QUOTE FOR THE DAY

16 March 2012

Angry Turk’s Message for Europe: “We are Coming”


March 16, 2012

Turkish Muslims Praying
Turkish Muslims Praying

“Whether or not you want us in the European Union, our influence in Europe is growing. We are more numerous. We are younger. We are stronger.”

A second-generation Muslim immigrant in Austria has authored a provocative new book in which he argues that Europe’s future is Turkish, whether Europeans like it or not.


The book’s short, sharp and confrontational title says it all: “We are Coming.”

The thesis is: “Regardless of whether or not you [Europeans] like us [Turks], whether or not you integrate us, whether or not you want us in the European Union, our influence in Europe is growing. We are more numerous. We are younger. We are more ambitious. Our economy is growing faster. We are stronger.”

The author, a 25-year-old Austrian-Turk named Inan Türkmen, says his objective in writing the book is to change the terms of the debate about Muslim immigration in Europe.

Türkmen — who was born in Austria to Kurdish migrants and speaks fluent German — says he is sick and tired of the way Turkish immigrants are being portrayed in the European media. He believes the time has come for Turks to fight back.

Taking a page from the playbook of the American Tea Party movement, Türkmen says he wants to establish an “angry citizen movement” (Wutbürgerbewegung) in Europe. His Turkish Tea Party would unite Turkish immigrants in Austria, Germany and other European countries to protest against European “arrogance.”

In an interview with the Vienna-based newspaper Die Presse, Türkmen says he decided to write “We are Coming” after getting “hot under the collar” over a recent book about Muslim immigration by the renowned German economist Thilo Sarrazin.

Sarrazin’s best-selling book, “Germany Does Away With Itself,” broke Germany’s long-standing taboo on discussing the impact of Muslim immigration. The book, which was first published in August 2010, is now on its 22nd edition. At last count, more than two million copies have been sold, making it one of the most widely read titles in Germany since the Second World War.

Sarrazin’s book has resonated with vast numbers of ordinary Germans who are becoming increasingly uneasy about the social changes that are transforming Germany, largely due to the presence of millions of non-integrated Muslims in the country.

The following are some excerpts from Sarrazin’s book:

“In every European country, due to their low participation in the labor market and high claim on state welfare benefits, Muslim migrants cost the state more than they generate in added economic value. In terms of culture and civilization, their notions of society and values are a step backwards.”
“No other religion in Europe is so demanding and no other migration group depends so much on the social welfare state and is so much connected to criminality.”


“Most of the cultural and economic problems [in Germany] are concentrated in a group of the five to six million immigrants from Muslim countries.”


“I do not want my grandchildren and great-grandchildren to live in a mostly Muslim country where Turkish and Arabic are widely spoken, women wear headscarves and the day’s rhythm is determined by the call of the muezzin.”


“If the birthrate of migrants remains higher than that of the indigenous population, within a few generations, the migrants will take over the state and society.”


“I do not want us to end up as strangers in our own land, not even on a regional basis.”
“From today’s perspective, the immigration of guest workers in the 1960s and 1970s was a gigantic mistake.”


The roots of Germany’s current problems with Muslim immigration can be traced back to October 30, 1961, with the signing of a labor recruitment agreement between West Germany and Turkey. At the time, West Germany’s post-World War II economy was booming and similar treaties with Greece, Italy and Spain were insufficient to supply Germany’s seemingly endless demand for labor. By the end of 1969, more than one million Turkish “guest workers” had arrived in Germany to work in the “host country’s” industrial zones.


The initial idea was that the Turkish laborers would return home after a period of two years, but the so-called “rotation clause” was removed from the German-Turkish treaty in 1964, partly due to pressure from German industry, which did not want to pay the costs of constantly training new workers. The predictable result was that many Turks never returned home.


Today, the Turkish population in Germany has mushroomed to an estimated 3.5 million, and Turks now constitute the largest ethnic minority group in the country. Demographers expect that the Turkish population in Germany will increase exponentially in coming decades, largely due to a high birth rate and Germany’s continuing high demand for foreign workers.


Germany’s demand for foreign labor is being fuelled by a demographic crisis in which the German population is not only ageing, but also shrinking, at a rapid pace. According to projections by the German Federal Statistics Office, Germany’s current population of 82 million, the largest in the European Union, is set to decline by as much as 20%, to 65 million, over the next five decades. At the same time, 34% of the population will be older than 65 and 14% will be 80 or more by 2060, up from 20% and 5% respectively in 2009.


The twin challenges of depopulation and aging will have major consequences for the financial sustainability of Germany’s cradle-to-grave social security system. For example, the number of pensioners that will have to be supported by working-age people could almost double by 2060, according to the Federal Statistics Office. While 100 people of working age between 20 and 65 had to provide the pensions for 34 retired people in 2009, they will have to generate income for between 63 and 67 pensioners in 2060.


This implies that in the future, Germany will become more, not less, dependent on immigrants. And Turks will continue to be a major source of labor, considering that the birth rate among Turkish immigrants in Germany is 2.4, nearly double that of the native German population (which at 1.38 is far below the replacement rate of 2.1 children per couple).


Time is on the side of the Turks and Inan Türkmen knows it. In a highly confrontational essay titled “You Germans Need the Turks more than the Turks Need You” which was published by the Financial Times Deutschland, Türkmen writes: “Our consolation is that Turkish influence in Europe is growing and there is nothing you Europeans can do to stop it. Of course, Turkey has always exerted influence on Europe. Mozart, Hayden and Beethoven were all inspired by Turkish music. Soon you will not even realize it because you will all be a little Turkish. People mix into cultures and I am planning to contribute something to make this happen. Up until now, all of my girlfriends have been European, not Turkish. In the future, freckles will become increasingly rare sight in Europe. The point is: The future belongs to Turkey.”

Eight weeks in prison for homophobic damage


[ed. Free expression aside note how the vandalism was treated a great deal more leniently than any offence committed in the previous article "UK Thought Police Send Man to Prison"...]

Metropolitan Police
13 February 2012

A man who sprayed homophobic graffiti over seventy times in a Shadwell housing block has been brought to justice, after Tower Hamlets Council worked in partnership with EastendHomes and the police to identify and prosecute him.

Mashudur Rahman, DOB 3/2/1989 of Luke House, E1, was today given an eight week custodial sentence for nine counts of criminal damage in a sentencing at Thames Magistrates Court. He had earlier pleaded guilty to the charges in a hearing at Stratford Magistrates Court on 3 February, and was fined £2,000 in costs.


The court heard that Rahman had written homophobic and racist graffiti in Gordon House, Glamis Road, Shadwell E1, numerous times during a six month period between March and his arrest on 28 September last year.

The court also heard a number of witness statements which described the alarm and distress caused by the graffiti, which contained numerous homophobic references

Lutfur Rahman, Mayor of Tower Hamlets, said: “The council will continue to work with our partners to bring perpetrators of all hate crimes to justice.”

Cllr Ohid Ahmed, Deputy Mayor of Tower Hamlets, said: “The actions of this man were despicable and condemnable. The messages of hate that he wrote caused considerable hurt and distress to the residents of Gordon House, and it is right that he has now been punished.”

Paul Bloss Chief Executive of EastendHomes, said: “The successful prosecution in this case is an excellent example of how EastendHomes works in partnership with other agencies such as the police and the council to rid the estate of this unacceptable type of behaviour”

DC Simon Fields, the police investigating officer, said: "Many people were involved in the investigation of this offence, including the local Safer Neighbourhood Team. It is a measure of how seriously we take Hate Crime that the perpetrator was identified and convicted and the sentence sends a clear warning that this type of behaviour will not be tolerated".

Jack Gilbert, Co-chair of Rainbow Hamlets, the LGBT Forum for Tower Hamlets,said: “We welcome this conviction. In particular we are pleased that the Court recognised that these were offences motivated by hatred of LGBT people and reflected that in its sentence. This sends a clear message: Homophobic crime in Tower Hamlets will not be tolerated.

“Offences like these cause considerable worry and distress to LGBT people and could well encourage others if not addressed swiftly. We are obviously concerned that the incidents took place so frequently and over so long a period. We will be inviting East End Homes, the police and the council to participate in a review of the case to ensure better practices are put in place for the future.”

The case was brought to court after officers from EastendHomes, which manages Gordon House, received reports of the offensive graffiti from residents. In response EEH carried out an initial investigation to gather witness statements and photos of the graffiti.

The case was then passed to Tower Hamlets Council’s Community Safety Service, who gathered video footage and stills of the perpetrator carrying out his crimes.

The complete package of evidence was then passed to Shadwell police Safer Neighbourhoods Team, who identified Rahman and progressed prosecution with the Crown Prosecution Service.

U.K. Thought Police Send Man to Prison

Bruce Bawer
Mar 14th, 2012

A few days ago I did some reflecting here on the steady rise of sharia in Britain, as exemplified by the BBC’s frank admission of its unwillingness to mock Islam, the harassment of an air passenger for an innocuous remark about hijab, and the see-no-evil response of a BBC reporter to mass displays of pro-sharia aggression in Luton.

Alas, the evidence of Britain’s decline and fall in the face of Islam just keeps on coming. This week’s case in point is that of Darren Conway, who on March 6 was sentenced to a year in prison for posting anti-Islamic materials in the window of his ground-floor apartment in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire. As the BBC puts it, he was “convicted of a religiously aggravated public order offence for putting anti-Islamic literature in his window.”

For once, the language used by the BBC was restrained and objective in comparison with the rhetoric employed by local news organizations covering the story. Here’s how the website This is Lincolnshire began its report:
A Gainsborough man who plastered his front window with vile anti-Islamic hate literature has been jailed for a year.
Darren Conway, a self-confessed supporter of right-wing organisations, was given a 12-months’ sentence at Lincoln Crown Court.
Note the way in which the reporter deploys the words vile and self-confessed. The very inclusion of such language in a supposedly objective news report means that what we are reading here is not, in fact, anything of the kind; what it is, rather, is an effort by the writer and the website to signal to their audience that they’re on the “right” side of this issue. The use of such language is a gesture of dhimmitude, an implicit statement of submissiveness, a tacit communication of acceptance of the sharia-based notion that, yes, criticism of Islam is vile and should be punished. And it is a plea: don’t hurt us. Similarly, note the use of the words offensive, inflammatory, and racist in this opening sentence of the article about Conway in the Worksop Guardian:
The offensive actions of a Gainsborough man were blasted by a judge as he was jailed for displaying inflammatory racist posters in the front window of his flat.
The word racist occurs frequently in the articles about the Conway case. Although most of the descriptions of the items posted in Conway’s window are very sketchy, there is nothing in any of them to indicate that any of the materials were genuinely racist; it seems pretty clear that when the reporters writing about Conway employ the word racist, they are making the now familiar equation of Islam criticism with racism.

Exactly what did Conway post in his windows? The most extensive description I could find was in the Worksop Guardian, which said that he had put up “posters, literature and photographs which attacked the Prophet Mohammed and the Muslim religion,” “slogans such as ‘Jihad works both ways,’ ‘no surrender,’ ‘Muslims are the most hateful of them all’ and a letter confirming that he was a member of the BNP.” Another source tells us that the materials “contained derogatory comments about Islam” and “promoted the BNP,” while “one poster showed a picture of an English Defence League demonstration.”

It would be useful to actually see the items Conway posted, so as to determine for oneself just how “vile” they were, to discover whether anything was, in fact, racist, and to find out if Conway called for acts of aggression or for somebody’s murder or anything like that. If he did incite violence, there might be good reason to put him behind bars; but I have not found any suggestion anywhere that this was the case. (Conway himself has been quoted as saying, “I have no problem with Muslims, although I do believe the Islamic faith is very much flawed but as for people who follow it I have no personal problem with.”)

In any event, just as nearly all the major Western news organizations refused to show the Danish Muhammed cartoons, none of the media reporting on the Conway case have dared to vouchsafe readers a glimpse of the materials he posted. No, we’re simply expected to take their and the prosecutors’ word that the stuff was, indeed, vile. One prosecutor, Edward Johnson, is reported to have “described the material…as grossly offensive towards the Muslim faith.” Meanwhile the Crown Prosecution Service’s own website has posted an extensive statement on the matter by Judith Walker, Chief Crown Prosecutor for the CPS East Midlands:
Everyone has the right to live free from harassment in a tolerant society. Darren Conway displayed highly offensive posters in his window targeted at the Muslim community. Although they were targeted at Muslims, they would cause offence to virtually anyone that saw them.

Today’s conviction sends a strong message that targeting groups in society in this deliberately offensive way has no place in our community and will not be tolerated. The words and images used by Conway were particularly disgusting, so it was important to bring this case to court and ensure that he faced the full consequences of his actions.
The Crown Prosecution Service will continue to treat cases based on hatred with the utmost seriousness. It is essential that everyone in our community is free to live without harassment and that anyone who jeopardises that freedom will face prosecution.
We all owe Walker a debt of gratitude, for in this statement she takes us right to the heart of the matter, giving us a crystal-clear picture of how these people think. To place in the window of your home slogans and pictures that add up to a criticism of Islamic ideology is not to exercise your freedom of speech; it is to commit an act of “harassment” that has no place “in a tolerant society” and that must therefore be punished.

Note Walker’s chillingly Orwellian understanding of the concept of freedom, which has its roots not in Magna Carta or the Enlightenment but in sharia. When she says that it is “essential that everyone in our community is free to live without harassment,” she means nothing more or less than this: that it is the right of Muslims in Britain to live in a society free of criticism of their religion. And when she says that “anyone who jeopardises that freedom will face prosecution,” she means this: that any British citizen who thinks that he enjoys the right under British law to criticize anything, including Islam, is mistaken; he does not have any such right; and if he acts as if he does, he will be incarcerated.

Walker’s pretense to the contrary, there is, needless to say, a colossal double standard at the heart of her thinking. The recent history of Britain has shown that a great variety of statements and actions by British Muslims that many non-members of their faith might well consider exceedingly vile and offensive, and might legitimately regard as acts of harassment – including a number of the statements and actions recorded in the above-mentioned BBC report on Luton – are in little or no danger of leading to prosecution or imprisonment. Such is the kind of legal thinking, and juridical practice, that, more and more every day, is shaping the destiny of the land of John Stuart Mill and Winston Churchill.

'Google is now just an ad company' ... obsessed with harvesting people's private information

Google now wants to 'learn as much about people's private lives as possible.
'Company has 'stopped' being a technology company focused on innovation'
When Gmail displays ads based on things in my email it creeps me out'
CEO Larry Page on 'mission' to beat Facebook

By Rob Waugh


A former Google executive has lambasted his ex-employer in a Goldman Sachs-style rant this week - claiming that the search company has been turned into an 'ad company' obsessed with harvesting people's private information.
James Whittaker, a current Partner Development Manager at Microsoft and ex-Engineering Director at Google, posted the 1328-word attack on Google on his Microsoft blog this week.
'Perhaps Google is right,' writes Whittaker, 'Perhaps the future lies in learning as much about people’s personal lives as possible.
'The Google I was passionate about was a technology company. The Google I left was an advertising company.'
The move comes in the wake of Google's controversial new 'privacy policy', which allowed the search giant to 'pool' information from 60 separate services including Gmail, Google Search and Android phones, to create 'personalised' advertising.
Google ignored an international outcry to launch its new privacy policy on March 1 this year, despite concerns it may be illegal in the EU, as well as countries such as Japan and South Korea.
European Union authorities said that the new privacy policy appears to violate European law,in an email to Google CEO Larry Page.
A coalition of 50 consumer groups in the UK and the U.S also wrote to Page to protest against the new policy.
Whittaker says that CEO Larry Page, who took over the company from Eric Schmidt, had a focus on 'beating' Facebook in advertising - which led the company to shift its focus from established products such as Google Mail onto its controversial social network Google Plus and other 'social' products built for advertising.
'Google could still put ads in front of more people than Facebook, but Facebook knows so much more about those people. Google took it personally. Larry Page himself assumed command to right this wrong,' says Whittaker.
The American Federal Trade Commission expanded its probe into Google to look at Google's Plus network earlier this year, as part of an investigation into anti-competitive practices.
'The old Google made a fortune on ads because they had good content. It was like TV used to be: make the best show and you get the most ad revenue from commercials. The new Google seems more focused on the commercials themselves,' says Whittaker.
Whittaker was formerly a vocal supporter of Google's products, which he documented in a page on Plus, Google's social network.
He reveals that he now feels that Google has been sacrificed to serve the network.
His full post, hosted on a Microsoft MSDN blog, is below.

Why I left Google
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jw_on_tech/archive/2012/03/13/why-i-left-google.aspx

13 March 2012

Highway bill amendment defeated that would have sent billions to Soros, Pickens, Douglas companies

by S. E. Robinson and Audrey Hudson
03/13/2012

The Senate Tuesday killed legislation to spend billions of taxpayer dollars to encourage companies to use natural-gas powered vehicles. The legislation also would have benefited wealthy backers of the Democratic measure, including George Soros, T. Boone Pickens, and Kevin G. Douglas.

The amendment to the highway bill required 60 votes to pass but was defeated 51 yeas to 47 nays.

First reported by HUMAN EVENTS, the measure sponsored by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) and Sen. Richard Burr (R- N.C.) would distribute billions in subsidies to these key entities and others for the purchase of natural gas vehicles and to build fueling stations. It would be funded through a new tax on consumers that charged 2.5 cents per gallon of natural gas beginning in 2014, with another increase to 12.5 cents in 2021.

“Gas prices are skyrocketing and meanwhile natural gas is $1.50 cheaper than gas, and we have 100-plus years of supply we can draw from,” Menendez said. “The only thing in our way is so few natural gas vehicles and gas stations on the road.” Menendez and Burr said their measure would give the natural gas market a needed jump-start by the federal government. “This gives it a five-hour energy drink,” Burr said. “This is essential if you want natural gas prices to stay down.”

With only a few minutes of debate allowed before the vote, no Senators on either side of the aisle spoke out against the New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions (NATGAS) Act.

Earlier in the day, Menendez said their measure would displace 20 billion gallons of petroleum. “Is this just another handout to energy companies? The answer to that question is a resounding no,” Menendez said.

The amendment was opposed by an unusual alliance of free market organizations and environmental groups who urged Senators in a letter Tuesday to vote against the measure.

“By providing billions in tax subsidies, the NATGAS Act interferes in the marketplace to favor natural gas over other transportation and energy technologies that may be more cost-effective or sustainable,” said the letter from Taxpayers for Common Sense, Competitive Enterprise Institute, Heartland Institute, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, among others.

The NATGAS Act provides significant subsidies for natural gas at all levels of production -- from manufacturing and infrastructure to consumer tax credits -- carrying an estimated $5 billion price tag, the organizations said.

“While a consumer fee would be used as an offset over the long-term, the fee does not even begin (to) phase in until 2014, sticking taxpayers with the immediate fiscal impacts,” the organizations said.

The office of Rep. John Sullivan (R-Okla.) declined to comment on whether he will withdraw support for the House version of NATGAS, which he introduced April 6, 2011.

Among the bill's big beneficiaries would have been George Soros, T. Boone Pickens, Kevin G. Douglas as companies under their control stood to reap the rewards of billions of taxpayer dollars in subsidies contained in the Democratic-sponsored measure.

The act would have subsidized three different enterprises controlled by Soros, Pickens and Douglas, who consistently rank among the most generous political donors, according to Federal Election Commission Records.

Moreover, HUMAN EVENTS has learned that one of these companies, Fuel Systems Solutions based in Santa Ana, Calif., has and continues to conduct business, through its foreign subsidiaries, with customers in Iran, according to the company’s U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings. The company acknowledges in those filings that tougher international economic sanctions levied in light of that nation’s civilian nuclear program may adversely affect its Iranian-based revenues in 2012, as such measures have in the past.

Douglas is a key shareholder in Fuel Systems, and he is the largest individual investor in Westport Innovations, a Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada-based supplier of natural gas engine systems and retrofit kits. Westport’s investors also include Soros Fund Management, an investment vehicle of the Soros family. Westport’s board previously included T. Boone Pickens, who currently owns Clean Energy Fuels Corporation, a Houston-based supplier of natural gas.

Fuel Systems, Westport and Clean Energy Fuels constitute what Robert Brown, a stock analyst with Craig-Hallum Capital in Minneapolis who specializes in the energy sector, referred to as “the big three” of the natural gas-powered automation arena in North America. The companies are all relatively small in terms of revenues and considered speculative as stock investments, but the NATGAS act would allow them to profit from their research, design and development.

Clean Energy Fuels supplies liquefied natural gas (LNG) and compressed natural gas (CNG), and specializes in the development of natural gas distribution platforms. Westport and Fuel Systems offer engine and fueling systems for vehicles that run on CNG, an alternative to gasoline, and LNG, an alternative to diesel.

Brown said that all three companies would profit handsomely on passage of the NATGAS act and that all three will be harmed should Congress scuttle the Menendez Amendment.

Pickens, Soros, Douglas fund NATGAS act proponents

The three investors and their affiliates are on record as financially supporting proponents of the NATGAS act, according to FEC reports. Douglas and his wife Michelle have contributed more than $130,000 to President Barack Obama, Democrats and Democratic super PACs since 2009, according to FEC records, including to Nat Gas act supporter Rep. Michael Capuano (D-Mass.).

Soros’ history of Democratic financial support is well known, such as $1.5 million to MoveOn.org from 2003 and 2004. In 2011, Soros gave $175,000 to the House Majority PAC and the Majority PAC, two super PACs whose donations have come mostly from American labor unions, according to FEC records. He has also given broadly to Democratic committees since 2009.

Pickens, his wife Madeleine and senior employees of Clean Energy Fuels have contributed more than $150,000 to politicians and committees that support the NATGAS act, according to FEC reports. Pickens and his wife gave $60,800 to House Representatives, including the act’s sponsor, Rep. John Sullivan (R-Okla.)

To Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) or related committees, the couple has given $20,800. To the Democratic Parties of New Mexico, Colorado and Nevada, all key states for the natural gas industry, the couple has given $30,000.

Clean Energy Fuels employees have given a combined $19,750 to congressional representatives who support the NATGAS act, and $10,500 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, according to a HUMAN EVENTS review of FEC reports. Clean Energy Fuels employees have also given $7,800 to Sen. Reid and $4,400 to Sen. Menendez.

Fuel Systems in Iran

Details regarding Fuel Systems’ business in Iran are available in the company’s Form 10-K filed March 8, 2012 for the year ended Dec. 31, 2011. The company’s investor relations spokesperson declined to comment on the companies operations in Iran and phone calls to the company’s corporate office were not returned as of Tuesday morning.

The SEC document, filed March 8, 2012 for the year ending Dec. 31, 2011, contains the following:

Some of our foreign subsidiaries have done, and may continue to do, business in countries subject to U.S. sanctions and embargoes, including Iran.

Some of our foreign subsidiaries sell fuel delivery systems, related parts and accessories to customers in Iran, a country currently subject to sanctions and embargoes imposed by the U.S. government, the European Union (“EU”), the United Nations, and other countries. In addition to Iran, there are other countries that are also subject to sanctions. These sanctions are complex. We believe we have procedures in place to conduct U.S. and foreign operations without violating U.S., EU, or other sanctions. However, if we fail to comply with U.S. sanctions, EU sanctions or other sanctions in our foreign operations, we could be subject to material fines and penalties and incur damage to our reputation, which may lead to a reduction in the market price of our common stock.

In addition, our foreign subsidiaries’ sales to Iran could reduce demand for our common stock among certain of our investors for political reasons.

Recent Iranian sanction laws and regulations have adversely affected our revenues and may cause us other adverse consequences.

In June 2010, the United Nations Security Council by Resolution voted to impose a new and expanded round of sanctions against Iran. In July 2010, the European Union implemented the UN Resolution. On July 1, 2010, President Obama signed into law the new Comprehensive Iran Sanctions and Accountability and Divestment Act of 2010 (the “CISADA”). In November 2011, President Obama signed Executive Order 13590 imposing broad sanctions similar to those included within the CISADA and which expressly apply to any individual or entity (whether or not a U.S. person). In January 2012, the EU expanded its sanctions against Iran. The expanded round of laws and regulations imposing sanctions on Iran has not significantly impacted our revenues derived from this country. We can offer no assurance that any further expansion of Iranian sanctions will not further adversely affect our revenues and cause us other adverse consequences.

12 March 2012

Afghans urge U.S. exit after killings; US says timetable unchanged


KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - The massacre of 16 villagers by a U.S. soldier triggered angry calls from Afghans for an immediate American exit even as the Obama administration vowed on Monday that the killings would not alter U.S. plans for the war.
Just days before Sunday's attack, Kabul and Washington had made significant progress in negotiations on a strategic partnership agreement that would allow American advisers and special forces to stay in Afghanistan after most foreign combat troops leave at the end of 2014.
But securing a full deal may be far more difficult now after a U.S. Army staff sergeant walked off his base in the southern province of Kandahar in the middle of night and gunned down at least 16 villagers, mostly women and children.
"This could delay the signing of the Strategic Partnership Agreement," an Afghan government official told Reuters.
The attack was the latest incident to ignite Afghan anger at the United States, coming on the heels of U.S. soldiers' burning of copies of the Koran on a NATO base last month, and other incidents that have intensified America's perception problem in Afghanistan.
U.S. President Barack Obama and his NATO partners intend to pull most of their troops out of Afghanistan by the end of 2014, leaving an inexperienced local army in charge.
Officials in Washington denied suggestions that the killings might alter U.S. plans.
"I do not believe this incident will change the timetable of a strategy that was designed and is being implemented in a way to allow for the withdrawal of U.S. forces, to allow for their transfer of lead security authority over to the Afghans," White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.
The soldier, who has not been publicly identified, is now in U.S. custody in Kandahar, a congressional source said on condition of anonymity. After leaving the Belambai base, the soldier began shooting people in two nearby villages, the source said. Five Afghans were wounded in addition to those killed.
The motive for the shooting was not immediately clear. The soldier was part of the 2-3 Infantry, 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, from the Lewis-McChord base in Washington state. After serving three tours in Iraq, he arrived in Afghanistan in December and has been at the Belambai base since February 1.
General John Allen, who commands U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan, told CNN that an Afghan soldier reported seeing the soldier leave the base, and that a search party was being assembled when reports of the attacks started to come in.
Allen declined to comment on reports that the sergeant had suffered a brain injury in the past.
U.S. officials, who have rushed to distance the shootings from the efforts of the 90,000-strong U.S. force that over the past year has beaten the Taliban back from much of southern Afghanistan, say an investigation was under way but did not know when it would conclude.
Afghanistan's parliament condemned the killings, saying Afghans had run out of patience with the actions of foreign forces and the lack of oversight. Civilian deaths have long been one of the main sources of tension between Kabul and Washington.
"We have benefited little from the foreign troops here but lost everything - our lives, dignity and our country to them," said Haji Najiq," a Kandahar shop owner.
"The explanation or apologies will not bring back the dead. It is better for them to leave us alone and let us live in peace."
UNWELCOME CHALLENGE
The incident is another unwelcome challenge for the Obama administration's efforts to establish stability - which will require the support of ordinary Afghans - more than 10 years after the Taliban government was toppled in an American invasion.
U.S. Representative Howard McKeon, Republican chairman of the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, said through a spokesman that "now is not the time to abandon hope and freedom's cause, but to persevere," and urged Obama to "rally the American people to this cause and demonstrate the will to win."
U.S. officials warned of possible reprisal attacks after the villagers were killed in the likely "rogue" shooting.
Fury over the killing spree, which brought demands that the United States withdraw earlier than scheduled, could be exploited by the Taliban to gain new recruits.
Anti-Americanism, which boiled over after the Koran-burning incident, might deepen after the Kandahar carnage.
"The Americans said they will leave in 2014. They should leave now so we can live in peace," said Mohammad Fahim, 19, a university student. "Even if the Taliban return to power our elders can work things out with them. The Americans are disrespectful."
The civilian deaths may also force Afghan President Hamid Karzai to harden his stance in the partnership talks to appease a public already critical of his government's performance.
"The Americans are not here to assist us they are here to kill us," said Najibullah, 33, a house painter in Kabul.
"I hate the Americans and I hate anyone who loves them, so I hope there is no long-term partnership between our countries."
The partnership agreement, which Washington and Kabul have been discussing for more than a year, is expected to be a framework for U.S. involvement in Afghanistan after foreign combat troops leave at the end of 2014.
Without a pact that keeps U.S. advisers or special forces in the country, there is a danger that civil war could erupt again in Afghanistan.
DETENTION CENTER
The Kandahar violence came just days after the United States and Afghanistan signed a deal on the gradual transfer of a major U.S.-run detention center to Afghan authorities, overcoming one of the main sticking points in the partnership negotiations.
Afghanistan wants a timeline to take over detention centers and for the United States and NATO to agree to end night raids on Afghan homes as preconditions for signing the pact.
Pentagon spokesman George Little said U.S. strategy would continue as it had before Sunday's shooting.
"There has been a series of troubling incidents recently, but no one should think that we are steering away from our partnership with the Afghan people, our partnership with Afghan National Security Forces, and our commitment to prosecute the war effort," he told reporters.
Allen acknowledged the shooting was a "setback" but said: "We're going to ensure that this relationship, which is resilient and possesses a lot of shock absorbency, that this relationship is the one that defines the success of our campaign."
U.S. forces invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to topple the Taliban rulers who had harbored the al Qaeda network responsible for the September 11 attacks of the United States. Kandahar is the birthplace of the Taliban.
Southern and eastern provinces have seen some of the fiercest fighting of the war.
"The Kandahar shootings will give the Taliban the chance to prove to Afghans that they are the freedom fighters and the Americans are the evil ones," said Waheed Mujhda of the Afghan Analysts Network.
Sunday's attack may also harden a growing consensus in Washington about what can - and can't - be accomplished in Afghanistan.
The bill for the war has already exceeded $500 billion and more than 1,900 U.S. troops have been killed, with the total number of foreign troops killed approaching 3,000.
"Not only will this horrific incident enrage average Afghans, it will likely significantly impact the American public attitude toward the war and renew calls for speeding up the pace of U.S. troop withdrawals," said Lisa Curtis, a security expert at the Heritage Foundation.
Karzai, whose relationship with his Western backers is troubled even in the best of times, condemned the rampage as "intentional murders" and demanded an explanation. Karzai's office released a statement quoting a villager as saying "American soldiers woke my family up and shot them in the face."
Amnesty International warned that those behind such attacks must be brought to justice or it would risk reinforcing a perception among many Afghans - fueled by the Taliban - that NATO had not done enough to keep Afghan civilians safe.
(Additional reporting by Hamid Shalizi and Mirwais Harooni in KABUL; Susan Cornwell, Missy Ryan, Alister Bull in WASHINGTON; Michelle Nicols, Louis Charbonneau and Emily Flitter in NEW YORK; Writing by Michael Georgy; Editing by Missy Ryan and Cynthia Osterman)

Arpaio investigation: Obama might be Kenyan

WND
9th March, 2012

Among the records missing for Barack Obama that would be available for an ordinary president are passport records, school records such as those from Punahou, Occidental, Columbia and Harvard, Harvard Law Review writings, scholarly articles for the University of Chicago, state bar association records from Illinois, Illinois state senate records, the marriage and divorce documents for his mother, his adoption records and others.

Now it has been revealed that the Cold Case Posse assembled by Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Maricopa County, Ariz., cannot confirm yet that Obama was not born in Kenya and brought to the United States as a days-old infant for his birth to be registered in Hawaii.

The reason? Missing records.

Speculation has held that Obama actually was born in Kenya, and as the son of an American woman and Kenyan father, probably would not have been considered under any circumstances to be a “natural born citizen” of America, as the Constitution demands for presidents.

It’s been revealed that the Kenyan government actually investigated that possibility earlier, without conclusive results.

Now Arpaio’s team, which was assembled to work on a volunteer basis after hundreds of constituents expressed fear that Obama was having his name put on the 2012 election ballot in Arizona using a fraudulent document, has reported that it checked to determine whether a young mother arrived in the United States from Kenya in the days after Obama’s reported Aug. 4, 1961, birth date.

The investigation report said that the records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service cards, which were filled out by passengers of that era arriving on international flights originating outside of the United States, cannot be found.

The investigation sought the records from part of the month of August 1961, and took a researcher to the National Archives in Washington, D.C., where other records of that time and from that time frame are stored.

NOTE: In case you missed the news conference of Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s “Cold Case Posse,” you can view it here.

It is the records from the week of Obama’s birth that cannot be tracked, investigators confirm.
The Arpaio report said the hunt for airline passenger flight manifests for 1961 for foreign flights landing in Honolulu was an attempt to see if Obama’s mother returned at that time.
“The idea was that if Barack Obama had been born in Kenya, or any other location outside the United States, there should be a passenger record of the airline flight on which she, a new mother, returned to Hawaii with her newly born infant son,” the report said.

But “to date, investigators have not been able to locate the relevant airline passenger flight manifests for 1961.”

What was found were records of cards the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service required all
passengers – including both U.S. citizens and foreign citizens – to fill out and file with passport control when arriving in Honolulu from a foreign city of origin.

The report said, “Microfilm records of INS cards for passengers arriving in New York on foreign files in 1961 have been found in the National Archives only recently; consequently these records have not yet been examined. Microfilm records of INS cards for passengers arriving in Honolulu on foreign files originating around the Pacific rim in 1961 have been examined at the National Archives in Washington, D.C.”

The microfilms that were found for the time period include “NARA Record Group A3573, Reel 184, INA records from July 28, 1961 through Aug. 7, 1961″ and “NARA Record Group A3573, Reel 185, INA records from Aug. 8, 1961 through Aug. 12, 1961.”

However, “Remarkably, all INS records for the week of Obama’s birth, Aug. 1 – Aug. 7, 1961, were missing from the end of Reel 184 and were not discovered anywhere on Reel 185, or any other microfilm reel in the record group,” the report said.

“The National Archives confirmed in a letter written on National Archives stationary that the INS records for foreign flights arriving in Hawaii during the week of Obama’s birth were missing, not only on the microfilm reels examined, but also in the primary database itself,” the report said.

That leaves open the door that Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, was, as others have reported, visiting her husband’s family in Kenya shortly before the birth. Airlines at that time likely would not have allowed a woman expecting to give birth any day to board an extended international flight, thus creating the circumstances for Obama’s birth in Kenya.

WND reported earlier that internal Kenyan government documents reveal Obama’s step-grandmother was interviewed by agents of the National Security Intelligence Service about reports she said Obama was born in the East African nation.

As WND reported that while there’s no proof to date placing Obama’s mother in Kenya for the birth, a disputed taped telephone conversation in which step-grandmother Sarah Hussein Obama purportedly claimed he was born in the coastal city of Mombasa became an Internet sensation after its submission in a lawsuit challenging the president’s eligibility.

Philip J. Berg, a former Pennsylvania deputy attorney general, included a transcript of the taped Oct. 16, 2008, telephone interview and sworn affidavits in a filing with the U.S. Supreme Court after lower courts dismissed as frivolous his Aug. 21, 2008, complaint alleging Obama was born in Mombasa.
Critics challenge statements on the telephone call, which was conducted through an interpreter. But two members of the Obamas’ Luo tribe who are fluent in the local Luo dialect, Swahili and English, have told WND that after carefully listening to the tape they believe she declared Barack Obama Jr. was born in Kenya and that she was present at the birth.

Kenya’s NSIS later investigated those statements, according to official government letters. WND also confirmed two letters purportedly written by Kenya’s immigration secretary during the 2008 U.S. presidential election campaign stated that officials in Nairobi could not find evidence Obama was born in Kenya. But the official said the government had “information” that relevant birth records may have been removed or were missing.

An “interim report” by the NSIS issued in September 2008 “concludes that a birth certificate in the name of Barack Hussein Obama may have been issued” in Kenya “but to confirm this would require a further thorough joint investigation” by the NSIS and Kenya’s Central Intelligence Department, or CID.

The report said that none of several investigations by various officers has been conclusive and that some leads require further investigation “because it appears some powerful forces as it were are hell bent in defeating this investigation.”

The government reported some hospital records appeared to be missing.

Further, a 2009 internal NSIS report (page 1 and page 2) said conflicting stories suggest the “the Obama family is trying to hide something but are not doing a very good job of it.”

The report said, “We have also investigated Mama Sarah to find out if she is speaking the truth but she had come out as vague and incongruent. In one interview with Mama Sarah Obama our officers recorded that Mama Sarah says she cannot remember if she attended the birth of Barack Obama or visited his parents at the Coast Provincial General Hospital around the official birthday of Barack Obama. But she confessed to have had part of her family there at around the same time. Some of her brothers were already working in Mombasa. In a second interview done much later, she says that she is sure Barack Obama was born in Mombasa because she was visiting her family there when he was born, and they were called to the CPGH (Coast Provincial General Hospital) where she met Barack Obama’s mother for the first time.”

The report said she later was hostile and gave conflicting testimony about the issue.

The NSIS also reported that there were multiple alterations and insertions in the hospital records, suggesting that someone was trying “keep off track any investigations into this case.”
There also was official correspondence involving Emmanuel Kisombe, the permanent secretary in the Ministry for Immigration and Registration of Persons, who in July 2008 told the U.S. ambassador about the possibility that Obama was born in their country.

He suggested an investigation. He wrote, “We have instructions from the Head of Civil Service and Secretary to the Cabinet carrying out directions of the Cabinet sub-committee on Security and Foreign Relations to investigate and report on efficacy of reports that Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic Party aspirant in the United States could be Kenyan-born.”

He cited “numerous intelligence reports that [Obama] might have been born in Mombasa at the Lady Grigg Maternity Wing of the Coast Provincial Hospital.”

Harvard-educated Dr. Jerome Corsi, who has written several books about Obama, wrote a year ago about the theories involving a Kenyan birth for Obama.

He cited the documentation that the Immigration and Naturalization Service suspected the marriage between Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, and Barack Obama Sr. to be a sham.

And there is the fact that within weeks of the birth, Dunham moved to Seattle to take night classes at the University of Washington.

Because of the absence of information, the reasons for some of those events remain unclear. But he noted in a column, “That Ann Dunham did not return to Honolulu until after Obama Sr. left in September 1962 to begin his graduate studies at Harvard suggests the possibility an estrangement between the conception of the baby and the birth had eliminated or eroded whatever bond might have existed between the two.

“Perhaps Ann hoped that she could persuade senior members of the Obama family in Kenya that she was a well-chosen daughter-in-law and her son was a desirable grandson,” he continued. “With her leftist ideological vision and the many comments she made to friends after arriving in Seattle with her infant son, Ann Dunham may well have harbored the hope of becoming the Eva Peron of Kenya.
“If Ann Dunham had been successful in persuading Obama Sr. and his family in Africa to accept her, she might have ended up in the desirable position of being the U.S.-born wife of a U.S.-educated Kenyan husband, who faced bright political prospects after he returned to Kenya with an advanced graduate degree obtained from a prestigious U.S. university,” his analysis said. “With the last six months of her pregnancy missing in her documentable chronology, it’s possible she was not in Hawaii during that time. Air travel from Honolulu was becoming increasingly more accessible to the average person by 1961.”

He said, “That Ann Dunham was rejected both by the Obama family in Kenya and by Obama Sr. in Honolulu also provides an explanation for her precipitous decision to leave Honolulu as quickly after the baby’s birth as possible. Hope followed by rejection would then define the emotions that explain Dunham’s behavior during her 1961 pregnancy.”

He said, “Moreover, if the baby was born in Kenya, the actual date of birth might have been earlier than Aug. 4, 1961. Very possibly, the grandparents decided to register the baby’s birth with the Hawaii Department of Health when they knew their daughter was returning to Honolulu from Africa.
“That Ann Dunham as an 18-year-old took an infant baby to Seattle by herself to rent an apartment and begin night courses would make more sense if the baby had been born in Kenya earlier than Aug. 4, 1961, the date of birth consistently advanced in the official Obama nativity story.”

The Cold Case Posse dismissed so-called evidence of two newspaper announcements in Honolulu citing Obama’s birth, explaining that those same announcements also listed foreign infants as Hawaii-born, as well as listing 3-year-olds as newborns.

Under Chapter 57 of the 1955 Revised Law of the Territory of Hawaii, a family in 1961 could report a birth as Hawaiian with merely the word of a family member or witness.
That there was reason for members of his family to claim a Hawaiian birth was documented by the state of Hawaii. In a 1955 paper by Robert Bennett, the chief of the Bureau of Health Statistics of the Hawaii Department of Health, he explained the vital records system he was then implementing for the Hawaiian Islands, which soon would be a state.

In an article entitled “Vital Records in Hawaii,” published in the Hawaii Medical Journal, Vol. 15, No. 2, November-December 1955, Bennett and his co-author, George Tokuyama, chief of the Registration and Records Section, wrote:

“The requirement of a birth certificate throughout the country to show citizenship, during World War II, gave a great impetus to the completeness of registration. This and other factors have made a birth certificate the principal document an American citizen uses to prove legal facts about himself. Almost every parent knows that a baby must be registered soon after birth, not only to meet requirements of the law, but to protect the child later in life.”

There also have been conflicting reports from Obama family members about which Hawaii hospital was his birth location, and neither has been able to provide any documentation confirming it.
There also have been discrepancies reported in the image of Obama’s birth certificate that the White House purported was “proof positive” of a Hawaiian birth, including an out-of-sequence number.
Further, research has revealed that on his INS paperwork filled out the same month Barack Obama Jr. was born, Barack Obama, Sr. incorrectly lists his wife’s name as “Ann S. Dunham” instead of “Stanley Ann Dunham,” and he neglected to mention that he had any children.

Obama Sr. also listed his address at 1482 Alencastre St. in Honolulu, a bachelor apartment he never shared with his wife or child.

And passport documents released for Barack Obama Jr.’s mother by the State Department on July 29, 2010, did not include any birth certificate documentation for him, despite one hand-written memo to the file claiming he was born in Honolulu.

Obama impeachment bill now in Congress

by Drew Zahn
12th March, 2012

Let the president be duly warned.

Rep. Walter B. Jones Jr., R-N.C., has introduced a resolution declaring that should the president use offensive military force without authorization of an act of Congress, “it is the sense of Congress” that such an act would be “an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor.”

Specifically, Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution reserves for Congress alone the power to declare war, a restriction that has been sorely tested in recent years, including Obama’s authorization of military force in Libya.

In an exclusive WND column, former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo claims that Jones introduced his House Concurrent Resolution 107 in response to startling recent comments from Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta.

“This week it was Secretary of Defense Panetta’s declaration before the Senate Armed Services Committee that he and President Obama look not to the Congress for authorization to bomb Syria but to NATO and the United Nations,” Tancredo writes. “This led to Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., introducing an official resolution calling for impeachment should Obama take offensive action based on Panetta’s policy statement, because it would violate the Constitution.”

Get the bumper sticker that tells everyone to Impeach Obama!

In response to questions from Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., over who determines the proper and legal use of the U.S. military, Panetta said, “Our goal would be to seek international permission and we would … come to the Congress and inform you and determine how best to approach this, whether or not we would want to get permission from the Congress – I think those are issues we would have to discuss as we decide what to do here.”

“Well, I’m almost breathless about that,” Sessions responded, “because what I heard you say is, ‘We’re going to seek international approval, and then we’ll come and tell the Congress what we might do, and we might seek congressional approval.’ And I just want to say to you that’s a big [deal].”
Asked again what was the legal basis for U.S. military force, Panetta suggested a NATO coalition or U.N. resolution.

Sessions was dumbfounded by the answer.

“Well, I’m all for having international support, but I’m really baffled by the idea that somehow an international assembly provides a legal basis for the United States military to be deployed in combat,” Sessions said. “They can provide no legal authority. The only legal authority that’s required to deploy the United States military is of the Congress and the president and the law and the Constitution.”
The exchange itself can be seen below:

The full wording of H. Con. Res. 107, which is currently referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary, is as follows:
Expressing the sense of Congress that the use of offensive military force by a president without prior and clear authorization of an act of Congress constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution.
Whereas the cornerstone of the Republic is honoring Congress’s exclusive power to declare war under article I, section 8, clause 11 of the Constitution: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That it is the sense of Congress that, except in response to an actual or imminent attack against the territory of the United States, the use of offensive military force by a president without prior and clear authorization of an act of Congress violates Congress’s exclusive power to declare war under Article I, Section 8, clause 11 of the Constitution and therefore constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution.

[ed. When it comes to Obama declaring war without authorisation is the smallest reason to impeach him...]

11 March 2012

Deporting Millions of Muslims May Be Necessary (video)

Welcome to the Sweden of Today (video)

THE LEFTIST STRATEGY OF ISOLATION

Increasingly the left is in the ascendency. They have got there in the last 40+ years by steadily eroding our society. On issues from homosexual marriage to immigration to abortion to racism to re-writing history entirely. Each step has been accomplished by a very simple strategy - isolation.They want to make you feel as if you are the only person in the world who believes this view (whatever it is) they will mock you, boycott you, harrass you and rob you of your dignity until you quit and sometimes even long afterward. Yet even this can be a useful beacon when deciding if you are on the right path or not.

There are times in the fight when it does feel that you are a lone voice, but you are not. There are literally millions around the world who reject leftist dogma, millions who know full well what it is to suffer under their tyranny and don't want it on their doorstep. There are millions who have have read the history books which highlight the mass slaughter and loss of identity, freedom and individuality that accompanies the left wherever it goes.

They do what they can do to turn things around. Then there are the millions who are the silent majority who also reject leftist dogma. Why are they silent? Mostly because the have been made to feel they are the only ones who have this opinion. Mostly because the media and government don't let their voices be heard. Mostly because they are afraid of the repercussions. Thus the strategy of isolation has served its purpose.

Which are you?

It is not wrong to have a contrary point of view and nobody should be persecuted, or prosecuted, for it, no matter how bizarre or 'irrelevant' or wrong it may or may not be. "Political correctness" and "racism". What are these ridiculous verbal chains that have have been forced upon us?? Only a servile population would allow such concepts to gain as much traction as they have gained, let alone place them on an even keel with freedom of speech.

Always remember though WE ARE NOT ALONE. An educated, well reasoned population not doped up on porn, sports, facebook, celebrity and clever catch phrases like "hope and change" is more than a match for any crackpot tyrants desire to reorganise our society and overwhelm it with third world immigration.

It is time.

 

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The Puppet Master

The Puppet Master

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Michelle Obama

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Pelosi

Pelosi
Pelosi

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Mr Charisma Vladimir Putin

Putin shows us his tender side.

Obama discusses the election

Obama arrested

Obama arrested
Or ought to be...

Cameron Acknowledges his base

Be Very Careful

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