Victor Davis Hanson:
This week Iran hosted an international conference on Holocaust denial. The gathering was as bizarre as a bar out of Star Wars, a collection of every crackpot anti-Semite the world over, all there for a scripted, tightly controlled hatefest advertised as a “free” exchange of ideas unknown in Europe…
The surprise is no longer that the cretin Mahmoud Ahmadinejad calls for the destruction of Israel, but only that his serial threats have still not become banal. In any language, there can be only so many synonyms and idioms for “wipe-out” and “vanish,” yet Ahmadinejad always finds some fresh way to express his fundamental desire.
http://victorhanson.com/articles/hanson121506.html

Muslims can help teach America about justice
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061225/NEWS99/61225002

Victor Davis Hanson:
The world of publicity-hungry Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is not expanding, but shrinking. Despite his supposedly populist credentials, his support at home and abroad will only further weaken as long as the United States continues its steady, calm and quiet pressure on him.
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/VictorDavisHanson/2006/12/28/iran%e2%80%99s_ahmadinejad_far_weaker_than_he_lets_on

Daniel Pipes:
After defeating fascists and communists, can the West now defeat the Islamists?
On the face of it, its military preponderance makes victory seem inevitable. Even if Tehran acquires a nuclear weapon, Islamists have nothing like the military machine the Axis deployed in World War II, nor the Soviet Union during the cold war. What do the Islamists have to compare with the Wehrmacht or the Red Army? The SS or...

Flying Over Big Ben and the British Parliament
Bakri: “What is today called ‘Londonistan’ is in fact ‘Heretistan,’ that is, dar al-kufr [the abode of heresy]. I think that loyal Muslims in Britain will one day turn it, with Allah’s help, into ‘Islamistan,’ that is dar al-islam [the abode of Islam], as the first Muslims did in Ethiopia and in Indonesia. Then the great Islamic dream will be fulfilled - that we will see the banner [proclaiming] ‘There is no God but Allah’ flying over Big Ben and the British Parliament, with Allah’s help.”
http://islamfirst-muqatil.blogspot.com/2006/12/we-will-see-banner-of-islam-flying-over.html

Und was Tony Blair dazu sagt:
To me, the most remarkable thing about the Koran is how progressive it is. I write with great humility as a member of another faith. As an outsider, the Koran strikes me as a reforming...

Never again? Again and again!
“The Lenins, the Maos, the Pol Pots . . . are no different than the types collected in Tehran. It is a mistake not to take such people seriously, and not to accept that they believe what they say they believe. The liberal impulse to discount the extremist, to rationalize his views, to refuse to take his threats literally, especially when he is in power, is itself a form of denial.”
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OWJjMTY1NjU0MzNlZmI5NDE1N2MwMDhlYTFiYTUxNTg=

It’s the genes, stupid!
The most underestimated emotion in Arab politics is humiliation. The Israeli-Arab conflict, for instance, is not just about borders. Israel’s mere existence is a daily humiliation to Muslims, who can’t understand how, if they have the superior religion, Israel can be so powerful. Al Jazeera’s editor, Ahmed Sheikh, said it...

I grew up in the US during the 1970s, the one decade universally acknowledged to have truly sucked. In 1970s America we danced to disco music, wore leisure suits and watched the Brady Bunch. But if that wasn’t torture enough, we had Jimmy Carter as our president…
Jimmy Carter was arguably the most hapless president in all American history, and indeed, today most presidential historians today rate him at or near the very bottom of the list.
Carter wants to do what’s just. His heart’s in the right place. He just can’t figure out what the right is. He is, and always has been, a man of good intentions bereft of good judgment. He invariably finds himself defending tyrants and dictators at the expense of their oppressed peoples. Not because he is a bad man, but because he is a confused man.

Paulette ist um die 5o, arbeitet im Maryland Visitor Center bei Newburg am Highway 3o1,  kurz bevor er den Potomac überquert, der die Grenze zwischen Maryland und Virginia bildet. “How can I help you?” Wir möchten wissen, wo “Bert’s 5o’s Diner” ist. Leider in der Richtung, aus der wir gerade kommen. Paulette war letzten Sonntag da, “and it was great!” Vor fünf Jahren war Paulette mit ihrem Mann in London, und weil der Eurostar non stop von Waterloo bis Gare du Nord fährt, beschlossen Pauline und ihr Mann zum Lunch nach Paris zu fahren. Die Amis sind so. Drei Stunden hin, drei Stunden zurück, und dazwischen eine Portion Bouillabaisse und eine Baguette mit Brie.
Als Paulette und ihr Mann nach dem Essen noch einen Cafe bestellten, kam ein bleicher Garcon auf sie zu und sagte: “Sie sind doch Amerikaner. Haben Sie gehört, was in New York...

Allein dafür hat sich die lange Anreise schon gelohnt: Brian Setzer’s Christmas Extravaganza, aufgenommen vor zwei Jahren im Universal Amphitheatre in LA,  jetzt in HD-Qualität auf Peters neuem Panasonic-Plasma-Bildschirm, der größer ist als manche Leinwand in einem Kino. Setzer auf Plateau-Sohlen, seine 18-Mann-Big-Band in Tigerjacken, roten Hemden und Weihnachtsmann-Mützen. Ganz oben links auf der Bühne Beth Curry und Julie Reiten,  die sich jeder Weihnachtsmann zum Fest wünschen würde, wenn er nur einen Wunsch frei hätte. Dem Kostümdesigner, der schon die Band eingekleidet hat,  muss der Stoff ausgegangen sein, als die Backup Girls an der Reihe waren. Und so gibt es nicht nur was für die Ohren sondern auch für die Augen.
Setzer spielt die Klassiker der Pop- und Rockmusik. Von Armstrong über Bill Haley und Elvis bis zu...

Einer der erfolgreichsten Songs der Beatles war urspruenglich ein Klezmer-Lidl, gespielt von der inzwischen voellig vergessenen Gruppe “Lokshen & Loshen” (Nudelsuppe und Muttersprache) in Manchester. Jetzt ist das Original bei archaeologischen Arbeiten wieder aufgetaucht. Baruch ha’Schem!

http://www.honestly-concerned.org/Temporary/SchverehTogedikeNakht.mp3