Thanks to Mark Alexander for alerting me to this video, quite a counterpoint to "Muslims Speak Out":
Labels: Islam, Muslims complain, Terrorism, Video
I will be visiting Mr. AOW's family in upstate New York for a few days. During that time, I do not expect to have Internet access, although I still plan to cohost The Gathering Storm Radio Show on Friday, July 27, 2007.
(Each "Question of the Week," an idea which I gleaned from A Republic If You Can Keep It, will remain toward the top of the blog until the next question appears. The previous Questions of the Week are HERE. Please scroll down for recent postings) ABC News' Teddy Davis and Lindsey Ellerson Report: Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., told Planned Parenthood Tuesday that sex education for kindergarteners, as long as it is "age-appropriate," is "the right thing to do."
[...]
...[I]t’s the right thing to do...to provide age-appropriate sex education, science-based sex education in schools."
Labels: QUESTION OF THE WEEK
Follow up to this posting...Losing My JihadismCLICK HERE to view the schedule for and to access the On Faith Forum "Muslims Speak Out." Here's our chance to ask pointed questions and to make appropriate comments. I've test-posted a comment there, and it went up onto the site.
By Mansour al-Nogaidan
Sunday, July 22, 2007; B01
BURAIDAH, Saudi Arabia Islam needs a Reformation. It needs someone with the courage of Martin Luther.
This is the belief I've arrived at after a long and painful spiritual journey. It's not a popular conviction -- it has attracted angry criticism, including death threats, from many sides. But it was reinforced by Sept. 11, 2001, and in the years since, I've only become more convinced that it is critical to Islam's future.
Muslims are too rigid in our adherence to old, literal interpretations of the Koran. It's time for many verses -- especially those having to do with relations between Islam and other religions -- to be reinterpreted in favor of a more modern Islam. It's time to accept that God loves the faithful of all religions. It's time for Muslims to question our leaders and their strict teachings, to reach our own understanding of the prophet's words and to call for a bold renewal of our faith as a faith of goodwill, of peace and of light.
I didn't always think this way. Once, I was one of the extremists who clung to literal interpretations of Islam and tried to force them on others. I was a jihadist.
I grew up in Saudi Arabia. When I was 16, I found myself assailed by doubts about the existence of God. I prayed to God to give me the strength to overcome them. I made a deal with Him: I would give up everything, devote myself to Him and live the way the prophet Muhammad and his companions had lived 1,400 years ago if He would rid me of my doubts.
I joined a hard-line Salafi group. I abandoned modern life and lived in a mud hut, apart from my family. Viewing modern education as corrupt and immoral, I joined a circle of scholars who taught the Islamic sciences in the classical way, just as they had been taught 1,200 years ago. My involvement with this group led me to violence, and landed me in prison. In 1991, I took part in firebombing video stores in Riyadh and a women's center in my home town of Buraidah, seeing them as symbols of sin in a society that was marching rapidly toward modernization.
Yet all the while, my doubts remained. Was the Koran really the word of God? Had it really been revealed to Muhammad, or did he create it himself? But I never shared these doubts with anyone, because doubting Islam or the prophet is not tolerated in the Muslim society of my country.
By the time I turned 26, much of the turmoil in me had abated, and I made my peace with God. At the same time, my eyes were opened to the hypocrisy of so many who held themselves out as Muslim role models. I saw Islamic judges ignoring the marks of torture borne by my prison comrades. I learned of Islamic teachers who molested their students. I heard devout Muslims who never missed the five daily prayers lying with ease to people who did not share their extremist beliefs.
In 1999, when I was working as an imam at a Riyadh mosque, I happened upon two books that had a profound influence on me. One, written by a Palestinian scholar, was about the struggle between those who deal pragmatically with the Koran and those who take it and the hadith literally. The other was a book by a Moroccan philosopher about the formation of the Arab Muslim way of thinking.
The books inspired me to write an article for a Saudi newspaper arguing that Muslims have the right to question and criticize our religious leaders and not to take everything they tell us for granted. We owe it to ourselves, I wrote, to think pragmatically if our religion is to survive and thrive.
That article landed me in the center of a storm. Some men in my mosque refused to greet me. Others would no longer pray behind me. Under this pressure, I left the mosque.
I moved to the southern city of Abha, where I took a job as a writer and editor with a newly established newspaper. I went back to leading prayers at the paper's small mosque and to writing about my evolving philosophy. After I wrote articles stressing our right as Muslims to question our Saudi clerics and their interpretations and to come up with our own, officials from the kingdom's powerful religious establishment complained, and I was banned from writing.
The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, gave new life to what I had been saying. I went back to criticizing the rote manner in which we Muslims are fed our religion. I criticized al-Qaeda's school of thought, which considers everyone who isn't a Salafi Muslim the enemy. I pointed to examples from Islamic history that stressed the need to get along with other religions. I tried to give a new interpretation to the verses that call for enmity between Muslims and Christians and Jews. I wrote that they do not apply to us today and that Islam calls for friendship among all faiths.
I lost a lot of friends after that. My old companions from the jihad felt obliged to declare themselves either with me or against me. Some preferred to cut their links to me silently, but others fought me publicly, issuing statements filled with curses and lies. Once again, the paper came under great pressure to ban my writing. And I became a favorite target on the Internet, where my writings were lambasted and labeled blasphemous.
Eventually I was fired. But by then, I had started to develop a different relationship with God. I felt that He was moving me toward another kind of belief, where all that matters is that we pray to God from the heart. I continued to pray, but I started to avoid the verses that contain violence or enmity and only used the ones that speak of God's mercy and grace and greatness. I remembered an incident in the Koran when the prophet told a Bedouin who did not know how to pray to let go of the verses and get closer to God by repeating, "God is good, God is great." Don't sweat the details, the prophet said.
I felt at peace, and no longer doubted His existence.
In December 2002, in a Web site interview, I criticized al-Qaeda and declared that some of the Friday sermons were loathsome because of their attacks against non-Muslims. Within days, a fatwa was posted online, calling me an infidel and saying that I should be killed. Once again, I felt despair at the ways of the Muslim world. Two years later, I told al-Arabiya television that I thought God loves all faithful people of different religions. That earned me a fatwa from the mufti of Saudi Arabia declaring my infidelity.
But one evening not long after that, I heard a radio broadcast of the verse of light. Even though I had memorized the Koran at 15, I felt as though I was hearing this verse for the first time. God is light, it says, the universe is illuminated by His light. I felt the verse was speaking directly to me, sending me a message. This God of light, I thought, how could He be against any human? The God of light would not be happy to see people suffer, even if they had sinned and made mistakes along the way.
I had found my Islam. And I believe that others can find it, too. But first we need a Reformation similar to the Protestant Reformation that Martin Luther led against the Roman Catholic Church.
In the late 14th century, Islam had its own sort of Martin Luther. Ibn Taymiyya was an Islamic scholar from a hard-line Salafi sect who went through a spiritual crisis and came to believe that in time, God would close the gates of hell and grant all humans, regardless of their religion, entry to his everlasting paradise. Unlike Luther, however, Ibn Taymiyya never openly declared this revolutionary belief; he shared it only with a small, trusted circle of students.
Nevertheless, I find myself inspired by Luther's courageous uprising. I see what Islam needs -- a strong, charismatic personality who will lead us toward reform, and scholars who can convince Islamic communities of the need for a bold new interpretation of Islamic texts, to reconcile us with the wider world.
Mansour al-Nogaidan writes for the Bahraini newspaper Al-Waqt.
Labels: Commentary, Georgetown University, Islam, Islamic Reformation, Newsweek, On Faith Forum, Washington Post
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, which WC and I cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday for one hour at noon, Pacific Time.Labels: Blog news, Media, Radio
(All emphases by Always On Watch)
Soaring prices for salvaged metals, driven by a global demand in Asian markets, have turned scrap into the new gold for the sticky-fingered set, leading to spikes in an array of property crimes in the Washington area and elsewhere. Manhole covers, beer kegs, light poles, air-conditioning units and even catalytic converters -- valued for the small amount of platinum they contain -- have been targeted to feed a $65 billion domestic scrap-recycling industry.Portions of the article defy belief, but apparently the thefts have been documented:
On several occasions this month, thieves dug up hundreds of feet of underground copper cable used to illuminate ball fields in Anne Arundel County, forcing the organizers of a youth baseball tournament to reschedule a half-dozen games. "We got hit three times in eight days," said Ray Fox, president of the Linthicum Ferndale Youth Athletic Association.Some of the thieves have met their demise in the course of the thefts:
In Northern Virginia this year, crime reports are peppered with metal thefts. Among them: bronze cemetery flower vases and stainless-steel construction edging stolen in Fairfax County, copper gutters and tubing taken in Loudoun and aluminum siding removed from a yard in Prince William.
Thieves in recent weeks have crawled under cars to cut out their catalytic converters, a component of a vehicle emissions system, in a parking lot in the Annapolis area and a junkyard in Howard County.
With the price of aluminum near a 20-year high last summer, someone carted away the bleacher seats at the District's Fort Greble Field, home to Ballou Senior High School's baseball team.
In some cases, thieves have put themselves in great danger by stealing live electrical wires from buildings. A 41-year-old man was electrocuted this month in a vacant building in Pasadena, and a 47-year-old man was killed while stripping wire from a D.C. school last year. In the past year, about two dozen people have been killed across the country while trying to steal metals, according to news accounts.What kind of moron breaks into a power substation and fools around with high-voltage wires?
Pepco spokesman Robert Dobkin said thieves in search of copper broke into the utility's substations eight times in the past year. "It's a commodity and they want to cash in on it, but our concern is injury," Dobkin said. "It's one thing to steal copper wire from a yard, and it's another thing to break into a substation with live electricity."
Because booming economies in such nations as China and India require massive quantities of metal, the market principles of supply and demand have made metal theft far more profitable than it once was. Copper traded for $3.35 a pound in June, a more than fourfold increase over its price in 2003. Platinum traded this month at about $1,300 a troy ounce, more than twice its value five years ago -- fueling the criminal appetite for catalytic converters.The following graphic depicts the changes in the prices of certain metals (Click on the image to enlarge it):
Metal bandits watch prices closely, of course, including those for stainless steel. In April, Ernest Vinson of Landover was charged in Charles County with the theft of as many as 35 empty beer kegs snatched from behind two Waldorf restaurants, an Applebee's and an Outback Steakhouse.I guess the good news is that the stolen kegs were empty.
[...]
Some beer distributors have sought to protect themselves by increasing the deposits keg beer buyers plunk down for the kegs, which is traditionally as little as $10. The thinking is that people will keep them tightly secured.
Labels: Crime, Current events, Washington Post
See recent postings at the The Center for Vigilant Freedom. Excerpt from a recent posting, quoting Frank Gaffney:
Thanks to the leadership of Sens. Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins, the chairman and ranking minority member, respectively, of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and especially that of Rep. Pete King, Sen. Collins’ counterpart on the House Homeland Security Committee, legislation along the lines of that adopted by an overwhelming bipartisan majority of the House of Representatives last May at Rep. King’s initiative will shortly become law.
The language will provide protection against the sorts of harassment lawsuits filed by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) after several unidentified individuals reported six Muslim imams engaged in suspicious – and frightening – behavior prior to boarding a USAir flight in November 2006. CAIR has been identified as a front organization for the Muslim Brotherhood and is an un-indicted co-conspirator in an alleged terrorism-financing plot.
Labels: Current events, Flying Imams, Politics, Vigilant Freedom/910 Group
I was alerted to the following horrible story by Mark Alexander, whose commentary reads as follows:
It high time for the Saudis to come into the civilized world! It is also high time that the Western world shun Saudi Arabia until they do so, regardless of the cost. Some things are more important than money, profit, or oil!
Labels: Saudi Arabia, Save Rizana, Shari'a Law, Video
[Hat-tip to Mark Alexander, who alerted me to this video about Wahhabism and Saudi Arabia]
Our friends the Saudis' have withdrawn their support for the so-called 'Saudi plan,' ostensibly out of fear of attacks by Iran or al-Qaeda. Under the 'Saudi plan' the Arab states were to recognize Israel's 'right to exist' existence in return for Israel's full withdrawal to the June 4, 1967 borders and permitting 'Palestinian refugees' to resettle in Israel and destroy the Jewish state from within. Obviously, I do not consider the 'Saudi plan' a great loss, but the withdrawal of Saudi sponsorship from even a bare recognition of Israel's 'right to exist' ought to prove - if anyone still needs it proven - that the dispute between Israel and the Arab world is not over borders but over the very existence of a Jewish state in this region.More at this link.
Labels: History, Saudi Arabia, Video
Photo credit
Saved by a moving performance of ChopinThe story of Natalia Karp's survival and determination reminds us of the power of music as healer and as unspoken message. More importantly, her story reminds us that the human spirit can remain resilient and unbroken even in the face of evil.
July 23, 2007
Natalia Karp, 1911-2007
Natalia Karp survived the Holocaust because the commandant of the Plaszow concentration camp in Poland wanted musical entertainment for his birthday.
Summoned, expecting to be shot, Natalia, then a beautiful 32-year-old, played Chopin's haunting and melancholic Nocturne in C sharp minor. Amon Goeth, the commandant, declared: "Sie soll leben." ("She shall live.")
Natalia told Goeth, chillingly depicted by Ralph Fiennes in the film Schindler's List, that her sister, Helena, should also be spared. Natalia was ordered to play for the Nazis on several occasions but her ordeal was not over.
After 10 months she was sent to Auschwitz, where she expected to die. "My sister and I clung to each other," she recalled. "Every day we thought could be our last."
Natalia was released the day after VE Day, and returned to Krakow with Helena, a ballerina. When she gave her first postwar performance of Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No.1, with its triumphant opening chords, her thought was "to show the Nazis that I was not beaten".
Karp, who has died at 96, was born Natalia Weissman in Krakow, the second of four children. Her father was a wealthy businessman; her mother sang opera arias at home. Karp played by ear before beginning lessons with Arthur Rubenstein's brother-in-law. In 1920 she played in Berlin, where Boris Pasternak's mother kissed her. At 15, she returned to Berlin for lessons with Artur Schnabel.
Later she developed her technique with Georg Bertram, and at 18 played Chopin's E minor concerto with the Berlin Philharmonic. But when her mother died, Natalia returned to Krakow to care for her family.
In 1933 she married Julius Hubler, a lawyer, pianist and music critic who was killed on the first day of the war. She was captured with Helena and two friends as they tried to flee the ghetto on false papers; they were to be sent to Plaszow.
After the war she met and married Josef Karpf, who was posted to the Polish embassy in London, where they claimed asylum in 1950. She dropped the "f" from her name for professional purposes.
Although she frequently played Beethoven and Schubert, Karp had a special affection for Chopin, whose music she played around Europe. Critics admired her "mellow tone and intuitively musical phrasing". In 1967 she played for Oskar Schindler.
Karp never truly retired. In 2005 she played the life-saving Chopin Nocturne for David Cohen, an interviewer. "The room is awash with notes, gentle and sad beyond words," he wrote. "In Natalia's half-shut eyes I can see that she is far away."
Natalia Karp's husband died in 1993. She is survived by her two daughters.
Labels: Holocaust, Music, Obituaries
From this source:
Pete King (R-NY) tried hard but the “John Doe” amendment protecting passengers’ rights to report suspicious behavior without being sued by CAIR in its Saudi-funded lawsuit jihad failed.and
UPDATE (as of 9:30 p.m., July 19): Susan Collins (R-ME) submitted her “John Doe” passenger protection amendment for a vote in the Senate (S.A. 2340) but the amendment failed just 3 votes shy of the 60 needed to pass. Michelle Malkin has the vote roll of aye’s and nay’s here. No Republican voted against it, but Sam Brownback (R-CA) and Obama (D-IL) did not vote.Malkin points out that the final conference report could be a last place to add language protecting passengers who report suspicious behavior from lawsuits - but this is becoming more of a longshot.How the vote went:
So, time to gear up:
— Expect more probes of the 6 Flying Imams variety, especially as we go into the August vacation season.
— Bring a videocamera or video cell phone with you, so you can gather evidence as needed to protect yourself and your fellow passengers, from both terrorism and lawsuits. You can pick one up for less than $100 at Walmart (online price maybe cheaper in the store), Target, or Radioshack.
— It’s time for a Passenger Bill of Rights and Passenger Training. If we have to protect ourselves, so be it. Kyle Shideler did a great post on this on May 3, and I’m reposting it below or link here (A Passenger’s Right To Survive) because it’s even more important now.
Labels: CAIR, Current events, Dhimmitude, Flying Imams, Politics, Vigilant Freedom/910 Group
(Each "Question of the Week," an idea which I gleaned from A Republic If You Can Keep It, will remain toward the top of the blog until the next question appears. The previous Questions of the Week are HERE. Please scroll down for recent postings) RICHMOND, July 12 -- Virginia Republican leaders, faced with growing opposition to the "abusive driver" fees that went into effect July 1, said Thursday that they will consider scrapping some of them when the General Assembly convenes in January.Complete article here.
The fees, some of which exceed $1,000 per infraction, were part of a transportation plan that lawmakers approved this year. They were designed to raise millions of dollars each year for road and transit projects by imposing surcharges onto the fines for Virginia motorists convicted of serious traffic offenses, such as driving under the influence.
But because of what legislators call an "error" and a "mistake," the fees also can be assessed on motorists who are convicted of less serious offenses. The surcharges did not receive much attention when lawmakers approved them Feb. 24., but the reaction has been overwhelmingly negative since Virginia residents learned about the fees this month.
[...]
For example, someone criminally charged with driving too fast for road conditions will have to pay $300 a year for three years, in addition to the regular fine. A motorist convicted of having an obstructed view of traffic will have to pay $350 a year for three years, as will anyone convicted of driving more than 80 mph on an interstate, according to an analysis by the Supreme Court of Virginia.
[...]
A coalition of anti-tax activists and advocates for the poor also has started an online petition drive calling for a special session. The group wants the General Assembly to eliminate all of the new fees, not just those for Class 3 or 4 misdemeanors. As of Thursday [July 12], more than 1,200 people had signed the petition. Another petition received more than 36,000 signatures.
[...]
The fees, which could raise as much as $65 million annually, were intended to be a partial substitute for a statewide tax increase...
[...]
In addition to the fees for misdemeanor and felony traffic convictions, motorists with eight or more points on their driving records will have to pay more. Those drivers have to pay $100 for the eight points and $75 for every additional point. Failure to pay will result in suspension of licenses.
Traffic offenders face whopping additional fees that live on long after they've paid their fines. It's part of a growing 'driver responsibility' trend that targets chronic offenders.
Traffic patrols have long been known as roving tax collectors. But in Virginia, they really are collecting taxes.
Starting July 1, an array of traffic offenses, from expired licenses to speeding, come with a "civil remedial fee" attached. That means a motorist convicted of reckless driving (75 mph in a 55 zone would qualify) faces not only a fine of up to $2,500 and a year in jail, but a non-negotiable $350-a-year tax for three years. The law forbids judges from waiving or reducing the fee.
Many fees dwarf the fines. A driver who disobeys an officer's order to pull into a weigh station would be fined $35 and required to pay a $61 court processing fee. But the civil remedial fee would be $900 over three years.
Drunken driving? A fee of $1,000 a year for three years, plus fines and court costs. No insurance? That's $300 a year for three years, plus fines.
It doesn't stop there. Anyone unlucky enough to have 8 points or more on his license (reckless driving is good for 6 by itself) would pay an additional $100, plus $75 for any points over 8, up to $700 a year. (For a complete list of fee-carrying offenses, see this .pdf file.)
Such "driver responsibility programs" have become increasingly common for two reasons: Many states find that serial offenders make up the bulk of their cases, and they simply need the money. In fact, Virginia added a fee rather than increase fines because it wanted the money to improve its roads, and revenue from fines must go to public schools. The fees are expected to raise $200 million a year.
The sponsor of the law, David Albo, is a partner in one of Virginia's largest law firms; one of its specialties is traffic cases.
One twist that has Virginia drivers enraged is that the state can't charge fees on out-of-state drivers or revoke their licenses. For now, the fees apply only to residents.
Virginia joins New York, New Jersey, Michigan and Texas in adopting "abusive-driver laws."
Here's a sampling of fees (information from TheNewspaper.com):
Michigan:
$100 a year for as long as the license has 7 points (plus $25 for each point over 7)
$1,000 x 2 years for DUI
$200 x 2 years for expired insurance
$150 x 2 years for an expired license
New Jersey:
$100 x 3 years for 6 points (plus $25 for each point over 6)
$1,000 x 3 for DUI
$250 x 3 years for expired insurance
New York:
$100 x 3 years for 6 points (plus $75 for each point over 6)
$250 x 3 years for DUI
Texas:
$100 x 3 years for 6 points (plus $25 for each point over 6)
$1,000 x 3 years for DUI
$2,500 x 3 years for two DUIs
$250 x 3 years for expired insurance
$100 x 3 years for an expired license
Virginia:
$100 x 3 years for 8 points (plus $75 for each point over 8)
$750 x 3 years for DUI
$250 x 3 years for an expired license
$250 x 3 years expired insurance
Labels: QUESTION OF THE WEEK
Yesterday I spent some time adding links to my right sidebar. One of those new links is Refugee Resettlement Watch, a site which states as follows on its "About" page:
A few months ago it came to our attention in Washington County MD that a non-profit group (Virginia Council of Churches) had been bringing refugees into the city of Hagerstown (county seat) for a couple of years. Some problems arose and citizens started to take an interest. One of the most startling things we found out about this very quiet effort is that these non-profit groups bring to the US about 25,000 Muslim refugees from the Middle East, Africa, the Balkans, etc, almost completely funded by the US Government through grants and contracts with these non-government agencies. Of the 168 refugees brought to our county since 2004, 125 are Muslim. Although we all have sympathy for persecuted and suffering people there are real questions to be answered about the wisdom of this policy. It turns out that there are hotbeds of this controversy throughout the US. We have identified some of those. We set up this online community organizing center [HERE]. If you have information or questions from your communities about Refugee Resettlement please get in touch with Ann Corcoran at refugeeresettlementwatch@vigilantfreedom.comFrom this page at Refugee Resettlement Watch, emphases mine:
Public benefits available to refugees and successful asylees include:Read more, especially the bulleted items at the top of the page for above-cited information.Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) formerly known as AFDCPrior to 1980, refugee sponsoring agencies were totally responsible for all refugee needs, including housing, medical care and employment. Today they have virtually no responsibilities. A newly arriving refugee aged 65 can immediately retire on SSI/Medicaid never having worked a day in the U.S.
Medicaid
Food Stamps
Public Housing
Supplemental Security Income (SSI)
Social Security Disability Insurance
Administration on Developmental Disabilities (ADD) (direct services only)
Child Care and Development Fund
Independent Living Program
Job Opportunities for Low Income Individuals (JOLI)
Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP)
Post secondary Education Loans and Grants
Refugee Assistance Programs
Title IV Foster Care and Adoption Assistance Payments (if parents are “qualified immigrants”)
Title XX Social Services Block Grant Funds
After 4 months the Volags [voluntary non-government agencies] do not even have to know where the refugees are located. Therefore they have no legal requirements to make sure the refugees are o.k. and are assimilating. One very interesting statistic I noted was that a few refugees actually return to their country of origin which brings up the question of how persecuted were they in the first place. In Washington Co. an Iraqi family left the area soon after arrival telling people the conditions were deplorable.
One area of change suggested by those advocating reform of refugee resettlement is to require Volags to identify sponsoring churches and organizations for each family and to be responsible for the family for a year before accessing welfare programs. Although not a legal contract requirement, VCC did not identify enough sponsors for refugees in Washington Co. and therefore many refugees were not adequately supported causing some of the political friction. Recently VCC stated that existing refugee families could sponsor new families which would not be a desirable solution.
The National Governor’s Assn. was critical of the program in its Policy Position on Refugee Resettlement on March 5, 2007. They are concerned about the lack of consultation by the Volags in placement of refugees and they are concerned about the cost of refugee resettlement (a Federal responsibility) being passed down to state and local governments. * This report is available.
It is often difficult to get accurate information from Volags about the numbers of refugees resettled in a community. VCC has stated publicly that they have resettled over 200 refugees in Washington Co. from Africa and Russia. In fact, the State Department places the number at 168 from 13 different countries. Of the 168, 125 are Muslim. Nationally about 50% of refugees brought to the US are Muslim. There are no Muslim Volags, most are various Christian faiths and one Jewish organization. * List of the major Volags is available.
Employment statistics vary from location to location, but in ORR’s 2004 Report to Congress only 16% of refugees find a job in the first 3 months and at 12 months only 62% nationally have a job. The average hourly wage in a 5 year population sample was $8.90. *This report is available.
The Department of Homeland Security is responsible for determining whether refugees pose any danger to the safety and security of the US, but this authority can be waived by the US State Department. For example, on May 5, 2006 Sec. of State Rice gave approval for the Burmese (Karen) people of the Tham Hin Camp in Thailand to enter the US even though some may be members of (or have given support to) the Karen National Liberation Army, considered a terrorist group by the US govt. Burmese (Karen) comprise the next group of refugees VCC would like to resettle in Washington Co. *Waiver is available.
Some states have another layer of bureaucracy, a kind of go-between office, that helps to facilitate Refugee Resettlement between the Volags and the Federal government. In Maryland, it is the Maryland Office for New Americans (MONA). Although listed as part of Maryland’s Department of Human Services it is funded primarily by grants from the Federal Government.
The cost of translation for such things as medical care, emergency response etc. is according to federal law the responsibility of the local government agency. In Washington Co., VCC says they are working with seven languages at the present time.
I have found no location where a Volag does any formal written reporting about their plans in advance of bringing refugees to a community, or any report to local governments during the program.
Other cities are having problems with Refugee Resettlement. Manchester, NH shut the program down completely after they had to build a wing on to the high school exclusively for English as a Second language students and had a problem with many refugee children having lead poisoning. Lewiston, ME tried to stop the influx of Somali Bantu but failed. Eastern Tennessee is having problems. Cayce, SC is the only town I have found so far that stopped Refugee Resettlement in advance.
Labels: Blog news, Refugee Resettlement Watch, Vigilant Freedom/910 Group
From this source:
Bloggers, clear your calendars Sunday, July 22, through Friday, July 27. Some real propaganda bombshells are bound to be dropped, and you’ll want to be there when “several leading Muslim clerics and thinkers from around the globe will participate in an unprecedented online dialogue about their religion, terrorism and human rights.”
The “dialogue,” sponsored by The Washington Post and Newsweek Interactive and presented in conjunction with Georgetown University, has been dubbed “Muslims Speak Out” and will take place at On Faith, a blog operated as a joint effort of the Post and Newsweek.
More at this link.
Addendum: Complete list of speakers
[END OF THIS POSTING]Labels: Current events, Education, Georgetown University, Muslims in America, Washington Post
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, which WC and I cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday for one hour at noon, Pacific Time.Labels: Blog news, Media, Radio
Today there have been some technical problems with the blog.
You may or may not have noticed that I haven't been around the blogosphere much lately. The reason? Dusti, one of our cats, was having "issues": urinating and defecating outside the litter box. I've been coping with a nasty situation! And I'm still working on getting that smell out of the piano rug and the bedroom carpet.
[Hat-tip to Foehammer's Anvil, where I spotted this material]
(All emphases by Always On Watch)
...[I]n recent days, the government has gone on the offensive. It is issuing almost daily statements saying how much it is doing to improve food and consumer safety. On July 3, it reported it was stepping up anti-corruption efforts. On July 4, it said it would ban firms that advertise medical claims that have not been approved by the government. On July 5 it said it was working on the country's first food recall system....Not here in the United States. In China.
Faced with mounting international concern over the safety of some of the products it exports, the Chinese government --often perceived as defensive and clumsy in how it handles public relations -- is firing back.According to this recent article in Time Magazine, concerns about catfish and seafood have now arisen:
In Washington, China has put together a team of lobbyists who have been practically living on Capitol Hill for the past few weeks. In Beijing, the government has taken the unusual step of seeking advice from outsiders, including public relations powerhouses Ogilvy and Edelman, about how to get positive messages out to Chinese and American consumers.
The result has been an aggressive campaign to save the ""Made in China" label by presenting an alternate view on consumer safety and globalization. The message is that China isn't the only country that has had problems with the products it exports. China, as government officials have been pointing out in recent days, rejects U.S. imports at a rate that is just a little less than the 1 percent of Chinese products rejected by the United States.
"China feels it is getting beaten up for things that are happening on a reciprocal basis to them," said Scott Kronick, head of Ogilvy's China practice.
At the same time, the Chinese government is trying to show that it is taking seriously recent recalls by making examples of individuals and companies that allegedly contributed to the problems. The recalls have included pet food laced with an industrial chemical, toys coated with lead paint, defective tires and toothpaste made with toxic chemicals.
Joey Tatum runs a Mississippi-delta eatery where catfish is king--and its origin clear. U.S. FARM RAISED, the menu of Fat Baby's proclaims. "There's no Chinese catfish in my restaurant," Tatum says. "Everyone knows they're not safe."Continuing now with the Washington Post article:
That's up to the FDA to decide, and over the years, its border inspectors have rejected tons of tainted catfish from China and closely monitored shipments by chronic offenders. Last month Mississippi officials decided to test Chinese catfish to see how good those controls are and found them wanting. Most grocery-store samples contained residues of two antibiotics that are banned for use in aquaculture in the U.S. but widely used in China. The catfish was ordered off store shelves.
These holes in the safety net are alarming public-health experts. China is the No. 1 exporter of seafood to the U.S.-- $2 billion worth last year--and has a troubling rate of violations. In 2006 nearly two-thirds of the seafood shipments that were turned back from U.S. ports because of residues of FDA-nonapproved drugs came from China, reported Food & Water Watch. The residues included malachite green, which kills fungus on fish--and causes tumors in lab rats.
The FDA is stepping up inspections of Chinese seafood. Still, only 5% of the 55,000 shipments last year were examined. Don Kraemer, the FDA's deputy director for food safety, acknowledged that border controls are not "completely airtight. But we've got a credible effort here to keep the products that would be of concern out of the country."
Aggressive exporters aren't easily daunted, though. The FDA, for example, strictly limits imports of puffer fish, which can contain a deadly toxin if processed improperly. After two Chicagoans got sick last month from eating what they thought was monkfish, the FDA began investigating whether a Chinese exporter had tried to sneak in puffer fish by labeling it monkfish.
The [Chinese] government has played up the fact that Zheng Xiaoyu, country's former chief food and drug regulator, was executed this week and that 180 factories that put industrial chemicals into food have been shut down.What folly it has been for the United States to expect quality-control from a Communist nation! How many more products and exports from China will turn out to pose a danger to consumers?
The approach represents a radical shift from how China has disseminated information in the past. Since the Communist Party rose to power in 1949, the job of propaganda offices has been largely to promote such slogans as "Serve the People" and "It is Good to Have Just One Child," which were written on chalkboards on almost every block.
Now the propaganda offices are being pushed to respond to breaking news and criticism from foreign governments and consumers half a world away.
[...]
Dan Harris, a U.S.-based attorney who runs a popular China law blog and represents small to mid-sized companies doing business with China,...predicted it would take years, if not decades, to undo the damage done to the reputation of Chinese manufacturers in recent months. "My view is that no matter what they say they are going to do and no matter how much they want to do it, the problem is so massive and so deep-seated that I think it's going to take huge amounts of money and a very long time for it to be cleaned up," he said.
Labels: China, Consumer Safety, Current events, World news
(Each "Question of the Week," an idea which I gleaned from A Republic If You Can Keep It, will remain toward the top of the blog until the next question appears. The previous Questions of the Week are HERE. Please scroll down for recent postings) [H]e argued that people were naturally wicked and could not be trusted to govern. Therefore, Hobbes believed that an absolute monarchy - a government that gave all power to a king or queen - was best.
Hobbes believed that humans were basically selfish creatures who would do anything to better their position. Left to themselves, he thought, people would act on their evil impulses. According to Hobbes, people therefore should not be trusted to make decisions on their own. In addition, Hobbes felt that nations, like people, were selfishly motivated. To Hobbes, each country was in a constant battle for power and wealth....
Governments were created, according to Hobbes, to protect people from their own selfishness and evil. The best government was one that had the great power of a leviathan, or sea monster. Hobbes believed in the rule of a king because he felt a country needed an authority figure to provide direction and leadership. Because the people were only interested in promoting their own self-interests, Hobbes believed democracy - allowing citizens to vote for government leaders - would never work. Hobbes wrote, "All mankind [is in] a perpetual and restless desire for power... that [stops] only in death." Consequently, giving power to the individual would create a dangerous situation that would start a "war of every man against every man" and make life "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."More on Thomas Hobbs, with many embedded links.
Despite his distrust of democracy, Hobbes believed that a diverse group of representatives presenting the problems of the common person would, hopefully, prevent a king from being cruel and unfair. During Hobbes' lifetime, business began to have a big influence on government. Those who could contribute money to the government were given great status, and business interests were very powerful. In order to offset the growing power of business, Hobbes believed that an individual could be heard in government by authorizing a representative to speak on their behalf. In fact, Hobbes came up with the phrase "voice of the people," which meant that one person could be chosen to represent a group with similar views. However, this "voice" was merely heard and not necessarily listened to - final decisions lay with the king.
Labels: QUESTION OF THE WEEK
[Hat-tip to Mark Alexander, who alerted me to this story]
"Lady" Jane Felix-BrowneLabels: Another jaw-dropper
Just how infiltrated is the UK? Take a look at the following map (Click on the image to enlarge it):
Labels: Eurabia, Islamification, Maps, World news
Enough of illegal invaders. From this July 11, 2007 article in the Washington Post, emphases mine:
Prince William County supervisors voted unanimously last night to approve a resolution that targets illegal immigrants by attempting to curb their access to public services and increasing immigration enforcement by local police. But the resolution approved last night significantly weakens a previous proposal, removing or altering several of its toughest measures but asking county employees to look for ways to lawfully deny services to illegal immigrants.The educational and healthcare systems in Prince William County are fiscally going under, due to illegals' taking advantage of those services and thereby depriving legal residents of adequate services. Nevertheless, those services are not being targeted. Then, exactly what services are we talking about? Just how many services funded by taxpaying citizens, are being accessed by illegal invaders?
The largest board meeting crowd in 20 years showed up for the vote at the county government complex, turning Prince William into a microcosm of a debate playing out in communities across the country in the wake of Congress's failure to reform immigration laws.
"How are we supposed to survive here?" asked Gregorio Calderón, a legal U.S. resident from El Salvador who said he worries that police will harass him because of his ethnicity. "They're going to pull me over just for being Hispanic."
The previous resolution would have required officers to check the residency status of anyone who breaks a law, no matter how minor. The measure approved yesterday directs officers to check the status of anyone in police custody who they suspect is an illegal immigrant.
The changes were made after county attorneys, police and supervisors expressed concerns about the legality of some of the measures. The new resolution would not deny access to schools and other legally mandated services. Another measure that would have allowed residents to sue the county for providing services to illegal immigrants was also stripped out.
But the measures still place Prince William at the forefront of Virginia jurisdictions that are trying to check illegal immigration.
"This resolution does have teeth and changes county policy immediately," said board Chairman Corey A. Stewart (R-Occoquan).
Protests before and after the vote and the unusually large crowd outside the board chambers created a charged atmosphere. More than 100 people addressed board members, delaying the vote. Hundreds of others watched on big-screen TVs in the lobby and were reminded to refrain from applauding or booing. One speaker was removed.
When Supervisor John T. Stirrup Jr. (R-Gainesville) introduced the resolution last month, he said its goal was to deny all public services to illegal immigrants and order local police to check the residency status of anyone caught breaking the law. The altered version charts a more cautious course.
Stirrup's resolution had said that illegal immigration is causing "economic hardship and lawlessness" in Prince William and that county agencies may be encouraging illegal immigration by failing to verify immigration status as a condition of providing public services.
The measure "is the first step towards taking back our community," he said.
The new version gives county workers 60 days to help board members determine which public services can be lawfully denied to illegal immigrants. Unlike the previous resolution, it specifies that services such as emergency medical care and other benefits mandated by law cannot be restricted. At the request of the county's attorneys, language was added to several sections to avoid violating federal and state laws.
A roughly equal number of speakers appeared to support and oppose the resolution. One was removed after berating Stirrup for a joke he made to Stewart at a previous meeting in which Stirrup suggested a "Hispanic flag" could be flown in Woodbridge, which has a relatively large Hispanic community.
Many speakers said they were Hispanic immigrants.
Immigrants "have built our homes; they have built our roads," said Hank Azais, who owns a tax preparation service catering to Hispanics in Manassas.
Others said they were worried about damage to the county's reputation. "Prince William County does not have to become the racist capital of America," said Harry Wiggins, a Lake Ridge resident.
Many Stirrup supporters told the board they applauded the measures and saw the effort as a last stand against rising crime, overcrowding and the failure of Hispanic newcomers to adapt to American culture.
"If we turn our heads and permit illegal entry into our county without making any effort or identification, we are saying our language, our culture, our Constitution, our neighborhoods and our flag are inconsequential," said Sue Fleming, a member of the group Help Save Manassas. "It is a price I do not care to pay."
Others decried rapid cultural changes in their communities. "I'm tired of pressing '1' for English" on the phone, Woodbridge resident Chris King said.
One element of Stirrup's resolution was noticeably absent from the amended version. It would have given residents the ability to sue county agencies if they suspected them of providing services to illegal immigrants. County staffers and supervisors expressed concern about the time and expense the county would potentially spend to fend off litigation.
Privately, though, several supervisors had expressed doubts about the implications of denying public services to immigrants. But given the political climate surrounding the issue, they said they felt compelled to back Stirrup.
"It's a start, and Mr. Stirrup was very gutsy," Supervisor Maureen S. Caddigan (R-Dumfries) said.
Language also was added to the resolution to recognize the benefit of legal immigration, "one of the very bedrock principles upon which our thriving society is built."In the first link above, Mr. Calderon asked,
Mr. Stirrup said he was "disturbed" by comments from some of the 115 people who spoke during the public comment period, characterizing the resolution as "anti-immigration."
"In no way, shape or form is that what this is designed for," he said. "This is about the rule of law. Unfortunately, that seems to have been lost in some of the press reports over the past few weeks. I have emphasized that. It's what our American civilization is all about. We're doing this directly in response to our community which has called repeatedly — repeatedly — for us to do something."
Mr. Stirrup said he introduced the resolution in response to accusations that the county employs so-called "sanctuary policies" protecting illegal aliens...
[...]
Other speakers include members of faith-based groups and members of Help Save Manassas, whose mission is to reduce the influx of illegal aliens in Prince William County.
Group President Greg Letiecq encouraged supervisors to pass the resolution.
"No more — no more tolerance for criminal illegal aliens who commit assault and battery, stalking, indecent exposure, driving while intoxicated or hit-and-run because these crimes aren't supposedly serious enough to warrant even notifying the immigration authorities," he said. "No more protection for illegal aliens who attempt to obtain taxpayer-funded services, which they are not entitled to receive in order to make their continued unlawful presence in the county more comfortable. No more selective enforcement of our laws in order to make it easier for vast numbers of illegal aliens to maintain in our midst."
How are we supposed to survive here?I've got news for you, sir. If you're illegal and cannot survive here, go back to your own country. It is not the responsibility of America to see to the "survival" of illegal invaders.
Labels: Immigration
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, of which I am cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday for one hour at noon, Pacific Time.Labels: Blog news, Media, Radio
A news item which Nanc sent me: A female Muslim juror has been arrested in Britain after allegedly listening to an MP3 player under her hijab headscarf during a murder trial, police said Monday.Read the rest.
The woman in her early 20s was spotted by a fellow juror listening to music as she was meant to be helping try the case of a pensioner accused of bludgeoning his wife to death after 50 years of marriage....
Source, with lots of Mo graphicsLabels: Another jaw-dropper, Islamification
I have invited Cassandra, author of Escape! From An Arab Marriage, to be a guest blogger here at Always On Watch. What follows is her first essay for this site: "Obama: Articulate, Well-Educated, Well-HeeledBarack (changed from the Arabic form Baraka) Hussein Obama is causing quite a stir in the political arena. He is presentable to the eye, says everything Americans love to hear, and has become a major Democratic hopeful for presidential nomination—some like to think of him as a “messiah in the Democratic Party” and that he has been “walking on water toward the White House.”
There is, however, much more to this individual than is apparent on the surface and none of it bodes well for us.
Obama claims that his father grew up herding goats. In reality, he was the son of a prominent and wealthy Muslim man and his son, Obama’s father, also Muslim, grew up in an environment of privilege and wealth as an outstanding student at a private school. He never herded goats.
No one ever meets any member his birth family, hears about them because they are traditional Muslims. Obama is clearly aware he needs to keep them under wraps because they prove beyond doubt that that his presentation of himself as the devoted, loyal, American citizen and hopeful for president is another premeditated deception.
Obama claims his name is African. It is actually Arabic-Muslim, comes straight from the Quran, and means ‘blessed’.
Obama claims to be Christian. Not so. In Arab culture and under Islamic law, if one’s father is Muslim, so are the children. Always. Once a Muslim, always a Muslim. If he, as he claims, left Islam, he would be considered apostate. His family members and every other Muslim would be obligated, by Islamic law, to do their best to kill him. There would have been at least one fatwa out on him, calling for his death. In order to escape this fate, he would have had to leave his family, leave the community he grew up in, move as far away as possible, change his name, and start an entirely new life in the hope that he would not be found and killed.
There have been no far-flung, hate-filled, announcements spat out from Muslim clerics or other Muslims about him deserving death because he became Christian. There have been no threats on his life and the lives of his family as there are on a daily basis for Wafa Sultan, Brigitte Gabriel, Salman Rushdie, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ali Sina, Irshad Manji, Anis Shorrosh, Walid Shoebat, and a host of other Muslims who have genuinely left Islam. The bona fide apostates must routinely take security measures to prevent assassins from knowing where they are at any given moment.
Instead, the silence from clerics, terrorists, and other would-be Muslim assassins is deafening. They understand very clearly what he is doing and why—and they approve. They know he is practicing the ancient tradition of takkiya/kithman—using lies, deceit, dissimulation, and the use of any other expedient in order to protect himself while he works to advance the absolute rule of Islam wherever possible.
There is a quote by Muhammad Navab-Safavi, a key figure in Iranian fundamentalism which clearly states normal, mainstream Islamic thinking, especially by jihadi Muslims no matter what approach they are taking to “do what they can for Allah”:“People say, ‘Don't lie!’ But the principle is different when we serve the will of Allah. He taught Man to lie so that we can save ourselves at moments of difficulty and confuse our enemies... People say, ‘Don't kill!’ But the Almighty Himself taught us how to kill...So shall we not kill when it is necessary for the triumph of the Faith? ... Deceit, trickery, conspiracy, cheating, stealing and killing are nothing but means.”To capsulize the above, one could say that the Muslims believe in “all for Allah, no matter how long it takes.”
There are no moral or ethical considerations involved. There is only the goal of insinuating Islam by every deception possible into the bowels of government, educational institutions, businesses, society at large; and using fear tactics to force Islam on civilizations by brutality; degradation; mass rapes as are now occurring in France, Sweden, Australia, Sudan, India, and everywhere else Muslims are in control; murder; and wholesale genocide. In the case of the United Srates, an additional goal is usurp our entire Judeo-Christian heritage to claim by Muslims as theirs by right since they are pathologically certain that the entire universe was handed to them by Allah because Muhammad said so. A third goal, never stated explicitly, is that of wholesale plunder and theft of every source of wealth this country possesses, including women and children for slavery, rape, menial labor, and breeding.
In a recent phone conversation with Dr. Shorrosh, formerly a Palestinian terrorist who converted to Christianity, the subject of Obama came up. Dr. Shorrosh stated unequivocally that if Obama becomes President, the Muslim plan to take over America by the year 2020 will be speeded up and may well occur ten years earlier—in 2010.
It is said that those who do not learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. So it was with Rome, China, and Greece. So it is occurring with Britain, France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden. . ..The list is long and growing because the politicians in each country are traitors and prostitutes for money.
It is beginning to happen here. We must stop this incipient apocalypse and we must help to do so by preventing Obama from becoming president.
— Contributed by Cassandra
A few weeks ago, WC and I interviewed Cassandra on The Gathering Storm Radio Show. She is the author of the book you see pictured on the right. Additional information about Cassandra's book is HERE.Labels: Guest Blogger Cassandra, Obama
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