybe depending on the paychecks of their wives, girlfriends, or parents; and some are drawing disability (a number that has doubled in recent years).
Most adults can remember the days when we had an economy where a man could work a job, professional or blue-collar, that paid well enough to support his wife as a full-time homemaker and buy a house for his family. Since millions of those good jobs have been outsourced to China and other low-wage countries, the husband is now lucky if he gets a $10-an-hour job and sends his wife out to look for a job.
We’ve lost an average of 50,000 manufacturing jobs every month over the last ten years. We are now supporting 44 million Americans on food stamps.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
10th Anniversary of 9/11: Time to Move on From Hate and Wars to Building Peace
Ten years ago this week, we witnessed the loss of thousands of lives during the horrific terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre. As Muslims we look back with sadness at what happened on September 11, 2001, it was undoubtedly an evil and criminal act of monstrous proportion. Muslims the world over have nothing to do with such an act of hate and destruction that drove the 9/11 bombers. Our prayers today are for the three thousand innocent lives lost, and thousands of other innocent men, women and children who have since lost their lives elsewhere as a result of the senseless wars unleashed in its wake.
On this anniversary, we recall with regret that this attack has been used to falsely accuse our cherished religion of Islam — a religion of humanity, being a target of irrational anger and hate, setting a global course of retaliatory action with little respect for human life, national sovereignty and rule of law. Terrorism is a crime and the perpetrators are not representatives of any faith, colour or race. A lot has changed in the last 10 years but one thing remains the same: ordinary Muslims have continued to live by the values that have always made them decent, hard-working and community-oriented citizens. These were the values shown at the recent riots, where Muslims joined with people of all faiths and none to restore normality in our communities. It has been a sad decade but has ended with grounds for optimism. It began with wars, more terror and even more lives lost. But it ended with Muslims in the Arab world demanding peace, democracy and the freedom to live their lives without fear and intimidation. The Arab Uprising was the best repudiation to the terrorists of 11 September 2001.
As we express our sympathy and solidarity to the families of all those who have lost their lives and suffered in 9/11 and since, let us honour their memory by rejecting the divisive agendas and placing our faith on our cherished values of global justice, freedom, and equality. We must redouble our efforts to achieve enduring solidarity amongst our diverse communities
[JP note: The only peace the Muslim Council of Britain believes in is a global Pax Islamica.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Caroline Glick: The War America Fights
Ten years ago, in the shadow of the crater at Ground Zero, the smoldering Pentagon and a field of honor in Pennsylvania, America found itself at war.
Today, a decade on, America is still at war.
Ten years after the September 11, 2001, attacks, the time has come to assess the progress of America’s war. But to assess its progress, we must first understand the war.
What war has the US been fighting since September 11?
President George W. Bush called the war the War on Terror. The War on Terror is a broad tactical campaign to prevent Islamic terrorists from targeting America…
| — Hat tip: Caroline Glick | [Return to headlines] |
Cliff Robertson, Actor Who Won Oscar for ‘Charly, ‘ Dies at 88
Cliff Robertson, the ruggedly handsome actor who won an Oscar for “Charly” and was consistently praised by critics but never quite reached the top echelon of movie stardom, has died at 88.
Mr. Robertson’s long movie career began with “Picnic” in 1955 and continued through “Spider-Man” and its first two sequels in the 21st century. He was also a familiar face in television dramas from the earliest days of the medium.
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High Schoolers Indoctrinated by UN’s Agenda 21
International Baccalaureate Diploma Program is Un- American
This is happening in Charleston, SC — a conservative area — so understand that if it’s happening here, it’s likely happening where you are. This article is about a program called IB Diploma, which as it turns out, is associated with the United Nations. It is right out of Agenda 21. You will be sickened by this. And, in most cases, I would bet that the parents of students enrolled in this program have no idea what their children are participating in. I also want to mention that it is not just the public schools participating here, in my research I discovered that students from two Catholic schools here are also participating. I’m appalled by this.
[…]
IB has a socio-political agenda pushing ideas that are counter to American values and culture, if not outright anti-American. It promotes a collectivist mindset. The American Dream is based on equal opportunities and personal responsibility, not social and environmental justice pushed by IB.
Some UNESCO mandates include a requirement to downplay nationality, social equity through redistribution of resources, and sustainable development by putting resources out of reach and redistributing others under the guise of social and environmental justice. The universal values taught by IB are NOT found in the Constitution, but rather in the United Nation’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Additionally, IB endorses the UN’s Earth Charter. Earth Charter is contrary to our Constitution. Earth Charter advocates redistribution of wealth between and within nations, same sex marriage, pantheism which equates God with the forces and laws of the universe, and military disarmament. The goal is to make the Earth Charter binding on all nations. These are not the Christian and American values I learned growing up in America . The Constitution provides for our Government to keep Americans safe which includes a strong military.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
New York, DC Beef Up Security in Face of ‘Credible’ Terror Threat
The two cities that were at the heart of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks are on high alert this weekend after the government received a “credible” tip that Al Qaeda plans to launch an attack on Washington or New York as the nation marks the 10th anniversary of 9/11.
Extra security is clearly visible on subways in both cities as officials are taking seriously a joint FBI, Homeland Security Intelligence Bulletin, first obtained by Fox News that states the timing and method of the potential terror plot.
“Al Qaeda possibly planned to carry out attacks…including a possible car bomb attack,” the bulletin reads.
Al Qaeda may have sent American terrorists or men carrying U.S. travel documents to launch the attack, government officials say.
One U.S. official says Al Qaeda dispatched three men, at least two of whom could be U.S. citizens, to detonate a car bomb in one of the cities. Should that mission prove impossible, the attackers have been told to simply cause as much destruction as they can.
Word that Al Qaedahad ordered the mission reached U.S. officials midweek. A CIA informant who has proved reliable in the past approached intelligence officials overseas to say that the men had been ordered by newly minted Al Qaedaleader Ayman al Zawahri to mark the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks Sunday by doing harm on U.S. soil.
The tipster says the would-be attackers are of Arab descent and may speak Arabic as well as English. Counterterrorism officials were looking for certain names associated with the threat, but it was unclear whether the names were real or fake.
Counterterrorism officials have been working around the clock to determine whether the threat is accurate, but so far, have been unable to corroborate it, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the investigation.
In the meantime, extra security was put in place to protect the people in the two cities that took the brunt of the jetliner attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon a decade ago. It was the worst terror assault in the nation’s history, and Al Qaedahas long dreamed of striking again to mark the anniversary. But it could be weeks before the intelligence community can say whether this particular threat is real.
Undaunted by talk of a new terror threat, New Yorkers and Washingtonians wove among police armed with assault rifles and waited with varying degrees of patience at security checkpoints Friday.
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Obama’s Defilement of 9/11
At the signing ceremony, President Obama said nothing about 9/11, except in passing. He expressed hope that the generation of young people “that came of age amidst the horrors of 9/11 and [Hurricane] Katrina, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, an economic crisis without precedent,” would come forward and volunteer to work for “change.”
Obama urged volunteers to participate “in the work of remaking this nation.” He conflated his Saul Alinsky-inspired neo-communist agitation as a community organizer in Chicago more than 20 years earlier with actual community service that helps people.
“All that’s required on your part is a willingness to make a difference. And that is, after all, the beauty of service. Anybody can do it. You don’t need to be a community organizer, or a senator, or a Kennedy or even a president to bring change to people’s lives.”
So it’s official: 9/11 isn’t about the murder of 3,000 innocent Americans by Islamic fanatics. It’s about, in Obama’s words, “solving today’s most pressing challenges: clean energy, energy efficiency, health care, education, economic opportunity, veterans and military families.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Tom Tancredo: Memo to Congress: Impeachment Probe Needed Now!
Barack Obama is indeed succeeding in his plans to “transform America,” but not in the way voters expected on Election Day in 2008. The number of the president’s actions that arguably qualify as impeachable offenses is staggering.
The question before the country is what to do about it.
True, Obama faces the voters in 14 months, and that will be seen by many as a reason to avoid the turmoil of an impeachment proceeding. But one process has nothing to do with the other. Elections proceed on an established calendar, but if he has committed acts that warrant removal by way of impeachment, that process should proceed independent of the election calendar. While impeachment must never be used to override an election victory, neither should the prospects of electoral defeat be used as an argument to avoid impeachment.
Obama has demonstrated contempt for the Constitution and is increasingly resorting to rule by decree. He is recognized by a growing number of Americans as a danger to the republic — certainly a danger to our liberties and also a serious threat to our national security.
It is time for the House of Representatives to take its constitutional responsibility seriously and launch an impeachment investigation. The investigative committee should hold hearings, collect and weigh the evidence, and then present its findings to the Congress and the nation.
Has Obama committed “high crimes and misdemeanors” that warrant impeachment and removal? There is much evidence that says, yes, he has.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
European Federalism and Comical Collins
by Andrew Lilico
During the late phases of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, no Iraqi government figure was more admired in the West than Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf. As the invasion proceded, he consistently and optimistically declared that the Iraqi army was winning the war. Even as the tanks rolled into Baghdad itself, gunfire could be heard across the city, and tank colums were visible to journalists assembled before him on the roof of the Palestine Hotel, he declared:”There is no presence of the American columns in the city of Baghdad at all. We besieged them and we killed most of them…Today, the tide has turned. We are destroying them.” His only speculation about tanks was that perhaps some Americans were coming in their tanks to surrender. This level of shameless, straight-faced denial made him a popular figure in the West, earning him the nickname “Comical Ali” and his face adorned many a t-shirt.
It is in this spirit, I think, that we must take Philip Collins’ remarkable article in today’s Times — “How weird is this Tory sovereignty obsession?” — in which he says Conservatives “cannot fathom that, as a political project, European federalism is dead”, that a “superstate” is “inconceivable”, and that the public will think of Conservatives as “mad as a box of frogs” if they claim otherwise! Like the Iraqi Information Minister, Comical Collins denies what can be seen simply by looking out of the window.
As with the Coalition invaders of 2003, Euro-federalism has already claimed all key strategic points. There is a civil service (the Commission), a legislature Parliament/Commission/Council of Ministers), a foreign diplomatic service (including foreign minister Baroness Ashton), a central bank, a supreme court, a currency union, a common trade policy, a common external tariff, free movement of people, capital and goods. Indeed, under the Lisbon Treaty the EU even has a formal status as a state, acceding to international Treaties in its own right. An EU military command and control structure is scheduled to be introduced, under existing provisions..
Now, the final few remaining fastnesses of sovereign states are being taken, as in response to the Eurozone crisis multiple senior policy-makers, including ECB president Jean Claude Trichet, and multiple bankers and economists have called for the establishment of a Eurozone treasury, probably accompanied by a Eurozone finance minister. Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy have called for “economic governance” for the Eurozone, including very significant curtailing of the discretion for individual Member States to borrow. And yet, as the Euro-federalist tanks are cheered with flowers into the final streets, Comical Collins declares that “European federalism is dead” and a “superstate” is “inconceivable”! One can only admire his resolution in the face of the facts.
Furthermore, we are long past the point at which any form of Eurozone arrangement that does not involve even greater political union than the plain-as-the-nose-on-your-face union there already is can survive. In this sense, matters are a little different from Baghdad 2003. If the Eurozone does not integrate further, it will almost certainly collapse, very probably bringing down the European Union with it. UBS, in a somewhat emotional piece a few days ago, claimed that this would lead to a 20-25% drop in GDP even for stronger states such as Germany, and contends that no paper currency union has ever broken down without civil war or the introduction of an authoritarian state. Personally I don’t go that far, but there would certainly be significant short-term consequences for the UK — probably a 5-10% further recession (as bad to twice as bad as that we had in 2008/9). And I agree there would be some risk of civil war or authoritarianism in some states (especially Greece).
Euro-federalism is not dead. It is nearing its peak. If it does not soon collapse under the weight of its own contradictions, it is about to be totally victorious. And, of course, the public knows this perfectly well. In the nicest possible way, Philip, though many of us might enjoy your Comical Ali impersonation, the person the public are going to think as “mad as a box of frogs” after this article is you.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Berlusconi: People’s Sovereignty in Hands of Judiciary
(AGI) Rome — While a guest of Atreju, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said, “The citizens have popular sovereignty, but the result of their vote is nullified. Popular sovereignty today no longer belongs to the citizens and parliament, but to judges in a democratic judiciary. I believe that it is not possible to accept this state of affairs. It is absolutely important to reform institutional architecture.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Culture Minister Announces Crackdown on Acts of Vandalism
(AGI) Rome — The Cabinet will soon examine a proposal to introduce harsher penalties for those engaging in acts of vandalism. Culture Minister Giancarlo Galan made the announcement while commenting on the recent defacement of the Fontana del Moro (Moor Fountain) in Rome’s central Piazza Navona. “Such acts of vandalism are nothing new, but how can we defend ourselves? First of all, by raising people’s awareness of the importance of our historical and artistic heritage.
Secondly, by introducing harsher penalties “ the minister told Tg1.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Naples Metro Line 1 Suspended After Theft of Copper Cables
(AGI) Naples- The Dante-University service on line 1 of Naples metro is down following the theft of copper power cables last night. Naples city council transport department announced that restoration of the service is dependent on the performance of extraordinary maintenance, which should be over by midday, and on the completion of police surveys.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Balotelli Summoned Over Visit to Naples Mafia District
Man City striker ‘inadvertently’ met Camorra mafia men
(ANSA) — Florence, September 7 — Italy striker Mario Balotelli has been summoned for questioning over a visit he made last year to a district in Naples notorious for drug trafficking and the activity of the local Camorra mafia.
According to prosecutors, the 21-year-old Azzurri and Manchester City player was accompanied by two “senior Camorra figures”.
Balotelli has always insisted he didn’t know who the men were who took him around Scampia, an area he was interested in because of its resemblance to the poor Palermo quarter where he grew up.
Asked about the summons ahead of last night’s 1-0 Euro 2014 qualifier win over Slovenia, Balotelli said “my conscience is clear” and he was looking forward to seeing prosecutors “serenely”.
The Italian media have likened Balotelli’s brush with the Naples Mob to former Napoli idol Diego Maradona’s occasional sightings with a Camorra boss.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Rome Fountain Vandal Arrested
Man admits Piazza Navona attack, failed Trevi Fountain assault
(ANSA) — Rome, September 5 — Italian police on Monday arrested a local man suspected of vandalising a fountain in the city’s landmark Piazza Navona and attempting to deface the capital’s beloved Trevi Fountain.
They said the man, 52, had admitted breaking off two heads of winged dragons from the Fountain of the Moor, the second most-famous work in the square after Renaissance master GIan Lorenzo Bernini’s Four Rivers Fountain.
Police said they identified the man from CCTV footage of the vandalism, which took place in the early hours of Saturday.
They said his heavy build and the distinctive white soles of his gym shoes had given him away.
At the time of his arrest the man was wearing the same clothes as on Saturday, police said, and was still exhibiting signs of “confusion”.
They did not say whether this appeared to be due to mental problems or the use of drugs or alcohol.
“He was switching from lucid moments to confused states,” they said.
The man, arrested in his home in Rome’s historic centre, was quoted as saying he wanted to “attract attention” because of “personal problems” due to legal cases.
The man also admitted the second attempted act of vandalism, throwing a brick at the Trevi Fountain later on Saturday, police said.
That much-loved landmark, of Three Coins in the Fountain fame, escaped unscathed.
The vandalism was the latest in a string of similar acts in Rome and gained international headlines. After the man’s arrest, Rome Mayor Gianni Alemanno hailed the police’s “swift” work and called for an “exemplary punishment”.
“Anyone who strikes an artistic monument is capable of any (kind of) violence or any madness, therefore there can be no clemency,” he said.
Restoration work on the Fountain of the Moor began Monday after the chunks of marble snapped off by the vandal were recovered.
The fountain was designed by Giacomo della Porta in 1575 and the statue of the Moor grappling with a dolphin, by Bernini, was added in 1653 along with four Tritons.
The original statues were moved to Villa Borghese in 1874 and replaced by copies.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Palma: Prisons Full But Still Room for Battisti
(AGI) Rome — “We’re at the limit of prison capacity with 67,500 inmates, but there is a spot for Cesare Battisti”. Justice Minister Nitto Francesco Palma made the statement while participating at the PdL Youth festival underway in Rome.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Lithuania: Basketball: A Question of Independence
Libération, Paris
The particular fervour gripping Lithuania, which is currently hosting EuroBasket 2011, is part of a long tradition in a Baltic country that has expressed its identity on the basketball court since Soviet times.
Willy Le Devin
Lithuania is absolutely basketball mad. Make no mistake about it: in this country, the sport is more than a game where you simply have to put the big orange ball into a basket. From Kaunas to Klaipeda, from Alytus to Marijampole, from Panevezys to the Nemen delta, Lithuanians will tell you that for many years, the aspiration for independence in the country was sustained by its pride in the sport.
So it is not surprising to see Lithuanian cars decorated with the country’s yellow, green, and red tricolour. Nor is there anything incongruous about the basketball shaped pizzas served in Lithuanian restaurants, or the hoops dominating playgrounds in the country’s smallest villages. Basketball is an essential component of Lithuanian identity, forged by bold acts of resistance that defied the Soviet ogre.
The Lithuanian love affair with the sport began in 1937, when the country, which often felt overshadowed by neighbouring Estonia and Latvia, won its first European Championship in Riga (Latvia). People here will tell you that the players spent dozens of hours returning home in a train which stopped in every small village so they could mingle with the crowds.
Soviet giant killers
But the popular jubilation was to be short-lived. In 1940, the invasion of Lithuania by Stalin’s troops paved the way for 50 years of inhuman occupation, marked by the deportation of political dissidents to Siberia and the tyranny of the KGB. Everything had to contribute to the greater glory of the USSR. Lithuanian players, who excelled on the basketball court but harboured nationalist sympathies, were blacklisted. So it was that magicians like Algirdas Linkevicius were never allowed to play wearing the CCCP strip.
As a result, Lithuania’s clubs took on the role of Soviet giant killers. Chief among them the legendary Zalgiris Kaunas and Statyba Vilnius, whose battles with CSKA Moscow, the Red Army club, were the object of unbridled passion. In the late 1980s, according to one spicy anecdote, 5,000 Lithuanian fans without tickets traveled to Moscow to watch the final of the Soviet championship between Zalgiris and CSKA. Warned of the arrival of this horde of troublemakers, Colonel Gomelsky, CSKA’s coach, made sure that all of the seats were distributed to Russian soldiers. Unfortunately for him, the Zalgiris supporters went on an afternoon tour of the city’s barracks, where they traded litres of vodka for the precious tickets. When the time came, the Moscow indoor arena was completely won over to the Kaunas cause. On another occasion, CSKA captain Sergei Tarakanov even received a photograph smeared with excrement!…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Mental Health: Survey Reveals a Mad and Sad Europe
A new survey reports that almost 40% of the population of Europe suffers from a mental disorder each year, writes the Irish Examiner. Along with depression, the survey by the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology includes in its ambit of mental disorders neural diseases like dementia and Parkinson’s. Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children, as well as panic attacks, obsessive-compulsive disorder and shyness, also form part of an impressive array of symptoms displayed by 165 million Europeans. “And with only about a third of cases receiving the therapy or medication needed, mental illnesses cause a huge economic and social burden — estimated at hundreds of billions of euro,” the Cork daily writes.
The Daily Telegraph singles out the fact that women are more than two-and-a-half times more likely than men to suffer from depression, “with most cases occurring during the “reproductive years” between the ages of 16 and 42.” According to the report, “The burden of trying to look after children, take responsibility for the family and hold down a job has seen rates of depression in women double since the 1970s.” While depression (30.3m overall) and anxiety (69.1m overall) seem to be disproportionately female ailments, men are more likely to become alcoholics (14.6m overall), particularly in eastern Europe.
For writer and novelist Lisa Appignanesi in the Guardian, such “worrying” reports “may draw attention to a rising toll of human suffering, but they pinpoint the imperialising tendency of the mental health sector.” Striking a sceptical note, she writes that the psychiatric professions have “spawned more and more diagnostic categories “inventing” disorders along the way and radically reducing the range of what can be construed as normal or sane. Meanwhile Big Pharma, feeding its appetite for profits and ours for drugs, has gained an ever greater hold over our mental and emotional lives, medicalising normality.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Paris Court Fines Galliano Over Anti-Semitic Behaviour
(AGI) Paris — John Galliano has been fined 6 thousand euros for Anti-Semitic insults and given a conditional discharge. The outre’ British fashion designer had been accused of using strong Anti-Semitic language about a couple in a Paris cafe.
The Paris court found him guilty of Anti-Semitic behaviour, despite his admission of being addicted to alcohol, sleeping pills and Valium.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Mayors: Med Railway Corridor Must be a Priority
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, SEPTEMBER 8 — A guide to stimulate the project of the Mediterranean railway corridor, so that it will be viewed as a priority by the Spanish government and Europe was agreed upon yesterday by the mayors of 11 cities on Spain’s Mediterranean area involved with the project. In the document signed by the mayors of Girona, Barcelona, Tarragona, Castellon, Valencia, Alicante, Murcia, Almeria, Granada, Malaga and Palma de Majorca, officials ask for the railway corridor to be included as a priority project in the trans-European transport network review, whose examination procedure by European authorities will begin midway through October. The document, inform sources from the Valencian government, will be sent to all regional, national and European parliamentary groups, as well as the municipal assemblies of the cities involved in the project, in order to obtain the maximum institutional support. The railway project was excluded from the previous review process in 2003 by the government of José Maria Aznar (PP), which did not request for it to be inserted into the trans-European transport network. The corridor, underlined the mayors of the 11 big cities which signed the document, involves an area that holds about 50% of the Spanish population, in addition to 55% of the national demographic growth, 45% of the GDP, and about 50% of European exports. The project will be necessary to connect Europe with “the large axis of global trade of goods channelled through the Suez Canal and Gibraltar, which connects the Far East and India to the United States and South America”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Remains of 6 Galleons of Plate Fleet Found
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, SEPTEMBER 7 — The legend of the treasure of Rande has survived the centuries intact, though the loot that has sunk to the bottom of the seas of the Vigo Strait and the St. Simon Inlet, inside Vigo Bay, in Galicia, does not contain any gold or silver. The treasure has inestimable historic and archaeological value, however. It is formed by the remains of at least six of the 25 galleons of the mythical Plate Fleet, which participated in the Battle of Rande on October 23 1702. The battle was fought between the Anglo-Dutch and the Hispanic-French coalition in the War if the Spanish Succession.
The Spanish galleons, loaded with treasures coming from America and escorted by French ships commanded by Francois Louis de Rousselet, count of Chateaurenault, entered the ‘ensenada’, the St. Simon Inlet, deep inside the fiord of Rande. But the ships were completely looted and sunk by admiral sir George Rooke, commander of the Anglo-Dutch fleet. To honour this success, a street in London is still named Vigo Street. Now, an expedition headed by marine archaeologist Javier Luaces in July has made it possible to identify three wrecks at a depth of 3 to 26 metres, and to locate “reliable remains” of three other galleons that belonged to the ‘Plate Fleet’. The results of the expedition were presented yesterday by Luaces in the Regional Council of Vigo. The goal is to classify the wrecks and study possibilities to recover them to exhibit them in a future Sea Museum or in a port in Galicia where an underwater museum is to be built. “One of the wrecks could be a French ship of 25 metres, another a galleon of 30 to 40 metres, well preserved,” explained the marine archaeologist, quoted by the press. The archaeological mission was organised after an agreement was closed between the Council of Galicia and the Culture Ministry, which is in charge of national heritage. The Ministry agreed with Javier Luaces who called the expedition, carried out by a team of five divers, “a success, beyond our best expectations.” A real archaeological treasure, considering the fact that it took several years of diving missions, carried out in the ‘90s by a team of 20 divers, and more recently in 2007, to find the wrecks of five other ships that took part in the Battle of Rande. New technologies have made it possible to make faster progress. Luaces has pointed out that he has explored evidence of the presence of more ships that have participated in the sea battle in 1702 and that the total number, together with the wrecks that were located earlier, could be around twenty galleons. It is certain that there is no gold or silver left on the ships, because the Fleet was looted by the winners of the battle. Still, the expedition leader does not rule out the possibility that some objects are found in the holds of the ships, representing enormous historic value. The traces that have been found are reason for optimism: parts of hulls or bows, cannon balls, anchors and ammunition that have survived sedimentation and erosion by the salt water.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Switzerland: Rail Takes Greater Share of Transalpine Cargo
The amount of freight carried through the Swiss Alps increased in the first six months of 2011, with rail continuing to increase its share.
There was an increase in both road and rail freight, with rail taking 64.1 per cent of the total as against 62.6 per cent in the same period in 2010, the transport ministry said on Thursday.
In all 7,513,000 tonnes went by road, and 13,432,000 by rail.
A record amount of “unaccompanied combined transport” — where drivers hand over vehicles or containers to continue the journey by train — crossed the Alps during that period.
But the growth in rail freight started to slacken in the second quarter. The “rolling highway”, which carries trucks between Freiburg in Germany and Novara in Italy, saw a slight drop in its business after having to cancel 60 trains — equivalent to about 1,000 trucks — because of a fire which temporarily closed the Simplon tunnel in June.
Overall the ministry attributed the slowdown to the sluggish economy in Europe and the weakness of the euro against the Swiss franc.
The amount of road freight was significantly up on the same period in 2010, reaching similar levels to 2007 and 2008. The Gotthard, with 481,000 trucks out of a total of 647,000 was by far the most popular route.
The government expects to complete its next transport report by the end of the year so that it can be submitted to parliament. It will contain a detailed analysis of long-term developments and make proposals about future policy.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UK Law Enforcement Favours Sharia Over Citizen Groups
US Readers: What you see in the UK is here now… UK: Tower Hamlets — Not Just Another Peaceful EDL Demo
In the run up to the EDL demonstration we saw the march banned, we saw the EDL misrepresented and attacked in the press, we faced scaremongering from the far-Left and then, at the last minute, we were forced to change our plans due to the threat of strikes by the RMT Union. And yet, despite all this, despite the efforts to sabotage our demonstration, and despite the frustrations that must have been felt, we managed to hold a peaceful protest. To everyone who attended — thank you.
Just two weeks after we embarrassed scaremongering local councilors in Telford by holding an entirely peaceful protest, we’ve once again proved that we have no desire to cause trouble, just a desire to exercise our democratic right to protest. There will be some critics who will continue to point to the efforts of the police as the only reason why there was only very few minor incidents. It is important to remember that alongside them, EDL Stewards did a fantastic job keeping an eye out for any potential trouble makers, and handed a couple of individuals over to the police.
But in battling to ensure a peaceful protest our focus was not on the need to control any unruly EDL supporters. Instead, our main focus was on combating the ludicrious (and dangerous) fabrications being spread by far-Left activists, fascists and radical Muslims: claims that we were intending to assault Muslims, that we were telling our supporters to attack Mosques, etc, etc.Behind the scenes we worked to disprove these accusations, and up and down the country our Division Leaders made sure that no one was under any illusions that our intentions would be anything other than peaceful.
If these accusations had any grounding in reality, we would have hoped that those making them would have informed the police, rather than incite trouble. As it happened, the police did receive intelligence that suggested that there might be parties in attendance who were intent on violence. But what the BBC, for one, may have failed to make clear was that these parties were not on the EDL side. No wonder Scotland Yard’s National Co-ordinator for Domestic Extremism, Adrian Tudway, recently stated that the EDL are not extreme, and that Muslim groups would do well to engage with us.
Perhaps if they understood some of the reasons why we were in Tower Hamlets, then hostility from the Muslim community could be avoided. Dialogue, as we will continue to say, is far more effective at ensuring ‘community cohesion’ than listening to provocateurs who claim that the only reasons we demonstrate are to divide communities, ‘spread hatred’, or incite violence. What an offensive thing to claim and, ironically, what an effective way of encouraging conflict.
The ability to exercise our democratic right to peaceful protest, in the face of people who would rather it were taken away, is of particular importance. Large numbers did come out in opposition to the EDL demonstration, but there will always be those who oppose freedom, or who are deceived by manipulative radical activists. Of the individuals present at the counter-demonstration, there was at least one man who may have had good reasons for opposing the EDL demonstration. He was Tower Hamlets Mayor Lutfur Rahman — the man sacked from the Labour Party because of his links with Islamic extremists, and a friend of UAF head Red Ken Livingstone. That a known extremist was able to play a part in the counter-EDL demonstrations says a great deal about what it was the UAF and other groups were there to oppose, and the fact that he is the mayor of the borough also says a great deal about the government’s failure to address radical Islam!
It appears that when it comes to ‘uniting against fascism’, the UAF have a bit of a blind spot for real fascism, preferring instead to promise to ‘smash’ those organisations that are dedicated to opposing extremism.. It’s possibly time they looked up the word ‘fascism’ in a dictionary. Despite the inevitable threats, encouraged by hateful and deceitful campaigns run by the ‘surprisingly-fascist’ far-Left, around 1,500 EDL supporters were not deterred and strode proudly into East London. For these supporters, it was important that our protest against radical Islam was not swept under the carpet, and that our voices were not silenced. Again, thank you.
Seeing as our supporters had gathered all over central London from as early as 9 in the morning, there wouldn’t have been many visitors to the capital who would have failed to hear the EDL and our message. Liverpool Street and Kings Cross stations were the two main gathering points and a tremendous noise was made at both, especially Kings Cross. God Save the Queen was belted out, loudly and proudly , on more than one occasion. Onlookers were eager to film us and tourists were delighted to finally see a bit of English culture in multicultural London. The last minute changes brought about by the RMT’s threat to close down stations caused some confusion at first, but the threat turned out to be an empty one with Tube staff being all too happy to assist us, and even giving us sole use of a platform at Kings Cross station in the run-up to the demonstration.
In the blistering heat, many bottles of water were visible and anti-extremists from across Europe converged on Aldgate. Flags were flying high: St George Crosses, Scottish Saltires, Union Flags, LGBT Rainbow flags, Stars of David and many more. Pleasantries were exchanged and the mood was a positive one: efforts to silence us had failed, and were ready to make clear our opposition to radical Islam and the government’s current ineffectual approach to dealing with it. The police was more relaxed than we might have expected, and did not feel it necessary to wear their riot helmets.
The world’s media were watching, and we’re certain that Tommy’s subsequent imprisonment will send shockwaves around the world. Kevin Carroll’s speech is also well worth a watch. In it he makes clear that our opposition is to radical or extremist Islam and that it is Sharia Law (and certainly not the EDL) that is ‘sick’. He also reaffirms our belief in Israel’s right to defend itself, thanks the police for the role they played, and reminds everyone of the importance of leaving peacefully:
As the protest came to an end, the EDL supporters were true to Kev’s wishes and left peacefully. We were escorted away from the demonstration via the iconic Tower Bridge; making for a spectacular sight. Hours of containment in extraordinary heat, with no access to toilet facilities or water, were beginning to take their toll. But unlike other protests that have taken place recently in London, we just got on with it, without feeling the need to riot (unlike Muslim youths last year), or cause any criminal damage (unlike the ‘protestors’ during the recent riots). We’re particularly thankful to the staff of Bet Fred, who helped us with water supplies and allowed us to use their toilets (and in return we resisted the urge to loot anything.)
[…]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: ‘Shocked’ Cumbrian Man Shouted Racist Abuse After Girlfriend Hit by Car — Court
A Wigton man has told a court he was so shocked after his girlfriend was hit by a car that he shouted racist abuse at a man on the street.
George Woodburn, 37, used foul language towards an Asian male — thought to be a waiter at Teza restaurant on Botchergate, Carlisle — moments after a car hit his girlfriend as they crossed the road nearby….
Woodburn later told officers he acted the way he did because he was extremely upset.
Representing himself, Woodburn pleaded guilty to a charge of racially aggravated harassment but told magistrates: “I am not racist. I was in a lot of shock. I apologise.”
Magistrates fined Woodburn £400 plus £85 costs and £15 victim surcharge.
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: ‘Timebomb’ Fear as ‘Rationing by Stealth’ of Operations Hits NHS
“Rationing by stealth” is hitting the NHS, the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) has claimed, after official figures were released showing a steep fall in the number of people referred to hospital by GPs.
Professor Norman Williams, president of the RCS, described the figures as “extremely disturbing”.
He said: “These data provide further evidence that rationing by stealth is occurring across the NHS.
“Such a steep reduction in the number of referrals by GPs suggests that patients are being given limited access to specialist clinical advice and could be missing out on treatments.”
He went on: “If correct this is extremely concerning for surgeons across the NHS.
“Stopping referrals is only storing up problems for the future — a timebomb which will end up costing the NHS and taxpayer more in the long-term.
“The rise in waiting times for orthopaedic surgery is an indicator that demand for surgery is not reducing and that the issue of rationing needs to be addressed. It will not go away.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: A Glimpse Into the Class Hatred at the Heart of the Anti-EDL Clique
This video currently causing a stink on Twitter, rather confirms what draws many young middle-class liberals towards anti-English Defence League campaigning: it provides them with a semi-legit cover for expressing their fear and loathing of the white working classes..
In the video, two well-bred kids say things about working-class EDL supporters that could have been lifted straight from the pages of John Carey’s The Intellectuals and the Masses, that exposé of early twentieth-century snobs’ disdain for vulgar little people. The anti-EDL campaigners describe a female supporter of the EDL as “the most tattooed, horrible scrote of a woman” they have ever seen and then laugh as they talk about how she was “kicked up the arse” by a left-wing protester. It’s not normally okay to hit women, they admit, but you can make an exception when it comes to female EDL supporters because “they aren’t women — they’re dogs”.
The video has proved enormously embarrassing for Left-wing campaigners against the EDL, who are desperately trying to distance themselves from the naked class hatred expressed by these two twits. Yet the fact is that a great deal of anti-EDL protesting is driven by a barely disguised hatred for that apparently ugly, uncouth, un-PC blob of white flesh that inhabits inner-city council estates. The two guys in the video have only stated it in a more explicit fashion.
So Laurie Penny rails against the men in the video for their “class snobbery”, yet only last week she was doing her best impersonation of Edith Sitwell and referring to EDL marchers as a “bedraggled, sweaty rabble”. That kind of language is deployed all the time against the EDL. Liberal hacks and campaigners claim to hate EDL supporters because of their politics, yet they always seem to end up talking more about these people’s bellies and tattoos and drinking habits and propensity to sweat rather than what they actually think or say. It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that this is moralistic disdain for Certain People dolled up to look like a principled political campaign. Read any article about the EDL and you’ll be left with the distinct impression of the white working classes as whiffy and racist, always a “mob” rather than marchers, always a “rabble” rather than a collective.
Whatever you think of the EDL (being a hugely pro-immigration type, I am opposed to it), it’s becoming increasingly clear why Leftists have leapt upon this small political grouping and blown its threat out of all proportion — because campaigning against the EDL provides them with a PC platform from which to express their disappointment and/or disgust with the white masses.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Cameron’s Dismissal of Israel
Government ministers might be concerned to know quite how often I am now accosted by strangers in public places. These strangers are usually, although not always, Jews. They accost me on the Tube, at the theatre, in the supermarket, in restaurants and in the street. They all say the same thing: keep on saying it about Israel, keep on telling it as it is, don’t ever give up. What is happening to us? they murmur. It’s unbelievable, astonishing, terrifying. The bias, the hatred, the lies. Where is it all going to end? And an increasing number say there’s no longer any future for us Jews in Britain.
Almost every few days brings fresh examples of the Israel Derangement Syndrome that so disturbs and frightens them. Last week, anti-Israel hooligans disrupted a Promenade concert where the Israel Philharmonic was playing, causing the BBC to abort its live broadcast. Last month, a St Andrews University student was convicted of racially abusing a Jewish postgraduate student over his support of Israel. And week in, week out, Israelis are blamed for defending themselves against mass murder.
By now, it must be obvious to all but the most supine or hostile to Israel within the UK Jewish community that what is happening is an evil uniquely targeted at the Jewish people.
For the demonisation of Israel is of a nature and type extended to no other country. While atrocities by tyrannies and rogue states provoke almost total indifference, Israel is treated as in a class apart: apparently the very worst country in the entire world, a kind of global blight which has to be expunged altogether from civilised society if not from the face of the earth.
Sound familiar? Oh, sorry, I forgot. Part of the madness is that we are totally forbidden to identify what this actually is — a prejudice directed solely at the Jewish people, who in this latest manifestation are uniquely demonised as usurpers in their own historic homeland. Few government minsters grasp the nature and scale of what is happening. Most don’t think there is a problem, and many of those who do think it is Israel’s own fault. Ministers would be amazed and appalled to know how many British Jews now feel so betrayed and abandoned. That’s because ministers tend to meet only those Jews who tell them that anyone who thinks like that can be safely disregarded as an hysteric, extremist or right-winger.
They would be even more appalled to be told that they themselves play a significant part in fuelling the madness.
They maintain — and probably genuinely believe — that the British government is a true if candid friend of Israel. To which one can only say: with friends like these who needs enemies? Actually, it’s more like having a close relationship with someone suffering from multiple personality disorder. For there is no doubt that at the military and intelligence level, Britain’s relationship with Israel is close and mutually supportive. British spooks and soldiers tend to understand very well the immense benefit to the UK of Israel’s intelligence and military prowess.
The problem lies at the political level. While many Tory backbenchers support Israel, the government — with some very honourable exceptions — is hostile. So much so that a group of Tory MPs and others in the party who are well-disposed to Israel have reportedly formed an informal group to prevent David Cameron from throwing Israel under the bus altogether.
This group has become very alarmed by the government’s repeated sniping against Israel, such as Cameron’s calculated gesture of hostility in stepping down as patron of the JNF.
And then there was last month’s video by International Development Minister Alan Duncan, in which he made false and inflammatory claims that, through its security barrier, Israel was annexing the Palestinians’ land and was also stealing their water.
First, the Foreign Office briefed that Duncan was only stating British government policy; later, it seemed to distance itself from his remarks. But the fact is that, despite his grossly ignorant and prejudiced rant, Duncan is still in post. Why? Because the callow and opportunistic Cameroons are blank slates upon which can be written the fashionable bigotry and historical illiteracy of our times. The Cameron government did not create the madness now raging against Israel. It could, however, control it by standing up for truth and justice against lies and prejudice. Tragically, it is choosing to fan the flames of ignorance and hatred instead.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Cameron Speaks Frankly on Al Jazeera About Past Mistakes in Response to 9/11 and His Optimism for the Arab Spring
In an interview with Sir David Frost on Al Jazeera last night, David Cameron conceded that Britain and the US lost some “moral authority” over their response to the 9/11 attacks.
The interview, conducted to coincide with the 10th anniversary of the September 11th attacks, focused in part on the events of 2001, and the response to the events, but also the response to the Arab Spring and terrorism now. Cameron’s tentative criticism, that Britain and the US “lost some moral authority” came with an acknowledgement of the “immense pressure” that both the British and US governments were under at a time. He referred to the “mistakes made” at Guantanamo Bay in particular, saying that “we have to be careful not to rush immediately to judgment”.
In an important lesson for the future, Cameron spoke of how the military intervention in Libya, unlike the response in Iraq, “was led by the Libyan people, backed by the Arab League, sanctioned by the United Nations. It wasn’t an occupying army” with backing from the international community and international law.
This said, Cameron refused to fall into the trap of heaping blame on previous governments, and their responses to the attacks. He said:
“Remember how many British people, how many French people, how many Germans, how many people of all nationalities were killed on September 11th. All of those governments and the American Government, if you remember go back to that time, were thinking this is going to happen again. This is going to happen very quickly. Maybe it’ll be a chemical or biological attack.”
Cameron also spoke optimistically about the Arab Spring, where he described people in Egypt, and Libya “seizing an alternative to the poisonous narrative of the extremists” and that “the spread of democracy and rights” was the trend rather than the “spread of extremism.” In comments that echoed Robert Fisk, on the death of Osama bin Laden, who described bin Laden as a “non entity” and Al Qaeda “politically defeated”, Cameron stated “Al Qaeda’s [has] had almost nothing to do with the Arab Spring. They’ve been irrelevant.”
With reference to Libya, the Prime Minister was also asked about the torture of Hakim Belhaj, and the maltreatment he received from the British side. Cameron stated that:
“Britain does not torture people. We do not believe in torture. We think torture is wrong. It is always wrong. The information you glean from torture is completely unreliable but torture is morally wrong in any case.”
Cameron promised that he would “set up a proper judge-led inquiry into allegations that Britain was somehow complicit in torture, or complicit in rendition and that inquiry will be able to go through all the cases, including this Libyan case, to get to the truth.”
You can read the full transcript of the interview here. The interview can also be watched here.
[JP note: The choice of al-Jazeera for the PM’s 9/11 interview is an indication of the UK’s special relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood — the UK no longer looks West, but East.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Gangsta Salute for ‘Fallen Soldier’ Mark Duggan Who Sparked Riot
In chilling scenes, youths dressed in black and baseball caps lined Tottenham’s streets with their arms outstretched in a “gangsta salute” to “fallen soldier” Mark Duggan.
The 29-year-old father of four — whose street nickname was “Starrish Mark” — was said to be a member of a postcode crew called The Star Gang.
His coffin, in a white carriage pulled by four plumed white horses, was adorned with flowers and wreathes spelling out the words “grandson”, “son” and “Dad”.
Grieving relatives, friends and well-wishers — including young men in sunglasses — arrived to pay their respects. More than 1,000 mourners packed into the church.
Outside at least 200 more congregated to listen to the 90-minute service broadcast on giant speakers.
The air was thick with the smell of cannabis.
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Hague Being ‘Held Back by Lib Dems’ On Europe
Foreign Secretary William Hague has said he would like more powers returned to the UK from Europe. He suggested the UK could “get ahead” by being distant from the European Union in areas other than the euro. But Mr Hague said the presence of the Liberal Democrats in the coalition government meant he had not been able to do exactly as he wanted on Europe. He told the Times: “It’s an area we’ve had to compromise on in return for other compromises.”
Mr Hague’s comments come after some Conservative MPs accused Prime Minister David Cameron of listening too much to Deputy PM Nick Clegg’s pro-Europe views. Some 100,000 people have signed a petition calling for a referendum on EU membership, enough signatures to trigger consideration of a parliamentary debate on the issue. And about 80 Tory MPs are currently preparing to discuss ways of pressing for a renegotiation of the UK’s position.
On Monday, they are expected to attend the first meeting of a new umbrella group designed to air grievances over Europe and build a platform for influencing government policy.
The gathering is designed to create a focused strategy out of different Conservative concerns and demands for action, ranging from changes to EU institutions such as the European Court of Justice, the repatriation of powers to the UK and outright withdrawal from the EU. Mr Hague, who fought a highly eurosceptic general election campaign in 2001 as the then Conservative leader, suggested to the Times that the UK might stand apart from the rest of Europe in areas other than the euro. He said: “It’s true of the euro, it could be true of more areas in future. In fact we may get ahead as a result of being outside.” The foreign secretary also expressed sympathy towards Tory Eurosceptics who have challenged the prime minister, saying it was certainly not “career suicide” to take their position.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Kicking Whites Out of Football — Clubs to be Forced to Appoint Black Managers to Combat ‘Racism’
Football clubs could be forced to interview black candidates when appointing managers, if the Professional Footballers’ Association, anti-white groups, and black former footballers with chips on their shoulders get their way.
New rules would make it mandatory for clubs to interview at least one black candidate for any managerial post in the football league, in which there are currently ‘only’ two black or mixed-race managers, Chris Hughton and Chris Powell.
The measures would replicate those already in place in the United States, where the ‘Rooney Rule’ obligates American football teams to consider black candidates for coaching jobs, or face heavy fines.
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Muslims Attack EDL Bus in London, EDL Members Arrested
A mob of angry “Asians” — the media’s code-word for Muslims — in England attacked a busload of members of the English Defense League who were traveling through an Muslim neighborhood in London on their return from a rally. The “Asians” launched rocks and bottles at the bus, which broke down in the dangerous place, and then attacked a white woman who exited the bus. Police arrested the victims of the attack and not the attackers. The sudden upsurge of hornet-like violence is yet another sign the EDL is hitting a nerve. It is protesting the Islamization of England, and the “Asians” don’t like it. During the past three years, Muslims have repeatedly called for Sharia law in England, and one radical suggested that Muslims should kill the royals at the recent nuptials of Prince William and Kate Middleton.
[…]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Miliband’s New Adviser in 75m Celebrity Tax Probe
Ed Miliband has hired a controversial tax expert whose ‘celebrity loophole’ schemes are being investigated by HM Revenue & Customs.
Patrick McKenna, 55, who will advise Labour on the ‘creative industries’, recruited dozens of high-profile figures including Wayne Rooney, Steven Gerrard and Jeremy Paxman to pump money into a fund giving tax benefits to those investing in films.
Under a complex scheme devised by Gordon Brown as Chancellor, investors could slash their tax bills if they used their money to back the industry. It resulted in more than £2billion being ploughed into productions each year, but led to claims that a ‘phantom film industry’ had been generated, with no-hoper productions being made purely for the financial advantages they offered backers.
The scheme, now outlawed, worked by persuading wealthy individuals to form a partnership with producers to put money into films. Investors could claim tax relief against virtually the total sum ploughed into the film by the partnership, not just the amount they personally put in.
For example, if a celebrity put in £100,000, it would be matched by £200,000 from the other backers — and the celebrity could claim tax relief on the full £300,000. They had 15 years to pay back the rebate, during which time they could invest the money cleverly to raise more than they owed.
Last night a spokesman for Ingenious Media said: ‘The routine HMRC investigation has not yet reached the conclusion of the process. However, we remain confident of a positive outcome.’
A Labour spokesman said: ‘To suggest that it is improper for him to advise the Labour Party on the creative industries is simply ridiculous.’
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Media Blackout on EDL Leader’s Six Day-Long Hunger Strike
The BBC reported this week that Shaker Aamer, a “close associate” of Osama bin Laden, and the “remaining British detainee” at Guantanamo Bay prison, is on hunger strike. You might be surprised to learn, then, that the leader of the controversial anti-Islamist movement Tommy Robinson has also been on hunger strike for the past week, in a British prison. The mainstream media regularly reports on events and personalities of the EDL, and journalists and “anti-fascist” organizations also regularly scour its Facebook pages, looking for potential stories. They could hardly have missed the information about Mr. Robinson’s detention or refusal to eat, then. However, not one mainstream newspaper has reported or commented upon Mr. Robinson’s hunger strike.
| — Hat tip: A. Millar | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Phantom Patients Net GPS Millions: How Dishonest Doctors Claim NHS Cash for Dead Patients and Non-Existent Treatments
Dishonest GPs are defrauding the taxpayer of millions of pounds by claiming money for ‘ghost patients’.
Some family doctors are retaining the details of patients who have died or left the country so they still receive annual NHS payments of up to £100 for every person registered with them.
In a separate scam, there is evidence of surgeries inserting bogus information on genuine medical records to claim vast sums of NHS cash for check-ups that never take place.
One investigation suggested there could be as many as 3.5million ‘ghost patients’ at surgeries in England — many of whom have been dead for up to 20 years. Now the Audit Commission has launched a fresh probe aimed at lifting the lid on illicit practices feared to cost the taxpayer more than £100million a year.
Last night Dr Jayanti Singh spoke only briefly at her £1.25million detached home.
She said: ‘The investigation which has been going on has not been proved. We have actually resigned our contract to run the practice.’
Asked whether more than 1,000 of her patients lived overseas, and others were dead, she said: ‘No, no, no.’
Last night, Dr Laurence Buckman, of the British Medical Association, said: ‘I am amazed that this could take place for so long. If these GPs have been keeping patients’ records when they shouldn’t be, then it is fraud.’
The pay of GPs has soared since the introduction by Labour in 2004 of a ‘bungled’ new contract. Many are now on salaries in excess of £250,000.
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Postal Workers Refuse to Deliver Bible Recordings Because the Cds Are ‘Offensive’
Postal workers refused to deliver CDs of Bible readings after deciding they were ‘offensive material’.
Several churches had paid for discs with recordings of St Mark’s Gospel to be produced to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible.
They were due to be delivered to all households on the Channel Island of Jersey, but church leaders were stunned when they were told postal workers would not handle the 45,000 CDs.
Rev Liz Hunter of St Helier Methodist Centre said: ‘Initially Jersey Post seemed quite positive about helping us deliver the CDs.
‘But then a couple of weeks ago somebody from their marketing department phoned to say they would be unable to deliver them on the grounds that they could be deemed offensive.
‘They said there were guidelines about mass material that is sent out across the island and that religious recordings could offend people.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The PSC [Palestine Solidarity Campaign] Is the EDL of the Left
It is entirely possible to oppose the particular policies of specific Islamist political parties, or the conduct of hate preachers, without inciting hatred against Muslims. However, the English Defence League — despite its claims to the contrary — routinely promotes anti-Muslim bigotry.
[…]
[Reader comment by James on 9 September 2011, 11:05 pm]
EDL supports democracy.
EDL support the UN Declaration of Human Rights.
EDL opposes terrorism.
EDL does not organise boycotts of muslim businesses.
EDL does not say that muslims should be deported.
EDL does not have the support of the anti-semitic liberal-left.
EDL does not have the support of all the large trade unions.
So, in what way is EDL like PSC? Or is the level of analysis on Harry’s Place simply assertion? Pathetic. But then I’d expect nothing more from Alan A. “Can you imagine the outcry if the English Defence League had a fringe meeting at the Tory Party conference? And if it were attended by MPs and senior Tory figures?” What we have here is an attempt by Alan A. to embarass the Labour Party with this outstandingly weak analogy. And the very unlikelihood of his imagined embarassing scenario shows that even he does not believe his own lies.
As EDL goes from strength to strength, the support for Israel in Britain will increase — just like Geert Wilders’ PVV is making the Dutch government invest rather than divest in Israel. And when the tables are turned on the PSC, it won’t be due to the years of failed efforts by those who run Harry’s Place. In the last 12 months alone EDL has had a demo in support of Israel, and often been outside Ahava to oppose the anti-semitic (national) socialist scum of the PSC.
The effete old duffers of HP just fight from behind their keyboards. I’ve stood alone with one jew and faced down 3,000 commies and muslims on a “Free Gaza” demo, getting threats of being knifed from “the religion of peace” no support from the police. Throughout the 4 or 5 hours that we stood our ground and argued the case for Israel (just weeks after the Mavi Marmara), frail and elderly jews came up to us and thanked us for what we were doing. Some of them had survived the gas chambers. We were also thanked by elderly WW2 veterans. For what it’s worth, I’m disabled and no spring chicken — but even some of the commies who opposed us that day commended our bravery. And perhaps on hearing their muslim allies say “one day we will take over all of Israel and eat every man, woman and child”, perhaps that day they realised they were supporting the wrong people..
These duffers at HP seem to be incapable of making the connection between increased support for islam on the left with the left’s increased hostility to jews and Israel. Considering that the entire body of left-wing activists hate Israel is enough to make me turn my back on the left. But not for the duffers of HP, whose egos are too bound to their past mistakes.
Sigh. Some of the people who run this site truly disgust me. I’d rather be compared to Anders Breivik than the PSC.
[JP note: Hats off to James.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Liberal Democrats Aren’t Especially Liberal — or Even Democratic
The junior Coalition partner’s policies have made a mockery of its historic name.
If the Liberal Democrats didn’t exist, under what circumstances would you choose to create them? I’ll assume that it’s the “Liberal” bit of their historical accident of a name that matters (not many anti-democrats run for election these days). If we did feel the need for a Liberal Party, I guess it would be because neither the Labour nor Tory organisations were being sufficiently, well, liberal in their policy-making.
Ten years of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown making illegal anything that moved, while repeatedly trying to give the state the power to lock us up without charge for longer and longer periods? Yes, I can see a need for some more liberalism; that there could be a useful role for a party to react viscerally against Labour’s criminalising tendencies. Ten years of Margaret Thatcher? I’m hardly one to criticise my political hero, but I can’t deny that prolonged exposure to her governing style might make a voter yearn for something a little less prescriptive; a little more laissez-faire in matters social. Regardless of your own political disposition, then, I don’t think it’s hard to make the case that political space could exist for a party which prioritised the autonomy of the individual over either stateist or corporatist collectivism.
Now imagine that you are a Liberal Democrat. Your organisation has been in the wilderness for 80 years, since the time of Lloyd George. The general election of 2010 gives you the chance to share government with the Conservatives; this is the first time in recent history that an administration will have a serious Liberal presence. How would you behave? Me, I would be bending over backwards to demonstrate that not only is a liberal instinct a useful one to bring to the art of government, but that it also makes sense to have that instinct embodied by my organisation. Anyone anyone can call themselves a “liberal”. The trick is to convince voters that such an instinct requires a party to carry it.
Instead, what has happened? Andrew Lansley’s Health Bill, which made a tentative step towards liberalisation of health provision in the UK, is first of all postponed, and then watered down, largely at the behest of the Lib Dems. Even after the Bill passed the Commons this week, Baroness (Shirley) Williams and the dis-elected ex-MP Evan Harris continued to mutter darkly and publicly about their inability to support it. Lib Dems ensured that the planned GP consortia — supposed to act for us, the patients — will include hospital doctors and nurses; a prioritisation of the producer over the patient. Unelected peer and dis-elected ex‒MP — I withdraw my opening remarks about the party’s name: they’re not even democratic, let alone liberal.
Also this week, Nick Clegg gave a speech about the Coalition’s flagship free schools. These schools are the last, best hope of those children failed by local education authorities. Academic excellence through freedom of choice: what could be more liberal than that? Instead, Mr Clegg chose to focus on the importance of preventing anyone running such a school from making a profit — profit is bad, apparently, because successful schools might use the money to expand — and went out of his way to support an even greater role for councils — the LEAs — in controlling access. In a straight choice, the Lib Dem leader prioritises the producer interest.
I could go on. Lib Dems also want to delay the election of local police commissioners. Anti-democratic again; and when was denying a voice to the people a “liberal” characteristic? And I’ve not mentioned the party’s support for the Human Rights Act, largely because it defies parody, let alone analysis. “Votes for prisoners”, say Lib Dems. It’s not quite the heady fight of the People’s Budget of 1909, is it?
Ah yes, say Lib Dem activists, but think of all the good we bring to the Coalition. When pressed, they trumpet the lack of recognition of marriage in the tax system. I’m not clear why it’s liberal to penalise the natural pair-bonding affinity of human mammals, but there you are. They also claim to have secured the increase in the personal allowance for the poorest taxpayers, as well as the retention — thus far — of the 50p top rate.
The 50p top rate is economically illiterate, and needn’t detain us. Symbolism does matter, though, and if keeping it there for a few months longer means that those such as Simon Hughes (“Champion of University Access”, no less) continue to vote with the Government, so be it. But did we need the Lib Dems to make the case for the increase in personal allowances? Tories have campaigned against the complex and inefficient recycling of income from the poor, to the government, and then back to the poor, for years. More importantly, the Right-wing view of tax (to reduce it wherever possible) is truly liberal, because it seeks to free people from state dependency. Lib Dems view tax as an instrument of social engineering; hence the posturing over 50p.
Eighty years in the wilderness, 80 years protecting the flame, and they can’t even mount a coherent case for electoral reform (“AV is a miserable little compromise” — Nick Clegg. But then: “Vote for AV” — Nick Clegg). Measured as the opportunity to show that British liberalism deserves the vehicle of its own party, coalition has been a disaster for the Lib Dems.
We have to face up to this political category error. Just because we can all agree that there’s a need for some liberalism in our politics, just because some unpopular politicians have given themselves that name, we’ve taken the Liberal Democrats at their own valuation. But Shirley Williams and Evan Harris are not liberals, and nor are the other former leaders and big Lib Dem beasts who haunt the media airwaves with a greater prominence than the paucity of their electoral support could ever justify.
Not that a political position has to be popular in order to be worth holding; and if a party wants to act as a pressure group for the producer interest in health and education, or as a supporter of judicial activism on Human Rights, or to call for ever-greater European integration (as Danny Alexander did this week), then good luck to it. But it shouldn’t mis-name itself.
Where the Lib Dems have been politically effective in the Coalition, they have been anything but liberal. And when they claim to be liberal, they are merely copying policy which the larger party would implement anyway. Neither tactic makes them a worthwhile coalition partner for a Conservative; worse, from the Lib Dem point of view, neither tactic has demonstrated that the 80 years without them were a political loss for Britain. If the Liberal Democrats didn’t already exist, to answer my opening question, I suspect that few would contemplate breathing life into the politically unattractive, social democratic clay from which they are fashioned. We already have a party to represent the sectional producer interest. It’s called “Labour.”
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Telford Child Sex Case Collapses
THE TRIAL OF seven Shropshire men facing a series of allegations involving sexual exploitation and child prostitution collapsed this afternoon after running for more than three months.
Judge Robin Onions formally discharged the jury from returning verdicts on a total of 49 charges at Stafford Crown Court today.
The decision by Judge Onions was made for legal reasons and followed a series of submissions by defence barristers.
The jury was sworn in on May 16, but the opening of the trial was delayed by legal discussions until June 13. From August 19 there was a pre-arranged break in the trial until September 2 when defence counsel each made applications to the court over the case’s future.
Over the 15 weeks the trial has run the court was in session for 70 days during which time there were a series of legal arguments and the jury heard evidence from just six of the prosecution witnesses.
The Crown Prosecution Service must decide whether to seek re-trials for the defendants. The seven alleged victims were aged 13 to 17 at the time the offences were said to have been committed between September 2007 and December 2009.
Ahdel Ali, 23, his brother Mubarek Ali, 28, and Noshad Hussain, 21, all of Regent Street, Wellington; Mohammed Ali Sultan, 24, of Victoria Avenue, Wellington; Tanveer Ahmed, 39, of Urban Gardens, Wellington; Mahroof Khan, 33, of Caradoc Flats, Wellington; and Mohammed Islam Choudhrey, 52, of Solway Drive, Sutton Hill, Telford, denied a total of 47 charges between them relating to sexual exploitation and child prostitiution.
Mohammed Ali Sultan and Ahdel Ali also both denied a charge of rape.
Before being discharged, on the direction of the judge, the jury returned formal not guilty verdicts on a charge of sexual activity with a child against Mohammed Ali Sultan and charges of meeting a child following sexual grooming against Mahroof Khan and Tanveer Ahmed.
Judge Onions directed the case should be listed at Shrewsbury Crown Court on September 20 when the position of the prosecution would be reviewed.
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: William Hague: Britain Could Benefit From Looser EU Ties
William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, has said that Britain could benefit by loosening its ties with Europe.
Mr Hague also said that he welcomed the debate on the issue provoked by increasingly vocal Conservative backbench MPs. He said, in an interview published today, that it would “certainly not [be] career suicide” to become linked to a new group that wants a shift in Britain’s relationship with Europe. Mr Hague suggested that Britain might do better by setting itself apart from the continent in the same way that it had done over the issue of the single currency. “It’s true of the euro, it could be true of more areas in future. In fact we may get ahead as a result of being outside,” Mr Hague said. He said the creation of the eurozone without closer tax and spending rules was “always a giant mistake” and it “would stand as a monument in time to how group-think can go so seriously away from what is realistic”.
David Cameron has come under increasing pressure to hold an “in or out” referendum on Europe. Earlier this week a 100,000-name petition was delivered to Downing Street, enough to trigger consideration of a parliamentary debate on the issue. Mr Cameron insisted there was “no case to answer” on membership, adding: “I want us to be influential in Europe about the things that matter to our national interest — promoting the single market, pushing forward for growth, making sure we get lower energy prices.”
On Monday a group of 80 new intake Tory MPs will meet to discuss what reforms they want. Backbencher George Eustice, one of the group’s conveners, said: “The aim of this new group is to promote debate about creating a new relationship with the EU and reversing the process of EU integration.” Mr Eustice has said that the eurozone crisis has given Britain the opportunity to press for change. Mr Hague said members of the new group would be welcomed into his office any time. He said he was “clearly” in favour of repatriating powers from Brussels, but that it was an area on which there had been necessary compromise in the Coalition with the Liberal Democrats. Danny Alexander, the Liberal Democrat Chief Secretary to the Treasury, has warned Tory MPs not to exploit the eurozone crisis to force a referendum on the issue of EU membership. But Nigel Farage, the leader of Ukip, has said there was “great anger” at Mr Cameron’s failure to offer a vote.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Walsall Man Arrested for Wearing Balaclava Dons Burkha to Court
A PROLIFIC thief arrested for wearing a balaclava and gloves arrived at court in a burkha to protest his innocence.
Posing for pictures outside Cannock Magistrates Court, Walsall man David Holmes said: “I’m not against the burkha, it’s the principle. Why can I wear this and not a balaclava?
“It’s the same thing. The police only arrested me because of my previous convictions. They are abusing their powers,” he added.
The 30-year-old construction worker was asked to remove the Islamic garment by the court clerk as he entered the dock.
He was subsequently found not guilty of ‘being equipped for theft’ after magistrates accepted his defence that he only wore the balaclava to annoy police.
The court heard that Holmes, of Beechdale, Walsall, was arrested just before midnight on July 20 after being spotted on CCTV cameras in Cannock shopping centre in a balaclava and gloves, accompanied by a male friend.
Police chased the two men through the town centre but only managed to catch Holmes.
He was not found to be carrying any tools, such as a screwdriver or hammer, associated with burglary.
Holmes said he purposefully wore the balaclava to antagonise police who had been “harassing” him since he was released from prison in May.
The seasoned convict, who admitted before court that he had been charged with around 60 offences during his lifetime, had been most recently serving a 16-month jail term for conspiracy to burgle.
He said that since his release, police had raided his home twice, stopped and searched his car five times and repeatedly knocked on his door at 4am to make sure he was not breaking his curfew.
“I was even stopped on my way to court today,” Holmes told the court. “It’s caused my a lot of stress.
“I wanted to get back at the police. It’s common knowledge there are at least 30 CCTV cameras in Cannock so I deliberately walked around there in a balaclava.
“I didn’t think I’d get arrested. I thought they’d stop and search me and then let me go.”
Finding Holmes not guilty, chair of the magistrates bench Hirendra Ravel said: “We cannot be sure beyond reasonable doubt that you intended to commit a theft.”
In a dramatic twist, the expectant father was re-arrested as he left the court room, on suspicion of stealing cigarettes from a shop in Cannock.
Speaking from his home later, after he had been released on police bail, Holmes said: “I’m a big bloke and every time a big bloke is caught stealing on CCTV, the police arrest me. It wasn’t me.
“I’ve told them I’ll happily go in an ID parade. It’s harassment. I’m putting a complaint in to police.”
| — Hat tip: An EDL buck | [Return to headlines] |
Albania: Car Bomb Explodes and Kills Judge in Vlore
(ANSAmed) — TIRANA, SEPTEMBER 9 — A judge has been killed in Vlore. Skerdilajd Konomi, 35, magistrate at the civil section of the Vlore Tribunal, was killed today at 9:20 AM when the car he was travelling in on the city’s main street blew up. Police have not made any statements on the reasons behind the tragic attack.
Head of State Bamir Topi immediately reacted, calling it a “brutal, mafia-like attack, an attack on the justice system, the rule of law and democracy. An attack on a judge represents a threat to society and state institutions,” Topi said in a statement released by the president’s office. The head of state urged the authorities to shed light on the matter and bring the perpetrators to justice. In the explosion, which police say may have been caused by a remotely-controlled bomb, some passers-by also suffered minor injuries and shop windows were shattered. The images broadcast by the Tirana broadcaster News 24 show car parts spread out over dozens of metres, as were the remains of the young judge. Another car bomb had previously occurred in central Vlore a few months ago. A young man was killed and three other people injured. The latter was attributed to a settling of scores.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Industry Minister Calls for Increased Trade With Serbs
Belgrade, 8 Sept. (AKI) — Italian industry minister Paolo Romani said on Thursday his country was interested in new investments in Serbia and in building Belgrade metro.
Ending a two-day visit to Belgrade, where he attended Serbia-Italy business forum, Romani said Italian companies were interested in investing in energy, textile, automobile and machine industry.
There are some 200 Italian companies already doing business in Serbia, employing over 15,000 people. The biggest Italian companies in Serbia are Fiat automobile producer, Benetton clothing company and four banks, including Banca Intesa.
Romani and Serbian economy minister Nebojsa Ciric signed a joint declaration on bilateral economic cooperation. “We are continuing a successful cooperation between the two countries and investments by Italian companies in Serbia,” Romani said.
He told prime mister Mirko Cvetkovic Italian companies were interested in building Belgrade underground metro, which would significantly improve transport in the city of two million and decongest traffic jams.
Italy is Serbia’s second trade partner, after Germany, and main importer of Serbian goods. Last year total trade turnover was 1.75 billion euros and marked a 25 per cent increase this year.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Lebanon: EU: 33 Mln for Environment, Justice and Governance
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, SEPTEMBER 8 — The European Union has allocated a 33 million euros cooperation package to Lebanon under the 2011 Annual Action Programme. Lebanon’s municipalities will benefit from a programme of 20 million euros, through the provision of new training and expertise to make administration in the municipal sector more effective and better able to manage public funds. According to the Enpi website (www.enpi-info.eu), 8 million euros will support the reform of the environmental governance. Training will be given to the Ministry of Ministry of Environment, as well as to other stakeholders in the sector, to help them better plan and implement environmental policy, including law enforcement.
Another action of 5 million euros will help reform the Lebanese justice system by implementing new training for clerks and opening up a national debate on the independence of the judiciary system by giving the Lebanese people chance to make their views heard in conferences and seminars. “Supporting our Lebanese partners — said Stefan Fule, Commissioner of European Neighbourhood Policy — in their efforts to create a well-functioning public administration system and boosting sustainable growth and democracy in the country is of vital importance. These reforms will give the Lebanese people more of a say in how their country is run, and help to build up trust and legitimacy of the justice system as a result”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Algeria: EU Project Restores Traditional Hydraulic System
(ANSA) — BRUSSELS, SEPTEMBER 07 — The Eu project Montada has been working to rehabilitate the ‘Terja N’Bouchemjene’ canal, located in the palm grove of the Algerian desert city of Ghardaia. This initiative, funded by the EU under the Euromed Heritage IV peogramme, has the objective of preserving the traditional hydraulic system in the M’zab Valley.
According to the Enpi website (www.enpi-info.eu), this action involved the supervision of architects specialised in historic monuments and consists in the restoration of the canal and its ramifications after it was damaged by floods in 2008. Besides from protecting the palm grove from floods, the aim of this action is the preservation of the ecosystem of the M’Zab valley and the regeneration of the old palm groves, as well as raising the awareness of the local population of the importance of their heritage.
Funded by the EU under the EuroMed Heritage IV programme with a budget of 1.8 million euros over a period of three years, Montada, which is implemented in Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia, aims to promote traditional built heritage by strengthening its identity through appropriation by the population.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Cairo: Protesters Re-Attempt Israel Embassy Break-in
Security forces on high alert after demonstrators try to breach embassy; report says military council rejected Egyptian PM resignation; Israel ambassador evacuates Cairo.
Security forces in Egypt were on high alert Saturday after protesters tried to break into Israel’s embassy in Cairo again this morning after the previous night’s attack.
Order was restored to the area Saturday morning, although small groups still lingered near the embassy, according to Al Jazeera.
The Egyptian Health Ministry has said that 1,049 people were injured in the attack, and three people were killed.
Egypt’s ruling military council rejected Prime Minister Essam Sharaf’s offer to resign for failure to handle the demonstration efficiently, the Arabic television channel Al Arabiya reported.
One news website earlier in the day had suggested he might offer his resignation over the violence that led to the Israeli ambassador flying out of Cairo to Israel.
Israel’s ambassador to Egypt and senior staff were evacuated on Saturday following the mass demonstration in Cairo Friday night in which hundreds of Egyptians stormed the building housing Israel’s mission and threw embassy documents and its national flag from windows.
A diplomat was left behind to maintain the embassy, an Israeli official said. The diplomat, identified as the consul for state affairs and Ambassador Yitzhak Levanon’s deputy, will remain in Egypt while Israel weighs a response to the overnight demonstrations, the official said.
| [Return to headlines] |
Gaddafi Sold 20% of Libya’s Gold Reserves to Pay Salaries
(AGI) Tripoli — In the last days of his regime, Muammar Gheddafi sold about 20% of Libya’s gold reserves to pay government salaries. The quantity, about 29 tons equalling a little more than $1 billion, was sold on the local market, sais Qassem Azzoz, governor of the Bank of Libya, at the beginning of April for a price considerably lower than its current value.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Doctors Without Borders Call for an End to UN Embargo on Medical Drugs
For Rosa Crestani, MSF Emergency Coordinator for Libya, the country’s health care system is on its knees from the war and the embargo. In Tripoli, health care workers have had to focus on war wounded at the expense of regular patients. Getting back to normal is an uphill struggle. The people of Libya express solidarity; its doctors show their skills.
Brussels (AsiaNews) — “The UN embargo on medical drugs is illegal, absurd and intolerable. Civilians, patients and the wounded from both sides suffer,” said in Brussels Rosa Crestani, Medecins sans frontiers (Doctors without Borders, MSF) emergency coordinator for Libya. Along with the International Red Cross, MSF is the only other organisation authorised to operate in Libya.
Speaking to AsiaNews, she said that UN sanctions have prevented the importation of medical drugs for six months, creating problems especially in Tripoli, where only now the situation is improving somewhat. “When embargoes do not take into account health needs, tragic situations always follow, which makes our job that much harder,” she said.
MSF workers were deployed in Libya in February, just before the start of NATO operations, opening up centres to provide medical care for the wounded and psychological support to civilians, first in Benghazi and then in Zlitan, Misrata and other war zones.
“In Misrata, we do surgery operations and provide psychological support to the population,” Crestani said. “We are also in three prisons with 600 prisoners, many of whom are seriously wounded.”
For the MSF coordinator, the more serious problems are in the capital where the organisation arrived only in early August. Tripoli is home to about a third of the Libyan population. Because of the embargo, hospitals had run out of supplies right on the eve of the offensive launched by NATO and the rebels.
“We were waiting for the papers from the Health Ministry,” she explained. “We only needed one form to bring in staff from Tunisia when the battle for Tripoli broke out. For the first week, we were not able to send in our staff. Only our coordinator was on site. Our 13-member team only arrived on 25 August.”
Although still functioning, the capital’s health system is on the verge of collapse, Crestani said. “Drug shortages mean that Libyan doctors can only operate on urgent cases (red code), which leaves routine cases waiting.”
“Despite the problems, hospital workers have responded well. We were impressed by the great solidarity of the Libyan people and the skills of its doctors,” She added.
Now things are getting back to normal, however some drugs that are essential in a number of therapies are still in short supply.
“Unfortunately, we are an emergency organisation and so focus on the most critical cases. We cannot help those who need special care like chemotherapy, AIDS, diabetes and chronic diseases. For these cases, drugs are not yet available.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Thousands of Tuareg Fleeing to Algeria
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, SEPTEMBER 9 — Thousands of Tuaregs are leaving southern Libya and heading for Algeria in an attempt to escape the violence to which the population of the “blue men” has been subjected by both Gaddafi loyalists and rebels. In order to cross the desert border, the Tuaregs have to travel long distances with extremely high temperatures and little food and water.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Netanyahu Determined to Preserve Peace With Egypt
(AGI) Jerusalem — Israel is committed to “respecting and preserving peace with Egypt, which is in the interest of both countries.” Benjamin Netanyahu wished to express in person that which his spokesman had already communicated, due to the current crisis between Israel and Egypt after the violence at the Israeli embassy in Cairo.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Palestinians Using Obama’s Voice in PR Campaign
While the U.S. is publically opposing the Palestinian Authority’s upcoming bid to the United Nations for a unilateral declaration of statehood, the PA has been using President Obama’s own words in its public relations campaign to garner support for the effort.
The PA sponsored a radio ad that uses audio from Obama’s speech to the U.N. General Assembly last year in which the president declared support for a Palestinian state.
“When we come back here next year, we can have an agreement that will lead to a new member of the United Nations, an independent, sovereign state of Palestine living in peace with Israel,” Obama is heard saying.
PA President Mahmoud Abbas then chimes in: “If [President Obama] said it, he must have meant it.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Yemeni Army Takes Back Al Qaeda-Controlled Town in Abyan
(AGI) Aden — Yemeni army regulars have reclaimed the southern city of Zinjibar from “groups with al Qaeda connections”. News of the operation’s success — as reported by Yemeni state broadcasters ‘Saba’ — was announced by the governor of Abyan, Saleh Hussein al-Zoary.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
In Dagestan, A Beach Under Sharia
“Women’s Mountain “ inaugurated in Makhachkala. Access permitted only to female swimmers and children. Even the lifeguards will be exclusively female.
Moscow (AsiaNews) — A beach for women only, in accordance with sharia, was opened in Makhachkala, the capital of the republic of Dagestan, a high-level terrorist area but which the Kremlin is trying to turn into a tourist destination, as throughout the North Caucasus.
The name of the beach is special “ Women’s Mountain “, as announced at the presentation ceremony on September 7 by Khanum Aliyeva, deputy mayor of the city on the Caspian Sea.
Access to the beach will be permitted only to women and children under six years of age, while the staff, including lifeguards, will be exclusively women, added Aliyeva quoted by Itar-Tass. He later explained: “Very often due to prejudices, attitudes and lack of security, women can not enjoy the benefits of a swim or sea air. But now more and more women in our country, and abroad, are asking to be able to relax on the beaches of Makhachkala. “
The “ Women’s Mountain “ is located in the district of Reduktorny and is divided into two parts: one equipped with wooden cabins and the other the beach itself. The structure was financed by private investors with the support of the local the city council. (N.A.)
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
India: Another Catholic Church Attacked in Kerala
The police has not yet identified the culprits, probably Hindu extremists. About 20 masked men forced the door of the building, broke windowpanes, and destroyed the altar, the confessional, lights, and sacred ornaments, desecrating the sacred building. Hearing noises, Catholics rushed to the church where they were threatened by the attackers.
Kollam (AsiaNews) — Police has not yet identified the extremists who on Sunday sacked the Catholic church in Kottenkulangara, near Kollam, in Kerala.
Twenty masked vandals, probably Hindu extremists, forced the door and broke the windows, destroying the altar, the confessional, lights, and sacred ornaments, thus desecrating the sacred building.
Their suspicions aroused by the noise, Catholics rushed to the church where the attackers threatened them. One of the attackers also stole a gold chain from Susi Antony, whose family lives nearby.
“We are deeply saddened by such an attack against a Catholic Church,” Sajan K George, president of the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC), told AsiaNews.
“The GCIC condemns the attack in the strongest possible terms. It is a matter of grave concern. An attack on a place of worship is extremely serious and this is the third attack on a Catholic Church in two months. The previous one were in Pune and Secundrabad.”
“This attack on the Church,” the GCIC president explained, “is aimed at grievously wounding the religious sentiments of the vulnerable Christian community.”
The local church, Our Lady of Vailankanni, was built in 1986. The Marian shrine is visited by thousands of people who attend Mass as well as Wednesday novenas.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Malaysia’s Parallel Judicial Systems Come Up Against Legal Challenges
As a Buddhist, Tan Cheow Hong didn’t expect to run up against Malaysia’s Islamic laws.
Then last November, his estranged wife showed up at their child’s school with a court order from a Sharia judge, who had granted her temporary custody of their 7-year-old.
The wife took their daughter away with the help of Islamic officials and police.
“If I had tried to stop them they would have arrested me,” says Mr Tan.
He says he had no idea his wife had become a Muslim. The next day his wife converted their daughter to Islam without Mr Tan’s consent. That means both mother and child are now subject to Islamic law, which does not apply to non-Muslims like Mr Tan.
He is now filing for child custody through the civil court while his wife is fighting for the case to be heard in the country’s Sharia court. Blurred lines
The case highlights a growing problem with Malaysia’s separate judicial systems and those caught in between. Muslims are bound by Sharia law on personal matters like marriage and custody rights, while members of other faiths follow civil law.
Yet the lines become blurred when cases involve both Muslims and non-Muslims. Analysts say some disgruntled spouses are exploiting the parallel judicial system.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
HRW Reports China Pressures About Uyghurs
(AGI) Beijing — Malaysia, Thailand and Pakistan are among the countries China is pressuring to return the Uyghurs in exile, the NGO Human Rights Watch reports. The mostly Muslim Uyghurs are a Turkic ethnic group that lives in western China. The Uyghurs have often clashed with the Chinese majority .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Vietnam: Post 9/11, Vietnamese Catholics Promoters of Dialogue With Islam
The 2001attack on the U.S. affected the followers of all religions, with a part of the country marginalizing Muslims. The archdiocese of Saigon initiated moments of interreligious encounter and created a special commission. Vietnamese priest: contact with other religions “makes our faith stronger.”
Ho Chi Minh City (AsiaNews) — The terrorist attack of September 11 and the dramatic images transmitted by television hit — albeit in a different way — the faithful of all religions in Vietnam. For this, the archdiocese of Saigon wanted to organize a group for interreligious dialogue, which to date, it has grown to become a Pastoral Commission for Ecumenism and Interreligious Dialogue. The day after the American tragedy, the Vietnamese began discriminating against Muslims, which is why the Catholic leaders created moments of encounter, dialogue and integration.
The Archdiocese of Ho Chi Minh City was the first to begin interfaith dialogue with Muslims: meetings, visits of courtesy, moments of cultural exchange, under the auspices of the Catholic Commission. A project that aims to develop the Church in every diocese in Vietnam, contributing to the growth of the country. So much so that in the pastoral letter of 2010 to the faithful, the People’s Assembly of God, Christian leaders explained that “ dialogue is at the service of God’s salvation, an attempt at mutual understanding and serving the true happiness of man.”
A priest of Saigon explains that “through contact and dialogue with Buddhists, Muslims, Protestants, Cao Ðài and Bahai’i faithful, people can benefit” in their lives and relationships with others in the community . Although some of the faithful, he adds, fear that interreligious dialogue can deviate from Catholic teaching, on the contrary contact with other religions “is an invitation to make our faith stronger.”
In Vietnam there are two different orders of Muslims, old and new, for a total of 64 thousand faithful throughout the country. In Ho Chi Minh City there are 4,850, divided into 16 communities and led by 69 local representatives. After the tragedy of 11 September 2001, they were victims of ostracism and discrimination by the majority of the population.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Spanish Warship Rescues French Hostage From Pirates
(AGI) Nairobi — A Spanish warship has rescued a French citizen held hostage for days by Somali pirates in the Horn of Africa.
The warship, that is part of the European Union Naval Force (NavFor), was patrolling the waters of the Horn of Africa. The French citizen is believed to have been kidnapped from on board a yacht, alongside three fellow countrymen, by Somali pirates two days ago off Yemen.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Tuareg Sources Say Gaddafi’s Generals Are in Burkina Faso
(AGI) Niamey — Some of Colonel Gaddafi’s generals have fled to Niger and then moved to neighbouring Burkina Faso. “Some three or four weeks ago,” a Taureg source reported from Niger, “ a convoy of Gaddafi loyalists, including some generals and top regime officials, crossed the border with Niger through the desert town of Agadez.” The convoy is said to have continued on to Niamey where a major financial operation was completed at the offices of the Libyan bank Bisic. Eventually the convoy reached its final destination in Burkina Faso.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Northern Ireland: Minister Rages Against Bras for Children
The Belfast Telegraph, 8 September 2011
“Bras on sale for girls as young as seven,” headlines the Belfast Telegraph. Airing concerns about “the sexualisation of children”, the Belfast daily leads with news that a number of clothes chains in the Northern Irish capital are “selling padded bras to enhance the figures of girls as young as seven, despite concern from children’s rights groups.” The bras have provoked the ire of Northern Irish minister Arlene Foster, “a mother of three children under 11”, who has called on the Northern Irish assembly “to step in to stop this practice.” To the south, meanwhile, shops in the Irish Republic are selling “bra and knicker sets for three to four year olds”. The Telegraph notes that logos on knickers include “And your problem is . . .?”, “I don’t ask for much, just my own way!” and “Whatever”. Said a spokeswoman for the Belfast Feminist Network — “Selling products like this to pre-teens is about conditioning young girls into the stereotyped roles society forces them into.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia: Gay Pride: Minister Offers Support to Minorities
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, SEPTEMBER 7 — Clear support to the Gay Pride event scheduled to take place in Belgrade on October 2 was expressed today to the organisers by Milan Markovic, the Serb minister for minorities and human rights.
At the end of a meeting today in Belgrade with the leaders of the homosexual gathering, Markovic stated that his Ministry has the duty to support all citizens in their affirmative action for their rights guaranteed by constitution and the laws.
The organisers of the Gay Pride event pointed out that any society that strives towards success must develop within itself a high level of tolerance and understanding towards what is different.
In recent days support for the Gay Pride event was also provided by Serb president Boris Tadic and by minister of the Interior Ivica Dacic, who however emphasised the danger of potential violence by groups of right-wing extremists and ultranationalists who already issued threats against gays and lesbians. That is why the exact location where gays and lesbians will meet still has to be announced, along with the route of the parade.
Last year’s Gay Pride, which took place in Belgrade on October 10, resulted in violent clashes between the police and homophobic demonstrators, with hundreds of people either wounded or arrested.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Switzerland: Making Prostitution Safer
If sex work were treated like any other profession, many of the problems associated with it, including violence, would be easier to tackle.
Eva Büschi, a professor at the School of Social Work of the University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland, interviewed managers of sex establishments for a study entitled “Violence in the Sex Business” and concluded that lack of regulation was a major problem for both sex workers and the establishments themselves.
“In other businesses workers get contracts, in which the tasks to be performed, the price and how long they should take are clearly laid down. In the sex business today this is mostly not the case,” she told swissinfo.ch.
One problem is that managers of sex establishments are afraid of falling foul of the law forbidding the promotion of prostitution, she explained.
But the study shows that violence is a daily reality in the business. It occurs among customers, between the managers and the workers, and among the workers themselves.
However, the managers of the businesses often downplay the issue. They tend to see their main problem as social stigmatisation, Büchi found.
Pragmatic approach
Given that the legal sex business generates a turnover put at SFr3.5 billion ($4.4 billion) per year, Büschi says it should be approached pragmatically, ensuring that workers are given the best possible conditions.
Pius Segmüller, well-known for his Christian convictions (he was for four years the head of the Papal Guard and is a member of the Christian Democrat party), told swissinfo.ch that he personally regards prostitution as immoral, but as commander of the Lucerne police from 2002 to 2006 he had to deal with the practical implications.
His conclusions are similar to Büschi’s.
“Sooner or later we have to give proper recognition to the business, so that it doesn’t drift into criminality,” he said. “We can’t put an end to the oldest profession by driving it underground.”
He says prostitution is safer practised in clubs or brothels than on the street. “The more legal something is, the more possibilities there are for keeping an eye on it.”
Working conditions
Proper working conditions are a key factor in preventing violence by customers, according to Büschi, because the agreement between client and sex worker could then be clearly defined from the very beginning.
Segmüller believes the managers of sex establishments should get together to form an association that would work out the norms to be followed and cooperate with each other.
“That’s the only way to really get to grips with violence and other problems,” he said.
While managers complain that they are stigmatised, he says it is to some extent their own fault. Some of them make a lot of money by treating the prostitutes unfairly, for example in what they pay them and in the infrastructure they provide.
When it comes to pimps, he draws a clear distinction between two different kinds.
“If pimps are there to put pressure on the prostitutes, I would regard that as unsavoury and illegal. But if they offer the prostitutes protection and are paid by them for that, I have nothing against it.”
Licence to operate
The authorities in Nidau in canton Bern have already introduced conditions for granting permits to would-be sex establishments. The move was regarded as a possible model for the rest of the country.
The managers of the establishments have to guarantee that the women are declared as sex workers and not as tourists, and that they are in the country legally.
They must give the women information leaflets in their own languages about their rights and duties — including that they must declare their earnings to the tax authorities.
Nor must the managers charge excessive prices for rooms or slap on unreasonable extra charges. In addition, the local advisory centre must be given unlimited access to the sex workers.
The police can make unannounced visits to check that the rules are being followed.
The establishment in Schloss Nidau was closed down in May, after a police raid found that several of the conditions were not being met.
“That is proof that the rules work,” commented Büschi.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Nasty Party Reveals Its Funny Bone
It’s not often that a journalist can’t quote from a speech by the Chancellor of the Exchequer because it’s unsuitable for publication in a family newspaper. If you heard what George Osborne said at the GQ awards this week, you’ll know what I’m talking about. If you didn’t, then I’ll leave it up to you to track down the details. Even a paraphrase could put you off your breakfast. Essentially, the Chancellor delivered a painfully detailed, pre-scripted joke about the pornographic appeal of GQ magazine and the solitary pursuits of teenage boys. To say that it fell flat would be an understatement. The groans from the audience weren’t of the jolly kind: more of the field-hospital-during-the-Crimean-War kind.
David Cameron made no such misjudgment when he poked fun at Nadine Dorries in the Commons on Wednesday. Miss Dorries is an eccentric self-publicist who made a hash of her attempt to introduce abortion counselling when MPs debated the Health Service Bill on Wednesday. But at PMQs earlier, she asked Mr Cameron a potentially deadly question about his tactical surrenders to the Lib Dems. The PM replied: “I know you are frustrated…” and the House fell about laughing. Cameron hadn’t intended the sexual innuendo, but he picked up on it instantly and we were treated to one of his oily chortles. Nadine was properly humiliated. Sexism? Perhaps. But I suspect Cameron would have displayed better manners if the questioner had been a sophisticated young lady from a think tank rather than an ex-nurse with flat vowels.
What does a comparison of the two incidents tell us? First, that Dave can work a room while George can’t. No surprise there. Second, less obviously, that the two men’s sense of humour is similar. There’s a subliminal nastiness there and it’s bound up with class. This isn’t to say that posh people are uniquely nasty: every social group has its own brand of cruelty. But it doesn’t reflect well on the PM and Chancellor that they both resort to their own variety so readily.
Hang on, you may say — Osborne’s joke was just a smutty gag that misfired. He was like a best man at a wedding, desperately ploughing ahead with a speech that should have been delivered at the stag night rather than the reception. Actually, it was more than that: this was a deliberate, if badly calculated, insult. The Chancellor began by saying that he wasn’t sure who read GQ’s political pages and that he assumed they were the only ones that weren’t stuck together. And it got worse from there. The point is that, even though he failed dismally, Osborne was attempting to extract a cheap snigger at the expense of his hosts. Dave would understand what he was trying to do. GQ? Vulgar. Good for a laugh. Nadine? Ditto.
Politicians reveal so much of themselves with their sense of humour, or lack of it. Ronald Reagan’s jokes were delivered with the polish of a professional actor — but the artifice didn’t hide his lovable nature. Margaret Thatcher recited her wooden gags dutifully: she didn’t pretend to be witty. Blair’s one-liners were slick; Brown’s were weird. Although Cameron is a better jokesmith than Osborne, both men revel in the humour of entitlement. We’re not talking about the quickfire banter of the Oxford Union, of which both William Hague and Michael Gove are masters: this is closer to the post-prandial sneering at an undergraduate dining society. “It’s Darwinian,” a former speechwriter for Cameron told me the other day. “Dave and George basically like laughing at losers.” And people still think of the Tories as the nasty party. Funny, that.
[JP note: Funny, I’ve always thought of the Tory Party as the Stupid Party for those with more land than sense.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Sharia Law
If there were just one single concept about Islam and jihad and terrorism that I could convey as we approach the tenth commemoration of the 9/11 attacks, it would be this: it’s not about the violence. It’s not just about the terrorism. It’s about shariah. It’s about Islamic law.
[…]
Now, if “violent extremism” were all we need worry about, then why would the Brotherhood go to the trouble of establishing a massive network of civilian, non-profit organizations that are not violent terrorist groups to wage this thing called the “civilization-jihad process” that is intended to destroy our country?
[…]
We must understand that the violent terrorism that is commanded by Islamic law has a purpose: to impose such a psychological burden of terror on non-Muslim populations that they will lose faith and hope in their own leaders and religions and societal principles and simply find it easier to capitulate to shariah. It is at that point, when the Dar al-Islam (Islamic world) subjugates the Dar al-Harb (non-Muslim world), that jihad and terrorism will end—because the objective, to impose Islamic law globally—will have been achieved.
[…]
During the week of 9/11, the Clarion Fund and RadicalIslam.org will offer a unique opportunity to viewers: The Third Jihad will be available for free online streaming on the website www.TheThirdJihad.com. On this tenth anniversary of the horrific attacks against the United States, it remains as important as ever to understand the threat of shariah Islam that animated the ideology of those nineteen hijackers and their commanders in al-Qa’eda and Iran. The same shariah obligation to jihad continues to drive millions across the globe, not just to violence, but to stealthy means in order to impose Islamic law (shariah).
| — Hat tip: Egghead | [Return to headlines] |
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