Saturday, December 04, 2004
Arab Student Pushed to see Therapist by Professor After Submitting Pro-American Essay
LOS ALTOS HILLS, CA –Dec 02, 2004. Yesterday, Foothill College Political-Science Professor Joseph Woolcock tried to intimidate student Ahmad Al-Qloushi into seeing a therapist because of a Pro-American essay he wrote in Woolcock's class. The thesis of Al-Qloushi's essay is that the US constitution was a very progressive document, which has contributed to freedom beyond America's borders.
One of the things students have come up with for dealing with this type of academic tyrrany is a movement towards a student's bill of rights, to protect the students from a community that is pretty much isolated and insular, and perhaps, as others have suggested, has drifted so far to one side they don't realize the true reality of what they are doing.The Foothill College Republicans are using this opportunity to make sure that intellectual diversity is respected on campus, by lobbying to have the “Academic Bill of Rights” as an official Foothill College policy."This is not an isolated case," said Cori Jenab, Vice-President of Foothill College Republicans. "Foothill’s faculty has disrespected students because of their political and religious beliefs in the past."
"Intellectual diversity must be respected at Foothill College," said Ahmad Al-Qloushi. "The only way to guarantee this is to have Foothill adopt the “Academic Bill of Rights.”
The Academic Bill of Rights was drawn up by an organization called Students for Academic Freedom. In March of 2004 Presidents of Colorado’s major public Universities adopted a memorandum of understanding. It included provisions of the Academic Bill of Rights that their regulations did not already cover. The universities pledged to provide protections to students of all political viewpoints, emphasizing “Colorado’s institutions of higher education are committed to valuing and respecting diversity, including respect for diverse political viewpoints.” To learn more about the Academic Bill of Rights and Colorado's memorandum of understanding, visit http://www.studentsforacademicfreedom.org
About Us: The Foothill College Republicans are a broad-based organization for conservative, libertarian, and moderate students at Foothill Community College. FCR boasts a membership that is over 70% minority.
Cori Jenab and Ahmad Al-Qloushi are available for immediate interview.
Press Contact: Ahmad Al-Qloushi
To contact the Foothill College Board of Trustees, click here.
ahmadalqloushi@sbcglobal.net
Europa - dein Name ist Feigheit
Matthias Döpfner, Chief Executive of German publisher Axel Springer AG, has written a blistering attack in the daily WELT against the cowardice of Europe in the face of the Islamic threat. Hartmut Lau translated the article for us.
A few days ago Henryk M. Broder wrote in Welt am Sonntag, "Europe – your family name is appeasement."
It’s a phrase you can’t get out of your head because it’s so terribly true.
Appeasement cost millions of Jews and non-Jews their lives as England and France, allies at the time, negotiated and hesitated too long before they noticed that Hitler had to be fought, not bound to agreements. Appeasement stabilized communism in the Soviet Union and East Germany in that part of Europe where inhuman, suppressive governments were glorified as the ideologically correct alternative to all other possibilities. Appeasement crippled Europe when genocide ran rampant in Kosovo and we Europeans debated and debated until the Americans came in and did our work for us. Rather than protecting democracy in the Middle East, European appeasement, camouflaged behind the fuzzy word "equidistance," now countenances suicide bombings in Israel by fundamentalist Palestinians. Appeasement generates a mentality that allows Europe to ignore 300,000 victims of Saddam’s torture and murder machinery and, motivated by the self-righteousness of the peace-movement, to issue bad grades to George Bush. A particularly grotesque form of appeasement is reacting to the escalating violence by Islamic fundamentalists in Holland and elsewhere by suggesting that we should really have a Muslim holiday in Germany.
What else has to happen before the European public and its political leadership get it? There is a sort of crusade underway, an especially perfidious crusade consisting of systematic attacks by fanatic Muslims, focused on civilians and directed against our free, open Western societies. It is a conflict that will most likely last longer than the great military conflicts of the last century—a conflict conducted by an enemy that cannot be tamed by tolerance and accommodation but only spurred on by such gestures, which will be mistaken for signs of weakness.
Two recent American presidents had the courage needed for anti-appeasement: Reagan and Bush. Reagan ended the Cold War and Bush, supported only by the social democrat Blair acting on moral conviction, recognized the danger in the Islamic fight against democracy. His place in history will have to be evaluated after a number of years have passed.
In the meantime, Europe sits back with charismatic self-confidence in the multicultural corner instead of defending liberal society’s values and being an attractive center of power on the same playing field as the true great powers, America and China. On the contrary—we Europeans present ourselves, in contrast to the intolerant, as world champions in tolerance, which even (Germany's Interior Minister) Otto Schily justifiably criticizes. Why?
Because we’re so moral? I fear it’s more because we’re so materialistic.
For his policies, Bush risks the fall of the dollar, huge amounts of additional national debt and a massive and persistent burden on the American economy—because everything is at stake.
While the alleged capitalistic robber barons in American know their priorities, we timidly defend our social welfare systems. Stay out of it! It could get expensive. We’d rather discuss the 35-hour workweek or our dental health plan coverage. Or listen to TV pastors preach about "reaching out to murderers." These days, Europe reminds me of an elderly aunt who hides her last pieces of jewelry with shaking hands when she notices a robber has broken into a neighbor’s house. Europe, thy name is cowardice.
Europa - dein Name ist Feigheit
source: Die Welt via Free Republic
Friday, December 03, 2004
Now Why Wasn't I Surprised by This?
Washington, DC (November 30, 2004) -- 49% of the students at the top 50 colleges and universities say professors frequently inject political comments into their courses, even if they have nothing to do with the subject. Almost one-third—29%—feel they have to agree with the professor’s political views to get a good grade.
A survey commissioned by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni reveals the politicization of the classroom and the intellectual intolerance of faculty.
According to the survey:
* 48% report campus presentations on political issues that “seem totally one-sided.”
* 46% say professors “use the classroom to present their personal political views.”
* 42% of students fault reading assignments for presenting only one side of a controversial issue.
The survey also indicates that political comments are consistently partisan. The survey, which was conducted just before and after the American presidential election, found that 68% of the students reported negative remarks in class about Pres. George Bush while 62% said professors praised Sen. John Kerry.
“Students pay hefty tuition to get an education, not to hear some professors’ pet political views,” said Anne Neal, president of ACTA. “When politics is relevant, multiple perspectives should be presented. The classroom should be a place where students are free to explore different points of view. They should not feel they will be penalized if they think for themselves.”
The ACTA survey was conducted in late October and early November by the Center for Survey Research & Analysis at the University of Connecticut at the 50 colleges and universities top-ranked by U.S. News & World Report. List attached.
The survey shows that college and university faculty are biased: 74% of students said professors made positive remarks about liberals while 47% reported negative comments about conservatives. A substantial majority—83 %—said that student evaluations administered by the college did not ask about a professor’s political biases.
The survey comes in the wake of a number of studies that have shown that party registrations of college professors are overwhelmingly one-sided. Last week, the Princeton, NJ-based National Association of Scholars released a study showing that the ratio of Democrats to Republicans at some top-50 schools is as high as 9 to 1.
American Association of University Professors president Roger W. Bowen called the NAS study “wrongheaded” and stated that political affiliations of professors are of little consequence in the classroom.
“The ACTA survey clearly shows that faculty are injecting politics into the classroom in ways that students believe infringe upon their freedom to learn,” said Neal.
ACTA opposes legislative intervention and is preparing guidelines for trustees and administrators on how best to ensure intellectual diversity and tolerance on our college and university campuses.
“The lack of intellectual diversity on our college campuses is clearly a problem,” said Neal. “We believe boards of trustees have the responsibility to ensure that students are exposed to a free and open exchange of ideas and are encouraged to think for themselves.”
The ACTA survey has an error rate of plus or minus four. The majority of students surveyed majored in subjects like biology, engineering and psychology—subjects that have nothing to do with politics. Referenced survey questions are available upon request.
ACTA is a nonprofit educational organization based in Washington, DC, and dedicated to academic freedom, academic quality, and accountability. It is located at 1726 M Street, N.W., Suite 802, Washington, DC 20036. For further information, contact ACTA at 202-467-6787 or at aneal@goacta.org.
# # #
Top 50 Schools Surveyed
A total of 658 randomly selected students from the top 25 National Universities and top 25 National Liberal Arts Colleges, as defined by U.S. News & World Report, were interviewed for this survey. Because of ties in the rankings, a total of 26 National Universities were included in the sample.
National Universities
1. Harvard University
Princeton University
3. Yale University
4. University of Pennsylvania
Duke University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Stanford University
8. California Institute of Technology
9. Columbia University
Dartmouth College
11. Northwestern University
Washington University in St. Louis
13. Brown University
14. Cornell University
Johns Hopkins University
University of Chicago
17. Rice University
18. University of Notre Dame
Vanderbilt University
20. Emory University
21. University of California-Berkeley
22. Carnegie Mellon University
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of Virginia
25. Georgetown University (DC)
University of California-Los Angeles
National Liberal Arts Colleges
1. Williams College
2. Amherst College
Swarthmore College
4. Wellesley College
5. Carleton College
Pomona College
7. Bowdoin College
Davidson College
9. Haverford College
Wesleyan University
11. Middlebury College
12. Vassar College
13. Claremont McKenna College
Smith College
Washington and Lee University
16. Colgate University
Grinnell College
Harvey Mudd College
19. Colby College
Hamilton College
21. Bryn Mawr College
22. Bates College
23. Oberlin College
24. Mount Holyoke College
Trinity College
Political movement in the Middle East?
But then I saw this news story on Yahoo News:
RAMALLAH, West Bank - In an apparent change in long-standing policy, a top Hamas leader said Friday the militant group would accept the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip (news - web sites) as well as a long-term truce with Israel.
Hamas' statement came as Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak (news - web sites) described Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites) as the Palestinians' best chance for peace.
Mubarak's comments could mean warming relations between Israel and an important Mideast peace mediator at a crucial time. It was a marked departure from past comments from Mubarak and other Egyptian officials blaming Sharon for the escalation of violence in the territories.
"I think if they (Palestinians) can't achieve progress in the time of the current (Israeli) prime minister, it will be very difficult to make any progress in peace," Mubarak told reporters.
From their lips to God's ears.
Thursday, December 02, 2004
Non-Embryonic Stemcell Research Continues to Show Results
A report from South Korea of a paraplegic woman walking six weeks after undergoing a transplant with stem cells from umbilical cord blood is only part of a mounting list of successful therapies that are not dependent on destroying embryos.
On the same day Hwang Mi-Soon, 37, took steps for reporters in Seoul with the aid of a walker, American and European studies were published that showed umbilical cord blood –- and the stem cells it includes -– could save the lives of many adults with leukemia who cannot find bone marrow donors, The New York Times reported.
Meanwhile, recent reports have provided evidence in human trials of a cure for urinary incontinence using a patient’s own stem cells, as well as results in experimental research with lab animals that gave hope adult stem cells might treat heart damage, cancer and eye disease.
Stem cells are the body's master cells that can develop into other cells and tissues, building hope of treatments for numerous afflictions. They may be found in such non-embryonic sources as bone marrow, umbilical cord blood, fat and placentas. The procurement of stem cells from such sources does not harm the donor.
Extracting stem cells from a human embryo is a different matter. It results in the destruction of the embryo, which is normally about a week old.
Supporters of embryonic stem cell research claim that this line of study has the most potential for creating cures, but that is not evident in the priorities of the multi-billion-dollar biotechnology industry, which has invested many times more in adult stem cell research. Also, embryonic stem cell research has experienced multiple failures, including the worsening of Parkinson's symptoms in one human test group and a tendency to produce tumors in laboratory animals.
Research on stem cells from non-embryonic sources, meanwhile, has produced more than 40 treatments -– and the positive results keep coming in.
“These successes point to the promise of adult stem cells for therapeutic ends,” said C. Ben Mitchell, bioethics consultant for the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. “Congress should superfund adult stem cell research, making embryonic stem cell research unattractive to scientists.”
Increases in funding for such research should occur not just because the results are more promising but because of its “ethically superior” nature, Mitchell said.
“Every effort should be made to exploit these sources of stem cells,” he said. “They are uncontroversial morally, but killing embryos for their stem cells cannot be justified ethically.
“We favor the advancement of science and the development of therapies, but subjecting human embryos to vivisection is not an advance, but a digression of science into biotechnological cannibalism,” said Mitchell, associate professor of bioethics at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in suburban Chicago.
The federal government provided more than $190 million in funding for non-embryonic stem cell research in 2003, according to the White House. Meanwhile, $24.8 million was set aside the same year for embryonic stem cell research under President Bush’s policy, which permits funds only for stem cell lines in existence before he instituted the restriction in 2001.
While the federal government withholds funds for research that destroys embryos, some states are in a race to fund the practice. California’s voters approved in November a proposition that legalizes and underwrites embryonic stem cell research, as well as therapeutic cloning, with up to $3 billion in state bonds over 10 years. Advocates for embryo-destructive research in Massachusetts, Wisconsin and Illinois are promoting funding plans to keep their states from falling too far behind California.
They have no one to exhibit as a benefactor of research using embryonic stem cells, however. Advocates of non-destructive research have no such handicap. Lupus, multiple sclerosis, heart disease, Crohn’s disease and diabetes are among the ailments that have been successfully treated with non-embryonic stem cells.
Hwang Mi-Soon is one of the most recent witnesses to the power of stem cells that do no require the demise of another human being. South Korean researchers introduced her and the remarkable results Nov. 25, describing hers as the first published case of a person with a spinal cord injury to be successfully treated with stem cells from umbilical cord blood, the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency reported.
“We have glimpsed at a silver lining over the horizon,” said Song Chang-Hoon, a professor at Chosun University’s medical school and a member of the research team, AFP reported. “We were all surprised at the fast improvements in the patient.”
The researchers transplanted stem cells from umbilical cord blood into the damaged part of Hwang’s spinal cord Oct. 12, according to The Korea Times. Within three weeks, she began to take steps with the aid of a walker, Song told reporters. Hwang had not walked since her legs were paralyzed in an accident 19 years before.
At the news conference, she got up from her wheelchair and shuffled a few paces with tears in her eyes, AFP reported. “This is already a miracle for me,” she said, according to AFP. “I never dreamed of getting to my feet again.”
The researchers acknowledged more research and verification is needed.
The results were similar, however, to those revealed in July in Washington, D.C., for two young American women. Susan Fajt, from Austin, Texas, and Laura Dominguez, from San Antonio, began walking with braces after receiving transplants with their own stem cells from pioneering Portuguese surgeon Carlos Lima. He transplanted stem cells from the olfactory tissue between the nose and brain to the location of the injuries to their spinal cords. Fajt was paralyzed in her lower body and Dominguez from the neck down from separate car wrecks in 2001.
In another account of a cure for paralysis, Brazilian doctors reported they used stem cells from a paralyzed woman’s bone marrow to restore quickly her ability to walk and talk, according to a Nov. 19 AFP article.
Maria da Graca Pomeceno, 54, suffered a brain hemorrhage that left her paralyzed on one side of her body, but doctors in Rio De Janeiro transplanted the stem cells five days afterward. While Han Fernando Dohmann warned tests were needed on other patients, the director of Rio De Janeiro’s Pro-Cardiaco Hospital said, according to AFP, “I would say that we have entered a new era in treating this condition.”Wednesday, December 01, 2004
Credo
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It isn't just in religious matters that Americans are more likely to be believers: it's true in general. Americans, as a rule, believe. They believe in themselves, they believe in their ideals, they believe in their country. Or rather, they believe in their country because they believe in their ideals.
The American who salutes the flag, who tears up at the anthem, is not indulging in some cheap sentiment or mindless ritual. Rather, he is saluting "the republic for which it stands" -- not the state, as such, but the ideals it embodies: about the rights of the individual, about the prerogatives of society, about the relationship between the two. What is significant in this is not that he should invest so much of his ideals in the American state, but that he has so much in the way of ideals to invest.This unique capacity for belief obviously owes much to America's origins, both religious and revolutionary. But in larger part, I think, it inheres in a sense of responsibility. As citizens of the mightiest power on Earth, on which the very freedom of the world depends, they do not have the luxury of cynicism. An American president could challenge his citizens to "ask what you can do for your country," to "pay any price, bear any burden," and expect them to respond affirmatively. The thought would not occur to a Canadian prime minister
.
Perhaps that's why so many Americans voted against what people thought was their economic self-interest, and get angry over the part of America that sees America as the bad guy. Because, although we know we're not perfect, we, as a whole, don't believe we live in the world of Dr. Strangelove. We know we are the guys that wear the white hats, and we are willing to spill our blood to reach out and help out.
And that, I believe, that willingness to sacrifice for what is perceived as good, is something precious worth preserving. Europe, which is busy stepping on rights in the name of continental unity, and prefers nihilism to belief, and Canada, who is letting their government make hate crimes out of religious doctrine for Christians, but allowing Sharia law for Moslems, just can't carry that torch forward. And it's sad.
JunkScience.Com points its finger at sloppy science for 2004
JunkScience.com’s Top Ten “low-lights” for 2004 are:
1. In August, Harvard University researcher Dr. Walter Willett delivered an urgent warning to parents declaring soft drinks harmful to children. Upon closer inspection, however, the report by Dr. Willett’s research team suppressed some highly contradictory evidence-- including findings from their own research -- to reach this far-flung conclusion. Read more...
2. Leading up to election day, Stanford researcher and TV spokesman, Dr. Irving Weissman, preyed on the public’s trust in his credentials as he hawked the $3 billion pro-embryonic stem cell research initiative, known as Proposition 71, to California voters -- without also disclosing the fact that, as a director and major options holder in a stem cell research company, he stands to benefit substantially from the windfall of taxpayer dollars. Read more...
3. Anti-obesity crusaders at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who claimed in March that “obesity kills 400,000 Americans each year,” received a long-overdue black eye when researchers from the National Center for Health Statistics attacked the oft-quoted estimate as overblown by as much as 200 percent -- revealing just how the crusaders cooked the books. Read more...
4. The Arctic Climate Impact Assessment alerted the public that polar bears may be on the verge of extinction due to global warming -- even though their own data show that the current Arctic warming trend is within the expected fluctuations of the Arctic’s natural cooling/warming cycle. Despite their claims, other scientific surveys indicate that polar bear populations have actually been increasing during the current warming trend! Read more...
5. The Center for Science in the Public Interest bestowed its annual “Integrity in Science” award to Dr. Theo Colburn, a major proponent of the 1996 health scare blaming trace levels of industrial chemicals in the environment -- so-called “endocrine disruptors” -- for every health problem from cancer to infertility to attention deficit disorder. Where was CSPI when, in 1999, the National Academy of Science’s National Research Council announced that there was no persuasive evidence to support the endocrine disruptor scare? Read more...
6. Bypassing the more established tradition of featuring a prominent scientist or official as keynote speaker for its 2004 Annual Meeting, the American Public Health Association chose to set the tone with none other than anti-toxin babe Erin Brockovich -- and proudly featured a revealing, bustier-clad photo of Ms. Brockovich on their website promotion. Read more...
7. In February, the Journal of the American Medical Association scared the public with a widely-publicized claim that even a single day’s worth of antibiotic use is associated with increased risk of breast cancer. The study’s researchers, however, based this claim on a fatally flawed analysis that did not adequately distinguish antibiotic users from non-users. Read more...
8. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers officials who had halted use of chlorine disinfectant in the Washington, DC drinking water system -- due to unfounded cancer fears hyped by the Environmental Protection Agency -- replaced this proven germ-fighter with a more corrosive substitute that leached lead from the pipes and caused wide-spread public alarm as lead levels climbed above federal standards. Read more...
9. In early 2004, a panel of the National Academy of Science’s Institute of Medicine urged that the recommended daily allowance of sodium be drastically reduced by almost 40% and that the average American’s actual sodium consumption be slashed by more than 60% -- even though 10 major studies conducted since 1995 have all concluded that lower sodium diets don’t produce health benefits and may pose risks for some. Why the extreme recommendation? Political correctness run amok. Read more...
10. University of Arkansas researchers attacked the Atkins Diet in January with a report linking a high-carbohydrate diet with weight loss, saying it was possible to lose weight without cutting calories and without exercising. What they didn’t reveal, however, was that the study subjects who lost weight actually ate 400-600 calories per day less than those who didn’t lose weight. Read more at...
Tuesday, November 30, 2004
Mosque used as car bomb factory
BAGHDAD - A mosque raided by security forces in southern Baghdad contained a workshop to rig suicide car bombs, with seven vehicles ready for terror attacks, an Iraqi Defense Ministry official said Sunday.
Car bombings and remote-controlled roadside blasts have become routine in the Iraqi capital in recent weeks, including a blast Sunday that wounded two U.S. soldiers...National guard forces raided the Sunni Muslim Al Yassen Mosque in the southern Baghdad area of Abu Dshir on Saturday, said Gen. Saleh Sarhan of the Defense Ministry. In addition to seven cars rigged with explosives, the guardsmen found 30 rocket-propelled grenades, high-powered rifles, mortars and remote control detonators, Sarhan said.
''The national guard arrested the imam of the mosque,'' Sarhan said, and detained an additional 18 people suspected of involvement in the car bombings.
Anti-U.S. insurgents used 60 mosques in the city of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, to stockpile weapons and provide cover during a U.S.-led offensive against the city earlier this month, the U.S. military says. One of the mosques was described as a general arms depot capable of equipping insurgents across much of Iraq.
And this is how it starts....
A special Guardian/ICM poll based on a survey of 500 British Muslims found that a clear majority want Islamic law introduced into this country in civil cases relating to their own community. Some 61% wanted Islamic courts — operating on sharia principles — "so long as the penalties did not contravene British law".<>They've been getting to do a little of it in Canada...Many civil cases in this country deal with family disputes such as divorce, custody and inheritance.
The poll also found a high level of religious observance with just over half saying they pray five times a day, every day — although women are shown to be more devout than men. The poll reveals that 88% want to see schools and workplaces in Britain accommodating Muslim prayer times as part of their normal working day.
Tolerance for the Intolerant Can Be Suicide
What was most upsetting to the Dutch public and Dutch politicians was the fact that this would-be martyr—Bouyeri expected to be killed by the police and had a rambling suicide note on his person when he was wounded and apprehended—was not a lone lunatic but part of an international terrorist network with links to Spain, Germany, Iraq, and Morocco. Indeed, according to Spanish counterterrorist judge Baltasar Garzón, one of the leaders of Bouyeri’s cell, 36-year-old Moroccan Abdeladim Akoudad, played "a leading role" in the Dutch terrorist organization known as the Hofstad Group. After the plot to attack the Dutch Parliament was uncovered, he provided logistical support for the Dutch cell. Meanwhile, one of Akoudad's contacts, Mouhsen Khaybar, has been active in supporting mujahedeen insurgents in Iraq, and appears to be linked to the infamous leader of the “al Qaeda Organization in Mesopotamia,” al Zarkawi. As for Samir Azzouz, he has been linked to Abdelaziz Benyaich, now jailed in Spain for his role in the Casablanca bombings of May 2003 and the March 11, 2004 Madrid bombings.
So Bouyeri was a little cog in a network covering three continents and some five countries. And that was just the Islamist angle; the shock of van Gogh’s assassination also pushed the Dutch authorities to decide to “discover” a training camp (yes, a “secret” training camp in an overcrowded country) operated by the Marxist/separatist Kurdish Workers Party (PKK, now renamed KONGRA-GEL). As the New York Times recently reported, “Turkey has long complained that the Netherlands and other European countries have been reluctant to crack down on PKK members operating on the Continent. Earlier this week, a Dutch court blocked the extradition of Nuriye Kesbir, a leader of the group, whom Turkey accuses of organizing and taking part in attacks from 1993 to 1995.”
The fallout from the Van Gogh murder continues. The leftist opposition and media are now accusing the center-right government of negligence (forgetting that, until two years ago, and for decades, they themselves were in power). Across most of the political spectrum, demands are being made for a further crackdown on (especially Muslim) immigration, an increase in the intelligence budget, the expulsion of radical imams, and the requirement that all citizens, imams included, learn Dutch. Common sense now seems to have become popular throughout the country.
Some practical steps taken earlier are already beginning to show results. Immigration reforms in the 1990s made it more difficult for settled Moroccan and Turkish men to bring "traditional" brides into the Netherlands by raising the minimum age of entry and requiring newcomers to learn Dutch. As a result, the national asylum centers organization, COA, plans to close 37 shelters due to the sharp drop in asylum applicants. In 2000, some 34,000 people applied for asylum in the Netherlands; in 2001, 25,000; and in 2002, 13,000.
As the Dutch seem now to realize, tolerance for the intolerant is suicide. The post-van Gogh Dutch awakening may be the beginning of a more general awakening in Europe and Canada, because what has suffered is not some “fascistic, right-wing conspiracy” to create a “xenophobic, racist, Islamophobic” state, but a way of life tailored by and for the “progressives.” There are some encouraging signs already, especially in neighboring Germany, where the left-wing government exhibits a new awareness of the problems raised by its 3.5 million Muslims and—a new development—admits that such problems are not the result of German “racism” but may have something to do with the immigrants themselves.
I have a vague memory of a saying that says if you hold a snake to your bosom, don't be surprised if it bites you. Europe is full of enclaves of people who hate the European way of life, who recruit, preach hate, and terrorize the local populations by crime. They have embraced the snake. Now it's time to decide what to do with it.
Monday, November 29, 2004
Political Correctness, Marxism, and the Attack on American History and Values
Political correctness is literally a form of cultural Marxism. Where Marxism is an economic-political doctrine, political correctness is a cultural-political doctrine. They are both totalitarian. They are both dangerous. The fact that political correctness is derived from Marxism is the last thing that its supporters want you to know. Left to their ways, whether knowingly or unknowingly, these tools of Marxism would eventually rewrite our nation’s history to reflect their neutered, genderless, religion-less and factually perverted version of how we came to be.This is not the first comment I've posted here about this issue, and I know the story has been broadly blogged, and even people who might not mention something political have talked about it. Why? Because it strikes at the heart of our founding ideas and concepts, of the definition of what America is and who were the people who set us on this track. To whitewash it so children don't see the word God is to work for the functional establishment of Atheism as the national religious belief system.
In the Cupertino Union School District of California there exists just such a ‘tool’ in Principal Patricia Vidmar. Where almost 100% of the principals in our education system are derived from its compliment of teachers we can argue that Vidmar is heavily influenced by the politically correct champion of left-leaning educational philosophies, the NEA.
Vidmar and the Cupertino Union School District are currently being challenged in court for not allowing a teacher to hand out supplemental literature to students about American History because the historical documents contain references to “God.” This is disturbing and a blatant example of the encroachment of political correctness into our history. More stunning and enraging is the fact that the supplemental literature in question is the United State’s Declaration of Independence.
Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Gary McCaleb said, "Throwing aside all common sense, the district has chosen to censor men such as George Washington and documents like the Declaration of Independence." He further stated, "The district's actions conflict with American beliefs and are completely unconstitutional." He was being nice.
Trying to manipulate our country’s history through political correctness is despicable. Nauseatingly, it happens all the time and more often than not in California where the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reigns. But censoring, effectively outlawing, our Declaration of Independence from the classrooms of our schools in an effort to be politically correct is tantamount to a direct attack on our country by Marxism. Make no mistake, this censorship; the outlawing of one of our founding documents was deliberate. Vidmar is a traitor guilty of sedition and should be held accountable for her actions....Words, sentiments and ideology are just as lethal as the bullet, knife or bomb. Nazi Germany stands in testament to that.
The first shot of the War on Political Correctness has been fired and their target is our Declaration of Independence.
In case you are interested, the phone and fax number of the school is:
Main Telephone Number: (408) 245-3312
Fax Number: (408) 245-7484
Email: (school)
block_leann@Cupertino.k12.ca.us
Principal
vidmar_patti@cupertino.k12.ca.us
address:
10300 Ainsworth Dr
Cupertino, CA 95014
Cupertino School Board : William Bragg, Superintendent : bragg_bill@cupertino.k12.ca.us
School Board : Pearl Cheng, Chairman Ben Liao Josephine Lucey Gary McCue George Tyson board@cupertino.k12.ca.us
Cupertino School Board 10301 Vista Dr Curpetino, CA 95014 408-252-3000
Sunday, November 28, 2004
Rights vs. Entitlements
In our Declaration of Independence, we hold it to be self-evident truth that we are endowed by our Creator with certain, unalienable rights - and this is the key, in my view; a right must be something which is inherent in an individual human being. If its not something inherent to a human being, then it is a privilege, not a right.
There seems to be some confusion in this country between the concept of entitlement and right. An entitlement is when government, in a form of redistribution of wealth, decides that members of its community have the privilege to do something, like have free education, access to free lunches if they quality, drive a car.
Some people are claiming that health care, for instance should be a right of all citizens.
Yet when we look carefully at the concept of rights in the history of the American experiment, we see rights are interpreted as something else than entitlements or special privileges. Rights are considered something basic to the human condition, and usually involve, in the classic American formula, guarantees from abuse of power and the right to participate in the political process.
A quick look back at the Declaration of Independence gives us the concept Jefferson and the other founders were dealing with:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...Governments in this view derive their purpose from the governed in order to secure rights that are inherent, not as grants from the government, but as inherent in the persons of the governed.
There's been a lot of complaint about voters not voting in their self-interest this time around, in part because the complainers thought that the voters should be wanting entitlements to a piece of the public pie instead of rights that are inherent and traditional to the American way of life. Some people went so far as to call those who disagreed with them stupid, and that there ought to be a way that they, who were not stupid, should be able to force this reasonable concept on the ones who weren't convinced or voted differently.
But one of the basic concepts of rights in America is that each person contributes - all are created equal in the political sphere and their right to participate in the procedure outweighs any elite telling them that this is the way we must do things.
If we do a quick review of the bedrock of our freedom, the Bill of Rights we will see that these rights fall mostly into protecting the rights of people from those with power or from letting government overstep the authority the founding members considered bedrock:
Rights of:
freedom of speech,
freedom to worship or not,
freedom of the press,
freedom to assemble
freedom to petition the government
freedom to bear arms
freedom to due process
Right to be protected from:
unlawful search and seizure
having property seized without compensation
freedom from excessive bail
In the American experiment, the concept of liberty, then determined that citizens were NOT chattels of the the government, nor were their goods. They don't belong to the state, in the socialist way, as a cog in the machinery. The machinery exists for them.
It hasn't been easy, and it has taken awhile to decide who then has the right to this liberty. For example, the voting franchise first was restricted to people with property, then to white males, then later to females and people of different racial backgrounds. It was a hard fight, but the concept was a spreading of the idea of who had these rights, not because of some grant of the government entitled them to perks, but because the government acknowledged that the inherent rights enshrined in the rules the country was set out with actually covered these groups as well.
These rights aren't privileges given out by the state. They are basic, inherent, and true. This is one of the reasons why America basically doesn't have one law for citizens and another law for foreigners - because we hold these truths to be self-evident: all men are created equal.
It's not perfect, but it is the great American experiment, and perhaps, all those who thought people weren't voting in their self interest actually were - for the rights that they consider bedrock to the country, that are more important, sometimes, than economic self-interest, and give meaning to all that this country has suffered and died for. Entitlements come and entitlements go, because they are granted by the state. But to Americans, the rights are the bedrock all else is built on.
And this person is allowed to instruct others, mind you....and get paid quite well for it.
PETER Singer, once a Greens candidate and now our most famous philosopher, has changed his mind on killing babies.
Good news, you might think, since this author of Animal Liberation used to say parents had a right to kill imperfect children in their first month of life. But in fact he's now told World magazine it would be ethically fine to kill even one-year-olds with disabilities. Or even to breed babies for spare parts.
And Singer, now a professor at Princeton, continues his spiral into the moral abyss, by adding "there's no moral problem" with someone having sex with the corpse of their lover, or "nothing wrong inherently in a moral sense" with having sex with an animal.
But I believe consent must be obtained. Does one baa mean yes?
Singer proves yet again that those who demand that animals be treated like humans, are in fact demanding that humans be treated like animals. No wonder he approves us culling our runts, and putting to sleep our aged.
