Friday Afternoon Roundup - No Telling Where To Go Next

RELIGIOUS FREEDOM? WE DON'T NEED NO STINKING RELIGIOUS FREEDOM.

Meet Obama's new appointee to promote religious freedom around the world.

Obama has announced the appointment of Azizah al-Hibri to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. Al-Hibri (full name, Azizah Yahia Muhammad Toufiq al-Hibri) is a Muslim professor and the granddaughter of a Sheikh, who claims that the Koran inspired Thomas Jefferson and the Founders and that the Saudi criminal justice system is more moral than the American one because it accepts blood money from murderers.

How's that for a start. But wait there's more.

In the early days of 2001, Al-Hibri traveled to the Afghan border and criticized the Western press for “sensationalizing” Taliban atrocities and using them “as an opportunity to attack Islam”. After the attacks of September 11, she cautioned against bombing Al-Qaeda and Taliban targets during Ramadan. And that same year she defended Wahhabism as part of Islam’s “religious diversity” and its “marketplace of ideas”.

And still more...

Yet the oddest moment in Al-Hibri’s career of promoting Islamic law in the United States may have come when before Clinton’s impeachment proceedings, she actually wrote an article discussing how a sitting President of the United States might be tried under Islamic law.

Read it all in my article The Professor Who Sharia’ed Bill Clinton exclusively at Front Page Magazine.



OUR LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE IS FINALLY BEGINNING

Weiner finally resigned. The biggest losers are in the media who now have to find a replacement for Mel Gibson, Charlie Sheen and Anthony Weiner. But they'll be sure to find one. And then we'll get another two weeks of the same insanity at the same insane tabloid pitch. On and on. Week after week. Month after month. Year after year.

Arnold Ahlert asks why his wife Huma Abedin's ties to the Muslim Brotherhood aren't being investigated in a woman who stands near the center of our foreign policy. But we all know what's important. Sending images of yourself over Twitter is much worse than being tied in with an organization dedicated to overthrowing the United States.

Just ask a Europe obsessed with Berlusconi's Bunga Bunga, while men like Tony Blair (who reads the Koran daily) aren't being held accountable for importing large numbers of Muslims into the UK. Which is more of a scandal? The Bunga-Bunga or the Jihad-Jihad?

Which should be more of a national scandal?

Labour threw open Britain's borders to mass immigration to help socially engineer a "truly multicultural" country, a former Government adviser has revealed.

or

A teenage belly dancer at the heart of the sex scandal involving sleazy prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has revealed how guests were naked at his infamous bunga bunga parties.

Guess which story has actually been dominating the headlines since time immemorial? Not the one that's destroying nations.

I would love to live in a country where Weiner's attempt to ban personal information about judges from being placed on the internet was a bigger scandal than taking shirtless photos in the gym. Sadly we don't live in that country.

The country we live in shooting a former marine in his own home and then waiting until he dies hardly makes headlines. It's not like Twitter or Facebook was involved, or anything salacious, which means it's not a news story. If only there were naked photos of someone involved in the shooting, then maybe it could get two weeks of coverage too.

A 59 year old pharmacist and disabled Air Force vet in OK city sentenced to life in prison for defending himself and his employees against an armed gunman. That's not a story. There are no shirtless pictures. I would love to be part of a blogsphere where this story got as much attention on some of the conservative blogs that devotedly ran every Weiner development. Still we all know it's not as important.

But good news. Weiner is out. We won. And by we, I mean the Obama Administration which now has its Urban Affairs Director Adolfo Carrion in place to step into Weiner's front runner spot in the mayor's race. The Obamas once again beat the Clintons. And managed to overshadow Palin and the GOP debate. And we helped them do it.

Mission accomplished.



THE REAL BATTLE IS COMING

Obama's ratings keep on tumbling. The GOP debate had a good showing across the board. In a race where most voters are unhappy with the selection, the candidates that showed up were all credible. Ignoring Ron Paul who brought his usual "cranky and crazy" thing to the proceedings, the only down side was a dumbed down debate format.

Bachmann had a break out performance, as Cain had in the previous debate. Her ratings are up, but not enough. The Two Minute Hate directed at Gingrich has benefited mainly Romney whose ratings continue to rise.

All that means if we're still on track for the real contest between Romney and Palin. Romney's asset is that he's the establishment candidate. The safe bet for people who don't really believe in all that much or pay that much attention.

Palin has taken a page from Obama's book and is running a completely non-traditional campaign. She has already demonstrated how well she can market her image and that she can get the media to cover her, without actually making a statement to them. That's something Obama was able to do thanks to media favoritism. But Palin has done it the other way by exploiting their fixation on her.

Romney wants Palin in the race, because it solidifies him as the only candidate who can beat Palin. And Palin wants Romney to be the decisive front runner, because it allows her to make the case that she's the only one who can beat him. That way she doesn't have to contend with fellow populists like Bachmann or Cain. She can respectfully acknowledge them but argue that only she has the support to do it.

Palin has no intention of jumping in prematurely. She wants there to be a clear choice. Either Romney or her. Just as she wants the election to be a choice between Obama and her.

The showdown within the GOP between Romney and Palin will be an interesting one. Romney is the traditional candidate. Palin is the non-traditional candidate. Her victory may dramatically change the party. His won't.

Palin's best asset is sincerity. Romney's is credibility. No matter how much he's hated, he can never be destroyed like Gingrich was. Wearing his trademark smile, the look of the man who should be playing the president in a movie of the week, he looks like he belongs. And no matter what he endorses or supports, so long as he stays on track, he has a clear road ahead. Not because he can do the job, but because he sounds and looks like he can.

Remember that generic candidate who keeps beating Obama in the polls? Romney is Mr. Generic.

Probably the oddest phenomenon has been the attempt to position Pawlenty as the man to beat him. There was nothing wrong with Pawlenty's performance, he was reasonably articulate and he even has presence, but not the megawattage that the role demands. Like Santorum, he came off as earnest and decent, but not ready to be anything more than a good loser. A Republican Dukakis who will earnestly explain his position, lose and then walk away with a homily about the importance of taking defeat well.

Contrast that to the focused energy that Bachmann brought to the debate. She could not only deliver the populist lines that helped give Cain the last debate, but she also backed it up with a sharp understanding of policy. It's a performance that should make Pawlenty boosters seriously think about a candidate who can stand next to Obama at a forum and hold her own.

It's coming to the point where anyone who wants an alternative to Romney is going to have to get behind a single candidate who can beat Romney and Obama. Pawlenty's numbers don't indicate that he's that guy. Cain is a good speaker, but lacks depth. Bachmann had a good opening round, but we'll see what comes next. Palin is almost certain to make her debut sooner or later.

Barring the increasingly unlikely possibility of Gingrich or Giuliani overtaking Romney, this will be a race between Romney and the alternative. Or 5 alternatives and Romney. In which case Romney will win.



SOMEONE'S WINNING A WAR IN LIBYA

Someone's winning a war in Libya. It might be us. Or maybe it's not. Who knows. But the important thing is that the anti-war candidate has dragged the country into another war, against the laws of the country, and without any actual justification for it.

Parties have done a 180 on their rhetoric before, but rarely has it been as blatant as this. As blatant as the man who ran as the anti-war alternative to warmonger Hillary, is now doing everything he spoke out against.

1. Illegal war. Check

2. Rapidly expanding mission. Check.

3. False justification for war. Check.

4. War leading to regional instability. Check.

It's like Obama took every criticism he ever made of the War in Iraq and decided to turn it into policy.

Impact of Operation Blow Stuff Up in Libya Because We Feel Like it... not good.

The air war over Libya will ultimately cost the Air Force pilot-training hours and force the military to trim funding from lower-priority programs, the White House announced.

And right now we're spending millions to get explosives out of Libya, because we're afraid of them falling into the hands of terrorists (who absolutely don't exist in Libya). At least we're prepping for the worst.

The Republicans are once again the anti-illegal war party. This time there's more traction, since unlike Yugoslavia, this time the Dems can't hide behind genocide. Though seeing Dennis "Department of Peace" Kucinich becoming the go to guy for Republican anti-war resolutions is surreal already.



ATROCITIES AHOY

Hillary Clinton is condemning Gaddafi's forces for using rape as a weapon of war. Newsflash. Every single Muslim army that ever exists or will exist uses rape as a weapon of war. Or just uses rape. Including Obama's own beloved Indonesia. Not to mention Sudan. Or Turkey. Or that guy named Mohammed who created a peaceful religion. I forget what his last name was.

The Koran doesn't just legalize raping female captives. It uses that as incentive.

Of course any claims of atrocities emerging from the Muslim world should be taken with a grain of salt. Or a mountain of it. Assaults are no doubt happening... on both sides. Video and photos of assaults by men in uniform mean nothing in a civil war where anyone can put on a uniform and stage atrocities. The more fanciful Viagra claims are even more dubious.

For example Syrian defectors to Turkey are carrying along this little tale

"When we entered the houses, we opened fire on everyone, the young, the old... Women were raped in front of their husbands and children," he said, predicting that there were some 700 deaths, although this has not been verified.

Did it actually happen? Probably not. And it also sounds identical to the reportage coming out of Libya.

And if you need a refresher course in why being skeptical of Muslim claims of atrocities is the smart thing to do, look at Yugoslavia or Gaza. Or look at Kuwait.

WASHINGTON - They spoke in voices trembling with anger and loathing. The listeners sat in rapt silence, occasionally shaking their heads at a particularly horrific detail.

In a room at the U.S. Capitol, six people who fled from Iraqi troops in Kuwait described for members of Congress inhuman atrocities they have seen and experienced as Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's forces have moved to dismantle the occupied nation and subjugate its people.

"The took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators and left the babies on the cold floor to die," Nayirah said. "It was horrifying

That sounds horrifying. We should have a war or something to deal with this.

I volunteered at the al-Addan hospital with twelve other women who wanted to help as well. I was the youngest volunteer. The other women were from twenty to thirty years old. While I was there I saw the Iraqi soldiers come into the hospital with guns They took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators and left the babies on the cold floor to die.[crying] It was horrifying.

Yes definitely a war. We must save the... oh wait.

What you may not know is: Nayirah's entire testimony was fabricated. Not a word was true. Nayirah was actually the daughter of Kuwait's Ambassador in Washington and she had been in her family's palatial home in Washington during the period described below. She never left the U.S. There was no vacation in Kuwait, no sister with a newborn baby, no volunteer work in a hospital.

But wait... Libya has babies too! Little tiny ones. That can only be saved with bombs and lots of aid to a new regime, which will totally promise not to bomb little tiny babies. Until they do. And then we have to bomb them to save the little tiny babies.

It's so hard to know what's true or false in the region anymore. If only we had a courageous gay female blogger to tell us about it.


COULDN'T WE JUST BOMB EVERYONE

And now the BBC reports from Libya

Libyan charities say they are getting reports that in the west of the country, which is particularly conservative, Col Muammar Gaddafi’s forces have tended to rape women and girls in front of their fathers and brothers.

“To be seen naked and violated is worse than death for them,” says Hana Elgadi. “This is a region where women will not go out of the house without covering their face with a veil.”

“Time is against us,” says Nader Elhamessi from the Libyan aid agency, World for Libya

“For the moment pregnancies can be disguised, but not for much longer. Many fathers will kill their own daughters if they find out they have been raped.”

Who are the victims here exactly?

We've got rapists and dead babies and fathers so demented they will kill their daughters for being raped. I can't help but think that Libya could be improved with a volcano or two.

Are we actually supposed to feel like overthrowing Kaddafi in support of a culture where people murder their own daughters for being raped is supposed to be a good thing? I don't see anyone we can save here or anything worth saving.




SPEAKING OF MUSLIM BABIES

Few subjects are more universally heartbreaking than the plight of sick children. Yet in this country babies are routinely born with terrible disabilities that could easily be avoided — if only the dangerous tradition of first cousins marrying, which still prevails in many Muslim communities, could be stamped out.

Unfortunately, others in my community cannot say the same. Many Muslims born in Britain are under intense family pressure to ‘marry within’, as a way of keeping money within the family. If they do not, they face being ostracised by their own relatives.

A lot of those honor killings you read about. This is what they're really about.

It's not just women being punished for wanting to choose their own husbands. They're being punished for marrying outside the family. Aside from the usual tribal stuff, marrying within the family keeps money within the family.

And the consequences? Not good.

Studies show that in Bradford, which has a large Pakistani community, 70 per cent of marriages are between relatives — and more than half of these are between first cousins.

The result of this inbreeding? Terrible disabilities like the ones I have witnessed in the children born to a woman in my own community. Her first child was born blind, the second deaf and the third mute.

As if that were not tragic enough, these disabilities are simply accepted with a casual shrug. Because everyone seems to know someone with a sick child, it is barely commented on within the community.

In the Pakistani-Muslim communities I have experience of, it is not a cause for  concern. The only thing that matters is ‘marrying within the family’; after that, no questions are asked.

To me, it is nothing short of shocking that this is happening in third, fourth and fifth generation British Pakistani communities.

So much for immigrant absorption changing behavior over time. It ain't happening.

Oh and the cost to British taxpayers? You do the math.

While only 3 per cent of UK babies are born to British Pakistanis, their babies account for one in three of those born with genetic illnesses.

NHS is euthanizing seniors to pay for Muslim inbreeding.


ROUNDUP OF ROUNDUPS

In the roundup of roundups, the Watcher of Weasel's council has spoken and I'm named, but not as one of the weasels. (via Maggie's Notebook)

The winner is... America's Descent into Hell.

The stock market has gone down for the last 6 weeks in a row. And if stock futures are to be believed at all, things will not be good Monday morning this next week. The last time the stock market dropped seven weeks in a row was in 2001 when the dot.com bubble burst. I have said for a long, long time that the stock market is fiction and is being manipulated. But they are running out of ways to fake recovery and growth – they can’t hide forever just how bad things are about to become. We are in free fall economically and stand to not only enter another great depression, but a great, great depression in the next twelve month

David Isaac wonders if the end is here for Middle Eastern Christians

The Economics of Settlement, George Gilder says what everyone knows but too few say anymore, (via Ruthfully Yours.)

Without Jewish settlements, Jordan was suffering heavy emigration (mostly to America and Palestine) while Palestine attracted increasing flows of immigrants, mostly clustering around the Jewish settlements. With Jewish advances in food production and in medicine and public hygiene, Arab health statistics increasingly converged with those of the Jewish settlers. While the Arab birth rate actually dropped by 10 percent, the death rate fell by one-third and infant mortality dropped 37 percent.

And the same story that is playing itself out in Europe now, played itself out in Israel.

But finally in a little slice of good news, the Ford Foundation may finally be divesting from Israel. In a good way.

With little fanfare, the Ford Foundation has initiated a phased withdrawal from its long, largely behind-the-scenes campaign to influence Israeli politics...

Looking back, Ford's directors may well feel vindicated. At the very least, Ford's outlay has helped damage Israel's security, weakened its international standing, and worsened its domestic divisions. More particularly, the fund's heavy investment in stoking a multi-layered campaign to force an Israeli withdrawal to the 1949 armistice lines—irrespective of Palestinian belligerence—does indeed seem to have gained inexorable momentum and, now, the evident backing of the Obama White House.

Will Ford-supported enterprises like the New Israel Fund be able to carry on alone after 2013?

So long as the EU keeps funding them? Probably.