Friday Afternoon Roundup - Hijacking the Internet

There has been a good deal of talk about Net Neutrality, but the Clinton Administration's internationalization of ICANN means that there's a much more serious threat to freedom of speech on the internet than even the FCC. A threat that hardly anyone is talking about.

Here's a brief excerpt of a much longer piece

10) Further alterations to the geographical makeup of ICANN's Board of Directors would mean a considerable shift in power towards the Arab League, which would presumably vote as a bloc far more than preexisting Geographic Regions.

12) Should the League of Arab States gain bloc voting power at ICANN, there is every indication that it will seek to replicate its effective takeover of the United Nations General Assembly, likely in conjunction with the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC).

15) On October 28, 2010, at OIC-CERT's Second Annual General Meeting, OIC Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu noted the following as a core mission of OIC-CERT: "In view of the phenomena of discrimination, stereotyping and defamation targeting Muslims and their religion known as 'Islamophobia,' we invite the OIC-CERT to use its available professional and technical resources (in line with its objectives stated in terms of reference) in order to cooperate with the 'OIC Islamophobia Observatory' to identify the best ways and means including technical, administrative and legal tools to combat anti-Islamic contents on the internet."

The OIC has already effectively used the UN to push its censorship agenda. But the UN is virtually toothless when it comes to the United States. However if the Muslim world can dominate ICANN the way it dominates the UN General Assembly, then free speech on the internet is dead.

If this succeeds then 10 years from now, not only will sites like Jihad Watch or Religion of Peace lose their domain names, and most discussion of Islamic terrorism have to 'go on the run' in pop up social media groups that constantly get shut down (already the situation on sites such as Facebook) functioning like rats in the walls. But even the sites of mainstream politicians and newspapers will be targeted. Mandatory filtering by ISP's. The removal of Israel's Il domain, are all possibilities. And if anything I probably haven't gone far enough.

The internet will become what the UN General Assembly is, a voice that speaks the Islamic narrative as one and bans any discussion or debate. Or marginalizes it so far that it never gets heard.

Is this already underway? Yes.

On September 25, 2010, ICANN's board of directors removed a reference to "terrorism" from the fourth version of its Draft Applicant Guidebook (DAG, or DAGv4), after complaints were received from several Arab individuals and organizations.

1) Until 2009, ICANN necessarily complied with applicable United States Office of Foreign Assets Control regulations regarding terrorism, and had no reason to specify such as the subject of a background check.

2) The term "terrorism" was included without any conceivably objectionable modifiers such as "Islamist."

3) The Chairman of the (Pan Arab) Multilingual Internet Group Khaled Fattal declared that the term "terrorism" itself was objectionable because "it will be seen by millions of Muslims and Arabs as racist, prejudicial and profiling." Fattal requested not only its removal, but an apology from ICANN.

The two-pronged approach of silencing dissent and unleashing terror is underway. This is why the internationalization of ICANN poses the gravest of threats not just to the thing we call freedom of speech on the internet, but to the entire global organization of knowledge and debate that has come to run through its networks. If ICANN goes IslamCANN then they will have captured the consensus.

This is a situation that few are talking about, even though in retrospect it may come to be one of the 5 issues that dramatically changes the world as we know it.

Meanwhile the UN is working along its own track.

The United Nations is considering whether to set up an inter-governmental working group to harmonise global efforts by policy makers to regulate the internet.

Establishment of such a group has the backing of several countries, spearheaded by Brazil.

At a meeting in New York on Wednesday, representatives from Brazil called for an international body made up of Government representatives that would attempt to create global standards for policing the internet - specifically in reaction to challenges such as WikiLeaks.

The Brazilian delegate stressed, however, that this should not be seen as a call for a "takeover" of the internet.

But that's exactly what it is. A unified set of laws with regard to the internet is not about policing criminal activity. That is already policed under existing laws. It's about criminalizing dissent.

Brazil's left wing regime, which just decided to recognize Palestinian Arab terrorists as a state, tried to help Iranian dictator Ahmadinejad get nuclear fuel, is acting as a stalking horse for the takeover of the internet.

India, South Africa, China and Saudi Arabia appeared to favour a new possible over-arching inter-government body.

The appearance of China and Saudi Arabia on this list is not exactly shocking. China wants to tightly control all content that its citizens access. And Saudi Arabia representing the Muslim world wants to control the depiction of Islam worldwide. Between the Muslim world and China and left wing regimes like Brazil, there is a common agenda. Censorship. Control.

US politicians have responded to moves from within the United Nations to form an inter-Government panel to regulate the internet, putting forward a resolution demanding the UN maintain a "hands-off approach".

California Congresswoman Mary Bono Mack has put forward a resolution that the United Nations and other international governmental organisations take their hands off the Internet.

Introducing House Resolution 1775 [see full text below], Mack argued that "the Internet has progressed and thrived precisely because it has not been subjected to the suffocating effect of a governmental organization's heavy hand.

"The attempt of the United Nations to overtake something that is so central to our economy-like the Internet-is offensive and completely out of line," she said.

"We have a hard enough time keeping the Federal Communications Commission's hands off the Internet; imagine having to convince governments like Syria, Iran and Venezuela."

A Republican congress is better position to oppose this, but the Obama Administration is committed to few things more seriously, than to weakening American power and collaborating with the ascension of the Muslim world.

The only real obstacle is likely to come from tech companies such as Google who benefit from open policies and don't want to see the boot of dictatorships come down on them. Not just for ideological reasons, but for profit motives too.

Vint Cerf, widely regarded as the father of the internet, also hit out at the United Nations plan.

"Today, I have signed that petition on Google's behalf because we don't believe governments should be allowed to grant themselves a monopoly on Internet governance," Cerf said on Friday on behalf of Google where he works as its chief internet lobbyist.

Cerf said the beauty of the existing governance structure was that it was "bottoms-up" and influenced by a range of stakeholders, including companies and academics.

"This model has not only made the Internet very open—a testbed for innovation by anyone, anywhere—it's also prevented vested interests from taking control," said Cerf.

With falling US leverage and the growing dominion of China and the Muslim world-- the ball is now in the court of companies like Google.

Of course I haven't touched on the Obama Administration's own attempts to take over the internet. But others have covered that issue more than adequately.

Eddie at Something You Might Like sums up the three overall routes. I've written about COICA myself recently in $335,906 is the price of the Constitution. But of these ACTA is probably the scariest. More so than Net Neutrality or COICA, because

1. ACTA is secret. There have been leaks but we don't know what's fully inside. The level of secrecy has been the subject of diplomatic complaints. And Freedom of Information requests have been denied on national security grounds.

2. ACTA is negotiated as part of an international process, which means it's likely to force the US to abide by the standards of countries with less respect for free speech. And that makes it a potentially direct attack on the Constitution.

And 3, from Eddie

Worse, since ACTA is structured as a “trade agreement,” it would not need Senate approval like a normal treaty. It’s a bureaucratic takeover of great proportions, aimed largely at the Internet.

Now in more transparency news, Freedom of Information Requests have torn the burqa off Mayor Bloomberg, forcing disclosures as to just how deeply involved he was with the Ground Zero Mosque aka Park 51.

The Bloomberg Administration tried to pretend that it was just standing up for Freedom of Religion, when in fact it was so thoroughly entangled with the project, that it might as well have been an investor. There are conflicts of interest here up the Wazoo and the Yangtze.

Mayor Bloomberg's top deputies went to great lengths to help the developers of a planned mosque near Ground Zero - even drafting a letter to the community board for them.

A flurry of emails released by City Hall yesterday revealed the coaching Hizzoner's brass gave to the imam pushing to build the mosque, Feisal Abdul Rauf.

At one point, Community Affairs Commissioner Nazli Parvizi even drafted a letter for Rauf's wife, Daisy Khan, to send to Community Board 1, which was voting on the project.

"As a Muslim-American and a New Yorker, I take my role in keeping New York the greatest City in the world serious," the draft said. Parvizi also provided the contact information for the board.

...

But one critic of the mosque charged that the emails prove that backers rigged the public approval process.

"They were in cahoots all along," steamed Andy Sullivan, a Queens construction worker and vocal mosque critic.

And it gets worse...

The e-mails also document donations of $300 from the Cordoba Initiative and $150 from the American Society for Muslim Advancement, a sister group, to help pay for an Aug. 24, 2009, dinner celebrating the holy Islamic month of Ramadan at the mayor's residence.

It was at that event that Rauf first told Bloomberg about his plans for the Islamic center, and the mayor responded that it sounded like a good idea, Loeser said.

Loeser said the donations did not influence the mayor's support of the project.

That looks a whole lot like Rauf helping fund an event to promote Islam at Bloomberg's pad. And Bloomberg getting behind the project after the event. Some politicians might call that synergy, but it smells a whole lot like corruption.

Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said the documents show the city was an active proponent of the project.

"The mayor's office was at the beck and call of the ground zero mosque folks," Fitton said. "He obviously feels strongly about it, but he shouldn't turn the taxpayers of New York into advocates for this group."

The American Center for Law and Justice, which has sued the city to try to stop the Islamic center, said Bloomberg continues "to promote and advance a project that offends most New Yorkers and most Americans." A CBS News poll in August said about 71 percent of Americans oppose the project.

Except Bloomberg doesn't care what New Yorkers or Americans think. The latest issue of New York Magazine actually praised him for it.

Pamela Geller has a lot more of on the latest on Rauf's antics.

But speaking of Bloomberg, the Mayor is back to posturing about the World Trade Center rebuilding. And pretending to be outraged that hardly anything has been done in over 9 years.

Mayor Bloomberg lashed out at the Port Authority Friday for the "craziness" that has delayed World Trade Center rebuilding efforts.

"It's time to stop this craziness of everything and we just have to move forward here," Bloomberg said on WOR radio Friday morning.

"And if we don't, you are going to see me out there beating the drums every day. I'm not going to leave this world with a hole in the ground 10 years from now," Bloomberg vowed.

Let's be clear about what "craziness" is. The craziness is the infighting between Bloomberg and Pataki\Patterson, none of whom actually want to rebuild the WTC, but all of whom want to pass the blame around in a circle to each other.

If Bloomberg had been a quarter as enthusiastic about rebuilding the World Trade Center, as he was about the Ground Zero Mosque, it would have been done already.

Instead Governor Pataki's office took their whack, rejecting a proposal to rebuild the Twin Towers, designating an unfit architect that Pataki had inappropriate ties to, turning in the unworkable and ugly Freedom Tower. Then not long after Michael Bloomberg got his crack, designating his own idiot architect who had described the original Towers as ugly, and completely trashed the project further. That was quite a while back.

The Port Authority deserves the blame. But so does Bloomberg. And when the state and city governments aren't blaming each other. They're blaming Larry Silverstein. Silverstein is not a very pleasant figure, but he's been the goat in all this. Even though as owner, he should have been the deciding voice in rebuilding the WTC, instead he's gotten screwed over and blamed for everything by an arrogant bag of wind like our Mayor Mike.

Now Mayor Mike is pretending otherwise in order to bash the Port Authority, which is a mess of its own caliber, a corrupt mismanaged agency run by two state governments incapable of even managing their own budgets.

His harsh words for the Port Authority came after WTC developer Larry Silverstein told 60 minutes that failure to redevelop Ground Zero is "a national disgrace."

Silverstein recently agreed to chip in another $250 million into the embattled project. But sources said he'll limit plans to two medium-sized towers and scrap one that was designed to be taller than the Empire State Building.

"Larry Silverstein in all fairness was asked to put some more money in the wing. He agreed to put $250 million of his own money in. He had a very rational plan and I can tell you at this point, it is the Port Authority that has to come back," Bloomberg told radio show host John Gambling.

That's the rational plan that Bloomberg condemned because it had too much office space, and not enough room to build community theaters, playgrounds, green space to display the horrible bizarre artwork that City Hall Park is already littered with, and every other piece of insanity that local community groups and the Mayor wanted.

This in a nutshell is why there's still a hole in the ground. It's a national disgrace, as Bloomberg says. Except insofar as the Federal government didn't just take over the whole damn project itself. I'm not sure the results would have been that much better, but I suspect under Bush, the towers might have actually gotten rebuilt, instead of the city getting a small tower, and a political football still being tossed around.

Speaking of malfeasance, Governor Paterson is going out by freeing the NAACP's favorite murderer. John Harris White gets set free after spending half a year in prison. White had already gotten a ridiculously light sentence of less than 5 years for murder. There are people in prison for stealing batteries who got longer sentences.

The NAACP has since dragged the White case through every possible forum, contending over and over again that he was the victim of racism, that the shooting was justified because of racism-- on and on and on. And now with a corrupt unintentional replacement governor on the way out, they finally got their wish. And a murderer walks free.

Local NAACP officials had campaigned aggressively on behalf of Mr. White. In October, the state chapter passed a resolution calling for his sentence to be commuted. "It's time for healing," said Hazel Dukes, president of the state chapter. "The district attorney did his job, and the governor did his job. No one is rejoicing; no one is gloating."

No one did their job actually. If race was taken out of the picture, John White would have been serving an extended stretch in prison. And Danny Cicciaro's wouldn't be constantly dragged out by a media eager to put the victim on trial. But the NAACP won. And Dukes is repulsively gloating at the last gift from a non-governor who may end up spending time in jail himself.

It's not time for healing. It's time to condemn the hijacking of the justice system to serve the ends of an organization with a racial agenda, that is more interested in creating a scandal for fundraising purposes, than in the public safety of all New Yorkers, and in justice being done.

Gov. David A. Paterson's decision to shorten John White's sentence followed a large-scale campaign on White's behalf with letter-writing drives, online petitions and personal appeals to the governor from African-American leaders, including the Rev. Al Sharpton.

Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota was sharply critical of the governor for not consulting Daniel Cicciaro Jr.'s family beforehand. Cicciaro was the 17-year-old whom White fatally shot after a confrontation outside White's Miller Place home.

Bassett confirmed the governor did not ask for any input from Cicciaro's family, nor was he required to. Spota's office also was not asked to weigh in on the

clemency application.

And why would he? It's not like this was ever about doing the right thing. It's about the same thing that all New York politics is now. Giving Al Sharpton whatever he wants. See Eric Schneiderman.

Moving on now. Boker Tov Boulder points out that America could be a coal superpower

Coal is truly “America's fuel.” The United States has more recoverable coal than any other nation; the 272 billion tons of coal reserves in the United States represent one-quarter of the world's total estimated coal supply.

There is more energy potential in America's coal than in all the oil of the Middle East.

In fact, America's recoverable coal has the energy content equivalent of a trillion barrels of oil, a figure roughly comparable to all the world's known oil reserves. At current rates of consumption, U.S. coal reserves will last at least another 200 years.

At NewsReal, Lisa Graas takes on Max Blumenthal's Islamophobia smear at CBS. That CBS would even showcase someone like Max Blumenthal shows just how low their standards have fallen.

Even more disturbing than Blumenthal‘s background is that the conspiracy rhetoric doesn’t merely appear on his own blog but is being promoted across the leftist media including CBS News, Mother Jones, The Nation, Huffington Post, Common Dreams, Tom Dispatch, Democratic Underground, and anywhere else that spastic leftists love to rejoice in ludicrous fantasies about an “Islamophobic crusade” conspiracy. If we needed any further proof that reason is dead in the leftist media, it’s certainly clear now.

But there's a basic difference between Blumenthal's work being featured in the unhinged dungeons of places like HuffPo or Democratic Underground where conspiracy theories, hatemongering and outright insanity find their natural habitat. But when that kind of sewer leakage moves up to CBS News, what's next? An op-ed by a 9/11 Truther? A Mossad killed Kennedy piece? It's not like there's much of a difference at this point.

From Solomonia and CIF Watch, a piece on the Guardian's continuing silence

On the morning of Tuesday, December 21st, catastrophe was narrowly averted when a Kassam rocket exploded near a kindergarten in a kibbutz close to the Gaza border just as the children were arriving. We are, of course, grimly familiar with this tactic of targeting educational establishments at crucial times of the day as used so often by the terrorists in Gaza for many years now.

The day before seven mortar shells were fired into the region surrounding the Gaza Strip and on the Sunday night, four mortars exploded near Ashkelon. In the three weeks since the beginning of December, thirty-one mortars and five Kassam rockets have been fired at civilian targets in southern Israel and the number of border incidents has doubled.

We can search in vain for the Guardian's outraged article about the targeting of pre-school children peppered with references to International Law and Geneva Conventions.

We can sit and accumulate cobwebs waiting for Harriet Sherwood's 'human interest' story on the psychological effects of years of living in the shadow of Islamist terror upon Israeli civilians.

We can look forward to the CiF expose of the smuggling route of weapons from Iran, via Syria, to Hizbollah and then to Gaza in much the same way as for years my little sister was convinced every birthday that she would awake to find a pony tethered to the end of her bed.

If this current escalation continues and gets out of hand, Israel will of course have to respond forcefully at some point in order to meet its obligations regarding the protection of its civilians. To the millions of Guardian readers throughout the world this will of course come totally out of the blue, just as Operation Cast Lead did at the time, because they will yet again have been denied the background knowledge which is so essential to a complete understanding of the difficulties facing Israel.

On that note I'd like to introduce readers to Irish4Israel, a new Ireland based pro-Israel organization, looking to pick up steam through participation and collaboration.

More fun from the Dar Al Islam, via the absolutely invaluable Religion of Peace website.

American Muslim indicted for wanting to join US military to kill soldiers

American Muslim indicted for wanting to join US military to kill soldiers. A US-born Muslim from Staten Island, New York, has just been indicted for lying to the FBI about his true intentions to join the US military and then start killing US soldiers. 21-year-old Abdel Hameed Shehadeh faces three terrorism-related charges that involve his plan to join the US military only so he could fight against US soldiers. According to the complaint, Shehadeh plotted to deploy with the US military to Iraq, but once there to desert the military and then fight alongside Islamic terrorists against the US. Shehadeh is also an operator of multiple, radical and violent Jihadist websites that promote terrorism against the west.

But no doubt, as Joe Klein claimed of the Fort Hood Massacre, he was just suffering from preemptive PTSD.

Much as the MEMRI video of a Gitmo detainee claiming that Jewish witches made him see his siblings naked and experience rape by a cat-- has been excused by leftist blogs claiming that torture drove him insane. Sorry, but no.

If Walid Muhammad Hajj had been considered as crazy by Al Jazeera as it is by us, it wouldn't have been aired. But this is a part of the world where people still believe in witches, and sometimes execute them. Where cats are associated with demons (Muslims believe cats drive away angels) and events such as this are not unusual.

Obviously Walid Muhammad Hajj was experiencing his own bizarre fantasies. Just as former Gitmo inmates who claimed that they were sexually harassed by women or had menstrual blood thrown at them, were describing their own insane fantasy life. And in the altered state of reality encouraged by their culture. Stories that were taken seriously as elements of outraged by their leftist enablers.

Now compare Walid Muhammad Hajj's fantasies with stories that were edited enough to be taken seriously by mainstream media outlets back in 2005.

One female civilian contractor used a special outfit that included a miniskirt, thong underwear and a bra during late-night interrogations with prisoners, mostly Muslim men who consider it taboo to have close contact with women who aren’t their wives.

...

The female interrogator wanted to “break him,” Saar adds, describing how she removed her uniform top to expose a tight-fitting T-shirt and began taunting the detainee, touching her ------, rubbing them against the prisoner’s back and commenting on his apparent ------.

And then the cat came out and raped him.

The difference is that one collection of lies sounds less plausible, because it's hard to convince even most Western terrorist sympathizers that there are Jewish witches siccing lustful cats on prison inmates. The other is just as stupid, but sounds plausible, even though it taps into delusional Islamic misogyny.

This is the same reason why the media usually doesn't report on claims about Zionists training attack sharks to destroy Egyptian tourism-- but does report on the usual THEY STOLE MY OLIVE TREES nonsense. But they're both lies and there's no difference between the lies. Not to Muslims anyway.

She may be the ancient Greek Goddess of Love, but a picture of a nude Aphrodite on the new passport of Cyprus has set more than hearts racing.

Cypriot diplomats are furious with the interior ministry for failing to consult with the foreign ministry before issuing passports with a depiction of a naked immortal that might offend conservative foreign cultures.

"They are worried that civilians and diplomats could get into trouble, particularly traveling to very conservative Islamic countries," the authoritative Phileleftheros daily newspaper wrote on Thursday.

The interior ministry said it was too late to change them, the newspaper said.

Funny how everyone else is expect to respect Islamic traditions, but Muslims are expected to react violently to the cultural traditions of others.

Cyprus should have just stuck with a cat. That's the one that really seems to set Muslim hearts racing.

Meanwhile Wikileaks reveals yet more US pressure on Europeans to promote Islam

And the New York Times appears to have censored Yisrael Medad on the Lede blog by Robert Mackey-- for the crime of proving Robert Mackey wrong. Robert Mackey is often wrong, always biased, and quoting facts that show he's wrong has become a bannable offense at the old Gray Hag.

For reference here is the controversial comment that h
ad to be censored



Facts are awful things. Aren't they.

To close it up. Saddam Hussein's Koran written in his blood still needs a home. Since Obama didn't like that Churchill bust and sent it back to the UK, maybe he'd like a Saddam's Blood Koran to display in the Oval Office instead?