BBC: Pravda For The Electronic Age

There's an old Cold War joke about a drunken diplomatic party in some Third World country. The British ambassador is challenged to a race by his Soviet counterpart, which he then wins. Pravda reported the events thus: 'In a race between ambassadors yesterday, the Soviet ambassador came second, while the British ambassador was second from last.'

There's more than a hint of that style of reporting in this BBC report:

Danish arrests after youth riots

More than 20 people have been arrested in Denmark following eight consecutive nights of youth rioting and vandalism across the country, police say.

Dang! Those pesky yoots again! What's wrong with kids today ?

But wait... by the time we get to paragraph four, we get this:

It is not clear what triggered the riots. Reports say the youths - mainly with immigrant backgrounds - have been accusing police of harassment.

Immigrants ? But from where ?

Nope - we need to wait two more paragraphs before we get this:

Some observers say last week's reprinting by Danish newspapers of a cartoon satirising the Prophet Muhammad might have fuelled the riots.

Well, y'know, we'd know if that was true or not if we knew who was rioting...

The BBC can't even leave it there, managing one last kick at the idea of journalistic ethics:

The publication came a day after Denmark's security services arrested three Muslims suspected of plotting to kill one of the cartoonists.

Say, what a coincidence! It's almost like cause & effect, right ? Some kind of protest against thuggish attempts to muzzle the press.

Oops, apparently not - that interpreation would kind of cut the legs from under the Islamopaths claim to victimhood, so down the memory hole it goes.

Best Headline Ever ?

This is certainly true.

The BBC: Sketchy Reporting

This report from the BBC has to be read to be believed. If dhimmitude was water, central London would be flooded right about now. Check out the opening lines:

Hundreds of Danish Muslims have been demonstrating in Copenhagen against the reprinting of a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad they consider offensive.

The cartoon depicts the Prophet with a bomb in his turban.

All major Danish newspapers decided to republish it after Danish intelligence said it had uncovered a plot to kill one of the cartoonists.

'Republish it' ? 'One of the cartoonists' ? Just how many cartoonists does it take to draw a cartoon ? But wait... I've just checked. Turns out there were twelve cartoons after all, and yes, the Islamopaths hated all of them, even the one with Mo as a little stick man. It's not about particular content, these people claim an omnibus right to censor any output from Infidels. It's kind of subtly hinted at in slogans like this:

Protesters marched in the capital's streets shouting "God is Great!" and "Freedom of speech is like a plague!".

No mention of bombs in turbans there. Then again....

Many carried the black and white flags of Hizb ut-Tahrir - the radical Islamic party that calls for the creation of a caliphate.

Yep, these guys. Well, y'know, if the cartoons can get even folks as chilled out as these guys all het up, well, they must be offensive.

You are reminded that we're talking about a BBC report here - the organisation that, without fail, labels everyone vaguely right of centre as 'conservative'. Isn't the fact that the driving force behind the alleged 'cartoons' protest is a group of off-the-scale Islamofascists also relevant ?

Earlier, at Friday prayers, Danish Muslims from many backgrounds expressed frustration that one of the cartoons they find so offensive could have been printed again.

'Frustration' ? Anything else ? Any other reaction ?

Many said they simply could not understand the motive unless it was hatred for Islam.

They must have been reading the BBC then (except, what with all those banners mentioning 'freedom of speech', it seems like they have grasped the issue after all).

But the overwhelming mood was not so much anger but weary resignation; a sense that they have been through this crisis once before and nothing has been learnt.

Yes, indeed. Those pesky Danes just won't learn their lesson, and submit to life as dhimmis. Somehow, the word 'implied' is not strong enough to capture the full weight of just how crudely the BBC is trying to suggest that cringing surrender is the enlightened position. Ditto, this bit:

Some Danish Muslims said they felt the problem was not the Danish people who were, if not well informed about Islam, at least generally liberal.

Hmmm... is there any evidence of a correlation between knowing the ins and outs of murdering Mo's death cult, and being pro-Islamic ? Or maybe the BBC's finally come out of the closet and admitted that snivelling absement is the default position of the 'generally liberal' ?

Instead, they pointed the finger of blame at the Danish media, saying it had stirred controversy instead of trying to help mend community relations

File that under true confessions: our state broadcaster thinks the role of the media in a democratic society is to 'mend community relations'. That explains a lot.

On Tuesday, Denmark's Security and Intelligence Service said it had uncovered a plot by three Muslims in Denmark to kill one of the cartoonists.

I'm guessing the BBC was this close to accusing the Security and Intelligence Service of being in on this plot to stir controversy.

Two of the men, who are not Danish citizens, are due to be expelled to Tunisia rather than put on trial.

Many Danish Muslims criticised this decision, saying it would be better to examine the evidence and punish the men if they were really guilty.

Say, how come these moderate Muslims keep siding with murderous lunatics ? Don't expect the BBC to tell us. Ditto, don't hold your breath waiting to hear from any Danes - that's the end of the article.

Exactly

Mark Steyn points out the essentially bogus nature of liberal tolerance. The left's support for multiculturalism is predicated on the idea that everyone else in the world is just like them, but with funny hats.

As Steyn says, our supposedly crude and imperialist ancestors at least did the locals the courtesy of learning about their actual culture. Meanwhile, liberals can only understand those pesky foreigners through the prism of their own preconceptions - which is how we end up with Senator Patty Murray praising Bin Laden's sterling work building day care centres for all those women busy juggling family and career under the Taliban.

In other words, liberal multiculturalism is actually kind of monocultural. Liberals simply can't analyse the outside world as anything other than an extension of their own parochial obsessions - as perfectly exemplified by Michael Moore's peevish complaint that the Sep 11 hijackers attacked blue states instead of red ones. Moore really can't see the war with Islamofascists as anything other than America's internal struggles writ large. Besides, who even believes in all that 'religion' stuff these days anyway ?

Outrage D'Jour

Lenin was wrong - the West won't sell our enemies the rope to hang us with - we'll give them it free.

Says It All Really

Actual Feminist Sighted

As opposed to the professional femiloons, who come down firmly on the other side here.

It's Totally Socialism, But, Like, Not

Mr E points out another case of liberal family values. As one of his commentors said, what exactly was the Guardian's beef with Derek Conway again ?

SIlence Peasants! Your Betters Speak

I've said it before and doubtless I'll say it again, but the bizarre thing about the Cameroonatics is not just that they're consistently appalling, but that they're always appalling in new and innovative ways. Which brings me neatly onto Tim Loughton, Tory shadow cabinet member who's just spoken out in favour of social workers.

No, I'm not kidding, and yes, it can get worse:

Social workers are too often vilified for creating problems rather than given due credit for the work they do with the vulnerable, a senior Conservative politician said today.

Much as drunk drivers are often vilified for the crashes they cause, rather than praised for all the times when they make it home safely.

But that's not even the best of it:

Tim Loughton, the shadow children's minister, told the National Children's Services Commissioning Conference in London that social workers are caricatured as a result of general ignorance about what they actually do.

Please. The left has been pushing the line for forty years, the argument that liberalism may seem like a brutal, thuggish abomination, but that's only cause you people are too stoopid to appreciate its finer points.

In so far as seriously believing this argument would seem to undercut the case for any kind of accountability, it's a fundamentally anti-democratic and even fascistic one. It's depressing beyond belief to hear this stuff from a member of any party, even a Cameron-led one, with 'conservative' in its title.

Loughton, who also chairs the Conservatives' commission on social work, attacked what he described as the "deeply corrosive situation where too many social workers are seen as part of the problem rather than an integral part of the solution".

So the problem isn't politically-motivated fanatics destroying lives to make trivial political points, it's the corrosive effect of people accurately reporting on what they do. Ah yes!

He told the conference, which is supported by the Guardian, that recent research by the General Social Care Council found only 40% of the population see the contribution of social workers to society as "very important".

Yes, the vast majority of the public hate them, so clearly there's something wrong with the public. How's that for a perfect microcosm of 21st Century European democracy ?

"This is perhaps unsurprising when another survey found that more than half understood little or nothing about what social work involves," said Loughton.

Well, y'know, we might not know the ins and outs, but a thug's a thug.

"Misconceptions are too often fuelled by stereotyped social worker characters as they appear in the media, ranging from slightly alternative liberal busybodies to out-and-out child snatchers.

The media let Victoria Climbie die rather than be seen to be imposing British values ? Who knew ? Well, either that or - and I admit this would be really stupid - he's criticising the press for accurately reporting stuff that happens (I told you these people hated democracy).

"Invariably they are panned, either for turning up too late after some terrible fate has befallen a vulnerable child or for intervening too early as the agents of 'nanny state'.

So the answer to the charge that the average social work department is completely unfit for purpose is to point out that not only do they let the innocent die, they also destroy families on fatuous grounds.

Well, I'm reassured.

We're back with our drunk driver, explaining how he understeered on one corner and hit a parked car, then oversteered on the next and went through a hedge, so overall he was driving OK.

Even children's computer games portray the appearance of the social worker as a 'game over' moment."

As opposed to real life, where care homes are proverbial for turning out well-adjusted young citizens.

Mounting a robust and, for a Conservative politician, eye opening defence of social work, he said little was heard about how many families are living in difficult circumstances have been held together through the dedication and professionalism of social services.

Isn't that like the manager of the local McDonalds demanding we pay tribute to his ability to serve lots of cheeseburgers ? It's called 'doing the job you're paid for'.

"But then no one is interested in hearing about the plane that lands safely," he added. "Yet a good social worker is as crucial to the wellbeing of vulnerable children or to the survival of damaged families as a doctor is to the health of his patient or a teacher to the learning chances of his pupil."

It's we're looking for aviation metaphors for social work, I'm thinking they're more towards the September 11 end of the scale. Besides, doctors rarely let their patients die rather than impose patriarchal standards of 'health' on them.

He said that in other countries, particularly in northern Europe, social workers are respected on a par with teachers, doctors and other public service professionals.

It's worse than I thought:Polly Toynbee's writing the speeches now.

Well, yes, in 'northern Europe' - possibly Europe in general - there's more inbuilt respect for the state than in Britain. Some of us think of that as a bug not a feature. With all due respect to the land of Sven and Ulrika, blind deference to officialdom does have its downsides. See, this is the kind of thing that makes people conservative - real conservatives rather than the type of conservatives who believe in the intrinsic goodness of state power - also known as 'liberals'.

"This inevitably makes for a more confident profession whose practitioners particularly question the risk-averse nature of social work in the UK," he said.

So what we have now is the result of social workers dialling down the crazee ?

I think my brain just broke from dealing with that concept, plus again with the 'huh ?' Since when did self-confident officialdom become a good thing ?

"If social workers are seen as part of the problem rather than part of the solution, no wonder there is concern about their morale."

And there you have it. The Tories think the public should stop holding these fanatics to account, lest we damage their morale. This isn't mere 'producer capture', this is the political equivalent of Stockholm Syndrome.

Loughton also promised that a future incoming Cameron government would not launch wholesale changes to social services but would instead look closely at how existing structures can be made to work better.

"We are not going to chuck out a whole lot of stuff that has gone before," he said. "A lot of what has happened in the last ten years has been good - there has been greater work between agencies. But we're not getting a enough bang for our buck."

Yes, indeed: vote Tory for more of the same, except more efficiently. I'll take a wild shot in the dark, and say that we'll keep hearing the time honoured phrase 'lessons will be learned'.

If nothing else, all the above nicely skewers one defence of Cameronism. Tories keep assuring us that the Cameroonatics' ideological fire sale is purely tactical in nature, that the core of the party is still conservative....

Well, no, it isn't just 'triangulation' after all. Leaving aside the remote possibility of the Millie Tants and Dave Sparts themselves voting Tory, I don't see anyone out there who was just hovering on the edge of switching their vote, but was waiting for the Tories to endorse lawless thuggery by unaccountable politically-motivated fanatics.

This speech is the perfect barometer of the Tories' ideological surrender. Not just because of specific atrocities like the aforementioned contempt for both the public at large, and the principle of democratic accountability in particular, but what it reveals about the underlying world view of this (supposedly) conservative party.

Consider Loughton's complaint that social workers have a bad reputation. Well, yes they do: it's the natural result of years of bad behaviour. The belief that bad actions should lead to bad consequences is pretty much a core conservative belief. More than that, the idea that in a healthy society there should, even must, be social consequences for dysfunctional and disruptive behaviour is an if-not-forget-it of small government.

Equally, Loughton's rhetoric betrays a tin ear for what social workers themselves say, and have been saying for quite some time. Social workers aren't well-meaning altruists just trying to 'do the right thing'. Au contrair, the majority of them are culture warriors, motivated by is a Frankensteinian mix of femilunacy, pop psychology, pink humbug and Marxoid idiocies.

To return to one of Loughton's more idiotic points, this is why we can criticise social workers for seizing kids on fatuous grounds and for leaving other kids in the hands of psychopaths. On the one hand, we have the belief that the traditional family is, by definition, an abusive environment, on the other the corollary, the promotion of the dysfunctional and the deviant as superior to those evil traditional values.

The question is whether or not politically-motivated fanatics should be allowed to destroy lives to make trivial political points ? If this strikes you as a hard question, no, you're not a conservative (oh, and one other question: why don't we need social services departments that 'look like Britain' - instead of like a fringe meeting at a Lib Dem conference) ?

Und so weiter....

To the point, the average social worker is the reification of everything that's wrong with liberalism and a conservative party that pretends our only problem is that they aren't efficient enough doesn't deserve the name.

Liberal + Truth Serum = Firestorm

People fall into three groups: those who make it happen, those who watch it happen, and those who wonder what the hell happened.

As far as the fire-storm over the Archbishop of Canterbury's remarks on Sharia go, I definitely in Group III. That's not to say that I don't think his remarks were insane, just that they're just the same ol' insania. Nothing the Bish came out wasn't the logical - well, liberal anyway - extension of standard multicultural doctrines.

It's not even an Islam thing. At least as far back as the post-1981 riots era, multiculti sensitivity has been the thing. We've had a quarter century of PC Plod turning a blind eye to folks driving round with signs saying 'Road Tax Applied For In Jamaica' (and there's even a religious angle here, at least as far as it involves a certain Rasta meditation aid). And that's how the black community became the success story it is today.

Ditto, unusual though it is for a liberal to come straight out and denounce the concept of equality under law, it is the natural outgrowth of the obsession with 'diversity' in the justice system. After all, what else can all this talk of 'different viewpoints' mean, other than differing interpretations of the law depending on who gets to do the interpreting ?

Actually, that was the Archbishop's only real sin: stating liberal doctrine clearly. Liberals keep yammering about right-wing extremists, but it's not the right that has to constantly dissemble about what it really believes.

More to the point, right now, with the RoPers dialling down the insanity, 40% of them will still admit to an inquisitive Infidel stranger that they think Sharia should be imposed in Britain (real figure: who knows what ?) Add in the fact that the second most popular name for a newborn boy in Britain is Mohammed and yes, we're already on the road to Sharia.

Will The Real K W Best Please Stand Up ?

Hey, the Immigration Advisory Service has called for government to allow in thousands of immigrants from Bangladesh to ease a supposed staff shortage in the curry industry.

Really.

I guess they're serving the meals Britons just won't serve, right ? Either that or the definition of 'skilled immigrant' isn't what it sounds like. But no, get this:

It argues that attempts to get eastern Europeans to work in curry restaurants have failed because they do not have the "cultural sensitivity" required.

Not only have the open borders lobby has spent years rubbishing all talk of 'culture' as a right wing plot, the whole open borders position relies on the idea that a Somalian militia man arriving in Britain will immediately turn into a model citizen. As I understand the state of play, you can't put just anyone in a kitchen, but there's no one who isn't qualified to live in Britain.

Needless to say, every other day of the week we're bombarded with terrible stories of the social exclusion of Muslims by racists whites (who never seem to target Hindus, Sikhs, Zoroastrians or Pakistani Christians). So which is it ? Labour shortage or mass unemployment ?

Don't expect the BBC to ask. Hell, they won't even point that, quasi-official name to the contrary, the 'Immigration Advisory Service' is not a public body, it's hard left open borders lobby group, run by convicted fraudster Keith Best. When are we going to do anything about the national shortage of journalists ?

Liberal Icon Involved In Sleaze Shocka!

Crivens! Malcolm and Cressida aren't going to like this.

That's What I Wanted To Say

A metaphor many have been grasping towards for years...

Imagine for a moment, and only for a moment, that you find yourself in 1939 America. You are by a water-cooler during a break and you hear your colleagues discussing the Nazis attacking Jewish businesses. You hear one of them say, "So what? Haven't Americans attacked Jews before? What, are we perfect?"

I know, for a moment you think you are in the Twilight Zone, so you interject, "But in Germany it is official policy that allows one to attack Jewish interests without legal consequences. In America, if such things happen, the perpetrators are arrested and punished."

Your colleagues are not impressed, "Ahhh, you're a Naziphobe and racist, what have you got against Nazis?"

You point out that the majority of Nazis either agree with Hitler's anti-Jewish Policies or say and do nothing to oppose them while in America it is only a small minority that engage in violent anti-Semitic acts and when they do they are punished. But they do not see the difference. If 99% of Nazis are evil and only 1% of Americans are evil then the two are morally equivalent.

That Don't Smell Like Smoke....

Say, does anyone know if there was some kind of fire over the weekend ? Maybe in London or something ?

Yes, indeed. Whatever the BBC's deficiencies, they're certainly well-covered on the vital 'Camden Market' beat. By the time News 24 rolled into it's seventeenth hour of coverage I was starting to detect a certain humbuggery.

If we must listen to the MSM in general, and the BBC in particular, keep yapping on about diversity, could they at least acknowledge that no one outside the M25, and probably few enough inside, actually give a toss what happens to some pretentious tat emporium ?

Here we have a chance - away from the hot button politics issues - to see what's really wrong with the MSM. The wall-to-wall coverage of a purely local story is symptomatic of the MSM's faults. There's the self-obsession, the desire to dictate the news agenda, the lack of anyone around to say 'hey, no one in Leeds cares about this stuff'. That's the central charge against the MSM, not the political bias, it's that they're just plain incompetent at their basic mission of reporting the news in the first place. Well, the news outside the M25 anyway.

Happy Fun Robbery

Shockingly, it appears less and less people are ready to stump up the cash to be berated by liberals. Fortunately for Satan's minions, they have an answer: a rebranding exercise.

In other words, to counter criticism that they're a bunch of arrogant spendthrifts, the BBC are splashing out public money to employ some yuppie scum ad agency to try and bamboozle us into thinking that being robbed is a good thing. That'll work.

Eldery Race Hustler Makes Desperate Bid For Relevance

Oh dear! Looks like someone at the BBC has finally grown a spine and yanked the feeding tube out of one of Britain's most sucessful shakedown artists:

Lenny Henry launched a scathing attack on the "Alf Garnett" generation of programme-makers last night and claimed racism still exists in TV.

Apparently racism is so deeply engrained in British TV that he can't find any examples from the last quarter century. It's that common!

Y'know, if a conservative tried to make a point by citing The Sweeney as an example of modern pop culture, we'd never hear the end of it. Maybe it's just that TV people don't want to hire a guy whose metaphors are old enough to have little metaphors of their own ?

Britain's most famous black comedian lambasted the BBC and ITV for not employing enough black staff behind the screen as well as on it.

Giving a Royal Television Society speech, he said: "TV producers of the 1960s and 1970s missed a great opportunity.

1960s and 1970s ? Yep, I'm guessing the ol' grievance mine is tapped out.

"Rather than reflect the reality of multi-ethnic Britain they chose a more xenophobic route - emphasising points of difference instead of similarities.

"If they had been more truthful in their observations, who's to say we couldn't have encouraged more young black kids at school or prevented the Brixton riots even?"

See ? He's not just another sleazy shakedown artist - giving him money will help heal our broken society.

Call it a hunch, but I'm guessing black underachievement at school might have less to do with what their grandparents watched on TV, and more with prominent black public figures tacitly excusing outbreaks of mass thuggery and continually telling kids that The Man will keep them down whatever they do.

Henry singled out 1970s comedy Till Death Us Do Part for its racist main character Alf Garnett, claiming the creation was "adopted as a hero by the very people he was satirising".

He said: "Writer Johnny) Speight tried to ensure that in each storyline, Alf came off the worst.

"But when I went to school the next morning, it was always me who came off worst.

And then I parleyed my modicum of talent and my whiny claims of victimhood into thirty years living the life of Reilly off of your licence fees

Actually, I added a bit to that quote. It's by way of making a point. OK, we'll buy into the young Lenny being traumatised by people laughing at him - at least that doesn't happen these days - but only if we can do the rest of the story, the bit about him going on to become filthy rich and having three decades plugged into the free money spigot. In Earth cultures this is known as a 'success story' but, nope, even after decades of thoroughly undeserved fame and fortune The Man is still oppressing him (and now we're back to those disengaged black kids).

Henry also criticised underrepresentation of minorities in Coronation Street and costume dramas - despite his wife, Dawn French, currently being in one - saying: "You can't move for bonnets and crinolines and the people wearing them are all white.

To say nothing of the lack of Inuits in martial arts movies.

Nope, turns out that Mr Hustler... Henry has an answer:

"By the time Queen Victoria was on the throne, this country had a sizeable black population, so where are they?"

So sizeable that no one living at the time thought to mention them. But let's pretend Henry isn't talking complete liberalism. Is he really saying that this country - the most racist evah! remember - had a large number of blacks in it back in the day, yet somehow they managed to get by without a huge race relations industry or a descent into massive criminality ? Hmmmm...... maybe homicidal insanity isn't a natural part of authentic black culture after all.

Henry told the audience that writers and producers were still using offensive discrimatory terms for other minorities - such as "chav" and "pikey".

Chavs as a victim group ? Huh ? Has this guy ever met any chavs ? Probably not - after years of living under the oppressive boot of the white power structure, Henry has somehow managed to scrape together the cash to buy a enormous place in the country - very, very far from the Hood - and from chavs too. Of course, it does mean there's one person out there ready to offer our 'travelling' friends somewhere to set up, right ?

And he called on TV bosses to use 'affirmative action' to employ more black people, adding: "And I am not talking about cleaners, security guys, scene-shifters - I am talking about decision-makers."

So the only person who's actually, provably, advocating racism in TV is Henry himself. Does recognising irony count as 'actin white' or what ?

In 2001, Greg Dyke famously described the BBC as "hideously white".

Henry said: "When I started, I was surrounded by a predominantly white workforce. Thirty two years later, not a lot has changed."

Spookily enough, Britain too is predominantly white. It's a conspiracy!

I thought these guys wanted a workforce that 'looks like Britain' ? Besides, I'm wondering if Henry sees a lot of brothers in his local village ? I guess racial arson is more rewarding when you're insulated from the consequences.

Again, back to the point I made above. This is a true rags to riches story, but no: Henry is still a really huge victim. He might have made his pile off of a mostly white audience, but Britain still sucks and whites are still scum. This goes beyond black culture's death spiral into victimhood, and it's broader than just Henry's desire to hang a 'No Natives' sign on the doors of the BBC. It's the same phenomenon Jonah Goldberg identifies here.

This where we are in the culture wars: a guy can stand up and spout insane conspiracy theories while proposing racist recruitment practices, and he's hailed for his courage in fighting racism.

Liberals 4 Immigration Control

I've always said that I don't like people talking about the 'immigration debate'. We don't object to immigration, we object to open borders. The left thinks even being a murderer is no reason to lose the right to reside, while the right thinks that we should insist, as a minimum, on the absence of homicidal insanity.

Mind you, we already know from past form that there are some people too loathsome even for liberals to let into the country. Now it turns out liberals have found another group of undesirables they want to keep away from our shores.

Yep, it took effort but the libs might just have found a victim group even less deserving of sympathy than doctors. Meanwhile, bar maids, bus drivers and painter & decorators can all suck it up. Got to keep things vibrant, doncha'know ?

Liberal Self-Awareness: Still Not Getting Any Better

The BBC Pioneers continue their cataloguing of the revolving door between the BBC and Labour, including this classic quote from Martin Sixsmith, during his spat with the Blair:

"Over the 10 years since 1997 there has been this chipping away at the confidence of the civil service, and I don't think it's the impartial, honest organisation it used to be....."

Yep, Mart, y'know, there's a lot of it about....

Civil Liberties 101

What Worries Civil Liberties Freaks: Surveillance on a terror 'suspect' (ho, ho!) picks up a meeting between the scumbag-in-question and an MP

What Doesn't Worry Civil Liberties Freaks: Agents of the state kidnap a newborn child without any legal authority whatsoever.

See ? I don't know why anyone thinks these people are a bunch of liberal kooks.

Mind you, I am just shocked to find that a surveillance operation aimed at dangerous subversives ended up taping a Labour MP. Seriously though, you have to question the strategy here: if they wanted to catch him making pro-terrorist statements they should have just listened to his speeches.

Needless to say, even the folks responsible for all manner of weird and wonderful interpretations of human rights laws can't find any actual law that have been broken. The nearest the left can get is a weenie convention from the Sixties that only mentions phone tapping and commits the government not to do it, unless they really need to, in which case they'll inform Parliament, sometime.

Call it a hunch, but I'd guess an MP hanging out with the mad bomber is what these guys had in mind when they made the language used so flexible - and that's before you consider the likely response if conservatives started citing conventions from forty years ago. We'd be accused of wanting to chain homosexuals to the kitchen sink and force women back into the closet. Or something.

I guessing we're not allowed to ask what it means when a supposed moderate pals around with jihadis, and I'll guess we're definitely not allowed to wonder what it means that Mr Moderate has no qualms about revealing this to the public. Say what you like about MPs, but they're masters of reading public opinion. I guess his constituents must be equally moderate, right ?

Meanwhile, even as liberals revel in ostentatious angst over the fact the security services treats MPs like ordinary people (socialism's not as straightforward as you'd think), the case of the Nottinghamshire baby napping disappears down the memory hole.

Let's check the scorecard here: agents of the state tapping what the victim assures us was just a conversation with an old pal: scandal! Agents of the state abducting a child: business as usual.

If nothing else, in so far as the left has reconciled themselves to the idea of an unrepresentative and unaccountable group of fanatics, protected from public scrutiny, using the power of the state to destroy families, could they at least stop warning darkly about the 'thin end of the wedge' and the like - we're pretty much up to the middle of the wedge by now. Ditto, they can drop the portentous references to Pastor Niemoller as well. For the average citizen, if they do come for you, they're more likely to be social workers than anyone in the security services.

They're Using The Metaphors The British Just Won't Use

...and can you blame us ?

One Day, Son, All This Constituency Will Be Yours

Hmmmmm.... spooky: every post is leading on to another post. See, talking of the BBC Pioneers reminds me of their sterling work documenting the left's fine history of nepotism. Here's another case.

Yep, not only another lefty lord, but another case of Junior following dad into the family business. It's socialism, Jim, but not as we know it!

Independence!

And talking of the BBC.....

Contrary to liberal strawmen, few people on the right claim that the BBC top brass issue actual talking points to their staff each day. Nope, the truth is actually worse. The BBC's recruitment pool is so narrow that their staff don't need any prodding to take the leftist position - they simply don't think there are any others. All of which wouldn't be so bad, if we didn't have to listen to one of the most monolithic institutions in the country lecture everyone else about diversity!

All of which is by way of saying that the BBC Pioneers' Heroes of Socialist Broadcasting series reminds us just how fast the revolving door spins between Nu Lab and our independent state broadcaster.

At Least He Didn't Have To Risk Catching Anything!

Talking of middle east media hoaxes, here's another one. Note that this time the Greatest Broadcaster Evah! was involved - and still hasn't retracted its report.

Sunlight Sonata

You don't see the bias ? That's because it's too dark!

For The People!

These libs - they're all about the civil liberties:

Music fans who repeatedly download songs illegally should have their internet connections severed, the manager of U2 has said.

Paul McGuinness, who has managed the best-selling group for 30 years, attacked internet service providers for failing to clamp down on illegal file-sharing.

Yep, liberals will be right behind Club Gitmo, just as soon as we start sending pirate CD sellers there.

Nice Shot!

Electability Ain't What It Used To Be!

Not to give aid and comfort to the enemy, but Tory bloggers: you could get away with casting Cameron giving Conway the boot as an example of firm leadership - but only if it hadn't taken him 24 hours to get there. Leadership often involves dealing with moral dilemmas, but what to do with a guy who's relieved the tax payers of £1.5 million isn't one of them.

Needless to say, I was shocked - shocked! - to find that all Cameron's pompous moralising was just a put on, still, it occurs to me that it's exposed something else about the World's Smartest Man.

If there's been one consistent theme in Cameron's leadership, it's that the base should just bend over and take it like a man in the cause of electability. Ideology is out, expediency is in. Yet when an outrageous case of corruption comes up, it's the senile fascists in the base who call it right, and Mr Electable who gets caught going the wrong way. I dunno, but you could almost think the whole 'electability' thing was just an excuse to shiv the conservative movement and replace their values with the kind of patrician arrogance which thinks that an MP with his hand in the till is no big deal.

And Another Thing...

In so far as the Nu Tories' official narrative insist that Helen Grant is the victim of anti-black racism, it's interesting to note that - like Livingstone's hustler-in-chief, Lee Jasper - she's not actually black. Both have white mothers who, incidentally, raised them alone after dad bailed.

It'd be interesting to see what Freud would make of Grant's determination to identify with the parent who abandoned her, rather than the woman who raised her, but for now, let's consider what it means politically that she chooses to pass herself off as black, even while waving the bloody shirt of supposed racism. Instinct tells me that Germany in 1938 wasn't overrun with Wehrmacht officers saying things like 'hey, did I mention dad was a Rabbi ?'

Race hustlers like Grant and Jasper can whine all they want about the supposed horrors of being a brother in the United KKKingdom, but check out what they actually do, and see just how bad it is.

Diversity!

The Dave Party continues its long march towards self-parody. They have appointed another diverse! Parliamentary candidate with a history of Labour activism. Yep,we have been here before with Tony Lit, but what this latest fiasco lacks in originality, it more than makes up in sleaze.

New Tory - in every sense of the word - PPC Helen Grant has been selected for a safe seat despite her previous history as a labour activist and would-be labour councillor which she, gosh darn it, got kind of confused about when explaining it all to the selection committee. But get this: her excuse is that she wasn't specifically asked about any previous activities.

Hey,that's reassuring. When exactly did caveat emptor become the standard for selecting MPs? Let's check the state of play here: if a suburban shopkeeper wants a shotgun, Mr Plod will be snapping on the rubber gloves for the prostate exam, but we have to metaphorically wrestle would-be MPs to ground before they'll disclose embarrassing information.

Seriously, let's try a little thought experiment here. Your great auntie Marge leaves you a big inheritance, and you decide to get that nose job you've always wanted. You go and see a surgeon, and just to reassure yourself, you ask if any of his patients had died on the table and he says, well, it depends how you define death.... you'd be out of there in a flash. There are certain jobs where full disclosure really has to apply.

Needless to say, Grant can't provide any details of where she was on this particular road to Damascus when she suddenly realised she was a conservative. Well, Tory anyway.

It's not like you can confuse left and right. Even if you're fuzzy on the details, the basic question of collectivism vs individuality is easy enough to grasp. Ditto, by 2006, when Grant supposedly saw the light, Nu lab were approaching a decade in office. We'd already had Rose Addis, a 'good day to bury bad news', tax hikes and the like. Grant is either sleazy, or just mildly retarded.

On the other hand, the Cameroonatics have mounted a passionate defence of their new heroine, pointing to her five-star CV and demonstrable record of achievement....

I kid! I kid!

Nope, they've called all their critics bigots - it's what I like to call "The Margo James Defence'. You know, you have to wonder about a procession of fantastically well qualified individuals that no one can cite any positive arguments for. Nope, it's all about how rotten we are for unfairly depriving them of their God-given right to a seat in the house. And thus was refuted the charge that the Cameroonatics have an elephantine sense of entitlement.

Talking of our House of Dumb heroine, in a move worthy of James herself, Grant's given a long interview to the Daily Mail talking at great length about her youthful victimisation by racist thugs, and how she refuses absolutely to play the race card.

Yet,that's what I always do when I'm trying to keep something quiet, give a long interview about it in the national press. I'm not totally up on modern etiquette, but as a rule of thumb, gaining credit for not trading on your race does kind of require that that you refrain from wearing a badge proclaiming "Ask me about my claim to racial victimhood".

What it's really all about it is the death spiral of modern politics. Richard Nixon put his finger on it when he claimed there were two types of people who went into politics: those who wanted to do big things and those who wanted to be big. The Cameroonatics are almost entirely of the second sort. Hence they don't have a problem with Grant, Lit et al. People change jobs all the time, right ?

At risk of stating the obvious, the job of being an MP involves slightly more than merely being an avatar of diversity. Ultimately, Grant will be one of the 646 people who gets to decide on trivia such as whether or not we go to war. I think we're entitled to be a little nervous about someone who didn't know she was a conservative until two years ago. Indeed, Grant herself is the perfect ink blot test for conservatism. If you can't see the funny side of a metropolitan lawyer being the pin up girl for diversity! in politics, no, you aren't a conservative.

The flip-side of that is the Nu Tories contempt for the base. Of course opposition to James, Grant and the rest of these lightweight wannabes is cast as bigotry. It's not just tactics, they really do believe that principle and bigotry are just two sides of the same coin. Far better to be an eye-rolling metropolitan sophisticate sniggering about the grass roots over the canapés. Why get bogged down in labels like 'conservative' or 'leftist' anyway ?

Well, let's hear what the great Rush has to say on a similar topic:

I think what the McCain people don't get here is that those of us who call ourselves conservatives also consider ourselves a movement. We're not politicos. We don't go issue by issue and say, "Okay, we support this, can it help us here, do this," we're movement people, and we're sick and tired of having Republicans elected who are not movement people.

We believe in conservatism. We believe in it as a governing ideology. We believe in it because it's the founding principle of this country. We want it to take root, and we want it to soar because when it does, people soar, country soars. S-o-a-r-s. And to sit around here, we're not making calculations on the basis of one political issue to the next.

Exactly. Grant, James, Lit and the rest of the smug metropolitan - but diverse! - shysters are looking for a chance to score some easy money and get on TV. The rest of us in the conservative movement are aiming a little higher. It'd be great if the Tories were actually pushing conservatism, but it's Helen Grant's party now - at least until she realises she's a Scottish Nationalist - and the conservative movement will have to look elsewhere. But that's OK. Liberals are obsessed with political power as the natural consequence of their worship of the state. Conservatives recognise that the ebb and flow of elections is just one aspect of the wider culture.

Whosoever wins the next election, they'll have to deal with this sort of thing. Does anyone think the Cult of Dave offer any answers ? Sure, winning is nice, but not at the expense of defining conservatism down to vanishing point.

That's What We Said

I get the feeling Steve thinks this quote from the Great Norman sticks it to the right:

When I look at what we denounce as the appalling conduct of 'ordinary people' I see the way the rich have always behaved. It's just that they have had the resources to deal with the fallout.

Well, quite. But that's hardly a new, or contradictory impulse on the right. The libertarian side of the shop have always regarded personal conduct as irrelevant, providing you're not drawing down on their resources. Meanwhile, social conservatives have not only been aware of this phenomenon, some of them talk of little else.

For all that the left likes to yammer about 'hypocrisy' back in the old days, that's surely less socially destructive than what we have nowadays: celebutards revelling in their dysfunctional lunacy. It's precisely because these people can have seven kids by eight fathers or get hooked on crack, with no apparent consequences, that this sort of thing is so damaging.

Another Right-Wing Myth

Remember everybody, this doesn't ever happen!

I guess he's robbing the money Britons just won't steal. On the plus side, now he's under threat of deportation. That'll teach him!

"I warn you not to fall ill. I warn you not to get old."

Old Left: That Neil Kinnock quote up top

New Left: Doctors not wanting to treat the old and unhealthy

Logical Next Step:

The revolution... is successful. But survival depends upon drastic measures. Your continued existence is a threat to the order we have restored; your lives mean slow death to the more valued members of the colony. I, therefore, have no alternative but to sentence you to death.

The Spirit Of The Dave Party

On the subject of the Nu Conservatives' problem with actual conservatism, consider a couple of posts from Tory A-lister Iain Dale.

The Reverend Dale sniffily dismisses as 'desperate' an advert which makes the purely factual point that there were real world consequences to Governor Mick Huckabee's habit of releasing just about any felon who could name eight out of ten commandments. For an example of 'non-desperate politics, we can turn to his very next post which features a supposed joke which revolves around the proposition that Tony Blair is like a Mafia Don because he is 'is indirectly implicated in the deaths of many people to promote his interests although he is never present at the killings'.

Ah yes.

Take that promoters of girly hysteria! Apparently, pointing out the consequences of accepting dubious evidence of rehabilitation is beyond the pale, but adopting wholesale the rhetoric of the loony left peace freaks and comparing political opponents to the Mafia ? Why, sir, it's the very epitome of constructive politics.

The Battle Of Ideas

Another quote from the US with resonance over here:

Fred [Thompson], I think, had a lot of enthusiasm because he didn't just say the right thing, he gave the right reason for believing the right thing (and the right subsidiary reason for believing the right reason). His conservatism, to many, was deeper. He didn't just have the conservative answer, but the underlying conservative assumptions supporting that answer.

Exactly. Even when the Cameroonatics take an actual conservative position, they do it with all the style and grace of the father of the bride dancing at a wedding.

The tiny minority who manage to espouse conservative positions without looking like they're chowing down on horse manure soufflé still don't convince, unable as they are to articulate why the conservative position on, say, crime is the right one.

Even if you believe, in the teeth of all the evidence, that the Cameroonatics few right-wing policies are anything more than a feint to the right, they'll still have to fight vested interests to implement these policies. In so far as these people are incapable of making the case for the right, it hardly speaks well for either their ability or their desire to push through these policies.

Quote D'Jour

The 'Iraqi Resistance' ain't:

Based on the Sinjar records, U.S. military officials in Iraq said they now think that nine out of 10 suicide bombers have been foreigners, compared with earlier estimates of 75 percent. Similarly, they assess that 90 percent of foreign fighters entering Iraq during the one-year period ending in August came via Syria, a greater proportion than previously believed.

'Irony' Doesn't Quite Cover It

Who'd have thunk it ? A member of the Kinnock family turns out to have scored a cushy government job. Nothing says 'socialism' like government being run as a family business. But that's not the best of it. Turns out the scion of Britain's most notorious family of Eurosnivellers is working for the British Council.

How exactly does that work then ? Mum & dad made their pile claiming Britain was a Third World hell hole that would be lucky to survive long enough to negotiate an orderly surrender to the EU, now Junior is coining it in promoting Britain abroad. Huh ? Is he lying now, or where his parents lying all those times they claimed Britain sucked ?

It gets better. Consider that Britain's filthiest family is back in the news after some minor thuggery by the Kremlin. Hmmmmm..... that rings a bell. Yes, I remember now: it was the USR...SUSR....RUSS... something like that.

Back in the day, when the Kremlin flexed it's muscles the death toll was measured in the millions. Meanwhile, Neil & Glenys were two of the most prominent public figures claiming that the USSR was being unfairly demonised by the right, and besides, we had to be realistic and come to some kind of compromise with the Soviets...

Hey, is anyone else seeing a pattern here ? Not that there's any conclusion to be drawn from the Kinnock's seamless transition from covering for the USSR to spinning for the EU. Britain is terrible, that's all you need to know (unless there's any more jobs going at the British Council).

Dhimmis Du Siècle

I've just had a message from a race of alien telepaths in the Pegasus galaxy - they've detected a sudden spike in emissions of dhimmitude from this planet.

This is it, the mother lode - a vein of dhimmitude so rich a single bucket-full would supply every campus in the UK for a decade. Get ready for a new world folks - this is it.

....

I want to come out with some snide comment, but it's not easy when your brain's giving you the blue screen of death.

Only When They Get Elected

This news reminded me of one of my favourite Wikipedia entries:

Coulrophobia is an abnormal or exaggerated fear of clowns....

Yep, it's an abnormal or exaggerated fear, as opposed to the normal, moderate fear induced by folks with red noses and wigs.

Question D'Jour

Which is worst here ? The science, the history or the moral philosophy ?

Some Terrorists We Can Hate

At last!

Hey, at least we'll know where we stand. Libs have spent years claiming that it's all about the race, well, now it turns out Islamofascists are also available in white, the left should have no trouble standing against these lunatics, right ?

The EU's Strangelove Moment

Hearing about the latest tantrum from the Euronuts reminded me of this line from Dr Strangelove:

Gentlemen, gentlemen! You can't fight in here this is the War Room

Or, as Euroloon Richard Corbett puts it:

[Eurosceptics] hit on two tactics. The first was to demand a full roll call votes (instead of a show of hands) on every paragraph and every amendment before the house. (Imagine that the House of Commons had a division on every paragraph of a bill). This slows down voting and costs £300 per vote (but they don't really care about taxpayers money).

Yep, parliament works much more efficiently once you get rid of the actual voting. Forget the wider issues (sliced & diced by Trixy as they are), is that or is that not, just the perfect insight into the hive mind of the EU ?

Not A Myth

Well, looks like the story about our PC PCs targeting a blogger wasn't actually an enormous right-wing hoax after all. Doubtless, all those folks who were about to support Lionheart, but they thought the threat was overblown, will be pitching in anytime now, right ?

Presumably thinking that they hadn't rammed home their thuggish nature quite explicitly enough, Bedfordshire Police give us a splendid insight into the mind of the modern police officer. Try this:

A spokesman for Bedfordshire Police said: "We are aware of this particular internet site and we are taking action."

Do you think someone should tell them that we have actual courts to 'take action' ? But no: liberals claim to be disgusted by the idea that airport security should pay more attention to the guy dressed as Bin Laden than an 88 year old widow, but when we're talking about crimes against PC, all that civil liberties garbage is under the bus before you can say 'Liberty'.

Then again, liberal activists-in-uniform do have to bluster about 'taking action' themselves. When they do finally have to present an actual, coherent, case in court, it doesn't usually end well for them. Come to think of it, with a bit of luck, Lionheart could be in line for a windfall.

More Non-Racial Violence

JuliaM points out this story. It really is a classic of BBC non-reporting. Why so cagey ? The closest we get to a hint of what's really going on is this:

All the victims are of "middle eastern appearance", police said.

Officers now believe the injured men may have been hit on the head with a blunt instrument.

Officers said the suspects, who are believed to be black men, fled the scene after the attack.

Yep, it sounds like a racial attack, but the libs aren't sure whose victimhood stats are highest, so they're holding off until they can find a way to blame the natives.

Science - Available For Sale Or Rent

The Lancet's notorious report of 900000000000 dead in Iraq was widely derided when it came out, and hasn't grown in stature any over the years. But it's still a surprise to see this.

Yep, well, liberals in 'scumbags' shocker, but think what this says about British science. There was already plenty objectionable about the Lancet study, including - but not limited to - the timing, immediately before the US presidential election, the way it bypassed the normal process of peer review and the basic methodology of extrapolating from a completely unrepresentative group of clusters, but liberals are sufficiently shameless to be able to cobble together some kind of defence to all that. The revelation that the authors were secretly being funded by the Kookfather is in a different league.

Alleged scientists took money from the Moonbat-in-Chief, then produced a garbage report supporting the left's position. More to the point, one of Britain's top medical journal enabled them. In so far as publication of a paper in a scientific journal is supposed to be the metric by which the quality of work is judged, prestigious publications printing absolute rubbish is the scientific equivalent of debasing the currency. Yet no one - at the the Lancet or elsewhere - had a problem with this.

Then again, few folks on the right appear bothered by this either. The mainstream right has swallowed whole the reductionist line that it's all about the economics. Well, no it isn't. This case is a perfect example of why fighting the culture war matters. Liberals managed to foist a bogus narrative on the public - and just think how many times you've seen the '650 000' dead figure trotted out - and that helped the left push their broader agenda. They're doing it right now with Gerbil Worsening. Again, that's helping the left sell the public on massively obtrusive state control. Meanwhile, large chunks of the right have either ceded the debate to the left, or even drank the kool aid themselves - and that's how we ended up with an allegedly conservative Conservative Party supporting massive tax hikes (but green ones!).

Pushing specific conservative policies in a wider culture dominated by the left is a fool's errand. Once you concede that consumption is bad or industry is evil, then the case for lower taxes or free markets is hobbled right from the start. That's what the Nu Tories don't understand. The culture war isn't just about the specifics of teaching five year old kids about felching and golden showers, it's about setting the terms of the debate. Is profit 'bad' ? Is one man's terrorist another man's freedom fighter ? Is torturing lawyers 'wrong' ? (Answers: no, no and yes - don't screw around, just shoot them on sight).

You can argue about tax policy all you want, but if the proverbial guy in the street associates the right with greed, selfishness and moustache-twirling millionaires doing down the common man, it's going to be an uphill struggle. Just as long as the British right follows its Maginot Line strategy of refusing to engage with whole areas of the national debate, then it too will find itself deservedly outflanked and irrelevant.

All Your Organs Are Belong To Us

Hey, where are all those femiloons chanting 'my body, my choice' when we need them ?

Mr Broon's de facto nationalisation of our bodily organs is creepy on its own terms, but Allah points out that the specifics are even worse.

Yep, targets. What could go wrong ?

I'd say What He Said, plus I give it approximately six seconds before the NHS 'accidentally' harvests someone who's opted out. But don't expect the MSM to mention any of this.

Needless to say, the most prominent cheerleader for the state-as-body-snatcher is the ever-independent BBC. Here's a massive power grab by the government, and our national broadcaster is running virtual infomercials.

I guess the closest we're going to get to critical comment in the MSM is this.

UPDATE:

Pop culture, hey ? Who can keep track ?

Outrage D'Jour

Like FR I'm pleased that at least the BBC are reporting this case, even if they are still hiding behind the wimpy euphemism 'Asian'. Baby steps:

Three Asian men who were convicted of attacking a group of friends and trying to kill one of them have each been given an 18-year jail sentence....

The court heard that as many as 30 men attacked the group of five white people, shouting racial abuse.

So it was a racist attack then ?

Well, not quite:

The three men convicted of attacking him were all found guilty of attempted murder, grievous bodily harm and violent disorder.

But there was no evidence that any of the three shouted racial abuse or used a weapon.

Yep, they were part of an 'Asian' mob that screamed racial epithets while beating their white victims, but they can't be convicted for a racist attack because there's no evidence that they personally were motivated by racial animus, rather than some other, unknown factor, that drove them to try to kill a white guy at the self-same time a mob of other Asians were, coincidentally, also trying to kill him, while screaming racist abuse. See, it makes perfect sense!

Tory MP Bows Before The Majesty Of Satan

The Cameroonatics are amazing: how can they be so consistently appalling, yet always in a different way ? DB points out this abomination.

Needless to say, the excuse for all this is that US politics is tilted so far right that the Democrats are, relatively speaking, right-wing. In so far as this argument is moronic, it does raise one question: is Burns merely retarded, or is he a sleazy fraud ?

But wait.... he's a Tory MP, so I guess we'll put him down for 'Both of the above'. Nevertheless, leaving aside the core mix of moronicity and third-degree humbuggery, there's also a creamy topping of stupid hypocrisy. Try this:

There was a combination of factors at work," says Burns, who helped the Clinton campagin in a variety of ways, including telephone and door-to-door canvassing, taking part in "visibility stunts", attending rallies and helping at polling stations on the day of the vote.

In other words, all the stuff that's beneath Tory MPs back home (and, by the way, who was watching the store while Burns was in league with the devil) ?

[Burns said] The media also failed to pay enough attention to the sheer scale of the organisation of Hillary's campaign in New Hampshire, which had been at work for ten months.

Wasszat ? An effective grass roots infrastructure can help win elections ? Really ?

Hey, if politics doesn't work out, that guys got a great future at NASA! Meanwhile, some of us are wondering why the Tories don't try and build their own grass roots infrastructure....

Oh yeah - that's right! Wannabe aristocrats like Burns look down their pointy noses at the base - after all, folks on the British Right generally have the two things the pampered princes in the Tory Party despise the most: conservative principles and real jobs. The last thing these freaks want is real grass roots conservatism - that would bring the risk of actual accountability.

Well, As Long As They're All Consenting Adults....

Harsh But Unfair

Ross mocks the Indie for devoting its front page to the Obamessiah's victory in New Hampshire. That seems a bit rough. Just because their predictions don't last twenty-four hours doesn't mean they can't tell us what the weather's going to be like in 2058.

Enormously Huge Shocker!

Hmmmmm..... a study shows that crime falls when violent thugs are otherwise occupied and unable to get tanked up and roam the streets. Who'd have thunk it, hey ?

I'm sure the left will gladly seize on this as another reason why public money should be spent on rubbish films no one watches. Me, I'm just wondering if there isn't some other kind of place we can use to keep thugs off the streets ?

Jihadis: Still Only The Second Worst Group Of Scum On Earth

The jihadis might be taking a pounding at the moment, but their allies are doing all it can to try and relieve the pressure.First, there's this:

A top military commander says in a sworn affidavit Canadian troops would have to quit fighting the Taliban if they could not hand prisoners over to Afghan authorities.

Listing a long series of possible embarrassments and defeats, Brigadier-General André Deschamps outlined what he says would be the dire consequences, including losing the war, should a Federal Court judge rule in favour of a request by human-rights groups to issue an injunction banning the transfer of detainees to Afghan prisons because of the risk of torture or abuse.

Hand prisoners taken in Afghanistan over to the Afghans ? Liberals won't hear of it. And so the position of the legal profession is now what it was in the Victorian era: you can't trust the wogs to behave like civilised men.

Of course, this is Canada. Even lawyers shape up when the threat becomes undeniable.

Well, maybe not:

This week the IDF distributed ribbons to its soldiers and officers for their service in the war with Hizbullah in 2006. The ribbons were a source of embarrassment. Soldiers and officers, who like the general public view the war as Israel's greatest military defeat, are loath to pin them on their uniforms.

While the soldiers and general public view the war as a failure, one sector of Israeli society sees the war as a great triumph. For Israel's legal establishment, the war was a great victory. It was a war in which its members asserted their dominance over Israel's political and military leadership.

In so far as the legal profession now openly boasts of its ability inhibit counter-terrorism, could the MSM at least stop presenting these people as disinterested commentators on civil liberty ?

Footballers Against Materialism

Well, no - it's even better. Thanks to DB again, we can check out two Beeboids taking on media bias:



Call it a hunch, but I'm thinking if anyone in the Dextrosphere joked about assaulting a Beeboid, the girly hysteria would go on for weeks

Two More Cases Of Sudden Asian Death Syndrome

One in Leeds, one in the north-west. Fortunately, neither of the victims were whiny, fat chicks with jobs in the city, so the femiloons have decided to sit this one out. I guess it's down to the rest of us to try and track down some kind of common factor in all these deaths.

It's A Quagmire!

Clearly, this is all Bush's fault.

Dhimmis D'Jour: Leadership Edition

A magistrate today received a reprimand after refusing to deal with the case of a Muslim woman wearing a veil covering her face....

Today's decision was rubber-stamped by the Lord Chancellor, Jack Straw, who has spoken out against the full face veil in the past.

A politician bottling it ? Get away!

Mr Murray left the hearing without explaining why - but said later he felt the way she was dressed raised identity issues.

This is true. Also ridiculousness issues.

Hussain's lawyer, Judith Hawkins, said the young mother was "shocked and distressed" by Murray's "insensitive and unacceptable" treatment.

Oh sure.... we can tell she's a sensitive soul all right:

She was convicted of criminal damage after causing £1,500 of damage to a council house when her family was thrown out for rent arrears.

Housing officers found graffiti sprayed on the walls and holes in the doors.

Yep, and she's the one the system backed. And thus was settled the debate over whether or not the courts were a wholly-owned subsidiary of the left.

Question D'Jour

I'm wondering one thing about the government's plans to criminalise the hiring of horizontal hospitality executives. Liberals have spent years telling us we can't do anything to stop twelve year old taking part in rainbow parties, so we may as well teach them how to swallow safely, so what about the sad cases ? Aren't people just going to hire hookers anyway ?

Dhimmis D'Jour: Sniper Barbie Edition

Victimhood poker strikes again:

To be honest, Woman's Hour is a bit of a 'no-go' area for me. I've always been a Ken Bruce man myself.

But a third of its listeners are men, one of whom, Mail reader Barry Gower from the Isle of Dogs, suggested I catch up with an item the programme broadcast about the suitability of women for police firearms duty.

The officer in charge explained that there were no barriers to women being deployed in specialist weapons units - bar one.

"Young black males and Muslim males don't react well to being told what to do by a woman," she said. "So we adapt and overcome and use a male officer."

In other words, when an experienced Inspector suggests that someone with Paris Hilton's build might not be the best choice for a job requiring huge upper body strength, he's being a sexist pig, but Paris better not be taking down any crack dens or terrorist safe houses in the near future. You wouldn't want to offend these people, they might turn violent.

Liberal Argumentation: Is 500 000 A Lot ?

Down in the comments to that last post, DB suggests a reason why the BBC has adopted a policy of unilateral debating - liberalism doesn't stand up well once people are allowed to answer back. Here's Leo McKinstry explaining to a Beeboid that, no, 500 000 is not a 'tiny' group:



This just reminds me of the upside of this liberal desperation to jail everyone on the right for 'hate speech'. Folks, they're not doing it because they're confident in their position. On the contrary, arguing that 500 000 people aren't really that many is the perfect barometer of how bankrupt liberal arguments really are. Hence the liberal desire to skip dealing with actual facts, in favour of girly hysteria.

BBC Mass Debation

They've just been discussing the splendid Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali's comments on the Jeremy Vine Show, which is to say they've been discussing them BBC style, which is like a normal discussion, but with only one side represented.

In this case, the debate was between well-known lunatic Yasmin Alibi-Brown and the snivellingly dhimmi Bishop of Burnley. In other words, the topic was whether or not Bishop Nazir-Ali's comments were appallingly appalling, or merely appalling. How best to sum it up ? Well, how about pointing out that at the end the Yazzmonster told Bishop Dhimmi 'You're a good guy. I like what you said. Well done'.

As if that wasn't enough, next up came the listener's comments. Normally, these are simple one or two-liners, but this time we first of all had a near essay read out from one Muslim, then a phone call from the Chair of the Muslim Public Affairs Committee. What luck he just happened to be listening when this topic came up!

Nope - five minutes later, Vine admitted that 'We called him' - his was 'a voice that needed to be heard' apparently - presumably as opposed to the two studio guests taking exactly the same line.

So, to summarise, what we had was a BBC debate featuring three separate contributors, all of took the liberal position. Not that they're biased or anything.

Steyn D'Jour

Another cracker from Steyn. The specifics are American, but there's plenty of resonance over here:

There is a potentially huge segment of the population that thinks homo economicus is missing the point. They're tired of the artificial and, indeed, creepily coercive secular multiculti pseudo-religion imposed on American grade schools. I'm sympathetic to this pitch myself. Unlike Miss Noonan, I think it's actually connected to the jihad, in the sense that radical Islamism is an opportunist enemy that has arisen in the wake of the Western world's one-way multiculturalism.

In the long run, the relativist mush peddled in our grade schools is a national security threat. But, even in the short term, it's a form of child abuse that cuts off America's next generation from the glories of their inheritance.

For all that the left's talk of comunidees and the like is creepy and disturbing, at least there's a recognition there that there's more to politics than tax rates. Meanwhile, the Tories have resolutely gone the other way, actively hostile to any attempt to cast conservatism in anything other than economic terms. The epic incompetence of this government may yet deliver victory to the Tories, but their determination not to engage with a huge chunk of the population should disqualify them from power.

It's The Duct Tape Of Statecraft

Ho hum - Anthony Giddens claims central planning is the only answer to the enormously huge threat of the Earth turning into a ball of fire. I'd point out that this would sound a lot better if folks like him didn't advocate central planning for every other social ill too, but as the Rotty Pup points out, he's gone and done that himself too. Truly a Tourettes moment.

Lifestyle change and how to achieve it, it could be argued, are now the name of the game in key areas of politics. The range of issues involved is very wide. Climate change is the big daddy of them all, but others include the obesity epidemic, lifestyle related diseases - including high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease and cancer - excessive drinking, drug dependence, antisocial behaviour and other areas besides. In many respects it is a new agenda, at least in terms of policy thinking.

Personally, I'm still waiting for the threat that liberals think doesn't require central planning. Hey, even if you buy into Gorebull Worming, isn't it possible to argue that only an innovative and vibrant society can come up with the right answers ? But no, liberalism's new policy thinking always turns out to be the same as the old one: central planning.

This is a fundamental difference between left and right. All the innovations are on one side of the spectrum. Say what you like about school vouchers, but they really are a new idea. Meanwhile, the left's busily trying to find new ways to rebrand the same old garbage. No wonder leftists are so obsessed with 'hate speech' and the like - it's not like their policy ideas can stand up to competition.

Police Track Dangerous Felon

I'm guessing that I'm the last blogger in Britain to post on the left's latest assault on free speech. There's something to be said for this approach, in so far as plenty of folks in the blogosphere seem to take The Matrix way too seriously. So, no, this isn't the blogosphere's Pearl Harbour, but let's not go the other way. Whatever the specifics of this case, there's something fundamentally repulsive about the idea that a Briton can only publish his work on the sufferance of the state.

Hey, even the left's usual sub-Marxoid fig leafs apply here. This is one guy, writing a blog. There's no 'imbalance of power', no one's being 'shut out of the debate', no one's lacking a 'right to reply' - on the contrary, it's the left that wants to outlaw whole areas of public debate.

Similarly, whatever may or may not actually happen to 'Lionheart', having activists in uniform carrying out the 'nice blog you've got here, pity if something was to happen to it' routine is not a neutral thing. These liberal thugs may not be able to get convictions, but they can still sure make life hellish for their victims.

There's an irony here too. When you think about it, Lionheart isn't being persecuted for anything he actually wrote. That might sound paradoxical, but remember that he's being harassed for supposed 'hate speech'. The content of the speech is irrelevant, except in so far as the usual suspects claims it incites hatred - a totally subjective standard. Meanwhile, over in Canada the Great Steyn is being hassled over accurately - but apparently offensively - quoting a Norwegian iman. In other words, 'hate speech' only becomes 'hate speech' when it's said by the wrong person.

These people would no doubt posture as determined opponents of 'prejudice', but consider where that word comes from - the pre-trial session in Roman courts where the rank of the contending parties was determined. We're supposed to be appalled by the idea of a court which bases its decisions partially on the social position of the accused, but flash forward 2000 years and now we have courts deciding that 'hate speech' depends on who's actually saying it. Is anything 'Lionheart' says about Islam really different from what the folks from 'Undercover Mosque' say ? Yet one is hate speech, while it's criticism of the other that counts as hate speech.

The left has gone one up on Humpty Dumpty - he only claimed words meant whatever he choose them to mean, but leftists claim the same words can mean different things depending on who says them. Whatever the ideological objections to the principle of 'hate crimes' laws, the reality is even worse. What we have is the law being used to victimise people not for what they actually say, but for the underlying position they take. It is literally thought crime.

Islamofascist Terrorists: Now Even Worse

Who'd have thunk that even murderous savages could go lower ? But they've managed it.

Personally, I loved this bit:

Uddin, who got his law qualifications in Bangladesh....

If only law really was a job the British 'just won't do'. Besides, importing thousands of lawyers might just be the only way to get the courts interested in actually upholding our immigration laws.

Then there's this:

We found Uddin working among a group of unsuspecting and honest lawyers at the Syed Shaheen firm in London's East End.

But wait... using their own loopy precedents, as developed when dealing with the Filth and the like, the mere existance of one nut must mean the rest of them are guilty as well. The honest lawyers (ahem!) should have challenged their colleague, right ? Clearly, there is a culture of corruption here. Compulsory retraining for everyone!

Joking apart, it's not as if there wasn't the odd hint:

He then bragged about his status: "I am a member of Lincoln's Inn, training for the bar. I want to be a barrister to help my people. I will be representing only Muslim brothers in court."...

He then closed his eyes and began loudly chanting verses from the Koran in a trance-like state—to the bemusement of other diners.

Dang! How were his coworkers to know he was up to something ? Like Fido said, I'm not seeing a lot of future for a white lawyer who adopted a 'Christians only' policy.

And there's plenty more. All of which leads to one conclusion: border security is seriously screwed. To return to a theme I raised before: if immigration control has broken down to such an extent that even a self-described terrorist, even a pretendey one, can get permenant residence, in what sense do we not have a de facto open borders policy ?

Outrage D'Jour

The current state of play is that puns are verboten but nobody can say who ordered this disgrace. Apparently, you can't walk through a British airport dressed as a soldier, but you can dressed as Bin Laden. Hey, even I might start taking the 'respectable left' seriously if they devoted half the rage to this case that they'd express if some airport banned Islamic regalia.

But At Least They Weren't Waterboarded!

Another pair of honour killings, this time in Texas. Robert Spencer makes the obvious point about the left's silence in all this, but for a true idea of just how far down the rabbit hole we've gone, consider this report from the Daily Mail:

It is known by a variety of names, the most common of which are female genital mutilation (FGM), female circumcision, or simply "cutting" - a word which somehow conveys the raw pain its prepubescent victims suffer...

By conservative estimates, 66,000 women and girls living in Britain have been mutilated. This figure, accepted by the Metropolitan Police, came in a report by a volunteer organisation funded by the Department of Health and carried out with academics from the London School of Tropical Hygiene and the City University.

Draw your own conclusions from the fact this is appearing in the evilest paper evah!, rather than, say, the screamingly right on Guardian. Say what you like about the right, but when we get accused of discriminating against women, the charge usually boils down to something like calling vacuous Blair Babes 'vacuous Blair Babes'. Actual mutilation, not so much.

A vote of thanks too for the race hustlers, ever ready to talk about the soul-chilling horrors of life in racist Britain, but silent in the face of real atrocities. Again.

Oops, no: silence would be an improvement. They're actively hindering attempts to suppress this savagery:

Usually [police] visits are well-received, but we found that at least one London council declined to publish material highlighting the suffering and danger the practice causes - for fear of offending ethnic African residents.

Yep, even when the topic is torture and mutilation, the cards win out.

Liberals Heart Learco

Looks like the left are pulling out all the stops for their new pin up boy, Learco Chindamo. Six months ago we not only had the left lyingly claiming that EU citizens couldn't be deported (oops) but as a back up, they also conjured up an absurd legal doctrine that claimed we couldn't deport criminals from anywhere if doing so would impact on their personal life.

Now it turns out that even that wasn't enough for the left. Looks like this scumbag will also benefit from another of the legal doctrines that passed unnoticed until 1997. Not only will this murderous savage get a free house (probably not what William Beveridge meant), but also, in the latest example of the left's ongoing battle with personal accountability, he'll be given a new identity.

That's where liberalism is at today. Nothing short of one of these murderous sociopaths being caught actually standing over the body of his next victim will convince liberals that murderers might be prone to violence, but the public at large ? To liberals they're a group of slavering savages, ever ready to form a lynch mob. Never mind that the number of cases of murderers being killed by mobs of respectable businessmen is approximately zero, liberals claim it's only a matter of time.

Well, either that, or it's just another step in the nationalisation of morality. Liberals believe the state should be the sole judge of good and evil but - wouldcha'believe it ? - members of the public keep insisting on looking down on sadistic maniacs.

Needless to say, the left's position that killers set free by the parole board should be treated exactly the same as a law-abiding, non-insane citizen, is a legal and moral absurdity. Previous generations understand that shaming, shunning and the like had their own part to play in upholding the law. Criminals didn't just face the loss of liberty, they faced being ostracised by society, which had its own deterrent effect.

Only with the rise of the Nu Left have we been faced with the absurd idea that a felon who has 'paid his debt to society' (i.e. served a nominal period of imprisonment) not only deserves to be released, but also deserves to be treated exactly the same as non-criminally inclined citizens. Unless they're Jeffrey Archer.

Apparently, in the secular religion of liberalism, the criminal justice system plays the role of the confessional, with its own unique take on confidentiality and absolution.

But not only does this murderous low-life get a free house and a new ID, he also gets state of the art security and (potentially) security guards - unfortunately, to keep him safe, rather than keep him inside. The funny thing is that the only person in this case who's definitely, provably, been the target of actual hate is Frances Lawrence, widow of the victim.

Leftists have taken time out from complaining about people being rude about a murderous savage to instead attack an elderly widow. More to the point, it looks like some folks are going for the direct approach. Hmmmm..... maybe she could do with some help with security ?

Here's Clue Number Two about modern liberals: liberals would rather waste taxpayers money to protect a scumbag from a pretendey threat than an actual, worthwhile citizen from a real one. I guess we're not allowed to ask why members of the criminal community would feel so strongly about helping out a model citizen like Chindamo. Ditto, let's not speculate about the likely response of lefty commentators if a storm of right-wing criticism of an innocent citizen exercising her democratic rights was followed up shortly after by actual, violent intimidation, other than to say that leftists would be be producing reams of portentous drivel about the right 'creating atmospheres', using 'code words' and the like.

But all of the above isn't even the most obnoxious part of it all. Say what you like about leftists, but they do a bang-up job excusing homicidal insanity, from 'agrarian reformer' Mao Tse-Tung to 'Saudi militant' Osama Bin Laden, the left can excuse almost anything. Yet, still, years after the fact liberals still haven't dreamed up any kind of bogus mitigation for Chindamo. His crimes are literally inexcusable even for folks who've dedicated their lives to obscuring evil.

Nope, liberals aren't defending Chindamo because they think he's the next Che, or even the next Tookie Williams. Liberals are defending a homicidal savage simply because he is a homicidal savage. That's all you need to make it as a liberal pin-up these days.