Mike Grimm, a G.O.P challenger to Democrat Mike McMahon's Congressional seat, took in over $200,000 in his last filing.
But in an effort to show that Grimm lacks support among voters in the district, which covers Staten Island and parts of Brooklyn, the McMahon campaign compiled a list of Jewish donors to Grimm and provided it to The Politicker.
The file, labeled "Grimm Jewish Money Q2," for the second quarter fundraising period, shows a list of over 80 names, a half-dozen of which in fact do hail from Staten Island, and a handful of others that list Brooklyn as home.
"Where is Grimm's money coming from," said Jennifer Nelson, McMahon's campaign spokeman. "There is a lot of Jewish money, a lot of money from people in Florida and Manhattan, retirees."
There's more. Read it if you want. McMahon has gone into damage control. We know that there is a double standard, and had a Republican made this charge against a Democrat, all the major news organizations would have already labeled him as a Nazi, a hate monger, and even worse, as somebody who doesn't worship diversity or multiculturalism. All of the "leaders" of the Jewish community and of the major Jewish organizations would be putting out editorials demanding apologies, and calling for his head on a platter. He would be pilloried, hung from a gibbet, and forced to drop out of the race. He would be demonized, his children hounded at school, his wife thrown out of her social circle. His name would (until the next scandal) become a synonym for irrational, blind hatred.
McMahon is lucky to be a Democrat. This will blow over in a day or two, and all of the major news organizations will accept the firing of this Jennifer Nelson as proper penance for this minor indiscretion. They will accept the dubious claim that he had nothing to do with it, it was all the fault of Jennifer Nelson, and they will go back to their Obama-worship and looking for dirt on Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh. Jewish organizations will go back to condemning conservative Christians and hunting right-wing extremists.
The worst part is that (and I really hope I turn out to be wrong here) his liberal Jewish supporters will pass over this blatantly anti-Semitic dirty trick. They will excuse it as "just politics" and nothing compared to what Bush did when he was president. (Yeah, I know. It's a non sequitur, but we've heard that argument before from progressives when they've lost the debate. Who needs facts when you have an insane alternate world view?) They have to forgive their Democrat, no matter how much this candidate demonstrates his disregard, or even his antipathy toward them. The alternative is unthinkable. No liberal Jew in their right mind wants the "nuclear option", you know, voting for a Republican.
And if you, like I do, think that is a ridiculous position for allegedly intelligent people to take, watch and see the large percentage of the Jewish vote Obama receives in 2012. Sure, he will lose some Jewish support, but I'm guessing he will still get over 70%.
It seems that things are not as desperate as the Hamas-loving, human rights fraud, Israel-haters have been telling us. According to the folks at Jewish Internet Defense Force,
While Hamas continues to complain that Gaza lacks building materials, a luxury mall in Gaza City held its grand opening over the weekend. Among the goods on sale are Israeli men's clothing, and items from Turkey, France, and the United States.
and
A variety of stores sell cosmetics, clothing, office supplies, toys, shoes, appliances and more. The mall boasts air conditioning and a delivery service.
Hamas has often accused Israel of creating a “siege” by keeping its border crossings to Gaza closed. According to Hamas, Gaza lacks electricity and building supplies.
however
Despite the bargain prices, Israelis are advised that it is forbidden to enter Gaza.
Here is a photo of a portion of the mall.
Lovely, isn't it? Uh, I mean, look at the humiliating circumstances that Gazans are forced to shop under by those oppressive Israelis! Where is the food court for heaven sake? How are those poor oppressed Gazans supposed to gorge on elephant ears? Why, there probably aren't even fitting rooms in which to try on that special bomb vest they are out shopping for. Not that parents would buy them for themselves but as presents for their young martyr-in-training.
Read the rest of the article. It's short and it's got some good links.
UPDATE: What? You want more? Much more? Go see Tom Gross' media dispatches. Scroll down and read his posts, but more important, look at the photos he's taken of the abject suffering of ordinary Gazans in the mall, at the Olympic-sized swimming pool, on the beach, and in pricey restaurants. It will make you want to take action - against the lying turds who have inverted reality and morality.
Yep, found it on the Internet of all places. Rather than annoy everyone on my email list, I'm posting it here where very few people will read it. Maybe one of them will annoy their email list.
Pinocchio, Snow White, and Superman are out for a stroll in town one day.
As they walk, they come across a sign: "Beauty contest for the most beautiful woman in the world." "I am entering!" said Snow White.
After half an hour she comes out and they ask her, "Well, how'd ya do?" " First Place!," said Snow White.
They continue walking and they see a sign: "Contest for the strongest man in the world." "I'm entering," says Superman. After half an hour, he returns and they ask him, "How did you make out?" " First Place!" answers Superman. "Did you ever doubt?"
They continue walking when they see a sign: "Contest! Who is the greatest liar in the world?" Pinocchio enters. After half an hour he returns with tears in his eyes.
I've been meaning to for years, and I finally read it. I finally read the first volume of The Gulag Archipelago. I could have put it off longer, but I found a paperback copy for a quarter at a yard sale. Then I needed something for the trip to NYC. With all the time one spends at the airport these days when one flies, a hunk of good solid reading material is a must.
This is certainly good solid reading material and it kind of blows the lid off of any thoughts anyone may have of any kind of socialist utopia where "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is possible. And that line about "Workers of the world, unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains"? Forget it. It's more like, "Fools of the world, unite. Exchange your current manageable chains for chains that will drag your body down the same way you've dragged your mind down if you still don't understand that communism is a mug's game.!"
Under the circumstances, this could have been a hideously depressing book and impossible to read. In fact, judging from the heft of the book and the number of used copies I've seen over the years, my guess is that more people bought it than read it. A lot more. I also have to surmise that even fewer people bought or read the second volume containing parts III and IV. (I picked that up yesterday at one of our better area used book stores. It's on my book shelf now, and I'll get to it eventually.) Solzhenitsyn softens the pain considerably with his constant sarcastic tone. No, the reader doesn't laugh along with him, but the reader shares the frustration and the irony of a system that some people today still worship as the greatest hope for mankind, but that arrested millions of innocent men and women in order to maintain control over citizens and to feed the gigantic slave labor pool that was needed to build projects that wouldn't have been able to be built otherwise. Let's face it: a controlled economy is no economy and that's what the Russians had under communism. For some of the true believers who were arrested on trumped up charges or on no charges at all, it was the shock of being caught in the system they supported that gave them the realization that something wasn't quite right here.
As musician, poet, and philosopher(?) Sun Ra said,
If you do wrong, you have to pay, But if you do right, you have to pay too; Also, if you do nothing You have to pay.
And it didn't start under Stalin, as some of the apologists would like us to believe. It built upon the prisons and police force of the czars. The inhumanity of the system was taken light years beyond anything the czars ever imagined. And it was taken there by Lenin and his henchmen.
Solzhenitsyn doesn't settle for merely telling his own story as a prisoner of the gulags. His is only one of hundreds that he shares. He also gives a history of the system, and a tour of the system, from his arrest to his arrival at some of his work projects. In between we get others' stories of both intentional and casual cruelty. While the conditions were almost uniformly horrible throughout the system from arrest, through transport, to prisons and work camps, Solzhenitsyn talked to other prisoners. Many of them, of course are long dead, having died somewhere along the way. Some prisoners, like Solzhenitsyn got lucky and were imprisoned in places where it was possible to not be worked to death.
While describing the horrors of the system, and according to him, Soviet jailers were much worse than Nazi jailers, as he met prisoners who were unfortunate enough to experience both, he also writes of the pleasures of talking to other prisoners, intelligent men and women who had important stories to share, of being able to read the occasional great book. He looked for and reported on the positive in a man-made hell.
By the time Solzhenitsyn was arrested the system had been functioning for years and ran like a well-oiled machine. Arrests were done at night so that the befuddled victim was less likely to fight back. Very few, including the author, did. From that point on, the cruelty built. Some of it, including interrogation and torture, was to break the prisoner in order to get false confessions and names of other "conspirators". And some of it was just to keep the system running more efficiently. Prisoners died at every step. Those who lived were moved to the next step, until finally he, or she, ended up at one of the gulags to, most likely, be worked to death.
I'm not sure a lesser writer could have pulled this off. The only part where it drags is in his review of many of the more notorious show trials. Other than that, it's a fascinating look into another facet of man's inhumanity to man.
In closing, I have to share a piece of advice from Solzhenitsyn. It's on page 591 of the paperback edition:
“Do not pursue what is illusory – property and position; all that is gained at the expense of your nerves decade after decade, and is confiscated in one fell night. Live with a steady superiority over life – don’t be afraid of misfortune, and do not yearn after happiness; it is, after all, all the same: the bitter doesn’t last forever, and the sweet never fills the cup to overflowing.
“It is enough if you don’t freeze in the cold and if thirst and hunger don’t claw at your insides. If your back isn’t broken, if your feet can walk, if both arms can bend, if both eyes can see, and if both ears can hear, then who should you envy? And why? Our envy of others devours us most of all. Rub your eyes and purify your heart – and prize above all else in the world those who love you and who wish you well. Do not hurt them or scold them, and never part from any of them in anger; after all, you simply do not know; it might be your last act and that will be how you are imprinted in their memory.”
Ichilov hospital in Tel Aviv treats up to 100 patients a month from Gaza, and often Hamas takes the role of middleman between Gaza residents and the Israeli hospital, Ichilov Director Professor Gabi Barabash said Thursday. Barabash spoke to Deputy Minister Ayoub Kara, a resident of the Druze village of Dalyat El Carmel near Haifa, who was touring the hospital and viewing its care for foreign Arab patients.
In addition to caring for patients from Gaza, the Ichilov staff treats many citizens of foreign Arab countries, including those that have no diplomatic ties with Israel. They all receive dedicated care, and the relatives who accompany them are provided with free food and a place to stay, Barabash said.
Kara praised the hospital's care at the end of the tour. Ichilov treats all of its patients equally, he said, but it is not the only one, and hospitals throughout the country send hundreds of people home to Gaza in good health each month after they arrived in Israel suffering from serious ailments.
He condemned Hamas for benefiting from the arrangement while giving nothing in return. “The time has come for Hamas to give us something small in return,” he said, “to release a single son of ours, who has been held for four years with no medical care, in exchange for the hundreds of people whose lives Israel saves every month.”
Kara called on Arab countries to take action: “I call on those Arab countries that are aware of how much we give them when it comes to medicine to call for Gilad Shalit's release as well.” Shalit's release would “make the peace talks much more meaningful,” he added. (IsraelNationalNews.com)
Will the world stand up and take notice? Will any of the world-wide league of bullies against Israel bother to acknowledge this?
For a while I was in correspondence with an anti-Israel mailing list. I was put on the list by an Israel hater who asked me never to contact her after I suggested that she read Dershowitz' book, The Case for Israel. I didn't object, but I did return comments in response to the Israel-bashing articles that were sent to me. I also sent unsolicited articles and forwarded emails to the list administrator. I haven't heard from them in a long time. If I still had the email address, I would forward this article. I think they're afraid of me, all 5'9", 145 arthritic pounds of me.
As Debbie Schlussel points out, pandering, bowing, and scraping to the Muslim world did not begin with Obama. The difference is, Obama doesn't try and hide it. In this respect, he is much more honest than those presidents who served before him. Like Debbie says,
When I was an intern on Capitol Hill in the summer of 1985 and still in high school, Saudi Prince Sultan Bin Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud held a giant party for all of the young interns on Capitol Hill. He and the Saudi Arabian Embassy rented out the Capitol Center and hosted free food, music, belly dancers, and other entertainment, trying to reach out to America’s future leaders and convince them of the modernity, hipness, and “appeal” of Saudi Arabia. The was the real purpose. But the ostensible purpose was to celebrate Prince Sultan’s trip into space, courtesy of NASA–Ronald Reagan’s NASA. While ultimately this was Reagan’s move, it was carefully orchestrated by then-Vice President George H.W. Bush, a close friend to the Saudi Royal family.
There were exhibits all over the Cap Center party honoring Prince Sultan’s space trip. And, at the time, everyone in the U.S. space program knew what a joke it was, what an obvious sop to the Saudis, given that the Prince didn’t have an iota of the years of training and skill it takes to become an American astronaut. He had the title of “payload specialist,” but the only payload for which he was actually skilled was “pay the lady.” Only months earlier, the Prince was the acting Saudi Information Minister and had zero space knowledge.
Everyone knew that this was a PR stunt that was outreach to Muslims in the form of fulfilling this spoiled Saudi Prince’s only unfulfilled Walter Mitty fantasy, courtesy of the Bush family that feted these people for decades. The real American astronauts laughed that the pretentious Prince Sultan insisted on wearing his Islamofascist get-up for the group picture of the STS-51-G Space Shuttle Discovery crew, yet he dressed in space gear for his individual shot. At the time, Sultan was the youngest person to fly in a space shuttle and not because he earned it. Even worse, U.S. taxpayer dollars helped finance Sultan’s launch and deployment of the Arab Satellite Communications Organization’s ARABSAT-1B satellite in space, the ostensible reason Sultan was aboard the flight. Yes, the Saudis supposedly paid a token amount. But it didn’t cover the overwhelming costs incurred. And that’s not the point.
Most of us weren't as aware of the pathologies of Islam as we are today. I was one of those who joked about it. Now, I'm a lot more serious, but there is still room for humor. Our sense of humor must never be lost. Then the terrorists (and their progressive supporters and enablers) will have won.
This Get Fuzzy comic has nothing to do with NASA or Islam, or anything of earth-shattering importance. But it's funny, and with me, funny counts.
Here is the dialogue in a more readable sized font: ROB: Bucky, whether you like it or not, Soccer is the most popular sport in the world.
BUCKY: Well, with all due respect, I wouldn't go around usin' "The World" to make a point. "The World" is nuts.
ROB: Again, most popular game in the world? Soccer, A.K.A., Football.
BUCKY: Oh yeah? What did it edge out? Ethnic-Cleansingball? Malariaball? Fighting-Over-A-Patch-of-Dirt-Ball?
We've come to expect scenes like this from the Religion of Peace. The insanity aspect is that so many self-proclaimed human rights advocates, and alleged fighters for equal rights have absolutely nothing to say about it.
Not long ago, when I watched British-Muslim actress Afshan Azad, 22 years old, glide into the Yule Ball at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire as Padma Patil, a witch going to the ball with pasty, red-haired “Ron Weasley,” I thought to myself: Only in the world of fantasy could a Muslim proudly play a Hindu girl, learning magic and choosing a "non-believing" man from outside the faith so freely—and without censure.
Indeed, according to the BBC, Azad's father, Abdul Azad, 54, and his son Ashraf, 28, allegedly threatened to kill the actress this year, on May 21, in their Manchester, England, home, because she was heard talking on the phone to her Hindu boyfriend. At a hearing last Tuesday, the father and son were charged with the attack. Ashraf was also accused of assaulting his sister and charged with “assault occasioning actual bodily harm.”
Of course it's got nothing to do with Islam. Her parents were mentally ill. They've perverted the message of peace inherent in the Qu'ran. They're part of a tiny minority who are perverting a great religion. The whole episode was taken out of context. It could just as easily been a member of any religion. It's the fault of the Jews. It's because of the predicament of the Palestinians. Feel free to add any further ridiculous excuses that I may have forgotten.
Beyond insane is this - reprinted in it's entirety because you have to read it. And if you're like me, you still don't believe it. In fact, I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll have to retract this post because it was a silly prank.
NASA's new mission: Building ties to Muslim world By: Byron York Chief Political Correspondent July 6, 2010
You'd be hard-pressed to find an American who doesn't know that the "S" in NASA stands for "Space." Since the race to the moon in the 1960s, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has been one of the most storied agencies in the U.S. government. Now, under President Obama, its mission is changing -- and space isn't part of the story.
"When I became the NASA administrator, [Obama] charged me with three things," NASA head Charles Bolden said in a recent interview with the Middle Eastern news network al-Jazeera. "One, he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering."
From moon landings to promoting self-esteem: It would be difficult to imagine a more dramatic shift in focus for an agency famous for reaching the heavens. Bolden's words left supporters of space exploration astonished. "Everyone had the same impression: Is this what he is spending his time on?" says a Republican Hill aide who tracks the space program. "A lot of people are very upset about it."
NASA is not getting out of the space business, at least not entirely. But Bolden's words, together with the president's decision to scrap much of NASA's mission and include the agency in the "Cairo Initiative" -- that is, the White House outreach program outlined in Obama's June 4, 2009, Cairo speech to the Muslim world -- show that the NASA of the future will be little like the past.
Obama released his plan for NASA a few months ago, and to many it seemed a blueprint for disaster. The moon program will be scrapped, replaced by a hazy hope to visit Mars. The space shuttle will die, too, leaving America with no way to put a man in orbit.
Obama's proposal stunned U.S. space heroes Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan -- the first and last men to walk on the moon -- who, along with Apollo 13 commander Jim Lovell, made a rare public statement denouncing the plan as a "devastating" scheme that "destines our nation to become one of second- or even third-rate stature."
Even John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth who later became a Democratic senator and Obama supporter, was dismayed by the president's plan to rely on the Russians to ferry American astronauts to the international space station. "We're putting ourselves in line for a single-point failure ending the whole manned space program," Glenn said.
The Muslim outreach at NASA is the result of the White House's preparation for Obama's Cairo speech. Staffers found that many Muslims admire American achievements in science and technology, so Obama used the speech to announce the appointment of U.S. "science envoys" and a new fund "to support technological development in Muslim-majority countries."
Obama appointed Egyptian-American scientist Ahmed Zewail as the first science envoy to the Middle East. Just last week, Zewail argued that the U.S. can build better relations with the Muslim world by "harnessing the soft power of science in the service of diplomacy." The NASA initiative is part of that.
Last month, Bolden himself traveled to Cairo to mark the first anniversary of Obama's speech. In an address at the American University, Bolden cited Zewail's work and stressed NASA's role in improving relations with Islamic nations. Beginning with a hearty "Assalaamu alaykum," Bolden explained that in the past, NASA worked with countries that were capable of space exploration, but now Obama has "asked NASA to change ... by reaching out to 'nontraditional' partners and strengthening our cooperation in the Middle East, North Africa, Southeast Asia and in particular in Muslim-majority nations."
"NASA is not only a space exploration agency," Bolden concluded, "but also an Earth improvement agency."
At the same time, Bolden gave a bleak assessment of the space part of NASA's mission. More than 40 years after the first moon landing, he told al-Jazeera, the U.S. can no longer reach beyond Earth's orbit without assistance from abroad. "We're not going to go anywhere beyond low Earth orbit as a single entity," Bolden said. "The United States can't do it."
Its space initiatives junked, its administrator rhapsodizing about helping Muslims "feel good" about themselves: That is the new NASA.
What exactly have Muslims contributed to the world in the past 500 years? Even if we go back to the beginning of Islam, and factor in the "golden age" of Islam, when they were more advanced than Europe, they still haven't given the world much in the way of real progress, advances for humanity, boons to civilization. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. Islamic scholars decided centuries ago that if it's not in the Qu'ran, they've got no use for it. They haven't been interested in advancing knowledge in the way the West has. Sorry, but that's the way it is.
When Obama was elected, many of his sycophants were upset because Rush Limbaugh hoped that he would fail. I wish they were as upset that Obama wants the United States to fail.
First, here's one featuring Bret Stephens, challenging liberals on their view of Israel.
Next up, we have a short piece on the Gaza flotilla.
For people with lengthy attention spans that still haven't been whittled down to nothing by constant computer usage, here's an interesting discussion about Ronald Reagan with Mark Steyn and Rob Long.
And finally, here's some Daffy Duck, because sometimes Daffy is the only one who makes sense in the world.
In today's Detroit Free Press, Stephen Henderson offered his views on the Fourth of July. Being an editor at the liberal Free Press, Henderson is no simple-minded cheerleader for America. Sure, we can celebrate, but we also have to acknowledge those less than savory episodes in our country's history.
But the Declaration's principal author, Thomas Jefferson, and its signers in the Continental Congress were clouded by a much more complex morality, principally hobbled by their inability to ensure that the independence they were asserting for themselves would apply to everyone.
and
There are, for example, our historic struggles with gender equality and the current debate over equal protection for gay Americans. You can see it in arguments over how we treat our enemies in the war on terror and how a nation of immigrants welcomes -- or shuns -- those who want to share in our freedom.
Of course, he's going somewhere with this. And it's his next sentence.
America is a journey toward perfection, defined by its struggles to overcome the frailty of human imperfection.
Perfection? Understanding that all we have to work with in this country, and on this planet, are imperfect, fallible human beings, the quest for perfection is strictly for suckers. I think we have to understand that first, and look at the other plans throughout history that sought perfection, but found instead slavery, fascism, and death.
I began rereading volume II (out of 3) of Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (my summer reading project) and came across the following quote:
A people who still remembered that their ancestors had been the masters of the world would have applauded, with conscious pride, the representation of ancient freedom, if they had not long since been accustomed to prefer the solid assurance of bread to the unsubstantial visions of liberty and greatness.
And then there was this, by Nolan Finley in today's Detroit News:
Voters in Port Chester, N.Y., went to the polls last month carrying six votes each to cast in the village board election. They could spread them out among multiple candidates, or plunk them all for one favorite. They were also allowed to cast ballots over a five-day period.
The hope of federal Judge Stephen Robinson was that Hispanics, who make up nearly half the Port Chester populace, would target their six votes each at Hispanic candidates, thus achieving his goal of crafting a board more demographically in line with the local population.
Robinson ordered the scheme, called cumulative voting, under the federal Voting Rights Act, which has turned into one of the greatest perversions of democracy ever imagined. The judge acted on complaints that despite their large presence in the community, Hispanics had never managed to win a seat on the board.
There was no evidence that Hispanics were being kept from the polls or discouraged from voting. Nor was there anything stopping Hispanic citizens in the past from pooling their considerable single votes behind one Hispanic candidate. But the fact that a Hispanic hadn't been elected was evidence enough for the judge to determine racial discrimination was at work.
Even some Hispanic voters found the solution unnerving.
With that kind of voting, why do we need people to vote at all? Our wise progressive judges can let us know who the winners should be, and then votes can be appropriately divided so that the correct candidate wins. All candidates will receive at least some of the votes. Self-esteem of the candidates must also be a consideration . . . mustn't it?
Did anti-Semitism in Europe end with the demise of the Third Reich, only to be reborn with increased Islamic immigration to Europe? Or did it merely go underground, seething and waiting until the time was right to once again take prominence in the minds of the European populace? I don't know. But I know that if I were a Jew living in Europe, even one of the supposedly free and democratic western European countries, I would pack up my family and make Aliyah. The reaction of European governments to the recent Gaza flotilla was monstrous. It has also been noted that England, the country, that thanks to Winston Churchill, stood fast against the Nazis in Europe's darkest hour, had strict quotas for Jews and rather than admit them during the dark days of the Shoah, sent Jews trying to escape the Nazis back to the continent to be liquidated. And of course during the 30s and 40s they tried to keep Jews out of the holy land.
England hasn't changed much since then, except for the worse. With all the fuss they made over forged British passports used to assassinate a Hamas terrorist in Dubai because they assumed the Israelis made the hit, they're strangely silent on the use of forged British passports used by Russian spies. As they continue to bend over further and further on their journey to dhimmitude, their natural animus against Jews has returned. How bad is it? Let Debbie Schlussel fill you in on the latest.
So, it’s no surprise that a British judge and jury said that vandalism–destruction that could have killed many and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars–is okay . . . so long as it’s against the Jews or Israel (or someone doing business with or helping them). It’s really not too different than laws the Nazis had in place. And that’s no hyperbole.
The ends justifies the means, Judenrein-style. Yup, 1940 Europe repeats itself 70 years later. Today, they use the euphemism “Israel” as their excuse, but tomorrow, they’ll openly use the word “Jew”:
Five activists who caused £180,000 damage to an arms factory were acquitted after they argued they were seeking to prevent Israeli war crimes.
The five were jubilant after a jury found them not guilty of conspiring to cause criminal damage to the factory on the outskirts of Brighton.
Yeah, go read the whole thing. And remember, this is Great Britain. There have been a few times in the last few years when I thought that England would wake up from its slumber and fight the enemy in its midst. I don't think so any longer. At some point, leftists in the United States who didn't care what was happening over there will be trying to bargain with the British Islamic mullahs in order to have the art treasures (more important than people to some) of the various British museums kept out of harms way, and perhaps moved to a safe (for the moment) haven in the U.S.
Some people have been trying to figure out why Europe hates Israel.
The Europeans' vicious attacks on Israel are animated less by the Jewish state's foreign policy than by Europe's ongoing fixation on the Holocaust. What else could explain the presence of posters equating Israel with Nazi Germany at pro-Hamas demonstrations in Vienna? According to one recent German university study, 45.7 percent of the European respondents supported the contention that "Israel is conducting a war of extermination against the Palestinians."
In their eyes, apparently, maintaining a naval blockade against a government sworn to destroy you – while providing the unfortunate people living under that government with tens of thousands of tons of supplies and humanitarian aid – now equates to looting and butchering six million people. Click here to find out more!
Wolfgang Benz, the controversial director of the Berlin Center for the study of anti-Semitism, neatly summed up this incongruity on German television when he insisted that "anti-Semitism is different from anti-Zionism."
Benz embraces the European wish to alleviate guilt by denying the weight of the Holocaust. (As the head of a center for the study of anti-Semitism, he's a particularly strange case; the German political scientist Clemens Heni discovered that Benz's beloved academic mentor was the now-deceased Karl Bosl, an outspoken Nazi who contributed enormously to spreading Hitler's ideology.)
Of course, nothing Israel has ever done can even begin to compare to the crimes of the Shoah. But to help alleviate their feelings of guilt, Europeans delegitimize Israel, ignore modern anti-Semitism, and portray Muslims – who number over one billion and whom no one seeks to eradicate from the earth – as the new persecuted Jews of Europe.
Some of that may be true, but after 1500 years of persecution, I think it has become ingrained into the European psyche. And then there's the new European (and generally Western) secular cowardice. Their ancestors unapologetically conquered the world and forced their morals and ethics - for good or bad - on those they conquered. Some of that conquest was done in the name of Christianity. So what. No matter how much anyone insists that there is, there is no moral equivalence between Western/Christian imperialism, and Islamic imperialism. That should be clear by looking at the results of both. The fruits of one over time is freedom and prosperity. The other has only spread barbarism and intolerance.
The secular descendants of European warriors quiver in fear, because to admit that unassimilated Muslim immigrants are destroying the Western freedom that their brave ancestors fought for and bestowed upon them, would be seen as racism and "islamophobia". They never had to work for their own freedom. It was unearned and so it means nothing. Until it's gone. Then it will be mourned by some. They will wonder what happened. But, it's better to shut up and be conquered without fighting back than to be thought a racist. Besides there are always the Jews to blame.
UPDATE: I almost forgot this article about the situation and the possible use of "decoy Jews" in Brussels.
In an effort to arrest the culprits who terrorize Jews, the Amsterdam authorities have ordered police officers to walk the streets disguised as Jews. The Dutch police already disguise officers as “decoy prostitutes, decoy gays and decoy grannies” to deter muggings and attacks on prostitutes, homosexuals and the elderly. Apparently sending out the decoys has helped reduce street crime. The “decoy Jew” has now been added to the police attributes.
Go ahead, read it and weep - or laugh. I mostly laughed at the insanity of it all. I'm sure decoy Jews will help solve the problem. Actually, if everybody dressed up as orthodox Jews . . .
Neil Steinberg is a good dad. He's taken for granted. That's probably normal. The wife and kids are used to having him around. I know my family is used to me - and my paycheck - and the occasional tutoring money - and rides when needed - and fixing things around the house - and being the one to be woken up when the kids have to puke in the middle of the night. (I don't know why it was me, but thankfully we're past those days). But that's just me being a dad. Millions of us do it. Other men don't. Steinberg calls them "bad dads." I have other names for them. I end up teaching their children while they're off doing whatever it is the scum of the earth do.
That’s why I feel a certain irrational envy for bad dads. You know the kind — shifty, gimlet-eyed petty criminals in plastic windbreakers who are forever hopping freight trains. Kids worship that kind of dad, mostly in the movies, but sometimes ]in real life. Look at Barack Obama. He was with his dad for what, a week after age 5? And he wrote Dreams from My Father.
and
All a bad dad has to do is arrive semi-sober at the big game — slipping into the stands at the last second — then give a thumbs-up and a toothless grin of encouragement to junior as he comes to the plate, and all is forgiven, the credits roll, and the music swells. A happy ending.
In a way, Steinberg is right. I've known kids who worship their dad who abandoned them. Sometimes the worship wears off though. I had a student this year, a fourth grader, who told me that he cares nothing for his father. His mother was getting married, and that was fine with him. I had another student a few years ago who was angry at her jailed father. She thought he was stupid. Her step-father was in the picture, so there was a male figure for her. She was happy with him.
I get students year after year, as do all of the other teachers I work with in this "urban district", who spend day after day mourning the loss of something they've never had but instinctively know they should have, a father. Some fathers just leave, or never show up in the first place. Others split at some point because they leave the mother. However it happens, those children are damaged, some more than others, but they all carry their psychic scars.
Situations arise that would never happen to a child in a stable two parent family. My first year of teaching, the music teacher kicked one of my students out of class for some misbehavior. The rest of the class laughed. She tried to calm them down and show them how unfeeling they were by scolding, "Stop it! How would you like it if your mother was a drug addict and you didn't know who your father was?" That didn't help matters at all.
Another time, a little boy was waving goodbye to his father. A little girl standing nearby told us that was her daddy too. The boy's response: "That's only because your momma's a 'ho', and my daddy did her."
I've seen big tough boys cry like babies because their fathers couldn't visit them the coming weekend - again. I've had missing fathers show up after not contacting their children for years in order to establish a relationship. And wouldn't you know it, it's always the mother's fault. Dad tells me about the mother's drug or alcohol use, or endless partying, and he is concerned for his child. And all of that may be true. But there were certain decisions made years ago that placed that child into this situation.
I did have a dad step up to the plate this year after I couldn't contact mom and grandma, who insisted that all of the problems were due to dad. After dad surprisingly demonstrated that he was a responsible parent, mom showed up regularly. Suddenly she was concerned and was going to do everything she needed to do in order for her daughter to succeed. Well, almost everything. It would have been nice had she had her daughter in school more often.
I saw one of my former students with his young son. It was good to see him taking an interest. (Who knows if he still does?) When I taught him, he was tight with two other young fellows. I was not the only one who saw them as Moe, Larry, and Curly. This was Curly. He seemed to have grown up.
I recently found out that another former student knocked up his fifteen year old girlfriend, a perfectly normal occurrence in the neighborhood where I teach. I can't offer any congratulations. I know what's coming.
I know two things about this situation. It's no longer a function of "ghetto culture." It has seeped into the mainstream, and single motherhood is no longer the scandal it used to be. It's almost accepted that "dad" will fade off into the sunset leaving mom with damaged kid - or kids. And the only thing I can do about it is to raise my children to understand that it is proper, acceptable, and the only right way to bring children into the world by first being married.
"No one can find a safe way out for himself if socety is sweeping towards destruction. Therefore everyone, in his own interests, must thrust himself vigorously into the intellectual battle. None can stand aside with unconcern; the interests of everyone hang on the result." -- Ludwig von Mises
War's legitimate object is more perfect peace. Flavius Vegitius Renatus
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