UN 'Human Rights Council' bans criticism of Islam

Israel Matzav:

The UN 'Human Rights Council' decided this week that it is forbidden to criticize Islam because "religious issues can be "very complex, very sensitive and very intense…This council is not prepared to discuss religious matters in depth, consequently we should not do it." From now on, only religious scholars would be permitted to broach 'religious matters' before the Council.

This means that any crimes committed by Islamists can not be addressed by the UN's HRC. The Organization of Islamic Countries is the largest voting block at the UN.

While we can not criticize Islam, it's OK to protest security measures on religious grounds:
And Now, Sniffer Dogs Are Offensive: Muslims travelling on trains from Brighton have objected to sniffer dogs being used to search them for drugs and bombs.



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A Note from the French Lunatic Asylum, and more in the afternoon roundup

A Note from the French Lunatic Asylum

Richard Landes has a translation of an article from the French weekly news magazine Le Nouvel Observateur up at Augean Stables. Because I am unfamiliar with the naval-gazing world of the French Elite (they invented the word!), at first I thought that "Nouvel Observateur" must be some kind of French Idiom for Lunatic Asylum. The thing is such a monument to un-self conscious self-deification and denial of reality that it reads most readily as either parody or the ravings of the insane. If you read it sentence by sentence and really listen to what they are implying, it really sounds as if it was written by a group of loonies- some who think they are Napoleons, Louis XIV, a few Richelieus and a Robespierre or two- sitting around in the day room of a French mental hospital. I searched some of the names of the signatories and to my surprise, most of them appear to be out on the streets and without psychiatric "paperwork". So, I guess, it turns out that we were meant to take it seriously.

Go read the whole post, and make sure to read Circling the Wagons around Charles: Le Nouvel Obs calls for Solidarity with their colleague under attack
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Getting by with a little help... from your friends:


Mary Katherine Ham has Obama on your shoulder
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New blog Versailles Beat has a great post on Dr Oscar Elias Biscet
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Don't Need a Weatherman to Know Which Way the Wind Blows
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Via Ace, the Amazon Wish list for the men and women recovering at the Walter Reed Medical Center.
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The menu at the World Hunger Meeting: Your UN Dollars Fighting Hunger!
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Egypt Uncovers 'Missing' Pyramid, unfortunately most of it was gone.

Speaking of archeology, Machu Picchu got looted by a German guy before Bingham got there. Too bad Klaus Kinsky is dead - Herzog could have made a great movie with Kinsky playing Berns the raider. Or will Indy get the prequel?



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Leftie Nicaraguan U.S. critic made UN assembly president -- update: Daniel Ortega missing

An Communist American-born Catholic priest is president of the next UN Assembly:

Nicaraguan U.S. critic made UN assembly president

A former Nicaraguan leftist foreign minister who has been a sharp critic of U.S. governments was elected on Wednesday as the next president of the U.N. General Assembly.

But within hours of his election, Miguel D'Escoto Brockmann said he wanted to turn a page on his past comments and work with the United States and other countries. Washington's U.N. envoy said he had similar assurances and would wait and see.

D'Escoto was elected by acclamation by the 192-member assembly after standing unopposed as candidate of Latin American and Caribbean countries, whose turn it is to hold the post. He will assume the year-long job in mid-September.

The assembly president has little power but chairs an annual gathering of world leaders in late September. He or she also presides over regular assembly debates, many on development issues, and oversees a long-running drive to expand membership of the powerful U.N. Security Council.

D'Escoto, 75, was foreign minister in the left-wing Sandinista administration that ruled Nicaragua from 1979-90, during which time it fought against an insurgency by U.S.-backed Contra rebels.

The "former" Sandinista is also a Catholic priest:

The son of a diplomat, D'Escoto was born in Los Angeles and ordained as a Roman Catholic priest. He espoused the left-wing liberation theology movement within the Catholic Church and backed the Sandinistas in the late 1970s, earning a reprimand from Pope John Paul II for involvement in politics.

Since the article does not mention that D'Escoto was not defrocked I assume he is still a priest. Like Fernando Lugo, the recently-elected president of Paraguay, he's another liberation theology-devotee who embraced Communist guerillas in the 1960s and 1970s.

Here in the USA we might elect a President closely aligned with black liberation theology. For more on that, please read Obama, Black Liberation Theology and Karl Marx parts one and two.

We'll be talking about liberation theology in today's podcast at 11AM Eastern. Please join us.

In other Nicaraguan news, Chávez oil fails to stem Nicaragua crisis

As the situation worsens, a growing chorus of critics are questioning the oil promises made to Nicaragua under the label of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, or ALBA - Chávez's leftist trade alliance among Venezuela, Bolivia, Cuba, and Nicaragua.

"ALBA is a mystery enveloped in a cloud of fog, wrapped in an enormous enigma," Mr. Aguirre says.

Though the lawmaker says that Venezuelan aid could "theoretically" be a great help to an impoverished country such as Nicaragua, the secrecy with which ALBA has been handled by Ortega has only fueled criticism and conjecture.

European donor countries – as well as the International Monetary Fund, opposition lawmakers, civil society, and the national media – have all asked for an explanation of Venezuelan aid under ALBA. But so far Ortega has remained tight-lipped, aside from admitting that Venezuelan aid to Nicaragua already totals $520 million.

D'Escoto's patron Daniel Ortega doens't want people to know where that half a billion dollars is going to:

Economists, too, are unable to explain ALBA, or account for the $520 million that Venezuela has supposedly given to Nicaragua – money that Ortega manages in a separate discretional fund with no third-party oversight.

Ortega's explanation of ALBA aid – including $35.3 million for unidentified "social programs" and $60.6 million for "other programs" – has done little to satisfy the opposition's call for transparency and accountability.

We'll keep an eye on this story; Nicaragua's regime is the most vulnerable of all the regimes Hugo's propped up so far.

Maggie reminds me that Obama's willing to send the UN trillions of dollars.

UPDATE
Apparently no one knows where Daniel Ortega's gone to after the Rome conference... Must have been some partee! The Nicaraguan press says he's governing by remote control (link in Spanish via Kate).



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"There was a lot of hate in that little Nakba rally."

Yesterday Mary, Yid With Lid and Pamela attended the Al-Nakbah rally in Dag Hammarskjold Park.

Aside from the curiously phallic signs the women carried, it's interesting to note that
1. most of the attendees were bussed in school buses
2. the people carrying signs reading "Peace, not ethnic cleansing" were screaming, "Jew Jew I hope you die today!" at a Jewish guy.

As Mary said, "There was a lot of hate in that little Nakba rally."



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Pope Benedict's speech at the UN

Late last evening I was discussing with a friend Pope Benedict's speech at the UN.

She, a practicing Catholic, was ver moved by his words.

I, a lapsed Catholic, was not.

And here's the reason why:

I firmly believe that the Declaration of Independence is a moral document because for the first time in the history of mankind a document stated,

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Right, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

At the UN, Pope Benedict's position was that human rights derive from a "sense of justice built primarily upon solidarity":

Experience shows that legality often prevails over justice when the insistence upon rights makes them appear as the exclusive result of legislative enactments or normative decisions taken by the various agencies of those in power. When presented purely in terms of legality, rights risk becoming weak propositions divorced from the ethical and rational dimension which is their foundation and their goal. The Universal Declaration, rather, has reinforced the conviction that respect for human rights is principally rooted in unchanging justice, on which the binding force of international proclamations is also based. This aspect is often overlooked when the attempt is made to deprive rights of their true function in the name of a narrowly utilitarian perspective. Since rights and the resulting duties follow naturally from human interaction, it is easy to forget that they are the fruit of a commonly held sense of justice built primarily upon solidarity among the members of society, and hence valid at all times and for all peoples. This intuition was expressed as early as the fifth century by Augustine of Hippo, one of the masters of our intellectual heritage. He taught that the saying: Do not do to others what you would not want done to you "cannot in any way vary according to the different understandings that have arisen in the world" (De Doctrina Christiana, III, 14). Human rights, then, must be respected as an expression of justice, and not merely because they are enforceable through the will of the legislators.

Unfortunately a "sense of justice built primarily upon solidarity" is exactly what generates the mentality where the UN Human Rights Council, and the UN World Conferences Against Racism, continue to condemn Israel and the US.



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McCain defends his record, Russert's inanity, and this morning's roundup

McCain angrily responds to flier about his war record. Sen. McCain has every reason to be angry; he defended our country at great sacrifice to himself and shouldn't have to put up with this garbage.
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The Unbearable Inanity of Tim Russert

Actually, the balls Russert favors may be hard, but the pitches he throws aren't curveballs, which go someplace useful. They're sillyballs, which go somewhere pointless.

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Mexico's Cartel War: Calderon in the Cauldron
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Two videos from Siggy:
Defending Racism And Genocide: Just Another Day At The UN


and
"Take That, Obama Girl!"


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Live from Vegas, it's Democracy Tonight!
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Via Larwyn, Barak Obama and Israel
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Ain't capitalism grand?
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ACLU Defends Sex In A Public Restroom


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The Edwards love child, and today's other stories (if there are any)

If you go to the link, National Enquirer World Exclusive: John Edwards Love Child Scandal! there's nothing there. The Enquirer pulled it.
Update, 12:20PM: the article's back up.

However, this being the internet, Doug Ross has capture and text, on the affair with Rielle Hunter.

Ace quotes from No Prisoners,

This is a perfect "one-two" punch by the Clintons. First, have some cutout mention that the Republicans might make hay out of a question about Obama "selling" drugs. Second, have a tabloid allege that Edwards has fathered a child while his loving, devoted, wife if dying of cancer. Since all sources are either being denied/fired or suspect, the damage is not enough to knock out either opponent - only weaken them. This way the two (Obama and Edwards) can split the anti-Hillary! vote but, both remain in the race (with reduced support) so she doesn't have to face only one strong contender.

This is pure Clinton "magic".

Dan Riehl has the video Hunter made for the Edwards campaign.

Politico has the story on Roger Altman, The Clintonite who owns National Enquirer

But hey, another married man claims to be the baby's father.

Sing it, Diana!

Ooh, ooh, ooh....aaaahhh

You think that I don't feel love
What I feel for you is real love
In other's eyes I see reflected
A hurt, scorned, rejected

Love child
Never meant to be
Love Child
Born in poverty
Love Child
Never meant to be
Love Child
Take a look at me

Started my life
In a old, cold, run-down tenament slum (tenement slum)
My father left he never even married mama
I shared the guilt my mama knew
So afraid that others knew I had no name

This love we're contemplatin'
Is worth the pain of waitin'
We'll only end up hatin'
The child we may be creatin'

Love Child
Never meant to be
Love Child
(Scorned by) Society
Love Child
Always second best
Love Child
(Different from) Different from the rest

(Hold on hold on just a little bit longer) Mmmmm baby
(Hold on hold on just a little bit longer) Mmmmm baby

I started school
And a worn, torn dress that somebody threw out
(Somebody threw out)
I knew the way it felt to always live in doubt
To be without the simple things
So afraid my friends would see the guilt in me

Don't think that I don't need ya
Don't think I don't want to please ya
But no child of mine will be bearing
The name of shame I've been wearing

Love Child
Love Child
Never quite as good
Afraid, ashamed
Misunderstood

But I'll always love you
Always love you

I'll always love you
Always love you

I warned them and warned them and warned them.
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Hillary wants to show she's likable, so Bill goes on Entertainment Tonight while she stays in the helicopter.



The Anchores thinks Bill doesn't want Hillary to win.

(Note to Hillary: If you want to project the image of the leader of the free world, don't stand next to anyone who dwarfs you phisically.)
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UNICEF's picture of the year:

An 11-yr old girl being married to a pedophile.

Where is UNICEF?
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Mass. Universal Care Faces Year-2 Reality

For those who like to believe there’s a free lunch, the table at Massachusetts' universal health care scheme is being pared.
...
The Boston Globe reports on Massachusetts' changes for 2008: "The changes will probably cut payments to doctors and hospitals, reduce choices for patients, and possibly increase how much patients have to pay."

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Via Maria, Dennis Prager writes about Secular Europe or Religious America?


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The WaPo notices Hugo's coup

Mr. Chavez's Coup
A constitutional 'reform' could complete Venezuela's transformation into a dictatorship

In fact, Mr. Chavez's rewrite would complete his transformation into an autocrat. It would lengthen his presidential term from six to seven years and remove the current limit of two terms, allowing him to serve indefinitely. He would have broad powers to seize property, to dispose of Venezuela's foreign exchange reserves, to impose central government rule on local jurisdictions and to declare indefinite states of emergency under which due process and freedom of information would be suspended. As a populist sop, one provision would reduce the workday from eight to six hours; that benefit, the state's control over national television and the voting process, and the apparent intention of many Venezuelans to stay away from the polls are expected to deliver the necessary ratification.

More surprisingly, UN labor agency, the International Labor Organization, condemns Venezuela government crackdown on business groups

Where's the Left? Blaming Bush, that's where. (h/t Siggy)

Is Chavez his own most dangerous enemy?

We shall find out.

Meanwhile, over at IBD... (h/t GM Roper

Technorati: Venezuela
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The boy who lived, homecoming in Baghdad, and this Sunday's features

We're twinseparable! Happy with his brother, the boy who refused to die, named after the Archangel Gabriel, whose name means "Fortitudo Dei", The Strength of God.
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The Petraeus Curve: Serious success in Iraq is not being recognised as it should be

Via Captain's Quarters, Thousands Return to Safer Iraqi Capital

As Matt said last Sunday,

he big story [on Iraq] that's not getting across in the mainstream media is that Iraqis are cooperating.

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Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, David Kopel writes about Fred Thompson vs. The UN's anti-self-defense campaign

Today, the Knoxville News reports that it was UN Dispatch that got the facts wrong. The Special Rapporteur's Report which Thompson criticized (and which was adopted and endorsed by a submcommission of the UN Human Rights Council) quite explicitly says that personal self-defense is not a human right.

Just two days ago Haiti expelled 100 Srilankan UN peacekeepers who are acussed of sex abuse

What's going to happen to the rapists? Probably not much:

A 2005 UN report suggested a central disciplining policy but member nations could not agree.

And from the "No sh*t, Sherlock" department,

In July, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Manfred Nowak, said the standards for selecting peacekeepers were too low.

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Via Sweetness and Light:

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Dr Sanity has the Carnival

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This week's WSJ's Five Best, on exploration:

They also listed "In Xanadu" by William Dalrymple and "White Gold" by Giles Milton, but Amazon is having problems with their links. My apologies for the inconvenience.
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This week's shoes:

I wonder how these would look with skirts.
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Half-right quiz (because I'm rarely depressed and never hopeless or bored), via Raven,

You Are a Ferris Wheel

Deep down, you are a fun, whimsical, and easygoing person. You often enjoy life for what it is, and the littlest changes in course can be quite thrilling. In relationships, people tend to feel what you feel. It can be liberating at first... But after a while, the people closest to you end up feeling a little trapped. Your life has perfectly normal cycles of ups and downs. However, you can't help but sometimes feel that you're missing out on the most exciting aspects of life. You only are happy when you're experiencing the highest of highs. Your low points just make you feel depressed, restless, and bored. At your best, you feel on top of the world with a great sense of perspective. You believe that anything is possible, and that you are happily looking down on everyone else. At your worst, you feel like your life is going in circles. You often feel like you're not going anywhere. This is sometimes psychologically disorienting. And sometimes it brings on a sense of hopelessness.

What Carnival Ride Are You?

Kouchner: "World Should Prepare for Possible War With Iran"

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said in an interview on RTL radio and LCI television,

"We must prepare for the worst," Kouchner said, adding: "The worst, sir, is war."

Le Monde (link in French) also mentions that the French armed services are preparing for such an eventuality:

"We are preparing ourselves by trying to put together plans that are the chiefs of staff's prerogative (but) that is not about to happen tomorrow."

An interesting aspect is that Germany is apparently also involved,

"We have decided to … prepare ourselves for possible sanctions outside the U.N. sanctions and which would be European sanctions. Our German friends proposed it. We discussed it a few days ago."

How will this translate in the upcoming UN summit?

We shall soon find out.

One thing is clear: Europe can not afford to have Iran armed with nuclear weapons. The Iranians have made themselves perfectly clear that they will use those weapons as soon as they get them.

Update, Monday 17 September:
Hardly surprising, Iran scorns French warning of war.


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Joy in Sadr City

As the number of truck bombs and other large al-Qaeda-style attacks in Iraq have declined nearly 50% and of course the NYT continues to twist the truth on British troop reductions, Matt taped this video smack in the middle of Sadr City:



Matt emailed,

Iraq is filled with children, more than what you'll see in the US. Despite the troubles, kids are always laughing, playing and generally seem healthy. These kids were playing soccer on the street and came over to try handshakes they have seen on television with the soldiers.

The surge must really be working: the UN wants a bigger role in Iraq

Update: And the troops are saving babies, too, Troops Shelter an Unlikely Survivor in Baghdad.
"There is an intangible and growing moral clout and it flows from an increasing respect among Iraqis for our military."

The World Bank putsch, and today's items

Wolfowitz 'broke World Bank laws', claims the Beeb; the WaPo says the committe found that Wolfowitz undermined the integrity of the institution.

Clarice Feldman explains The Attempted Putsch at the World Bank

This suggested, of course, that Wolfowitz would be allowed to directly comment to the Board on their testimony before the Ad Hoc Committee issued its final report but apparently he will not be, the Board having received an updated version of the Ad Hoc Report without Wolfowitz having been given an opportunity to address his rebuttal directly to the Board ahead of that transmittal. Certainly, he was given no opportunity to cross examine these witnesses himself, and as the discrepancy on the record of outgoing vice president for human resources Xavier Coll shows, there is plenty of reason to question the veracity of the chief witnesses against him.

Confidential proceedings of this group and the Board are regularly being leaked to friends in the press and to outside organizations critical of Wolfowitz, while he and Riza have been gagged and precluded from responding quickly by releasing internal documents supportive of their defense. In this way, it seems clear the Ad Hoc Committee is trying to force recalcitrant Board members to cede to their recommendations, thereby precluding independent judgment by the larger 24 board of Executive Directors. Indeed, although the media has been rushing to print every word of Board members and staffers opposed to Wolfowitz, the report takes issue with his deigning to defend himself against these baseless and overblown charges of improper dealing.

(h/t Larwyn)

World Bank Jobbery
More evidence the Wolfowitz accusers chose to ignore.

All of this is further evidence that what Mr. Wolfowitz is facing here is a kangaroo court. The Europeans and bank staff thought they could get him to leave quietly if they smeared him and Ms. Riza enough in the press. But now that he has fought back to clear his name, the Europeans led by Dutch politician Herman Wijffels have decided to ignore evidence to justify their one-sided conclusions. They also largely ignore Ms. Riza's own statements to the committee while condemning her for objecting to a process that all but ended her career at the bank.

Claudia Rosett writes on World Bokum.

Meanwhile, George Soros sets his sights.
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Call It the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Dictatorships
Business as usual as Zimbabwe takes a seat. This is exactly how the UN is meant to work.
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Sarkozy soap opera grips Paris
Amazing how the press is spilling the beans on Sarko but kept silent everybody else's soaps - starting with Chirac and his Japanese mistress.

Update: Via Maria, No rest for Citizen Chirac as he relinquishes the throne

"Jacques Chirac has deep convictions," he told Le Monde. "A locomotive like Chirac will get things moving."

As vans shuttled the Chiracs' belongings across the Seine, staff at the Elysée Palace spent the day shredding documents. Orders were given to destroy or take home all personal documents and notes. Tapes of meetings and press conferences were also destroyed and deposited in rubbish skips that were parked around the palace.

Don't expect any new developments to shed light on Chirac's mysterious millions any time soon.

Or ever.
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Getting past prestige names when searching for a college

Strategically, students have a better chance at capturing merit money if they look for schools where they will be among the top 25 percent of incoming students in grades and SAT scores. You can find out how your child stacks up by looking at the CollegeBoard.com and examining the range of SAT scores.

Being in the top tier of kids, however, won't get you any money if the school doesn't award any. So it's important to know which schools do. This will be especially important if you do not expect to receive any need-based financial aid. Some Ivy League schools and other prominent East Coast schools don't award merit money.

Blatherin' Rosie

Via Mara, LGF has the video

Rosie: "For the first time in history steel was melted by fire." Wrong Rosie: steel is melted by fire each and every day around the world. What's melting are the few neurons left in what you call a brain inside your head.

Gerard has an excellent post,

Be sure to tell yourself that whatever has happened to you, it is not your fault. Be a post-post-modern American. Be an eternal victim. You've got it coming.

When the going gets tough, blame your genes and demand that all share your pain, send you a check, and pay extra for medical research to cure what ails you. For free. It's you're right written right there in the invisible ink between the lines of the Constitution.

When the going gets really tough, blame George Bush, the center of all the evil that is America. Besides, the people that really want to kill you are far too numerous and far too dedicated to your death to contemplate. It is much lighter on the breaking brain to believe that George Bush wants to kill your right to dissent even if it is much harder to see. Your real enemies are far too frightening to contemplate. Your secret hope is that they'll burn you in an instant in some thermonuclear fire so you don't have to be around to put everything back together.

Don't think for a minute that you are unraveling what is left of your social fabric. Who needs clothes in the dark? You are only taking advantage of your First Amendment rights. What was the Second one? Oh, that's the bad one. Then there's 5. And the others? Who remembers? Who can count that high these days?

The excerpt from Gerard's post doesn't do it justice, so make sure to read it all (thank you Larwyn).

And don't even look at the UN:
I mean, watch this:


(h/t Atlas)
The United States remains the UN's largest contributor.

We pay 22% of its regular budget, and about 27% of its peacekeeping costs. On top of that, we give generously to support the work of UN agencies providing humanitarian relief, electoral assistance, food aid, and more.

When are we going to wake up?

Off to a lecture, but in the meantime,

I was down with a cold yesterday but today I'm well enough that I want to listen to the chief political correspondent for The Jerusalem Post speak on "Israel in the Eyes of Foreign Media". I might post on it later tonight or tomorrow morning, depending on how my cold treats me.

As I said this morning, Hans Blix's going to discuss disarmament across the street from that lecture. Too bad he couldn't give the talk in Pyongyang or Tehran.

In the meantime, a little diversion,
Al Pacino leads his lady to tango heaven:

And I want that dress.

"The future is upon us"

Read it now.

A round-up to warm you up this cold morning

I was reading this, and wondering, is carbon offsets the new Florida real estate scams? Because, as The Political Economy of Alternative Energy points out, good Energy Deserves No Subsidy.

Sunday The Anchoress had a great post and round-up on global warming, 17,000 scientists dissent; no consensus on global warming. I had two posts last year on the subject, which got me a fair amount of unfriendly emails from those who want to achieve consensus through coercion.

Al Gore: "Warm up the escape pod, Tipper!" (h/t Larwyn) - just don't head to Mars, which is getting warmer.

The globalarmist propaganda's reaching the schools, like these: Gore global warming 'Truth' reaching DODDS classrooms

Maria sent me An Inconvenient Truth About Al Gore. Rap Star In Gore Climate Concert Lineup Flies Dinner Across The Atlantic. Yet another reason I don't join the global hysteria is that I won't buy into wearing a hair shirt when the preacher's wearing an ermine coat. And then, there's a chance that Global Warming will make you healthy and sexy, something we all can use.

More likely, hyping global warming can possibly make you rich and powerful - Dan says that Gore Funding Plan For "A New World Order". Some don't see anything wrong with the idea of "global governance" - I see a lot wrong with the idea of "global governance", and globalarmism is just one of the means to sell us on the idea.

Meanwhile in the EU, Richard asks Who is to lead?

Unfortunately, Merkel has bought into the anthropomorphic global warming scam and says she believes that "Europe" will not be taken seriously unless it agrees a binding target of 20 percent renewables by 2020 – enforceable in the European court.

She is determined to get agreement to act at the informal European Council - to be held on Thursday and Friday - saying that she wants the Council to demonstrate that "Europe" is willing to provide a global lead in tackling climate change.

But, given the leading role Germany is taking on this issue, one has to wonder whether it really is "Europe" that Merkel wants to be in the lead, or whether this is another way of giving Germany that position.

While the UN chief warns on climate change and claims that "climate change poses as much of a danger to the world as war", An analysis of the United Nations widely-touted 2007 IPCC Global Warming Summary for Policymakers by UK Lord Viscount Monckton has found 31 errors and exaggerations. Here's the Lord's report (pdf file).

Allegre's second thoughts

Fifteen years ago, Dr. Allegre was among the 1500 prominent scientists who signed "World Scientists' Warning to Humanity," a highly publicized letter stressing that global warming's "potential risks are very great" and demanding a new caring ethic that recognizes the globe's fragility in order to stave off "spirals of environmental decline, poverty, and unrest, leading to social, economic and environmental collapse."
...
With a wealth of data now in, Dr. Allegre has recanted his views. To his surprise, the many climate models and studies failed dismally in establishing a man-made cause of catastrophic global warming. Meanwhile, increasing evidence indicates that most of the warming comes of natural phenomena. Dr. Allegre now sees global warming as over-hyped and an environmental concern of second rank.

The French scientist is not alone: here's an article in Spanish from a Chilean newspaper, sent by Maria Blanco who lives in Spain, about the Economista de Harvard que desmiente a Al Gore, Harvard economist Xavier Sala-i-Martin, who takes the opportunity to call Gore an actor and a hypocrite.

If you think you're beyond the globalarmists' reach after you die, think again: Towards a carbon neutral death

Even death offers no escape from the global warming debate. But as with most things these days, there are eco-friendly alternatives. Woodland burials and wicker coffins are the among the greenest ways to a carbon neutral end.

At least marriage lasts only "til death do us part" - but globalarmism lasts forever. My first question is, what will the effect of burials in wicker coffins be on the water supply? Will we all turn greener from it? Or just die in a carbon-neutral way?

Why do a global warming post this morning?

Because it's 15F outside and Carnegie Lake is still frozen, even after the very warm weekend we just had. February was the coldest in record since 1979. I'm glad the Beeb's not reporting from here - we've had practically no snow while having this record-cold temperatures, but the Beeb's tied its knickers in a knot because Tokyo didn't get snow this year. I say, go to Buffalo if you want snow.

One of the more amusing presentations at CPAC was the one by the author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming:


I hope someone plays this documentary here so I can watch. Here's their press release and broadcast information.
-------------------------------------------
In case any of you want to know, I'm done discussing Ann Coulter. I've discussed the subject ad nauseam with other bloggers while in DC, through emails, at other blogs, during yesterday's podcast, on the phone with friends, and at home. Enough. You'll have to go elsewhere for that.

Blogging from the Public Library

This morning there's no internet connection at casa de Fausta. The problem certainly wasn't caused by the snow, which was sparse,

and therefore thousands of children had to get up early and head to school.

I left The Husband to deal with the internet problem and took my trusty laptop to the Princeton Public Library, that $18,000,000 living room where

people shop, talk and fall in love

I realize one can't really control who one falls in love with, but I'll do my best to refrain from all of those three activities. Right now I'm sitting entirely by myself right next to the LARGE PRINT BOOKS section. It smells of popcorn.

Last night while I was tidying up the family room I watched one of the weirdest musicals ever: In Caliente (1935), starring Dolores del Rio, whom I remember from when I used to wait for my piano teacher when I was a kid living in Puerto Rico. One of the local TV stations used to play in the afternoons old Mexican movies (mostly horrible tragedies) and Dolores starred in many of them after she left Hollywood.

In Caliente takes place in a Mexican town of the same name at the Hotel Caliente (the hot hotel) where four mariachis followed the guests singing the title song, much like Sir Robyn's minstrels, and, while they didn't meet the same fate as the minstrels, there was much rejoicing. Dolores del Rio managed to look impeccable while wearing evening gowns throughout the film no matter the time of day or what was happening around her, mariachi or no mariachi.

The rest of the movie's a Busby Berkely musical, and the songs' lyrics were written by Al Dubin, of Tip-toe Through the Tulips fame. Judging by his lyrics, Al must have been a wild and crazy guy with a Brooklyn accent, with the emphasis on crazy: here's She's A Latin from Manhattan

Fate sent her to me over the sea from Spain
And she is one in a million for me
I found my romance when she went dancing by
And she must be a Castillian, si, si
Is she from Havana or Madrid?
But something about her is making me doubt 'er
I think I remember the kid, yeah!

She's a Latin from Manhattan
I can tell by her 'Man-ya-na"
She's a Latin from Manhattan
But not Havana
Though she does the rhumba for us
And she calls herself Dolores
She was in a Broadway chorus
Known as Suzy Donahue

She can take her tambourine and whack it
But to her it's just a racket
She's a hoofer from Tenth Avenue

While the NYT reviewer said,

Perhaps its most notable factor is the restraint of Busby Berkeley's song and dance interludes

restraint is not what comes mind when you watch eight horses running amok in a Mexican cantina while three dozen dancers drink from shot glasses and sing "Muchacha, at last I've gotcha where I wantcha, muchacha", and Dolores del Rio has just smacked her suitor across the face with a crop, after which he falls down the stairs and miraculously recovers all the while keeping time with the music.

Here's a still showing the moment just before she grabbed that crop and whacked him.

The lyrics are special,

Muchacha, tonight I've gotcha where I wantcha, my Muchacha.
I'll watchcha just like a cat would watch a little cucaracha.
So, stand up and hand me your lovely charms,
Give me two red lips and a pair of arms.
I've gotcha and in the lingo of the "Gringo," I'm so hotcha,
Muchacha, for you.

I can almost guarantee that no one's going to be falling in love at the Public Library if they hear those pick-up lines, but going by what Robert Osborne said, being at the set must really have been a hoot.
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On to today's items:
Things are getting more caliente in Venezuela now that the National Assembly has given initial approval to a bill granting the president the power to bypass congress and rule by decree for 18 months.

Also caliente, the Chinese used a ground-based medium-range ballistic missile to destroy a weather satellite that had been launched in 1999. Meanwhile in Iran, the UFOs are flying.

Venezuela and Iran are now facing reduced oil demand, and oil futures dropped to $50. Captain Ed asks, Have The Saudis Declared Economic War On Iran?

This morning's WSJ has the latest UN scandal, the Cash for Kim, a.k.a., United Nations Dictator's Program

The stakes are nonetheless very high because, unlike Saddam's Iraq, North Korea has already succeeded in testing its nuclear bomb. The hard currency supplied by the UNDP almost certainly goes into one big pot marked "Dear Leader," which Kim can use for whatever he wants, including his weapons programs. This may not violate the letter of Security Council Resolution 1718, which restricts trade in anything having to do with North Korea's nuclear or missile programs, but it certainly violates its spirit.

Unlike Oil for Food, there's no evidence to date that corrupt UNDP officials are in on the game--though given the U.N.'s record of late, it would be unwise to rule that out before a full investigation.

In Turkey, Hrant Dink has been shot dead. He's the guy who had been prosecuted under Turkey's strict laws against "insulting Turkishness."

In lighter news,
There's a local exhibition of diverse views on 'What's Sacred'. I might drop by during the weekend.

Geoffrey Chaucer got tagged with the V Thinges Meme

Al Gore, weather maker Takes on His Critics... while Instapundit links to Gore Effect in the Urban Dictionary:

The well documented phenomenon that leads to very low, unseasonal temperatures, driving rain, hail, snow or all of the above whenever Al Gore visits an area to discuss global "warming". Hence the "Gore Effect"

Then there's that creepy picture. Botox? Wrinkle fillers? Make-up? Or airbrush?

And from Maria
Castro Shuffling in Place

The cadaverish dictator shuffling in place is a perfect metaphoric rendering of Castro's Cuba over these many decades. He took his country from prosperity and a place at the head of Latin America in material terms to the bottom. In practically every material measure his country is a slum. In terms of freedom it is one vast jail. Had he, when he came to power after the overthrow of Fulgencio Batista's seven-year dictatorship, made good on his promise to return Cuba to the democratic condition in which it had existed in the 1940s, his country today would most likely be the richest and freest country south of our borders, and possibly Castro would be in the pink and deserving of the accolades now paid him by the American left's rich and fatuous.

Bad science, and today's items

Via Maria, Celebrities told to embrace the facts, not bad science
The Sense About Science guys have their work cut out for them.
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From Larwyn,
Supply Factors and Stagnant Wages

Blue collar workers' real wages have stagnated because of labor supply factors. These include:

-The baby boom
-Immigration
-Diversity

They have also stagnated because of:

-Health insurance costs and
-Costs of bureaucracy due to workplace regulation.

Social stratification has increased because of:

-Urban renewal and disruption of blue collar social networks and
-Unnecessary college degree requirements.

In other words, supply factors and government intervention have caused the stagnation of blue collar real wages that the US has suffered in the past 30 years.

RTWT

More on Conyers: Get This Turkey Off Judiciary Committee
Oh yes, let’s put our lives in the hands of the government
UN Workers Raping 12 year olds in Sudan
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Via Beth., Honoring Those Who Died
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Via SC&A, from the Victims of Political Islam site, Dr Nasr Abu Zaid
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Call me overprotective, but I would have never allowed my son to do this when he was fourteen.

More blogging later.

Saddam to hang at 10PM EST

A top Iraqi official said Saddam will be executed before 10 p.m. EST Friday.

I certainly hope al-Jazeera carries the execution. This is why:
Earlier this year when I went to listen to Dan Senor, one of the main points he made was that

Arab Muslims are voting and holding their governments accountable; al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya have broadcast this around the regions... This is very powerful and very important.

Specifically, on Saddam's trial, he stated,

The trial sends a message to almost every ruler who identifies with Saddam. The only thing that never happened is the governments to be held accountable - until now. The trial's being aired by al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya. Senor spent half a day with one of Saddam's attorneys and was told that other area rulers are terrified, and particularly mentioned Al-Assad.

One dramatic development in the trial in recent days was Saddam's admission that he was responsible for the 1981 assassination of a small Sunni town where 150 people killed and the town was razed.

It is important for Iraq to close this 3-decade chapter [in its history].

Let's not underestimate the power the image of Saddam's execution will carry across the Middle East.

Update Round-up at Right Voices

Iraq The Model has the latest.

Update, Saturday December 30 While CNN spouts off how Saddam - whose own official documents suggest that a staggering 5 million executions were made during Baath era alone - was a"champion of the Arab cause", Gateway Pundit points out that Saddam was hanged inside one of his former torture centres. As I said above, area rulers are watching.
The Anchoress, who's a much better woman than I, grapples with the issues of morality. Me, I'm glad the SOB's dead. So is Pamela.

And now for The Very Briefest of Neocon Retrospectives. More from Claudia Rosett.

Another update: Again, we can be proud that the United States of America brought him down. And that no dictator can ever feel entirely safe again.

Hat tips: Larwyn

Later update, Sigmund, Carl and Alfred and Dr Sanity examine the reaction from the Left.