Sept. 23, 2006: Bud Talkinghorn &

A hidden little fact about the U.N.

I was watching Lou Dobbs on CNN, when he had on America's potential U.N. ambassador, John Bolton. Dobbs was asking him about the criticism the U.S. gets for not being " a team player". Bolton said, "Well, we pay for 20% of the U.N's budget, while 97 other countries--more than half the Assembly--pays for 0.06% of it." So, all you Canadians who bash the U.S. for not being mindlessly multinationalist, think what would happen if the U.S. simply pulled out altogether. The indigent delegates would have to give up their Manhattan penthouses and go back to poor-mouthing their influential kin, the ones who gave them their UN positions. They might even have to pay the thousands they owe for illegal parking tickets before departing The Big Apple.

Ah, the dream of universal peace and justice that the U.N. was founded on has become a bit fragmented. Some would say it has turned into a Kafkaesque nightmare. There is no world problem that can't be better discussed over supper at Elaine's. You can almost hear them saying, "Yes, a sub-committee to investigate the real problems of Darfur should be struck next month. Or maybe after our annual vacations would be a better time, while we are fresh to tackle such a serious genocide. However we should see if the Yankees will pony up for it first." Well, the solid bloc of American-haters, who refuse to pay their UN bills, might just have to reconsider their voting patterns. Bolton's subtly implied threat might cause a few sacrificial goats (or voodoo dolls) to turn up on his doorstep. It is amazing how potent a little capitalist blackmail could be. Wasn't this the guy who actually suggested that "the top 17 floors of the U.N. building could be demolished with no consequence whatsoever"? Finally, Anerica has a truly scary dude in place to match the unbelievably scary dudes that come from Somalia, Burma, and other Orwellian hellholes.

© Bud Talkinghorn--You da man, John! Keep their feet to the fire.



Bob Rae--The final insult to the voter

Full disclosure: I have no respect for political turncoats, whatever their political stripe. How can the average person vote for someone who has betrayed his professed election ideology? Rae has gone from ruining Ontario as an NDP premier to a co-leader in the Liberal leadership race. Now it seems that he gave donations to NDP candidates as late as January. Charest moved on from the leadership of the (granted) moribund Progressive Conservative Party to become the Liberal premier of Quebec. Stronach ( when do I get to be P.M.?), Brison (Peter wouldn't even take steam with me) and Emerson (I was always a Conservative mole) all showed no political convictions. Obviously they stand for nothing except self-aggrandizement. And the salt in the wound was that they all were given cabinet positions for their treachery. You suspect they would join the Neo-Nazi party if it would advance their careers. And these politicians have the nerve to talk about democratic renewal. A fly-in candidate like Ignatieff (I hope they buy my Trudeau schtick) isn't going to renew anybody's faith either. Watch the voter participation drop further in the next election.

© Bud Talkinghorn


My comments:

Bud, what is even more scary is that the average citizen, if h/she makes a last-minute attempt before voting to catch up on the political news, will be taken in by the (hardly independent) mainstream media's biased reporting. Ordinary people are so busy with just what it takes for daily life and then amusing themselves in the time they have left after working to pay their bills and and high taxes--that significant percentage of a salary that becomes an Ottawa slush fund (think Gomery), the money that some politicians treat so cavalierly. What really galls is that the left and the media will then promote the idea that the hard working citizens' tax money really should be spent to prop up other people who have made dumb choices, those who choose not to work because of laziness or drug addiction or other personal choices rendering themselves useless to an employer, those who may be profligate because they believe someone else will take up the slack and provide them with education--upgrading or skills development because they didn't make wise decisions the first time around, housing and spaces in daycare or kindergarten for people who had children without considering the consequences or whose partner didn't stick around for the responsibilities, at least a bit of money to live, counselling, drug treatment, whatever ... and they may go on, pursuing the same careless lives. FHTR

Sept. 23, 2006: Various

Related to Sept. 21, 2006: Crying Wolf or ... what? or scroll down to it.
frosthitstherhubarb.blogspot.com/2006/09/
sept-21-2006-crying-wolf-or-what.html

Audio: Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir on AQ’s alleged nuclear plot , September 21, 2006 by Allahpundit

hotair.com/archives/2006/09/21/audio-pakistani-journalist-
hamid-mir-on-aqs-alleged-nuclear-plot/

The audio picks up with Mir talking about his recent meeting in Afghanistan with AQ capo Abu Dawood. It ends with him alleging a closer relationship between Al Qaeda and Iran than most counterterror experts believe.

Report: Al Qaeda planning nuke attack for Ramadan , September 12, 2006 by Allahpundit
hotair.com/archives/2006/09/12/
report-al-qaeda-planning-nuke-attack-for-ramadan/

Check, but I believe Ramadan starts Sept. 24.




Update: Little Black Book The online version of The Little Black Book has now been removed from public viewing on the StStephensHouse website -- People were not happy with it.
www.canadianvalues.ca/warning_page_001.htm

This website has screen captures. Parents may be very interested in this on "supporting radical groups" with tax money.

If you wish to comment on tax dollars being sent to organizations such as StStephensHouse which funded "The Little Black Book"--online version sponsored by Industry Canada--email:
Maxime Bernier, Minister of Industry: minister.industry@ic.gc.ca
PM Stephen Harper: pm@pm.gc.ca



PM at UN: Mainstream Media and Celestial Junk

Debris shamed CTV: "CTV Dirty Little Tricks" on the Prime Minister's speech at the UN.
www.haloscan.com/tb/debristrail/115886681490857588/

Check the photo and especially the brief explication written. Well done!


UN Speeches: Bush vs. Ahmadinejad , Captain's Quarters

www.forumsvibe.com/elwoodpdowd/
viewtopic.php?t=358&mforum=elwoodpdowd

[....] We have come to expect a less-than-truthful approach from the Iranians over the years, especially given their background with the IAEA, and Ahmadinejad delivered on another expectation with surprising candor. .... He obliquely argues for the destruction of Israel at the body that created it, calling Israel (inaccurately) a result of guilt from World War II and the need to relocate survivors of the Holocaust -- but oddly, never refers to the genocide and therefore leaves the entire notion unsupported. [....]

Afghan President Hamid Karzai snubs meeting with Layton
www.forumsvibe.com/elwoodpdowd/
viewtopic.php?t=368&mforum=elwoodpdowd

OTTAWA (CP) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai arrived in Canada on Thursday to help drum up support for the mission in his troubled country, but a meeting with the country's most prominent anti-war politician did not appear to be on his agenda.

NDP Leader Jack Layton has made several requests for a meeting with the Afghan leader - and has had no reply.

Layton is the only major federal party leader to have called for a withdrawal of Canadian troops from Afghanistan. [....]

Liars, Frauds, and Charlatans -- "You can’t claim to support anyone, if you don’t consider that person’s viewpoints, perspectives, and opinions." which leads to this: Smoking Out “Progressive” Liars, 06 September 2006
cjunk.blogspot.com/2006/09/
smoking-out-progressive-liars.html

It usually takes time and a memory that lasts more than a few months to catch people at disingenuous political games. But, if one is patient, and if one waits, any phony political position will usually be brought to the light of day.[....]

Canada’s intrepid defender of Canadian “progressive” values, Jack Layton, [called] for the withdrawal of Canadian troops from Afghanistan [....]

First, let’s consider the crowing and braying that pierced the air a few years ago when the United States was poising itself to invade Iraq. You remember, the peace marches, the pontificating, and above all:

“The War in Iraq is illegal because it is not United Nations sanctioned!”

[....well reasoned part here which ends with] Jack could admit that the “progressive” class he represents are pacifists. Then, all that he says and what his NDP peddle would make perfect honest sense. ....

Jack Layton, Svend and other "progressives", read this

Symposium: 9/11: Five Years Later , By Jamie Glazov, FrontPageMagazine.com, September 11, 2006
frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=24313

McCarthy [....] The mindless approbation of Islam as a "religion of peace" and an unqualified force for good in the world. The inescapable fact is that while there is not terrorism everyplace there is Islam, there is Islam virtually everyplace there is terrorism. Militancy, moreover, is not the only stream of Islamic practice, but it is the dynamic one -- and the one that lines up most comfortably with doctrine. While religion is what men and women make of it, doctrine is where the making begins, and this doctrine demands a lot more of our attention.

Ayatollah Sistani, the highest authority of Shiite Islam in Iraq (and widely touted by our State Department), maintains (on his website) that non-Muslims should be considered in the same category as "urine, feces, semen, dead bodies, blood, dogs, pigs, alcoholic liquors and the sweat of an animal who persistently eats [unclean things.]" Sistani's fatwa that homosexuals should be brutally killed is even now being acted on in the Shiite areas of the "new" Iraq. In the "new" Afghanistan, a man was nearly put to death for apostasy. In Yemen [....]

Perhaps you get the idea, but check the rest.



In a similar vein: A George Will column on Ayaan Hirsi Ali , Posted by: Nemo2 at September 21, 2006 05:13 AM

www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/a_thoroughly_
modern_muslim_opedcolumnists_george_f__will.htm

Quote: "Europe, she thinks, is invertebrate. After two generations without war, Europeans "have no idea what an enemy is." And they think, she says, that leadership is an antiquated notion because they believe that caring governments can socialize everyone to behave well, thereby erasing personal accountability and responsibility. "I can't even tell it without laughing," she says, laughing softly". [....]

Someone, show this to Jack Layton, the CBC/MSM, Liberals, the courts and anyone else who would benefit from reading Hirsi Ali.



It isn't just Michael Coren talking tactical nukes... here's what's being said in Israeli military circles. Guess which other Middle Eastern country is also scared [****less] about a nuclear Iran... , Posted by: neo at September 21, 2006 01:19 AM
hallsofmacadamia.blogspot.com/2006/09/
how-scary-is-iranian-nuclear-threat.html

Comment: THE BEATINGS WILL CONTINUE UNTIL MORALE IMPROVES.
Posted by: wallyj at September 21, 2006 01:43 AM



MUMBAI BOMBERS CONFESS - CLAIM PAKISTAN AND MOHAMMAD ATTA LINK -- "India wants to talk to FBI to see if there is a larger link here. ..." , Indian TV Sept- 21-2006
www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1705404/posts


ENEMIES -- Red Flower of North America , Sept. 16, 06
www.washingtontimes.com/national/20060918-124646-8530r.htm

Bill Gertz, defense and national security reporter for The Washington Times, describes a growing threat posed by foreign agents and terrorists who exploit U.S. weaknesses in this first of three excerpts from his new book, "Enemies: How America's Foes Steal Our Vital Secrets -- And How We Let It Happen" (Crown Forum), out this week.

Tai Wang Mak dialed a phone number in Guangzhou, China.

The man who answered, Pu Pei-liang, was a researcher at the Chinese Center for Asia Pacific Studies at Zhongshan University, known to U.S. intelligence officials as CAPS.

[....] Mak and Pu, investigators say, were undercover military intelligence officers with the Second Department of the People's Liberation Army, the spy service well-known to U.S. counterspies as 2 PLA.

Investigators say Tai Mak's brother, Chi Mak, headed a family spy ring in Los Angeles. After his Oct. 28 arrest by the FBI, Chi Mak, a naturalized citizen and electrical engineer with a major American defense contractor, told investigators that he had supplied sensitive Navy weapons secrets to the Chinese since 1983. [....]

United Nations -- Most Mainstream Media MIA

Captain Ed: The Rally That (Almost) No One Covered , September 21, 2006 -- NatPost

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.ht
ml?id=f264ff59-5ab4-42f0-bc75-00b99c5b8ebf&k=65325

www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/perseus.cgi/8110

One of the most well-known philosophical questions known to popular culture asks whether a falling tree makes a noise if no one witnesses it. Now we can add whether a rally attracting tens of thousands of supporters for Israel outside the UN exists if no newspapers bother to report it. Fortunately, the New York Sun and Power Line manage to outdo the rest of the media in informing readers: [links on that webpage]

As world leaders convened for the second day of the United Nations General Assembly, tens of thousands of supporters of Israel gathered across the street from United Nations headquarters to protest President Ahmadinejad of Iran and to call for the unconditional release of the Israeli soldiers kidnapped on July 12. The international and national leaders who stepped up to the podium also challenged the United Nations to take preventative action against the Iranian leader who threatens the Jewish people with genocide. [....]

At the least, though, the rally and its speakers has solid news value. Too bad most of the media thundered after Hugo Chavez following his sulphuric speech at the General Assembly. [....]

If there is a leftist rally, we hear of it ad nauseam from the MSM. Remember the AIDS Conference in Toronto? Will the MSM allow us to forget it ... and the aftermath? But if a Muslim state--a nuclear wannabe--Iran, threatens a neighbouring country .....




Drugs: RCMP and Aussie Feds

6 men arrested in Australia in big haul of cocaine imported from Canada , Sept. 20, 06, International Herald Tribune / AP

www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/09/21/asia/
AS_GEN_Australia_Canada_Cocaine.php


Canadians held in Australian drug bust -- Cocaine, ecstasy shipped , CanWest, September 21, 2006

[....] "This operation has again demonstrated the value of customs container X-ray facilities, which are located in all of Australia's major sea cargo ports," Mr. Carmody said. [....]

The shipment was the second seized in four months from Canada. The first was the seizure of 1.2 million Ecstasy tablets in Melbourne in June that resulted in four arrests.

[....] The five Canadian men --ranging in age from 25 to 39 -- have been charged with a number of offences, including importing a commercial quantity of a border-controlled drug. A 62-year-old Sydney man has been charged with two counts of conspiracy to import a commercial quantity of a border-controlled drug. [....]

Gun Registry

The Gun Registry- front line view point
".........From its inception, I was advised not to depend on it to make decisions. It is outdated, inaccurate and completely unreliable. To make a decision at a call based on registry information would be foolish at best and deadly at worst. "......... , newsbeat1 -- Toronto Star: A flawed waste of time and money , by Michael Mays, Sgt. Ret'd, Barrie, Ont.

newsbeat1.com/2006/09/gun-registry-front-line-view-point.html

www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=
thestar/Layout/Article_PrintFriendly&c=Article&cid=
1158790224795&call_pageid=968332189003


Gun Registry Poll -- a moment in time

It's a good thing the guns were registered , wagccan, 9/14/2006 13:30:13
www.canoe.ca/mb2/messages/cnewsf/12450.html

The 3 guns used by 25 year old Kimveer Gill - Montreal's Dawson College Shooter - were legally registered. What does this tell you about the effectiveness of the $1.5 billion gun registry?

It needs to be improved 12.5%
It should be scrapped 85.6%
Other 1.72%
Total Votes: 1564

Coren, Elmasry, Nuclear

Another round: Mohamed Elmasry, CIC’s national president vs Michael Coren -- and Canadian Arab and Muslim groups aim to silence journalist Michael Coren -- includes a link to Coren's full column, 20 September 2006
www.forumsvibe.com/elwoodpdowd/viewtopic.php?t=
354&mforum=elwoodpdowd

www.judeoscope.ca/breve.php3?id_breve=2625

"Worse yet, the biggest bully is frequently Coren himself, egging on participants that he has personally chosen in order to generate more heat than wisdom on the day’s most sensitive and complex topics." [Elmasry, himself, revealed his position on Jews on one of Coren's programs.]

Both the CIC and CAF have denounced Coren’s published and broadcast views as repugnant and a mockery of Canada’s history as a progressive, multi- ethnic country [.... Cue the violins ...]

It was signed by Mohammed Elmasry ...

[....] Note: It was on the Michael Coren Show that Canadian Islamic Congress President Mohamed Elmasry made his infamous statements legitimizing terror attacks against all adult Israeli civilians.

Michael Coren has received death threats in response to his controversial column published on September 2, 2006, in the Tortonto Sun, advocating the use of precision nuclear strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities, for which his newspaper has refused to apologize.

[The full column is here -- Judge for yourself
torsun.canoe.ca/News/Columnists/
Coren_Michael/2006/09/02/1795183.html ]

[.... Comment: AnnieO] Remember Christine St-Pierre that got slapped down for her "personal opinion" about our soldiers in Afghanistan telling them to ignore the criticism . ( She was suspended as punishment by Radio CBC - French programming)

Excerpts with comments on Dearest Illusions and Dangerous Mistakes , September 17, 2006, by Bruce Thornton

www.forumsvibe.com/elwoodpdowd/viewtopic.php?t=
367&mforum=elwoodpdowd

victorhanson.com/articles/thornton091706PF.html

Nowhere is this mistaken belief in the universal endorsement of Western values more evident than in our fight against jihad. Failing to understand our opponent and the historical nature of Islam, we have interpreted his behavior in term of our own values and goods and materialist assumptions. Since we value individual freedom and material prosperity, we assume that those are also the supreme motivating goods of Muslims. Since we privilege material causes over all others, we ignore spiritual causes or reduce them to deformed responses to unfulfilled material needs. Since we prize the transparent fulfillment of the requirements of agreements we sign, we assume other peoples will also, even if those requirements contradict a more important national interest or a spiritual goal, such as fighting the infidel until the whole world is for Allah, as the Koran puts it [....]

Search: "First, who cares if the world 'doubts the moral basis' of why we fight?

Continue reading for comments on the pressure to show leadership or to be liked.



Norway Synagogue Shooters Plotted Attacks on US and Israel Embassies
littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=22673_
Breaking-_Norway_Synagogue_Shooters_Plotted_Attacks_
on_US_and_Israel_Embassies&only




Small Town Veteran, related to posts on tolerance.
www.smalltownveteran.net/posts/
2006/02/yo_muhammad_her.html



Related to Sept. 21, 2006: The "Big Picture" from Fort Dork

CBC Newsworld: The Big Picture with Avi Lewis: The Root of All Evil? -- featuring Richard Dawkins who says "Religious faith discourages independent thought, it's divisive and it's dangerous."

The Guests:

Richard Dawkins, Evolutionary biologist, Oxford University and Author of The God Delusion (in his film and by satellite)
Ronald de Sousa, Emeritus Professor, University of Toronto, Philosophy Department, Atheist extraordinaire
Cheri DiNovo, Reverend, Emmanuel-Howard Park United Church
Charles McVety, President, Canada Christian College
Imam Aly Hindy, Salaheddin Islamic Centre
Alia Hogben, Executive Director, Canadian Council of Muslim Women, Led the fight against bringing Sharia Law to Ontario
Joseph Ben-Ami, Executive Director, Institute for Canadian Values (faith based public policy think tank)
Anver Emon, Islamic law historian, University of Toronto's Faculty of Law, Specializes in Religious Fundamentalism

For commentary
www.cbc.ca/bigpicture/discussion/
2006/09/the_root_of_all_evil.html





CHRISTIE BLATCHFORD: Can we not wait a day before exploiting deaths? -- "It was such a curiously Canadian way to die."
www.forumsvibe.com/elwoodpdowd/
viewtopic.php?t=352&mforum=elwoodpdowd

[....] Yet there have not been so many bicycle suiciders, what the military calls BBIEDs, or bicycle-borne improvised explosive devices. They are about as rare as DBIEDs, or donkey-borne IEDs, though there have been a couple of those too. And to the Western eye, there is something almost innately peaceable about a guy on a bike. In Canada, the most famous cyclists are NDP Leader Jack Layton and his wife Olivia Chow, who as it happened, arrived at the House of Commons yesterday, a familiar sight, on their bikes.

What was the response, at home, to their deaths?

Why, let's be blunt, it was to feast upon the carcasses. There was barely a pause. I don't know quite when we became a nation that eats its fallen, but that is what has happened. [....]

'Tropical Taliban' feared as Cubans look beyond Castro -- 80-year-old leader's decline seen as signalling new era , Bernd Debusmann, Reuters, September 18, 2006

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=
e901b15f-4b67-4107-9efd-995625bc1a7c

HAVANA - No matter whether Fidel Castro returns to office or not, diplomats and dissidents say the post-Fidel era has begun and some foresee an ideological tug of war between "tropical Taliban" and proponents of Chinese-style economic reforms. [....]

More than 70% of Cuba's 11 million population were born after Fidel Castro seized power in 1959 and tend to be reluctant to talk about a future without him. But a number of dissidents speak out frankly and on the record. [....]

"What would be disastrous would be for the tropical Taliban to run the country," Espinosa Chepe said. The phrase refers to a younger generation of officials mentored personally by Fidel Castro. [....]

Sept. 22, 2006: Non Destructive Test ...

Of Your Tolerance

These came from someone I know in Holland where there is much discussion of tolerance and its limits.

How you respond will determine for you whether it is possible for you to live in a tolerant, freedom-loving Western democracy, which may include something which, while not violent, may bother you.

Which of these would you like to see on our beaches? Which most offends your delicate sensibilities?

Het Strand Van Zeeland

Sept. 22, 2006: Tolerance Test #1

Choose which peaceful, tolerant protester you would like as a neighbour in diverse, increasingly multicultural Canada.

You may choose only one, so choose carefully.

Sept. 22, 2006: Netherlands related

Memory Lane: Netherlands related

News Junkie Canada Feb. 19, 2004
newsjunkiecanada.blogspot.com/
2004_02_19_newsjunkiecanada_archive.html

Scroll to:

Yes, you can go home again

The National Post (Feb. 18, A10) had an article about the ever-tolerant Dutch saying "Enough is enough!" The parliament has authorized the deportation of 26,000 illegal foreigners--which is less than the 40,000-odd deportees that Canada has lost track of lately. [....]

***A [Dutch] parliamentary report last month concluded that the country's 30-year experiment in tolerant multiculturalism had been a failure, ending in sink schools, violence, and ethnic ghettoes that shun inter-marriage with the Dutch.*** [....]

Dutch race policy 'a 30-year failure' [....]

Muslims hail Dutch defeat of Fortuyn List party [....]

Homosexuals and women, take note. [....]

Simpson on Sunday: Holland's anti-Islam dandy is lost for words, by John Simpson, May 5, 2002
[The link has developed a problem; the correct one is below:
www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/
news/2002/05/05/wsimp05.xml ]

Sept. 22, 2006: Tolerance and Reason

The Pope's Speech, Islamic Reaction, Anglican Bishop Carey and the Pope's "sono rammaricato"


Carey backs Pope and issues warning on 'violent' Islam -- "a lecture titled The Cross and the Crescent: The Clash of Faiths in an Age of Secularism, at Newbold College, Berkshire", By Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent, and Richard Owen, in Rome
www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2366419,00.html

THE former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey of Clifton has issued his own challenge to “violent” Islam in a lecture in which he defends the Pope’s “extraordinarily effective and lucid” speech.

Lord Carey said that Muslims must address “with great urgency” their religion’s association with violence. He made it clear that he believed the “clash of civilisations” endangering the world was not between Islamist extremists and the West, but with Islam as a whole.

“We are living in dangerous and potentially cataclysmic times,” he said. “There will be no significant material and economic progress [in Muslim communities] until the Muslim mind is allowed to challenge the status quo of Muslim conventions and even their most cherished shibboleths.”

Lord Carey’s address came as the man who shot and wounded the last Pope wrote to Pope Benedict XVI to warn him that he was in danger. Mehmet Ali Agca, the Turkish gunman who tried to murder John Paul II in 1981 and is now in prison in Turkey, urged the Pope not to visit the country in November.

“I write as one who knows about these matters very well,” Agca said. “Your life is in danger. Don’t come to Turkey — absolutely not!” [....]

Search: contemporary political scientist, Samuel Huntington , "not Islamic fundamentalism. It is Islam ..." , Westophobia




Key excerpts: The Pope's speech
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5348456.stm

Remarks by Pope Benedict XVI in a speech in Germany have provoked outrage in the Muslim world and led to demands that the pontiff apologise for "insulting" Islam.

Below are some key excerpts from the Pope's speech at the University of Regensburg, entitled Faith, Reason and the University: Memories and Reflections.

ON UNIVERSITY LIFE [....]

ON HOLY WAR

I was reminded of all this recently, when I read... of part of the dialogue carried on - perhaps in 1391 in the winter barracks near Ankara - by the erudite Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Paleologus and an educated Persian on the subject of Christianity and Islam, and the truth of both.

In the seventh conversation...the emperor touches on the theme of the holy war. Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the "Book" and the "infidels", he addresses his interlocutor with a startling brusqueness on the central question about the relationship between religion and violence in general, saying: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."

The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. "God," he says, "is not pleased by blood - and not acting reasonably is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats."

ON RELIGION AND REASON

The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God's nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality.

At this point, as far as understanding of God and thus the concrete practice of religion is concerned, we are faced with an unavoidable dilemma. Is the conviction that acting unreasonably contradicts God's nature merely a Greek idea, or is it always and intrinsically true?

ON THEOLOGY AND SCIENCE [....]

Read the Pope's entire speech [37KB] -- requires Adobe Acrobat Reader -- download on the same webpage.
news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/15_09_06_pope.pdf

The Pope's speech
www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/
20060919/pope_apology_060920/20060920?hub=World

[....] Benedict cited a Medieval text that characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad as "evil and inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the faith."

"I trust that after the initial reaction, my words at the University of Regensburg can constitute an impulse and encouragement toward positive, even self-critical dialogue both among religions and between modern reason and Christian faith," the pope told thousands of faithful in St. Peter's Square Wednesday. Security in the square had been stepped up. [....]

We're already living under Muslim law , By John Burtis, September 19, 2006 re: The Pope, fatwa, a nun's murder, John McCain

www.canadafreepress.com/2006/burtis091906.htm

Boy, it sure seems that the old religion of peace, Islam, is up to no good, again, what with their latest fatwa on the Pope and our strong suspicions about having a few of their ardent adherents mow down a nun by shooting her four times in the back. [....]

But pity poor Sister Leonella Sgorbati, a 38-year-veteran of East Africa's most poverty stricken areas, who had served in Somalia for the past five, bringing her good deeds to the world's poorest. She ran afoul of the great Muslim outpouring of grief and shock over the Pope's speech and caught a quick four bullets or so in the back for being a woman of the same cloth, who worships the same God as Benedict.

But such is modern Islam. The slightest hint of an insult results in a plethora of fatwas calling for outright murder and, of course, the follow on death of as many innocents as can be piled up for the photo-shop enhanced photos streaming from the stringers paid by the AP, Reuters, and, of course, the New York Times. [....]

The Peaceful Ones React & Translation of Pope's "sono rammaricato"

The West Should Be Free To Criticize Islam or "Pope Benedict Criticizes Islam" , by Daniel Pipes, New York Sun. September 19, 2006
www.danielpipes.org/article/3968

* In Britain, while leading a rally outside Westminster Cathedral, Anjem Choudary of Al-Ghurabaa called for the pope "to be subject to capital punishment."
* In Iraq, the Mujahideen's Army threatened to "smash the crosses in the house of the dog from Rome" and other groups made blood-curdling threats.
* In Kuwait, an important website called for violent retribution against Catholics.
* In Somalia, the religious leader Abubukar Hassan Malin urged Muslims to "hunt down" the pope and kill him "on the spot."
* In India, a leading imam, Syed Ahmed Bukhari, called on Muslims to "respond in a manner which forces the pope to apologise."
* A top Al-Qaeda figure announced that "the infidelity and tyranny of the pope will only be stopped by a major attack."

Then, in what may be an unprecedented step by a pope, Benedict himself proffered the sort of semi-apology often favored by those feeling the heat. "I am deeply sorry for the reactions in some countries to a few passages of my address," reads the official Vatican translation into English, "which were considered offensive to the sensibility of Muslims. These in fact were a quotation from a medieval text, which do not in any way express my personal thought."

In the Italian original, however, Benedict says only sono rammaricato, which translates as "I am disappointed" or "I regret." [....]

Captain Ed of Captain's Quarters wrote a good article on how the Pope should respond.



Iran: suggested response
www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.ht
ml?id=72b3c6cf-4dca-4fd8-9609-51c9928c02e5&p=2

In Iran, about 500 theological school students protested in the holy city of Qom yesterday and hardline cleric Ahmad Khatami warned that if the Pope did not apologize, "Muslims' outcry will continue until he fully regrets his remarks."

"The Pope should fall on his knees in front of a senior Muslim cleric and try to understand Islam," Mr. Khatami said. [....]

Sept. 21, 2006: Bud Talkinghorn #2 & More

Please, a little water with your Muslim whine

I find it rich that Islam is so offended by the Pope's historic allusion to the sack of Constantiople by the Muslims. Mind you, the Pope could spend days on allusions to past Catholic barbarities--the Inquisition, conversion by torture of native peoples, and The Thirty Years War, to name a few. However, if the Pope wanted to be really nasty towards Islam, he wouldn't need to go back centuries. Islamic nations have a heap of skulls piled up in the last three decades: the blind eye turned to their fellow black Muslims in Darfur, the massacre of Christians in the south of Indonesia, the Sunni jihadis' attempts to create a bloodbath between them and the Shia in Iraq, to name a few. The list is extremely long and spans the Islamic globe ... and now has entered the West.

My guess is that the shame about their benighted homelands is so great that no avenue must be opened to legitimate inspection nor criticism. That is why the Islamic nations vote as a bloc to squelch any U.N. condemnation of their repression and unrestrained mayhem, e.g. the Algerian civil war, Mauritania's continuing slave trade, or Hezbollah's ruinous adventure against Israel. They and the infidel thug nations are in collusion, each propping up the other. Perhaps the outrage emanates from that old maxim, "The best defense is a good offense". While religious freedom in their countries is rare, and criticism of the "infidels", especially Jews, is a constant, yet, Muslims demand obsequiousness from others. To press their demands, the political and religious authorities can always employ the vast unemployed "Arab Street" to rage, burn, kill and loot in protest. The dictators love to let their oppressed peoples vent once in a while, so long as it is externalized. As Syria's former dictator, Hafez al-Assad showed in Ham'a / Hama (20,000 murdered in 1982 by the army), fundamentalist ideology doesn't play well on the domestic front.

Ironically, the violent protests against the West's freedom of speech have only solidified our resolve not to be intimidated. Now, even the leftish press is fighting back through columns and editorial letters. This culture of victimology, carefully nursed (and distorted) by radical Islamic elements is backfiring. Just an aside here, but Hedy Fry, the former Liberal Minister of Multiculturalism, was the only candidate in a leadership poll shown as having sub-zero support. "The racists are burning crosses on the lawns of Prince George as we speak" simply didn't cut it as leadership material.

Like the British, Scandanavians and Dutch, Canadians are starting to read the handwriting on the wall concerning radical Islam at home. The millions of Muslims killed by fellow Muslims in the last quarter century get scant concern, but, oh boy, don't let the Pope mention a Muslim atrocity half a millennium ago. Making mountains out of molehills does the Islamic cause no favours. Time they looked within for real targets of outrage.

© Bud Talkinghorn



The "Big Picture" from Fort Dork

CBC, a.k.a. Fort Dork, has launched another version of Carol Off's "Counterspin". The premise was that Avi Lewis would show a documentary and then follow it up with a panel discussion. On paper it sounded promising, but the spin was typically CBC'ish, Wednesday night's premier documentary had Richard Dawkins, a scientist, presenting the viewpoint that religion is the cause of most evil. In fact, the documentary's title was "The Root of All Evil--The God Delusion". If he had centered in on Islam's inflexible code, as well as that of fundamentalist Christianity, then I would have been content. Alas, he used almost all the time to sneer at American evangelicals and their claim that everything in the Bible is true. Obviously Avi is a man smart enough not to have a "fatwa" or death sentence issued against him--a la Salman Rushie. [Or one could say he's too gutless to peer into extremist Islam too far for fear of backlash? After all, Daddy Stephen Lewis works for the UN, where several tiny Muslim states make up several times the clout in votes as does each Western democracy such as the US, the UK and Canada -- wouldn't want to ruffle those touchy fellows. Frost Hits the Rhubarb]

That would have been irritating enough, but Avi Lewis rubbed salt into the wounds. Much of the time he cornered a representative from a Canadian evangelical group. He attempted to show how illiberal and fatuous his viewpoints were. Of Aly / Ali Hindy, probably Canada's most vehement exponent of radical Islam whose own network includes some of the alleged terrorists rounded up within the last few months, he asked one question--and accepted Hindy's puffball answer. There was no sneering follow-up to expose the poisonous Islamic triumphalism of that faith. Like Dawkins, Lewis is not going to court disaster with a frontal attack on Islam. No matter how CBC pretends to be neutral and balanced, they can't change their leftist spots. The female Methodist minister was allowed to get away with her "God is love, love, love" spiel. With a room full of potential opinion and comment, I counted her being allowed to speak at least four times. Except for a few statements from the audience-- the majority of whom were merely "atmosphere" people--the center of attention was the Christian guy. Like Ralph Benmergui, Avi Lewis is a CBC ghost who cannot be exorcised. Surely, if CBC wanted to broaden their appeal beyond their usual group-think crowd, they would have appointed a moderator other than Lewis. Even a new lefty voice would have been appreciated. On the other hand, CBC has always been a cottage industry for the social engineering folk.

Two other things stuck out in the panel discussion. One was how much background checking Lewis had done on the Christian chap. He even knew that he had met with an American evangelical political organizer. The second thing was the affront that Lewis and many in the crowd showed when this man openly admitted that he wanted Christians to bloc vote for candidates -- ones who are sympathetic to Christian values. Horrors! Gasp! How dare he force his narrow values on Canadians! Doesn't he understand that only the socialist agendas can be countenanced in elections? [I would add that, if Lewis were able to get wild applause and a vote for leftist/socialist/UN ideas, that would have been acceptable bloc voting. Some views are "more equal" than others, I would posit. Stalin knew that. FHTR]

Too bad. The concept of the program had real potential. Hard-nosed questioning of Ali Hindy's prejudices would have been welcomed. It is to be seen if Lewis will stack further audiences with university radicals, as Off was prone to do. I suppose I should be thankful that Lewis didn't let Carol Off's blow-hard Hussain Ibbish on to completely dominate the rap. Next week we get a doc and "discussion" on global warming. See if you can spot David Suzuki disguised as a college student panel member.

© Bud Talkinghorn


My comments on the film and program:

For an anti-religion film, there was far too much concentration by Richard Dawkins on Christianity and too little on, for example, Islam. There was a lengthy section on fundamentalist Christians in the US. How convenient for the CBC. Emphasize the anti-Christian message without a parallel emphasis upon the one religion today that is showing its utter irrationality ending, at the merest provocation, in violence and death. For the CBC, fortuitously, the program in showing Christians in a negative light would allow once again a linking in viewers' minds of Canadian Christians with the American ones ( I have noticed an increase in this lately on CBC/MSM). Note was taken of how many Christians support the US President; of course, this is only the opening salvo in the CBC/MSM's election attacks on the Stephen Harper Conservatives as being too close to the US Pres. and, always, understood is that any Canadian right-wing, fundamentalists might have something to say about how Canada is governed ... by voting.

The Canadian minister or head of a Christian council (McVety) did mention voting. Leftists should have voting power to influence governmental direction but woe betide any Christian who thinks he should be able to do the same. After all, extreme left wingers like the NDP, the UN-supporting Stephen Lewis with his network of comfortable, champagne socialists--some of whom believe themselves to be an elite, even sophisticated academics uttering "correct speak / right thought", the Liberal/MSM cabal who have run Canada for years--all think their voices should count, but those who believe in a God should not be accorded the same respect. Their participation in the democratic process might be ... too Christian? Well, one doesn't have to attend a church nor believe in any god to say this is not right. Every citizen's beliefs deserve a hearing and respect ... unless they are intolerant and exhorting death, destruction and terrorism. Then they should be silenced. I prefer a more permanent solution. No more immigration for those of intolerant beliefs. No more bending to their touchy ways. From what was not included nor emphasized on the program, I would say we have enough potential intemperate and touchy ones here, already.

Islam as it is practiced throughout the world, is too intolerant for a Canadian democracy, as the leftists would find out if Islam ever became very powerful and got its way here. But Avi Lewis wasn't willing to explore that one -- except through Dawkins' filming of a Jew in Jerusalem who had converted to Islam. How long did someone have to search to find him? Additionally, why did the program host not search for more local voices who would actually speak? Avi could have found intolerant fanatical Muslims in imam Aly Hindy's Salaheddin mosque in Scarborough, for example, which would have been quite enlightening for viewers. A number of very dodgy alleged terrorists and extremists have been connected to that mosque. The professor of Islamic Victimology 101 or is that apologetics? studies from the University of Toronto was on Avi's program (named Emon?), but there was no lengthy exploration of the fanaticism of the more rabid followers of Islam around the world. Also, for the program why not engage Mohamed Elmasry (He started his own personal "congress" (CIC) where he posts advice and information for fellow Muslims) to repeat what he said on Michael Coren's program about all Jews being legitimate targets. ... Of course, there might have been audience fireworks in response, even ridicule of Islam as opposed to ridicule of Christianity. It might have caused an eruption of Muslim outrage ... and Avi wouldn't want to have that. You see, if CBC/MSM types like Avi anger or insult Christians, they might be unhappy, angry, not appear on the program, not watch it, diss the host or the television station ... but they won't lash out in jihadi violence burning and killing ... On the other hand, irritated or insulted Muslims--it takes so little to raise their victim's hackles--may issue a fatwa ... kill ... or blow up something important ... like the CBC.

The Mothercorps has learned its lesson well. Do not tick off the followers of Mohammed. Allah Akbar! FHTR

Sept. 21, 2006: Crying Wolf or ... what?

I was led to the following from this forum by rosemarie59 who pointed to what follows from Canada Free Press and also suggested that we "note the date"

Al-Qaeda's Hidden Arsenal and Sponsors:
Interview with Hamid Mir
By Ryan Mauro TDCAnalyst@aol.com Team
Thursday, May 25, 2006

Hamid Mir truly has deep access inside Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. [....]

Mir has had remarkable reliability. For example, most recently he said that Osama Bin Laden was going to issue a new tape, but the mainstream media did not report it. A few days later, a tape was released. He was the only one to predict the event. [....]

If terrorists cause us to cry "wolf" often enough and nothing happens, then we will be lulled into carelessness; then they will strike. This may mean something or ... nothing. Note also that there is more than one article below, including A NUCLEAR MISSION IN CANADA and much documentation on the website of CanadaFreePress.com. A list of the Subheadings is at the end. If that doesn't get you to read the whole, nothing will.


Next Attack Imminent: Muslims ordered to leave the United States, By Paul L. Williams & David Dastych, Saturday, September 16, 2006
www.canadafreepress.com/2006/paul-williams091606.htm

Before you dismiss this, consider what Canada Free Press has included about the background of the authors included below:

Urgent news from Abu Dawood, one of the newly appointed commanders of the al Qaeda forces in Afghanistan:

Final preparations have been made for the American Hiroshima, a major attack on the U. S.

Muslims living in the United States should leave the country without further warning.

The attack will be commandeered by Adnan el Shukrijumah ("Jaffer Tayyer" or "Jafer the Pilot"), a naturalized American citizen, who was raised in Brooklyn and educated in southern Florida. [Photos of him are below.]

The al Qaeda operatives who will launch this attack are awaiting final orders. They remain in place in cities throughout the country. Many are masquerading as Christians and have adopted Christian names.

Al Qaeda and the Taliban will also launch a major strike (known as the "Badar Operation" against the coalition forces in Afghanistan during the holy month of Ramadan.

The American people probably will be treated to a final audio message from Osama bin Laden which will be aired some time later.

The announcements from Abu Dawood were obtained by Hamid Mir [....]

The Authors

Hamid Mir, the author of the interview, is a top Pakistani reporter, head of the Geo TV Bureau in Islamabad. He has won a world-wide acclaim for his interviews with Osama bin Laden and Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, before and following 9/11. His new book about OBL is due to appear in Britain, later this year.

Long time investigative journalist, Paul L. Williams is the author of such best-selling books as The Dunces of Doomsday, The Al Qaeda Connection , Osama's Revenge: The Next 9/11. He has been the subject of a PBS documentary and the subject of programs on the Discovery and History channels. He is a frequent guest on such national news networks as Fox News, MSNBC, and NPR.

(International journalist David M. Dastych writes for Poland's acclaimed weekly,Wprost. His columns appear regularly in the Edmonton-based Polish Panorama.) He can be reached at: David.dastych@aster.pl


There is much more in the above article on the CFP website, as well as another article with a Canadian, a McMaster University, and a nuclear reactor connection. See below.



El Shukrijumah






Al Shukrijumah, Adnan G., tbk.com -- The Terrorism Knowledge Base

www.tkb.org/KeyLeader.jsp?memID=6183

Biography: Born in Saudi Arabia on August 4, 1975, el Shukrijumah is wanted in connection with possible threats against the United States. The United States District Court of Eastern District of Virgina issued a Material Witness Warrant for his arrest for his possible involvement with al-Qaeda terrorist activities.

El Shukrijumah has a Guyanese passport, but may also attempt to enter the United States with a Saudi Arabian, Canadian, or Trinidadian passport.

A NUCLEAR MISSION IN CANADA

The search for Adnan El Shukrijumah , By Paul L. Williams, Monday, September 18, 2006 -- A note about the author is above.
www.canadafreepress.com/2006/paul-williams091806

This is only an excerpt of the whole which is definitely worth reading.

[....] A NUCLEAR MISSION IN CANADA

Following the success of 9-11, Shukrijumah became singled out by bin Laden and al-Zawahiri to spearhead the next great attack on America -- a nuclear attack that would take place simultaneously in seven U.S. cities (New York, Boston, Miami, Houston, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Washington D.C.), leaving millions dead and the richest and most powerful nation on earth in ashes.[xii]

To prepare for this mission, Shukrijumah and fellow al Qaeda agents Anas al Liby, Jaber A. Elbaneh, and Amer el Matti, purportedly were sent to McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, a facility that boasted a five-megawatt nuclear research reactor , the largest reactor of any educational facility in Canada. At McMaster, [....] He also managed to obtain employment at the reactor - - allegedly as a guide.[xiv] [....] Bit by bit, the al-Qaeda operative allegedly managed to pilfer approximately 180 pounds of nuclear material from the university - - enough to build several radiological bombs.[xv]

... Shukrijumah was under surveillance by Canadian officials in early October 2003, when he suddenly stopped attending classes and failed to show up for work. His disappearance aroused no concern, the sources say, until a few days later when the nuclear material was reported missing.[xvi]

[....] McMaster officials denied [....] But witnesses have verified Shukrijumah's presence in Hamilton and the school, according to several sources, has experienced radiological"leakage."[xvii]

THE UNANSWERED QUESTIONS [....]

Who gave Shukrijumah, a Saudi Arabian under suspicion, access to the reactor? And how is it that no one noticed increasing amounts of nuclear or radiological materials were disappearing over a period of months? [....]

[xvii] Christine Cox, "Terror Fears Suspend Tours of Mac Reactor," Hamilton Spectator, October 15, 2001. See also"Board Suspends Hospital License," Mc Master News (the news outline for Mc Master University), March 1998, www.mcmaster.ca/us/opr/courier/mar998/news.html

There is also much more information with considerable documentation on the CanadaFreePress.com website.

Subheadings:

ANOTHER PRODUCT OF BROOKLYN'S FAROUQ MOSQUE
TRAINED FOR TERROR
SLICK AS AN EEL
ADNAN'S ADVENTURES
A NUCLEAR MISSION IN CANADA
THE UNANSWERED QUESTIONS
THE POCKET LITTER
THE PLOT REVEALED
'DEMANDING, RUDE, AND OBNOXIOUS'
THE WAZIRISTAN SUMMIT
SHUKRIJUMAH SOUTH OF THE BORDER
NUKES ARRIVE IN MEXICO



More to come as time permits.

Sept. 21, 2006: Bud Talkinghorn

Afghanistan and the rutted path to democracy

I think it is a given that most Westerners want to see a democratic and reasonably prosperous Afghanistan. Even Jack Layton wants this--just with no guns involved. The trouble is that guns are one of the few tools of technology that most Afghans own. Entire regions hate other ones. Even within provinces, the tribe counts more than any external authority. A harsh landscape inhabited by primitive peoples, living by a religious code unchanged in centuries, does not augur well for democracy. Throw in the Taliban resurgence, with Pakistani connivance and hope is further diminished.

With Pakistan as a refuge and endless recruiting ground, the Taliban cannot be defeated. It is also suspected that Pakistan's Intelligence Service has active Taliban supporters. Whole sections of the western area are essentially lawless, thus no-go spots for the regular Pakistani army. President Musharraf has to appease the fundamentalists, as they are politically powerful. In short, Pakistan has become the new Afghanistan ... one with nuclear weapons. What, short of outright war with Pakistan, could destroy the combined al-Qaeda-Taliban nexus? The allied forces can't even control the opium kingpins or the various warlords within sight of them.

On the other hand, what can the Western nations do except try to bring progress--needed in every single field. Are we to condemn the Afghanis--especially the women--to the Taliban's brutal theocracy? Maybe we, by our nature, are condemned to fight a quixotic war against invincible ignorance. A classic example of damned if you do, and damned with you don't.

© Bud Talkinghorn--Perhaps for me the most chilling statement came from a Taliban commander. "The Russians had their watches, but we controlled the time."



The Dawson college shootings--a pattern emerges

Elliot Leyton, the author of "Hunting Humans", has investigated these types of mass murders. He admitted that he didn't know Quebec well, except for investigating the three mass murders occurring there. He pointed out that there was a strange pattern operating. All three massacres were committed by immigrants or their children, they happened in Montreal, and all occurred at universities or colleges. He concluded that the elites who have encouraged these misfits to emigrate here need to re-evaluate their immigration/refugee stance. Of course if things get too tough in their cities, they can always commute from their cottages-cum-mansions. Joe Average can't, unfortunately. He gets to try to daily navigate around the increasingly messy cities.

I agree with Leyton that this country has a small, but powerful, "elite" group, who indirectly influence government policy--when not attending various ceremonies to give each other Awards for Excellence. Their lives and that of the average Canadian's are worlds apart. They pontificate on the injustices of the world, and how Canada should respond to them -- almost always from a leftist position. They harbour grandiose visions of social equality and humanitarian refugee policies. The dangerous leftist notion of "Nobody is illegal" is the latest incarnation of an already overly-generous refugee system--the highest acceptance rate in the Western world. If only their social engineering could prevail completely, the country would receive manna from Heaven for all. Well, actually there would be crippling taxation and almost zero social improvement across the urban landscape, as more and more unable-to-be-assimilated immigrants crowd in. If the elites are lucky, their tinkering wouldn't cause a hideous decline. However, from their lofty heights, they tend to miss these small negative aspects. Their latest gig is try to make the Dawson shootings a plus for the gun registry--even though Gill had acquired guns legally.

It is time for these people to take one more of ex-Queen Adrienne's Circumpolar Tours, but with a one way ticket only, please. Or Michaelle Jean could take them home to Haiti, where they could be kidnapped. Might give them a small taste of the real world.

© Bud Talkinghorn--These elites wouldn't be so galling if they had been elected to influence wide-ranging political decisions. They are the true Fifth Estate and Fifth Column.


Bud, don't the "Awards for Excellence" have a Liberal trademark?



Multiculturalism and its discontents

Some blog themes cannot be easily abandoned, even if you have written on them before. Multiculturalism is one of them. While not condoning the conspiracy theory that says this government policy was devised to destroy any Anglo-franco power bloc, it has nearly succeded. While French-Canadians and Anglo-Canadians don't always (Never?) see eye to eye on numerous issues, they do come from the same cultural and political backgrounds. What multiculturalism does is suggest that the customs of the Third World are equal to those of our founding fathers. If Third World immigrants came with our attitudes towards equality, democracy and scientific progress then there would be no need for this imposed mosaic model. However, they don't, as a rule. Most still carry some of the cultural attitudes which doomed their homelands to Third World status.

Mark Steyn in The Western Standard (Sept, 26, 06, 60-61) presents a definitive argument against the cultural relativism that sits at multiculturalism's heart. The great strength of this doctrine is "that it short-circuits the possibility of argument. If there's no difference between English Common Law and native healing circles and Tamil Tiger fundraisers and gay marriage and sharia, then what's to discuss?" Steyn goes on to say that even to try to debate this cultural relativity is expose yourself to the label, "bigot". The big "however" though is that some beliefs, but only from some segments of society are not to be allowed. Some Edmonton guy was sentenced to 16 months in jail for referring to Jews as "debauched and demonic". However, if you carry placards down a main street calling for the death of Jews, or you are an A-list imam who calls Jews "the brothers of pigs", you are exempted from censure. Of course it is not just the Muslims who get a ride free from criticism. Gays, women, bogus refugees, bilingualism, and Wiccas are beyond criticism. The Hate Laws seem to have a large number of loopholes embedded in them.

Steyn quotes the eminent Islamic scholar, Bernard Lewis, who stated that whatever glue kept Britain together during WW1 and WW11 has dissolved. "It is different today. We don't know who we are, we don't know the issues, and we still do not understand the nature of our enemy." Our Western universities and leftist media make sure of that. How long before we'll be able to earn our degrees, with a major in "Western Guilt"? In the last half century we have diminished the role of Christianity, the family, and our Western social progress. In their place we have instituted a grab-bag of values. Chief among them is gross consumerism. When our main thought is how far Wal-Mart has dropped prices, rather than how our values of social justice and common decency have been dropping, then we are in deep trouble. We can see that decline in how the RCMP brand has fallen and is disparaged. One slip-up in their security handling of the Arar case and suddenly they are racist. Or as the left likes to describe it, "endemic racism in all police forces". That certain groups are vastly over-represented in domestic terrorism or street crime is another no-no for discussion. Our Muslim associations are quick to pick up that "racist" epithet.

Until we openly proclaim the inherent values that made Canada (not Somalia) great, we are facing ruin. When sharia law, with its various degrees of female devaluation, can be considered seriously as legally equal in Canada, then we have a problem. The core values of our Western ideology must be "bred in the bone", as Steyn would say. It would then be possible that our university students would boycott the radical socialist professors. They would understand the hokum of "deconstructionism and neo-colonial hegemony" for what it is. I feverishly await that day, but I am not holding my breath.

© Bud Talkinghorn

Sept. 20, 2006: Various

Unions must practice what they preach -- "If Mr. Clancy really cared about democracy, he would offer basic democratic rights to union members, including the right to associate or not associate with unions, the right to a secret ballot vote, the right to choose to withhold dues designated for non-workplace related union spending, the right to choose to cross a picket line, and the right to freedom of speech for union members." , Susan Martinuk, National Post, September 20, 2006

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.ht
ml?id=be43ad38-024c-47e7-95fd-ba155d96e0e6

NUPGE (National Union of Public and General Employees) president James Clancy and I have a history of sorts.

[....] A secret ballot vote is a given part of the democratic process. Yet unions still deny this .... misinformation and coercion and ensures that workers who would oppose a union are kept out of the loop about the union drive. Some employees don't even know ... there are no requirements for the union to inform all workers of a union drive or to hold an open, public debate when using card certification.

The truth is, unions are notoriously undemocratic in their practices. [....]

I always found that unions were so busy protecting dead wood that they were of little use to those who actually liked to work ... though I must say my experience is very limited. However, I don't like coercive unions, coercive governments, coercive language tzars (Yes, Dyane Adams, that's you and your coercive bureaucratic fiefdom.), nor anything else which forces its will upon the citizenry under the mistaken assumption that it knows best ... or that its ways are best and will work. It it just builds ill will. (If the shoe fits ... )

Memo to thug religious group practitioners: religious conversion is not conversion when it is forced.

Academe is particularly coercive about "right think" / "politically correct think" and assumes its "correct methods" are best. So much depends upon the individual student and what s/he responds to. Give students an instructor who knows something worth passing on and who wants to get it across, whether in universities or in grade schools. Get rid of the coercive nature of so many curriculum and methods practices. The alternative is for educators to mouth assent and subvert the system by doing what works in their classes. Finally, get rid of teacher assessments at universities which allow callow youth to decimate the reputations of those profs who try to get their students to work hard, learn and produce. I have seen too many students give glowing assessments of mediocre instructors who court them with A's; those same students hand devastating assessments to the best instructors who give out a range of marks. No-one ever complains about an A, unfortunately, and its worth has been severely devalued.


Traditional lectures sent to the back of the class -- But some worry universities losing the human touch, Sarah Schmidt, CanWest, September 20, 2006

Any student backlash against academia's fascination with all things online could come as a relief for many professors who loathe e-mail and online chat groups in favour of old-fashioned office hours and traditional class discussions. But it would also present a challenge to institutions that have invested time and money to meet the new generation on its terms. [a pity they hadn't invested in teaching students to read adequately or hired more staff in order to respond to human needs, perhaps even raised standards, instead]

The new 2006 Technology and Student Success Survey, commissioned by education publisher McGraw-Hill Ryerson, found that hybrid learning -- a combination of traditional lectures with online learning features -- is now the norm on campuses.

In 2003, 59% of faculty taught exclusively face to face. This year, that number has dropped to 31%, the national survey of Canadian universities shows. [....]

Online lectures have not the advantage of spur of the moment elaboration in response to student input, body language, humour, tone, the whole variety of what accompanies speech and enriches it.

(So my friend J reminds me. He writes that I sound vitriolic ... even on days when I am not ... I'm smiling, J, since you can't see me.)




UN speech ... Iran

Iran, U.S. clash at UN -- President blasts West for causing conflict unrest , Steven Edwards, CanWest, September 20, 2006

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.ht
ml?id=cb49b3eb-9553-4b2f-a5df-a4c372da329a

UNITED NATIONS - He mentioned the United States by name only once, but no one in the United Nations General Assembly had any doubts which country Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had on his mind as he spoke from the podium yesterday evening.

[....] "Some seek to rule the world relying on weapons and threats, while others live in perpetual insecurity and danger.

"Some occupy the homeland of others, thousands of kilometres away from their borders, interfere in their affairs and control their oil ... while others are bombarded daily in their own homes." [....]

Guess which country is blamed, along with the US?




The enduring fraud -- The Protocols of the Elders of Zion has been debunked countless times. Yet for the world's anti-Semites, the book's authenticity remains an article of faith, Daniel Greene, National Post, September 19, 2006

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/issuesideas/story.ht
ml?id=346e5972-d809-4b4c-9237-6644f856ea7d

[....] It is a clip from a 29-part Syrian-produced television miniseries, Al-Shatat (The Diaspora), based largely on the fraudulent Protocols of the Elders of Zion. According to the series, a secret global Jewish government seeks to control the world. The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) reports that the Hezbollah-run Al-Manar TV service aired Al-Shatat in 2003.

Al-Shatat followed a 41-part Egyptian-produced television series, Knight Without a Horse, which also drew inspiration from the Protocols. The first episode aired in November 2002. Protests from the West included a condemnation of the series by the U.S. State Department.

What is The Protocols of the Elders of Zion? And, why is this book, which was proven a fraud as early as 1920, still serving to spread hatred of Jews to this day?

[....] The Protocols is entirely a work of fiction. [....]

So, what accounts for the sustained popularity of this book among those with anti-semitic agendas?

The Protocols functions so effectively as a propaganda tool in large part because of the insidious seductiveness of conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories explain a complicated world in simple ways. "It's the Jews," has provided a simple, and often hateful, way to make sense of ever increasing complexity.

The Protocols was likely concocted by the Czarist secret police in Paris during the late 1890s. A version of the text appeared in a Russian newspaper in 1903, and [....]

Would it be politically incorrect to suggest that those who believe this are daft or stupid lack education and sophistication? No one tiny country could be as insidious as the Middle East countries would have us believe Israel is. Besides, we can compare countries' output ... Need I say more?



Michelle Malkin: Breeding terror in our prisons , September 19, 2006 07:55 AM
michellemalkin.com/archives/005951.htm

There's a new study saying the same old thing about our failure to stop the spread of jihad in the US prison system:

U.S. prisons are becoming major breeding grounds for Islamic terrorists, but state and local authorities are too cash-strapped to prevent or track recruiting, a new report concludes.

The report, to be released Tuesday, found there aren't enough legitimately trained Muslim religious leaders to counsel an estimated 9,000 U.S. prison inmates who want Islamic services. That allows Islamist extremists to target their vulnerable prison-mates with distorted versions of the Quran and other Muslim readings that urge radicalization and violence. [....]

Our refusal to profile jihadists and their sympathizers in prisons is suicidal. Maybe if the MSM had less of an obsession with Abu Ghraib and worried more about the poison being spread in our prisons here, Washington would be moved to do something about it.

Why should prisons be supplying imams for prisoners anyway, given what we know about imams, a number of whom preach radical Islam and terrorism? Let prisoners do without Islamic chaplains until such time as security can be assured that the imams are not creating more radicalized prisoners. They may have a right to religious services but there is no sense in being stupid about it. Robert Reid and Jose Padilla should have taught a lesson on this. Or is there no common sense when "rights" are involved?

The [inspector general's] report ... reported on the scandalous employment of Warith Deen Umar, former head Islamic chaplain of New York's state prison system, who also served as a federal U.S. Bureau of Prisons (BOP) contractor.

The Journal quoted Umar saying at a public event, "Even Muslims who say they are against terrorism secretly admired and applaud [the 9/11 hijackers]." It also reported Umar stating he believed black inmates who converted to Islam in prison were logical recruits for committing future terrorist attacks against America. Both state and federal officials fired him in the wake of the article.

Well, do you think the prisons need imams? The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) needs a good old fashioned leader who states the obvious, sticks to his/her guns, and does not allow more prosletyzing by imams for "the peaceful ones".




Memory Lane -- found on the way to something else

Gift idea: Frost Hits the Rhubarb: December 19, 2004 The Cons and the Pros -- book by Willie Gibbs, the highly respected former head of the National Parole Board

The UN Global $$$ Grab

UN Law of Sea angle -- Feds, Nfld. in oil-cash dispute -- "A section of the UN law requires that up to 7% of oil revenues from areas beyond the limit be shared with developing countries." , Dec. 20, 2004, CP

frosthitstherhubarb.blogspot.com/
2005_05_15_frosthitstherhubarb_archive.html

[....] The dispute arose when Canada ratified the UN Law of the Sea Convention on Nov. 6, 2003. Among other things, the convention allows Canada to claim sovereignty over any parts of its continental shelf that lie beyond the current 200-nautical-mile limit. [....]

Read the fine print. Ah, after UNSCAM, what next? Which UN kleptocrats will get that money if Newfoundland and Labrador does not? [....]

Won't it be wonderful when all of us have another layer of grasping governance ... with their hands in your pockets ... the United Nations?



Diversion from J

When I was married 25 years, I took a look at my wife one day and said, "Honey, 25 years ago, we had a cheap apartment, a cheap car, slept on a sofa bed and watched a 10 inch black and white TV, but I got to sleep every night with a hot 25 year old blonde. Now, we have a nice house, nice car, big bed and plasma screen TV, but I'm sleeping with a 50 year old woman. It seems to me that you are not holding up your side of things."

My wife is a very reasonable woman. She told me to go out and find a hot 25 year old blonde, and she would make sure that I would once again be living in a cheap apartment, driving a cheap car, sleeping on a sofa bed. Aren't older women great? They really know how to solve a mid-life crisis.

Sept. 20, 2006: Sakhalin-2

Russia pressures shell on us$20b oil/gas project, NatPost/FinPost, Sept. 20, 06

www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/story.ht
ml?id=4635555b-685c-4f2f-8af2-44a0aaca88d3

[....] Analysts suspect the Kremlin will ratchet up the pressure to the point where Shell would be forced to surrender long-established production deals to give Russia a bigger slice.

"The Russians want in, full stop," said UBS's chief Moscow economist, Al Breach. "Russia does not want these big fields run by foreign companies. They are putting pressure on Shell to come to a deal. It's all about money." [....]

Sakhalin-2 involves the construction of the world's biggest liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant with capacity of 9.6 million tonnes a year that would supply customers in Japan, the United States and Asian countries. [....]

Search: asset swap talks , revoke environmental approval , hurt diplomatic relations

Perhaps ex-PM Jean Chretien could ride to the rescue consult as he did previously ... on Yukos, wasn't it? Check further.

Sept. 20, 2006: Is it what ... or whom you know?

Harmony Airlines -- David TK Ho

Harmony to start transpacific service with partners' help -- Hawaiian Airlines and Air Pacific , Chris Sorensen, Financial Post, September 20, 2006

www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/story.ht
ml?id=26ad9a7c-1325-426d-9b46-3e7d5201532f

Harmony Airways Inc. is set to expand its reach across the Pacific after receiving permission from Canadian regulators to operate flights to Australia and Fiji. [....] Harmony has a similar codeshare relationship with China Eastern that allows it to sell tickets to destinations in China.

Who owns Air Pacific? It's not completely clear to me -- more research needed. Qantas owns 46.5 percent of Air Pacific, so don't be surprised if you're ushered onto an Air Pacific plane when you thought you'd booked on Qantas. ...
www.fijiatoz.com/a.html


Air Pacific Annual Report pdf -- Air Pacific Limited currently owns 100 shares in Richmond Limited ...
www.airpacific.com/website.nsf/4C256E0400
755A354C256DC5001A9BF5/$FILE/AP03REPORT.pdf


Air Pacific, Fiji's International Airline -- "During the year, the previously fully owned subsidiary, Richmond Ltd, was launched as a joint venture with Colonial Life Fiji Ltd to construct the Novotel Denarau Island Resort and ... services to Apia, Nukualofa and Port Vila." -- "service to Los Angeles ... Melbourne, Brisbane and Auckland"

www.airpacific.com/website.nsf/v/NWS024


Novotel Denarau Island Resort

The Sofitel Fiji Resort & Spa is owned by Richmond Ltd -- Gerald Barrack, Chairman of Richmond Limited, said the decision to upgrade the hotel to Accor’s premier Sofitel brand reflected the growth in demand for upmarket accommodation from Fiji’s principal source markets.

Will it be a gambling resort? Another rest and recreation spot for those members of the UN overworked from doing so much good throughout the world?





Memory Lane: David TK Ho and Harmony Airlines ... networks of friends and associates

Frost Hits the Rhubarb: May 15 - 20, 2005
frosthitstherhubarb.blogspot.com/
2005_05_15_frosthitstherhubarb_archive.html

Harmony to have China flights , Financial Post, May 19, 05 [....]

Business Deals: Harmony Air China Flights [....]

Winning in Business in Canada: More Tripping Along the Yellow Brick Road

I have noted a great degree of cross-pollination between educational institutions, honourary degrees, other awards, political donations, civic celebrations, networks in Canada which have gone global, powerful figures in our government, what appear to be political favours and great success in business. See what you think. [....]

China, Canada, Networks & Connections, Harmony Airways, Donations to PM, Awards Received & More

For an airline begun such a short time ago, in the face of extremely difficult times for the air industry, David TK Ho's Harmony Airlines' rise has been meteoric. Of course, it helps to have studied in Canada years ago, to be very wealthy, and . . . . [....]

The HSBC (bank) is one of Li Ka-shing's companies, along with Cheung Kong Holdings, involved in construction of the Black Tusk Highway leading up to Whistler and the Olympics 2010. HSBC was mentioned as a sponsor, along with TK Ho and Harmony Air, of the "HSBC Celebration of Light" , Radical Press, 2/19/2003. Note the date. [....]

2003 October -- CSL wins award in Hong Kong [CSL used to belong to Paul Martin, ex-PM, now belongs to his sons, according to my information, but check what has happened since Martin lost in the last election.]

There are other connections and networks of interest -- and awards.

The winning campaign: Citation For Outstanding TV Campaign -- “One2Free ‘SMS Lovers’" -- Hong Kong CSL Ltd. -- Paul Martin's CSL--ex-company--divested to his sons. Check when. [....]

2003

The former deck-hand who bought the company -- Paul Martin will be the first Canadian prime minister with a true, blue-ribbon background in business , November 4, 2003, Glen McGregor, Ottawa Citizen [....]

The donors' list shows that Mr. Martin's support from the business world is transnational, with Chinese billionaire Li Ka Shing and Hong Kong airline operate David TK Ho donors to the Martin leadership campaign, through Canadian companies. [....]

May 27, 2005 ... Growing an Airline in Canada .... Ho of Harmony Airlines & DTKH Robson Developments .... Hainan Airlines

frosthitstherhubarb.blogspot.com/2005/05
/tipping-point-de-guzman-of-bre-x.html