Tuesday, February 28, 2006
THE EURO-DEBATE
Glenn, Helen and Claire Berlinski, podcasting on Europe.
UPDATE: Well, if Berlinski's book is as good as the interview I would certainly not buy it. To recommend that the State Department start preparing 'contingency plans' without even hinting for what eventuality - other than the broad-based term ‘going to hell’ - and what these plans should consist of, is being gratuitously alarmist. And to totally stumble on the significance of the Van Gogh murder is for an expert on Europe’s dark future an almost capital offense. Berlinski came across as clueless, serving up some simple over-generalizations that lacked any depth. If America is starting to make plans based on her commentary, there is reason for worry indeed. It was Helen’s grace and Glenn's unique sense of humor that made it a palatable experience, but next time if Glenn and Helen want to talk about Europe they should give me call.
Posted at 10:04 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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END OF TOLERANCE?
Newsweek has weighed in on the European integration challenge with an article called The End of Tolerance?
It starts of with the usual and flawed idea that Europeans, and in particular the Dutch, are tolerant by nature and that recent incidents such as the cartoon controversy have put an end to all that. That is too much of an unresearched and back-of-the-envelope assessment as 'pragmatism' rather than 'tolerance' has been, in particular in the Dutch case, the virtue that helped shape policy.
Therefore I am also not too confident with Newsweek's assertion that Europe is taking a tougher stance with regards to Muslim immigrants. What has happened is that the debate has been opened up and consequently it is far easier these days to discuss harder and less-tolerant approaches than used to be the case. It remains to be seen however if all of that new openness about these issues will yield tangible results and sustained policies irrespective of which political parties happen to be in power. And that's where the real concerns are in my opinion.
The one thing that Newsweek gets exactly right is the requirement outlined in my post below about Fukuyama's take on integration:
It's an open question whether Germans, Dutch, or Danes will ever truly accept a multiethnic, multireligious "Germanness," "Dutchness" or "Danishness." But given the immigrant and demographic trajectories of Europe's future, there is little choice but to try.
Posted at 02:20 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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EUROPE AND MUSLIMS: INTEGRATION POSSIBLE?
Francis Fukuyama has taken a closer look at Europe’s struggle with radical Islam and considers the various options the continent has to proactively engage the problems it is facing. And Fukuyama gets it, offering a strategy that is very similar to the Peaktalk-approach:
Governments need to clamp down on extremists and jihadists in ways that do not risk further alienating minority communities; their aim must be to integrate moderate Muslims better while avoiding a right-wing populist backlash.
The toughest part however is to come up with a solid integration model as sending every Muslim back to his native grounds with an incentive payment to do so from the European taxpayer is simply not a viable option. Fukuyama notes that time is indeed running out for Europe and his suggestion of offering a positive Americanized version of integration would most likely offer the best road to success:
The problem that most Europeans face today is that they don't have a vision of the kinds of positive cultural values their societies stand for and should promote, other than endless tolerance and moral relativism. What each European society needs is to invent an open form of national identity similar to the American creed, an identity that is accessible to newcomers regardless of ethnicity or religion.
But in that we can already discern the difficulties: the absence of any positive cultural values and the inability to define a set at a point in time when Europe’s nation states are increasingly drifting towards abandoning their national values in favor of a bland Euro-label, designed in Brussels.
It once more highlights the need to let each European nation define its core cultural values, something which by itself will be a serious and lenghty process of soul searching. The long post-war journey build on secularism and relativism has bred a generation that is terribly ill-equipped to define these positive cultural values, let alone come up with a message that could attract or even integrate others. And should there be sufficient appetite to engage in such a fundamental debate, any positive outcome will be subject to the left and right sides of political spectrum finding some sort of consensus. This is a particularly tall order and even if it’s filled it will take time, something which according to Fukuyama, is in short supply.
On the other side of the integration divide however there is less ambiguity or cultural confusion, on the contrary. Call them positive, call them negative, the group that you seek to integrate has a very consistent set of values. Who can honestly blame it for so far being unwilling or unable to accept the loosely defined moral framework that seems to be sinking the European ship?
Monday, February 27, 2006
CHINA'S WEAK FOUNDATION
The pessimists see a China as an unstoppable economic miracle that will become the next superpower and militarily challenge US hegemony, the optimists see China as an unstoppable economic miracle that will become a future US partner in a new Pacific age.
I definitely veer towards the latter, but will concede that we need a healthy dose of realism here. A realist will argue that China is a useful example of reforming a communist nation by unleashing huge economic potential first while considering democratic reform as a secondary, more gradual, item on the wish list. At the same the realist will take a very sobering view of what is currently shrouded by the incessant growth numbers and success stories that we are asked to take at face value. That is The Dark Side of China’s Rise, as outlined by Minxin Pei. Key excerpt:
China has already paid a heavy price for the flaws of its political system and the corruption it has spawned. Its new leaders, though aware of the depth of the decay, are taking only modest steps to correct it. For the moment, China’s strong economic fundamentals and the boundless energy of its people have concealed and offset its poor governance, but they will carry China only so far. Someday soon, we will know whether such a flawed system can pass a stress test: a severe economic shock, political upheaval, a public health crisis, or an ecological catastrophe. China may be rising, but no one really knows whether it can fly.
And therefore it is in our strategic interest to help China along when it encounters its various stress tests, which given our previous experiences with emerging tigers will initially be economic ones. Minxin Pei’s observations by the way contain a kernel of hope for the pessimists: China is not nearly as strong or as threatening as some try to make it out to be.
Posted at 12:02 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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OSCAR PREVIEWS
Getting ready for Oscar Night? The LA Times notices that each of the best-picture nominees left quite a bit on the cutting-room floor. The more I read and see, the more I am beginning to believe that the real controversial movie this year is not 'Brokeback', but 'Crash':
The conceit of "Crash" and the Oscar-nominated L.A.-bashing movies it borrows liberally from ("Magnolia," "Short Cuts," "Grand Canyon") is that they have the guts to portray the real Los Angeles. In truth, they tell us far more about the neuroses of their directors — and the prejudices of academy voters — than about our actuality.
Maybe, although I did like Magnolia and was hopeful we'd see P.T. Anderson collect an Academy Award some day. Whatever happened to him?
Posted at 12:01 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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BLACKBERRY DISTRESS
Although most of the people I work with carry the damn thing, I personally have no use at all for a Blackberry. The laptop and cell phone give me sufficient access to the world and, quite frankly, I really don’t need to improve people’s access to me. Given the choice I’d rather reduce it.
Anyway, that doesn’t mean I haven’t been following the Blackberry patent infringement case which is quite interesting and Dan Morgan argues why in the wake of this affair the US will need some patent reform. He may be right about that although I will argue that a reduced ability to patent new ideas will adversely affect investment in new technologies.
Posted at 12:00 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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Sunday, February 26, 2006
SAM SULLIVAN’S OLYMPIC STRENGTH
The Olympic Winter Games ended in Torino today and I can honestly say that I didn’t see one minute of it, even today when I decided to watch part of the closing ceremony I tuned in too late for the part that I really wanted to see. And that was the passing of the Olympic flag to Vancouver-mayor Sam Sullivan whose city will host the 2010 edition of the games:
Rogge fit the flag into a special holster on Sullivan's motorized wheelchair. The mayor, a quadriplegic from a skiing accident when he was 19, then drew a standing ovation from the sellout crowd at the 35,000-seat Stadio Olimpico when he weaved his wheelchair along the stage to follow the tradition of waving the flag eight times.
Sullivan’s amazing strength and spirit should stand as
a formidable example to us all:With his neck broken and four limbs all but paralyzed, Sullivan, 46, went from 15 months in hospitals and rehab centers into public housing and onto welfare. He languished for seven years, spiraling deeper into self-pity and despondency, he said in an interview, until he became suicidal. ''I had to decide whether or not I wanted to continue living," he said.
And he chose to live. Sullivan established a number of non-profit organizations, learned Cantonese and embarked on a political career where he had to overcome another major obstacle in a left-coast city like Vancouver as Sullivan is a conservative. Yet, his determination enabled him to defeat a hard-left candidate last fall and we can only hope that Sullivan wins another mandate in 2009 to witness the next edition of the Winter Olympics as mayor and as an exampe of strenghth and recovery to us all.
NOTE: Driving home today from a quick errand to the local mall I encountered a horde of environmentalists who had picked today to vent their anger over the construction of a new Vancouver-Whistler highway which is part of the overall Olympic infrastructure. It will make the road - one of the deadliest in North America - significantly safer and will no doubt give another boost to surging property prices. But the relatively small price of cutting a few trees and removing some scenic rocks is even for some too much to pay. Confident prediction: their effort to block construction will fail.
Posted at 07:38 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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THE SILENCE OF THE LEFT?
Cathy Seipp - who also runs the excellent Cathy’s World blog - had an interesting column up in the LA Times yesterday built around the notion that:
“ … one of the great paradoxes of our time is that two groups most endangered by political Islam, gays and women, somehow still find ways to defend it”
While a somewhat sweeping generalization, it goes to the heart of the Fortuynist argument that the groups that benefited most from the liberalization of our society in the 1960s and 70s, probably are least aware of what they stand to lose if radical Muslims and their western appeasers are allowed to embrace and implement a new social agenda.
Seipp’s claims sparked a sharp rebuff from Gabriel Rotello on the Huffington Post where he countered by compiling a list of notable gays and women who have taken on the excesses of radicalism in our midst. That of course is a fairly superficial way of addressing the issue as anyone can come up with a list that contains Sullivan, Bawer, Manji, Hirsi Ali and the late Fortuyn. But it doesn’t address the core of the issue and therefore Rotello largely misses the point.
The fact that the focus is on these few brave individuals that speak up and who now in some cases have to live under police protection proves Seipp’s point: it is the left at large that has been silent. Where is that mass movement, where are the rallies, those concerted efforts that characterized women’s and gay movements from the 1960s onwards? And it is not just gays or women: there is a string of left-wing causes which always managed to find a joint umbrella under which it protested the free west’s accomplishments, think of the “women against nukes” or the various “animal rights” groups. I grew up in a country that was in the vanguard of this leftist revolution and which as a result spawned a political and media establishment that was firmly rooted in the values of this post-war social and cultural revolution.
And therein lays the exact problem. The journey from young and dynamic social renewal to becoming entrenched and institutionalized interests does not really allow for ideological deviation. On the contrary, and any alignment against the politically correct establishment is punished by expulsion which is precisely what someone like Pim Fortuyn experienced. “The bullet” as one of Fortuyn’s assistants remarked shortly after his death; “came from the left”. And although I am hardly an expert on the dynamics of gay or women’s rights movements, I have read enough of Andrew Sullivan and Tammy Bruce to know that their views are not terribly popular among the established constituencies that helped propel these writers to prominence.
The mainstream left of recent is confused and struggling to find a response and a revamped agenda to the challenges of the new century where capitalism is triumphant and jihadism the next mortal threat. The absence of a clear new agenda combined with a desperate attachment to the old one hardly makes for a compelling call to take to the streets and protest ‘en masse’ for basic rights such as drawing a simple cartoon.
And so it is today. Last Friday’s demonstration in support of free speech at the Danish Embassy yielded only a few hundred participants, among them two rather famous men who have long ago been ejected by the left. It underlines that today’s progressives – those who look forward – remain small in numbers. The North American and European majority consists of people who are either part of the confused and silent left or sufficiently lethargic and disinterested to stay home while their rights and future are steadily frittered away. Not a great slate to defend the free world with, but then the mass protest movements of the left started out small too. Let’s see if the left remains silent or if somehow their own dissidents can force them into some critical thinking and finally some action.
Saturday, February 25, 2006
DEFEAT OR WIN?
William Buckley argues that the time has arrived to acknowledge defeat in Iraq. Despite the torrent of violence however there is still room for optimism, and it is Victor Davis Hanson who - fresh from an Iraq visit - explains why. Both projections are on the outer bands of pessimism and optimism, but even if we allow Hanson's generous take to prevail, Iraq will continue to be a heavily militarized zone where dissent and ethnic sentiments will have to be suppressed for decades to come. Hardly a democratic win, but neither a loss to Islamist and Baathist troupes.
Posted at 11:33 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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THE INFLUENTIAL DISSIDENT
The topic of politically active royals has been the focus of some attention here before – some of you may remember Royal Dutch and of course Moonbat Princess – but these were rather low profile exercises compared to the latest affair from Britain. The unauthorized publication of some of Prince Charles’ diaries where he styles himself as a “dissident”, acting as a counterweight to the political establishment has provoked an outcry on a number of levels. Apart from the juicy bits such as the prince lamenting having to fly business class, the most interesting one surely is the political dimension of it all. He may be a dissident, but politicians generally let him and worse, listen to him.
A few years ago British writer-columnist Johann Hari published a rather scathing review of the Windsor clan entitled God Save the Queen and he has offered some extracts of it on his site this week. So to underline the point of political influence that some royals have been granted or simply taken, here’s telling excerpt from Hari:
Thirdly, the Prince acted as an “unofficial envoy” during the war on terror. Charles and his spin-doctors were eager to see this task trumpeted in the press (it made the front page of the Daily Mail) despite the fact that it was meant to be a behind-the-scenes job. Charles’ task was to keep the Saudi royal family – notoriously one of the most corrupt, decadent and totalitarian ruling houses in the world – on side because he is so friendly with them. Yet even in this, he was unsuccessful: the House of Saud has publicly distanced itself from the ‘war on terror.’
Such a role for the prince could be explained away as helpful or as not directly interfering with ministers as
Tony Blair did earlier this week. Yet, it is hard not to escape the impression that the extreme deference of elected officials to a future king does have the potential for some unwanted political outcomes. The absence of any tangible public records leaves us to guess whatever it is that Britain’s dissident-prince discussed with his for instance his Saudi counterparts. Or how in turn the prince himself may have become unduly influenced by whatever agenda the House of Saud saw fit to promote when the prince came calling. The release of the prince’s diaries by one of his former assistants – while questionable from an ethical point of view – has once more raised the issue of political transparency in the West’s few remaining monarchies.
Posted at 11:00 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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Friday, February 24, 2006
CONSERVATIVE COUNTRY SONGS
Here's a list of fifteen great country songs that promote conservative ideas. There are few on the list that I am really familiar with and only one - the inimitable Stand by Your Man by Tammy Wynette - that made it to my personal all-time top twenty-five. (via Patterico)

Posted at 05:35 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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ROLL CHANGES
I've just updated the contents of the right sidebar in order to let it reflect my daily reading habits which change over time. So, some necessary adjustments and at the same time they are recommendations for you. The brand new feature is the 'Commentary' section with some of my favorite columnists, I never really understood myself why these sidebar rolls were exclusively reserved for bloggers. No more, change!
Posted at 05:08 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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DANISH EMBASSY RALLY
Updates and some good photos over at Stephen Green's and Vital Perspective (via Glenn Reynolds).
UPDATE: More from Sully.
Posted at 01:09 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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IDOL
Kate reminds me that every now and then it is time for some lighter fare on the blog menu. Agreed, and the Dorsmans have been watching American Idol too, although it conflicts with our deep calvinist ethics of working and doing something useful with our spare time. Watch TV? Read a book!
Following a bunch of teenagers and twenty-somethings sing and sitting through Paula Abdul's endless platitudes is hardly that, but somehow this stuff performs an important role in our lives too. So much that we will probably be checking regularly on the journey of our favorites which in my case is definitely this one.
Posted at 09:48 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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LIVINGSTONE
Below more comments from readers on David Irving and how his case is materially different from the cartoon controversy. While posting it I noticed that London mayor Ken Livingstone was back in hot waters:
Feisty London Mayor Ken Livingstone was suspended for a month on Friday for comparing a Jewish reporter to a concentration camp guard, a verdict the mayor said struck "at the heart of democracy".
A three-person panel which hears complaints against local authorities ruled in a case brought by a Jewish group that Livingstone, 60, had brought his office into disrepute. It ordered him suspended for four weeks from March 1.
Exactly the same logic applies to Livingstone as it does to Irving: the public arena is there to correct the man and
Harry Place's makes a compelling case for that particular argument. In fact, Red Ken's comments are probably fairly innocent and since he was leaving a party maybe Londoners should ask themselves if Ken didn't have one too many. And that raises a completely different set of questions.
READERS ON IRVING, CARTOONS
One of my longtime readers has been fairly persistent on the issue of using the courts to address certain forms of free speech. She argues that the objective truth should be protected from Irving-style diatribes:
When Mohammed says "God told me to kill infidels", I suspect he is lying, but since nobody caught on tape exactly what God said, I can not prove it. But then again, neither can Mohammed prove anything. We both are acting on faith. And therefore, each of us speaking about our faith, which may and often do contradict each other, is protected.
Islam has always rejected that it is one faith among many, so I do not doubt that its adherents will try to use the courts to stifle debate. But the fact that they will try, means somebody should have thought out the effects of multi-culturalism before encouraging Islamic immigration. It does not diminish the conviction of David Irving for slanderous speech toward victims of the Holocaust.
Given that Islam contributed to the historical foundation of the Holocaust - Hitler very specifically said "Who remembers the Armenians?", I find it ironic that the two issues are raised as opposites, but that is just me. For me, to uphold the right of David Irving to deny the Jewish genocide is to uphold the right of the Turkish government to deny the Armenian genocide or the right of the remaining Pol Pot cadre to deny the Cambodian genocide. Rwanda, Darfur, the Great Leap Forward, Ukraine, the Hindu Kush ... are all of these killing grounds to be taken as disputable matters of faith or fancy and not as fact? Already we have seen the trivialization of the term "Gulag" by Amnesty International... To me these things are related issues: free speech evolving into freedom of individual truth. I support the first, but reject the latter.
When the American constitution was being developed the "truth test" for free speech was rejected on the grounds that people can speak contradictory about the truth. "I paid you enough money for the cow!", "No, you didn't!" but at least, both litigants agreed there was a cow. That is very different from David Irving trying to tell us, "there is no cow!" while we are out standing amongst the paddies.
It's a sound analysis, but to me it doesn't address the question of using the courts to re-establish the truth. The public arena in and by itself should serve as a filter for the nonsense that Irving spews out. In case that such a public test fails our society has probably already fallen so deep that even court mandated speech regulation will have precious little effect.
Posted at 09:14 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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Wednesday, February 22, 2006
MORE CRITICAL THINKING
Irshad Manji explains today in the LA Times that there once was a tradition of free and critical thinking within is Islam, called ijtihad:
This concept of creative reasoning, pronounced ij-tee-had, has a track record. In the early decades of Islam, thanks to the spirit of ijtihad, 135 schools of thought flourished. In Muslim Spain, scholars would teach their students to abandon "expert" opinions about the Koran if their own conversations with the ambiguous book produced more compelling evidence for their peaceful ideas. And Cordoba, among the most sophisticated cities in Islamic Spain, had 70 libraries. That is one for every virgin that today's Muslim martyrs believe Allah pledges them. Books then, women now: an unlikely indicator of how far Muslims have plunged intellectually.
Resurrecting that tradition may not be an easy undertaking but Manji points to some encouraging evidence that Muslim women can play an important role in that process. Read it all.
Posted at 04:22 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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AN EGG FILLED WITH PAINT
I've been getting quite a bit of mail inquiring about my positive stance on China as a long-term partner for the US in bringing about world stability. It will be the subject of a longer piece down the road, promise, but suffice it to say that I am not as blind to some of the more unpleasant tidings coming out of the Middle Kingdom as some of you may think.
Today, one of the last imprisoned Tiananmen activists, Yu Dongye, was released from prison, destroyed for life for having had the temerity to deface the portrait of Chairman Mao with paint-filled eggs seventeen years ago:
His mother, Wu Pinghua, said the former journalist, now 38, is a broken and mentally-deranged man. She told The Times: "Yu Dongyue can do nothing for himself so when he comes home I will care for him."
Mrs Wu said that she last saw her son a year ago. "He looked at me through the glass but didn’t recognise me. He pushed the phone aside and wouldn’t talk to me and just mumbled in some foreign language. He never called me ‘Ma’."
For daring to deface the portrait of a man still revered in China as the architect of its liberation from feudalism and colonialism, Mr Yu spent two years in solitary confinement, and was subjected to electric shocks and brutal beatings.
Once he was left standing in the sun, tied to a post, for days. A friend said that when he was transferred to a prison hospital after a mental breakdown in 1992, other prisoners were ordered to take care of him, but beat him at will.
His mother described scars on his face and hands and said she planned to take him to a hospital for a checkup. "He hasn’t come home for 17 years. I’m very happy ... but he’s mentally ill and it will be a burden to take care of him."
Stories like this one are extraordinarily depressing and underline that it is not just the Muslim world that has a very hard time accepting that mocking and questioning the sainthood status accorded to some is what free and inquiring minds normally do. And there are many ways to do so: draw a cartoon, throw an egg, express your doubts, write on your blog.
Apart from the terrible and heartbreaking human suffering, this case presents yet more evidence of China's deep insecurity over its past and by extension over its immediate future as a polity under communist party rule. Yes, it has been seventeen years since Yu was arrested, but there can be little doubt that anyone replicating his brave actions today will suffer a very different fate.
Posted at 04:15 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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Tuesday, February 21, 2006
PROSPEROUS, MODERN, AND NORMAL
That describes the city of Dohok in Iraqi Kurdistan. Michael Totten has another worthwhile and revealing report with lots of photos.
Posted at 05:34 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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IT'S NOT ENOUGH TO MAKE MONEY, YOU MUST ALSO SAVE THE WORLD
Steve Maich in Macleans thinks that western companies are "selling their souls" by doing business with repressive regimes. Or even doing business in countries with repressive regmines.
Leave aside the anthropomorphism of declaring that legal entities have souls to sell, what perplexes me is this demand that the companies with which we do business be more ethical, more moral than our elected representatives. Maich points out that several companies are being asked to testify of a US congressional subcommitte, but that "it's not clear how far Western lawmakers are willing to go to defend human rights in the world's hottest new market".
The answer is, of course, not very far at all, especially when Western diplomats are bending over backwards to avoid offending the same regimes.
I'm not going to defend any behaviour. It seems clear that the actions of Western companies in China in particular vary from mostly harmless to actively participating in repressive activities.
What interests me is the devolution of responsibility. The new thesis is that business is responsible for social change.
If businessmen were to show as much courage in the face of Communist leaders as they do in the boardroom, China would be a far more liberated place than it is today. "Business people are supposed to be able to do this kind of thing, they should be natural at it," Kamm says. "You should be able to sell the guy on something he may not want to hear initially. That's what salesmanship is!" But after more than a decade of cajoling and lobbying high-profile CEOs, Kamm has yet to convince a single one to make the promotion of human rights part of their strategy in China.
Maich goes on to give a few more examples of where business leaders have affected social change. All true, and heartwarming. But now it's not enough when the occasional courageous CEO puts human rights above profit. Now we expect them to be the agents of change.
Instead of relying on our elected governments to push for human rights awareness, we give them a free pass. Paul Martin for example could meet with Chinese government officials and only bring up human rights issues 'in passing', but we expect more from our business leaders dammit.
It's a crazy world we live in, where we expect our federal government to abdicate their diplomatic responsibilities to private enterprise, but won't let the similar private companies (for example) deliver health care.
Posted at 12:57 PM by Ginna Dowler |
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IT'S NOT FEMININE TO WIN BIG
Girls shouldn't be too competitive. That's the basic message in an opinion piece by frequent commentator Father Raymond de Souza in today's National Post. Our team may have won the Gold, but they did it by winning too big. He agrees with Don Cherry, who said last week that "To run up a score like [16-0], that is wrong. It's not the Canadian way." (Good thing the score wasn't 33-0, like it was in the most lopsided game in Olympic history, as the Canadian men whupped the Swiss in 1924.)
But see I can't remember Don saying anything like that when he runs across a lopsided NHL score. No one seems to suggest that it's un-Canadian to kick a NHL team when they're down. Maybe I missed where Don thought that empty net goals should be disallowed because they're just mean?
Of course, Cherry claims the real issue is that without competition, the IOC might decide to remove women's hockey from the games. (Such musing took place before Sweden took the silver, proving that at least one other team is competitive.) De Souza meanwhile, is all in favour of such a move. Somehow, goes his thinking, girls in Europe will play hockey in greater numbers if the pressure of dreaming about the Olympics is removed. Or something.
I don't know how other teams would ever become competitive without major international competition, but of course that's not the point. His thesis is that it would be rude if we were the host country and our girls were so unsportsmanlike as to actually win big.
Maybe I'm wrong but I can't honestly imagine such a discussion about men's sport. More importantly, to call our women unsportsmanlike is just devastatingly wrong on so many levels. As Mark Spector points out elsewhere in the Post, our women worked extremely hard to achieve this gold medal. Unlike their highly paid male counterparts, who are giving up a couple weeks of golfing to represent their countries, our women gave up jobs and lives to be in Calgary as a team. They took part-time jobs at the Home Depot and elsewhere to feed themselves while the rest of the time they played hockey. They played boys teams, they played the Americans, they did whatever was required to get themselves ready.
And when the hard work was over and Games finally here, instead of support they had to hear Canadian commentators chide them for doing their best, instead of going easy on the competition.
Is that really the message we want to give our daughters? Winning is okay as long as you don't win too much or too big? And for goodness sakes' don't go so far as to try your best. That would be unseemly. Unfeminine even.
Posted at 12:19 PM by Ginna Dowler |
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THE WMD FILES - NEW VIDEOS
At Pajamas Media's WMD Files, there are new videos from this weekend's Intelligence Summit featuring interviews with Saddam tape translator Richard Miniter, former CIA-director James Woolsey and author Bill Tierney.
Posted at 10:23 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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BLOGGERS COME AND GO
There was an e-mail this morning from medical blogger and old Peaktalk friend Galen that he had decided to abadon his blogging activities. Yet, some who disappear sometimes return back to the front and it is good to see that Debbye, our American in T.O. is back at it again. Bookmark her.
Posted at 10:20 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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JEWS AND MUSLIMS
Can they work together and can Muslim imigrants learn from the Jewish experience in Europe? Dutch Rabbi Awraham Soetendorp thinks so. In an environment that is less volatile, less charged, probably yes.
Posted at 10:14 AM by Pieter Dorsman |
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Monday, February 20, 2006
IRVING'S SENTENCE
Sentencing David Irving to three years in prison for denying the holocaust, which is what an Austrian court did today, borders on the absurd. The bottom line is that for as long as Irving has been getting any meaningful media attention, it has been a well established fact that he is borderline material, a historian on the fringe. That to me is his life sentence. So far, this sentiment seems to be echoed by many other noteworthy bloggers - check out LaShawn Barber, Tigerhawk - but the most pointed question comes from Natalie Solent:
Islamofascists will say that if Holocaust denial can be criminalised why not depiction of their prophet?
Exactly, and it echoes my
earlier comments in the wake of the cartoon crisis about freedom of speech and I won't repeat them again. But, what bothers me enormously about this case is that it is an Austrian court that goes to these lengths to put Irving in prison, and that, it is doing so under a law that dates back to only 1992. That is some four decades after what should have been the completion of Austria's de-nazification.
However, absolving yourself of a very incriminating past has not been a particularly easy journey for Austria, especially not given its enthusiastic and disproportionate contribution to the holocaust. So, adopting the rigid law in 1992 may well have been an effort to "Europeanize" Austria and to placate the European Union which it joined in 1995. And as we know now, the EU has a certain fondness for regulating and monitoring free expression.
NOTE: The Dutch experience in WWII especially has been tainted by Austrian Nazis, but that is just some complimentary history for those interested, and I couldn’t resist bringing it up. Don't take it as a bias against all things Austrian.
Posted at 07:01 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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GOOD START FOR HARPER
The man has hardly been seen in public since he assumed the role of Prime-Minister, but it seems that despite some initial glitches, Canada's new conservative government is off to quite a good start. Three exhibits support this notion.
Firstly, the party has moved away from its socially conservative Western roots and started to embrace the Canadian center as Chantal Hébert discusses today in the Toronto Sun. It is a move not always popular with those that initially supported and funded your political journey, but it is necessary to consolidate your tentative hold on power and try and keep it for a while. The Orange County clan that enabled Reagan's journey to Washington was equally unimpressed with moderate Republicans and Washington insiders getting key appointments in the Gipper's team, but it served a very clear purpose, and, it worked.
That brings us to the second point which shows that the Canadian public is taking a fairly positive view of Harper's honeymoon period, with the latest poll suggesting that Conservatives are now getting more support than on the late January election day.
Still observations over 'moderation' and 'poll support' pale in comparison to actual accomplishemnts and in that department Harper scored too, and fairly significantly. Without a solid minority he will have to govern on an issue-by-issue basis, but it seems that at least one party is more than willing to give the conservatives room to govern:
The Bloc Québécois says it intends to keep the Conservative minority government in office for a “good while,” encouraged by the Tories' openness toward Quebec.
With the Liberals already digging in their heels more than a month before the new Parliament begins and the NDP at least one vote shy of holding the balance of power, the Bloc will often be the deciding factor between Conservative success and an early federal election.
If this arrangement can be made to work, then Harper can deliver on his agenda and begin to slowly and steadily move Canada's political center to the right, while solidifying his budding support in francophone Canada. He is by all accounts holding the right cards, now he has to play them - still carefully - to reap his rewards.
Posted at 01:10 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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FUKUYAMA ON THE NEO-CONS
Is the neo-con movement past its peak? Judge for yourself when you evaluate Francis Fukuyama thought provoking piece in the NYT. There are three things worth noting as they reflect themes often presented here on Peaktalk:
What is initially universal is not the desire for liberal democracy but rather the desire to live in a modern — that is, technologically advanced and prosperous — society, which, if satisfied, tends to drive demands for political participation. Liberal democracy is one of the byproducts of this modernization process, something that becomes a universal aspiration only in the course of historical time.
Which of course finds its proof in the emerging nations of East and South-East Asia where freedom has lagged wealth creation.
And some words for Europe too:
Meeting the jihadist challenge is more of a "long, twilight struggle" whose core is not a military campaign but a political contest for the hearts and minds of ordinary Muslims around the world. As recent events in France and Denmark suggest, Europe will be a central battleground in this fight.
Precisely, although the political struggle will be accompanied by surges of violence that may come perilously close to militarizing Europe's streets.
And nailing down the jihadist threat:
Radical Islamism is a byproduct of modernization itself, arising from the loss of identity that accompanies the transition to a modern, pluralist society. It is no accident that so many recent terrorists, from Sept. 11's Mohamed Atta to the murderer of the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh to the London subway bombers, were radicalized in democratic Europe and intimately familiar with all of democracy's blessings. More democracy will mean more alienation, radicalization and — yes, unfortunately — terrorism.
Fukuyama's has a valid point in arguing - like Fareed Zakaria in The Future of Freedom - that in creating stable and free societies, the social and economic foundations will have to come first. Democracy can only thrive when a stable and civic society is already in place. And that of course is the ultimate pitfall in Iraq and the Palestinian territories, where the 'democracy first apporach' has turned out to be a dicey game given the absence of any civic structure and basic prosperity. But that doesn't mean these projects have failed, nor would it imply that neo-conservatism is past its peak. But, a number of assumptions have to be tested against our democratization experiences in the Middle East and against the realization that there are no quick and easy fixes. We will need some tweaks and adjustments and we will even have to work with democratically elected regimes - yes, that's you Hamas - that do not quite fit our standards of governance.
NOTE: Roger Simon has some comments on the journalistic aspects of Fukuyama's piece.
Posted at 12:40 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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RELIGION AND WALMART
A Jesuit order in Guelph Ontario is continuing their fight against Walmart, although they've now upped the ante. The new argument is that the existence of a Walmart will violate their charter rights. (Home Depot, Staples and Canadian Tire stores are already nearby, not to mention the Curling Club.)
The order makes the astonishing comparison between not wanting (another) big box store on their doorstep and the expulsion of the Israelites from Egypt.
But there is also a deeper social incompatibility, which can only be appreciated by stepping into the realm of mystical spirituality and religious symbolism.
An enduring aspect of the Judeo-Christian tradition is an invitation to leave behind the concerns of this world in order to experience the Divine in solitude, in the depth of our being. The Israelites were
driven out of Egypt and were spiritually transformed wandering in desert solitude for 40 years.
Jesus went into the desert for 40 days of mystical experience, and often retreated to a quiet place in nature to pray. Early Christian mystics are called the Desert Fathers because they stepped away
from urban life to find God in remote solitude. And ever since, men and women have left the preoccupations of normal life to contemplate the Divine in monasteries and retreat houses located in peaceful, bucolic settings. Another tradition associates high places as the typical location where humans report encountering God. Moses met Yahweh on Mount Sinai. Judaism built its temple, where God resided in the Holy of Holies, on the Temple Mount. Jesus was transfigured on Mount Tabor. Mount Athos is the pre-eminent monastic cluster for Orthodox Christians, as is Monte Cassino for Roman Catholics. Thus, it is not by accident that the Jesuits located the Church of our Lady and the Jesuit Centre on high places.
So basically, Home Depot didn't violate the inherent spirituality of the 600 acres owned by the order, but Walmart will? I know the deep hatred of Walmart in many people is in itself a religion, but this is going a bit far.
Posted at 12:38 PM by Ginna Dowler |
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Sunday, February 19, 2006
"CARTOON CATALYST"
LGF links to a poll in the Telegraph which reveals that 40% of British Muslims favor the introduction of Sharia in Britain. It reminded me of this post a little while back which looked at the situation in The Netherlands where that number would be around 25% according to this translated excerpt from an interview with a Rotterdam alderman:
Fifty percent of Muslims here has indicated they would vote for a Muslim Party if there was one, and another fifty percent of that group has indicated it would approve if that party would implement Sharia. That’s quite something I think. That’s something to really worry about.
He went on to say that the numbers by themselves were not that alarming, but that in combination with some sort of catalyst, the results could potentially be very unpleasant:
But I am not afraid that something like that will actually happen, in our country there are about one million Muslims out of a total of sixteen million inhabitants, that’s about nine seats in parliament – not really shocking. In Rotterdam one out of every six voters is Muslim and that gives them sevens seats here, still not dramatic. But in some neighborhoods of the city more than half is Muslim. Imagine that in a district election a Muslim party will get close to a majority, and if some idiots from Green Left join the action by being politically correct, then the outcome may be quite troubling.
Muslim radicals continue to represent a very small portion of the overall population in Europe and even the 40% highlighted by the Telegraph is in real terms a small fraction of the overall British population. And since it is a poll, I take the 40% number with a huge grain of salt, especially given the much lower number recorded among Dutch Muslims when asked a similar question.
But - as we have seen during the cartoon controversy - the radical elements do not have to count on their own natural constituency to further their cause. It is quite feasible that appeasement and accommodation from some of Europe's own political parties could enable religious slogans and sentiments to re-emerge as the foundation of public policy on Europe's streets. Call it the cartoon catalyst.
UPDATE: Stephen Pollard has some interesting observations on how this process is unfolding in Britain.
Posted at 07:42 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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THE EDITOR SPEAKS OUT
Flemming Rose, culture editor of the Jyllands-Posten, has a long op-ed in the Washington Post, explaining his rationale for publishing the Mohammed Cartoons. In it he highlights something which so far has been somewhat underreported:
Since the Sept. 30 publication of the cartoons, we have had a constructive debate in Denmark and Europe about freedom of expression, freedom of religion and respect for immigrants and people's beliefs. Never before have so many Danish Muslims participated in a public dialogue -- in town hall meetings, letters to editors, opinion columns and debates on radio and TV. We have had no anti-Muslim riots, no Muslims fleeing the country and no Muslims committing violence. The radical imams who misinformed their counterparts in the Middle East about the situation for Muslims in Denmark have been marginalized. They no longer speak for the Muslim community in Denmark because moderate Muslims have had the courage to speak out against them.
In January, Jyllands-Posten ran three full pages of interviews and photos of moderate Muslims saying no to being represented by the imams. They insist that their faith is compatible with a modern secular democracy.
Let more Muslims reiterate this important message. It is probably the only way out of this mess.
Posted at 01:05 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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Friday, February 17, 2006
RUMSFELD LAMENTS
Modernization is crucial to winning the hearts and minds of Muslims worldwide who are bombarded with negative images of the West, Rumsfeld told the Council on Foreign Relations.
The Pentagon chief said today's weapons of war included e-mail, Blackberries, instant messaging, digital cameras and Web logs, or blogs.
[ ... ]
He lamented that vast media attention about U.S. abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq outweighed that given to the discovery of "Saddam Hussein's mass graves."
There is no shortage of bloggers to help
Rumsfeld getting his message out - I can think of a few - but it seems to me that among the major blogs that have a general pro-US and pro-GWOT position, practically none of them are reaching a broad and international audience. Even this blog, which has a decidedly international focus, gets some 65% of its visitors from the US, 15% from Canada, followed by Britain, The Netherlands and Australia who together capture some 12%. If Rumsfeld wants to spread the word beyond the Anglo-Saxon sphere of influence he has to discover a way that allows him to penetrate a linguistically very diverse universe. If he cracks that barrier, it would be a huge boon for the entire blogosphere which loves to grow and expand its readership globally.
The other part of the Rumsfeld lament is not so much content-driven messaging, but the actual jihad that takes place in cyberspace. There the enemy has had a distinct advantage for some time, most notably because a lot of the counter-terror measures taken by the west never took account of their futility in the presence of the enemy’s technological savvy. Deporting a radical imam because you want him to stop influencing disoriented Muslim youths in Europe is not terribly effective if they are getting their orientation online.
UPDATE: Here's the full text of Rumsfeld's speech, via Dan Drezner.
Posted at 04:27 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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NORWAY'S CAPITULATION
Michelle Malkin has another cartoon round-up in place and in it she links to this post at Riehl World which has a threatening video, targeting the journalists of the Norwegian publication Magazinet which was the first outlet to republish the cartoons outside Denmark. As it happens, Bruce Bawer has a longer piece about Magazinet's editor up on his site, summarizing how the editor of the magazine, Velbjorn Selbekk, initially stood up for his rights to re-publish the cartoons. However, as Bruce reports, the end of the story is not very encouraging at all:
There, to the astonishment of his supporters, Selbekk issued an abject apology for reprinting the cartoons. At his side, accepting his act of contrition on behalf of 46 Muslim organizations and asking that all threats now be withdrawn, was Mohammed Hamdan, head of Norway’s Islamic Council. In attendance were members of the Norwegian cabinet and the largest assemblage of imams in Norway's history. It was a picture right out of a sharia courtroom: the dhimmi prostrating himself before the Muslim leader, and the leader pardoning him – and, for good measure, declaring Selbekk to be henceforth under his protection, as if it were he, Hamdan, and not the Norwegian police, that held in his hands the security of citizens in Norway.
It's not up to me to judge someone's actions when his life is under threat, however the involvement of members of Norway's cabinet leads me to believe that it wasn't just Islamic pressure that was applied to Selbekk.
This case demonstrates once more that in the pursuit of press freedom individuals in the west have as much to fear from their own governments as they have from jihadist zealots. In fact, it's even scarier to find out that in turning to the institution you trust for your protection, you are forced to discover that it has aligned itself with your enemy. What strikes me as a particular odd turn of events here is that had Norway been a part of the EU - which has slowly and tentatively confirmed its support for press freedom - it would have had far less leverage to come down on Selbekk in the way it has. Poor man, poor Norway.
Posted at 01:54 PM by Pieter Dorsman |
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BAWER ON EUROPE
I've been meaning to link to CompassPoint's interview with Bruce Bawer, but I never got around to actually doing it. Today Glenn today reminds of the interview again as well as Bawer's new book. Read the whole interview, Bawer nails the subject matter superbly.
MUSLIM MODERATION
The Jakarta Post used to be a pretty unreadable newspaper - at least in the 1990s when I worked in Indonesia - but the waves of democratic change have contributed to a publication that has improved significantly. And it seems it is impervious to the darker forces that seek to foment unrest in the world’s most populous Muslim nation. Today's online edition has a very concise debunking of how radicals in the Muslim world have fomented the cartoon crisis and why Indonesia can and should act differently:
In conclusion, it would be wise for all of us here in Indonesia, with the world's largest Muslim population, to reflect on these questions, and not let ourselves get riled by provocateurs, whose stock-in-trade are false rumors meant to cause conflict in which everybody loses.
Let us also keep in mind the context of how this all came about: It was in Denmark, in a particular socio-political climate relating to a specific discourse within that whole context. The caricatures were seen as a healthy, satirical exercise in freedom and tolerance amongst Danes -- Muslims and non-Muslims.
It would be encouraging if some of these saner voices could be heard in the Arab as well as in the Euro-Muslim world, rather than the other way around. We can’t afford to lose some of the largest pillars of Muslim moderation.