Liberals: There's Satire And There's Satire

Re: the Evil Parade of Humiliation down in Cornwall, it suddenly occurs to me that the Left wasn't always so worried about marchers mocking religion. On the contrary, back in the day they wanted to force public servants to attend such events, and discipline them if they refused:

Mullah Ahmed Khan said they "had legitimate concerns about being the subject of taunts and jokes".

He said in some cases their religious sensibilities would have been offended...

"They were asked, while in uniform, to hand out leaflets during a demonstration where they had legitimate concerns about being the subject of taunts and jokes, and in which in some cases, their religious sensibilities would have been grossly offended by people dressed as terrorists and camels lampooning the Prophet."

Actually, I changed a few words - can you guess which ?

Failure Of Appeasement Shocker!

Those who will not learn from history are doomed to become Leftists - I think that's how it goes anyway. Consider the latest misfortune to strike the Cult of Dave.

The supposed détente between the Tories and the BBC was supposed to be the crowning achievement of the Ayatollah Khameron, but as soon as he's deviated one centimetre from the approved BBC line, all bets are off.

Yes, the news that our favourite unbiased broadcaster's idea of journalism is deciding what line to take then trying to find people to support it will be a shock to the system for folks recently returned from Venus, but for the rest of us only the sheer brass neck of it all stands out. Even so, it's hard to have any sympathy for the Cameron Party - not after they've so thoroughly abased themselves before the BBC previously. Come to think of it, the Tories aren't exactly above borrowing from the Left's playbook themselves.

Forget all the Cameroonatics' pretentious blather about 'detoxifying the brand', all they've really proven is that there's no faster way for a soi dissant Rightist to garner applause from the Liberal media than to turn on his fellow Rightists.

Don't accuse the Tories of being ineffectual though. In so far as Cameron's actual proposals were unbelievably weak, the hysterical reaction shows just how having a Tory leader who sounds like a Guardian editorial merely allows the Left to move the ratchet so far leftwards, they can cast even the mildest policies as evidence of unhinged extremism.

All of which is by way of saying that these events have undermined the whole justification for the Nu Tories. The excuse for the reign of Princess Dave was that he could help make Tory polices palatable to the public, yet he has achieved the exact opposite. In so far as he's given credibility to every stupid libel the Left has every told about Conservatives, he's actually made it harder for Rightist policies to succeed in Britain.

Another Victory For The Immigration Service

Open borders ? What open borders ?

The editor of an Arabic daily newspaper published in London said in an interview on Lebanese television that he would dance in Trafalgar Square if Iranian missiles hit Israel.

Talking about Iran's nuclear capability on ANB Lebanese television on June 27, Abd Al-Bari Atwan, editor-in-chief of Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper, said, "If the Iranian missiles strike Israel, by Allah, I will go to Trafalgar Square and dance with delight

Don't worry though, at least he's found gainful employment.

Bari Atwan founded the pan-Arab daily in London in 1989, and today the paper has a circulation of around 50,000. He is also a regular commentator on Sky News and BBC News 24.

But watch out for those bloggers and their extremist views!

Culture Of Passivity Too Passive

PC Plod is not happy with the response to appeals on the Rhys Jones case. They think they should have more support from the public.

Personally, I find it very surprising. If there's one thing Merseyside Police is famous for, it's the ability of its officers to attract support from unofficial sources. Oh wait... that probably wasn't what they meant. No, on second thought what they meant was they're baffled why the public are reluctant to inform on a gang of heavily-armed sociopaths. Hmmmm.... with deductive skills like that, the case'll be wrapped up in days.

It's great that the Filth claim they'll protect any witnesses, but that does kind of ram home the point that for decades the police have been trying to prevent citizens protecting themselves. Of course, there's the jihad against guns (but at least it's stopped all those shootings!), but there's also the more general war they've waged against the right to self-defence itself. They've spent years telling the public not to get involved, and actively persecuting those who do, but now it turns out they didn't mean it in that way.

But even that's just part of a wider issue. What's with this 'community' thing anyway ? When exactly did the Filth declare independence from the rest of us ? Wasn't Sir Robert Peel's original conception of the police as 'citizens in uniform' ? For anyone still taking that seriously, check the comments threads at the excellent Policeman's Blog, and see how semi-literate constables disparage their fellow citizens as 'civilians' (not that you can't trust them to protect your family). Then again, it comes from the top. Smug yuppie scum police management have abandoned the mucky business of controlling the streets, in favour of political games playing and pseudo-CSI techniques. The only problem is that, in the strict sense of reducing crime, the Nu Police are absolutely useless. Hence why, billions of pounds later, it all turns out to be the fault of the civvies after all.


UPDATE:

JulieM points out the police's less than stellar record of protecting 'civvies'

SS Social Experiments

While the BBC continues to struggle with the difference between dressing up as a Nazi and actually being a Nazi, it's worth remembering that the BBC wasn't always that sensitive.

Ah no - dressing like a member of the Waffen SS might be verboten, but imitating a member of another murderous fascist organisation, why sir, that's some cutting edge documentary making that is. Hence why, just weeks after July 7, the BBC sent this guy...


...to travel around London with a big rucksack on his back - including a visit to 10 Downing Street. Hilarious, hey ?

Conservatism: Is There Anything It Can't Do ?

USS Neverdock points out this story at the BBC: apparently, women-owned businesses are starting to succeed in Afghanistan. It's a good news story, but the BBC tries to make up for that with its usual tricks:

Since the Taleban were ousted from Afghanistan....

Yes, they were 'ousted' by some mysterious force. Call it a wild shot in the dark, but I'm thinking if the BBC were reporting a huge increase in cannibalism after the 'ousting', they wouldn't be using the passive voice to describe the defeat of a hideous regime.

Anyway, back to the story:

Since the Taleban were ousted from Afghanistan, many women have found that gaining or regaining their rights is a long and difficult process.

Yep, since the defeat of one of the most misogynistic regimes in history, women have really been having a hard time. Hello ?

Yet in some places, they are managing to chip away at patriarchal institutions.

Nice to see our unbiased news service adopting the language of the femiloons. These people see the hand of the patriarchy in bad weather, but I'm thinking we can be a little more specific about what ails women in Afghanistan.

Actually, it turns out that the BBC does know the real villain, after all:

[North Afghanistan's biggest city, Mazar-e-Sharif] remains socially conservative, with most women going about in white or blue burkhas, the all-encompassing veil.

Yes, indeed, social conservatives. Hey, this is the broadcaster that objects to the crude generalisations involved in calling a terrorist 'a terrorist', but now they can't see any difference at all between opposing compulsory gay propaganda in primary schools and insisting your wife wears a giant bag on her head ?

It gets better:

The shop owners are getting good returns, giving them more financial security.

And they appear to be popular with the customers - in conservative Afghanistan, many families do not want their womenfolk entering shops run by men.

Hey, BBC, what exactly is it they want to 'conserve' - is it some kind of ideology, ?

Some conservative local clerics are unhappy with the moves.

Conservative clerics ? Does that mean they worship Lady Thatcher ? But that's as close as we get to a hint that the problem may not be over-enthusiasm for privatisation and small government after all. Just don't ask what the 'clerics' actually believe.

Chindamo: It Gets Worse

Not only a new ID - lest his record of homicidal insanity unfairly impinge on his social life - but also a free house - so if you've been caught out by the recent rate rises, you know what to do.

Teachers Complain: Boys Still Not Gay Enough

Yessss, gang violence, guns, thuggery, all very bad but there's still no excuse for this kind of whiny androphobia. Boys think blowing stuff up is cool - deal with it.

Again, it's Libs fumbling with the whole reality/fantasy thing. One more time: writing a story about being a footballer does not make you a footballer (mind you, judging by Wednesday night, playing for England doesn't make you a footballer either).

UPDATE:

The whole 'not gay' craze seems to be an international phenomenon. Down in the comments, JuliaM points out this. As the folks at Free Republic asked: if he'd drawn the school on fire, would they have evacuated the building and charged him with arson ?

Outrage D'Jour

Secret courts ? Profiling ? The media gagged ? Law-abiding people held to account for crimes they could commit at some time in the future ?

It's like every pretentious BBC script ever come true! So how come Shameless Shami hasn't ordered Liberty to go to WHINECON ONE, latte Libs aren't chaining themselves to the railings outside the Westminister Asylum and Harold Pinter isn't penning a play about it all ?

Ah, well, you see, it's like this...

Hey, forget the rest, in so far as Liberals claim to be so horrified by the prospect of family break-up that they won't allow us to deport murderers, the humbug meter just jumped off the dial.

Anyone remember the Forest Gate Kittens ? A source had provided technically accurate details of a bomb said to be held at an address occupied by a family with multiple criminal convictions, including firearms offences, and known to have Islamofascist sympathies, but the Left was enraged that the police hit the address. Apparently, police searching an address is a sign of the impending dark night of fascism, except if they leave with all the kids in the house.

See, this is what I was on about here - except that in that case the mother actually was delusional - really mentally ill, rather than potentially suffering a made-up illness invented by a disbarred fanatic and diagnosed by an untrained quack. Other than that, the cases are identical.

Incidentally, this is why I disagree with Steve. The whole 'Human Rights' scam isn't despised just because it protects criminals, but also because it fails to protect the innocent. It's all the calories, none of the taste. Like I said at the top, here's your over-bearing state power right here, but no: the only law the human rights lobby consistently respect is the one about 'no enemies to the Left'.

Could it get sleazier ? Why, yes! Note the government's slippery non-denial denial. Hey, these are people who'll set the Competition Commission loose on mobile phone companies, supermarkets and airlines, but social workers abducting babies for fun and profit ? Zzzzzzzzzzz....

If nothing else, these people are potentially guilty of fraud, so why aren't the fraud squad carrying out dawn raids ? Actually, given that they're social workers, a noon raid would probably do just as well, still, why aren't doors being kicked in ?

This is what I was talking about yesterday. Once the administration of law is contaminated by the need to 'send the right message' - as our idiot Liberal friends would no doubt say - then all hope of justice is lost. I guess the only way we'll get members of the Liberal Cult interested in claims of State-sponsored child abduction is if we can find proof they're sending the kids to Guantanamo Bay.

Philosophy With Laban

Laban raises an interesting question: how often does stuff have to happen before it ceases to be an isolated incident ?

Meanwhile, over at B-BBC, Laban reports on the BBC's struggle with the important distinction between reality and fantasy. It strikes me that John Sweeney may not be the best person to be accusing people of having a Hitler complex. Just wait until the BBC finds out about the 'Sealed Knot' and their sinister plan to make this country an absolutist monarchy.

Meanwhile, I guess it's up to the Blogosphere to investigate any connections between the organisation which secretly films people while they're drinking heavily and then quotes them out of context, and the other BBC, the one that thinks it's a gross invasion of privacy to ask that a publicly-funded organisation conduct its own affairs transparently.

Where Did The Libertarianism Go ?

Samizdata has decided to go all Guardian on us.

As ever, the first riposte is to wonder why these advocates of Vulcan justice never seem to notice the queue of social workers, psychologists, aromatherapists and various other candidates for the Golgafrinchan B Ark, all lined up ready to file into court and explain why Joe Scumbag is the real victim.

Let's not have any pious sermonising about the need to cleanse our courts of emotionalism - the judicary are perfectly prepared to put with all manner of weeping and whailing, but only if it serves the cause of letting lowlife off the hook.

Equally, in so far as the argument seems to rest on the belief that we should trust our betters on the bench, rather than risk contaminating the process with the idiot emotionalism of the lower orders, it's an odd argument for Libertarians to make. Surely if you think people are ignorant morons, that kind of undercuts the case for Libertarianism ?

There's something more to it though. Communism fails, in part at least, because it requires people to sacrifice themselves and their own natural instincts to conform to some absurd ideological model of how things should be. Now the courts are going the same way.

It is entirely right and proper that people should demand, and even expect, that the courts should provide satisfaction - it is a natural human instinct, and we on the Right, above all else, recognise the importance of dealing with humanity as it is.

More to the point, the supposed contrast between the rationality of the courts and the fickleness of the (hypothetical) mob is a fraud. On the contrary, it is the pro-courts side that demands that the whole business of dealing with individual crimes be subordinated to the requirements of social engineering and political theatre. The public are remarkably consistent in wanting the punishment to fit the crime, it's the courts that want the punishment to fit the particular tactical needs of the political establishment at the moment of sentencing.

That's why it's so plain weird to see Libertarian's getting all misty-eyed over the courts. What could be more inimical to the spirit of Libertarianism than victims denied justice by the desire of the State to push its own agenda ?

UPDATE:

OK, there's a bit of life in the comments, so let me clarify my position. There's actually two debates here. The first is the specific question of what should be allowable in court. You can argue that courts should be the sphere of pure logic, insulated from emotionalism, but opposing victim impact statements, even while allowing testimony in mitigation from all manner of voodoo scientists, makes no kind of sense.

The second question is the wider one. What is the legal system actually for ? To protect the innocent and resolve disputes, or to pursue some abstract notion of justice ? It's perfectly possible to oppose victim impact statements even while opposing the determination of the courts to deal with crime solely in the abstract. For that matter, why should people who don't trust the state in any other context nevertheless trust state employees to deliver on such a slippery concept as justice ?

Tactically Irrelevant, But Strategically Important

One thing that's being missed in coverage of the Learco Chindamo case has been the precedent set by the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal. Yes, as an EU citizen, this pond life can't be exported anyway, but now our friends on the Left has established as a legal principle that even non-EU murderers can't be deported, if only they've had the nous to bring their family over with them. Again, to return to a point I made earlier, in so far as the Left opposes deporting even murderers, in what sense do we not have a de facto open borders policy ?

Not Anti-Violence, Just On The Other Side

If the case for Liberalism is so strong, how come we're never allowed to discuss the evidence ? Take the latest in the case of their new pin-up:

Veteran author Gitta Sereny has defended the killer of headteacher Phillip Lawrence's right to anonymity on his eventual release from jail....

Legal experts agree Chindamo would need the protection of a lifetime injunction to hide his identity if he is allowed to stay in Britain...

'Legal Experts' - or, as Earth people say: lawyers.

Ms Sereny said: "I think that if he is released from jail within the next year it is almost inevitable that they should give him anonymity because his life would be made impossible otherwise...

It would be impossible for him to find work and make new friends if he is not granted anonymity.

See, this is what I was saying: in a sane society it's kind of accepted that people have the right to avoid associating with murderous savages.

Meanwhile, the same Left that's consumed with grief for all those homicidal thugs cold-shouldered at the golf club has no problem abusing actual, real victims.

(tip of the hat to you know who)

Steyn Quote D'Jour

Talking of Leftists defending the indefensible:

It's one thing to dislike Bush, it's one thing to hate America. But it's quite another to hate America so much you reflexively take the side of any genocidal psycho who comes along. In their terminal irrelevance, the depraved left has now adopted the old slogan of Cold War realpolitik: like Osama and Mullah Omar, Saddam may be a sonofabitch, but he's their sonofabitch.

And that goes double if your wacky radical posturing leads you to throw your hand in with homicidal gansta trash

We Need The Careful Fact-Checking Of The Blogopshere

The MSM spent yesterday reporting on the latest example of the crimes we don't have any more since Blair took guns off the street. A Liberal law-enforcement initiative having comprehensively failed, the MSM naturally decided we needed even more Liberalism. Apparently, it's all about the poverty! I mean, scousers, man! Who wouldn't want to cap someone living in that post-nuclear wasteland ?

Even wackier, the Jeremy Vine Show had on a guy from a Home Office-supported charidee which campaigns for more social welfare spending. In other words, the government is using our money to lobby itself to spend more of our money. At least when the Right call for stiffer sentances, we do it on our own dime.

Needless to say, our charitable activist believed we needed to spend more money - oh, and force schools to teach black history (huh ? is he saying that there's some link between the homies and violence ?).

The only problem with all the above is that Croxteth just ain't that bad. Yes, it is in Liverpool, but leaving aside that geographical fact, it is a fairly blameless slice of suburbia. High employment, lots of owner-occupation, cutesy semis in cul-de-sacs, blah, blah, blah.

To the point, journalists living in a hellhole like the Republic of Ken have got some cheese calling Croxteth a slum (plus, in so far as it's almost totally white, the lack of really compelling black role models is unlikely to be a factor, unless - perish the thought - the MSM is keeping something from us).

There is a real story here, but not one our MSM will touch. Members of the underclass will always do violence to each other, no government can stop that, but the problem now is that people can't isolate themselves from that. Needless to say, in our PC era no one in the MSM would dare put it that way, but that raises the question of chickens and eggs.

The horrors of social exclusion are supposed to be a given, but isn't the exclusion of the violent and the deranged a feature of a healthy society ? We've had forty years of non-judgemental engagement yet, strangely enough, young children were able to return from football training in safety back in the bad old days before we employed 800 000 yoof workers. The assailant needs a role model ? Hey, Libs, thanks to you he's already got one: Learco Chindamo.

Absolute Lack-Of-Morals Authority

As the Great Ann once said, when right-wingers rant, at least there's a point. Take the criticism of Doreen Lawrence after she injected herself into the London Mayoral election. The Right criticised her idiotic arguments, while the Left pouted and whined about how unfair we were.

On the other hand, what, exactly, is the point of the Left's attack on Frances Lawrence ? They can't attack her position - she hasn't made any political statements - so instead they call her a fraud and 'The Black Widow'. This is how five year olds argue. Expect to see the Guardian describe her as a 'poo-poo head' any time now.

Unlike the Left's bogus charge against critics of Doreen Lawrence, these guys really are questing the authenticity of Frances Lawrence's suffering. They want to claim that Frances Lawrence is motivated by some kind of hidden agenda, rather than merely appalled at seeing the low-life who murdered her husband escape deportation. They'll throw every pot and pan to stop people noticing that their latest pin-up boy really is a murderous savage.

After all, it's not like the bar is exactly set high here - Robert Mugabe, Myra Hindley, Osama Bin Laden and Mumia Abu-Jamal have all qualified for the Left's Hug-A-Thug program, but even the experienced apologists for evil on the Left have drawn a blank trying to find a way to reinvent Chindamo as some kind of victim or social activist (if only he was a cop killer!).

We're back to Evan Sayet again, and the nihilism of the modern Left. Take away the murder, and what else has this creature done ? Precisely. Learco Chindamo has become a Lefty pin-up because of his homicidal insanity. That's all you need to have Liberals swooning these days, a record of insane violence.

Big Huge Enormous Shocker! (Bumped For A Big Update)

On the plus side, at least the Learco Chindamo fiasco has shed some light on the folks running our legal system. Consider the head of the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal, Sir Henry Hodge. How come he's so keen to ensure a murderous scumbag gets to stay in Britain ?

Well, it's funny you should ask because....

Sir Henry is the former chairman of the National Council for Civil Liberties - now known as Liberty.

Yep, the guy supposedly guarding our borders is a former head of one of the most wacked-out lefty nut groups in the known universe. Suddenly, it all becomes clear!

UPDATE:

Actually, his whole CV reads like something from Richard Littlejohn. I guess this must be what the Left means about having an independent judiciary.

UPDATE II:

Down in the comments, Umbongo points out good evidence that our man on the tribunal, the 'ordinary guy in the street Joe Six-Pack' lay member, may not be entirely impartial.

Academic Boldly Defies Stereotype

It strikes me that this guy has managed to produce almost the perfect academic paper: it's got the snobby sneering at tabloids, blames everything on Lady Thatcher and tries to claim suspicion of a vast, unaccountable bureaucracy is identical to hatred of Europeans (zzzzzzzzzzzz!). All he really needed was to work in a gay angle and the Guardian column would have been a cert.

Is it ironic, or just stupid, that a guy whining about stereotypes produces an argument so dependent on absurd Leftists caricatures ? Meanwhile, productive members of the public are wondering under what train wreck definition this garbage counts as scholarship.

BBC Bias: How It Is Done

Good catch from Snafu. It's an example of a more general phenomenon. Leftists will fight tooth and nail against giving any real clout to victim impact statements, even while the courts are fill to the brim with psychologists, sociologists and other purveyors of voodoo science, all appearing for the defence.

One More Thing

Thinking further about Learco Chindamo: can the Left at least stop pretending to believe in anything other than a total open borders policy ? Once you decide murder is no reason to deport someone, then you've pretty much lost any credibility to talk about enforcing border controls.

Non-Outrage D'Jour

Remember that church in America that refused to hold a funeral service for an ex-serviceman just because he was gay ?

Well, you'll never guess but.....

Liberalism Eating Itself

Actually, I'm thinking it would be more efficient if I just turned the blog over to JulieM. She points out another outbreak of insanity on the Left: femiloons vs race hustlers. To quote the tagline from Aliens Vs Predator - whoever wins, we lose!

Well, At Least It's Not 'Right-Wing'

It's an interesting question - who looks more uncomfortable: the Lib Dums talking about law & order, or the Cameroonatics talking about the NHS ? In both cases they have that 'dog walking on his hind legs' quality.

They know they can't tell the public what they really believe, so instead they fumble around for what they think the public wants to hear. Trouble is that they're so divorced from anything approaching real life that they never quite get it right, hence the Ayatollah Khameron's reliance on 84 policy groups to tell him what he should say.

I'm guessing this is why the Tories latest big idea is to stop even trying to say anything positive about health-care reform, and just rely on idiotic scaremongering. It says a lot about where the Tories are now that they've made the inheritors of the stinky cess pit of socialism look like deep thinkers.

The Mysterious Art Of Journalism

US uber blogger Ace points out a certain sleight of hand in the MSM's indictment of bloggers.

It's a brilliant point - all I'd add is that applying the same logic the MSM uses to dismiss bloggers, you have to seriously question the value of actual journalism. The MSM claims that bloggers shoot from the hip, while they themselves can spend *hours* researching articles on medical malpractice, police corruption and friendly fire incidents (and possibly all three at once). Sure, but becoming, say, a competent neurosurgeon takes over a decade, yet give him twenty four hours to read the 'Dummies Guide To Brain Stuff' and Joe Journalist is ready to explain why Professor Jones is an incompetent weasel. Where, exactly, is the dividing line between ill-informed rants and precisely-crafted journalism ? Two hours research ? Thirty minutes ? And do you get a pass if you've, y'know, spent your working life in that particular sector of the economy ?

On the other hand, it turns out that journalism is such a complex art form that no one outside the MSM can possibly have any worthwhile opinion about it. Even the question of whether or not the BBC should be swapping round the time line on its documentaries is apparently too complex for mere mortals to comment on.

Evil Bigots Proven Right (Again!)

See, I told you the sodium penthol would work - here's Beeboid Kirsten O'Brien:

A BBC children's presenter has said that "everyone at CBBC is either gay or childless and don't like kids".

Well, quite. Doubtless, there'll be a non-clarifying clarification issued anytime now, but her comments are both blindingly obvious and track perfectly with what others have said previously.

Oops - guess it'll have to be Plan B for the Left. We've had years of them yammering about how they think companies should be forced to hire a representative workforce, but now it turns out that they're a company that looks like Brighton. They can't produce the weather forecast without someone to offer the black perspective on rain, but children's TV doesn't require input from anybody with actual children.

As ever with these BBC revelations, the thing that grates is that any outsider who said the same thing would have been smeared as a paranoid bigot. Here's another case where the Right called the result and the scorers but, funnily enough, it turns out to be an isolated case with no wider resonance whatsoever - and don't raise the question of why a children's presenter is the only BBC staffer in history to mention Palestinian TV's unique approach to education.

It Begins ?

The Dialogue's Poor, The Characters Are Repulsive And The Plot Doesn't Make Sense

Thanks to the indefatigable JulieM, I find out that we're in for another round of kabuki theatre. Yep, another scumbag is exploting human rights to beat the system, and the government is just shocked - shocked! - by the whole thing.

In other words, a Liberal government is shocked that a tribunal stuffed with Liberals uses Liberal laws they themselves introduced to allow a scumbag to escape justice. Honestly, it's like an Alzheimer's joke - there are probably civilisations in the Pegasus galaxy that have heard how our Liberals use the human rights angle to protect scumbags.

Say what you like about Lady Thatcher, but at least when she privatised stuff, she didn't claim she was being forced into it by nasty old bureaucrats. Meanwhile, the Great Clunking Fist wishes us to know that he'd love to help but, like, it's out of his hands, init ?

It'd be hard to top Nu Lab's political amnesia for sleaziness, but you-know-who have managed it. The Tories are equally outraged, and equally short of actual policies....

But wait - Mr Tory would like me to point out that they're thinking about considering a possible review of the Human Rights Act. True, but even if the HRA was ripped up tomorrow, the underlying legislation would still be in place, so we'd still end up with the usual suspects scoring huge legal aid fees for helping scumbags avoid justice.

That's not even the best of it. Even if a successful scumbagectomy could be performed, in so far as Italy is in the EU, this low-life has the right to jump back on the next plane. But find an MSM outlet that will point that out.

In other words, wacko Liberal activists are using Liberal legislation to pursue Liberal objectives, the Tories say they're appalled, but not to the extent of doing anything about it, and the EU has managed to screw things up beyond repair anyway. But remember, if you don't vote, the Reverend Dale will be mightily upset!

Outrage D'Jour

This story is rightfully getting a lot of play in the Blogosphere. That's good, but it's still pleasing to see an MSM outlet pick up on the BBC's disgraceful behaviour.

The other thing is that it's amusing to see the Left's hierarchy in action. Normally, the BBC would die in a trench rather than mention the insane violence of the animal rights nuts, but when there's Islamofascism to be excused, the lab rat lovers are under the bus before you can say 'smoking beagle'. It's like victimhood poker in reverse.

Slice Of Life

Thinking about this story, it occurred to me that this must be the 'modern Britain' that The Dave is so anxious for Conservatives to be at ease with.

Even More Liberal Frauds

Returning to a theme from last week, the folks over at Ace of Spades reminisce over a few more famous Liberal frauds in this post and comments.

Non-Outrage D'Jour

Even by MSM standards, it's an achievement to say something stupid even before the first sentence is complete. Here's the Times:

EVERY foreigner in America, including British visitors, would be required to carry an ID card bearing photograph and fingerprints under plans drawn up by Rudolph Giuliani....

Including British visitors ? Why, I'm just outraged! How could anyone think Britons like Captain Hook, the Tipton Taliban, the Forest Gate Kittens et al could be a threat ? Yes, this extra security will be a pest, but there's an easy way round it: don't go to America. The Yanks aren't imposing on anyone's rights, they're just defending their homeland. Meanwhile our MSM sneers that people who take national defence seriously are playing the security card, and the government hands out citizenship at the drop of a hat - and we're supposed to be shocked that a British passport ain't what it used to be ?

You Don't Have To Be Mad To Be A Liberal Pin-Up, But It Helps

Spookily enough, the week after the David Shayler meltdown, the unspeakably wonderful Ann Coulter has given us a rundown of some of America's favourite Liberal pin-ups. Apparently, the Left's 'hump 'em and dump' attitude to the victim d'jour isn't just a British thing.

Worst Attempt At Victimhood Evah!

Will no one speak up for millionaire authoresses ?

Core Support Still Flaking Away, Huh?

The Reverend Dale is just appalled at all of you folk who don't take take part in those little ceremonies we have every so often. Hmmmm....

You know, bagging people for not voting works better when you're not the highest profile blogger for a party whose face cards keep yukking it up over the way they can screw the the base with impunity because 'they've got nowhere else to go'.

Ah, but we do, Iain, we do: pubs, footy, cinema.... anywhere really other than spend our time voting for people who clearly despise us.

There's more to it than that though. Dale's post sums up where the country in general, and the Tories specifically, have gone down the philosophical U-bend. It was probably never true that an Englishman could go through life unaware of the existence of any branch of government except the post office, but it does express an important - and uniquely anglospheric - ideal.

Our freedom isn't the right to indulge in politics, it's the right not to, the right to go about your business free of government interference, not the right to try and make it interfere with someone else. At best, the Dale doctrine sees government as some kind of retarded ninja monkey, needing endless supervision by the public lest it go a murderous rampage. At worst, it sees the public as servants of the state, to be conscripted as sock puppets in whatever idiotic production the political classes dream up. Either way, it testifies to what may just be the most obnoxious characteristic of our political class right now: their enormous sense of entitlement.

Would That Be Just The One Way Ticket, Mr Bin Laden ?

Speaking personally, I try to avoid 'loveable Oirishmen' on general princple, but even so Michael O'Leary seems to be suffering a particularly heavy case of weaselitis. Take his latest wacky ad campaign.

Doubtless, our friends on the Left will already leaping into action to protest this, right ? Ah no, apparently eating during Ramadam is an offence against PC, but wacky terrorist humour is just a laugh. Guess we all need to lighten up.

Uh OK, Libs, how about my idea for a new campaign: Nick Griffin saying 'Now, it's cheaper than ever to send them all back' ? Funny, eh ?

Liberalism Kills

Every time I turn on the radio and hear some government drone explaining how 'lessons have been learned', I think 'who have the social workers killed now ?' Down in the comments to this post, JulieM points out that they've struck again.

On the plus side, at least they've launched an inquiry - that ought to do it. Not to give the end away, but I'm guessing it'll turn to be the system wot done it. Again. There's not a lot you can say about the fast food industry, but at least when a 17 year old pizza delivery boy runs someone over, he gets charged. Our hard-working, highly trained, professional social workers don't have to deal with that kind of accountability.

In fact, in so far as a job in social work appears to involve no standards, responsibilities or any sense of vocation whatsoever, is it any surprise that their 'clients' are so uniformly screwed-up ? It's like appointing George Best as an alcohol counsellor.

But that's not it. What really grates is that every time we have a case like this, we get one of the little weenies trotting out the old line that they're criticised both for seizing kids unnecessarily and for acting too late. Well, true, but only in the sense that in both cases the decision is driven by ideological loopiness.

Look at the three famous cases of supposed satanic ritual abuse: Orkney, Pembrokeshire and Rochdale. Now look at three cases where social workers failed to act: this one, Victoria Climbie and Toni-Ann Byfield.

You know, it's like there's some kind of pattern there....

Incidentally, to return to one of last week's themes, here's more proof that the race hustlers are a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Left. Where vulnerable black girls are concerned, social workers may as well just go the whole hog and turn up wearing robes and a scythe, but Trev, Lee and the rest of freak show don't want to know. No enemies to the Left, homies ?

Anyway, we're back to Evan Sayet's famous speech and the warped nature of modern Leftism. Liberalism is not only built around the cult of victimhood but, as the yang to that yin, they believe that those who aren't victims must, by definition, be guilty.

That's how we ended up with social workers in Rochdale engaging in a literal witch hunt to try and prove that innocent families were hotbeds of sexual abuse, even in the absence of any of that, y'know, 'evidence' thing. Hey, they were traditional British families, so they clearly evil.

Meanwhile, those kids unfortunate enough to fall into the hands of designated victims are doomed. Who are we to impose our British concept of 'child abuse' on effnick persons, just because they live in Britain ? Ditto, add in the fact that in the three cases above the kids were in the hands of either lunatics or criminals and that's enough to put any social worker into moral equivalence Nirvana.

As long as we allow political hacks to use social work as a cover for social engineering, these deaths are going to keep happening. Hence, why they need to keep hiding the truth behind blather about lessons being learned.

Yes, I Can See An Overlap

While popular Leftist blog 'The BBC' takes out an onion for those British residents in Club Gitmo- none of whom were, technically speaking, resident at the time they were captured - we need to check out the comments at B-BBC for the real story on them.

Same ol', same ol'. Still, it did amuse me to see this on the BBC's page:

Libyan-born Omar Deghayes was granted refugee status with his family in the 1980s.

He grew up in Brighton, was privately educated and studied law at British universities. Amnesty International said he wanted to be a human rights lawyer.

Well, quite.

Quote Of The Day

We now live in a docudrama world in which techniques of fiction and nonfiction are starting to blur. Many reporters think objectivity is a myth. They see journalism as inherently a subjective exercise in which the feelings and the will of the journalist function to reveal the truth of what has occurred. Two results are the emotional commitment to powerful but untrue story lines, and a further loss of credibility for the press.

BLANK Cheque

Who'd have thunk it ? The BoJo-obsessed BLANKers turn out to be on Komrade Ken's payroll - by which I mean on the public payroll thanks to Livingstone. There's plenty of things wrong with public money being used to hire political hit men, but I'm just bemused by the idea of the supposed representatives of da homies in da hood acting as errand boys for some old white dude. Keepin' it real!

How To Defeat Racism By Raping People

Free clue for the MSM: just because you refuse point-blank to report something doesn't make it a 'hidden world'. And that's without even considering the chutzpah required to claim to be reporting on this hidden world, even while employing the tired old euphemism 'Asian'.

On the other hand, the report is balanced in the sense that not only does it miss out who's doing the crimes, it also misses out who first raised the issue. Well, duh! The BNP, man. They're evil. Horrible. Nasty. The only way we can stop them is by turning a blind eye to the rape of children.

Spare me the faux outrage, Liberals. That is exactly what the Left's position boils down to. Forget any wider issues - police are reluctant to even investigate these cases in the first place. Just the basic facts: young girls are being sexually assaulted and PC Plod doesn't want to know. Here is the warped nature of modern Liberalism on full display.

Just about the only Leftist in the country prepared to speak out is Ann Cryer, and even she's OD'ed on Dhimmi Aid. Take this:

After the trial, Ms Cryer said that young Asian men were caught between two cultures having been brought up in a Western society in families while retaining the cultural values of the Asian sub-continent.

The family and cultural norms of their community means they are expected to marry a first cousin or other relative back in a village in Mirapur or wherever the family comes from. Therefore, until that marriage is arranged they look out for sex.

Firstly, let me say: WTF ? Since when has the Left spent its time defending rapists ? Then there's the delightful argument that they screw children as older girls won't go for them. Hey, and I thought it was something squalid!

But let's leave such trivia aside and focus on Cryer's key point: it's naive young men desperate for some action. Ah yes:

Zulfqar Hussain, 46, and Qaiser Naveed, 32, from east Lancashire, were each jailed for five years and eight months after exploiting two girls aged under 16 by plying them with alcohol and drugs before having sex with them.

Call it a hunch, but I'm thinking these guys are already past the arranged marriage stage.

Still, Cryer does manage one of the great one-line summaries of multiculturalism:

I think there is a problem with the view Asian men generally have about white women. Their view about white women is generally fairly low. They do not seem to understand that there are white girls as moral and as good as Asian girls

Yes, white girls are worse than 'Asian' girls, or as good as, but never better. Hey, in so far as good behaviour amongst white girls doesn't need to be enforced with the machete, I'd say it was white girls who were the more moral - but then again honour killing is another thing Libs would rather you didn't mention.

Of course, there's something else here though. In so far as Cryer's position implies that it's wrong to rape good and moral women, that kind of implies there are girls who really are 'asking for it' - as the saying goes.

Can you imagine the likely reaction if an MP took that position in almost any other context ? But no - whatever brand of sleazy Liberal freak you're dealing with, it all comes down to the cards, after all.

Dhimmis D'Jour

Not the most obvious problem that comes to mind when you think of Muslim doctors in the NHS.

There's No Business Like Leftbusiness!

If you've read the comments to this post, you'll already have heard from JulieM about the latest absurd twist in the case of Truther pin-up David Shayler. Yep, he finally gone all the way round the bend.

Speaking personally, I feel robbed. All the other public statements fat boy has made have been gobbled up by the MSM and discussed endlessly. How come there's no opening segment on Jeremy Vine this time ? Even if his claim is not technically true, surely it speaks to a wider truth ? Shouldn't we ask what it says about the 'overall climate' ?

I tell you, these people are ruthless. Guy picks one bad script and suddenly he can't get his calls returned by anyone on the Left.

Actually, that's kind of the point. Joking apart, the Left has spent years positioning Shayler as a courageous whistleblower, but now we find out his whistle's well and truly blown. It's Cindy Sheehan again: an obviously mentally-unbalanced individual ruthlessly exploited by the Left, then discarded when no longer useful.


Extra Factoid:

Reading Shayler's page at W********, we see this:

He later attended the University of Dundee starting in 1984 where he was editor of the student newspaper Annasach and was responsible for publishing extracts of the book Spycatcher by another former MI5 officer Peter Wright (banned in the UK at the time).

So, even before he joined MI-5, Shayler was playing to Leftard gallery by sticking two fingers up to national security. Nice bit of recruiting!

They're Not BLANKers

Despite the best efforts of the race hustlers to blame all their problems on the Vast White-Wing Conspiracy, light is dawning even in some of the most unlikely places in the black community.

The Guardian Does Science

Much in the way the hillbillies did Ned Beatty in 'Deliverance'. Ace has the full gruesome details.

The problem with the whole Gerbil Watering thing is that it fails the basic test of a scientific theory: it can't be falsified. In other words, there are no results, no set of weather patterns or such like, that can disprove the theory. Too hot, too cold, too wet and too dry ? Why, that's exactly what was predicted. But now this latest line of argument makes astrology look like hard science.

We're supposed to wreck the economy, hand over huge amounts amounts of money and power to the state and generally undercut the principles of western civilisation, all at the behest of a bunch of wierdo cultists. Where's The Dawk when we need him ?

Shills ? Us ?

Of course, even in the midst of Hate Day here at the House of Dumb, we should avoid the temptation to unfairly label groups genuinely concerned with fighting racial prejudice as Left-wing front groups. Take our friends, the BLANKers. There is absolutely no excuse for trying to cast some kind of aspersions on the motives of a group that covers a whole range of important issues, as this screenshot from earlier today will confirm (click to enlarge):

Welcome To The Show!

The Cameroonatics are shocked - shocked! - to find that Liberals often use bogus charges of racism to silence opponents. Who was hiding that from the Tories ?

First, there was the BoJo fiasco, now David Davis has been targeted, and the Tories are ever so angry. If there's one thing the Cameroonatics can't stand, it's people being unfairly smeared as racists.

That's the thing: the best you can say is that the Tories have acquiesced to this kind of racial witch hunting, even at its most ludicrous. More than that, The Dave himself has been a willing participant. Look at Patrick Mercer, thrown under the bus, for claiming that the 'offensiveness' of particular words depends on context, and that some folks play the system with bogus claims of racism. Or, to put it another way, he was fired for taking the self-same position the BoJo boosters are taking right now. I guess it must be all about the 'context' after all.

Nuance!

Snafu notes that Mr Plod's criteria for investigating folks featured in documentaries appears to have 'moved on' - as the Left would no doubt say - in the last few years.

Me, I'm thinking of the contrast with a more recent case. Not 48 hours ago, Libs were screeching that satire was no defence for Boris Johnson using the word 'piccaninnies'. Who cares if he was using it to ridicule the colonial pretensions of Princess Tony ? The word was UNACCEPTABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now, all these hours later, suddenly Libs need to see the context before they can decide whether or not calling for people to hate Infidels counts as encouraging hate. That must be some context if it can make calling gays to be thrown off mountains into a reasonable statement of policy.

BBC Misses The Target

Uh oh - the BBC's reporting that 50 Afghan civilians have been wounded in a US air strike on a market place. So which brand of screw up is it this time ? Did one of the Good Ol' Boys decide hitting the same post code was close enough for government work, or did the intelligence geeks screw up and confuse a pile of bananas with an RPG stockpile ?

Well, since you mention it, neither. The strike was bang on the money. Apparently, the civilians just happened to have stopped off to get some fags and a lottery ticket in the exact same place a shed-load of Taliban were meeting. Not only that, but the demographic spread seems a little off.

In other words, the BBC's report was unmitigated rubbish. As ever, there's a wider point. The BBC maintains an attitude of constant scepticism towards any statement from allied forces, but airs even the loopiest Taliban propaganda without a qualm. This is what they call impartiality.

Who's Been Tampering With The MSM ?

Say, does anyone know if anything's happened in the Jessie James case ? I think I heard something on the radio, during the bulletin at every-single-*******-hour-all-day o'clock.

Oh right, here it is. Stop the Press! Police may be about to make some arrests. Hey, I'm not complaining. In fact, I'm glad we don't just shrug our shoulders and accept this sort of thing as normal, but it does kind of blow out of the water the Left's claim that the MSM's minimalist coverage of a certain other case is because they don't usually carry reports until there's an actual verdict.

Take one recent event in the Charlene Downes case, this comment from the presiding judge:

[Mr Justice Henriques] praised [the jury] for being "highly professional" in the midst of "continuous tensions and pressure".

Hello ? If this citizen suspects attempts have been made to pressure the jury during this trial, shouldn't he report it to......

Ah - I see the problem. But, apparently, no one from the MSM does. A judge in a murder trial has just made a cryptic admission that jury members have been pressured, and it's a yawner. Same ol', same ol'. I guess they're tied up covering the news that the police have issued a statement saying they think the suspects in the Jessie James case 'may be dangerous'.

UPDATE:

Call me cruel, and yes, two wrongs don't make a right, but in so far as 15 year old Mr James was gunned down in the early hours of the morning on his way to a party, I can't help wondering if counsel for the prosecution in this case will share his opinion on how likely the victim was to be 'tucked up at home at 10 o'clock at night.'

Chutzpah, Thy Name Is Tories

The Tory meltdown accelerates. The latest meme is that the party's doing badly because people keep unfairly focusing on David Cameron instead of on their policies. Yes, it's a mystery alight - perhaps this guy can shed some light on it. Meanwhile, the rest of us can enjoy a back flip of Olympic standard.

The Cameroonatics never offered the public anything like a coherent program or even any kind of overall vision. Au contraire, they sneered at anyone who did have actual convictions as a member of the 'Tory Taliban' and such like. Instead, they offered us Call Me Dave as the Princess Di of politics. It's a bit late for the Tories to complain about people focusing on Cameron's personality, when that's the ground they themselves chose to fight on.

We can't hardly talk about any actual ideology anyway. What few policies the Tories did introduce, were chosen purely on the basis of whether or not they helped Brand Cameron. Take the very policy that Dale claims the press should have focused on: abolishing the independent panels that hear appeals against school exclusions. Whether or not you think there should be independent oversight, there does exist a legal right for parents to have exclusions reviewed by an independent body - you can either have the panels, as now, or you can abolish them and have the case heard before Mr Justice Moonbat. In other words, the sole effect of Cameron's policy would be to have legally-aided lawyers facing off against school-funded lawyers in a court room. And yet people still don't take him seriously ?

Ditto, the flip-side of the charge - that people aren't giving Gordon Brown as hard a time. Maybe not, but that's because he's a serious, substantial politician. Or, as Janet Daly says:

Am I not aware that I do, in fact, disagree with him on almost every fundamental point of political and economic principle? Yes, of course I am.

So why then do I persist in my admiration, not just for his performance over these recent weeks, but for the person who seems to be emerging from it? Precisely because all those things on which I (and most Tory supporters) would disagree with the Brown philosophy are just that: legitimate areas of serious, substantive argument.

Exactly. You may like Brown's policies, or you may not - I mostly don't - but you can't claim that this isn't a man engaged with the problems of Britain. He has his principles and he prepared to stand up and fight for them. In contrast, how does Call Me Dave propose to, say, fix the NHS ? Oh - that's right, we're still waiting to hear. There you have it, the true barometer of the Tories decline into irrelevance:

Sir Winston Churchill:

You ask, what is our policy? I can say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us: to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy.

Call Me Dave:

You ask, what is our policy? Beats me. I can't say until the policy review groups have told me what to pretend to believe. But vote for me anyway because I'm so loveable and, besides, I went to Eton so I'm much smarter than you peasants.

It's Not Hate, It's Contempt

OK, so I called it wrong. I guessed that the Left's Girly Hysteria Squad would claim the folks who ridiculed Doreen Lawrence's unhinged rant were trivialising her suffering. In fact, they've gone the double or quits route. It turns out that we're all a bunch of Nazis.

In other words, the race-hustlers tried to smear a political opponent as a racist and ended up wrapped round a lamppost, so now they've switched to Plan B: try to smear their opponents as racists. Them Libs, hey ? Who knows what they'll do next ?

See, this is why Libs fail so utterly on-line. Back in the days of the MSM monopoly, they could get away with this kind of drive-by smear. Once people can actually answer back, drive-by quickly turns into pile-up. In the Blogosphere people don't have to take their charges on faith - they can actually check the original source material and see whether, say, Boris Johnson's use of archaic language to describe the locals in the Congo was genuinely racist, or just an attempt to satirise Princess Tony's colonial pretensions. Of course, in so far as that would involve discussing actual facts, Leftists are at a clear disadvantage. Hence, the hysteria.

Ditto - with sword, oak leaves and gold cluster - the attempts to smear bloggers as haters. Like Ross F says, the race baiters may be able to winkle out one or two nutcases, but if the idea of agents of the state monitoring what citizens say in their own homes doesn't strike you as fascist, just what would you call it ? Answer: don't call it anything, just call anyone who asks a bigot. Oh.... and definitely don't mention that this proposal was too outrageous even for the Blair government.

Then again, there's something distinctly totalitarian about the argument that off-the-scale kooks like Doreen Lawrence should be allowed to spend any amount of time shouting 'fire!' in the crowded theatre of British racial politics, but the haters are the people who object to her paranoid, racist ranting. Of course, the BLANKers have their own reasons for encouraging people to go easy on those caught trafficking in baseless charges of racism .

Liberals Not Even Hiding It Anymore

While us Righties are continually accused of subtly discriminating against certain groups, our betters on the Left rise above such misconduct, preferring to openly discriminate against people they hate. The usual excuse is that they're only trying to boost the participation of under-represented groups - meaning what, who knows ? Even if you're daft enough to concede such a slippery point as that, you have to admit their latest scam kind of blows that out of the water.

Yes, indeed. They're trying to gay up the entertainment industry. Apparently, the movies were only their second choice, but they were put off by the air of aggressive masculinity surrounding the world of hairdressing.

Dhimmis D'Jour

Ah....and I thought the Libs didn't like faith-based schooling ?

I don't even want to know what they'll be doing in science lessons.

A Post In Which I Reveal A Childhood Trauma

Over at TWA.

Absolute Moral Authority Update

In so far as we're not allowed to question even their loopiest comments, lest we be accused of questioning the authenticity of their suffering, freaks like Doreen Lawrence perform a useful social function in letting us know what Libs would say, if they thought they could get away with it. Take the question of supposed 'anti-racism' - Liberals would rather get a job in the private sector than admit there was anything Orwellian about it, but then we get comments like this from Doreen Lawrence:

"[Boris Johnson] felt that people should be entitled to say what they want. It sounds to me that what he believes is that because something is said and done in private it is acceptable, but clearly it can never be acceptable to hold those views."

No room for misquote there then. Merely having the wrong views should be a crime (unfortunately, we never hear what kind of sentence she thinks would be appropriate).

Still, in so far as having the wrong views should now be an offence, I'm wondering what Mrs Moral Authority thinks should be done about those who try and stir up racial hatred with insane conspiracy theories ?

This Is Great

We Have Ideas

The Indie has belatedly noticed that the Dextrosphere is much more lively than their own mates on the Left. In case you're wondering, they attribute this to the Tories meltdown. Well, it could be that, or maybe the fact we actually have something to debate.

There are many ideas on, say, fixing health care: some kind of right-wing, some very right-wing and some utterly off the scale right-wing. Meanwhile, the Left has handcuffed itself to the helm of the NHS Titanic. The Left's sole contribution to the debate is explaining why anyone who thinks the NHS needs reform is just like Hitler. Ditto, everything else.

The Left's contribution to political debate is entirely negative. They don't have any actual ideas, but they can tell you why your ideas are evil, hence PC. The Left might have been able to choke off debate in academiz and the MSM, but in the blogosphere they're ruthlessly exposed as the nasty, whining scolds they are.

Equal Rights For Zombies

Prepare for the lamest attempt yet at racial victimhood: equal rights for the living dead. In case you've missed the previous 6000 'Resident Evil' games, basically the deal is that your character is one of a handful of humans surrounded by homicidally-inclined zombie-type creatures - subtle diplomacy is not where it's at. Trouble is, with the release of the second trailer for Resident Evil 5, the usual suspects have finally realised that, if the game's set in Africa, that means the zombies will be African too (nothing gets past these people).

Clearly then, the game is obviously a metaphor for...... something. Furthermore, the African setting propagates the common stereotype that Africa is overrun by alien parasite infected zombies. Common amongst the insane, anyway.

There's only one answer: never again feature blacks in any form of mass entertainment. That should avoid controversy.

It's Libeliousous!

Apparently, it's National Libel Week. Not only is Johann the Hutt threatening to sue everybody in the world (except the ones with actual resources), but now we find that Britain has become the venue of choice for libel suits.

More seriously, Hot Air covers how these laws have been used to suppress discussion of the funding behind the Jihad. Same old story here - we'll never get to hear the actual evidence, the money did all the heavy lifting. All of which tells us a lot about the modern Left.

Leftist are obsessed with the fantasy of some people called 'the rich' - as opposed to lawyers, actors and pop stars, all of whom live in cardboard boxes - buying their way out of the justice system. Well, here it is. Here are the rich and powerful being able to avoid public scrutiny and the Left thinks its a yawner. It's not like we're talking criminal law, where blocking loopholes used by the Guilty Rich could mean wrongly-convicted paupers. Libel is a rich man's game anyway.

No, this is just example no 732 of the intrinsic elitism of the Left. These people - they're all about standing up to the little guy.

Heretic Burned

Fortunately, there are still some religious groups in this world prepared to stand up to defend their God.

Dhimmis D'Jour.

Amongst all the slagging off of the Anglicans, it's worth remembering that there are some churches which make even these folks look like Opus Dei. All of which is by way of introducing this.

Needless to say, the dhimmi weasel behind it all got his fifteen minutes of fame on the Jeremy Whine Show yesterday, where - shockingly enough - he exposed himself as a pretentious Liberal maroon even before he managed to dislocate his shoulder patting himself on the back. Apparently, religions are all the same, and we need to embrace different faiths.

OK, Libs, you can go embrace that nice Mr Bin Laden. The rest of us can wonder what kind of faith it is that's totally promiscuous in its beliefs. There's not a lot to be said for The Dawk, but at least he follows through on the logic of his world view. Meanwhile, the Unitarians are still busy explaining why decapitating people is just an alternative lifestyle.

Dirty Hari

Folks, I bring terrible news! There's trouble in Toyland. Our betters on the Left have fallen out with each other. Were all those conflict resolution classes for nothing ? Maybe the UN could intervene ?

Speaking personally, I don't bother tracking these Lefty spats. I adopt the same approach as Edward Woodward in The Wickerman:

May Morrison: Can I do anything for you, Sergeant?
Sergeant Howie: No, I doubt it, seeing you're all raving mad!

Still, this case really is particularly crazy delicious. Full story over here, but executive summary is as follows: Johann Hari files a review of Nick Cohen's book 'What's Left ?' which starts by noting that Cohen's parents were Orwell fanboys, a childhood trauma which left Cohen desperate to sell himself as this century's Eric Blair. Au contrair says Cohen: his parents were hard-core commies, and sure as hell weren't going to say anything nice about a sell-out like Orwell. Harry's Place posts the relevant excerpt from Cohen, with commentary to the effect that a reputation for making stuff up ought to be a career killer in journalism at which point Hari threatened to sue Harry's Place - but not Cohen.

OK, with me so far ? If not, here's a summary of the summary: Hari publishes an anecdote, Cohen denies it, HP points out a reputation for fantasy is bad, Hari threatens HP.

How does that work ? What ? Yes, Mr Pedant, I know repeating a libel is treated legally as the same as originating it, but Cohen is in the clear, while Hari wants to sue HP for what is, after all, a truism. Who thinks that a reputation for lying should be a plus point in journalism ? Come to think of it, why on earth would Hari imagine that any talk of journalists making stuff up would apply to him ? Does he have something he wants to tell us ?

As it happens, it's not the first time one of Hari's would-be killer anecdotes has been questioned. Then again, that hardly matters with libel laws. No matter how unworthy the case, there's still plenty of scope for the plaintiff to bleed the defendant even without the tedium of going to trial. Hey, is it just me, or is there something really funny about a guy who poses as the Che Guevara of the MSM running off to Nanny Law to try and shut down his critics. Anarchy!

Meanwhile, the 'decent' Left are enraged at the thought of someone using the threat of vexatious legal actions to chill criticism. Two words: 'hate speech'. Hell, if Hari had only claimed to be a victim of homophobia, half the Left would have rallied to his cause even if he'd come out in favour of molesting children.

Oops - he already did that, writing in favour of 'embracing despised minorities like gypsies and paedophiles'. Hey, Conservatives get accused of not liking blacks, but at least we've never bracketed them with Ian Huntley.

But if you think that's bad, you ain't seen nothing yet:

I sat next to Ross from Oregon on the first day of the "conference". He was my age - 23 - and approximately twice my size. Picture the Incredible Hulk, but considerably less green and only moderately less angry, and you've got the idea. We made polite small talk about how evil blacks or gays or some other minority group are; he told me an unpublishably disgusting joke, and I chortled along and - what can I say? - I fancied him.....

He was a harder nut to crack, but at least he could (and did) drink an awful lot of vodka. I'll spare you the details: suffice it to say that Germany did successfully invade Poland.... there's something uniquely rewarding about bagging a homophobe.

OK, point one: if the MSM must publish this garbage, could we at least have one of the sub-editors pointing out that the verb for 'having sex with someone when they're incapable from narcotics' is not 'seduced'.

There's more to it than that though. Yes, it's technically true that there still remains the vestigial remnants of morality in the supposed 'decent' Left, but this case shows just how warped the mainstream Left is. Maybe Hari lies, maybe he doesn't, but what is certain is that we have a (still) well-respected mainstream Leftist writer who's whole ideology is based around the promotion of depravity and evil. Forget the quotations from Orwell and John Stuart Mill, is there no one there who'll say 'screw you Hari, we're not embracing people who rape kids, we're jailing them!' ? Nope - they're all tied up arguing over whether or not Cohen's mum was a commie or not.

UPDATE:

Ross lays out the full scurvy truth about Hari's love of creative writing.