WANNA VOTE FOR OBAMA? YOU'RE IN GOOD COMPANY.

* The Syrian regime has indicated its preference for Obama. Buthaina Shaaban, an adviser to President Bashar al-Assad, has written: “The change suggested by Obama is essential not only for the U.S. but for the entire human family.”


* Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi called Obama “a Muslim” and said: “All the people in the Arab and Muslim world and in Africa applauded this man. They welcome him and prayed for his success":




Hamas political adviser Ahmed Yousef said this year: “We like Mr. Obama and we hope that he will win the election... He has a vision to change America.”


Hezbollah’s second in command, Sheik Naim al-Kassim, urged Americans to vote for Obama as a step toward peace with Islam, and pro-Hezbollah columnist Amal Saad-Ghorayeb said there is “no doubt Arabs should welcome an Obama presidency”.


In Saudi Arabia, commentator Hussein Shobokshi wrote that an Obama presidency “would mark an important moral transformation in the superpower and is a healthy indicator of the long-awaited improvement in the international arena.”


By now it's a public secret that a large amount of Obama's cash is illegal funding from abroad. Take it to the bank - no pun intended - that apart from a gazillion gullible Americans who are now donating glassy-eyed in order to later pay a multitude in taxes, there are many others across the globe financing to Obama's election machine. Via Michelle Malkin:

The Republican National Committee (RNC) today filed a supplement to its complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) against the Obama for America campaign addressing its acceptance of foreign national and excessive contributions, donations from unknown sources, and demonstrated lack of oversight or concern for compliance with the law. The complaint demonstrates that the Obama campaign has failed to comply with federal campaign finance law in its fundraising. RNC Chief Counsel Sean Cairncross released the following statement today concerning the supplement to the complaint:

“Based on numerous press accounts that have come to light since our initial filing in early October, it is clear that the Obama for America campaign is operating outside of the law. The complete and total lack of any control mechanisms within the Obama campaign’s fundraising operation has undermined any confidence in their ability to curtail excessive, foreign, and fraudulent contributions and demands immediate attention from the Federal Election Commission (FEC).”

To those who feel beaten to a pulp by the Goebbelesque propaganda emanating from the Democrats, I've got a nice anecdote for you. On December 16, 1944, nazi troops launched a surprise attack in the Ardennes, Belgium, with the aim of cutting the Allied armies in two and conquer their main supply port, Antwerp. The day after, Eisenhower had a meeting with his senior generals. When he entered the conference room, he noticed that all faces were glum and depressed. He strongly reproached them all and, contrary to common wisdom, advocated that the crisis situation should be viewed with confidence and optimism.

I am sorry to say that I seem to discern a similar attitude among our American readers - at least, those who see Obama for what he is, a charlatan hell bent on destroying the America as we know it and morphing it into a cross between the EU and the USSR. Too many faithful readers seem to have resigned to the fate of living under a socialist regime, and my message to them is: THIS IS NOT OVER YET! MCCAIN CAN STILL WIN THIS! Like General Eisenhower on that cold grey winter morning long ago, we need to look at the current situation with optimism and confidence. In reality, McCain's situation is deliberately depicted worse than it is by the MSM, with the express aim of discouraging Republican voters to even show up at the voting stations. DON'T STEP INTO THAT TRAP. Shake off that glum mood!!! I thought real Americans were winners??? In case you have forgotten, that's a credo from another iconic great American from a time when the threats against your country were in fact much bigger! I am talking about General Patton of course, and to give you yet another quote, when Patton realized that the nazis in the "bulge" had in fact put themselves in a situation extremely vulnerable from the flanks, he exclaimed to his superior, General Bradley: "Brad, the nazis have stuck their head in the meat grinder... and this time I am turning the lever!!!"


In this final week of the elections, we all need a chunk of that untameable Patton grit. Me being a Belgian, I can't participate in the US elections nor give financial support - unlike Obama's foreign supporters, I respect US law. But what I can do, and WILL DO, is lending moral support. Why? Because I have always admired America. It's not that I turn a blind eye on America's faults, hard as it may seem to people who possibly think I'm a critiqueless zealot. It's just that I have until now always been able to conclude - I am absolutely convinced it's an honest, reasonable conclusion - that while there are some faults and warts and what not, America still is, and unequivocally so, a Force for the Good. Because she is what she is, UNTIL NOW. With this strange hyperbolic creature in the White House, a quintessentially elusive figure of vapor, hollow statements, false rhetoric and impossible promises, America will be transformed into a second European Union and believe me, YOU DON'T WANT THAT TO HAPPEN.

Therefore I must urge all you Americans, at least those who love their country passionately and cherish the freedom and liberty granted to them by your country's marvellous Constitution, TO DONATE NOW FOR ONE LAST EFFORT. COME ON! DONATE NOW! OPEN THAT BANKING ACCOUNT!!!




DONATE HERE!

"To avoid being mistaken for a sellout, I chose my friends carefully. The more politically active black students. The foreign students. The Chicanos. The Marxist professors and structural feminists." - Barack Obama

What more proof do you need for chrissake???



MFBB.

AYERS. DOHRN. MARSHALL. WRIGHT. PFLEGER. REZKO. RASHID KHALIDI. RATHKE. ODINGA. GUYS IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD 'R US.

... and speaking of guys spreading the wealth around...

BOLIVIA SPIRALS TOWARD CRISIS.
Things have been going from bad to worse under President Evo Morales, a Chavez clone.

- by Anna Aliaga, PajamasMedia, October 8, 2008

Bolivia is in crisis. During the last month the lowland provincial leaders and their followers carried out a series of marches, protests, and violent takeovers of government offices protesting the Morales government’s position on the distribution of gas revenues (IDH) and the issue of previously agreed-upon departmental autonomies. So far there are 17 dead, one prefect has been arrested, a partial state of siege has been declared, and the lowland city of Santa Cruz was surrounded by 10,000 to 12,000 armed and angry MAS (Movimiento al Socialismo) supporters.

Government officials, church leaders, representatives of social movements, and prefects are in a series of meetings trying to come to an agreement before Santa Cruz becomes the stage for another ugly confrontation. Evo Morales was in New York at the UN meeting lobbying for support for his government and rubbing shoulders with his allies, Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Evo has said that if the opposition prefects do not sign a document agreeing to the proposed constitution, he will not take responsibility for what might happen in Bolivia. As we say in Bolivia, aquí estamos — here we are.

The overriding issues are the distribution of gas revenues, the issue of departmental autonomy, and the new constitution proposed by MAS. Evo Morales’ major accomplishment has been the nationalization of the natural gas sector. As Chavez before him, Evo wants to control the revenues of the newly nationalized companies. One of the problems that has ignited the recent crisis is the distribution of gas revenues. The original distributions were based on percentages agreed upon by consensus between the gas-producing regions, the prefects, and the central government...

When you go to that voting booth on November 4....

... don't be a FOOL.

MFBB.

TOTAL VICTORY IN IRAQ; AL QAEDA DESTROYED; BUSH STRATEGY VINDICATED.

A stunning report from Iraq by Major General John Kelly, Commanding General Multinational Force-West, I Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward). On Thursday, October 23, he spoke via satellite to reporters at the Pentagon. Hat tip Tom The Redhunter:




Excerpt from the transcript:

GEN. KELLY: ...We started a share-the-road program where no longer would Iraqi traffic have to do anything particularly different when they came upon military convoys. That was a big change. Moved most of our convoys -- I think something on the order of 95 percent of all military movements, administrative, logistics movements, and that includes the contract convoys -- they all move late at night, certainly after 21:00 or 9:00 at night and they're off the roads by 5:00 a.m. The average Iraqi, of course, is home in bed in at that particular point in time, so they don't even see much traffic, much military activity in the province anymore.
We started to tear down literally hundreds of checkpoints, particularly the ones that had -- certainly were once very necessary as defensive positions all over the province but no longer serve the purpose. And it was kind of an operation Rudy Giuliani that we did to clean up the cities and to, as I say, take down these unsightly defensive positions, roll up the barbed wire in this attempt to convince the average Iraqi that the good news of reduced -- significantly reduced security over the last couple years -- correction, violence -- was real and even the Marines, even the coalition forces felt confident enough to allow them to travel on their own roads around us without having to stop, pull over, be under the threat of any type of gunfire and, at the same time, to break down these defensive positions.

We did PIC on the first of September. That has gone very well. We're still very much engaged but in overwatch with the Iraqi security forces. We are outside the cities, for all intents and purposes -- not to say that we don't go in frequently, to meet with them, to bring training to them.

We still have Marines and some U.S. Army soldiers as police advisers that still live inside police stations, but down to a very small number in comparison. We were up over 115; now we're down below 30. And that's -- the good news is, we are backing out. They're on their own and all we're doing is providing them training.

Even in the area of funding, we have probably in April started to shift away from the U.S. -- the use of U.S. money; as much as we could, started to rely on government of Iraq funding. It's a little harder or more frustrating because the U.S. CERP money, as I think you all know, is -- you know, we can use that in a relative sense, in a lightning quick way, but that doesn't teach the Iraqis how to budget and how to execute a budget, so we really started backing off on the use of money that I have, U.S. money, and forcing -- not forcing them, but teaching them, working with them, to use their own money. And that's turned out very well...

To be sure, by "Bush Strategy Vindicated" I meant his staunch decision to push through The Surge. If the advice of the infamous Iraq Study Group had been followed, the "re-deployment" would likely have developed in a rout, Al-Qaeda and the sadrists would have gotten a tremendous moral boost and retaken or completely established control of the parts vacated by US troops, and every gain that would have been made in the past five years would have been obliterated. America's standing in the world would have been tarnished beyond repair, and its credibility would lay in tatters. Once again, like after Somalia, islamic terrorists would have an argument to boast that Americans don't have the stomach to fight.

Credit for devising the Surge Plan must go largely to general Keane. Credit for implementing it in the field to General Petraus. But credit for forcing the plan through must go unequivocally to President Bush. President Bush is the prime reason why today, America is victorous in Iraq. It is just as important to underscore the fact that the Iraq withdrawal option was strongly advocated by senator Barack Obama. If his advice had been followed, the ominous scenario described above would today... be reality. Senator Obama grandiously failed his first Foreign Policy Test, which is probably why we hear nothing from it.

Amazing stories of progress can be found on the website of Multi National Force-West. It pays to check them out. Of course, anno 2008 it is still far too early to assess whether the US's schedule of implementing democracy in the Middle East will eventually lead to that region, and by extension the muslim world, picking up in the mainstream of forward moving democracies. The Middle East has been a hellhole ever since World War II, and even before that. Maybe, just maybe, the seeds of democracy planted at such a cost in Iraq will lead some day to the arab world coming to terms with its small neighbor, the country of Israel. Maybe the conflict that has jeopardized the west's energy supply for decades will thus become a thing of the past. It's still a big maybe. But then, if this hadn't been tried, one would never have known whether it could have worked. Generations of western diplomats have devoted lives and careers to try to hammer sense in arab and muslim heads and get them to accept the existence in their midst of a sliver of 0.5% of the arab world with 6 million jews on it... all to no avail. The Bush Administration's grand strategy marked the Great Turning Away from a ridiculous, decadelong policy of useless negotiations. The end result still isn't clear, and it is still too early to tell whether it will work. It's just that it takes people with PhD's to not understand that.


MFBB.

WOULD YOU RATHER HAVE THIS VEEP...

... or this one?





Two more weeks to go, and we go for nothing less than VICTORY!!!



MFBB.

THE 'LONG MARCH THROUGH THE INSTITUTIONS' EXPLAINED.

It happened in Europe.

If you ever wondered how the policies of the EU and of so many European states can possibly be so self-destructive, it's this:

... so many of the rank and file of the May 68 agitators...

... are now Europes Heads of State, Members of Parliament, and party chiefs. Think of Manuel Barroso, EU Chief, a former Maoist. Think of Daniel Cohn-Bendit, ultrahardcore leftist in his youth, now an influential MEP. Think of Joschka Fischer, who made it German Foreign Minister under the Schroeder government. Think of former Belgian Socialist Party Chairman Willy Claes, who even managed to become NATO Secretary General!

When you go to that voting booth on November 4, and you think you are in for a "Change" because you cannot bear with the strong economic growth, low taxes and record low unemployment of the Bush Administration (that is, until Congress turned majority Democrat in 2006), because you cannot stand the successful conclusion of the War on Islamic Terror, and because you cannot live thru yet another year without a successful terror attack on American soil...

... you are apt to get more change than you ever wanted.

STOP BARACK OBAMA. STOP CREEPING MARXISM.

MFBB.

PERSONS OF TOLERANCE AND DIVERSITY BRIDGING THE AISLE!!!!!!!!

You just hang on New York, San Francisco et al!!! Next year apply for membership of the EU!!! You're almost there!!!


Hat tip Luc Van Braekel.


MFBB.

YOU SHALL KNOW A MAN BY THE FRIENDS HE KEEPS.

Curiously, I only found out about the Kilpatrick relation one month ago, when I attended a speech in Antwerp given by Derk Jan Eppink, a Dutch born journalist and longtime columnist for the daily De Standaard, who now lives in the States because his wife has a high position at the UN. In the Low Countries, Derk Jan Eppink's succinct and to-the-point political analyses have established his fame, grudgingly acknowledged even by the left, and it's only natural that at some point in his career he said De Standaard farewell. In the spring and early summer of 2008, Eppink accompanied several presidential hopefuls on their campaigns (a.o. Giuliani) and, having ample time, he immersed himself completely in the fascinating world of US elections. When describing how Barack Obama, who represents himself as an agent of "change", is actually the product of Chicago's political machine, he mentioned in passing Obama's adoration for Kwame Kilpatrick, the notorious ex-mayor of Detroit, and the involvement of the latter in the murder of prostitute Tamara Green. This is what Wikipedia says about it:

Kilpatrick's controversies started from a wild party in the fall of 2002 involving strippers at the official residence of the mayor—the city-owned Manoogian Mansion. It is alleged by former members of the mayor's Executive Protection Unit that the mayor's wife, Carlita Kilpatrick, came home unexpectedly and upon discovering Kwame with the strippers began to attack one of the women.[24] Allegations began to surface after Officer Harold C. Nelthrope contacted the internal affairs unit of the Detroit Police in April 2003 to have them investigate abuses by the mayor's Executive Protection Unit (EPU). Mayor Kilpatrick denied all allegations and rumors of any misconduct by him or his security team. An investigation by Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox and the Michigan State Police found no evidence that the party actually happened.[24] Nelthrope and Gary A. Brown, head of the Detroit Police Department's internal affairs unit allege that they were fired by the administration in retaliation for investigating the Mayor and other superiors. Nelthrope and Brown filed a whistleblower lawsuit and were awarded an $8.4 million-dollar settlement.

Additionally, two other officers of the Detroit Police Department, Walt Harris and Alvin Bowman, correctly claimed they were retaliated against for their involvement in investigations that would highlight the mayor's misconduct. Harris was a former member of the EPU, who was identified by the administration as cooperating with the state's investigation of the mayor and subsequently suffered a smear campaign in the media by the Kilpatrick administration.[24]

The murder of Tamara Greene
Tamara Greene was a 27-year-old exotic dancer who went by the name "Strawberry", and who allegedly performed at the Manoogian Mansion party and was, again allegedly, attacked by the mayor's wife, Carlita, the same night. While sitting in her car with her boyfriend, Greene was shot multiple times with a .40 caliber Glock handgun. Although official statement by Detroit Police Department claims that Ms. Greene was shot three times, sources from Homicide Division of DPD have claimed that she was shot 18 times. Her boyfriend was wounded, but he was not shot after the white Chevrolet TrailBlazer driven by the shooter(s) turned around and drove by a second time. This fact led Bowman to conclude that Greene was the intended target and not her 32-year-old boyfriend.[25] She was murdered on April 30, 2003, at around 3:40 am, near the intersection of Roselawn and West Outer Drive.[25][26] Her murder came after a first attempt on her life failed. This led to the theory that this was a "deliberate hit" by a member of the Detroit Police Department,[26] a theory that Bowman would investigate. He alleges his investigation was the reason that he was taken off of the case and transferred out of homicide.[25]

Yet, this is the guy who Obama called a "Great Mayor":



Upon learning more about Detroit's and Michigan's predicaments, I noticed that Detroit is something like Charleroi, and Michigan something like Wallonia. Charleroi, and by extension Wallonia, are economic graveyards, and I guess it has now become clear to most remote observers that the tensions in my country Belgium have everything to do with the unwillingness of Flanders, Belgium's rich north, to pay any longer 6.5% of its GDP annually to fill the bottomless pits in Belgium's south - Wallonia. Why is Wallonia dirt poor and miserable? Why is Charleroi a hellhole of corruption and misery? I guess for the same reason that Michigan and Detroit are: people, despite the evidence, voting for over a century for a party that has not their interest at heart, but only its own perverse interest in continuing its corrupt existence at the expense of... the very people they claim to support. In Michigan, which coincidentally has a Democratic governor, they are called Democrats. In Wallonia, Socialists. But they are two sides of the same coin, and the end result is the same: endless misery for their constituency. In Detroit, Kilpatrick was the iconic image of "democratic" rule. Given the fact that the WHOLE of the entire Democratic Party has moved significantly to the left over the past decades, and that Obama is now the icon of the Democratic Party, this bodes not well for the future of America. In short, America is in for Michiganizing should this walking disaster ever make it into the White House.

Kwame Kilpatrick called Obama "the next President of the United States". When you stand in that voting booth, ask yourself whether you really want to give a scumbag who was charged with eight felonies for a.o. perjury, misconduct in office, obstruction of justice and assaulting a sheriff, who held sex parties in the Mayor's residence, and who used money for public education to treat himself and his family to luxurey travels, what he wants.

Don't say you haven't been warned.


MFBB.

FEEL THE LOVE!!!

What would be poor, stupid Beljuns be without the EXCELLENT, top notch quality coverage of US elections by our sophisticated, enlightened, all-knowing, fair and balanced press and TV?





One among many: a snapshot from the Belgian daily Het Laatste Nieuws, online version. Title: Verkiezingen. De race naar het Witte Huis. (Elections. The race to the White House.).


* Topic no. 1: "Sarah Palin uit de kleren in pornofilm". Translated: "Sarah Palin bares all in porn movie."

* Topic no.2, center left: "Lohan verkleedt zich op Halloween als Palin". Translated: "On Halloween Lohan dresses up as Palin".

* Topic no. 3, center middle: "McCain drie weken voor verkiezingen wanhoop nabij." Translated: "McCain desperate three weeks before elections."

* Topic no. 4, center right: "IJshockeyfans trakteren Palin op boegeroep." Translated: "Ice hockey fans treat Palin on boo concert."

At the bottom we get the results of the Polling Gallup 21/09/08. To the left a photo of a smiling, confident Obama, 369 electoral votes. To the right a photo of a glum and silly looking McCain, 169 electoral votes.


With coverage like this it's no wonder Obama is Europe's Golden Boy. But is the coverage only part of the reason of Obama's popularity? Probably not. Regardless of the reasons, according to a poll in The Netherlands (granted, an NPS poll of the public broadcasting company) a staggering 88% of the Dutch would support him. In Britain, The Guardian brags that "Britain's backing Obama: Democrat beats McCain by five votes to one". In Sweden, Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt openly supports Obama. 75% of the French favor an Obama presidency while only 10% would support McCain in the White House. And 85% of the Germans would rather see the senator from Illinois calling the shots in Washington.

Which all brings me to the question:

WHAT DO YOU SAY, AMERICA???

MFBB.

DON'T KNOW HOW IT IS WITH YOU, BUT THESE ARE NO GUYS I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR.

Yikes.


MFBB.

WHO'S YOUR LADY?

From FOX News, October 7, 2008:

Madonna: 'Palin can't come to my show'

During the U.S. kickoff of her "Sticky and Sweet" tour at the Meadowlands in New Jersey on Saturday night, she shouted: "Sarah Palin can't come to my party. Sarah Palin can't come to my show. It's nothing personal," according to the New York Post's Page Six gossip column.

She also told the crowd, "Here's the sound of Sarah Palin's husband's snowmobile when it won't start," followed by a loud screeching noise.

Madonna endorses Barack Hussein Obama.


MFBB.

IF ONLY HE RAN FOR PRESIDENT...

Already a week old, but no less (f)actual. From RealClearPolitics. The Master Speaks:

The current financial bailout crisis has propelled Barack Obama back into a substantial lead over John McCain-- which is astonishing in view of which man and which party has had the most to do with bringing on this crisis.

It raises the question: Do facts matter? Or is Obama's rhetoric and the media's spin enough to make facts irrelevant?

Fact Number One: It was liberal Democrats, led by Senator Christopher Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank, who for years-- including the present year-- denied that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were taking big risks that could lead to a financial crisis.

It was Senator Dodd, Congressman Frank and other liberal Democrats who for years refused requests from the Bush administration to set up an agency to regulate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

It was liberal Democrats, again led by Dodd and Frank, who for years pushed for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to go even further in promoting subprime mortgage loans, which are at the heart of today's financial crisis.

Alan Greenspan warned them four years ago. So did the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to the President. So did Bush's Secretary of the Treasury, five years ago.

Yet, today, what are we hearing? That it was the Bush administration "right-wing ideology" of "de-regulation" that set the stage for the financial crisis. Do facts matter?

We also hear that it is the free market that is to blame. But the facts show that it was the government that pressured financial institutions in general to lend to subprime borrowers, with such things as the Community Reinvestment Act and, later, threats of legal action by then Attorney General Janet Reno if the feds did not like the statistics on who was getting loans and who wasn't.

Is that the free market? Or do facts not matter?

Then there is the question of being against the "greed" of CEOs and for "the people." Franklin Raines made $90 million while he was head of Fannie Mae and mismanaging that institution into crisis.

Who in Congress defended Franklin Raines? Liberal Democrats, including Maxine Waters and the Congressional Black Caucus, at least one of whom referred to the "lynching" of Raines, as if it was racist to hold him to the same standard as white CEOs.

Even after he was deposed as head of Fannie Mae, Franklin Raines was consulted this year by the Obama campaign for his advice on housing!

The Washington Post criticized the McCain campaign for calling Raines an adviser to Obama, even though that fact was reported in the Washington Post itself on July 16th. The technicality and the spin here is that Raines is not officially listed as an adviser. But someone who advises is an adviser, whether or not his name appears on a letterhead.

The tie between Barack Obama and Franklin Raines is not all one-way. Obama has been the second-largest recipient of Fannie Mae's financial contributions, right after Senator Christopher Dodd.

But ties between Obama and Raines? Not if you read the mainstream media.

Facts don't matter much politically if they are not reported.

The media alone are not alone in keeping the facts from the public. Republicans, for reasons unknown, don't seem to know what it is to counter-attack. They deserve to lose.

But the country does not deserve to be put in the hands of a glib and cocky know-it-all, who has accomplished absolutely nothing beyond the advancement of his own career with rhetoric, and who has for years allied himself with a succession of people who have openly expressed their hatred of America.

- Thomas Sowell


Also, don't miss this film:




This very evening, I found myself in the house of a client of mine and a newsflash came up. It was the news broadcast from the VRT, the Flemish Radio and Television, which is supposed to take a neutral stance since it is funded with taxpayer money, amongst others from yours truly. They were as usual openly rooting for Obama, blasting Sarah Palin for attacking the Democratic hopeful for his ties to terrorists. They then explained in one sentence who Ayers was, adding that Obama, at the time of Ayers' terrorist acts, was just 8.

And that was that. The gullible viewer was supposed to assume that, because Obama was 8 when the Pentagon was attacked, there coule never have been a link between Ayers and Obama. In the same manner one could argue that Mohammed Atta could never have been inspired by the Phropet Mohammed because at the time that the latter murdered the Jews of Khaybar, Atta was minus 1339. F*cking BRIL-LI-ANT!!!

Only it isn't brilliant. It's cheap demagogy. I know that with regards to the subprime crisis and the catastrophic aftermath we have sailed in, there's plenty of blame to go around. But to any level-headed, objective observer it's clear who should get the tar and feathers treatment. Over here... NOTHING of substance is heard about the way in which Clinton amended the CRA so that banks faced fines if they did not issue loans to people who should never have gotten them in the first place, about how Barney Frank insisted all was right with the GSE's when it was clear they were heading towards the abyss, how Raines made millions of dollars after mismanaging Fannie Mae...

... nothing.

Thanks to the Internet I am swimming in an information pool. And while that is a good thing, it's at the same time scary. It is scary because all around me, I see people being lied to. Lied to on a massive scale. Being spoonfed tailored bits and pieces of information. And they are swallowing it. How else do you explain Obama is presidential choice no. 1 in 16 out of 17 countries?

Stop Barack Obama. GET. OUT. THE. VOTE.


MFBB.

DUTCH BLOG GEENSTIJL BETS ON STRONG CARIBOU.

The Dutch maverick group blog GeenStijl, probably the most popular blog in The Netherlands, has a nice header:

(Never mind the truncated pic below of the fella with a knife in his head. Just a case of knife culture. Like the Brits, the Dutch have recently discovered they, too, now have a knife culture).

They wouldn't want to hear it themselves but some would call GeenStijl a rightwing blog. Imho they are not really rightwing, they just don't respect anybody. E.g., they regularly bash the small fundamentalist christian party ChristenUnie, of which the main constituency is in The Netherlands' very own "Bible Belt". But what is certain is that they reserve most of their scorn for the left in Holland, since few countries in Europe are more PC and terminally multicutlural than the small kingdom of wooden shoes and windmills by the North Sea.

One of the many cases in point was when last summer, at the occasion of the DNC in Denver, they trashed the Dutch public broadcasting company NPS, and then especially its news chapter NOVA. NPS is somewhat like PBS in the States: a government-sponsored TV station. As such it is supposed to be politically neutral, just like in Belgium the VRT is supposed to be politically neutral. But like the fellas from GeenStijl use to say: Helaas Pindakaas (loosely translated as Unfortunately Cucumber Jelly). Like PBS in the US of A, NPS and NOVA in The Netherlands are as far left as you can get before settling for good in NORK. So when the Obamessiah had his styrofoam pillars of wisdom erected on the DNC stage one month and a half ago, the NPS Board had the luminous idea to dispatch ONE THIRD, or TWENTY (20) of the sixtyplus strong NOVA staff, to Colorado. For the sake of objectivity, NPS would also, certainly certainly, send a delegation to the Republican Convention one week later in St.-Paul, Minnesota. The Dutch public must get its daily news portion fair and balanced!!! Only, the delegation would consist of ONE reporter (that's één, un, uno, eins, jeden). The reason according to NPS/NOVA? McCain would lose anyway! To cut a long story short, were it not for GeenStijl Jan Klaas would never know NPS sent a platoon to the DNC and a dog with a hat on to the RNC because, well, because the news is made by NPS! Thank God that inconvenient truth guy invented the internet!

Another megahit was Geenstijl's coverage, also last summer, of the colourful career of a certain Wijnand Duyvendak, MP for the greenleft party Groenlinks, a collection of commie ecobozos so far down the cliff that it makes a sane person, upon realizing these folks have political power, fear for humanity's future. Now who the f*ck is Wijnand Duyvendak? GeenStijl found out that he was the brain behind several burglings in military complexes (a.o. in Dubbeldam) as well as in the Ministry of Economic Affairs in 1985. During these sessions Mr. Duyvendak stole sensitive military documents and plans for a nuclear powerplant. What for? Could the verrrrrry friendly contacts between the euroleftist parties and their comrades from across the Iron Curtain have something to do with it? Furthermore Mr. Duyvendak and his cronies personally torched several Makro complexes (Makro being the Dutch equivalent of Wal-Mart) as well as Shell petrol stations. Cost: 100 million gulden, about 50 million US $. Motif? The ties Makro and Shell had with South Africa, at the time still under the Apartheid regime. In the nineties Duyvendak popped up as one of the strongmen of the extreme leftwing organization Milieudefensie (Environmental Defence), which used illegal ways to block the expansion of Schiphol International Airport. Milieudefensie closely collaborated with another extreme leftwing outfit called Milieu-Offensief (Environment Offensive), which counted in its ranks another colourful character, a certain Volkert Van Der Graaf . In a later life this tolerant diversity champion would decide that a certain Dutch politician, Pim Fortuyn, posed a threat to society, and dealt with him in hiw own peculiar way, but that is another story. As for Duyvendak and Van Der Graaf, well, it's another illustration that birds of a feather flock together, especially endangered spec, erm, I meant dangerous species. To cut a long story short, Wijnand Duyvendak, this bomb layer, arsonist, burglar of military secrets, developer of terrorist sleeper cells and criminal trespasser, the Dutch William Ayers so to say, entered Dutch Parliament in May 2007. For once, what is possible in the States, namely that an avowed and unrepentant terrorist can continue to live like a free man and even take up a high public position, proved impossible in The Netherlands: GeenStijl's merciless reporting on Duyvendak led to his dismissal from Dutch Parliament one month ago.


Anyway... while I don't think GeenStijl would really appreciate being labeled rightwing - that Palin supporting slogan warms the heart. And I may hope not only of us beleagured mavericks in blood(y) red Europe, but also across the pond.


MFBB.

P.S.: hey, pssssst Sarah! That debate of yours! You won!

GET OUT THE TRUTH. THEN GET OUT THE VOTE.

Excellent post over at Roger's Rules. Hat tip fcal.

Packaging the American Dream.

A home of your own. It’s part of the American dream. Work hard, save up for a down payment, pay your bills on time and, presto, you, too, can buy a home.

For decades the government has done things to help Americans to realize the dream, e.g., graciously allowing citizens to keep some of their own money to help pay for the interest on a mortgage (the official term for this is a “tax deduction,” but I prefer my locution since it emphasizes the fact that it is YOUR MONEY we are talking about).

But what about people who do not work hard (if they work at all)? What about people who have not saved up for a down payment? What about people who do not pay their bills on time (if they pay them at all)? Why shouldn’t they get to live the American dream?

That was the question that led to

“The Community Reinvestment Act” (see here for more).

* The original Community Reinvestment Act was signed into law in 1977 by Jimmy Carter. Its purpose, in a nutshell, was to require banks to provide credit to “under-served populations,” i.e., those with poor credit.

The buzz word was “affordable mortgages,” e.g., mortgages with low teaser-rates, which required the borrower to put no money down, which required the borrower to pay only the interest for a set number of years, etc.

* In 1995, Bill Clinton’s administration made various changes to the CRA, increasing “access to mortgage credit for inner city and distressed rural communities,” i.e., it provided for the securitization, i.e. public underwriting, of what everyone now calls “sub-prime mortgages.”

Bottom line? It forced banks to issue $1 trillion in sub-prime mortgages.

$1 trillion, i.e., a thousand billion dollars in sub-prime,i.e., risky, mortgages, in order to push this latest example of social engineering.

But wait: how did it force banks to do this? Easy. Introduce a federal requirement that banks make the loans or face penalties. As Howard Husock, writing in City Journal way back in 2000 observed: “Bank examiners would use federal home-loan data, broken down by neighborhood, income group, and race, to rate banks on performance. There would be no more A’s for effort. Only results—specific loans, specific levels of service—would count.” Way back in 1994, for example, Barack Obama sued Citibank on behalf of a client who charged that the bank “systematically denied mortgages to African-American applicants and others from minority neighborhoods.”...

I have one small caveat to make. The flurry of links to the CRA the internet offers these days focuses too much, imho, on the impact the granting of loans to "risky minority borrowers" has had, by which obviously the African-American community is meant. While I wholeheartedly agree that a disproportionate percentage of that community indeed consists of people not worth a credit, because whatever passes for their "street culture" (rap, gangs, generally f*cking around) stands in the way of a proper education, strong traditional families, and ultimately success in life, I would wager that by numbers alone bad African-American credit takers can never had such a disastrous impact. AFAIK African Americans make up some 11 per cent of the US population. Make that 10% for easy calculating. I have no stats as to what percentage of these would pose a risk when being handed a loan they possibly can't pay back. But let's assume it's 50% - I guess there's also plenty of African Americans who walk the line and are decent contributing citizens. That would mean a monstrosity like the CRA ultimately only enabled half of one tenth of the US population to get a loan while they were not really creditworthy. I refuse to believe that that small percentage can have gotten the US financial sector in the mess it is now in.

What I DO believe is that the Democrats, by sluicing the CRA through Congress (and amending it to disastrous effect during the Clinton years) they also enabled, apart from "risky" minorities, all kinds of other risky borrowers - be they white, yellow, light brown, red, purple or whatever - to get mortgages they were in fact not entitled to.


Furthermore, don't miss this film:





Hat tip CDR Salamander.


And one final note: a couple of days back, regular reader (if not regular commenter) Adriane linked to this. It is well worth a read. If you are an intelligent person, you will soak it in, appreciate its logic and wonder why the hell it doesn't get the attention it clearly deserves. If you are a blunt IDIOT, you will rather believe a schtoopid cunt like Nancy Pelosi when she shrieks that the current crisis is just another result of George Bush's disastrous economic policy.

As a European who struggles to keep his small company afloat in a toxic environment and who knows that the fruits of his labor are used to import the left's next electorate, I have but one advice to sane, self-respecting and decent Americans:

KEEP BARACK OBAMA OUT OF THE WHITE HOUSE.


MFBB.

A DAY OUT IN THE ARDENNES.

It was lovely weather today and I had been promising my daughter for some time to go visit a well-known theme park in Coo, a village in the northern Ardennes, so today we packed and left for Belgium's east, in the footsteps of generations of Belgians. Because a day out for Belgians has for aeons been usually either to the coast or to the Ardennes. For those unfamiliar with Belgium's geography, despite the fact that it's a very small country (some 340 kloms across at its greatest length) there's several distinctive geographical regions. One can debate about how far one can go in subdividing the landscapes, but basically it's everything that lies between two "extremes", the 65 kilometer "long" Belgian coast with, true to say, fine beaches, and the Ardennes, which is an old massif nowhere higher than 700 meters. The coast is entirely in Flanders, the Ardennes are entirely in Wallonia, so to paraphrase Billy Joel, the Flemings hold the coastline and the Walloons the highlands, hehehe. We had a great day, especially the kiddos in that theme park, and when they are happy we are (more than) happy. So even when I couldn't do what I really like to do when in the Belgian Alps - hiking on my own with sturdy mountain shoes on, map at hand, rucksack well stocked - I had a field day, and a great view like the one below is just a bonus.





Most readers will know by now I am a World War II buffoon, and while I swear I took the kids to this place only for their pleasure, I couldn't resist the temptation of taking, on the way home, a shortcut through La Gleize, which is a village some 5 kloms west of Coo. La Gleize is one of those places you wouldn't otherwise have heard of in a million years, were it not that 64 years ago - damn, how time flies - it was the scene of a tenacious fight between a German Kampfgruppe and elements of the US 30th Infantry Division and 82nd Airborne Division during the Ardennes Offensive, which in the US is known as the Battle of the Bulge. History has been a bit unkind to those US troops not fighting in Bastogne, because to many Americans the Battle in the Bulge is Bastogne. Few know that very heavy fighting took place in other sectors of the "bulge", and one of those sectors was the northern front, where the 6th Waffen SS Panzer Army (the 6th, led by Sepp Dietrich) attacked in the early morning hours of December 16, 1944. That Panzer Army's backbone was formed by four crack SS Panzer divisions, the 1st (Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler), the 2nd (Das Reich), the 9th (Hohenstaufen) and the 12th (Hitlerjugend). 2nd SS and 9th SS were deployed only later on, the initial moves were by 1st SS and 12th SS. Of the former, the main element was the so-called Kampfgruppe Peiper (Battle Group Peiper), and ad hoc formation comprising the bulk of 1st SS's armour. Its commander was Obersturmbannfuehrer (Lieutenant Colonel) Jochen Peiper, an able and battle hardened veteran from the Eastern Front. His name would gain a notorious reputation, for on the second day of the offensive, when Peiper had effectively broken through the American lines, elements of his battle group overwhelmed the lightly armed Battery B of the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion near Baugnez, a hamlet near the town of Malmédy, in German-speaking Belgium. Those who survived were driven together in a meadow. What happened next has been the subject of countless reconstructions and investigations, but at some point Germans started machinegunning the American POW's. About 90 men perished. Peiper himself was not directly involved, although at a post-war trial he was held accountable for orders he should have given stipulating that no prisoners were to be taken.

After this infamous episode which became known as the Malmédy Massacre, the whole of the Kampfgruppe move further along the narrow roads of the northern Ardennes, and in Trois Ponts point US engineers blew up a bridge right before his nose, denying Peiper a smoother ride to the crucial Meuse river and forcing him to move his troops even further down the tortuous Amblève valley in search for a bridge. This proved to be his swan song, because he got stuck in... La Gleize, and even though a forward party made it a bit further still, to Stoumont, ultimately the bulk of Peipers men and most of his armour, perhaps 2,000 men and 70 tanks, plus numerous other vehicles, found themselves surrounded in the tiny village, for behind their back the road to Trois Ponts had been cut off by 82nd Airborne. After six days, Peiper had run out of fuel and ammo and with a Luftwaffe unable to drop supplies, he asked for, and finally got, permission to break out. This he managed to do, and on the 25th Peiper was able to report to 1st SS Panzer Corps that he had extricated 770 of his men from the La Gleize pocket. He left behind all of his matériel, and since Kampfgruppe Peiper had been allocated a disproportionate amount of 1st SS's armour, it meant that the division had lost most of its teeth. This event would herald the eventual failure of "Wacht am Rhein", which waas the German codename for the whole Ardennes operation. A lot has been said and written about the causes and the reasons of that failure, but in Peipers case, I would wager that the man, although an able tactician on the regimental level, was given command of a formation that was too big for him. As mentioned before, his battlegroup not only counted the bulk of the parent division's armour, but also the schwere SS Panzer Abteilung 501 (Heavy SS Tank Battalion 501), normally an independent formation. From the accounts that I have read, I would wager that Kampfgruppe Peiper wasted away because its commander could not hold it together (nor use it properly in such a confined theatre). Anno 2008, there's still one tank from Kampfgruppe Peiper standing in La Gleize. It's the Koenigstiger (King Tiger) once commanded by Obersturmfuehrer Dollinger of the sSSPzAbt. 501. In almost mint condition it stands near the small museum "December 1944" in La Gleize's center. Which is where I landed this very evening after the kids had enjoyed their day out.

A Koenigstiger was the final development of the heavy Tiger tank, and weighing close to 70 tons (far more than an M1-Abrams) it was the heaviest MBT to enter service by either party in World War II.

And another pic up front. Notice the sheer menacing bulk of the beast. The gun is an 88mm L71, probably the best anti-tank gun of the war.

Standing next to the Koenigstiger this evening, it again struck me how massive this machine is. It was powered by a 700 HP engine, the same as the one used in the far lighter Panther tank. In the 45-ton chassis of this vehicle the Maybach performed very well (there were also MAN versions), but to propel a Koenigstiger properly was asked too much, and much has been said about the tank bogging down in rough terrain. A 1,000 HP engine was what was needed for this tank, but anno 1944 the German war industry, overwhelmed with hyperpressing demands from all sides, was unable to yet produce such a motor. Still, it is said that on good hard level going a Koenigstiger could reach a top speed of 38 kloms per hour. The following YouTube film of tanks of sSSPzAbt 501 passing through the German village of Tondorf prior to the Ardennes Offensive gives you an idea of their dynamics.





Shit. There I went again. Starting out with Plopsaland Coo and ending with a frigging Nazi tank. That can only be me. I really am a World War II nutter.


MFBB.

OKTOBERFEST 2008.

It's Oktoberfest baby!!!



Girls can't drink beer.

However ladies: what dirndl type are you? (Sorry, but it's in Krautspeak. Type away though. Follow your intuition).


MFBB.

FILIP DEWINTER AWARDED THE ORIANA FALLACI PRIZE.

Last week, an anti-islamization conference was held in Florence, Italy with the theme “Islamophobia and Freedom of Speech”. Responsible for the organization was the “Associazione Una Via Per Oriana”, Oriana of course being the famous progressive Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci who died two years ago of cancer. In her heyday Mrs. Fallaci had decidely leftist inclinations but not unlike quite a few intellectual giants, at some point reality struck home. Mrs. Fallaci spent the last years of her life writing fierce critiques of the monstrous politico-religious ideology currently assaulting Europe, The Force of Reason and The Rage and the Pride. Indeed, as we speak and write, Hamas flags fly over the Rhine river at Mulhouse, France; more and more cities in The Netherlands experience a homegrown intifada - the latest hotspot is Gouda; and to top it all off, last week it transpired that Gordon Brown's Labour government has secretly sanctioned powers for sharia courts in the UK. It is against this terrifying backdrop that we must see last weeks' conference, where many leading authors of works warning of islam were present, like Bat Ye’or, David Littman and others.

Among the invitees at the Oriana Fallaci Commemmoration was Filip Dewinter, fraction leader for the Vlaams Belang in the Flemish Parliament. Following the event, Mr. Dewinter was honoured with the Prize bearing the name of the deceased journalist, which he received from the President of Una Via Per Oriana, Armando Manocchia. In his speech, Mr. Manocchia stressed that Mr. Dewinter was awarded the prize “because of the courage he has, rowing upstream against the flood wave of political correctness. With ‘Cities Against Islamisation’ Filip Dewinter has funded a democratic movement of resistance that will protect our European identity and Western civilisation against the Islamic religion of conquest”.




Dewinter gave a speech himself. A stellar one, if I may say so. Here are some key excerpts:

Ladies and gentlemen,

Don’t be mislead, there's no such thing as ‘moderate Islam’. I give you a recent quote from the Turkish premier Erdogan: “There is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam and that’s it.” Let’s cut he crap, Islam is bound for world dominance. Islam is an imperialist religion who forces their rights with violence. It’s an historical evidence that Europe is the first and most important enemy of Islam. Almost fourteen centuries Europe is resisting the islamisation of its continent. The first Islamic invasion of Europe was halted at Poitiers in 732 a.D. The second Islamic invasion was stopped at the gates of Vienna in 1683.The matter is now to halt the currently ongoing third Islamic invasion, and to push Islam back to where it belongs: to the other side of the Mediterranean.

Radical islam is nowadays fighting with other means than before: The scimitar has been replaced by the terrorists’ bomb, but apart from that less has changed. The only fundamental change is that Europe no longer dares to resist Islamic aggression and we tend to behave more and more as dhimmi’s.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Islam does not belong in Europe, not yesterday, neither today, and certainly not
tomorrow. Islam is diametrically opposed to our European morals and values. Islam is but way much more than a religion, it is in fact a political ideology, a social order and a jurisdictional system. Islam is a political ideology, a social order and a jurisdictional system that has undergone hardly any change since Medieval times. To tolerate, acknowledge and fund islam in Europe, is to throw away all European acquirements and freedoms, and return to the darkest days of Middle Ages. There are many ways in which the ongoing islamisation of Europe reveals itself. Not only do we have to give in on fundamental principles of European society, but we are also confronted with a demographic time bomb.

It was the Algerian president Boumédienne who said: "One day, millions of men will leave the Southern Hemisphere to go to the Northern Hemisphere. And they will not go there as friends. Because they will go there to conquer it. And they will conquer it with their sons. The wombs of our women will give us victory." Indeed, Europe nowadays counts up to 50 million Muslims while only 50.000 lived here a century ago. Islam has grown to be the second largest religion in Europe and in twenty years cities as for example Marseilles, Malmö, Brussels and Birmingham will know a majority of Muslim inhabitants. Muslim women on average give birth to 3 to 4 children, whereas native European women barely reach an average of
one point thirty seven children. The power of the numbers is in advantage of Islam.

The European population is aware of this, and is able to observe it on daily basis.
Europeans have had enough of burqas, of chadors, of hijabs and kaftans, Europeans have had enough of the “ritual” slaughter of animals, of the boundless popping up of mosques, Quran schools, and minarets, of the Arab and Turkish writings on bus and tram, enough of halal food at the butchers and stores, of the never ending flow of sighs and demands made by Islam on behalf of “multicultural tolerance” and so called “freedom of religion”. If we want to save Europe, than we will have to push back the islamisation and end the green fascism of radical, totalitarian Islam!

Ladies and gentlemen,

If one would ask me if I’m xenophobic, than I answer: no, I do not object immigrants under condition that they behave, adapt and submit to our morals and values. If one would ask me if I’m islamofobic, than I firmly answer: “yes” since I’m worried by Islam. The biggest mistake we can make in Europe is to picture Islam – for reasons of political correctness – as a religion of peace and tolerance. Islam is indeed a religion of peace and tolerance, but unfortunately only for those Muslims who are willing to submit to Allahs’ will as written down in the Quran.

For dhimmi’s – the unbelievers – Islam is a religion of hatred, of violence and intolerance. Islamophobia is not merely a phenomena of unparalleled fear, but it is the duty of every one who wants to safeguard Europe’s future. Europe means Rome, Greece, Enlightenment and judeo-christian roots. Europe is a continent of castles and cathedrals, not of mosques and minarets. Oriana Fallaci showed us the way in her books “Rage and pride” and “The force of reason”. Therefore I wish to conclude by quoting her in “The force of reason”:

“Islam is like a pool, and a pool is a puddle of water standing still. Water that does not flow away, does not move, and thereby is never purified. The West is like a river nourishing life. It’s like water that flows on, that’s purified and renewed in it’s course, that absorbs other water and finally reaches the vast sea. Thanks to the force of reason we’ll eventually prevail. But hence we must continuously renew, continuously absorb other water and prevent any dam against he flow of the water current.”


-Filip Dewinter

Hat tip Gates of Vienna and Tundra Tabloids.



MFBB.

BRUSSELS SOCIALIST MAYOR HAS VLAAMS BELANG MEMBERS ARRESTED FOR COMMEMMORATING 9/11.

On Thursday, 9 September 2008, three Vlaams Belang members were arrested by the Brussels Police because they were commemmorating 9/11. The arrests took place at the end of a peaceful ceremony organized by Vlaams Belang at the Brussels WTC-tower. The ceremony comprised the laying of one rose per participant at the foot of the tower.


Earlier, the Brussels mayor, Freddy Thielemans of the Parti Socialiste, had written a letter to Filip Dewinter (not the VB chairman, but certainly the party's most enigmatic personage) that the ceremony would be regarded as a demonstration and that he would not allow it, given, I quote:

"the very delicate theme of the manifestation, the proximity of the [offices of the] Immigration Service, the proximity of sensitive neighborhoods and the period of Ramadan."... "[the manifestation's message] is of a hateful and provocative nature which greatly enhances the possibility of counter demonstrations and violent outbursts."

The Vlaams Belang lodged an appeal against the ban imposed by Thielemans but it was rejected by the Council of State, Belgium’s highest administrative court. Nevertheless, the ceremony went ahead. Also present was a small delegation from the STI initiative (Steden tegen Islamisering, Cities Against Islamization). I borrowed most of the photos below from their site, the composed photo to the left is from the VB site though. Readers will recall that last year, a similar peaceful gathering organized by the VB was savagely beaten up by the Brussels Police. This time, perhaps wary of the negative publicity, the police initially kept its most zealous officers in check.

The man with the beard, walking stiff upright with a rose in his hand, is another VB heavyweight, Gerolf Annemans, VB fraction leader in Belgium's federal parliament. Annemans is known for his fierce pro-Americanism, even more so than Dewinter himself, and he is especially fond of President Bush. At the time of the 2004 elections, when asked by a Belgian daily who he would vote for were he an American, he answered: "I certainly choose for Bush. He has introduced a neoconservative reveil in the States so that the country is now ten years ahead of Europe." Needless to say, Annemans too has been attacked fiercely for this unashamed show of support, and he is a favorite target of extreme leftwing bloggers like Yelloman. Yelloman is, as some attentive readers may recall, one of the main sources providing LGF's Charles Johnson with bogus material claiming the VB is a nazi party.






Filip Dewinter managed to stage a short speech, in which he denounced, in the strongest terms, PS-mayor Thielemans which he called an islamosocialist and a collaborator with radical islam. Some key quotes from Dewinter's address:

"The ban is the most eloquent proof of the islamization of our country", dixit the VB frontman. He added that "9/11 was not simply a terror attack, but also a declaration of war of radical islam to the free West. Islam legitimizes via the Quran the use of violence against infidels to obtain its goals. Islam has to denounce every form of violence and distance itself from Quran passages wich exhort to violence against infidels, otherwise islam can never be tolerated on European territory."

Here are two stills from the 9/11 ceremony in Brussels:





Then, right after Dewinter had laid flowers at the foot of the WTC building, the Brussels Police intervened and stopped the ceremony. Two female VB secretaries and one VB member who still tried to lay their flowers down were arrested and locked up in a cell for the rest of the day (the secretaries later lodged a complaint against the police for sexual harassment). Was NOT arrested: Italian MEP (Member of the European Parliament) Mario Borghezio, of the Italian rightwing party Lega Nord. Last year, during the previous 9/11 commemmoration, Borghezio was roughly handled and arrested, an act so outrageous much that the Italian government officially complained to the Belgian government. I guess this time the officers had received strict instructions not to stir up diplomatic trouble again.


The efforts by the Brussels Police clearly paid off. The only retaliation for daring to commemmorate 9/11 and humiliate muslims in the process, especially during ramadan, came in the evening, when those famous "youths" attacked buses from the public transport company "De Lijn" in Kuregem, an immigrant neighbourhood of Brussels. Spokeswoman for "De Lijn" Karen Vandenplas confirmed that the youths were - gasp! - angry because earlier in the day Flemish politicians had tried to hold a vigil for the victims of the 2001 9/11 attacks in Manhattan, so Mr. Thielemans was indeed right to fear for his constituency. Another bus was attacked in Molenbeek, as readers may recall the Brussels commune where the socialist mayor Philippe Moureaux has forbidden his police officers to eat sandwiches and drink coffee on the street during ramadan. Both in Molenbeek and in Kuregem the passengers on the bus escaped unhurt and the only damage was some bumps in the chassis and windows shattered. So it was not as bad as in March, when a general strike paralyzed the "De Lijn" network because bus drivers were fed up with their buses being shot at and pelted with stones and molotov cocktails, courtesy of the "youths".


But does the banning frenzy of the Brussels mayor now mean the end of free speech in the greater Brussels neighborhood (25% muslims)????? Luckily not, many groups still receive permission to hold demonstrations. Take the following demo e.g. On Sunday, 9 September, some 400 truth activists demonstrated in Brussels to demand an international independent investigation into what really happened on 9 september 2001 in New York. They gathered at the Berlaymont Building (the seat of the European Commission) and headed from there to the American Embassy. Luckily, there were no riots from "youths", I guess that ramadan fasting takes its toll. All demonstrators are equal, but naturally, those from the diversity and equality side are more equal than others. Being the vilain that I am, I simply stole this account from their website. Take especially notice of the last sentence: "Er waren geen incidenten, en de organisatoren waren opnieuw uitgesproken positief over de samenwerking met de Brusselse Politie."





Oooooooh you can't read it??? Oooooooh it's in that pesky peasant's language Flemish??? Let me help you:

"There were no incidents, and the organizers were again explicitly positive about the cooperation with the Brussels Police".

Now isn't life WONDERFUL, after all?


MFBB.

IN MEMORIAM MICHELE COYLE-EULAU (1963-2001).

* Married to Dennis Eulau, devoted mother of Matthew, Mark and Eric,
* IT professional, management consultant at Marsh & McLennan, 96th Floor, North Tower
* working mom, soccer mom, career woman, sportswoman, still finding time to organize the family's outdoor trips

A Maximum Mom.

Brutally murdered by islamic terrorists on September 11, 2001.


MFBB.

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER (PART 2)

On September 2, 2008, four Belgian F-16 fighter bombers which departed the day before from Melsbroek AFB near Brussels, arrived on Kandahar Airfield (KAF), in Afghanistan's volatile south. It was a two-legged journey, with a stop on the Greek island of Crete and in-air refuelling probably somewhere over the Caspian sea from a French KC-135 tanker, see above. This is relatively standard practice since there is some sort of an operational agreement between the French and Belgian air forces whereby our jets always train with their tankers, I suppose because it is the most common type throughout NATO. Our northern neighbors, the Dutch, also have tanker capacity but consisting of two modified KDC-10's, originally civilian planes (unlike the KC-10 Extenders used by USAF), and AFAIK the only ones in Europe.

The mission of the F-16's in southern Afghanistan will last 6 months. Unlike in 2006, this will be a fighting mission whereby, apart from shows of force, the guarding communication lines, and reconnaissance, they will also be deployed actively to strafe and bomb Taliban targets. This represents a sea change in Belgian ISAF participation, since, although Belgian ground troops have been in Afghanistan since 2002, guarding Kabul Airport and demining in Kunduz, they were never allowed to engage terrorists unless attacked directly. Though the operation, dubbed "Guardian Falcon" is essentially a part of ISAF, the jets may also, if required, operate within the framework of "Enduring Freedom". The F-16's will operate in an international squadron together with four Dutch F-16s, some six French Super-Etendards and/or Mirage 2000s and several US jets. They will be equipped with a novelty, the sniper pod, a brand new electronic gondola carried under the fuselage allowing surveillance, detection and identification of a target, this in tandem with ground controllers who pinpoint the targets with a laser beam.

The four F-16s and roughly one hundred personnel will be based at Kandahar Airfield (KAF), an international base populated by more than 13,000 troops from 17 different nations. KAF, autonomous in terms of electricity and water, has to be supplied regularly by transport aircraft, since it is located in a remote area away from Kandahar City. The plus of this is that the airfield is less prone to attacks by land or air. Our government is still cautious, since ground personnel cannot not leave the KAF perimeter during our presence. Two F-16 missions, each comprising two planes, are planned daily. All in all an amazing feat for a country like Belgium. The current Belgian government, the Christian-Democrat dominated Leterme 1 administration, is unpopular, ineffective and moribund, but in its short existence it has accomplished what was impossible during eight years of socialist rule: active participation in the War On Terror.


MFBB.


PS: YouTube video of F-16 refuelling over AF (2006 video)
Some info on the Belgian F-16s

FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS OBAMAS.

First off, I think US Weekly is tring to tell us something.




Second, I think quite a lot of people are wetting their pants.

Third, how low do you have to be to drag a baby with Down syndrome into a vicious political hatefest?

Fourth, they clearly photoshopped Mrs. Palin. Not exactly to make her more beautiful than she already is. Someone over at US Weekly is very, very, very, very pissed.

You just go ahead punks. Make our day!



MFBB.

A DAY OUT IN BRUSSELS.

Leopold II may have been a bastard but he was our bastard. This is one of the things he gave us:



The triumphal arch of the Cinquantenaire Park, east Brussels. Pic taken on August 17 when I took my mother-in-law for a sightseeing tour of Brussels. "Cinquantenaire" is difficult to translate, "fiftyish" comes maybe closest. In 1880 Belgium was 50 years independent and Leopold II, yes, he of the Congo atrocities, was King. He organized a world exhibition in Brussels and for its location chose a former military exercising ground. To impress the European "established states" and to show off Belgium's growing prosperity, he ordered the arc and its adjacent palaces built. Unfortunately, the complex was not ready for the 1880 exhibition, and once this had taken place, the King got into a clinch with the Belgian government for funding of the project, which the government saw as unneccessary. It would take more than a decade before the project got back on its tracks again and then only because by then the King was flush with money from his Congolese adventure and decided to spend his personal fortune on it. And so it was that by 1905 the arch was finally ready, just in time for the celebration of... 75 years of Belgian independence. I don't want to brag, but it's really an impressive monument, crowned by a quadriga, an allegoric ensemble of horses and a battlecart symbolizing the key province of Belgium, Brabant, wherein Brussels lies (the colors of the Belgian flag are originally Brabantine, btw). The other 8 provinces are symbolized by allegoric statues of single persons at the foot of the columns.

Say about Leopold II what you will, and again, he may have been an atrocious man and a pervert, but if Brussels today has just enough grandeur and gravitas to be European capital it is because of him. That is not to say it has those qualities in abundance, because several large parts of Brussels are unimpressive and/or neglected, and after all Brussels is, with 1 million inhabitants, still a rather small city. But in many respects our capital is indeed a small version of Paris. Btw, now that I am talking about Leopold's Congolese endeavours, that deserves an elaborate post of its own. One very important thing to know, and which I see constantly overlooked by non-Belgian observers, is that the atrocities against the Congolese population took place during the period that the so-called Congo Free State was Leopold's personal fiefdom. By 1908, international pressure had rendered the King's holding onto his very own colony impossible, and Congo became a colony of the Belgian state, after which conditions for the local population improved dramatically. We do have a historical guilt towards the Congolese for the deprivations and the massive death toll - although demographic evidence strongly suggests that Adam Hochschild's 15 million victims are impossible - but on the other hand, I'd wager we paid at least part of that back. We paid it back because when we Belgians left the Congo in 1960, we left them also a modern infrastructure: good roads, hospitals, a decent educational system, a railway network, a well-equipped port, airfields, industry and mines etc. etc. etc... second perhaps only to South Africa's. And... the Congolese screwed it all. What followed after the independence practically reversed the clock to pre-1908 days, and if we are to believe the reports coming from Congo's eastern jungle, a genocide is taking place there of at least the magnitude of the one during Leopold's days. But I don't see Hochschild write a book about that soon. Still, I do think we have some kind of moral obligation to support the Congolese nation and by and large, I think we took/take our responsibility. But more about that later. Hopefully.


MFBB.

FINALLY, CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN.

Yes, we can. Yes, we can change. Yes, we can.




The GOP, that is.


MFBB.

BELGIAN "TOP" NEWSPAPER "DE STANDAARD" WRITES THAT MARGARET THATCHER STARTED FALKLANDS WAR.

The Belgian newspaper "De Standaard" is for Belgium what "Le Monde" is for France or the NYT for the US. It pretends to take a neutral stance in politics, but with every passing year this claim is becoming more laughable. Today, Monday 25 August 2008, "De Standaard" hit a new low with an article on Mrs. Thatcher's declining mental capabilities. The former "Iron Lady" increasingly suffers from dementia and has to be reminded every day of the death of her husband Dennis, deceased now already five years ago. By contrast, she remembers every detail about her eleven-year long tenure as PM of the United Kingdom. A lot has been said about Mrs. Thatcher's successful economic record, but the single most important feat which marked her early years was unquestionably the 1982s Falklands War, which shook the British out of the dreadful lethargy in which they had sunk after the Suez Crisis. Take a close look at the bottom paragraph of the "De Standaard" article:

De IJzeren Dame is een door dementie aangetaste, verwarde vrouw geworden. Maar over de elf jaar dat ze op compromisloze wijze haar land leidde, de steenkoolmijnen sloot, de Falklandoorlog begon met Argentinië en een bomaanslag van het Iers Republikeins Leger (IRA) overleefde, weet de eerste en voorlopig enige vrouwelijke premier van het Verenigd Koninkrijk nog alles.

Translation:

The Iron Lady has become a confused, demented woman. But on those eleven years during which she held the reins in her country, shut the coal mines, began the Falklands War with Argentina, and survived an IRA bomb attack, the only female PM of the UK still knows all.

Time for a reality check. Two excerpts from the book "Forgotten Voices of the Falklands" by Hugh McManners, Ebury Press, 2007.

- John Pole Evans, Falkland Islander:

"Whilst the shooting was going on, we lay on the floor in the centre of the house, the safest place. Tanks came in along the road at the back of the town. We were in the second row of houses back down the hill from the road. Some of them fired into the town through the houses, and pieces of house landed on our roof. We could hear helicopters and planes overhead, but didn't get up to look out the windows.....
The first lot of Argentines came banging on our house door and my dad got up and opened it. They only came into the back porch and didn't search the house at that stage, but wanted to know who we were and what we were doing."

- Commander Robert Denton Green, Intelligence Staff Officer to CINC, Fleet HQ, Northwood:

"I didn't sleep for thirty-six hours after the Argentine invasion. We were really struggling. There was a complete panic. I was briefing the Admiral, plus we had to keep the Soviet threat monitoring going as well. We asked all the companies who'd supplied the Argentines with ships and weapon systems to come clean on exactly what they'd provided, which versions and modifications. Our dossier on their order of battle started with data from the publication Jane's Fighting Ships, and all the aviation weeklies and magazines."

April 2, 1982. Argentinian Amtraks in the streets of Port Stanley, the capital of the Falkland Islands. The small garrison of some forty-plus Royal Marines of Naval Party 8901 never stood a chance against the overwhelming military might of the Argentinians. Yet De Standaard wants its readers to believe that Margaret Thatcher, an unashamedly rightwing Head of State, began the war. Deliberate misinformation by the left. Ponder that.

At 43, I have seen, heard and read it so many, many times. Like poison which is secretly administerd in small doses to a person to lethal effect much later on, downright lies and dubious assumptions are cleverly hidden in the fabric of seemingly neutral stories, as part of a process that spans decades. In the end, you get a readership that subconsciously has soaked in over the years a multitude of untruths, and has as a result formed itself a worldview that fits the agenda of our moral betters: The Left, which in Belgium, like in other western countries, is disproportionally overrepresented in television, radio and the written press. Their perfidious lies are enthusistically echoed by their idiotic lackeys from the entertainment industry. "De Standaard" may claim it is neutral, but that is a flat lie just like the ones their stories abound with. It is a leftist rag through and through, and with this latest blatant example of rewriting history they confirm the credo of that famous socialist now long deceased, Dr. Joseph Goebbels: "A lie repeated a hundred times becomes the thruth". Somewhere, everywhere, young naive people, not very critical, read "that Margaret Thatcher began the Falklands War". They will take it for granted. In the same breath, "De Standaard" will remind them that Margaret Thatcher was also an evil rightwinger, because she took the jobs of poor miners. This is how the notions warmonger/inhuman/conservative are blended together, in a stealthy way like here, or in a vulgar, crude in-you-face way like with that performance by the world's biggest SLUT Madonna, who freely links images of McCain, Mugabe and Hitler. And you wonder why young people vote leftwing?

The above example is but one item in a long list of deliberate lies, and as we have seen the tactic used is slipping it in between statements which are otherwise true - Thatcher did crack down on Arthur Scargill's miners' union, and she was the target of a dramatic IRA bomb attack in Brighton - therefore the reader assumes what is in between those statements must also be true. This is an old trick, and one which was indeed used by the Nazis also. Sometimes however the hatred is such that there is no time nor willingness to apply literary multicam and the editors in question are almost tripping over their own words to get their message across. The ensuing results, detectable by repeated and/or attentive reading, would even be funny, were they not so quintessentially tragic. One such event was the publication of two columns in De Standaard, one by Ine Roox and the other by an editor using the initials "esn" (probably Evita Neefs), in the days following the July 7 bombings of the London underground. As some readers may recall, on July 8, 2005 De Standaard first published the following report by Roox, the newspaper's UK correspondent at the time:




I encircled in red first the correspondent's name, and then the paragraph wherein she introduces a certain "Norma":

Norma from Leicestershire would remain only one day in London. It panned out differently. Yesterday evening she didn't get out of the city anymore. "Never again I set a foot in London", she says flabbergasted. "I am still shivering all over." When she arrived in Kings Cross station yesterday morning, twenty minutes earlier a bomb had exploded there. "They were cordoning off the station. Everyone was evacuated." recalls Norma.

And so on. Norma is then allowed to describe how she saw aid workers help out people with blackened faces, how whe heard that many victims lost arms and legs etc. Then a businessman has his say, and then it's Norma again:

Norma shakes her head. "This could be expected. Nobody likes that rotten war in Iraq. Nobody likes Blair. We did not support that war! In my eyes Blair is the biggest terrorist in this country."

Whereupon that last citation is repeated again, printed in a bigger type as if to emphasize something really, really important. However, in her haste to convey Norma's message to the world, Roox, intentionally or not (in which case it's a Freudian slip), writes "Voor mij is Blair de grootste terrorist in dit land" - "For me Blair is the biggest terrorist in this country" instead of "In mijn ogen" - "In my eyes" - the words used by the woman from Leicestershire. Above you see just the clip, courtesy of Luc Van Braekel, and you can make out the key phrase in the upper right corner of the bigger photo preceding the clip. It is placed there prominently - no reader may miss it.


Now enter De Standaard editor "esn", probably, as we have already said, Evita Neefs, a woman frothing at the mouth whenever she hears a word commencing with "A" and ending on "merica". The day after Roox' piece, the following profile of the British PM appeared:




The two focal points in this article are the header "De grootste terrorist" - "The biggest terrorist" and a photo of a grim looking Tony Blair, conveniently placed immediately to the right of the word "terrorist" - thou shalt not miss the connection. And then it comes, see the text encircled in red:

"Een woedende man in het zwaar getroffen Kings Cross Station noemde hem gisteren in een gesprek met deze krant al "de grootste terrorist van allemaal"."

Translation:

"An angry man in the heavily hit Kings Cross Station called him [Tony Blair - MFBB] yesterday in an interview with this newspaper already "the biggest terrorist of them all"."

There you have it. It is not difficult to imagine "esn" frothing at the mouth when she entrusted this crap to the paper, for he or she must have been so elated by hearing some dumb cunt call the PM a "terrorist" that, not getting enough of using the word again and again, she forgot Norma's gender. But then of course, De Standaard being made up of progressive, enlightened and sophisticated individuals, swapping genders is probably not frowned upon so much as by us stupid, uncouth, archaic and definitely unintelligent rednecks.


The issue that deserves our immediate attention is, I would wager, an immediate and forceful rebuke of such outrageous statements and insinuations. But perhaps the bigger issue at hand is a broad and thorough investigation into "the nature and the causes" of such and inherently sick intellectual attitude. Compare it to first tackle the symptoms, but then try to root out the origin of the mal. Take this into account. For good or bad, a country participates in a war meant to oust a tyrannical regime and exclude the possibility that this regime develops WMD and/or harbors islamic terrorists willing to use them. As a citizen of that country, you can agree or disagree with the stance of your government, and, you can even decry or protest the fact that the terrorist attacks are indeed the result of the intervention of your country. In se, this is true of course - if Britain had not participated in the liberation of Iraq the bombs would most certainly have exploded in another country which did. Of course, a reasoning like that is either an exercise in futility or an act of cowardice, because in a world in which the biggest global threat is islamic terrorism, ultimately no one is safe, whether you stand in the front row or not. But we may even forgive our less gung-ho citizens this Chamberlainian attitude.

However, once we have gotten there, the ways of the Chamberlains and the Churchills among us should converge. Once that you are in it, you are in it, and under normal circumstances even the biggest coward should have no problem to discern who the bad boys are, and who the guys around which to gather for the retaliation, even if it is from the rear, even if it is to come up with an alternative strategy.

Here is where we can detect what is totally fucked up - excuse me for the mot - in our present postmodern, post christian, post everything societies.

We have in our midst, and not just in our midst, but in all kinds of important posts and functions and channels, a certain influential kind of people who are unable to identify evil, even when they trot in the guts of a dismembered person who the moment before was sitting next to them. Rescue personnel scrape the blackened remains of commuters from underground walls, and instead of at once recognizing the heinous, unbelievably evil nature of the enemy we are facing... those petty "intellectuals" trip over their words in their haste to call their own leader.... the biggest terrorist!!! This is not normal anymore , and apart from protesting the outrageous lies and accusations, we - the normal ones - must address this very, very serious, and apparently deeply rooted major malfunction. There is something rotten, not just in the State of Denmark, but in all western states, and it bears serious scrutiny. As we approach a pivotal election in the leading nation of the West, indeed in the leading nation on the planet, it is more important than ever that the voices among us who basically advocate self-destruction, are answered. I do not say silenced, because to do so would mean to compromise a key western value. Silencing opponents is something for leftists, and we can never allow ourselves to stoop to that level. We must simply trust that if we bring on the basic, honest arguments and tell our children the West's stories and histories, not just the highlights, but also the things we can't indeed be too proud of, they will be able to see that in spite of the warts, there's more than enough to be immensely proud of.

Hat tip for the article with the Thatcher allegation Luc Van Braekel.


MFBB.