Well, Jacques Chirac has spoken and while he has delivered a clever piece of political navigation the outcome of it all remains very unclear. The contentious labor reforms will proceed, but Chirac announced two major amendments: one that will reduce the law’s trial period for workers aged under 26 from two years to one year; and one that introduces a requirement for companies to justify a worker’s dismissal.

So in essence the law will proceed, but De Villepin has been given a few chips to soothe public sentiment and salvage his own image going forward. And while it may settle the immediate issue of Chirac’s credibility, it is not clear if this move is sufficient to silence the opposition and avert deepening social unrest. The students and unions are, of course, unhappy.

The other question is if this will do enough for De Villepin to neutralize his direct opponent Sarkozy. The latter welcomed the move as a “wise decision” and may well be adopting a far more moderate tone than we’ve been used to hearing from him. The president and his two potential successors are all moving to the center for personal political gain, but it remains to be seen how this will do France’s competitiveness any good.

One reader pointed to an opinion poll yesterday and asked if it was not wiser – given the poll’s results – to pull the proposed legislation:

"a poll by the Ipsos agency for LCI television said 62 percent of the French agreed with the movement against Mr. de Villepin's law, and that a full 92 percent want it rescinded or modified. The poll Wednesday of 804 people aged 18 and over gave no margin of error."

In general I don’t think that nations should be governed by opinion polls, no matter how compelling their numbers appear to be. De Villepin & Co. have a mandate from the voter to do what is in the best interest of the French Republic, not to please them by making easy choices. Yet having said that there is an argument to be made that if politicians believe that they are acting in the best interest of the nation they can and should sometimes make some strategic moves to ensure that they will remain in power to carry out their agenda. And that is what happened tonight, the final outcome of it all however will remain far from certain.

Of course since the AIVD - the Dutch intelligence service - blundered its way through the entire Van Gogh episode, there is reason to believe that they are now over-cautious in assessing and predicting the dangers of a world of terror. It is very similar to the increased awareness that we saw from US security agencies after they had missed the boat on 9/11. Still, the conclusions from their recent report warrant attention, although they are hardly new:

Terrorism increasingly originates in the Netherlands. The Jihadist threat is increasingly often a home-grown product and does not come from abroad, concludes the AIVD secret service in a report 'The violent Jihad in the Netherlands, current trends in the Islamic-terrorist threat'.

As the primary reason for domestic Jihadism, the AIVD names the increasing recruitment and radicalisation among young Muslims born and bred in the Netherlands. Internet plays an increasing role in this process. The terrorist threat has not waned since the November 2004 murder of Theo van Gogh, but a new trend is that members of local networks increasingly seek and make contact with Jihad veterans from other countries, such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the report reads.

More here.

The French Constitutional Council has approved the proposed labor reforms which means the ball is now in Chirac's court to either sign them into law or send them back to De Villepin for reconsideration. Tomorrow night he will address the nation and my guess is that he will proceed. Any sign of watering down or hint of negotiation will be a formidable blot on Chirac's already tainted domestic record and play right into the hands of presidential hopeful Nicholas Sarkozy. This is as much about salvaging France's economic propsects as it is about ensuring that De Villepin inherits the Chirac mantle.

In the meantime protests continue leading Andrew Sullivan to conclude that:

It's important to remember that excessive welfare states do not only impede economic growth and freedom, they also change people's minds and souls - from independence to dependency, from self-help to resentment, from pride in work to rioting to perpetuate unemployment.

Yes. In France and beyond.

The first government to cut financial aid to the Palestinian Authority following Hamas taking the reigns of power: Canada.

I haven't been paying a lot of attention to the commotion over illegal immigration in the US and it seems that opinions vary widely. A good point to start would be John Hawkins who answers a list of 13 frequently asked questions about immigration. Michelle Malkin has been on top of the affair as well, focusing on the reconquista element and other negative aspects of the movement that has come out in support of granting legal status to illegal immigrants. There is a flip side to that, and Megan McArdle has collected her thoughts on why she favors immigration and why an influx of Mexican immigrants is good for both the US and Mexico.

Since we've been looking at Europe's experiences - which are not dissimilar - there are a few comments I would like to make. Firstly, all western societies will face some sort of a demographic crunch and need to import human capital to cover the impending shortfall. As we've learned any immigration process that is not carefully managed and monitored will produce unfavorable results. An amnesty for illegal immigrants would not only validate such a failed process, but it would ensure its replication in the future. And it would be grossly unfair to the immigrants that opt and make a serious effort to walk the legal route to entry into the US.

Secondly, regardless of how immigrants got in there is the issue of integration. This is where Europe and the US diverge, and there is reason to believe that Hispanic immigrants are an easier match for the American melting pot that Muslims who enter a continent where there is anything but a melting mechanism. Both the US and Europe have a moral and political obligation to ensure that immigration is managed carefully. Blanket amnesties and opening borders should be dismissed, a well-crafted, fair, structured and legal approach shouldn’t.

UPDATE: Some excellent commentary from George Will who more or less stakes out a position in the middle as well.

Thanks to one of my loyal readers I found out that there is some tension brewing between The Netherlands and Venezuela in relation to the Dutch Antilles. The three Dutch islands (Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire) are only a short distance off Venezuela's coast and it would require very little effort to invade them. He writes:

I’m concerned that a Dutch coalition government of the left may not have the backbone or stomach to face down Hugo Chavez. I’m not sure if it’s bluster or not but I suspect that if the Dutch government shows what he perceives to be weakness, he’ll move. It is almost a no lose scenario for him. He is dealing with discontent at home and a little island snatching can distract the populace. Remember the Falklands? But where is the Dutch Maggie Thatcher? Additionally if he succeeds, he stood up to the United States and humiliated Bush in his own back yard – or so the press reports will read. He’ll get kudos, accolades and concession from all of his neighbors who don’t want to be next.

It may be a wild and unlikely scenario, but that's what we all said about the Falklands which did turn into a major armed conflict. As for a "Dutch Maggie Thatcher", well she announced today that she is mulling a bid to run:

Immigration and Integration Minister Rita Verdonk revealed on Thursday she is after all considering entering the race to lead the Liberal (VVD) party into the general election in 2007.

When the previous incumbent Jozias van Aartsen resigned after the local elections earlier this month, Verdonk dismissed the idea she would be a candidate to replace him.

But the minister - who prides herself on sticking to her decisions, no matter how controversial - appears to be wavering.

Interesting times.

The terminolgoy keeps getting better. The latest buzzword finds its origins in the epicenter of Western decline, France.

I've argued before that vulgarity on TV or radio tends to be subject to a self-correcting mechanism. Call it humanity's inborn tendency to act decent.

The FCC does not believe that such a mechanism exists, on the contrary, it considers itself to be the ultimate arbiter of good taste. And we're not even talking vulgarity here, no the extreme measures of censorship have resulted in outlawing that very innocuous, every day term: bullshit. Too much for Jeff Jarvis who is mighty angry.

My maternal grandparents - the paternal ones I never got to know - died some twenty years ago and they still are a part of my life today in some way or the other. To experience their deaths as a teenager was deeply moving, especially given the great time I had with them as a child growing up. Judging from Glenn Reynolds' post about the passing of his grandmother at age 91 that experience doesn't change when you're a lot older and death has become one of the inevitable realities of adult life. A moving post from the Instapundit.

European demographics have been the theme over the past week and general interest in it has always been driven by projections of Europe’s collapsing birthrate and the often cited Muslim baby-boom. And while some have poured cold water on these notions before, they have remained fairly persistent absence any numbers to debunk them. Yet, evidence from the Dutch Central Bureau for Statistics (CBS) does indeed appear to support the claim that the birthrates of second-generation immigrants adjust towards that of the native population:

Non-western immigrant women are getting less babies. The number of children produced by the second generation of immigrants is almost equal to that of native Dutch women.

[ … ]

Especially the number of births given by Moroccan women has decreased sharply over the past decade. The first generation Moroccan women who were born between 1945 and 1949 got an average of 5.4 children. For women of the first generation who were born twenty years later that number has been halved.

The age at which the second generation of immigrant women becomes a mother has also moved closer to that of the native inhabitants. For them the average age in 2004 was 30 years, Antillian and Aruban women are even somewhat older when they get their first child.

Furthermore, immigrant women are increasingly childless, report the researchers. Turkish, Moroccan, Surinam and Antillian women are more often without children at age 35 than local women.

This is not an insignificant finding and does indeed put the “Sharia 2050” theory, always more of an argumentative estimate, into question. It also underlines that immigrants do integrate as their reproductive behaviour can not be seen in isolation from their social and economic circumstances.

It doesn’t mean we can abandon some of our deeper concerns over Europe and its future, they stand, but we do have to better understand the numbers that underlie these alarmist assumptions.

When the exit polls were released yesterday there appeared to be some upbeat mood about a Kadima win and the likely ease of cobbling together a Kadima-Labor coalition. Having the digested the final numbers, we need to temper such enthusiasm just a bit. Kadima ended up with 28 seats which is not even a quarter of the Knesset and together with Labor a coalition would be far short of a necessary parliamentary majority. Ergo, Olmert needs help from the smaller parties and that could potentially affect the effectiveness of Kadima’s tentative win.

Israel’s electoral system is almost identical to the Dutch one, a form of proportional representation where the tinier and less relevant special interest groups have a very decent shot at earning seats, to the detriment of the larger parties. It may be time for Israel to follow Germany’s example where a 5% threshold is required before a party can get any representation in parliament. That would prevent entities like for instance Hadash and Meretz getting in and would drastically reduce the seat count of the Pensioners party which did well last night.

Above all, Israel needs a broad national consensus to give effect to Ariel Sharon’s vision and while Ehud Olmert can probably make things work, there will always be a risk that such a fragile coalition may fall apart at a critical juncture. And that makes governing Israel, not an easy task to begin with, a highly challenging undertaking.

Other Reactions:

Dutchblog Israel argues that the low voter turn-out affected Kadima and Labor.

Allison Kaplan Sommer on Kadima: “A key strategic error in the campaign -- they acted like confident front-runners, so even those who really wanted them at the helm felt free to vote their social issues and support smaller parties”. Exactly the phenomenon I described above, call it a frivolous vote with a disastrous result.

John Podhoretz - via Hugh Hewitt - expects it will be a short-lived government and another call to the polls soon, Roger Simon doesn’t think so.

Ed Morrissey rightfully attributes the Kadima win to Ariel Sharon: “The lower turnout underscores the grim decision that faces their country, but the result confirms the wisdom and brilliance of the first of the hard-liners who dared to imagine another path to security”

Israpundit has a round-up of reactions too and is not very optimistic about the outcome.

However tentative the mandate, it is a new beginning and there is merit for ending on a positive note. Jonathan Edelstein points out that Olmert can build a coalition with the help of the smaller parties and says “We have just witnessed the beginning of the end of the occupation, and the continuation of Israel's journey back to itself. Ladies and gentlemen, the good guys won” Let’s hope he’s right.

Social turmoil in Europe is not exclusively restricted to France which today experienced a national strike, disrupting public life. Britain was hit by a major shutdown too today:

Teaching assistants, clerks, trash collectors and other government workers throughout Britain shut down thousands of schools and disrupted transportation and businesses in what may be the nation's biggest strike in 80 years.

More than a million workers downed tools today to protest Prime Minister Tony Blair's plan to raise their retirement age to 65 from 60, the Unison union said. Last year, Blair pulled back from similar plans for central government employees.

We are entering a new phase in British politics with Gordon Brown waiting in the wings, ready to take over and some believe that he is far less of a centrist than Tony Blair is. And a succession battle in France is shaping up as well where rivals De Villepin and Sarkozy are activley positioning themselves to take over the reigns from Chirac next year. Whoever wins wil have to face a resurgent left and may be forced to take the hard edges of any reform package.

So, against the backdrop of intense social unrest there is an increased likelihood for both France and Britain to take a more measured approach to necessary pension and labor reforms, something we already witnessed earlier in Germany. Whatever reform Europe may need, it may be an extraordinary hard sell and therefore take much longer to implement.

The European birth deficits are compensated for almost exclusively by immigrants who in turn have more babies than the average European family, according to EU Business. It's not an entirely surprising conclusion, but it's nice to have some firm numbers in place supporting it.

Related Posts
More Euro-Demographics
The Patriarchy Returns
Europe's Next Generation
Baby Bonus

Only hours following Lyn Nofziger's death another core member of the Reagan-crew has died, Caspar Weinberger at age 88.

It's interesting to note that the Washington Post in the first paragraph announcing his death mentions that Weinberger "was a central figure in the Iran-Contra scandal". It's odd, but it would seem to me that there were at least a number of other Reagan era officials (McFarlane, Poindexter, North) who were central to the Iran-Contra disaster. It was the National Security Center that was the epicenter of Iran-Contra, not the Pentagon.

Although Weinberger was indicted the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about him were his ruthless budgetary skills, first in Governor Reagan's team in California and later in Washington as Secretary of Defense. The military build-up during the Reagan years that were instrumental in defeating the Soviet Union and which ironically created sizeable deficits can to a large extent be attributed to "Cap the Knife". May he rest in peace.

UPDATE: WaPo has now changed its first paragraph and it now reads that Weinberger "got ensnared in the Iran-Contra scandal". Ah, the beauty of online editing.

Lyn Nofziger, one of the earliest Reaganites and one of the Gipper's most solid advisers died earlier today of cancer at the age of 81. May he rest in peace.

Factoid: he was one of the few American political personalities that I've seen in person. In early 1999 I had breakfast at the Hay-Adams in DC and an American colleague of mine pointed across the room at a table and said: that's Lyn Nofziger, Nixon's Press Secretary. Quietly I continued my breakfast not sure how to repsond. Although Nofziger did indeed serve under Nixon as a deputy assistant to the president for congressional relations, I was quite surprised that someone my age would identify him with Nixon - and attribute the wrong position - and not Reagan.

Bruce Bawer's While Europe Slept was reviewed in the Washington Post Book World. Bruce himself was not overly pleased with what he described as "a perfect expression of political-establishment orthodoxy" so he decided to 'fisk' it. To give you a flavor, here's an excerpt:

Bawer preaches here mostly to the converted.

A patently misleading statement -- this book consists not of "preaching" but of facts -- and a patent attempt to keep "the non-converted," as Simon would have it, from reading the book. It's not "the converted" who need to read While Europe Slept, but the others -- those who don't know about Europe's problems or don't realize how drastic they are. That's whom this book is addressed to.

The presence of imperfectly integrated communities of highly traditional Middle Eastern and North African Muslims in Europe, as well as the chasm that separates many European Muslims from the cultural norms of their adopted countries, were familiar well before Bawer arrived,

"Familiar" to whom? Not to most Americans, certainly. It was all but impossible to find mention of the situation in the European or American media.

even if Christian Europeans had no idea how to cope with them.

Indeed, Bawer's complaint was vividly and conspicuously personified by the populist Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn. A proud homosexual, he was assassinated by an animal-rights activist in 2002.

An "animal-rights activist," that is, who was infuriated by Fortuyn's stance on Islam, and who killed him after having been brainwashed by Dutch media and politicians into viewing Fortuyn as a dangerous, racist extremist.

His right-wing, anti-immigration stance rested on the insistence that Islam was too socially retrograde to be integrated into liberal Dutch culture.

For the millionth time, Fortuyn was not "right-wing." His concern about the influx of Muslims into the Netherlands was based on the fact that many of them were incorrigibly right-wing -- and not just right-wing, but reactionary to a degree beyond the imagination of most Westerners.

So there's not much new here,

"Preaching to the converted," "not much new here" -- move along, folks. Don't worry. Be happy.

No, not much new. Funny, then, how I keep getting emails -from extremely intelligent people who read newspapers like the Washington Post every day and consider themselves well-informed -- and yet have been stunned by what they've learned from this book.

There's lots more. Enjoy it. And buy the book.

This time the BBC has taken a closer look at the numbers for Europe and the various ways in which governments are trying to get their citizens to procreate.

The magic replacement number is 2.10 children per family, a number that even Europe's most active breeders, the Catholic Irish, fail to attain with an average of 1.99 babies per family. Of course, this number fits the image that Ireland has always had in Europe (at least until its recent economic fortunes) as a backward and impoverished nation.

The nation that has almost given up on replacing itself is Greece where the score is 1.29, a number for which I don't have a credible explanation. If any of you does, let me know and I'll post it.

Related Posts
The Patriarchy Returns
Europe's Next Generation
Baby Bonus

She has been somewhat under the radar because here enemies are not Muslim, but Hindu. Still, Deepa Mehta is a highly controversial moviemaker in India and her experiences are another instructive tale of how artists have to tread carefully these days. Even when "the script had been approved by the Government".

Milblogging has come to Canada and here is a new blog dedicated to the sacrifices made by the country’s armed forces.

More than once have I received e-mails about Canada’s poor record in participating in overseas military efforts, but I think that such criticism is not always entirely fair. Those comments reflected frustration over the inability of Canada’s political leadership to step up to the plate with a strong enough commitment in major efforts such as Iraq, but such blame can not be apportioned to the men and women in uniform. With a new government dedicated to its armed forces, Canada appears to be re-entering the allied stage of which it had always been a proud member.

The Dutch NRC Handelsblad ran a fairly devastating editorial on France on Saturday. I thought it might be a good idea to translate the core elements of it in order to demonstrate that pointing the finger at Chirac’s ailing state is not just a favorite pastime of the Anglo-Saxon right: a center-left European newspaper is equally capable of it. And it contains some interesting facts as well:

And even though member states have recently become seduced by protectionist behavior, it must be said that France has put itself in a particular negative light. The service directive, intended to facilitate market entry of companies in each other’s market, was diluted because of French resistance. “The Polish Plumber”, the symbol of the foreign worker who will put pressure on wages, already played a part in the (French) rejection of the European Constitution last year. France subsequently announced that eleven industry sectors would be protected against foreign corporate takeovers. That was put into practice last month by pre-empting the Italian interest for gas and water conglomerate Suez, by rapidly merging Suez with Gaz de France. And there is government resistance against a bid by Mittal Steel for the largely French Arcelor. French companies, among them Electricité de France and Arcelor itself, are unhindered in their quest for hostile takeovers abroad.

[ … ]

The French government resists globalization, yet tries to take advantage of it, but also tries at the same time to introduce domestic reforms which are nullified by its electorate. In the meantime French president Chirac chose to leave an EU-meeting last Thursday when a French employers federation leader talked in English. It may be a worthwhile effort to find a masterplan behind all this, but the right conclusion is probably that every attempt to effect change in France is blocked, by citizens and politicians – first and foremost by Chirac.

Both citizens and politicians, indeed. The paper concludes by arguing how European unity becomes a difficult proposition when one of its key members is in such a desperate and un-cooperative state. That assessment is right, especially in light of the fact that the speed train to European unity has always been driven by the now severely handicapped French-German tandem.

It also begs the question what is needed to turn France back into a viable and open economy, willing to play its part on the world stage as a reliable and equal partner. All bets are off until Chirac is gone next year, but even then it will take some formidable talent to bring about reform and ensure a buy-in from a majority of the French public. If such a leader fails to get elected to the Elysée then all bets are off too.

If your professor is a noted conservative, but if you still can't figure out where he stands on Marxism then you are probably being taught by an unbiased giant. Thomas Sowell was interviewed by OpinonJournal this weekend and I thought this excerpt in particular was interesting:

"The left likes to portray a group as sort of a creature of surrounding society. But that's not true. For example, back during the immigrant era, you had neighborhoods on the Lower East Side [of Manhattan] where Jews and Italians arrived at virtually identical times. Lived in the same neighborhoods. Kids sat side by side in the same schools. But totally different outcomes. Now, if you look back at the history of the Jews and the history of the Italians you can see why that would be. In the early 19th century, Russian officials report that even the poorest Jews find some way to get some books in their home, even though they're living in a society where over 90% of the people are illiterate.

"Conversely, in southern Italy, which is where most Italian-Americans originated, when they put in compulsory school-attendance laws, there were riots. There were schoolhouses burning down. So now you take these two kids and sit them side by side in a school. If you believe that environment means the immediate surroundings, they're in the same environment. But if you believe environment includes this cultural pattern that goes back centuries before they were born, then no, they're not in the same environment. They don't come into that school building with the same mindset. And they don't get the same results."

And conservative values will have the upper hand once again according to Phillip Longman in an absolutely fascinating and upbeat piece about our demographic future. Read it all.

Do take a look at Ayaan Hirsi Ali's take on crimes against women. It is a typical Hirsi Ali call for action, raising a pressing and underreported issue, but light on concrete proposals to find a solution. Asking the International Court of Justice in The Hague to look for the 113 million to 200 million women and girls that are missing is not an entirely realisitic proposition. Other than that, a prescient piece and recommended reading.

NOTE: If you don't have LA Times access, try the IHT link.

Perry de Havilland at Samizdata has a photo-essay up of the pro-freedom of expression rally in London yesterday. A timely event it seems:

On two occasions, The Plod tried to prevent certain signs being shown (one featured the Mohammed Cartoons on a placard from the Iranian Communist Party and another showed a mask of Tony Blair over a Nazi symbol). These incidents at a 'pro-freedom of expression' rally, and the presence of the police taking pictures of the crowd, were a useful reminder of the deadening hand of the state and just how precarious the state of civil liberties in Britain are.

Indeed.

It appears that the resistance to the proposed labor legislation in France will result in a general strike this coming Tuesday:

In a joint statement, the students said they planned to block train stations and main roads on March 30 and called on the government to resign.

"The government's deafness does not weaken our determination," they said after two months of protests which have led to sporadic riots and rising fears the demonstrations could be hijacked by hooligans.

France risks chaos on Tuesday as students, school children and their parents march in many cities, while the trade unions have called for a general strike which is expected to disrupt public transport with many trains and flights cancelled and only one in two Paris metro trains expected to run.

The pro-market measures can of course not be seen in isolation, they come not long after a series of devastating riots by immigrant groups among whose ranks unemployment is disproportionally high. The NYT picked up on this theme yesterday and pointed to the concurrent surge of anti-Semitism in France. The toxic mix of unemployment and manipulating race relations brings back memories of Europe's less than glorious recent past as Richard Landes' notes in the introduction to the collection of his essays on France:

And yet, over the last five years, a stunning transformation has taken place in Europe, made all the more rapid by the radical denial that has marked mainstream European attitudes until this day. If civic Europe survives — which I passionately hope it does — these opening years of the 21st century will be remembered as a period, much like the 30s, when well intentioned people made consistently foolish choices, deepening their danger.

It seems that the French time for choosing has somehow passed; the street is increasingly making future choices and another instalment of that destabizing process will unfold itself this week.

Jacques Chirac walked out of a European summit meeting yesterday:

Mr Chirac interrupted and asked why he was speaking in English. "I'm going to speak in English because that is the language of business," replied the former chief of the French employers' group, which has been at odds with Paris.

The president stalked out of the conference room. The French delegation then followed, forcing Philippe Douste-Blazy, the foreign minister, and Thierry Breton, the finance minister, to leave with as much dignity as they could muster.

[ ... ]

The incident highlighted French sensitivities to the unstoppable rise of English in the EU, which welcomed millions of new citizens from the ex-Communist bloc in 2004 with little or no interest in speaking French but years of English lessons under their belts.

The only hope one can have for the French is that a sense of pragmatism will prevail following the presidential elections next year. A mix of misguided national pride and deep frustration over failed policies have turned the current French president into yesterday's man.

UPDATE: There's a French-American merger in the works, any guess what the language of choice will be for the new entity once the deal is complete?

The global warming debate has strong momentum again all of a sudden, and now the Times is saying that London could be under water by 2100. Thankfully there is an interactive tool available online where you can manipulate the water levels: Flood Maps. Once you have done that you can determine how to plan your future, Florida and The Netherlands probably being the least attractive places to build your house.

UPDATE: More from Roger Simon.

While many are wondering how Europe is going to get itself out of its demographic bind, there are some who will do anything to make things worse. Take Sharon Dijksma, deputy parliamentary leader of the Dutch Labor Party who came up with the following:

"A highly-educated woman who chooses to stay at home and not to work - that is destruction of capital," Dijksma said. "If you receive the benefit of an expensive education at the cost of society, you should not be allowed to throw away that knowledge unpunished."

The MP said a fine for non-working mothers is a logical consequence of the PvdA's intention to introduce a 'feudal system', under which graduates repay money dependant on their earnings. "If someone chooses not to work, then a substantial repayment is in order," Dijksma said.

There is simply no logical argument to be found in this argument, not even a fiscal one, but then the Dutch left have for years made it a priority of the state to get women to work in spite of any practical considerations. Millions of guilders and euros have been wasted on studies, workshops, back-to-work-programs and endless government advertising without sparing even so much as a moment to consider the ultimate cost to society.

Don't get me wrong, I am highly supportive of working women and equality in the workplace, but the state just does not have any business in artificially manipulating this process. The results of these efforts very often have some unintended consequences and in this case women may well decide to forego having an education when they know that having children and planning to take care of them - perish the thought - will cost them. There never is an easy answer for families to balance work and career requirements and governments just do not have a great track record in helping them out.

That also means that the opposite, getting women to stay at home and give them an incentive to produce offspring, is equally unwelcome statist tinkering. But at a time when a shrinking and exceedingly egotistical population is set to represent the Dutch future - if there is one - there will be a cost to Dijksma's ideas that dwarfs her outdated concepts of beneficial social engineering.

The media and Iraq, nicely condensed in another solid Steyn interview.

One reader questioned the Fareed Zakaria quote and offered a piece from Steyn's column in the Jerusalem Post as a rebuttal to that:

A NEW study by the American Enterprise Institute suggests that, aside from the terrific press, continuing this policy would not have come cheap for America: if you object (as John Kerry did) to the $400-600 billion price tag since the war, another three years of "containment" would have cost around $300 billion - and with no end in sight, and the alleged death toll of Iraqi infants no doubt up around six million. It would also have cost more real lives of real Iraqis: Despite the mosque bombings, there's a net gain of more than 100,000 civili ans alive today who would have been shoveled into unmarked graves had Ba'athist rule continued. Meanwhile, the dictator would have continued gaming the international system through the Oil-for-Food program, subverting Jordan, and supporting terrorism as far afield as the Philippines.

Zakaria's point was that at this point in time the cost of the war outweighed the benefits and that an accounting which will see the US and the Iraqi people in the plus will have to wait until some point in the future. In essence, Steyn and Zakaria are not that far apart, it's the way they pick their words that differentiates them.

It's been a while since we looked at the state of US-Canadian relations and in particular at the various attempts to manipulate anti-American sentiments. And that practice wasn't just the provenance of some left-leaning politicians who had run out of good arguments to attract voter interest. One of their cheerleaders, market research analyst Michael Adams has been on a relentless campaign to point out the diverging values of the two North American nations. As a foreign observer active in both nations I have always been puzzled by Adams' fire and ice theory, and today some numbers were released to counter it:

But those who think that means Canadians are manifestly distinct from the folks next door may be disappointed by a study by Ronald Inglehart of the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan.

The political scientist says his empirical findings will come as a "shock to Canadians." After all, he says, "The worst insult I can make to my Canadian friends is to say, 'Aw, you're just like us.' "

Inglehart's numbers put both nations very close in terms of balancing secular and traditional values as opposed to European nations which scored much higher when it came to secular and rational values. It would be interesting to correlate these findings with economic attitudes, but even there I suspect Canadians and Americans may end up far closer as opposed to the Europeans than both would like to believe. History, geography and demography do impact values in a very crucial way.

There's been an endless flow this week of arguments about Iraq from the left and right, the pro-war and anti-war, all making predictable comments. There was thus little incentive for me in linking them, but today I will make an exception for Fareed Zakaria - not someone to be put into one particular ideological box - which is why his conclusion is so encouraging:

There is no doubt today that the costs of the invasion have far outweighed the benefits. But in the long view of history, will that always be true? If, after all this chaos, a new and different kind of Iraqi politics emerges, it will make a difference in the region. Even now, amid the violence, one can see that. The old order in Iraq was built on fear and terror. One group dominated the land, oppressing the others. Now representatives of all three communities—Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds—are sitting down at the table, trying to construct a workable bargain they can all live with.

These sectarian power struggles can get extremely messy, and violent parties have taken advantage of every crack and cleavage. But this might be inevitable in a country coming to terms with very real divisions and disagreements. Iraq might be stumbling toward nation-building by consent, not brutality. And that is a model for the Middle East.

Read the whole thing.

As you know, I continue to be supportive of the Bush doctrine, but this version of pre-emption strikes me as a little too drastic: the State of Texas is now arresting people in bars for being drunk. And why you ask is this a pre-emptive move? The true and committed nanny-staters have some excellent reasons as to why they should be doing this:

The goal, she said, was to detain drunks before they leave a bar and go do something dangerous like drive a car. "We feel that the only way we're going to get at the drunk driving problem and the problem of people hurting each other while drunk is by crackdowns like this," she said.

"There are a lot of dangerous and stupid things people do when they're intoxicated, other than get behind the wheel of a car," Beck said. "People walk out into traffic and get run over, people jump off of balconies trying to reach a swimming pool and miss."

Or try to retain their balance sitting on a barstool after downing ten pints, but somehow not being able to quite accomplish that. Well, you won't have to worry about things like that any longer when you're in Texas. Your local officer will ensure your safety by pre-empting your fun.

Further to my earlier post, the results are now in:

The Latinos beat the women’s team 8-0, the Muslims beat the gay team 4-0 and the Muslims went on to win the final against the Latinos 4-1.

“Unfortunately the women lost and the gays lost but it’s not about winning and losing. It’s about having fun together,”

Via Norm.

If you haven't done so already, I would really encourage you to buy Bruce Bawer's excellent While Europe Slept.

Bawer, an American who lived in Amsterdam and who currently resides in Oslo, Norway, has written extensively about Europe's troubles which is of course one of the core Peaktalk themes. I've always argued that outsiders with direct exposure to the continent - and having left the place sixteen years ago I consider myself to be one too - to be best positioned to write about Europe. Deep enough knowledge and a sufficient amount of distance to enable a measure of objectivity.

Bruce's essays and other work can be found on his rich in content website which also has a useful geographical link page.

The debate over women and Islam continues. Today, Cinnamon Stillwell contrasts the new generation of feminists with the old 1960s-style women's lib movement in a comprehensive and link-filled article.

Over the weekend the anti-war crowd was out on the streets again, but the term ‘in full force’ it seems no longer really applies. It has become some sort of fringe movement which acts as a consolidator for a variety of increasingly irrelevant causes such as unreconstructed Marxism and the pro-Castro lobby. Here is an interesting and highly entertaining photo essay of events in San Francisco last weekend.

Canada’s efforts in Afghanistan have given new momentum to the anti-war rallies there although the numbers that braved the northern cold were not that impressive either, the largest event in Toronto attracted some 1000 protestors. It did however lead to one interesting flare up when the desperation of the demonstrators there prompted some of them to argue that life in Afghanistan had been better under the Taliban. This resulted in a swift response from the Afghan ambassador in Canada, Omar Samad:

Obviously these groups have their own views and they're entitled to it," he said. "I have contacted some of these groups. They're sort of reluctant to discuss the issues."

Samad suggested it was hypocritical of opponents to Canada's involvement in Afghanistan to protest now when they remained silent in the 1990s while the Taliban oppressed women and denied children a modern education.

"Where were you when the women of Afghanistan were imprisoned?" he asked. "Where were you when the children of Afghanistan were denied schooling? Where were these demonstrations for human rights and dignity and honour?"

Not in his wildest dreams would someone like Samad have imagined something as utterly perplexing as seeing wealthy and free westerners call for a return to Taliban rule in his ravaged country. Yet, for a brief moment this week that call – and other equally reprehensible statements – made it clear to him how the fragile freedom project in his nation could be endangered. For if the western contributions to it start to incur some unforeseen (and human) costs, then the irrelevant fringe may have some ammunition to restart its journey to relevancy. I doubt it will, but you never know.

Over at Gates of Vienna the work on the Bloody Borders project continues. The latest update is here.

One of the things that probably get lost in all the demographic projections for Europe – which by the way are subject to some credible criticisms - is the fact that they most likely do not take account of native Europeans becoming Muslim. The Washington Post yesterday had a revealing piece on one Rabi'a Frank, a Dutch woman who used to go through life as Rebecca Frank, and who following her marriage to a Moroccan immigrant became a devout Muslim. Here are some quotes from Frank which gives you a general idea of the unique transformation she went through:

"I'm a Muslim, a woman and also Dutch," she continued. "What upsets people is that I'm a Muslim first."

"I am a Muslim," she said with finality. "That's my identity."

During her pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia with her husband and mother-in-law, she covered her face in public for the first time. Far from feeling oppressed, she said, she felt liberated.

We can talk all we want about integration, but if the hallmark of being Muslim is Europe is being “Muslim first” it may be an uphill struggle although Frank could be an anomaly. More alarming is the statement that “she feels liberated” which interestingly coincides with a newspaper <