President Bush has been seduced by the dark side of the Force.

That’s the only explanation I can think of.

He will speak tomorrow at the Washington Islamic Center, the most prominent Saudi-funded mosque in Washington DC. Not to mince words, it’s a Wahhabist mosque.

The speech is at 11:30 AM, so time is short.

Dymphna posted on this topic earlier this afternoon, in an open letter to the President.

Bloggers: we need to blog on this, and have our readers light up the phones at the White House tonight and tomorrow.

Readers: see the contact info at the bottom of this post. The important phone numbers are 202-456-1414 (voice) and 202-456-2461 (fax).

The Administration claims to want to shut down terrorist groups. The groups represented at the President’s speech include CAIR, MPAC, ISNA, etc., which are known cover groups and fronts for the architects and funding sources of the Muslim Brotherhood and related Islamic terror groups. The President must state his firm commitment to shutting down these terror groups.

The President must make the point that Islam as it is practiced by many of these groups is not a religion, but a political ideology which seeks to dominate the rest of us by force.

The groups invited to and/or sponsoring this event must disavow Hamas, Hizbullah, etc. specifically and by name and not just utter generalized mealy-mouthed condemnations of “all kinds of terrorism”. Those who will not join in such a denunciation are de facto apologists and supporters of the jihad groups.

The leaders of these groups have not addressed the criminal and immoral attacks on civilians by Islamic suicide bombers and terrorists. This must change. They must publicly and clearly denounce these attacks as unacceptable and un-Islamic.

Any effort to implement the above changes is routinely denounced as “racism” and “Islamophobia”. The President must make clear that opposing political Islam is not any of these things; it is an honorable, patriotic, and morally justified enterprise in defense of human liberty.
– – – – – – – – – –
These groups must be compelled to acknowledge that extremist and violent Islam is a real, widespread, and serious problem, and not just a figment of the “infidel” imagination. They must be seen publicly to join in the movement to denounce and resist it.

The Islamic groups which encourage their followers not to cooperate with the police, the FBI, and other law-enforcement agencies are not just being unhelpful, they are breaking the law.

The groups involved in this event have routinely denounced the “Zionist lobby”. It should be stated explicitly that this is an unacceptable attack on the pluralism of American society.

The focus on Israel as the putative cause of all Islamic violence must stop.

We call on President Bush to state publicly and forcefully that the Muslim Brotherhood, which is behind many of these “charities” and lobbying groups, is a dangerous, violent, and subversive entity which threatens the security of the United States and the entire Western world. It must be delegitimized and put beyond the pale of acceptable social action.

Contact info:

George W. Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. N.W.
Washington D.C. 20500

voice: 202-456-1414
fax: 202-456-2461
e-mail: president@whitehouse.gov

Dymphna
Gates of Vienna
Foothills of the Blue Ridge, VA
June 26, 2007

President George W. Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

[Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461]

Dear Mr. President:

I write to you with great sadness, the kind of despair that descends on one after hopes have been dashed many times, after repeated betrayals by a leader who said what I wanted to hear, but whose actions have not lived up to his words.

You have a chance to redeem yourself with the many millions who voted for you. At 11:30 a.m., when you speak tomorrow at the Washington Islamic Center, you could put all of our hearts at ease if you change the direction and tenor of your communications to Muslims in this country.

Sir, you must stand up for our pluralist values. You must ask the Muslims you address tomorrow to disavow the Islamists who were responsible for September 11th. You must forcefully tell them to rein in their children in this country, twenty-five per cent of whom think suicide bombing attacks are a justifiable and honorable way to deal with the enemy.

You must name the enemy out loud to the Muslims you will be addressing. You must specifically condemn Hamas and Hezbollah by name. It is not sufficient or honorable for you, as the sitting President, to vaguely refer to “terrorists.” It is imperative that you say it: Islam as it is practiced by many of these groups is not a religion, but a political ideology which seeks to dominate the rest of us by force.

You must tell these Muslims – at least the ones who are American citizens – that it is wrong to refer to Israel or to American Jews as the “Zionist lobby.” You know very well there is a vocal Muslim lobby in this country. You must address them directly: if they do not refrain from anti-Semitic remarks, then you, as a Texan, will speak forthrightly about the powerful, well-funded Islamist lobby, led by the Muslim Brotherhood and its followers and fellow-travelers.

You must tell those in the audience at the Islamic Center – funded by the Wahhabist Saudis – that they are obliged to begin demonstrating American-style moderation, that they must cease their demands for special privilege and their claims that jihadism does not exist. You know their claims are lies, Mr. President, and you must tell them you know it. Otherwise you are merely another politician whose soul has a price – and you will be thusly judged by your fellow Americans and by history.

It is your job to give direction and leadership to all of us, including the Muslims who live here. Tomorrow you have a shining opportunity; I beg you not to tarnish it with weasel words and untruths. Your people have had all they can take, sir, and they need you.

You have sent men into battle to fight the enemies of America. Do not betray your soldiers by refusing to speak up in their behalf in front of this group. Their lives are in your hands; if you let them slip through your fingers for God-knows-what political reasons, then their blood is on you. After tomorrow, if you do not speak up, fewer parents will want to meet with you. What comfort could you offer them? Your tears are not enough.

Please prayerfully consider what you will say tomorrow at the Islamic Center. We will all be listening. We will all be waiting to hear you uphold the oath of office you took – twice – to protect us.

May God have mercy on all of us, but particularly on you. You asked for this job, you fought hard for it. Now go out tomorrow and perform it.

This is your last chance to regain my loyalty, and I am sure that is true for many others who voted for you. If you do not stand up for the liberty you were so willing to name, then we are lost to you and can only wait in silence for you to leave.

I await your speech.

Sincerely, your fellow citizen,

Dymphna

[ends here]

The British author Paul Weston has sent us the latest in his series of essays on modern Multicultural life in the UK.

Warning: This article includes graphic details of violent criminal acts. Sensitive readers may want to skip it.

The Big Story That Isn’t
by Paul Weston

One of the biggest stories in recent times is due shortly to hit the British media. This follows the unprecedented decision of Mohammad Sarwar, Labour MP for Glasgow Govan since 1997, to stand down before the next elections, following threats upon both his and his children’s lives.

The press are in frenzy because there are so many aspects to this story deemed irresistible to the media-driven modern Britain in which we are so fortunate to live today. Mr. Sarwar has the dubious honour of being both Britain’s first Muslim MP, and Britain’s first MP to be driven from office upon threat of death.

When he was elected, to a fanfare of media coverage, Mr. Sarwar managed yet another first; he refused to swear allegiance to the Queen, preferring instead the ancient British tradition of swearing his oath upon the Koran — the copy of which, incidentally, was placed inside an envelope lest it “be touched by one not of the faith.” This, unsurprisingly, drew the ire of the racist Right and Mr. Sarwar was subsequently threatened by an assortment of organisations, including Combat 18 and the National Front.

This of course is manna from heaven for the British media. The BBC have led the way, camping outside Mr. Sarwar’s constituency home, interviewing local Pakistanis who feel “threatened and uncomfortable” and conducting an undercover infiltration of the BNP in order to track down the perpetrators behind the violent threats that have forced a standing British MP to go into hiding for the first time in our modern history.

If you possess a powerful telescope, and train it carefully upon Glasgow, you may well be able to view the events unfolding. Be sure though, to point it at Glasgow, Planet Fantasy, Milky Way 1. If you do not, you will see very little, because this story exists only in the Britain of a parallel universe. Back here on planet reality it is a non-story, indeed almost a non-event. A by-line here, a by-line there, but virtually unreported on television news stations.

The reason for this media blackout is very simple. It is not the National Front, Combat 18 or the BNP who have issued the recent death threats, it is local Muslims themselves, incensed by what they see as his treacherous behaviour in relation to the murder of Kriss Donald, a white Glaswegian, in 2004.

Those of you familiar with the case, or those of a sensitive disposition, need not read the next paragraph. I note the details only because they have a relevance which I will come to later.

Kriss Donald, a slightly built, 15-year-old schoolboy was abducted from the streets of Pollockshields, Glasgow, on March 14, 2004. His kidnappers were five British Muslims of Pakistani descent, intent on exacting retribution on a white male — any white male would do — following a fight in a night club the previous weekend. Kriss was driven around for several hours whilst he was held down and tortured in the back of the car. He was eventually taken to an area of waste ground where he was finished off. Before he died, it is alleged that he was castrated, burned with cigarettes; his eyes were gouged out and he was stabbed repeatedly. Once on the waste ground he was doused with gasoline and set alight whilst still alive. He crawled a few metres and then, mercifully, died. A walker who discovered his body the following morning was unaware that it was even human, remarking, that at first, he thought it was the carcass of an animal.
– – – – – – – – – –
Two men were subsequently arrested, but the other three, aware the police knew their identities, fled to Pakistan. The Foreign Office at that time was involved in delicate negotiations with Pakistan over the extradition rights concerning full-blown terrorists, so an unimportant little murder such as Kriss Donald’s was simply a fly in the ointment they did not need. As a result, they did their best to frustrate attempts by the British police to retrieve their suspects.

Enter Mr. Mohammad Sarwar, a man with a clearer sense of right and wrong, and a political position with which to do something about it. Mr. Sarwar was instrumental in forcing the British government to press ahead with the extradition of the three men, and thus, in the eyes of some British Muslims, committed a crime of such magnitude that only his death could adequately compensate for his treachery.

I apologise for detailing the gory details of Kriss Donald’s torture and murder, but its relevance is shown in the following quotes from Mr. Sarwar, printed in the Daily Telegraph:

“Life is not the same since I brought them back… I received threats to my life, to murder my sons, to murder my grandchildren…I was told they wanted to punish my family and make a horrible example of my son… they would do to him what they did to Kriss Donald.”

There were other firsts in the story that should have interested the media. Daamish Zahid, one of the five killers, was the first person in Scotland to be convicted of racially motivated murder, whilst the sheer brutality of the murder itself was unprecedented in Britain. (An issue all too predictably rectified a year later by six black British men who gang raped, tortured and murdered Mary Ann Leneghan.)

But I digress.

To recap, Britain’s first Muslim MP is also Britain’s first ever politician to stand down in the face of death threats; threats uttered by followers of the Religion of Peace who sympathise with the Islamic savages involved in the most horrific racial murder in Britain’s recent history, one of whom, to boot, was also the first “Scotsman” to be convicted of racially aggravated murder.

Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but surely there’s a story in there somewhere? I know it is now a tired old cliché, but imagine if Mr. Paul Boateng, Britain’s first black MP, had been driven from office by a bunch of white, right wing Christian fundamentalists, enraged that he had succeeded in bringing the white killers of the black Stephen Lawrence to justice?

A foolish hypothesis, I admit. One could discard the telescope, whilst an investment in blinkers and earmuffs would be necessary to avoid the media hysteria. We are used to the double standards utilised by the media with regard to racial murder, but this time it is different. This is not any old murder, not any old death threats, and Mr. Sarwar is not any old person.

When Britain, a First World country, loses a democratically-elected politician because he fears for his life, we are entering a wholly new era. Britain is now an Iraq, a Zimbabwe.

We are becoming, in political terms, a genuine Third World country, and our BBC-led media, showing a total disregard for impartiality, has veered from mere bias to dangerous censorship, with all the disturbing implications this portends for our democratic future.

Many political commentators believe that Britain is dead, Lawrence Auster in particular, but Mr. Auster also thinks it can be resurrected. If this is to happen it must happen soon.

Our national heart has ceased to beat. Our national soul is hovering indecisively above the operating table. The crash team have been called, but the politically inclined hospital switchboard have told them there is no problem, that everything is under control.

The life support boys have heard otherwise, they are hurrying to get there, but other hospital staff members have switched the signage to the operating theatre and killed the lights. It is a big hospital, they only have minutes to get there, they are lost, confused, misinformed, and the clock is relentlessly ticking, and ticking, and ticking…

©2007 Paul Weston

A commenter, Steve, left a message on a previous post about the North American Union project, which has been shuffling along under the table during the last three administrations. Steve is right to be concerned, considering that he lives at the hub — the Kansas City Smart Port:

Steve said…

I live in Kansas City, and they want to put a point of entry here and make it sovereign territory of Mexico. There would be no inspections of cargo until it got here.

That’s going over real well here, and of course it’s being denied.

Would you like a nuke with your Nikes?

Who the bleep are these cretins? Let’s make the world a nicer, happier place by pi**ing off our citizens. Perhaps people need to reread the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, particularly the Bill of Rights, paying attention to the first couple of amendments.

Unfortunately, those founding documents are honored more in the breach by those in power. Bush would be booed off the stage now were he to attempt to deliver a speech on individuals and liberty. On several fronts he’s busy selling our sovereignty.

Last year, World Net Daily looked at the problems with KC and its Smart Port, including the movers and shakers, not to mention the pushers of this project, already well underway. Back then, Jerome Corsi noted an interesting development:

A Mexican customs facility planned for Kansas City’s inland port may have to be considered the sovereign soil of Mexico as part of an effort to lure officials in that country into cooperating with the Missouri development project.

Despite adamant denials by Kansas City Area Development Council officials, WND has obtained e-mails and other documents from top executives with the KCSmartPort project that suggest such a facility would by necessity be considered Mexican territory – despite its presence in the heartland of the U.S.

[…]

The documents reveal a two-year campaign initiated in 2004 and managed by top SmartPort officials to win Mexico’s agreement to establish the Mexican customs facility within the Kansas City “inland port.” Kansas City SmartPort launched a concerted effort to advance the idea, holding numerous meetings with Mexican government officials in Mexico and in Washington to push the Mexican port idea in concert. The effort involved Missouri elected officials, including members of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.

Corsi drew on emails and statements by those involved in the SmartPort development that the news was to be kept from the public:

[They were] obviously concerned that press scrutiny might end up producing an adverse public reaction that could destroy the project. Gutierrez specifically proposes a low-profile strategy designed to keep the KC SmartPort and the Mexican customs facility out of public view.

“The one negative that was conveyed to us was the problems and pressure the media attention has created for both sides,” he wrote. “They want us to stop promoting the facility to the press. We let them know that we have never issued a proactive press release on this and that the media attention started when Commissioner (Robert) Bonner was in KC and met with Rick Alm. The official direction moving forward is that we can respond to the media with a standard response that I will send out on Monday and refer all other inquiries to U.S. Customs. I will get the name from them to refer media calls.”

That was 2006. Now comes the latest below-the-radar meeting, again reported by World Net Daily. It was held in Canada last week, with only one press person permitted in. Those attending were a Who’s Who of Political Elites:
– – – – – – – – – –

…”confirmed” participants including Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of State George Shultz, former Central Intelligence Agency Director R. James Woolsey, former Immigration and Naturalization Services Director Doris Meissner, North American Union guru Robert Pastor, former Defense Secretary William Perry, former Energy Secretary and Defense Secretary James Schlesinger and top officials of both Mexico and Canada, there has been no press coverage of the event. The only media member scheduled to appear at the event, according to documents obtained by WND, was the Wall Street Journal’s Mary Anastasia O’Grady.

[…]

The Canadian event is just the latest of a series of meetings, policy papers and directives that have citizens, officials and members of the media wondering whether these efforts represent some sort of coordinated effort to implement a “merger” some have characterized as “NAFTA on steroids.”

Nevertheless, opposition is mounting. And it’s not just coming from the tinfoil hat brigade.

Perhaps the most blistering criticism came earlier this summer from Lou Dobbs of CNN – a frequent critic of President Bush’s immigration policies.

“A regional prosperity and security program?” he asked rhetorically in a recent cablecast. “This is absolute ignorance. And the fact that we are – we reported this, we should point out, when it was signed. But, as we watch this thing progress, these working groups are continuing. They’re intensifying. What in the world are these people thinking about? You know, I was asked the other day about whether or not I really thought the American people had the stomach to stand up and stop this nonsense, this direction from a group of elites, an absolute contravention of our law, of our Constitution, every national value. And I hope, I pray that I’m right when I said yes. But this is – I mean, this is beyond belief.”

What has Dobbs and a few other vocal critics bugged began in earnest March 31, 2005, when the elected leaders of the U.S., Mexico and Canada agreed to advance the agenda of the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America.

No one seems quite certain what that agenda is because of the vagueness of the official declarations. But among the things the leaders of the three countries agreed to work toward were borders that would allow for easier and faster moving of goods and people between the countries.

Coming as the announcement did in the midst of a raging national debate in the U.S. over borders seen as far to open already, more than a few jaws dropped.

Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo. and the chairman of the House Immigration Reform Caucus as well as author of the new book, “In Mortal Danger,” may be the only elected official to challenge openly the plans for the new superstate.

Responding to a WorldNetDaily report, Tancredo is demanding the Bush administration fully disclose the activities of the government office implementing the trilateral agreement that has no authorization from Congress.

Tancredo wants to know the membership of the Security and Prosperity Partnership groups along with their various trilateral memoranda of understanding and other agreements reached with counterparts in Mexico and Canada.

And the same inane excuses for secrecy still apply today:

Geri Word, who heads the SPP office, told WND the work had not been disclosed because, “We did not want to get the contact people of the working groups distracted by calls from the public.”

World Net Daily has been digging, but it can’t find any congressional oversight on this potential monster:

WND can find no specific congressional legislation authorizing the SPP working groups nor any congressional committees taking charge of oversight.

Many SPP working groups appear to be working toward achieving specific objectives as defined by a May 2005 Council on Foreign Relations task force report, which presented a blueprint for expanding the SPP agreement into a North American union that would merge the U.S., Canada and Mexico into a new governmental form.

World Net Daily says the SPP began in earnest in 2005, but this thing has been in the works since NAFTA was signed by Bush I in 1992. President Clinton made its passage a priority in 1993. And Bush II has continued in his his daddy’s footsteps, pushing this new world order.

The New World belongs not to your children or their liberty but to the Transnationalist Capitalists. It is being pushed through by people who have everything to gain and nothing to lose.

Guess who gets the short end of the stick?

You can dig forever on this thing, but scroll to the bottom of this World Net Daily page to see the yeoman’s job they have done on gathering the materials about this monstrously large attempt to eradicate the sovereignty of three nations. Mexico stands to gain much, but fortunately, Canada is prosperous enough and dislikes us sufficiently that we may become bedfellows of necessity in this fight to retain our borders.

And whoever runs for President from the Republican side had better listen to Tom Tancredo. He appears to be the only one paying attention.

As if taking aim at Mohammed weren’t bad enough, the Danes had the nerve to defame the Great Ever-Living God of Gonzo Rock and Roll, Mr. Mojo Risin himself, the late great Jim Morrison.

That’s according to a report from our Swedish correspondent LN, who sent this brief note today:

Good taste in Sweden: the performance artist Itziar Okariz of NY urinating in front of a paying public at the Opera of Norrland in Umeå some two months ago, remuneration SEK 10,000 ($1,450 US).

[LN included a photo of the artist at work here, which regretfully had to be excluded. — BB]

Bad taste according to the Swedish blogger Gudmundson: burning a Mohammed straw puppet in Denmark.

Gudmundon is a normally respected and oft-cited Swedish blogger…

His headline: Profeten och Jim Morrison skändade i Danmark (“The Prophet and Jim Morrison desecrated in Denmark”)

“…but that rather is very near to some kind of inflammatory crime taking into consideration their slogan about a Denmark free from Muslims.

“…The video is accompanied by the worst version of The Doors classic “Light My Fire” that I have ever heard. Without any doubt there will be consequences.This is not the first time the Danes have challenged good taste. [emphasis added]

The rest of LN’s message was a lengthy quote in Swedish from Mr. Gundmundson’s blog. My Swedish is even worse than my Danish, so a full translation will have to left to others.

[Nothing further.]

…Islamic entrepreneurs have found the solution.

Thanks to Darrin Hodges for information about this useful product:

[Nothing further.]

Think the EU is pee-yew? How does the NAU grab you?

Complain about the dollar? Would you prefer the amero instead?

Are sovereign boundaries old hat? How about an express train system that runs from a port in Mexico straight through into Canada? [and don’t ask how much eminent domain robbery is going to be involved in this one]

Read the Security and Prosperity Partnership’s fact sheet before you make up your mind.

See Condi Rice meeting with the other transnationalists at the table. Is this what is known as “the things we do for love?” Few of her fellow citizens asked for this, but she travels in elitist circles and they want it for sure. There is money – trillions – to be made here and the Secretary of State is a loyal type. She dances with the one who brung her.

Don’t these “public servants” – unelected, without referenda from their citizens – have a heinous nerve doing this to the citizens of their three countries without so much as a by-your-leave?

Look at the following list provided by your friendly rich uncle. Never mind that some of the links don’t appear to work. They don’t have to; they’re government links:
– – – – – – – – – –

SPP Documents and Useful Links
Security and Prosperity Partnership Of North America

• U.S. Department of State Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs
• U.S. Department of Transportation SPP Page
• U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration Binational Planning Page
• Office of the United States Trade Representative: Monitoring and Enforcement
• U.S. Food and Drug Administration International Arrangements Page
• Framework of Common Principles for Electronic Commerce
• U.S.-Mexico Air Transport Agreement
• U.S.-Canada Memorandum of Understanding on Linking Critical Disease Surveillance Systems (PulseNet)
• U.S.-Canada Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation Related to The Safety of Consumer Products
• US-Mexico Memorandum of Understanding on Mutual Assistance in Consumer Protection Safety Matters
• U.S.-Canada Memorandum of Understanding on Pipeline Safety
• North American Energy Working Group (NAEWG)
• United States Environmental Protection Agency and Environment Canada Joint Great Lakes Programs page
• Government of Canada SPP Page
• Mexico Office of the Presidency SPP Page
• North American Natural Gas Vision
• Oil Sands Workshop SPP Report
• North American Steel Strategy
• North American Competitiveness Council (U.S. Site)

Watch your taxes rise. Watch you freedoms decrease.

Kiss your sovereignty good-bye.

UPDATE: YouTube has removed the Mohammed-burning video, but it has now been posted at Google Video. The embed below now references the new location; let’s hope it works.

If it doesn’t, click here.

I mentioned on Saturday that a group in Denmark was planning to burn an effigy of Mohammed (instead of a witch) at the traditional midsummer festival.

Since then the group that burned the Prophet has contacted SIAD, who kindly uploaded the video for us.

The Danes made quite a production of the bonfire — the soundtrack has “Light My Fire” on it…

The intro is in Danish, and it goes by too fast for me to translate easily. Maybe some of our Danish readers can give us the gist of it.

But the last thing you see before the action rolls is this:

For a Mohammedan-free Denmark!

Hold on to your helmets, Vikings. You’re in for a wild ride…

Update: CVF operative flyboy has translated the Danish text for us:

We declare:

Saint Hans’ Eve has always celebrated the tradition of burning away the evil, in earlier times symbolized by the witch, who was supposedly directly connected to Satan. And if the witch was not burned then the harvest could not be safely brought into the house.

Now a new evil has arrived in Europe, an evil that lies and kills in the name of their so-called God. An evil that springs from the so-called Prophet Mohammed. Therefore, in our time, it is he who symbolizes evil and it is not just one harvest that will disappear, but all of Western Europe’s future that will vanish if this evil is not dispatched to Hekkenfeldt [i.e. Hell, literally the Hekla volcano in Iceland — BB].

Therefore will we burn the so-called Prophet Mohammed, on June 23, 2007, in three nameless places.

We burned Mohammed in three different places across the country. We now release the video from the first burning. The next videos will be released on July 23 and August 23.

For a Mohammed-free Denmark!!!

[Nothing further.]

I reported on Saturday that a group in Denmark was planning to burn an effigy of Mohammed — instead of a witch — at the traditional midsummer festival.

I have just heard from a reliable source in Denmark that the burning did indeed occur, and that he (and the Danish media) are awaiting the video of the event with great anticipation.

As soon as someone sends me photos and/or a video link, I will post them here.

[Nothing further.]

The latest word on the Danica White, via al-Reuters:

A Danish cargo ship hijacked by Somali pirates earlier this month has run out of food and fresh water at sea, a Kenyan maritime official said on Monday.

The MV Danica White and its five Danish crew members were carrying building materials from Dubai to Kenya when it was seized off Somalia in the world’s most dangerous waterway.

“The news we are getting is that food has run out in that ship and there is no water,” said Andrew Mwangura, director of the Mombasa-based East African Seafarers Assistance Programme.

The vessel’s generator had apparently broken down, Mwangura told Reuters, so its water purification equipment also failed.

Now Reuters puts forth what has become the standard MSM refrain about Somalia since Ethiopia and the United States collaborated to push out the Islamists last winter:
– – – – – – – – – –

Such attacks have increased since a Somali Islamist movement that brought a semblance of order for six months was ousted in January.

“A semblance of order”, eh?

Just a reminder: the “semblance of order” involved the amputation of limbs, the banning of music, the mandatory wearing of the hijab for women, and the use of twelve-year-old boys as executioners to slit the throats of blasphemers and apostates.

That’s what Reuters considers “order”.

Mussolini may have been a bit of a bully, but, hey — he made the trains run on time.

When King John’s rebellious barons forced him to sign the Magna Carta in 1215, it wasn’t an act of noble altruism on their part. They were responding shrewdly and decisively to an encroachment on their interests, and strove to hobble the king in order to secure their own privileged positions.

The barons had no idea that by acting in their self-interest they were laying the basis for the rule of law and the modern constitutional republic. The English parliament, jury trials, and the Common Law gradually evolved out of the various forms of the Magna Carta hammered out in the 13th century.

The English barons did not see themselves as acting in a revolutionary fashion, but rather as reclaiming their ancient liberties. Previous compacts had confirmed their time-hallowed privileges, and the Magna Carta was a quintessentially conservative initiative: an attempt to codify and re-establish what tradition had always mandated.

As another unintended consequence, in the process of limiting the king, the Magna Carta also limited the power of the elected legislators of the future: it was cited in the 17th century as a bulwark against the tyranny of Parliament.

This, after all, the nature of the rule of law: it limits the power of the king and the legislature, of the ruler and the people’s elected representatives. A political structure bound by law seeks to deter tyranny in all its forms.

And now, nearly eight hundred years later, the British government is on the verge of overthrowing the heritage of the Magna Carta, and is ready to surrender the ancient liberties of the Queen’s subjects — and the sovereignty of the country itself — to an unelected and tyrannical entity known as the European Union.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

When they created the European Constitution, the mandarins in charge of the EU counted on the mind-numbing length of the document, the indifference and inattention of the populace, and the compliant media to aid their efforts. A few soothing words spoken into the microphones, a little grease on the parliamentary skids, and the founding document of the new European superstate was expected to slip right on through.

But it didn’t work out that way. When the Dutch and the French voted “no!” in their respective referenda, the EU bureaucrats were aghast. How dare they? The nerve of it — an unwashed rabble, the hoi polloi, going against the judgment of their betters!

The mandarins in Brussels were determined to get their way, regardless of the will of the people. The constitution was to be implemented by hook or crook. But Tony Blair, acting the part of a doughty British bulldog, declared that British voters would be allowed to vote on the EU Constitution before Britain would adhere to it.

Unfortuantely, a slightly revised EU Constitution has morphed into a new “treaty”, thereby removing the obligation from Tony Blair to keep his promise. In his waning days as Prime Minister and the leader of the Labour Party, Mr. Blair has weaseled out. There will be no British objection to the “treaty”, and Old Blighty will go gentle into that good night.

There was a rumor that Mr. Blair’s successor, the Hon. Gordon Brown, would go against his predecessor’s intentions and call for a referendum. But it is not to be:

Gordon Brown last night attempted to rule out a referendum on the new European Union treaty, despite warnings that it will give sweeping extra powers to Brussels and pave the way for a superstate.

As details of the deal agreed early yesterday filtered out, experts claimed that the treaty marked the return of the EU Constitution in all but name.

Brussels has won extra powers in more than 40 areas, including foreign affairs, defence and immigration.

The new arrangement sports a fig leaf that supposedly allows Britain to opt out of some of the foreign policy provisions in the treaty, but we all know that when the time comes, what little backbone remains in Britain’s leaders will have dissolved.

Will the Tories act differently if they gain power? That remains to be seen, but they talk a good game:

Shadow Foreign Secretary William Hague said it was clear that much of the EU Constitution had simply been repackaged.

He added: “Blair and Brown have signed up to major shifts of power from Britain to the EU and major changes in the way the EU works. Given their manifesto commitment to a referendum on the EU Constitution, the Government has absolutely no democratic mandate to introduce these major changes without letting the British people have the final decision in a referendum.”

The Lib Dems are responding in their accustomed mealy-mouthed fashion:

The Liberal Democrats, who backed demands for a referendum on the original constitution in 2005, said they would consider a fresh call for a public vote after they had examined the new treaty. Former Labour Foreign Secretary Lord Owen said: “There are deep constitutional questions and to pretend otherwise is absurd.”

And the UKIP speaks the plain truth about the deal:

UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage said: “This agreement is a significant step towards a European superstate, which is what they always intended.”

Here are excerpts from two editorials in today’s Sunday Express. The first:
– – – – – – – – – –

German Chancellor Angela Merkel had called the meeting with the intention of reviving the already rejected plan for a European constitution. In the event, although constitutional issues were discussed, the summit simply produced a new EU Treaty, not a constitution – but what’s in a name?

Tony Blair says that he has written guarantees that exempt Britain from future constitutional interference arising from the Treaty. According to Blair, this special deal means that the new agreement will not require a referendum here. Three years ago, he promised UK voters a referendum on whether we should sign up to a European constitution, now he must honour that.

The Sunday Express does not trust the outgoing Prime Minister. Although it isn’t called a constitution the EU Treaty transfers more power from Westminster to Brussels. The new laws will affect the way we live for years to come. We demand the right to decide such fundamental issues ourselves.

And the second editorial:

The European Union is in dire straits.

For all the alleged benefits Britain gets, it is becoming obvious to millions that there are massive drawbacks associated with our membership.

We pay far more into its budget than we ever get back in grants.

Our membership makes controlling immigration almost impossible given that all the citizens of the 26 other member states have the right to live here. It also limits our democratic freedom of action in many other fields.

The Common Agricultural Policy keeps food prices higher than they need to be in order to subsidise inefficient French farmers. Meanwhile, EU trade barriers prevent Africa from pulling itself out of poverty through exports.

Citizens right across Europe feel an overriding loyalty to their nations and want the EU to have less power over their lives, not more. The French and the Dutch – two peoples traditionally at the core of the EU – voted down plans for it to be given a constitution.

Yet, incredibly, the arrogant Brussels elite will attempt another power grab this week and all the signs are that

Tony Blair is happy to help them.

In the dying days of his administration, Mr Blair is wriggling like the slipperiest snake in the political jungle in his bid to avoid giving the British people the referendum on Europe he promised them.

The new deal was almost scuttled by the intransigence of Poland. The Poles were holding out for a better deal on the apportionment of votes in the EU Parliament, but at the last moment backed off their demands in return for a postponement of the new rules until 2017.

The Poles had issued some string rhetoric against the Germans during the negotiations, stating publicly that they deserved more votes, since the lesser population of Poland is due to the millions of Poles killed as a result of Nazi aggression in the Second World War. But then they changed their minds — did somebody twist their arm?

Here’s how the new voting looks (the “ratio” is the population of each country in millions per allotted vote):

Country		Pop		Votes		Ratio
Germany		83,251,851		29		2.9
Turkey		71,158,647		29		2.5
France		60,765,983		29		2.1
United Kingdom		59,778,002		29		2.1
Italy		59,715,625		29		2.1
Spain		45,061,274		27		1.7
Poland		38,518,241		27		1.4
Romania		22,303,552		14		1.6
Netherlands		16,491,461		13		1.3
Greece		10,645,343		12		0.9
Belgium		10,274,595		12		0.9
Czech Republic		10,256,760		12		0.9
Portugal		10,084,245		12		0.8
Hungary		10,075,034		12		0.8
Sweden		8,876,744		10		0.9
Austria		8,169,929		10		0.8
Bulgaria		7,621,337		10		0.8
Slovakia		5,422,366		7		0.8
Denmark		5,368,854		7		0.8
Finland		5,183,545		7		0.7
Ireland		4,109,086		7		0.6
Lithuania		3,601,138		7		0.5
Latvia		2,366,515		4		0.6
Slovenia		1,932,917		4		0.5
Estonia		1,415,681		4		0.4
Cyprus		767,314		4		0.2
Luxembourg		448,569		4		0.1
Malta		397,499		3		0.1

As you can see, the Poles already had a pretty good deal, with more than twice the clout per capita than the Germans.

The scheme is supposedly designed to give the smaller countries a stronger say in affairs by increasing their voting representation. But if that’s the intention, then why not have a bicameral legislature modeled on that of the United States, with an upper house in which each country gets the same number of votes?

It’s obvious that the system is really designed to maintain the existing power structure, in which the larger countries like France, Germany, and Britain gather together privately and agree on policy, with the parliament acting as a rubber stamp after the deal goes down.

You can see why Turkey makes some of the current partners nervous.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

Is Great Britain going to cease to exist in the form we have known for the last few centuries? Will the British really allow themselves to be subsumed into the soft totalitarianism known as the EU?

The next elections will tell us something. The BNP is expected to make a strong showing, and if they do, all bets are off.

Our Swedish correspondent LN has been following British affairs closely — he’s the one who tipped me about today’s editorials — and, once again, I’ll give him the last word:

In England Tony Blair is called a traitor; the last thing he did before quitting was to do away with the Magna Carta in a single stroke of the pen.

In the mind of a Muslim, a writer who publishes a second-rate book that mocks Mohammed is the same as someone who blows up two skyscrapers and kills three thousand innocent people.

At least that’s what one particular Muslim thinks. From today’s Daily Telegraph:

Muslim peer likens Rushdie to 9/11 hijackers

A Muslim peer compared Salman Rushdie to the September 11 hijackers yesterday as protests over the author’s knighthood escalated.

At Regents Park Mosque in London, demonstrators held up placards saying “May God curse the Queen” and one speaker said that should Tony Blair become an envoy in the Middle East he should be sent back “in a bag”.

The Labour peer Lord Ahmed of Rotherham, who was interviewed in Le Figaro newspaper in France, added fuel to the row.

“This honour is given in recognition of services rendered to Great Britain,” he said. “Salman Rushdie lives in New York. He is a controversial man who has insulted Muslim people, Christians and the British. He does not deserve the honour.

“Two weeks ago Tony Blair spoke about constructing bridges with Muslims. What hypocrisy. What would one say if the Saudi or Afghan governments honoured the martyrs of the September 11 attacks on the United States?“ [emphasis added]

I’d like to say that such an attitude is rare among Muslims, but, sadly, I don’t think it is. One often reads of Muslims who disapprove of extremist Islamic violence, but…

Somehow, they can understand how righteous religious anger can force people to commit such acts.

And here’s something that’s not surprising:
– – – – – – – – – –

The protest at Regents Park was organised by Anjem Choudary, who also organised the protests against the publication in Denmark of cartoons of the prophet Mohammed.

If The Satanic Verses can induce all this apoplexy, what will be the effect of the burning of Mohammed’s effigy tonight in Denmark? I hope the Danish embassies in Damascus and Tehran are beefing up their security right now.

As thousands of worshippers at Teheran University chanted “Death to the English,” Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, told them: “They have awarded him only because he insulted the prophet.

“In such a situation, awarding him means confronting 1.5 billion Muslims around the world. Britons should know that they are the losers in this matter.”

Do you hear that, Tony Blair, you lap poodle of Bush? What were you thinking of? Who wants to face the wrath of 1.5 billion Muslims?

In Pakistan, the national assembly unanimously passed a second resolution calling on Britain to revoke the knighthood and “apologise to the Islamic world” and the prime minister criticised Britain.

Shaukat Aziz said the knighthood had “hurt the feelings of Muslims”.

Consider the lengths our governments go to in order not to “hurt the feelings of Muslims”. Why bother? Why don’t we just surrender and start paying the jizyah right now? Such deeply-felt anguish will be assuaged by nothing less.

Alas, I don’t think this little set-piece is over just yet. Expect the British government to cave shortly and apologize to all of the 1.5 quadrillion offended Muslims in the known universe.

And will the knighthood be withdrawn? What do our British readers think?

Breaking news: SIAD is announcing that Mohammed is to be burned up this evening. My Danish is not good enough to translate the entire article, but I think I have been able to get the gist of it — Vikings, correct me if I’m wrong.

Today is Midsummer’s Day — Saint Hans’ Day in Denmark — and the traditional Danish midsummer custom is to burn an effigy of a witch in order to banish evil from the country and ensure the good fortune of the people in the coming year. This year there’s going to be a slight variation on the usual ritual.

According to SIAD, a previously secret group is planning to burn an effigy of Mohammed instead of a witch, to symbolize the need to rid Western Europe of a new kind of evil. Tomorrow the group will release a video of tonight’s Midsummer bonfire.

I’m sure the “Muslim street” is not going to take this one lying down, so now is a good time to buy stock in Danish flag manufacturers and the butane lighter companies.

As a matter of interest, the Danish word for being burned up is almost the same as the idiom for being slapped in the face (det var en afbrænder: “it was a slap in the face”). I don’t know if the wordplay is intentional.

As soon as I have any more news to report on this event I will post it, especially if it’s in English.

[Nothing further.]

Last month Sappho, the Danish online magazine, published an interview with the German sociologist Gunnar Heinsohn about the ramifications of the demographic implosion in Europe, and the simultaneous demographic explosion of the Muslim population, both in Europe and the Middle East.

I consider Dr. Heinsohn’s cogent observations to be the among the most important scholarly work on the nature of the Great Jihad that the West is now facing. We were fortunate to be able to carry the English translation, “A Continent of Losers”, here at Gates of Vienna.

Now comes word that the blog Insoumission has posted a large portion of the interview in French translation.

So, to our Francophone readers: spread the word to anyone who might want to read Gunnar Heinsohn in French.

If anyone knows of other languages into which the interview has been translated, please send me the links. This piece needs to be disseminated as widely as possible.

Hat tip: Pistache, in the comments.

[Nothing further]