This blog has moved...

I have decided to move my blog to my own server(s) to have full control over the whole process, from writing, through publishing to presenting, including tweaking at the tiny little knobs in the server software to make the best presentation, and without having to rely on the goodwill of some 3rd party hosting... This way I'm 100% in control of my blog for good and bad...

The address of the new blog is http://beta.kimcm.dk/

Happiness is found in Denmark

Happiness is found in Denmark
From Sydsvenskan.se, September 2, 2006
Translation from Swedish: Zonka

If you want to be happier. Move to Denmark ? it's the place where people are most happy in the whole world.

What makes people happy?
The Socialphychologist Adrian White from the university of Leicester have compiled hundreds of surveys, which together contains what 80,000 people around the world have answered on questions about they feeling of happiness and unhappiness.

Nowhere in the world do people feel more happy than in Denmark. The nordic countries are seen as a whole the happiness center of the world: Iceland is 4^th, Finland 6^th and Sweden 7^th on the list.

• Health, prosperity and education is the three factors that people mostly associate with happiness, says Adrian White.
• There is a conception that capitalism creates unhappy people. However, when people are asked whether they feel happy and satisfied with their life, then it is those that lives in countries with a good health care, good mean income and access to education that mostly answers yes.

Several studies ave earlier shown that when people reach a level where they can satisfy their basic needs, then the connection between money and happiness is lessened.

Christian Bjørnskov who is a national economist, teacher and researcher at Handelshøjskolen (Business School -- ed) in Aarhus, proclaims that peoples trust as the decisive factor in why Denmark is at the top of the happiness list. In the small and homogeneous Danish society the inhabitants largely believes the best about their fellow people. They feel save and the social stability is solid.

Among the 178 countries that are in Adrian White's study it is countries that are plagued by oppression, war and/or civil war where people find themselves least happy. On the last seven places on the list is Armenia, Sudan, Ukraine, Moldavia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Zimbabwe and lastly Burundi in Central Africa.

Read it all

Pause in blogging...

I have been taking a break from blogging here, not because there have been nothing to write about, quite the contrary... but I feel that sometimes it's good to take a pause and do other things so that any one thing doesn't consume all your time.

So the blog isn't abandoned it's just that the author had to take a break and enjoy some time doing some other stuff and trying to do some thinking without making my head explode...

YOU MAY BE AN ISLAMOPHOBE IF...

From: Democracy Frontline

This little test is delivered to our readers by Warner

1. You refer to the midwinter holiday as »Christmas«.
2. You save loose change in a p***y-bank.
3. You allow your children to read unexpurgated versions of Winnie the Poo.
4. You doubt whether it's politically correct to stone rape victims.
5. You believe that the earth is round.
6. You think there's something weird about a 50 year old man marrying a six year old girl.
7. Your children have Barbie dolls or Teddy Bears
8. You object to being a second class citizen in your own country.
9. You fail to celebrate cultural diversity when your daughter is gang-raped for not wearing a headscarf.
10. You think government policy should be determined by your elected representatives rather than a howling mob.
11. You object to your taxes being used to support people who are plotting to kill you.
12. You aren't convinced that 'Jihad' means 'Inner Spiritual Struggle'.
13. You don't understand why the Jews must be exterminated.
14. You allow your children to play with LEGO.
15. You aren't married to at least one of your cousins.
16. You sometimes have doubts about BBC reporting.
17. You occasionally wonder what's inside those walking tents.
18. You realise that taqiyya is not a Mexican beverage.
19. You believe moderate Muslims ride unicorns.
20. You don't appreciate the multicultural need for Methodist grandmothers to be body-cavity searched before boarding aircraft.
21. You claim to understand the words »Slay the unbelievers wherever you find them«, even though you don't speak Arabic.
22. You object to taxpayers' money being spent for terrorists to hold a festival to commemorate the anniversary of their massacres.
23. You have reservations about 'faith schools' where the kids will be taught that you and your family are najis (excrement), at public expense.
24. You don't understand why flying your country's flag has become a hate-crime.
25. You don't appreciate why it is so insensitive and offensive for the police to prevent oppressed minorities venting their frustration by mass murder.

EVALUATING YOUR SCORE
How many of the questions did you answer 'YES'? On a scale of 0 to 25

0 you are a Dhimmi
1 to 5 you are a Najis Kaffir
6 to 10 you are an Islamophobe
11 to 15 you are a Thought Criminal
16 to 20 you are an Enemy of Allah
21 to 25 you are a Zionist Crusader offspring of pigs and monkeys.

Researcher: Danes fear muslims

In his book "The conflict about the new Danes", written by the Jens Peter Frølund Thomsen, associated professor at Aarhus University, he states that 40% of the Danes consider Islam as a threat to the Danish Democracy. This number comes from a survey from 2002, where 1500 people were asked to complete a questionaire of about 70 questions about their attitude towards ethnic minorities. From the answers he concludes:

»There is almost a hostile attitude amongs the Danes towards immigrants and refugees, who have Islam as a religion. 40% of all danes consider Islam as a threat to the Danish democracy.«

»The immigration issue have been most important in many years and will continue to be so for a long time, and here I want to see if we can do thing differently. That, I believe, is the duty of researchers. We need to point at problems, and then other must figure out what needs to be done.« says the associated professor.«

Since the survey was made in 2002, I guess the number of Danes who considers Islam to be a threat has gone up by now as more and more people have become aware of what Islam is about and generally not liking muslims after what happened during the Muhammed Cartoon Controversy. And I also believe that most Danes don't consider it a problem that we have a healthy scepticism or even feel antagonistic towards Islam, and though people might fear Islam and a possible Islamic terror attack on Denmark – I don't believe that fear is the right word to use with respect to the Danes attitude towards Islam – disdain, anger, frustration and insecurity is probably more accurate emotions use!

Times to wake up?

On Friday a day after the averted airplane attacks, Gerard Baker of the British Times wrote an opinion piece The first step towards defeating the terrorists: stop blaming ourselves, that suggests that some elements of the Times actually have their eyes quite open and cleared of sand. Gerard Baker, suggest that it is time that we realize that the attacks are not a response to something that we're doing, they are not a response to the wars in the Middle-East, they are not a response to the politics of Bush or Blair... They are carried out by muslims who yearns for a muslim dominated world and by diverting our attention to other explanations we're missing the point and even worse we're unable to lock onto the real threat and come up with ways of stopping the threat.

Go read the whole story: The first step towards defeating the terrorists: stop blaming ourselves

British police thwart aircraft bomb plot

British police and intelligence service have most foiled a major terror attack, aiming to blow up several airplanes in transit, presumably hoping to create a bigger catastrophe than 9/11. Police have rounded up the suspects and are investigating the situation while both Britain and the USA have raised the terror-alert to the highest level!

Of course AP doesn't mention that the suspected terrorists are British born muslims of Pakistani origin... sigh!

British police thwart aircraft bomb plot
LONDON (AP) - British authorities said Thursday they had thwarted a terrorist plot to simultaneously blow up several aircraft heading to the U.S. using explosives smuggled in carry-on luggage. British Airways canceled all flights between London's Heathrow airport and all points in Britain, Europe and Libya for the day.

Britain's Home Secretary John Reid said 21 people had been arrested in London, its suburbs and in Birmingham, including the alleged "main players" in the plot.

Huge crowds formed at security barriers at Heathrow as officials searching for explosives barred nearly every form of liquid outside of baby formula.

Officials raised security to its highest level in Britain and banned hand-carried luggage on all trans-Atlantic flights.

The extreme measures at a major international aviation hub sent ripple effects throughout the world. Heathrow airport was closed to most flights from Europe.

The U.S. government responded by raising its threat alert to its highest level for commercial flights from Britain to the United States amid fears the plot had not been completely crushed. The alert for all flights coming or going from the United States was also raised slightly.

In Washington, two U.S. counterterrorism officials said the terrorists had targeted United, American and Continental airlines. They spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.

A U.S. intelligence official said the plotters had hoped to target flights to major airports in New York, Washington and California, all major summer tourist destinations.

Britain's Home Secretary John Reid said 21 people had been arrested in London, its suburbs and in Birmingham following a lengthy investigation, including the alleged "main players" in the plot. Searches continued in a number of locations.

The suspects were "homegrown," though it was not immediately clear if they were all British citizens, said a police official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case. Police were working closely with the South Asian community, the official said.

The official said the plotters intended to simultaneously target multiple planes bound for the United States.

"We think this was an extraordinarily serious plot and we are confident that we've prevented and attempt to committee mass murder on an unimaginable scale," Deputy Commissioner Paul Stephenson said.

READ ALL

Michelle Malkin have more information as does The Counterterrorism Blog.

*** UPDATE ***
Exile has an interesting take on the media coverage of The Non-attack on Heathrow.

Are we ready for confrontation?

The following opinion letter showed up in Jyllands-Posten on Monday – it is interesting for several reasons, not only because the content is very relevant to the conflict between the Islamic world and the Western world, that is brewing and getting worse all the time. It is also an eye-opener as to the way that the debate is more open here in Denmark than many other places. The letter would never have been accepted in many other European countries. In fact in many of those countries the letter would be condemned as racist, alarmist, islamophobic, or similar and then quickly dumped into the shredder. To be fair there is a couple of Danish newspapers that would give this letter the same treatment, but fortunately not all.

This post is also available on Gates of Vienna – thanks to Baron Bodissey, who have some comments of his own and a picture of Dr. Hasselbalch.

Article: Are we ready for confrontation?
By Ole Hasselbalch, professor, Doctor of Laws – Jyllands-Posten, August 7, 2006
Translation: Zonka

There is no more respite for being slow of perception or fickleness. He who doesn't understand the foundations for the benefits, he enjoys and is willing to act in accordance to that, is bound to lose them.

It isn't written anywhere that the West and our model of society will win. Thus there are no basis for dialogue with Islam, as long as that faith's practicioners only considers such as a tool for deception, says the author of todays article.

The waters have been parted after the Muhammed-affair. Those, who do not now understand, what the situation is, will hardly ever understand.

It wasn't a case of a spontaneous and popular indignation over some not very sensational cartoons: The affair started months after the publication, the Egypt government acted as birth helper, and the authentic cartoons was supplemented with a set of fakes and lies. And one doesnøt burn embassies and flags in that part of the world without governmental approvement.

Within the Arabic cultural sphere a feigned anger over an alleged offense is a wellknown trait. Last winter there were many reasons to invent such an outrage: Egypt was facing a parlamentary election, and the regime needed a case to boost their image. Iran needed a diversion from the Western attention to the nuclear ambitions of the country. Syria needed to have the pressure lifted after the involvement in the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister. The negotiations about Kosovos future was imminent. The new Palestinian government needed credit. Finally there were a need for tougher blasphemylaws to cap the increasing tendency in Western European medias to occupy themselves with the unacceptable parts of Islam – the British parlament was about to discuss "The Religious Hatred Bill".

In short, the Muhammed-affair wasn't set off by an offense. It was created in the expanding muslim world in use for the conflict with the West.

This conflict is fundamentally about whether a political ideology, clothed in a religious mantle will be allowed to force their dogmas and even dictate, that these must replace empirical knowledge. If this succeeds, we're back to the times when Copernicus and Galilei was facing the inquisition. On such a foundation no decent society can be built.

As the Muhammed-affair shows, the means, that are employed against us are unusual.

The core element is the population development. As Per Stig Møller is noting in JP Jul. 7:

In the middle of this century half a billion Europeans – included herein a large number of muslim immigrants – will be facing a Middle-East and Northern Africa with four times as many people.

He could have added that demographers at Copenhagen University have predicted a muslim majority in Denmark within this century. (Berlingske Tidende August 8, 2005).

This situation is being exploited by the frontrunners of Islam. In Norway the resident fundamentalist, Mulla Krekar says it this way:»Look at the development in Europe's population, where the number of muslims are growing like mosquitos. Each western woman in EU produces on average 1.4 children. Every muslim woman in the same countries are producing 3.5 children. In 2050, 30% of the population in Europe will be muslims« (Dagbladet March 13, 2006). Libya's Gadaffi states it this way: »We have 50 million muslims in Europe. They are a sign that Allah will give Islam victory over Europe – without swords, without canons, without conquest. The 50 million muslims in Europe will turn Europe muslim within a few decades. Allah is mobilising the muslim Turkey and adds that to the European Union. That is an addition of 50 million more muslims. Then there will be 100 million muslims in Europe. Albania, which is a muslim country is already in the EU. Bosnia which is a muslim country is already in the EU. 50% of the population in those countries are muslim.« (Memri-TV)

It is furher known, which currents that dominates the muslim immigration groups. Based on the Muhammed-affair one can mention the survey LO published in Ugebrevet A4 on March 13, 2006: Under half would distance themselves from the Danish-hostile riots in the Middle-East – 11% even fully endorsed flagburnings, destroying embassies and boycotting Danish goods.

The so-called moderate muslims are insignificant. Only 1,000 signed up for "Democratic Muslims" in four weeks – the same number as the fundamentalists at any time can muster in Nørrebrohallen (Meeting place of Hitzb-ut-tahir – translator). The moderates will thus very likely be silenced in the long run, simply because there will be insufficient police resources to protect them.

Now it is certainly not a law of nature that the most populous cultures always are victorious. The spaniard Cortez toppled the mighty Inca empire with a few hundred soldiers. The people behind the Muhammed-affair know that they can neither defeat the West militarily or economically. This is why they operate on the psychological level by inventing fictive offenses and demand "respect" for their "religion". They need our passitivity, until the population development will make it impossible to stop them.

Therefore criticism of Islam is characterized as smear campaigns and hatred, natural defenses are called "discriminatory", and those who for 25 years have warned about what is going on, are being labelled and stigmatized with the aid of Danish collaborators as "rightwing extremists".

If we for that reason allow ourselves to be sucked into debates about the "tone of the debate", we lose precious time – and at the same time overlook how the respect for other religions are being practiced the the deeply intolerant Middle-East, where in the last 100 years they have virtually succeeded in wiping out the Christian and Jewish societies.

Status today is, that Europe is about to be lost because of European leaders lacking ability to identify the character of the threat or at least is looking the other way, fickleness, and a reluctance to say things clearly and a dislike of taking the unpleasant steps now, that will prevent something even worse later on.

As a consequence of this a society after Middle-Eastern fashion with corruption, nepotism and religious madness is wating at the door. Along the way the freedom rights will be suppressed – first because he who risks being suicide bombed, usually rather gives on the ideals than lose his life. Taxation will break down as the conditions in the kiosks and small shops (mostly owned by muslim immigrants, and known for cheating on taxes – translator) will spread to other branches of commerce. The Police will not be able to in increasingly larger geographical areas. The social structure will collapse as a result of the muslims family structure, their views on womens palce in society and a lack of understanding among too many of them about the connection between giving and receiving benefits. The consequence will be worse that the midevival Black Death, since our successors will be a suppressed minority who will not have the ability to rebuild what has been lost.

Humans often have difficulties to imagine calamities that haven't happened yet, and the many influential Seidengfadens and Skov Christensens (multi-cultural islamic apologists – translator) will with their fantasy tales pull the wrong way.

There is however, no more respite for being slow of perception or fickleness. He who doesn't understand the foundations for the benefits, he enjoys and is willing to act in accordance to that, is bound to lose them. It isn't written anywhere that the West and our model of society will win.

It is thus damaging to continue to support the establishment of a culture here, whose supporters as a group considered haven't and after all human experience neither will ever understand, what the preconditions are for the peace and prosperity that they enjoy are. Such an "integration" is the same as retreat of the western society order on our own soil. We have both a right – and to our decendants a duty – to protect ourselves from such.

Therefore the distribution of citizenship to persons, who cannot be expected to respect our values, must stop – and those who have received citizenship anyway, must be motivated to strike camp. Likewise the current influence of Middle-Eastern culture in the daily life of Danes must be opposed and not supported. When Jewish high-shool are being harrassed and threatened in school, their parents are not to be adviced to transfer their children to other schools, but the school have to be cleared of muslims, who can't behave. And if muslim ladies can't bathe together with others in swimmingpools, they are to be referred to the Red Sea instead.

It is furthermore important to gain insight into how much influence have been purchased by petrodollars on the press, the bureaucracy and politicians who are pushing in the direction of where we are heading, and which manipulation of Middle-Eastern origin the public is exposed to. It is known that the oil-sheiks have bought not only American ambassadors, but even a former president. How is the situation in this country? NATO can resist a frontal tank battle, but the Western leaders have been completely unprepared for the scams and tricks behind the Muhammed-affair. Are they better prepared today?

Finally and not the least it is thus that respect for Islams wickedness isn't promoting islamic soul searching. Islam as of today contains some serious systematic problems: It interferes aggresively and without paying attention to the means, in other peoples lives in the same way as totalitarian ideologies. Other world religions had to be re-interpreted before they – in the past – could be used in the same way.

There is thus no basis for a dialogue with Islam, as long as this belief's practicioners just considers such as a tool for deception.

Hizbollywood

What started with the questions at the EU Referendum blog about the photographs of the bombing of Qana, then continued with the discovery of faked photographs by Adnan Hajj. And now the search have started to uncover more staged, manipulated and faked photographic "evidence" from the conflict in Lebanon... And so far the results doesn't look good, as each stone is turned, what is revealed underneath is not pretty – expect the confidence in news agencies to plummet drastically!

As an example the blog Drinking From Home has found a couple of photos that might not have been doctored, but are definitely staged or we are having a case of a very unfortunate woman who have now twice in a very short time been robbed of her home by Israeli bombs....

A Lebanese woman wails after looking at the wreckage of her apartment, in a building, that was demolished by the Israeli attacks in southern Beirut July 22, 2006. REUTERS/Issam Kobeisi (from Yahoo News)

A Lebanese woman reacts at the destruction after she came to inspect her house in the suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Saturday, Aug. 5, 2006, after Israeli warplanes repeatedly bombed the area overnight.(AP Photo/Hussein Malla) (from Yahoo News)

Same clothes, same scar on her left cheek, same mark under her right eye. Two pictures of the same woman, maybe even taken on the same day.

And this is just the beginning, there's more... see A bridge too Weird and as the blogosphere dig deeper I'm sure a lot more will be uncovered. We are being led by the nose by islamic propaganda, and our own medias and others are buying the propaganda wholesale. And it didn't start with this current conflict it has most likely been going on for years, coloring our perceptions of what is really going on in the Middle-East. Up to now Islams propaganda war has been working, and it's about high time that they are exposed and we pull the plug on being lied to and misled every step of the way.

Our medias have to do some serious soul searching to regain some of their integrity and honesty and it's not a minute too soon!

*** UPDATE Aug 11, 2006 ***
Zombietime have a nice round-up of the Reuters photo fraud.

Help support the Israeli Soldiers

Send a hug and some chocolate to Israeli soldiers by following this link – it won't cost you anything except a minute of your time!

(h/t: Bombe i en turban)

Reuters Image Problem

Well Reuters have admitted that the fake picture with the smoke billowing over Beirut was doctored, and that they won't use the photographer again. Which is good, but it seems like this picture was just the tip of the iceberg... after the blogosphere have started to investigate the matter and the photographer, many more fakes have show up – many from the same photographer Adnan Hajj but also from others.

I won't repeat all of the pictures or the analysis here (but see links below), but suffice it to say that Reuters and other news agencies are having a major image problem on their hands. It is very reminiscent of the Pallywood productions – see the following video:



So while Reuters and other may have problems it's mostly of their own doing, in order to save money they are relying on local photographers and stringers to provide them with the news, and doesn't really check whether the stories and pictures they receive are biased or not, and particularly not when the story they receive is fitting with their own agencies bias. After all the worst that can happen to one of the local crew that get caught is that he is fired, however if the local crew brings images or stories that doesn't suit the local top dogs (Hizballah) then he might end up being dead (for real) in the next Hizbollywood production.

Doctored, Staged and Misleading Images and Analysis
To see the images that so far have been found to be misleading, faked, doctored and/or staged visit the following webpages and blogs:

1. Ed Driscoll: Picture Kill: How we got here
2. The Jawa Report: Reuters Doctoring Beirut Photos (Updated)
3. Ace of Spades HQ: Another Hajj Photo That Should Be Retracted (Seriously)
4. Michelle Malkin and LGF has numerous recent posts about the Reuters Incident.

*** UPDATE ***

Reuters withdraws all photos by Lebanese freelance

LONDON, Aug 7 (Reuters) - Reuters withdrew all 920 photographs by a freelance Lebanese photographer from its database on Monday after an urgent review of his work showed he had altered two images from the conflict between Israel and the armed group Hizbollah.

Global Picture Editor Tom Szlukovenyi called the measure precautionary but said the fact that two of the images by photographer Adnan Hajj had been manipulated undermined trust in his entire body of work.

"There is no graver breach of Reuters standards for our photographers than the deliberate manipulation of an image," Szlukovenyi said in a statement.

"Reuters has zero tolerance for any doctoring of pictures and constantly reminds its photographers, both staff and freelance, of this strict and unalterable policy."

The news and information agency announced the decision in an advisory note to its photo service subscribers. The note also said Reuters had tightened editing procedures for photographs from the conflict and apologised for the case.

Removing the images from the Reuters database excludes them from future sale.

Reuters ended its relationship with Hajj on Sunday after it found that a photograph he had taken of the aftermath of an Israeli air strike on suburban Beirut had been manipulated using Photoshop software to show more and darker smoke rising from buildings.

An immediate enquiry began into Hajj's other work.

It established on Monday that a photograph of an Israeli F-16 fighter over Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon and dated Aug 2, had also been doctored to increase the number of flares dropped by the plane from one to three.

"Manipulating photographs in this way is entirely unacceptable and contrary to all the principles consistently held by Reuters throughout its long and distinguished history. It undermines not only our reputation but also the good name of all our photographers," Szlukovenyi said.

"This doesn't mean that every one of his 920 photographs in our database was altered. We know that not to be the case from the majority of images we have looked at so far but we need to act swiftly and in a precautionary manner."

The two altered photographs were among 43 that Hajj filed directly to the Reuters Global Pictures Desk since the start of the conflict on July 12 rather than through an editor in Beirut, as was the case with the great majority of his images.

Filing drills have been tightened in Lebanon and only senior staff will now edit pictures from the Middle East on the Global Pictures Desk, with the final check undertaken by the Editor-in-Charge, Reuters said.

Hajj worked for Reuters as a non-staff contributing photographer from 1993 until 2003 and again since April 2005. Most of his work was in sports photography, much of it outside Lebanon.

Hajj was not in Beirut on Monday and was not responding to calls. He told Reuters on Sunday that the image of the Israeli air strike on Beirut had dust marks which he had wanted to remove.

Questions about the accuracy of the photograph arose after it appeared on news Web sites on Saturday.

Several blogs, including a number which accuse the media of distorted coverage of the Middle East conflict, said the photograph had been doctored.

Premature Detonation

If you ever are contemplating a suicide mission you might want to consider not riding a bike on bumpy roads with fully armed explosives attached to your body... or you might end up blown to bits in a nearby ditch, not the way to go to become a martyr and be welcomed in Islam's Heavenly Brothel...

Man exploded on bicycle
From Ekstra Bladet, August 6, 2006
Translation: Zonka
A suicide bomber exploded early Sunday on his bicycle, when his bomb belt exsploded prematurely. The police have afterwards found his head.

Early Sunday morning in the town of Hub in the Southwestern Pakistan a loud boom was heard, caused by an exploding suicide bomber.

Fortunately only the suicide bomber himself was killed. His bomb belt went off by an error, when the terrorist was on his way on a bicycle towards his target, says the police according to Fox News.

- This man came driving on his bike. He had secured explosives to his body, so that he was ready for his suicide attack, when the bomb suddenly went off, says the local chief of police, Munir Hussein.

Afterwards the man's head was found.

It is yet uncertain what target the man had chosen, but it is being investigated.

In the Baluchistan where the town of Hub is located, there have previously been attacks on gas pipes.

Photoshopping for war

The photographer Adnan Hajj, that was also involved in the Qana photo controversy is apparently at it again, this time with the following photo:


Click here to see the original context of the image (original link removed from the net)

It is obvious that there is something amiss in this photo, the repeating patterns in the smoke and upon closer examination buildings are being duplicated as well. This doesn't bode well for the photograph and it will be interesting to see how Reuters who is responsible for publishing the photo will react to this...

For more information about the photo and how it was doctored see:

• Allahpundit's The worst Photoshop I've ever seen
• LGF's Reuters Doctoring Photos from Beirut
• The Shape of Days: Adnan Hajj isn't even trying anymore

Reuters have three options now as I see it:

1. Apologize for being duped and getting rid of Adnan Hajj
2. Show conclusively that we are all mistaken and that the photo is genuine (and pigs can fly)
3. Act as if nothing have happened and lose credibility as the story spreads even wider

Also don't miss the Qana Director's Cut

The UNdemocratic United Nations

Finally a sane voice in the Sea of increasingly political correct and leftwing dominated media, that dares to break through the taboo of criticizing the U.N. and show that they have an anti-democratic political agenda. The U.N. myth is just that a myth, that unfortunately it is still convenient to believe in, but it is becoming increasingly clear that the U.N. have been hi-jacked on almost every level by corrupt, and anti-democratic forces, being a testament to the increasingly global democratic deficit. Perhaps it is time for truly democratic countries to pull the plug on the United Nations farce and walk out. Like the predecessor of the U.N. – The League of Nations failed to fulfil its purpose and was dismantled, it seems increasingly clear that the U.N. is racing down towards the same fate. The League of Nations displayed their impotence in the Manchurian question in the 1930s, the U.N. is displaying their impotence, corruption and ineptitude to take a stand for their own ideals all over the place, and like the League of Nations failed on the brink of a major global armed conflict, so it seems like the U.N. is doing the same following in the footsteps of their predecessor!

Whatever the successor of the U.N., if any is uncertain, but if there needs to be a super-national body we in the west must demand that it will be a more democratic and open organization!

Speech without mandate
By Hans Hauge, Jyllands-Posten, August 5, 2006
Translation: Zonka

The U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Jan Egeland was visiting Beirut last week. He then stated that Israel was violating international humanitarian laws. He then demanded that Israel should stop the bombing. Can he do that?

The problem is that Jan Egeland isn't democratic elected by anyone. The "International Community", that he comes from is a community without a people – demos. Neither is he a judge, yet he judges a whole country.

Jan Egeland belongs to a Norwegian elite of socialdemocrats; his wife is a former minister for relief-aid, and he represents special interests. He is one of numerous Norwegians, who makes a career on relief-aid's illuminated by the media spotlight. I would never vote for him, if I had the opportunity, but I don't.

In the same way Kofi Annan isn't democratically elected by anyone. Those two cannot demand anybody to to anything. Their words have no legitimacy.

It is something else with Ehud Olmert or George W. Bush. They have legitimacy, which has been granted them, because they are elected in democratic elections. They can be removed in an election, however we cannot get rid of Annan and Egeland using our vote. They are undemocratic bureacrats. The UN have a gigantic democratic deficit. Apparently nobody is worried about that. Even the EU is far more democratic than the UN. If one have to decide who can decide anything on the International scene, the choice will must always fall on USA instead of UN.UN.

The United States is made up of democratic states, while United Nations is made up of a long string of dictatorships and democratic national states. A state has to be "national" to be given access to the UN, but not democratic.

Who defends human rights best? USA or UN? Well, if you ask the leftwing, who always talks about democracy, they will answer UN. In the UN Sudan and Cuba are monitoring that the Human Rights are being kept in Denmark and other places. As everyone knows, USA is a country that promotes, spread and defends Human Rights. In fact they actually invented them. And there is the difference between the UN way and the USA way, that USA have the power to spread and defend Human Rights, while the UN can only organize large luxurious conferences about them.

When USA's UN ambassador John Bolton, speaks it is the voice of authority, while Egeland and Annan only have rhetoric, and that is a form of impotence. John Bolton have been through a public and democratic process to be elected in contrast with the others.

Jan Egeland was also in Sudan, when the genocide took place there, however Sudan is simply not as interesting for the medias as Lebanon. They have to die in solitude and outside the spotlight – forgotten by churches and human rights organizations, the radical Hizb-ut-leftwing and Ole Sippel (News Correspondent – ed). Have Egeland also condemned Sudan? What is the difference between the American perception of Human Rights and the Global perception? It is that in the USA the Human Rights exist for the benefit of humans. They should be adapted to what we want. The "Human-Rights-Fundamentalists on the other side believes that humans should adapt to Human Rights. They are humanists, we are fundamentalists.

In short: Global institutions of all kinds promotes moralistic and socialistic elites completely random exercise of power, which is beyond any democratic control. Therefor any democrat should support USA.

The Closed System of Academia

On Snaphanen yesterday a story was referenced from Danmarks Radio about a new Ph.D. thesis that explains how we are voting – namely that the length of our education is decissive for where we put our vote and the longer the education, the more likely the vote is going to either the extreme left or the multi-cultural parties.

Well without being a Ph.D. I could have told the same thing, it's been obvious from centuries if not from the Dawn of Man, that people are generally seeking like minds and the parties that the "highly educated" people are voting for is the parties that is being built by people with high educations and with a majority of highly educated people in them. But it is also the political parties that are most out of touch with what is going on in reality and is living under the illusion that reality must conform to their ideological or intellectual ideas of a perfect society... theories that have been created and rehashed over and over again on the finest universities in the world... so how can they be wrong?

Well for starters, most of the highly educated people and politicians have lives a rather sheltered life – Reality is something you read about in a book, and not something that needs to be experienced! And likewise the perfect society can be described in a study and released as a thesis, that is neatly wrapped and contains all the right answers without having to check the contents of the thesis with reality, rather check it against previous work in the field!

In a way academics today are living such a sheltered life that they believe their books and thesis' more than reality, reality is often a big mess, complex, and not very easy to describe in simple terms, thus let us reduce reality to some simple models and fit our perception on reality to these simplified models! There is nothing wrong with this as it can help clarify certain aspects of reality, but if you forget to check the model against reality or completely abandon reality and believe that you have the perfect solution to all kinds of problems solely based on models of reality then there is a big problem: delusion!

And delusions are thriving within the academic world, there are so-called experts on every imaginable subject, that loves to talk long and hard on their speciality and also often have a very P.C. solution to just about everything. The P.C. part comes from the "indoctrination" in schools, college and universities where P.C. behavior and thinking is becoming more and more the norm and non-P.C. thinking and behavior is scorned. And with academics with little experience of life outside the academic circles they hardly know anything else.

In days gone past it was considered a good thing for an academic to be well versed in many different issues that had little to do with their chosen field. It was considered a good thing to wait a year or two after college to travel the world, have a regular job or generally get some other experiences than school before starting university... Not anymore, there is a pressure on young people to go directly from school to university and not "waste" any time getting their degree. Likewise in Denmark (at least) it used to be (until 1971) mandatory to take a course called Examen philosophicum irregardless of what your speciality were – to get a broader knowledge of general areas within academia and the philosophy-history behind our culture in a way to place education within context. Today we don't have that and academia have lost their sense of context to the sense that all the disciplines of education is not helping to pull the society together in a certain way, but pulling it apart by pulling each in their own way. And at the same time is struggling to find their own sense of context again, however, this time not as being part of society as a whole, instead by defining it solely upon the world of academics, in a closed little world of its own.

So I believe that the main problem is that the academia is becoming a closed system, with limited knowledge of the world outside the academic circles, and the ideologies that thrive in this closed system is high-flying theories and ideologies that have time and again proven to be not working in the real world, no matter how good they sound on paper, such as P.C.-ism, Marxism, Communism, Multi-Culturalism, Cultural-Relativism, etc.

I don't have the solutions to this, but maybe some partial ones: I believe that something like the Examen philosophicum should be re-introduced as mandatory with a curiculum of giving the students a broad introduction to the history, philosophies and values of our culture, as to give them an anchor in which they can see the perspective of their society and culture and a sense of purpose in their education, instead of drifting to and fro. I also believe that it is a mistake to pressure young people to go directly from school to college to university, without taking a break and experience the life outside of schools, and it should also be encouraged that students have some real work experience before graduating from university – and not just student-jobs but real life jobs, meeting people from other walks of life and building a network that isn't just confined to academia!

What happened at Qana Updated

The story of what happened at Qana continues to develop, as new evidence and attempted rebuttals comes in, and new manipulated stories are being uncovered. Read the updates at the end of the original post.

The Social Work by Hizballah

Every so often one hears that the so-called terrorist organizations such as Hizballah are doing the people in the area they control a great service by providing social work, in the form of schools, hospitals and such institutions. Which on the surface seems to indicate that they do care for the people and often mitigates their terrorist status in the medias. However, the purpose of undertaking such social work, does not seem to be for the benefit of the people it was supposed to help, but an integral part of their overall strategy of winning the PR war as well as winning the struggle against Israel, as the following letter to the editor of Die Tageszeitung, from a Lebanese Shiite, explaining Hezbollah?s evil strategy:

I lived until 2002 in a small southern village near Mardshajund that is inhabited by a majority of Shias like me. After Israel left Lebanon, it did not take long for Hezbollah to take have its say in other towns. Received as successful resistance fighters and armed to the teeth, they stored rockets in bunkers in our town as well. The social work of the Party of God consisted in building a school and a residence over these bunkers! A local sheikh explained to me laughing that the Jews would lose in any event because the rockets would either be fired at them or if they attacked the rockets depots, they would be condemned by world opinion on account of the dead civilians. These people do not care about the Lebanese population, they use them as shields, and, once dead, as propaganda. As long as they continue existing there, there will be no tranquility and peace.

Difference between IDF and the opposition

The IDF unlike their opponents tries to avoid killing civilians, and to that end they often announces where they will strike in advance either by fliers, radio announcements or even calling residents in target areas by phone, giving them a chance to get away before the boms falls. Something that you cannot say about the opposition, that gladly target civilian areas with rockets filled will ball bearings, designed to maximize civilian death count on impact, and naturally no warnings are given.

But even the tactics of warning the civilians are seen as a sinister psychological warfare of the IDF:

From: LA Times, August 1, 2006:

Last week, many Khan Younis residents answered the phone and heard a recorded warning message in Arabic. The Israeli army also has broken in on the frequency of the Hamas radio station to broadcast warnings.

In all cases the message was similar: Don't harbor militant fighters or store weapons for them. Those who do will place themselves in harm's way.

"It's intense psychological pressure," said Abu Ahmed, a spokesman for Islamic Jihad. "They're trying to force the civilians to drive the resistance away from the civilian population centers."

What happened at Qana?

It seems more and more likely that the tragedy of Qana was not caused by IAF bombings, but rather a staged event by Hizballah for the benefit of the world media, which has been grateful for the chance to prop up their anti-Israel rhetoric with pictures of "innocent civilians" bombed by the cold hearted Israelis!

It seems again that it is left to the blogosphere to uncover these staged events and find the truth as the MSM seems to have very little interest in the truth in these matters, they want their »Death Porn« and confirmation of the evilness of the Israelis! And again the blogosphere have provided evidence that things aren't exactly as they seem to be if you're only looking at the biased MSM coverage!

And as Islamic clerics have made abundantly clear – »There are no Civilians in Islamic Law« and it is mandated in the Qu'ran and Hadith that they should fight the infidels using every stragatem of war, and that »War is Deceit«... So when the Western media is so eager to help their cause, why not help them by staging some gruesome events and blame it on Israel... After all it's all Halal!

See the following webpages for an extensive coverage of the events at Qana:

• War Porn [Gates of Vienna]
• Were the Qana Bodies Staged? [Confederate Yankee]
• Qana's Unresolved Questions [Confederate Yankee]
• Milking it? [EU Referendum]
• Who is this man? [EU Referendum]
• A Tyre For Qana? [Riehl World View]
• Qana Staged? [Strata-Sphere]
• Who killed Mohammed al-Dura? [Worldnet Daily] – Background info.

*** ADD ONS ***
Read also:

• The Weaponization of Children by Vanderleun.
• What happened in Qana? Michelle Malkin on Hotair
• The curious Qana body count [The American Thinker]

*** UPDATE I ***

And now AP staffers are congratulating themselves with a job well done... patting each other on the back and awarding cash prizes. A letter sent to all staffers were intercepted at LGF, before reading you might want to grab a barf-bag, just in case you'll need it.

Dear Staffers:

Last Sunday proved to be one of the most dramatic days in the war between Israel and Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon. AP?s extensive photo team produced a stunning series of images that day that beat the competition and scored huge play worldwide.

Rumors surfaced early Sunday morning that an Israeli airstrike had flattened a house in the southern Lebanese village of Qana. The number of deaths wasn?t immediately known, but the seriousness of the incident was clear. Beirut-based photographer Hussein Malla immediately called AP photographers Nasser Nasser, Lefteris Pitarakis and stringer Mohammed Zaatari and advised them to rush to the scene. Nasser arrived as the bodies of many civilians ? including numerous children ? were being pulled from the rubble. Lefteris later took over, enabling Nasser to get his pictures swiftly onto the wire. Kevin Frayer was dispatched from Beirut to boost AP?s presence. Throughout the morning, AP?s team filed a steady stream of powerful images.

Meanwhile, in Beirut, a small Hezbollah demonstration exploded into violence at word of the Qana attack. Hezbollah supporters stormed the nearby United Nations building, scaling walls and smashing their way past bulletproof glass barriers to enter the building itself. Photographers Hussein Malla, Kevork Djansezian and Ben Curtis were all there to capture the rioting. Beirut-based photo editor Dalia Khamissy coordinated with photographers in the field and handled a steady stream of stringer photos. All day long, AP photographers relayed what they were seeing to AP reporters for print stories.

Nasser?s most haunting image showed a man emerging from the rubble carrying the lifeless and dust-covered body of a child. Calm, morning light shone down on man and child, highlighting them against an almost monochrome background of pure rubble. The photo is here. Nasser?s image ran on the front pages of at least 33 newspapers, including the San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the New York Post. It also won a double-page center spread in The Guardian of London. Lefteris?s image of a resident weeping next to a row of bodies made the front of The Washington Post, among many others. Hussein, Kevork and Ben?s images of the storming of the UN building easily beat those of the competition.

For a day of outstanding a memorable photos, taken in conditions of substantial danger, the Lebanon photo team of Nasser Nasser, Lefteris Pitarakis, Kevin Frayer, Mohammed Zaatari, Ben Curtis, Hussein Malla, Kevork Djansezian and Dalia Khamissy shares this week?s $500 Beat of the Week award.

*** UPDATE II ***

Jihad Watch reader S have posted an open letter to AP, AFP, and Reuters about the Qana photos:

To Whom It May Concern,

Many powerful photographs were taken following the recent tragedy at Qana. Legitimate questions have arisen regarding the actual times certain photos were taken.

News agencies have begun responding to some of the questions raised. Here is AP's response: http://www.forbes.com/home/feeds/ap/2006/08/01/ap2920008.html:

The AP had three different photographers there who weren't always aware of what the others were doing, and filed their images to editors separately, said Santiago Lyon, director of photography.

There are also several reasons not to draw conclusions from time stamps, Lyon said. Following a news event like this, the AP does not distribute pictures sequentially; photos are moved based on news value and how quickly they are available for an editor to transmit.

The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse all distributed photos of which questions have been asked relative to the time shot. What Lyon of AP does not address, is that the exact time of digital capture is recorded along with the image. This EXIF information cannot be altered, and would give accurate timings as to the sequence of all photos released.

We urge AFP, AP, and Reuters to make available to this website a small JPEG file, with all EXIF data attached, of each of the photos analyzed on the various websites that have raised this issue. A list will be provided if they are not already known. Sensitive IPTC data may be removed, if any responding agency wishes. The EXIF is the only important data.

The actual capture times, between photos of all agencies, would then be made a public record -- chips falling where they may.

It is the responsibility of a free press to ferret out information that those in power wish to withhold. It is the responsibility of an informed citizenry to openly request information from press sources when there is the appearance that they are withholding information critical to their mission of maintaining the public trust.

We await response from AP, AFP and Reuters that could lay to rest this one important issue.

To which I have a slight nit-pick, that it is possible to alter the EXIF information embedded in the digital photos from most digital cameras, it's even possible that the date and time on different cameras aren't even close to being in sync with the real time or set to times in other timezones. So the time/date information will not be conclusive evidence – in a way the most fishy result would probably be doctored EXIF timestamps that shows a consistent and stringent timeline! However, that doesn't defray from the other suspicious points being raised in the Qana "incident".

*** UPDATE III ***

It seems like the Qana story isn't the only one that smells fishy... Riehl World View have the story of the Israeli bombing of two ambulances, that's also most likely a piece of fiction that the MSM have bought and brought uncritically!

Italy to legalize 350,000 illegal immigrants

After Prodi won the election in Italy, it is following in the footsteps of Spain, who also gave amnesty to a whole lot of illegal immigrants. One might think that such acts are an internal problem to the countries granting such amnesties – wrong... it's a problem for the other European countries in the Schengen agreement! Once these people are legal in one Schengen country they are free to move within the other countries as well. So instead of being a problem for Italy... Italy is now exporting the problem to the rest of Europe as well, without having to consult the rest of the Schengen countries!

Italy warned over immigrant amnesty
From the EU Observer, July 31, 2006

The European Commission has issued a warning to Italy that it could face EU sanctions if its move to legalise up to 350,000 immigrants breaches union law.

Justice commissioner Franco Frattini said that the Italian authorities would have to check each one of the thousands of applications for regularisation to make sure they comply with EU law.

"I am asking the Interior Minister Giulio D'Amato to examine one by one the 350,000 requests for regularisation from immigrant workers," said Mr Frattini in Rome, according to news agency AFP.

"Checks are needed to determine if these are fictitious demands or if they effectively correspond to a work offer and lodging. Otherwise, European Union sanctions are envisaged," he said.

Taking figures from a 2004 survey, the justice commissioner pointed out that Italy had a higher than average amount of people working on the black market.

"Italy had 16-17 percent working 'on the black', compared to a European average of four to five percent: the fight against illegal immigration also has to be seen in this light."

Mr Frattini's warning comes after Rome last week announced that it intended to put in place a quota of 350,000 non-EU citizens who would be able to legalise their status in Italy as well as regularising more than 500,000 workers already in the country.

This is not the first time the EU has warned member states about these kinds of moves.

Brussels grumbled when Spain last year put in place an amnesty allowing thousands of immigrants to be legalised saying governments should make these steps in a more harmonised manner.

Madrid's surprise move was also criticised by some member states leading to calls for an early warning system to be put in place when governments are considering immigration procedures that will affect other countries.