…most Japanese are shocked to hear that their nation also tried to build an atomic bomb. “I have no doubt Japan would have used it if it succeeded,” [former schoolteacher Kiwamu Ariga, 81, said].

Independantly from Martin Fackler's New York Times article, it's good to again listen to Bill Whittle take on the liberals' Hiroshima myth (aligato to Instapundit).

Jon Stewart gets his facts wrong about America's use of the Atomic bomb in World War 2. Should Harry Truman have been prosecuted as a war criminal? Whittle takes you back to those fateful days and tells you the facts about the history altering decisions to drop two Atomic bombs on Japanese cities.

As it turns out,

for decades Ishikawa’s role [regarding Japan’s secrecy-wrapped efforts to build an atomic bomb during World War II] went largely unnoticed, as an economically resurgent Japan tried its best to put its wartime past behind it. Since the 1990s, major media have become less inhibited about discussing the war, including Japan’s atomic bomb programs. However, the programs still seem to be easily forgotten in a nation that is more accustomed to thinking of itself as the victim of the deadly American atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

… “We were brainwashed during the war, and we were brainwashed again after the war,” Mr. Ariga said. “Maybe we will get wise the third time.”

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Thanks also to Michael Savage for da linky love to ¡No Pasarán!.

You’re an evil genius, and Britons don’t deserve you, your observations and commentary, NOR your mushroom sauce recipe... Britannia rules the knaves, anyway.

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When the lights went out across Europe:

As of 1 September, conventional light bulbs of more than 40 watts will be taken off the market. In the countries of the Arctic Circle, it’s a step into the dark that’s being badly received.

Actually it’s more like watching a bear peddling a unicycle without any background music in a basement full of silent, ruminating Iggy Pop wannabees.

Next will be vacuum cleaners, fans, coffee makers, hair dryers.

Every time you use a coffee maker, Gaia strangles a puppy.

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Nicolas Sarkozy, Barack Obama: two presidents now on parallel paths of bad unemployment numbers, lousy poll scores, and prospects for re-election next year that run from diminished to dubious.

Thus starts John Vinocur's article in the International Herald Tribune.

Not to mention weakening economies, a couple of shooting wars in Libya and Afghanistan, and countrymen who view their nations’ roles in the world as exceptional and universal — although the Americans more in terms of a burden of responsibility and the French as a pick-and-choose entitlement.

… Coming back to France after close to four weeks of unscientific watching and listening on the other side of the Atlantic provides an interesting contrast.

In the United States, the impact of markedly bad unemployment figures of 9.1 percent — the net job change of zero in August was the first of its kind since 1945 — has immense shock value in a country used to jobless rates regularly half those of Western Europe. People are truly taken aback.

Reporting on Mr. Obama’s August vacation island of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, a center of left-wing chic, The Boston Globe said “Obama fever” on the island had become a memory, replaced by disaffection over partisan deadlock and the stalled economy.

But that was mild stuff compared with criticism coming from core constituencies — environmentalists who describe as a brazen sellout the president’s abandoning a major anti-pollution effort, or blacks complaining that he was avoiding focusing on dramatic employment rates in black communities.

America’s ambient noise has clearly changed. Strikingly, words like weak, ineffectual and mediocre to describe Mr. Obama have migrated and been transmogrified from talk-radio screech into reasonable on-air discussion.

… Mitt Romney, a possible mainstream Republican candidate asked, “Have we ever had a president before who was eager to address the world with an apology on his lips and doubt in his heart?”

… So a little more than three months before an election year, who’s better off? Mr. Sarkozy, who has limited popularity but a certain credibility in crises, or Mr. Obama, whose lifestyle and mannerisms don’t find contempt, but whose competence managing the American economy (and foreign policy) is increasingly in doubt?

… For both French exceptionalists and the general French public, victories are a relative notion — being in the game, being respected, and, when possible, doing things differently, à la française.

That’s a million miles from predicting a Sarkozy victory or an Obama loss, or vice versa. But while the two confront similar issues, an American president has unquestionably higher hurdles to clear in a nation where winning — and not oozing around the edges of loss or decline — is still an instinctive, national expectation.

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Xie's family asked why Xie would choose to severely mutilate so much of his body in a suicide attempt.

Voila les Chinoiseries:

Anti-corruption official found dead with 11 knife wounds, police declare it a suicide

Enjoy your “post-American-century, folks!

It was suggested that Xie's suicide was possibly related to work issues, stemming from his failure to be promoted to the standing committee at his office.

And remember: Daddy drinks because you cry!

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…jamais un événement historique n'aura été si vite, si abondamment représenté et commenté de manière fictionnelle.

Le Monde has a dossier by Macha Séry on TV films and TV series [but not movies] inspired by the 9-11 attacks (The Event, Rubicon, and The Killing, along with even Mad Men and episodes of West Wing), which of course includes the subhead "a culture of fear"; which misspells the name of Georges Bush, while castigating Fox News' alleged "propaganda" in Dubya's favor; and which includes Martine Delahaye's fillers on shows such as Fringe (Fringe), FlashForward (FlashForward), Rescue Me, les Héros du 11-Septembre (Rescue Me), and of course 24 Heures Chrono (24) as well as the documentary Les Routes de la terreur.

Après le 11-Septembre et la guerre en Afghanistan, deux perspectives se sont ouvertes aux scénaristes : dépeindre une Amérique qui doute, traversée par une perte de confiance (séries conspiration-nistes, type « Alias ») ou renforcer le patriotisme en suggérant la victoire morale des Américains.

Dans "Science-fiction et paranoïa", un documentaire américain de 2011, Steven Spielberg avoue qu'il n'aurait jamais fait Rencontre du troisième type et E.T. : « Je pense qu'après le 11-Septembre, j'ai perdu un peu de mon innocence. L'inconnu n'est peut-être pas aussi bienveillant que ça. » Aux espions de l'Est, aux communistes armés de la bombe nucléaire, au fantasme de cinquième colonne, a succédé à l'écran, jusqu'à y proliférer, la figure du terroriste, de l'ennemi invisible, des cellules dormantes.

« A partir de 2002, nota l'historienne Olivia Brender dans une étude publiée en 2007 par l'institut Pierre Renouvin, les personnages d'«Arabes» se multiplièrent dans les séries télévisées. Si, par le nombre d'intrigues où des Arabes furent suspectés à tort d'être des terroristes, la fiction télévisée hollywoodienne sembla assumer un rôle pédagogique en combattant les clichés qu'avaient pu faire naître les attentats du 11-Septembre, force est de constater qu'elle participa insidieusement à alimenter la peur à l'égard des Arabes vivant sur le sol américain. (...) Par sa seule présence physique, le personnage «arabe» crée un danger potentiel. »

As for Radio France, writes Alain Constant, it has prepared a theme for every day:
• terrorisme, état de la menace (jeudi 1er septembre),
• génération 11-Septembre (vendredi 2),
• le 11-Septembre inspire la culture (samedi 3),
• ma vie a changé (dimanche 4),
• la guerre de dix ans (lundi 5),
• l'économie mondiale (mardi 6),
• les religions (mercredi 7),
• les transports (jeudi 8),
• les dix ans des Etats-Unis (vendredi 9).
• Des reportages en direct de New York et du Pakistan seront diffusés
samedi 10, et dimanche 11 pour les cérémonies de commémoration.

France Bleu programme mardi 6 septembre sur ses 43 antennes une journée spéciale, en partenariat avec le Mémorial de Caen. Le lendemain, c'est France Culture qui propose une journée intitulée " New York/Le Caire : le choc des civilisations est-il derrière nous ? ", avec des rendez-vous en direct du Caire, de New York et de Kaboul. Vendredi 9, de 6 heures à minuit, France Inter propose, en direct de New York, des rendez-vous avec de multiples invités, dont Jay McInerney et Patti Smith. Toujours vendredi 9, Le Mouv' diffuse les reportages d'Antoine Giniaux en direct du French Institute.

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After his French owners emigrated to New York, Texas (that's the cat's name) opened his own blog.

Welcome to my weblog!

I finally got my human to finished my weblog so we can have more serious conversations about serious issues: cat food, catnip, napping, playing with your human, domesticating your human…

(Dogs welcome too if they can behave)

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In a Le Monde interview with Christophe Ayad that is highlighted on the front page of the French daily, the National Transition Council's newly-nominated head of Tripoli's security admits to having had ties with Al Qaeda. Needless to say, Abdelhakim Belhaj adds in a reassuring voice that the faction that he was part of (the Islamic Combat Group) was never subservient to Osama Bin Laden's organization.

Not to worry, therefore: Abdelhakim Belhaj — who claims to having been arrested in Malaysia in 2004, tortured by the CIA in Bangkok, and put on a plane for Libya to be handed over to Kaddhafi's henchmen (he was not released until March 2010) — claims further that his ideals are "a civilian state with real liberties, and respect for law and justice. We wanted change, we wanted reforms. We never fought just for the sake of fighting."

All good, if true. Problem is, we might be getting exactly the same speeches, the same explanations, and the same excuses as from Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. (Marhaba, Michael Savage fans)

Appartenez-vous à Al-Qaida ?

Beaucoup d'informations erronées circulent à ce sujet. Oui, j'ai bien été membre du Groupe islamique combattant, dont le domaine d'action a toujours été exclusivement et uniquement la Libye.

Le but de cette organisation était de délivrer le peuple libyen de la dictature de Mouammar Kadhafi, nous n'avons jamais eu aucun intérêt hors de notre pays. Le Groupe islamique de combat n'a jamais fait partie d'Al-Qaida, ni d'un point de vue idéologique, ni sur un plan opérationnel, ni au niveau de ses objectifs. Il est arrivé que nous nous trouvions au même endroit et au même moment qu'Al-Qaida : c'était en Afghanistan, où nous avons parfois combattu à ses côtés, quand il s'agissait de libérer le pays, mais nous ne lui avons jamais été inféodés.

…Je n'ai pas pour autant renoncé à mes idéaux : un Etat civil avec des libertés réelles, respectant la loi et la justice. Nous voulions un changement, des réformes. Nous n'avons jamais combattu pour combattre. …

Etes-vous pour l'installation d'un Etat islamique en Libye, ou de la charia ?

Nous appartenons à la société libyenne et nous sommes de simples musulmans. Nous ne nous distinguons pas sur l'application de la justice. Tout ce que nous désirons, c'est la protection, la sécurité et la confiance pour notre pays, nos voisins et tous les pays avec lesquels nous sommes en relation.

En Libye, nous avons vécu quarante-deux ans sans Constitution, ni loi, ni justice. C'est ce qui a conduit à la chute de ce régime dictatorial. Nous voulons un Etat civil, qui respecte la loi et le droit, un Etat qui applique la justice. Quant à la forme du régime et du gouvernement, ce choix relèvera du peuple libyen. Nous rendrons nos armes, nous ne sommes pas là pour installer un régime taliban par coup d'Etat.

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On either side of a skull and crossbones on a wall in the Tunisian city of Tataouine (which inspired George Lucas, who filmed scenes of the first Star Wars movie near the town, for the name of Luke Skywalker's home planet) are the words "Texas Liberty" and "Don't Mess with Tunisia." (، والقراء Instapundit ترحيب)

P.S. However, those aren't longhorns above the word "Texas" but some sort of Arabic script (Yeah, I too wonder what they mean)

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France’s Socialists have yet to come to terms with the modern world

comments Charlemagne as The Economist analyzes those whom it calls "the dinosaurs".

The oddity is that almost everywhere the European left is in decline. Among the large countries, Socialist parties rule only in Spain, where they look likely to lose November’s election. The only big place where the left has a good chance of returning to power is France, at next spring’s presidential election. Yet France’s Socialist Party also stands out as Europe’s most unreconstructed. Hence the contorted spectacle of a party preparing for power at a time when the markets are challenging its every orthodoxy.

… Next to such patent nonsense [i.e., the French Socialist thinking of an “anarchic globalisation”-denouncing Ségolène Royal or of a “deglobalisation”-promoting Arnaud Montebourg], promises by the two front-running candidates, Martine Aubry and François Hollande, seem merely frozen in time, circa 1981. They want to return to retirement at the age of 60 (it has just been raised to 62), and to invent 300,000 public-sector youth jobs. Each supports Mr Sarkozy’s deficit-reduction targets, but refuses to approve his plan to write a deficit rule into the constitution. More taxes, not less spending, is their underlying creed.

The party is not out of tune with public opinion. The French are almost uniquely hostile to the capitalist system that has made them one of the world’s richest people. …

The causes of French left-wingery are various, but a potent one is the lingering hold of Marxist thinking. Post-war politics on the left was for decades dominated by the Communist Party, which regularly scooped up a quarter of the votes. In the 1950s many intellectuals, including Jean-Paul Sartre, clung to pro-Soviet idealism even after the evils of Stalinism emerged. Others toyed with Trotskyism well into the 1970s. François Mitterrand, who mentored Ms Royal, Ms Aubry and Mr Hollande, was swept to the presidency in 1981 by offering a socialist Utopia as a third way between “the capitalist society which enslaves people” and the “communist society which stifles them”. …

Please allow us a moment of madness

All this requires heroic faith among centrists considering voting Socialist that reason will triumph over fiscal folly. Moreover, experience suggests that the Socialists, if elected, may feel compelled to introduce some signature policy as a sop to their disappointed base. Under Mitterrand, it was the wealth tax. Under Mr Jospin, it was Ms Aubry’s 35-hour working week. With France’s recovery fragile, the prospect of more such lunacy is chilling.

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The apocalypse brigade continues to onanisticly fools itself:

RATES of mental illnesses including depression and post-traumatic stress will increase as a result of climate change, a report to be released today says.
The paper, prepared for the Climate Institute, says loss of social cohesion in the wake of severe weather events related to climate change could be linked to increased rates of anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress and substance abuse.
As many as one in five people reported ''emotional injury, stress and despair'' in the wake of these events.

...in the past tense. Honest of them isn’t it?

The conclusion?

Mental illness rise linked to climate

Surely. But isn’t everything?

The report also looks at mental health in the aftermath of major weather events possibly linked to climate change.

It shows that one in 10 primary school children reported symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder in the wake of cyclone Larry in 2006. More than one in 10 reported symptoms more than three months after the cyclone.

Which is weather, despite the fact that we are told that weather is not climate. Sometimes.

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I guess with all of that “most ethical congress” transparency stuff on their minds, they forgot to hide their graft and cronyism.

Since Regina Dugan became the director of Darpa, the Pentagon’s top research division has signed millions of dollars’ worth of contracts with her family firm, which in turn owes her at least a quarter-million dollars. It’s an arrangement that has raised eyebrows in the research community, and has now drawn the attention of the Defense Department’s internal auditors and investigators.

She was a program manager at DARPA from 1996-2000 when Clinton was in office. She then founded RedXDefense, the recipient of the contracts in question in 2005.

Her strength was not in engineering as is so firmly touted, but rather in the business of gaming tax money:

The company allowed Dugan to dig into a range of business activities -- she worked on developing relationships, fundraising, legal and financial work, as well as marketing.

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It’s a side effect of France’s one psychosis policy.

Chinese women come home super sluts after studying in France, according to an associate judicial professor lecturing his class.

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On est loin de la promesse faite par le gouvernement, en octobre 2007, de réduire la pauvreté d'un tiers en cinq ans.

After a dip in 2008, poverty in France resurged in 2009 ("France's worst recession since the Second World War"), writes Philippe Le Coeur in Le Monde, with the poverty rate reaching 13.5% (although the median standard of living improved that year) and with the government promising to bring an "exceptional" tax for the country's richest citizens.

Meanwhile, Louis Maurin points out that the number of people living under the poverty level has grown (from 7.5 million to 8.2 million people) between 2002 to 2009, as has the poverty rate (from 12.9% to 13.5%). Needless to say, the Observatoire des inégalités director, interviewed by Anne Chemin, castigates tax decreases (as "wasted money").

…la pauvreté augmente dans notre pays. C'est un tournant historique…

…Si l'on veut améliorer de façon durable la situation de ceux qui sont le plus en difficulté dans notre pays, il faut agir de façon concrète. Imaginez quelle serait la situation de notre pays si les 80 milliards d'euros gâchés chaque année en cadeaux fiscaux aux catégories aisées avaient été consacrés pour moitié à réduire les déficits et pour moitié à des programmes d'investissements concrets, qu'il s'agisse de transports en commun, de logement social, d'accès aux soins !

L'un des volets les plus importants est une vraie réforme du système éducatif, de la maternelle à l'université. Taillé sur mesure pour les milieux favorisés, c'est lui qui fait que les plus démunis le restent de génération en génération. Bref, dans les années 2000, la France a loupé l'occasion de se moderniser. Tout ce que l'on peut espérer, c'est que la crise actuelle débouche sur une véritable remise à plat. Les niches fiscales n'ont déjà plus la cote.

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