Since Obama likes to play the "crypto-Zeropean", I tell him what I tell the French: "allez vous faire foutre, pôvs cons"

The only good thing about being a bilingual American is being able to tell foreigners to "fuck off" in their own language.

If their Culture is so Precious, Why is it Packaged and Exported like Menthos?

Humble yet powerful. Tall yet short. Touching, yet lecturesome. I have a question: is there anything a European Architect think he (but rarely she) isn’t? Or are they everything, nothing, and its’ opposite too? Why not when you can always rationalize that the magic from your fingertips will otherwise be wasted like the sperm on the walls.

In an article in der Spiegel from 21.12.2007, architect Christoph Ingenhoven wrote an article aimed at provoking a "long overdue debate" about what Deyan Sudjic describes as the "close ties between architecture, power, money and politics", which make it difficult for some architects to view their work with the necessary political distance. Ingenhoven said he would never "want to be responsible for the representative buildings of a non-democratic regime", adding that he wouldn't build for Libya, because he couldn't see "why [he] should champion an intolerable regime."

Amazingly, what these guys still do best is put a pretty face on de-facto tyrants building idealized factory cities, and using the “sustainable city” cover to retread Cabrini Green style schemes and oafish central planning concepts.

Strangely enough when they impose their imprint on people, they call it “Elysium”. If these self-absorbed, self-declared übermenchen need to bone up on “Architecture and Morality” (both of which they think are out of the common man’s reach), they should probably tone down their marketing racket for a few minutes and look here, where it’s quite clear that the debate is not long overdue to the rest of us, and has been ongoing continuously.

The world’s favorite game: handing France its ass

Conquer France.

Don't believe your lying eyes

There have been no anti-Semitic attacks in Paris and its suburbs recently, just as there were no Muslim riots in the Paris suburbs in 2005.

O! Compared to Republican Warmonger Who Suspended Haebeus Corpus

Of course being everything to everyone, and all that, a jihad to “Lincolnize” a man who has never liberated anybody is underway.

Euro-intellectualism in Film School

Timing is Everything

Bétancourt:

But, while praising President Alvaro Uribe's work towards her release, she said it was time to end "extremist" language towards the Farc.

That 'time' being right after she was freed. Then again, consider the audience.

Ms Betancourt is in Paris, where she flew after her release on Wednesday.

"I think we have reached a point where we must change this radical, extremist vocabulary of hate of very strong words that intimately wound the human being," she told French radio.

The FARC (or their flunkies) not being given to that kind of thing.

Meanwhile, back in the bosom of democracy and reason, the hunt for bigots continues.

Surprise, Surprise

First the denials, then the legalisms. As if it wasn’t obvious, German fantasy-lefty Gregor Gysi was a stool pigeon for commie spooks.

Linksfraktionschef (Left group leader) Gregor Gysi has repeatedly failed, by court Stasi allegations against him in the media. [Television network] ZDF had "sufficient factual evidence," the court ruled.


Hamburg - In the dispute over allegations of Stasi cooperation, left Group chief Gregor Gysi suffered another legal defeat: the Hamburg regional court rejected a request to gag ZDF disclosure of their investigative report, according to a court spokeswoman on Wednesday. Gysi wanted Stasi document Supervisor Marianne Birthler to defend her statement [of his participation with the Stasi]. Birthler had accused him on "Heute Journal" that as a lawyer in the GDR regime he "knowingly and willingly" reported Robert Havemann, a critic of the regime, to the State Security Service. Gysi denies the allegation.

The court ruled that there is a legitimate public interest in the publication to be able to see Birthler’s statements. Gysi’s privacy rights have to defer to the public interest in this case. "The report is still permissible as investigative journalism," said court spokeswoman. ZDF had carefully researched the facts behind the allegations against Gysi. It would be "sufficient factual evidence, expressed suspicion that the case". Gysi had requested an injunction against ZDF over the release of the report.

The district court ruled in ZDF’s favor. Moreover, the facts were presented to Gysi, and he was given an opportunity to refute them. He was offered an interview but declined. According to a group spokesman, Gysi will dispute the court’s decision. Previously, a court in Mainz rejected Gysi’s request to require that his reply be broadcast.

It needs to be noted that a great Germans take at face value accusations that American suppress dissent, but will rationalize the right to gag journalism at home. Even in a strange, nearly kangaroo-court-like matter of regurgitating harm-done under a government that no longer exists. It might be in poor taste, and that he could potentially be found at fault for the consequences, but to try to say that it’s discussion can be disputed is nearly as chilling.

Parce qu'on s'en lasse pas !

In Perpetual Morrissey Mode

Europe

Humanity

Any questions?

Roger Kusch, a former senator in Hamburg and a prominent right-to-die campaigner, has said he advised Bettina Schardt, a healthy 79-year-old pensioner, on how to prepare a lethal cocktail of sedatives and anti-malaria drugs which would kill her. He said he then left her flat shortly before she died.

Mr Kusch filmed nine hours of conversations with the unmarried and childless woman, who said she dreaded being taken to a home for the elderly. However, she did not have a terminal illness and said: "I can't say that I am suffering."

- Hat-tips to Perfesser Norm and Clarsonimus

Something for the hippies to Digg

The New Greatest Generation...