THE SAGA OF THE USS KIRK.

They told you that the US had no business in Vietnam, but never uttered a word about the involvement of the USSR and China. They told you about America violating Cambodia's airspace but never questioned the legitimacy of the Ho Chi Minh Trail. They told you that a Third World country vanquished a superpower but never that the Thet Offensive was actually a complete disaster for the North Vietnamese. And they told you all about Agent Orange, rightly so for that matter...

... but then they'd never tell you anything about the USS Kirk's story.





You can read it here. Do so. Some exerpts:

"The Kirk steamed through the night to Con Son and reached the island just as the sun came up on May 1. There were 30 South Vietnamese navy ships, and dozens of fishing boats and cargo ships. All of them were packed with refugees, desperate to get out of Vietnam.

The ships "were crammed full of people," says Kent Chipman, who in 1975 was a 21-year-old machinist's mate in the ship's engine room and today works at a water purification plant in Texas. "I couldn't see below deck, but above deck the people were just as tight as you could get, side by side."

There was no exact count of how many people were on those ships. Some historical records say there were 20,000 people. Other records suggest it was as many as 30,000. Jan Herman, a historian with the U.S. Navy Medical Department, who is documenting the story of the Kirk, uses the higher number.

The Kirk sent its engineers to some of the boats to get them started.

....


After fixing what could be fixed on the seaworthy vessels and transferring people from the ships that would be left behind, the Kirk led the flotilla of naval ships, fishing boats and cargo ships toward the Philippines.

The USS Cook, another destroyer escort, like the Kirk, helped out as the ships were leaving Con Son. The Cook's crew provided rice, and its corpsman helped Burwinkel and his assistant from the Kirk attend to the sick and injured, too.

As the flotilla headed out to sea, on the way to the Philippines, other Navy ships came in and out of the escort, according to Herman. Among those other ships were the USS Mobile, USS Tuscaloosa, USS Barbour County, USS Deliver and USS Abnaki.

But it's clear from the daily logs from the Kirk and the other ships that the crew of the Kirk took the lead.

"For me, the Kirk was ideal," says Armitage, who moved from the Kirk to the Vietnamese navy's flagship. "It could communicate with the rest of the U.S. fleet. They would go with us across to the Philippines and would be able to rescue any of the folks who might be in harm's way. Some had been wounded. Some were pregnant. All were sick after a while. And we needed a way to take care of those folks."

The Kirk's sailors kept busy providing food, water and medicine to people on the South Vietnamese ships.

Burwinkel spent his time moving from ship to ship treating the sick and injured. With thousands of people — many of them babies and children — he had to work almost nonstop.

"When they gave me the meritorious service medal over all this, I quite frankly referred to it as my 'no-sleep' medal," says Burwinkel, who made a career in the Navy and is now retired and living in Pensacola, Fla. "I would go out there and do my thing and at dark we would come back to the Kirk and try to get a little bit to eat and make some rounds — gather my wits about me, resupply myself and get ready for the next day."

'Last Sovereign Territory Of The Republic Of Vietnam'

Of the some 30,000 refugees on vessels escorted by the Kirk over six days, only three died.

But as the flotilla approached the Philippines, the Kirk's captain got some bad news. The presence of South Vietnamese vessels in a Philippine port would present the government in Manila with a diplomatic predicament.

"The Philippine government wasn't going to allow us in, period, because these ships belonged to the North Vietnamese now and they didn't want to offend the new country," Jacobs, the captain, recalls.

The government of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos was one of the first to recognize the Communist rulers now in control of a single Vietnam, and Jacobs was told the ships should go back.

Armitage and his South Vietnamese friend, Capt. Do, came up with a solution that Marcos had to accept.

Do recalls the plan: "We will raise the American flag and lower the Vietnamese flag as a sign of transfer [of] the ship back to the United States, because during the war those ships are given to the Vietnamese government as a loan, if you want, from the United States, to fight the Communists. Now the war is over, we turn them back to the United States."

There was a frantic search to find 30 American flags. Two officers from the Kirk were sent aboard each Vietnamese ship to take command after a formal flag ceremony.

Rick Sautter was one of the Kirk officers who took command of a Vietnamese ship.

"That was the last vestige of South Vietnam. And when those flags came down and the American flags went up, that was it. Because a Navy ship is sovereign territory and so that was the last sovereign territory of the Republic of Vietnam," he says.

"Thousands and thousands of people on the boats start to sing the [South Vietnamese] national anthem. When they lower the flag, they cry, cry, cry," Do remembers. "

Also, check out this video. How a young American woman of Vietnamese descent found out about the origins of her middle name.





A fine and proud ship, the USS Kirk:





Hat tip CDR Salamander.



MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT HUEY LEWIS AND THE NEWS, THE CLASH, GARY NUMAN.

In the mid-eighties, San Francisco based Huey Lewis and The News had a string of hits. Hip to be square comes to mind, but this wasn't bad either.





Heart and Soul from the 1983 LP Sports, which proved to be their breakthrough album (they still exist today, btw). But Jesus Christ Almighty, how
eighties videos suck.


The Clash with Rock the casbah. From the album Combat Rock (1982), a successfull but also rather commercial album.





Needless to say, my favorite line is 'Drop your bombs between the minarets'. Lead man Joe Strummer (vocals, guitar) died far too early in 2002 of a heart attack, aged 50. His band had already broken up in 1985, after only 9 years of existence. Even so, The Clash were a highly influential punk band.



1982. Londoner Gary Numan, for some time known as the King of Electronic Pop, with Music for Chameleons.





Dunno if you ever heard or saw Numan. Despite his somewhat ghey appearance, at least in his heyday, the man reportedly slept with 500 vhimen. At some point, he married a member of his fan club, a certain Gemma O'Neill, with whom he has three children. Also, he seems to be an accomplished stunt pilot.



That's all for today. Nite, and may the farce be with you.


MFBB.

THE SIGN FALLS OFF THE WALL.

No comment.



MFBB.

IN MEMORIAM STAFF SERGEANT ROBERT J. MILLER.

Today, President Obama awarded the Medal of Honor, posthumously, to Staff Sergeant Robert J. Miller, who, aged 24, fell in combat against taliban forces in Konar Province, Afghanistan.





This is the official narrative as taken from the US Army website:

"Staff Sgt. Robert J. Miller, U.S. Army, heroically distinguished himself by exceptionally valorous conduct in the face of the enemy of the U.S. while serving as the Weapons Sergeant, Special Forces Operational Detachment Alpha 3312, Special Operations Task Force–33, Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force–Afghanistan, Forward Operating Base Naray, Kunar Province, Afghanistan, in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.

During the pre-dawn hours of Jan. 25, 2008, ODA 3312 conducted a combat reconnaissance patrol to Gowardesh, Afghanistan, to confirm or deny enemy activity and/or insurgents presence in the vicinity of Chen Khar in order to clear the valley of insurgent safe havens. This area was known to have several high- and medium-value targets massing and operating freely in the valley and three surrounding villages. The area of operations was also symbolically and strategically important because it was a Russian-era chokepoint, provided the enemy a tactical advantage due to its high ground and deep valley summits, and was a well-known insurgent stronghold.

Insurgents had prepared reinforced rocket-propelled grenade and small arms fighting positions with fortified overhead cover throughout the valley. They also amassed weapons caches comprised of RPGs, PKM medium machine guns, AK-47 assault rifles, ammunition, and food stores in the event of a protracted engagement.

The enemy’s confidence and morale was at a two-year high following a series of tactical successes against Afghan National Security Forces. The experience garnered from these battles, continued refinement of sophisticated tactics, techniques and procedures (including ambushes) and the expansion of insurgent forces in the region threatened the Coalition's ability to operate freely in this key terrain. Insurgents were confident in their ability to win any battle against Coalition Forces on their own terrain.

As the combined ODA and ANA convoy neared its objective, ODA 3312 was forced to halt twice to dismount and explode insurgent-emplaced boulders along its route. Staff Sgt. Miller and other members of ODA 3312 recognized this tactict as a potential precursor to an insurgent ambush and immediately heightened security. Recognizing the historical enemy tactic used to canalize and ambush Coalition forces, the detachment dismounted an overwatch element.

Staff Sgt. Miller led the overwatch elements as the threat of imminent danger increased. The rocky, snow-packed terrain, freezing temperatures and a fierce wind chill further exacerbated the ODA’s movement to the objective. The ODA’s only Pashto speaker, Staff Sgt. Miller took charge of the dismounted element and assembled partnered ANA forces to ensure they could move under cover.

Once ODA 3312 arrived at the target compound, Staff Sgt. Miller led the ANA and established security around the ODA’s ground mobility vehicles. After security was established, the team confirmed through the employment of an unmanned aerial vehicle that 15 to 20 insurgents were congregating and occupying prepared fighting positions in the targeted compound.

Maintaining his situational awareness, Staff Sgt. Miller immediately jumped into his vehicle's turret and engaged the enemy with its mounted MK19 40mm automatic grenade launcher.

From his vantage point in the turret of his vehicle, Staff Sgt. Miller expertly described the engagement area to the joint tactical air controller and identified insurgent positions by engaging them with his MK19.

As a result of his superior tactical skills, he positively marked the enemy while simultaneously describing the area to the JTAC. Without his expert marksmanship and accurate description of the area, the JTAC would not have been able to provide accurate grid locations for close air support.

As noted by the team’s JTAC, Staff Sgt. Miller’s involvement in the employment of CAS was largely responsible for the accuracy of four 30mm strafe runs and the emplacement of three precision-guided GBU38 munitions on the objective. As a result of his efforts, two A-10 Warthogs and two F-15 Strike Eagles dealt lethal effects onto numerous enemy positions and disrupted their ability to maneuver.

As Staff Sgt. Miller continued to neutralize numerous insurgent positions, his MK19 sustained a catastrophic malfunction, which eliminated it for the duration of the battle. Without hesitation, Staff Sgt. Miller quickly transitioned from the MK19 to an M240B machine gun mounted on the rear of his vehicle and continued to effectively engage the enemy.

Understanding the peril of the battle and the composition of his force, Staff Sgt. Miller moved from his firing position and began emplacing ANA soldiers in positions to provide overwatch, detect movement from the high ground, observe the rear of the patrol and provide security to the flank of the ground assault. His actions provided security for his team and enabled them to maintain their focus on enemy targets. Once ample security was established, Staff Sgt. Miller re-engaged the enemy.

During a lull in fire, Staff Sgt. Miller dismounted his GMV a second time to repair a malfunctioning Carl Gustav 84mm recoilless rifle.

Upon completion of the initial contact and CAS, the ODA commander directed a dismounted patrol to conduct battle damage assessment and a post-CAS strike assessment of the destroyed insurgent positions. Sensing the need to provide the ANA additional assistance, the ODA commander charged Staff Sgt. Miller with the responsibility to lead the partnered ANA force in an advisory role.

With the proficiency of an already-proven combat leader, Staff Sgt. Miller briefed the ANA platoon leadership on the scheme of maneuver onto the objective in their native Pashto language. Staff Sgt. Miller established rapport and instilled confidence in the ANA platoon leadership and its soldiers despite being partnered with the ANA platoon only 30 minutes prior to the mission.

Again, because of his tactical prowess, leadership and command of the Pashto language, Staff Sgt. Miller was selected as the point man for the dismounted patrol comprised of an Alpha and Bravo team from ODA 3312 and 15 ANA soldiers. He led the patrol with his M249 squad automatic weapon across the Gowardesh Bridge toward the target area.

During the movement, Staff Sgt. Miller continually reinforced proper patrolling techniques as well as repeatedly adjusted and corrected the ANA rate of speed. Realizing that the engagement area was located in the mouth of a small, extremely steep and narrow valley that created a natural choke point, Staff Sgt. Miller directed the ANA to disperse from a file into a modified wedge.

As Staff Sgt. Miller and the lead element of the patrol entered the mouth of the narrow valley, they confronted an insurgent hiding behind a large boulder. Refusing to surrender, the insurgent leaped from the boulder yelled, “Allah Akbar!” and began firing on the lead element from approximately five meters. Staff Sgt. Miller stepped forward to return fire and killed the insurgent instantly.

This contact initiated a near-ambush from a company-sized group of insurgents. The insurgent forces fired on Staff Sgt. Miller’s patrol with multiple PKM machine guns, RPGs, and AK-47 assault rifles from distances of less than 25 meters.

The patrol was completely vulnerable, in the kill zone and without cover in a complex ambush with insurgent fighting positions located to the front (East), the left (North), and the right (South).

It soon became evident that numerous insurgents occupied prepared, elevated and hardened fighting positions in the mountain rock with overhead cover along the North and South valley ridgeline. Insurgents on the valley floor to Staff Sgt. Miller’s direct front, left, and right were fighting in defilade and possessed ample cover and concealment necessary for the employment of overwhelming fires on the totally exposed patrol.

As enemy fire erupted from the high ground, Staff Sgt. Miller called out the contact report to his team members and his detachment commander located behind him. He simultaneously engaged multiple insurgent positions from a distance of approximately 15 to 20 meters.

In the face of devastating insurgent fire, the ANA located directly behind Staff Sgt. Miller broke formation and bound away downhill and out of the kill zone, leaving Staff Sgt. Miller alone and with no support in the open terrain.

To the front of Staff Sgt. Miller’s position one PKM machine gun and five AK47s were inflicting devastating hostile fire on the retreating ANA members and the remaining ODA patrol. Understanding the potential for catastrophe, Staff Sgt. Miller boldly charged the enemy and accurately engaged the entire force with his squad automatic weapon, thus eliminating the threat.

With heavy fire from insurgent forces from all sides of his position engulfing him, Staff Sgt. Miller continued to engage at least four other insurgent positions, killing or wounding at least 10 insurgents.

The darkness of the night and limited visibility made Staff Sgt. Miller’s weapon, also the most casualty producing, the greatest threat to the insurgent ambush. The highlighted muzzle flash and the distinct sound from his SAW instantly marked Staff Sgt. Miller as an easily identifiable target.

Cognizant that his vulnerability increased with every burst from his SAW, Staff Sgt. Miller continued to engage the enemy courageously drawing fire away from his team and onto his position. Within seconds, Staff Sgt. Miller began receiving a majority of the insurgents’ heavy volume of fire.

Realizing that his team was pinned down and unable to actively engage the enemy, Staff Sgt. Miller, with complete disregard for his own personal safety, continued to charge forward through the open area engaging multiple elevated insurgent positions and purposely drawing fire away from his trapped ODA members.

Staff Sgt. Miller’s cover fire was so accurate that it not only provided the necessary cover to save his team, it also suppressed the enemy to the right flank of the patrol, to the point where they could not reposition from that direction against the ODA for the duration of the engagement.

His actions single-handedly provided the needed cover fire that allowed his fellow ODA members to maneuver to covered positions as the ANA broke formation and ran away from the kill zone.

During his final charge forward, Staff Sgt. Miller threw two hand grenades into fighting positions, destroying the positions and killing or wounding an additional four insurgents. Only when Staff Sgt. Miller realized his fellow team members were out of immediate danger, and in positions to support him, did he attempt to move for cover.

As he directed his fire to engage enemy positions above him, an insurgent shot him through the right side of his upper torso under his right arm; the area not protected by his body armor. Staff Sgt. Miller immediately turned toward the enemy and shot and killed the insurgent who had wounded him. During this time, Staff Sgt. Miller’s detachment commander also sustained gunshot wounds to his upper chest and shoulder.

The perilous situation forced the detachment commander to order the ODA to fall back to cover. Staff Sgt. Miller realized his commander was seriously wounded and that, as the point man with ODA’s only SAW, he had the highest potential to inflict the most casualties on the enemy. Again, with complete disregard for his own personal safety, Staff Sgt. Miller remained alone at the front of the patrol, so his team could bound back.

Ignoring the severity of his critical wound and still completely exposed to intense, direct enemy fire, Staff Sgt. Miller continued to low crawl through the snow, incessantly fighting uphill into the valley to engage insurgent positions to the East and South in order to draw fire away from his wounded commander and identify insurgent positions to his fellow ODA members.

Without his heroic efforts, his wounded commander would not have been moved safely out of the kill zone to the casualty collection point.

Throughout the engagement, the insurgent fire around Staff Sgt. Miller was so intense that his fellow team members could not see him due to the dust, debris, and RPG and small arms fire impacting around him. During the ensuing 25-minute battle, Staff Sgt. Miller was mortally wounded by a second gunshot to his upper torso under his left arm. Despite suffering a second and fatal wound, Staff Sgt. Miller remained steadfast and continued his selfless acts of heroism. He provided essential disposition and location reports of insurgent actions and he relentlessly fired his SAW until he expended all of his ammunition and threw his final hand grenade.

At the first opportunity, members of Staff Sgt. Miller’s team bound up to his position to render aid and recover him. Enemy reinforcements overwhelmed the recovery team with direct fire causing the team to seek cover. During the recovery attempt, the enemy’s precision was clearly evident as team members sustained multiple hits from small arms fire to their body armor and equipment.

Approximately an hour and 45 minutes later, a quick reaction force arrived, which allowed the ODA to lead a patrol back into the valley to recover Staff Sgt. Miller. As a testament of the enemy’s tenacity, the quick reaction force sent to assist with recovery operations sustained additional casualties from intense direct RPG and small arms fire. Because of the enemy’s dominance of the terrain and potential for loss of additional lives, the patrol was forced to use its second CCP and two MEDVACs.

The entire battle lasted nearly seven hours.

Post-battle intelligence reports indicate that in excess of 140 insurgents participated in the ambush, more than 40 were killed and over 60 were wounded. Staff Sgt. Miller is credited with killing more than 16 and wounding over 30 insurgents. His valor under fire from a numerically superior force, complete selflessness and disregard for his own life, combined with his unmatched ability to accurately identify and engage insurgent positions, allowed his patrol to move to the safety of covered positions.

Staff Sgt. Miller chose to remain in the fight and provide vital suppressive fires to his teammates in order to save their lives, while disregarding his own mortality.

Staff Sgt. Miller’s selfless acts saved the lives of his seven of his ODA members and 15 Afghan soldiers. As a result of Staff Sgt. Miller’s heroic actions, the Gowardesh Insurgency was dealt a crippling blow, decimating insurgent forces involved in the battle, and shattering their morale and confidence. Staff Sgt. Miller’s actions exemplify the honored tradition of military heroism and reflect distinct credit upon himself, Special Operations Task Force–33, the Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force–Afghanistan, Special Operations Command Central, and the U.S. Army."

Here is the video of the ceremony:





God bless.


MFBB.

ECONAZIS GIVE WHOLE NEW DIMENSION TO 'FREUDIAN SLIP'.

I realize I'm late to the party, but I can't help a little gloating so this thing comes up again, here, on DowneastBlog. I'm talking, of course, about the appalling 10:10 'No Pressure' video made by Richard Curtis, meant to instill in the broader public, beginning to suspect that MMGW and perhaps GW itself is the mother of all hoaxes, new fears about ecological disasters if we don't reduce our carbon footprint.

The video has been taken down on the organizations' website, but for those few among you who haven't watched it yet, here it is again:





In my opinion, by far the best column on the subject was The Telegraph's James Delingpole's:

Gillian Anderson, Peter Crouch [a tall footballer], Radiohead, David Ginola [a French footballer] and – above all – Richard Curtis, I salute you! You have just released a video which has entered history as the most emetic, ugly, counterproductive eco-propaganda movie ever made. Believe me this thing is going to go viral beyond your wildest dreams. But unfortunately that virus is ebola. (Hat tips: Barry Woods/Tom Dalton/Pete Hayes/Old Goat/half the civilised world….)

Here’s what the Guardian had to say, excitedly, when it previewed the video yesterday:

Had a look? Well, I’m certain you’ll agree that detonating school kids, footballers and movie stars into gory pulp for ignoring their carbon footprints is attention-grabbing.

It then goes on to quote one or two of the usual suspects, such as this light-hearted, “no we don’t really want to blow up schoolchildren for showing insufficient environmental zeal, that’s just our sense of humour, ha ha ha ha” little missy:

“Doing nothing about climate change is still a fairly common affliction, even in this day and age. What to do with those people, who are together threatening everybody’s existence on this planet? Clearly we don’t really think they should be blown up, that’s just a joke for the mini-movie, but maybe a little amputating would be a good place to start?” jokes 10:10 founder and Age of Stupid film maker Franny Armstrong.

What’s fascinating, reading this kind of thing, is seeing just how far removed from reality the green movement has gone. Kyoto is dead. Copenhagen was a flop. Cancun is going to make a mockery of all those green dreams about global carbon emissions legislation. And how do the environmentalists respond?

By force of argument?

By presenting new evidence which supports their cause?

Nope.

By threatening to blow up anyone who disagrees with them.

And not just that: they believe this is actually an entirely reasonable and rather amusing position to adopt...."

Upon learning more about 10:10 and the creepy people behind it - take Franny Armtrong e.g. - and after watching 'No Pressure' again, and again... I was reminded of those marvellous words of wisdom by Thomas Sowell in his groundbreaking work 'The Vision of the Anointed':

'...What a vision may offer, and what the prevailing vision of our time emphatically does offer, is a special state of grace for those who believe in it. Those who accept this vision are deemed to be not merely factually correct but morally on a higher plane. Put differently, those who disagree with the prevailing vision are seen as being not merely in error, but in sin. For those who have this vision of the world, the anointed and the benighted do not argue on the same moral plane or play by the same cold rules of logic and evidence. The benighted are to be made “aware”, to have their “consciousness raised”, and the wistful hope is held out that they will “grow”. Should the benighted prove recalcitrant, however, then their “mean-spiritedness” must be fought and the “real reasons” behind their arguments and actions exposed....'

Right. The 'mean-spiritedness of the recalcitrant' must be fought. By blowing them up, for instance. Rarely have econutters so blatantly exposed their true intentions as in 'No Pressure'.

The extreme leftist people behind this appalling 'movie' - 10:10's founder Franny Armstrong is an avowed Ken Livingston fan, to give just one example - may look like lunatics. But we should never forget they are dangerous lunatics. Madam Armstrong may make nothing of the blood splattering in No Pressure: "Clearly we don’t really think they should be blown up, that’s just a joke for the mini-movie, but maybe a little amputating would be a good place to start?” and "the five people blown up are but a blip compared to the hundreds of thousands dying from climate change"...

... but you better take these bozos at their words.

I reckon you recognize this guy?





Pim Fortuyn, murdered in broad daylight in 2002 in Hilversum, The Netherlands, with six bullets in the back and head.


But you may have trouble placing this guy:





Let me help you. Fortuyn's murderer Volkert Van Der Graaf. Vegan. Animal Rights Activist. Member of the militant environmental organization Vereniging Milieu Offensief.


A greenie.


They may look like fools, but they are dangerous.



MFBB.

A DAY OUT IN THE ARDENNES.

Saturday was a day with shitty weather but unbelievably, the weather broadcast for this Sunday was a warm (up to 23°C) and sunny 3rd of October, so I guessed this might just be about the last summer-like day of 2010, ideal for a day out in the Ardennes with wife and kiddos.

First off, a pic of the Meuse river, with to your right the principal rocks of the Massif de Freyr, very popular with Belgian, Dutch, British and Northern French rock climbers. The rock wall you see is the so-called l'Al Lègne, a 120-meter high nearly vertical wall of stratified limestone.





A pic from a bit closer up, on top of a grate. You can well see how through the ages the Meuse has carved this valley through the land, with the Rochers de Freyr nevertheless being so hard they forced the river to bend. The two lads had just finished climbing up l'Al Lègne. I don't know whether the lady did so too, but she sure had nice titties, pity there was no cleavage.





Uh, wait a minute. What did I just say? I was talking about valleys, right?


Okay, have some patience with poor old Outlaw, who still hasn't upgraded from his geriatric Nikon Coolpix 4800. I post this video just to annoy people.





Here, a better shot of the Chateau de Freyr, which is actually some kind of mini Versailles. Indeed, the park, with a.o. 300 year old orange trees, was designed by the famous landscape architect Le Notre, who also did Versailles' parks, and the Sun King himself, Louis XIV, stayed here. This Renaissance castle was in fact the summerresidence of the Dukes of Beaufort-Spontin, and their descendants, in their 20th generation now, inhabit it to this day.





Then it was off to another chateau, more precisely the Chateau de Walzin. Very interesting place, in fact. Chroniclers mention the existence of some stronghold on this very spot from the 11th century on. What you see right now is of course a neogothic folly built from 1850 on by a certain Alfred Brugman, and adapted in the thirties by a descendant, Frédéric Brugman. What stood here before was ravaged four times, and only the 11th century donjon is still there. Castles and chateaux have been peppered quite abundantly in this corner. Also nearby is the Chateau de Veves, another must-see.





When I had a closer look at my photo this evening, I saw that I should have waited a couple of more weeks, till some kind of Indian Summer turns the Ardennes into a red-green-yellow-brown carpet. When you take a pic then, yu get something like this (not my photo):





After Walzin the evening had set in, so we off to nearby Dinant, the "fille de la Meuse" [the Daughter of the Meuse - MFBB], for a wrapup of the trip in a cafeteria. There I took this pic of the Cathedral of Notre Dame, with Dinant's citadel behind it on top of the cliffs.





Here's another overview of the centre of this town of 13,000 people. I picked this photo from Wikipedia, we had no time left to cross the Meuse for a photo op from this angle. When you cross the bridge on foot, you might want to look out for a commemmoration plaque marking the spot where a young Lieutenant Charles de Gaulle was wounded in World War I. Speaking of World War I, long before the Waffen SS Dinant was subjected to teutonic fury, since in the opening days of the Great War, no fewer than 674 Dinantois were brutally murdered by German soldiers.




Dinant is also famous for being the birthplace of Adolphe Sax, the inventor of the saxophone.





And we conclude with a pic for the romantic souls. Again, not mine. Photographer's a certain Luc Viatour.





Good night.


MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT DAVID MCCOMB, MOBY, PATTI SMITH.

David McComb with Setting you free, from the album Love of Will (1994).




He was the front man of famous Aussie band The Triffids. Died in 99 as a result of complications following both a car crash and drug abuse.


Moby. That's when I reach for my revolver (1996). It's actually a cover from a 1981 Mission of Burma song.





You can see that from the early days Moby was some kind of nutter.


Patti Smith with Frederick.




I seem to recall there's something tragic with this song (as a non-native English speaker, haven't paid much attention to the actual lyrics, weird though that may sound. Non-native English speakers are always first struck by the musical arrangements, then the text). Anyroad, IIRC the Frederick Smith is singing about was her friend or husband who tragically died. I think so. RIP.



MFBB.

NEW CENTER-RIGHT MINORITY GOVERNMENT IN THE NETHERLANDS: A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION.

Circumstances and lack of time prevented me from ever putting up a decent post about this years' parliamentary elections in The Netherlands, which took place on June 9th, and resulted in a clear shift to the right. The big winners of these elections were the VVD [the liberal party, but note that in Europe 'liberal' is considered center-right - MFBB] and the PVV, Geert Wilders' Party For Freedom [Partij voor de Vrijheid - MFBB]. For a host of reasons the clear outcome did not immediatey result in a government, not least because of the machinations of the leftist parties which were understandably totally upset because of the PVV's ascendance. All through summer and early fall the negotiations dragged on. But yesterday, Thursday September 30, the soon-to-be Dutch PM Mark Rutte (VVD), announced the formation of a minority government consisting of VVD and the christian-democrat CDA, with, and this is important, gedoogsteun (conditional support) from the PVV. In short, Wilders' PVV is not part of the new government. He will however support it as long as it implements the far-reaching measures the PVV has been asking for for years. The formula is not new, and has been tried succesfully in Denmark, where Pia Kjaersaard's Dansk Folkeparti (DF) has in the same manner supported Anders Fogh Rasmussen's center-right minority government for years. As a result, Denmark is now far, far better off than most European countries.




The Danish Option. "Rechtsaf" means "to the Right". From left to right: Maxime Verhagen (CDA, a former Foreign Secretary), Mark Rutte (VVD, the future PM) and Geert Wilders (PVV, he will offer support for the minority government VVD-CDA).


The guidelines Rutte wants to follow are:

a.) Cutting government spending
b.) Cutting the number of government employees
c.) Reducing the size of House and Senate, which in The Netherlands are called the Eerste en Tweede Kamer.
d.) Reducing the EU contribution
e.) Slashing expenses in child allowances, the public broadcasters and the army (the latter point is a bummer of course)
f.) Implementing a more severe immigration and asylum policy.
g.) General prohibition of the burqa
h.) More means for domestic security
i.) Raisin the retirement age to 66, with an option of raising it further in the future if life expectancy allows it

The motto of the new government is "Freedom and responsibility".

Geert Wilders, PVV chairman, is pleased with the accord. In an interview yesterday he was quoted as saying 'Your voice has made that a new wind will be blowing. The country becomes safer, the number of asylum seekers will drop, and there will be investments for elderly care'.

It is indeed true that one of the focal points of Wilders' campaign is enhanced portfolios for taking care of the elderly. This is not so strange as it may seem. Due to The Netherlands' catastrophic demography 'dynamic', which it shares with basically all western countries, it will be confronted, two decades hence, with an enormous block of 65+ voters. Wilders' emphasis on more means for them is meant to placate them and avoid a Catch 22 scenario, in which disgruntled retirees would block necessary reforms, thus making future reforms ever more necessary. How this is all going to pan out is still unknown, but it seems to me the PVV's preoccupance with the elderly is more about psychology than actual welfare.

Wilders also claimed that if the proposed measures to cut down immigration are applied in full, they will result in a reduction of 50% in the number of non-western immigrants.

All in all, I think there is cautious reason for optimism, but this should only be a beginning. I do not want to sound like an incurable pessimist, but I see nowhere concrete measures to stop islamization. Nevertheless, this new Dutch center-right minority government is a step in the right direction, and further confirmation of what I have been predicting for years, namely Europes shift to the right - even though 'right' in Europe obviously still means something quite different from what it means in the States.



MFBB.


P.S.: See also this excellent post over at Gates of Vienna.

AMERICA, WAKE UP.

Yet another mob of muslims aggressively taking possession of the streets. Only this time it's not in Paris' Barbès neighborhood, nor before a Milan church, nor the Groenplaats in Antwerpen.

It's Madison Avenue, NYC.





You allow islam to gain a foothold, you'll end up with this:

"... Sardar Israullah Zehri, a tribal leader and senator from Balochistan and a member of the PPP, took to the floor of parliament this past August to defend violence against women. Five women in his province had been buried alive for staining their family’s honor. (Reports from various human-rights groups indicate the number of women buried may actually be as high as ten.) No one knows who the women were; we have snippets—a first name here, a date of birth there—but they’ve been murdered terribly well, erased from public record.

In parliament, a month after the women were buried alive, Zehri defended the killings as “part of our traditional customs.” Three months after his atrocious declaration, he was appointed the Federal Minister of Postal Services (see?) and made an adviser to the prime minister’s cabinet. When criticized for his statements, Zehri shrugged off his critics—five women died and the sky didn’t fall, the charming minister is reputed to have said.

Then, in November, the PPP and its president, Benazir Bhutto’s widower Asif Zardari, appointed Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani as Federal Minister of Education (a cabinet post with actual heft to it). Any Pakistani with a memory should have alarm bells ringing in his head at the mention of Bijarani’s name. In 2007, the chief justice of Pakistan ordered his arrest after he decreed that five girls be handed over, like currency, to the family of a murdered man to settle a feud between their two families. Bijarani was acting as head of a local tribal council similar to the one that had Mukhtaran Mai gang raped. The eldest of the girls was age six, and the youngest were only two years old...."

Article by Fatima Bhutto. Hat tip The Daily Beast.


ISLAM IS CANCER. Live with it. Or rather, live with that statement. You know how it goes with cancer. You either destroy it with chemiotherapy, or you cut it away. If you don't, or you don't do it in time, you die from it.

America better wake up.



MFBB.

BILDERBERG GROUP DISCUSSES... WAIT FOR IT... GLOBAL COOLING!

Over the course of the past two years I have come to appreciate the UK's The Telegraph very much, and especially several of its young unapologetic columnists. One among them is James Delingpole, who last week had the following interesting column:

"Bilderberg. Whether you believe it’s part of a sinister conspiracy which will lead inexorably to one world government or whether you think it’s just an innocent high-level talking shop, there’s one thing that can’t be denied: it knows which way the wind is blowing. (Hat tips: Will/NoIdea/Ozboy)

At its June meeting in Sitges, Spain (unreported and held in camera, as is Bilderberg’s way), some of the world’s most powerful CEOs rubbed shoulders with notable academics and leading politicians. They included: the chairman of Fiat, the Irish Attorney General Paul Gallagher, the US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke, Henry Kissinger, Bill Gates, Dick Perle, the Queen of the Netherlands, the editor of the Economist…. Definitely not Z-list, in other words.

Which is what makes one particular item on the group’s discussion agenda so tremendously significant. See if you can spot the one I mean:

The 58th Bilderberg Meeting will be held in Sitges, Spain 3 – 6 June 2010. The Conference will deal mainly with Financial Reform, Security, Cyber Technology, Energy, Pakistan, Afghanistan, World Food Problem, Global Cooling, Social Networking, Medical Science, EU-US relations.

Yep, that’s right. Global Cooling.

Which means one of two things.

Either it was a printing error.

Or the global elite is perfectly well aware that global cooling represents a far more serious and imminent threat to the world than global warming, but is so far unwilling to admit it except behind closed doors.

Let me explain briefly why this is a bombshell waiting to explode.

Almost every government in the Western world from the USA to Britain to all the other EU states to Australia and New Zealand is currently committed to a policy of “decarbonisation.” This in turn is justified to (increasingly sceptical) electorates on the grounds that man-made CO2 is a prime driver of dangerous global warming and must therefore be reduced drastically, at no matter what social, economic and environmental cost. In the Eighties and Nineties, the global elite had a nice run of hot weather to support their (scientifically dubious) claims. But now they don’t. Winters are getting colder. Fuel bills are rising (in the name of combating climate change, natch). The wheels are starting to come off the AGW bandwagon. Ordinary people, resisting two decades of concerted brainwashing, are starting to notice.

All this, of course, spells big trouble for the global power elite. As well as leading to food shortages (as, for example, it becomes harder to grow wheat in northerly latitudes; adding, of course, to such already-present disasters as biofuels and the rejection of GM), global cooling is going to find electorates increasingly angry that they have been sold a pup.

Our fuel bills have risen inexorably; our countryside, our views and our property values have been ravaged by hideous wind farms; our holidays have been made more expensive; our cost of living has been driven up by green taxes; our freedoms have been curtailed in any number of pettily irritating ways from what kind of light bulbs we are permitted to use to how we dispose of our rubbish. And to what end? If man-made global warming was really happening and really a problem we might possibly have carried on putting up with all these constraints on our liberty and assaults on our income. But if it turns out to have been a myth……"

A couple of years ago we had a lefty contributor here, at least in the comments section, and if I were a mean character it would please me to no end to conclude, anno 2010, that all his predictions and estimates have by now proven to be a steaming pile of shit. Man Made Global Warming or even Global Warming in se? Sorry, sooooooooo nineties. And I'm not even elaborating on his other claims.

By contrast, I think we over here at DowneastBlog have a habit of being continually right, whether it's on islamization, Europes rightward shift (no matter how much that shift leaves to be desired), Iraq, the Surge, Obama's disastrous tenure or The Jam. Actually, a man'd get tired of being right so often. And now the steady unraveling of the MMGW/GW hoax. Btw, d'you know how many months I was able to switch off central heating in my house this year so far?

One. One month.

July that was.



MFBB.

POWERFUL AD.

Hat tip the inimitable Theo Spark. Also check out this article, full of Hope.


MFBB.

DUTCH AIRLINE COMPANY KLM FLYING GAYS TOWARDS SOUND BEATING UP.

Via Dutch online daily Algemeen Dagblad - Economie, September 13, 2010:

"AMSTERDAM - by means of a quiz about gay capitals, the national Dutch airline company KLM tries to appeal to British gays, writes the Algemeen Dagblad today. The campaign, which runs till the end of the month, aims to convince the target group of the gay-friendliness of the Koninklijke Luchtvaartmaatschappij.

'How hot are you on gay capitals?' begins the quiz on the site klmgaygetaway.co.uk. Visitors only have to guess the destinations on ten photos they see, fill in the multiple choice questions and leave their personal data. Thereafter they stand a chance to win a flight to one of the 'Top Gay Capitals' KLM is serving.

KLM finds it 'dead normal' that it aims at a specific target group. 'That's a bit business as usual for us', says spokeswoman Joyce Veekman. KLM regularly runs targeted campaings at, for instance, businessmen and golfers.

The quiz is part of a broader campaign for gays in general (CN/BVDL)."

Future historians, standing on the ashes of western civilization, will wonder how entire societies so willingly marched towards self-destruction. The fertility rate among your average autochton Europeans is now at a moribund 1.3 children per couple, although I suspect that number may still be too high. Yet KLM sees no problem presenting a lifestyle that does not result in that most precious of assets - customers - as utterly normal.

Apart from the fact that KLM chooses for short-term financial gains without having a clear strategy for the nearby future, which will be determined not only by the massive disappearance of customers with purchasing power, but also by terrifying problems in finding competent technical personnel (keep in mind that the output in terms of technicians and engineers of the muslim community is pathetically small), you have to wonder whether the company's top brass sits in some ivory control tower.

The autochton Dutchmen and -women take presumably pride in Amsterdam as one of the top gay capitals in the world. However, if you avoid rosy MSM accounts you discover an entirely different reality. Amsterdam, which, like Rotterdam, is undergoing a stealth ethnic cleansing at the hands of mainly muslim immigrants, is actually getting quite dangerous for gays. Via Big Peace, September 2010:

GAYS HARASSED DURING DEMONSTRATION

AMSTERDAM — A demonstration of two thousand gay and lesbians against anti-gay violence Sunday was ruined by a series of incidents. In one of them a demonstrator[1] was injured at the hands of two women of 18 and 19 years. Afterwards the demonstrator reported the perpetrators to the police. They were both subsequently detained, but set free on Monday.

The two women wanted to get through a group of demonstrators on the Westermarkt with their bikes, shortly after the march had ended. When the man said something about it, they shouted insulting remarks at him. This resulted in a fight in which the man was hit by the two women. When one of the woman hit him with a bag, he was wounded in the head. The man and bystanders managed to hold the girls until the police arrived.

[Note: Shortly after the demonstration against anti-gay violence a boy was beaten up by two Moroccan girls. This was reported by eyewitnesses who were present. (source) — VH]

But there were more incidents. On Monday, the reports poured in to a gay-rights organization, the foundation “Right to Feel Safe”, as spokesman Fya Hopelezz said.

For example, there were boys on scooters [see article below; these may have been Moroccans] who repeatedly drove onto the protesters. A group of lesbians was threatened, verbally abused and pelted with beer cans [see also the article below], and several fights had to be calmed down.

“This makes me very sad. It shows how rock-hard the situation is now in Amsterdam,” says Hopelezz. “The anger sits deep in the gay community. Anger over the violence, but also because everyone keeps saying that anti-gay violence is not that bad within the city.”

This is no recent phenomenon, of course. Five years ago already, The Times ran the following article:

"WHEN the editor of one of America’s leading gay magazines visited the world’s gay capital a fortnight ago, he assumed that he would be safe.

But as Chris Crain, editor of the Washington Blade, was walking hand in hand with his boyfriend near one of the gay districts in Amsterdam, two men standing on a street corner spat at his face. He stopped to ask why, was called a “fag” and suddenly the two youths turned into seven.

Surrounded, Mr Crain was kicked to the ground by the gang and ended up in hospital with a broken nose and badly bruised face.

His attackers were Moroccan youths, blamed by Dutch gay rights groups for a disturbing rise of gay-bashing, as conservative Islamic culture clashes with Dutch liberalism.

For the first time, the Amsterdam Tourist Board has issued a warning to gay visitors to be careful in the city. In the first country to legalise homosexual marriage, gays are increasingly fearful of holding hands in public. Some have been chased out of their houses and middle-class gays are moving to rural areas for safety.

“I was really surprised. I felt comfortable, because it is San Francisco times ten. But I didn’t appreciate the depth of hostility between different groups there, and we walked right into the middle of it,” Mr Crain said from his home in Washington.

In the city where six months ago Theo van Gogh, the Dutch film-maker, was killed by an Islamic extremist, the tourist authorities felt compelled to issue a warning.

Herman Terbalkt, of the Amsterdam Tourist Board, said: “Gay visitors should be careful and alert. Some people in Amsterdam are not tolerant of other people. It is a social problem.”

A social problem huh. I suppose KLM's Board of Directors and marketing boys are too high on cannabis to be aware of Amsterdam's 'social problems'.

Fucking fools. I am surrounded by fucking fools. They are all over the place.



MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT THE JAM, WIM DE CRAENE, PREFAB SPROUT, REM.

The Jam with Start! It's 1980 and actually The Punk Age, but Paul Weller & Co wear tailored suits and really are cool. Another big band of the age that's outside the Punk movement, and which is often named in one breath with The Jam, is The Clash.






Belgian/Flemish singer/songwriter Wim De Craene, unfortunately deceased in 1990, with Tim (1975), a beautiful ballad about a father letting his son free to find his way in life.






Prefab Sprout with Hey Manhattan! Cheesy video, but easy listening. From one of their best albums, From Langley Park to Memphis (1988).





For some reason, these guys, Brits who formed in Newcastle in 78, never topped in the States. I guess it'd have to be an American to explain us why, although I do have some idea.



We end with What's the frequency, Kenneth? The first single taken from the 1994 album Monster.





Nite.



MFBB.

FRENCH MUSLIMS DESTROYING HOST COUNTRY FROM WITHIN.

Via Galliawatch:

"(...) In Limoges, there was on Friday an almost unbelievable spectacle in the downtown area between 5:00 and 6:00 p.m. A man, with a megaphone, called for a civil war, a jihad. He cited Christine Tasin, declared that there were between 10 and 15 million Muslims in France, incited them to rise up against the French whom he called "scum", blamed September 11 on the Jews, called the law banning the burka racist, affirmed that he did not recognize our criminal code, incited Muslims to burn it, etc... a speech, heard by several dozen disciples, that must have terrified the peaceful residents of this city. And as if that weren't enough, they had to suffer through a demonstration with slogans demanding the right to wear the scarf and the burka."





Meanwhile, French muslims continue their two-pronged attack to turn France into an islamic country within two decades. On the one hand, muslim youth gangs torch cars in each and every French city every night, with the aim of terrorizing the authochton Frenchmen and creating no-go zones for the police. Below is just a daily tidbit from the city of Alençon, 26 september:

"C’est finalement dix véhicules, et non sept, qui ont été la proie des flammes dans la nuit de vendredi à samedi, à Alençon. Six ont brûlé place Marguerite de Lorraine, face à l’hôpital. Et trois autres, ainsi qu’un partiellement, rue Victor Hugo, au cœur du quartier populaire de Perseigne. L’enquête a été confiée à la police judiciaire, qui va tenter d’exploiter les traces retrouvées sur place.

(Translation)

"Finally 10 cars, and not seven, have fallen prey to flames in the night of Friday to Saturday in Alençon. Six were torched on the Place Marguerite de Lorrains, in front of the hospital. And three others (plus one partially) in the rue Victor Hugo, in the heart of Perseigne neighborhood. The investigation has been trusted to the judicial police, which will try to exploit traces found on the spot."

In the two-pronged muslim attack to destroy France, the youths constitute the hammer. But the anvil is the relentless pressure applied by the so-called "moderate" muslims. The youths are keeping the pressure on the lid. But the "moderates" are letting demographics and leftist collaboration do the work, then claim they need extra space for the faithful. If permission and government money to construct new mosques is not forthcoming quick enough, they hold prayer sit-ins in the streets.

This is from the same city of Alençon:

Les quatre lieux de culte alençonnais sont tous régulièrement saturés lors de la prière du vendredi. L'Amar vient de faire refaire, cet été, une partie des peintures et de l'électricité des salles de prières et d'ablutions de la mosquée de l'ouverture, qui laissaient à désirer. Et d'y installer une cuisine aménagée, pour des festivités comme le Ramadan.

Des travaux nécessaires, pour le secrétaire de l'association Amar. « Mais on continue à chercher un terrain constructible pour une future mosquée. On en avait trouvé un, il y a un an, mais le propriétaire a fini par refuser de peur de ne pas vendre les terrains voisins à cause de la proximité de la mosquée ». Du côté de la mairie, on est favorable au projet, « sur le principe. Mais la difficulté est de trouver le terrain », reconnaît Ahamada Dibo, adjoint à l'urbanisme et à la politique de la ville.

(Translation)

The four prayer facilities in Alençon are all choke-full during friday prayers. Last summer, the Amar organization conducted some refurbisment, namely painting jobs and electricity in the prayer rooms and ablutions, which left to be desired. The kitchen also needed an update, with a view on ramadan.

Necessary works, for Amar's secretary. "But we continue to look out for a building spot for a future mosque. We had found one one year ago, but the proprietor finished by refusing, out of fear of not being able to sell the adjacent grounds because of the proximity of the mosque." The city council has a favorable view on the project, "but the difficulty is finding a suitable spot", says Ahamada Dibo, deputy for urbanism of Alençon.

Ahamada Dibo huh? I s'ppose Jean-Luc Dupont is gone fishing? Or has he perhaps croaked already in his Maison de Repos?


Alençon is a study in microcosm of what islam is doing in the whole of France. Since 2005, muslim mobs have destroyed an estimated 280,000 cars, apart from countless shops, schools, buses, and public infrastructure. On the other hand, very assertive, or rather aggressive behaviour from the "elders" has resulted in a record number of mosques built. The inauguration is often done in the presence of a beaming autochton official, often, but not always, a socialist. Recall that the French PM, François Fillon, from Sarkozy's supposedly "rightwing" party UMP, is making it a sport these days to inaugurate important mosques personally.


France is dying before the world's eyes. If you want to see the Eiffel Tower or the Louvre yet, do it soon.



MFBB.

MARK STEYN RECEIVES THE SAPPHO AWARD 2010.

Sappho is the magazine of the Free Press Society and as such Denmark's 'most outspoken magazine on free speech, radical islam, culture and politics.' Their yearly award goes to 'an opinion leader who has shown remarkable courage and persistence in his defence of free speech.' Past recipients include Melanie Phillips in 2009, the British journalist and commentator. Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard was 2008's recipient in 2008, and in 2007 Flemming Rose, Jyllands-Posten´s cultural editor, received it. This year, the Sappho Award went to Mark Steyn, the 'Global Content Provider' and merciless chronicler of the West's self-chosen decline. At the event, in a Copenhagen hotel, Mr. Steyn was apparently in good company.




Holy cow! Why wasn't I invited????



Check out the opening address by Sappho's Eva Agnete Selsing:

"... This year the award goes to an outstanding person, whose courage, wit, incomparable journalistic talent and, not least, characteristic sense of humor, has brought him much – and well-deserved – acclaim.

His books are international bestsellers, his columns in various prestigious newspapers and magazines are highly popular and read all over the world. They deal with a variety of topics. From islamofascism to popular culture.

He has given interviews, participated in panel debates, hosted radio and television shows and appeared on the Rush Limbaugh Show and with Sean Hannity on FOX News, just to name a few.

He is, indeed, as stated on his homepage: A one-man global content provider.

It is, of course, Mark Steyn who is this year’s recipient.

Not only as a consequence of his ample contributions as a cultural critic, but also for his success in influencing the debate on Islam, the disastrous ideology of multiculturalism and the crisis of the Western civilization.

His most famous book, America Alone – The end of the world as we know it, is among the most influential writings on those topics.

In it, he argues that when Europe falls due to heavy welfare statism, declining fertility rates and mass immigration, America will lose its continental ally. As a consequence, the prevalence of Western civilization and the freedom it has secured, will soon be history.

Those are harsh predictions. His critics say they are exaggerated and alarmist. But are they?

The European welfare states are real enough. The declining fertility rates are just as real. With its low fertility rate, the Spanish population will halve in a generation’s time, and it doesn’t look much better in Italy, Greece or Germany. On top of this, mass immigration from the third world has effectively begun the alteration of the European populations.

As Christopher Caldwell has put it: Can Europe be the same with different people in it?

This is the question which many of our fellow Westeners refuse to ask, let alone answer.

But what Steyn points to are facts. Facts. Not guesses or wild speculations. They are facts, and the mainstream media supported by the elitist intellectuals refuse to acknowledge or even discuss them.

And they, the intellectuals of the West, are another primary topic in the book.

Under the guise of human rights, the monstrous programme of multiculturalism has prevailed. Claiming that no culture is better than another – except for Christians and jews, who are, of course, always evil and oppressive – multiculturalism has succeeded in undermining the identity of the Westerners.

With the constant accusations of imperialism, slavery, colonialism, male chauvinism and racism, the people of the West have been taught to hate their own history. And a civilization that rejects its heritage is a civilization on the verge of death.

It might be that the islamofascicts who wish to exterminate us are our prime enemy, but our Western elites seem to do the job quite well by themselves.

And this cultural suicide is, as Steyn describes, enhanced by the demographic changes in Europe. As he writes in the book:

“A people that won’t multiply can’t go forth or go anywhere. Those who do will shape the age we live in. Because, when history comes a-calling, it starts with the most basic question of all: Knock-knock. Who’s there?”...

I was unable to find a decent transcript of Steyn's speech, but I think this article dealing with freedom of speech, written immediately upon return, is a good substitute:

"... Too many people in the free world have internalized Islam’s view of them. A couple of years ago, I visited Guantanamo and subsequently wrote that, if I had to summon up Gitmo in a single image, it would be the brand-new copy of the Koran in each cell: To reassure incoming prisoners that the filthy infidels haven't touched the sacred book with their unclean hands, the Korans are hung from the walls in pristine, sterilized surgical masks. It's one thing for Muslims to regard infidels as unclean, but it's hard to see why it's in the interests of us infidels to string along with it and thereby validate their bigotry. What does that degree of prostration before their prejudices tell them about us? It’s a problem that Muslims think we’re unclean. It’s a far worse problem that we go along with it.

Take this no-name pastor from an obscure church who was threatening to burn the Koran. He didn’t burn any buildings or women and children. He didn’t even burn a book. He hadn’t actually laid a finger on a Koran, and yet the mere suggestion that he might do so prompted the President of the United States to denounce him, and the Secretary of State, and the commander of US forces in Afghanistan, various G7 leaders, and golly, even Angelina Jolie. President Obama has never said a word about honor killings of Muslim women. Secretary Clinton has never said a word about female genital mutilation. General Petraeus has never said a word about the rampant buggery of pre-pubescent boys by Pushtun men in Kandahar. But let an obscure man in Florida so much as raise the possibility that he might disrespect a book – an inanimate object – and the most powerful figures in the western world feel they have to weigh in.

Aside from all that, this obscure church’s website has been shut down, its insurance policy has been canceled, its mortgage has been called in by its bankers. Why? As Diana West wrote, why was it necessary or even seemly to make this pastor a non-person? Another one of Obama's famous "teaching moments"? In this case teaching us that Islamic law now applies to all? Only a couple of weeks ago, the President, at his most condescendingly ineffectual, presumed to lecture his moronic subjects about the First Amendment rights of Imam Rauf. Where's the condescending lecture on Pastor Jones' First Amendment rights?

When someone destroys a bible, US government officials don’t line up to attack him. President Obama bowed lower than a fawning maitre d’ before the King of Saudi Arabia, a man whose regime destroys bibles as a matter of state policy, and a man whose depraved religious police forces schoolgirls fleeing from a burning building back into the flames to die because they’d committed the sin of trying to escape without wearing their head scarves. If you show a representation of Mohammed, European commissioners and foreign ministers line up to denounce you. If you show a representation of Jesus Christ immersed in your own urine, you get a government grant for producing a widely admired work of art. Likewise, if you write a play about Jesus having gay sex with Judas Iscariot.

...

But forget about notorious rightwing hatemongers like me. Look at how liberal progressives protect their own. Do you remember a lady called Molly Norris? She's the dopey Seattle cartoonist who cooked up "Everybody Draws Mohammed" Day, and then, when she realized what she'd stumbled into, tried to back out of it. I regard Miss Norris as (to rewrite Stalin) a useless idiot, and she wrote to Mark's Mailbox to object. I stand by what I wrote then, especially the bit about her crappy peace-sign T-shirt. Now The Seattle Weekly informs us:

You may have noticed that Molly Norris' comic is not in the paper this week. That's because there is no more Molly.

On the advice of the FBI, she's been forced to go into hiding. If you want to measure the decline in western civilization's sense of self-preservation, go back to Valentine's Day 1989, get out the Fleet Street reports on the Salman Rushdie fatwa, and read the outrage of his fellow London literati at what was being done to one of the mainstays of the Hampstead dinner-party circuit. Then compare it with the feeble passivity of Molly Norris' own colleagues at an American cartoonist being forced to abandon her life: "There is no more Molly"? That's all the gutless pussies of The Seattle Weekly can say? As James Taranto notes in The Wall Street Journal, even much sought-after Ramadan-banquet constitutional scholar Barack Obama is remarkably silent:

Now Molly Norris, an American citizen, is forced into hiding because she exercised her right to free speech. Will President Obama say a word on her behalf? Does he believe in the First Amendment for anyone other than Muslims?

Who knows? Given his highly selective enthusiasms, you can hardly blame a third of Americans for figuring their president must be Muslim. In a way, that's the least pathetic explanation: The alternative is that he's just a craven squish. Which is an odd considering he is, supposedly, the most powerful man in the world.

Listen to what President Obama, Justice Breyer, General Petraeus, The Seattle Weekly and Bluehost internet services are telling us about where we're headed. As I said in America Alone, multiculturalism seems to operate to the same even-handedness as the old Cold War joke in which the American tells the Soviet guy that "in my country everyone is free to criticize the President", and the Soviet guy replies, "Same here. In my country everyone is free to criticize your President." Under one-way multiculturalism, the Muslim world is free to revere Islam and belittle the west's inheritance, and, likewise, the western world is free to revere Islam and belittle the west’s inheritance. If one has to choose, on balance Islam’s loathing of other cultures seems psychologically less damaging than western liberals' loathing of their own..."

Damn right.





Huh??? Was she there too???? I GOT to get nominated for the Sappho 2011!!!



MFBB.

A DAY OUT AT LEEUWERGEM CASTLE.

My wife is rather fond of gardening and me myself and I are rather fond of castles, so when we got the news there was a gardening fair on the grounds of Leeuwergem Castle (Kasteel van Leeuwergem), in the province of East Flanders, we off to the event.


It's a rather small chateau, not far from the town of Zottegem, and it was built between 1762 and 1764 by Ghent nobility, more precisely Pieter Emmanuel d'Hane (1726-1786). What is now Belgium was then a part of the so-called Austrian Netherlands, and run from Vienna. Before that, we were the Spanish Netherlands, but we came to the Austrian Emperor at the end of the Spanish Succession War in 1713. This Austrian rule would last until 1795, when French revolutionary armies invaded the Low Countries.

In any case, when the chateau was built, it was done so in Louis XV style, or rococo if you want. That late Baroque movement in the arts and architecture, characterised by less stringent adherence to classical lines and decidedly more ornate, florid and frivolous, originated at the French court. A common recurrence is the shell motif, and indeed it can be found both on the inside and the outside of this little palace.

On the first floor there's a small charming chapel, dedicated to the four evangelists. It hasn't changed in appearance since it was inaugurated in 1764.








Initially the garden was designed as a rococo garden too, but not for long. Already in 1785 work was begun on a typical English landscape garden. Of course - I have visited English landscape gardens - the original ones are far, far bigger. Leeuwergem's is cosy and its major lanes can be walked in less than an hour.





Unique is the so-called "Looftheater", a "natural theatre" so to say, formed entirely by clever planting of hedge beech (carpinus betulus). It's formed by an oval archway (completely sheltering people passing through it with its leaves) encompassing a "natural" stage on a slightly lower level, with smartly cut beech outcroppings forming the suites protruding from the archway. On the pic below is the small rectangular inside field serving as the "stage"...





... while this photo provides a good view of some of the "suites". All in all, the whole "Looftheater" isn't that big. Still the chateau's website claims 800 spectators can attend an event.






MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT THE SHADOWS, THE OFFSPRING, FOO FIGHTERS.

The Shadows with the immortal Wonderful Land. This single is from 1962, can you believe it? Almost half a century old and still, well, wonderful.





I picked this youtube audio still 1° because sound quality is real good and 2° because of the sketch, which intrigued me. When I saw it I wanted to bet it was an artist's impression of a scene in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion, and 'lo and behold, that turned out to be true. The artist in question is Ted Nasmith, a Canadian and like me a Tolkien aficionade, although through his art he takes his fondness for that Englishman's masterpieces to an entirely higher level. The white city on that hill in the middle of the plain is Gondolin. The character looking out over it Tuor. I thank God on my bare knees for letting me discover Tolkien. A long time ago that was. Fall 1982. Started by devouring The Lord of The Rings. Discovered The Silmarillion, which actually treats Middle Earth history thousands of years placed back in time vis-à-vis LOTR, in the early spring of the following year.


The Offspring with Self esteem, a smash hit from the aptly named album Smash (1994).




Foo Fighters with the excellent single Everlong.





Must be one of the nuttiest videos ever.




MFBB.

RAMADAN IN MOSCOW.

Ramadan scenes from Moscow.








Check out these videos:








More here.


If there is anyone who still thinks that in-your-face prayer sit-ins like these ones, the ones in France, in Milan, or in NYC of all places, are just a koinsidens, I have a bridge across the Dniepr to sell you. Islam is going right now through some major transformation, but a renaissance it ain't. It's more like a schoolyard bully waking up from dozing at his desk in the back of class and deciding to wreak havoc during playtime. Indeed, all across the planet muslims are behaving more assertively at the expense of their surrounding population, be it Jews in Malmo, Christians in the Philippines, or Moscow commuters finding their way to office blocked by hordes of paedophile worshippers.

Assertivity can be understood, if not condoned, when the mechanism behind it grants it a certain raison d'etre. Germany woke up in the late nineteenth century/early twentieth century to claim its place at a European table long dominated by France and England, because it had something to show for being braggard: its own Industrielle Revolution, Krupp steel, talented chemists, amazing engines developed by messrs Benz and Diesel.

Islam has no such thing, yet it too claims a place at the global table, what do I say, at the head of the global table. Islam is like Mike Tyson storming in at a congress of astrophysicists and demanding he be given his rightful place. As the most recent UN Arab Development Report shows, the quintessential muslim nations keep lagging behind in just about everything except the production of oil and terrorists, and even those not spending their black gold revenues on madrassas on the other side of the planet have to rely on western and Asian engineers, architects and builders to construct their desert phantasmagorias. As for non-arab muslim nations, when was the last time you bought a car made in Pakistan? Any Nobel Prize winner in sight to succeed Ahmed Zewail?

In short, muslims have NOTHING to justify their increasing presence on our TV screens. I don't want them. You shouldn't want them. Every goddam fucking day there's a steady drip drip drip, although I suspect it's already become a torrent, of news stories about the horrible treatment of non-muslims in archetypical muslim nations. If they want to show us that's where they intend to take us, by taking ungranted possession of Madison Square Garden or the Place de la Concorde, it's time we wake up and tell them that they too can get their own private Srebrenica if they just keep pestering us for too long.



MFBB.

VLAAMS BELANG/CITIES AGAINST ISLAMIZATION DEMO AND 9-11 COMMEMMORATION FORBIDDEN BY BRUSSELS MAYOR FREDDY THIELEMANS - AGAIN.

I realize I'm a bit late with the news, but the demo a delegation of Vlaams Belang and Cities Against Islamization intended to hold in front of the US Embassy on September 11, to commemorate the 9/11 victims, protest against the Ground Zero mosque, and warn against Europes ongoing islamization, was forbidden at the last moment by the Brussels mayor, Freddy Thielemans.

Filip Dewinter, the VB's most recognizable face although he is "only" its fraction leader in the Flemish Parliament, then staged a short, "illegal" demo in front of the VB offices in central Brussels on the Madouplein/Square Madou:





On DowneastBlog, we have already shed some light on the sad personage of Freddy Thielemans, a disgusting Parti Socialiste pork barrel spender and archetypical dhimmi.





It was this scumbag who in 2007 forbade the VB to stage a 9/11 commemmoration (while a few days earlier allowing a muslim demo which had not even been officially requested), and who orchestrated the violent arrest of several VB MP's who were not even demonstrating, but talking to reporters. Most internet aficionados, at least the ones interested in politics, will remember a photo like this all too well:





In 2006, Thielemans also managed to appoint a muslim woman as acting mayor of Brussels for a couple of months. This woman was Faouzia Hariche, like Thielemans a heavyweight, be it not in the literal sense like Fat Freddy, in the Brussels chapter of the Parti Socialiste (PS). When Thielemans, on account of health problems due to his lavish lifestyle, had to be hospitalized in December in 2006, he appointed Hariche in direct violation of the official procedure, which would have seen his first deputy as temporary mayor. As it was, the Brussels Parti Socialiste was all too eager to opt for Hariche, even though she was only the 7th in line. Her first act as Brussels mayor was to land her husband, Mohamed Laghmiche, in the well-paid director's seat of one of Brussels' numerous subsidy sponges, a "youth organization" of which, surprise surprise, she herself was the Chairwoman. But I digress.


The scandalous prohibition of what was never intended to be more than a peaceful demo and commemmoration, on very dubious grounds, is once again a stark reminder of what a Europe dominated by the Left and Islam will look like. At first glance, Brussels is a gleaming and prosperous metropolis - and to be sure, that impression would not exist if it weren't true to a large extent.

But already the rot has set in and is reaching a dangerous treshold. For the moment, Brussels is a city with a Janus Head. On the one hand it is the capital of the European Union and it boasts a plethora of international institutions, the headquarters of numerous corporations big and small, the second largest number in the world of accredited journalists and so on.

On the other hand, its population counts already 25% muslims, and that number will do nothing but rise in the future. With it, the levels of unemployment and criminality.

Itself thoroughly in the grip of socialist rule, Brussels is currently the hottest dossier in the Belgian governmental crisis, which revolves around the aspirations of most Flemings to have more say about their own money and safeguarding their cultural and territorial presence in and around Brussels, and the anachronistic desire of most Walloon parties to keep their lavish socialist system afloat and even enhance it (a key demand is even more "federal" money, read Flemish, for francophone-dominated Brussels).

What we are witnessing is that after hundred years of misbegotten socialist experiments in the economy, the Walloon negotiators, who are the socialists since they got a staggering 36% of the vote in this year's parliamentary elections, want... more of the same. And this after anno 2010 the 800 pound gorilla in the Room of Economic Understanding is the conclusion that socialism, redistribution, heavy taxes, and excessive government regulation simply DO-NOT-WORK. The historic body of evidence that socalism destroys a country's economy is now so overwhelming, from the USSR over Argentina, afrosocialism and Cuba to present-day predictables like Venezuela, Spain and the US, that it is simply and truly amazing, what do I say baffling, that hard earned lessons are forgotten the moment they are being taught.

But not only does the leftist/islamic alliance, so clear to see now, present a grave warning to Europes future with regards to economic matters.

On the political level too, the emergence of this incongruous axis will also introduce a sweeping change compared to the past. Europe, though envious of the US, mocking it simultaneously, and often offering a lukewarm response when asked for help from across the ocean, was and still is the US's "best friend". European leaders may harp about American jingoism, but have sent their armies to Afghanistan, even though often hamstrung by ridiculous caveats.

A future Europe, dominated by islamosocialism, will not even do that. As a fine study in microcosm of this inevitable reality, one of the other demands of the Socialistische Partij/Parti Socialiste in the current negociations to form a new Belgian government, was that Belgium withdraw its military as soon as possible from AF. Small wonder, when both parties have now reached a stage by which they cannot even exist in any meaningful way without the muslim vote.

I see hopeful signs across the Atlantic that America may not be ready yet to follow Europe's path. But if it manages to get past what I hope was but a short lived and foolish love affair with EUtopianism, it should prepare for the eventuality that in decades to come, it may find it is alone.



MFBB.



P.S.: apparently, in the current US Administration, there IS interest in the matter of Europes relation to its Atlantic neighbour a few decades hence. Although the current Administration being what it is, the interest described does not exactly offer a hopeful perspective.

Which is why US voters should kick the crooks out in November.