“Innocence of Muslims:” Innocent of Craft, but not Truth

(I began this piece months ago. Events have had a way of running beyond my ability to keep up and write about them.)

That backdrop looks like Death Valley to me.

As the controversy over Benghazi snowballs, more and more have heard of “Innocence of Muslims,” a a film that few – if any have seen – but the trailer for which the Administration posited as the proximate cause of the assault on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya.

(The snowballing controversy I mention has melted into slush, after endless obfuscation b the President and many members of his administration, and such distractions as the Petraeus resignation.)

‘The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam’ Why not? And, who cares? Truth is not slander.

Secretary Clinton called it “disgusting and reprehensible.” The President of the United States saw it as “crude and disgusting.” Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney joined the chorus of condemnation calling the YouTube sensation “… a reprehensible video insulting Islam.”

For years, it has been apparent to me that most of the politicians, reporters and pundits who routinely comment on matters pertaining to Islam actually have little direct knowledge of the religion, and simply accept that it much like any other, but one with some problematic followers.

It is unlikely that any of the major players in the Benghazi controversy have watched the full trailer, and the odds are astronomical that in the unlikely event they have, or had a member of staff do so, none have looked into the origins of the points the film makes, and whether they have any basis in Islamic doctrine and tradition.

Foreign Policy Magazine did have a look, but provides a joking precis rather than any real analysis. It is sad to see this venerable publication trying to snark like a junior writer on Slate. They did this, they say, so their readers would not have to watch the film. This video clip was elevated to worldwide importance by the administration, including the President, who mentioned it no less than six times in his address to the United Nations.

Let me then do the work that Foreign Policy did not.

FP’s summary:

An introduction featuring a Muslim mob in fake beards slaughtering Christians in modern-day Egypt as police look on. The rest of the film seems to be a flashback in which a father explains the roots of Islamic extremism to his daughter.

The insinuation that Mohammed is a “bastard of an unknown father”

Khadija comforting Mohammed by placing his head between her legs

Mohammed calling a donkey “the first Muslim animal”

Mohammed telling his followers they should feel free to molest children

Mohammed having sex with the wives of his followers

Mohammed also being gay. (When a follower asks if he is “dominant or submissive,” he replies, “both.”)

An old lady — with a mysterious New York accent — being drawn and quartered by camels

Lots of terrible overdubbing, cheesy green screen backgrounds, and The Room-level dialogue and acting. 

As Foreign Policy says, the film begins with Muslim mobs slaughtering Coptic christinas while polce look on. This is hardly entierely fctive. The opening scene could, sadly be generic, in today’s Egypt. Simply search “Christians,” “Copts,“Muslims, and “clash” -the favored term for a Muslim attack on minorities – and you will get plenty of results.

The aspersion on Muhammad’s parentage is weakly founded on the tradition that his father Abddallah, died away from home some months before he was born. There appears to be no scholarship pointing to Islam’s founder as illegitimate. The mention of bastardy is clearly put forth as an insult; a particularly pointed one for a religion that prescribes lashing or even death for extramarital sex.

We of course have no word on the martial relations between Muhammad and his first wife Khadidjah, a considerably older, and wealthy woman. Muslims see the marriage as their founder taking a lonely and defenseless woman under his protection, and claim he increased her fortune; detractors say that the founder leeched off a helpless woman because he had no talent of his own. This scene may then be a metaphorical statement of the latter view, but that is a a bit of stretch considering the writing overall.

Showing a donkey as Muhammad’s first convert is over the top, but while not canonical ,there is a story of a there is talking donkey in Islamic tradition. This amazing ass was part of the spoils from the subjugation of the Jews of Khaybar.

The bit about the Messenger allowing his followers to molest children is  excessive, but has its origin in an undisputed – and to modern eyes – thoroughly distasteful aspect of Muhammad’s life. One merely needs point to the settled fact – among Muslims –  that Muhammad married a six year old, and while he did not consummate the marriage until she was nine, in the intervening years he did find gratification with her. This may have been customary in that place and time, but this tradition is remarkable for its uniqueness among religious figures, and continues to provide a rationale for child marriage in the Muslim world to this day.

“Use of the children whom you wish. The rest are to be sold as slaves,” Says the messenger Again, this is an accusation of pederasty. While there is little to rest this on other than Muhammd’s relationship with Aisha, it is partly true: In the aftermath of the Battle of the Trench, men and boys were killed. Women, girls, and those boys without pubic hair were were spared,but sold as slaves.

As for Muhammad having sex with the wives of his followers, that is something of a broad brush, but not entirely unfounded. The story of his marriage to Zaynab is illustrative. This woman was married to the prophet’s adopted son Zayd. When His eye fell on favor on his daughter in law, Muhammad was place in a dilemma as the relationship while not consanguineous, was considered too close. The adoption was nullified via one of a typically many convenient Koranic revelation, as the film shows:

“I’m canceling the adoption that business with my adopted my son’s wife”

“Islamic nation forbids adoption. That is next verse of the Koran” Muhammad does have rather convenient revelations.  Thereafter adoption was forbidden in Islam. This is something to consider when one is asked to contribute to a Muslim orphanage. The children may be kept of the street, but they will never find homes.

And the prophet was not limited to a set number of wives. Zyanab, also his first cousin, was his fifth., and like all Muslims was allowed to have sex with his slave girls.

“Is the messenger of god gay?” a character asks.

Type in “Was Muhammad Gay “ in your search bar and you will get quite a number of posts. The very idea seems absurd, as Islam is quite clear on what should be the fate of homosexuals: death. The prevalence of same sex affection in Islamic countries where women are simply not available to unmarried men, but as there are references to beautiful boys in Islamic paradise, stories in the hadith that Muhammad wore kohl to highlight his eyes, and sometimes liked to wear his wife Aisha’s clothes, discussions of Muhammad’s gayness abound However, all these references are disputed and there are lengthy debates on translation involving Syriac versus Arabic vocabulary, far too abstruse to go into here.

Again,there is little on which to base this accusation, and it is clearly a calculated insult, but understandable given the low status and near invisibility of women in orthodox Islam.

he old lady’s “mysterious New York accent” is, I think, either a deliberate obfuscation, or lack of the simplest research on the part of FP. . There is no one New York accent. New York Irish, Italians, blacks, and, as in this case, Jews, have distinct ways of speaking that while commonly identifiable as New Yorkese, are also distinguishable as to ethnicity. The old woman is clearly meant to be Jewish

This scene refers to a story that is not canonical, but which does appear in some Islamic chronicles.

“….and Umm Qirfa Fatima was taken prisoner. She was a very old woman, wife of Malik. Her daughter and Abdullah Masada were also taken. Zayd ordered Qays to kill Umm Qirfa and he killed her cruelly (Tabari), by putting a rope to her two legs and to two camels and driving them until they rent her in two.)”

The problem is that this woman was Bedouin, not Jewish. Had the producer done his research, he would have found ample examples in Islamic scripture of atrocities, murder and plunder of Jews. This scene conflates those with the murder of the old woman, something FP could easily have ascertained

The Foreign Policy précis leaves out some other important points the film clumsily attempts to make.

The Koran is depicted a  purpose built fiction,and indeed, it is such..

“I will make a book for him. It will be some version of the Torah and the New Testament. Which is clearly what the Koran is.  The Koran does contain many elements from both the Torah and New Testament, some quite distorted, or as Muslims believe, corrected, so as to agree with the eternal Koran which has been corrupted by Jews and Christians.Biblical figures and stories float through the book, with no clear narrative structure, so that Jesus, Moses, and Abraham appear as contemporaneous forbears to Muhammad.

Muslims believe that the Koran has existed eternally and was revealed to Muhammad at the time of his prophet-hood. At the same time their historical tradition admits that the founder, an illiterate, did not write, or cause to have written down a single version of the book, but rather that its fragments, written on scraps of paper, cloth, and bone, were gathered together at the command of the Caliph Usman many years subsequent to Muhammad’s death. Unless one does believe in Divine guidance, it is clear that such a process would result in many unacknowledged sources.

In another r scene the founder tells his followers prior to a caravan raid“We will kill the men, loot the goods and take the women.”

This is an accurate summary of Islamic rules of war. The goods and persons of non-Muslims, or those Muslims deemed to be in opposition to true Islam, are forfeit. That Muhammad was a leader in the sole Bedouin industry – plunder – is acknowledged,and indeed, celebrated in both the Koran and hadith.

There is much more, but I will conclude with this:  Islam is on earth, not to complete revelation,but to suppliant it, and those who resist do so at their peril.

In the film, Muhammad asks a Jew “What about Jericho?”

The Jew replies that Jericho “had a chance.”  This is not the way I remember the story, but he goes on to say that Jews  didn’t ask others to convert to Judaism. This is true, and the lack of a proselytizing urge in Judaism is in stark contrast the Islamic mandate to dominate the globe.

The Jew goes on to say that Jews believed in one god long before Muhammad, as did the pharaohs  of Egypt.  This last is a stretch, but one Egyptian ruler, Akhenaten, did briefly establish monotheism.

To this, Muhammad replies that  it is not not enough to believe in one god, but rather  “you must say God and Muhammad his messenger.”  Muslims were once commonly called Muhammadans, and this term, while no longer acceptably, is accurate..  The cult of the Prophet,”al-Ihsan”, the perfect man,is what the “religion” is about.

Christians are taught to emulate Jesus, whom the believe was divine; Muslims emulate Muhammad, who was human, and throughtly profane.

“Innocence cf of Muslims” seems designed to show that Muslims are not innocent of the violence that is endemic in their lands and along their borders, and which has been brought to the West and elsewhere again and again since the six Day War . The film is indeed crude, but not vile or reprehensible. The points it makes could have been better supported, and are so in countless books, blogs, and better made videos.

In its negative aspersions upon Islam it is, on the whole, truthful.

Finally, I disagree with FP in its comparison of “Innocence” to “The Room:” “‘The Room” was better.

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Post Campaign 2012: Settling into the Occupation

A month now after the U.S. election.

Readers of these pages will know that I am no supporter of Mr. Obama, but that I had a foreboding he would win.  Many of my friends were on board with Messers. Carl Rove, Dick Morris, Michael Barone and other pundits, convinced that Romney would win.  After all, no president looking for a second term with the country in similar distress had ever succeeded.

I replied to these pep talks that the country now was not the country then, not even the same country that rejected McCain in 2008.

Paris, 1941. OK, I’m not as despondent as this guy was.

So, I really should not be despondent.  But I am.

In 2008, Mr. Obama promised fundamental transformation, and prior to the vote, one could hope that it had not been yet fully accomplished.  Now it will be completed.

The guns have fallen silent, and the occupiers are marching in.

From the Huffington Post:

“Obama Meets With Rachel Maddow, Al Sharpton, ‘Influential Progressives’”

White House deputy press secretary Josh Earnest confirmed the meeting took place. It wasn’t listed on Obama’s schedule.

“This afternoon at the White House, the President met with influential progressives to talk about the importance of preventing a tax increase on middle class families, strengthening our economy and adopting a balanced approach to deficit reduction,” Earnest said in a statement Tuesday.

There it is.( Al Sharpton?  Can you say “Tawana Brawley?”)

No need to dissemble anymore. Nobody is watching anyway

We have re-elected a President who sees “Progressives” as major players. Of course, he and his staff met with these people earlier in his term, but now there is no reason to dissemble.  The fifth columnists and franc tireurs show themselves.

George Meany of the AFL-CIO and many others at 1962 signing of Manpower Training Act

AFL-CIO head Richard Trumka along with Soros funded Moveon.org head Justin Ruben after meeting the President in the White Hoiuse November 13, 2012. Just in case you had any doubt as to who is in charge.

On November 13,The President met with AFL-CIO leader Trumka and Moveon.org at the White house.  I’m old enough to remember George  Meany, and a time where  unions, having purged the radical leftists among them, were pretty solidly at the center of American politics.  If Trumka ever watched “On the Waterfront,” he was cheering for the bad guys.

The comment boards are full of hopeful writers who put out their point by point programs for retaking Congress, and then the White House. Others rightly point to the institutions, schools and churches,

The Hollywood Left( which is most of them) never forgave director Elia Kazan for both testifying to communist influence in Tinselstown, and making this film showing the leftist thugs among the longshoremen.

which must be retaken by grassroots action.  The entire culture,online pundit Roger L. Simon says,must be retaken.  He recommends Youtube. Or something.

And then there is the fight between those who want to dump social issues, and those who would rather see the Republic obliterated before one more fetus is aborted.

Not to mention those who recommend investing in “brass and lead” and can’t wait to shoot leftists. Let’s remember the last scene in  1970 movie “Joe” in which hippie hating Peter Boyle ends up wasting his daughter. Or the Spanish Civil War.

And of course, the United States Military, which, PC as it may have become, still can cream pretty much any fighting force on earth..  And then there is DHS, ramping up local law enforcement firepower.

So, all of this is blather, in my view.  A “center right” country could have elected Obama in a fit of inattention, but such a nation could not have reelected him.

Mr. Obama still bridles at being called a socialist, but he need not.  When 23% of Republicans have a favorable view of socialism, “progressives” should lick their

                              WTF? Just WTF!

chops.

 

23% of Republicans viewing socialism favorably?

Do they know what socialism is?  Do they know what Republicans are?  Do Republicans know what Republicans are?

And then, there is this ” Americans Aged 18-29 Have A More Favorable Response To Socialism Than To Capitalism.”

Perhaps they will grow out of it, but I wouldn’t bet on it.  I doubt many under 50 would have much idea of the references I’ve used here. There are those things, it seems, that have to be learned through experience rather than study.

Something has changed.  And perhaps the country that those of us who despise this change mourn, never existed.

If it did, it will not return, and what takes it place will be what it will be.

What’s in a Name? In the President’s Case, Quite a Bit, and Quite a Few

( I profoundly hope this will be my last post on President Barack  Obama)

                      D’oh!Bama

Remember BusHitler?  Perhaps you’ve seen Shrillery and Romoney. President Obama has inspired a naming frenzy far beyond the slanging epithets of other campaigns.

In Islamic tradition, Allah has 99 names, or more properly, attributes, such as “Allah the Merciful.”  It occurred to me that President Obama who is something of a demigod himself in some quarters might have at least as many, so I began collecting them some months ago, and the amount rose rapidly.

There are two reasons for this.

First, a large portion of the electorate, and that of core includes me, profoundly disapprove of Mr. Obama, his foundational philosophy, administration, and plans, such as they are, for our future.  This dislike appears across the internet in the nearly endless plays on the President’s name.

The second is linguistic.  Consider the huge number of words beginning with “ob” and the even vaster total starting simply with “o,” and the President is cooked.  That his name begins and ends with a vowel doesn’t help, and even more variants can be added by using words ending in those vowels, as prefixes and suffixes.

Then there is the vocative imperative s in “Oh, bite me!”

The word plays fall into recognizable categories.  Let’s look at a few.

Obamamugabe, Hugobama, Maobama  derive from the President’s  authoritarian leanings.  HoBama sounds like a ghetto epithet, but was a reference to Ho Chi Minh.

Quite a number point to the President’s  Islamophilia . Obama bin Laden is pretty obvious and is a slip of the tongue that even experience newscasters have made. My spell check must know something as it want to change “Obama” to “Osama.”  More and more writers are avoiding this by spelling the dead terrorist’s name “Usama,” which is in fact closer to the actual Arabic.

Buraq Obama is a bit subtler.  The buraq was the flying steed that transported Muhammed to Jerusalem and back one night. Then there is Obamatollah.

Some, such as Obongo( although this first one could be a reference to long time dictator Omar Bongo of Gabon) and Obango might be considered racist.  T’Won(the one) and Teh Won are reminiscent of some of the idiosyncratic spelling in names favored by some African Americans.  Not all of these names are derived directly from the president’s name.

There is “Chocolate Jesus.”  Before calling “racism,” one should consider that this is likely derived from “Chicago Jesus,” coined by David Axelrod. Others of this sort are “Captain Zero” and” “President Downgrade,” commemorating the president’s presiding over the first ever downgrading of U.S. credit.

Others refer to Mr. Obama’s performance in office: Obumble, which also produces the morphological variants Obumbler and Obumbles.

 HomObama? I don’t think so!

There are many more.

In Arthur C. Clarke’s 1953 story “The Nine Billion Names of God”  the universe comes to an end when some Tibetan monks use a super computer to write out all the possible names of God. President Obama is still a long way from nine billion names, but if he’s around for another four years he will easily garner another ninety nine or more.  In that case the stars will not fall from the sky as they did in the story, but the Stars and Stripes may well.

 

Slightly more than 99 names follow:

Obumbles	Obumbler
Al-Obama
Bamster
Barack huisinsane Obama
Barpuke Ovomit
Barrack Ebola
BO
Buraq Obama
Captain Zero
Chocolate Jesus
Chicago Jesus
D’One
DuhBama
DumBama
Duoh!Bama
Farouk Obama
HoBama
HugoBama
Insane Hussein
Kim Il Bo
Maobama
Obamugabe
Nobama
NoMoBama
O-hole
O’Bama
O’bomber
Obambi
Obama bin Laden
Obama bin Lyin
Obamaa+
Obamadon’tcare
Obamamismo
Obamamuhammed
Obamanazi
Obamanocchio
ObamaMussolini
Obamanure
ObamatollaH(ps)
Obambabm
Obambi
Obamessiah
Obamoron
Obamugabe
Obamunist
Obango
Obi Wan
Obie
Obimbo
Oblame-o	Oblamer
Obleeep
Oblhblah
Oblivious
Oblooper
Obloviator
Oblowme
Oblunderer
Obombya
Obomination
Obominator
Obongo
Obooboo
OBootie(Michjelle)
Obozo
Obumbler
Obumbler
Obumfuk
Obysmal
Odamnbama
Odubya
Odumass
Odumbo
OhbiteMe
OhCrap
OhNO!
OhPoop
OhShit
Olameass
OmarBama
Ososorry
Ovomit
Ozero
Showbama
T’Wan
Teh Won
Zerobama
homobama
Obamamismo
Bamster
Farouk Obama
DaONe
Barpuke Ovomit
OHDAMMMIT
Yo!Bama
hIS onE-nESS
B-hole
HoBama
Occupier inc hief
Obamocuppier
Urkel
Zerobama

Twits at the BBC Provide 21 More Reasons to Vote for Romney/Ryan

22 October 2012 Last updated at 23:21 GMT

BBC poll: Rest of world favours Obama

A Beeb poll conducted in 21 nations around the world shows President Obama the clear favorite. I can just imagine the newsroom folks cackling sententiously as they make American jokes with appallingly bad Texas accents. As an expatriate working among mostly Brits and Aussies I was constantly being condescend to, and was met with utter incredulity when I objected.  As far as I am concerned these 21 nations are 21 more reasons to vote for the Romney –Ryan ticket. Except for perhaps in his own mind, Mr. Obama is not running for President of the world, but maybe he should, as the past four years show him to be singularly unfit for the job of President of the United States.

Among a certain set in the U.S., largely the same demographic that enjoys British period drama series on PBS, this survey will serve as confirmation of their own place among the smug global elect.  After all, the rest of the world agrees with us, so we must be right.  Things are  in my view, unfortunately – changing, but historically the US hasn’t much cared what the rest of the world thought, and this may be the single most important reason why we are still here.

Let’s look at the world that so many in the Obama camp think we should emulate.

First there is Europe.  There has always been a certain summer in Tuscany set that thought the European way far superior to the disordered and rapid pace of American life. While we work long hours, they are sitting in cafes sipping fine coffee and discussing, well,

important stuff.

What one needs to remember is that, despite recent demographic shifts, a majority of

Saint Bartholomew’s Day massacre in Paris on 24 August 1572. 70,000 Hugenot protestants murdered.

Americans are descended from people who thought their lives depended on getting the hell out of Europe.  This was a rather sensible outlook.  Why would thoughtful people with some gumption wish to remain on the continent that gave us Wars of Religion, and wars of succession where armies battled and looted to advance the

The alfresco cafe is now a part of the American scene. The coffee at 7-11 is pretty darn good, too.

hereditary prerogatives of whoever had married whichever princess, somewhere, sometime.

And that was the good stuff, just a warm up for the total wars of ideology.

Well, now in the US we have fine coffee, outdoor cafes and, while we still don’t have long vacations, even in the current downturn, a lot more of us have jobs than do over  on the other side. We are grateful for some of our European heritage.  After all, we gained our independence based on our rights as Englishmen, and our founders were profoundly influenced by the Enlightenment, both French and Scottish.

Thus is it is sad for us to look at Britain, where the same elite that staffs the BBC

In Britain they haven’t quite figured out thoughtcrime, but crimespeak will get you finds and/or jail. The black and white hands would seem to have anticipated the ruling multicutural ideology.

unilaterally decided to overwhelm its native people with an alien and unassimilable horde because, well, because it would be neat to have more “diversity.” This disarmed and helpless populace could do little about it if they wanted to, as under their “unwritten constitution,” which is none at all, they can be taken into custody for such Orwellian offenses as “conspiring to commit a public nuisance” or” damaging community cohesion.”  We are grateful to Mr. Orwell for providing us the language to describe this madness, but wish his countrymen had listened a little more closely. The ruling class has little fear of change as the brutal and demeaning class system remains in lace, destroying the working class’s sense of self worth from the cradle on, and anesthetizing a large part of  it with the dole.

King John signs the Magna Carta 1215. It helps when you write stuff down.

Somehow, after a promising start at Runnymede you never quite found your way.

Then there is France.  Her revolution was  the model for every bloody vanguard of the proletariat uprising since, and the monster this nation laid to rest at Les Invalides gave the world total war.  Still, the wine and cheese are great, and the movies, well, I think a lot of us were faking when we hung out, smoked and drank coffee while discussing the Nouvelle Vague.  We don’t smoke anymore and our wine and cheese have gotten pretty awesome.

From the Time of that latter Louises until now, statism has been your way of life, andt he results have been mixed to say the least. It enabled you to wage war, but not to win.

“Third of May” Francisco Goya. Napoleon’s troops shoot civilians. An archetype for countless atrocities over the next century and a half.

Germany, well while we are grateful for the industriousness of the many Germans whose descendants are still a major segment our population, the less said about you, the better.

         It’s as if Goya were clairvoyant.

Spain has been an indirect, but still major influence on our history because she bequeathed her system to our neighbors. Latin America may prefer Obama, but there is no reason to listen.  A continent yet to pull itself out of the seventeenth century feudal mercantilist economic and social structures bequeathed it by Iberia has nothing to teach us.  One has only to look at the telenovelas so popular around the world, or pictures of the ruling classes, to marvel at the almost uniformly white faces in a continent whose inhabitants are predominantly brown and black.

We’re grateful for the great food, exotic cocktails, and wonderful music, but have no interest in the dizzying and manic array of social organizations you have attempted to solve your problems.  Military dictatorships, collectivism, crypto socialists, fascist populists, race based oligarchies, messianic leaders combinng the qualities of caudillo, cacique and shaman come and go down there, but we are still here.

Asian ladies are a highlight of any trip to the symphony these days.

As for Asia, even better than the fine cuisines you’ve brought our way are the industry and success of your emigrants, who, like the Europeans before them, had to leave their ancient lands so as to thrive. We’ll take your engineers, physicists, classical musicians and entrepreneurs, but you can keep your caste systems and oligarchic collectives.

In Africa, perhaps the affection for Mr. Obama there is based on a sense of him as a native son made good.  He has certainly done nothing else of benefit for that struggling continent. We are happy to welcome arrival such as Alioune Niass, the Senegalese street vendor who helped foil the 2010 Times Square bombing plot, but want no part of the conditions that drove him across the Atlantic.

Arabian American OIl Company’s(ARAMCO) first producing well, Dammam #8, 1938.

Then there is the Middle East.  No one would pay any attention to you were it not for the fortunate placement of hydrocarbons in your region, and you would not have that had not the  British and Americans found it for you.  Please, refrain from boastful myth about inventions you had nothing to do with.  Arabic numerals came from India. What you did do was over a millennium ago, and your real thinkers and doers of that time you imprisoned or killed, as you do today.

So, you see, we don’t care what any of you think about who should lead us.  We take from you what is good, and leave you the rest.  And now, we will ignore your advice, and elect a man who looks to us, not to you.

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The War for Africa

Has already started.

“Ex Africa semper aliquid novi”

“Always something new from Africa” said Pliny the Elder, and this remains true today, but unfortunately, the news is most often bad, especially for Africans.

Ansar Al Dine fighters near Timbuktu, Mali. Note the black war flag of Jihad.

In April of this year, in the disarray after a military coup, Malian government forces fled the country’s northern cities, abandoning an area as large as France. While there were several actors in the anti-government movement, hard-line Islamists affiliated with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb quickly appeared alongside the local Islamic militia, Ansar Al Dine.

The fabled city of Timbuktu came under shariah law, with wine and music banished, and floggings, amputations and the demolition of ancient Muslim shrines in their place.  This is an appalling situation for the people of Northern Mali, one that is little noticed in the West, at least among the priorities of foreign policy establishments. It should be, not only for the gross violations of human rights in Northern Mali, but for its larger strategic implications.

In the wake of Muammar Qadaffi’s deposition, vast stores of weapons and armaments

Benghazi US consulate under attack on 9/11/2012

found their way into many hands. In fact, Navy seal, Glen Doherty killed at Benghazi, was tasked with trying to retrieve shoulder fired anti aircraft missiles. Libya’s interim president has stated that foreign fighters, including some from Mali, were involved in the attack. There is little reason to doubt him, as his version of events has been proven right, while the “evolving” positions of the US administration have been consistently wrong.

One fears then that American policy makers have little if any idea of what they are dealing with: far more than isolated terrorist attacks, but a continent wide challenge.

In Nigeria, Boko Haram, a violent Jihadist movement, began its campaign in 2009. Yet, while information on its savage asymmetrical war of bombings, assassinations, beheadings and ethnic cleansing has been reported by the wire services from the start, it was long rarely mentioned in broadcast news reports. A search shows CNN first reporting in 2011, and then only in security matters blogs. Boko Haram’s atrocities make for lurid reporting, but the group has a far larger significance,

An AFP (Agence France Presse) report datelined September 27, 2012,  Gao, Northern Mali that as jihadi fighters pour across the Niger border,

Perhaps the most startling thing about these fighters along this frontier route is that nearly all of them are from sub-Saharan Africa rather than the Maghreb.

, I am surprised,” Nigerien Hicham Bilal, who is leading a katiba (combat unit) to Gao, admitted to AFP. “Every day we have new volunteers. They come from Togo, Benin, Niger, Guinea, Senegal, Algeria and elsewhere.”

This then, is the significance of Mali.  A route has been opened for jihad from the Mediterranean to the Gulf of Guinea.  A look at the map shows the enormous advantage the forces of Islam have. Boko Haram began by demanding Islamic rule in the Muslim majority northern half of the country; now it fights to brig all of Nigeria under sharia.

Why then would one doubt that Islamic rule in North Africa and the Sahel would not press

The fall of Northern Mali has opened a jihad trail between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic.

further, through migration, economic pressure, and outright war? There are strategic thinkers among the Islamists.  The movement that now triumphs in Egypt began in the1920s.

In Arabic “abd,” slave, also means  black African The Arab drive for domination of black Africa began many centuries ago, manifested most blatantly in the Arab slave trade, reaching deep into the interior, penetrating as far as the Central Congo. Confronted with superior European technology and organization, Arab influence in Central Africa receded, but has long since renewed its assault as the decades long Civil War ( which might better be called the war for Independence of black Sudan) in Sudan, and the continuing oppression of Muslim black people in Darfur. The ancient Christian land Of Ethiopia is already one third Muslim, and Christians have been expelled from some Muslim areas. In Kenya , Somali Al Shabab jihad operatives have carried out attacks in the capital, Nairobi. Any African country with a substantial Muslim population can expect Arab directed violence and aggression, with the assistance of these large fifth columns,

Poor Africa.  The continent seems destined to be dominated and plundered. These trends

Tippu Tip or Tib (1837 – June 14, 1905 Once owned 10,000 slaves. His influence reached the Easter Congo. While he appears black, he was partly  of Muscat descent, considered himself an Arab, and acted accordingly towards non Muslim Africans

point to a future in which black Africa faces economic, political and religious enslavement.   Christianity in the ancient lads of Christendom has become largely nominal; in Africa it is fervent belief. Christian Africa will not submit willingly, but its resistance will be at a severe disadvantage.  The Muslim forces will have the support of their brethren globally, and the weapons and resources for war in which the Middle East and North Africa are well stocked.  If Christian Africans receive the same level of support that the West has given minorities in Muslim lands, the their future may be grim.

This Arab empire will be like its predecessors, living off plunder and captive populations, perhaps partnering with Russia and China in resource extraction, even as hose nations fight their own Islamic insurgents.

So, are these the musings of someone with an internet connection ad too much time on his hands?

Perhaps not.

Africom, established in 2007 and headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany, is U.S military’s hybrid military-civilian organization with the mission of working with African nations on security matters, with security broadly defined as including not just military capability but economic and social developmen,t as well.  Although  the US has bases in Africa, no African nation has agreed to host the command,

The commands mission is sounds relatively benign, but some Africans see it as aimed a securing resurces and supply lines. This may be so.  Perhaps the US is pre-positioning  for its part in the wider struggle. On whose side it will stand, and why is open to question, but what isn’t, is that it is Africa that will suffer as it always has.

It’s a Bitch Being Right: The Arab Spring: Unlike Irish Spring, No Matter How Much You Scrub, It Still Stinks

Benghazi “demonstrators.”

( I have been picking away at this post since last year.  Events always seemed to overtake me.  In the wake of the Cairo Embassy and Benghazi attacks and deaths,now seems a good time to bring it to  a close.)

In an email to a list of friends that was the predecessor to this blog, I wrote on the first of February 2011:

Some of you, I suspect ,had not heard of the Muslim Brotherhood a week or two ago.  By now, I’m sure you all have.

“Allah is our objective.
The Prophet is our leader.
Qur’an is our law.
Jihad is our way.
Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.”

 - Hassan al-Banna (1906 – 1949),

Have a look at this “explanation” on their official website.  Notice that after lines and lines of blather, he gets back to the point.

(Note:  shortly after my email, the Brotherhood  scrubbed the jihad message from its  English website.  It was there: I pasted the motto above from it.  Screenshots have been preserved on the web.)

@Robert and I have known about these guys since ’81, but our attention wandered.

However, as soon as Tunisia went, I thought (and many much better informed and wiser than I, long before this all started to unwind), it’s all gonna go and then we saw copycat self-immolation across the region, including in Egypt.

And I thought, uh-oh, the Brotherhood, because as anyone keeping up on developments over the years was aware, even from MSM, these are the guys who assassinated Sadat for making peace with Israel, and although outlawed, have been tolerated as they turned their efforts to “social work,” providing services the Egyptian government could not, or perhaps would not provide.  An alternate name for Hamas is the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine

Just as in the early days of the Tunisian revolution the MSM told us Islamists weren’t involved (Listen, any time you hear mobs shouting Allahu Akbar, it’s Islamist!) only to have to cover the return of Islamist  exiles and clashes between them and secularists, so the Brotherhood was first ignored, then called marginal, and now of course is being discussed across the media spectrum since the Brotherhood itself has no desire to hide.

Predictably ,we see puff pieces on CNN as to who they have “changed,” and statements by the Brotherhood that they only want to “participate”  You should be aware of a core Islamic principle, taqyiya –deception which states that it is acceptable and desirable for Muslims to lie and deceive their opponents in advancing Islam.  Peace treaties are signed in times of weakness, abrogated in time of strength.   A bit of an archival search will show this same MSM process of threat minimization regarding Iran in 78.

Some of the more “radical” anti Islam commentators I read of course see the minimizing of the MSM as part of an overall “plot.”

I don’t.  While there are some elements of the nihilist left – philobaribarists and neo- Rousseauvians – who just plain hate Western civilization( Why?  I don’t really care.) in the media and academia, I would characterize the impulse to ignore the threat of Islam as coming from two sources, one reprehensible, and one laudable, but misguided.

Hitler and Lenin said exactly what they were going to do, but no one listened.  Muhammad, too, is equally plain spoken. 

Chamberlain and his ilk simply couldn’t bear the awful truth.  That was cowardice, plain and simple.

In our day, we are the children of Martin Luther King.  We have been reared to value diversity ( and I’m not making fun here, although I think the word “diversity” has been hijacked and defiled).  It is against our very natures to characterize a group as evil.  But that is what we must do to those who adhere to the literal teachings of Islam.

No matter the puff pieces from the MSM, or outreach from the White House and the State Department(Obama invited members of the brotherhood to his Cairo speech, despite their outlaw status, certainly something they would take as a clear signal as to where he stood on Mubarak, whether he meant it that way or not ) The Brotherhood has not changed its mission, nor has its many front groups.( see CAIR)

It will take over Egypt, and Egypt will become a front line jihad state. There is no chance of any kind of democracy – other than the Iranian variety – ultimately emerging. None.  Nothing can stop this, and we shouldn’t try.  If we acknowledge the threat now we can make rational preparations to counter it.

This is a civilizational crisis, like the earlier ones of the 20th century.  The difference is that with Islam, given its utter didacticism ( Marxism was capable of reinterpretation and mutation), and tendency to war with itself –there will be no Muslim Lenin, Hitler or Stalin, so  it will be far easier to contain, and when contained, will quickly collapse from its contradictions –as all ideologies do, and as do empires based on conquest(see Rome)

The question is, how long do we wait?

Note:   I could provide lots of links to bolster my assertions, but I think it’s better if people look on their own, and base their conclusions on sources they trust.  

Not long after this, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, ex-Muslim atheist writer and former member of the Dutch Parliament who fled Holland for America after continuing  credible death threats from Islamists, wrote in the Wall Street Journal that a rush to elections in Egypt would bring the Brotherhood to power and that it would be better to put a constitution in place first, one that assured the freedoms that many of the revolution’s early supporters were ready to,and in many cases did die for.

Ms Ali did not reference, but surely had in mind the statement a week earlier for the the US Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper,  during a House Intelligence Committee hearing  that Egypt’s branch of the Muslim Brotherhood movement was “a very heterogeneous group, largely secular, which has eschewed violence and has decried  al -Qaeda as a perversion of Islam.”

The Brotherhood has eschewed violence because it has found far more effective ways to work, organizing on the ground through civil society groups, and exploiting the pathetic eagerness of western political, academic and media elites to believe  that it’s all going to turn out well..

“The Muslim Brotherhood (is) not seeking power,” said Mohammed Morsi, a member of the organization’s media office. “We want to participate, not to dominate. We will not have a presidential candidate. (We) want to participate and help; we are not seeking power.”UPI feb9 2011

But, by May…

Islamist Leader Pursues Egypt’s Presidency

CAIRO—A popular reformist leader in Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood said he will run for president, in a move that raises the possibility that Islamist politicians could dominate the country’s presidency and its parliament.

And now he is President of Egypt

These lies or “evolution” did nothing to discourage Arab Spring revelers:

29 November 2011:”MPAC(Muslim Public Affairs Council) announced today it will host two special events tomorrow focusing on the Arab Spring, a Capitol Hill forum on “Islamic Political Movements and the Arab Spring: Committed to Democracy and Pluralism?” and a special dinner with  Rachid Ghannouchi, leader of Tunisia’s Ennahda Party.”

Now, the question in the event description was rhetorical, but I think the answer should now be obvious.

The re-branding of Islamic supremacism never stops. All Islamist parties are now “moderate.”

VOA:November 03, 2011

Islam in Tunisia – Will Ennahda Win Usher in Religious Reform?

I guess this answers that question: September 14, 2011. The blag flag of jihad flies over the US embassy in Tunis.

Tunisians question the Ennahda Party Constituent Assembly win in a country that has been secular for decades. Others say that’s precisely why the Islamists did win. And everyone is getting an education in democracy.

and: Secularists are still scratching their heads: How, exactly, did Islamists perform so well in the election.

Gosh, I dunno, maybe because Muslims voted for them?  Pew Research has been showing high favorables for sharia law in muslim contries, for quiet some time. Stoning adulterers is quite popular.

Islamic reform?  What are we to make of this?  Nice reforms that lead to a better life under Islam?    Or face veils and beheadings?  No doubt the Washington establishment expects the former.

Does anyone remember Mao’s cadres being labelled “agrarian reformers?”  Indeed they were.  So much so that there wasn’t much agriculture to speak of left when they got through with it.  Or Castro the Democrat?

NYT:

Moderate Islamist Party Winning Morocco Election

By SOUAD MEKHENNET and MAÏA de la BAUME

Published: November 26, 2011

quote:“We have a progressive approach to Islam,” Mustafa Ramid, a party leader, said in an interview. “The Islamicization of Morocco will be achieved only by re-establishing justice, and religious freedom.”

Of course, Islam does not allow religious freedom, but in Islamic thought, freedom to submit to Islam is freedom.  Still, nothing to worry about, plenty of diversity in that context, according to experts such as Noah Feldman,(November 29, 2011) “the Harvard law professor who has specialised among other things in Islamic law, pointed out that the Muslim Brotherhood would not have to fight for amendments to write sharia into the Egyptian constitution because it’s already there. “The Egyptian constitution as written is perfectly considtent with the Brotherhood’s ideals. It states that Islam is the source of law and that laws cannot contradict the sharia. It is an Islamist constitution — it’s just not applied in a very Islamist way,” he said. The new Iraqi and Afghan constitutions, both drawn up while U.S. troops were fighting armed Islamists there after invading in the last decade, are also both Islamic constitutions in that way.”

              Now, this guy was really scary.

Feldman said he expected the Muslim Brotherhood to work within the democratic system while promoting a socially conservative agenda in accordance with Muslim values. So there would be more mosque attendance, possibly more Islamically inspired legislation like better welfare for the poor. But he saw this as essentially a cultural shift somewhat akin to the change seen in Washington in 2001 when another party with strong religious links took power.

Mohamed Morsi, Egyptian President and a real sweetheart.

“It’s not very different from when the Bush administration came to Washington,” he said. “The culture was subtly affected by this. There were more people of evangelical and southwestern backgrounds. The president was seen going to church on Sunday and actually meaning it. These cultural differences are related to religion but it’s too simple to reduce them to religion,” he said.

US Embassy Cairo : It’s not the Jolly Roger, folks. Well, in a way, it is.

What an ass.  I don’t recall “theocrat” George W. Bush conducting any blasphemy trials.  Instead, he began the pandering to the Religion of Peace that has simply escalated since then., and reached its apogee this week as the President and his Secretary of State continue to blame  the assaults on American facilities in the Middle East and elsewhere in the Islamic word as reactions to an offensive video. The simple, and obvious question, that what kind of culture would react so violently  to a crude( but not unfounded) criticism, is one they cannot ask themselves, because the answer is so transparently clear that their false construct of an Islamic world that is at heart not so different from ours, will instantly collapse. It is this willful self delusion that led to Benghazi.  Indeed, while it may seem harsh, I suspect that murdered ambassador Stevens was subject to it himself.

Panglosssian Globalist and friend

Rather every time the Islamist rulers of Egypt and the other “liberated” countries ramp up their rhetoric, and action, they are simply re-branded .  Every time thei rstory changes, they new line becomes truth.  Unless its something really unpleasant, like amputating hands, in which case the chattering class ignore it completely. Thus we have the indefatigable globalist Thomas Friedman, schmoozing  with veiled women who assure him their votes for the brotherhood and salafis were “not based on religion.”  Mr Friedman needs to know that his Lexus has run head on into the Olive Tree.  The Lexus is totalled, the tree isn’t going anywhere.  The one world convergence of democratic consumerism isn’t happening; the convergence of Islamic supremacism with the human will to power, is.

Now, the question is, if I – and countless others – could figure this out, why couldn’t Washington?http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2011/02/09/Muslim-Brotherhood-wont-field-candidate/UPI-59081297265941/#ixzz1kI2IarTY

Randy Newman Has No Reason To Live

After all, he’s an old (born 1943) white guy. And these days nobody much gives a shit about white guys, especially if they are old, and don’t work in the Left Coast entertainment industry or are paid up members of the Right Coast chattering classes.. So, in the typical  submissive pose adopted by liberals towards the blinding authenticity of minorities, Mr. Newman has written a song mocking white people.

The song, “I’m Dreaming of a White President” was hailed by NBC Entertaiment :

” Randy Newman has released a swooning, lyrically wicked new cut, “I’m Dreaming,” that finds the songwriter stepping into the shoes of a narrator who’s “dreaming of a white President/ Someone whom we can understand/ Someone who knows where we’re coming from.”

Mr Newman says:

“For me it’s a reaction to the Republican Party, which seems to have drifted farther to the right than a major party has drifted in my lifetime in any direction,” added Newman. “It seems to have become almost a radical party. The hate and . . . I don’t think it’ll last. That kind of thing doesn’t seem to last.”

The Hollywood Reporter and the New Yorker are on board as well, with the latter praising “the heavily ironized refrain:”  “Heavily” is the operative word; leaden, in fact. Liberal wit seems to be based on cliched articles of faith with which they hope to beat their audience into submission.

In the Reporter, Newman says;

“I think there are a lot of people who find it jarring to have a black man in the White House and they want him out,” Newman said in a press release. “They just can’t believe that there’s not a more qualified white man. You won’t get anyone, and I do mean anyone, to admit it.”

What Mr. Newman, and the sorts  who read the Reporter and New Yorker, cannot comprehend is that there are legions who believe there are many more qualified to hold the President’s job, of both genders and any range of colors,

The song writer is  putting over the baseless( and by this time, utterly tedious) but unquestioned trope that anyone opposed to President Obama is a racist, because the President is black. Mocking people for the color of their skin is not of course, hate, when that skin is white.

Newman has written a theme song for what has been an ecstatic festival of white liberals flagellating others for being white and disagreeing with them. He needn’t have made the effort. Simply take his classic “Short People,” which says the little guys have no reason to live, and substitute “white people.”

Geoffrey Dunn  of the Huffington Post described the Tampa GOP Convention as “Snooze Fest–better known as the Gathering of Pasty White People-”  and looked forward in dizzy ancticipation to the opportunity to mock Old White Guy Clint Eastwood, who was once mayor of “the upscale and frighteningly white community of Carmel” (Mr. Dunn lives in Santa Cruz, California, not exactly overrun with brothers, either)

Mr. Eastwood did not disappoint, his Empty Chair routine throwing out red – er, white – meat for Caucasian  paleface haters. Sen Tom Harkin(D) of Iowa said “I got to thinking he is the perfect icon for today’s Republican tea party: an old angry white man spewing incoherent nonsense.”

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews is a dependable source of incoherent nonsense. He describes the GOP message as “a relentless dog whistle” that “treats black voters with disdain and treats white people like well, well-trained canines.” Those opposed to this racist assault should be “be on the alert for the tribal messages, the war drums of racial division” says Mr. Matthews.

Now that reminds me of those old movies where the planter says “The natives are restless tonight,”  a little bit racist, dontcha think?  In any case, Matthews is allowed to say such things without accusations of dog whistling because he’s a white guy who doesn’t like white guys

Joan Walsh of Salon has a nifty little cash cow gonig with her hate on white guys.  During the primaries she described Republican Newt Gingrich as the “Face Of ‘Resentment, Racism And Angry White Male Rage’ and can be found all over the net talking about aggrieved whites and hawking her new book “What’s the Matter with White People: Why We Long for a Golden Age That Never Was” ( I’m not giving this bitch a link to Amazon!)

You get the picture.  Examples of this phnomenon are endless.  I’m not about to go into a Stormfront( no link for them, either) style rant on race traitors.  It’s far simpler than that: These people want to hang ot with the cool kids, and they are not old and white. President Obama is the sine qua non of cool kids these days.

Whites are white; they cannot be non white, but they can apologize for their whiteness and thus hope to earn their way into the charmed inner circle. It’s amusing, at first glance, but deeply disquieting given some thought. Barack Obama was to be the post racial president, and has instead brought race back to the forefront, as a place marker and bargaining chip. Early in the campaign season, I wrote with of tentative optimism about race relations in America, specifically between blacks and whites.  My sanguinity was unfounded. Mr Obama has given us no hope that race can ever be overcome, and has opted against change, instead cleaving to divisive interest group politics, well beyond the simple black-white divide, a 21st century high tech social networked Tammany Hall, with a society fractured along uncounted fault lines of self interest defined by grievance. .

Race politics are here to stay.  There are too many people, with too much invested, for them to vanish.

In fact, racial analysis of society is a growth industry in academia, with courses and departments devoted to exposing “white privilege,” even as America becomes more and more mutiracial. This invidious subversion creates an endless feedback loop as participants embrace their roles of victim and penitent former oppressor.

And it spreads far beyond campuses and think tanks, informing the world views of ordinary people. Recently, I had a Twitter encounter with a young Latina.  She wrote that “White” equalled wealth and privelege.  A few more tweets and she conceded that white did not necessarily equal wealth, but that privilege was given. She had to admit that all white people were not rich,  as her partner was one, as was the father of her child.

This nastiness, wherein  race hustlers push their ideologies, can then divide families.

I know, because this is true for me. One daughter studies public administration and writes her thesis on racial profiling.  She looks mixed – if you now that she is. Yet she has thrown her lot with those who would divide us, and is canny enough to see potential gain in her position.

The other daughter, while pale, does not at all look Caucasian.  She told me not long ago that in a mandatory “diversity training” session, the trainer singled her out, and said “This looks like someone who may have been treated differently bcause she looks different.”

My daughter replied, “Not until now,” and flipped her off when she turned back to the white board.

She is angry about all this and so am I.  First there was sadness, but in the end anger is just. I never enslaved, nor discriminated, nor disparaged anyone because of race.  And this is what I get for my good will. This poison is spread for political and career gain, and those who do so do not think of the social and psychic wreckage they create.

I’m old.

I’m angry.

I’m white.

To paraphrase the great Ring Lardner,

“Fuck you,” he explained.

A Short Message to Followers of the Prophet from Arabia

So you are offended?

We don’t care.

Here’s the deal: Despite hand wringing by both left leaners who think we should be nice to offended Muslims, and right wingers who think we should “do something,” most Americans simply don’t care. Nor should they. We will go about our lives, enjoying our freedoms, and a standard of living that although falling somewhat, is still astronomically more advanced than you poor benighted souls rioting in your pestilential and barely standing nations could even imagine, let alone ever achieve. Baseball season is coming to an end. Fall is in the air, and football starts soon. To hell with you. We don’t care.

President Obama No Longer Promising Change, but Asking for Yours

President Obama’s reelection campaign is nothing if not consistently innovative in seeking ways to scoop up the scattered caches of spare cash remaining in his bankrupt country.  First there was the Dinner with Barack lottery, then the Obama Event Registry, and the First Lady’s suggestion that Americans give up pizza nights in support of the POTUS.

Here’s an empty chair for you to set out in your driveway when you give your Yard Sale for Obama

Now we have Yard Sale for Obama.

The Campaign is asking supporters to organize yard sales and donate the proceeds to the President’s reelection effort.

What’s next, national look under the sofa cushions for spare change for Obama day?

Many of the President’s opponents have criticized his disregard for the law as in his executive order allowing children of illegal aliens to apply for scholarships and work.

In the case of the presidential yard sale, the Chief Executive may be violating his administration’s rules. The Federal Government’s recent Resale Round Up initiative is aimed at the resale of dangerous toys.  This may sound like a good idea, but not only shady operators, but everyday Americans selling things they may not know have been recalled are subject to penalty.

As a Mcclatchy News story comments:

“Those who resell recalled children’s products are not only breaking the law, they are putting children’s lives at risk,” said Inez Tenenbaum, the recently confirmed chairwoman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The crackdown affects sellers ranging from major thrift-store operators such as Goodwill and the Salvation Army to everyday Americans cleaning out their attics for yard sales, church bazaars or — increasingly — digital hawking on eBay, Craigslist and other Web sites.

Secondhand sellers now must keep abreast of recalls for thousands of products, some of them stretching back more than a decade, to stay within the bounds of the law.

In this instance, the Consumer Product Safety Commission seems determined to protect us from ourselves.  One wonders where “Reuse and Recycle” fits in all this.  Online resale is a boon to anyone wishing to make or save a few bucks, and these days there are more and more Americans in that category.  With eBay, Amazon and other sites, garage sales have gone national, if not global, creating millions of part time merchandisers.

We’ve all seen the stories of authorities busting some kid’s lemonade stand.  Can we now expect to see Feds busting yard sales?.  Perhaps DHS could get in on this, as they have already shown their animus for informal commerce in Baltimore their flea market bust  earlier this year.

What is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the gander.  The preening gander in the White House is now asking the geese who flock in his wake to pluck themselves.

.

The Increasing Reach of Sharia Law

Does anyone remember Ahmad Kashgari, the young Saudi journalist and  blogger, returned by Malaysia to Saudi Arabia, after a red notice issued by Interpol at the Kingdom’s request?  Mr. Kashgari had expressed some mild doubts, and not disbelief in, as to the character of Islam’s prophet, Mohammed. Thousands called for his death.  He has recanted, but is still imprisoned. Even if released, it is unlikely that he will ever know freedom, and will live out his life in that desert prison nation.

The greater scandal was that Interpol, headed by an American, headquartered in Lyon, France,cooperated in a depriving a man of his freedom for violation of ancient religious law.  Now it appears that Interpol may be at it again, this time with the cooperation of Sweden, a country that touts itself as a bastion of tolerance and liberal values, but which has abased itself to multiculturalism, opened its borders, and subjected its people to assaults on their persons, as well as their  ancient values and freedoms.

As reported  2 September 2012, in the English language Saudi Gazette:

Efforts on to bring back ‘Al-Khobar girl’ from Sweden

AL-KHOBAR — The Al-Khobar girl who fled the Kingdom after allegedly converting to Christianity will be brought home from Sweden in a matter of few days, Al-Yaum newspaper reported Saturday quoting informed sources.

The(sic) Interpol is coordinating with the Saudi Embassy in Stockholm and Swedish authorities to return the girl to her homeland before her “kidnappers” move her to another country, the sources said.

This story started showing up a few days ago on conservative, Christian, and anti-jihad sites.  “Al Khobar girl” is a telling trm, aimed at leading readers to think we are dealing with a minor whose parents have her best interests at heart.  No age is given, and this is significant: in Islam, women are not considered autonomous indivuals, and never achieve majority, remaining children, and chattels, throughout their lives.

It is intereting that the Gazette gave both “Al Khobar Girl, in the headline, and “kidnappers” in the body, quotation marks, which, given the climate in the Kingdom, is a subtle but still gutsy note of skepticism.

That skepticism is warranted is demonstrated by this statement:

Sources said it is highly likely that a global human trafficking network was involved in the kidnapping of the girl, who was persuaded by her Lebanese manager to embrace Christianity and leave the country without the knowledge of her family.

Human Trafficking?  Really?  Have the pervs become so jaded that they are no longer satisfied with Russians, Romanian, Kazakh, Moldavan, and Mainland Cinese women – all of which operate here in Indonesia, where I live, especially in Jakarta’s Chinatown, where these working girls pull down a grand a night or more – that traffickers are looking for novelty in Saudi Arabian hookers?

I doubt it.

That the young woman embraced Christianity, fled and is now being sought by the Saudi and Swedish authorities, facilitated by Interpol, I’ll take as true, until any of these deny it.  Whether Western media decide to pursue this story remains to be seen, but I’m certainly not expecting women’s rights organization to take up the Saudi “girl’s” defense.

In the United states, those who warn about the influenced of Sharia law are routinely derided as bigots and nuts.  Lost  in the politically correct white noise is that the anti- shariah movement does  not posit that the the Supreme court will one day be staffed with bearded, turbaned kadis, but that U.S. case law might be decided with reference to the shariah, and without regard to basic constitutional principles.  In fact, this has already happened. The anti Islamic law movement has morphed into a ant iforeign law movement, which is gaining momentum despite denigration by media and government voices.

Those, generally on the left, who deride these efforts as at worse “islamophobic bigotry,” and at best frivolous, should reflect on Mr. Kashgari, who was returned from Malaysia en route to New Zealand, in response to Interpol’s red notice, to Saudi Arabia, were the penalty for his offece is ofcially, death, as it is for that of the “al-Khobar girl.”

Malaysia is an Islamic country but now we may have Western  authorities colluding to return a Muslim to face punishment for something that is not an offense in any Western legal tradition.

How long before a Westerner suffers rendition for an offense to Islam?

Never happen?

Really?