Cool. I'm sorry I missed it - but I did pass my scuba test (written)

(I already posted about this, but it's my blog so I'll revise it and say it as often as I please - .ed)

Voltaire said, "I may disagree with what you have to say, but I shall defend, to the death, your right to say it".

The concept of vigorously defending free speech has faded to nothingness in Western society, a fact that was made clear during the Salman Rushdie "controversy".

Muslim author Salman Rushdie wrote a book, published in Britain, called the Satanic Verses. Apparently something in the text violated Islamic Shariah laws. Political Islam, in the form of Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini, declared its right to condemn Rushdie, a Westerner living in Britain, and everyone associated with the book in any way, to to death in accordance with Sharia.

On February 14, 1989, a fatwa promising his execution was proclaimed on Radio Tehran by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of Iran, calling his book "blasphemous against Islam." Furthermore, Khomeini condemned Rushdie for the crime of "apostasy"—attempting to abandon the Islamic faith— which according to the Hadith is punishable by death. This was due to Rushdie's communication through the novel that he no longer believes in Islam. Khomeini called on all "zealous Muslims" to execute the writer, as well as those of the publishers of the book who knew about the concepts of the book.

"I inform the proud Muslim people of the world that the author of the Satanic Verses book which is against Islam, the Prophet and the Koran, and all involved in its publication who were aware of its content, are sentenced to death."

This fatwa was (and is) a form of collective punishment.

Collective punishment is a term describing the punishment of a group of people for the crime of few. It is contradictory to the modern concept of due process, where each individual receives separate treatment based on their individual circumstances — as they relate to the crime in question.

This type of Fatwa is also a form of terrorism, defined by Amnesty International as a crime against humanity.

Terrorism, collective punishment and suppression of free speech are a violation of everything Western society is supposed to stand for. So, how did the Western world punish the Ayatollah for these crimes?

We didn't. We didn't even give him a ticket. Jaywalkers are punished more severely.

Rushdie chose to hide after this fatwa was issued. He lived to write more books and he's currently married to a model. Others weren't so lucky.

At the University of California at Berkeley, bookstores carrying the book were firebombed. On February 24 in Bombay, 5 people in a protest at the British Embassy died from police gunfire. Several other people died in Egypt and elsewhere. Muslim communities throughout the world held public rallies in which copies of the book were burned. In 1991, Rushdie's Japanese translator, Hitoshi Igarishi, was stabbed and killed in Tokyo, and his Italian translator was beaten and stabbed in Milan. In 1993, Rushdie's Norwegian publisher William Nygaard was shot and severely injured in an attack outside his house in Oslo. Thirty-seven guests died when their hotel in Sivas, Turkey was burnt down by locals protesting against Aziz Nesin, Rushdie's Turkish translator.

That oppression is what inspired the latest controversial issue, the Jyllands Posten cartoons. [cartoons and commentary posted here]. These cartoons were created to bring attention the allegation that no artist was willing to illustrate a children's book about Muhammad by the Danish writer Kåre Bluitgen without remaining anonymous, out of fear of revenge from extremist Muslims.

The result was protests, with weapons and without them. These peaceful and non-peaceful protesters are only reinforcing Jyllands Posten's point. They aren't just asking for an apology, they're insisting that the West should respect the apartheid Sharia laws that violate everything we stand for.

Well, used to stand for...

Muslims armed with assault rifles and grenade launchers rallied outside the European Union headquarters in Gaza City and fired shots in the air.

They were demanding an apology for cartoons that "disrespected" Islam by relating it to terrorism.

In Basra, Iraq, a roadside bomb targeted a joint Danish-Iraqi military patrol. There were no casualties in the attack.

"British Maj. Peter Cripps said coalition forces are investigating if there was any link between the attack and September's publication by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten of cartoons of Prophet Muhammad deemed offensive by many Muslims."

Like this one? *

If Muslims are characterized as terrorists, whose fault is that?

* ironic observation thanks to jOnz, at this very extensive discussion at Harry's Place.

Via the Energy Bulletin:

Word just came out that Kuwait, long regarded as home to some of the world's largest reserves of petroleum, may possess only half the amount of oil reserves that it officially has been stating for many years.

According to a restricted report issued by the authoritative industry newsletter Petroleum Intelligence Weekly (PIW), internal Kuwaiti records reveal that the nation's oil reserves are far below the officially stated amount of about 99 billion barrels....The PIW report is based upon data circulating within the top echelons of the Kuwait Oil Co....The PIW report claims that Kuwait's remaining proven and nonproven oil reserves total about 48 billion barrels, or 51 billion fewer barrels than previously advertised.>

..Yet another way of stating the matter, and in a macro sense, the amount of estimated world oil reserves just fell by 5%. This 5% drop in reserves is the equivalent of almost 20 months worth of total cumulative worldwide oil production and consumption, based on the current world oil use of about 84 million barrels per day. From the standpoint of the world reaching the absolute Peak Oil point, we now live in August 2007, not January 2006. And as the Mogambo Guru would say, "Thanks a hell of a lot, guys."

For my money, though, you can forget the technical discussion. Instead, take a look at the second graph in Stuart's post, which shows that virtually every OPEC country abruptly increased their reserve estimates in 1986. Although this was partly legitimate (the American companies that had provided the earlier reserve estimates had been systematically too conservative for reasons of their own), the increases were mostly nothing more than a response to OPEC politics. Export quotas are based on reserve estimates, and in the mid-80s every country raised their reserve estimates in order to get a bigger quota. They hadn't suddenly discovered a whole bunch of new oil they never knew was there before.

My rough rule of thumb is that OPEC's real reserves are about halfway between the 1980 estimate and the 1990 estimate — or maybe a bit under that. Eventually it will be impossible to pretend otherwise, and we'll start hearing rumblings from other countries similar to those we're hearing from Kuwait. Buy a hybrid now and be prepared.

The single best data we get on OPEC oil production comes from a fabulous firm called Petro-Logistics in Geneva, Switzerland, and in case none of you have ever been to the offices of Petro-Logistics (I haven’t, I’ve just heard a lot about it), it’s a one-man show over a grocery store in Geneva, run by Conrad Gerber. I think it’s basically a scam. He’s front running for somebody, because there’s no way on earth that somebody could be over a grocery store in Geneva and say what Saudi Arabia is now producing. But the fact that everyone has been so clammed up about their own information has left the world held hostage to Conrad Gerber’s Miltsonian eye, ah, you know, which is itself alarming.

The only proof we have that Saudi Arabia has the outlook that the world is counting on is what I would call ‘trust me.’

Jim at L'Ombre d'Olivier recently published the Jyllands Posten cartoons on his blog. A few critics have offered these complaints:

You simple-minded morons, what do you think makes YOU different than all the seperatists that try to divide mankind into counter-groups like muslim/christian, rich/poor, beautiful/ugly, men/women, german/jew? How can you put the blame on a religion you don't really know the essence of, or a prophet that respects all religions and everything God created. I can't believe you don't really see that the 'Islamic' terror gives a solid reason to "oil invading" countries and their so called "world police" policies.. You should become REAL journalists by making a thorough research before provocating people against muslims or the religion of Islam, then maybe you can see 'whose terror' it really is and what monsters hide behind your so called "freedom of speech".
LeA | 20.Jan.06 - 10:51 | #

:::

we muslims believe and respect all of the prophets not like you pinheads who only believe in jesus, we belive in jesus and all of the prophets that god has send,and you come and mock our prophet.prohet muhhamad is above you all you earth parasites i dont give a dman if you call us fanatics but our prophet is the one person who is you can't even come close to mocking him.so keep swimming into your hatred coz that won't change anything only proves to us that you are the lowest of the low,parasites of this earth.
my beloved prophet muhammad | 27.Jan.06 - 0:04 | #

:::

i want to add something that i am real muslim and i do believe in allah and our profet mouhammed(Peace Be Upon Him) and all other profet including jesus and our profet will not be harmed by your resist thoughts so allah will judge us in judgement day and it is soon but you think it is far until then when we meet and remember this day you well regret for that and at that time there will be no execuse and every body at that time will face what deserves and i am so happy that i am muslim and so happy that your true face has been shown by your own way so hell will be your siutable place and i really pray that you will see hell soon

DR.Hani Alnajm from saudia arabia
Anonymous | 27.Jan.06 - 17:22 | #

:::

i am one of the muslims in Afghanistan my name is Maiwand Rohani, i just want to ask the person who Has draw such bloody cartons and name the Holy Person in the world, he is the only one for whom the earth and whole world is created, you are created because of him I am created because of him, if you do not respect him God will ask about this drawings one day be sure, but I can only tell you that have we Muslims ever made fun of your religion? God? or what ever you believe, We never made such fun and we will never make, because we respect your religion, SAYS: DO RESPECT TO GAIN RESPECT, if you don’t respect our religion I am sure no one will respect you and your religion and you will see a very bad day in Denmark very soon, I cant do any thing but USAMA BIN LADEN can do any thing you know better and you saw the world trade Centre (11-September- 2001)

if any one is agree with me please contact me on (maiwand.rohani@gmail.com) KHODA HAFIZ

TOIEZO MAN TASHA WA TOZELO MAN TASHA BEYADAKAL KHAIR Maiwand Rohani | 28.Jan.06 - 10:57 | #

:::

i think there's nothing left to say. i can't imagine how Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) could be described in this way. i don't want to threaten the Danes or attack them. why?? becasue our prophet and our god is far beyond these silly acts of racism and dishumanity, yes dishumanity because even animals wouldn't act this way. i don't wanna go so far in my words coz those artists may have their reasons -i personally don't think so- just like their little and deformed knowledge of islam. about boycotting the danish products, i think every Arabic and Muslim country should do so because it's not about a magazine as some people say, it's about Denmark's prime minister and high court who refused to apologize for the Muslim world hiding behind the lies of democracy and freedom of speech. i just want to ask every one in this world including Denmark's people and prime minister and judical sysytem, if i was in Denmark and had some doubt about the HOLOCAUST and the jews lies and i try to publish this in a news paper, what will happen then? i challenge every one to give me a satisfactory answer, any way we all know what happened to Roger Garodi, so where is the freedom and democracy. come on people just stop fighting Islam which is not affected in result because Islam continues to grow widely through out Europe and the world. such things will only trigger the fire for more terrorist acts and crimes and more separation among relegions.

one last word for the so called "used to be a muslim", i know you're pasting here no more, may be you only read what people are writing about you, personally i blame my fellow Muslims because they are giving you more than you deserve. some thing with no belief, with no goal, with no future in this life, guess what you look like, you must've figured it out. you know the whole universe represents no more than a wing of mosquito to Allah, so scale it your self, what are you???!! definetly "NO THING!", be careful and be ware, you are getting your self in deep trouble. i know you are not a real human but let me assume that you are then take a moment to think of the moment you are laid on your death bed, just tell me what would you feel that moment when you know that Allah and Mohammad whome you offended are waiting for you on the other side? tell me what, you take a different way, hope you can. in the end i agree with Duke that you are a Zionist agent whose been instructed to deform the image of the Islam because even a muslim who converts will still have some dignity, thanks Allah you are not a muslim anymore because i would not enter Heaven if you were there. Maher | 30.Jan.06 - 4:36 | #

::

Let's face it, images of Mohammed have been around for many years, and religious Islam hasn't made much of an issue of it.

However, political Islam, meaning the Wahhabists and Salafists, make a very big issue of it. According to Khaled Abou El Fadl of the UCLA School of Law, this "supremacist puritanism in contemporary Islam is dismissive of all moral norms or ethical values. Its main purpose is not to integrate particular values within Islamic culture, but to empower Islam against its civilizational rival."

The protests against these cartoons are not a demand that we respect a religion. They're a threat of collective punishment, and they're part of the Islamist war against us. We have nothing to apologize for.

Well, that's not true. We should only apologize for the fact that we have not pasted the Jyllands-Posten images on every available media outlet and surface of the free world.

Some are from Jyllands Posten and some are not. The ones that are not have been in circulation, some for decades, some for centuries.

As usual, the problem isn't with Islam or with free speech, it's with "moderate allies in the war against terrorism", the Saudi Wahhabis, who have been using oil money to spread their puritanical message of hate around the world. Many of the visitors to L'Ombre de l'Oliver were referred by Saudi Arabia. At Winds of Change, Tarek Heggy writes about how Wahhabi Desert Islam has recently affected the Muslim world.

Drinking from Home and Islamaphobic have posted the entire Jyllands Posten collection.

Thomas the Wraith asks artistic bloggers to produce their own images

UPDATE: Zombietime has a bunch of images of Mohammed, from 17th century book frontspieces to South Park TV episodes. Zombie says:

Controversy over the publication of images depicting Mohammed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten has erupted into an international furor. While Muslim nations are calling for a boycott of Denmark, Europeans are divided as to whether they should stand up for Western principles of freedom of speech, or cave in to to self-censorship in the name of multiculturalism and fear.

While the debate rages, an important point has been overlooked: despite the Islamic prohibition against depicting Mohammed under any circumstances, hundreds of paintings, drawings and other images of Mohammed have been created over the centuries, with nary a word of complaint from the Muslim world. The recent cartoons in Jyllands-Posten are nothing new; it's just that no other images of Mohammed have ever been so widely publicized.

Via Yahoo: Pollution Limits Sun in China.

For anyone who has ever traveled to Asia, this is a dog-bites-man story. Outside of the mountainous regions, China is notorious for yellow skies and dour weather.

The strange part of the article is here:

The haze may have masked the effects of global warming across large parts of China, particularly in the central and eastern regions, where daily high temperatures have actually been decreasing," Qian said. "This may seem like good news, but any success China has in curbing emissions will accelerate the effects of global warming in those areas when the cooling mask is lifted."

Hamas' victory over Fatah is the victory of one group of murderers over another. I'm not sure why anyone is shocked or pleased by this election. If smooth Ted Bundy lost an election to the more brutish John Wayne Gacy, it wouldn't be something to cheer about or be disappointed about - it should just cause us to ask why these murderers were being allowed to run for election in the first place. We weren't willing to tolerate the existence of serial killers - why are we tolerating Fatah and Hamas?

Imagine if we treated our homegrown criminals the way we treat the Palestinians - when someone commits a crime, blame the victim and give the criminal more money. Give the biggest criminals the most political power. If someone knocks off a liquor store, make them mayor. Put the embezzlers in charge of the treasury, make mass murder a requirement for the highest offices. That'll teach them responsibility.

Tolerance of terrorism destroys societies. The Palistinians are proof.

33rd and 6th

Via the New York Sun

Iraq's WMD Secreted in Syria, Sada Says

Mr. Sada, 65, told the Sun that the pilots of the two airliners that transported the weapons of mass destruction to Syria from Iraq approached him in the middle of 2004, after Saddam was captured by American troops.

"I know them very well. They are very good friends of mine. We trust each other. We are friends as pilots," Mr. Sada said of the two pilots. He declined to disclose their names, saying they are concerned for their safety. But he said they are now employed by other airlines outside Iraq.

The pilots told Mr. Sada that two Iraqi Airways Boeings were converted to cargo planes by removing the seats, Mr. Sada said. Then Special Republican Guard brigades loaded materials onto the planes, he said, including "yellow barrels with skull and crossbones on each barrel." The pilots said there was also a ground convoy of trucks.

The flights - 56 in total, Mr. Sada said - attracted little notice because they were thought to be civilian flights providing relief from Iraq to Syria, which had suffered a flood after a dam collapse in June of 2002.

"Saddam realized, this time, the Americans are coming," Mr. Sada said. "They handed over the weapons of mass destruction to the Syrians."..

...The Syrian ruling party and Saddam Hussein had in common the ideology of Baathism, a mixture of Nazism and Marxism.

In related news, Syria is backing Iran's nuclear plans. The Palestinians have chosen Islamist/terrorist rule by voting for Hamas. Hamas, which is often called a "charitable organization" is supported by Islamist Iran and Saudi Arabia.

As President Bush said, "Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists, and every government that supports them".

[NY Sun link thanks to Atlas Shruggs]

According to the "world green list", the UK is ranked fifth best for general environmentalism in the world. The US, of course, falls far behind the rest at 28.

According to the judges:

"Good governance emerges as as a critical driver of environmental performance," the report said...

..The US had the best water quality in the world, but was ranked low on energy. On individual issues, the UK scored highly on environmental health but did not score highly on greenhouse gas emissions, or air quality.

The top scores in sustainable energy were in Uganda, Laos, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

I don't know if they're still eating people in Uganda, but they do in the Democratic Republic of Congo, specifically UN representatives. The Congo is in a state of chaos, with a civil war that has taken millions of lives.

Are these environmentalists suggesting that this is the sort of good governance we should copy in the US?

[Link thanks to Norm Geras]

Via the New York Times:

8 Are Killed by Bombings in Restive City in South Iran

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been expected to meet his cabinet in the city, but the trip was canceled Monday evening. His office said the four-day trip was canceled because of bad weather, the IRNA news agency reported Monday. The explosions occurred at the time he had been expected to make a speech in Ahwaz.

..his office told the BBC the visit had been cancelled due to bad weather.

Mr Ahmadinejad's media chief said the president had feared the weather would have prevented people from attending his meetings in the city.

Here's a photo taken on the same day of the bombing. The weather doesn't look so bad...no umbrellas, not even a breeze.

More from the Times:

A series of deadly bombs went off in Ahwaz last year, and the government accused Britain of provoking the attacks. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said in October that Iran had proof of British involvement.

Britain has repeatedly denied the accusations.

Mostafa Pourmohammadi, the interior minister, said the bombings on Tuesday were motivated by foreigners. Mr. Ahmadinejad ordered the Intelligence and Foreign Ministries to investigate "the role of foreign hands" in the bombings, the ISNA student news agency reported...

.."Iran has always been victimized by terrorism, and these blind blasts show the continuity of brutal acts against Iran by international terrorists," he added....

...Ahwaz is the capital of Khuzestan Province and home to a Sunni Arab minority. The province borders Iraq and was battered during the Iran-Iraq war. It has remained one of the least developed regions in the country since then.

Unrest broke out in the city in April, and several people were killed after rumors spread that the government planned to relocate Arabs.

What should we do about Iran? We should do nothing.

Seriously. When a belligerent little foaming-at-the-mouth nation shouts about nukes, they expect us to pay attention to them. This encourages other belligerent little foaming-at-the-mouth nations to do the same. So let's not.

Imagine no reaction from the US; no attempts to appease Ahmadinejad; no threats to bomb, no threats of invasion, no sanctions. Maybe we can give them a gallic shrug. After all, Chirac is already doing the job of jumping up and down and shouting, a nice role reversal.

Iran's bellowing doesn't even deserve a shrug. We've been playing nuclear poker for more than half a century and we've walked away with the pot every time. This Ahmadinejad pushes his way into this high-stakes game and he thinks he should be treated with respect? Look at this punk. How did he get past the bouncers?

As Armed Liberal says, even if Ahmadinejad does get a few nukes he's still a punk. It's not likely that he has nukes now and he may not have them in the near future. Some analysts, like George Friedman of Stratfor and believe that Iran may be bluffing. Ahmadinejad's over-the-top behavior is a boast traditionally designed to sap the enemies' will before combat. He's acting according to his 'cultural values.'

Traditional cultural bellowing won't get him very far in this game. It's poker, not volleyball.

So why should we let this loser sit at the table? Because Ahmadinejad's decision to leave the secretive, asymetric war game (described here by Captain Peter Layton, Royal Australian Air Force) behind may be one of the few lucky breaks we've had in the war against terrorism. Our goal should be to dismantle the Islamist infrastructure. To do that, the world needs to hear what Ahmadinejad has to say.

Our enemies in the war against terrorism, the nations that funded 9/11 and who are funding terrorist attacks around the world (Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran the Sudan, etc.) have been in a constant state of undeclared war with us for years. These terror-supporting nations are also at war with Israel, India, Thailand, Russia, etc. They've been fighting their war against us by using trained paramilitary groups, placed in strategic areas around the world. Mosques are their recruiting centers and their armories. They've been hiding their political goals behind Islam's skirts, they use Orwellian tactics like calling oppression 'peace' and apartheid laws 'freedom'.

The Saudis are the best at playing the asymetric game. Wahhabi extremists spend billions to spread hate and support terrorism. They spend billions paying public relations firms and universities to market themselves as moderates. They pretend to be our allies as they join with the Syrians and the Iranians in their support of terrorism in Israel; they sell us oil as they join with the Iranian Shi'ites in supporting al Qaeda. This unified front has been secretive about their intent because their strategy requires it. They know we can obliterate them militarily in a few days.

Unfortunately for them, Ahmadinejad has abandoned the asymetric model. The threat of nukes doesn't make Iran more dangerous - in many ways, they make them more vulnerable, something the Iranian people should be made aware of. His bloviations are giving the world a defined, obvious Islamist state opponent. He's not hard to trace and he's not impossible to stop.

Islamists and other genocidal groups have never needed nukes to slaughter masses of innocents. The Rwandan Hutus killed hundreds of thousands with machetes. Hate and totalitarianism have killed more than a hundred million people in the past century without nukes. Compared to those WMDs, nukes are nothing.

Ahmadinejad is also destroying the Islamist cover of secrecy. He's not using the code words anymore. All terror supporting states have expressed their hatred of infidels, especially Jews, but the leaders of these states try not to be recorded saying that in a public forum. Ahmadinejad openly and proudly displays Islamist hate for the world to see. He doesn't say that he opposes "Zionism", he openly states that he hates Jews. He denies the Holocaust, a red flag that even the Europeans noticed. He says he wants to destroy Israel. We know that every Arab nation wants to destroy Israel, but Ahmadinejad says it. He's trying to gather WMDs. Every other terror supporting nation is trying to do the same thing, but they don't talk about it. As a result, it's beginning to slowly dawn on the Europeans that Islamists might be kind of dangerous. The Americans are starting to talk about not relying on oil from the Middle East. The French are as far from sangfroid as it gets.

Ahmadinejad is also destroying the unity that asymetric warfare requires. He's openly trying to declare himself head of the Ummah. Bin Laden, who believes that he should be head of the Ummah, is feeling very replaceable lately. He's clamoring for attention and respect, which is hard to do when you're pooping in a cave. Bin Laden's Saudi supporters are also sweating into their kaffiyehs. Ahmadinejad's challenge has put them between a rock and a hard place - they can't openly oppose him so they have to mumble about what an extremist he is, which even the American government admits sounds funny coming from them.

If we did go to war and if we did kill Ahmadinejad, we'd probably be doing the asymetric warriors a favor. Afterwards, the Saudis and other states will send their "insurgents" into Iran just as they did in Iraq, and just as they're doing in Israel, India, Thailand, Chechnya, Afghanistan, etc. It's what they've always done before, it's what they'll do for as long as they can.

The strength of these militarily weak states has always been their unity, their secrecy, the plausible deniability of their support of terrorism. In his loud attempt to gain power, Ahmadinejad makes them all weaker, not stronger. We should downplay Ahmadinejad's threats, ignoring him if possible. This will probably make him yell even louder, shocking more of the world, perhaps into action, giving more of the game away.

Ahmadinejad's story will probably end badly. He may expire from heat exhuastion, bad sushi, or the traditional exploding car. But right now, he's blowing the cover off the asymetric ruse. He should be encouraged to do so.

[cross-posted at Dean's World]

Winston Churchill on Liberalism*:

Liberalism is not Socialism, and never will be. There is a great gulf fixed. It is not a gulf of method, it is a gulf of principle. ... Socialism seeks to pull down wealth. Liberalism seeks to raise up poverty. Socialism would destroy private interests; Liberalism would preserve private interests in the only way in which they can be safely and justly preserved, namely by reconciling them with public right. Socialism would kill enterprise; Liberalism would rescue enterprise from the trammels of privilege and preference ... Socialism exalts the rule; Liberalism exalts the man. Socialism attacks capital, Liberalism attacks monopoly."

At least modern British leftists are honest enough to admit that they're socialists. It's too bad that the American Left can't abandon their tactic of hiding behind the misnomer 'liberal'. If they were also honest, it would save everyone a lot of confusion.

[* Thanks to Callimachus, commenting on Neo-neocon's post]

Of the bin Laden tape, he says:

What a pathetic, posturing, blowhard country we've become. Yesterday a new audio surfaces from Osama bin Laden, the man many speculated was dead. The media and political response was a phony show of "strength" and an embarrassing self-contradiction. Now it doesn't take a terrorist expert to understand that when a charismatic figure who was instrumental in the deaths of 3000 Americans and remains apprehended four years later extends a "truce" to the U.S., that this is hardly a sign of weakness. It is a gesture of supreme, serene hauteur.

Larry C. Johnson grasps the significance of bin Laden's rhetorical flourish:

"So, why is Bin Laden speaking now? He has suffered some recent setbacks. He is certainly reacting to the missile strikes last week in Pakistan that apparently killed some Al Qaeda operatives. Bin Laden is letting his followers and the world know that he is alive and ready to fight to the death. He also is reminding us that he takes the longterm view. The offer of a truce is not a sign of weakness, rather it is a gesture to the Muslim world intended to portray Bin Laden as a man of reason and honor who is intent on being faithful to God's commandments.

Ahmadinejad's bellowing efforts to prove that he should be top dog of the Ummah can't be making bin Laden very happy. Osama's Saudi benefactors know that Ahmadinejad is pissing in their direction, and they're not happy either. Osama is still trying to prove that his side is in charge, a difficult task from his spider hole.

Lesson #1,456,926 on why feeding the crocodile is a stupid strategy. The "najas" "animal", George Galloway, has earned a fatwa:

Recently, Allah (SWT) has disgraced these so-called Muslims and the one they have associated with Allah, George Galloway, by causing him to appear on a reality TV show "Celebrity Big Brother". Shows such as this contain all the corruption Allah (SWT) has forbidden, such as free-mixing, fornication, drinking, nudity, swearing and many other abominable acts. These kinds of programmes attract only the lowest of the low who desperately seek recognition and fame by any means possible. They are people who have no honour, respect or dignity and can only be described as animals. George Galloway will certainly have no trouble fitting in as he has all the criteria the show is looking for. Just recently, the media has shown George Galloway at his best – behaving like a cat (animal) purring at the hands of a woman. This is not surprising as one cannot expect anything more from a person of such low intellect and morality, a representative of those who voted for him.

Furthermore, we all saw how Allah (SWT) humiliated and exposed the hypocritical (munaafiq) organisation based in the East London Mosque, Islamic Forum Europe, after Mr Galloway's election victory last year. They were shown on television, and in newspapers, carrying the najas (impure) Galloway on their shoulders, celebrating and parading the one they had shamelessly associated with Allah in order to gain some worldly benefits.

Is this the animal they took as a lord (lawmaker) besides Allah? Is this animal the one they chose to ally with instead of the believers? Is this the animal they chose to represent them in this world and the Hereafter? Is this the animal they campaigned for and called other Muslims to vote for? Is this the animal they appointed to be their knight and liberate Muslim lands? Is this the animal they claimed embraced Islam? How many promises has he fulfilled? Which war has he stopped?

Let this be a lesson for us all. Dignity, honour and respect can only be sought from Allah (SWT) and the way of life He has chosen for mankind, Islam. Whoever seeks 'izzah (dignity) from the Kuffaar or from their ways of life will only be humiliated and disgraced by Almighty Allah in this life and the Hereafter.

[link thanks to LGF]

Back in 1921, Winston Churchill described our moderate Saudi allies this way*:

In the vast deserts of Arabia, which stretch eastward and north-eastward from the neighbourhood of Mecca to the Persian Gulf and to the boundaries of Mesopotamia, there dwell the people of Nejd, powerful nomadic tribes, at the head of whom the remarkable chief Bin Saud maintains himself. This Arab chief has long been in a state of warfare, raid, and reprisal with King Hussein and with his neighbours generally. A large number of Bin Saud's followers belong to the Wahabi sect, a form of Mohammedanism which bears, roughly speaking, the same relation to orthodox Islam as the most militant form of Calvinism would have borne to Rome in the fiercest times of the religious wars. The Wahabis profess a life of exceeding austerity, and what they practise themselves they rigorously enforce on others. They hold it as an article of duty, as well as of faith, to kill all who do not share their opinions and to make slaves of their wives and children. Women have been put to death in Wahabi villages for simply appearing in the streets. It is a penal offence to wear a silk garment. Men have been killed for smoking a cigarette, and as for the crime of alcohol, the most energetic supporter of the temperance cause in this country falls far behind them. Austere, intolerant, well-armed, and bloodthirsty, in their own regions the Wahabis are a distinct factor which must be taken into account, and they have been, and still are, very dangerous to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, and to the whole institution of the pilgrimage, in which our Indian fellow-subjects are so deeply concerned.

T.E. Lawrence(of Arabia), Churchill and most of the British establishment planned to give the more moderate Hashemites control of the Middle East. So, why did they wind up giving control of Mecca and Medina to genocidal barbarians? Listen to this strangely familiar story, which reads like a colonial version of Star Wars 1, 2 & 3; T.E. Lawrence and Churchill play the Jedi and British spy Jack Philby plays the part of Darth Vader. Everyone is stuck on Tatooine:

Philby secretly began to favour Ibn Saud over Sherif Hussein as "King of the Arabs", a difference with British policy, which was promising support for the Hashemite dynasty in the post-Ottoman world. On return Philby completed the crossing from Riyadh to Jeddah by the "backdoor" route, thus demonstrating Ibn Saud was in control of the Arabian highlands, whereas Sherif Hussein could not guarantee safe passage. Later he was awarded the Royal Geographical Society Founders Gold Medal for the desert journey. Back in Jeddah he met with an embarassed Sherif Hussein.

On 7 November 1918, four days before the Armistice, Britain and France issued the Anglo-French Declaration to the Arabs assuring self-determination. Philby felt the betrayal of this assurance, along with the Balfour Declaration and other diplomatic manouvres broke faith with the promise of a single unified Arab nation in exchange for aligning themselves with the Allies in the war against the Ottoman Turks and Central Powers.

Philby argued that Ibn Saud was a "democrat" guiding his affairs "by mutual counsel" as laid out in the Koran (Surah XLII. 37), in contrast to Lord Curzon's "Hussein policy". British policy on Arab affairs was wracked by rivalries between the Foreign Office and the India Office...

...He worked with T. E. Lawrence for a while, but did not share Lawrence's views on the Hashemites. Here he met his American counterpart, Allen Dulles, who was stationed in Istanbul. At the end of 1922 Philby travelled to London for extensive meetings with all involved in the Palestinian question. They were Winston Churchill, King George, the Prince of Wales, Baron Rothschild, Wickham Steed, and Chaim Weizmann, the head of the Zionist movement.

The modern world begins, the authors suggest, at the end of World War I, when British diplomat/adventurers Jack Philby (father of Soviet spy Kim Philby and legendary Arabist) and Lawrence of Arabia endeavour to unify a bunch of warring Bedouin tribes into nationhood, best represented by Saudi Arabia. Aware that black gold (oil) lies underneath the desert sands, Philby gingerly befriends Ibn Saud, and makes him the first Saudi king. But Philby is not solely interested in empire, even his own British one; he is interested in making money, and forges an alliance with an American intelligence agent in charge of Middle Eastern affairs, Allen Dulles.

By the 1930s, Ibn Saud and Philby are secret supporters of the Nazi rise to political power in Germany, and bring Dulles, a NYC-based corporate lawyer for Sullivan and Cromwell, in on their scheme. It is a triple game driven by their hatred of Zionism and the Jews, motivated by their obsessive seeking of profits, and designed to completely transform the landscape of the Middle East. Philby and Dulles convince Ibn Saud to allow limited Jewish immigration to Palestine, assuring him that the numbers will never challenge or upset his control. When Jews leave Germany, their assets are confiscated by Hitler, who shares a percentage of these with dummy corporations established by Philby, Dulles, and their allies. Some of this money is used to arm Ibn Saud, and intelligence disclosures to him by Philby enable Ibn Saud to become king of Saudi Arabia over other Arab leaders supported by the British government. This double-dealing by British and American corporations continues throughout World War II, and incredibly is never halted by the Western allies, who would rather that Dulles stay in place andround up German intelligence agents after World War II's end for the upcoming Cold War against a previous ally, the USSR. One of the reasons that Jews are so hated by this clique, which includes Rockefeller's Standard Oil, is that many Jews were supporters of the left, anathema to corporate internationalists."

[* link thanks to Kesher Talk]

The wind was blowing pretty hard yesterday, knocking some things around and tossing garbage pails down the street. I didn't think much of it, because I used to live in Cape May, where we call nonstop gale-force winds "April". But apparently these winds caused some major problems.

My son was without power and hot water in his Boston dorm. My husband was giving a business presentation on the seventh floor of a Connecticut office building when part of the roof on the eighth floor collapsed from the weight of rainwater. And Neo-neocon had a bummer of a day.

In his post "Preparing for the end of the world", Norm Geras notes that the man who invented the concept of Gaia is now predicting the end of the world as we know it. According to James Lovelock:

The world has already passed the point of no return for climate change, and civilisation as we know it is now unlikely to survive, according to James Lovelock, the scientist and green guru who conceived the idea of Gaia - the Earth which keeps itself fit for life.

In a profoundly pessimistic new assessment, published in today's Independent, Professor Lovelock suggests that efforts to counter global warming cannot succeed, and that, in effect, it is already too late.

The world and human society face disaster to a worse extent, and on a faster timescale, than almost anybody realises, he believes. He writes: "Before this century is over, billions of us will die, and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable."

He's an enviornmentalist who is pro nuclear energy. And he looks like a nice guy. I guess everyone gets a little nutty sometimes.

And he's right about one thing - unless we discover some magical anti-aging drug, billions of people will die before the end of the century.

So, I'll just mock someone who deserves it, like George "airplanes are the devil's work" Monbiot, a moonbat whose anhedonic, puritanical prattling makes Cotton Mather sound like a libertine. It's a strange attitude for someone who looks like Maxwell Smart on meth.

Monbiot claims that cars, Australians and (of course) Americans are Satan's spawn in his latest work "They call themselves libertarians; I think they're antisocial bastards". He says:

...this is not, or not really, an article about speed, or cameras, or even cars. It is about the rise of the antisocial bastards who believe they should be allowed to do what they want, whenever they want, regardless of the consequences. I believe that while there are many reasons for the growth of individualism in the UK, the extreme libertarianism now beginning to take hold here begins on the road. When you drive, society becomes an obstacle. Pedestrians, bicycles, traffic calming, speed limits, the law: all become a nuisance to be wished away. The more you drive, the more bloody-minded and individualistic you become. The car is slowly turning us, like the Americans and the Australians, into a nation that recognises only the freedom to act, and not the freedom from the consequences of other people's actions. We drive on the left in Britain, but we are being driven to the right.

Pootergeek has the best intro to a Robert Fisk article. Sweaterman!

Have you ever had that experience when you’re quietly browsing a public library and you (foolishly) strike up a conversation about one of the books on display with one of the other regulars—a slightly intense-looking middle-aged man in sweater—and you gradually realise you are engaging with someone from the other side of the reality/fantasy interface?

Oh, it’ll start innocently enough:

[points at copy of The Magus] “It’s really not his best, is it? But it does seem to be very popular with a certain type of reader. Every time I got irritated with it I took a disgraceful pleasure in the thought that hordes of obsessives wrote to him, demanding to know its ‘true meaning’.”

Mr Sweater will latch his staring eyes onto yours with the desperate gratitude of a man who has spent a decade being avoided by other human beings. Then he is off:

“It’s about the manipulation of perceptions. It’s about the veil of so-called experience, the veil They draw across our eyes. Life isn’t as simple as it looks on the surface, you know. Everything we read and watch is manipulated in the interests of the Eurocrats and the military-industrial complex…”

And at that moment you wish you were talking to a Bob Dylan otaku about the rumours of post-production overdubs on the notorious Autumn ‘05 Ohio concert so-called bootleg.

Anyway, here’s an interview with Robert Fisk..

Via Arutz Sheva:

Researchers at Hebrew University have found that extracts from the cannabis plant can help strengthen human bones, preventing osteoporosis, according to an Israel21c report.

Substances produced mainly in the brain, called endocannabinoids, are made of fatty acids and exist in the bone and elsewhere. The substances bind to and activate two receptors - CB1 in the nervous system and CB2 in the immune system.

A high number of CB2-receptors were found in the bones of the mice and shown to be essential in preserving normal bone density. Mice lacking those receptors were shown to develop osteoporosis as they age.

Osteoporosis, a common ailment in the Western world, can lead to easily broken bones and disabilities.

The study shows that plants such as cannabis, which contain substances that activate CB2 receptors, can be used as a basis of drugs to help those suffering from osteoporosis. The researchers have developed a synthetic compound called HU-308 which succeeds in combatting osteoporosis in mice.

Now we finally found the solution - hold the milk and pass the ganja.

[link thanks to Zelda at the Urban Grind]

We know about Chuck Yeager - but what about Joe Kittinger?

In his post The First Man In Space... Skydiving Down To Earth, Ace linked to this video and said:

So, in 1960, this cat ascends to 30km above the earth in a balloon and.... jumps. He accelerates to 900 mph (I guess terminal velocity's a lot higher when the air is thin). He actually broke the sound barrier, without a vehicle.

He was testing to see if high-g acceleration would kill him, by the way. It didn't, but he didn't know that when he agreed to try it.

Now there's a man who needs to have a movie done about his life. I'd guess that Tommy Lee Jones could play the older Joe, but who would play the younger..?

[cross-posted at Dean's World]

When gang violence increased in Canada, Canadian officials blamed their traditional boogyman, America for "exporting its violence" by provoiding access to guns.

Here in New Jersey's Hudson County, we blame our boogyman, Pennslvania:

Experts blame guns and gangs for this year's spike in homicides in Hudson County.

There have been 50 homicides in Hudson County this year, the highest total since 1989. Nearly half the homicides - 23 out of 50 - were shooting deaths, records show.

Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio blamed "the availability and access to hand guns, especially semiautomatic pistols.

"There are just too many (guns) out there," he said.

New Jersey has relatively strict gun control laws, but criminals can drive to Pennsylvania and purchase several firearms with little scrutiny, he said...

Who are we supposed to blame for the increasing strength of the local gangs - the police, who apparently aren't doing their jobs by investigating and arresting these criminals? Get real.

In fact, there have been no changes made in the legal availablilty of guns in the past year, but there has been a change in the structure and efficiency of gang organization.

.. "What you had were people hanging out at a street corner who were part of a local crew," Wagers said. "Now they are a subset of the Bloods."

On a video via the BBC and on the front page of the Standard (via Harry's Place)

George Galloway, the "truly righteous" British/Leftist/Fascist politician who famously came to America and 'spoke the truth to power' is currently on a reality show called "Big Brother" pretending to be a cat, lapping up cream in "I'm Rula Lenska"'s lap.

Galloway's nouveau-fascist RESPECT coalition is ashamed and embarrassed. So is the BBC. They're totally loving it at Harry's Place.

Gee, who does Galloway resemble here?

Could it be ocicatman James Wolcott?

With Galloway's star quickly falling, maybe this up and coming truth speaker will be the new kid in town. The world needs more comic relief.

Our most important ally in the war agaist terrorism in the Middle East met yesterday with Michael Moore's favorite minuteman, Moqtada Sadr.

MINA, Saudi Arabia - Saudi King Abdullah has received radical Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr at his palace in Mina near the Muslim holy city of Mecca, as the annual hajj pilgrimage winds down.

"The meeting was to strengthen relations between the two countries," the firebrand cleric said on Wednesday, declining to give details.

Saudi state television broadcast footage of the meeting which took place late Tuesday, after which the Saudi monarch appeared showing Sadr around the palace.

[link thanks to Jihad Watch]

Esbiem of ElginTyrell.com let me know that the comments were down. I thought it was just a problem with signing up thru powerblogs, but then I realized that comments were inexplicably disabled on random posts.

Still not sure why this happened but I've re-enabled them. Sorry about that...

Via Yahoo:

Natural-food grocer Whole Foods Market Inc. said Tuesday it will rely on wind energy for all of its electricity needs, making it the largest corporate user of renewable energy in the United States.

The Austin-based company said it is purchasing 458,000 megawatt-hours of wind energy credits a year — enough to power 44,000 homes annually — from Renewable Choice Energy of Boulder, Colo.

The decision follows the publicly traded company's mission of environmental stewardship without losing sight of the bottom line, Whole Foods regional president Michael Besancon said...

..As of Oct. 1, 2005, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency listed Whole Foods as the eighth-largest user of renewable energy among U.S. corporations and governmental agencies.

Based on those figures, Tuesday's announcement would put Whole Foods ahead of the U.S. Air Force (312,416 megawatt-hours) and corporate leader Johnson & Johnson (241,398 megawatt-hours), according to the EPA.

Shares of Whole Foods rose 55 cents to close at $78.18 on the Nasdaq Stock Market.

I have to admit, I'm prejudiced in favor of Whole Foods. I just shopped there for the first time the other day, and it's foodie heaven. They've got excellent prices on essentials like bread and wine, a great selection of international foods and a transcendent deli. I bought a totally overpriced flank steak stuffed with blue cheese and asparagus that was to die for.

I'd always avoided the place because it sounded like a granola bar hangout, but now I'm hooked. This announcement is just the sprinkling of parsley on the sherry reduction sauce. I'm hooked.

[link thanks to Jane Galt]

Two of us were waiting in front of the Army recruiting office on 22nd Street, the destination of the march. We were ready with a large banner reading "Complete the Mission First...THEN Bring Them Home," and a huge flagpole with Support Our Troops, U.S. and Iraqi flags. When the moonbat parade rounded the corner, they were completely disheartened. Their proud stand in front of the recruiting office turned into a confusing hodgepodge, with our large banner and signs getting most of the attention. We were all mixed in together. One of the old hippies kindly offered to help hold up our heavy banner.

Via John Atkinson at Winds of Change

According to a report issued by the Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century (REN21), an international policy initiative supported by energy-related departments of several governments and a team of over 100 researchers, global investment in renewable energy experienced strong growth in 2004. The fastest-growing technologies for the year (2004) were grid-connected Solar PVs at 54% growth, biodiesel at 26%, and wind power at 20% (via Worldchanging). As Renewable Energy Access notes however, despite this recent growth, these investments only represent 6.7% of total investments in the energy industry.

..by cutting down the rainforest?

Climate scientists were "shocked" by finding that forests produce at least one third of the methane gasses that apparently contribute to global warming.

So, if science doesn't know if forests are good or bad, how can we expect them to know if the earth is warming or cooling? Are farting ungulates helpful or harmful? Or (most earth shattering of all) - was Reagan right?

I've often thought British efforts to give the Saudi Wahhabis control of Mecca and Medina was comparable to giving the Nazis control of the Vatican.

Today's example of the effects of Saudi control of these holy sites:

Hajj stampede kills hundreds

MINA, Saudi Arabia (CNN) — At least 345 people have been killed in a stampede during a symbolic stoning ritual at the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia, according to the country's health ministry.

Government officials said 289 others were injured in the trampling near Mecca.

Major Gen Mansour al-Turki, a ministry spokesman, blamed this year's stampede on misplaced luggage.

Sadik H. Kassim describes the results of Saudi administration of Muslim holy sites. He concludes:

These cases demonstrate that sites of common historical value should not be placed under the whims and controls of one entity, the Wahabbis-Saudis in this case. Rather, these sites should be administered by an international body whose sole aim is to preserve. Unless Muslims act to pressure the Saudi government and their own governments, we can look forward to further wanton destruction.

Actor Sean Penn added to the enthusiasm of the day by stressing that all of the nation’s anti-war activism was taking hold and was starting to work—while admitting that the stress of living under the current administration was making it tough for him to quit smoking. Stating that he “was not a pacifist on the inside”, he was moved to be one on the outside for the sake of his children and grandchildren’s future. He said we have to fight for everything we have.

* two points if you know the movie and the source..

Al-Fawzan: "Someone who denies Allah, worships Christ, son of Mary, and claims that God is one third of a trinity - do you like these things he says and does? Don’t you hate the faith of such a polytheist who says God is one third of a trinity, or who worships Christ, son of Mary?

"Someone who permits and commits fornication - as is the case in Western countries, where fornication is permitted and not considered a problem - don't you hate this? Whoever says 'I don't hate him' is not a Muslim, my brother."

[...]

"This is not racism, my brother. We don't hate a polytheist because of his color, gender, blood, country, or because he is American, European, Chinese, or Asian. They are our partners in humanity. An American Muslim may be better in Allah's view than all the Arabs."

[...]

"But if this person is an infidel - even if this person is my mother or father, God forbid, or my son or daughter - I must hate him, his heresy, and his defiance of Allah and His prophet. I must hate his abominable deeds. Moreover, this hatred must be positive hatred. It should make me feel compassion for him, and should make me guide and reform him."

Defensive Jihad must be authorized by the leader, if the Muslims have a legal leader. It is possible that the leader, along with the leading jurisprudents and the nation's leaders, will think that the Jihad should be postponed due to certain interests. But if they don't have a leader, as is the case unfortunately, in some Muslim countries, should the Muslims surrender to the occupying enemy? No cleric would allow such a thing. The clerics have all agreed that if an enemy invades a Muslim country, Jihad against this enemy becomes an individual duty applying to anyone who can wage Jihad.

Of our allies in Saudi Arabia, R. James Woolsey, former director of the CIA, said:

...al Qaeda launches attacks in Saudi Arabia and the Saudis work with us to capture and kill al Qaeda members who threaten them. In this sense both Saudi government officials and probably even Wahhabi clerics are willing to "cooperate with the U.S. on counter-terrorism." But this cooperation does not negate the fact that al Qaeda and the Wahhabis share essentially the same underlying totalitarian theocratic ideology. It is this common Salafist ideology that the Wahhabis have been spreading widely — financed by $3-4 billion/year from the Saudi government and wealthy individuals in the Middle East over the last quarter century — to the madrassas of Pakistan, the textbooks of Turkish children in Germany, and the mosques of Europe and the U.S. Alex Alexiev, senior fellow at the Center for Security Policy, testified before Congress on June 26, 2003, that this is approximately three-four times what the Soviets were spending on external propaganda and similar "active measures" at the peak of Moscow's power in the 1970s.

This underlying Salafist ideology being spread by the Wahhabis is fanatical and murderous, indeed explicitly genocidal. (The president's "Islamofascist" term is thus perhaps understated — the Italian fascists were horrible, but not genocidal. "IslamoNazi" would be more accurate.)..

The direct consequences of such murderous teachings extend to the war in Iraq. In November of 2004, 26 Wahhabi clerics in Saudi Arabia published a call for jihad against the U.S. in Iraq. Because of the high religious status of the clerics within Saudi Arabia, the exhortation was widely interpreted as a fatwa, a religious ruling. Several Saudi suicide bombers and other terrorists captured in Iraq have indicated that it was this fatwa that had turned them to terrorism. Said one: "I hadn't thought of coming to Iraq, but I had fatwas . . . I read the communiqué of the 26 clerics ... ." During the battle for Fallujah in 2004 Saudi Sheikh Abd Al-Muhsin Al-Abikan said to the London daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, "What is happening in Falluja is the result of such fatwas ... [The resistance] is bringing about tragedy and destruction for Iraq, Falluja, and their residents." Nasser Sulayman al-Amer, one of the 26 signers of the call for jihad, admitted recently at a press conference in Kuwait that he had met with Iraqis on this matter. On November 13 of this year the Iraqi national-security adviser, Mowaffak Rubaie said: "Most of those who blow themselves up in Iraq are Saudi nationals."..

..Following the controversy over the 26 clerics' edict the Saudi government retracted it, in a sense. But the only two Saudi officials who released the retraction publicly were two Saudi ambassadors, those to the U.S. and the U.K. And the retractions were issued only in English.

Woolsey acknowledges that the Saudis are our enemies, yet he recommends that treat them as we treated the Soviets during