Berlusconi Is Back

Michael Ledeen on a “huge, perhaps historic, victory;

It’s considerably worse than AP lets on. Berlusconi defeated Walter Veltroni’s “Democratic Party” by a full 9 points in both the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies. And since the Italian electoral system gives a bonus to the winning side, the margins are very big and stable: 340 to 241 in the Chamber (with another 36 for a couple of small parties), and 167 to 137 in the Senate (with 5 to three little parties), which was expected to be a photo finish. Eighty percent voted, down about three percent from last time.
The big news is that the Communists are gone, for the first time since the end of the Second World War. Really gone. They didn’t win a single seat in either chamber. A lot of famous faces will vanish from Parliament, and it is even possible, although unlikely, that some of the comrades will be forced to join the working class. The Greens are also gone..
[…]
Berlusconi is an outspoken, even passionate admirer of George W. Bush and the United States of America. Reminds one of the elections that brought Sarkozy to the Elysee, doesn’t it? Best to keep that quiet, or somebody might notice that hatred of America doesn’t seem to affect the voters in Italy, France or Germany.

Return Fire


Marc Lebuis;

Today, I filed a complaint to the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC) for “hate propaganda” against Montreal salafi imam Hammaad Abu Sulaiman Al-Dameus Hayiti who officiates at the Association Musulmane de Montréal Est mosque. The complaint relates to his book L’Islam ou l’Intégrisme ? À la lumière du Qor’an et de la Sounnah downloadable from the Internet, and his extremist teachings that are also broadcast on the Internet.
The teachings of imam Al-Hayiti are suprematists, misogynistic and hateful. According to the imam, his fellow non-Muslims are “koufars” (unbelievers, infidels, impious), Québec women are perverse, and the population is “stupid and ignorant.” The imam also calls for the destruction of the “idols” of the West: democracy, human rights, secularism, freedom and modernity. By disseminating his teachings on the Internet, the imam tries to win adherents to his extreme views.
[…]
If the CHRC refuse to investigate my complaint, the public will be free to conclude that an institution meant to promote human rights is practicing a form of one-way absurd censorship. As a result, legitimate criticism of Islam is discouraged, while those who advocate the destruction of democracy and freedoms are protected. If the CHRC agrees to open an investigation, the writings of the imam will be exposed and scrutinized and, hopefully, discredited by the media. In the future, the media and the public will feel free to denounce subversive and hateful preachers without having to resort to the CHRC.

Hammaad Abu Sulaiman Al-Dameus Hayiti… “Alphabet Imam” works better for me. (Speaking of which – whatever happened to that perfectly sensible convention of changing one’s surname to something pronouncable when arriving on our shores?)

Let Us Take A Moment

To thank the one person who, nearly singlehandedly, brought this about;

[Saskatchewan’s] record haul of $265 million from its oil and natural gas land sales in April — the first of the 2008-2009 budget year — is $73.5 million more than the province budgeted for the entire year.
It followed a record sale in February, which bodes well for the five other land sales that will be held this budget year.

Here’s to you, Ed Stelmach!

Tony Blair’s Britain

Where the foxes caper unmolested, the government packs your school lunch and this little piggie went dhimmi…

Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council (Tory-controlled) has now announced that, following a complaint by a Muslim employee, all work pictures and knick-knacks of novelty pigs and “pig-related items” will be banned. Among the verboten items is one employee’s box of tissues, because it features a representation of Winnie the Pooh and Piglet. And, as we know, Muslims regard pigs as “unclean”, even an anthropomorphised cartoon pig wearing a scarf and a bright, colourful singlet.

florentine.jpg […]
When the Queen knights a Muslim “community leader” whose line on the Rushdie fatwa was that “death is perhaps too easy”, and when the Prime Minister has a Muslim “adviser” who is a Holocaust-denier and thinks the Iraq war was cooked up by a conspiracy of Freemasons and Jews, and when the Prime Minister’s wife leads the legal battle for a Talibanesque dress code in British schools, you don’t need a pig to know which side’s bringing home the bacon.

(Note – a commentor has brought the date of this piece to my attention. I’d missed that it was written in ’05.)

What Is Amazing

What is amazing

“… is the fact that all those “free-speechers” who have gathered around the likes of Steyn, Ezra Levant and even one high-profile Neo-Nazi/anti-Semite never raised a stink about that case – and that one was an actual attack on freedom of speech. But since it involved a Liberal, and a non-white person to boot, those “free-speechers” did not much care about the case.”

No – what is “amazing” is that leftie bloggers would simply assume that we read them, and that we follow every twitch in that corner of the sphere. (Do they not know their traffic stats?) For the record, the first time I heard of the Mark Francis case(link fixed) was about 2 days ago. Whose fault is that?
So, what is “amazing” is that his fellow travellers on the left lifted not a hand to help him, expended no effort to get the word out. Even in this post, Patels neglected to provide a name or a source link.
For all the left’s faith in the power of the collective, it rather failed to kick start when needed, no?
Perhaps they were waiting for the government to do it.

When They Began Firing Marriage Commissioners

…who refused to marry same sex couples on the grounds that it violated their religious freedom, defenders argued the dismissals were justified as commissioners are “agents” of the state.
You didn’t honestly believe it would end with that?

Elaine Huguenin co-owns Elane Photography with her husband. The bulk of Elane’s work is done by Elaine, though she subcontracts some of the work some of the time. Elane refused to photograph Vanessa Willock’s same-sex commitment ceremonies, and just today the New Mexico Human Rights Commission held that this violated state antidiscrimination law. Elane has been ordered to pay over $6600 in attorney’s fees and costs.

Thus, precedent has been established in New Mexico – owning a registered business now submits an artist’s individual liberty to state ordered servitude. Of course, they’re only following in our enlightened Canadian footsteps.
I wonder, though… if a Harley owner were to file a HRC complaint that I’d refused to paint two nudie nymphetes making out on his bike tank, would they accept the case?
(There’s more discussion here.)
h/t Sean McCormick

“‘Late you come, but still you come,'”

A couple of weeks ago I alluded to this, to the dishonest outrage of a vocal few who, by defect or design, chose to miss the point entirely;

The problem is, the Weimar Republic had such laws. It used them freely against the Nazis. Far from stopping Hitler, they only made his day when he became Chancellor. They enabled Hitler to confront Social Democratic Party chairman Otto Wels, who stood up in the Reichstag to protest Nazi suspension of civil liberties, with a quotation from the poet Friedrich Schiller:
“‘Late you come, but still you come,'” Hitler pointed at the hapless deputy. “You should have recognized the value of criticism during the years we were in opposition [when] our press was forbidden, our meetings were forbidden, and we were forbidden to speak for years on end.”
The Nazis would have been just as repressive without this excuse, but being able to offer it made Hitler’s task easier. Like Canadian supporters of hate-speech legislation, supporters of the Weimar Republic thought that their groups and causes would occupy all seats of authority and set all social and legal agendas forever. Shades of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association or the Canadian Jewish Congress! They couldn’t envisage the guns of their own laws being turned around to point at them one day.

Meanwhile, the crack investigators at the CHRC scour the dark corners of the internet in the relentless search for “Nazis” as the Aryan Guard parades down a Calgary street in broad daylight, complete with police escort.
(Speaking of which – when the Communists show up to protest the Nazis, you’re supposed to pray for an asteroid, not pick a favourite.)

Long Day

It started with isp problems this morning, followed by a trip out to a dog show and then dinner with family. I’m pretty beat, so will probably just finish up the chores I have around here and relax away from the computer for the evening.
Thanks to reader and sometimes guest blogger Sean McCormick for sending this recent example of his work along. Go check out his other stuff by clicking on the image…
springstorm.jpg
And to think that people actually ask how we deal with the “boredom” of driving across the prairies.

Libel Tourism

Roger Kimball;

I recently received a message from someone who helps distribute our books in Britain: “Can you please let us know if there are any references to Saudis and terrorist[s] in the book. We are just concerned that this book could potentially create libel lawsuits as it could offend Saudis living in England … “

Read it all.

World Press Freedom Prize Finalists

Congratulations

Four Canadian journalists who have stood up to threats to freedom of expression in Canada are the finalists for an annual World Press Freedom prize.
Toronto Star Asia Correspondent Bill Schiller, freelance journalist and author Derek Finkle, reporters Joel-Denis Bellavance and Gilles Toupin of Montreal’s La Presse and Maclean’s columnist Mark Steyn will be considered for the $2,000 prize, which is awarded each year to the Canadian media worker who, in the view of the jury, has made the most significant contribution to press freedom in this country over the previous 12 months.
The prize will be awarded by the Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom at a lunch event marking World Press Freedom Day on Friday, May 2nd at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa.

(We’ve put a call in to Barbara Hall.)

“People wonder why I quit university teaching”

Flea;

Imagine an office – all your colleagues and all your supervisors and anyone with a say in your tenure prospects, your research funding and your publications – where everyone organizes their careers in such a way that a “human rights” commission would have no reason to object. Their teaching practices, their research, their political views; everything they think and do including and especially their “private” lives from the television they (do not) watch to the fast food they (do not) eat to the sex lives they (do not) allow themselves to have. Even the concept of a “private” life dismissed as reactionary and/or illusory and in any event subject to the scrutiny of any undergraduate with internet access and a grudge. That is the life I escaped. Even a couple years after the fact I find it a surprise when my internal censor warns me against writing something for fear of losing my livelihood and my career and I realize I have already crossed that bridge, burned it and done a little dance some time ago. It is a small price for freedom compared to the price so many have already paid for me. But it is something.”

The bigger picture is slowly beginning to sink in.
The CHRC reach into the realm of our impolite medium treads upon the internet’s most sacred ground, something we have taken for granted since the earliest days of Usenet – the right to call each other names.
“First, they came for KKKate, and I did not speak out because I was a leftard.

the thing is, that if kate’s case gets tossed then precedent is set. i’ve gone through comments at major news outlets, ctv the globe etc, and seen sda quality comment threads, including some base and potentially actionable stuff. if kate gets walloped, there’s a certain sense that she had it coming from a purely combative and ideological perspective. that said it would contribute to a chilling effect on the blogs. many of us would need to reconsider our approaches.

I wonder how many of you have paused to consider your own databases, and the google caches they lurk in? Have you thought about how you might be called to account for readers who have accused me of being bought and paid for by politicians? Of being a “Nazi sympathizer”? Who’ve denigrated my artwork? Who have posted fabricated “quotes” they’ve attributed to me?
Because, in case you haven’t noticed, there’s really no way for me to lose. I may shell out a few dollars over this complaint, but the precedent will be a gold mine. The Canadian left have provided me the fodder for a full time career as a plaintiff.
So, hurry now.
Purge.
But, set that aside for the moment – have your commentors accused Brian Mulroney of criminal activity? Jean Chretien? Grant Devine? Every premier in the history of British Columbia? They’re all private citizens, they all know good lawyers.
And as a commentor accessing this medium – what then? Welcome to your new role as “Exhibit A”. Will the blog owner trade your identity for a free pass?
Someone in media asked me in private conversation why this issue is so heated, so personal. I answered, “Then, you don’t understand. This is an existential threat to the Canadian blogosphere. This is not about what we say – this is about who we are.”

From the beaver’s mouth

If you read milblogs, you get to hear regularly from U.S. servicemen and women about the improving situation in Iraq.
Far more rare is a Canadian officer’s ground-level perspective on the effort there. Meet LCol Darryl Mills, a CF officer on exchange as Deputy Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army’s 3rd Infantry Division currently operating in Baghdad:

LTC Mills seems to believe that the section of Iraq under 3ID’s responsibility has hit a tipping point, though he didn’t use that phrase. As security improves, “markets pop up everywhere, providing local economy stimulation and security, which creates a Circle of Life in some ways.” Coalition forces are “no longer worrying about the crisis of the day. The Iraqi government and military are stronger each day, exercise their power more each day.” As things get better and better, LTC Mills reports they become self-reinforcing. “Once you get to a certain point there is no going back. Each day government, economy and military get stronger and it’s harder for the terrorists to come back.”
***
He’s also adamant about the growth he’s seeing in Iraqi capabilities. “I’m here on the ground, so I see the change day-to-day, he reports. I see a government that is standing up.”
Because of his optimism and the upward trajectory of conditions in the AO, LTC Mills almost sounded disappointed when he spoke of GEN Petreaus’ Tuesday testimony on Capitol Hill. “I get his comments about ‘guarded optimism,’” he said. And he agreed with GEN Petraeus’ message of “let’s not rush,” but LTC Mills is obviously very optimistic and excited about the future. He acknowledged that improvements are uneven across Iraq, “[But] in our area, there has been a lot of progress… it has been quite substantial.”
I suspect it would not surprise many readers that one of the bigger challenges 3ID is facing right now has to do with the homefront. As Deputy Chief of Staff, LTC Mills doesn’t usually interact directly with VIPs who visit from the U.S., but he hears about the visits and has definite opinions about them. “We respect [visitors who are informed and] can speak about the before and after… who tend not to come in with an agenda. Not all are like that, sadly.”

As the cool kids say, RTWT.

Y2Kyoto: I Miss The Arctic Ice Cap

Canadian Press;

For the first time in its history, Husky Energy (TSX:HSE) has shut down production at the White Rose offshore oil project because of the threat posed by icebergs drifting nearby.
Production has been shut down since Tuesday after thick sheets of ice accompanied by “sizable” icebergs were spotted near the oilfield, said Ruud Zoon, Husky’s vice-president of East Coast operations.
“Obviously, we want to stay away from icebergs coming in contact with our production installation,” Zoon said in an interview Wednesday.
[…]
“This is an annual event, when the pack ice moves south. However, this time it’s actually moved further south and closer to our production installations.”

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