Retake Constantinople

NASA Detects Mysterious 'Explosion' In Space

2006-02-24T14:30:00.000-08:00

Astronomers have detected a new type of cosmic outburst that they can't explain, and it was close.

It was spotted by NASA's Swift telescope and is being monitored by other telescopes around the world as scientists wait to see what will happen.

Neil Gehrels, principal investigator for the Swift mission at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, called the event "totally new, totally unexpected."

The event, detected Feb. 18, looks as powerful as something like a gamma-ray burst (GRB), scientists said. But it is much closer—about 440 million light-years away—than others. And it lasted for about 33 minutes. Most GRBs are billions of light-years away and last less than a second or just a few seconds.

Other aspects of the newfound eruption were inexplicable, astronomers said. It was dimmer than most. Even so, the newly spotted point of light in the sky outshines the entire galaxy in which the event occurred.

Islamic Fundamentalists On The Rise In Africa

2006-02-24T13:32:00.000-08:00

A recent upsurge in violence in Somalia's capital has focused attention anew on the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the chaotic Horn of Africa state. The violence had killed at least 22 people and wounded more than 140 since Saturday.

Somalia has been without an effective central government since 1991, when warlords overthrew the government and then began fighting each other.

Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys, said by the United States to be linked to al-Qaida, describes his rivals as "forces of evil" supported by Western powers. Wednesday he pledged to keep fighting a new alliance arrayed against him in Mogadishu, the Somali capital.

His rivals, meanwhile, describe the fundamentalists as terrorists, accusing them of killing moderate intellectuals, Muslim scholars and former military officials in a string of unexplained murders. Islamic militias have set up their own courts in some parts of Mogadishu, where they shut down bars and destroy shops that reproduce or sell pirated DVDs and music cassettes.

The United States linked Aweys, who has vowed to establish an Islamic state, to al-Qaida shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Aweys has said such allegations were invented by his enemies.

Last year, U.N. experts monitoring an arms embargo on Somalia reported that Islamic hard-liners were importing heavy weapons and establishing military training camps. Among them were members of Al-Ittihad al-Islami, which wants to impose Islamic law in Somalia and allegedly has ties to al-Qaida.

Also last year, the International Crisis Group reported the emergence of a Mogadishu extremist cell led by a young Somali militant trained in Afghanistan, where al-Qaida was once based.

The International Crisis Group, a private think tank which tracks conflicts around the world, noted that al-Qaida contributed to attacks on U.S. and U.N. peacekeepers in Somalia in the early 1990s and used the country as a transit zone for attacks in neighboring Kenya and later as a hiding place for some of its leading members.

Saturday, a coalition of warlords and businessman announced they were taking a stand against the fundamentalists. They said in a statement they would "eradicate the extremists, terrorists and their supporters so as to pave the way for a peaceful country for the Somali children."

The emergence of the coalition is evidence the warlords see the fundamentalist as a serious threat. With stakes high on both sides, it could signal the start of a significant deterioration in security in an already lawless land.

30 Christian Churches Down, Several Thousand To Go

2006-02-23T23:16:00.000-08:00

Christians living in the Islamic world have become the targets of continuing violence. The L.A. Times has linked the recent burning of a church in the city of Sukkur in southern Pakistan to the climate of unrest caused by the cartoon riots. The day before that, Muslims protesting in the city of Maiduguri in Nigeria attacked Christians and burned 15 churches. And shortly after the cartoons were published, a 60-year-old Roman Catholic priest was shot to death in Turkey in an incident that observers believe to be linked to the cartoons.

The Christian Association of Nigeria claims at least 93 people have died as a result of the Nigerian Muslim's murderous rampage.

"The disruption of key oil supplies, and the simmering religious tensions in the north where 17 people have been killed and 30 Christian churches burned, Nigeria is again teetering on the edge of chaos."

Banning All Images For Fear Of Islamic Backlash

2006-02-23T23:12:00.000-08:00

As violent protests over caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad continue around the world, a St. Paul charter school is quietly negotiating the delicate question of how to teach art to Muslims.

Any depiction of God and his prophets is considered offensive under Islam, and disrespectful representations are even worse, as the recent worldwide outrage over the Danish cartoons has shown. But some Muslims also refrain from producing images of ordinary human beings and animals, citing Islamic teaching.

That presented a challenge for Higher Ground Academy, a K-12 school just west of Central High School on Marshall Avenue that has about 450 students. About 70 percent of them are Muslim immigrants from eastern Africa.

Executive Director Bill Wilson said he had concerns for some time about how to reconcile the school's art curriculum with the views of Muslim families, but the departure of the art teacher at the end of last school year gave him a window to act. This fall, he hired ArtStart, a St. Paul-based nonprofit organization, to offer more options for about 150 kindergartners through second-graders, including visual arts and drumming. But parents were still upset that their children were drawing figures, Wilson said, and some pulled their children out of art class altogether.

Wilson then sat down with teacher and parent liaison Abdirahman Sheikh Omar Ahmad, who also is the imam at an Islamic center in Minneapolis, to work with ArtStart in determining how to meet state standards without running afoul of Muslim doctrine...

...Second-grader Hawi Muhammed said her parents don't mind if she draws people once in a while, but "God … doesn't like people to draw a lot," she said.

Lessons Of The UAE Port Deal

2006-02-23T23:04:00.000-08:00

Lesson One of Portgate: Scream "Islamophobia/xenophobia" often enough, and people will start to back down.

Lesson Two of Portgate: Mislead and mischaracterize your critics often enough, and people will start to back down.

Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove tells Fox News Radio that Dubai is a "great military asset" and "vital to our security." Meanwhile, the WSJ reports today:

Dubai is believed to have been one of the most important conduits for Iran's nuclear technology acquisition program, according to U.S. court cases and interviews with experts in the field. The Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, a nongovernment advocacy group, last year published a list of 38 weapons-related smuggling cases since 1982 in which the goods moved through Dubai and the other islands that constitute the United Arab Emirates. Most of the illicit goods crossing Dubai go through its ports.
More generally, according to sanctions experts and numerous U.S. court and regulatory cases, Iran uses Dubai to evade U.S. economic sanctions on Iran and other Middle Eastern countries. The UAE doesn't recognize those sanctions.

Iranian front companies in Dubai routinely obtain prohibited U.S. goods, federal court records show. In one undercover investigation by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency that resulted in a November 2005 guilty plea in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the representative of an Iranian front company was caught on tape assuring an undercover agent posing as a businessman not to worry about sanctions regulations.

"You are going to export to Dubai, which does not have any regulations. It's a free, uh, country for importing, exporting," said Khalid Mahmood, according to his guilty plea. Asked if the equipment would then be shipped to Iran, Mr. Mahmood replied, "Once it comes here, we'll ship it anywhere in the world, no problem."

Similarly, in 2003, UAE officials refused a U.S. request to intercept a shipment of nuclear technology bound for South Africa by a smuggler named Asher Karni, according to University of Georgia sanctions expert Scott Jones, who works with U.S. agencies on proliferation issues. Mr. Karni was convicted of violating sanctions against weapons of mass destruction last year in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The UAE also was believed to be a nexus for Pakistan's nuclear program and hosted at least two front companies that forwarded material to Islamabad.

The supporters of, and retreaters on, the deal are also silent about the unprecedented, Islamic law-compliant funding scheme that allowed state-owned Dubai Ports World to force its more experienced rival to drop its bid for P&O. (The underwriters of Dubai Ports World's $3.5 billion Islamic financing instrument called a "sukuk" --Barclay's and Dubai Islamic Bank--were both cited as probable conduits for bin Laden money.)

California Enforcing Lower Standard For Colored Lawyers

2006-02-23T22:20:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of John Rosenberg, here's an article praising the ABA's new "diversity" standard on the theory that it will require California law schools to create more African American attorneys.

Putting aside the issue of Proposition 209, to the extent that as a result of the new standards California law schools bend their admissions standards in some legal or illegal way to admit more African American matriculants, it's not clear that this will have much of an effect on the number of African American lawyers, or that it would worth the cost if it did.

According to the very same article, only 33% of first-time African American bar exam takers in California passed, compared to 69% of whites. Some implications that seems rather obvious to me: (1) California (and the ABA) can most easily increase the number of African American attorneys by either (a) making the bar exam easier; (b) abolishing it altogether; or (c) finding some way to increase the passage rate for African Americans; and (2) Given that 2/3 of African American bar exam takers are already failing the bar exam on their first try (and that does not account for students who failed out of law school and never took the bar), and that many of those who fail the first time will never pass, where is the logic in encouraging law schools to admit even more African American students, unless there is some evidence that these students will be stronger than recent crops of students?

Vatican Calls Out Muslims On Their Hypocracy

2006-02-23T15:46:00.000-08:00

After backing calls by Muslims for respect for their religion in the Mohammad cartoons row, the Vatican is now urging Islamic countries to reciprocate by showing more tolerance toward their Christian minorities.

Roman Catholic leaders at first said Muslims were right to be outraged when Western newspapers reprinted Danish caricatures of the Prophet, including one with a bomb in his turban.

After criticizing both the cartoons and the violent protests in Muslim countries that followed, the Vatican this week linked the issue to its long-standing concern that the rights of other faiths are limited, sometimes severely, in Muslim countries.

Vatican prelates have been concerned by recent killings of two Catholic priests in Turkey and Nigeria. Turkish media linked the death there to the cartoons row. At least 146 Christians and Muslims have died in five days of religious riots in Nigeria.

“If we tell our people they have no right to offend, we have to tell the others they have no right to destroy us,” Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, told journalists in Rome.

“We must always stress our demand for reciprocity in political contacts with authorities in Islamic countries and, even more, in cultural contacts,” Foreign Minister Archbishop Giovanni Lajolo told the daily Corriere della Sera.

Reciprocity — allowing Christian minorities the same rights as Muslims generally have in Western countries, such as building houses of worship or practicing religion freely — is at the heart of Vatican diplomacy toward Muslim states.

Vatican diplomats argue that limits on Christians in some Islamic countries are far harsher than restrictions in the West that Muslims decry, such as France’s ban on headscarves in state schools. Saudi Arabia bans all public expression of any non-Muslim religion and sometimes arrests Christians even for worshipping privately. Pakistan allows churches to operate but its Islamic laws effectively deprive Christians of many rights.

Turkey Calling The Shot On 'Brokeback Mountain'

2006-02-23T12:52:00.000-08:00

The pirate DVD version of Brokeback Mountain made it to Turkey before the offical screenings had a chance to, and evidently the title they’ve gone with translates in Turkish to “Faggot Cowboys.” Reader Odradek shares with us this scan from local paper Radikal showing the 'translation.'

Good job with that engrish.

Abortion More Important Than The Mother's Life

2006-02-22T17:44:00.000-08:00

A spokesperson for the APA openly stated that the Association supports abortion as a civil right, and therefore research contradicting claims that abortion improves women’s health would have no effect on the APA’s position, because “to pro-choice advocates, mental health effects are not relevant.”

Researchers in Christchurch, New Zealand, whose extensive study found clear links between abortion and women’s mental health problems, accused the APA of selectively ignoring current research that shows the negative effects of abortion on women’s mental health.

They suggested that the APA defense of abortion is based on seriously flawed studies, long outdated, and refuted by research from the last seven years clearly showing negative effects from abortion. In an interesting twist, the Christchurch research team, which supports abortion, undertook their study in order to attempt to refute claims that abortion damaged women’s mental health.

UofIllinois: Show Anti-Catholic Works, Get Accolades, Show Anti Muslim Cartoon, Get Fired

2006-02-21T20:27:00.000-08:00

The February 9 edition of the Daily Illini, the student newspaper at the University of Illinois, republished cartoons that made fun of Muhammad. Those responsible for doing so, the editor in chief and the opinions page editor, have now been suspended.

The response of school officials to this incident is the subject of Catholic League president Bill Donohue’s news release:

“Richard Herman, the chancellor of the University of Illinois, is critical of the decision to reprint the anti-Muhammad cartoons. He maintains that a discussion about the controversial Danish cartoons could have taken place without republishing them. He’s right, but that is not the way the university treats anti-Catholic fare on campus.

“In March 1997, the same Urbana-Champaign campus displayed drawings by Michele Blondel that showed red glass vaginas hanging inside European Roman Catholic cathedrals; two of them had red glass holy water cruets with crosses on them. I wrote a letter to the president registering my objections, and received a reply from the chancellor, Michael Aiken.

“Aiken said he regretted that the art ‘disappointed’ me (flat beers disappoint me, not lousy art). He instructed, ‘Most viewers find Blondel’s art to be quite subtle as it invites the viewer to contemplate and reflect on topics as diverse as the body, the church, and architectural and religious symbolism.’ Stupid me—I thought it was Catholic-bashing porn. His closer was precious: ‘The University believes that true intellectual discourse extends not only to written communication but also to the visual.’ Except when Muslims get angry.

“So what’s changed? Do Catholics have to call for beheadings to get respect? How else to explain the condescending response I got, and the sympathetic response afforded Muslims? Similarly, nobody was disciplined for offending Catholics, but two kids have been suspended for offending Muslims!”

Former President Clinton Encouraging Jail Time For Anti-Muhammad Cartoons

2006-02-21T19:57:00.000-08:00

Former US president Bill Clinton on Friday condemned the publication of Prophet Muhammad’s caricatures by European newspapers and urged countries concerned to convict the publishers.

Talking to reporters after meeting Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz in Islamabad, Clinton said he disagreed with the caricatures and that the publication was against religious and ethical norms. Clinton said he had no objection to peaceful demonstrations being held worldwide, but this was not the time for violence. He said it was the time to promote inter-faith harmony and stand together on the issue.

He said the people’s religious convictions should be respected at all costs and the media should be disallowed to play with the religious sentiments of other faiths. He said the media could criticise any issue including governments and people, but nobody had the right to play with the sentiments of other faiths."

UN Running Hate Schools, Producing Muslim Terrorists

2006-02-21T16:15:00.000-08:00

Which Organization Runs Schools That Use Materials That:

[Describe] Zionism as "a racist ideology and political movement that appeared in the second half of the nineteenth century" and inform[] readers that the Protocols of the Elders of Zion were "a group of confidential resolutions adopted by the [Basel Zionist] Congress ... the goal of which is world domination."
[P]rovide Middle Esat maps with no] mention of Israel.
[Give] students this assignment: "Let us research and write [an essay] about one of the Palestinian martyr leaders [suicide bombers]."

The answer, Michael Krauss and Peter Pham report, is the United Nations, specifically the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. In response to some follow-up questions from Volk, Michael Krauss further reports:

The schools are operated directly by UNRWA — it is a huge operation, involving over 600 primary, elementary, and secondary schools with over 16,000 teachers ... and nearly half a million students.
The passages cited in are articles are all from textbooks currently in use. Incidentally, the UNRWA's official dodge when confronted with this is "The curriculum in the Agency’s schools is determined by the education authorities in the locations where it operates. For historical reasons UNRWA schools followed the Jordanian curriculum in the West Bank and the Egyptian curriculum in the Gaza Strip and this practice continued under the Israeli control of those areas between 1967 and 1994. Since 1994 the Palestinian Authority has progressively been replacing the old Jordanian and Egyptian textbooks as new PA-produced textbooks become available."

That is to say, UNRWA doesn't control content, it just buys anything the PA sells — how reassuring.... If that's a "standard," with Hamas now elected, by this time next year we'll be wishing for the current Fatah textbooks.

Forced Abortions Coming To Holland

2006-02-21T15:26:00.000-08:00

A health official in the Netherlands has called for a debate on the idea of forced abortion and contraception to deal with what she sees as a crisis of unwanted children.

Alderman Marianne van den Anker of the Leefbaar Rotterdam Party wants specifically to target communities of Antilleans and Arubans where she sees the biggest problems of unwanted children.

Her comments have stirred protest by a health foundation working with those communities in Rotterdam. The group, which called the comments degrading, is asking Mayor Ivo Opstelten and other politicians to distance themselves from Van den Anker's views.

Van den Anker is a mother of two children and the official in charge of Rotterdam's health and security portfolios.

In an interview in a newspaper Saturday, she said she had tried everything to prevent child abuse.

"I fail, I fail," she told the interviewer as she outlined her controversial idea for a debate on compulsory abortion and contraception.

The target groups for her program are Antillean teenage mothers; drug addicts and people with mental handicaps, she said, according to a report in Expatica.

According to the report, Van den Anker said children from these groups run an "unacceptable risk" of growing up without love and with "violence, neglect, mistreatment and sexual abuse."

"The exceptions," she said, "and there are some, can be counted on a pair of hands."

Van den Anker pointed to the growing number of Antillean youth gangs in Rotterdam whose members come from loveless homes.

Bounty Up To 11.5 Million To Kill For 'Religion Of Peace'

2006-02-21T11:36:00.000-08:00

A minister in India’s Uttar Pradesh state government has offered a reward of $11.5 million to anyone who would kill any of the cartoonists who drew the images of the Prophet Muhammad.

Muhammad Yaqoob Qureshi, minister of state for Haj and Minorities Welfare in the Uttar Pradesh government, told a rally in Meerut, 65 km east of New Delhi, after Friday prayers that he would give “the avenger” 510 million rupees ($11.5 million) and his weight in gold.

“Drawing a cartoon of the Prophet is blasphemous and Muslims will not tolerate this insult,” he said in a speech that was broadcast by Indian television stations. “The money will be paid by the people of Meerut,” said Yaqoob.

Australian Prime Minister Under Attack Over Factual Statement

2006-02-20T13:53:00.000-08:00

Prime Minister John Howard’s suggestions that some Muslims are extremists who cannot embrace the country’s ways are offensive and ignorant, the Islamic Council of NSW says.

Mr Howard today said he stood by his comments outlined in a book to mark his 10 years in power, claiming sections of Australia’s Muslim population are antagonistic to Australian culture.

He said a commitment to jihad and extreme attitudes towards women were two problems unique to Muslims that previous intakes of migrants from Europe did not have, and that Australia wanted people to assimilate and adopt Australian ways. Mr Howard said today it was his “right and duty” to express his thoughts.

“I stand by those comments that there is a small section of the Islamic population in Australia that, because of its remarks about jihad, remarks which indicate an extremist view, that is a problem,” Mr Howard told reporters in Sydney.

“It is not a problem that we have ever faced with other immigrant communities who become easily absorbed by Australia’s mainstream.” "Australians wanted people to assimilate". “We want people when they come to Australia to adopt Australians ways. We don’t ask them to forget the countries of their birth, we respect all religious points of views and people are entitled to practise them but there are certainly things that are not part of the Australian mainstream.”

“There is within some sections of the Islamic community an attitude towards women which is out of line with mainstream Australian society,” he said. “It needs to be dealt with by the broader community, including Islamic Australia. There is really not much point in pretending it doesn’t exist.”

Lebanese Muslims Association spokesman Keysar Trad said Mr Howard was “unfortunately just pandering to the Islamaphobia out there by making these comments”.

“I’m extremely disappointed that the PM would again single out the Muslim community still reeling from the spin out of the Cronulla riots,” Mr Trad said.

“I’m a bit struck by his comments about jihad. The greatest form of jihad is freedom of conscience - to speak your mind in the face of wrongdoing.

“Another great form of jihad is to be a good citizen. To someone like me when the PM criticises something like jihad he is criticising freedom of conscience, freedom of speech and efforts to be a good citizen. Jihad is a personal struggle to be the best that I can be.”

Mr Trad also said Mr Howard had been wrong to criticise Islamic attitudes towards women, saying Mohammed had had given women equal rights long before they became acceptable in 20th century western society.

Fear Of Murderous Revenge, Keeps Muslims Out Of The News

2006-02-20T11:37:00.000-08:00

'The Phoenix' is Boston's leading ''alternative" newspaper, the kind of crass, pull-no-punches weekly that might have been expected to print without hesitation the Mohammed cartoons that Islamists have been using to incite rage and riots across the Muslim world. Its willingness to push the envelope was memorably demonstrated in 2002, when it broke with most media to publish a grisly photograph of Daniel Pearl's severed head, and supplied a link on its website to the sickening video of the Wall Street Journal reporter's beheading.

But the Phoenix isn't publishing the Mohammed drawings, and in a brutally candid editorial it explained why.

''Our primary reason," the editors confessed, is ''fear of retaliation from . . . bloodthirsty Islamists who seek to impose their will on those who do not believe as they do . . . Simply stated, we are being terrorized, and . . . could not in good conscience place the men and women who work at the Phoenix and its related companies in physical jeopardy. As we feel forced, literally, to bend to maniacal pressure, this may be the darkest moment in our 40-year-publishing history."

slamic Extremists Supported By More Than 12 Million Muslims Worldwide

2006-02-20T10:14:00.000-08:00

Joint Chiefs of Staff planners have produced a 27-page briefing on the war on terror that seeks to explain how to win the "long war" and says Islamic extremists may be supported by 12 million Muslims worldwide.

Military planners worry that al Qaeda could win if "traditional allies prefer accommodation."

Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the document states, "is absolutely committed to his cause. His religious ideology successfully attracts recruits. He has sufficient population base from which to protract the conflict. ... Even support of 1 percent of the Muslim population would equate to over 12 million 'enemies.' "

The unclassified production, titled "Fighting the Long War -- Military Strategy for the War on Terrorism," is a component of the Pentagon's ongoing campaign to explain that a lengthy struggle requires patience from the American people and Congress...

"The United States cannot be defeated militarily," the briefing says, "the enemy knows this. But consider ... terror attacks weaken the world economy. Continued casualties weaken national resolve. Traditional allies prefer accommodation."

The enemy has "inherent weaknesses," including "no military capacity to expand their fight beyond terrorist tactics."

"Marginalizing an ideology requires patience and promoting reform from within," the briefing said.

Although it is similar to the Cold War, the war on terror has a distinction.

"We cannot discredit all of Islam as we did with communism," the document says. "It is a divine religion. We can only discredit the violent extremist."

"Americans will commit to a 'long war' if ... they are confident our leaders know what they are doing."

Muslims Lay Waste To Christian Churches Over Cartoon Fury

2006-02-19T12:10:00.000-08:00

murdering all the way.

Nigerian Muslims protesting caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad attacked Christians and burned churches on Saturday, killing at least 15 people in the deadliest confrontation yet in the whirlwind of Muslim anger over the drawings.

It was the first major protest to erupt over the issue in Africa’s most populous nation. An Associated Press reporter saw mobs of Muslim protesters swarm through the city center with machetes, sticks and iron rods. One group threw a tire around a man, poured gas on him and setting him ablaze.

It is in Nigeria, where mutual suspicions between Christians and Muslims have led to thousands of deaths in recent years, that tensions boiled over into full scale sectarian violence.

Thousands of rioters burned 15 churches in Maiduguri in a three-hour rampage before troops and police reinforcements restored order, Nigerian police spokesman Haz Iwendi said. Security forces arrested dozens of people, Iwendi said.

Chima Ezeoke, a Christian Maiduguri resident, said protesters attacked and looted shops owned by minority Christians, most of them with origins in the country’s south.

“Most of the dead were Christians beaten to death on the streets by the rioters,” Ezeoke said. Witnesses said three children and a priest were among those killed.

Nigeria, with a population of more than 130 million, is roughly divided between a predominantly Muslim north and a mainly Christian south. Thousands of people have died in this West African country since 2000 in religious violence fueled by the adoption of the strict Islamic legal code by a dozen states in the north, seen by Christians as a move to impose religious hegemony on non-Muslims.

With Saturday’s deaths, at least 45 people have been killed in protests across the Muslim world, according to a count by The Associated Press.

HAMAS Threatenes, Striking Terrorists Only Increases Hatred

2006-02-19T10:38:00.000-08:00

Defend yourself and they hate you, prevent them from killing you and your only making it worse.

Israel's cabinet has approved punitive sanctions on the Palestinian Authority, now led by militant group Hamas.

Israel will withhold an estimated $50m (£28m) in monthly customs revenues due to the PA, and will tighten borders for people and food crossing into Gaza.

Before the cabinet meeting, acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called the Hamas-led PA a "terrorist authority" and ruled out direct talks...

The newly-elected speaker of the Palestinian parliament, Aziz Duaik, said Israel's decision would prove counter-productive.

"This is a faulty decision, and the Israelis must reconsider their decision. It will only increase hatred."...

DNA Testing Proving Mormons Wrong, Maybe...

2006-02-18T12:31:00.000-08:00

Yesterday the LA Times ran a fascinating story about DNA and Mormon scripture. For decades, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been very successful in converting Native Americans and Pacific Islanders to Mormonism because these people have been told by Mormon missionaries that they are decedents of a blessed lost tribe of Israel.

But in recent years, DNA tests have shown that Pacific Islanders and Native Americans are of Asian descent, not Middle Eastern descent, as claimed in the Book of Mormon transcribed some 175 years ago:

According to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, an angel named Moroni led Joseph Smith in 1827 to a divine set of golden plates buried in a hillside near his New York home.
God provided the 22-year-old Smith with a pair of glasses and seer stones that allowed him to translate the "Reformed Egyptian" writings on the golden plates into the "Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ."
Mormons believe these scriptures restored the church to God's original vision and left the rest of Christianity in a state of apostasy.
The book's narrative focuses on a tribe of Jews who sailed from Jerusalem to the New World in 600 BC and split into two main warring factions.
The God-fearing Nephites were "pure" and "delightsome." The idol-worshiping Lamanites received the "curse of blackness," turning their skin dark.
According to the Book of Mormon, by 385 AD the dark-skinned Lamanites had wiped out other Hebrews. The Mormon church called the victors "the principal ancestors of the American Indians." If the Lamanites returned to the church, their skin could once again become white.

The apologists for the Mormon scripture have the following explanation for the DNA evidence:

The latest scholarship, they argue, shows that the text should be interpreted differently. They say the events described in the Book of Mormon were confined to a small section of Central America, and that the Hebrew tribe was small enough that its DNA was swallowed up by the existing Native Americans.
"It would be a virtual certainly that their DNA would be swamped," said Daniel Peterson, a professor of Near Eastern studies at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, part of the worldwide Mormon educational system, and editor of a magazine devoted to Mormon apologetics. "And if that is the case, you couldn't tell who was a Lamanite descendant."

10 More Die Over In-ability To Dismiss Dissenting Opinion

2006-02-18T09:52:00.000-08:00

Libyans angry over caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad rioted at the Italian consulate on Friday, storming the building and setting it on fire. A diplomat said at least 10 people were killed in clashes with police.

It was the deadliest demonstration yet against the cartoons, which have set off violent protests throughout the Muslim world. At least 29 people have been killed altogether.

Muslim Cleric Offers Cash For Murder

2006-02-17T11:23:00.000-08:00

Just another example of the 'Religion Of Peace tm' I suppose.

A Pakistani cleric offered a 1.5 million rupee (€28,000) reward and a car for anyone who kills the cartoonist who drew Prophet Mohammed.

Another Islamist leader was put under house detention, amid fears of more deadly demonstrations today, officials said.

The cleric did not name the cartoonist, and several cartoonists submitted images to the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, which first published them.

Blasphemy Of Any Kind Illegal In Norway

2006-02-16T15:57:00.000-08:00

Amongst all the international bad press over the Mohamed-Bomb cartoons, Norway has now made blasphemy illegal.

"There is a difference between freedom of expression and freedom of insulting."

So, apparently, now in Norway, its illegal to insult anyone.

Article 135-A of the Norwegian Penal Code orders a maximum penalty of three years in jail for publishing articles mocking religions or ethnic groups.

I can only wonder: Who determines what is blasphemous? Will the Catholic church bring the protestant churchs up on blasphemy charges? Will the Jews bring charges against the Christian whole? Can I sue because I'm a big fat 50 stone hurting, that kids make fun of.

Norway, hope you enjoy that can of worms you just opened.

And As a sidenote: The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is pressing for a ban on religious intolerance to be part of the bedrock of a planned new United Nations human rights body.

So as they sit back at their conferences attacking Jews at every opportunity, they're calling on the world to not 'insult' them. The hypocracy is un-ending.

Europe Falling To Koranic Law

2006-02-16T11:24:00.000-08:00

In a 2005 book, Eurabia, a scholar who goes by the nom de plume Bat Ye’or wrote illuminatingly about what she called "dhimmitude" – the relegation of non-Muslims, in the Muslim world, to the subordinate social position of "dhimmis," individuals who have no rights and who are tolerated as long as they behave obsequiously and accept their inferior status. Ye’or warned that many European leaders were assuming an increasingly dhimmi-like posture in relation to radical Muslim leaders both in Europe and beyond, reflexively overlooking the more unpleasant aspects of Muslim culture and the widespread resistance to integration. Ye’or noted that if this dhimmitude persisted, and if present immigration and birth rates held up, Europe would soon fall under the sway of Koranic law – sharia.

To many, this sounded outrageous. But on February 10, in Oslo, came a dramatic capitulation that seemed a classic case of sharia in action. For days, Velbjørn Selbekk, editor of the tiny Christian periodical Magazinet – the first publication to reprint the now-famous Muhammed cartoons from the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten – had firmly resisted pressure by Muslim extremists (who made death threats) and by the Norwegian establishment (which urged him to give in). But then, on that morning – the day before a planned mass demonstration against the cartoons – Norway’s Minister of Labor and Social Inclusion, Bjarne Håkon Hanssen, hastily called a press conference at a major government office building in Oslo.

There, to the astonishment of his supporters, Selbekk issued an abject apology for reprinting the cartoons. At his side, accepting his act of contrition on behalf of 46 Muslim organizations and asking that all threats now be withdrawn, was Mohammed Hamdan, head of Norway’s Islamic Council. In attendance were members of the Norwegian cabinet and the largest assemblage of imams in Norway's history. It was a picture right out of a sharia courtroom: the dhimmi prostrating himself before the Muslim leader, and the leader pardoning him – and, for good measure, declaring Selbekk to be henceforth under his protection, as if it were he, Hamdan, and not the Norwegian police, that held in his hands the security of citizens in Norway...

In recent days, these acts of dhimmitude by Norway and Sweden have had their counterparts in the corridors of international power. On February 9, Franco Frattini, EU Commissioner of Justice, Freedom, and Security, promised to take steps to "regulate" speech (though he later denied this); Kofi Annan, in a February 12 interview on Danish TV, said "You don’t joke about other people’s religion, and you must respect what is holy for other people." Since when do the EU and UN tell supposedly free people what to respect and what not to respect? Since now, apparently.

Many Islamists do not hide the fact that their long-term goal is to turn Europe into a Muslim caliphate ruled by sharia law. Alas, it looks at present as if the cartoon controversy may turn out to have been a significant step on the way to that goal. One thing is clear, at any rate: these have been the darkest days for European freedom since 1938.

Italy’s Leader: ‘I Am The Jesus Christ'

2006-02-13T16:49:00.000-08:00

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has compared himself to both Napoleon, and Jesus Christ, prompting the open scorn of his political opponents and even the quietly raised eyebrows of his coalition partners.

“I am the Jesus Christ of politics,” Italian media quoted him as saying at a dinner with supporters on Saturday night. “I am a patient victim, I put up with everyone, I sacrifice myself for everyone.”

Giuseppe Giulietti, a leftist parliamentarian, joked that he was sure that “God the Father and the rest of Jesus’ family did not take this very well.”

Marco Rizzo, a communist parliamentarian, called it a “grotesque comparison.”

Pierferdinando Casini, a sometimes uneasy Berlusconi ally and outgoing speaker of parliament, distanced himself.

“I live on Earth. I don’t want to mix foolish things with serious things,” the Ansa news agency quoted him as saying when asked about Berlusconi’s Christ comments.

On Friday, Berlusconi compared himself to Napoleon, saying only the French emperor had done more for his country.

All The Gay Movies In Hollywood, Gay Actors Winning Award ,Yet Somehow Not Enough

2006-02-13T16:27:00.000-08:00

Despite multi-award winnign BrokeBack Mountain, Chasity Bono, Ellen etc. Ian McKellen has said openly gay US actors are prevented from having successful Hollywood careers.

Apparently un-aware that gays make up less than 15% of the population, he wishes all of Hollywood to be under the gay thumb.

"It is very, very, very difficult for an American actor who wants a film career to be open about his sexuality," the gay British actor said.

"And even more difficult for a woman if she's lesbian. It's very distressing to me that that should be the case."

The Lord of the Rings star added: "The film industry is very old fashioned in California."

Those 'old fashion' Christian values clearly must be done away with. Those darn Americans don't want every movie they see to be about gays, whats wrong with them.

'Fewer US actors have been willing come out and big names such as Rock Hudson and Montgomery Clift hid their sexuality for most of their lives.' So the best proof he can come up with is 50 year old dead guys?

Brokeback Mountain, Capote and Transamerica all feature prominently in the Oscar nominations but thats not neary enough. Not happy untill all films are gay related, cast by gay, forcing pro-gay agenda on everyone.

Be-Heading Americans Not As Offensive As Cartoon Mahammad

2006-02-13T10:51:00.000-08:00

A disgraceful art exhibit in Milan has illustrated once again the deep affinity between the Left and the forces of the global jihad. In these days of Muslims the world over calling for the deaths of those who have “insulted Islam,” anyone who wants to see Oriana Fallaci beheaded need look no further than the Galleria Luciano Inga-Pin in Milan, which is exhibiting Giuseppe Veneziano’s “American Beauty” from January 19 through March 18. This is a series of paintings designed to highlight the “weakness and perversity of the ‘American way of life.’” It accordingly features straightforward, if somewhat lurid, portraits of Michael Jackson and Ronald McDonald, along with the distinctly non-American Harry Potter. Then comes a bizarre depiction of a nude man having sexual intercourse with the Pink Panther, five artistic renditions of the Abu Ghraib prison photos (each with “American Beauty” scrawled across the top), and — Oriana Fallaci’s decapitated head.

Veneziano’s painting is doubly offensive, however, in light of the fact that Fallaci herself has been driven out of Italy by frivolous charges that she has “defamed Islam.” Giuseppe Veneziano is not on trial for depicting Fallaci decapitated, but Fallaci faces trial for making a series of heated but largely true statements about Islam and Muslims. Veneziano’s painting is triply offensive in that it depicts exactly what the Muslim exponents of cartoon rage around the world would like to see done to Fallaci — and thus manifests the ever-closer empathy between the Western Left and Islamic jihad. “Behead those who insult Islam,” read a sign at a recent demonstration in London protesting the Danish cartoons of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. If Fallaci has insulted Islam with her monumental post-9/11 cries of freedom and resistance, The Rage and the Pride and The Force of Reason, Giuseppe Veneziano is happy to oblige the mujahedin, at least on canvas.

Plans On For War With Iran

2006-02-12T21:04:00.000-08:00

Strategists at the Pentagon are drawing up plans for devastating bombing raids backed by submarine-launched ballistic missile attacks against Iran's nuclear sites as a "last resort" to block Teheran's efforts to develop an atomic bomb.

Central Command and Strategic Command planners are identifying targets, assessing weapon-loads and working on logistics for an operation, the Sunday Telegraph has learnt.

They are reporting to the office of Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, as America updates plans for action if the diplomatic offensive fails to thwart the Islamic republic's nuclear bomb ambitions. Teheran claims that it is developing only a civilian energy programme.

"This is more than just the standard military contingency assessment," said a senior Pentagon adviser. "This has taken on much greater urgency in recent months."

Christians Attacked In Lebanon, Churchs Destroyed, Over Cartoon 'Insult'

2006-02-11T20:05:00.000-08:00

Lebanon's Interior Minister resigned late Sunday, February 5, after a mob of approx. 20,000 Muslims not only torched the Danish Embassy but also attacked the Christian community in the capital Beirut over published cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad.

Hassan al-Sabaa, a Sunni Muslim retired officer loyal to the country's anti-Syrian majority coalition, submitted his resignation at a late night government session to discuss the anti-Christian violence, in which at least one person was killed and dozens others were injured.

Reporters said protesters attacked three fire engines at the embassy to stop them from extinguishing the blaze and hung up a banner at the building's entrance reading: "We are ready to sacrifice our children for you, O Prophet Mohammad."

Waving green Islamic flags and chanting "Allah is greatest," they also threw stones at the Maronite Catholic church as violent protests spread towards Christian areas in eastern Beirut late Sunday, February 5. In addition the protestors attacked properties and shops in the district, the Christian area of Ashrafiyeh, throwing stones, breaking windows and overturning cars, eyewitnesses said.

Some were seen carrying banners that read "Whoever insults Prophet Mohammad is to be killed" while throwing stones at security forces, who fired teargas and used water cannon to disperse the crowd.

The attacks came as Lebanon's Christians were already on edge amid reports that the name of Lebanon's Christian Maronite Patriarch, Butros Nasrallah Sfeir appeared on a hit-list uncovered by a United Nations commission probing the assassination of former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri, BosNewsLife monitored.

Speaking on condition of anonymity the source told Italy's Adnkronos International (AKI) news agency last month that publisher Gibran Tueni killed in a December 12 bomb blast in Beirut also appeared on the the list which was submitted by the former head of the UN panel, Detlev Mehlis to the Lebanese authorities.

There were fears that Sunday's Muslim demonstrations would provoke an angry Christian outcry in a country that has not fully recovered from its 1975-1990 civil war. Some turbaned clerics reportedly pleaded with demonstrators to stop the violence, as red and white flag of Denmark was set alight.

"This is the fate of all those who turn against Islam and our prophet. They will be burned by the fires of hell," some demonstrators were heard saying. Many of them turned out in response to a call by a group called the "National Movement for the Defense of the Prophet Mohammed," news reports said.

Saudi Arabia's Ambassador to the United States, Prince Turki al-Faisal, urged the Western world to show restraint and said the cartoons were unacceptable. Asked on Cable News Network (CNN)'s Late Edition program why his government allows Anti-Semitic cartoons in newspapers, he said that "this had to do with the specific situation in the region."

"We come to power with gun in hand!"

2006-02-10T21:34:00.000-08:00

"We come to power with gun in hand!" Hamas political leader Khaled Mashaal declared at a rally in Qatar Friday night, Feb. 10

"The Palestinian rifle proved its power to evict the Jews from the Gaza Strip when Israel carried out its evacuation," Meshaal declared. "Unless we use force, no one will talk to us. At this moment, Palestinian government belongs to the force whose platform pledges warfare."

DEBKAfile’s political sources describe the rush of events Friday as blowing away the last remnants of the Middle East policies charted in Washington and Jerusalem.

Our Moscow sources report Meshaal made his speech after Russia’s special Middle East envoy Alexander Kalugin personally handed him President Putin’s invitation to visit the Russian capital. He then received a pile of invitations from Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait and Syria. Turkish prime minister Tayyip Erdogan said he justified the Russian-French position. "I too invite Hamas leaders to Ankara," he said.

Drug Using, Mass Fornicating, Idolater Feels He Deserves To Be In The Bible

2006-02-10T19:51:00.000-08:00

I'll chalk this up to a crack smoking binge.

Jackass rap star KANYE WEST is calling for a revised edition of the Bible, because he thinks he should be a character in it.

The 'Jesus Walks' hitmaker, who picked up three Grammy Awards last night, feels sure he'd be "a griot" (West African storyteller) in a modern Bible.

He says, "I bring up historical subjects in a way that makes kids want to learn about them. I'm an inspirational speaker.

"I changed the sound of music more than one time... For all those reasons, I'd be a part of the Bible. I'm definitely in the history books already."

Yea. Prostitution, sloth, drug abuse, falsely accusing they neighbor, cheating, stealing, lying, idolatry, assaulting others, coveting they neighbors wife, just what the bible needs. He can show how to break all 10 commandments and commit all 7 deadly sins in one album.

Washington Taxpayer Funding Sex Changes, Boob Jobs

2006-02-10T19:19:00.000-08:00

At a time when Washington State lawmakers struggled to find money for health care for the state's most vulnerable people, Washington taxpayers footed the bill for a sex-change operation, penile implants, breast augmentation and ear piercings.

In his most recent review of state Medicaid expenses, Auditor Brian Sonntag found a pattern of questionable expenditures in the 2004 fiscal year. One in particular jumped off the page.

Medicaid paid $9,549.92 to surgically transform a woman into a man.

"You pick up the paper or watch the evening news and you see senior citizens who can't get medications of diabetes and things," Sonntag said. "And here you see tax dollars being used for things like this, it makes you ask, 'Why?' "

The documents show the state spent at least $3,500 to insert and repair penile implants, $40,000 on plastic and cosmetic surgery and more than $100,000 on breast implants and augmentation.

Two people got paid for having their ears pierced at a total cost of $210, according to the report.

Officials at the State Department of Social and Health Services have disputed many findings of the report but none of the procedures that were provided and paid for courtesy of Washington taxpayers.

Get Yer Authentic Mohammad Tee Shirt

2006-02-10T14:02:00.000-08:00

In a daring stand against the ongoing wave of anti-free-speech, and civil rights regression sweeping Europe and elsewhere, I have to salute metrospy.com

They have the courage to stand up to those Islamic extremists, and state: I will wear what I want to wear, I will say what I think, I am free to express myself though editorial comics statements. I will not pre-emptively bow down to some foreign extremists who allready demand my death. I will not allow my principles to be violated because some bitter third-world heathens are mad because they are failures. This is my country, my land, my freedom.

Not that its too original or anything. It needs a thought bubble saying Qur'an 47:4 "strike the necks" of the unbelievers or maybe 4:34 "Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other... So good women are the obedient"

Yea, that'll get you laid at the latest intifada. To get your copy go here. I'm sure Kofi Annon and the UN is rushing back to session to outlaw it as we speak.

The chopping off the heads of innocent little girls is fine, but buy a shirt with a mohammad-bomb, and your an insensitive, offensive, provocative, inciter of hatred and violence. More-ham-ed. More Ham? Nevermind.

By the way, I'm looking for someone who speaks German. Leave me a comment please.

Florida City Bans Christian Paintings

2006-02-10T10:41:00.000-08:00

Paintings by artist Lloyd Marcus have been banned from being exhibited during a Black History Month display in Deltona, Fla., an Orlando suburb, because some of the paintings contain "Christian symbols" that reflect the artist's memories of his childhood at his dad's storefront church.

Marcus says the Christian symbols have nothing to do with the painting's subjects, but he is "up in arms? over what he views as another absurd episode in the war against Christianity.

"People need to know how bizarre things have gotten," Marcus told NewsMax.com in an exclusive interview. "It would be different if I had a picture of Jesus, for example, but now it's gotten so bad the very hint of anything Christian is banned from the public square.

"This whole anti-Christianity movement has just gotten way out of hand,? Marcus continued. "It's hidden under the radar and people don't know about it. When this happened to me I thought, ?Wow,? I don't think people realize how bad it's gotten."

"I would hardly call these paintings 'in your face religious,'" Marcus told NewsMax.com. "We're asked to tolerate every other religion. Meanwhile, any hint of Christianity is banned from the public square."

The seemingly sweet, innocuous paintings drew the ire of Deltona's acting city manager, Roland Blossom. He told the Daytona Beach News-Journal he could not tolerate a mingling of church and state, even if the only evidence is a partial Bible lying on a table and a church sign.

Marcus is a reluctant crusader, but is determined to use this incident as a wake-up call to alert the public about how far the war on Christianity and religion has gone.

"I am not angry at Deltona City Hall," he said. "The anti-Christianity movement speaks loudly and carries a big stick. However, this incident confirms that things have gotten out of hand. It is time for Christians, in a Godly way, to fight back."

"I hate doing this because Deltona has gotten a lot of negative publicity with the hurricanes and the mass murders here that made the national news, and I love the town," he explained. "The last thing I want to do is bring Deltona more negative publicity, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought this is patently wrong and people need to know."

Marcus thinks the Deltona situation is just a localized version of a disturbing trend to ban God from the public square, threatening to make the United States a nation with "freedom from religion," rather than a country founded on "freedom of religion."

The decision may also be damaging, Marcus says, to the pride of African-Americans who worship regularly and joyfully, many of whom fought hard for the right just to be recognized as members of proper society.

"This is black history month," Marcus said. "I was raised in a storefront church in Baltimore, Maryland, and these are simply paintings from my childhood. I didn't paint them with the intention of selling religion. After all, they came to me. They [Deltona city officials] picked them on Friday and then they called me on Monday and said they had to take two of them down because of religious content. "I was really upset and angry because when you look at those paintings it's a black history month display and they have good positive black role model messages but because there's a bible on the nightstand or somebody wearing an I love Jesus baseball cap they can't be shown in a public building. That's crazy.

"Maybe this will be a wake-up call that will get Christians to say 'We're mad as hell and we're not going go take it anymore.' "

"The ACLU has gotten everybody so terrified that the city manager probably figured that, rather than going with the threat of a lawsuit, let's just take these paintings down,? he told NewsMax.com. "It's time for people to say 'enough is enough!'

Muslim Imams Using Fake Pictures To Stoke Hatred

2006-02-09T19:13:00.000-08:00

The Danish editor who published the drawings of the prophet Muhammad that have sparked worldwide protests said the furor was deliberately stoked by a group of Danish imams who toured the Middle East with a portfolio that included images never printed in his paper, among them, drawings of the prophet having sex with animals.

Flemming Rose, cultural editor of the Danish paper, Jyllands-Posten, said a group of men he called "radical imams" traveled to the Middle East several months after his newspaper's Sept. 30 commentary on self-censorship, which was accompanied by cartoons of Muhammad, "to stir up the crowds by telling lies."

He said the group carried a 45-page portfolio that contained not just the 12 cartoons published in his paper but several more incendiary drawings whose origin was unclear. They included depictions of the prophet with the face of a pig, and having sex with animals and children.

"All of that gratuitous rubbish was trumped around to trigger a campaign of senseless hatred," Rose said.

Palestinian Authority Cleaning Out The Prison, Letting Everyone Go

2006-02-09T14:30:00.000-08:00

Palestinian Authority Chairman Abu Mazen has thrown open Jericho prison and freed 56 convicted terrorists.

Among the men freed without prior notice are 26 Islamic Jihad members from northern and central Samaria, who plotted and masterminded suicide bombings in Hadera, Netanya, and Kfar Saba in 2005.

Also released were 13 members of the PA General Intelligence Service, loyal to Col. Tewfik Tirawri, and 17 members of the PA Military Police – all of whom participated in terrorist attacks.

Abu Mazen thus renews Yasser Arafat's revolving-door policy for terrorists, while Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni call Hamas a terrorist organization and speak about the need to call Hamas a terrorist organization and fight terrorism.

German Arrested For Writing 'Koran' On Toliet Paper

2006-02-09T11:53:00.000-08:00

BERLIN. A German man will go on trial February 23rd for printing the name of the Quran on toilet paper and offering it for sale to mosques and media organizations.

Authorities say the man called Islam's holy book a "cookbook for terrorists" which he said calls for acts of violence. He said he wanted to use money from the toilet paper sales to fund a memorial for victims of Islamic terror.

The offer led to telephone death threats against him.

Prosecutors say the man's actions overstepped the legally guaranteed freedom to criticize other religions.

From Wince It Comes

2006-02-09T10:08:00.000-08:00

The excesses which followed, druing the early hours of the Ottoman victory, are described in detail by eyewitnesses.

They were, and unfortunately still are, a common practice, almost a ritual, among all armies capturing enemy strongholds and territory after a prolonged and violent struggle.

Thus, bands of soldiers began now looting. Doors were broken, private homes were looted, their tenants were massacred. Shops in the city markets were looted. Monasteries and Convents were broken in. Their tenants were killed, nuns were raped, many, to avoid dishonor, killed themselves. Killing, raping, looting, burning, enslaving, went on and on according to tradition. The troops had to satisfy themselves.

The great doors of Saint Sophia were forced open, and crowds of angry soldiers came in and fell upon the unfortunate worshippers. Pillaging and killing in the holy place went on for hours. Similar was the fate of worshippers in most churches in the city. Everything that could be taken from the splendid buildings was taken by the new masters of the Imperial capital. Icons were destroyed, precious manuscripts were lost forever. Thousands of civilians were enslaved, soldiers fought over young boys and young women. Death and enslavement did not distinguish among social classes. Nobles and peasants were treated with equal ruthlessness.

2006-02-09T10:06:00.000-08:00

GOP Bloggers

2006-02-09T10:03:00.000-08:00

Blogs for Bush: The White House Of The Blogosphere

2006-02-09T10:02:00.000-08:00

George Bush's Campaign Team Joins Straight Talk Express

Islamofacists: United States Leader Of Europe And Leading Infidel World

2006-02-09T08:45:00.000-08:00

Police killed four people Wednesday as Afghans enraged over drawings of the Prophet Muhammad marched on a U.S. military base in a volatile southern province, directing their anger not against Europe but America.

The U.S. base was targeted because the United States "is the leader of Europe and the leading infidel in the world," said Sher Mohammed, a 40-year-old farmer who suffered a gunshot wound while taking part in the demonstration in the city of Qalat.

"They are all the enemy of Islam. They are occupiers in our country and must be driven out," Mohammed said.

Sacrificing Lives Over Cartoons

2006-02-07T21:30:00.000-08:00

The Pakistan Medical Association has vowed not to prescribe medicines from firms based in European countries where controversial cartoons portraying the Prophet Mohammed were published, said Shahid Rao, the body's general secretary for Punjab province.

The association will boycott drugs from Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, Germany and France to protest the 'blasphemous' drawings, Rao said.

'We have taken a unanimous decision and it will be immediately implemented in Pakistan,' Rao told AFP.

'Doctors in the country are very motivated on this issue,' he said. 'We would use alternate medicines in future till a public apology comes from these countries.'

Pharmacists have also vowed not to sell such medicines, Rao said.

The association is advising patients against using medicines from the offending countries if they are mistakenly prescribed by doctors, he added.

Pope John Paul, Miracle Worker

2006-01-31T23:14:00.000-08:00

The Vatican may have found the "miracle" they need to put the late Pope John Paul one step closer to sainthood -- the medically inexplicable healing of a French nun with the same Parkinson's disease that afflicted him. Luke 4:23

Monsignor Slawomir Oder, the Catholic Church official in charge of promoting the cause to declare the late Pope a saint of the Church, told Reuters on Monday that an investigation into the healing had cleared an initial probe by doctors.

Oder said the "relatively young" nun, whom he said he could not identify for now, was inexplicably cured of Parkinson's after praying to John Paul.

He said Church investigators would now start a more formal and detailed probe of the suspected miracle cure.

New Rules For Blog Censoring Courtesy Microsoft

2006-01-31T14:17:00.000-08:00

Microsoft attorney Brad Smith says that the company has a new policy to deal with a foreign government's request that alleges posted material violates its laws. The policy was apparently developed after Microsoft's own employees complained after a Chinese blogger hosted by Microsoft was censored.

'Smith said Microsoft will only remove blogs when given proper legal notice, and even then, will only block access to that material within the country where it is deemed unlawful. The site will still be viewable from outside the country, he said.'

Death To The Cartoonists

2006-01-31T13:38:00.000-08:00

Thousands of Palestinians protested for a second day on Tuesday against Denmark for allowing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad to be published, saying an apology by the newspaper involved was not enough.

Demonstrators burned Danish flags, chanted "War on Denmark, Death to Denmark" and called for an Arab boycott of products from the small north European country until it showed contrition for the satirical caricatures deemed blasphemous by Islam.

Anger has spread across much of the Muslim world.

The offices of the Danish newspaper were evacuated on Tuesday after a bomb threat. "I can confirm we evacuated Jyllands-Posten. There has been a bomb threat and we have evacuated the building," a police spokesman said.

The offices of Jyllands-Posten in its headquarters in Denmark's second city Arhus and in the capital Copenhagen were evacuated and police and sniffer dogs searched the buildings.

The newspaper apologized on Monday, but that was not enough for the Gaza protestors.

'The End Of Diplomacy'

2006-01-31T13:32:00.000-08:00

Iran struck back Tuesday at the Big Five's decision to refer the country's nuclear file to the Security Council, saying the move has no legal justification and would be the end of diplomacy.

At a London meeting that lasted into the early hours of Tuesday, envoys of the United States, Britain, China, France and Russia agreed to recommend that the International Atomic Energy Agency report Iran to the U.N. Security Council.

They also decided the Security Council should wait until March to take up Iran's nuclear file after a formal report on Tehran's activities from the U.N. agency, which meets Thursday in Vienna.

"Reporting Iran's dossier to the U.N. Security Council will be unconstructive and the end of diplomacy," said Iran's leading nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani. State television quoted him as saying Iran still believes the issue can be resolved peacefully.

Saudi's Recall Ambassador Over Cartoons

2006-01-27T10:37:00.000-08:00

Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Denmark on Thursday to protest against a published series of cartoons of the prophet Muhammad, which provoked a wave of rage in Islamic countries when they were published last year in a Danish newspaper.

Ambassador Mohammad Ibrahim Al-Hejailan had been posted to Denmark since March 2003. Embassy officials did not answer phone calls Thursday afternoon.

The 12 drawings published Sept. 30, 2005 by the Danish paper Jyllands-Posten included one showing Muhammad wearing a turban shaped as a bomb with a burning fuse. Another portrayed him with a bushy grey beard and holding a sword, his eyes covered by a black rectangle. A third pictured a middle-aged prophet standing in the desert with a walking stick in front of a donkey and a sunset.

Islamic tradition bans any depiction of the prophet, even respectful ones, out of concern such images could lead to idolatry.

Palestine Gov Promises 'Complete The Liberation Of Palestine'

2006-01-27T10:00:00.000-08:00

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said the Islamic group will "complete the liberation of other parts of Palestine," But did not say which territories he was referring to or how he would go about it.

Of course by his definition the territories in question include every inch of the State of Israel. So in effect the same they've been doing all this time, calling for the destruction of Israel.

Palestinian Elections A Call For Iserali Destruction

2006-01-27T09:51:00.000-08:00

The denial started almost immediately after Hamas captured 57 percent of the seats in the Palestinian parliament. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice opined: “Palestinian people have apparently voted for change, but we believe their aspirations for peace and a peaceful life remain unchanged.”

But what kind of peace? And how does Hamas propose to rid the Palestinian Authority of corruption? To these questions the answer has been clear for as long as Hamas has existed; the answer to both is Islam. The Hamas Charter of August 18, 1988, quotes Hassan Al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, the first modern Islamic terror organization and the direct forefather of Hamas: “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it.” A Hamas supporter in Gaza amplified that principle on Thursday: “We’re happy that now we will have an Islamic state. God willing, Islam will prevail and we will get rid of corruption.”

The Iranian regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has joined Hamas in calling for the destruction of Israel, expressed delight at the election outcome. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman said: “Iran...hopes that the powerful presence of Hamas at the [political] scene brings about great achievements for the Palestinian nation.”

Others were not so joyful. Jasser Jasser, a Christian pharmacist in Ramallah, said of the prospect of Hamas rule: “We’re all afraid. We’re worried about the future, that we’ll become a second Iran.” Jasser and other non-Muslims have every reason to be afraid. Hassam El-Masalmeh, Hamas leader in Bethlehem, recently declared that his movement intended to reinstitute the traditional tax, the jizya, stipulated in the Qur’an for Jews and Christians in an Islamic state. “We in Hamas,” Masalmeh announced, “intend to implement this tax someday. We say it openly – we welcome everyone to Palestine but only if they agree to live under our rules.” Since along with this tax, Islamic law stipulates that Jews and Christians must submit to a series of humiliating and discriminatory regulations, ensuring their second-class status in line with the Qur’anic stipulation that they “pay the jizya with willing submission and feel themselves subdued” (9:29).

Holocaust Museum Refuses To Show Muslim Anti-Semitism

2006-01-26T14:09:00.000-08:00

The grand mufti of Jerusalem made an alliance with Adolf Hitler during World War II. Yet, visitors to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., will learn nothing about it.

Some Jewish activists want to change that.

The locally based Holocaust Museum Watch is urging the museum to take a leadership role in exposing Arab and Muslim anti-Semitism both during the Holocaust and in the present day.

The absence of programs or information on the topic is a “dereliction of duty” by the facility, HMWatch chair Carol Greenwald charged last week, speaking during a forum at Ohev Sholom Talmud Torah.

HMWatch had asked U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council chair Fred Zeidman to speak at last week’s program, but he declined the invitation....

Among their complaints is the museum’s failure to detail Jerusalem Grand Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini’s connection to the Nazis. The two met in Berlin in 1941, and Hitler pledged his assistance in ridding the Arab world of Jews.

Later in the war, the mufti, among other activities, broadcast radio messages supporting the Nazis and helped recruit Muslim SS units in the Balkans.

The museum also bypasses the persecution of North African Jews, said Shelomo Alfassa, founder of the Sephardic Holocaust Project and executive director for the International Society for Sephardic Progress.

Nothing in the museum details the forced labor camps in Tunisia, from which 4,000 Jews were deported to European extermination camps, Alfassa said. Nor, he said, is there mention of the “Vichy restrictions” forcing Jews into ghettos in Morocco during the wartime period.

Edwin Black — author of “Banking on Baghdad, a history of Iraq” — points out that the museum makes no mention of the Farhud, a 1941 pro-Nazi pogrom in the Iraqi capital city that killed more than 200 Jews and destroyed hundreds of Jewish businesses.

Efforts to get the museum to recognize the anniversary of the Farhud have been rebuffed, he said. Black emphasized that he was not a member of HMWatch, but was representing himself on the panel.

He believes that the museum has avoided the topic because if museum historians “didn’t discover it, grow it and package it, it doesn’t exist.”

Others blame political demands for the museum’s failure to include such information in its permanent exhibit, or to explore concerns about current Muslim anti-Semitism in the same way the museum has sponsored programs on the genocides in Sudan and Rwanda....

ACLU Sues To Get Terrorist Into US

2006-01-26T14:00:00.000-08:00

The American Civil Liberties Union sued the U.S. government Wednesday for preventing a Muslim guy from entering the country, arguing that the government was using anti-terrorism laws as "instruments of censorship."

The lawsuit asks the court to find a provision of the Patriot Act unconstitutional and seeks clearance for Tariq Ramadan, a Swiss intellectual and 'Muslim scholar', to accept invitations to speak in the United States.

Ramadan was blocked from accepting a tenured teaching position at the University of Notre Dame when his visa was revoked in August 2004 because of a provision of the Patriot Act, said Jameel Jaffer, an ACLU staff attorney.

Jaffer said it was part of an effort by the federal government to bar foreign scholars whose political views might be contrary to those of the U.S. government. The provision blocks entry to the country for prominent aliens who used their status to endorse or espouse terrorism or to persuade others to terrorist activity, he said.

"We don't think there's any evidence at all that he has endorsed terrorism," Jaffer said.

New York Times: Catholic Background Makes Extremists

2006-01-26T11:17:00.000-08:00

The Newy York Times does it again. Effectivly calling out Catholic religion as forcing one to "holds extreme views..threatens to undermine the nation's basic philosophy of government."

get a free login here

So the call for Filibuster continues. The liberal left in their never ending drone, Roe V Wade, Roe V Wade, Roe V Wade. Apparently even while they moan of the president having "presidential privilege to ignore every restraint" they want judical privilege to ignore every restraint. The president is elected and the Supreme Court Judges appointed.

Of course thats the way the constitution works that there hoping no-one looks at.

To try to move Supreme Court Justices to some kind of Election based principle is violating the constitution on how Justices are placed into their seats. What they're doing is in effect filibustering the election results. One man elects a supreme court justice, the president. Then the congress determines if they are legatimately qualified for said post. To belive they they should follow your party lines in a fantansy against the constitutional process setup to appoint not elect. You can't filibuster the election results cause you don't like the results, no matter how it compares to your viewpoint. Do we really need to talk about pro-hibition? No, I didn't think so.

Judge Alito was 'elected' by the one person who gets to vote. That turn it into is he qualified as a Judge?

Let me bust a few more quotes:

"The judge's record strongly suggests that he is an eager lieutenant in the ranks of the conservative theorists"

No need to represent 'ranks of the conservative theorists.' They're just evil so we won't count them as part of the United States.

"who ignore our system of checks and balances"

Like Roe V Wade?

"He has expressed little enthusiasm for restrictions on presidential power"

Life following FISA? Or the infamous EO 12139? It nice to think that after 27 year they have a problem with it now.

"a president's intent in signing a bill is just as important as the intent of Congress in writing it","apeculiar argument."

So all the hundreds that he doesn't sign are important?

"Judge Alito's refusal to even pretend to sound like a moderate"

Refusal to pretend he's something he's not? How dare he! And from the mouth of the biggest left-wing slant factory to not name him a 'moderate!' I'm falling swoo to the liberal propaganda as we speak...

"whatever he said...when he was questioned by the Senate has little practical impact on how he will rule now that he has a lifetime appointment"

Nice they admit to some actual facts based 'in words' written in the constitution. So unless they get some mind readers it won't matter anyway. Kinda like a former ACLU attorney ruling in an ACLU supreme court case.

"A filibuster is a radical tool. It's easy to see why Democrats are frightened of it. But from our perspective, there are some things far more frightening."

Thats the same thing terrorists say about sucide bombings.

Conservative Websites Face Liberal Pounding, Personal Attacks

2006-01-25T21:51:00.000-08:00

If you run a conservative blog with a comments section, and the media does an article that mentions your blog, you can be sure they're going to to be filling it up with foulmouthed raving loonerey.

Glenn Reynolds: I think that one reason has to do with media treatment. Charles Johnson, for example — who does have comments — has repeatedly faced media stories about his site in which comments made by his readers are directly attributed to him, as if he had written them. I certainly worry about that sort of thing, too. I think that lefty sites expect, and get, less of that kind of mistreatment.

Ann Arbor, Mich.: Some of you have comments on your weblog, and some don't — notably Glenn Reyholds and, now, parts of the Washington Post. We know about the Washington Post situation. Would Glenn Reynolds explain about his decision not to have comments?

Glenn Reynolds: I've already done this in one of the other posts. Basically it boils down to time, and my fear that comments by trolls would be attributed unfairly to me, as has happened to others. Plus, it's not like it's hard for people to get their own blogs.

Jay Rosen: I must say I have never heard of that concern before: "media reports would attribute comment trolls to me, so I don't have them."

I have comments at my blog, and they are completely open. I not only monitor them carefully, I'm an active presence in comment threads and I argue a lot with readers. I get mad at them too. A great many users have told me that while I write good posts, what they really like is the range of reactions from others in comments. For some, that discussion is a primary, not a second-order good on offer at PressThink.

Glenn Reynolds: It happened to Charles Johnson and he was quite upset. Perhaps the press would be more sensitive where you're concerned, Jay.

As if on cue, the Associated Press delivered a perfect example of what Reynolds was talking about this afternoon in an article about the controversy over Joel Stein's "I Don't Support the Troops" op-ed:

The article, which ran on the Times opinion page on Tuesday, was quickly linked on conservative sites across the Internet, where readers poured scorn on Stein, on the newspaper and on liberals in general.

"If I ever run into the a**hole, I'm going to knock his frickin' block off," one man wrote on the Little Green Footballs (www.littlegreenfootballs.com) Web site, one of nearly 500 people who had commented on the article by mid-afternoon.

The article doesn't directly attribute the comment to Charles Johnson, but his Web site is nevertheless represented in the mainstream press by this comment, which he had no control over. The authors of most Web sites that have commented on the Stein article, like Blackfive, have disagreed strongly with Stein without threatening him. But the AP finds one comment and uses it to paint the entire conservative blogosphere as violent and crazy. No matter how vile the comments get on the left-wing sites, I never read about them in the press.

It's just an amazing coincidence that the AP provided an immediate answer to all the people blogging about the chat who thought Reynolds's excuse was lame.

Muslim Treaty For Non-Belivers, Kuffar

2006-01-25T21:21:00.000-08:00

The latest greatest document on Islamic treatment of non-Muslim minorities is a document published in AD 717 known as the Pact of Umar. Not surprisingly many Muslims will find the occurences in today's Malaysia acceptable since this is where they get their guidelines on acceptable behaviour from.

The author writes "First of all the Muslims term all the people who are kaffir as 'dhimmis'. This means they have to pay a jizya or a poll tax for protection. The local samseng back at school used to call this protection money. In the more refined Malaysia we give Muslims back tax dollars for monies paid to their religion. I once published a post or two on how Muslims are freeloaders because of this. I got condemned by a heavy hitting blogger but so far there has been no response from anyone as to why Muslims get their tax dollars back in equal amount for monies paid to the mosque and I don't get money back in equal amount paid to the church. Call it jizya, call it protection money or call it a mob shakedown. It's the first pillar of Islam in dealling with dhimmis. You pay more so that they can take more. Where I come from, that's called freeloading."

Let's see what else is in the Pact of Umar.

Scientists, Your Dark Matter Is Gone

2006-01-25T11:46:00.000-08:00

As science moves on,a theory of modified gravity, which has no need of dark matter, has just explained why the Pioneer 10 probe is 400,000 miles off its expected course as it leaves the solar system

Astronomers realised in the 1970s that the gravity of visible matter alone was not enough to prevent the fast-moving stars and gas in spiral galaxies from flying out into space. They attributed the extra pull to a mysterious substance called dark matter, which is now thought to outweigh normal matter in the universe by 6 to 1.

Now, Joel Brownstein and John Moffat, researchers at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics and the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, say another modified gravity theory accounts for both galaxies and galaxy clusters.

The theory, called scalar-tensor-vector gravity (STVG), adds quantum effects to Einstein's theory of general relativity. As in other branches of physics, the theory says that quantum fluctuations can affect the force felt between interacting objects.

In this case, a hypothetical particle called a graviton – which mediates gravity – appears in large numbers out of the vacuum of space in regions crowded with massive objects such as stars. "It's as if gravity is stronger" near the centres of galaxies, Brownstein said. "Then, at a certain distance, the stars become sparse, and the gravitons don't contribute that much." So at larger distances, gravity returns to the behaviour described by Newton.

Government Tax On Illegal Drugs Bringing In The Money

2006-01-25T11:08:00.000-08:00

During its first year, Tennessee's "Crack Tax" has brought in nearly $2 million dollars in state revenue.

The illegal substances tax that went into effect last January basically says drug dealers are supposed to pay taxes on illegal drugs and alcohol.

They pay confidentially, and when they do, they get a stamp. If they're caught without the stamp, they'll be prosecuted for not only selling drugs, but for not paying their taxes too.

All money made from the stamps is supposed to go to fighting drugs but somehow I'm expecting politicians won't let this golden goose get too big before it starts slicing it up.

Al-Jazeera Columnist: Europe Should Accept Its Muslims Masters

2006-01-24T14:03:00.000-08:00

In this column in Al-Jazeera, Soumaya Ghannoushi points out the manifestly true and obvious fact that to take defensive measures against Islamic terrorism contradicts the multiculturalist ethos. Then she adds this:

In this context, the intensely rich and complex Islamic culture, which had fostered some of the most cosmopolitan and open societies in history, in Baghdad, Damascus, Cordoba, or Istanbul, has found itself reduced to a narrow set of vulgar stereotypes.
These range from the subordination of women and arranged marriage to fanaticism and religious despotism. Such arguments bespeak much ignorance and prejudice.

Above all, they overlook the fact that all cultures are subject to different modes of interpretation, and that no culture is homogenous or absolute. To reduce the Islamic culture to these phenomena is akin to identifying ‘Britishness’ with Victorian military expansion and the British massacres of natives in Kenya, Sudan, and Malawi, or seeing Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and the burning of the corpses of so- called enemy combatants as representative of American culture.

Random Set Of Quotes

2006-01-24T13:20:00.000-08:00

Fight in the way of Allah against those who fight against you, but begin not hostilities. Lo! Allah loveth not aggressors. And slay them wherever ye find them, and drive them out of the places whence they drove you out, for persecution is worse than slaughter. And fight not with them at the Inviolable Place of Worship until they first attack you there, but if they attack you (there) then slay them. Such is the reward of disbelievers. (2:190-191)

Slay the disbelievers. Sounds like a religious war to me. So does this:

Fighting is prescribed for you, and ye dislike it. But it is possible that ye dislike a thing which is good for you, and that ye love a thing which is bad for you. But Allah knoweth, and ye know not. They ask thee concerning fighting in the Prohibited Month. Say: "Fighting therein is a grave (offence); but graver is it in the sight of Allah to prevent access to the path of Allah, to deny Him, to prevent access to the Sacred Mosque, and drive out its members." Tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter. Nor will they cease fighting you until they turn you back from your faith if they can. And if any of you Turn back from their faith and die in unbelief, their works will bear no fruit in this life and in the Hereafter; they will be companions of the Fire and will abide therein. (2:216-217)

And this, which identifies the enemies of the Muslims as disbelievers and friends of Satan:

Let those fight in the cause of Allah Who sell the life of this world for the hereafter. To him who fighteth in the cause of Allah,- whether he is slain or gets victory - Soon shall We give him a reward of great (value). And why should ye not fight in the cause of Allah and of those who, being weak, are ill-treated (and oppressed)?- Men, women, and children, whose cry is: "Our Lord! Rescue us from this town, whose people are oppressors; and raise for us from thee one who will protect; and raise for us from thee one who will help!" Those who believe fight in the cause of Allah, and those who reject Faith Fight in the cause of Evil: So fight ye against the friends of Satan: feeble indeed is the cunning of Satan. (4:74-76)

Here the religious warriors, or the angels who protect them, are to behead those who do not believe:

Remember thy Lord inspired the angels (with the message): "I am with you: give firmness to the Believers: I will instil terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers: smite ye above their necks and smite all their finger-tips off them." (8:12)

Cf. this verse, which also makes clear the religious character of the fight:

Therefore, when ye meet the Unbelievers (in fight), smite at their necks; At length, when ye have thoroughly subdued them, bind a bond firmly (on them): thereafter (is the time for) either generosity or ransom: Until the war lays down its burdens. Thus (are ye commanded): but if it had been Allah's Will, He could certainly have exacted retribution from them (Himself); but (He lets you fight) in order to test you, some with others. But those who are slain in the Way of Allah,- He will never let their deeds be lost. (47:4)

This one states the goal of the fighting in terms that also make clear that the war is religious:

And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is all for Allah. (8:39)

This one, like many others, makes it clear that the fighting that believers must do is not spiritual, but physical -- otherwise the promise that the believers will overcome long odds would make little or no sense:

O Prophet! rouse the Believers to the fight. If there are twenty amongst you, patient and persevering, they will vanquish two hundred: if a hundred, they will vanquish a thousand of the Unbelievers: for these are a people without understanding. (8:65)

This is the celebrated "Verse of the Sword":

But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the Pagans wherever ye find them, an seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war); but if they repent, and establish regular prayers and practise regular charity, then open the way for them: for Allah is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful. (9:5)

Again, hard to see that as spiritual or metaphorical fighting. And this one establishes that the warfare is against the People of the Book, that is, Jews and Christians:

Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued. (9:29)

Catholic League Confirms, Book Of Daniel Canceled

2006-01-24T12:43:00.000-08:00

“A story posted on worldnetdaily.com earlier in the day said that the NBC-TV show, ‘The Book of Daniel,’ has been cancelled. We have since confirmed the veracity of this story with an NBC affiliate producer; an internal memo has been released to that effect.

“This is good news for Christians, and bad news for those who get their jollies trying to disparage them. As I said in a news release on January 4, the decision to air this show about a totally dysfunctional Christian family was another example of Hollywood’s agenda. That was two days before the show premiered. But the very next day, we changed our tune: Kiera McCaffrey, the league’s director of communications, had an opportunity to preview the first two episodes, and after having done so she told ‘Entertainment Tonight’ that she ‘couldn’t be offended by it because it’s more moronic than anything else.’

Democrats Set Dangerous Judiciary Precedent

2006-01-24T11:59:00.000-08:00

"From what I can see, the Democrats are going to make a cause celebre out of this, even though Judge Alito is more than qualified," Hatch told FOX News on Tuesday before the vote, adding that Democrats are making abortion the big issue on which to oppose Alito. "I'm afraid they're making a political fiasco out of this," he added.

Hatch noted that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was confirmed with a vote of 96 to 3, while Justice Stephen Breyer was approved 87 to 9 — both were Clinton administration nominees; Ginsburg was previously a lawyer for the ACLU.

"We all knew they were social liberals ... yet we voted for them because they were qualified and they were put forth by the president of the United States. …Where were the filibusters, where were the litmus tests and the scorecards?" Hatch said during Tuesday's hearing. "We acknowledged their obvious qualifications and judicial temperament and we gave the then-president the deference to the separation of powers … Judge Alito should receive at least as much support as they did."

Israel Planning Massive, 60 Target Air Strike

2006-01-23T20:38:00.000-08:00

Israel's Air Force is practicing to destroy Iranian nuclear assets in a single sweeping strike, a U.S. specialist said in a radio interview.

Israel has established 60 targets required for the destruction of Iran's nuclear weapons program, Kenneth Timmerman told Israel National Radio.

Timmerman said any military strike on Iran would be much more difficult than the Israeli destruction of Iraq's nuclear weapons program in 1981. Israel Air Force F-16s destroyed the Osirak nuclear reactor outside of Baghdad in 1981, setting back Iraq's program for a decade.

"It's not going to be Iraq, but the short answer is yes [Israel can destroy Iran's nuclear weapons program]," Timmerman said.

Israel has not confirmed Timmerman's assertions. But former senior officials and parliamentarians stress that Israel must prepare for a military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities, preferably in cooperation with the United States.

"We must make practical preparations in that maybe we will be asked to operate as part of a coalition," former Israel Air Force commander Maj. Gen. Eitan Ben Eliahu told the Herzliya Conference on Sunday.

Timmerman, author of a new book, "Countdown to Crisis," said Israel has the ability to destroy Iran's nuclear weapons program.

"They have identified five dozen targets that they believe are high-priority targets," Timmerman said.

Ben Eliahu said numerous Iranian sites must be targeted in any effort to destroy that nation's nuclear program. He appeared to doubt the ability of Israel to carry out such a mission alone.

"If this is operation is to be conducted, it must be done in continuing waves [of air strikes]," Ben-Eliahu said. "Therefore,we are talking of an international effort."

Timmerman said Israel has formed a leadership team that has focused on the destruction of Iran's nuclear weapons program. He pointed out that the new head of military intelligence, Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin, was the lead air force pilot in the operation against Osirak.

"I don't think that was a coincidence," Timmerman said. "You have a team in place that has tremendous experience, knows what they're doing and has cool nerves."

Pope Goes Pro-Copyright

2006-01-23T18:57:00.000-08:00

I guess there getting more like Scientology every day.

The Pope has announced that henceforth, and retroactively, the "divinely inspired" words he utters and pens will be governed by copyright, and only publishable after permission is secured and royalties are paid to the church.

Publishers will have to negotiate a levy of between 3 per cent and 5 per cent of the cover price of any book or publication "containing the Pope's words". Those who infringe the copyright face legal action and a higher levy of 15 per cent.
The Union of Italian Catholic Publishers and Booksellers said that it had not been consulted, and that the edict "flies in the face of what we do -- spreading the Pope's message to the world".
A Vatican spokesman said that the Holy See had to defend itself against "pirated editions". The move is also aimed at "premature publication". Journalists accredited to the Vatican are handed papal texts under embargo. The Vatican said that if embargos were broken in future not only would the journalist face sanctions but also his or her publication would face legal action.

Prono Stepping Into Undustrial Limelight

2006-01-23T18:00:00.000-08:00

At the recent adult entertainment awards, host Greg Fitzsimmons highlighted the deep relationship between the internet and pornography

Stating "'The Internet was completely funded by porn,' he said [...] And if it wasn't for the Internet, he added, 'you guys would be completely out of business.' The audience, packed with porn actors and adult entertainment moguls like Jenna Jameson and Larry Flynt, roared with laughter."

Now it appears that the adult entertainment industry has chosen to ante up in the DRM battle as well. Some companies have chosen to take sides, like Digital Playground who will be supporting Sony's Blu-Ray. Others, like Vivid Entertainment, seem to think that the answer is diversity and will be supporting both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD.

Man Who Shot The Pope Writing New 'Bible'

2006-01-23T13:09:00.000-08:00

Mehmet Ali Agca, the man who tried to kill pope John Paul II, was "writing a new bible" when he was rearrested on Friday under government "threats and pressure", his brother said yesterday as he led a protest outside the prison holding him.

"Is justice a toy of the media?" asked one of the placards Adnan Agca and a group of supporters waved outside the Kartal prison, where the former right-wing hitman was taken Friday night after just eight days of freedom.

Agca's release was widely criticised by the media, which yesterday was near unanimous in hailing the decision to send him back to jail.

Agca was freed on January 12 after 19 years in Italian prisons for his attempt on John Paul II's life and five and a half in Turkish prisons for an earlier murder and two robberies.

His early release based on sentence reductions and amendments to the penal code was overturned by the High Court of Appeals, acting under instructions from the justice ministry, which said his jail time had been miscalculated.

"Judges and prosecutors are under heavy threats and pressure," Adnan Agca told reporters outside the prison. "They are under pressure from their own ministry.

"The Vatican has proclaimed my brother the messiah. My brother is the messiah, he is the mahdi (the Muslim messiah).

"Believe it or not, he has dedicated his life and his ideal to his country and to his nation," Adnan Agca said, adding that his brother's attorney would take legal action against the Appeals Court decision.

Lawyer Mustafa Demirbag told the NTV news channel that he would also file a formal complaint against Justice Minister Cemil Cicek, who ordered the review.

The Supreme Court's decision to return Agca to prison shows the country's legal system works and is able to correct its errors, Cicek said yesterday.

"My brother was very happy to have been set free," Adnan Agca said. "He was not expecting this decision. He was writing a new Bible."

Some angry, some jubilant, Turkish newspapers agreed that Agca's return to jail was a good thing.

"Back where he belongs," headlined the liberal Milliyet, whose emblematic editor Abdi Ipekci was murdered by Agca in 1979, two years before he shot and wounded John Paul II in Rome's St Peter's Square.

"Scandal in spades", bannered the popular Aksam.

The miscalculation of sentence reductions made Turkey "the laughing stock of the world", Aksam wrote, "and to boot, we gave the killer centrestage." "Eight days of vacation, eight more years in jail," headlined the popular Vatan; "Forward, march - back to the hole," was the banner in the mass selling Hurriyet, while the liberal Radikal wrote: "Killer fails to flee."

Agca, who fled a Turkish prison while awaiting trial for the Ipekci murder and resurfaced, gun in hand, outside the Vatican on May 13, 1981, was pardoned by Italy in 2000 and extradited to Turkey.

South Dakota To Outlaw Abortion

2006-01-23T10:00:00.000-08:00

In the next six weeks, South Dakota lawmakers will decide to make abortion a crime.

A bill that would ban abortion in the state will be introduced within the next two days. The bill, called the Woman's Health and Life Protection Act, will ban abortion, but won't prosecute a doctor who performs one to save a woman's life.

And the lawmaker who's introducing the bill says he thinks now is the right time to try and over-turn Roe vs Wade. Rep. Roger Hunt says, "Abortion should be banned."

Those four words will likely lead to many others in the South Dakota House and Senate as lawmakers will decide whether to criminalize abortion in the state. The bill's supporters are using findings from a controversial abortion task force report recently given to the legislature.

Hunt says, "DNA testing now can establish the unborn child has a separate and distinct personality from the mother. We know a lot more about post-abortion harm to the mother."

The legislature debated a similar bill two years ago, but Governor Mike Rounds vetoed it because of concerns over some technicalities. Hunt says, "We have made those corrections to the bill."

Sunday, Hunt and other anti-abortion advocates held an event promoting their legislation. They say now is the time to pass it, because other states are considering similar bills and because with new Chief Justice John Roberts, and possibly Samuel Alito, the US Supreme Court is changing.

Hunt says, "Two very solid, we feel, pro-life candidates. Again you never know but based on their testimony to the senate we feel they're good candidates."

Hunt says he thinks enough other lawmakers support the bill for it to pass, but he still thinks the decision will be a close one. "I learned a long time ago the only time you really count the votes is when you're taking the votes."

Hunt will also introduce two other bills this week. One is meant to ensure doctors explain the risks of an abortion to a woman is writing. The other deals with sex education and says school districts need to include principles in their curriculums dealing with abstinence and personal responsibilities.

UK Sex Rehab, Pedophile's Teaching School

2006-01-23T09:23:00.000-08:00

At least 150 convicted pedophiles are working in English schools, The Sun has discovered.

They uncovered the shock figure last night as Education Secretary Ruth Kelly battled to save her skin over the scandal of pervert teachers. She admitted both herself and her ministers cleared five sex offenders to work in schools in just 13 months. That’s the same number as were cleared by ministers in all the EIGHT YEARS since Labour came to power.

The scandal emerged as Education Secretary Ms Kelly admitted to MPs that 88 child abusers had not been banned from classrooms, or had been lost in the system.

Only a handful are feared to have returned to teaching. But SEPARATE figures disclosed to The Sun reveal a more shocking threat to British children.

A conservative estimate is that at least 150 pedophile teachers are in the nation’s classrooms. All are sexual predators convicted before 2000 and given partial bans.

All will be subjected to new investigations led by Sir Roger Singleton. Their names are among 4,045 on the Education Department’s discredited List 99 — which the public had been led to believe barred sex offenders outright from working with children.

Yesterday embattled Ms Kelly was backed by Tony Blair as she pledged to close loopholes in the system. She declared: “Nobody who is convicted or cautioned for child sex offences should be allowed to teach in schools.” Shadow Education Secretary David Willetts demanded: “So why has this Government done so for the last eight years?”

Ms Kelly said that of the 88 perverts, 32 were never put on the schools blacklist, despite being on the Sex Offenders Register. Thirteen sexual offenders are under investigation after being given the green light by officials to work in classrooms but it is not known if they are teaching.

Others won permission to continue working — like PE teacher Paul Reeve, who was caught viewing child porn, and maths master William Gibson, a convicted child molester.

And on a side note, whats the difference between 'paedophile' and 'pedophile'?
Colour or color.

Authors of Dufar Genocode To Head AU

2006-01-23T09:12:00.000-08:00

Five African leaders have asked Sudan to withdraw a bid to head the African Union that has prompted worries it could sink the Darfur peace talks and dent the group's credibility, an AU official said on Monday.

Sudan has nominated itself to chair the 53-member AU, based on a tradition that the host becomes the next head. Sudan, which is under fire for rights abuses, would take over from Nigeria.

However, Khartoum's bid has provoked criticism from rights groups which say a Sudanese presidency would damage AU efforts to improve the continent's record on democracy and human rights, and is opposed by several African regional blocs.

An AU official told Reuters that five heads of state had met Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir on Sunday and told him "there was a consensus that he should withdraw".

"Bashir said he would consult with his neighbouring countries and reply," the official said. He said the five nations included Nigeria, whose president, Olusegun Obasanjo, has already led the AU for two years.

"It is looking like the compromise is for Obasanjo to stay because then Bashir will save some face," the official said.

An AU force of 7,000 troops is monitoring a tentative truce between the government and rebels in Darfur in western Sudan, and critics, including the United States, say it would be inappropriate for Sudan to head the group leading that force.

Sudan has no real government yet there're gonna lead the AU. I guess this is showing what we have to look forward from Africa if the west doesn't step in. A rulinging thug-ocracy. Various competing 'warlords' representing Africa?

UN Denies Rape Victum Right To Testify

2006-01-22T13:29:00.000-08:00

Mukhtar Mai, the Pakistani woman whose defiant response to being gang-raped by order of a tribal court brought her worldwide attention, was denied a chance to speak at the United Nations on Friday after Pakistan protested that it was the same day the country's prime minister was visiting.

Ms. Mai had long been scheduled to make an appearance called "An Interview With Mukhtar Mai: The Bravest Woman on Earth" in the United Nations television studios, sponsored by the office for nongovernmental organizations, the Virtue Foundation and the Asian-American Network Against Abuse of Human Rights.

But on Thursday night the organizers were informed that the program would have to be postponed because of Pakistan's objections...

Mr. Aziz is scheduled to see President Bush in Washington next week.

This was not the first time that Pakistan's government had interfered in Ms. Mai's travels. President Pervez Musharraf blocked her from taking a trip to the United States in June and then relented last fall when Glamour magazine honored her as its "Woman of the Year."...

Blog Shut Down Due To Abramoff Attacks

2006-01-20T22:43:00.000-08:00

C|Net has an article by Katharine Q. Seelye of The New York Times, which indicates that the Washington Post is having to close one of its blogs, due to 'too many personal attacks, profanity and hate mail directed at the paper's ombudsman.'

It seems that Deborah Howell, the newspaper's ombudsman, wrote an article on the Jack Abramoff scandal which elicited a storm of protest and led to readers using profanity and making unprintable comments, which the paper had to take extra care in removing. This was apparently more based on the issue at hand, as the Post's other blogs have not experienced similar problems."

What kind of precedent does this set for other mainstream news sites? What we'd consider a normal day around here has to look fairly intimidating to the average newspaper editor. Will this dissuade news sites from blogging in the future?

Chinese Arrested 18,000 'Security Threats'

2006-01-20T12:09:00.000-08:00

Chinese authorities arrested more than 18,000 people for national security reasons in the mainly Muslim western region of Xinjiang last year, a newspaper said on Friday, which a dissident described as a rise of a quarter.

Uighur activists, who Beijing says are terrorists trying to split China, have been struggling for decades for self-determination in remote Xinjiang, formally established as an autonomous region on October 1, 1955.

The official Xinjiang Daily put the number of people arrested in the region for threatening state security -- which China considers everything from terrorism to sometimes even talking to foreign reporters -- at 18,227 people in 2005.

Dilxat Raxit of the World Uighur Congress, a German-based group seeking more freedom for the region they call East Turkestan: "If anything, the human rights situation in Xinjiang is getting worse" . "The world is not putting enough pressure on China because they are scared of affecting economic ties."

Human Rights Watch, a New York-based organization that campaigns against political repression and torture, said in its annual worldwide report that China remained beset by widespread rights abuses.

On Thursday, China lashed out at the report, saying the claims came out of "thin air" and were entirely politically motivated. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Kong Quan told reporters he had not even bothered to read the report.

"If China thinks the report is wrong, it should let international human rights groups into Xinjiang to investigate without limits," Raxit said.

In October, China marked the 50th anniversary of the establishment of Xinjiang as an autonomous region. China says its system of 'autonomous regions' for ethnic minorities allows them a degree of self-governance but activists say it is a means for Beijing to maintain tight control.

The Public Security Ministry last year labeled East Turkestan forces the main terrorist threat to China and said more than 260 terrorist acts had been committed in Xinjiang in the past two decades, killing 160 and wounding 440.

Among the most prominent Uighur activists is Rebiya Kadeer, a Uighur businesswoman freed in March and exiled to the United States after serving years in jail on charges of providing state secrets abroad.

What Goes Up, Needs To Come Back Down

2006-01-20T11:46:00.000-08:00

A growing amount of human-made debris—from rocket stages and obsolete satellites to blown-off hatches and insulation—is circling the Earth.

Scientists say the orbital debris, better known as space junk, poses an increasing threat to space activities, including robotic missions and human space flight.

"This is a growing environmental problem," said Nicholas Johnson, the chief scientist and program manager for orbital debris at NASA in Houston, Texas.

Johnson and his team have devised a computer model capable of simulating past and future amounts of space junk.

The model predicts that even without future rocket or satellite launches, the amount of debris in low orbit around Earth will remain steady through 2055, after which it will increase.

While current efforts have focused on limiting future space junk, the scientists say removing large pieces of old space junk will soon be necessary.

UCLA Threatens Legal Action To Stop Conservative Activist

2006-01-19T21:58:00.000-08:00

The University of California Los Angeles is preparing to take legal action against a former student who has established an unofficial alumni association targeting "political radicalism on campus."

UCLAProfs.com offers profiles of more than 30 "radical" professors, along with descriptions of their political "proselytizing" in the classroom. The website ranks the professors' level of socialism, using miniature clenched fists, just as movie reviews often use stars to rate films.

The website's founder, Andrew Jones, graduated from UCLA in 2003. He launched the Bruin Alumni Association (BAA) in January 2005, prompting UCLA to issue a cease-and-desist letter alleging trademark violations.

Under pressure from UCLA, Jones removed the school's seal from his website. He also added a disclaimer, confirming that the Bruin Alumni Association is not affiliated with the university nor with the official UCLA Alumni Association.

Jones said he hasn't heard from the university since making the changes, but UCLA spokeswoman Tricia Halsey told Cybercast News Service that Jones' new project, a description of the "most radical" UCLA professors, may invite further legal action.

"I wouldn't be starting an alumni association if I didn't care about the school," Jones told Cybercast News Service . But, he continued, "the [official] Alumni Association is...not interested in having a full discussion of the issues; they're interested in covering over problems when they come up because they don't want to disrupt or knock off the tracks the fundraising gravy train."

Jones said his new project is trying to "be very detailed about our charges and really lay out the full scope of the problem."

"Do you have a professor who just can't stop talking about President Bush, about Howard Dean, about the war in Iraq, about MoveOn.org, about the Republican Party, about the Democratic Party, or any other ideological issue that has nothing to do with the class subject matter?" the website asks.

Jones said he's not asking people to believe what he's saying based on faith or anecdote: "We're going to put all this together and we're going to take our case to the public and say, 'Until UCLA agrees to shape up, perhaps your donor dollars should go elsewhere.'"

But his efforts aren't going over well with the UCLA administration. Spokeswoman Halsey stressed that the BAA has "no affiliation with UCLA at all" and called Jones a "guy who got angry and started his own thing."

She said more legal pressure is being put on Jones to abandon his project, but she was not sure if the school or the Alumni Association was behind the new effort. "I'm not sure what the process is, but I know that they're currently trying to get him to stop," she said.

Jones said he's confident that he's exercising protected free speech, and he said he is ready for a fight.

"I'm sure they have plans for us," he said. "I'm hoping any day now to get the cease-and-desist letter so then we can end up with a David-versus-Goliath situation. They will lose and they will lose badly."

Bible Ban Approved At University of Wisconsin

2006-01-19T21:19:00.000-08:00

A committee formed to examine bans on employee-led Bible studies at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire (UWEC) last week recommended that the university system president allow the bans to continue.

In a Jan. 11 report, the committee of administrators and students recommended that University of Wisconsin System President Kevin Reilly allow the university's campuses to ban student employees from leading Bible studies in their university-funded dormitories.

Reilly formed the group in December after Lance Steiger, a Christian resident assistant (RA) at the Eau Claire campus, filed a federal lawsuit against the school charging that its ban on dormitory-based Bible study violated his free expression of religion.

RAs "can participate in, organize, or lead meetings as long as they don't use their position to inappropriately influence, pressure, or coerce student residents to attend," the university report states. It does not explain what inappropriate influence means.

The group's findings, which Reilly must endorse if they are to become official university policy, state that the university "has the right to establish reasonable restrictions on RA activities" and "the determination of where the meetings may be held has been left to the discretion of the individual institutions."

If approved by Reilly, the policy would allow the Eau Claire and Madison campuses of the University of Wisconsin to continue enforcing their pre-existing bans on RA-led Bible studies, at least until the Steiger lawsuit is decided.

Greg Lukianoff, interim president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), which is backing Steiger, said he wasn't sure why the university committee recommended support for the bans.

"Certainly from where I'm standing it looks like there's been an awful lot of response to this case," Lukianoff said, pointing to "an awful lot of angry phone calls and e-mails by regular citizens to the university, but also state political involvement too."

The case has prompted U.S. Rep. Mark Green, a Wisconsin Republican, to voice his support for Steiger and other religious RAs in a letter to Reilly Jan. 13. "While I am glad the working group did not directly reaffirm the current ban on Bible studies by RAs in their dorm rooms," Green wrote, "I am extremely disappointed that it fell short of explicitly guaranteeing this Constitutional right."

Green added, "Any policy that doesn't specifically affirm the right of RAs to hold private, non-mandatory Bible studies in their room is unacceptable and I urge you to reject it."

Lukianoff also expressed concern that the UWEC Office of Housing and Residence Life was promoting what he called a double standard because it "likes and endorses ... public and official politicized events, but doesn't seem to want to tolerate private religious expression."

The UWEC office sponsors a student group called Making Our School an Intercultural Community, which organizes productions of the controversial feminist play, "The Vagina Monologues."

The student group also organized a presentation of the "Tunnel of Oppression," an exhibit at campuses nationwide that exposed students to graphic depictions of racial and sexual oppression. Cybercast News Service reported on the University of Maryland's version of the "Tunnel of Oppression" in May 2005.

Reilly has not announced when he will make a final decision regarding the new policies at the University of Wisconsin. Representatives from his office did not return repeated calls requesting comment for this article. Meanwhile, the website outlining the recommendations welcomes feedback from the public.

Germany To Iran: Holocaust, Yes We Did That!

2006-01-19T21:05:00.000-08:00

The German government has condemned Iran's plan for a conference designed to try to prove the Holocaust never happened.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called the Holocaust a "myth."

The Iranian government announced plans for the conference last weekend and said it would invite prominent Holocaust deniers to speak. Among those mentioned were German neo-Nazi Horst Mahler, the Israeli journalist and Christian convert Israel Shamir and the historian David Irving.

Politicians, especially in Germany, were up in arms at the idea of such a conference, Deutsche Welle said. "This is international anti-Semitism at work," said Gert Weisskirchen, the foreign affairs spokesman for the Social Democratic Party in an interview with German magazine Der Spiegel.

Shamir's Web state carried a post saying he had not been invited to the conference, has "knowledge whether such a conference will take place at all." The post said if an invitation is received "it will be considered carefully."

It's Not Offensive, Its From The Koran

2006-01-19T20:42:00.000-08:00

Copies of the Koran were handed to the jurors in the Abu Hamza trial yesterday as his defence argued that some of the cleric’s “offensive” statements were drawn directly from Islam’s holy book.

Edward Fitzgerald, QC, for the defence, said that Abu Hamza’s interpretation of the Koran was that it imposed an obligation on Muslims to do jihad and fight in the defence of their religion. He said that the Crown case against the former imam of Finsbury Park Mosque was “simplistic in the extreme”.

He added: “It is said he was preaching murder, but he was actually preaching from the Koran itself.”

Mr Fitzgerald cited two verses of the book that Abu Hamza would rely on, among many others, as theological justification for the words that had led to him being charged. They were Chapter 2, verse 216 and Chapter 9, verse 111. He said that all the great monotheistic religions had scriptures that contained “the language of blood and retribution”.

Abu Hamza’s remarks, which the prosecution alleges amount to an attempt to stir up racial hatred against the Jewish people, were, Mr Fitzgerald said, a reference to the Hadith — sayings of the Prophet Muhammad — in which fighting between Jews and Muslims is predicted.

The Hadith says that the trees will call out to the Muslims “there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him”.

The defence counsel said this was “a highly unusual case” because unlike most prosecutions for incitement to murder it did not involve someone telling a specific person to kill an identifiable individual.

Abu Hamza’s sermons had to be viewed in context, coinciding with conflicts in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bosnia, Kosovo and the Palestinian territories. Mr Fitzgerald said that the West had initially been on the side of the Mujahidin in Afghanistan when they were fighting the Soviet Union army. There had even been a James Bond film, The Living Daylights, in which 007 fought alongside the Mujahidin.

He added: “Mr Hamza has said things that most people will find deeply offensive and hateful. But he is not on trial for describing England as a toilet. There is no crime of simply being offensive.”

Expanding On Why A OBL Truce Is Meaningless

2006-01-19T14:37:00.000-08:00

The basis for Western treaties is pacta sunt servanda -- treaties (agreements) are to be obeyed. To us this idea, which was not at all obvious, seems obvious. But it has long been part of Western jurisprudence. And the Western world has not distinguished on the basis of the nature of the parties making such a treaty.

The basis of Islamic jurisprudence dealing with treaties (agreements) is quite different. Any agreement between Muslims and non-Muslims is subject to the rules that were established in Qur'an, Hadith, and Sira. And it is the Sira, the biography of Muhammad, that Model for All Time, that guides Muslims in their treaty-making with Infidels. When in 628 A. D. Muhammad made a treaty of peace -- really, a "treaty of truce" --with the Meccans, it was to last 10 years. Within 18 months, as he felt his forces had become stronger, Muhammad broke the treaty. That he did so deliberately, that he found a pretext, that he regarded this as the proper way to behave, is clear from all the telling and re-telling of this story. It was regarded as a splendid example of Muhammad's conduct of war against his enemies -- in this case, the Meccans who had refused to become followers of Muhammad, and of his still-developing (the Qur'an itself was dictated by the Angel Gabriel over 23 years) creed.

This is not an imaginary charge. It is laid out by all the relevant Muslim scholars. If CAIR or some group of Arab diplomats insists that this is all a product of perfervid Infidel imaginations, then simiply direct them to, inter alia, "The Law of War and Peace in Islam" by the celebrated scholar Majid Khadduri (who gave his name to a chair now comfortably occupied by the noticeably-reticent-on-Islam Fouad Ajami).

Unless the basis of Islamic jurisprudence with Infidels is understood, the Infidel peoples and polities will be constantly disappointed -- and worse, they will be always at a disadvantage. They cannot rely on such treaties. There is not a single agreement signed between Israel and any of its Arab (or partly-Arab, for most of Lebanon's Christians are Arabic-speaking, not Arab) neighbors that has not been violated by the Muslim side, in ways little and big. Yet the Israelis will not learn, or have not learned, from their experience.

That is their problem. But the rest of the Infidel world can learn from Israel's unhappy experience with such treaties -- for the benefit of that larger Infidel world, if not for that of trusting, ever-hopeful, diplomatically awkward and tongue-tied Israel.

And these type of instructions are stroight from Islamic holy text (The Hadith): Volume 4, Book 52, Number 268:

Narrated Abu Huraira:

Allah's Apostle called,: "War is deceit".
I can't wait for the Pelosi/Dean "aid and comfort for the terrorists" to jump on this supposed "truce" proposal.

Iraqi 'Insurgents' Resort To Childer Sucide Bombers

2006-01-19T14:04:00.000-08:00

The United Nations on Wednesday called attention to a disturbing trend in the Iraq war: child insurgents.

"A boy said to be aged between 10 and 13 years allegedly carried out a suicide bombing targeting the police commander in the city of Kirkuk. Later that month, two boys aged 12 and 13 years reportedly carried out attacks against [U.S.-led forces] in Fallujah and Hweeja, respectively."

The report touches on a range of rights violations in Iraq, the longstanding insurgent attacks, violence surrounding the December 15 election and problems involving the Interior Ministry.

"The persistent conflicts affecting the country and weaknesses in law enforcement continue to have a serious and adverse effect on the enjoyment of human rights," it said. "Ongoing attacks by armed groups, acts of terrorism, violent crimes, large-scale arbitrary arrests and evidence of mistreatment in detention centers together presented a pattern of major human-rights violations."

And then they go to tell us that the reason why is, of couse, everybody else fault except the actual islamofacists doing said horrible action. Let me summarize the key points to whose fault it is

Coalition military
the Iraqi government
foreign nationals
elections
the Interior Ministry
Coalition military
U.S. counter-insurgency operations
protection for people involved in the Saddam Hussein
The Trial

Yup, everyone except the one doing said slaughter.

bin-Laden Offers Fake Truce

2006-01-19T13:08:00.000-08:00

Al-Jazeera on Thursday aired an audiotape purportedly from Osama bin Laden, who says al-Qaida is making preparations for attacks in the United States but offering a truce "with fair conditions."...

Not to be a bubble buster or anything, but I once again have bring to light "al-Hudaybiyah."

In Islam there is a principle known as Takiya, the right to fake peace when you are weak for the purposes of defeating your enemy when you are stronger.

This sound like he's admitting al-Qaida is struggling. This is the best time to finish off the beast.

"We do not mind offering you a long-term truce with fair conditions that we adhere to," he said. "We are a nation that God has forbidden to lie and cheat."

Yeah, just like your fobidden to aduterate, drink alchol, murder the innocent? No thanks, we see straight through it.

Intelligent Design Is Not Science

2006-01-18T20:46:00.000-08:00

So says the Vatican. It has published an article saying "intelligent design" is not science and that teaching it alongside evolutionary theory in school classrooms only creates confusion.

The article in Tuesday's editions of L'Osservatore Romano was the latest in a series of interventions by Vatican officials — including the pope — on the issue that has dominated headlines in the United States.

The author, Fiorenzo Facchini, a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Bologna, laid out the scientific rationale for Darwin's theory of evolution, saying that in the scientific world, biological evolution "represents the interpretative key of the history of life on Earth."

He lamented that certain American "creationists" had brought the debate back to the "dogmatic" 1800s, and said their arguments weren't science but ideology.

"This isn't how science is done," he wrote. "If the model proposed by Darwin is deemed insufficient, one should look for another, but it's not correct from a methodological point of view to take oneself away from the scientific field pretending to do science."

Intelligent design "doesn't belong to science and the pretext that it be taught as a scientific theory alongside Darwin's explanation is unjustified," he wrote.

"It only creates confusion between the scientific and philosophical and religious planes."

Supporters of "intelligent design" hold that some features of the universe and living things are so complex they must have been designed by a higher intelligence. Critics say intelligent design is merely creationism — a literal reading of the Bible's story of creation — camouflaged in scientific language and say it does not belong in science curriculum.

Facchini said he recognized some Darwin proponents erroneously assume that evolution explains everything. "Better to recognize that the problem from the scientific point of view remains open," he said.

But he concluded: "In a vision that goes beyond the empirical horizon, we can say that we aren't men by chance or by necessity, and that the human experience has a sense and a direction signaled by a superior design."

The article echoed similar arguments by the Vatican's chief astronomer, the Rev. George Coyne, who said "intelligent design" wasn't science and had no place in school classrooms.

Pope Benedict XVI reaffirmed in off-the-cuff comments in November that the universe was made by an "intelligent project" and criticized those who in the name of science say its creation was without direction or order.

Arab Militias Go Rape-Crazy in Darfur

2006-01-18T11:45:00.000-08:00

Sexual violence is now an integral and devastating part of the conflict aimed at breaking the will of the local people, humiliating them so that they will abandon their lands and weakening tribal ethnic lines....

Until a few weeks ago women who sought medical help after being raped were actually arrested by the Sudanese security forces.

In Darfur, where close to 400,000 people have been killed as part of a government-sponsored program of ethnic cleansing, the brutal rape of women and children has become a weapon of war.

Sexual violence is now an integral and devastating part of the conflict aimed at breaking the will of the local people, humiliating them so that they will abandon their lands and weakening tribal ethnic lines.

Every day women in Darfur face the prospect of being raped and beaten when they leave their homes to find food or search for firewood. They face this prospect even though the international community claims that it is protecting them.

When the international community finally found the will to complain to the regime in Khartoum, the arrests stopped, proving we can make a difference when we can be bothered to confront Sudan's dictators.

We haven't heard much about what is happening in Darfur recently. The killing and raping continues, but the Sudanese regime has changed tactics.

It no longer needs to use its air force to bomb its own people because it has achieved its racist aim: 90% of the black African villages have been destroyed.

Now the Sudanese are using their proxies, the Janjaweed militia, to rape women whenever they venture out for firewood.

Khartoum has rightly guessed that the international community is not going to take them to task over the daily suffering of hundreds of thousands of women who cannot bear to talk about their ordeal.

Is this our response? Is this what innocent women and children deserve? The United Nations has repeatedly refused to send peacekeepers to Darfur.

Time To Get Serious About Jihad

2006-01-18T11:00:00.000-08:00

Beginning with the Revolutionary War, when British agents and sympathizers attempted to derail independence, people have tried to infiltrate the United States for the purpose of undermining and destroying it. In modern times, communism and fascism have sent agents among us, but we discovered their plans and defeated them here and abroad.

Now comes what may be the greatest threat: radical Islam, whose "agents" may have established a base more solid and more dangerous than anything we've encountered before. The good news is they speak openly of their intentions. The bad news is that many of us are not taking them seriously....

The West does not know how many share this twisted religiosity. Instead, political leaders repeat the bromide that Islam is a "peaceful religion" and radicals are trying to hijack it. Are we being infiltrated by people who, on the outside, pretend to be peaceful and tolerant, but inside wish to overthrow our government?

One clue may be found on (http://muslim-canada.org/muslimstats.html), a Canadian Muslim Web page. In a discussion on Muslim population statistics, which includes a chart projecting that the world Muslim population will outgrow the Christian population by 2025, it is noted that Islam is growing nearly 3 percent per year, faster than the total growth in world population. While the ratio of older to younger people is weighted to the older in the West, the reverse is true among Muslims. We have been warned.

Islamic Group Demand Catholic School Move To Muslim Faith

2006-01-17T22:35:00.000-08:00

An Islamic campaign group has called for a Catholic primary school to be based on the Muslim faith.

The Campaign for Muslim Schools said 90 per cent of pupils at St Albert's Primary, in the Pollokshields area of Glasgow, are Muslim, yet children are having to take part in Catholic rituals like saying the Lord's Prayer and attending mass.

Osama Saeed, co-ordinator of the alliance of Glasgow's main mosques and Muslim organisations, said he could see no reason why the main faith of the school should not change.

He said: "Clearly the parents of that area find a faith school, even if it is of another denomination, preferable to a secular one. But surely it should be possible for them to have one that is relevant to their own faith."

What a fantastic example Europe surrendering to the percieved Muslim threat. If it was based on Islamic Faith wouldn't they have to kick out all the females? Why don't they open their own school instead of attacking another religion based school? Why do I have the feeling this will be the standard across Europe over the next century?

Pope To Put Out His First Encyclical (Lecture Book)

2006-01-17T21:36:00.000-08:00

Pope Benedict XVI is expected to delve into the nature of unconditional and erotic love with his first encyclical, the most authoritative form of papal writing.

It is expected to be released in the coming days.

The 50-page document entitled "Deus Caritas Est," Latin for "God Is Love," could set the tone of Benedict's young papacy. Italian media reports say it will warn Catholics not to disassociate their feelings of erotic love from their understanding of unconditional love.

"I know that it's going to be on love, on the different types of love," Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick of Washington said, speaking on the sidelines of an academic conference held in Rome on Tuesday.

According to the Italian news agency ANSA the encyclical draws upon the ancient Greek concept of love known as "agape," or spiritual love, and `eros," erotic love.

Benedict notes that marriages that base themselves solely on "eros" risk being "degraded to pure sex," turning love into a form of "merchandise ... that can be bought and sold."

"A marriage based on an exclusive love becomes a representation of God with his people and vice versa," Benedict reportedly writes.

"Deus Caritas Est," which takes its name from the first letter of St. John the evangelist, is also expected to address the need for Catholic charity in the world.

ANSA reported that American Archbishop William Levada, Benedict's successor at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, will present the encyclical at the end of the week.

McCarrick said he expects the encyclical to demonstrate that Benedict is both "a true successor of John Paul II and his own man."

John Paul wrote 14 encyclicals on themes ranging from church doctrine to workers' rights and geopolitics. Benedict has said he intends to focus his efforts on buttressing John Paul's legacy.

Britain Big On Forced Idiological Education

2006-01-17T15:32:00.000-08:00

UK School Welcomes Their Chinese Overlords.

A leading public school is making Mandarin Chinese compulsory for new pupils in recognition of the country’s growing economic influence.

All 140 boys and girls entering Brighton College from September will be forced to study the language alongside a more traditional fare of French, Spanish and Latin for at least a year.

Richard Cairns, the headmaster, made the unprecedented decision within a week of taking charge of the school, which has 1,200 pupils. An Oxford history graduate who has never visited China, Mr Cairns was inspired by a news bulletin while holidaying in Australia.

“I heard on the news that the Chinese had overtaken the British economy, to the considerable glee of the Australians, and I decided we really ought to do something about this,” he said.

The school is hoping to employ two teachers to introduce all 11-year-olds to Mandarin for a year, before deciding whether to take the language on to GCSE and A level.

“Becoming a centre of excellence in Chinese is not my prime goal,” he said. “Rather, I wish all our students to be exposed to some Asian language. One of my key tasks is to make sure our children are equipped for the world in which they live.”

Charles Aylmer, head of the Chinese department at Cambridge University library, welcomed Brighton’s move as one that would help children to see the world with a different perspective.

“These children will have their eyes opened. I’m all in favour of it. I would put it in every school and it would be quite possible with interactive whiteboards, there’s no barrier to it at all,” he said. Not only does Chinese use a different part of the brain from languages such as French or German, the characters have also been used to help children to overcome difficulties in reading and writing English by treating words as pictures rather than letters.

Professor Aylmer was sceptical, however, about how much 11-year-olds might learn within a year. To have a conversation in Mandarin and read a newspaper or a book, students must master a minimum of 4,000 to 5,000 characters. At Cambridge, only those students who have spent two years learning the language are expected to be able to visit the country and carry on a conversation.

The Chinese Embassy in London was delighted and hoped that the move would help to end the requirement for all schools to offer a second European language before they can offer Chinese.

Former Iranian Diplomat: Jews Had It Coming

2006-01-17T15:08:00.000-08:00

The following are excerpts from an interview given by former Iranian diplomat Mohammad-Hasan Ghadiri-Abyaneh, which was aired on Jaam-E Jam 1 TV, on December 27, 2005.

All Germans viewed the Jews in a negative light. Why? This question should also be asked. What did the Jews do that made them so evil? I believe this should be investigated as well....

The reason is that the Jews had only their own interests in mind, and tried to accumulate wealth. They placed their personal interests above the national interest, and were willing to commit any crime in order to accumulate wealth. This incited public opinion against them.

Interviewer: The Europeans defend the issue of the Holocaust because of their national zeal. This is only natural. But why do the Americans support this?

Mohammad-Hasan Ghadiri-Abyaneh: Let's not forget that the Zionists rule America. The Rockefellers.... America, too, is in the hands of the Zionists.

Rockefellers? Wasn't that like a hunderd years ago? Good ole elected rule

Hebron`s Jewish Quarter Declared A Military Zone

2006-01-17T13:55:00.000-08:00

Hebron`s Jewish quarter is declared a closed military zone after three days of clashes by hundreds of demonstrators with police and army over the coming eviction of eight Jewish families from the old vegetable market.

The eight Hebron families marked for eviction say they are living on former Jewish properties which they acquired legally and are willing to come to terms with the Palestinians who moved into the market. After listening to the arguments of one of these families which lives in three former shops, the Kfar Saba magistrate handed down a temporary injunction barring their eviction.

The hundreds of protesters, some masked, include teenagers attracted to the forefront of any extreme action against government attempts to remove Israelis from the West Bank. With them is a large group of angry youngsters whose families were forcibly evicted from Gush Katif in the Gaza Strip last September and have vowed to fight against the recurrence of such action. More than a thousand of these teenagers are homeless, on the loose and in a state of extreme social alienation. There have been cases of attempted suicide, drug abuse and alcoholism.

Maj-Gen Yair Naveh, OC central command, signed the Hebron directive with orders to evacuate out-of-town demonstrators and detain masked demonstrators and stone-throwers on the spot.

During the day, hundreds of Israeli border police commandos and mounted police swept through the Jewish Avraham Avinu Quarter of the West Bank city searching for the rioters, most of whom had disappeared from Hebron. After fruitless house-to-house searches, they detained three young girls. The police commissioner is deploying hundreds more riot police in the town.

Earlier, interim prime minister Ehud Olmert accused the protesters of extreme violence and raising their hands against the forces of law and order. He instructed the police to take aggressive action to subdue them.

Ignorance, the Greatest Threat

2006-01-17T11:39:00.000-08:00

The intention of this article is to provoke a much needed debate on the nature of a phenomenon called Islamic Terrorism. Most people in America assume that the phenomenon called Islamic Terrorism started after the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. Actually, the world was in a deep coma about the nature of Islamic Terrorism before the events of September 11, 2001. In some cases, people still are in denial of Islamic Terrorism. However, this phenomenon did not start on or about September 11, 2001. This event was conceived and put into action 1400 years earlier on the hot sands of Arabia.

The word “Islam” means submission. One may ask submission to what or whom? A Muslim is a person who is obedient to the will of Allah. According to the words of the Prophet of Islam, Allah is the author of the Quran, thus a Muslim is a person who must do what the book says. If he or she does not follow the Quran, he or she is not considered to be a Muslim. Muslims insist that the almighty Lord of all living things is synonymous with what is known in Arabic as Allah. Muslims confess that every word in the Quran is the word of Allah. It contains 114 Surahs (chapters) and over 6000 verses. Ironically, the greatest enemy of Islam is this very book which Muslims vow to be pure from errors.

Islamic scholars proudly state that the Quran is unrivalled in its recording and preservation. They proudly say that the holy book has remained unchanged even to a dot over the past fourteen hundred years. However, they won't allow any one to question any parts of it. Questioning any part of the holy book will result in death. As we have witnessed, the Islamic zealots do not tolerate opinions contrary to their own. For Quran’s teachings you may go to http://www.faithfreedom.org/Quran.htm.

Nowadays, we hear from the Muslim apologists that Islam has been hijacked by the militant Muslims. Even some Americans utter the same thing. Muslims keep repeating that Islam means “peace”, something my American friends say as well. In reality though, Islam means war. It is through so many wars that Islam established itself as another religion. It is through fear, intimidation and indoctrination of innocent people that Islam has made its loyal follower to adhere to this ideology of hate. It is through sacrifices and the killing of innocent people that Islam has lasted as long as it has. It is with the sword of Islam that people became Muslims.

There is no such thing called good Muslims or bad Muslims. “Good Muslims” are nominal Muslims, the ones who have never read the Quran and do not understand or do not want to understand the nature of Islam. They merely were born into a Muslim family. Those who think Islam has been hijacked by the bad Muslims are not true Muslims. Bad Muslims are those who execute the words of Allah. Therefore, the bad Muslims are the true believers who follow the path of the prophet of Islam. In other words, the Islamic Terrorists are the true sons and daughters of the Islamic faith.

Understanding what Islamic Terrorism is and identifying the signs or association with those who may become Islamic terrorists, may help us detect and prevent or capture the terrorists before they commit crimes against the innocent civilians. A better understanding of the true nature of Islam will alarm people of the dangers of Islamic Terrorism.

1-Islam rewards those who are willing to die for Allah. Everybody hates and fears death. Only those who believe in a life after death and its promised rewards would be seeking death.
2-Have no unbelieving friends. Kill the unbelievers wherever you find them.
3-If the unbelievers do not “offer you peace” (submit) kill them wherever you find them.
4-Those who oppose the messenger and become unbelievers will go to hell.
5-Christians are wrong about the Trinity. For that they will have a painful doom.

These are the messages of the Quran.

Everyone eventually will face death. However, the destination after death is not the same for those who believe and those who don’t. Those who believe in Allah and follow what his messenger said will be in paradise. In other words, those who commit crimes against humanity, murder the infidels, rape little girls, burn the cities of disbelievers, hijack airplanes, fly them into buildings and bring down towers and cast terror in the hearts of people will spend their eternal rest in heaven. To top it, 72 virgins will greet them at the gate with a bottle of French wine.

For those who deviate from executing the words of Allah, an eternal blazing Fire (Hell) will be awaiting them. In other words, every good person, kind person, giving person and innocent person on earth will taste eternal fire.

Muslims still insist that Allah is the same as the eternal God, the Creator of the Universe, Lord of all lords, King of all kings, Most Compassionate, Most Merciful, yet he needs blood and lots of it.

Since its inception 1400 years ago, Islam has been at war with the people of this planet. Millions of people have been literary butchered with the sword of Islam. Some may argue that all religions at one point in time have committed crimes against humanity. That may be so, but none of the existing world religions’ foundations have been based upon shedding the blood of its innocent victims. Islam lives, breaths and grows on blood. Once one takes away this red element from Islam, Islam will vanish completely. Islam cannot possibly live in the hearts and minds of its believers. Islam needs to shed the blood of the infidels, meaning all non-Muslims. Islam is about world domination.

Islam is worse than a plague, worse than leprosy, worse than hunger and famine, which cause bodily damage to humans. Islam slowly, like a canker, gnaws at the soul and the spirit. Islam stops your brain from thinking, and empties out your love and kindness for others. Islam will turn you into a killing machine. We may be able to cure the plague, leprosy and other diseases, but we are unable to deal with Islamists. We can’t cure them with medical technology. We can’t take them to a doctor to see where it hurts. Once you become an Islamist, no earthly medicines are able to cure you. True Muslims literally have turned into walking missiles.

You can’t reason with people blinded by hate. You can’t argue with people blinded by Islamic faith. Islam hates the power of the individual. Islam hates the achievements of women. Islam hates progress. Islam hates the religious freedom of others. Islam hates the pre-Islamic heritage of other nations. Islam hates the light of truth. Islam is against free will and hates democracy, liberty and justice for all. Islam simply loves to eat you alive. That is what Islam does and that is what Islam is. Worshipping that? NEVER!

Americans are slowly waking up from their long winter sleep. However, there are still millions of Americans who are extremely naïve about the dangers of Islamic terrorism. Americans are good people; they are sympathetic people. They are giving people. They like to see the goodness in human beings and for that; they unconsciously refuse to believe that a faith can make wild animals out of humans.

The greatest threat facing America today is Americans’ ignorance about Islam. Until Americans understand the threat of Islam on its society and its soil, people will continue to die. Until there is a true understanding of this faith and means to control it, Americans, along with other people will continue to die. The threat of Islam is real. Until the Americans understand that all violent Islamic fundamentalist groups, including al-Qaeda and Hezbollah and others are true Muslims who wish to kill all Americans, they will continue to die.

No, Islam has not been hijacked by the Islamic militants. The cult of Islam has hijacked humanity for almost 14 centuries. Until we digest this and do something about it, innocent people, including Americans, will continue to die.

Plight of non-Muslims in Muslims Countries

2006-01-17T11:05:00.000-08:00

Exerpt from 'Civilization Clash Between Islam and the West'

Myth of Injustice against the Muslims

Muslim people – educated or illiterate, moderate or fanatic – keep harping about them being oppressed in America, Europe and Australia, in India, China, Philippines, Thailand, Russia (Chechnya), Nigeria, Serbia and of course in Israel. As a rule of the thumps, wherever Muslims are a minority, they are being oppressed there by the majority ethnic or religious groups. In this blame game, Muslims have found a number of well-known Western activists, namely reporter Robert Fisk, UK MP George Galloway, US professor Edward Churchill and Naom Chomsky, London mayor Ken Livingstone and many more. These so-called Western liberals, who come from the leftist and/or communist background, constitute a case of strange bedfellowship with the Muslims because these staunch lefts and liberals, many of whom are atheists, agnostics or skeptics, are the most hated enemies of the faithfuls of Islam. Let us recall here the Koranic injunctions on these group of people “The worst beasts in Allah's sight are the disbelievers [Koran 8:55] and when gotten the opportunity, these groups of people will be dealt with by the Muslims in the harshest way – they way such people are being treated in Islamic Kingdom, say in Iran, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan etc. It should be recalled here the naïve Lefts and Communists joining the Islamists in the Iranian revolution and when gotten into power, these strange-bedfellows were ladled out the cruelest of treatments in which tens of thousands of them were exterminated by the Ayatollahs. We must not forget also as to how the body of Afghan communist leader Nazibullah was dragged across the streets of Kabul when the Taliban militias swept into power.

Malaysia has received world-wide recognition as a modern and progressive Muslim state, including from the West.

Yet, the minority non-Muslims citizens (mostly Chinese and Indians) in Malaysia have faced a situation of apartheid designed by the state over the decades. Non-Muslims are barred from Government educational institutions, jobs and business ventures through discriminatory. Yet, thse minority Chinese and Indian non-Muslims (35%) are the life-line of Malaysian economy despite the severe discrimination by they face. It is the Muslims who get all Government-funded local and overseas education whilst the non-Muslims have to settle for local private schools, Universities or overseas education supported from their own pockets. In the religious front, non-Muslims cannot preach and seek converts from amongst the Muslims whilst the Muslims have created elaborate programs for converting the non-Muslims to Islam. Even then, without the contribution of the hard-working non-Muslims (non-Bhumiputras) population, Malaysia will be like any other impoverished and anachronistic Third World country – not a modern and wealthy state which Malaysia and Muslims worldwide always keep boasting about.

Is there a single country in the entire world dominated by the non-Muslims, where the minority Muslim people are discriminated like this? Such is the color of a true secular and modern Muslim state! The fact that the Muslims population is increasing disproportionately in countries dominated by the non-Muslims, whilst non-Muslim population is decreasing in Muslim-dominated countries, including in Israel clearly demonstrate that Muslims’ crying foul about the injustice against them is without foundation but instead the opposite scenario is the glaring reality of today as has been in the past. Yet, this fake trump card has been used effectively by the Muslims to draw sympathy and sometimes staunch support from amongst the gullible non-Muslims in the Western world and elsewhere.

Unstated Premises Of The Media About Islamic Jihad

2006-01-17T10:10:00.000-08:00

Sorge Diaz of Western Resistance, whose site was named as was this one in S. I. Rosenbaum's St. Petersburg Times piece yesterday, has detailed four unstated premises that led Rosenbaum to slant her article the way she did. These premises show up in many, many other mainstream media pieces about jihad and terrorism as well.

Unstated Premise 1; hate is always bad, except when it isn't: The article's title is telling: "Are bloggers against hate, or feeding it?" The writer examines in great detail how the actions of bloggers either lead or might lead to hatred against Muslims, but no attention is paid to hatred by Muslim themselves, or to the message of Islam. Only hatred--or "hatred"--by non-muslims is worth reporting.
Unstated Premise 2; Comments by non-muslims should be examined, comments by Muslims accepted uncritically: The message of Muslim spokesmen is never critically examined in the piece, while the message of their critics, well....

Unstated Premise 3; There is such a thing as Moderate Islam: The existence of Moderate Islam, a great, wonderful doctrine that will save us all, is assumed away; it is never looked for, let alone found. The History and Theology of Islam is conveniently ignored.

Unstated Premise 4; The Government is Always Right, when it agrees with us: I'll give you the passage:

Daniel Sutherland of the Department of Homeland Security said the government is more interested in forging bonds with Muslims.
"There is no clash of civilizations going on here, there is no "us' and "them,"' he said.

Stop the presses, a guy from the Department of Homeland Security repeated the Government's official view, it must be true! It amazes me how reporters capable of unbound skepticism of the Government in some areas, become willing peddlers of the official line when that line agrees with the "Islam is a Religion of Peace" canard.

Homosexual Movie Globe's Favorite

2006-01-16T11:03:00.000-08:00

The unnatural, homosexual romance "Brokeback Mountain," the film biography "Capote" and the road-trip tale "Transamerica" were among key contenders for Monday's Golden Globes, a potential breakthrough night for gay-themed movies.

"Brokeback Mountain," director Ang Lee's story of two rugged family men (Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal) concealing their homosexual affair, led the field with seven nominations, including best drama.

The Globes are awarded by the relatively small Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which has about 80 members, compared to 5,800 film professionals eligible to vote for the Oscars.

I think this is only proving just how out of touch Hollywood is with the rest of America. A movie on unnatural acts, living a life of sin, is promoted as the best America has to offer? Its no wonder America hasn't the moral authority to defend itself from outside threats to its survival. With the left promoting the active destruction of all things natural, it'll be no suprise when they demand pre-emptive surrender to any outside force.

How about a movie on the Muslim sacking of the Vatican? No, that wouldn't fit the left's agenda. Better make another movie about murders being the victums , the big bad Infadels killing poor innocent jihadists.

Judicial Precedent Means Nothing

2006-01-15T14:33:00.000-08:00

We've heard a lot over the past few weeks about judicial precedent and how very important it is. Indeed, to our liberal and leftwing friends, judicial precedent seems to be more important than what is actually in the United States Constitution. To hear them talk about it, once a Supreme Court ruling is made it must stand for all time. This is, of course, an absurd position to take - Dred Scott and Plessy are just two examples of Supreme Court decisions which simply had to be overturned in the name of simple justice.

In this Opinion Journal piece, however, it is noted that a couple other sacred precedents were overturned of late, with nothing but good things said about the overturning on the left:

Certainly, liberals don't mind overturning precedents they don't like. In Lawrence v. Texas, the 2003 ruling that banned state sodomy laws, a 6-3 Supreme Court majority eagerly overturned Bowers v. Hardwick, a 5-4 decision from 1986 that had declared such laws to be the prerogative of the states.
And in Roper v. Simmons, last year's decision banning the death penalty for juveniles, the Court's liberal bloc (assisted by the protean Anthony Kennedy) was only too happy to overturn Stanford v. Kentucky, which was decided in 1989. In justifying this reversal, moreover, the Court put less reliance on American case law than on foreign legal precedent.

As we can see, liberals demand adherence to precedent only when such precedents enshrine liberal ideology - but have a precedent liberals disagree with, and it can't be overturned fast enough.

To me, bad law is bad law - if the Supreme Court made a mistake, as it clearly did in Roe and many other decisions in the past 40 years, then the decisions must be overturned at the earliest possible moment. Part of the problem here is that we've become dependent upon the courts - we are afraid, as it were, to exercise our responsibility as Americans to read and understand the Constitution on our own. Lawyers like to tie the law up in knots for their own advantage, but the really magnificent thing about our Constitution is that in order to tie it up, you have to lie about what is in it. In the past, the Supreme Court lied about what is in it to make Dred Scott, Plessy and, of course, Roe. None of these decisions have even a remote connection to what is clearly written into the Constitution, but each of them were made by a Supreme Court too often viewed as the infallible arbiter of the Constitution.

As I've said before, our real need is not so much conservative judges (though this is a very good thing), but judicial reform to reign in an out of control judiciary and restore the proper balance between the judicial branch and the rest of our government. We are either free people able to govern ourselves, or we are not - if we are, then no set of nine justices should be allowed to make rulings which are clearly unconstitutional, and when such decisions do get made, we should have the will to swiftly undo them by the various legislative means provided for in the Constitution. It is be free, or be ruled by judges, judge-ocracy, the choice is ours to make.

Saudi Cleric Encourages The Murder Of Arab Intellectuals

2006-01-15T13:04:00.000-08:00

A three-volume treatise by Sa'id ibn Nasser Al-Ghamdi, titled Deviation from the Faith as Reflected in [Arab] Thought and Literature on Modernity, has recently gained publicity in the Arab world for making a call to murder intellectuals. The book, published in December 2003 inSaudi Arabia, is based on Al-Ghamdi's 2000 doctoral dissertation, submitted to the Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud Islamic University, for which he received his degree summa cum laude. In his treatise, Al-Ghamdi names more than 200 modern Arab intellectuals and authors whom he accuses of heresy - thus making it permissible to kill them...

Al-Ghamdi's book was reviewed on the reformist website www.metransparent.com by Egyptian poet and literary critic 'Abdallah Al-Samti, who said: "The most dangerous thing in this book is its outright call to murder, and the fact that it legitimizes the killing of Arab intellectuals, since Sa'id Al-Ghamdi claims that 'the statements, actions, and beliefs of [these intellectuals] demand the ridda punishment [3] and legitimize their killing. However, in the current secular political climate that has been imported from the West, they have [been able to] spread the heresy and atheism that is in their decayed hearts...'"

In his dissertation, Al-Ghamdi explains that "since the arrows of doubt shot by the enemies of Islam have multiplied... and they have spread their intellectual and behavioral poisons among the Muslim youth in an attempt to drown them in deviancy, to bring them out from light into darkness, to replace their inner conviction and faith, and to cast them into the wasteland of doubts, skepticism, and vanities - [for these reasons] it is incumbent upon those who understand this to make clear to their [Islamic] nation and their community the danger inherent in this behavior...

"The most dangerous and vile thing that the enemies of Islam have done in order to achieve their deviant aims has been to use cultural means, which are outwardly manifest as literature, poetry, culture, and criticism, but which internally embody heresy, skepticism, and hypocrisy.

"The enemies of Islam have succeeded in sowing the seeds of their hatred in the land of the Muslims, and in growing the evil tree - the tree of accursed materialism. Muslims see and hear the people who openly call to heresy and to departure from the right path, and who openly spread intellectual and moral depravity, sometimes in the guise of 'modern literature' and sometimes under the slogan of 'human culture'..."

Guy Who Shot The Pope MIA

2006-01-14T19:34:00.000-08:00

The Turkish gunman who shot Pope John Paul II failed to report to a police station Friday — the day after his release from prison — and authorities said the military could ask for his arrest for draft-dodging.

Mehmet Ali Agca was required to report daily to a police station to allow authorities to keep tabs on him until at least officials decide on whether he should serve his military service.

Istanbul Gov. Muammer Guler said Agca — whose whereabouts were unknown — had not reported to any police station by Friday evening. Guler said Agca was also required to report to a military hospital on Monday.

"If he doesn't show up, he will be listed as a draft-dodger" and his arrest could be sought, Guler said

Agca, 48, received a hero's welcome by his ultranationalist admirers, who tossed flowers at the car whisking him through the gates of the high-security Kartal Prison outside Istanbul.

Religion Of Peace On Trial In England

2006-01-14T12:54:00.000-08:00

Abu Hamza, the Muslim preacher, had a 10-volume terrorism manual at his home which was dedicated to Osama bin Laden and featured a list of targets including Big Ben, skyscrapers, airports and football stadiums, a court heard yesterday.

The Encyclopaedia of Afghani Jihad was written in Arabic between 1989 and 1999 with the help of Mujahadeen fighters in Afghanistan. It featured sections on explosives, sabotage and assassination, the Old Bailey was told. The first volume talks of a holy war against English, French and Communist “imperialists” who protect Israel.

It also refers to an “external pressure unit” which “belongs to the execution unit which operates abroad” and should be sent to a country “at least 10 years” before the Jihad starts. Among the high-profile targets suggested are the “Statue of Liberty, Eiffel Tower and Big Ben clock”. Targets where there would be bigger loss of life are suggested as “skyscrapers, ports, airports, nuclear plants, football stadiums and large congregations at Christmas”. ...

Hamza, 47, who was born in Egypt and has lived in Britain for several years as a British citizen, is accused of nine counts of soliciting to murder, four counts of using threatening, abusive or insulting behaviour and two counts of possessing abusive recordings with a view to distribution and possession of a document useful to preparing terrorism.

When police raided his home in west London in May 2004 they found more than 2,700 audio tapes and 570 video tapes, some of them labelled “Jihad”, meaning holy war, the court was told.

The jury saw pictures of Hamza’s home in Shepherd’s Bush. It contained boxes piled with blank tapes and others labelled “master”, suggesting they were being prepared for distribution. The tapes included sections on the evils of adultery, drink and e-number additives in food.

In one speech, delivered to a meeting in Whitechapel, east London, in 1997 or 1998 Hamza said the role of women should be to encourage their husbands to train children as young as 10 so they could become mujahadeen (holy warriors).

In a tape aimed at young people he said: “When you meet Allah you will be asked who was killed at your hands?”

Britain and Western nations were “100 per cent anti-Islam”, he said in another tape, calling on his followers to spread Islam “by the sword” and adding: “European leaders only respect those that are strong.”

He said: “Killing the kafir for any reason is OK, killing the kafir for no reason is OK,” and he specifically singled out those that granted licences for “wine shops”.

Hamza added: “We like blood and are addicted to it. When they say they love Allah they must ask themselves how much kafir blood they have spilt for Allah.”

Describing non-believers as “germs and viruses” in another tape he added: “There is no drop of liquid loved by Allah more than blood of Serbs, Jews or any other enemy of Allah.”

Holocaust A Punishment From God, Ok To Kill Kuffar

2006-01-14T11:33:00.000-08:00

ABU HAMZA AL-MASRI used his position as imam of the Finsbury Park mosque to preach virulently anti-Semitic sermons, the Old Bailey was told yesterday....

In a sermon in Arabic, a translation of which was read to the court by David Perry, for the prosecution, Abu Hamza said that God had decreed that the Jewish people should face further torture.

He said: “Every time they lit the fire for war God has put it out. And this is the imminent result and this is a universal result too. Hitler looked at their dealings and their treachery. They wanted to deceive him in his war. Some were dealing with the Allies against him.

“So he killed them and punished them and this is a sunna (Islamic rule). And they will be inflicted with that again when the stones and the Sharia start talking to the Muslim — you the worshipper of God . . . This is a Jew dealing in usury, so come and kill him.

“This shows that the Jews will be destroyed, the State will be destroyed and some of the Jews will be running around hiding behind the trees and the stones and then they get cursed by the earth until there is not one of them left.”

In a separate video, Abu Hamza told a group of people that shoplifting and theft by Muslims from non-believers was permitted. Students were not required to repay loans and identity fraud by Muslim refugees was allowed, according to his interpretation of Islam.

In other passages from his lectures, the court heard Abu Hamza telling his audience that they were allowed to kill non-Muslims.

He said: “Killing a kuffar (unbeliever) who is fighting you is OK. Killing a kuffar for any reason, you can say it is OK even if there is no reason for it.”

The cleric reserved particular ire for the owners of off-licences and authorities that granted licences for the sale of alcohol.

“Don’t go to the man in the wine shop and tell him, ‘Please why are you selling the wine, come to the mosque’. Make sure the person who gave him the licence for that wine shop does not exist any more on the earth. Finish him up. Give him dawa (the spread of Islam), if he doesn’t respect dawa, kill him.”

Tortured Convert Fights For Religious Freedom

2006-01-13T11:14:00.000-08:00

Seven hellish days of torture in an Egyptian prison did nothing to diminish Muslim-turned-Christian Majed El Shafie’s faith in God, but it did ignite a passion for helping other persecuted Christians worldwide.

El Shafie, founder of Toronto-based One Free World Ministries, will share his harrowing story and testimony at 7 p.m. Sunday at Em-manuel United Methodist Church in Newark. Through his ministry, he has reached out to lawmakers in the United States, Canada and Israel to relieve the plight of persecuted Christians in Asia and the Middle East. El Shafie urges love and forgiveness in the face of terrible hardship.

“I decided to forgive those who tortured me, but with forgiveness comes action,” he said. “We have to help the people that are suffering for their beliefs.”

Born into a prominent Muslim family in Cairo, El Shafie seemed destined to go into law. His father and brother are successful attorneys and an uncle serves as a judge on a high court.

“When you’re born into a family like this, you have lots of books on law, justice and freedom,” he said.

While studying law in Alexandria, El Shafie was shocked to see the harsh treatment of Christians. Building churches is illegal in Egypt, he said, and Christians are treated worse than second-class citizens.

Struck by this intolerance, El Shafie began studying the Bible. In 1998, when he was about 20, he converted to Christianity and organized an underground congregation that attracted 24,000 worshippers within two years.

It was literally an underground church, worshipping in caves near the outskirts of the city.

El Shafie ran afoul of the Egyptian government when he appealed for equal rights for Christians. He also took issue with the harsh teachings of the Koran, which the government used to justify persecuting Christians.

“It’s not that they’re bad because they’re Muslims,” he said. “Our problem was with their teaching of Islam.”

Earth Is For Muslims, Booty For Islam

2006-01-13T11:05:00.000-08:00

TWO very different Abu Hamzas appeared at the Old Bailey yesterday as the trial of the former imam of Finsbury Park mosque was shown video recordings of the radical cleric preaching.

Abu Hamza al-Masri sat in silence in the dock watching a much more animated and younger version of himself. The on-screen Abu Hamza was passionate, gesticulating with the stumps of his amputated arms as he emphasised the plight of Muslims around the world, the duty to fight the unbeliever and the evils of democracy.

This Abu Hamza emphasised the need for young Muslim men to train for jihad and to identify targets including the law courts, banks and brothels — all of them symbols of corrupt “kuffar countries” like Britain....

The war against the unbeliever must be fought, Abu Hamza stated, “until you see the Khilafa sitting in the White House ruling from there like the Prophet Muhammad said, that Allah showed him the Earth, that Allah told him that the whole Earth will be for Muslims, booty for Islam.”

ON MUSLIMS IN BRITAIN
“It looks unfortunately that we have been forced to be inside a toilet . . . and some of us think they can be leaders in that toilet unfortunately. We are all under the feet and the heavy boots of the kuffar”

ON FIGHTING
“The first phase is called the Shawkat al-Nekaya, it is called the needle of bleeding the enemy. Like you imagine you have one small knife and you have a big animal in front of you . . . You have to stab him here and there until he bleeds to death . . . This is the first stage of jihad, destruction of the enemies of Allah”

ON LEGITIMATE TARGETS
“Every court is a target and every brothel is a target and everybody who’s endorsing that is a target”

ON CHRISTIANITY
“The Church itself have lost every capacity it has. In the hearts and minds of people preachers have become homosexual, they have become child hazard. Churches have become places of dancing, iniquity, business, black magic, you name it. Child prostitution and everyday there is evidence of that”

ON MULTICULTURALISM
“The Hindus don’t worship God, they worship the cow, and as far as Christians (are concerned) they don’t worship God they worship Jesus, and Jews they worship their desires and Muslims, they worship Allah. So your God is different from their God”

ON WEAPONS
“We ask Muslims to . . . bleed the enemies of Allah anywhere by any means. You can’t do it by nuclear weapon, you have to do it by kitchen knife, no other solution. You can’t do it by chemical weapons, you have to do it by mice poison”

Muslim Scholar Urges Muslims Must Hate Christians With "Positive Hatred"

2006-01-12T22:29:00.000-08:00

Sheikh Abd Al-Aziz Fawzan Al-Fawzan, a professor of Islamic law at Al-ImamUniversity, who frequently appears on Saudi TV recently made anti-Christian comments on Saudi Al-Majd TV.

He told his audience to hate anyone "who worships Christ, son of Mary" and added that "whoever says 'I don't hate him [i.e. a Christian]' is not a Muslim..." He went on to explain that such an attitude "is not racism" since the Christian is not hated "because of his color, gender, blood, country, or because he is American, European, Chinese, or Asian," and stipulated that this hatred should be "positive hatred" that guides and reforms.

UN: Human Rights Not Equal To Not Offening Muslims

2006-01-12T22:07:00.000-08:00

Norwegian Muslims on Wednesday, January 11, blasted an obscure magazine for echoing a Danish daily and publishing a set of caricatures offending Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

"The Supreme Islamic Council (SIC) condemns in the strongest possible terms the publishing of such offensive cartoons by Magazinet," SIC Head Mohammad Hamdan told IslamOnline.net over the phone from Oslo.

The Christian magazine on Tuesday, January 10, published the same cartoons that caused uproar in the Muslim world after first emerged in Denmark's mass circulation Jyllands-Posten last September.

It printed the blasphemous cartoons in the name of "freedom of expression."

"What on earth does freedom of expression mean?" A furious Hamadan wondered.

"Editors should not take free speech as an excuse to insult a certain religion; otherwise they risk an extremist response from the offended, which carries grave consequences."

Maybe if Muslims didn't use anything deemed 'offensive' as an excuse for extremist actions they could understand what freedom of expression meant. I mean I find smelly Frenchmen offensive but that doesn't mean I can kill them by the busload, but I digress.

Danish Muslims are planning to take their legal battle against the Jyllands-Posten daily to the country's federal attorney general and the EU human rights commission after loosing a local case.

Al-Azhar, the highest seat of religious learning in the Sunni world, has vowed to raise the issue of the provocative caricatures with the UN and international human rights organizations.

Maybe the UN can educate them on what a repressive religion means? No, what was I thinking.

This matter has become a test case for the continued viability of freedom of speech in Western countries. And now The Economist has written about the story in a way that reveals the biases and false assumptions so prevalent in the public discourse today.

As Islamic terrorism and jihad violence spread all over the globe, The Economist has doggedly maintained its tone of blame-the-West-first attitude. Instead of seeing the cartoon controversy as another threat to freedom of speech in the West, it places the blame on Danish racism and xenophobia. The spin starts in the lead sentence: “For much of last year, various squabbles have simmered over several prominent Danes' rude comments about Islam.”

And it only gets better:

Louise Arbour, the United Nations human-rights commissioner, said she was "alarmed" by such an "unacceptable disregard for the beliefs of others".

Is he talking about a country that will execute you for trying to spread the word of Jesus? NO. Is he talking about a religion that proudly boasts that killing the un-belivers is every good folowers duty? NO. Is he talking about people who blow themselves up over percieved thousand year old greavences? NO. He's saying that the in-alienable human right of the freedom to dis-agree with the mullahs is unacceptable. I hope everyone see the UN uber-hypocrisy. I hope the world see's why the US must act unilaterly.