A couple of years ago I wrote a blog post dealing with one of Mark Steyn's hate tracts about the Muslim "takeover" of Europe. Steyn, like his ardent admirer Martin Amis, displays a remarkably transparent psychosexual panic at the thought of big Muslim bucks breeding holy warriors to cast the white man down. (As an American Southerner, I am all too familiar with this "Mandingo Syndrome.")

Oddly enough, of all the articles I've written over the years, the Steyn piece has produced the longest-lasting reaction. To this day, I still get hate mail and indignant comments from Steyn's little sycophants, denouncing my ignorance of Islam's relentless, monolithic devouring of European "civilization." (I would highly recommend Mark Mazower's magisterial work of history, "Hitler's Empire," for anyone interested in seeking how very civilized Europe has been within living memory.) Given that I live in one of the nations that the psychosexual panickers seem most exercised about -- Great Britain -- and in a neighborhood where at least every third person is a Muslim, or of Muslim background, I always find these condemnations of my "ignorance" on the subject of Islam in Europe pretty funny. I live among Muslims, work alongside Muslims, trade with Muslims, my children go to school with Muslims. I can reports from years of my own experience the astonishing fact that Muslims are actual, individual human beings like everyone else: a unique combination of disparate, changing, often conflicting elements, with wildly varying beliefs and behaviors. (What's more, a great many "Muslims" are not really Muslims; that is, they are about as "religious" in their actual behavior as, say, the countless millions of American "Christians" who have made pornography one of the Homeland's largest industries.)

But you would never know any of this from our best-selling Islamophobes. Or, given the ethnic and linguistic origins of Islam, should we not call them by their true names: anti-Semites? For indeed, their own rhetoric and ideas are indistinguishable from those of the anti-Semites of the early 20th century, who also wrote of dark, barbaric hordes of religious fanatics breeding and wheedling their way into dominance over a weak, flaccid, overly "liberal" white Europe. Substitute "Muslim" for "Jew" in the scared-stiff (or is it scared-flaccid?) screeds of Steyn, Amis, and others, and you will hear an exact replica of the anti-Semitism that was so rife throughout Western "civilization" in the pre-Holocaust years.

In Saturday's Guardian, Pankaj Mishra gives us a detailed and devastating look at the "respectable" Islamophobes who are given such prominence in the Anglo-American press -- and of the sinister, far-right political movements now piggy-backing on this "respectable" anti-Semitism to gain more and more power in nations which have indeed been "taken over" -- not by the miniscule number of Muslims in Europe, but by rapacious, homegrown elites, whose relentless, ruthless pursuit of profit and privilege have destabilized or destroyed communities for centuries.

The whole piece is well worth reading, but here are some choice excerpts:

Is Europe about to be overrun by Muslims? A number of prominent European and American politicians and journalists seem to think so. The historian Niall Ferguson has predicted that "a youthful Muslim society to the south and east of the Mediterranean is poised to colonise - the term is not too strong - a senescent Europe". And according to Christopher Caldwell, an American columnist with the Financial Times, whom the Observer recently described as a "bracing, clear-eyed analyst of European pieties", Muslims are already "conquering Europe's cities, street by street". So what if Muslims account for only 3% to 4% of the EU's total population of 493 million? In his book Reflections on the Revolution in Europe: Can Europe Be the Same With Different People in It? - which was ... commended as "morally serious" by the New York Times and has beguiled some liberal opinion-makers as well as rightwing blowhards -- [Caldwell claims that] "advanced" cultures "have a long track record of underestimating their vulnerability to 'primitive' ones".

...Caldwell stops short of speculating what Europe would or should do to atone for its folly of nurturing a perfidious minority. The Canadian journalist Mark Steyn, whom Martin Amis has hailed as a "great sayer of the unsayable", does not hesitate to spell it out in his bestselling America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It:

In a democratic age, you can't buck demography - except through civil war. The Serbs figured that out - as other Continentals will in the years ahead: if you can't outbreed the enemy, cull 'em.

Bruce Bawer, whose book While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying the West from Within was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle award, suggests that European officials, who are "in a position to deport planeloads of people everyday", "could start rescuing Europe tomorrow". There are now even politicians ready to do the "unsayable". The Dutch MP Geert Wilders, whose party was one of the big rightwing winners of June's elections to the European Parliament, proposes expelling millions of Muslims from Europe. A separate ministry for this purpose is advocated by Austria's extreme-right parties, which gained an unprecedented 29% of the popular vote last year...

Ordinary Muslims in Europe, who suffer from the demoralisation caused by living as perennial objects of suspicion and contempt, are far from thinking of themselves as a politically powerful, or even cohesive, community, not to speak of conquerors of Europe. So what explains the rash of bestsellers with histrionic titles - While Europe Slept, America Alone, The Last Days of Europe? None of their mostly neocon American authors was previously known for their knowledge of Muslim societies; all of them suffer the handicaps of what the philosopher Charles Taylor, in his introduction to a new collection of scholarly essays entitled Secularism, Religion and Multicultural Citizenship, calls "block thinking", which "fuses a very varied reality into one indissoluble unity". Certainly, the idea of a monolithic "Islam" in Europe appears an especially pitiable bogey when you regard the varying national origins, linguistic and legal backgrounds, and cultural and religious practices of European Muslims. Many so-called Muslims from secularised Turkey or syncretistic Sindh and Java would be condemned as apostates in Saudi Arabia, whose fundamentalist Wahhabism informs most western visions of Islam....

A more thoughtful conservative than Caldwell could have examined valuably how neoliberal capitalism, while enriching Europe's translational elites, has frayed the continent's old cultures and solidarities. In Europe, as in India and China, globalisation has provoked great anxieties about inequality and unemployment, fuelling new xenophobic nationalisms and backlashes against ethnic and religious minorities. The social anthropologist Arjun Appadurai claims in Fear of Small Numbers: An Essay on the Geography of Anger that "minorities are the major site for displacing the anxieties of many states about their own minority or marginality (real or imagined) in a world of a few megastates, of unruly economic flows and compromised sovereignties".

...In actuality, the everyday choices of most Muslims in Europe are dictated more by their experience of globalised economies and cultures than their readings in the Qu'ran or sharia. Along with their Hindu and Sikh peers, many Muslims in Europe suffer from the usual pathologies of traditional rural communities transitioning to urban secular cultures: the encounter with social and economic individualism inevitably provokes a crisis of control in nuclear families, as well as such ills as forced marriage, the poor treatment of women and militant sectarianism. However, in practice, millions of Muslims, many of them with bitter experiences of authoritarian states, coexist frictionlessly and gratefully with regimes committed to democracy, freedom of religion and equality before the law.

..Liberal spaces within Europe have brought many more Muslim women out of their old confinements. Benhabib asserts that these women, who "struggle at first to retain their traditional and given identities against the pressures of the state", then go on to engage and contest their Islamic traditions. As Europe's own passage from tradition showed, this necessary reconfiguration is not the work of a day. It requires the practices and institutions of European citizenship to grow more rather than less flexible.....

Writing in 1937 about the minority then most despised in Europe, Joseph Roth predicted that "Jews will only attain complete equality, and the dignity of external freedom, once their 'host nations' have attained their own inner freedom, as well as the dignity conferred by sympathy for the plight of others". This proved to be too much to ask of Europe in 1937. But the moral challenge has not gone away - civilisation remains an ideal rather than an irreversible achievement - and the dangers of leaving it unmet are incalculable.

NOTE: A follow-up to this post can be found here.

Comments (46)

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Why the demographic transformation?, Low-rated comment [Show]

Sean O'Neil said:

... Nothing like a fuming, noisome pile of bigotry to make the world go 'round. Eh Mickey? .............................. I have found a good number of Martin Amis's novels very funny and/or very interesting -- Money, Dead Babies, Time's Arrow, London Fields -- but his bigotry is a lot like what Mickey displayed above me. It's pretty inexplicable, save for the Mandingo analogy and the rank ignorant fear of the "other." What sheer hell it must be to live in such existential panic as does Amis, as does our friend Mickey above, at the mere thought of the "other" sharing your continent, your nation, your region, your town! great googly-moogly, not the same town?! what cowards they are ... and how immoral their response.

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August 16, 2009 | url
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Chris Floyd said:

... Again, substitute "Jew" for Muslim (and "Germany" for "England") in the comment from Mickey and see what it sounds like. And remember that many leading Nazis were originally for "humane deporatation" of Jewish "immigrants" -- even those "born in Europe" who retained a "strong tie with their homeland" -- all that stuff about "next year in Jerusalem,"etc. But in the end, these "compassionate conservatives" found another solution to the "problem" of people who were "displacing" the native population.

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August 16, 2009
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Wondering said:

	Please explain So you're saying Steyn is wrong about there being a demographic transformation in the UK? Or you're saying that there is a demographic transformation, but Steyn is wrong (and racist) in contending that some big change in Britain will happen as a result?
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August 16, 2009
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Ilya Kuryakin said:

The problem is not "demographics" Mickey... It's the fact that while technologically we may be in the 21st century, morally, most of the planet is still in the 16th. I have the good fortune to live in a fairly diverse part of Toronto, on my own small street there are about 150 bungalows belonging to Iranians, Sri Lankans, several different Carribean countries, Germans, Scots, Yugoslavians like me, and others. Aside from a couple of Mickey Mouse crackpots, for the most everyone is pretty cool with each other. Like it or not, that is the future of mankind. Deal with it. The real problem, if you would like to know, is the campaign of manipulation by the western "elites", using your own fears and prejudices to realize their agenda: namely the exploitation of resources and human labour of these "lower" nations. What the Elites fear most is losing their Imperial control, their global economic and military hegemony, to newly empowered nations that Insist on their Sovereignty, rather than being mere puppets. States such as Venezuela, China, Russia, Iran. Anyone who doesn't toe the Imperium's line, agree to handover their natural resources for chump change, or put their own interests ahead of the Imperium's are de facto "enemies" or "terrorists" or "subversive". In my opinion, we are doomed, by 2025 at the very latest, to an all-out global war, fought for no other reason than to maintain the crumbling Washington-based fiat Empire and it's fascist infrastructure of greed and theft, enabled by the shallowness and ignorance of western populations weened on generations of "civilizing" and moral self-righteousness. A last ditch effort to "save the world" from...Democratic Pluralistic Socialism.

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August 16, 2009
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Roger Beesley said:

roger in florida It is amazing how the wilfully blind go to their own extinction. If you allow huge numbers of immigrants from dysfunctional third world crapholes to emigrate to and congregrate in cities in first world countries, those cities quickly become dysfuctional craphole copies of the countries of origin. These groups will provide a base of political power for leaders more in line with the political structure of the originating countries than with the enlightened host countries. Thusly will Europe enter a new dark age. It is coming, regardless of your PC pieties. The awakening for trendy leftie do-goodies like Chris Floyd will be all the more amusing.

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alice in New York said:

Roger, speaking of dysfunctional crap-holes... Roger, your state Florida, is one of the most dysfunctional states in the union - first in the nation in mortgage fraud, second in foreclosures, last in high school graduation rates and you can't blame any of that on immigrants. And don't get me started about the dysfunctional politics. But hey, you can't help where you are from, can you? I live in New York where 36% of the population is foreign born, people from "third world crap holes". I would take the wonderfully diverse culture of New York any day over the bland culture of middle american suburbanites. I had a good cheap lunch of korean bulgogi on Tuesday and authentic Indian food on Wednesday and not an ounce of cheese or fried potato in sight. My friends are interesting people from those "third world crap holes". Throughout my life they have helped me understand that there is more to the world than my tiny corner. I thank my lucky stars every day that I live here and not some place with a bunch of small-minded, mean spirited, ethnocentric crackers.

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August 16, 2009
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Roger said:

Alice: Amazing that you PC whiners can't get over the restaurants. Buy a cookbook for God's sake. As for dysfunctional politics, I think NY has that over FL any day. At least FL is not in imminent danger of finanacial collapse. You have probably never heard of the City of Miami; it had to be taken over by the "crackers" of Dade County after the cubans had re-shaped the city's polics in their own image, complete with rampant corruption, nepotism and outright theft, but hey, why blame them, they are just the blameless products of a third world craphole. Your problem Alice, is not with Floridians, it is with white people.

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August 16, 2009
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Roger said:

	Alice: While you are about it; take a trip to LA and get a real taste of Tijuana.
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August 16, 2009
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Linda J said:

Distract Them with BS Elites go about their nefarious business of building up, then tearing down the productive basis of society, all for profit. To deflect the rest of us from examination of their murderous deeds, they sic people like Steyn and Amis on to immigrants as scapegoats. Mickey, when did the time line for the real estate you are protecting for "indigenous populations of Europe" begin? Here in America, non-white populations preceded the currently dominant culture.

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Mickey said:

... Get a grip, Sean. Take a deep breath, there you are. Now, as you don't answer any substantive points, (e.g. socialist Spain paying immigrants to go home) but engage in armchair psychoanalysis, I am going to do the same. (And by the way, I am quite happy with my sex life, my 'endowment' etc. I think Mr. Floyd and Mr. O'Neill might be projecting/overcompensating) Now try to concentrate Sean. I simply don't feel the need to commit autogenocide against my own people. Not for any 'guilt' over the events of 1933-1945, not so I can have a handy supply of Bul Gogi. Interestingly, non of the other advanced, non-European societies feel the need to do so either. The Japanese don't import millions of Filipinos, the Koreans (originators of Bul Gogi) have virtually zero immigration, despite the fact that they are wealthy compared to most of Asia. India does have immigration -- if you can prove you are of Indian descent. So it seems that my views are closer to the majority opinion of mankind than is your cosmopolitanism. But it really isn't cosmopolitanism. I used to think it was self-hatred or anti-white hatred , kind of like that on display by the New York reader. But now I think more it is a sort of status game See how tolerant I am! So tolerant I am willing to see my children grow up in a society where their ancestors were once the overwhelming majority, but now they are local , and eventually national, minorities. (Of course, with someone named Sean O'Neill, it could just be plain anti-English hatred). Funny thing is, we know that immigration hurts the poor in the receiving countries. We know it stresses the local environment. Yet lefties are so determined to prove their purity -- the 'anti-racism' -- they will promote policies known to conflict with their previously held goals like a good environment and low income inequality.

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Mickey said:

... Here in America, non-white populations preceded the currently dominant culture. Exactly right, Linda. I don't see why indigenous Europeans should will themselves into the status of the American Indians, or do you think that the Amerinds are a good model to follow? As for timelines, while there have always been a small number of none Europeans in, say, Britain, the scale since the 1950s is an order of magnitude of difference. I'd put the timeline right about there.

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August 16, 2009
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Mickey said:

A word about rhetoric Two of the greatest butchers in history, Lenin and Stalin, were big on anti-imperialist rhetoric. Does modern anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist rhetoric's being fairly similar to that of the old commies make you either culpable for their crimes? Will it lead inevitably to man-made famines, the liquidation of the kulaks, the gulag, and re-education camps? That is the analog of comparing those of us who warn about the demographics of immigration to Hitler or the policies of the Nazis.

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August 16, 2009
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Chris Floyd said:

... If modern, "anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist rhetoric" declared "we will liquidate the kulaks (the financiers, the imperialists, etc.) as a class," as Stalin did, if modern "anti-imperialist" rhetoric called for "mass terror" against class enemies, as Lenin did, then why yes, one could then say that modern anti-imperalist, anti-capitalist rhetoric could well lead to crimes such as those seen under the Bolsheviks. Likewise, if those "who warn about the demographics of immigration" go to say that Europe's nations will eventually "learn the lessons taught by the Serbs" and end up "culling" the "enemy" which they "can't outbreed," then why, yes, I would say that such rhetoric could well lead to eliminationist crimes like those seen under the Nazis. I would further say that rhetoric which equates "immigration" with "auto-genocide" is also a pretty far piece down the road to eliminationism. After all, if the "immigrants" are trying to commit "genocide" against the majority, then what measures would NOT be justified to defend against such an evil? And yes, this is precisely the sort of language that Goebbels and the Nazis used: that the Jews were trying to "destroy" the German race. Thus, by the logic of their rhetoric, the Holocaust was simply a defense against the "genocide" the Jews were trying to inflict on the Germans. So what measures would all you affable "warners about immigration demographics" be willing to accept in order to avert the "genocide" of your people? Or even to reduce the proportion of immigrants back to 1950s levels? Of course, you conveniently forget to note that millions of European Muslims were born in, er, Europe, and thus are, er, Europeans. So are you saying that you would like to see levels of actual immigrants -- i.e., those living today who entered Europe from another country -- back to 1950 levels; or are you saying that the European-born children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren of former immigrants should also be "culled," one way or another? Following the logic of your rhetoric, it suddenly doesn't seem so affable after all.

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Coldtype said:

	... "Following the logic of your rhetoric, it suddenly doesn't seem so affable after all" -CF Never underestimate what these rabid nutjobs are willing to consider as "logical" Chris.
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DeanTaylor said:

Mickey tell me true... "I used to live in an area of London with a large Muslim population, fairly near the infamous Finsbury park. Whatever it was, IT WAS NO LONGER ENGLAND" [stress added]. Parsing this telling comment: "I used to live in an area of London with a large Muslim population.." Mein Gott, what an open-minded Anglo-Saxon we have here! Whatever possessed you? "Whatever it was, it was no longer [sob!] England." By Crikey! The England of...bangers and mash--gone forever! Oh, that's right, cuisine is not your long suit. The England of...Maggie Thatcher ["put the cat out, dear"]--despoiled! Please take a moment to explain to the unenlightened, lesser races which "England" it is that you were hoping to preserve from the taint of: Europe, Asia, the Americas...? Please define, with as much care as you are capable of, this "England" you have logged in your alleged mind. Because, perhaps you are correct, i.e., perhaps there is, in fact, something dear, something remarkable, something humanity needs to secure for--what?--some sort of sickening, inbred, "racially pure" posterity? Possibly a nudge in the right direction will serve disclosure: is it the Klu Klux Klan's utterly vacuous, yet cherished nonetheless idea of "blood in the face"? That's it, is it not? Your heretofore unidentified "concerns" pertain to the level of melanin in one's derma--correct? Or, in the interest of shoring up your disgusting, enfeebled argument, would you rather not have it be known that you have aligned yourself with that bastion of Southern intelligentsia, the KKK? Selma to Piccadilly, is it? Small wonder, then, at our anxiety of late. Look at who is--or was--in possession of just oodles of melanin--and please have the courtesy of letting us know to what locus they are to be relegated--i.e., away, away, far away from the purity of Albion: How about Thelonius Monk? Black as the ace of spades, i.e., scads of melanin--and, he had a penchant for wearing "funny" hats: you did already mention, did you not, your neurotic fear of Muslim headdress, did you not? Out, Monk! Out you go! Another musician: Charlie "Yardbird" Parker--the father of Bebop. No blood in the face here, to be sure. Mickey, what shall we do with this lad who desires residence in dear, dear, N4? Right! Out, Bird! Desmond Tutu? More melanin, damn it all! He's taken a flat in N4. What shall we do with him? Nelson Mandela? Paul Robeson? Dark, dark, through a glass, darkly...That's it, benighted Mickey. "And then we shall see face to face..."

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August 16, 2009
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Roger said:

	To Deantaylor Whatever it is that you are taking, try a lower dose.
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August 17, 2009
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DeanTaylor said:

America: Ur-craphole "Your problem Alice, is not with Floridians, it is with white people." "Whatever it is that you are taking, try a lower dose." Listen, my snot-nosed, WASP, cock-sucker of a friend. The Muslims are not leaving N4. The negro is not leaving 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Not at your behest, nor Mickey's. Does this trouble you? That's good. "Thusly will Europe enter a new dark age." Yes, "thusly," and perhaps you could enlighten us all regarding the dark age--i.e., the current one--which has 58,000 Americans and 3-4 million Vietnamese destroyed owing to the dark age of American Empire? Or, the current dark age wisdom which has 24,000 Americans confronting 40 million Pashtuns? Or, the current dark age wisdom which transmits tax-payer largesse to G-Sax felons: "And here's the real punch line. After playing an intimate role in four historic bubble catastrophes, after helping $5 trillion in wealth disappear from the NASDAQ, after pawning off thousands of toxic mortgages on pensioners and cities, after helping to drive the price of gas up to $4 a gallon and to push 100 million people around the world into hunger, after securing tens of billions of taxpayer dollars through a series of bailouts overseen by its former CEO, what did Goldman Sachs give back to the people of the United States in 2008? "Fourteen million dollars. "That is what the firm paid in taxes in 2008, an effective tax rate of exactly one, read it, one percent. The bank paid out $10 billion in compensation and benefits that same year and made a profit of more than $2 billion — yet it paid the Treasury less than a third of what it forked over to CEO Lloyd Blankfein, who made $42.9 million last year" [Taibbi]. It would appear that your "dysfunctional third world crapholes" have a role model in the dysfunctional craphole, writ large, that is these here U-nited States. And this, going back to the Founding Investors and their disgusting, elitist hypocrisy which reified property owners, grandstanded for their ostensible revolution, and then bought their way out of military service. And this prescinds from the crucifixion of Blacks and the planned genocide of Native Americans. Unless you were one of the clique of white, male, well-to-do solons and their "investors," this place sucked from day one. i.e., the Ur-craphole that is America. And, do save YOUR contempt for your hideous offspring that you are no doubt rearing in your own tedious, racist image...

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August 17, 2009
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Gonzolegend said:

Oh Chris upset ze racists LOL Must be sooooo scary to live in their narrow world. What with all these internetz, and youtubes and ethnic folk slowly entering into their towns, hell there LIVES. I'm worried for the white man as well I mean look at the rest of the world outside Europe and USA they ALL got weird accents and THEY SURROUNDING US what with there fine foods and multicultural ideals :S And look at Space ! Completely 100% BLACK WTF is that about !!!

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August 17, 2009
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kafir said:

... Instead of arguing amongst ourselves, maybe we should listen to what a significant number of Muslims the world over are telling us: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8Wg3j6MTJg&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oXhE9ZdVdo HuT UK spokesperson: "We are an international Islamic political organization, and our overall aim is to re-establish an Islamic ruling system, the Khalifah (Caliphate) State." "What you see across the Muslim world is a great support for the return of Sharia law.....a recent report from University of Maryland, USA, showed a 70% support for return of Sharia law in Muslim countries." Sharia is the antithesis of the Western system of "democracy, freedom of religion and equality before the law" that Muslim migrants "coexist frictionlessly and gratefully with", as described by Pankaj Mishra. Thousands of British Muslims recently attended conferences in London and Birmingham to assert this "global political aim", and we're told that 70% of Muslims the world over- according to the Muslim spokesperson for HuT UK-support the implementation of Sharia Law? Sure sounds like a "monolith".

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August 17, 2009
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tom said:

unintentional self parody? Substitute "Muslim" for "Jew" in the scared-stiff (or is it scared-flaccid?) screeds of Steyn, Amis, and others, and you will hear an exact replica of the anti-Semitism that was so rife throughout Western "civilization" in the pre-Holocaust years. Exact replica, yes yes. Oh, except for that even the dastardly Robert Spencer has never claimed that Muslims are subhuman, unworthy of life, or the "offspring of pigs and apes." No, those terms are pretty much still aimed exclusively at Jews. By Muslims. In Hyde park as well as Ramallah. You're right that Islam is far closer in origin to a heresy of Pharisitical Judaism than Christianity, though. A post-modern academic might get a thrill from inverting the most obvious and common-sense of ideas, but will bristle when challenged that, hey, that urinal really isn't art after all but pretty much just a piss pot. In the same way a heretic religion will want to eliminate first the branch from which it sprung, to prevent the danger of being shown for what it is.

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August 17, 2009
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Sean O'Neil said:

Mickey drinks a Mickey Finn Hilarious "comment" from Mickey -- accusing me of all sorts of things, the least of which -- "not concentrating" -- amuses me endlessly. Why? Mickey doesn't know me, but he pretends to with his "knowing" assessments of me. I could see the fear and panic in Mickey's post. OH BOY! Natives of the UK -- whatever that means -- are getting "displaced by" immigrants. What's the problem there? How does one get "displaced" by an immigrant? Is the UK forcing every Walesman, Scot, Englander, Irishman to leave his/her home, and give it over to an immigrant? No? Then what in Hades is Mickey afraid of? The other. The deathly fear of the other. Well done Mickey.

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debunker said:

... The current "plight" of Muslim "victims" can be likened to the prelude to the Jewish Holocaust???? The Jewish people were victims of a shocking atrocity. And Muslims- most of whom remain silent while fanatics among them actively call for non-believers to be put to death (highest on that list= the Jews) - see themselves as "objects of suspicion and contempt" (aka victimhood). Which means that Muslims are the new Jews. Right. Get it. Although, going back 70-plus years, I don't recall that there were any terrorist acts perpetrated by members of the Jewish community around that time......or that they were demanding the introduction of 7th century system of religious law......or that they viewed women as inferior beings. And as for the present day.... how to account for the resurgent wave of anti-Semitic attacks against Jews in Europe by certain "youths"?? And how to account for a group of Pakistani Muslim head-hackers storming Mumbai, and taking special effort to go to the Chabad House to kill the Rabbi and his wife?? And the apparent lack of violent attacks against Muslims?? Hmmm The words of the great man in Europe's darkest hour- the man who recognized that evil of Nazism, and brought to an end the horror of the Holocaust- are worth remembering: "Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities - but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world." River War, 1899

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August 17, 2009
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Deb said:

... I do like Pat Condell- really cuts through the leftist BS on this subject, as demonstrated by Chris Floyd, Dean Taylor et al http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4FpTvp0tgs. These cowards- including the above named- seem happy to hand over their cherished liberal values, hoping, on some level, it will win them favor with this implacable foe. And they continue to carry on with their "racist" rants in an attempt to shut down debate as the predictions become reality. Yup- multiculturalism trumps freedom and real human rights. To argue otherwise is "racist".

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August 17, 2009
Votes: -2

Ilya Kuryakin said:

what was I thinking? "multiculturalism trumps freedom and real human rights" - DEB Yeah, Mono Cultural-ism has worked out sooo well these past several centuries! White Europeans slaughtered somewhere between 120 and 150 million natives in North and South America - those are base-line numbers, it might be way more, but we'll never know for sure. The British Empire is responsible for at least that many more dead in India and China. And this century just past saw the slaughter of another 120 million - about 40 million of which the mighty US is responsible for in undeclared wars, covert operations, coups d'etat, and so on, in Iraq, Central and South America, Angola, Philippines, SE Asia. The litany of evil is long, surpassing even Stalin's. Get it through your thick numb skulls: the Imperialist elites are using your race, religion, and ethnicity to enable their goals. Not yours. Theirs. They don't give a shit about you, or anyone else who isn't part of the clique. It's about empire building and maintenance, and it always has been. The few crumbs tossed to the Empire's base populations are wink-and-a-nod payoffs to keep you silent, and the news media/Hollywood are there to keep you stupid and uninformed. Just look at your "elected representatives"! Aside from maybe Paul and Kucinich, I doubt there is more than a handful who have an IQ above 85. Buffoons, nearly to a man. And yeah, that includes the sainted figurehead Obamessiah. When Caligula named a horse to his senate, it was an object lesson: you are powerless, the real power lies elsewhere. Anyone who doesn't get the message, gets got. About half the world's population gets by on two dollars a day. Not because they don't have resources, or arable land, or are stupid, but because the Empire and it's boot-licking cohorts spend all their waking hours thinking of new ways to steal everyone else's resources, whether by IMF usury, coups, or direct military assault. Fortunately, your Imperial days are numbered. So enjoy your lattes, Die Hard sequels, Carbon Credits, global warming-mongering, phony H1N1 viruses, GMO dogshit "foods", while you can.

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August 17, 2009
Votes: +2

Roger said:

Deantaylor A little life advice for you: Try and spend a bit less money on dope, a bit less time masturbating and a bit more time at work, then even you too may enjoy the American dream. With the extra maney you make; save and invest, my shares in Goldman Sachs have done really well, thank you. As for the current occupant of the White House, he's gone in four, white people have had their fun and now they see the results of electing a negro crack dealer. It is a pity that the next occupant will have to have the place tented, that won't look good, and it's going to be hell getting the fried chicken stains off the carpets. As for Afghanistan, I agree, I have always felt that the best way to deal with troublesome skidmarks is nuclear. Now you go and have a nice day, ya hear!

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August 17, 2009
Votes: -3

helena said:

... I'm surprised that nobody seems to get this: the reason the lefties are so tolerant of Islam, welcome it, and scream at anyone who criticizes it as "intolerant" is very simple. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Lefties perceive Muslims as anti-Christian (some are, some aren't, but the most powerful ones definitely are) and as fellow travellers in their vast project of destroying Christianity from the face of the earth. That's why with only 3% of the population in the U.K., a Muslim has been named head of religious affairs at the BBC.

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August 17, 2009
Votes: -1

Phillip Allen said:

DEANTAYLOR, one point While in general sympathy with your efforts to tweak the noses of the rightists who have graced us with their comments, you wrote Listen, my snot-nosed, WASP, cock-sucker of a friend. I'm sure you will agree, when you think about it a moment, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with cock sucking. You enjoy having it done, right? Then how can it be that referring to a person who provides such a pleasant experience can serve as an insult? Someone who sucks cock may well be an idiot, a vile racist fool, or any other possible thing, but their practice of the oral arts is irrelevant to any of these things. Trust me in this, as both recipient and provider of this delightful pastime.

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August 17, 2009
Votes: +0

Sean O'Neil said:

... I love how the "critics" in this thread have pasted anyone who empathizes with Muslims as "lefties." What that tells me quite clearly is that these "critics" are nothing more than partisan sycophants, believing themselves on the correct side of things by being anti-left, meaning presumably, they are proud to be "right wing." In Israel, the "right wing" is occupied by bloodthirsty Zionists who seek to murder all Islamic followers in the whole of the Middle East. Under what supposed moral pretense do these "right-wing" Zionists claim a right to such broad-spectrum murder? Presumably, it's "revenge" for Jews being persecuted by Hitler's regime. But how does that work, exactly? How does being a Jew today warrant murdering Muslims today, for something Hitler did 60 years ago? I mean, there's not even a connection between Hitler and Islam. I predict the real source of Zionism's hatred of Islam is the same as Christianity's hatred of Islam -- it's the point that Islam hates the idea of money earned on money... interest, in other words. I suggest that end-times Christians and bloodthirsty Zionists fear that loan banking could be undone by a cultural wave emanating from Islam. What else suggests that Islam is a threat? I guess there's the ridiculous over-playing of the "evils" of Sharia law. But what about the way Israelis are interpreting Yahweh's laws to justify murder of Muslims? Is that superior to Sharia law, morally speaking? Don't think so. All we need now is to have the sons and daughters of Abe Foxman to come in and try to pin their donkey-tails on me.

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August 17, 2009 | url
Votes: +1

Deb said:

... Sean O'Neil, you are so right. It's all about an irrational, right-wing fear of Sharia compliant finance. And the rest of the Sharia system, is, as you say, ridiculously overplayed as "evil". For instance, the fact that a woman's testimony is worth half that of a man is really not that big a deal. The "punishment" for homosexuality, if memory serves me, is death. Again- totally blown out of proportion as "evil" system of law. Interesting that over three quarters of Dutch gays- who previously formed a reliable liberal base- are now voting for "right wing" parties. Wonder why that would be. Perhaps gay marriage rights are not such a concern once you feel there's a looming existential threat. For the record, Johann Hari (Chris Floyd's hero, apparently) is a supporter of the UK based One-Law-For-All (against Sharia) campaign. See their website or youtube for his talks at their rallies. At least he understands this. Easy for you, though, as a straight (I'm assuming) male to make such pronouncements. And fascinating to see the "logic" of appeasers and cowards who allegedly hold liberal values and universal human rights so dear. The double standards really are jaw-dropping, as Pat Condell points out in the video I posted. Oh- one last thing you might be interested in: "I mean, there's not even a connection between Hitler and Islam." http://warandgame.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/mufti_inspecting2.jpg Hajj Amin (center, in black coat and white hat) does the Nazi salute as he inspects his Nazi SS Bosnian Muslim troops. http://news-political.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/hitler_mufti.jpg Hitler confers with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem

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August 17, 2009
Votes: +1

Deb said:

	... For Chris Floyd and Sean O'Neil etc: Here is the link I mentioned including Johann Hari- a gay "leftie"- discussing the "evils" of Sharia Law. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YU0rcFAX730
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August 17, 2009
Votes: +1

Sean O'Neil said:

... Deb, You are free to overstate things, as the Heroes of Zion are doing. Sharia law does not run Islam; Sharia law does not run anything but those who choose to do two things: 1) follow Sharia law 2) interpret it in the same way its critics suggest So if you want to use Sharia law as a straw-man to defend Israel, go right ahead. I'll remind you that even Sharia law does not excuse Israel's murder of Muslims. I'll remind you that even the most distorted views of Sharia law do not support anti-Muslim sentiments. I'm not sure what gays and lesbians have to do with Israel murdering Muslims. I don't think you know either. I think you're just looking to hate Islam. Your name wouldn't actually be Glenn Greenwald -- would it? Because you're spouting the same crap that Greenwald spouted some 5 years ago when I first encountered Greenwald, and he was spewing anti-Islam hate because, "as a gay man," he was worried about Islam for reasons nearly identical to what you're saying. There's no proof that Islam intends to take over my life and impose Sharia law on me. Being realistic, then, I notice how ridiculous Glenn's and your over-reactions are. I hear that on Pluto, there are beings who eat heterosexual humans alive. Maybe we should nuke Pluto before they come here and force us heteros to be dinner.

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August 17, 2009 | url
Votes: -1

Deb said:

... Never mentioned Israel, Sean. You did- mention both Sharia and Israel in both your posts. I specifically responded to your assertion that "there's the ridiculous over-playing of the "evils" of Sharia law." It was you who created the straw man. I haven't said a single word about Jews or Israel, other than to point out your appalling ignorance re: "I mean, there's not even a connection between Hitler and Islam." I'm a straight female, for the record- easy to confuse my views with those of a gay man though, evidently. I am very involved with Maryam Namazie's One-Law-For-All campaign, which I've linked to. Before you continue to spout off about "right-wing Zionists", the group, if anything, has a predominantly left-wing base- but of the kind who genuinely uphold universal human rights, not someone such as yourself. You would do very well to educate yourself just a bit about Sharia, and specifically the issues relating to Sharia tribunals in the UK and Europe, which you evidently have very little knowledge of. "There's no proof that Islam intends to take over my life and impose Sharia law on me." Good to know your line of thinking- a statement that betrays a profoundly selfish viewpoint. One that is also profoundly "racist", because to say "it won't affect me" is to imply that Muslim women, for example, who've migrated to the West should be subjected to "their" discriminatory cultural mores, while native Westerners continue to enjoy genuine human rights. That you should also dismiss it by framing it as these women choosing to "follow" or “interpret” Sharia as such gives an interesting insight into your twisted logic. But go on- respond with non sequitur references to "Israel" and "Zionists" if it makes you feel righteous.

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August 17, 2009
Votes: +1

Sean O'Neil said:

... Deb, you're not making any sense. I mentioned Israel and Zionists EARLIER in this thread, so I was trying to stay consistent, which is something you're not doing. You're hopscotching all over, with the only apparent target as far as I can see... Sharia law. There are plenty of old world "laws" in dusty books around the planet. I'm not sure what referring to any of them means. I'm not sure you know. I'm pretty sure you're not making it clear why you chose to make a big stink on Sharia law in this thread. It came from out of nowhere. Nobody mentioned it in any relevant context. I mentioned it as a joke, because it's something I see crazed Zionists using as a pretext for killing Muslims. Somehow you took that to mean that we need to examine the dire threats posed by Sharia law. I'm not sure why you think we need to examine this question. I guess everyone needs a pet issue. Yours is Sharia law. Good for you. Have fun stirring up paranoia and fear. Maybe you should also go on a campaign against Zoroastrian faith, or Mithraism.

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August 17, 2009 | url
Votes: -1

Deb said:

... And by the way Sean- I take it you didn't watch the video I linked to- only 10 minutes, including Johann Hari, Ibn Warraq, Maryam Namazie. I would be very interested to hear your thoughts, SPECIFICALLY about what they have to say. NOT about Israel and Zionists. Not even about my own "anti-Islam hate" and "distorted views of Sharia law". Just a response about what these people have to say on the topic.

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August 17, 2009
Votes: +1

Roger said:

Deb You are wasting your time trying to educate wastes of space like sean o'neil. Quite clearly he knows nothing of muslim countries or islamic society, he exists in a world from the other side of the looking glass, where muslim rage boys detonate themselves amongst Israeli civilians and he calls it jewish murder. Where the iranian revolutionary guards imprison professional women and their children and leave them, no charges, no representation, no hope, those that are still alive are still in jail, for 30 years now, their crimes: being female and educated. Try Pamela Geller's site for more details of the wonderful culture that is islam. Third world crapholes, all of them, because of the third world crap that live there. Of course an insouciant ponce like o'neill won't believe it. He and the rest of the lefties on this site fail the most basic test of manhood, they won't defend their society, they are garbage, all of them.

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August 17, 2009
Votes: +1

Deb said:

... Didn't read your last post Sean before posting my own. "I guess there's the ridiculous over-playing of the "evils" of Sharia law." "There's no proof that Islam intends to take over my life and impose Sharia law on me." "I'm not sure why you think we need to examine this question." And finally......"Have fun stirring up paranoia and fear." Sorry to have even bothered you with the post before this Sean. You think the above named individuals (some of whom are ex-Muslims) are “stirring up paranoia and fear” and “spewing anti-Islam hate”, so I don't have to ask. That's all I needed to know about you. FEAR masquerading as tolerance. And, I might add, misogynistic- although that hardly needs to be pointed out. Oh- and good luck with your "bloodthirsty Zionist" pet issue. Dare I say- you seem just a tad obsessive about it.

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August 17, 2009
Votes: +1

Sean O'Neil said:

... You Islam-haters aren't doing yourselves any credit here. The regular readers of Chris Floyd aren't a bunch of idiot bigots who are salivating for the chance to nuke Islam. Whom do you think you're reaching with your hate-preaching? Roger fancies himself an intellectual wit, while displaying neither humor nor brainpower. Perhaps Roger needs to return to the junior high school forums he frequents for his "debate" skills polishing. Deb, I just don't understand. I doubt she understands herself. She contradicts herself with every post. She stabs in the dark, shoots into nothingness, spits into the wind. And condemns Sharia law. Bully for you, Deb! Now go get those evil Mithraists! And the Puritans who burned witches at the stake, travel back in time and get them too! Do it all for social purity, Deb! We need YOUR type of purification. Really, we do. What a laugher.

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August 18, 2009 | url
Votes: +1

Roger said:

	Deb Never mind the creep o'neil, just ask yourself this question: Would the supposed "men" on this site defend you? You know the answer don't you? And so do they.
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August 18, 2009
Votes: +1

DeanTaylor said:

mea culpa, Herr Beesley... In limning your stomach-turning persona, did I employ the term "cock-sucker"? Sincere and profuse apologies to the gay community. I most surely meant to write "self-fellating." Mea culpa. "Afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted," i.e., you, Herr Beesley in particular, and the Anglo-American prerogative in general, are a bit too "comfy" to suit any one's more enlightened sensibilities. Try News Corp., or Bill O'Reilly where you will most assuredly be readily accepted--without rancor or contradiction, both of which are galling to crypto-white-supremacists like yourself.

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August 18, 2009
Votes: +0

Deb said:

... I'd already pointed out that Sean "I-will-hunt-down-every-last-bloodthirsty-Zionist" is a misogynist pig. He is also disturbingly inconsistent, accusing me of two entirely incongruous things: 1. Monomania (about Sharia) 2. "Hopscotching"; stabs in the dark; inconsistency in argument. Sean- you can’t have it both ways. Either my argument involves the kind of Knight’s move thinking that you display (Jewish Holocaust ......Israel.......Muslims…..Sharia finance....bloodthirsty Zionists), or it's about one thing. I have talked about only one thing here, I don't deny that (although you tried to bring in your twisted "Zionist" obsession). And there has been no inconsistency in what I've said. Sean generalizes about “hopscotching”, but is too irrational (or ill-informed) to point out WHAT this alleged inconsistency is. I think what Sean is attempting to say is that he DISAGREES with me, which is another thing altogether. It takes me back to my first post. For anyone interested, please watch this. Pat Condell's recent video “Apologists for Evil” brilliantly sums up the contempt I have for a person like Sean O'Neil who is the kind of person who would "put his mother in a burqa to avoid being called intolerant." In fact, Sean is described in great detail here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4FpTvp0tgs Johann Hari also describes, much better than I, a distain for Sean O'Neil types. Don't know how Chris Floyd, who's been conspicuously silent here, reconciles himself with the fact that the journalist whom he so glowingly quoted a few years back is one of the most vocal people campaigning against Sharia. Is he a hate-preacher too, Chris? Curious to hear your views. (Chris, not Sean. PLEASE, not Sean).

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August 18, 2009
Votes: +1

Deb said:

	... And just to remind anyone who missed this clanger from Sean O'Neil (and I quote): "I MEAN, THERE'S NOT EVEN A CONNECTION BETWEEN HITLER AND ISLAM." I still don't know if that's denial, or just gross ignorance. I think it's the latter, but would not be surprised if the former played a part given his "bloodthirsty Zionist" pre-occupation.
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August 18, 2009
Votes: +1

Sean O'Neil said:

... Deb, you're humorous. You're all over the map again, and using Abe Foxman's trick now. That's cute. Is this the new ADL tactic -- you don't scream ANTI-SEMITIC! any more, you just go straight for Islam's jugular, by whatever means necessary... in this case, attacking SHARIA LAW which supposedly THREATENS EVERYONE! Hurry home, people! Hide under your covers! Sharia Law is floating around in people's minds! We're all going to die because of SHARIA LAW! Holy frijole, Deb. You're positively paranoid and definitely unhinged.

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August 18, 2009 | url
Votes: +0

DeanTaylor said:

screwing Mother Beeseley--but good! [Beeseley]: "...my shares in Goldman Sachs have done really well, thank you." Really? Please consider: "Monday afternoon, Goldman Sachs reported much larger than expected first quarter profits....No one should be surprised. The Federal Reserve has provided the banks with lots of cheap funds through its various emergency lending facilities and quantitative easing. The Federal Reserve has permitted the banks and financial houses to park vast sums of unmarketable paper on its books—securities made nearly worthless by the misjudgment and avarice of bankers. In return, the Fed has provided these scions of finance with fresh funds, cheaply, that they may lend at healthy rates on credit cards, auto loans and even mortgages. While the Fed cuts the banks slack, the bankers are busy turning the screws on their debtors by raising credit card rates and fees, and harassing distressed borrowers with all the zeal of the Roman army sacking Palestine. This all comes at a cost to someone—AMERICA'S ELDERLY. Many retirees depend on interest from certificates of deposit. Those rates are down dramatically, and as CDs expire retirees are compelled to reinvest their savings at lower rates and live on less. They can take comfort that their sacrifices are helping pay off Wall Streets losses from the lavish bonuses paid bankers. For example, the $70.3 million Goldman doled to CEO Lloyd Blankfein in 2007" [Morici; stress added]. He might have mentioned the felons at AIG-FP--as Goldman-Sachs' "insurer-of-choice"--to the mix of rentiers and other kleptocrats. Herr Beeseley, super-patriot yahoo out in the hinterlands somewhere, is, essentially, an enemy of the people, i.e., of a working class attempting to live their lives free of that mercenary code (read: greed) referred to as "the American Way." And this, a policy of self-aggrandizement marketed to the hopelessly naive as being endorsed by the Good Lordy Lordy via the barnyard theology of Jimmy Swaggarts and Jerry Falwells in your insular community. Said another way: the Good Lordy Lordy does not give a flying fuck that you have a sound stock portfolio this quarter. That "belief system" is merely Weberian "rationalization" working at a fever pitch--and, small wonder, what with America's coffers to loot within your own delimited time frame. All of this prescinds from the ludicrous argument of working to the American Dream--so-called. The Nazis of the 1940s--not America's Nazi's, e.g., Wall Street or the "captains of industry"--prescribed a similar "Arbeit macht frei" ruse. In that instance, though, the collective was under extreme duress, whereas the fatuous collective buying into that chimera today are, well, like you--the result of inbreeding gone awry. Since the time of Milhous' unlinking of the dollar from gold--and the knowing and consequent handing over of all that lovely new volatility to Wall Street--we have gone from a production-based economy, implying, inter alia, the possibility of decent wages for American workers, to one that is debt-based, implying, "screw over American labor and their families, i.e., their wish for decent wages. We'll just give them 'access' to debt instead!" Similarly, we have given China--which is the lucky possessor of two trillion US dollars worth of bad paper--"access" to OUR debt via T-bills, which T-bills feeding our, perforce, endlessly-proliferating military aggression around the globe. "The financial 'wealth creation' game is over. Economies emerged from World War II relatively free of debt, but the 60-year global run-up has run its course. Finance capitalism is in a state of collapse, and marginal palliatives cannot revive it. The U.S. economy cannot 'inflate its way out of debt,' because this would collapse the dollar and end its dreams of global empire by forcing foreign countries to go their own way....So the government tries to recover the happy Bubble Economy years by getting debt growing again, hoping to re-inflate real estate and stock market prices. That was, after all, the Golden Age of finance capital’s world of using debt leverage to bid up the book-price of fictitious capital assets."

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August 19, 2009
Votes: +0

DeanTaylor said:

screwing Grandma--part II II. "Today, the financial sector is translating its affluence (at taxpayer expense), into the political power to pry yet more public infrastructure away from state and local communities and from the public domain at the national level, Thatcher- and Blair-style as it is sold off to absentee buyers-on-credit to pay off public debt (while cutting taxes on wealth yet further). No one remembers the cry for what Keynes called 'euthanasia of the rentier.' We have entered the most oppressive rentier epoch since feudal European times" [Hudson]. "Working people are not being crushed by accident, but according to plan. It is the way the system is designed to work. Bernanke knows that sustained demand requires higher wages and a vital middle class. But Bernanke works for the banks, which is why the Fed's monetary policies reflect the goals of the investor class. Bubblenomics is not the way to a strong/sustainable economy, but it is an effective tool for shifting wealth from one class to another. The Fed's job is to facilitate that objective, which is why the economy is headed for the rocks. The financial meltdown is the logical outcome of the Fed's monetary policies. That's why it's a mistake to call the current slump a 'recession'. It's not. It's a planned demolition" [Whitney]. So, therefore--and finally--do you recognize how wrongheaded it is to feed into "the System" (and boasting about doing so as well!), which System needs to be carefully, but decisively, undone? You aspire to the kleptocracy which is bleeding America white, ergo, you are not a patriot, but, rather, a self-aggrandizing bloodsucker hoping against hope to become a beneficiary of the System--an opportunistic looting before the final meltdown. You do not care about America--you care about Beeseley's own "piece" of America. Shame on you--phony. [citations: ]http://www.counterpunch.org]

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August 19, 2009
Votes: +0

Lester Ness said:

anti-immigrant crap-talk nothing new 100 years ago, people like mickey were saying the same nonsense about my grandfathers. Somehow square-heads from Norway, Holland, Germany, etc., were going to ruin everything. They didn't go to the right churches! (Or not at all, in grandpa Ness' case). Yet somehow the USA hasn't disappeared. In 1910, the population in northwest Iowa (my heimat) was 70% foreign born; I knew most of those guys when I was a boy in the '50s-'60s. If you look around Buena Vista County, you will not find bits of fallen sky!

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August 20, 2009
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