I have published a number of blogs warning that Obama will be a disaster for Israel. I always notify a close Jewish friend in San Francisco about those blogs. Some of his friends have taken offense to my writings about and opposition to Obama. They, along with some prominent Jewish leaders, believe that attacks against Obama for favoring the Palestinians are a bunch of right-wing lies.
Right-wing lies? Maureen Dowd, the Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times columnist has written an eye-opening op-ed piece on "Obama's Troubling Internet Fund Raising." Dowd is certainly no "right-winger." In her June 29, 2008 column, Dowd attempted to discover the sources of Obama's internet campaign funding. Here is some of what she wrote:
"While the security people were not able to track most of the sources due to firewalls and other blocking devices put on these contributions they were able to collate the number of contributions that were coming in seemingly from individuals but the funds were from only a few credit card accounts and bank electronic funds transfers. The internet service providers (ISP) they were able to trace were from Saudi Arabia , Iran , and other Middle Eastern countries. One of the banks used for fund transfers was also located in Saudi Arabia."
Here are some more excerpts from her column: "I guess we should have been somewhat suspicious when the numbers started to come out. We were told (no proof offered) that the Obama internet contributions were from $10.00 to $25.00 or so."
"If the $200,000,000 is right, and the average contribution was $15.00, that would mean over 13 million individuals made contributions? That would also be 13 million contributions would need to be processed. How did all that happen?"
"It became clear that these donations were very likely coming from sources other than American voters. This was discussed at length within the campaign and the decision was made that none of these donations violated campaign financing laws."
Does anyone really believe that Israel's sworn enemies are supporting Obama just because his middle name is Hussein? Not if they are in their right mind. The only reason the Arabs and Iranians are backing Obama with loads of cash is because they are convinced that his administration will adopt a pro-Palestinian foreign policy. Top Palestinian officials of both Hamas and Fatah have endorsed Obama and voiced their belief that his recent statements of support for Israel are nothing more than political rhetoric designed to ensure that the traditional Jewish vote remains committed to the Democrats.
I have previously blogged about Obama's foreign policy team. It is headed up by Jimmy ("Israel is an apartheid state") Carter's national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski and includes Anthony Lake, Robert O. Malley, Susan Rice and Samantha Power who have all expressed strong pro-Palestinian policy positions. Here is what an op-ed piece in the Jerusalem Post had to say about Brzezinski, Malley and Rice:
"Brzezinski has been disseminating vitriol about Israel for three decades and recently publicly defended the Walt-Mearsheimer study which concluded that US policy towards Israel was the result of Jewish pressure and inconsistent with American interests. More recently Brzezinski called for the US to initiate dialogue with Hamas, described Israel's action in the Second Lebanon War as a killing campaign against civilian hostages and earlier this month made a trip to confer with Syria's President Assad, ostensibly unbeknownst to the Obama campaign.
Robert O. Malley, another former Carter Administration diplomat and President Clinton's special advisor on Arab-Israeli affairs, is an unabashed advocate for the Palestinians, co-authoring a spate of anti-Israel propaganda with former Arafat advisor, Hussein Agha, including a tract that blames Israel for the failure of the 2000 Camp David talks and another piece which blames the Bush Administration for continuing Israeli-Palestinian strife.
And then there is Susan Rice, foreign policy advisor to the ill-fated John Kerry presidential campaign in 2004, where she concocted the idea of solving the Middle East problem by appointing none other than Jimmy Carter and James Baker as negotiators, an idea which was later repudiated by her own boss as being unbalanced against Israel. Nor are these the only "bad apples" in Obama's foreign policy bin…"
With friends like Jimmy Carter and with Zbigniew Brzezinski as his foreign policy team leader, how can there be any doubt that Israel's sworn enemies are right in believing that Obama's administration will follow a pro-Palestinian foreign policy. And Obama's tight relationship with Jeremiah Wright, his beloved anti-Semitic and Israel-demonizing pastor and mentor for nearly 20 years, should have been a wake-up call to those American Jews who are foolish enough to believe that the Democratic nominee for president will be a staunch supporter of Israel.
Monday, August 04, 2008
Sunday, August 03, 2008
REDUCING URBAN CRIME (Part 1)
It is unfortunate that my city, Houston, does not practice "broken windows" policing and that its mayor and his puppet police chief have chosen not to institute the proven "CompStat" management program which has been so successful in New York, Los Angleles and in many other U.S. cities. A civic minded real estate broker, who has made it his personal crusade to have the Houston Police Department adopt CompStat, sent me a copy of the below paper from the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. Due to its length, I am reproducing it in two parts.
In the following viewpoint George L. Kelling and Ronald Corbett assert that crime in American cities is declining and provide suggestions as to how urban areas can continue to prevent crime. According to the authors, lowering the rates of urban crime requires cities to target small crimes such as panhandling and public drunkenness, remove illegal weapons and guns from the streets, hold the police accountable for the crime rate, and involve community residents in crime-fighting efforts. They contend that those efforts have been responsible for decreasing crime rates in urban America. Kelling is a professor of criminal justice at Rutgers University in New Jersey, and Corbett is the executive director of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.
As you read, consider the following questions:
What should be "the guiding vision of law enforcement," in the authors' opinion?
According to Kelling and Corbett, how does "broken windows" policing reduce the number of criminals in the general population?
As explained by the authors, how did the New York City Police Department reduce the problem of drug dealing?
Here is Part 1 of George L. Kelling and Ronald Corbett's paper, "This Works: Preventing and Reducing Crime," Civic Bulletin, March 2003. Copyright © 2003 by the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research.
The most impressive achievement of city governance during the urban renewal of the 1990's was the enormous decline in crime. Over the last decade [from 1993 to 2003], police departments across the country adopted innovative new crime prevention strategies and realized unprecedented results. Despite those successes, however, much work remains to be done in reducing crime and increasing public safety. While some cities across the nation have made great strides, driving down the national crime rate to levels unseen since the 1960's, there were many that missed out on the national trend, reducing crime only marginally, if at all. Moreover, from [2002 to 2003], with several notable exceptions, crime rates have plateaued, and in some cities have even begun to track upward once again. If the success of urban America is to continue, it is essential that police departments and civic leaders not rest on their laurels, but rather continue to improve and refine their crime prevention strategies, adopting the most effective methods displayed in recent years.
Two principal goals must guide the creation of strategies to replicate the most impressive crime prevention successes of the 90's: Order maintenance and the creation of law enforcement structures to support it. The guiding vision for law enforcement must be to maintain order within each city, not to catch criminals. Creating an environment that is not conducive to illegality, rather than seeking to punish illegal conduct after the fact, is the key to preventing crime. Having adopted this vision, implementing it on the streets requires that local police units have the resources to do their job properly and the freedom to use them innovatively, and that they be held strictly accountable for the results, whatever they may be. This naturally requires careful tracking of crime patterns and close communication within police departments in order to target resources appropriately and to place responsibility accurately. It also requires the integration of other law enforcement and public sector agencies, as well as the local communities, into an order maintenance framework. By adopting the combination of an order maintenance philosophy and a flexible, accountability-driven law enforcement structure, cities that have made little progress to date can achieve reductions on par with the most dramatic declines in urban crime during the last decade, while those cities that have already experienced such successes can continue to force crime down to ever lower levels.
PROACTIVE POLICE
The purpose of law enforcement is, ultimately, to prevent crimes rather than to solve them. Solving crimes and punishing criminals is a necessary, but by no means sufficient, aspect of defending the citizenry. In order to effectively reduce crime, law enforcement must focus its efforts on maintaining order within its jurisdiction, eliminating as far as possible the conditions that allow illegality to flourish. To achieve this goal police departments and other law enforcement officials must adopt strategies designed under this vision, rejecting a reactive, after-the-fact, policing approach. They must target factors, such as small-scale public disorder and illegal guns and drugs, that spawn both contempt for the law and ever greater crime trends. They must also work to ameliorate communal problems even before they become criminal, and to employ the advantages afforded by the parole and probation system to exercise control over those people who are statistically most likely to commit crimes. Finally they must manage those problems they cannot solve, accepting that perfect crime prevention is unobtainable and focusing on ensuring that criminal conduct they cannot eliminate has the minimum possible effect on the community.
There is a natural temptation for any police department to focus their efforts on responding to reports of crimes. Certainly it is the least complicated approach. When a crime is reported, the police respond as quickly as possible to stop the crime if it is in progress, or to work the case and catch the perpetrator. Such activities naturally represent a large part of the necessary work of any police force. However, when this kind of response-oriented policing becomes the central mission of law enforcement it will have an extremely damaging impact on the success of crime prevention. Removing criminals from the streets is a means to reducing crime, not an end in and of itself, and police departments cannot afford to focus on it to the exclusion of other, equally important methods of crime prevention. It is crucial, therefore, that the focus of law enforcement officials be on proactive measures, rather than reactive ones.
ADOPT "BROKEN WINDOWS" POLICING
One of those proactive methods, and probably the single most important tool for maintaining order available to law enforcement, is the "Broken Windows" approach to policing. "Broken Windows" policing focuses on small "quality of life" crimes, such as prostitution, public drunkenness and urination, aggressive panhandling, and the like, putting large numbers of cops out on the streets at all times and ensuring that the city's public spaces are free of any illegal activity. When communities fail to enforce laws against these so-called minor offenses, accepting a low level of disorder as inevitable and not worth the trouble of addressing, the result is that the disorder increases and major offenses, from robbery to murder, follow in its wake. Taking action against crime at its most innocuous sends a clear message that illegal behavior will not be tolerated, reducing the incidence of every level of crime.
At the same time, many of those arrested for small crimes prove to be wanted for other more serious offenses. In this way "Broken Windows" policing both reduces the number of current criminals in the general population and creates an environment in which new criminals are far less likely to emerge. The most comprehensive, and successful, application of this policing approach has been in New York City, where a recent analysis of its decline in crime found that between 1989 and 1998 over 60,000 violent crimes were prevented solely by the use of "Broken Windows" policing.
Beyond its effectiveness in reducing crime, this approach to policing is extraordinarily effective in securing many of the subsidiary benefits of a less crime-ridden city. Citizens not only are safer, they feel safer. Robbery of local shops is not merely less likely to occur, storeowners believe they can operate without constant concern. By freeing the streets from low-level disorder as well as high levels of crime, police provide city residents with the freedom from fear that is essential to a flourishing urban environment.
A key principle, intimately linked to "Broken Windows," underlying effective crime prevention is that the proper business of police is problems, not incidents. Response-oriented policing approaches police work as a series of disconnected incidents that had neither history nor future. In fact, most such incidents have both. The factors that lead to a certain crime will usually evidence themselves in one form or another and likely would resurface in similar terms. Thus, incidents of spousal abuse or noisy and boisterous bars, for example, are often indicative of an ongoing communal problem that can be managed or solved before it blossoms into broader illegality. Doing so requires police to engage in activities, from mediating disputes to issuing friendly warnings to loitering teenagers, that do not directly address criminal activity. The tremendous results generated by Boston's "Pulling Levers" program, which explicitly embraced problem solving, provide a perfect example of its effectiveness. Just as adopting "Broken Windows" allows police to stop major crimes by controlling smaller ones, accepting problem solving as a legitimate role and goal for the police can stop bad situations from blossoming into crime.
(Continued in Part 2)
In the following viewpoint George L. Kelling and Ronald Corbett assert that crime in American cities is declining and provide suggestions as to how urban areas can continue to prevent crime. According to the authors, lowering the rates of urban crime requires cities to target small crimes such as panhandling and public drunkenness, remove illegal weapons and guns from the streets, hold the police accountable for the crime rate, and involve community residents in crime-fighting efforts. They contend that those efforts have been responsible for decreasing crime rates in urban America. Kelling is a professor of criminal justice at Rutgers University in New Jersey, and Corbett is the executive director of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.
As you read, consider the following questions:
What should be "the guiding vision of law enforcement," in the authors' opinion?
According to Kelling and Corbett, how does "broken windows" policing reduce the number of criminals in the general population?
As explained by the authors, how did the New York City Police Department reduce the problem of drug dealing?
Here is Part 1 of George L. Kelling and Ronald Corbett's paper, "This Works: Preventing and Reducing Crime," Civic Bulletin, March 2003. Copyright © 2003 by the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research.
The most impressive achievement of city governance during the urban renewal of the 1990's was the enormous decline in crime. Over the last decade [from 1993 to 2003], police departments across the country adopted innovative new crime prevention strategies and realized unprecedented results. Despite those successes, however, much work remains to be done in reducing crime and increasing public safety. While some cities across the nation have made great strides, driving down the national crime rate to levels unseen since the 1960's, there were many that missed out on the national trend, reducing crime only marginally, if at all. Moreover, from [2002 to 2003], with several notable exceptions, crime rates have plateaued, and in some cities have even begun to track upward once again. If the success of urban America is to continue, it is essential that police departments and civic leaders not rest on their laurels, but rather continue to improve and refine their crime prevention strategies, adopting the most effective methods displayed in recent years.
Two principal goals must guide the creation of strategies to replicate the most impressive crime prevention successes of the 90's: Order maintenance and the creation of law enforcement structures to support it. The guiding vision for law enforcement must be to maintain order within each city, not to catch criminals. Creating an environment that is not conducive to illegality, rather than seeking to punish illegal conduct after the fact, is the key to preventing crime. Having adopted this vision, implementing it on the streets requires that local police units have the resources to do their job properly and the freedom to use them innovatively, and that they be held strictly accountable for the results, whatever they may be. This naturally requires careful tracking of crime patterns and close communication within police departments in order to target resources appropriately and to place responsibility accurately. It also requires the integration of other law enforcement and public sector agencies, as well as the local communities, into an order maintenance framework. By adopting the combination of an order maintenance philosophy and a flexible, accountability-driven law enforcement structure, cities that have made little progress to date can achieve reductions on par with the most dramatic declines in urban crime during the last decade, while those cities that have already experienced such successes can continue to force crime down to ever lower levels.
PROACTIVE POLICE
The purpose of law enforcement is, ultimately, to prevent crimes rather than to solve them. Solving crimes and punishing criminals is a necessary, but by no means sufficient, aspect of defending the citizenry. In order to effectively reduce crime, law enforcement must focus its efforts on maintaining order within its jurisdiction, eliminating as far as possible the conditions that allow illegality to flourish. To achieve this goal police departments and other law enforcement officials must adopt strategies designed under this vision, rejecting a reactive, after-the-fact, policing approach. They must target factors, such as small-scale public disorder and illegal guns and drugs, that spawn both contempt for the law and ever greater crime trends. They must also work to ameliorate communal problems even before they become criminal, and to employ the advantages afforded by the parole and probation system to exercise control over those people who are statistically most likely to commit crimes. Finally they must manage those problems they cannot solve, accepting that perfect crime prevention is unobtainable and focusing on ensuring that criminal conduct they cannot eliminate has the minimum possible effect on the community.
There is a natural temptation for any police department to focus their efforts on responding to reports of crimes. Certainly it is the least complicated approach. When a crime is reported, the police respond as quickly as possible to stop the crime if it is in progress, or to work the case and catch the perpetrator. Such activities naturally represent a large part of the necessary work of any police force. However, when this kind of response-oriented policing becomes the central mission of law enforcement it will have an extremely damaging impact on the success of crime prevention. Removing criminals from the streets is a means to reducing crime, not an end in and of itself, and police departments cannot afford to focus on it to the exclusion of other, equally important methods of crime prevention. It is crucial, therefore, that the focus of law enforcement officials be on proactive measures, rather than reactive ones.
ADOPT "BROKEN WINDOWS" POLICING
One of those proactive methods, and probably the single most important tool for maintaining order available to law enforcement, is the "Broken Windows" approach to policing. "Broken Windows" policing focuses on small "quality of life" crimes, such as prostitution, public drunkenness and urination, aggressive panhandling, and the like, putting large numbers of cops out on the streets at all times and ensuring that the city's public spaces are free of any illegal activity. When communities fail to enforce laws against these so-called minor offenses, accepting a low level of disorder as inevitable and not worth the trouble of addressing, the result is that the disorder increases and major offenses, from robbery to murder, follow in its wake. Taking action against crime at its most innocuous sends a clear message that illegal behavior will not be tolerated, reducing the incidence of every level of crime.
At the same time, many of those arrested for small crimes prove to be wanted for other more serious offenses. In this way "Broken Windows" policing both reduces the number of current criminals in the general population and creates an environment in which new criminals are far less likely to emerge. The most comprehensive, and successful, application of this policing approach has been in New York City, where a recent analysis of its decline in crime found that between 1989 and 1998 over 60,000 violent crimes were prevented solely by the use of "Broken Windows" policing.
Beyond its effectiveness in reducing crime, this approach to policing is extraordinarily effective in securing many of the subsidiary benefits of a less crime-ridden city. Citizens not only are safer, they feel safer. Robbery of local shops is not merely less likely to occur, storeowners believe they can operate without constant concern. By freeing the streets from low-level disorder as well as high levels of crime, police provide city residents with the freedom from fear that is essential to a flourishing urban environment.
A key principle, intimately linked to "Broken Windows," underlying effective crime prevention is that the proper business of police is problems, not incidents. Response-oriented policing approaches police work as a series of disconnected incidents that had neither history nor future. In fact, most such incidents have both. The factors that lead to a certain crime will usually evidence themselves in one form or another and likely would resurface in similar terms. Thus, incidents of spousal abuse or noisy and boisterous bars, for example, are often indicative of an ongoing communal problem that can be managed or solved before it blossoms into broader illegality. Doing so requires police to engage in activities, from mediating disputes to issuing friendly warnings to loitering teenagers, that do not directly address criminal activity. The tremendous results generated by Boston's "Pulling Levers" program, which explicitly embraced problem solving, provide a perfect example of its effectiveness. Just as adopting "Broken Windows" allows police to stop major crimes by controlling smaller ones, accepting problem solving as a legitimate role and goal for the police can stop bad situations from blossoming into crime.
(Continued in Part 2)
REDUCING URBAN CRIME (Part 2)
Here is Part 2 of Kelling and Corbett's paper, "This Works: Preventing and Reducing Crime."
TARGETING ILLEGAL WEAPONS AND DRUGS
Illegal weapons are a major factor in exacerbating crime rates. High rates of criminal gun possession tend to increase the overall violence associated with crimes, and are incredibly destructive of public order. It is impossible for a community to believe that crime will not be tolerated if they see people flouting the law by carrying illegal guns on a daily basis, let alone if the night is occasionally punctuated by gunfire. The fewer guns on the streets in malicious hands, the fewer shootings there will be, and the safer and more orderly a city will be.
It is important, therefore, for police to specifically target illegal guns. One strategy simply requires police to check the identification of those stopped for less serious offenses. Persons wanted for other crimes can be searched, and they will often turn out to be carrying illegal guns, which can then be confiscated. This dovetails neatly with "Broken Windows" policing, which naturally increases the number of people stopped for minor offenses. Another effective strategy is to trace how those arrested with illegal guns obtained their weapon. In New York, which pioneered the most aggressive targeting of illegal guns in the 90's, police interrogations of those arrested with illegal guns have netted the arrest of hundreds of gun dealers and record levels of illegal gun confiscations.
In most cities, there is a clear link between crime and illicit drugs. Crime and drug use follow one another, and where drug markets exist other crime will be practically inevitable. Even more so than in the case of illegal guns, a thriving drug trade engenders contempt for the law, as it is so obviously unenforced. Devoting resources to effective anti-drug initiatives will therefore result not only in reductions in the drug trade, but also make a major impact in reducing other related crimes and restoring order. The central strategy that informs successful initiatives is to blanket areas where the drug trade flourishes and give drug dealers no place to hide. Employing tactics such as "buy and bust" operations, a major uniformed patrol presence, and putting neighborhood drug gangs out of business can transform drug-ridden communities into safe, orderly spaces. Carried out broadly enough, they can have the same effect on entire cities....
REDUCING THE IMPACT OF CRIME
In developing a vision for crime prevention, it is important to recognize that not all crime problems can be solved. Reducing the amount of crime, or even of a particular type of crime, to zero simply isn't a reasonable goal for urban law enforcement authorities. Efforts to reach unachievable targets can sap morale, reduce public confidence, and most importantly lead to a misallocation of police resources. Instead, police must learn to deal with problems without a solution by managing them in a way that reduces their impact on the citizenry to its lowest possible point. For example, prior to the mid-90's, large areas of New York City were infested with drug dealing. Employing a variety of tactics, the NYPD was able to dramatically reduce the problem, but they were, and still are, unable to eliminate drug use and dealing from their city. Realizing this, the police focused their efforts, with immense success, on driving drug dealers off the streets and indoors where, while continuing their illegal activities, they ceased to instill a climate of disorder and lawlessness on the city. Thus, by managing the problem rather than trying fruitlessly to solve it, the NYPD maintained order even where they could not totally eliminate crime.
Applying an order maintenance strategy can only succeed so far without a law enforcement structure that properly supports it. Creating that structure requires extensive central data collection and analysis, and constant feedback and review of the effectiveness of police programs. It also requires the creation of strategic partnerships between the police, other branches of law enforcement such as parole and probation departments and district attorney's offices, non-law enforcement public service agencies, and community groups. Such partnerships are essential both to marshal all the necessary resources government and the public can bring to bear to prevent crime, but also to gain the consent and involvement of each community's members, without which maintaining order within the communities will be nearly impossible. Perhaps most importantly of all, a culture of accountability must be instituted within the structure. At every level, from the whole city to a single street, the law enforcement personnel entrusted with preventing crime must take responsibility for failure, and be recognized for their success.
POLICE DEPARTMENTS MUST BE ACCOUNTABLE
No matter what vision of crime prevention is chosen and what strategies are selected to implement it, no law enforcement organization is likely to succeed in reducing crime unless it is held responsible for doing so. Far too often in the decades preceding the 90's reforms, criminologists and political leaders argued that social, economic, and demographic "root causes" were responsible for crime, and that nothing mere police officers could do would change the crime level afflicting a city. This attitude, which unfortunately still infects a significant portion of the national debate on crime, undermines any attempts at better crime prevention.
Insisting that police don't matter eliminates all the pressure and most of the incentives for them to succeed, saps the morale of officers, and leads inexorably towards a response-oriented brand of policing, the flaws of which were outlined above. A key principle of crime prevention, therefore, must be an absolute insistence on the accountability of police departments for the crime rate. While the police do not have limitless capabilities, and will often require partnerships with other groups to succeed in preventing crime, theirs is the central role. Using the proper strategies, including such partnerships, the police can reduce crime, and failure to do so must not be written off as an inevitable result of amorphous social trends....
INVOLVE THE WHOLE COMMUNITY
One last crucial component to effective crime prevention is community support. Without the consent, and hopefully active involvement, of the people among whom the police operate, it is extremely difficult to reduce crime. The entire project of maintaining order, after all, is only possible in an area where the majority of citizens actually want order. If the majority opposes the police, denying the consent of the community to their efforts, the community as a whole can itself act to maintain disorder by active opposition to the police. While the extreme version of this phenomenon, such as the Los Angeles riots following the Rodney King case [which involved King's beating by police], is quite rare, even fairly small degrees of community opposition can cripple law enforcement efforts and provide aid and comfort to illegal activity. It is, therefore, absolutely essential to work with leaders in the community being served, and to pay careful attention to the concerns of normal community members.
If gaining community consent is essential, involving community members actively in the effort to maintain order is nearly as significant. Police resources are necessarily finite, and retaking the streets of a neighborhood from disorder and illegality, not to mention keeping them once efforts are directed to other troubled areas, requires the help of the people who live and work there every day. Community residents know what the local problems are and community institutions are the ones that can combat acceptance of criminal activity. Close cooperation with the people crime prevention is designed to benefit must be a part of any law enforcement strategy.
The formula for massive crime reduction developed in major cities across America over the past ten years has been tested, and found effective. Order maintenance-based policing implemented through a law enforcement structure designed to support it has resulted in the most dramatic crime prevention successes in the history of the nation. Continued reductions in crime are certainly possible, even as the national downward trend seems to be coming to a halt. Cities such as New York and Baltimore have seen precipitous crime declines ... even as crime elsewhere has stabilized or risen. It is not a coincidence that both cities employ an aggressive order-maintenance policing strategy. If other cities wish to continue to see safer streets and more secure citizens, they would do well to follow the same path.
TARGETING ILLEGAL WEAPONS AND DRUGS
Illegal weapons are a major factor in exacerbating crime rates. High rates of criminal gun possession tend to increase the overall violence associated with crimes, and are incredibly destructive of public order. It is impossible for a community to believe that crime will not be tolerated if they see people flouting the law by carrying illegal guns on a daily basis, let alone if the night is occasionally punctuated by gunfire. The fewer guns on the streets in malicious hands, the fewer shootings there will be, and the safer and more orderly a city will be.
It is important, therefore, for police to specifically target illegal guns. One strategy simply requires police to check the identification of those stopped for less serious offenses. Persons wanted for other crimes can be searched, and they will often turn out to be carrying illegal guns, which can then be confiscated. This dovetails neatly with "Broken Windows" policing, which naturally increases the number of people stopped for minor offenses. Another effective strategy is to trace how those arrested with illegal guns obtained their weapon. In New York, which pioneered the most aggressive targeting of illegal guns in the 90's, police interrogations of those arrested with illegal guns have netted the arrest of hundreds of gun dealers and record levels of illegal gun confiscations.
In most cities, there is a clear link between crime and illicit drugs. Crime and drug use follow one another, and where drug markets exist other crime will be practically inevitable. Even more so than in the case of illegal guns, a thriving drug trade engenders contempt for the law, as it is so obviously unenforced. Devoting resources to effective anti-drug initiatives will therefore result not only in reductions in the drug trade, but also make a major impact in reducing other related crimes and restoring order. The central strategy that informs successful initiatives is to blanket areas where the drug trade flourishes and give drug dealers no place to hide. Employing tactics such as "buy and bust" operations, a major uniformed patrol presence, and putting neighborhood drug gangs out of business can transform drug-ridden communities into safe, orderly spaces. Carried out broadly enough, they can have the same effect on entire cities....
REDUCING THE IMPACT OF CRIME
In developing a vision for crime prevention, it is important to recognize that not all crime problems can be solved. Reducing the amount of crime, or even of a particular type of crime, to zero simply isn't a reasonable goal for urban law enforcement authorities. Efforts to reach unachievable targets can sap morale, reduce public confidence, and most importantly lead to a misallocation of police resources. Instead, police must learn to deal with problems without a solution by managing them in a way that reduces their impact on the citizenry to its lowest possible point. For example, prior to the mid-90's, large areas of New York City were infested with drug dealing. Employing a variety of tactics, the NYPD was able to dramatically reduce the problem, but they were, and still are, unable to eliminate drug use and dealing from their city. Realizing this, the police focused their efforts, with immense success, on driving drug dealers off the streets and indoors where, while continuing their illegal activities, they ceased to instill a climate of disorder and lawlessness on the city. Thus, by managing the problem rather than trying fruitlessly to solve it, the NYPD maintained order even where they could not totally eliminate crime.
Applying an order maintenance strategy can only succeed so far without a law enforcement structure that properly supports it. Creating that structure requires extensive central data collection and analysis, and constant feedback and review of the effectiveness of police programs. It also requires the creation of strategic partnerships between the police, other branches of law enforcement such as parole and probation departments and district attorney's offices, non-law enforcement public service agencies, and community groups. Such partnerships are essential both to marshal all the necessary resources government and the public can bring to bear to prevent crime, but also to gain the consent and involvement of each community's members, without which maintaining order within the communities will be nearly impossible. Perhaps most importantly of all, a culture of accountability must be instituted within the structure. At every level, from the whole city to a single street, the law enforcement personnel entrusted with preventing crime must take responsibility for failure, and be recognized for their success.
POLICE DEPARTMENTS MUST BE ACCOUNTABLE
No matter what vision of crime prevention is chosen and what strategies are selected to implement it, no law enforcement organization is likely to succeed in reducing crime unless it is held responsible for doing so. Far too often in the decades preceding the 90's reforms, criminologists and political leaders argued that social, economic, and demographic "root causes" were responsible for crime, and that nothing mere police officers could do would change the crime level afflicting a city. This attitude, which unfortunately still infects a significant portion of the national debate on crime, undermines any attempts at better crime prevention.
Insisting that police don't matter eliminates all the pressure and most of the incentives for them to succeed, saps the morale of officers, and leads inexorably towards a response-oriented brand of policing, the flaws of which were outlined above. A key principle of crime prevention, therefore, must be an absolute insistence on the accountability of police departments for the crime rate. While the police do not have limitless capabilities, and will often require partnerships with other groups to succeed in preventing crime, theirs is the central role. Using the proper strategies, including such partnerships, the police can reduce crime, and failure to do so must not be written off as an inevitable result of amorphous social trends....
INVOLVE THE WHOLE COMMUNITY
One last crucial component to effective crime prevention is community support. Without the consent, and hopefully active involvement, of the people among whom the police operate, it is extremely difficult to reduce crime. The entire project of maintaining order, after all, is only possible in an area where the majority of citizens actually want order. If the majority opposes the police, denying the consent of the community to their efforts, the community as a whole can itself act to maintain disorder by active opposition to the police. While the extreme version of this phenomenon, such as the Los Angeles riots following the Rodney King case [which involved King's beating by police], is quite rare, even fairly small degrees of community opposition can cripple law enforcement efforts and provide aid and comfort to illegal activity. It is, therefore, absolutely essential to work with leaders in the community being served, and to pay careful attention to the concerns of normal community members.
If gaining community consent is essential, involving community members actively in the effort to maintain order is nearly as significant. Police resources are necessarily finite, and retaking the streets of a neighborhood from disorder and illegality, not to mention keeping them once efforts are directed to other troubled areas, requires the help of the people who live and work there every day. Community residents know what the local problems are and community institutions are the ones that can combat acceptance of criminal activity. Close cooperation with the people crime prevention is designed to benefit must be a part of any law enforcement strategy.
The formula for massive crime reduction developed in major cities across America over the past ten years has been tested, and found effective. Order maintenance-based policing implemented through a law enforcement structure designed to support it has resulted in the most dramatic crime prevention successes in the history of the nation. Continued reductions in crime are certainly possible, even as the national downward trend seems to be coming to a halt. Cities such as New York and Baltimore have seen precipitous crime declines ... even as crime elsewhere has stabilized or risen. It is not a coincidence that both cities employ an aggressive order-maintenance policing strategy. If other cities wish to continue to see safer streets and more secure citizens, they would do well to follow the same path.
Friday, August 01, 2008
PAT CONDELL ON THE SAUDIS
Here is the transcript of British stand-up comic Pat Condell's video monlogue on the Saudis:
Well, it’s a gloomy rainy old day to be here in London, but it could be worse. I could be in Saudi Arabia, where men are men and women are cattle. Can I say that?
The Saudi Arabian Human Rights Commission, now there’s a collection of words to boggle the mind, but apparently this organization does actually exist, and they intend to complain later this month at an event in Copenhagen that Muslims living in Europe are denied human rights and are not allowed to freely practice their faith. How about that? Being lectured in human rights by Saudi Arabia. What next, animal welfare from the Koreans? "Does it get any more surreal?" you ask.
Yes, apparently it does, because they also want us to stop linking Islam with terrorism, which is pretty rich coming from the guardians of Islam, and the guardians of terrorism.In a sane society, the guy who actually stands up to make this speech would be bum-rushed out the door the moment he opened his mouth. Or, even better, run out of town on a rail and dumped in the river.But this is Europe, so instead we’ll probably listen to what he’s got to say, take it all on board, and then change our way of doing things, as usual. Just this week in the UK we’ve been told that a leading supermarket chain is now allowing Muslim checkout staff not to handle alcohol if they don’t want to.
We’ve had a pharmacist refusing to sell birth control because of religion, we’ve had a Muslim dentist who refused to treat a woman because she wasn’t wearing a headscarf, and now we’ve been told that some Muslim doctors are refusing to treat certain people because of their precious faith. Here in the UK we have a technical term for this kind of behavior.
We call it "taking the piss". And we don’t like people taking the piss. It "gets up our nose", and it gives us "the right hump". It’s a cultural thing.
If Muslims are really as downtrodden as the Saudis would like us to believe, why are there currently plans for a Saudi-funded gigantic mosque to be built right here in London, the largest mosque in Europe, no less.
Eat your heart out, Denmark. We know you’d love to have it, but we’re getting it instead.
And it’s going to be built right next to the site for the 2012 Olympic Games, if they can get the planning permission.
Even some local Muslims have been protesting about this plan. They say they’ll be marginalised because this mosque will be run by extremists for extremists, which means it’s pretty much guaranteed to get the go ahead, and the London Olympics will doubtless be dominated by a mosque the size of a football stadium.
I don’t know if the marathon will be interrupted for prayers, or if female athletes will be required to compete wearing a tent, though I’m sure if the mad mullah of multiculturalism, Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London, has anything to do with it, that won’t be too far off the agenda. The fact that the Saudis feel they can get away with this cynical bullshit just shows how far we’ve already allowed ourselves to be pushed here in Europe.
Radical Islam has seen us for what we are, a soft touch. It sees that political correctness is like a drug that we just can’t stop injecting, even though we know it’s going to kill us. And they’re taking full advantage of that, turning our sense of fairness against us, and making us despise ourselves for one of our best qualities. And any concession made will be seen as a sign of weakness to be exploited further, because there is no dialogue with radical Islam. It doesn’t want to be agreed with. It wants to be obeyed.
It thinks it has the God-given right, aptly enough, to make the rules, not just for Muslims, but for everyone, and some of us, frankly, thing that’s a little bit too much to ask. And if you think that’s unreasonable, all I can say is my freedom is more important than your faith. Much, much more important.
And besides, I just have this natural aversion to being bullied and pushed around by bigoted misogynistic ignoramuses. And I say that with all due respect.
And before somebody accuses me again of insulting Islam, please grow up. I don’t need to insult Islam when there are already so many Muslims willing to do it for me every time they strap on a suicide belt or stone somebody to death for the crime of having a private life. These are the people who insult Islam, not people like me. Of course I realize Islamofascists take pretty much every criticism as an insult by default, but, to be fair to them, it would be difficult to think of a compliment, wouldn’t it?
What do you say? "Nice jihad. Like the dogma. Way to go with the bigotry and the hate"? There’s not much scope, really, is there? But these are the people who are actually insulting Islam. And these are the true enemies of Muslims. And the biggest enemy of all is the royal family of Saudi Arabia, because it’s thanks to their activities, funding and encouraging cold blooded murder in the name of religious dogma that have made Islam feared and resented all over the civilised world, not because of people like me. And the Muslim population needs to take that fact on board and recognise it.
As for us in the west, well, our good friends the Saudis are waging war against us, and we’re so fat and complacent we don’t even know it, so maybe we deserve everything we get.
People have said to me, "You’re pronouncing that wrong. It’s not "Sordi" it’s "Sowdi". OK, fair enough, I’m happy to pronounce it "Sowdi". I’d be even happier if the country was just called Arabia, and the medieval wackos who currently run it were back in the desert living in their tents with their livestock, where they belong. In fact, I’m looking forward to the day when we can finally wean ourselves off oil altogether, and pull out of the Middle East, and then "Sordi" and "Sowdi" Arabia can quietly revert back into the stone age, unless they manage to exploit their other great natural resource, and start exporting egg timers.
Now that might even be something worth praying for. Peace.
Well, it’s a gloomy rainy old day to be here in London, but it could be worse. I could be in Saudi Arabia, where men are men and women are cattle. Can I say that?
The Saudi Arabian Human Rights Commission, now there’s a collection of words to boggle the mind, but apparently this organization does actually exist, and they intend to complain later this month at an event in Copenhagen that Muslims living in Europe are denied human rights and are not allowed to freely practice their faith. How about that? Being lectured in human rights by Saudi Arabia. What next, animal welfare from the Koreans? "Does it get any more surreal?" you ask.
Yes, apparently it does, because they also want us to stop linking Islam with terrorism, which is pretty rich coming from the guardians of Islam, and the guardians of terrorism.In a sane society, the guy who actually stands up to make this speech would be bum-rushed out the door the moment he opened his mouth. Or, even better, run out of town on a rail and dumped in the river.But this is Europe, so instead we’ll probably listen to what he’s got to say, take it all on board, and then change our way of doing things, as usual. Just this week in the UK we’ve been told that a leading supermarket chain is now allowing Muslim checkout staff not to handle alcohol if they don’t want to.
We’ve had a pharmacist refusing to sell birth control because of religion, we’ve had a Muslim dentist who refused to treat a woman because she wasn’t wearing a headscarf, and now we’ve been told that some Muslim doctors are refusing to treat certain people because of their precious faith. Here in the UK we have a technical term for this kind of behavior.
We call it "taking the piss". And we don’t like people taking the piss. It "gets up our nose", and it gives us "the right hump". It’s a cultural thing.
If Muslims are really as downtrodden as the Saudis would like us to believe, why are there currently plans for a Saudi-funded gigantic mosque to be built right here in London, the largest mosque in Europe, no less.
Eat your heart out, Denmark. We know you’d love to have it, but we’re getting it instead.
And it’s going to be built right next to the site for the 2012 Olympic Games, if they can get the planning permission.
Even some local Muslims have been protesting about this plan. They say they’ll be marginalised because this mosque will be run by extremists for extremists, which means it’s pretty much guaranteed to get the go ahead, and the London Olympics will doubtless be dominated by a mosque the size of a football stadium.
I don’t know if the marathon will be interrupted for prayers, or if female athletes will be required to compete wearing a tent, though I’m sure if the mad mullah of multiculturalism, Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London, has anything to do with it, that won’t be too far off the agenda. The fact that the Saudis feel they can get away with this cynical bullshit just shows how far we’ve already allowed ourselves to be pushed here in Europe.
Radical Islam has seen us for what we are, a soft touch. It sees that political correctness is like a drug that we just can’t stop injecting, even though we know it’s going to kill us. And they’re taking full advantage of that, turning our sense of fairness against us, and making us despise ourselves for one of our best qualities. And any concession made will be seen as a sign of weakness to be exploited further, because there is no dialogue with radical Islam. It doesn’t want to be agreed with. It wants to be obeyed.
It thinks it has the God-given right, aptly enough, to make the rules, not just for Muslims, but for everyone, and some of us, frankly, thing that’s a little bit too much to ask. And if you think that’s unreasonable, all I can say is my freedom is more important than your faith. Much, much more important.
And besides, I just have this natural aversion to being bullied and pushed around by bigoted misogynistic ignoramuses. And I say that with all due respect.
And before somebody accuses me again of insulting Islam, please grow up. I don’t need to insult Islam when there are already so many Muslims willing to do it for me every time they strap on a suicide belt or stone somebody to death for the crime of having a private life. These are the people who insult Islam, not people like me. Of course I realize Islamofascists take pretty much every criticism as an insult by default, but, to be fair to them, it would be difficult to think of a compliment, wouldn’t it?
What do you say? "Nice jihad. Like the dogma. Way to go with the bigotry and the hate"? There’s not much scope, really, is there? But these are the people who are actually insulting Islam. And these are the true enemies of Muslims. And the biggest enemy of all is the royal family of Saudi Arabia, because it’s thanks to their activities, funding and encouraging cold blooded murder in the name of religious dogma that have made Islam feared and resented all over the civilised world, not because of people like me. And the Muslim population needs to take that fact on board and recognise it.
As for us in the west, well, our good friends the Saudis are waging war against us, and we’re so fat and complacent we don’t even know it, so maybe we deserve everything we get.
People have said to me, "You’re pronouncing that wrong. It’s not "Sordi" it’s "Sowdi". OK, fair enough, I’m happy to pronounce it "Sowdi". I’d be even happier if the country was just called Arabia, and the medieval wackos who currently run it were back in the desert living in their tents with their livestock, where they belong. In fact, I’m looking forward to the day when we can finally wean ourselves off oil altogether, and pull out of the Middle East, and then "Sordi" and "Sowdi" Arabia can quietly revert back into the stone age, unless they manage to exploit their other great natural resource, and start exporting egg timers.
Now that might even be something worth praying for. Peace.
PAT CONDELL ON APPEASING ISLAM
Here is the transcript of British stand-up comic Pat Condell's video monologue on Appeasing Islam:
According to a recent opinion poll, many muslims say that the way for the West to have better relations with Islam, is to show it more respect. And who said, ‘Muslim’s don’t have a sense of humour’?
Given that Islam is above criticism in the west, it’s hard to imagine how we could give it any more respect . . .short of closing down all of the pubs, growing beards and beating up women who don’t want to dress like nuns.Ah, yes, of course. Silly me.I think many people in the West, are now realizing that Islam has already been given far too much ‘respect’. Especially here in Europe where according to another poll, people now see it as a threat to their culture. They carry on accomodating it’s every demand of course, but this is not because Islam is welcome in Europe. Far from it. It’s because people have been conditioned by the lie of multiculturalism to believe that what they SHOULD think is more important than what they DO think.So, although people will criticise Islam in private, they know that to do so publicly, in other words to be honest about their feelings would instantly make them racists and Islamophobes and nazis and disgusting imperialists, ethno-centric-fascist bastards grinding their jack boots into the faces of the innocent and the weak - so, best not make a fuss. You want to beat your wife and mutilate your daughter? Be our guest. We’ll even subsidize it - because we want to be your friend. What’s that? You want to destroy our corrupt society? Well that’s our fault. Not yours. Here, have some more money.
This film that’s coming out in Holland shortly, which has got the whole country in a state of heightened terrorist alert, is yet more proof that everything in Europe now needs to be measured against the possiblity of Muslim violence. Every play, every film, every art exhibition, every magazine article . . .in fact, our whole culture is now subject to Muslim approval. But then, this is Europe and we have a history of appeasment and caving into threats. Radical Islam knows this and is playing us like a violin. They KNOW that Islam will never get blamed for anything in Europe, no matter what happens. So that, for example, when the Danish press reprinted the cartoons recently, which was followed by a week of rioting by Muslim ‘youths’, Copenhagen’s Chief of Police refused to admit that it had anything to do with the cartoons. He said it was because they were ‘bored’.Yes, that’s right. They all rushed out and set fire to the city every night for a week ‘for something to do’. If only they had a table tennis club!The whole thing happened because three Islamic fanatics were caught planning to murder the cartoonists. Imagine how ‘bored’ THEY must have been!
Oh, yes. Also. A news flash for European journalists. An anti-semitic attack by Muslims on Jews IS NOT a ‘conflict between communities’. In case you haven’t noticed, Islam HATES Jews. Even if Israel didn’t exist, Islam would still HATE Jews. Their holy book tells Muslims that they should HATE Jews. So, I think you’ll find that what is happening is NOT a ‘conflict between communities’ at all, but a violent unprovoked racist attack by Muslims on Jews - because they’re Jews. Just thought I’d clear that one up for you so that you can report it accurately next time if you bother to report it - at all.If we were serious about respecting Islam we would give it an HONEST REALITY CHECK.
Islam needs to adapt to Europe. Not the other way around. Now, I know a lot of Muslims actually agree with this and they make an effort to adapt and to rub along with everybody else, which is great and it’s very welcomed.But we all know that a lot of others don’t. Which is why many European cities have large Muslim ghettos controlled by religious bigots, where indigenous law and values are increasingly unwelcome.Places full of people who have no intention of integrating and who want nothing less than the end of our civilization while we pander and defer to them thanks to a biased press and a complacent judiciary and the kind of politicians you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy. Actually, you probably would. And this situation is as much a threat to the freedom of ordinary Muslims as it is to everybody else. And it’s a clear indication of what we need in Europe now is NOT more respect for Islam. It’s less respect for Islam, and MORE RESPECT FOR OURSELVES.
We need to stop pretending because thats what we are doing. We’re pretending that all cultures are equal. Well we can clearly see that they’re not. Islamic culture is NOT equal to Western culture. It encourages violence against women, against Jews and homosexuals. It sanctions polygamy and marrying old men to young children in a disgusting travesty of human relations. Anyone in the West advocating these kind of values would very quickly find themselves in jail. It’s NOT equal. It’s inferior. And given radical Islam’s openness about it’s totalitarian agenda, this is NOT something that should be encouraged in ANY WAY.It should be discouraged by firm legislation and by rigorous enforcement of the law.Remember, "the law"?Now, I know that I’m going to be accused of racism and Islamophobia by the usual self-righteous pinheads but I don’t mind because those words have no value in this context. One has been neutralized by repeated dishonest disuse and the other is just a bare faced lie concocted by the political left in tandem with the religious right in a marriage of convenience which is, well, quite simply beneath contempt.A phobia is an irrational fear.
Resisting Islam is not irrational. Pandering to it is irrational. Indulging the lie that Islamic culture is somehow equal to Western culture - while ignoring the victims of that culture - is more than irrational. It’s downright criminal. And if you really want to talk about racism, then look no further than the poisonous fiction of multiculturalism, a devisive and patronizing racist ideology. And the governments of Europe who promote it are racist governments. The civil servants who pander to it are racists. The university lecturers who encourage it are racists. The journalists who lie about it are racists. And the ordinary people who say one thing in private and another in public are cowardly racist hypocrits.If we can’t bring ourselves to say what’s in our hearts when it truely matters, then we have already given up our freedom and with it the freedom of future generations - which is something that we have no right to do. We didn’t earn this freedom. It was handed to us on a plate by people who DID earn it with their lives. We don’t own it. We’re custodians of it. It’s not ours to give away.
So, it’s time to speak up Europe. It’s time to stop whining and belly aching about the Americans for five minutes and show a little back bone for once. Just once! Or, do we want to spend the rest of our lives cowering like frightened mice from a handful of violent bigots who think they have a right to poke a finger into our chest and tell us how we are allowed to live. . . what we can and can’t do, say and think. Well, I don’t know about you but anyone who asks me that question is going to get a very short answer. I’ll give you a clue, it won’t contain the words ‘allah’ or ‘akbar’. Peace, wouldn’t that be nice?
According to a recent opinion poll, many muslims say that the way for the West to have better relations with Islam, is to show it more respect. And who said, ‘Muslim’s don’t have a sense of humour’?
Given that Islam is above criticism in the west, it’s hard to imagine how we could give it any more respect . . .short of closing down all of the pubs, growing beards and beating up women who don’t want to dress like nuns.Ah, yes, of course. Silly me.I think many people in the West, are now realizing that Islam has already been given far too much ‘respect’. Especially here in Europe where according to another poll, people now see it as a threat to their culture. They carry on accomodating it’s every demand of course, but this is not because Islam is welcome in Europe. Far from it. It’s because people have been conditioned by the lie of multiculturalism to believe that what they SHOULD think is more important than what they DO think.So, although people will criticise Islam in private, they know that to do so publicly, in other words to be honest about their feelings would instantly make them racists and Islamophobes and nazis and disgusting imperialists, ethno-centric-fascist bastards grinding their jack boots into the faces of the innocent and the weak - so, best not make a fuss. You want to beat your wife and mutilate your daughter? Be our guest. We’ll even subsidize it - because we want to be your friend. What’s that? You want to destroy our corrupt society? Well that’s our fault. Not yours. Here, have some more money.
This film that’s coming out in Holland shortly, which has got the whole country in a state of heightened terrorist alert, is yet more proof that everything in Europe now needs to be measured against the possiblity of Muslim violence. Every play, every film, every art exhibition, every magazine article . . .in fact, our whole culture is now subject to Muslim approval. But then, this is Europe and we have a history of appeasment and caving into threats. Radical Islam knows this and is playing us like a violin. They KNOW that Islam will never get blamed for anything in Europe, no matter what happens. So that, for example, when the Danish press reprinted the cartoons recently, which was followed by a week of rioting by Muslim ‘youths’, Copenhagen’s Chief of Police refused to admit that it had anything to do with the cartoons. He said it was because they were ‘bored’.Yes, that’s right. They all rushed out and set fire to the city every night for a week ‘for something to do’. If only they had a table tennis club!The whole thing happened because three Islamic fanatics were caught planning to murder the cartoonists. Imagine how ‘bored’ THEY must have been!
Oh, yes. Also. A news flash for European journalists. An anti-semitic attack by Muslims on Jews IS NOT a ‘conflict between communities’. In case you haven’t noticed, Islam HATES Jews. Even if Israel didn’t exist, Islam would still HATE Jews. Their holy book tells Muslims that they should HATE Jews. So, I think you’ll find that what is happening is NOT a ‘conflict between communities’ at all, but a violent unprovoked racist attack by Muslims on Jews - because they’re Jews. Just thought I’d clear that one up for you so that you can report it accurately next time if you bother to report it - at all.If we were serious about respecting Islam we would give it an HONEST REALITY CHECK.
Islam needs to adapt to Europe. Not the other way around. Now, I know a lot of Muslims actually agree with this and they make an effort to adapt and to rub along with everybody else, which is great and it’s very welcomed.But we all know that a lot of others don’t. Which is why many European cities have large Muslim ghettos controlled by religious bigots, where indigenous law and values are increasingly unwelcome.Places full of people who have no intention of integrating and who want nothing less than the end of our civilization while we pander and defer to them thanks to a biased press and a complacent judiciary and the kind of politicians you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy. Actually, you probably would. And this situation is as much a threat to the freedom of ordinary Muslims as it is to everybody else. And it’s a clear indication of what we need in Europe now is NOT more respect for Islam. It’s less respect for Islam, and MORE RESPECT FOR OURSELVES.
We need to stop pretending because thats what we are doing. We’re pretending that all cultures are equal. Well we can clearly see that they’re not. Islamic culture is NOT equal to Western culture. It encourages violence against women, against Jews and homosexuals. It sanctions polygamy and marrying old men to young children in a disgusting travesty of human relations. Anyone in the West advocating these kind of values would very quickly find themselves in jail. It’s NOT equal. It’s inferior. And given radical Islam’s openness about it’s totalitarian agenda, this is NOT something that should be encouraged in ANY WAY.It should be discouraged by firm legislation and by rigorous enforcement of the law.Remember, "the law"?Now, I know that I’m going to be accused of racism and Islamophobia by the usual self-righteous pinheads but I don’t mind because those words have no value in this context. One has been neutralized by repeated dishonest disuse and the other is just a bare faced lie concocted by the political left in tandem with the religious right in a marriage of convenience which is, well, quite simply beneath contempt.A phobia is an irrational fear.
Resisting Islam is not irrational. Pandering to it is irrational. Indulging the lie that Islamic culture is somehow equal to Western culture - while ignoring the victims of that culture - is more than irrational. It’s downright criminal. And if you really want to talk about racism, then look no further than the poisonous fiction of multiculturalism, a devisive and patronizing racist ideology. And the governments of Europe who promote it are racist governments. The civil servants who pander to it are racists. The university lecturers who encourage it are racists. The journalists who lie about it are racists. And the ordinary people who say one thing in private and another in public are cowardly racist hypocrits.If we can’t bring ourselves to say what’s in our hearts when it truely matters, then we have already given up our freedom and with it the freedom of future generations - which is something that we have no right to do. We didn’t earn this freedom. It was handed to us on a plate by people who DID earn it with their lives. We don’t own it. We’re custodians of it. It’s not ours to give away.
So, it’s time to speak up Europe. It’s time to stop whining and belly aching about the Americans for five minutes and show a little back bone for once. Just once! Or, do we want to spend the rest of our lives cowering like frightened mice from a handful of violent bigots who think they have a right to poke a finger into our chest and tell us how we are allowed to live. . . what we can and can’t do, say and think. Well, I don’t know about you but anyone who asks me that question is going to get a very short answer. I’ll give you a clue, it won’t contain the words ‘allah’ or ‘akbar’. Peace, wouldn’t that be nice?
PAT CONDELL ON THE TROUBLE WITH ISLAM
Pat Condell is a British stand-up comic. He is an outspoken atheist who has slammed every religion in his comic routines. He has made a number of controversial video monologues. Condell has received a number of threats on his life for his monologues on Islam. His video monologue on The Trouble With Islam got him condemned by the crackpot City of Berkeley (California). Here is the transcript of that monologue:
Hi, I’d like to say a few things about Islam, "if I may." Now here in the U.K. religion was always pretty dormant until Muslims came along and started burning books and passing death sentences and generally demanding special treatment for no good reason. But they’ve showed everybody else what can be achieved by bullying and intimidation so now every crackpot in the country feels entitled to respect for their precious beliefs.
Beliefs often lifted whole sale from the ramblings of some ancient desert nomad with a psychological disorder. It does seem quite ironic to me the very people who clearly have made no attempt to think for themselves are always the most vocal for demanding respect for their "ideas". But some Muslims go further than this and claim they are being victimized in British society, but I don’t really believe that’s true. I do think a lot of people are getting fed up with hearing about Muslims all the time, and they wish Muslims would just shut up and get on with their lives instead of constantly belly aching about nothing, but that’s not the same as being victimized.
But because we live in a Liberal Democracy and therefore have certain double-standards to maintain, any criticism of Islam or of Muslims always draws the immediate accusation of Islamophobia. A dishonest word which seeks to portray legitimate comment as some kind of hate crime. When the truth is, Islam has a chip on it’s shoulder the size of a Mosque, and it looks to take offense at every opportunity. Some Muslims, it seems, are almost permanently offended about something, and yet you never hear a peep out of any of these people when some young Muslim girl is murdered for bringing dishonor among her insane family, suddenly everyone’s looking at the floor then.
They keep telling us that Islam is a religion of peace, but all the evidence points to a religion of war. Its holy book urges Muslims to conquer the world and subjugate everyone to the rule of God. If Islam had it’s way, elections would become a thing of the past and the rest of us would be living in the past for the foreseeable future. And some people are very keen to bring this situation about, especially the loud mouth rubble rousing Islamic clerics who we always hear praising the suicide bombers as "glorious" martyrs.
And yet curiously, you never hear about any of these enthusiasts blowing themselves up for the glory of God, they’re always keen to delegate that particular honor, despite the guarantee of all those luscious virgins waiting for them in Heaven, these guys are so selfless that they can always find somebody more deserving. Now of course the whole 72 virgins scenario has become something of a comedy staple and with good reason. But it does have one serious problem and that is the virgins are likely to be good wholesome Islamic virgins, because there won’t be any infidel riff raff in Heaven. So, presumably they’ll have brothers and cousins and uncles who are all determined to defend their honor by killing anyone who makes eye contact with them. They haven’t really thought this whole thing through, it seems to me.
Also, I think Muslim woman in Britain who cover their faces are mentally ill. Now, I realize that in some parts of the world women actually don’t have any choice in this matter, governed as they are by primitive pigs whose only achievement in life is to be born with a penis in one hand and a Koran in the other. But it just seems to me that if God had intended you to cover your face then , in his wisdom he would have provided you with a flap of skin for the purpose. Of course, if it gave you any sexual pleasure , it would have to be removed, that goes without saying.
But I don’t want to be too hard on Islam here for two reasons, firstly, because I don’t want to be murdered by some hysterical self-righteous carpet chewing, book burning Muppet with *shit for brains. And secondly, I do think we need to make allowances for Islam, because we have to remember Islam is quite a young religion.
So, maybe right now it’s just going through a difficult age, a little headstrong, full of itself, thinks it knows all the answers, but I’m sure it’ll learn. I think years from now , a lot of intelligent Muslims will be looking back on all this Medievalism and Jihad nonsense with embarrassment and shame, like the Germans do with the Nazi’s, and maybe then we can all have a good laugh about it, but in the mean time I think that any religion that demands earthly vengeance and retribution for any reason is not really a religion at all, but an illness and should be treated as such.
"Peace" and I mean that most sincerely.
Hi, I’d like to say a few things about Islam, "if I may." Now here in the U.K. religion was always pretty dormant until Muslims came along and started burning books and passing death sentences and generally demanding special treatment for no good reason. But they’ve showed everybody else what can be achieved by bullying and intimidation so now every crackpot in the country feels entitled to respect for their precious beliefs.
Beliefs often lifted whole sale from the ramblings of some ancient desert nomad with a psychological disorder. It does seem quite ironic to me the very people who clearly have made no attempt to think for themselves are always the most vocal for demanding respect for their "ideas". But some Muslims go further than this and claim they are being victimized in British society, but I don’t really believe that’s true. I do think a lot of people are getting fed up with hearing about Muslims all the time, and they wish Muslims would just shut up and get on with their lives instead of constantly belly aching about nothing, but that’s not the same as being victimized.
But because we live in a Liberal Democracy and therefore have certain double-standards to maintain, any criticism of Islam or of Muslims always draws the immediate accusation of Islamophobia. A dishonest word which seeks to portray legitimate comment as some kind of hate crime. When the truth is, Islam has a chip on it’s shoulder the size of a Mosque, and it looks to take offense at every opportunity. Some Muslims, it seems, are almost permanently offended about something, and yet you never hear a peep out of any of these people when some young Muslim girl is murdered for bringing dishonor among her insane family, suddenly everyone’s looking at the floor then.
They keep telling us that Islam is a religion of peace, but all the evidence points to a religion of war. Its holy book urges Muslims to conquer the world and subjugate everyone to the rule of God. If Islam had it’s way, elections would become a thing of the past and the rest of us would be living in the past for the foreseeable future. And some people are very keen to bring this situation about, especially the loud mouth rubble rousing Islamic clerics who we always hear praising the suicide bombers as "glorious" martyrs.
And yet curiously, you never hear about any of these enthusiasts blowing themselves up for the glory of God, they’re always keen to delegate that particular honor, despite the guarantee of all those luscious virgins waiting for them in Heaven, these guys are so selfless that they can always find somebody more deserving. Now of course the whole 72 virgins scenario has become something of a comedy staple and with good reason. But it does have one serious problem and that is the virgins are likely to be good wholesome Islamic virgins, because there won’t be any infidel riff raff in Heaven. So, presumably they’ll have brothers and cousins and uncles who are all determined to defend their honor by killing anyone who makes eye contact with them. They haven’t really thought this whole thing through, it seems to me.
Also, I think Muslim woman in Britain who cover their faces are mentally ill. Now, I realize that in some parts of the world women actually don’t have any choice in this matter, governed as they are by primitive pigs whose only achievement in life is to be born with a penis in one hand and a Koran in the other. But it just seems to me that if God had intended you to cover your face then , in his wisdom he would have provided you with a flap of skin for the purpose. Of course, if it gave you any sexual pleasure , it would have to be removed, that goes without saying.
But I don’t want to be too hard on Islam here for two reasons, firstly, because I don’t want to be murdered by some hysterical self-righteous carpet chewing, book burning Muppet with *shit for brains. And secondly, I do think we need to make allowances for Islam, because we have to remember Islam is quite a young religion.
So, maybe right now it’s just going through a difficult age, a little headstrong, full of itself, thinks it knows all the answers, but I’m sure it’ll learn. I think years from now , a lot of intelligent Muslims will be looking back on all this Medievalism and Jihad nonsense with embarrassment and shame, like the Germans do with the Nazi’s, and maybe then we can all have a good laugh about it, but in the mean time I think that any religion that demands earthly vengeance and retribution for any reason is not really a religion at all, but an illness and should be treated as such.
"Peace" and I mean that most sincerely.
COUNTERING TERRORIST GROUPS
The Rand Corporation's prestigious non-partisan think tank recently released a research brief which concluded that military force was not the most effective way of countering terrorism. Here is Rand's brief:
" 'How Terrorist Groups End - Implications for Countering al Qa’ida'
The United States cannot conduct an eff ective counterterrorism campaign against al Qa’ida or other terrorist groups without understanding how such groups end. While it is clear that U.S. policymakers will need to turn to a range of policy instruments to conduct such campaigns—including careful police and intelligence work, military force, political negotiations, and economic sanctions—what is less clear is how they should prioritize U.S. eff orts.
A recent RAND research effort sheds light on this issue by investigating how terrorist groups have ended in the past. By analyzing a comprehensive roster of terrorist groups that existed worldwide between 1968 and 2006, the authors found that most groups ended because of operations carried out by local police or intelligence agencies or because they negotiated a settlement with their governments. Military force was rarely the primary reason a terrorist group ended, and few groups within this time frame achieved victory.
These findings suggest that the U.S. approach to countering al Qa’ida has focused far too much on the use of military force. Instead, policing and intelligence should be the backbone of U.S. efforts.
'First Systematic Examination of the End of Terrorist Groups'
Th is was the first systematic look at how terrorist groups end. The authors compiled and analyzed a data set of all terrorist groups between 1968 and 2006, drawn from a terrorism-incident database that RAND and the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism jointly oversee. The authors used that data to identify the primary reason for the end of groups and to statistically analyze how economic conditions, regime type, size, ideology, and group goals affected their survival. They then conducted comparative case studies of specific terrorist groups to understand how they ended.
Of the 648 groups that were active at some point between 1968 and 2006, a total of 268 ended during that period. Another 136 groups splintered, and 244 remained active. As depicted in the figure on the next page, the authors found that most ended for one of two reasons: They were penetrated and eliminated by local police and intelligence agencies (40 percent), or they reached a peaceful political accommodation with their government (43 percent). Most terrorist groups that ended because of politics sought narrow policy goals. The narrower the goals, the more likely the group was to achieve them through political accommodation—and thus the more likely the government and terrorists were to reach a negotiated settlement.
In 10 percent of cases, terrorist groups ended because they achieved victory. Military force led to the end of terrorist groups in 7 percent of cases. The authors found that militaries tended to be most effective when used against terrorist groups engaged in insurgencies in which the groups were large, well armed, and well organized. But against most terrorist groups, military force was usually too blunt an instrument.
The analysis also found that
• religiously motivated terrorist groups took longer to eliminate than other groups but rarely achieved their objectives; no religiously motivated group achieved victory during the period studied.
• size significantly determined a group’s fate. Groups exceeding 10,000 members were victorious more than 25 percent of the time, while victory was rare for groups below 1,000 members.
• terrorist groups from upper-income countries are much more likely to be left-wing or nationalist and much less likely to be motivated by religion.
'Police-Oriented Counterterrorism Rather Than a "War on Terrorism" '
What does this mean for counterterrorism efforts against al Qa’ida? After September 11, 2001, U.S. strategy against al Qa’ida concentrated on the use of military force. Although the United States has employed nonmilitary instruments— cutting off terrorist financing or providing foreign assistance, for example—U.S. policymakers continue to refer to the strategy as a "war on terrorism."
But military force has not undermined al Qa’ida. As of 2008, al Qa’ida has remained a strong and competent organization. Its goal is intact: to establish a pan-Islamic caliphate in the Middle East by uniting Muslims to fight infidels and overthrow West-friendly regimes. It continues to employ terrorism and has been involved in more terrorist attacks around the world in the years since September 11, 2001, than in prior years, though engaging in no successful attacks of a comparable magnitude to the attacks on New York and Washington.
Al Qa’ida’s resilience should trigger a fundamental rethinking of U.S. strategy. Its goal of a pan-Islamic caliphate leaves little room for a negotiated political settlement with governments in the Middle East. A more effective U.S. approach would involve a two-front strategy:
• Make policing and intelligence the backbone of U.S. efforts. Al Qa’ida consists of a network of individuals who need to be tracked and arrested. This requires careful involvement of the Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation, as well as their cooperation with foreign police and intelligence agencies.
• Minimize the use of U.S. military force. In most operations against al Qa’ida, local military forces frequently have more legitimacy to operate and a better understanding of the operating environment than U.S. forces have. Th is means a light U.S. military footprint or none at all.
Key to this strategy is replacing the war-on-terrorism orientation with the kind of counterterrorism approach that is employed by most governments facing significant terrorist threats today. Calling the efforts a war on terrorism raises public expectations—both in the United States and elsewhere—that there is a battlefield solution. It also tends to legitimize the terrorists’ view that they are conducting a jihad (holy war) against the United States and elevates them to the status of holy warriors. Terrorists should be perceived as criminals, not holy warriors."
Two of my former colleagues took strong exception to this research brief. Jim H wrote: "The sweet smell of surrender. This is just what Dr. Obama ordered ; Back to pre 9/11 thinking. The jihadists must be jumping for joy. I feel like I am living in pre-WWII America."
Jerry A wrote: "The Jihadists have declared war on us and they killed 2,983 people in a one day attack on America. Let's not forget the 1993 bombing of the WTC which was treated as a criminal act. Let's not forget the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing (19 American servicemen were killed and 370+ people were injured) in Saudi Arabia which was treated as a criminal act. Let's not forget the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole (17 American servicemen killed and 39 injured) in port at Yemen... criminal indictments were brought against all participants arrested in these attacks. Then came September 11, 2001, the worst single terrorist attack of all. We replied with military force. How many terrorist attacks have we experienced on America since we stopped treating terrorism against our country as a criminal act?"
My former colleagues make some good points, but considering the history of terrorism throughout the world, the Rand brief also makes some good points. And, since the study concludes that there is a place, albeit a reduced one, for the military in countering terrorist groups, I personally do not see the brief's recommendations as mirroring Obama's rhetoric or as constituting a surrender to al Qaida and its terrorist allies.
" 'How Terrorist Groups End - Implications for Countering al Qa’ida'
The United States cannot conduct an eff ective counterterrorism campaign against al Qa’ida or other terrorist groups without understanding how such groups end. While it is clear that U.S. policymakers will need to turn to a range of policy instruments to conduct such campaigns—including careful police and intelligence work, military force, political negotiations, and economic sanctions—what is less clear is how they should prioritize U.S. eff orts.
A recent RAND research effort sheds light on this issue by investigating how terrorist groups have ended in the past. By analyzing a comprehensive roster of terrorist groups that existed worldwide between 1968 and 2006, the authors found that most groups ended because of operations carried out by local police or intelligence agencies or because they negotiated a settlement with their governments. Military force was rarely the primary reason a terrorist group ended, and few groups within this time frame achieved victory.
These findings suggest that the U.S. approach to countering al Qa’ida has focused far too much on the use of military force. Instead, policing and intelligence should be the backbone of U.S. efforts.
'First Systematic Examination of the End of Terrorist Groups'
Th is was the first systematic look at how terrorist groups end. The authors compiled and analyzed a data set of all terrorist groups between 1968 and 2006, drawn from a terrorism-incident database that RAND and the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism jointly oversee. The authors used that data to identify the primary reason for the end of groups and to statistically analyze how economic conditions, regime type, size, ideology, and group goals affected their survival. They then conducted comparative case studies of specific terrorist groups to understand how they ended.
Of the 648 groups that were active at some point between 1968 and 2006, a total of 268 ended during that period. Another 136 groups splintered, and 244 remained active. As depicted in the figure on the next page, the authors found that most ended for one of two reasons: They were penetrated and eliminated by local police and intelligence agencies (40 percent), or they reached a peaceful political accommodation with their government (43 percent). Most terrorist groups that ended because of politics sought narrow policy goals. The narrower the goals, the more likely the group was to achieve them through political accommodation—and thus the more likely the government and terrorists were to reach a negotiated settlement.
In 10 percent of cases, terrorist groups ended because they achieved victory. Military force led to the end of terrorist groups in 7 percent of cases. The authors found that militaries tended to be most effective when used against terrorist groups engaged in insurgencies in which the groups were large, well armed, and well organized. But against most terrorist groups, military force was usually too blunt an instrument.
The analysis also found that
• religiously motivated terrorist groups took longer to eliminate than other groups but rarely achieved their objectives; no religiously motivated group achieved victory during the period studied.
• size significantly determined a group’s fate. Groups exceeding 10,000 members were victorious more than 25 percent of the time, while victory was rare for groups below 1,000 members.
• terrorist groups from upper-income countries are much more likely to be left-wing or nationalist and much less likely to be motivated by religion.
'Police-Oriented Counterterrorism Rather Than a "War on Terrorism" '
What does this mean for counterterrorism efforts against al Qa’ida? After September 11, 2001, U.S. strategy against al Qa’ida concentrated on the use of military force. Although the United States has employed nonmilitary instruments— cutting off terrorist financing or providing foreign assistance, for example—U.S. policymakers continue to refer to the strategy as a "war on terrorism."
But military force has not undermined al Qa’ida. As of 2008, al Qa’ida has remained a strong and competent organization. Its goal is intact: to establish a pan-Islamic caliphate in the Middle East by uniting Muslims to fight infidels and overthrow West-friendly regimes. It continues to employ terrorism and has been involved in more terrorist attacks around the world in the years since September 11, 2001, than in prior years, though engaging in no successful attacks of a comparable magnitude to the attacks on New York and Washington.
Al Qa’ida’s resilience should trigger a fundamental rethinking of U.S. strategy. Its goal of a pan-Islamic caliphate leaves little room for a negotiated political settlement with governments in the Middle East. A more effective U.S. approach would involve a two-front strategy:
• Make policing and intelligence the backbone of U.S. efforts. Al Qa’ida consists of a network of individuals who need to be tracked and arrested. This requires careful involvement of the Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation, as well as their cooperation with foreign police and intelligence agencies.
• Minimize the use of U.S. military force. In most operations against al Qa’ida, local military forces frequently have more legitimacy to operate and a better understanding of the operating environment than U.S. forces have. Th is means a light U.S. military footprint or none at all.
Key to this strategy is replacing the war-on-terrorism orientation with the kind of counterterrorism approach that is employed by most governments facing significant terrorist threats today. Calling the efforts a war on terrorism raises public expectations—both in the United States and elsewhere—that there is a battlefield solution. It also tends to legitimize the terrorists’ view that they are conducting a jihad (holy war) against the United States and elevates them to the status of holy warriors. Terrorists should be perceived as criminals, not holy warriors."
Two of my former colleagues took strong exception to this research brief. Jim H wrote: "The sweet smell of surrender. This is just what Dr. Obama ordered ; Back to pre 9/11 thinking. The jihadists must be jumping for joy. I feel like I am living in pre-WWII America."
Jerry A wrote: "The Jihadists have declared war on us and they killed 2,983 people in a one day attack on America. Let's not forget the 1993 bombing of the WTC which was treated as a criminal act. Let's not forget the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing (19 American servicemen were killed and 370+ people were injured) in Saudi Arabia which was treated as a criminal act. Let's not forget the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole (17 American servicemen killed and 39 injured) in port at Yemen... criminal indictments were brought against all participants arrested in these attacks. Then came September 11, 2001, the worst single terrorist attack of all. We replied with military force. How many terrorist attacks have we experienced on America since we stopped treating terrorism against our country as a criminal act?"
My former colleagues make some good points, but considering the history of terrorism throughout the world, the Rand brief also makes some good points. And, since the study concludes that there is a place, albeit a reduced one, for the military in countering terrorist groups, I personally do not see the brief's recommendations as mirroring Obama's rhetoric or as constituting a surrender to al Qaida and its terrorist allies.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
ADDITIONAL 10 YEARS NOT JUSTIFIED
The 5th U.S. Circuit of Appeals has just upheld the 11 and 12 year prison sentences of two Border Patrol officers who shot a fleeing unarmed drug smuggler in the ass when he attempeted to escape back into Mexico. This case has been a flashpoint for conservative politicians, talk radio and blogs. It has angered and demoralized the rank and file officers of the Border Patrol.
As a former law enforcement officer, I tend to lean in favor of officers who get themselves involved in questionable situations. In this case it is hard for me to come down on the side of the officers. Long ago, the courts ruled that police officers cannot shoot a fleeing offender unless he constitutes an immediate threat to the pursuing officers or if his escape, based on the nature of his crime, would constitute a serious threat to the public at large.
The Border Patrol officers tried to cover up the incident by removing the spent shell casings from the scence and by failing to report the shooting. They lied to their supervisors about the shooting when it bacame public. And, they claimed that they shot the smuggler only because they saw him carrying something that looked like a weapon.
Here is the problem I have with these officers. They tried to cover up the shooting. Their failure to report the incident indicates to me that they knew they were wrong in shooting the fleeing smuggler. You can bet your life they did not pick up the shell casings in order to save the brass. They compounded their predicament by lying to their supervisors about the circumstances of the incident.
I never fault an officer for shooting an unarmed offender when he is really in fear for his life, even though it turns out that the perpetrator was unarmed. In this case, however, the failure to report the shooting and the subsequent lies lead me to question the claim that the officers thought the fleeing smuggler was armed.
I do have a problem though with the sentencing of the officers. The smuggler was shot in the ass and recovered from his wound. The officers were convicted of felonious assault and violation of civil rights, but a mandatory 10 years was added to their sentences because they were also convicted of "using a firearm during a crime of violence."
When Congress mandated an additional 10 year sentence for using a firearm during a crime of violence, the lawmakers obviously failed to consider that this law would also apply to peace officers in the performance of their duties. A major purpose of that law was to protect peace officers by discouraging the use of firearms by dope dealers and it was not intended to be used against the very people it was designed to protect.
The two officers have been imprisoned for nearly two years. Their law enforcement careers are over. Their "victim" has a long criminal history. Justice was not served with the additional 10 year sentences in this case. That is why I support those who are calling on President Bush to commute their sentences. I also support the efforts of those who want to change the law against using a firearm during a crime of violence by exempting from its provisions peace officers in the performance of their duties.
As a former law enforcement officer, I tend to lean in favor of officers who get themselves involved in questionable situations. In this case it is hard for me to come down on the side of the officers. Long ago, the courts ruled that police officers cannot shoot a fleeing offender unless he constitutes an immediate threat to the pursuing officers or if his escape, based on the nature of his crime, would constitute a serious threat to the public at large.
The Border Patrol officers tried to cover up the incident by removing the spent shell casings from the scence and by failing to report the shooting. They lied to their supervisors about the shooting when it bacame public. And, they claimed that they shot the smuggler only because they saw him carrying something that looked like a weapon.
Here is the problem I have with these officers. They tried to cover up the shooting. Their failure to report the incident indicates to me that they knew they were wrong in shooting the fleeing smuggler. You can bet your life they did not pick up the shell casings in order to save the brass. They compounded their predicament by lying to their supervisors about the circumstances of the incident.
I never fault an officer for shooting an unarmed offender when he is really in fear for his life, even though it turns out that the perpetrator was unarmed. In this case, however, the failure to report the shooting and the subsequent lies lead me to question the claim that the officers thought the fleeing smuggler was armed.
I do have a problem though with the sentencing of the officers. The smuggler was shot in the ass and recovered from his wound. The officers were convicted of felonious assault and violation of civil rights, but a mandatory 10 years was added to their sentences because they were also convicted of "using a firearm during a crime of violence."
When Congress mandated an additional 10 year sentence for using a firearm during a crime of violence, the lawmakers obviously failed to consider that this law would also apply to peace officers in the performance of their duties. A major purpose of that law was to protect peace officers by discouraging the use of firearms by dope dealers and it was not intended to be used against the very people it was designed to protect.
The two officers have been imprisoned for nearly two years. Their law enforcement careers are over. Their "victim" has a long criminal history. Justice was not served with the additional 10 year sentences in this case. That is why I support those who are calling on President Bush to commute their sentences. I also support the efforts of those who want to change the law against using a firearm during a crime of violence by exempting from its provisions peace officers in the performance of their duties.
Monday, July 28, 2008
ISRAEL'S DAY OF INFAMY
Recently I blogged about Israel's swap of Samir Kuntar, the murderous Lebanese terrorist ("Israelis Will Rue the Day They Made This Swap" /7-5-08 and "Hero to the Palestinians"/7-18-08) and the likelyhood that it would lead to further hostage taking by the Jewish nation's enemies. In the past I have referred to Prime Minister Olmert as "Ehud the Idiot." I have often stated that tiny Israel badly needs a strong resolute leader, namely Benjamin Netanyahu of the Likud party, to resist the international community's call for the Jewish state to make suicidal concessions to the Palestinians.
Burt Prelutsky's column in today's Townhall.com contains some very notable comments on the Kuntar "swapping human garbage for human cadavers" fiasco. Prelutsky has been a humor columnist for the L.A. Times and a movie critic for Los Angeles magazine and has written a bunch of successful television series and movies. He is the author of "Conservatives Are From Mars (Liberals are from San Francisco)." Here is Prelutsky's column from Townhall.com:
"It's Time Israel Woke Up by Burt Prelutsky
Because December 7, 1941, was when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, FDR quite aptly called it a day that would live in infamy. For Israel, July 15, 2008, is just such a date. That was the day that Ehud Olmert’s government swapped child murderer Samir Kuntar and four of his Lebanese cohorts to Hezbollah for the corpses of Israeli army reservists Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev. Israel agreed to do this even though the Arabs reneged on their promise to disclose the present whereabouts of Israeli airman Ron Arad.
While one can sympathize with the families of Goldwasser and Regev, who desired closure and only wanted to give the young men a proper burial, one can’t help wondering what’s gone wrong with Israel’s leadership. Have they decided for some odd reason to take their lead from people like Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama?
Once you begin trading live terrorists for dead soldiers, what have you done but encouraged your sworn enemies to abduct and murder your soldiers as well as your civilians? How do you trade for the corpses of Goldwasser and Regev, but not for the dead bodies of the next two Israelis or the next dozen or the next hundred? Once you open the door to such depraved swapping, how do you ever close it? How do you tell the next set of Jewish parents that the remains of these two were worth infinitely more than the corpses of their own sons and daughters?
Frankly, I have no idea how Israel has so far resisted the urge to unleash nuclear bombs on the likes of Syria, Iran and the Palestinians. But be that as it may, I do have a couple of suggestions I wish they’d take to heart. One, I wish they’d finally institute capital punishment. Until the day they begin to execute terrorists, they will leave themselves open to more of this same sort of emotional blackmail.
Until they can bring themselves to exterminating the likes of Samir Kuntar, who went home to a hero’s reception, the Israelis will continue to find themselves swapping human garbage for human cadavers. Furthermore, the next time Kuntar murders a Jewish child, and assuredly this unrepentant savage will, the child’s blood will not only be on his hands, but on the hands of Prime Minister Olmert, President Shimon Peres and the rest of the gutless politicians currently running things in Israel.
My second suggestion is that Israel announce that from this moment on, the remains of any suicide bomber, in fact of any Muslim terrorist captured and executed in Israel, will be buried carefully wrapped in pigskins. Not only should that policy act as a deterrent, but what could be a more appropriate fate for swine?"
Burt Prelutsky's column in today's Townhall.com contains some very notable comments on the Kuntar "swapping human garbage for human cadavers" fiasco. Prelutsky has been a humor columnist for the L.A. Times and a movie critic for Los Angeles magazine and has written a bunch of successful television series and movies. He is the author of "Conservatives Are From Mars (Liberals are from San Francisco)." Here is Prelutsky's column from Townhall.com:
"It's Time Israel Woke Up by Burt Prelutsky
Because December 7, 1941, was when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, FDR quite aptly called it a day that would live in infamy. For Israel, July 15, 2008, is just such a date. That was the day that Ehud Olmert’s government swapped child murderer Samir Kuntar and four of his Lebanese cohorts to Hezbollah for the corpses of Israeli army reservists Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev. Israel agreed to do this even though the Arabs reneged on their promise to disclose the present whereabouts of Israeli airman Ron Arad.
While one can sympathize with the families of Goldwasser and Regev, who desired closure and only wanted to give the young men a proper burial, one can’t help wondering what’s gone wrong with Israel’s leadership. Have they decided for some odd reason to take their lead from people like Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama?
Once you begin trading live terrorists for dead soldiers, what have you done but encouraged your sworn enemies to abduct and murder your soldiers as well as your civilians? How do you trade for the corpses of Goldwasser and Regev, but not for the dead bodies of the next two Israelis or the next dozen or the next hundred? Once you open the door to such depraved swapping, how do you ever close it? How do you tell the next set of Jewish parents that the remains of these two were worth infinitely more than the corpses of their own sons and daughters?
Frankly, I have no idea how Israel has so far resisted the urge to unleash nuclear bombs on the likes of Syria, Iran and the Palestinians. But be that as it may, I do have a couple of suggestions I wish they’d take to heart. One, I wish they’d finally institute capital punishment. Until the day they begin to execute terrorists, they will leave themselves open to more of this same sort of emotional blackmail.
Until they can bring themselves to exterminating the likes of Samir Kuntar, who went home to a hero’s reception, the Israelis will continue to find themselves swapping human garbage for human cadavers. Furthermore, the next time Kuntar murders a Jewish child, and assuredly this unrepentant savage will, the child’s blood will not only be on his hands, but on the hands of Prime Minister Olmert, President Shimon Peres and the rest of the gutless politicians currently running things in Israel.
My second suggestion is that Israel announce that from this moment on, the remains of any suicide bomber, in fact of any Muslim terrorist captured and executed in Israel, will be buried carefully wrapped in pigskins. Not only should that policy act as a deterrent, but what could be a more appropriate fate for swine?"
Friday, July 25, 2008
ACADEMIA'S POISONOUS ATMOSPHERE
In yesterday's blog, "Colleges Now and Then." I wrote about today's poisonous campus atmosphere of political correctness, identity politics, radical feminism, militant marxism and thought control. I also mentioned that students who do not agree with the radical left are intimidated and even disciplined for expressing opposing viewpoints. This lunacy has also spread to include the prohibition of reading books on campus in front of anyone who might be offended by the subject matter. Here is a case in point.
Keith Sampson is a janitor and part-time student at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). He is in his early 50s and has been gradually accumulating credits at IUPUI for a degree in communications studies. He has 10 credit hours to go. Last year, while on a break from his janitorial duties, Sampson was reading "Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the KuKluxKlan," a book he had checked out from the public library.
Nakea Vincent, a black janitor, spotted Sampson reading and happened to get a glimpse of the book's title. She went ballistic and filed a racial harrassment complaint against Sampson with the IUPUI administration. Her complaint led to an inquiry of major proportions and caused an innocent Sampson considerable grief. In an initial letter, dated Nov. 25, 2007, Sampson was told by Lillian Charleston of the university's Affirmative Action Office that he "racially harassed" black coworkers by reading the book in their presence. Here is what the letter said:
"The Affirmative Action Office has completed its investigation of Ms. Nakea Vincent's allegation that you racially harassed her by repeatedly reading the book, Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the Ku Klux Klan by Todd Tucker in the presence of Black employees. In conducting this investigation, we interviewed you, Nakea Vincent, and other employees with information relevant to the mailer.
Upon review of this matter, we conclude that your conduct constitutes racial harassment in that you demonstrated disdain and insensitivity to your co-workers who repeatedly requested that you refrain from reading the book which has such an inflammatory and offensive topic in their presence. You contend that you weren't aware of the offensive nature of the topic and were reading the book about the KKK to better understand discrimination. However you used extremely poor judgment by insisting on openly reading the book related to a historically and racially abhorrent subject in the presence of your Black co-workers. Furthermore, employing the legal "reasonable person standard," a majority of adults are aware of and understand how repugnant the KKK is to African Americans, their reactions to the Klan, and the reasonableness of the request that you not read the book in their presence.
During your meeting with Marguerite Watkins, Assistant Affirmative Action Officer you were instructed to stop reading the book in the immediate presence of your coworkers and when reading the book to sit apart from the immediate proximity of these co-workers. Please be advised, any future substantiated conduct of a similar nature could result in serious disciplinary action.
Racial harassment is very serious and can result in serious consequences for all involved. Please be advised that racial harassment and retaliation against any individual for having participated in the investigation of a complaint of this nature is a violation of University policy and will not be tolerated.
This concludes this matter with the Affirmative Action Office. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us."
Of course, it did not take long for Sampson's predicament to become public. After the university was battered by a blistering barrage of well-deserved outrage, Sampson received a second letter, dated Feb. 7, 2008. Here is what Charleston's second letter said:
"This letter will replace my prior letter to you dated November 25, 2007.
I wish to clarify that my prior letter was not meant to imply that it is impermissible for you or to limit your ability to read scholarly books or other such literature during break times. There is no University policy that prohibits reading such materials on break time. As was previously stated, you are permitted to read such materials during appropriate times.
I also wish to clarify that my prior letter to you was meant only to address conduct on your part that raised concern on the part of your co-workers. It was the perception of your co-workers that you were engaging in conduct for the purpose of creating a hostile atmosphere of antagonism. Your perception was that you were reading a scholarly work during break time, and should be permitted to do so whether or not the subject matter is of concern to your coworkers.
I am unable to draw any final conclusion concerning what was intended by the conduct. Of course, if the conduct was intended to cause disruption to the work environment, such behavior would be subject to action by the University. However, because I cannot draw any final conclusion in this instance, no such adverse disciplinary action has been or will be taken in connection with the circumstances at hand."
"........ I cannot draw any final conclusion in this instance ........" What an absolutely absurd statement! All that Sampson did was to read a book during a break from work. A scholarly book at that. He cannot be blamed for the fact that some nosy black female, afflicted with a severe case of victimitis, took a glimpse at what he was reading and was offended by the book's title.
I don't know who is more ignorant - Lillian Charleston, the ubernut affirmative action officer, or Sampson's black co-worker, Nakea Vincent? Vincent should have been disciplined for making a false racial harassment accusation and for causing disruption to the work environment by "creating a hostile atmosphere of antagonism." But instead of disciplining Vincent, the university left Sampson dangling under a cloud of suspicion. And so it goes on today's college campus.
Keith Sampson is a janitor and part-time student at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). He is in his early 50s and has been gradually accumulating credits at IUPUI for a degree in communications studies. He has 10 credit hours to go. Last year, while on a break from his janitorial duties, Sampson was reading "Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the KuKluxKlan," a book he had checked out from the public library.
Nakea Vincent, a black janitor, spotted Sampson reading and happened to get a glimpse of the book's title. She went ballistic and filed a racial harrassment complaint against Sampson with the IUPUI administration. Her complaint led to an inquiry of major proportions and caused an innocent Sampson considerable grief. In an initial letter, dated Nov. 25, 2007, Sampson was told by Lillian Charleston of the university's Affirmative Action Office that he "racially harassed" black coworkers by reading the book in their presence. Here is what the letter said:
"The Affirmative Action Office has completed its investigation of Ms. Nakea Vincent's allegation that you racially harassed her by repeatedly reading the book, Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the Ku Klux Klan by Todd Tucker in the presence of Black employees. In conducting this investigation, we interviewed you, Nakea Vincent, and other employees with information relevant to the mailer.
Upon review of this matter, we conclude that your conduct constitutes racial harassment in that you demonstrated disdain and insensitivity to your co-workers who repeatedly requested that you refrain from reading the book which has such an inflammatory and offensive topic in their presence. You contend that you weren't aware of the offensive nature of the topic and were reading the book about the KKK to better understand discrimination. However you used extremely poor judgment by insisting on openly reading the book related to a historically and racially abhorrent subject in the presence of your Black co-workers. Furthermore, employing the legal "reasonable person standard," a majority of adults are aware of and understand how repugnant the KKK is to African Americans, their reactions to the Klan, and the reasonableness of the request that you not read the book in their presence.
During your meeting with Marguerite Watkins, Assistant Affirmative Action Officer you were instructed to stop reading the book in the immediate presence of your coworkers and when reading the book to sit apart from the immediate proximity of these co-workers. Please be advised, any future substantiated conduct of a similar nature could result in serious disciplinary action.
Racial harassment is very serious and can result in serious consequences for all involved. Please be advised that racial harassment and retaliation against any individual for having participated in the investigation of a complaint of this nature is a violation of University policy and will not be tolerated.
This concludes this matter with the Affirmative Action Office. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us."
Of course, it did not take long for Sampson's predicament to become public. After the university was battered by a blistering barrage of well-deserved outrage, Sampson received a second letter, dated Feb. 7, 2008. Here is what Charleston's second letter said:
"This letter will replace my prior letter to you dated November 25, 2007.
I wish to clarify that my prior letter was not meant to imply that it is impermissible for you or to limit your ability to read scholarly books or other such literature during break times. There is no University policy that prohibits reading such materials on break time. As was previously stated, you are permitted to read such materials during appropriate times.
I also wish to clarify that my prior letter to you was meant only to address conduct on your part that raised concern on the part of your co-workers. It was the perception of your co-workers that you were engaging in conduct for the purpose of creating a hostile atmosphere of antagonism. Your perception was that you were reading a scholarly work during break time, and should be permitted to do so whether or not the subject matter is of concern to your coworkers.
I am unable to draw any final conclusion concerning what was intended by the conduct. Of course, if the conduct was intended to cause disruption to the work environment, such behavior would be subject to action by the University. However, because I cannot draw any final conclusion in this instance, no such adverse disciplinary action has been or will be taken in connection with the circumstances at hand."
"........ I cannot draw any final conclusion in this instance ........" What an absolutely absurd statement! All that Sampson did was to read a book during a break from work. A scholarly book at that. He cannot be blamed for the fact that some nosy black female, afflicted with a severe case of victimitis, took a glimpse at what he was reading and was offended by the book's title.
I don't know who is more ignorant - Lillian Charleston, the ubernut affirmative action officer, or Sampson's black co-worker, Nakea Vincent? Vincent should have been disciplined for making a false racial harassment accusation and for causing disruption to the work environment by "creating a hostile atmosphere of antagonism." But instead of disciplining Vincent, the university left Sampson dangling under a cloud of suspicion. And so it goes on today's college campus.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
COLLEGES NOW AND THEN
Emmett Tyrrell, a conservative columnist, is the founder, publisher and editor-in-chief of The American Spectator. In today's Townhall.com, his column, "A Victory for Campus Diversity," included his observations of what is happening on college campuses today as compared to the way things were in the 1950s. Here are some excerpts from Tyrrell's Townhall column:
'The life of the mind nowadays is celebrated so rarely in academe. A livelier cultural atmosphere can be found at a Starbucks cafe or health food emporium. On most university campuses, the bulletin boards sulk with notices about "Rape Awareness Week," "Anger Management Counseling," "The Readings of the Prophet Obama."
A half-century ago, things were different. Learning was widespread on campus -- at least among the profs. Free thought was encouraged, even among the profs. In the humanities, there were distinguished professors, at least on the best campuses, where they wrote and taught and often seemed to live the good life. Even the faculty communists were relatively pleasant.
The university at the middle of the 20th century was a happy place, congenial to civilized thought.
Today it is gloomy, populated -- particularly in the humanities -- by narrowly opinionated adepts of identity politics and sham studies: the feminists, the black-studies lecturers and other special interests too esoteric to mention. The prevalence of these irritable sciolists explains why in the nation today there are so few historians of the stature of, say, Arthur M. Schlesinger or Samuel Eliot Morison; political philosophers of the stature of Leo Strauss; or political scientists of the stature of Hans J. Morgenthau.'
I believe that Tyrell has hit the nail right on the head. Once the Vietnam War protests gripped our nations colleges and universities, the curltural atmosphere on campuses began to spin out of control. And that is where we are today, still out of control. Students are subjected to political correctness, identity politics, radical feminism, militant marxism and thought control. Freedom of speech is encouraged, but only for those who agree with the radicals. Students who disagree will be intimidated and may even be disciplined for expressing opposite viewpoints.
When Tyrrell mentioned that "even the faculty communists were relatively pleasant" he wasn't whistling Dixie. That reminded me of my Economics class at the University of Texas right after World War II. The first thing the prof said when he introduced himself was, "I want all of you to know that I am a communist." But the way he taught the course, you would never have known he was a communist had he not mentioned it. He did not castigate capitalism, nor did he ever spew out a shitload of anti-Americanism.
With the prevalence of left-wing radicalism on many of today's campuses, it is no wonder that many of our college graduates are ill prepared to face the realities of life away from the halls of ivy. That is particularly true for those who majored in the social sciences and humanities, today's breeding grounds for educated idiots.
'The life of the mind nowadays is celebrated so rarely in academe. A livelier cultural atmosphere can be found at a Starbucks cafe or health food emporium. On most university campuses, the bulletin boards sulk with notices about "Rape Awareness Week," "Anger Management Counseling," "The Readings of the Prophet Obama."
A half-century ago, things were different. Learning was widespread on campus -- at least among the profs. Free thought was encouraged, even among the profs. In the humanities, there were distinguished professors, at least on the best campuses, where they wrote and taught and often seemed to live the good life. Even the faculty communists were relatively pleasant.
The university at the middle of the 20th century was a happy place, congenial to civilized thought.
Today it is gloomy, populated -- particularly in the humanities -- by narrowly opinionated adepts of identity politics and sham studies: the feminists, the black-studies lecturers and other special interests too esoteric to mention. The prevalence of these irritable sciolists explains why in the nation today there are so few historians of the stature of, say, Arthur M. Schlesinger or Samuel Eliot Morison; political philosophers of the stature of Leo Strauss; or political scientists of the stature of Hans J. Morgenthau.'
I believe that Tyrell has hit the nail right on the head. Once the Vietnam War protests gripped our nations colleges and universities, the curltural atmosphere on campuses began to spin out of control. And that is where we are today, still out of control. Students are subjected to political correctness, identity politics, radical feminism, militant marxism and thought control. Freedom of speech is encouraged, but only for those who agree with the radicals. Students who disagree will be intimidated and may even be disciplined for expressing opposite viewpoints.
When Tyrrell mentioned that "even the faculty communists were relatively pleasant" he wasn't whistling Dixie. That reminded me of my Economics class at the University of Texas right after World War II. The first thing the prof said when he introduced himself was, "I want all of you to know that I am a communist." But the way he taught the course, you would never have known he was a communist had he not mentioned it. He did not castigate capitalism, nor did he ever spew out a shitload of anti-Americanism.
With the prevalence of left-wing radicalism on many of today's campuses, it is no wonder that many of our college graduates are ill prepared to face the realities of life away from the halls of ivy. That is particularly true for those who majored in the social sciences and humanities, today's breeding grounds for educated idiots.
Monday, July 21, 2008
CITY OF UBERNUTS
Those who live on the West Coast, particularly those in California, are different from the rest of us. For one thing, they tend to be much more liberal than most other Americans. They are more innovative and, as such, are trend setters for the rest of the country. Some of their ideas are great, some turn out to be quite nutty. That is why many people refer to California as "the land of nuts and fruits."
If California is the land of nuts and fruits, then San Francisco is the city of ubernuts and fruits. This is the city that gave us Haight-Ashbury during the '60s and '70s with its young "hippies" and their wide open use of drugs and "free love." San Francisco has a large and politically powerful homosexual community. It is not uncommon to observe gay and lesbian couples "rolling" in the grass at the city's parks. Until stopped by a court ruling, the mayor ordered city hall to issue marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples. The city is a sanctuary for illegal aliens from south of the border.
Recently, some practical jokers were drinking beer at a San Francisco bar when they decided to "honor" the forty-third President of the United States, George W. Bush. They formed the "Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco" and proceeded to have the name of a sewage treatment facility adjacent to the city zoo changed from the "Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant," its present name, to the "George W. Bush Sewage Plant."
Normally, a plot hatched over some beers to name a sewage plant after our nation's president would have gotten some laughs and ended there. But not in San Francisco where it takes the signatures of only 7,168 city voters to place a measure on the election ballot. The city has certified that the "commission" had obtained the signatures of 8,500 ubernuts, 1,300 more than needed to include the sewage plant name change on the November ballot.
If the measure passes, the renaming would take effect on January 20, 2009, when the new president is sworn in. And regardless of the measure's outcome, its supporters plan to commemorate the inaugural with a synchronized flush of hundreds of thousands of San Francisco toilets, an action that would send a flood of water, pee and turds rushing toward the sewage treatment facility.
Will a majority of the city's electorate vote to rename that facility the George W. Bush Sewage Plant? That all depends on how many Bush hating ubernuts there are in San Francisco. Considering the ultra-liberal makeup of San Francisco's population with its hatred of conservatives and its particular hatred of President Bush, I'm willing to bet that what started out as a practical joke will become a humiliating remembrance of George W. Bush.
If California is the land of nuts and fruits, then San Francisco is the city of ubernuts and fruits. This is the city that gave us Haight-Ashbury during the '60s and '70s with its young "hippies" and their wide open use of drugs and "free love." San Francisco has a large and politically powerful homosexual community. It is not uncommon to observe gay and lesbian couples "rolling" in the grass at the city's parks. Until stopped by a court ruling, the mayor ordered city hall to issue marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples. The city is a sanctuary for illegal aliens from south of the border.
Recently, some practical jokers were drinking beer at a San Francisco bar when they decided to "honor" the forty-third President of the United States, George W. Bush. They formed the "Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco" and proceeded to have the name of a sewage treatment facility adjacent to the city zoo changed from the "Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant," its present name, to the "George W. Bush Sewage Plant."
Normally, a plot hatched over some beers to name a sewage plant after our nation's president would have gotten some laughs and ended there. But not in San Francisco where it takes the signatures of only 7,168 city voters to place a measure on the election ballot. The city has certified that the "commission" had obtained the signatures of 8,500 ubernuts, 1,300 more than needed to include the sewage plant name change on the November ballot.
If the measure passes, the renaming would take effect on January 20, 2009, when the new president is sworn in. And regardless of the measure's outcome, its supporters plan to commemorate the inaugural with a synchronized flush of hundreds of thousands of San Francisco toilets, an action that would send a flood of water, pee and turds rushing toward the sewage treatment facility.
Will a majority of the city's electorate vote to rename that facility the George W. Bush Sewage Plant? That all depends on how many Bush hating ubernuts there are in San Francisco. Considering the ultra-liberal makeup of San Francisco's population with its hatred of conservatives and its particular hatred of President Bush, I'm willing to bet that what started out as a practical joke will become a humiliating remembrance of George W. Bush.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
DON'T MESS WITH TEXAS
Here we go again. Last October, I blogged INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE MEDDLES IN OUR DOMESTIC AFFAIRS (10-19-07) when Mexico went to the U.N.'s International Court of Justice (World Court) to claim that its nationals who were condemned to death for murder in the U.S. were deprived of their rights under the 1963 treaty known as the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.
According to the Vienna Convention, whenever a citizen of a foreign country is arrested he must be advised of his right to obtain the assistance of his country's consulate. The World Court, acting on Mexico's request, ordered a halt to the execution of 51 Mexican nationals who were not afforded that right, ruling they must be granted new sentencing hearings. President Bush then ordered Texas and the other death penalty states to comply with the World Court order.
Texas and the other states appealed Bush's order to the U.S. Supreme Court. Last March, by a 6 - 3 majority, it decided that the President was wrong in ordering the States to hold those new sentencing hearings, ruling that the World Court had no right to impose its will on the sovereignty of the United States. (Refer to my blog WORLD COURT AND THE PRESIDENT REBUFFED, 4-2-08.)
Now Mexico and the World Court have done it again. Mexico asked the international tribunal to stop Texas from executing five of its nationals. The World Court complied, ordering the State of Texas to grant those five cold-blooded killers a stay of execution. After our Supreme Court's ruling, what part of "no" does the U.N.'s International Court of Justice fail to understand?
Here are the five sterling Mexican nationals whose executions have been ordered stayed by the World Court:
Jose Medellin, 33. In 1993, he was convicted for the strangulation, rape and kidnapping of two Houston teenagers.
Cesar Fierro, 51. He has been on death row since 1980 for shooting an El Paso taxi driver to death. That's 28 years on death row.
Ruben Cardenas, 38. He was convicted for the 1997 rape, beating and strangulation of his victim.
Hector Garcia, 47. He was convicted for the 1989 killing of a 14-year-old boy during a convenience store robbery in the Rio Grande Valley.
Robert Ramos, 54. He was convicted for the 1992 murders of his wife and their two children, aged 7 and 3.
One would think that Mexico would be loath to embrace any of these five sorry-ass murderers as their nationals. Each of the condemned would easily qualify as a poster boy for the death penalty. Medellin's date with death has been rescheduled for August 5, a date that can't come too soon for the loved ones of the young girls he fatally brutalized - two families that have been waiting 15 years for justice to take its course.
The Governor and the Attorney General of Texas have no intention of complying with the World Court order, and we can be thankful for that. Mexico, which does not have the death penalty, would be well advised to look after its own affairs. In recent years, thousands of its citizens, including police officials and prosecutors, have been killed in the turf wars fought by Mexico's drug cartels..
Mexico and the United Nations should stay out of the domestic affairs of the United States. The World Court should limit its rulings to international border disputes, to war crimes, and to crimes against humanity, none of which apply to any Texas executions. And above all, they should heed the anti-litter campaign slogan - DON'T MESS WITH TEXAS.
According to the Vienna Convention, whenever a citizen of a foreign country is arrested he must be advised of his right to obtain the assistance of his country's consulate. The World Court, acting on Mexico's request, ordered a halt to the execution of 51 Mexican nationals who were not afforded that right, ruling they must be granted new sentencing hearings. President Bush then ordered Texas and the other death penalty states to comply with the World Court order.
Texas and the other states appealed Bush's order to the U.S. Supreme Court. Last March, by a 6 - 3 majority, it decided that the President was wrong in ordering the States to hold those new sentencing hearings, ruling that the World Court had no right to impose its will on the sovereignty of the United States. (Refer to my blog WORLD COURT AND THE PRESIDENT REBUFFED, 4-2-08.)
Now Mexico and the World Court have done it again. Mexico asked the international tribunal to stop Texas from executing five of its nationals. The World Court complied, ordering the State of Texas to grant those five cold-blooded killers a stay of execution. After our Supreme Court's ruling, what part of "no" does the U.N.'s International Court of Justice fail to understand?
Here are the five sterling Mexican nationals whose executions have been ordered stayed by the World Court:
Jose Medellin, 33. In 1993, he was convicted for the strangulation, rape and kidnapping of two Houston teenagers.
Cesar Fierro, 51. He has been on death row since 1980 for shooting an El Paso taxi driver to death. That's 28 years on death row.
Ruben Cardenas, 38. He was convicted for the 1997 rape, beating and strangulation of his victim.
Hector Garcia, 47. He was convicted for the 1989 killing of a 14-year-old boy during a convenience store robbery in the Rio Grande Valley.
Robert Ramos, 54. He was convicted for the 1992 murders of his wife and their two children, aged 7 and 3.
One would think that Mexico would be loath to embrace any of these five sorry-ass murderers as their nationals. Each of the condemned would easily qualify as a poster boy for the death penalty. Medellin's date with death has been rescheduled for August 5, a date that can't come too soon for the loved ones of the young girls he fatally brutalized - two families that have been waiting 15 years for justice to take its course.
The Governor and the Attorney General of Texas have no intention of complying with the World Court order, and we can be thankful for that. Mexico, which does not have the death penalty, would be well advised to look after its own affairs. In recent years, thousands of its citizens, including police officials and prosecutors, have been killed in the turf wars fought by Mexico's drug cartels..
Mexico and the United Nations should stay out of the domestic affairs of the United States. The World Court should limit its rulings to international border disputes, to war crimes, and to crimes against humanity, none of which apply to any Texas executions. And above all, they should heed the anti-litter campaign slogan - DON'T MESS WITH TEXAS.
Friday, July 18, 2008
THE GREAT STATE OF TEXAS
Trey, my "surrogate son," sent me this essay on Texas, explaining that "I received this from my friend, former co-worker and true Texan, Tommy Rodgers. It is worth reading." I agree, and that is why it is in this blog.
TEXAS
Have you ever looked at a map of the world? Look at Texas with me just for a second. That picture, with the Panhandle and the Gulf Coast , and the Red River and the Rio Grande is as much a part of you as anything ever will be. As soon as anyone anywhere in the world looks at it, they know what it is. It's Texas. Pick any kid off the street in Japan and draw him a picture of Texas in the dirt and he'll know what it is What happens if I show you a picture of any other state? You might get it, maybe after a second or two, but who else would? And even if you do, does it ever stir any feelings in you?
In every man, woman and child on this planet, there is a person who wishes just once he, or she, could be a real live Texan and get up on a horse, or ride off in a pickup. There is a little bit of Texas in everyone.
Texas is the Alamo . Texas is 183 men standing in a church, facing thousands of Mexican nationals, fighting for freedom, who had the chance to walk out and save themselves, but stayed instead to fight and die for the cause of freedom.
We send our kids to schools named William B. Travis and James Bowie and Davy Crockett, and do you know why? Because those men saw a line in the sand and they decided to cross it and be heroes. John Wayne paid to do the movie himself . That is the Spirit of Texas .
Texas is Sam Houston capturing Antonio Lopez De Santa Anna at San Jacinto.
Texas is huge forests of Piney Woods like the Davy Crockett and Sam Houston National Forests.
Texas is breathtaking mountains in the Big Bend.
Texas is the unparalleled beauty of bluebonnet fields in the Texas Hill Country.
Texas is the beautiful, warm beaches of the Gulf Coast of South Texas.
Texas is the shiny skyscrapers in Houston and Dallas.
Texas is world record bass from places like Lake Fork.
Texas is Mexican foods like nowhere else, not even Mexico.
Texas is the Fort Worth Stockyards, Bass Hall, the Ballpark in Arlington and the Astrodome. (guess now the Reliant Stadium too).
Texas is larger-than-life legends like Michael DeBakey, Denton Cooley, Willie Nelson, Buddy Holly, Gene Autry, Audie Murphy, Tommy Lee Jones, Waylon Jennings, Farrah Fawcett, Janis Joplin, Sandra Bullock, Kris Kristofferson, Tom Landry, Eva Longoria, Darrell Royal, ZZ Top, Eric Dickerson, Earl Campbell, Nolan Ryan, Sam Rayburn, Howard Hughes, George H. W. Bush, Lyndon B. Johnson, and let's not forget GEORGE STRAIT and PANTERA!!!!!!!!!!!!
Texas is great companies like Dell Computer, Texas Instruments and Compaq, Bell Helicopter and LOCKHEED MARTIN AEROSPACE, Home of the F-16 Jet Fighter and the JSF Fighter.
Texas is NASA.
Texas is huge herds of cattle and miles of crops.
Texas is home to the most amazing sunsets of gold over an empty field.
Texas is hundreds of deer running around neighborhoods and fields.
Texas is skies blackened with doves and fields full of deer.
Texas is a place where towns and cities shut down to watch the local high school football game on Friday nights and for the Cowboys on Monday Night Football, and for the night In Old San Antonio River Parade in San Antonio.
To drive across Texas is to drive 1/3 the way across the United States .
Texas is ocean beaches, deserts, lakes and rivers, mountains and prairies, and modern cities.
If it isn't already in Texas , you probably don't need it.
No one does anything bigger or better than it's done in Texas .
By federal law, Texas is the only state in the U.S. that can fly its flag at the same height as the U.S. flag Think about that for a second. You fly the Stars and Stripes at 20 feet in Maryland , California , or Maine , and your state flag, whatever it is, goes at 17 feet. You fly the Stars and Stripes in front of Klein Oak High or anyplace else at 20 feet, the Lone Star flies at the same height at 20 feet. Do you know why? Because it is the only state that was a Republic before it became a state.
Also, being a Texan is as high as being an American down here. Our capitol is the only one in the country that is taller than the capitol building in Washington , D.C. and we can divide our state into five states at any time if we wanted to!
We can become a republic again at any time the voters of Texas choose, and we included these things as part of the deal when we came on. That's the best part, right there.
Editor's Note: A few of these claims are in dispute. The Texas flag can fly at the same height as the U.S. flag only when there are two or four flags flying sid by side. When there are three flags, the Texas flag must be three feet lower. There are those who contend that there was never any agreement with the federal government permitting Texas to be divided into five states, nor was there any agreement permitting the Lone Star State to secede from the Union.
TEXAS
Have you ever looked at a map of the world? Look at Texas with me just for a second. That picture, with the Panhandle and the Gulf Coast , and the Red River and the Rio Grande is as much a part of you as anything ever will be. As soon as anyone anywhere in the world looks at it, they know what it is. It's Texas. Pick any kid off the street in Japan and draw him a picture of Texas in the dirt and he'll know what it is What happens if I show you a picture of any other state? You might get it, maybe after a second or two, but who else would? And even if you do, does it ever stir any feelings in you?
In every man, woman and child on this planet, there is a person who wishes just once he, or she, could be a real live Texan and get up on a horse, or ride off in a pickup. There is a little bit of Texas in everyone.
Texas is the Alamo . Texas is 183 men standing in a church, facing thousands of Mexican nationals, fighting for freedom, who had the chance to walk out and save themselves, but stayed instead to fight and die for the cause of freedom.
We send our kids to schools named William B. Travis and James Bowie and Davy Crockett, and do you know why? Because those men saw a line in the sand and they decided to cross it and be heroes. John Wayne paid to do the movie himself . That is the Spirit of Texas .
Texas is Sam Houston capturing Antonio Lopez De Santa Anna at San Jacinto.
Texas is huge forests of Piney Woods like the Davy Crockett and Sam Houston National Forests.
Texas is breathtaking mountains in the Big Bend.
Texas is the unparalleled beauty of bluebonnet fields in the Texas Hill Country.
Texas is the beautiful, warm beaches of the Gulf Coast of South Texas.
Texas is the shiny skyscrapers in Houston and Dallas.
Texas is world record bass from places like Lake Fork.
Texas is Mexican foods like nowhere else, not even Mexico.
Texas is the Fort Worth Stockyards, Bass Hall, the Ballpark in Arlington and the Astrodome. (guess now the Reliant Stadium too).
Texas is larger-than-life legends like Michael DeBakey, Denton Cooley, Willie Nelson, Buddy Holly, Gene Autry, Audie Murphy, Tommy Lee Jones, Waylon Jennings, Farrah Fawcett, Janis Joplin, Sandra Bullock, Kris Kristofferson, Tom Landry, Eva Longoria, Darrell Royal, ZZ Top, Eric Dickerson, Earl Campbell, Nolan Ryan, Sam Rayburn, Howard Hughes, George H. W. Bush, Lyndon B. Johnson, and let's not forget GEORGE STRAIT and PANTERA!!!!!!!!!!!!
Texas is great companies like Dell Computer, Texas Instruments and Compaq, Bell Helicopter and LOCKHEED MARTIN AEROSPACE, Home of the F-16 Jet Fighter and the JSF Fighter.
Texas is NASA.
Texas is huge herds of cattle and miles of crops.
Texas is home to the most amazing sunsets of gold over an empty field.
Texas is hundreds of deer running around neighborhoods and fields.
Texas is skies blackened with doves and fields full of deer.
Texas is a place where towns and cities shut down to watch the local high school football game on Friday nights and for the Cowboys on Monday Night Football, and for the night In Old San Antonio River Parade in San Antonio.
To drive across Texas is to drive 1/3 the way across the United States .
Texas is ocean beaches, deserts, lakes and rivers, mountains and prairies, and modern cities.
If it isn't already in Texas , you probably don't need it.
No one does anything bigger or better than it's done in Texas .
By federal law, Texas is the only state in the U.S. that can fly its flag at the same height as the U.S. flag Think about that for a second. You fly the Stars and Stripes at 20 feet in Maryland , California , or Maine , and your state flag, whatever it is, goes at 17 feet. You fly the Stars and Stripes in front of Klein Oak High or anyplace else at 20 feet, the Lone Star flies at the same height at 20 feet. Do you know why? Because it is the only state that was a Republic before it became a state.
Also, being a Texan is as high as being an American down here. Our capitol is the only one in the country that is taller than the capitol building in Washington , D.C. and we can divide our state into five states at any time if we wanted to!
We can become a republic again at any time the voters of Texas choose, and we included these things as part of the deal when we came on. That's the best part, right there.
Editor's Note: A few of these claims are in dispute. The Texas flag can fly at the same height as the U.S. flag only when there are two or four flags flying sid by side. When there are three flags, the Texas flag must be three feet lower. There are those who contend that there was never any agreement with the federal government permitting Texas to be divided into five states, nor was there any agreement permitting the Lone Star State to secede from the Union.
A PAIR OF FOUR-FLUSHING PHONIES
A week ago, I published "Cut His Nuts Off" (7-11-08) about Jessee Jackson saying he wanted to cut Obama's nuts off, a remark he made with an open mic while on a break during an interview on Fox News Channel. Unknown to me at the time was the fact that Fox deliberately concealed a much more damaging part of Jackson's remarks.
As you may recall, these are Jackson's remarks that Fox initially made available to the public: "See, Barack's been talking down to black people on this faith-based. I wanna cut his nuts off. Barack, he's talking down to black people." Unknown to the network, someone within the news organization leaked Jackson's remark containing the "N" word to the internet, a remark Fox had no intention of making public.
Here is what Jackson actually said: "See, Barack's been talking down to black people on this faith-based. I wanna cut his nuts off. Barack, he's talking down to black people, telling niggers how to behave." Whoa, what was that? Telling niggers how to behave? Had I known Jackson said that, the title of my blog would have been: "Cut his nuts off for telling niggers how to behave."
The words Fox attempted to conceal are from a preacher who has been on a crusade against the use of the "N" word. Jackson is the same guy who, two years ago, called for a boycott of the Seinfeld TV show DVD because Mike Richards, Kramer on the show, used the "N" word during an angry tirade at a West Hollywood comedy club. What I cannot fathom is why did Fox conceal Jackson's use of the "N" word when that network should have exposed his hypocricy?
When Jackson's use of the word "nigger" was brought to the attention of his buddy Al Sharpton, how did the other preacher react? The harshest thing Sharpton could say was that "I'm very dissapointed." Dissapointed? Now what do you suppose his raction would have been had some white radio or TV personality used the "N" word? Sharpton would have gone ballistic, demanding that he be fired.
Jackson and Sharpton are nothing more than a pair of four-flushing phonies. Why do politicians, like Obama and the Cintons, keep sucking up to these two hypocrites? Why does the media keep providing these two charlatans with a platform? When are African-Americans going to wake up and realize that Jackson and Sharpton have been playing them for suckers with their rabble-rousing gospel of black victimhood? It can't be too soon!
As you may recall, these are Jackson's remarks that Fox initially made available to the public: "See, Barack's been talking down to black people on this faith-based. I wanna cut his nuts off. Barack, he's talking down to black people." Unknown to the network, someone within the news organization leaked Jackson's remark containing the "N" word to the internet, a remark Fox had no intention of making public.
Here is what Jackson actually said: "See, Barack's been talking down to black people on this faith-based. I wanna cut his nuts off. Barack, he's talking down to black people, telling niggers how to behave." Whoa, what was that? Telling niggers how to behave? Had I known Jackson said that, the title of my blog would have been: "Cut his nuts off for telling niggers how to behave."
The words Fox attempted to conceal are from a preacher who has been on a crusade against the use of the "N" word. Jackson is the same guy who, two years ago, called for a boycott of the Seinfeld TV show DVD because Mike Richards, Kramer on the show, used the "N" word during an angry tirade at a West Hollywood comedy club. What I cannot fathom is why did Fox conceal Jackson's use of the "N" word when that network should have exposed his hypocricy?
When Jackson's use of the word "nigger" was brought to the attention of his buddy Al Sharpton, how did the other preacher react? The harshest thing Sharpton could say was that "I'm very dissapointed." Dissapointed? Now what do you suppose his raction would have been had some white radio or TV personality used the "N" word? Sharpton would have gone ballistic, demanding that he be fired.
Jackson and Sharpton are nothing more than a pair of four-flushing phonies. Why do politicians, like Obama and the Cintons, keep sucking up to these two hypocrites? Why does the media keep providing these two charlatans with a platform? When are African-Americans going to wake up and realize that Jackson and Sharpton have been playing them for suckers with their rabble-rousing gospel of black victimhood? It can't be too soon!
HERO TO THE PALESTINIANS
Since I starte blogging, I have frequently written on the Palestinian and Arab hatred of Jews and their determination to exterminate the State of Israel. I have included Mahmoud Abbas, the "moderate" Palestinian president, among those wanting to destroy Israel. Two weeks ago, I blogged about Israel's swap with Hezbollah of Samir Kuntar and four other Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorists for the bodies of two Israeli soldiers.
Kuntar, who in 1979 brutally murdered two Israeli men and killed a four-year-old child by repeatedly smashing her head with his rifle butt, has received a hero's welcome upon his return to Lebanon. Mahmoud Abbas sent "blessings to Samir Kuntar's family" and his spokesman Ahmad Abdul Rahman sent "warm blessings to Hezbollah on the return of the heroes of freedom headed by the great Samir Kuntar."
The support by Abbas and other "moderates" for those who have sworn to wipe Israel off the map is one of the reasons I have opposed the international community's call for Israel to make suicidal concessions to the Palestinians. The "Road Map to Peace," as envisioned by the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States, is a path paved with the stones of Israeli concessions, making it a roadway leading to the eventual dissapearance of the Jewish State.
In her column in today's Townhall.com, Mona Charen details Kuntar's brutality, the heroes welcome he received in Lebanon, and the likely consequences of the Israeli swap. Here is Mona Charen's Townhall column:
"A Child Killer's Homecoming" by Mona Charen
What can you say about a people who welcome a child murderer as a hero?
Most Americans are familiar with the brutal murder of wheelchair-bound Leon Klinghoffer on the cruise ship Achille Laura in 1985. Terrorists led by Abu Abbas (who was later given safe haven in Baghdad by Saddam Hussein) took the ship captive and threw Klinghoffer overboard. But few recall that the ship was seized to bargain for the release of, among others, Samir Kuntar from an Israeli prison.
Kuntar had taken part in an earlier terror attack. In 1979, as a 16-year-old, he and four others had traveled to northern Israel by boat from Lebanon and come ashore in the seaside town of Nahariya. At midnight, Smadar Haran recalled, they burst into her apartment building. Peering out to see what the noise was, Smadar, mother of two, slammed shut her apartment door when she saw the terrorists -- but too late. Kuntar had glimpsed her. Her husband, Danny, helped Smadar and their younger daughter, 2-year-old Yael, to squeeze into a crawl space above the bedroom.
Smadar wrote later, "I will never forget the joy and the hatred in their voices as they swaggered about hunting for us, firing their guns and throwing grenades." As police began to arrive, Kuntar and the others dragged Danny and 4-year-old Einat down to the beach. With Einat watching, Kuntar shot Danny in the head and then threw his body into the surf. Kuntar then repeatedly smashed Einat's head against a rock with his rifle butt, killing her, too. Yael did not survive the attack either. In an effort to keep the baby from crying and betraying their hiding place, Smadar had accidentally suffocated her.
This week, Kuntar, dressed in fatigues and sporting a Hitlerian mustache and haircut, walked down a red carpet arrayed for him in Beirut. The government closed all offices and declared a national day of celebration. Tens of thousands of Lebanese cheered, waved flags, threw confetti, and set off fireworks as Hezbollah staged a rally to celebrate their "victory" over Israel. Mahmoud Abbas, the "moderate" leader of the Palestinian Authority, sent "blessings to Samir Kuntar's family." PA spokesman Ahmad Abdul Rahman sent "warm blessings to Hezbollah on the return of the heroes of freedom headed by the great Samir Kuntar."
The statement went on to laud the "heroic" actions of "martyr" Dalal Mughrabi, whose body was returned to Lebanon. She had participated in the worst terror attack ever against Israeli civilians, the hijacking of a tourist bus in which 37 people including 12 children were murdered. The Palestinian Authority spokesman took the opportunity to vow that the Fatah party "will continue to struggle in the way of the pure Martyrs, until the state is liberated and the Palestinian state is established with Jerusalem as its capital." Kuntar, acknowledging the adulation of the crowd, took the microphone and declared, "I return from Palestine only to go back to Palestine."
And what did Israel get in return? Two corpses. The bodies of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, the two reservists whose kidnapping in 2006 prompted the botched and inconclusive Israel/Hezbollah war. After this shameful and stupid trade of live terrorists for dead soldiers, Hezbollah has achieved its goal.
In 2006, Hezbollah had crossed the border and attacked two Israeli border patrol jeeps, killing three and wounding two. Two others, Regev and Goldwasser, also believed wounded in the attack, were kidnapped and taken into Lebanon on orders from Hezbollah leader Sheikh Nasrallah, who thought he could demand the release of all Lebanese terrorists in Israeli prisons in exchange for the two soldiers. (Hamas simultaneously kidnapped Gilad Shalit in the south.) Israel at first responded with a war. But while most of the civilized world rooted for the Israelis to destroy Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, Israel flinched and conducted a feckless conflict. Thousands of Lebanese and Israeli civilians were hurt and displaced, but nothing was settled -- until now. Now Hezbollah has achieved total victory.
Every Israeli is now at much higher risk for kidnapping and murder. Why in the world should Israel's enemies shrink from murdering their captives if they get just as much for corpses? Hamas continues to hold Shalit in Gaza. His life expectancy has just been radically reduced. It's inspiring that the Israeli government (like the U.S. armed forces) is devoted to bringing their people home dead or alive. But not like this. Not like this.
At the welcoming ceremony for Kuntar and his fellow terrorists, Sheikh Nasrallah made a brief appearance. In company with Lebanese president Michel Suleiman, Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, and Speaker of Parliament Nabih Berri, Nasrallah hugged and kissed Kuntar and the rest. "The time of defeat is long gone," he said. "Today is the time of victory."
Who can deny it?
Kuntar, who in 1979 brutally murdered two Israeli men and killed a four-year-old child by repeatedly smashing her head with his rifle butt, has received a hero's welcome upon his return to Lebanon. Mahmoud Abbas sent "blessings to Samir Kuntar's family" and his spokesman Ahmad Abdul Rahman sent "warm blessings to Hezbollah on the return of the heroes of freedom headed by the great Samir Kuntar."
The support by Abbas and other "moderates" for those who have sworn to wipe Israel off the map is one of the reasons I have opposed the international community's call for Israel to make suicidal concessions to the Palestinians. The "Road Map to Peace," as envisioned by the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States, is a path paved with the stones of Israeli concessions, making it a roadway leading to the eventual dissapearance of the Jewish State.
In her column in today's Townhall.com, Mona Charen details Kuntar's brutality, the heroes welcome he received in Lebanon, and the likely consequences of the Israeli swap. Here is Mona Charen's Townhall column:
"A Child Killer's Homecoming" by Mona Charen
What can you say about a people who welcome a child murderer as a hero?
Most Americans are familiar with the brutal murder of wheelchair-bound Leon Klinghoffer on the cruise ship Achille Laura in 1985. Terrorists led by Abu Abbas (who was later given safe haven in Baghdad by Saddam Hussein) took the ship captive and threw Klinghoffer overboard. But few recall that the ship was seized to bargain for the release of, among others, Samir Kuntar from an Israeli prison.
Kuntar had taken part in an earlier terror attack. In 1979, as a 16-year-old, he and four others had traveled to northern Israel by boat from Lebanon and come ashore in the seaside town of Nahariya. At midnight, Smadar Haran recalled, they burst into her apartment building. Peering out to see what the noise was, Smadar, mother of two, slammed shut her apartment door when she saw the terrorists -- but too late. Kuntar had glimpsed her. Her husband, Danny, helped Smadar and their younger daughter, 2-year-old Yael, to squeeze into a crawl space above the bedroom.
Smadar wrote later, "I will never forget the joy and the hatred in their voices as they swaggered about hunting for us, firing their guns and throwing grenades." As police began to arrive, Kuntar and the others dragged Danny and 4-year-old Einat down to the beach. With Einat watching, Kuntar shot Danny in the head and then threw his body into the surf. Kuntar then repeatedly smashed Einat's head against a rock with his rifle butt, killing her, too. Yael did not survive the attack either. In an effort to keep the baby from crying and betraying their hiding place, Smadar had accidentally suffocated her.
This week, Kuntar, dressed in fatigues and sporting a Hitlerian mustache and haircut, walked down a red carpet arrayed for him in Beirut. The government closed all offices and declared a national day of celebration. Tens of thousands of Lebanese cheered, waved flags, threw confetti, and set off fireworks as Hezbollah staged a rally to celebrate their "victory" over Israel. Mahmoud Abbas, the "moderate" leader of the Palestinian Authority, sent "blessings to Samir Kuntar's family." PA spokesman Ahmad Abdul Rahman sent "warm blessings to Hezbollah on the return of the heroes of freedom headed by the great Samir Kuntar."
The statement went on to laud the "heroic" actions of "martyr" Dalal Mughrabi, whose body was returned to Lebanon. She had participated in the worst terror attack ever against Israeli civilians, the hijacking of a tourist bus in which 37 people including 12 children were murdered. The Palestinian Authority spokesman took the opportunity to vow that the Fatah party "will continue to struggle in the way of the pure Martyrs, until the state is liberated and the Palestinian state is established with Jerusalem as its capital." Kuntar, acknowledging the adulation of the crowd, took the microphone and declared, "I return from Palestine only to go back to Palestine."
And what did Israel get in return? Two corpses. The bodies of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, the two reservists whose kidnapping in 2006 prompted the botched and inconclusive Israel/Hezbollah war. After this shameful and stupid trade of live terrorists for dead soldiers, Hezbollah has achieved its goal.
In 2006, Hezbollah had crossed the border and attacked two Israeli border patrol jeeps, killing three and wounding two. Two others, Regev and Goldwasser, also believed wounded in the attack, were kidnapped and taken into Lebanon on orders from Hezbollah leader Sheikh Nasrallah, who thought he could demand the release of all Lebanese terrorists in Israeli prisons in exchange for the two soldiers. (Hamas simultaneously kidnapped Gilad Shalit in the south.) Israel at first responded with a war. But while most of the civilized world rooted for the Israelis to destroy Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, Israel flinched and conducted a feckless conflict. Thousands of Lebanese and Israeli civilians were hurt and displaced, but nothing was settled -- until now. Now Hezbollah has achieved total victory.
Every Israeli is now at much higher risk for kidnapping and murder. Why in the world should Israel's enemies shrink from murdering their captives if they get just as much for corpses? Hamas continues to hold Shalit in Gaza. His life expectancy has just been radically reduced. It's inspiring that the Israeli government (like the U.S. armed forces) is devoted to bringing their people home dead or alive. But not like this. Not like this.
At the welcoming ceremony for Kuntar and his fellow terrorists, Sheikh Nasrallah made a brief appearance. In company with Lebanese president Michel Suleiman, Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, and Speaker of Parliament Nabih Berri, Nasrallah hugged and kissed Kuntar and the rest. "The time of defeat is long gone," he said. "Today is the time of victory."
Who can deny it?
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
SAY WHAT?
"We must also engage, however, in the more difficult task of understanding the sources of such madness. The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others. Such a failure of empathy, such numbness to the pain of a child or the desperation of a parent, is not innate; nor, history tells us, is it unique to a particular culture, religion, or ethnicity. It may find expression in a particular brand of violence, and may be channeled by particular demagogues or fanatics. Most often, though, it grows out of a climate of poverty and ignorance, helplessness and despair."
Say what? That was Barack Obama's solution for stopping jihad. It was published in a Chicago newspaper eight days after 9/11 and quoted again in the July 21, 2008 issue of the New Yorker, the one with the satirical cartoon on its cover depicting "President" Obama in the Oval Office dressed as a Muslim fist-bumping Michelle, an assault rifle and bandolier draped over her shoulder, an American flag burning in the fireplace and a portrait of Osama bin Laden over the mantelpiece.
Obama's explanation of how to stop Jihad, is typical intellectual gobbledygook. Michelle Malkin called it "a self-parody of blind, deaf and dumb Kumbaya liberalism." Whatever. Obama attributes the 9/11 attacks to a climate of poverty, ignorance, helplessness and despair. Say what? Osama bin Laden is a member of a wealthy Saudi family and attended Oxford. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama's second-in-command, comes from a wealthy Egyptian family and has a medical degree in surgery.
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the instigator and prime organizer of the 9/11 attacks, received a degree in mechanical engineering from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. Mohammed Atta, one of the 9/11 hijackers, came from a wealthy Egyptian family, received a degree in architecture from Cairo University and studied urban planning at the Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg in Germany. Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, the beheader of journalist Daniel Pearl was born to a wealthy family in England and attended the London School of Economics, where he studied Applied Mathematics and Economics. And then there were those seven Muslim physicians who participated in the 2007 London and Glasgow bombings.
So much for poverty, ignorance, helplessness and despair. When you look at the terrorists either with or linked to al-Qaeda, and at the leadership of Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian terrorist organizations, you will find that their leaders and operatives come from upper-middle class or wealthy families and are well educated. And that makes Obama's solution for stopping jihad sound like the musings of an educated idiot.
For those, like Obama, who don't seem to get why 9/11 happened, let me paraphrase Bill Clinton: It's the age-old struggle of the Islamic faithful against Western civilization, stupid!
Say what? That was Barack Obama's solution for stopping jihad. It was published in a Chicago newspaper eight days after 9/11 and quoted again in the July 21, 2008 issue of the New Yorker, the one with the satirical cartoon on its cover depicting "President" Obama in the Oval Office dressed as a Muslim fist-bumping Michelle, an assault rifle and bandolier draped over her shoulder, an American flag burning in the fireplace and a portrait of Osama bin Laden over the mantelpiece.
Obama's explanation of how to stop Jihad, is typical intellectual gobbledygook. Michelle Malkin called it "a self-parody of blind, deaf and dumb Kumbaya liberalism." Whatever. Obama attributes the 9/11 attacks to a climate of poverty, ignorance, helplessness and despair. Say what? Osama bin Laden is a member of a wealthy Saudi family and attended Oxford. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama's second-in-command, comes from a wealthy Egyptian family and has a medical degree in surgery.
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the instigator and prime organizer of the 9/11 attacks, received a degree in mechanical engineering from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. Mohammed Atta, one of the 9/11 hijackers, came from a wealthy Egyptian family, received a degree in architecture from Cairo University and studied urban planning at the Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg in Germany. Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, the beheader of journalist Daniel Pearl was born to a wealthy family in England and attended the London School of Economics, where he studied Applied Mathematics and Economics. And then there were those seven Muslim physicians who participated in the 2007 London and Glasgow bombings.
So much for poverty, ignorance, helplessness and despair. When you look at the terrorists either with or linked to al-Qaeda, and at the leadership of Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian terrorist organizations, you will find that their leaders and operatives come from upper-middle class or wealthy families and are well educated. And that makes Obama's solution for stopping jihad sound like the musings of an educated idiot.
For those, like Obama, who don't seem to get why 9/11 happened, let me paraphrase Bill Clinton: It's the age-old struggle of the Islamic faithful against Western civilization, stupid!
Sunday, July 13, 2008
A FORGERY CONTINUES TO FLOURISH (Part 2)
Here is the conclusion of Rev. Stokes article on the forgery and use of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion."
"When most think of religious influences around Nicholas II, attention is usually given to Grigori Rasputin, the mad monk who haunted that scene beginning about 1905. But often overlooked, and certainly more ominous as far as long-term impact on the world is concerned, is the influence of his cultic contemporary, Sergei Alexandrovich Nilus. He was a writer on religious matters and a self-styled spiritual mystic.
And he is also the man who first published Golovinski’s sinister forgery.
Initially placing the Protocols as a chapter in one of his books, Dr. Nilus saw to it that the potentate was fully briefed and convinced about the purported Jewish threat. And like Rasputin, he also had the ear of ruler’s wife – so the Tsar, never a man to have his own firm opinions, fell prey to the lie. And in the days following his nation’s defeat at the hands of the Japanese at a loss of several hundred thousand men, not to mention overwhelming financial expense, circumstances were ripe for the rotten fruit of a compelling scapegoat story.
On January 9, 1905, the Tsar’s troops opened fire on protesters who peacefully marched near the palace in St. Petersburg. This would become known as Bloody Sunday. The Tsar and his inner circle saw in the Protocols the real reason for the unrest – it was a big Jewish plot to overthrow the monarchy.
So it began – the gargantuan conspiratorial lie that has reared its hideous head time and time again over the past one hundred years. Jewish plotters were blamed for The Great War (1914-1918). Then in its aftermath, when Germany was struggling to recover from defeat, the big lie was discovered by the greatest demagogue of the day, Adolf Hitler. By the time the future German dictator was sent to prison in 1923, he was well versed in the Protocols and drew significantly from the forgery as he wrote his own hate-filled and delusional to me, Mein Kampf.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion became, to men already filled with anti-Semitic ideas, proof positive of a sinister Jewish agenda. To those who believed the lie, the writings were sufficient evidence for the indictment, condemnation, and eventual execution of these conspiratorial people. The Protocols in many ways fueled the Holocaust.
Yet all along, reasonable people – scholars, journalists, and statesmen – have gone to great lengths to expose the fraudulent nature of the Protocols. Beginning with a lengthy analysis in the Times of London in 1921, to a celebrated trial in Switzerland in 1935, to a report by the United States Senate in 1964, good people have said again and again: "the book’s a fake." Good people still do.
It’s the bad people who are the problem.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the biggest publishing hoax of the past one hundred years, is not going away. This is largely because Islamists are using it, with great effectiveness, to fan contemporary flames of hatred. In fact, it’s arguable that there are more copies of this lie-laden text extant, than ever before. The forgery is used by politicians and clerics in the Muslim world to justify their distorted and destructive world-view.
Gamal Abdel Nassar, the late president of Egypt, recommended the book to his countrymen. His Saudi contemporary, King Faisal, had the forgery put in hotels in his nation, like Gideon Bibles (he once gave a copy to Henry Kissinger). The Ayatollah Khomeini, who took over in Iran in 1979, made the Protocols a national bestseller. An entire generation of Islamic thinkers and scholars now aggressively promotes the forgery as literal fact.
Hamas owes Article 32 of its charter to these long-ago-discredited writings when it says things like: "Zionist scheming has no end…Their scheme has been laid out in the Protocols of Zion." And it’s, of course, a perennial favorite with Holocaust deniers such as that wacky Iranian, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Islamist anti-Semitism is at the root of the so-called War on Terror. The bad guys use the Protocols of the Elders of Zion as their proof-text. It would make sense that if we really want to eradicate the symptom we must deal frankly with the cause. Islamism isn’t an aberration. It’s an ideology based on prejudices rooted in the distant past and lies that won’t seem to go away.
Shortly before his death in early 2005, the legendary pioneer of twentieth-century graphic art, Will Eisner, a man who spent much of his life debunking the infamous forgery, called the Protocols a "terrifying vampire-like fraud."
Indeed."
"When most think of religious influences around Nicholas II, attention is usually given to Grigori Rasputin, the mad monk who haunted that scene beginning about 1905. But often overlooked, and certainly more ominous as far as long-term impact on the world is concerned, is the influence of his cultic contemporary, Sergei Alexandrovich Nilus. He was a writer on religious matters and a self-styled spiritual mystic.
And he is also the man who first published Golovinski’s sinister forgery.
Initially placing the Protocols as a chapter in one of his books, Dr. Nilus saw to it that the potentate was fully briefed and convinced about the purported Jewish threat. And like Rasputin, he also had the ear of ruler’s wife – so the Tsar, never a man to have his own firm opinions, fell prey to the lie. And in the days following his nation’s defeat at the hands of the Japanese at a loss of several hundred thousand men, not to mention overwhelming financial expense, circumstances were ripe for the rotten fruit of a compelling scapegoat story.
On January 9, 1905, the Tsar’s troops opened fire on protesters who peacefully marched near the palace in St. Petersburg. This would become known as Bloody Sunday. The Tsar and his inner circle saw in the Protocols the real reason for the unrest – it was a big Jewish plot to overthrow the monarchy.
So it began – the gargantuan conspiratorial lie that has reared its hideous head time and time again over the past one hundred years. Jewish plotters were blamed for The Great War (1914-1918). Then in its aftermath, when Germany was struggling to recover from defeat, the big lie was discovered by the greatest demagogue of the day, Adolf Hitler. By the time the future German dictator was sent to prison in 1923, he was well versed in the Protocols and drew significantly from the forgery as he wrote his own hate-filled and delusional to me, Mein Kampf.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion became, to men already filled with anti-Semitic ideas, proof positive of a sinister Jewish agenda. To those who believed the lie, the writings were sufficient evidence for the indictment, condemnation, and eventual execution of these conspiratorial people. The Protocols in many ways fueled the Holocaust.
Yet all along, reasonable people – scholars, journalists, and statesmen – have gone to great lengths to expose the fraudulent nature of the Protocols. Beginning with a lengthy analysis in the Times of London in 1921, to a celebrated trial in Switzerland in 1935, to a report by the United States Senate in 1964, good people have said again and again: "the book’s a fake." Good people still do.
It’s the bad people who are the problem.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the biggest publishing hoax of the past one hundred years, is not going away. This is largely because Islamists are using it, with great effectiveness, to fan contemporary flames of hatred. In fact, it’s arguable that there are more copies of this lie-laden text extant, than ever before. The forgery is used by politicians and clerics in the Muslim world to justify their distorted and destructive world-view.
Gamal Abdel Nassar, the late president of Egypt, recommended the book to his countrymen. His Saudi contemporary, King Faisal, had the forgery put in hotels in his nation, like Gideon Bibles (he once gave a copy to Henry Kissinger). The Ayatollah Khomeini, who took over in Iran in 1979, made the Protocols a national bestseller. An entire generation of Islamic thinkers and scholars now aggressively promotes the forgery as literal fact.
Hamas owes Article 32 of its charter to these long-ago-discredited writings when it says things like: "Zionist scheming has no end…Their scheme has been laid out in the Protocols of Zion." And it’s, of course, a perennial favorite with Holocaust deniers such as that wacky Iranian, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Islamist anti-Semitism is at the root of the so-called War on Terror. The bad guys use the Protocols of the Elders of Zion as their proof-text. It would make sense that if we really want to eradicate the symptom we must deal frankly with the cause. Islamism isn’t an aberration. It’s an ideology based on prejudices rooted in the distant past and lies that won’t seem to go away.
Shortly before his death in early 2005, the legendary pioneer of twentieth-century graphic art, Will Eisner, a man who spent much of his life debunking the infamous forgery, called the Protocols a "terrifying vampire-like fraud."
Indeed."
A FORGERY CONTINUES TO FLOURISH (Part 1)
David R. Stokes is the Senior Pastor of Fair Oaks Church in Fairfax, Virginia. He is also a prolific author. His most recent article, "The Big Anti-Semitic Lie That Won't Go Away" appeared in today's Townhall.com. The article deals with the forgery of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" and the use of this forged document by Muslims and others to spread their hatred of Jews.
Back in the '70s, I was shocked to find a stack of the Protocols in the college bookstore at College of the Mainland where I taught. The Protocols were required reading for a course offered by one of the college's avowed Marxists (Robert H.). He used the Protocols to teach students that Jews have been plotting to control the world.
Due to the length of Rev. Stokes' article, I have divided it into two parts. Here is Part 1 of "The Big Anti-Semitic Lie That Won't Go Away":
"While fires were still smoldering at Ground Zero, the Pentagon, and in a Pennsylvanian pasture, malicious people conjured up an evil myth. In the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, many in the Arab world believed that the vicious attack on America was not the work of Islamists, but rather was an Israeli-driven Mossad operation. This legend soon developed muscular legs and is now widely regarded by millions of Muslims as the truth.
And why not? For decades school children in Muslim nations (not to mention their parents at home) have been baptized in anti-Semitic narratives. The opinions in their world about Jews in general, and Israel in particular, are concrete – thoroughly mixed up and permanently set.
And the most persistent and pernicious ideas that have been accepted by millions as factual truth flowed from the poisonous pen of a guy named Mathieu Golovinski.
The spurious publication called the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is an Islamist must-read. The work tells a story that fits the pattern of long-standing prejudices. The words reinforce the visceral hatred Islamists have toward Jews.
Islamist anti-Semitism is not a new thing. It didn’t begin with the creation of the modern state of Israel in 1948, or the Six-Day War in 1967. It was around long before there was a Hitler – in fact, it grew up alongside Islam from the beginning. It’s an enmity that can be traced back to Muhammad and what he said, wrote, and did. And to those looking for ammunition to use against people they have been historically conditioned to hate, the often denounced and repeatedly refuted forgery is just what the evil doctor ordered.
In the interest of fairness and full disclosure, it is true that non-Muslims and non-Nazis have at times bought into the notions set forth by the Protocols - some even in the name of Christianity. This is sad. But it is also statistically rare these days. Neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan types apparently still peddle the book, but these people are the proverbial skunks at our national picnic. And eighty years ago, there were a few prominent Americans (automobile magnate Henry Ford notable among them) who endorsed the writings. But that was a passing, though very regrettable, thing.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion purports to be written evidence of a vast and secret Jewish conspiracy to dominate the world. It’s presented as a factual and detailed description of a late-nineteenth century meeting to plot international Hebrew hegemony through manipulation and treachery. These ideas are at the root of the mother of all conspiracy theories for those who live in the bizarre world of alternative historical reality.
In fact, the publication is a forgery – probably the most sinister and infamous fake in literary history.
The year is 1898, and Nicholas II rules a Russia that’s beginning to experience the revolutionary stirrings of modernism. The Tsar is not the sharpest knife in the drawer and tends to be easily led by strong people around him. He tries to take incremental steps toward leading the nation away from its feudal past, but some in his court are alarmed. Thus, evil men began to seek a way to short-circuit these liberalizing influences.
If only they could convince the Tsar that the voices of change he’s listening to are motivated by something other than the best interests of Russia – but how? It was in this environment that the greatest of all anti-Semitic lies was born. A threatening conspiracy would be manufactured - one that would bring Nicholas to his senses – and the Jews to their knees.
Mathieu Golovinski was living in Parisian exile at the time. Though he was Russian, having been born in the Simbirsk region in 1865, he was forced to flee after repeated clashes with Russian authorities, usually having to do with his tendency to fabricate documents and evidence in legal matters. He was a master of spin, innuendo, and dirty tricks. He was also very skilled in the arts of forgery and plagiarism.
And he worked for the Okhrana – the Tsar’s secret police.
He was approached by agents’ provocateur from the Tsar’s inner circle about creating a convincing anti-Jewish legend. They needed a narrative, one that would be seen as proof of a sinister plot behind the winds of change beginning to blow in Russia. Golovinski was commissioned to fabricate the evidence.
He came across an old book, written in 1864 by an anti-monarchist activist named Maurice Joly. It was entitled, Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquie and was written as a thinly disguised attack on Napoleon III’s rule in France. The book was suppressed by the French government and the writer was imprisoned. He committed suicide in 1878.
A plan was hatched to borrow from this obscure book, changing some of its cosmetics and phrasing. It would be recast, using Joly’s fictional dialogue for a model, as the actual deliberations of a secret cabal of Jews bent on taking over the world. When the fake was finished, it was spirited back to St. Petersburg, and all that would be needed was a way to get it before the ruler of the realm.
Enter the other religious zealot in and around the court of the Tsar."
Continued in Part 2.
Back in the '70s, I was shocked to find a stack of the Protocols in the college bookstore at College of the Mainland where I taught. The Protocols were required reading for a course offered by one of the college's avowed Marxists (Robert H.). He used the Protocols to teach students that Jews have been plotting to control the world.
Due to the length of Rev. Stokes' article, I have divided it into two parts. Here is Part 1 of "The Big Anti-Semitic Lie That Won't Go Away":
"While fires were still smoldering at Ground Zero, the Pentagon, and in a Pennsylvanian pasture, malicious people conjured up an evil myth. In the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, many in the Arab world believed that the vicious attack on America was not the work of Islamists, but rather was an Israeli-driven Mossad operation. This legend soon developed muscular legs and is now widely regarded by millions of Muslims as the truth.
And why not? For decades school children in Muslim nations (not to mention their parents at home) have been baptized in anti-Semitic narratives. The opinions in their world about Jews in general, and Israel in particular, are concrete – thoroughly mixed up and permanently set.
And the most persistent and pernicious ideas that have been accepted by millions as factual truth flowed from the poisonous pen of a guy named Mathieu Golovinski.
The spurious publication called the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is an Islamist must-read. The work tells a story that fits the pattern of long-standing prejudices. The words reinforce the visceral hatred Islamists have toward Jews.
Islamist anti-Semitism is not a new thing. It didn’t begin with the creation of the modern state of Israel in 1948, or the Six-Day War in 1967. It was around long before there was a Hitler – in fact, it grew up alongside Islam from the beginning. It’s an enmity that can be traced back to Muhammad and what he said, wrote, and did. And to those looking for ammunition to use against people they have been historically conditioned to hate, the often denounced and repeatedly refuted forgery is just what the evil doctor ordered.
In the interest of fairness and full disclosure, it is true that non-Muslims and non-Nazis have at times bought into the notions set forth by the Protocols - some even in the name of Christianity. This is sad. But it is also statistically rare these days. Neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan types apparently still peddle the book, but these people are the proverbial skunks at our national picnic. And eighty years ago, there were a few prominent Americans (automobile magnate Henry Ford notable among them) who endorsed the writings. But that was a passing, though very regrettable, thing.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion purports to be written evidence of a vast and secret Jewish conspiracy to dominate the world. It’s presented as a factual and detailed description of a late-nineteenth century meeting to plot international Hebrew hegemony through manipulation and treachery. These ideas are at the root of the mother of all conspiracy theories for those who live in the bizarre world of alternative historical reality.
In fact, the publication is a forgery – probably the most sinister and infamous fake in literary history.
The year is 1898, and Nicholas II rules a Russia that’s beginning to experience the revolutionary stirrings of modernism. The Tsar is not the sharpest knife in the drawer and tends to be easily led by strong people around him. He tries to take incremental steps toward leading the nation away from its feudal past, but some in his court are alarmed. Thus, evil men began to seek a way to short-circuit these liberalizing influences.
If only they could convince the Tsar that the voices of change he’s listening to are motivated by something other than the best interests of Russia – but how? It was in this environment that the greatest of all anti-Semitic lies was born. A threatening conspiracy would be manufactured - one that would bring Nicholas to his senses – and the Jews to their knees.
Mathieu Golovinski was living in Parisian exile at the time. Though he was Russian, having been born in the Simbirsk region in 1865, he was forced to flee after repeated clashes with Russian authorities, usually having to do with his tendency to fabricate documents and evidence in legal matters. He was a master of spin, innuendo, and dirty tricks. He was also very skilled in the arts of forgery and plagiarism.
And he worked for the Okhrana – the Tsar’s secret police.
He was approached by agents’ provocateur from the Tsar’s inner circle about creating a convincing anti-Jewish legend. They needed a narrative, one that would be seen as proof of a sinister plot behind the winds of change beginning to blow in Russia. Golovinski was commissioned to fabricate the evidence.
He came across an old book, written in 1864 by an anti-monarchist activist named Maurice Joly. It was entitled, Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquie and was written as a thinly disguised attack on Napoleon III’s rule in France. The book was suppressed by the French government and the writer was imprisoned. He committed suicide in 1878.
A plan was hatched to borrow from this obscure book, changing some of its cosmetics and phrasing. It would be recast, using Joly’s fictional dialogue for a model, as the actual deliberations of a secret cabal of Jews bent on taking over the world. When the fake was finished, it was spirited back to St. Petersburg, and all that would be needed was a way to get it before the ruler of the realm.
Enter the other religious zealot in and around the court of the Tsar."
Continued in Part 2.
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