CIVITATENSIS

When Jimmy Carter won the election and became the 39th US president in 1976, he did so on a platform to change the world with a revolution of human rights. He was such a nice man, people voted for him. It did not take long before America’s enemies set out to test his resolve, in Iran, Afghanistan, El Salvador and Nicaragua.

For the last 30 years, five administrations have been dealing with the fall out in those countries. It is still the case today. We know of Afghanistan and Iran because we hear it about them in the news often enough. In Central America the two guerrilla movements who increased their power under the tutelage of Jimmy Carter in those countries at the time, eventually turned to political parties and are both now in power.  It’s been, did I mention, 30 years?

Now, America’s enemies are on the march again, no doubt trying to test the resolve of the man who would be prophet and transform the world with hope. North Korea does not seem to like hope or has decided that Obama does not offer them enough of it. In Iran, things are not so well with nukes either. In the meantime, the new government of El Salvador will probably join ALBA, the so-called Bolivarian movement piloted by Hugo Chavez.

Together with their Russian and Iranian allies, ALBA too will test the resolve of President Hope sometime soon. When a president stands on a campaign record saying that he is more likely to hug the thugs than carpet bomb them, the likelihood is that a few will want to earn a hug or two.

How’s hope working for him in North Korea so far?

Nicaragua may be headed for civil war for the first time this century. If we count conservatively (how else would I count anything?), they had three big ones last century, each worse than the first.

The Sandinistas under Daniel Ortega have just stolen the Nicaraguan municipal elections held November 9th (Doesn’t that sound like a reprise of 1984?) backed by Hugo Chavez and Vladimir Putin. There is mounting evidence of blatant and massive fraud. There is mounting evidence that Nicaraguans don’t want to roll over on this one. Ortega’s traditional domestic allies have abandoned him. For example, the man with whom Ortega stole the 1984 elections, Sergio Ramirez, broke off from Ortega years ago and founded his own party. Ramirez’ party has now been banned.

There is a new Cold War afoot in Latin America.  Chavez and his Latin American acolytes appear to be Cold War warriors from the Left.  They see the advancing American empire under every bed in the region. All of it at a time that the Empire has been so occupied in the Middle East that it has had trouble remembering where Latin America is. Nobody said that it had to be connected to reality, but the rhetoric does have resonance with their followers.

Looking at the 20th century civil wars in Nicaragua, the next one will be worse than the previous ones. Vladimir Putin is already supplying weapons to Daniel Ortega. The Nicaraguan opposition?: parties, NGOs and individuals are slowly and systematically being intimidated, beaten, persecuted and some journalists even assassinated. The Sandinista strategy prepares the ground for Ortega’s next move. The removal of the constitutional obstacle to his continuation in power.

The armed opposition will begin, if it has not already, like all the others did before. Quietly, a fed up group of individuals at the social and political margins of the country will pick up weapons and head for the hills.  The boiling point may already have been reached as more and more people become aware or suspect the Sandinista long plan, when they realize that Ortega and his wife have no intentions of relinquishing power at the end of their term in two years. Little by little, the urban elites will catch up to the rebels and join.

The rest just follows a well-established logic.

At a time when more and more Canadians think that political parties have far too much power over elected representatives, Jack Layton promises to increase his own power over them, should he form a government. For the sake of scoring political points with the locals, Layton announced inVancouver that he would make floor-crossing illegal.

Later in Vancouver, Layton told an audience in Foreign Affairs Minister David Emerson’s riding that he would outlaw floor-crossing in the Commons.

The result of such idea has draconian implications. It would increase the power of party leaders like Layton and undermine the power of electors as well as the ability of MPs to act according to what they believe to be right. In essence, Taliban Jack would rob MPs their ability to make decisions based on their own convictions. It would force them to tow party lines and shut up, or forced them quit triggering frequent and expensive by-elections.

I know that there is a populist appetite to tie MPs to the nebulous will of their constituents. But in situations when a party heads into political territory loathed by those who voted a member in (think AdScam, for example), an MP would not be able to abandon his party’s corrupt ways to respect his constituents’ views. This is not Recall Layton is proposing, but the shakling of MPs to party bosses.

There is a greater chance for Joseph Stalin to rise from the dead and return to power in Russia than there is for Taliban Jack to form a government in Canada. We all now that. But it’s good to see that Layton truly understands how voters, Parliament, and its rules can work to increase the power of political elites.

If we don’t trust those who represent the public, effectively we don’t trust the public.

Daniel Ortega, the Sandinista president of Nicaragua, elected again in 2006, is the architect of a nefarious constitutional re-arrangement in his country. The legal deal, or “el pacto” as Nicaraguans call it, divides most state powers between two corrupt signing parties, and squeezes out most other small and medium size political entities. It so happens that the delisted parties are the backbone of effective opposition.

The Arnoldo Aleman faction of the Liberals is not much opposition to the ruling Sandinistas at all. They are one of the contracting parties in el pacto, and their leader is a convicted felon, who siphoned millions from the public purse. His partner, Daniel Ortega, accused of raping his daughter for nearly a decade, has not faced justice for the crimes against a child. In short, the criminals are running the little Central American republic, and they have re-arranged the state powers to forestall prosecution against them.
Daniel Ortega and Robert Mugabe were the heroes of the North American and the Europeans Left during the 1980s. But there is a mounting wave of opposition against the rapist president in Nicaragua. Only recently having seen the light, many of his warring comrades and intellectual co-religionists are turning their backs on him in increasing numbers. Nicaragua’s youth have taken an active role. Ortega’s recent political campaign used a musical re-arrangement of John Lennon’s “Give Peace a Chance.” A group of young Nicaraguans is asking Yoko Ono to demand that Daniel Ortega and his party cease and desist in the use of her husband’s music as an unofficial anthem for the Sandinistas. Here is a link to the video on youtube.

Update: From the above mentioned youth:

The song “Give Peace a Chance” is being used by a corrupt government in Nicargua as the Party’s anthem!!!

We plead all John Lennon fans and anyone else who is in favor of Democracy to please join this group and show your support!

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=21281645582&ref=mf

The Arrogant Worms are right. Their mayor truly is a dork.

The last time Democrats were in a great hurry to get rid of the man in the White House, they elected Jimmy Carter. Carter has managed to remain the popular incarnation of concern for human rights and representative democracy among the learned classes. A statement made last week in Israel, however, shows that poor Jimmy doesn’t understand tyranny and democracy.

When I go to a dictatorship, I only have to talk to one person and that’s the dictator, because he speaks for all the people.

Democratic representation is a big, fat headache. For the sake of expediency, Jimmy’s preference is tyranny. It makes “diplomacy” so much easier.

Are there no patriots in Zimbabwe?

Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe bitterly attacked former colonial ruler Britain on Friday in his first major speech since disputed elections, saying London was paying the population to turn against him.

Mr. Mugabe, 84, told 15,000 cheering supporters in a fiery address to mark independence day: "Down with the British. Down with thieves who want to steal our country."

In a stream of insults against Britain, Mugabe added: "Today they are like thieves fronting their lackeys among us, which they give money to confuse our people."

One patriot. It would only take one.

It’s nobody’s fault: Some of us are simply not as quick on the uptake as others…

Syed Soharwardy, who withdrew his HRC complaint against Ezra Levant, has made some interesting confessions today. Levant is the former publisher of the now defunct Western Standard, which reproduced some of the Mohammed (peace be upon him) cartoons from Denmark (see one of the horribly offensive images below). Here is some of what the Imam had to say:

“Over the two years that we have gone through the process, I understand that most Canadians see this as an issue of freedom of speech, that that principle is sacred and holy in our society,” said Soharwardy, president of the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada.

“I believe Canadian society is mature enough not to absorb the messages that the cartoons sent. Only a very small fraction of Canadian media decided to publish those cartoons.”

Can Soharwardy be so thick that it took him two whole years to figure out the free speech angle? I can not know, but the important thing is that he has. But he has veered so far the other way now as to declare free speech to have religious characteristics. In the same amount of time, he reflections have led him to figure out that free speech is “holy”!! Free speech as holiness is not even a western belief, let alone a Muslim one. To Soharwardy, it seems clear, nothing that could be historically held in such high regard could possible be secular. I wonder if Soharwardy will now recommend such holy a thing to those who attend his Mosque.

Soharwardy still sees the mere cartoons as evil that would be absorbed by Canadians, were they to see them (so don’t look). Except that he has kindly changed his mind about the maturity of all of us. Two years ago and until yesterday Soharwardy seemed to have believed us all to be immature. His apparent desire to impose his superstitious views about depictions of the prophet (peace be upon him) was nothing but an attempt to save Canadians from our own immaturity. In the last two years though, he figured out that we are not as immature as he imagined. So he has now decided that it’s okay because we are okay.

Indeed it’s not easy for the immature to identify maturity, but Soharwardy has now turned the corner after two years. It takes some a life time to do so; so two years is not so bad. Congratulations Syed! Well done!

Note: Soharwardy is also spelled as Suhrawardi, Suhrawardy, Soharwardi, Sohrawardy, Soharvardy, Suhravardy, Sohravardi, Sohrawardi, sohravardi, etc:

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Is citoyen Stephane Dion saying that NATO will have to intervene in Pakistan? Is this not also the same fellow who wants our troops to pull out of Afghanistan?

The only way for Dion to make this blunder even greater would be to suggest that Indian troops should enter Pakistan on behalf of NATO.

ST has the scoop here.

The Globe reports that Citoyen Stephane Dion, the Liberal leader, and his current sidekick, Michael Ignatieff, are in Afghanistan. They are there to consider pulling the Canadian presence out of combat roles in the near future and stay exclusively to help with organisation and development projects.

Liberals say that the present mission is unbalanced. If it is, that’s an acknowledgment that they sent Canadian soldiers to a lopsided mission when the were in government and accepted to move our soldiers from Kabul to Kandahar. But no matter, the Liberal change of heart would have Canadians build schools and clinics and then wait for the Taliban to come destroy them, placing more people at risk, including more Canadians. Better to have Canadians killed while they hold no weapons in their hands!

"We must be realistic about our ability to continue such a mission. The [Canadian Forces ] simply cannot continue to engage in an extremely dangerous combat campaign of this scale for an indefinite period of time."

Instead of a counterinsurgency combat role, Liberals suggest Canada could re-focus on development work, diplomatic efforts, building a justice system, and alleviating water shortages in Afghanistan.

By this rationale, we should send social workers and boy scouts instead of soldiers to deal with the suicidal islamists who want to kill  little girls to stop them from being educated.  By the same rationale, we should have never sacrificed our soldiers on the beaches and fields of Europe last century. We should have just sent social workers to deal with the Nazi killing camps.

The Grits are in dire need of picking a leader who can talk to his dog and to his dead mother these days.  In the past, such Grit leaders have had more sense in international affairs than the whole lot of latte-sipping central Canadians they  presented to themselves in the last leadership contest.

The Economist has picked up on the Mark Steyn/Maclean’s as Islamophobes story:

Maclean’s published 27 letters, many of complaint. That was not enough for some offended Muslims. Last spring a group of Toronto law students marched into the magazine’s offices demanding equal space for a rebuttal by an author of their choosing. Ken Whyte, the editor and publisher, told the group he would rather see Maclean’s go bankrupt.

That story here.

Mark Steyn comments on the silliness of Human Rights complaint against him. That there are people offended by some of what he writes should not be a surprise, but Steyn is livid about the Human Rights Commission accepting and thereby legitimising political idiocy.

If you examine Dr. Mohamed Elmasry’s formal complaint to the Canadian Human Rights Commission about my article, Grievance #16 objects to the following assertion:

“The number of Muslims in Europe is expanding like ‘mosquitoes.’ ”

That claim certainly appears in my piece. But they’re the words not of a notorious right-wing Islamophobic columnist but of a big­­shot Scandinavian Muslim:
” ‘We’re the ones who will change you,’ the Norwegian imam Mullah Krekar told the Oslo newspaper Dagbladet in 2006. ‘Just look at the development within Europe, where the number of Muslims is expanding like mosquitoes. Every Western woman in the EU is producing an average of 1.4 children. Every Muslim woman in the same countries is producing 3.5 children.’ ”

Given that the “mosquitoes” line is part of the basis on which the HRC accepted Dr. Elmasry’s complaint of “Islamophobia,” I’m interested to know what precisely is the of­­fence? Are Mullah Krekar’s words themselves Islamophobic? Or do they only become so when I quote them?

A third grade child would know what the appropriate answer to the last question is. As Steyn sees it, the Commission has demonstrated an efficiency rivalled only, perhaps, by the Soviet Show Trials in the 1930s.

Nonetheless, even in this craven environment, Canada’s “human rights commissions” are uniquely inimical to the marketplace of ideas. In its 30 years of existence, no complaint brought to the federal HRC under Section XIII has been settled in favour of the defendant. A court where the rulings only go one way is the very definition of a show trial. These institutions should be a source of shame to Canadians.

The whole piece is here.

Cuba’s system of social and political control at the grass root level, the neighbourhood watching committees known as comites de defensa de la revolucion, has been eroding for years, but it’s still there.  Almost 50 years later, they’re still bent on totalitarian control and the creation of the new New Man. What is it that they say about insanity and beating one’s head into a wall?

“We want to always have a proud and independent homeland instead of a Yankee colony,” Castro said.”We must save the Revolution. We must save socialism. This is the task we urge the 7.5 million CDR members to undertake.”

Every Cuban is expected to join the local CDR and participate in committee activities whether or not they are Communist Party members. Each CDR has a popularly elected president and separate secretaries of security, volunteerism and education.

Some Cubans don’t join or don’t participate, but at great risk of being labeled an “enemy of the Revolution.” CDR presidents can organize “acts of repudiation,” in which neighbors stand outside the homes of those suspected of illegal activity and scream insults — sometimes for days.

When a Cuban wants a job in the lucrative tourism industry — where a worker can earn three or four times the usual state salary — the CDR president’s imprimatur is essential. Applicants labeled “anti-social,” code for transgressions such as dissident activity or lack of interest in volunteer projects, are almost assured of being turned down.

If a child is born, active CDR presidents pay a visit to the parents.

“We start to attend to the political development of a child, in a gradual way, from the time they are born,” said DeLeon, a veteran of the Revolution who has a photograph of Fidel Castro in his living room.

As the child grows, DeLeon is watching. He stops by to make sure children are attending classes, especially the courses on Cuban history that recount Castro’s triumph.

“We’re creating something,” DeLeon said, “Something called a ‘political conscience.’ “

These people are flogging a comatose horse and they don’t seem to know it.

The people of Venezuela, …well a little more than half of them who voted anyway, voted yesterday to put the brakes on Hugo Chavez’ “revolution.”

Chavez had 49.29 percent of the vote compared with 50.7 percent for the “No” camp.

With all the resources they possessed and the intimidation tactics against opponents, it’s amazing that Chavez’ thugs did not prevail over the every day Venezuelan. But anyone who thinks that this is the end of the Venezuelan saga does not know Chavez and does not know “revolutionaries.” Chavez himself made it clear: "For now, we could not do it." In other words, it’s just a temporary setback. They’ll be back.

They will have learned from this experience. Only 56% of registered voters voted. At best, Hugo Chavez and his tribe will likely conclude that they need to educate that 44% of Venezuelans. At worst, and perhaps most likely, they will conclude that their intimidation tactics were not far reaching enough. Chavez is still in resounding control of the country and as the referendum shows, he has no intention to quit power but to consolidate it even further. The referendum result will not change that reality; it will not change him. He still has his foot on the accelerator. Venezuelans have not yet seen the last of it.

Raul Baduel, Hugo Chavez’ former brother-in-arms, has written an OpEd piece in the NYT: “Why I Parted Ways With Chà ¡vez.”

ON Dec. 17, 1982, three of my fellow officers in the Venezuelan Army and I swore our allegiance to the Bolivarian Revolutionary Army 2000. We considered ourselves to be at the birth of a movement that would turn a critical eye on Venezuela's troubled social and political system - and formulate proposals to improve it. One of the officers with me was Hugo Chà ¡vez, the current president of Venezuela, whom I have known since I entered the military academy 35 years ago.

Hugo Chà ¡vez and I worked together for many years. I supported him through thick and thin, serving as his defense minister. But now, having recently retired, I find myself with the moral and ethical obligation as a citizen to express my opposition to the changes to the Constitution that President Chà ¡vez and the National Assembly have presented for approval by the voters tomorrow.

The proposal, which would abolish presidential term limits and expand presidential powers, is nothing less than an attempt to establish a socialist state in Venezuela. As our Catholic bishops have already made clear, a socialist state is contrary to the beliefs of Simà ³n Bolà ­var, the South American liberation hero, and it is also contrary to human nature and the Christian view of society, because it grants the state absolute control over the people it governs.

The rest of the piece is here.

h/t: Daniel and The Devil’s Excrement

Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan tyrant, is threatening Spain’s investments in his country. Unless HM King Juan Carlos, the Spanish monarch, apologises for telling Chavez to be quiet at the recent Santiago summit of Iberoamerican countries, Chavez says he may nationalise Spanish investments in his country.

The King is likely not going to apologise to the dictator, so Chavez may have his excuse further to grab private businesses on his way to turning Venezuela into a socialist paradise. Probably, Chavez is grandstanding for the sake of distracting attention from his new power grab inside Venezuela, which if ratified (and it likely will be) in early December will remove term limitations on power. But with one never knows with a man like Chavez.

"Whatever has been privatized can be taken back, we can take it back," Mr. Chavez said earlier at a news conference. "If the government of Spain or the state of Spain … start to generate a conflict, things are not going to go well."

King Juan Carlos will be well advised not to say another word that might inflame the volatile Venezuelan tyrant for it might cost Spanish investors billions.

The world has been reasonably amused by the recent exchange between Hugo Chavez and the Spanish delegation at the Iberoamerican Summit in Chile, where Chavez called former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar a fascist.

The Venezuelan president knows his fascism well. Below are some pictures of how his armed thugs handled a peaceful university protest last week. Students at the Universidad Central de Venezuela protested against Chavez’ constitutional “reforms,” which will grant Chavez even greater power and will allow him to orchestrate another re-election for himself. They were met by a group of armed thugs, who fired at them injuring several students.

 Source: La Prensa.

Click on picture for more images and check out video here.

Ultra sensitive, Disney-loving folks like this reporter are half scandalised over “gun-totting” Alberta hunters having “a day.” Worse still, there is at least one minister of the Crown among the hunters. Guns, by which they mean legal firearms, are a bad thing. Shooting game is even worse because killing is bad.

It’s a legitimate view, to be sure, but most always those who hold that view love to enjoy a fat, juicy steak or a chunk of white chicken meat. What is more, they are also the folks to sing high praise to gun-totting dictators like Hugo Chavez, Daniel Ortega or Fidel Castro, who have killed scores of their own people on more than one occasion to secure and to keep their political power.

There is no perspective in the critical remarks about a politician hunting. An Alberta minister killing a duck for food is a horrible act of barbarism, the enlightened reporter –whose name is ironically Remington– suggests. Shooting one’s own co-citizens for the sake of power, however, may be a cool thing.

Many Venezuelans will not take Chavez’ decision to bully the press sitting down. Chavez’ new constitution grants his cronies  –a panel of loyalists appointed by him, the power to muzzle the press if what they publish is perceived to be offensive to the Chavez.

Tens of thousands of Venezuelan protesters marched on Saturday to the Caracas headquarters of an anti-government television station, which is being forced off the air after President Hugo Chavez’s administration refused to renew its broadcasting license.

Waving flags with the logo of RCTV, demonstrators packed the streets of the capital where news anchors and soap opera stars slammed the imminent closure of the opposition channel.

Canadian peace activists that have rubbed elbows with well-known international terrorists at a “conference” in Egypt expect that their dialogue with the killers will bring the world closer to peace.

Canadian activists were out in force at a recent conference in Cairo that sought to forge closer links between the international antiwar movement and Islamic resistance groups, including several on Canada’s terrorism list.

[...]

The conference attracted representatives of at least four organizations that appear on Canada’s list of terrorist organizations — Hamas, Hezbollah, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Jamaat al-Islamiya, best known for killing 71 tourists in Luxor, Egypt in 1997.

Among the attendees were Moussa Abu Marzouk, deputy leader of Hamas, and Ali Fayad, a member of Hezbollah’s politburo.

According to conference literature, the main purpose of the gathering, sponsored by the officially banned Muslim Brotherhood and Egyptian opposition parties, was to forge “an international alliance against imperialism and Zionism.”

The so-called anti-war activists would never accept to be in the same room with the president of the United States or the prime minister of Israel. But to sit and chat with cold-blooded and indiscriminate killers, to them, sounds like a good idea. Mostly, what is somewhat amusing is the self-importance of our compatriots.

Canadian peaceniks love to paint themselves as a morally-evolved species who can convert any one with their message of tolerance. How easy would it be for our peace lovers to compromise, for the sake of world peace, say, on the blanket “right” that women possess in Canada to have abortions on demand? Perhaps the jihadists wouldn’t care. Perhaps they would see that as an enjoining interest: killing infidels is the jihadists’ primary business after all.

The peaceniks afford the terrorists a priceless level of legitimacy and respectability, which the terrorists wouldn’t risk eroding. But in their promotion of peace and openness, how many Canadian delegates in Cairo would even have confessed to their jihadist interlocutors being gay, lesbian or bisexual?

Charles Krauthammer, that old Cold War Warrior, remembers Boris Yelsin’s great achievement. It is worth noting that Krauthammer begins by undermining the popular view that Mikhail Gorbatchev was the man who took the USSR down.

Credit for the fall of communism usually is given to two sets of actors. On the one side, Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and John Paul II, whose relentless pressure caused a hollowed-out system to collapse. On the other side, conventional mythology credits Mikhail Gorbachev.

This is quite wrong. True, Gorbachev inadvertently caused the collapse of communism. But his intention was always to save it. To the very end, Gorbachev believed in it. His mission was to reform communism in order to make it work. To do that, the Soviet system had to become more human — i.e., more in tune with real human nature — and thus more humane. Gorbachev’s problem was that humane communism is an oxymoron.

The man who brought down the Soviet Union from the inside was Boris Yeltsin. In the mid-1980s, he turned decisively against communism and, fully intending its destruction, performed one of history’s great acts of liberation.

Yeltsin, who died this week, did this without turning to the guillotine. “For the first time in Russian history,” notes Russian opposition leader Garry Kasparov, “the new ruler did not eliminate the losers to consolidate control.” What distinguished Yeltsin “was something that he did not do when he took power” — “wipe out the other side.”

The rest of the piece is found here.

I do have something of a quarrel with one of Krauthammer’s sentences:

Outside of college English departments, no sane person takes Marxism seriously.

Frankly, the comment bestows underserved sanity to English departments.

The historical record is littered with politicians masking as prophets and prophets taking on political roles. Al Gore is a politician dressed as a religious prophet.

The Florentine political philosopher, Niccolo Machiavelli, understood well how princes can use religion to advance their political power. In reference to how Ferdinand of Aragon advanced his own power in the late fifteenth century, Machiavelli wrote:

Further, always using religion as a plea, so as to undertake greater schemes, he devoted himself with pious cruelty to driving out and clearing his kingdom of the Moors; nor could there be a more admirable example, nor one more rare. Under this same cloak he assailed Africa, he came down on Italy, he has finally attacked France; and thus his achievements and designs have always been great, and have kept the minds of his people in suspense and admiration and occupied with the issue of them. And his actions have arisen in such a way, one out of the other, that men have never been given time to work steadily against him.

That Gore preaches but does not practice his own message is evidenced in the way that he lives. As Machiavelli counsels, it is more important for princes to appear to be pious than to be pious. Gore knows his Machiavelli and has increasingly understood how to turn the power of the new environmental religion to his personal political advantage.  He has become the de facto head of the Holy New Congregation of Climate Change

The Reuters picture of Al Gore that adorned the story about Gore calling the Harper government’s Green Plan a fraud is a clear example (see below). Gore has recently adopted a new pose in a deliberate attempt to appear pious.

And here is the iconic Dalai Lama, the most famous of Tibetan monks, displaying the same holiness that Gore seeks to portray by clasping his hands together.

A common attitude of prophets is to join their spiritual struggle willingly but reluctantly. Biblical prophets often are reluctant to carry the message to their people that the divinity has revealed to them. Al Gore’s reluctance was expressed last week in very similar manner:

Former U.S. vice-president Al Gore said yesterday [April 25] that he initially thought that making his climate-change lectures into the Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth was a serious mistake.

“I had to be talked into it and I’m glad that I was talked into it,” Gore told reporters in New York.

I am willing to bet that when Gore runs for public office again, he will say the exact same thing in relation to civic duty.

Al Gore is encouraging the breaching of the separation between church and state at the hands of the new religion. The breach is taking place without much objections from those who have traditionally been the greatest advocates for preserving the same separation.

In a world threatened by a new desire to have government become the handmaid of religion, Al Gore represents a new danger to the American republic and to the rest of liberal democracies.

The West, even the very same people who follow Gore today, would not normally tolerate religions leaders telling government how to run public affairs and what their priorities should be. As media and an increasing number of faithful devoutly follow the Gordian religion and demand that international and domestic policy conforms to their beliefs, Gore is making such practice more and more acceptable.

Krauthammer reflects on Euro-impotence in light of Iranian piracy.

Where then was the European Union? These 15 hostages, after all, are not just British citizens but, under the laws of Europe, citizens of Europe. Yet the European Union lifted not a finger on their behalf.

Europeans talk all the time about their preference for “soft power” over the brute military force those Neanderthal Americans resort to all the time. What was the soft power available here? Iran’s shaky economy is highly dependent on European credits, trade and technology. Britain asked the European Union to threaten to freeze exports, $18 billion a year of commerce. Iran would have lost its No. 1 trading partner. The European Union refused.

Why was nothing done? The reason is simple. Europe functions quite well as a free-trade zone, but as a political entity it is a farce. It remains a collection of sovereign countries with divergent interests. A freeze of economic relations with Europe would have shaken the Iranian economy to the core. “The Dutch,” reported the Times of London, “said it was important not to risk a breakdown in dialogue.” So much for European solidarity.

 Formalities are still pending but the British Marines held hostage by Iran will be going home.

If only some of the Marines would learn to keep silent.

In a Letter to the Editor, a reader writes in the NP:

In the end, had the Greeks succumbed to Xerxes' invasion, there would have been no such entity as " the West" at all, and everyone in today's Western world would have been speaking the language of the Persians: Farsi.

Er… The Greeks won. Okay. I guess that’s why we all westerners speak Greek today.  Duh!

The wife of a Chinese diplomat in Ottawa says she has defected over fears that she would be sent back to China and persecuted.

Jiyan Zhang says she renounced her citizenship earlier this month, shortly after quietly revealing to friends at the Chinese consulate that she is a Falun Gong practitioner.

And Ms. Zhang says she expects others will follow.

At a news conference today in Ottawa, Ms. Zhang denounced her former country’s Communist leaders for cracking down on the Falun Gong movement.

Correction: “Wife”of diplomat

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has threatened an already isolated Iran with total isolation unless they return the British sailors seized by Iranians within Iraqi territorial waters.

Britain's decision to release data supporting its position marked a decisive switch from private to public diplomacy. It came as Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, vowed to intensify pressure on Iran over its seizure of the naval personnel, saying Tehran faced "total isolation" in the standoff.

"It is now time to ratchet up the diplomatic and international pressure" on Tehran, Mr. Blair told Parliament, adding that "there was no justification whatever" for the detention of the Britons."

I’m sure that Tony Blair now has the barbarians shaking in their shoes with that threat.

For intending to contradict his Liberal boss, Ontario MP Joe Comuzzi was purged from Citoyen Dion’s caucus last week.

In trying to avoid the much entrenched national perception that he is an indecisive and tentative political whimp, Citoyen Dion is looking like a bully by overcompensating.

I encourage the discussion of opinions on matters of policy. However, it is not possible to support this bad Conservative budget and to be a member of the Liberal caucus. Mr. [Joe] Comuzzi has made it very clear that he will vote in favour of the budget. A vote on a budget or a Throne Speech is always a vote of confidence. The unavoidable consequence of voting against the caucus on these votes is to no longer be part of the caucus.

That the guy has not even voted yet, nobody has, seems to have eluded the illustrious chief of her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition.

Joe Commuzzi, that big threatening, ungetlemanly guy, has issued a reply:

Furthermore, if you study the budget and it’s implications there are opportunities for the forest industry to look at themselves in new ways. Research and development and knowledge - based opportunities in the forestry sector are clearly eligible to be part of it. The 195 million dollars contained in the budget over the next two years is designated to put knowledge to work for the social and economic benefit of Canadians. Why aren’t we developing new and innovative manufactured forest products, new equipment design and silviculture procedures or linking pharmaceutical research to the Boreal Forest? The representatives of the labour and the forest industries need to redefine their industry, the old way of doing things has clearly changed. I love Canada and my region and if doing the right thing has consequences, I must accept them. However I will never, never put my gain in front of representing my constituents.

May the Liberal Party keep Stephane Dion at the helm for the next half a century.

h/t: DA

The CSM presents a portrait of the murderous Khalid Sheik Mohammed in some of its complexity.

In addition to the cowardly beheading of Daniel Pearl and the planning of the 9/11 attacks, he  has taken responsibility for so much that it seems unlikely that one man who be involved in so much.

Mohammed also claimed participation in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing; the “shoe bomb” plot involving Richard Reid; the nightclub bombing in Bali, Indonesia in October 2002; a planned second wave of 9/11-like attacks on skyscrapers in Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, and New York; planned attacks on the Panama Canal; attacks on suspension bridges in New York and the New York Stock Exchange; attacks in London against Heathrow Airport, the Canary Wharf building, and Big Ben; and a missile attack against an El Al airliner near Mombasa, Kenya, among others.

He also admitted to involvement in assassination plots against then President Bill Clinton, former President Jimmy Carter, and Pope John Paul II.

“I’m not making myself [a] hero when I said I was responsible for this or that,” Mohammed told the panel, in broken English.

Read the whole thing here.