When Le Monde decides to give a full-page article to a common citizen of Iraq, somebody whose opinion is supposed to reflect the general view in the street, whom does the independent newspaper choose?

An Iraqi citizen who complains of the "atrocities" and the "atrocious war", of course, who justifies the "resistance", of course, who refuses to vote "out of principle", of course (!), and who naturally wails that fear, "'anxiety', 'trembling', [and] 'disgust' … are my daily lot since that accursed night of March 20, 2003, and the beginning of the Americans' war against my country."

I, a [49-year-old, French-speaking middle-class] Iraqi woman, the mother of two children … I can say that today, fear accompanies me everywhere, even in bed, which has become collective, shared with my sons, out of fear of dying separately, each one alone in bed, should a rocket or a missile fall on us at night by mistake.

(As you will read later on, the sons in question are even more traumatized than she is.)

Besides the explosions, Nadia Ahmed (not her real name [!]) goes on to complain of the content of television programs, of "the noise of low-flying planes which tears apart the silence and steals our intimicy", of the continuing buzz of the electric generators (when the grid isn't cut), of having consequently to get up at 6 a.m. to do the laundry and vacuum the house, and, if the electricity does happen to fail half-way through her cleaning chores, of having to finish washing the dishes by hand.

She also fears taking a drive in her car, and that one day she will be crushed by a Humvee, or see

Americans break down the door to search our house, as they do so often elsewhere.

As you can see, poor Nadia Ahmed has a lot to complain of, and we can only agree with her that life would be much better were Saddam and his Mukhabarat thugs still in power. (The secret police never broke down doors; its fear-inspiring members didn't have to.)

But let's not be too harsh or too sarcastic. The poor mother is understandably concerned about the effect the war will have on her 16- and 10-year-old sons. Notably, she imagines her children being terrified of the news of a bomb in their school. I hate to sound callous, but personally at that age I would have found any kind of alert exciting to the hilt.

As it turns out, the boys do not seem to be frightened of the GIs at all. Au contraire.

From the very first day of the conflict, in March 2003, Ahmed [10] and his friends started playing war, asking for soldier toys, machine guns, tanks, and planes. Ahmed often imitates the Americans. A weapon in his hands, he kicks doors open with his feet, shouting "Go! Go! Go!" He always takes the side of the GIs, their technology fascinates him. He is happy when Iraqis are killed.

Uh-oh. Incoming whopper (When you hear the word "logic", you know you're going to hear an example of moral relativism).

His cousins hold the same language, the same logic: that of the strongest. I try to explain that they are occupiers and that one must defend one's country against occupiers, and to tell them the damage that this war has caused, there is nothing to do.

Well, see, of course, if Iraqis (kids or other) are not afraid of the Americans, then that, too, is something that… the Americans must be reproached for! And in impeccable (il)logic, if the kids are not traumatized, this in itself is cause for… traumatism!

The traumatism is such that it seems impossible to heal in so short a time. Violence turns them into agitated, perturbed, anxious kids, undermined by the apprehension of being killed or kidnapped, which is very frequent.

Of course, life was much better when schoolkids sat in classrooms, simply chanting the name of Saddam Hussein as the leader and protector of all Iraqis, and Iraqis the country over were taken away to jail and to the death fields.

When a woman is killed by a bomb, Nadia Ahmed calls her

yet another victim in this war that has made so many orphans, so many widowers and widows, so many poor and mutilated people, so many innocent prisoners, so many hoodlums in liberty, and also so many women cloistered at home, condemned to question themselves about the country's future.

Regarding "the country's future", did she vote, at least (hyperlink: thanks to Chris)?

I might as well tell you right away: I didn't participate [in the elections]. For reasons of security, first of all, and for reasons of principle. Numerous political parties and cities were not allowed to join in. Something that made the vote hobbled and predetermined!

"Numerous political parties were not allowed to run"? The evidence was visible all through the article, here, as far as I am concerned, is the ultimate proof:

When Le Monde wants a nativist opinion on the situation in Iraq, France's newspaper of reference chooses a member, or a sympathizer, of the Ba'athist party!

What a waste, my God, what a waste! …

May God curse the Americans and those that support them!

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Be sure to check out NetWar's "sixty-four-thousand-dollar questions Europeans should put to their media"

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Regarding the apprehensiveness that individuals have in parts of Europe of opening their mouths in support of Uncle Sam and to show their suspicion for the supposed humanism of members of the "peace camp" (and no wonder, with the snickering, the castigation, and the slander that they know will be forthcoming), let us remember that today is the birthday of Adlai Stevenson, the American Statesman (1900-1965) who said:

A free society is one where it is safe to be unpopular.

All progress has resulted from people who took unpopular positions.

He added that

A hypocrite is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump and make a speech for conservation.

A politician is a statesman who approaches every question with an open mouth.

After four years at the United Nations I sometimes yearn for the peace and tranquillity of a political convention.

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The great silence by left-leaning Western feminists, and other large parts of the left, to human rights abuses carried out in the name of Islam is, to see it as its kindest, caused by an overdeveloped sense of tolerance or cultural relativism

writes the Australian's Pamela Bone in The Silence of the Feminists, as she asks, "Why don't left-leaning Western women speak up about abuses in the Islamic world?"

But it is also part of the new anti-Americanism. Look at American Christian fundamentalism, they say.

Dislike of George Bush's foreign policy has led to an automatic support of those perceived to be his enemies. Paradoxically, this leaves the left defending people who hold beliefs that condone what the left has long fought against: misogyny, homophobia, capital punishment, suppression of freedom of speech. The recent reaffirmation by Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei of the fatwa against Salman Rushdie has been met by virtual silence; as has the torture and murder in Iraq of a man who would be presumed to be one of the left's own — Hadi Salih, the international officer of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions. The hard left these days is soft on fascism, or at least Islamofascism.

The religious right in America would, if it could, wind back access to abortion and some other women's rights. But as far as I am aware, no Christian fundamentalist in the US has suggested banning women from driving cars, or travelling without their husbands' permission, or forcing them to cover their faces. Contrary to popular opinion, one is not the same as the other.

It does not take a lot of courage for people living in Western democracies to criticise aspects of their culture that need criticising (indeed, it sometimes takes more courage to defend the culture). It takes a great deal of courage for people living in totalitarian states to speak out against the injustices done in the name of their religion or culture. The problem with politely ignoring abuses of human rights because "it's their culture" is that it lets down the brave liberals and democrats and human rights defenders who are trying to change things that so badly need to change for the welfare of women and men in their own communities and in the world.

(Cheers to Mister Hoffmann)

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PRESIDENT BUSH’S State of the Union speech on Wednesday night got the usual thumbs down in the perfumed salons of the self-appointed intellectual liberal elites

writes Gerard Baker in his Times article Like the fall of the Berlin Wall, Iraq's elections will change world history, noting that "The momentum for change in the Middle East is now unstoppable".

… The visual field of the smart-thinking classes is now so seeped in red whenever the American President speaks that there is not the least possibility any longer that they will faithfully report what he has said. They simply use it as another opportunity to promote their own caricature of him.…

What Mr Bush [said Wednesday] might be incidental to those who seek to convey only a distorted, paranoid image of America, but to the rest of us, or indeed anyone willing to listen, it repays some attention.

… Whatever else you can say about this latest agglomeration of proposals … it defies easy caricature.

But the meat of the President’s speech was the same, animating foreign policy goals that he laid out in his inaugural address two weeks ago. Mr Bush restated the ultimate aim of US strategy as ending tyranny on Earth. This time, perhaps anticipating a little better the carping criticism that this is crazy/dishonest/hypocritical, the President added some specifics that are likely to shape US policy for years ahead. In doing so he demonstrated that rhetoric has its own consequences. George W. Bush is slowly, steadily ratcheting up the rhetoric, not to threaten all-out war, as his screaming critics claim, but to create an international climate in which the price of supporting repression is intolerably high.

By calling explicitly on Saudi Arabia and Egypt to liberalise, he made it harder than ever for the US to return to an approach that connives at those regimes’ corruption and autocracy. By challenging Iran and Syria to stop their support for terrorism, and in Iran’s case, its pursuit of nuclear weapons, he emphasised again that the post-September 11 world is not a safe one for dictators and fanatics who thrive through mass murder.

But the entire speech, indeed the entire opening act of this President’s second term, was ventilated by the extraordinary air that has blown around the world from Iraq since Sunday’s elections.

Contrived it may have been, but there was no escaping the emotional symbolism of the moment when Janet Norwood, the mother of a Marine killed in the assault on Fallujah last year, embraced Safia Taleb al-Suhali, the daughter of an Iraqi murdered by Saddam Hussein who had just triumphantly voted in Iraq’s elections. It was an iconic moment. The symbolism was captured by two poignant visual effects — Mrs Norwood clasped her son’s dog tags; Ms al-Suhali waved the purple finger of magnificent defiance.

If the world could only strip away some of its blind resentment it might start to see without prejudice what Mr Bush and Tony Blair are seeking to achieve in their grand and noble venture in the Middle East. But in the end, it will matter not how the world reports a president’s or a prime minister’s words. It will be the inescapable logic and reality of events that will eventually persuade even the most cynical critic.

Sometimes moments of truly historic significance are almost instantly recognisable for what they are. The Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 proclaimed its universal importance right from the start. No one needed to be told that the fall of the Berlin Wall was going to change history. With others the consequences creep up on us slowly, even surreptitiously. Some wise heads see the significance; others resist it or are blind to it. It was not immediately necessarily evident that Hitler’s ascent to power in 1933 would lead to the unrelenting tragedy that unfolded for Europe and the world over the next decade. We all know better now.

Last Sunday I think will quickly fall into the first category. There is an unstoppable momentum for change in the Middle East now. In just two years tyrannies have been felled in Iraq and Afghanistan. In Palestine, the inexorable clock of human mortality has ended another. But the crucial element was always going to be the voluntary and courageous act of self-assertion that democratic and free elections represent — a message heard around the region and the world.

The way is open now, as it has never been, for an end to the servitude and alienation that have been the lot of the people of the Middle East for centuries. Long after the rhetoric has been ridiculed and scorned, the reality will stand as a magnificent monument to the possibilities of liberty.

(Danke zu Herr Hoffmann)

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Punish Côte D'Ivoire, ignore Armenia, forgive Cuba

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1 Shot, 1 Kill, No remorse, I Decide	1 Balle, 1 Tué, Aucun remords, Je prends la décision
American snipers.	Tireurs embusqués américains.

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Regarding the individuals in "old Europe" who are wary or afraid to voice their support for Uncle Sam and their skepticism with regards to the so-called "peace camp" because of the attendant castigation, mockery, and marginalization they know is forthcoming, it is not a bad thing to remember that today is the birthday of Rosa Lee Parks, the American civil-rights activist who said

I have learned over the years that when one's mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear.

Each person must live their life as a model for others.

Have you ever been hurt and the place tries to heal a bit, and you just pull the scar off of it over and over again.

Memories of our lives, of our works and our deeds will continue in others.

My only concern was to get home after a hard day's work.

Whatever my individual desires were to be free, I was not alone. There were many others who felt the same way.

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Excerpts from an article in
The Australian:

French worked up over hours
Emma-Kate Symons,
ParisFebruary 04, 2005

Socialist Party figures accusing the Right of wreaking "ideological revenge", unions and white-collar workers will march in most large French cities in defence of "les trente-cinq heures", or each worker's right to clock on for no longer than 35 hours a week.

Despite earlier suggestions the law would be abolished, both Mr Raffarin and President Jacques Chirac have made clear they will not completely junk the piece of social engineering that was designed to entrench a better national quality of life and lower unemployment. The reason? The 35-hour week is now deemed an "acquired right".

However, this was followed by a return to record high unemployment, a slump in economic growth, and a political backlash at the 2002 election when the Socialists' working-class base deserted the party.

Former IMF head Michel Camdessus late last year handed a report to the French Government that found "decline is a real threat", and growth prospects would be limited without a sharp change in policy direction.

Unemployment in France rivals Germany, which this week recorded 5 million jobless, or 12 per cent, a post-reunification high.

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France balks at EU single job market plan
UPI - Thursday, February 03, 2005

Date: Thursday, February 03, 2005 11:05:15 AM EST

BRUSSELS, Feb. 3 (UPI) -- France has vowed to fight a European Union plan to create a single job market for professionals such as doctors throughout the 25 member countries.

In Paris, French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin called the draft law that would erase borders for such professions as medicine, law and architecture "unacceptable," the International Herald Tribune said Thursday.

"We will take every measure to oppose this directive," Raffarin told the French National Assembly.

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The French Exception: The US is the only unilateralist expoliter of resources, especially the very "outree" pollution emitting sort, but France is not. The intention is clearly not to support the cause of free people living in peace and security:

Thalif Deen reports in the Inter Press News Service:

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 3 (IPS) - France, the former colonial ruler of Cote d'Ivoire, is being lambasted for manipulating the U.N. Security Council to politically and militarily isolate the West African nation, which has been ravaged by an ongoing civil war.

In an unusual arrangement, French troops have the right to act alone and do not come under the military authority of UNOCI.

The French are ”too tainted” by their historic neo-colonial relationship to Cote d'Ivoire. ”The French clearly have an interest in retaining their role as the hegemonic power over their former colonies,” he added.

Addressing a U.N. press conference last month, Ambassador Philippe Djangone-Bi of Cote d'Ivoire told reporters that the Security Council should integrate the French orce into UNOCI.

”The sooner unified command and action was achieved, the sooner UNOCI would succeed in its actions,” he added.

If unified command is applied to most U.N. peacekeeping missions, ”why is Cote d'Ivoire an exception?” he asked.

A Washington-based group that calls itself Friends of Democratic Governments says that colonial rule in Cote d'Ivoire ended more than 40 years ago, ”but France and its embedded corporate interests refuse to let go.”

”The same French government that opposed 'regime change' in Iraq is using its influence in the United Nations to undermine a democratically-elected president in West Africa,” the group says in its website.

In respsonse to the advertisement placed by the Friends of Democratic Governments, a spokesperson for the French Embassy in Washington said:

"[It] is not France who decided to have an embargo on Ivory Coast. This is the entire international community embodied by the [U.N.] Security Council. And, of course, the arms embargo applies to every possible Ivorian party -- not just the Ivorian army, but every militia, every group."

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The Press Association reports -
"Amar was 19, but he had the mind of a four-year-old. This handicap didn't stop the insurgency's hard men as they strapped explosives to his chest and guided him to a voting centre in suburban Al-Askan.

""I have heard of them using dead people and donkeys and dogs to hide their bombs, but how could they do this to a boy like Amar?"

"Apparently, Amar triggered the bomb before he got to the intended target. It exploded while he was crossing open ground.

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Discussing a pedanticly typical exchange of undigested ideas on a BBC Radio 4 program, Frank, a commenter on The Daily Ablution raises a salient point: could left-thinkers truly tolerate the relativism that they seek in their great future Nirvanna-topia?
In reference to terrorism, if one first asks "why do they hate us?", and that's concidered humanistic, "lucide," and virtuous, would they manage to think of a rapist the same way as a terrorist? Should one be caring and warm, and ask ourselved "why does he hate her? She shouldn't call the police - he might be offended and do it again!"

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Made available here in Windows Media Player format
by The Daily NK [EN] [KN].

Many, many thanks to Avery.

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In Afghanistan, we helped liberate an oppressed people. And we will continue helping them secure their country, rebuild their society, and educate all their children -- boys and girls. In the Middle East, we will continue to seek peace between a secure Israel and a democratic Palestine. (Applause.) Across the Earth, America is feeding the hungry -- more than 60 percent of international food aid comes as a gift from the people of the United States.

- President George Bush in the State of the Union address, 02-February-2005

Meanwhile, unaware that they're revealing their narcissism and lack of ideas, his opposition wastes time talking about themselves.

I was born and raised in the high desert of Nevada in a tiny town called Searchlight. My dad was a hard-rock miner. My mom took in wash. I grew up around people of strong values - even if they rarely talked about them. ...

-Senator Harry Reid -

Opposition rebuttal to the address. 02-February-2005

Note: The New York Times truncated his use of the word "God" for some reason.

I'm sure and still believes in a place called hope. I wish him happiness in getting there someday. But the Democratic position reminds me of people who imagine that all of those little stickers over the years have actually lead to a "Free Tibet".

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Bringing in a new rulebook	Casser le jeu
A true subversive.	Un vrai subversif.

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[Many pundits, East and West, have suggested that anti-Americanism results primarily from the role that the United States has played in denying Muslims and Arabs in the Muslim world democracy]

Henh? Ex-queeze me? Baking powder? Oh, I get it. The U.S. is always wrong.

Craig "I was raised in the Jim Crowe south" Merrihue in the same fine opus asks the question "Who Needs a Jewish State?" Never mind the fact that he was in college in the 80's after the great transomation of the south away from racism was substancially complete. If he really wants to promote liberalism and the rights of individuals, shouldn't he be one of the evil, blood sucking neo-cons that Mama warned him about?

Hard to believe from a group of people who are trying to convince readers that all is honky-dorey in southern Sudan, when their "like totally world, man" fellow travellers entirely disagree.

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French peacekeepers in Ivory Coast denounced Monday as a "crude rumour without any base in truth" information in the pro-government media that their troops had attempted to kill President Laurent Gbagbo

writes the AFP. Of course, when crude rumors concern Uncle Sam and (crude) oil, the French are much less likely to be as vocal in their denouncements.

The Notre Voie (Our Path) daily linked to Gbagbo's ruling Ivorian Popular Front party charged that French troops tried to assassinate Gbagbo on Saturday at Abidjan's airport by shooting down his plane when he was leaving for the African Union summit in Nigeria.

The French peacekeeping contingent said the paper had turned a small misunderstanding into a "fantasy".

But how the French love to turn misunderstandings involving America into fantasy, and castigations, and …crude rumors.

The Reporters Without Borders media rights group has repeatedly criticised the Ivorian government-controlled media for encouraging a climate of hate and encouraging the riots against foreigners last year.

How often has RWB criticized the French government-controlled media (yearly tax rebates of 30%, among other carrots) for encouraging a climate of hate against America (sorry, against Bush)?

Gbagbo, has repeatedly accused the French, who helped broker a peace deal to end a rebellion two years ago, of working against his regime.

Dubya, seems like ya got a soul-mate here…

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An accusation by Australian Prime Minister John Howard that France was guilty of lingering "anti-Americanism" drew sharp words from Paris on Tuesday during a visit by the Australian foreign minister

writes the AFP. To no one's surprize, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier refused to draw any lessons from the comments or admit to any failures ("mistakes" is only what happens in Washington), and did nothing except the usually relativizing of the problem, equating temporary American anger about France's betrayal at the UN in 2003 (when it was planning to put its troops in harm's way) with the perennial anti-Americanism that is never far from the surface in France.

The Australian leader — a strong US ally — on Sunday accused "old Europe" of unleashing "unfair and irrational" criticism on the United States during a panel debate at the forum.

"America has made mistakes," Howard told the panel, but later added in comments to The Australian newspaper that he believed there was an "irrational level of anti-Americanism" in Europe.

"It is a sign of parochialism and it is disturbingly intense," he said, singling out France and Germany as the worst offenders.

"I found the French and German attitude has lingered longer than I thought it might, and longer than it is in anyone's interests," Howard said.

More about Barnier's (typical) reaction

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I thought it was only in Lower Manhattan where they talked about "hair crimes".

Une crise de cheveux, mais pas à Paris.


Street photos from North Korea. If anyone finds a link to the recently revealed videotape of North Korean opponents of the DPRK, please let us know and ¡No Pasarán! will carry the link.

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What a difference a war makes	De guerre lasse
CNN battered and bloddy. From avant-garde world beater to agonizing dinosaur in just 12 years.	CNN est drôlement amoché. Il y a 12 ans en position d'avant-garde sans véritable concurrent, la chaîne finit en dinosaur à abattre.

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Who's the dummy?	Poupée de cire, poupée de çon
Must have been kidnapped by the French kids over there. Little morons.	Il a dû se faire enlever par les chères têtes blondes franchouilles qui sont là-bas. Petits imbéciles.
UPDATE/DERNIERES INFOS: Toy Story.

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Even the left that liked Bill Clinton didn’t trust him, possibly because he seemed to moderate for them. If someone out there thinks that hiring him on (source!) as a U.N. Special Representative will endear Americans to the U.N. is sadly mistaken. It strikes me to be about as bright an idea as hiring Woody Allen to peddle tourism in France. Especially since they're both widely thought of as sexual predators.

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Ted Kennedy calls for surrender by another name. Zut Alors?!? But why?

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Possibly because it's the only place that those enlightened leftists (who know so much about the world) can find on a map. It reminds Jonah Goldberg of The Jetsons.

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Bad neighborhoods	Quartiers chauds
Ratholes ready to blow. Many thanks for these links to the blog of that insufferable French socialist asshole, Julien Dray.	Trous à rats prêts à exploser. Ces liens grâce au blog de ce connard de socialiste franchouille insupportable du nom de Julien Dray.

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Valerie Solanas, like so many mad ramblers who get sucked into inhumane and hateful philosophies, had a lonely death, in this case as a drug addicted ho in San Francisco.

Forget about being loved, or even liked, the one trait evident with virtually all of these people is that they are completely incapable of having a relationship with another human being. For their comfort they resort to seeing everything through the prism of power and violence.

Making people hate one another is their currency. Happy Valentine's day, people.

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Don't let the dildo jam you up on the way out, sweetheart	Gode-bye trou à bites
Karen Bach, a sort of sub-commandant Valerie Solinas within Ripoublika Franska's numerous gay-matriarchy private militias, committed suicide this past Friday.	Karen Bach, une espèce de sous-commandant Valerie Solinas à la solde des nombreuses milices pédalo-matriarche en Ripoublika Franska s'est suicidée ce vendredi dernier.
UPDATE: Hysterical rich cunt, on the rag.	DERNIERES INFOS: Pétasse hystérique, pleine aux as, qui a ses règles.

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Give me liberty or give me death - Live free or die

These expressions have lost all meaning in France (if they ever meant anything here). The Iraqis have proudly invigorated these axioms with a real life demonstration of sheer balls. The contrast was striking Sunday on LCI French cable news where reports of Iraqi elections switched directly over to reports of some more inane bickering between François Hollande and Laurent Fabius. Seeing these two French socialists, from the very same political party that was weak and stupid enough to lose to Le Pen's National Front, taking part in some idiotic inner party struggle, made very clear to what extent France was a very small country indeed.

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Stay confused and let the press be the judge.

Le Monde’s Mouna Naïm on 01-february reported:

Le terrorisme s'étend dans la région du Golfe et gagne le Koweït après l'Arabie saoudite

Ainsi, lundi 31 janvier, cinq "terroristes", selon les forces de l'ordre, ont été tués, cinq autres dont trois blessés ont été arrêtés au terme d'un échange de tirs avec la police, qui avait cerné l'habitation où ils se trouvaient dans la région d'Al-Quraïn, à 25 kilomètres au sud de la capitale.
L'un des "terroristes" arrêtés, Amer Khlaïf Al-Enezi, ne serait rien moins que le chef spirituel des activistes islamistes dans l'Emirat, à en croire un porte-parole du ministère de l'intérieur. Trois membres des forces de sécurité ont également été blessés.

So they aren’t really terrorists, they’re “terrorists”… Which means they’re harmless, unless 3 cops are killed, which they were... But they just can’t be!?! It’s not REALLY a problem. However judging by the headline, it’s a GROWNING non-problem.
But wait, it’s time to mix it up with religion, not to mention that they must have just been young people just trying to express themselves, kind of like in grammar school arts-and-crafts class:

Pour la plupart, il s'agirait de jeunes gens qui ont peu de chances, vu leur âge, d'avoir appartenu aux "Arabes afghans", qui avaient fait le coup de feu
contre l'armée soviétique aux côtés des moudjahidins afghans. Ils s'inspireraient néanmoins de l'idéologie du réseau terroriste Al-Qaida et de son chef, Oussama Ben Laden. Ils auraient participé à la rébellion de Fallouja avant de se replier sur le Koweït après l'assaut de cette ville irakienne par l'armée américaine, en novembre 2004. Parmi les personnes interpellées figurent au moins deux Saoudiens, selon les autorités koweïtiennes.

The poor little darlings. All they want to do is kill. Is that so wrong?
Then again, she also does a nice job of reporting the obvious, if not the intended result.

Le scepticisme domine dans les capitales arabes à l'aube du second mandat de M. Bush

Naw…. Really?

A bonus for your amusement: here’s another bunch that really doesn’t get the point. Free Syria, but please, prudy please, don't invade Iraq. Make it all please happen by magic or interpretive dance or something....

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David and Ray, the Rowan and Martin... the Gilbert and Sullivan... The Caviar and Champagne... (but definately NOT the Captain and Tennille of or the Ren and Stimpy) of Blogworld, are at it again.

(AGAIN, you ask? Aber WIE?)

Learn some German and gehen sie jetzt da sofort!

Hoowah!

And leave the Gutmenschen behind!

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George McGovern didn't use the word "withdrawal", or anything of the kind, he called for surrender. To whom? Him? To the People's Council of Officially Self-Appointed Victims?

They call for "Surrender" because that's all they have in their vocabulary. They've wasted a lifetime inventing non-existent straw-men to enrage gullible high-school and college age people to take power? A veteran of the culture wars, David Horowitz explains:

"On Christmas Day, former U.S. senator and Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern wrote a letter to the editor of the Los Angeles Times (and probably many other papers) calling for an American surrender in Iraq.
George McGovern has not been in the headlines for three decades, and his name consequently may be unfamiliar to many. But no one has had a greater or more baleful impact on the Democratic Party and its electoral fortunes than this progressive product of the South Dakota plains.

"As a post-graduate student at Berkeley in the early Sixties, I was one of the organizers of the first demonstration against the war in Vietnam. It was 1962, and the organizers of this demonstration as of all the major anti-Vietnam demonstrations (and those against the Iraq war as well) were a Marxist and a leftist, respectively. The organizers of the movement against the war in Vietnam were activists who thought the Communists were liberating Vietnam in the same way Michael Moore thinks Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is liberating Iraq.

"The events that followed this retreat in Indochina have been all but forgotten by the Left, which has never learned the lessons of Vietnam, but instead has invoked the retreat itself as an inspiration and guide for its political opposition to the war in Iraq. Along with leading Democrats like Democratic Party Chairman Terry McAuliffe, George McGovern called for an American retreat from Iraq even before a government could be established...

Actually, that is not what happened. Four months after the Democrats cut off aid to Cambodia and Vietnam in January 1975, both regimes fell to the Communist armies. Within three years the Communist victors had slaughtered two-and-a-half million peasants in the Indochinese peninsula, paving the way for their socialist paradise. The blood of those victims is on the hands of the Americans who forced this withdrawal: John Kerry, Ted Kennedy, Howard Dean, and George McGovern – and antiwar activists like myself.

"It is true that Vietnam eventually became a trading partner (“friend” is another matter). But this was not true that it occurred “once we left and quit bombing its people.”

[Emphases mine]

Their goal is as limited as their view of the world. They don't care what happens in the world as long as their country, the U.S. "loses" in some way, or is at least denegrated. It nothing more than their personal problems projected onto others. Can anyone rationally say that anyone would benefit from both nothing changing Iraq AND the U.S. "losing" something... anything, really, as long as they get can enjoy a pyrrhic victory. At the same time they demand more from the state, but still they hate it. This view of their neither progresses, evolves, or changes. Drowned in rapidly solidifying rarebit, it makes it's adherents more violent, and make deeply illiberal allies. In reality they're just mad that they didn't think of it themselves, and resort to old fashioned Jew bating.

Horowitz escaped the sickness, but many are still wearing their red diapers well into maturity.

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Iraq's president said Tuesday it would be "complete nonsense" to ask foreign troops to leave the country now, although some could depart by year's end

reports Mariam Fam for the AP.

That is akin to calling French foreign policy, or at least one of the central tenets of French (and "peace camp") foreign policy, "complete nonsense".

During a news conference, President Ghazi al-Yawer was asked whether the presence of foreign troops might be fueling the Sunni Arab revolt by encouraging rebel attacks.

"It's only complete nonsense to ask the troops to leave in this chaos and this vacuum of power," al-Yawer, a Sunni Arab, said.

He said foreign troops should leave only after Iraq's security forces are built up, the country's security situation has improved and some pockets of terrorists are eliminated.

"By the end of this year, we could see the number of foreign troops decreasing," al-Yawer said.

Al-Yawer had been a strong critic of some aspects of the U.S. military's performance in Iraq, including the three-week Marine siege of the Sunni rebel city of Fallujah in April.

Al-Yawer helped negotiate an end to that siege. But the city fell into the hands of insurgents and religious zealots, forcing the Marines to recapture Fallujah last November in some of the heaviest urban combat for American forces since the Vietnam war.

"There were some mistakes" in the occupation "but to be fair ... I think all in all it was positive, the contribution of the foreign forces in Iraq," al-Yawer said. "It was worth it."

Later Tuesday, Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan said Iraq would only ask U.S. and other forces to leave when the country's own troops were capable of taking on insurgents.

"We don't want to have foreign troops in our country, but at the same time we believe that these forces should stay for some time until we are able to control the borders and establish a new modern army and we have efficient intelligence," Shaalan told reporters. "At that time ... we'll ask them to leave."

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Of course, you have heard, or read (there is an email circulating), the list of statistics showing that, based on their numbers in the world, Americans allegedly own a disproportionate amount of riches, produce a disordinate amount of pollution, and are generally responsible for all of the inequalities in the world…

Speaking of "stinginess", the charge which was hurled at Uncle Sam after the tsunami struck in the Indian Ocean, Ann Coulter provides us with a statistic that is rarely heard around the world:

Americans make up about 5% of the world's population and give about 35% of the aid. …

At a minimum, in order to discount the largesse of the United States, one must carefully exclude gigantic categories of aid, such as military aid, food aid, trade policies, refugee policies, religious aid, private charities and individual giving.

And don't Americans also pay almost one quarter of the UN's budget (22%, to be exact)?

It turns out that, according to the Rockefeller Foundation's Center for Global Development, Uncle Sam ranks far below countries such as Denmark, Norway, and France in what is called "peacekeeping", and this, although

The U.S. did not merely write a check to help the oppressed people of Afghanistan and Iraq: The U.S. did most of the fighting and liberating as well as a significant share of the dying.

In addition to being

the country that dispatched the Taliban and Saddam Hussein [it is the country that,] before that, ensured that the above countries [Denmark, Norway, and France] would not be speaking German or Russian

So much for statistics…

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Our Diplomad, a young pup then, was at the June 1992 Rio Earth Summit Conference, one of the Great International Victories of the New Marxists

reports the Diplomad.

It was set up to ensure that the USA would be the villain. It would attack the US on global warming AND on the biotech industries then emerging in the USA — this was a two-pronged attack: 1) stop experimenting with biotech; 2) give away your patents and research so others can have them. It was your basic UN international conference, complete with a parallel "summit" by thousands of NGO reps, enormous waste of money, time and effort, and fawning media coverage aimed at convincing the world that it was a more important event than Moses getting the Ten Commandments at Mt. Sinai, or the 1969 Miracle Mets winning the World Series. It was replete with probably hundreds of emissions-spewing limos ferrying about deeply concerned enviro-worriers and warriors to and from their five-star lodgings.

…President George H.W. Bush … went to Rio … probably [thinking], correctly, that the climate change people did not factor in enough of the idea of economic impact, while the biodiversity people cared not at all about the protection of intellectual property. He and his Administration actually took a principled position against both those deals — and took incredible heat for it. The mistake the USA made, of course, was assuming that the people who set up these conferences actually want to have a conference where ideas are expressed and debated. Nope. The UN's idea of such meetings is straight from the Soviet Parliamentary Handbook.

…These mega-UN conferences are really more like circuses than they are like significant diplomatic meetings. They become self-fulfilling prophesies of bigness, much bigger on form than on substance.

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…and implemented a much fairer, a much more objective, a much more peaceful, and, overall, a much better solution?

Among the countries elected to the a five-member panel that will decide which complaints are heard by the U.N. Commission on Human Rights at its annual meeting are Cuba, Zimbabwe, and Saudi Arabia…

(Thanks to RV)

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When Amr Moussa, secretary-general of the Arab League, warned that the U.S. invasion of Iraq would "destabilize" the entire region, he was right

writes Mark Steyn in the Washington Times.

That's why it was such a great idea.

Noting that the "International Monetary Fund noted in November that the Iraqi economy is already outperforming all its Arab neighbors", he adds that

The "realpolitik" types spent so long worshipping at the altar of stability they were unable to see it was a cult for psychos. The geopolitical scene is never stable. It's always dynamic.

If the Western world decides in 2005 it can "contain" President Sy Kottik of Wackistan indefinitely, that doesn't mean the relationship between the two parties is set in aspic.

Wackistan has a higher birthrate than the West, so after 40 years of "stability," there are a lot more Wackistanis and a lot fewer Frenchmen. And Wackistan has immense oil reserves, and President Kottik has used that oil wealth to fund radical schools and mosques in hitherto moderate parts of the Muslim world.

Cheap air travel and the Internet and ATM machines that take every bank card on the planet and the freelancing of nuclear technology mean Wackistan's problems are no longer confined to Wackistan: For a few hundred bucks, they can be outside the Empire State Building within seven hours.

Nothing stands still. "Stability" is a fancy term to dignify laziness and complacency as sophistication.

If you want a good example of excessive deference to the established order, look no further than Iraq. I am often asked about the scale of the insurgency and whether this doesn't prove we armchair warriors vastly underestimated things, etc.

I usually reply that, if you rummage through the archives, you'll find I wanted Iraq liberated before the end of August 2002. The bulk of the military were already in place, sitting in the Kuwaiti desert twiddling their thumbs.

But President Bush was prevailed upon to go "the extra mile" at the United Nations, mainly for the sake of Tony Blair. And thanks to the machinations of Jacques Chirac, Gerhard Schroeder and company, the extra mile wound up being the scenic route through six months of diplomatic gridlock while Washington gamely auditioned any casus belli that might win the favor of the president of Guinea's witchdoctor. All that happened in that time was that the fringe "peace" movement vastly expanded and annexed most of the Democratic Party.

Given all that went on in America, Britain, France, etc. during the interminable "extra mile," it would be idiotic to assume that, with an almighty invasion force squatting on his borders for six months, Saddam just listened to his Sinatra LPs. He was very busy, as were the Islamists, and Iran, and Syria.

The result is not only an insurgency far more virulent than it would have been if Washington had followed my advice rather than Tony's and invaded in August 2002, but also a broader range of enemies who learned a lot about how "world" — i.e., European — opinion could be played off against us.

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By 2008 France will no longer be the biggest wine-consuming nation and the French individually no longer the biggest drinkers

reports the AFP, before adding a piece of news that will make it more difficult in the future for Frenchmen to ridicule Americans as a nation of hamburger-eaters and soft-drink guzzlers…

The United States is likely to be the country with the highest consumption in 2008, followed by Italy and then France, the study … said. …

In 2008 [the United States, Britain, and Germany] would account for 38.7 percent of world consumption of still wines from 25.4 percent in 2003. This amounted to an increase of nearly 9.0 million hectolitres.

France would also lose its place as the country with the highest per-capita consumption of wine.

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"Earlier today, I ordered America's armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq. They are joined by British forces. Their mission is to attack Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors.

"Six weeks ago, Saddam Hussein announced that he would no longer cooperate with the United Nations weapons inspectors called UNSCOM. They are highly professional experts from dozens of countries. Their job is to oversee the elimination of Iraq's capability to retain, create and use weapons of mass destruction, and to verify that Iraq does not attempt to rebuild that capability.

"The international community had good reason to set this requirement. Other countries possess weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles. With Saddam, there is one big difference: He has used them. Not once, but repeatedly.

"I made it very clear at that time what unconditional cooperation meant, based on existing UN resolutions and Iraq's own commitments. And along with Prime Minister Blair of Great Britain, I made it equally clear that if Saddam failed to cooperate fully, we would be prepared to act without delay, diplomacy or warning.

"If we had delayed for even a matter of days from Chairman Butler's report, we would have given Saddam more time to disperse his forces and protect his weapons.

"We have no quarrel with them. But without the sanctions, we would see the oil-for-food program become oil-for-tanks, resulting in a greater threat to Iraq's neighbors and less food for its people.
The hard fact is that so long as Saddam remains in power, he threatens the well-being of his people, the peace of his region, the security of the world.

Wednesday, December 16, 1998, William Jefferson Clinton, President of the United States of America

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The second death of Van Gogh	La seconde mort de Van Gogh
In the face of a terrorist threat, Iraqis have balls. In the face of a terrorist threat, Zeropeans cave.	En face d'une menace terroriste, les irakiens montrent qu'ils ont des couilles. En face d'une menace terroriste, les zéropéens se penchent en avant (leurs mains protégeant leurs moignons de zobs).

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Around the world, leaders and editorialists in several countries, even Iran, hailed [Iraq's] elections as historic

Brian Knowlton reports in the International Herald Tribune.

In London, Prime Minister Tony Blair … said the election was "a blow right to the heart" of global terrorism, but warned that it was only a beginning, adding, "There is still a great deal to do."

France, a leading opponent of the war, welcomed the elections and the apparently high turnout rate as "good news." When a radio interviewer asked a government spokesman, Jean-François Copé, whether the polls represented a victory for the Bush administration, he replied that they were, more broadly, "a great success for the international community."

Yeah. Right. And a great sacrifice was what the entire international community made to ensure the removal of Saddam Hussein and the holding of the elections, n'est-ce pas, Jean-François? And so it is that the spin to dilute and/or remove positive references to Bush and his administration (and his country and its type of society) continues…

Belgium, a leading critic of the war, said that it was prepared to help Iraqis draft a constitution. Saying that "Iraqis have chosen resolutely to take their destiny in their own hands," Foreign Minister Karel De Gucht offered the services of Belgian constitutional-law specialists…

I am positive that the Iraqis can hardly wait for the Belgians to send their contingent. Knowlton ends his article with this:

In Washington, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that Iraqis had taken "a huge step forward" and she declared Sunday to have been "a great day."

Visibly buoyed, Rice said that other governments had "to realize that it is our obligation to continue to spread freedom and liberty across the globe."

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SALIM MANSUR writing in the Toronto Sun


"Yet what is remarkable in Canada and elsewhere -- places where the media are dominated by lib-left thinkers certain of their own moral and intellectual superiority -- is the doubt cast on the legitimacy of Iraq's election due to the conditions under which it is being held, which they say will prevent a large segment of the population from participating out of fear.

"The same lib-left media, however, did not discount the legitimacy of the recently held Palestinian election in which somewhere around 30% of Palestinians did not, or could not, vote due to circumstances beyond their control.

"Nor would this lib-left elite suggest Canadian elections -- with similar or higher rates of voter non-participation -- are invalid.

"During the last century, communist fellow-travellers in the West found nothing right in the effort of Americans and others who supported the cause of freedom in communist-controlled societies of the East.

A similar lib-left mindset, presently at work in Canada and Europe, is unwilling to go beyond its petulant anti-Americanism and see for itself how raw the struggle for freedom is, as being witnessed in Iraq.

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Condoleezza takes over.

Naturally Madeleine Albright was appointed.
Now if they could only spell her name correctly.

How very Gesellig...

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When a Russian official's position on the environment had to be cencored at Davos, what seems quite obvious is that the Euro-view has very ittle to do with honest dialogue and debate. The cencor does what he does in order to snuff a convincing proposal which is not his own, and does it knowing that his position is weaker. It proves the censor wrong in any case, and only reinforces the validity of the 'forbidden thought'.

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"Since the fall of the Saddam régime, France's foreign policy has been skeptical, suspicious", says Iraqi foreign minister Hoshyar Zebari to Le Monde's Cécile Hennion, and "has had more to do with its relationship to the United States than to its relationship with Iraq." He adds that while its overt policies have been almost passive, he wonders whether Paris doesn't have more clout with the country's "insurgents" than it lets know…

In other matters, Laurent Zecchini interviws [sic] Henry Sokolski about Iran, leading the non-proliferation specialist to say that "the European [negotiators] are cynical and are going to fail. … The Europeans prefer to appear as being in control of the situation, rather than stigmatize Iran."

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I don't want to see there stinking faces unless they're serving me paella and cerveza	Je ne veux plus voir leurs sales tronches à moins qu'il ne m'apportent ma commande de paëlla et cerveza
Dead and dying Zeropa. Spanish collaborationists protest the Iraqi elections in Madrid. This is the same scum that let their elections to be decided by Al-Queda.	La Zéropa se meurt. Des collabos espinguoins manifestent contre les élections irakiennes à Madrid. C'est la même sale populace qui a laissé décider ses élections par Al-Queda.

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What a quagmire!	Quel bourbier!
Flippin' the bird to the UN.	Le gros doigt sorti pour l'ONUzi.
Flippin' the bird to France.	Le gros doigt sorti pour la Fwance.

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From the BBC's (Don't) Have Your Say website are concerning the Iraqi national election , the following comment was placed on top of the dogpile:

The election process has been rejected by a high percentage of Iraqis, this spells doom for democracy in Iraq. Classifying voters as either Sunnis, Shias or Kurds will produce a very unstable Iraq for many years to come.

Thanks for the shot in the arm, sparky. I'm sure the commenter can't wait for doom to fill his emotional void. Since when is 72% participation a large rejection? It's as high as every presidential election in France since 1969. It's higher than the last two parliamentary elections in the UK. In fact, it's higher than the turnout for every French Parliamentary election held since 1958. In that case, obviously none of those elections should be concidered legitimate.

The overwelming majority of the opinions posted are positive about the election, like this one which actually disproves what the Beeb has been reporting/promoting all day:

I have just spoken with an Iraqi Sunni friend in Baghdad and he told me how so many people in his neighbourhood are so happy! The insurgents, not the Americans, are the real problem in the country. This election is not about the US controlling oil, it's about giving the Iraqis the right to choose. We will leave Iraq in the next few years, God willing. And I pray for all those Iraqis who have the courage to stand up to the insurgents, who are the ones who are killing the Iraqi people and security forces. Wake up Europe and the rest of the world. Just because you don't like George Bush, it doesn't mean that you have to denounce this day.

Meanwhile, back in the Netherlands, the "root cause" is found to all of this pessimism, anticipation, nay, hope for failure, royal badness, bad juju, and nasty funk. In fact they seem quite resigned to doom and bad juju, in spite of modern dentistry, high quality Lebanese Red, and an endless supply of psychiatric care -

Depressed?
You will be...Finally, De Telegraaf adds to the gloomy mood by saying we've never in history been so depressed as now. More and more Dutch people find it difficult to cope with life - almost 23 percent admit to having problems. But contrary to what one might think, the paper says the murder of Theo van Gogh hasn't had much of an impact. A much more plausible reason for the rise, says De Telegraaf, is that psychiatrists and other therapists have been so eager to help in recent years that they're convincing more and more people to believe they're having problems.

If they can't be happy with themselves, Europeans need to stop being such a huge buzz-kill.

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When elections are introduced, thanks to Uncle Sam's boys, Le Monde's pundits and artists have little choice but to tone down their anti-American rhetoric (although Pancho's still manages to be condescending).

(Autres = others.) But don't get your hopes up: at the slightest occasion, at the slightest flame-up, no matter how tiny or trivial, they will bring back that good ol' Yankee-bogeyman speech.

(Just for the record: The following appeared during the Palestinian election earlier this month:)

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'If you don't take a job as a prostitute, we can stop your benefits' reports Clare Chapman in The Telegaph (Filed: 30/01/2005)

Now that prostitution is no longer considered by the law to be immoral, there is really nothing but the goodwill of the job centres to stop them from pushing women into jobs they don't want to do.

Miss Garweg believes that pressure on job centres to meet employment targets will soon result in them using their powers to cut the benefits of women who refuse jobs providing sexual services.

Under Germany's welfare reforms, any woman under 55 who has been out of work for more than a year can be forced to take an available job - including in the sex industry - or lose her unemployment benefit. Last month German unemployment rose for the 11th consecutive month to 4.5 million, taking the number out of work to its highest since reunification in 1990.


The more that government gets involved in society, the worse, not better, life gets. Governments have often resorted to euthenasia, and have also had to deal with the blowback. "You broke it, you bought it." Again, from today's Telegraph:

Czech women to sue over forced sterilisations
By Michael Leidig in Prague (Filed: 30/01/2005)

In a series of cases with disturbing overtones of the forced sterilisation programmes run by some of Eastern Europe's former Communist regimes, the women - from poor, little-educated or ethnic minority backgrounds - claim that they did not give proper consent for operations which have left them unable to have children.

Yes, that is the photo I wanted on this post...

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Last week it was total environmental collapse by 2015. Wow, science sure is wonderful, isn't it?
All that progress in just one week!

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In a December demonstration against the opening of a McDonald's in the Mediterranean town of Sete, France, about 500 protesters, using a homemade catapult, bombarded the restaurant with fresh catches of the area's renowned delicacy, octopus.

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Iraqis to Zarqawi: no thanks, we've got other ideas	Les irakiens à Zarkaoui: non merci, sans façon
French to Iraqis: but what's not to like? Zarqawi is a revolutionary who hates Americans.	Les franchouilles aux irakiens: mais il n'y a rien à jeter! Zarkaoui est un révolutionnaire qui déteste les ricains.

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Caroline Glick clues us in to a continent trying desperately to not learn from their elders a lesson taught to us by the horrors of Auschwitz.

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Bush radicalism works its magic: Iraqis turnout at over 70%	Le radicalisme de Bush se porte comme un charme: les irakiens votent avec un taux de participation de plus de 70%
The French presse Pravda concentrates on violent incidents, mutters something about 50% voter participation, and occults the fact the the Iraqi elections are a resounding success. Of course, the UN and France are nowhere to be seen and the Iraqis will keep that in mind. Iraqi voters are real life risk takers, not like collaborating French journalists.	La presse Pravda franchouille met l'accent sur les incidents violents, marmonne des conneries au sujet d'un taux de participation qui tourne autour de 50%, et occulte le fait que les élections en Irak sont un succès retentissant. Et puis, l'ONUzi et la Fwance ne montrent pas les bouts de leurs queues rabougries là-bas. Les irakiens s'en souviendront. Les électeurs irakiens sont de vrais preneurs de risques ce qui les différencie des collabos de journalistes franchouilles.
UPDATE: Even Al-Reuters must admit that turnout was high in the Sunni 'triangle of death'.	DERNIERES INFOS: Même Al-Reuters est obligé de reconnaître que le taux de participation est élevé dans 'le triangle de la mort' Sunnite.

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French collaborators have a hard-on for the terrorists	Collabos franchouilles bandent pour les terroristes
Le Monde Al-Jazeera on the Seine and Agence France-Presse, who can't see further than the tip of their miniscule dicks, ridicule the elections in Iraq based on early voting in France.	Le Monde Al-Jazira sur Seine et l'AFP, qui ne voient pas plus loin que les bouts de leurs queues rabougries (et puis, ce ne sont pas les seuls dans ce cas de figure), dénigrent les élections en Irak sur la base du taux de participation en Fwance.

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