Islamism is the Racism of Our Time

Naser Khader, a Muslim and member of the Danish Parliament, tries to make the case. I think the term “racism” is oft misapplied, especially when Islamists accuse their opponents of it. In part of the article it seems that Khader is making a metaphorical case:

Islamism is the racism of our time. It can be said no more clearly than this. And as such, a united democratic world must turn against Islamism — not seeking ‘dialogue’ or ‘understanding’, but in rejection and concrete resistance.

That seems to say that Islamism should be fought the way racism is fought. But here he really calls it racism:

I believe that the Danish government should use Durban II to propose a condemnation of political Islam as a racist ideology. We owe it to ourselves and to our soldiers, who set their lives on the line fighting terrorism on the battlefield, that we at the lofty conferences in the international society act equally firmly and with principle against Islamism.

As much as I relish the idea of hijacing a UN conference this way, it’s not my race that Jihadists hate: It’s my unwillingness to submit. This part, though, is hard to argue with:

It is time that we discard the velvet gloves and make this clear: There exist religious practices that are not compatible with fundamental human rights. Islamism is one of those, and must therefore be fought.

It is not sufficient to keep killing Taliban warriors on the battlefields of Afghanistan, if we do not simultaneously put our fullest efforts into the other battle. If our souls are lost to the Islamists, we will eventually lose the War on Terror. Democracy must learn to strike hard.

Paper or Plastic?

Full disclosure: I’m in this movie. But you won’t see me. Still, it’s a lot of fun; an affectionate look at middle America. Catch it if you can.

The Sun Has Set

Britain is not only dead, but the corpse is already starting to stink.

ISLAMIC law has been officially adopted in Britain, with sharia courts given powers to rule on Muslim civil cases.

The government has quietly sanctioned the powers for sharia judges to rule on cases ranging from divorce and financial disputes to those involving domestic violence.

Rulings issued by a network of five sharia courts are enforceable with the full power of the judicial system, through the county courts or High Court.

In the absense of a clear policy on Iran

this will do.

Editing

I’m in the film business, which has given me the opportunity to learn just how powerful editing can be. If you’ve never shaped a scene in editing, you just have no idea. You can come close by seeing yourself edited in the media. I was interviewed for an industry magazine puff piece years ago and was stunned at how they turned me into a blithering illiterate. I’ve since wished that everyone could have that experience just once so they’d know to never trust the media on anything.

You can have that experience vicariously, sort of, thanks to Mark Levin. Read these excerpts of the Gibson/Palin interview and then be suspicious of everything you ever see that isn’t complete and unedited. Gibson and ABC were so egregiously heavy-handed (dare I say amateurish?) that even UPI thinks there may be a backlash.

No sh*t, Sherlock.

I think that politicians, and anybody else getting interviewed, should run their own camera or audio recorder so they can post the raw interview on the web. And I’m not alone. It would be cheap insurance against typical MSM hatchet jobs, and any interviewer who refuses that as a condition has revealed himself an untrustworthy adversary instead of a reporter of fact.

Update:

It seems that some folks already do, with predictable results.

Glenn: Bravo for your column on the need for politicians to make their own record of interviews. I am a corporate communications consultant and I routinely advise my clients not to agree to taped interviews. If a taped interview is unavoidable, I tell them that when the news crew arrives and starts setting up its cameras and microphones, the interview subject should set up his own cameras and microphones. A few have taken my advice, but many do not, thinking it will tick off the media even more. I tell them the media is not your friend under any circumstances and you are foolish to trust it.

I must say, though, on the few occasions when my advice was heeded, I wished I had a camera of my own to record the priceless expressions on the reporters’ faces as we set up our own cameras. “What are those for?” one asked nervously. “Oh, we just have a policy of making our own record,” I said nonchalantly. He seemed a bit perturbed, but went ahead with the interview, which turned out tough, but reasonably fair. I can’t help but think that having our own record made at least some difference.

Empty Suit Jitters

So they work hard to nominate a guy who’s all sizzle, and suddenly they notice there’s no steak.

Maybe they hear the marching of an Army of Sarahs.

Wile E. Reporter

Suuuuper Journalist!

Of course it’s the Religion of Peace

which is why its Saudi leaders say it’s OK to kill people who broadcast “bad” programming during Ramadan.

Raise your hand if you’re for Obama

Because, as he and his spokesman seem to have forgotten, thanks to beatings by communists McCain can’t raise his.

Even for a Marxist Obama has a vanishingly small amount of class. And, as Mark Steyn points out, he’s not so hot with Google his own self.

Update:

It gets better.

“Let’s talk about talking.”

Does saying that make Joe Biden the most self-unaware man in Washington?

Finally found out what TSA stands for

Too Stupid for Arby’s.

Guilty?

Coulda knocked me over with a feather.

Never Forget

Unlikely to be seen on al Jazeera

Pig 1, Suicide Bomber 0.

Barry Turns a Deaf Ear

This is trajifunny.

Must be that crack team of which he is, as he reminds us, the executive. Maybe we call them “The Gang That Couldn’t Slime Straight.”

In case you’re worried

Up to the minute updates here: hasthelargehadroncolliderdestroyedtheworldyet.com

Update:

The site should be highly reliable. A programmer I work with just observed:

If you read the html source for the page, you see a Javascript program
that determines whether the world has ended or not:

   <script type="text/javascript">

      if (!(typeof worldHasEnded == "undefined")) {

         document.write("YUP.");

      } else {

         document.write("NOPE.");

      }

   </script>

It also points to a feed url, so you can use your rss reader to get
updates on the destruction of the world:

<link rel=”alternate” type=”application/atom+xml” title=”Recent Entries”
href=”http://www.hasthelargehadroncolliderdestroyedtheworldyet.com/atom.xml&#8221;
/>

And, there’s a warranty in an html comment:

<!– if the lhc actually destroys the earth & this page isn’t yet updated
please email mike@frantic.org to receive a full refund –>

The Real Reason to Oppose Obama

I’ve long recognized him as a garden variety Marxist. Melanie Phillips outlines just why he’s so dangerous. It can be summed up with two words: Saul Alinsky. In case you were wondering what a “community organizer” is:

His creed was set out in his book ‘Rules for Radicals’ – a book he dedicated to Lucifer, whom he called the ‘first radical’. It was Alinsky for whom ‘change’ was his mantra. And by ‘change’, he meant a Marxist revolution achieved by slow, incremental, Machiavellian means which turned society inside out. This had to be done through systematic deception, winning the trust of the naively idealistic middle class by using the language of morality to conceal an agenda designed to destroy it. And the way to do this, he said, was through ‘people’s organisations’.

Community organisers would mobilise direct action by the oppressed masses against their capitalist oppressors.

The bottom line:

Alinsky was a radical straight out of the Gramsci playbook. In both America and Britain, Gramsci’s acolytes have been conducting a decades-long march through the institutions. In Britain, they have substantially achieved their aim of subverting western morality and changing the face of British society. No political party stands against this. In the US, they have made huge inroads but haven’t yet won. With Palin on one side and Obama on the other, it is now clear that this US presidential election has taken the culture war to the gates of the White House itself.

Don’t think it can’t happen here. Britain has already been destroyed.

Dear Mr. Obama

Barry:

Please watch this video. Get back to me on your reaction to it, OK?

(H/T BlackFive)

The Worst of Times

David Gorski gives the anti-vaccine airheads the Dickens.

Basically, the design of the Hornig study study was pretty simple, and, better yet, it was an intentional attempt to replicate the research of Andrew Wakefield using rigorous methodology. The design was a case control study in which children with autism and GI problems were compared to children with GI problems and no autism for a number of parameters, including MMR vaccination and the presence of measles virus RNA in the gut of children who underwent endoscopy. The overall approach was to determine whether children with autism and GI symptoms were more likely to have detectable measles virus RNA in the gut. The result?

Zero correlation. Nada. Zip.

Vaccinate your kids.

Palin Locks Up Key Constituency

Photo credit: Agrapha

Where Eagles Dare

Michael Yon files his first report from Afghanistan, and it’s as dramatic as anything he posted from Iraq.

When I was briefed on the top-secret mission before it was launched, I thought : “Good grief.  I might have to report on the failure of one of the largest and most important missions of the entire war.”

It was a stunning, unqualified success. Which probably explains why you’ve heard so much about it in the media. Oh, you say it’s news to you? I keep forgetting whose side the MSM is on.

Yon, and British combat photographers, brought back some amazing images. Be sure to read the comments, especially the one from a sniper who was there:

Sirs,

without breaking rules etc, I am a Australia Serviceman who also went on this op.

I am a sniper assigned “overwatch” meaning to travel ahead a few Klicks, setup, spot and if needed , Neutralise the opposition. then repeat when the “charlie team” ( 3 teams, 1 set, one moving, one setting up)

and after reading this i am so happy to say its spot on. Truth in reporting at last!!!

Now people can see what we do and why. 60% of the Afghani folks want us here, the rest are scared of the Talibs but when its dark offer us tea or water before running away before another Afghani see’s them.

One day they’ll hopefully not be so scared and i personally think when this day come the Talibs are done for , they play on fear and intimidation. remove the fear and they are nothing but rabble with guns.

Full marks to the reporter! I’ll buy you a beeer for this one mate!

cheers

J

Instapundit spoke to Michael via satphone.

He’s with British troops now, and his comment is: “These guys are studs. All they do is work out and fight.” He says troop morale generally in Afghanistan is really good, partly because there’s more public support for that war, but that the overall situation is “not great” and “clearly deteriorating.” He adds that “we’re not losing,” but that we’re not making progress either. “I’ll tell you Glenn, we really need more troops here.” With what he describes as a “meltdown” going on in Pakistan, he says that Afghanistan needs a lot more troops — like 50,000 or more. Part of the problem, he adds, is that many of the Coalition troops, like the Germans, aren’t really allowed to fight, making the effective number of available troops lower than it seems.

Update:

Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle. The Times covered it. No, not the one in New York, silly.

Willie’s Worried

The Bay Area’s very own Minister of Arrogance and King of Corruption thinks Palin landed a solid right hook.

The Democrats are in trouble. Sarah Palin has totally changed the dynamics of this campaign.

Period.

Palin’s speech to the GOP National Convention on Wednesday has set it up so that the Republicans are now on offense and Democrats are on defense. And we don’t do well on defense.

Suddenly, Palin and John McCain are the mavericks and Barack Obama and Joe Biden are the status quo, in a year when you don’t want to be seen as defending the status quo.

From taxes to oil drilling, Democrats are now going to have to start explaining their positions.

Whenever you start having to explain things, you’re on defense.

I actually went back and watched Palin’s speech a second time. I didn’t go to sleep until 1:30 a.m. I had to make sure I got the lines right.

Her timing was exquisite. She didn’t linger with applause, but instead launched into line after line of attack, slipping the knives in with every smile and joke.

And she delivered it like she was just BS-ing on the street with the meter maid.

She didn’t have to prove she was “of the people.” She really is the people.

All together now: “Awwwwwww.”

Truly, he has a dizzying intellect

Ignorant, and proud of it.

After all, said Zahar, a donkey can eat shrubbery and survive, but a human cannot.

“So, a donkey is more evolved than a human? No,” scoffs Zahar, seemingly satisfied that he has demonstrated the absurdity of Charles Darwin’s theory. Allah, not evolution, made man, he says, and Allah has made Gaza Islamic.

This pea-brain is a “surgeon”. May Allah keep him away from me with a knife.

Meanwhile, in Afghanistan

Michael Yon’s latest email, titled “Many Taliban dead”:

03 Sept 08

0910 est

Michael has no internet but called on the sat phone.

British 2 Para in Helmand provence have been repeatedly and successfully closing with and engaging the Taliban. In ongoing operations today a number of British paratroopers lured Taliban into an attack. British forces responded with machine guns, small arms, shoulder fired rockets, mortars, and a 500 lb bomb. Locals say “Many Taliban dead.”

More Later….

He also posted this just the other day.

How To Make Magic Happen

I tell friends, tours, and pretty much anybody who will listen that the reason “art” and “technology” are words that unite us here rather than divide us is named Ed Catmull. Here he generously makes it clear exactly how he did it.

Pixar is a community in the true sense of the word. We think that lasting relationships matter, and we share some basic beliefs: Talent is rare. Management’s job is not to prevent risk but to build the capability to recover when failures occur. It must be safe to tell the truth. We must constantly challenge all of our assumptions and search for the flaws that could destroy our culture.

Well worth reading.

The funny part is that I’d bet folding money that no other studio will take his advice.

An Exciting Day at the Office

A Warthog pilot describes a busy afternoon.

Balz comes off the tanker and I asked him for its location because I was on fumes.  He said look up!  The tanker was in the target area at 20,000ft exactly were I needed him.  I jumped on, took 8000lbs of gas (the jet only holds 10,000).  I recommended the tanker stay West of the fight due to possible man pads but when I came off the boom I looked down and I was again directly over the fight, exactly where I needed to be.

It’s Time for Facts

about Sarah Palin. A sample:

Sarah Palin is the reason compasses point North.

Sarah Palin will pry your Klondike bar from your cold dead fingers.

Sarah Palin makes Andrew Sullivan regret some key life choices.

Sarah Palin’s finishing move in the VP debate will be pulling Biden’s still beating heart from his chest & taking a bite.

Something you don’t see every day

Pity Biden

At some point he’ll have to debate a Hockey Mom.

Big News

As if the MSM is going to notice.