SATURDAY NIGHT MANIC STREET PREACHERS, LIVING COLOUR, ROBERT PALMER, FUN LOVIN CRIMINALS.

Probably the best Welsh band ever, Manic Street Preachers seemed to emerge out of nowhere in 1992 with the smash hit Motorcycle Emptiness. An alternative rock band from Blackwood, Wales, they had been around though since 1986. Members to this day are James Dean Bradfield (vocals, guitars), Nicky Wire (bass, occasional vocals) and Sean Moore (drums, backing vocals, occasional trumpet). A fourth member, Richey Edwards, mysteriously disappeared on February 1st, 1995.





Living Colour is Living Proof (well... perhaps not anymore) that black bands can make great rock. Nothingness, from the 1993 album Stain. Trivial fact: the singer, Corey Glover, had a B-role in Oliver Stoned's Vietnam movie Platoon.





Then a number from the Gentleman Rocker, Robert Palmer. Johnny and Mary, from the 1980 album Clues.





Finally We have all the time in the world, the marvellous Fun Lovin Criminals version from the 1996 album Come find yourself. The original is by Louis Armstrong. This number brings back melancholic memories from a time long past when I used to sit, on saturday night evenings in summer, on a bar stool in my favorite pub, De Drei Deurkisj (Flemish slang for The Three Little Doors), enjoying the Holy Trinity: a Cigarette, a Coffee, and a Humo magazine. And somehow expecting the quintessential female to walk in and surrender herself to me.





At some point I had to forget romantic stuff like that. But no way I was going to surrender. I invaded Poland instead.


Nite all.


MFBB.

GLOBAL WARMING HITTING EUROPE HARD.

NASA's Terra satellite captured the UK on January 7, as it was coping with a shitload of Global Warming:



The clouds you see have a silver lining though: PM Gordon Brown has suggested to cut Britain's carbon dioxide emissions with 42% by 2020. The estimated £500 billion this scheme entails will ruin the UK's economy, but that's a small price to pay for preventing those precious glaciers from melting.

France's famous landmark the Mont Saint-Michel is now also accessible on foot when it's high tide:



Germany expects the Mother of all Snowstorms the coming weekend. 40cm snow is expected in the south and east. Biggest problem's going to be the wind however, which may heap up the white powder in veritable snow dunes.

In Poland, on January 4 the tally of people frozen dead had reached 122, and the country's main stream, the Vistula, is frozen over.

And in Belgium, Outlaw Mike hopes the fuel oil truck can make it up the slippery hill where he lives.


Nite all!



MFBB.

POSITIVE NEWS FROM FRANCE: THIS TIME, ONLY 1,137 CARS TORCHED ON NEW YEAR'S EVE.

Positive trend in France: the number of cars torched on New Year's Eve is only 1,137 this time round. Or, ten down from last year. Those who claim this has something to do with the deployment of a record number of 45,000 police and riot forces and 50,000 firefighters are either incurable pessimists or else RACISTS, for surely the downward trend hints at the greater influence of muslim moderates among France's famous "youths".





France's Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux is certainly not a racist:

“Globalement, nous sommes soulagés. Il n’y a pas eu d’accidents graves, et il y a une rupture de la tendance à la hausse du nombre de voitures brûlées, déclare au Monde le ministre de l’intérieur Brice Hortefeux. La baisse est même très sensible dans l’agglomération parisienne.”

Translation:

"Taking it all together, we are relieved. There have been no grave accidents, and the rising trend of cars torched has been curbed [declared Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux to Le Monde newspaper]. The downward trend is even very discernible in the Parisian region."

A li'l movie from Chalon/Saone:

Incendie véhicules au Stade 01/01/2010, 0h05 Chalon/Saône
door infos-chalon

In Strasbourg the rightwing UMP opposition party is nitpicking, as per usual:

"Alors que les autorités parlaient d'une Saint-Sylvestre plutôt calme, avec 61 voitures incendiées dans la Communauté Urbaine, dont 55 à Strasbourg, l'opposition municipale UMP-Nouveau Centre et indépendants évoque "95 véhicules brûlés, sans compter les feux par propagation, 32 feux de poubelles et 25 feux d'habitations."

Translation:

"While the authorities talked of a New Year's Eve rather calm, with 61 cars burned in the greater metropolitan area, with 55 in Strasbourg, the opposition of UMP-New Center and independents claim that 95 cars were torched, without counting the fires resulting from spreadouts, 32 burned waste bins and 25 fires in houses."

And... what about the indigenous Fwenchmen partying into 2010? Le Figaro writes that this year, there were 200,000 people celebrating New Year's Eve on the Champs Elysées, vs. 500,000 the year before: une nuit de la Saint-Sylvestre calme. You wonder where these 300,000 missing ones partied this time. Stayed at home perhaps, fearing for CO2 pollution from their fireworks?







This is but a small blog, but in years to come... do not say I haven't warned.

MFBB.

ISLAMIC EXTREMIST ATTEMPTS TO HACK KURT WESTERGAARD TO PIECES WITH AXE: MODERATE MUSLIMS SPEAK OUT.

The year 2010 did not really start well for Kurt Westergaard, the Danish cartoonist who became famous for his cartoon of a bomb-turbaned Muhammad. At around 10pm on Friday the 1st, a 28-year old Somali broke into his house, and had it not been for the fact that Westergaard had the time to lock himself up in a panic room with his 5-year old granddaughter, he would have been chopped to pieces by the murderous fanatic.

As it was, the lunatic was unable to smash the steel door of the panic room and all he could do was scream "BLOOD!!!!" and "REVENGE!!!" at the terrified occupants. After about three minutes Danish police arrived, alerted by Westergaard via an emergency button. Before the lunatic was shot in the hand and shoulder, he attacked an officer by throwing his axe at him. The officer was lucky to survive.

Westergaards would-be assassin had been living in Denmark since he was 16. As insane as it may sound, he had a Danish residence permit while the authorities KNEW he was a member of al-Shahaab, Al Qaeda's Somali branch. In September 2009, Kenyan police foiled an al-Shahaab plot to kill US Foreign Secretary Hillary Clinton who was staying in Nairobi's Hotel Intercontinental; one of the five terrorists arrested reportedly was... the Somali who tried to kill the Danish cartoonist. From Kenya's Daily Nation, September 5, 2009:

"The threats were neutralised a week to the Agoa meeting in combined efforts by the military and other security agencies,” the official said. “The operation in Nairobi netted five crucial suspects, one of whom carries Danish identification documents but is believed to be a Somali national. The other four, one of whom is a woman, hold Kenyan identification documents believed to be fake. Investigations into their identity and plan are on.”

I assume that when I state that the very lenient sentence the terrorist received in Kenya - seven weeks in prison - may have had something to do with the fact that Kenya's PM, Raila Odinga, is a muslim and an acquaintance of a certain president who says one should never jump too fast to conclusions, it must be my bad character. Anyway, once a free man the guy was allowed to move back to Denmark where he could roam around freely, undisturbed by the Danish authorities, since, according to an official, "they did not have the means to follow him around all the time, given that, although he was known to be dangerous, he had not committed any actual crimes yet."

The Somali now has a defense lawyer, a certain Niels Christian Strauss. Mr. Strauss matter of factly told journalists outside the court that "he had urged his client to remain silent during the hearing to give him more time to examine the evidence." Sounds familiar, no?

Now, back to the Middle East. More precisely to the modern, "liberal" gulf states. This is how the moderate daily Gulf News reported on the attempted assassination of Kurt Westergaard in its January 3 edition:





From the second paragraph:

"There is no doubt that the cartoon was deeply offensive to all Muslims. For his work, Westergaard is regarded with the greatest possible contempt by all who believe in the true faith of Islam."

...we learn that the issue of the cartoon made by a septagenarian of a murderous warlord who fucked a nine-year old girl as well as the wife of his adopted son is, five years after publication of the cartoon, still far more relevant than the murder attempt. Then:

"Targeting him, however, is descending to the level of a contemptuous and despicable man."

Yeah. Right. So chopping a man to pieces equals drawing an offensive cartoon. Let's continue:

"This revenge attack merely again serves to highlight the insult wrought by Danish newspapers, stoking the embers of insult with the oxygen of hatred. Westergaard and his ilk are better forgotten."

Fair and balanced reporting.


My oh my. Who needs al-Shaheed terrs from Mogadiscio when you can have moderates from Abu Dhabi? I think the last word should go to Thomas Landen in The Brussels Journal, who writes:

"Two years ago, Westergaard’s wife was fired from the kindergarten where she used to work. She was sacked because several parents expressed concern for the safety of their children. It is not hard to understand the worries of the parents of the children Mrs. Westergaard cared for. These parents were afraid that one morning some axe-wielding barbarians would show up at the door, screaming “Heeere’s Muhammed!” Their concern is reasonable, because everyone knows what they are capable of. Nevertheless, instead of kicking out Mrs. Westergaard, as the kindergarten did at the request of the worried parents, the parents should ask themselves whether the time has come to kick out the barbarians within the gates."

Nite all. My God what a madhouse the world has become.



MFBB.