Labor Day and The EMPTY Chair

Today is Labor Day. And in celebration of this holiday marking the end of summer - and one which used to mark the beginning of the new school year - conservative bloggers are taking the occasion to celebrate a new twist: Clint Eastwood's very funny monologue at the Republican Convention last week.

No one knew what Eastwood was going to say: one of the perks of being an icon is that you can get away with not revealing much.

Well, his act was something! According to the Right, it is entering the annals of the 2012 campaign along with "you didn't build that" and "hopeychangey"; there are lots of others.

The Left dismissed Eastwood as a crazy old man but that's the best they could do. Given that part of his schtick was exactly that - i.e., playing a man talking to a chair- the complaint was lame.

At any rate, Mr. Eastwood requested this empty chair to be on stage with him, and everyone figured he'd be sitting in it for his five-minute speech. Instead (don't forget this fellow was a method actor before many of us were born) the chair became the place in which sat an imaginary Barack Obama. And Eastwod proceeded to have a dialogue with the airy BHO for ten minutes, not his allotted five...rank hath its privileges after all.

Yes it was very funny.

So now the call has gone out to the conservative blogosphere: build your own chair. Put it on your lawn, or put it on your blog, but make Labor Day "Empty Chair Monday".

Thanks to the Baron for his design...

UPDATE:...a design which he adapted for me from one sent to Michelle Malkin by a reader in Oregon. This acknowledgement would have been here when the post was first published (~ 2:00 a.m.) but Blooger ate it, not once but twice... make that three times. I gave up and went to bed - unable to either remove the unfinished post or to edit it.

Perhaps we should ask for our money back?

Gates of Vienna News Feed 9/2/2012

The news feed is strangely light tonight. Is everyone away for the Labor Day weekend? But what about our European tipsters?

The most interesting story — aside from the results of the congressional audit of the Federal Reserve — concerns NATO’s suspension of the training of Afghan recruits. Until it can discover the underlying causes of the “extremism” that lies behind the green-on-blue attacks that have killed so many Coalition troops, NATO has decided to halt the training.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, Takuan Seiyo, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

Set up for a Blasphemy Charge?

Rimsha Masih is a fourteen-year-old Christian girl in Pakistan who reportedly has Down’s syndrome. She was arrested two weeks ago on a blasphemy charge after she allegedly burned pages of the Koran. She has been denied bail up until now, and is still in custody.

Hundreds of Christians fled her neighborhood in fear of the collective reprisals that routinely follow accusations of blasphemy against Christians in Muslim countries.

In a new twist to the case, an imam named Khalid Jadoon Chishti has been arrested after a congregant at his mosque told police that he planted the burned pages of the Koran in Miss Masih’s bag. We can only pray that these latest revelations provide enough evidence so that the girl may be freed.

It’s important to remember that the arrested imam may not even have broken any laws under sharia. According to Islamic law, there is no crime — not even burning pages of the Koran — which cannot be forgiven if committing it serves to advance Islam. Mr. Chishti’s reported motive — to drive Christians out of the country — is considered a duty under sharia. A strict interpretation may render his deeds quite legal.

Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video:

The Failure of the Metropolitan Police in Walthamstow

The above photo — a screen shot from a video — shows English Defence League leader Tommy Robinson speaking to his supporters from the window of a police van in Walthamstow yesterday afternoon.

“But, Baron,” you say, “why was Tommy sitting in a police van? Why wasn’t he standing on the platform speaking to the crowd at the demo? Was he arrested? Did he break the law?”

Those are all good questions, and none of the answers reflect well on the Metropolitan Police or the British civil authorities.

Tommy Robinson, a leader of the supposedly ultra-violent EDL, was taken into police custody for his own safety, because the London police were unable to protect him or the other EDL leaders from people who were trying to kill them.

He was not arrested. He broke no laws. The leftists and the Muslims threw bricks and bottles at the EDL, but they weren’t arrested, either.

Funny about that.

The police were evidently short-handed, and found themselves unable to protect law-abiding native English citizens from the rampaging violence aimed in their direction by anarchists and Muslims. You’ll notice, however, that the Metropolitan Police had ample resources and staff to take photographs of the EDL demonstrators.

That’s right: they couldn’t protect peaceful citizens from being pelted with bricks and bottles, but they could take pictures of them with the most advanced photographic equipment — photos which will presumably be used against the “fascists” later when the opportunity arises to charge them with a “racially aggravated public order offence”.

That’s what policing has come to in Modern Multicultural Britain. As the British Freedom website says: “Freedom of Speech RIP”.

Here’s the video of Tommy speaking to the EDL from protective custody:


This is a report sent in by an EDL supporter who arrived early in Walthamstow yesterday:

Kosher Slaughter and Anti-Semitism, Part 2

When I posted last Friday about Geert Wilders’ support for a ban on ritual slaughter, I knew it would cause an argument. There are certain hot-button issues in our line of work, and this is one of them.

Before I go any further: This post is not about the merits or demerits of kosher slaughter. Commenters discussed that aspect of the case in the earlier thread, but this essay is solely about the meta-issue. If you want to argue about whether kosher slaughter is good or bad, humane or inhumane, do it somewhere else.

Today’s discussion focuses solely on whether opposition to ritual slaughter is inherently anti-Semitic.

To refresh your memory: Geert Wilders, the politician who leads the PVV, is on record in support of a ban on kosher and halal slaughter in the Netherlands. Some Jewish groups have taken Mr. Wilders’ stance as an expression of anti-Semitism. Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld, an Austrian-born Israeli writer, was quoted by Reuters as saying this:

“Are you going to support a guy [Geert Wilders] who is at forefront of the anti-Semitism movement in Europe?,” he said.

More information on Dr. Gerstenfeld’s position has become available since I posted my essay last week. According to Tundra Tabloids, he says he was misquoted.

This is what Dr. Gerstenfeld told TT (my emphasis):

The journalist of Reuters promised me that before publishing he would send me the text of my quote. He later apologized that this was not possible because of time pressure.

I have informed him that the quote was not correct and should have read:

“are you going to support a guy who is at the forefront of the anti-Semitism movement in Europe on one major issue?”

I agree that this addition makes an important distinction. And I can sympathize with someone who has been misrepresented by the perfidious mainstream media.

Unfortunately, the same problem still exists, albeit in a reduced fashion.

Fjordman: Monitoring Islam-Critics in Norway

The following essay was published a week ago at FrontPage Mag, but was eclipsed by the announcement of the verdict in the Breivik trial. Meanwhile, it has been translated into German and published at Europe News.

Some excerpts are below:

LO, the influential Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions, has intimate — some say organic — connections to the ruling Labor Party. Together, the two organizations have arguably made up the country’s most important network of power for generations. Sections of LO will from 2012 on donate half a million kroner every year to the Norwegian Centre against Racism to combat right-wing extremism. “To be against the Multicultural society, as Breivik says, is nothing other than what Hitler espoused,” says Leif Sande, who represents one of LO’s subgroups.

Kari Helene Partapuoli, leader of the Centre, which already receives millions in direct state support annually, says the money will partly be spent on mapping international networks opposed to multiculturalism. Partapuoli earlier warned against the dangers of “subconscious” racism, stating that there is a racist in all of us. She didn’t explain what kind of mental exorcism will be required to drive out our racist inner demons, however. Shoaib Sultan, the former General Secretary at the Islamic Council of Norway, currently works for them as an advisor on how to deal with extremists who oppose the colonization of their country through mass immigration.

In late 2011 there was a demonstration against racism at Youngstorget in Oslo arranged by LO. Its powerful national leader, Roar Flåthen, promised that the labor unions will fight relentlessly against racism and intolerance throughout society and in the workplace. “We want a Multicultural society. This is enriching,” he told the crowd. Flåthen is also a politician for the Labor Party and sits on the board of A-pressen, a large national media company partially controlled by LO that is the whole or partial owner of dozens of local or regional newspapers.

Marooned on Isla de Tierra

A group of latter-day Calibans from sub-Saharan Africa have become castaways on a tiny Spanish island just off the coast of Morocco, in hopes of making their way to the European mainland.

Many thanks to Michael Laudahn for translating this article from El Mundo:

Spanish rock 30 metres from Morocco

Another 68 immigrants attempt to enter into Spain through the Isla de Tierra


The first stage: Isla de Tierra

• On Thursday Spain transported three women and three babies from the tiny island to Melilla
  
• Friday, the army brought blankets, water and drinks to those 13 who stayed behind
  
• There was also an assault attempt against the Melilla border fence
  
• The Delegación del Gobierno sees an ‘action orchestrated by the mafias’

This summer, Spanish sovereignty over the islands and rocks in the north of Africa is turning into a real brain-racker for the government. Their situation very close to the Moroccan coast and the absence of vigilance and safety measures in these territories make a perfect cocktail for the immigrants, whose objective is to enter Spain.

The Isla de Tierra, just 30 metres off the Moroccan beach during high tide, seems to be the target of choice. On Wednesday, 19 arrived in a barge, of which 13 [presently] remain there, because the other six, three babies and three women, were transported to Melilla [see map: arrow is the island; Melilla is to the east, at the margin of this map]. This morning another 68 came, so that the small island in the Archipiélago de Alhucemas, until only four days ago uninhabited, already has a population of 81 sub-Saharans.

According to what El Mundo has learned from police sources, the immigrants arrived at the Isla de Tierra around 5 o’clock this morning. A time very similar to the one when an assault attempt occurred against the Melilla border fence, specifically in the Río de Oro section, the same zone where just two weeks ago two avalanches occurred, assembling some 450 immigrants, of which 60 managed to make their way into the autonomous city.

On this [today’s] occasion, the sub-Saharans were repelled by the Guardia Civil, which in these days of major immigration pressure has deployed a command of the Grupo Rural de Seguridad (GRS) along the border.

The New Face of Terror in India

This IBN report describes a new breed of Islamic terrorists in India. According to the notes accompanying the video:

The arrest of young scientists, doctors, journalists and MBA students in connection with the Karnataka terror plot probe has stunned law enforcement agencies. These young educated men, hailing from middle class backgrounds and with no prior police records, pose a new challenge to the anti-terror sleuths.

You’ll notice that, just as in the United States, Canada, and Europe, IBN apparently has a policy of not mentioning Islam or Muslims when discussing “extremism” and terror attacks:


Hat tip: Vlad Tepes.

Gates of Vienna News Feed 9/1/2012

Jang Song-taek, the uncle of Kim Jong-un, paid a visit to Beijing on behalf of the North Korean dictator. North Korea has experienced a series of natural disasters, and Mr. Jang had hoped to receive financial aid from China. He went home empty-handed, however — all he received for his troubles was a lecture from Chinese Trade Minister Chen Deming on how a free market works.

In other news, recent polls indicate that the popularity of Russian president Vladimir Putin has dropped significantly. Last spring 69% of Russians held a favorable view of Mr. Putin, but by August that number had fallen to 63%.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, JP, McR, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

Multiculturalism’s Failure in Europe

The following essay was written by the Norwegian author and historian of religions Hanne Nabintu Herland. It is based on excerpts from her recent bestseller, “Respect”.


Multiculturalism’s failure in Europe
by Hanne Nabintu Herland

Over the past decade the opponents of multiculturalism have multiplied. Leading politicians such as Angela Merkel, David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy have all condemned this Leftist strategy of integration that equates the ideals of other cultures with European traditional values. The idea is that Europeans should not uphold their own cultural roots, but instead listen humbly to new immigrant residents and accept their traditional norms and customs in the name of diversity.

But multiculturalism has in essence turned out quite differently than the utopian dreamers of the naïve Leftwing socialists hoped for when they first started out. Today many decline to engage in necessary discussion concerning the need to uphold traditional European values in a time of upheaval, for fear of offending non-Western immigrants and being labeled intolerant and racist.

This implies a tragic misunderstanding of what tolerance really means.

To be tolerant means to respect other cultures when visiting their countries, just as immigrants from foreign cultures are to respect European values and ways of life when they move to Europe. To be tolerant is to respect the traditions, values and social norms of the country in which you are staying.

One of the main problems with multiculturalism is that it does not respect the differences and boundaries between nations and cultures. For instance, for a number of years there have been demands to tone down the Christmas celebration and exclude it from school arrangements, justified by Leftist claims that the holiday’s emphasis on the birth of Jesus Christ and the celebration of Santa Claus will offend non-Western immigrants. Yet many Muslims object to these types of multicultural attempts, as they say that they of course have nothing against celebrating the birth of Jesus, or in Arabic “Isa”. After all, he is a prophet in Islam.

Similarly, in Norway there are efforts to criticize the traditional use of the Norwegian flag on Independence Day, the 17th of May, to avoid conflicts with non-Western newcomers. Hardcore multiculturalists want each person to use the flag of his country of origin, rather than the Norwegian flag, which symbolizes national unity.

When pride in one’s own traditional values is continuously suppressed and spurned, the result may be that Europeans feel discriminated against in their own culture. This becomes a “racism against whites” which in turn creates a growing environment of displeasure with “non-Western foreigners”. In turn, resentment fuelled among ethnic groups may grow malicious. The Swedish city of Malmö is an excellent example of how bad things can get when a sloppy careless multiculturalism is implemented and society doesn’t demand respect for Swedish law. In Malmö foreigners are moving back to their countries of origin like Iraq or Iran, because things are much better in those countries than in Sweden.

The mistake of multiculturalism and its contempt for traditional European values is that it fails to recognize the need for a strong common ground of cultural unity.

All Cultures Are Not Equal

The following observations about “honor killing” were published by the Finnish author and politician Jussi Halla-aho on September 30, 2011. Many thanks to Heikki Polojärvi for the translation.


Some thoughts about honour violence
by Jussi Halla-aho

Recently there were news reports about a Pakistani girl named Kainad Soomro. Four men gang-raped her when she was thirteen years old.

By being raped and consequently losing her virginity, Kainat, according to the local perception of honour, shamed her family. The community demanded that Kainat’s father should kill his daughter, which he refused to do. The family had to flee from their hometown to Karachi, but the harassment has continued there as well.

The honour murder traditions of Islamic countries have been a difficult subject in the Western countries. Any discussion quickly turns to how women are, in fact, oppressed everywhere, the form of oppression only varies.

As if the under-representation of women in the governments of listed stock companies was in any way the same kind of paradigm as a 13-year-old girl being killed for having been raped.

[…]

Firstly, it has to be stated that family violence — both abuse and homicides, and attempts at them — are quite evenly shared between men and women [Finnish statistics].

Secondly it must be remembered that usually an act of violence is committed on impulse or while drunk, which is why the perpetrators (both men and women), are usually convicted for manslaughter instead of murder. However, a Pakistani-style honour murder is a deliberate, organised project carried out in cold blood.

The main difference between “honour killing” and “honour murder” is the social acceptability of the deed. A family killing is not considered justified by the society, the killer’s family or friends or, actually, the killer himself. Not a single Finnish family killer walks out of the police station as a free man/woman. Not a single family killer appeals in the court to his sense of honour, or defence of it, or get any reduction of his sentence with this argument. Not a single husband’s, ex-husband’s or boyfriend’s father, mother, brother or sister requires him to defend the family honour by killing his wife, ex-wife or girlfriend.

And not a single Finnish man would kill his 13-year-old daughter for shaming his family by being raped.

The Crossroads Generation

Many of you may have seen Paul Ryan’s speech at the Republican convention. The take-away line for many young people was Ryan’s remark about the faded Obama poster on their walls, the one put up with such optimism for Obama’s hope and change in 2008.

The current crop of young people — those who turned out in great numbers for Obama four years ago — are finding life a rough go. About half of those who graduate from college are forced to move home because they can’t find work that will pay enough to live on their own, or to even share a house with roommates:


Goverment bureaucrat jobs? Sure, there are plenty of public sector slots... if you don’t mind the D.C. rat race and the anomie. But for many young people who don’t want to move to the hive, the pickings are slim. And with Obama’s draconian insurance system about to go into place, small businesses are forced to stay small or lose money. Jobs that could have been created are aborted out of fear of government interference.

The reality for young job seeker with a load of college debt is grim:

The Islamization of Germany

In this news report from CBN, Erick Stakelbeck reports on the growing influence of Salafists among German Muslims.

As a side-note, pay attention to the radical sheikh about halfway through this video. You’ll notice that he’s clearly wearing eye makeup — much like the notorious Australian convert, Ibrahim Siddiq-Conlon.

Has this become a common fashion statement among Islamic extremists? Should I have referred to “radical chic” instead of “radical sheikh”?

Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video:

Who’s Your Mama?

As reported in the news feed a couple of weeks ago, Csanad Szegedi, a leader of the Hungarian nationalist movement Jobbik, was recently “outed” as a Jew. It turns out that, unbeknownst to him, his maternal grandmother was a Jew — a survivor of Auschwitz, in fact.

Unlike many European nationalist parties, Jobbik really is anti-Semitic, and very much in the mold of the original National Socialists. As a result of the sensational revelation, Mr. Szegedi was forced to resign his party post as he came to terms with his new ethnic and religious identity.

As Vlad pointed out at the time, it’s like the old Dave Chappelle sketch “The Black White Supremacist”, in which a blind KKK leader learns for the first time that he’s in fact a black man. A TouTube video of the sketch is (language warning) here.

Our occasional guest-essayist J-Practical has his own take on the topic. What interests him is the grandmother’s story: What did the poor woman think when her own grandson took up a version of the same ideology that sent her family to the death camps?


Csanad Szegedi: Who’s Your Mama, and where’s the real story?

by J-Practical

I have to admit, the story of Csanad Szegedi tickles my sense of the absurd.

Ever since I first saw the movie ‘Annie Hall’, I’ve always wanted the chance to figuratively reach off-screen and pull Marshall McLuhan into a situation where some pontificating loudmouth needs to be shut down. If nothing else, I’ve always wanted to see someone else do it.

That’s what somebody just did to the hapless Csanad Szegedi.

Szegedi grew up a Presbyterian, and spent his adult life forming or leading anti-Semitic neo-fascist organizations, and telling the world that Jews “desecrated Hungary’s national symbols”. Then, suddenly some guy in line got tired of the pontification, reached off-screen and pulled in Szegedi’s Jewish grandmother. Szegedi had no clue that she had come from a Jewish Orthodox family, or that she was a survivor of Auschwitz and Dachau.

Where do you go from there? Psychology’s concept of the Identity Crisis is just too pedestrian for the story of Csanad Szegedi. Now he’s been forced to leave the extreme right-wing Jobbik party where he’s been a leader and shining star, and to relinquish his elected seat in the European Parliament.

All because he has Jewish grandparents.

What a reversal of fortune.