 The face-covering burqa and niqab veils worn by some Muslim women have no place in Denmark, Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen says, adding his government was considering restricting them. Rasmussen stopped short, however, of calling for a ban on the veils, noting "legal and other limits". "The government's position is clear: the burqa and the niqab have no place in Danish society.
They symbolise a view of women and humanity that we totally oppose and that we want to combat in Danish society," Rasmussen told reporters on Tuesday. Denmark is "an open, democratic society where we look at the person to whom we are talking, whether it's in a classroom or on the job," he said. "That is why we don't want to see this garment in Danish society," he added. He said his centre-right government was "discussing ways of limiting the wearing" of the veils without violating the Scandinavian country's constitution. The prime minister's comments came a day after the publication of a report which showed that use of the burqa was "extremely rare" in Denmark, though no figures were given, and that the niqab was worn by "between 100 and 200" women. The report was commissioned by the social affairs ministry and written by researchers at the University of Copenhagen. It follows a heated debate on the burqa that has divided the two-party coalition government since the summer amid pressure from its key parliamentary ally the far-right Danish People's Party. Some 100,000 Muslim women live in Denmark, representing about 1.9 per cent of Denmark's total population of 5.5 million. Some 0.15 per cent of the Muslim women wear the niqab, according to the report. Denmark has had tense relations with the Muslim world following the publishing in 2005 of cartoons depicting Islam's Prophet Mohammed that were considered blasphemous and insulting by much of the Islamic world. It triggered violent protests in Muslim countries. SMH 
 Multiple press reports seem eager to pigeonhole this decision as a racial issue, and a move to cater to a constituency that is described narrowly and somewhat patronizingly as the "white working class." But it is not a racial matter, nor is it about socioeconomic classes; it is a matter of principle for the sake of a free and open society. "British party calls for ban on burkas," from UPI, January 16: LONDON, Jan. 16 (UPI) -- The United Kingdom Independence Party says burkas, the Islamic cloak that covers women from head to toe, should be banned in Britain. The conservative group, which advocates withdrawing from the European Union, issued a call Friday to ban the garments in what was seen as an attempt by the UKIP to expand its appeal to disaffected white, working class voters, The Times of London reported Saturday. "We are taking expert advice on how we could do it," UKIP leader Malcolm Pearson told the newspaper. "It makes sense to ban the burka -- or anything which conceals a woman's face -- in public buildings. But we want to make it possible to ban them in private buildings.
It isn't right that you can't see someone's face in an airport." The Times said the UKIP is the first British party to call for an all-out ban on burkas although the far-right British National Party believes advocates banning them from schools. "We are not Muslim bashing, but this is incompatible with Britain's values of freedom and democracy," Pearson said.
 By Eeyore First, thank you to Proud Kafir who sent me this excellent interview. But secondly, I am really sick and tired of European media referring to this man and his party, as well as Geert Wilders and frankly anyone who stands in the way of Islamic fascism as “far right wing”.
This man like Geert is clearly a classical liberal. Someone who wants to defend women’s rights as people. Someone who believes that all should be equal before a secular and rational law, for which there is machinery in place where it can be amended as needs be. Machinery such as for example, the direct democracy that was used to create the minaret ban. Banning a minaret is not racist as minarets are not a race. Muslims are not a race for that matter. Islam is a political philosophy of violent global conquest. A minaret is a symbol of that conquest. It should be banned along with political Islam.
Two weeks after voters approved a ban on minaret construction, the rightwing Swiss People’s Party deputy Oskar Freysinger gives his reading of events.
In French-speaking Switzerland Freysinger became the voice of the yes side. He recently defended the minaret ban, accepted by 57.5 per cent of voters on November 29, in a debate on the Arab television channel al-Jazeera. Freysinger rejects outright the argument that the yes vote stemmed from fear and ignorance and he deplores the fact that people have used the result to attack direct democracy. swissinfo.ch: The anti-minaret vote has provoked a huge amount of comment and criticism both in Switzerland and abroad. What struck you most from what has been said and written on this subject? Oskar Freysinger: What stays with me, is that the focus slipped very quickly from minarets to direct democracy. Two camps emerged: the elite who said that direct democracy was anti-democratic and against human rights, which is a total paradox, and the defenders of popular rights, who, while recognising that it is not ideal, nonetheless think that the system is the best possible, because it allows people to feel involved and to have an outlet of expression. In Europe, people envy us. I’ve received a huge number of emails from France and elsewhere. People regret that they do not have the instruments to allow them to express their will. In fact Switzerland, at the heart of Europe, has just given an incredible lesson in civic spirit, against the politically correct, against the elites, against the media and against the monumental pressure of uniform thought. That could give ideas to the people who surround us, and that is feared by the European intelligentsia. swissinfo.ch: But are the people truly always right? Can they not also make mistakes? O.F.: Let’s say it’s like the dogma of papal infallibility: the pope is always right in questions of faith, not in the absolute. The people are always right because the system makes them right. Determining who is right and wrong is always complex. As a politician I have lost plenty of votes with the electorate. You have to accept it and deal with the situation, even if that is extremely difficult, as with the free movement of people [between the EU and Switzerland] today. swissinfo.ch: A lot has been said about this being a vote based on fear. What is your take on that? O.F.: Based on the thousands of messages and reactions I received, I can detect the tendencies. Throughout the campaign, it was not fear that dominated but a cool reflection, relatively specific and neutral in tone about what Islam is and its doctrinal incompatibility with our state based on law. On this subject I also received some information that was useful to me during the debate. It is not therefore a purely irrational and ill-informed vote, as has often been said. As for the yes voters, some of them are proponents of self-determination who believe that our identity should be protected during this time of open borders which make it impossible to regulate migration flows. There was also the yes vote of the Catholics who did not follow their leaders, as well as a yes vote by women. Many of them told me that they never vote for the People’s Party, but that on this subject, they felt the threat of a particularly patriarchal religion. swissinfo.ch: Several recommendations have been made, the creation of a constitutional court, a new article on tolerance, in a effort to ”correct” this vote. What do you think of that? O.F.: The decision of the people acts as law. If we want to change this article in a few years’ time because Islam no longer presents a problem, the people alone will be able to modify the situation. Replacing the vote by an article that covers everything, which would have the disadvantage of penalising all religions would be superfluous because tolerance is already enshrined in the Constitution and Swiss laws. As for a constitutional court, it is a system imaginable in a country where the parliament alone determines the laws. But in Switzerland the people are sovereign. Introducing a system like that would go back to muzzling the people. In any case, what makes lawyers better able to distinguish what is for the best or worst for the citizens? swissinfo.ch: What would you say to those who reproach you for having taken the risk, with this initiative, of destabilising the peaceful integration of Muslims in Switzerland, most of whom are non-practising, and making them turn inwards to their community? O.F.: This complaint does not hold up. I distinguish three categories among Muslims. The non-practising, who, by definition, are free from religion and therefore indifferent to the presence or not of a minaret or even a mosque. The there are those who live the religion as a personal choice and a private affair. These are the ones who pay today for the damage inflicted by the third category, that is those who do not accept that civil law should be placed above religious dogma. Financed by Saudi Arabia and Turkey, this fringe, the most demanding, also bears a responsibility in this vote. swissinfo.ch: The day after the yes vote, several extreme right parties in Europe welcomed your initiative. What are your ideological affinities and differences with these movements? O.F.: I’ve heard this confusion with the extreme right and fascism for a long time. But the differences are substantial. The first is that the People’s Party defends democracy and the state of law absolutely without restriction. Another difference, we do not believe you should reject the other simply because he is different, that is racism and xenophobia. On the contrary, the behaviour of a person who comes to Switzerland is not irrelevant. What gets us branded as racists is that we attack the dysfunctional behaviour imported through immigration. But it is the behaviour that we denounce, and not the colour of the skin or where the person comes from. Carole Wälti, swissinfo.ch (translated by Clare O’Dea) With thanks to Vlad Tepes
 By Alan Caruba When President Obama delivers a speech on why he is going to send more thousands of U.S. troops and spend more billions on the eight-year-old conflict in Afghanistan, it would be a good idea to better understand why so much of what is reported from the Middle East suffers a great disconnect from the truth.
In 1998, Joris Luyendijk , a Dutch student who had studied Arabic at Cairo University for a year, was offered a job as a Middle East correspondent for a Dutch news agency despite having no experience as a reporter. What followed was his real education about the Middle East and the way it is presented to the West by the news media.
His book about that experience, “People Like Us: Misrepresenting the Middle East” was initially published in the Netherlands in 2006 and has since then it has been translated and published in Hungary, Italy, Denmark and Germany. In October an English edition was published by Soft Skull Press, an imprint of Counterpoint, a Berkeley, California publisher.
Having begun my career as a journalist, I was interested to learn what Luyendijk had taken from his years hopping around the Middle East before and after 9/11 and during the two Iraq wars waged by the U.S. to resolve a problem called Saddam Hussein.
For anyone digesting the news from his morning newspaper or watching it on television, suspecting that it might be biased or wrong, this book that focuses on reporting from the Middle East is a revelation because Luyendijk strives mightily to expose the way the news is manipulated by all the parties involved.
Covering his experiences from 1998 to 2003, the author is refreshingly candid, admitting that, despite his student year in Cairo, he had little or no real understanding of Egypt or the rest of the Middle East.
There is, however, one thing that anyone can understand. The Middle East is composed of dictatorships and the sole purpose of each one is to survive. To do that, their people must be constantly indoctrinated and fearful. That is made possible by rendering them, individually and as a group, powerless. There simply is no such thing as justice or the opportunity to express an opinion in opposition to the leader.
Significantly, those living in the Middle East cannot make an informed judgment of what is occurring around them because they operate two points of view that are very real to them. First is a widely accepted sense of victimhood, and, second, they believe that Israel, ultimately, is manipulating the entire world!
Conversely, Americans who have no contact with the Middle East beyond the headlines and snapshots of bloodshed and warfare are comparably unable to make informed judgments about a people who differ among themselves in many ways.
The Middle East is very different from the West and Luyendijk believes that few in the West are even vaguely aware that those who live there live in a parallel universe; one that functions by the rules of ruthless dictatorships, by tribes, and by a religion that is hostile to all others.
Democracy is not likely to take root in the Middle East and this can be traced to the prevailing religion of the region, Islam. The only reason democracy occurred in Turkey is because the founder of the modern state, Ataturk, isolated Islam from the conduct of governance and that has been backed up by an army that has, thus far, ensured the separation.
 The leader of Britain’s Jewish community claimed the continent’s population is in decline because people care more about shopping than the sacrifice involved in parenthood. He blamed atheist “neo-Darwinians” for Europe’s low birth rate and said religious people of all denominations are more likely to have large families. The Chief Rabbi, who entered the House of Lords last week, made his comments in a lecture on religion in the 21st century hosted by Theos, the public theology think-tank, on Wednesday night. Lord Sacks said that faith had survived so far because it could provide answers to mankind’s eternal search for meaning in life - unlike the market, the state, science or philosophy, which underpin modern liberal democracies. He claimed religion could continue to play an important role worldwide in the future, by engaging in debate with scientists, by campaigning on issues such as global poverty or the environment, and by discussing the nature of the common good with humanists. The Chief Rabbi warned that secular Europe is at risk, however, because its moral relativism can easily be defeated by fundamentalists. And he claimed that its population is also in decline, compared with every other part of the world, because non-believers lack shared values of family and community that religions have. Lord Sacks said: “Parenthood involves massive sacrifice of money, attention, time and emotional energy. “Where today in European culture with its consumerism and instant gratification – because you’re worth it – where will you find space for the concept of sacrifice for the sake of generations not yet born? “Europe, at least the indigenous population of Europe, is dying.” “That is one of the unsayable truths of our time. We are undergoing the moral equivalent of climate change and no one is talking about it. “Albert Camus once said, 'The only serious philosophical question is why should I not commit suicide?’. “I think he was wrong. The only serious philosophical question is, why should I have a child? Our culture is not giving an easy answer to that question.” He added: “Wherever you turn today - Jewish, Christian or Muslim - the more religious the community, the larger on average are their families. “The major assault on religion today comes from the neo-Darwinians.’’ Discussing the popular secular idea that there are no absolute moral values, he said: “You cannot defend a civilisation on the basis of moral relativism. “In a head-to-head contest between a moral relativist and a fundamentalist, who wins? The fundamentalist must win because he is sure he’s right, and you are not sure he’s wrong.” He said that although the war on terror had been portrayed by Western politicians as a “battle of ideas”, there is little hope that Islamists who believe they owe allegiance to God would be swayed by talk of freedom or democracy. “The place for religion is in civil society, where it achieves many things essential to liberal democratic freedom. It sanctifies marriage and the family and the obligations of parenthood, and it safeguards the non-relativist moral principles on which Western freedom is based. “It may not be religion that is dying, it may be liberal democratic Europe that is in danger, demographically and in its ability to defend its own values.” Lord Sacks, who has been Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth since 1991, described the modern phenomenon of “angry atheists” as the “intellectual equivalent of road rage”. He said that more respectful dialogue is needed between religious groups and the secular world. “All peace depends on compromise and that is why peace comes to seem to some religious groups to be a form of betrayal, and that is why peacemakers get assassinated.” Source: Telegraph
On Saturday 31 October, Islam4UK plans to hold a procession called "March for Sharia" starting at 1pm. They intend to march past the Houses of Parliament where their members will call for the imposition of Shariah law and for the House of Commons to be abolished. This website was set up by a collection of groups and individuals - both Muslim and non-Muslim - to organise a counter-demonstration against those who seek to undermine and challenge our values. We come from diverse social and religious backgrounds but share a common belief in secular democracy and the values of the British liberal state such as legal and constitutional equality for all, equal rights for women and minorities, and the right to religious freedom (including freedom from religion). Source: Secular Democracy H/T: GH
 by Supna ZaidiI have always viewed push-up bras as false advertising, but does wearing one deserve a whipping because of their "deceptive" and "un-Islamic" nature? I don't know, but the controlling Islamist Shabaab party of Somalia seems to think so. And if our bras are not at issue, it's some other part of our bodies. Apparently, women should simply not participate in public life and if they try, they should be marginalized with one misogynist application of Islamic law after another. Otherwise, if you believe Islamists in Muslim-majority countries, free will would transform Muslim women into western ones. Not real American women, for example, who are busy working, raising families, but the one-dimensional women portrayed on shows like "Melrose Place" and Hooter ads on American highways. Such simplification was reinforced rather than combated on an Oct. 4, 2009, Islamic news show by Dalia Mogahed, President Obama's appointee to his Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. She made no effort to separate herself from extremist positions offered by fellow guests like a representative from Hizb-ut-Tahrir, or the Islamic Liberation Party.
HT members want Islamic law applied globally, and agitate for it with conferences like, "The Fall of Capitalism, the Rise of Islam" presented in Chicago a few months ago. Mogahed's failure to defend secular democracies as societies where the law protects an individual's right to be as orthodox or as "liberal," "progressive," or "cultural" as they choose makes sense considering her contribution to a controversial study, "Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think." The study defines Shariah as "the rule of law," including ethics and morals. Such a loose interpretation justifies her radio show comment that "the majority of women around the world associate Shariah with 'gender justice.' " She added that "the perception of Shariah and portrayal of Shariah has been oversimplified even among Muslims." Oversimplified? That is ironic considering Mogahed's definition of Shariah. What ethics? Whose morals, and whose law legitimizes Shariah? If I took a poll of all Americans today defining Islamic law simply as "living ethically and morally," I guarantee that 100 percent would want to live under it. This is because each person would insert his or her unique understanding of right and wrong, just as the Saudi, Iranian and Somali Islamists do. Muslims who do not want to live under Islamic law are not oversimplifying. Rather, they are accepting that Mogahed's vapid description bears no resemblance to Islamic law in practice. Reformers like Asma Jahangir, a Muslim human rights activist and lawyer in Pakistan know. Jahangir regularly defends men and women against discriminatory laws and cultural mores in the name of Islam. She is also one of many men and women in Pakistan fighting to have the misogynistic religious Hudood laws repealed. Mogahed sounds a lot more like Abu Tayyeb, one of the Taliban kidnappers of New York Times journalist David Rohde. The kidnapper claimed "the Taliban treated women better than Americans did ... women in the United States were forced to wear revealing clothes and define themselves solely as sex objects. The Taliban protected women's honor by not allowing them to appear in public with their faces unveiled." Promiscuity and "male disrespect for women" are not the definitive traits that govern relations between men and women in the West, just as abuse of women, child brides, female genital mutilation, honor killings, and denial of equal opportunities for women are not the only way women live in Muslim-majority countries. But those are realities that Islamists do not wish to address, preferring to defend their egos on radio shows like the one in which Mogahed participated. Obama will only make progress when he chooses to appoint spokespeople who do not pander to current global anti-Americanism by abandoning universal human rights, but show that they can be proud practitioners of their faith in a society that defends everyone irrespective of faith. Source: Middle East Forum H/T: Solstice Witch
 Islamists are sworn to make war on the West, to drive out freedom and democracy, replacing them with the mandated tyranny of Islamic law.They declare all laws and all nations that do not originate or abide by Islamic law to be invalid. And they reserve the right to make war on them by any means necessary, from the political to the economic to the terroristic. And yet it might surprise many people to realize that most Islamists are not haggard fanatics living off dried goat meat in caves.
Instead many of them are doctors and lawyers working in major American and European cities, they serve as advisors to Western politicians and write newspaper columns. Their organizations are treated with respect and given veto power over the policies of governments whose existence they reject.
And that in a nutshell is the trouble of it all. Because Islamism should carry a price, instead it only carries rewards.
Islamists in Europe and America do not actually have to be isolated hermits working out of a few ghettos. Instead they are able to gain all the benefits of the West, from advanced degrees to high paying jobs to political recognition, while maintaining their hatred for the West.
The results are inevitable. The investigation of a CERN physicist for contacts with Al Queda, and a Glasgow doctor and dentist attempt to carry out an airport car bombing. These are not the alienated or disenfranchised immigrants, a description that the press routinely uses to try and turn the perpetrators into victims.
No, some are even European born. Rather what they are are Islamists who blended successful lives in the society of the infidels, with their own religious fanaticism. And they were able to do that because tolerance for Islam eliminated any barriers and obstacles to being both Islamists and middle class professionals.
The question is not a casual one, because in reality most terrorism stems from the sons of the middle and upper class.
The immigrants in the ghettos may riot, toss molotov cocktails at the police and rob and rape-- but it tends to be the university graduates who actually join up with international Muslim terrorist groups and begin planning attacks.
Traditionally the middle class has always provided the upper ranks of terrorist groups, and it is no different with Islamist terrorists.
H/T: gramfan
 Good news, in an update on this story. "Dutch MP overturns UK entry ban," from BBC News, October 13 Far-right Dutch MP Geert Wilders has won an appeal against a Home Office decision barring his entry to the UK. "Far-right": Media-speak for "frightens children, barks at other people's dogs, and makes Cratchit work on Christmas." The Asylum and Immigration Tribunal ruling overturns a government decision that led to Mr Wilder being turned back at Heathrow in February. The Freedom Party leader - who has been accused of Islamophobia - was due at a House of Lords' screening of his film linking the Koran to terrorism. Then the Middle East, the Horn of Africa, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, and Malaysia are chock-full of Islamophobes. The Home Office said it was disappointed at the new ruling. Ridiculous mischaracterization and moral equivalence in 3... 2... A spokesman said: "We are disappointed by the court's decision. The government opposes extremism in all its forms. "The decision to refuse Wilders admission was taken on the basis that his presence could have inflamed tensions between our communities and have led to inter-faith violence. We still maintain this view." Mr Wilders faces trial in his own country for inciting hatred. In February, he had been invited to the House of Lords to show his controversial film Fitna, which caused outrage across the Muslim world when it was posted on the internet last year. When he was refused entry, Mr Wilders told the BBC it was a "very sad day" for UK democracy. "I'm not doing anything wrong. I'm not protesting or running through the streets of London," he said. "Democracy means differences and debate. It's a very sad day when the UK bans an elected parliamentarian."...
 Jihad Watch 02 September By Hugh Fitzgerald “Chechen rebels have today called for prominent separatist leader Akhmed Zakayev to be killed, saying he has abandoned Islam.” – from this news article Zakeyev is to be killed not because he is himself a bully-boy and murderer (he is both of those things), but because -- nota bene -- he has "fallen away from Islam."
That is the only category that makes sense for Muslims. Mere corruption or murder of opponents is not enough.
The Ruler is to be obeyed, unless his behavior can be characterized as not that of a Muslim. There is no appeal to universal principles of morality. It is not that this family has appropriated much of the nation’s wealth, or that ruler has appointed all of his cousins to high positions, or that the sons of that other ruler go around raping girls with impunity. Had Zakeyev been someone else, someone just as vicious and murderous as he is, but merely an indigenous lord of Muslim misrule, instead of, as Zakeyev is, a local enforcer for the Russians, then only the usual handful of the intellectually and morally advanced would have been against him. The rest would have been subservient to the ruler’s authority. Despotism comes naturally to Muslim polities. Look at the Muslim-dominated countries. There are 57 members of the O.I.C. How many of those dominated by Muslims are at all "democratic"? How many hold elections, but the elections are farcical? How many Arab Muslim countries are ruled by families who seize much of the nation's wealth -- or demurely, by now, merely have it appropriated --- such as the Al-Maktoum of Dubai, the Al-Nahyan of Abu Dhabi, the Al-Thani of Qatar, the Al-Sabah of Kuwait, and so on? Read more here,,,, Source: Europe News
 By Tawfik Hamid After Sept. 11, many voices in the West argued that the lack of democracy in most of the Muslim world is the main cause of terrorism. Their analysis was based on their assumption that when young Muslims do not find a way to express themselves or state their opinion in a democratic process, they have no other option but to start down the path of extremism. This theory, while it seems attractive, does not explain certain fundamental observations. Advocates for solving the problem of Islamic radicalism via implementing democracy need to explain the following: Why do Christians in the Middle East, who live under the same political circumstances as their fellow Muslims, not contribute to terrorism and suicide bombings? If a lack of democracy is the true cause of terrorism, it should affect both Muslims and Christians to the same extent. Furthermore, the ‘lack of democracy’ theory can not explain why homegrown terrorism and Islamic extremism developed in democratic countries and societies such as the United Kingdom. The theory also can not explain why Islamic extremism has developed in the United States, as we have recently seen with some young Muslims from North Carolina, and with some U.S. citizens of Somali origin who traveled to Somalia to wage violent jihad. Read more ...Source: NewsMax
By Aunohita Mojumdar in Kabul  | | Female candidates contesting the poll have received threats in many parts of the country [AFP] | Shinkai Karokhail, a member of parliament in Afghanistan, has hopes that candidates running in upcoming presidential elections will bring women's issues to the fore. She says she is concerned that since the US-led effort to oust the Taliban in 2001, women in many parts of the country have continued to face a lack of liberties and access to education. Karokhail, who campaigned against a controversial Shia Family Law passed by the government in April, believes the major contenders for the presidential race have largely avoided women's issues in their election campaigns. "Women's issues are as sensitive as the Durand line (the contested border between Afghanistan and Pakistan). Why should they [candidates] do something that might lose them the votes of conservatives and extremists?" Women's political rights Rights activists in Afghanistan are concerned that local media have focused on the high profile electoral campaigns of the candidates, particularly the top contenders, but sidelined women's issues. Hoping to push their agenda forward, a group of women activists from Kabul organised a loya jirga (grand assembly) to mobilise women's votes and raise awareness of their rights. Bringing together activists from around the country, the jirga was designed to put women's issues back on the agenda and to make sure that their voices are not ignored. "We want women to learn how to obtain their political rights in a society dominated by men," Karokhail told Al Jazeera. "Men will realise we have a voice. We need more women ministers, more diplomats, and for those who are there to come together and speak in one voice." Read more here,,,, Source: Al Jazeera (English)
Mahmoud Saikal | August 14 NEXT Thursday's presidential and provincial elections in Afghanistan have the potential to strengthen the nation's democratic institutions, provide a fresh mandate for the fight against terrorism and extremism, and help improve the living conditions of Afghans. Moreover, judging from the large and enthusiastic crowds at the leading candidates' election rallies, the elections may bring to office a new president, a new government and younger provincial members. Although a US-funded survey released this week shows the incumbent, President Hamid Karzai, has 36per cent support among voters, some of his rivals, in particular former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, are gaining ground and there is the strong possibility of a run-off, especially if local strongmen are unable to mobilise blocs of supporters in favour of the status quo. Yet, far from being destabilising, a change, if handled wisely by the Afghan elite and its international partners, would strengthen democracy. Unfortunately, there are signs that opponents of the election are determined to disrupt it. Read more here ... Mahmoud Saikal has served as Afghanistan's deputy foreign minister (2005-06) and ambassador to Australia (2002-05). He is a visiting fellow at the Australian National University's Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy. This article reflects his personal views. Source: The Australian
Condoleezza Rice and Barack Obama said radically different things about democracy when each spoke in Cairo.By Joseph Puder It may be a historical curiosity that both Condoleezza Rice — President Bush’s secretary of state — and President Barack Obama chose Cairo University as the venue to send their messages to the Arab world. Egypt, the most populous Arab country and the largest Arab recipient of U.S. foreign aid, is also the country from which President/dictator Hosni Mubarak pledges his support for the U.S. and the West, causing his countrymen to hate America for its support of their dictator. Mohamed Atta, the leader of the 9/11 al-Qaeda suicide bombers, was an upper-middle-class Egyptian. Read more ... Source: PJM
 By Michael Ledeen I studied fascism primarily because I wanted - desperately - to understand how so many people could have appeased it. Did they - and by “they” I mean the European victims of the Holocaust and the European and American targets of the Axis - not see the evil? Did they not hear the words of the tyrants who constantly called for the destruction of the Western democracies, the enslavement of the inferior races, and the imposition of a new order? Did they not see the armies on the march, the concentration camps being built, and the ruthless campaigns against the racially unworthy, from the Jews to the gays, the gypsies and the mentally challenged? Why did it take Pearl Harbor to bomb us into action? Why did the Soviet and European Communists–intended victims of Nazism–make a Grand Bargain with the Fuhrer? Why did the Jews, with rare exceptions, go quietly onto the cattle cars? Nearly fifty years later, I think I understand at least part of it, and, alas, that understanding applies to the current appeasers as well. You’ll find it discussed at length in my forthcoming book, Accomplice to Evil, which identifies many sources of the willful blindness that has long been a central part of the foreign policies of the Western democracies. Read more ...Source: PJM
 By Daniel Greenfield In Sudan a dozen women were sentenced to be flogged for wearing pants. Some of them were Christian, but that has never really mattered, as the essential premise of Islamic law is that it is inherently superior to every other law. Naturally no men have ever been sentenced for wearing pants. That is a law that applies only to women, because there is a fundamental difference between Islamic law and Western law, not simply in morality or structure-- but in equality.A Muslim man will never be sentenced to be flogged for wearing pants, just as a Muslim Imam will never be tried for blasphemy no matter how many ugly things he says about Hindusim, Christianity, Judaism or Buddhism. Blasphemy is a charge that is meaningful only in relation to the doctrine that is at the heart of Islamic law, that is Islam itself. Islamic law is law made by Muslim men for the benefit of Muslim men, and the detriment of everyone else. It is the product of an inherently unequal system, designed to perpetuate that system. Under it non-Muslims are inferior to Muslims because by rejecting the "truth" of Islam, they cast doubts about their moral fitness. A non-Muslim is an infidel who drinks alcohol, eats pork and has forbidden sexual relations. As far as Islamic law is concerned he is already of poor moral character and a criminal. Women are inferior to men, as they are lower in status than men. When Mohammed declared, or was said to declare in Islamic scripture, that, "I also saw the Hell-fire and I had never seen such a horrible sight. I saw that most of the inhabitants were women", he was articulating the top down theology of a cult that defined sinfulness in terms of position of tribal power. Therefore in the Mohammedan vision of hell, the underworld was to be populated mostly by women for their ingratitude to their husbands, who under Islam were also their masters. And slaves are defined as moral to the degree that they serve their masters. Under the circular logic of Islam, women are second class citizens because they are untrustworthy, and untrustworthy because they are second class citizens. This makes women automatically suspect of all sorts of things. It is why a woman who was raped is more at fault than the man who raped her. In the Islamic worldview, which is itself a carryover of Bedouin tribalism, a rapist has taken someone else's property. By contrast the woman who was raped was careless with the property of her husband or her father. Whether the woman had consensual sex or was raped does not matter very much, because in either case she is only property that was damaged. Not a human being. The honor killing is simply a male relative or spouse destroying what Islamic tribalism considers to be "damaged property". Her consent is not considered significant, because Islamic law does not take the agency of a woman seriously, or treat her as competent to make decision on the level of a man in the first place. It is why the woman is always at fault. While Western jurisprudence considers diminished capacity to be an extenuating circumstance, Islamic jurisprudence considers it to be a statement of guilt. That is because Western jurisprudence presumes innocence, while Islamic jurisprudence presumes guilt. The lower the role, the more readily the presumption of guilt is applied. Since Islam treats all people as inherently sinful, and therefore perpetually guilty, the higher the form of awareness, the more likely the Muslim is to avoid sin. A Muslim mam has more agency than a woman, and is more likely to do the right thing. A Muslim woman is considered to have less agency, which is why she must have a husband to master her, and why Islam considers her more likely to be at fault. Like slaves, women can only demonstrate their worth through submission to their masters. Muslim men in turn can only demonstrate their worth through submission to the will of Allah as expressed by the Imams. Since the core of Islamic law is held by Arab Muslims, they effectively serve as superior to non-Arab Muslims. And throughout it all, one thing is missing. Equality under the law and equal justice for all. Read more here ...
 If America should not impose “its own” democratic system, can it stay neutral when oppressive regimes and forces impose their “own repressive” systems?By Dr. Walid Phares Another issue raised by President Barack Obama during his July 11th speech at Accra is the “relative” notion of democracy. In contrast with the previous administration’s call for a U.S.-backing for the “spread of democracy,” Obama underlined that “America will not seek to impose any system of government on any other nation. The essential truth of democracy is that each nation determines its own destiny.” In fact, the difference between the previous and the current U.S. approach is not about the “role,” as no one in Washington’s government has had any project to “impose” democracy, or specific institutions. The George W. Bush approach tried to say that all nations yearn for democracy and freedom with the same intensity, if given the opportunity. The Obama approach says the same about the ultimate quest but recommends stirring away from fermenting, inciting, or pushing for it. He said: “Each nation gives life to democracy in its own way, and in line with its own traditions.” Read more ... Source: FSM
 Saturday, 04 July 2009 Neda, the young and beautiful freedom-loving Iranian student was slain in cold-blood by the current Islamic regime in Iran. Almost instantly, Neda became, not only the divine call of the Iranian uprising, but, she symbolized the call for liberty around the globe. Here's the video of Richard Roth's report which contained the image of Neda.If either President Ronald Reagan or President John F. Kennedy were alive today, they would stand in solidarity with the Iranian people. In fact, they would declare “Today we are all Iranians." It appears the Iranian people are showing the world what a revolution looks like and some Americans have started paying close attention and taking notes. Neda knew the value of freedom. She died for it. Her blood was not wasted and she did not die in vain. Headlines have heralded the young woman as a martyr and some even dubbed her Iran's Joan of Arc. Not only has she become a "symbol of goodness" battling against her brutal oppressor, her story has laid open a much larger issue, freedom and liberty. There is a site dedicated to Neda proclaiming, “We are all Neda.”Each year, on the fourth of July, we celebrate America’s birth and independence. This is a day that the heart of every American must glow with pride and appreciation. On this special occasion, the Iranian martyr, Neda, has a special message for all freedom-loving Americans: “Do not take your liberty for granted” “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure," said Thomas Jefferson. I think Neda would have said, “I have given my blood for the cause of liberty for my country and I hope you don’t have to give yours once again.” We are going through some troubled times in America. We Americans need to wake up and realize that our liberties and freedoms that we take for granted are slowly and inexorably being taken from us. Once we lose them, it will be very hard to get them back. Let the blood of the Persian freedom-fighter, Neda, inspire all of us to cherish our liberty. “We are fighting and dying on the streets of Tehran to have what you have had for more than two centuries. You, America, have been an inspiration to millions of us in Iran to become free, free to roam, free to grow, and free to bloom,” Neda would have said. Read more here....
Latest recipients of The MASH Award
 By Jonah Goldberg Do it, President Obama, please. Take the side of democracy. Declare yourself and your nation on the side of hope and change where it is more than a slogan and better than a rationalization for ever-bigger government. Stop measuring the success of your diplomacy with Iran by the degree to which the grinning, hate-filled stooge of a clerical junta will "temper" his rhetoric about the pressing need to destroy Israel and slow his ineluctable pursuit of nuclear weapons. Instead, choose a higher standard. Look to history. Look to the aspirations of the students risking their lives and livelihoods to protest a sham election. Stop fawning over the mythological Muslim street only when it hates America, and look to the real Iranian street at the moment of its greatest need, when its heart may be open to loving America. You often invoke President Kennedy's pledge to put a man on the moon to justify your domestic agenda. You and your supporters invite comparisons to Camelot. Well, what of John F. Kennedy's most solemn vow? "Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty." No, we should not bomb Iran, or invade it. Those prices are too steep; those burdens are too heavy. But maybe you could lift a finger for democracy? During the campaign you mocked those who belittled your rhetoric as "just words." Well, what you've offered so far is less than just words. You've put a fresh coat of whitewash on Iran's sham "democracy." On Monday, you proclaimed yourself "troubled" by the events in Iran, before hinting that you'd negotiate with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad no matter what an official investigation into his "landslide" victory found. (Would you trust Mafia internal audits, too?) Before the sham election you cheered Iran's "robust debate." But that debate has been robust only if you are grading on a curve. Ahmadinejad's main opponent, Mir Hossein Mousavi, was an accidental reform candidate. The mullahs had disqualified about 400 others, leaving in the race only four presumed hacks deemed pliant enough not to rock the boat. Mousavi's popular support and the robustness of the debate he ignited were an unintended consequence of a rigged election and a clerical politburo indifferent to its people's desires, not the intention of a democratic regime. Reportedly, you are biding your time, waiting to see what happens, as if it is a great mystery. Your campaign lived and breathed YouTube. Check it now, check it often. You and your team promised "soft power" and "smart power." How about moral power? Because by not clearly picking a side, it appears you have chosen the wrong side. Do you fear antagonizing the powers-that-be in Iran? That ship has sailed. Though I am sure they're tickled by your eagerness not to roil the seas around them. Is it because you think "leader of the free world" is just another of those Cold War relics best mothballed in favor of a more cosmopolitan and universal awe at your own story? "Enough about those people bleeding in the street. What do you think of me?" Is that how it is to be? During the Bush years, what was best about liberalism had bled away. One of the worst things about the Republican Party has always been its Kissingerian realpolitik, the "it's just business" approach to world affairs that amounted to a willful blindness to our ideals beyond our own borders. The Democratic Party may not have always gotten the policies right, but it had a firm grasp of the principle. In the 1990s, liberals championed "nation building," and many conservatives chuckled at the naivete of it. Then came Iraq, and Republicans out of necessity embraced what liberals once believed out of conviction. The result? Liberals ran from their principles, found their inner Kissingers and championed a cold realism whose chill emanated from the corpse of their ideals. Labor unions, such as the AFL-CIO, once battled tyranny abroad on the grounds that workers everywhere need democracy. Today, the president turns a blind eye to the independent labor movement in Iran, and the unions and Democrats spend their time trying to figure out how to eliminate the secret ballot in the American workplace. So far, "hope and change" has meant spending trillions we do not have on expanded government we do not need. Meanwhile, the huddled masses of Iranians yearning to breathe free think hope and change means something more. But the new American colossus stands all but silent, her beacon dimmed, her luster tarnished. Please, Mr. President, prove me wrong. Stop voting "present" on democracy. Source: Townhall
 Many still ask: Was it worth it? If we examine the question from an American, British or Australian perspective, then it would be difficult to present an answer that could convince all critics. For the coalition members this was a war of opportunity, not a war of necessity. Going to war or not was never an issue that could affect the existence of a coalition member, nor was winning or losing. For Iraq and its people however, this war was the beginning of a struggle for rebirth, a very difficult but necessary one, for sure. People of my generation who were born in democracies may take the freedom they enjoy for granted. This is certainly not the case for me or my people. I was born a decade after the murderous Ba'ath Party grabbed power in Baghdad in the sinister coup of July 1968. To us, the war brought an end to that 35-year-long nightmare and the beginning of an era of freedom, thanks to our friends in the coalition. For me and many Iraqis, it was certainly worth it. Life is better today than it was before 2003. That is even though we were on the receiving end of this war in all its phases, from initial invasion through the bloody sectarian violence and terror that paralysed the country for years. Despite the high price in blood, today is brighter than yesterday. Above all, we have hope - something we did not have under Saddam's dictatorship - that tomorrow will be even brighter. I would like to share two snapshots from Iraq that I hope will help you see why I believe Iraq is making solid progress towards liberty, prosperity and the rule of law. Recently, two stories dominated the media in Iraq. The first started when the ministry of trade was bombarded with allegations of rampant corruption. Corruption is a serious problem, but worse than corruption itself is if there is a lack of checks and balances that can stop it. In Iraq this used to happen all the time, but now a wind of change is blowing. Pressure from the press, the public and partners in the Government forced the minister of trade to submit his resignation. Resignation alone was not deemed enough. The minister was arrested on Saturday as he was attempting to flee the country. He will join other corrupt officials in custody awaiting trial. The fascinating thing about this case is that the indicted minister is a member of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Dawa Party. Then there is the case of Kitabat, the prominent Iraqi online journal. Kitabat, founded in 2002 by an Iraqi expatriate, has somewhat served the role of a shadow parliament in which people from across the Iraqi spectrum voice their opinions without censorship. Five months ago, Kitabat published an article in which the author accused the office of Maliki of nepotism and abuse of authority. How did the Prime Minister respond to these, indeed unfounded, accusations? In Saddam's days the case would have been closed with a bullet to the dissident's head. It was common practice to send embassy officials on assassination missions armed with silent pistols or even axes, as was the case in the attempt on former PM Iyad Allawi's life in London in 1978. Instead, Maliki opted to go to a court of law and sue the author and the owner of Kitabat. Maliki's decision came under severe criticism from free press advocates who saw his action as an attempt to restrict freedom of speech. Read the rest here.. Omar Fadhil Al-Nidawi is a security policy specialist from Iraq. He and his brother Mohammed run the weblog Iraq the Model:http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/. Source:The Australian
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The face-covering burqa and niqab veils worn by some Muslim women have no place in Denmark, Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen says, adding his government was considering restricting them.
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