What's with the skiing? Nothing, it's just that's when I was looking for a decent video of DAG's Lovely Jane, I stumbled upon this short film of French dudes who used the song as background. Lovely Jane is from DAG's debut album Righteous, released in 1994. The band, from Raleigh in North California, had actually been playing for five years already. And they split five years later, after having produced two other albums. The singer and bass guitarist is Bobby Patterson. Hearing their sound in the nineties left a somewhat anachronistic impression, like if you would be hearing a great Simple Minds hit from the eighties only now for the first time. But it wasn't bad then, and to me, it isn't bad today either.
You, me and World War Three. Relatively unknown hit by Irish singer-songwriter Gavin Friday, ex Virgin Prunes. It's on his 1995 album Shag Tobacco. When I first heard it, I thought I was hearing Bowie. Friday is more active than you think, having worked on the soundtrack of movies like In the name of the Father (that's one you gotta see), Mission: Impossible and Moulin Rouge.
More than five years ago, on November 6, 2004, I had a short post about an event which took place right after the murder of Theo Van Gogh by a radical Netherlands-born muslim, Mohammed Bouyeri - a murder which coincidentally took place the day that George Bush was re-elected for a second term. This event was the removal by force, on orders of a Dutch mayor, of a mural in Rotterdam with the text "Gij zult niet doden" ("Thou shalt not kill"). Here is an exerpt from that post:
BAD NEWS FROM EUROPE - PART TWO.
A Rotterdam artist, Chris Ripke, made this simple mural (photo) on a wall nearby a mosque in Rotterdams Insulindenstraat, with a line from The Ten Commandments: "Gij zult niet doden"("Thou shalt not kill"). This in an, imho, very restraint and dignified expression of his disgust at the callous murder. Look at it yourself: Apart from the text, a pigeon (or angel), a date and a blue triangle not much sock to it, huh?
Wrong.
The mosque’s Imam found the mural offensive and called Rotterdam’s mayor, Mr. Opstelten. Incredibly enough, Mr. Opstelten sent a special utility vehicle to remove graffiti to get rid of the mural. A local reporter of local TV broadcaster Cineac Noord was present. First he was asked not to film "because it would cause too much tension in the neighbourhood". When the reporter saw the utility vehicle arrive and prepare to remove the artist’s piece, he stood in front of it to protect it. When he refused to give up his stand, there was a brush with the police who then arrested him. The mural was removed.
So now, apparently someone was able to film it. And even though we are five years further now and the world has witnessed far more bloodshed in the name of islam and far more dhimmitude, I thought I would just heed the advice of our friends over at Gates of Vienna and Vladtepesblog and spread the link around. Here goes:
It's a rather long video, so you can speed forward around 6 minutes in it, where city personnel is destroying the mural after a request of the local imam.
We are five years further now, and how have things evolved in the meantime in The Netherlands?
Not so well.
All big cities are islamizing at an alarming rate. The photo below shows Stadsdeelvoorzitter Ahmed Marcouch, the mayor of the Slotervaart neighborhood in Amsterdam, at a "Sinterklaasfeest" (he's sitting to the left of Santa). The cross on Santa Claus' mitre has been neatly removed.
Increasing violence everywhere involving the now (in)famous "youths", see this article about the dire situation in Gouda.
Europes biggest port, Rotterdam, has a muslim mayor, Ahmed Aboutaleb. A holder of two passports, he has already made clear where his loyalties lie, a.o. by bypassing the Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhaghen in his relations with Morocco, and by staying away from a Rotterdam commemmoration ceremony, Veterans Day. He preferred a short journey to his homeland Morocco instead.
Dutch Interior Minister Guusje Ter Horst, ordered a "scientific study" concerning Geert Wilders, the chairman of the PVV (Party for Freedom), and the "scientists" concluded that Wilders is "undermining social cohesion and democracy" in The Netherlands. On the basis of the "scientific report", Geert Wilders is now being prosecuted. His trial starts in January. The prospect of this kangaroo court was welcomed by a.o. Alexander Pechtold, chairman of the center-left party D66, with the ominous words:
Fabricating "scientific" reports to kill off political opponents. You'd think it used to happen in the USSR in the fifties. But this is The Netherlans, 2009. So, and who would be the "scientists" behind the report? These are their names and official titles:
* Radicalization Investigator Hans Moors * Professor in (Counter)Terrorism Bob de Graaff * Extreme Rightwing Expert Jaap van Donselaar.
From Radicalization Investigators and Extreme Rightwing Experts you can expect they home in on men like Wilders. But in a world which has seen, oh, around 14,500 islamic terror attacks since 9/11 you'd think a Counterterrorism Professor has better things to do than investigate a guy with blonde hair who has been walking around day and night for several years now with six bodyguards, huh?
Belgian Air Force F-16 being refueled over Afghanistan by a US KC135 tanker.
As old as the F-16 may be, the KC 135 beats it hands down. The KC 135, successor to the piston-driven KC 97, was the USAF's first jet powered aerial refueling tanker, and was derived from the Boeing 707 airliner. When looking at that pic, which still does not project antiquity, it's hard to imagine these tankers have been in service for 52 years now, a feat only accomplished by a handful of other designs. Although maintenance costs are rising steeply (in 2002 it was calculated that one hour of flying time cost 11,000 US$ - that's maintenance cost, not even flying cost), it's still worthwile to keep them in the air - theoretically they could last 80 years (!) - and replace them only gradually. Actually, the whole issue of replacement is a story in itself, with a project of a modified version of the Boeing 767 shot down in 2003 because of charges of corruption in how Boeing was awarded the contract. Yet that company was subsequently able, in 2008, to freeze a possible USAF-Grumman Northrop/EADS deal involving the much-vaunted KC-45A tanker of the latter (in fact a modified Airbus 330). Or, how the feud Boeing/Airbus will never end. Currently, the KC-45A contract seems to be in limbo and USAF may have to rebid it. It all means that the sturdy workhorse above won't disappear soon.
In what is being called 'huge surprise,' about 57.5% of citizens accept far-right call to oppose 'Islamization of Switzerland'. Result certain to embarrass country's neutral government.
Swiss voters approved a ban on construction of new minarets on Sunday, a surprise result certain to embarrass Switzerland's neutral government. The Swiss news agency ATS and other media said about 57.5% of voters and all but four of the 26 cantons approved the proposal in the nationwide referendum, which was backed by the right-wing Swiss People's Party (SVP). The government and parliament had rejected the initiative as violating the Swiss constitution, freedom of religion and the country's cherished tradition of tolerance. The government had said a ban could "serve the interests of extremist circles". "
The vote against the building of more minarets is a huge blow for the Swiss government, which had beforehand stated that it was strongly against holding the referendum. For the Liberal Democrats and the Christian Democrats in the four-party coalition that is the Swiss government, the explanation for their reluctance is clear: they fear backlash from the muslim world which has gigantic assets in their country. The ties go beyond the merely financial aspect though: the prime organization of the salafist movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, opened its first and most influential embassy in Geneva. It was headed by a certain... Said Ramadan, father of you-know-who. But back to the Swiss government. In the case of the third party making up the current coalition, the socialists (the fourth party is the rightwing SVP, which called for the referendum), there is like in every European country the evident dhimmitude and self-loathing element which lies at the base of their opposition to the popular vote. Here, too, the Swiss leftists have been tripping over each other to import and accommodate as many immigrants as possible, especially muslims. In this regard it is impossible to get around a person like Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey. On the photo you see her in 2008, at the occasion of the signing of a dubious gas deal with Iran. But there is more to this lady under that veil than you would expect. She was the first Swiss official to protest vehemently the refusal of the Bush administration to grant a visa to Tariq Ramadan, islam's "leading intellectual" in Europe and a citizen of Geneva. And in the same year as her controversial encounter with Ahmadinejad, she stated in front of the international press that she would be okay with direct talks with Osama Bin Laden to end the terrorist threat. I am not kidding:
It's only natural that Calmy-Rey & Co. would like to have as many minarets as possible spoiling the Alpine skyline. Expect a lot of bruhaha in the coming days from their corner hinting at the racist edge in the Swiss popular vote, and it wouldn't surprise me if they wouldn't try to look for means to circumv.... hold on a second, did I say "coming days"??? Silly me!!! Haha, barely an hour after the result got known, the chairman of the Swiss Greens and a comrade of Calmy-Rey (though his party does not participate in the government), Ueli Leuenberger, called SVP's initiative "unconstitutional" and stated that he would bring the referendum's outcome to the European Court for Human Rights.