Political Digest November 30, 2009

PoI post articles because I think they are of interest. Doing so doesn’t mean that I necessarily agree with every—or any—opinion in the posted article.

Why the Peaceful Majority is Irrelevant
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/6996
This has been around, but is worth reading if you missed it. Excerpt: I used to know a man whose family were German aristocracy prior to World War II. They owned a number of large industries and estates. I asked him how many German people were true Nazis, and the answer he gave has stuck with me and guided my attitude toward fanaticism ever since. “Very few people were true Nazis,” he said, “but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.” We are told again and again by experts and talking heads that Islam is the religion of peace, and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unquantified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the specter of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam. The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars world wide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or execute honor killings. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. The hard, quantifiable fact is that the “peaceful majority” is the “silent majority,” and it is cowed and extraneous.

Teaching plan: America 'an oppressive hellhole' University outlines 're-education' for those who hold 'wrong' views
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=117313
Indoctrinating the next generation to hate America—and thus to lose it. Excerpt: A program proposed at the University of Minnesota would result in required examinations of teacher candidates on "white privilege" as well as "remedial re-education" for those who hold the "wrong" views, according to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. The organization, which promotes civil liberties on the campuses of America's colleges and universities, has dispatched a letter to University of Minnesota President Robert Bruininks asking him to intervene to prevent the adoption of policies proposed in his College of Education and Human Development. "The university's general counsel should be asked to comment as soon as possible," said the letter from Adam Kissel, an officer with FIRE. "If the Race, Culture, Class, and Gender Task Group achieves its stated goals, the result will be political and ideological screening of applicants, remedial re-education for those with the 'wrong' views and values, [and] withholding of degrees from those upon whom the university's political re-education efforts proved ineffective." By any "nontotalitarian" standards, he wrote, the the plans being made so far by the school are "severely unjust and impermissibly intrude into matters of individual conscience." Kissel wrote that it appears that the university "intends to redesign its admissions process so that it screens out people with the 'wrong' beliefs and values – those who either do not have sufficient 'cultural competence' or those who the college judges will not be able to be converted to the 'correct' beliefs and values even after remedial re-education."

Misunderstanders of Islam suspected in Russia train bomb http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/11/misunderstanders-of-islam-suspected-in-russia-train-bomb.html
Didn’t get the Islam-is-a-religion-of-Peace memo.

Germany home to 90 combat Islamists: report
http://www.thelocal.de/society/20091128-23577.html
Quick, send them the memo before more die! Excerpt: There are about 90 combat-trained Islamists in Germany moving among underground networks, Focus magazine reported Saturday, as intelligence agencies and police prepare to overhaul the country's anti-terrorism approach. Some 30 of them have actual fighting experience through clashes with US or Pakistani soldiers, the magazine reported, citing German security sources. In total, 185 Islamists trained in terrorist camps in central Asia had lived or worked in Germany in the past 10 years, the sources said.

Anti-Semitism czar on group accused of working against Israel
J Street pick hints Jewish state to blame for hatred against its people
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.printable&pageId=117248
Excerpt: President Obama's new anti-Semitism czar serves on the board of a controversial Israel-lobby group accused of working against the Jewish state, while her writings suggest Israel's policies are to blame for anti-Semitism. Hannah Rosenthal, a former Health Department regional director under the Clinton administration, started her position earlier this week as the State Department's new special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism. She previously headed the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, an umbrella U.S. Jewish organization. Rosenthal, however, serves on the board of J Street, a lobby group that is mostly led by left-leaning Israelis and that receives funds from Arab and Muslim Americans.

Riding HIV's superhighway
http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-11-20-riding-hivs-superhighway
Political Correctness continues to kill blacks in Africa. Excerpt: The differences in HIV prevalence between South Africa’s racial groups are as large as those between countries with the highest and lowest prevalences in the world. It follows that examining the different sexual behaviours underpinning these differences would likely provide helpful clues about what is driving our ongoing high HIV transmission rates. Why then has no such study been published in South Africa? The prevalence rates are 19.9%, 3.2% and 0.5% for 15- to 49-year-old Africans, coloureds and whites respectively. The dominant explanation for the racial differences in HIV prevalence is that these merely reflect the fact that HIV is a disease of poverty….We have experienced one reason first-hand. When presenting our data showing higher concurrency rates are the most plausible reason for higher HIV rates among Africans and that this is driven more by cultural than socioeconomic factors, we have been accused of both “cultural essentialism” and racism.

The great climate change science scandal http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6936289.ece
Excerpt: Steve McIntyre, a prominent climate sceptic, was amazed. “Words failed me,” he said. Another, Patrick Michaels, declared: “This is not a smoking gun; this is a mushroom cloud.” Inevitably, the affair became nicknamed Climategate. For the scientists, campaigners and politicians trying to rouse the world to action on climate change the revelations could hardly have come at a worse time. Next month global leaders will assemble in Copenhagen to seek limits on carbon emissions. The last thing they need is renewed doubts about the validity of the science. The scandal has also had a huge personal and professional impact on the scientists. “These have been the worst few days of my professional life,” said Jones. He had to call on the police for protection after receiving anonymous phone calls and personal threats. Why should a few emails sent to and from a single research scientist at a middle-ranking university have so much impact? And most importantly, what does it tell us about the quality of the research underlying the science of climate change?