San Francisco has bigger scandals than a debauched mayor
Bookworm on Feb 12 2007 at 10:43 pm | Filed under: Education, Free speech, Muslim violence, Palestinians
San Francisco has been in the press a lot lately (and inspired some pretty funny Jay Leno riffs) because of Gavin Newsom’s sexual misconduct with his ex-campaign manager’s wife. It’s sordid, it’s sexy, and, at bottom, it’s not troubling. That is, as with all good sex scandals, we can purse up our lips disapprovingly, look for the scintillating, salacious details, and know that, in the grand scheme of things, this story will have absolutely no effect on our lives.
The problem with this sex scandal is that it’s been useful to depress two other, much uglier and more significant stories out of that same city. The first story sheds some light on the renewed fervor and aggression of Holocaust deniers. Eli Wiesel, a famed Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize winner (one of those who actually deserved the prize), was assaulted and almost kidnapped at a San Francisco hotel by a Holocaust denier who had been stalking him for some time. Wiesel sees the attack on him as something larger than a single sick person’s obsessive mania:
Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel said in an interview published Monday that an attack on him earlier this month in San Francisco shows that Holocaust deniers are increasing worldwide and getting bolder by the day.
The Holocaust scholar was dragged from an elevator and roughed up during a peace conference at a San Francisco hotel on Feb. 1, according to police. The author was not injured.
“Until today they used words; now they have switched to violence,” Wiesel told Milan-based daily Corriere della Sera. “Their numbers are growing by the day.”
He’s right. In year’s past, Holocaust deniers were small groups of greasy haired wackos skulking around at hole-in-wall conferences. That all changed when Ahmadinijad convened the world’s most “prestigious” Holocaust denial conference — one that Matthias K
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Comprehensive post, Book.
As I noted above, what happened at SFSU goes beyond the usual dhimmitude. That is, to the extent SFSU mentioned that the flag stopping could
Y: Is Sala’s article satire, or is she really that shallow and revolting a person?
These days the absurb and reprehensible is probably true.
TYPO: that should read absurd and represensible.
Real. You can tell by the fact that she said that she had anarchist tendencies and it is a conflict because she also wants a Palestinian state. Can’t say that it was a surprise she fell for the ‘Qana false flag’ operation. Well done that one was.
Oh, when I say Sala, I mean CDR Salamander ; )
It is on his main page –>
that should read
I think you should have just left it at absurd ; )
Thanks for the Sala tip. Didn’t catch that. I think of him as Phibian!
Faliuer to pwoofreed. My bbadl.
It shocks me that a radical university would allow the burning of its own nation’s flag (as I am certain they do) but not allow the burning of other nations’ flags. IT DOES NOT MATTER WHAT IS WRITTEN ON THOSE FLAGS. But, I must wonder, why am I shocked? Leftists have rarely been able to organize around a principle. There are no such thing as principles, just occurences, and each occurrence is unique alone.
Having said that, I wonder if a different protest might not be effective?
A. Locate the parts of these flags that contain the script ‘Allah’. With a pair of scissors, CUT IT OUT.
B. Begin your protest by waving the flags and chanting, ‘Down With Theocracy!’ and ‘Separation Of Church And State!’. Removing a symbol of God (however you may see your God) from any national flag is precisely a correct protest to separate church and state. Shouldn’t THAT go over well at a leftist university?
C. Once that part of the protest is complete, and now that Allah is no longer present in script as written on these flags, now it should be perfectly fine to begin a protest against the two countries and BURN THEIR FLAGS and STOMP ON THEM! Because they no longer contain the Allah script, you are now protesting precisely the actions of these two countries.
Actually their principle seems quite simple. Hate and undermine America, the power and prestige of America. That’s it. Anything that is good for America, must be blown up. Anything that is bad for America, must be promoted. Seems simple enough of a philosophy for the Left.
Ymarsaker, you’re right. That was glib of me. They do have principles – but they seem to violate them upon any expediency. It must be noted that they’re hardly alone in this: the positions of the Left and Right on Kenneth Starr’s prosecution of Clinton for lying about sex to a grand jury have been reversed exactly 180 degrees for Fitzgerald’s prosecution of Scooter Libby. Principle requires that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. But we don’t see enough of that anywhere. Political expediency is the name of the game.
I’d like to clarify my above post (#8). I’m not a fan of national flag desecration. I’d never do it. But once you admit to its use, then by principle you can’t start refusing it for this nation or that nation. Also, I was speaking with religious tolerance when I advocated – and I am serious – removing ‘Allah’ script from the flags before protesting against theocracy. If you can protest by defacing any national flag, but you can’t carefully cut a religious symbol from a flag, what are we left with? I am quite serious too, that once ‘Allah’ has been – with great care – removed from the flags, as a nod to religious sensibilities, then there is no remaining argument against burning or stomping on their flags, as students at that university would burn and stomp on our own.
Well written. I’ve linked to this outrageous story on my blog. There are a couple of Wiesel books I’ve been meaning to read. Now seems like the time to purchase them.
FWIW the assault on Wiesel took place in Nancy Pelosi’s congressional district. I don’t think that says anything about Ms. Pelosi herself but it’s sadly suggestive of the people who elected her.
The brief report I read on the internet stated the assailant had been trailing Wiesel for weeks. How do you know he was even from San Fran? I think that is rather thin reasoning to condemn the entire SF Congressional district on the basis of one anti semite stalker. Not that SF isn’t a hotbed of trendy lefties but this nutcase who accosted W. might be from a compound in Montana for all we know.
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What a fabulous post, Bookworm. I hope that you don’t mind, but I am going to cut and paste it into an e-mail and circulate it (with the proper attribution, of course). Thank you…………..
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[...] of speech on trial at SFSU A month ago, I wrote about dhimmitude run amok at San Francisco State University in San Francisco, where the University had announced its [...]