374 vehicles burned, 212 arrets, 2 police injured (1 in the hospital after getting hit with a metal bocce ball in the Paris suburb of La Courneuve in the Seine Saint Denis area where police are on minimum duty), riots in the city center of Lyon, public demonstrations banned in the Paris which is cordoned off to prevent rioting youths to gain access to the capital, and continual government bleating that everything is getting calmer.
Car burnings continued in the suburbs of Toulouse and Lyon. In Carpentras, a pre-school was burned down, a car was torched in front of a retirement home, and a school was rammed into by a vehicle.
Behind the Façades in France: What expats and the mainstream media (French and American alike) fail to notice (or fail to tell you) about French attitudes, principles, values, and official positions…
Sunday, November 13, 2005
What next? bowling pins?
At 04h Paris time ITN filed this report from the festival of non-creative destruction:
A Petanque ball as a weapon. How bizarre. I suppose they’ll ban that now too.
By 11 p.m. (2200 GMT) there were no reports of disturbances in central Paris, though Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy was heckled when he inspected security forces in the Champs Elysees by people who called for his resignation, witnesses said.
The Times Online (UK) adds:The 72-year-old head of state has been off balance ever since voters defied him by rejecting the European Union constitution in May. Even his lieutenants in the centre-right governing team seemed to be putting the boot in. “Chirac looks stunned, almost overtaken by events,” Jean-Louis Debré, president of the national assembly, was quoted as saying.
Baffled, indeed. François Hollande was just re-elected as the head of the normally discombobulated Parti socialiste by a margin of 56%.
Chirac, a veteran of countless political battles, baffled his opponents by leaving it to a spokesman to announce the revival of a state of emergency law to quell the unrest.
His few defenders said Chirac was simply following a tradition among French presidents who like to hover loftily above the political fray. A less charitable interpretation was that he had become hopelessly out of touch.
Compost for brains
They seem to be trying to set up another pathetic round of Bush-believes-in-something—and-he-went-to-war-therefore-religion-causes-war-therefore-our-original-hatred-of-it-is-correct. It looks more it a revival meeting on moonbat hill. Okay. I see. Societies that don’t have religion don’t have war?
The left has through it’s provisional wing, the media, already slagged religion nearly to death. Now they’re wheedling with the right to expose your children to its’ views, and to have any pride in it out of existence as well. Why do they continue beating on (what is effectively in Europe,) a dead horse? What reflex does it bring out in them? Surely you’ve encountered the man on the European street that winces at the very mention of a church wedding - as if it's any of their damned business to begin with.
To some, religion is a politically useful straw-man, to others it distracts the proletariat and the cadres from their new God: the state, possessor of all virtue and goodness. In this case they somewhat resemble Lenin, but given the trope detected around the edges, they are more akin to Hitler.
The Nazis actively tried to construct a quasi-religious mythology, even inventing archeological finds in their search for “Germania” and a great Aryan myth in Viking and Neolithic culture.
The thoughtful, the morally aware, the unmoldable were a threat to Hitler. Today’s leftists feel that most religion is a threat to them. To conceal this predilection, they draw too more attention than seems humble to their involvement with groups like the Quakers, and such, but I don’t think that they could be “in this world, but not of it” as the Society of Friends suggests. You can do this test for yourself: after looking up just what it is that they do, mention the words "Opus Dei", to a garden variety European leftist, and see what kind of reaction you get.
Because it's lefty's way. Joyously legislating their idea of a better life on all of us, New Age half-wits now run our world with rules, rules, and more rules that feel great when their warm and fuzzy town councils pass them. When passing this stuff, they likely see these measures in a vacuum that ignores the last beaurocratic nightmare that they voted in the month before in their strange little cult of the stempel from window six to justify the letter from a notaire. That sure sounds like paradise.
Any argument spurred on by the left and the Stormfront types about the evils of Christianity and Judaism miss the mark - they should take a second look at the desiccated, aromatherapy buying, aging children lurking around. when they want to find an opaque yet goofy force clouding people’s minds.
Saturday, November 12, 2005
Selective Memory
Observing Hermann, (written by a very funny chap) based in Berlin has this to stay about living down the old immorality:« In a long-term, multi-generational study (www.zeit-wissen.de), social psychologist Herald Welzer has examined how "family recollections" of the nazi era have been passed down in the native culture. To his astonishment, over two thirds of the randomly questioned test participants reported that their family members were either victims of the regime or actively participated in resistance against it.»
How, then, is it that every German I meet always seems to remember the same moronic boilerplate about the American Indians being awful victims of those big meanies like Tcheorge Poosch? Or big words like Echelon Project, or some screwy thing about fluoride in the water?
You’ll find me linking Hermann who is watching Hermann.
What Trotsky meant by "Solidarity"
Prepared to fight to the last innocent bystander, the dependably irritable and violent Greek leftists engage in a sympathy violence:
Greek anarchists attack French schools, back rioters
With thanks to Tom P. who is given to calling this the "Evian Flu". Why not The “Contrex Flu”, Tom? 
About 50 people, wearing hoods and helmets and carrying red and black flags, threw stones, spark plugs and bottles filled with paint at the central Athens French Institute on Friday morning, breaking windows and damaging parked vehicles. Police said there were no injuries and the group dispersed quickly after the attack.
Another group attacked the French institute in the northern city of Thessaloniki on Thursday evening, smashing windows while classrooms were filled with language students. They spray-painted “Rioters Are Right” on the front of the building.
“They just appeared out of nowhere, I think about 70 or 80 of them. They smashed everything and we just sat there terrified,” one student told reporters. Poor French suburbs have been hit by two weeks of rioting. French police have arrested hundreds of people in what is considered the most serious unrest since student-led protests in 1968.»
Please to deconstruct...
Hm... Do you think that they might be trying to blame Sarkozy? If so, how could that explain 30 years of social malaise if Sarko was only 19?
Also in this special issue: Nuremburg: Les Nazis Faces Leurs Crimes!
Are they after a Gitmo/ Nuremburg bank-shot, or do they want to imply that the subject of their oh-so special edition are actually Nazis?
And what about Naomi?
Tune in next week to another episode of "You've bet your life."
Hey like, no rush, but is that fatwa thing working yet?
The riots in France are increasing a bit, and at the worst possible moment. Police officers unhappy with the way they are being treated by French MSM and the government cabinet (who make it clear that the treatment of filthy animals takes precedent over the people in the front lines fighting this scum) are making their feelings known and the Seine Saint Denis section of France's largest police union has announced that its men will be on minimum duty until further notice.
City center hit by riots
Aside from the nighttime incidents at the Place de la République in Paris last weekend, the riots have not hit a major city center, until late this afternoon. The Lyon city center was rocked twice by rioting youths who faced down police at the Place Bellecour on 2 occasions late this afternoon.
Riot police launched tear gas on the rioters who threw stones and garbage cans. Shops closed up and the Lyon Book Fair ceased operations.
Who needs cops anyway? That fatwa will surely kick in real soon now.
Just when we need these guys the most, the French government -- as hamfisted and maladroit as ever -- insults and then abandons them. Now they are just plain fed up. France's leading police union speaks out against the growing media and government cabinet abuse of French law enforcement while it deals with urban guerilla activity and the premices of a civil war.
Translation of article linked from “Who needs cops anyway? That fatwa will surely kick in real soon now.”
From ¡No Pasaràn!: Who needs cops anyway? That fatwa will surely kick in real soon now. we linked the following from TF1:
“Le "ras-le-bol" des policiers”The "dissatisfaction" of police officers
End of item.
Alliance, the main police union called putting 5 officers under investigation for aggravating a young man in Courneuve "disproportionate and unjust." The same young man was arrested Saturday, suspected of having struck firemen.
On Saturday morning, the young man who had been struck by police officers on Monday in Courneuve was arraigned in his home town of Le Bourget. He is suspected of having thrown stones at firemen on Friday evening. According to Michel Gaudin, the general manager of the national police force, the man, 19 years old, was identified among a group of young people throwing stones at firemen trying to extinguish a car fire in Le Bourget. The day before, five police officers who were put under investigation in Bobigny were filmed by France 2 who broadcast the beating. One of the two officers presumed to have struck the 19 year old was placed in provisional detention. This drew the indignation of the national police force trade union. The four other officers to one degree or another, were placed under legal control.
Alliance, the main Police union stated Saturday that police officers are getting"dissatisfied" that the officers were put under examination, and called for "calm and professionalism" within the force. "There is a very perceptible state of tension in police stations, including ourselves", said Assistant Secretary General of the union, Jean-Claude Delage. "We call on all our colleagues to maintain their calm, dignity, and professionalism that they have shown since the riots began", he added. "It is necessary to continue to ensure the safety of our fellow-citizens and also that of all our fellow officers and gendarmes who are engaged in the fight against these riots.”
For its part, the Aliance police union local 93 announced Saturday that the police officers of Seine-Saint-Denis could only provide "minimum coverage" with his call due to continuous operations dealing with rioters.
Marked Sarkozy "has sacrificed" [ED.: sold out] officers
Alliance also repeated that the court decision concerning the police officers of Courneuve was "disproportionate and unjust," especially that concerning the police officer placed in custody. Jean-Claude Delage asks that the incarcerated officer be placed under legal control, which could "raise morale" of the police nationwide.
Me Gilbert Collard, defender of the police officers implied in the court in Courneuve, has for its part marked Saturday Nicolas Sarkozy "to have sacrificed" these police officers whereas it "leads to the crime" in the suburbs. "On one hand, we finally have an Interior Minister who is really against crime, and on the other hand suspend police officers in a cheap political display", said the lawyer on Europe 1. "It is nevertheless scandalous, when one ties the hands of police officers in a context of a riot, reminding ourselves that we can’t blame an Interior Minister who calls these suburban residents 'riff-raff', and persists to".
Dear readers, since the beginning of the riots, we have have many vistors to our web site. We thank you. But taking into account the number of comments we have received, it has become impossible to publish them and maintain our objectivity quick, in-depth reporting. We thank you for your understanding and loyalty.
The Riots in Facts and Figures; and the Timeline
Here is the (regularly updated) timeline of France's riots in the cités, as well as the unpleasantness in facts and figures and the international coverage thereof……
Anne Applebaum on those lovely Le Monde cartoons
«"Katrina's devastation points the finger at Bush's system ... Issues forgotten for years are back to the fore: poverty, the state's absence, latent racism.»
Quotes writer and Washington Post editorialist Anne Applebaum from Le Monde on 8 September 2005 «The quotation above appeared in a front-page article in France's newspaper of record. Just below was a cartoon
[ED.: below]showing the American president watching TV footage of black corpses floating in the water. "But, what country is this?" the caption had him saying to his generals: "Is it far away? We absolutely have to do something!"
Unfortunately, this column does not come with its own cartoon attached, so I'm forced to describe the one I think Le Monde should print this week: A drawing of the French president, Jacques Chirac, watching black neighborhoods go up in smoke. The president is asking his generals, "But, what country is this? Is it far away? We absolutely have to do something!"
It is in our own interest, then, to be magnanimous and to come up with ways to assist the French. We could, for example, help them to shatter the myth that they live in an enlightened society, insulated from racial tension, by mass-mailing them copies of Le Monde with the word "America" crossed out in all editorials and the word "France" substituted instead.»Désordre profound!!! Ali-bour-tonne!!!
Et pourtant, le pays a un Président élu avec un score de roi nègre
The African press, in their coverage of the riots, tears la Fwance a new one.
Translation of article linked from “Et pourtant, le pays a un Président élu avec un score de roi nègre”
From ¡No Pasaràn!: Et pourtant, le pays a un Président élu avec un score de roi nègre we linked the following from Libération:
“ En Afrique, la presse incendie la France”Seen from Africa, both in the north as wall as in the Sub-Sahara, the suburban revolt is seen as a failure of the integration of second and third generations immigrants. In the French-speaking press of the ex-colonies, one does mince words.
End of item.
For la Nouvelle Expression of Cameroun, France has lost its republican spirit by closing the door to outsiders, both within and without. "the fact that two major incidents occurred almost simultaneously, like repatriation in Morocco of those seeking immigration to Europe (with like principal destination being France), and revolts by the young French seeming like two sides of the same coin", says a lead-in to an article titled "France: breakup of the republic!" Moreover, it continues, "there is a bond between people having difficulty with integration" as immigrants "in the Republic which found their grandfathers and fathers useful as either cannon fodder or as industrial labor, and the other jobs relegated to clandestine immigrants. Their dreams of a better life were dashed. Nicolas Sarkozy’s zero tolerance policy (...) led France at the edge of the explosion."
The Algerian daily El-Watan was indignant. In its pages a lawyer and the author of “Memories of immigrants” "Discusses" the careless attacks of Nicolas Sarkozy, heir according to him to a line colonialist thinking and xenophobia. "As recently as yesterday they called their parents ‘wogs’. Today, one describes them as "riff-raff" from the suburbs (...). As recently as yesterday they cleared out some one colonies with napalm. Today, one wants to clean them in Kärcher. Is this the State that advocates rights? Is this the fatherland of human right and of the democracy in which the suburban young believed in?" The author goes on to pester thos eon the right supporting the ideas le Pen, and against the cowardice of the left: "should one then speak of institutional discrimination? After all, isn’t that what calling many of the people in the suburbs "riff-raff" is? They are citizens of France, they were born there, studied there, pay their taxes there. They have been citizens of this country for several generations. Their exiled parents spent the best years of their lives defending, and helping to build the France of today; they are stripped of their elementary voting rights in local elections as the left promised which was disavowed since, which again raises the question of demagoguery."
Other African newspapers keep a more neutral tone with respect to a friendly government. Le Quotidien of Tunis reconsiders the fifty year history of immigration to France. “The immigrant suffered intolerably. A suffering whose political power, in France and also elsewhere in Europe, was not taken seriously. Now it confronts them brutally and frontally ", the commentator regrets.
In the Ivory Coast there was another alarm: France no longer has an air of moral authority in the country of Laurent Gbagbo, and the occasion is celebrated. "French Rebellion", was the title of Monday’s headline in the pro-government daily newspaper Notre Voie, rather mockingly: "Here thus large France confronted with a rebellion of immigrants who refuse to discuss with Sarkozy, but would readily accept Villepin. Should we proposed to them gracefully that they should follow the model of the Abidjan suburbs?" in a mocking reference to the negotiations of peace between factions in the Ivory Coast held in 2003 at the instigation of then Foreign Minister de Villepin.
Now that's what I call Faux News
The Managing Director of LCI French cable TV news (owned by TF1) admits to censuring coverage of the riots in French to avoid helping the extreme right. The extreme right, mythical (and largely inexistant) bogeyman bandied about by the French preSS, whenever they see fit to tighten the screws on this country of sheep.
Poetic justice
Un journaliste fouille-merde de Libé PropagandaStaffel reçoit un coup de couteau juste au moment où il se trouve à fouiner dans la rue de Palestine à Tunis.
TAIF (Thank Allah it's Friday)
Police State. Unprecedented police presence in the Paris area and around the country. All Paris public transport "under surveillance". Riot cops perched on Champs-Elysées rooftops and public gatherings not sponsored by the State banned until tomorrow morning. Despite the crackdown 502 vehicles were burned yesterday, and 206 arrests were made (a slight increase in violence compared to the day before).
Internet message boards and mobile telephone networks are still buzzing with calls to bring the riots into the French capital.
Friday, November 11, 2005
The exo-rational snowjob is just beginning
And it’s probably cash, and not light that they’re looking for at the end of this tunnel. «In an official statement, the gathering concluded that the last fifteen days violence "expresses the 30 years frustrations with the refusal of recognition of the people living in those areas (...) who have rights under French law but relegated in the minds of the political elite as an unconscious collective who are intellectually and economically, in the category of second-class citizens". At the same time as he "calls for the return to a state of calm in the densely populated districts", the collective initially asks the president and the government "to listen sincerely, in particular to the young people in these districts, in order to effectively fight all the forms of discrimination from which they suffer daily". Can one be French and have the name Mohamed or Sidibé, or without having to be white and catholic?"»
TF1: "What does it mean to be French today?"
And I'm sure these politcal operators would like to do the defining for you as well.
Present at the gathering were the secretary-general of [ED.: the socialist race hustling organization,] MRAP, Mouloud Aounit said: "of course, it will be necessary to bring answers in terms of employment and of housing to this plea for help launched in our suburbs. But it will be especially important to answer a central question: what does it mean to be French today?
Will someone please tell these otherwise entertaining leftist tools that their lack of success isn't entirely the government or society's problem, especially if they direct their social and political energy into blackmailing and guilt-tripping the well intended?
People's heads are still spinning from years of circumlocution about people being nothing if not part of a “group” or “political tribe”, and from deconstructing their society to the point that the disinterested laïques themselves lose track and lose any hope they once had.
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