Bookworm Room

Conservatives deal with facts and reach conclusions; liberals have conclusions and sell them as facts.

Bookworm Beat 3/8/2019 — the Democrat Party goes full anti-Semitism

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An illustrated edition focusing on the Dems’ weirdly ecumenical transition from anti-Black (slavery, Jim Crow, ghettoization) to untrammeled anti-Semitism.
(Plus other examples of the myriad threats socialists pose to America, and the way Trump is a bulwark against those threats.)

Before getting to the posters, a short video I urge you all to watch:

We now return to our regularly scheduled illustrated edition

Anti-Semitism Ilhan Omar David Duke Democrats

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How can we be sure that what we call “evil” really is evil?

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I believe evil exists, but I fear I’ll miss it when it’s present or, worse, find evil where none exists. How do you define evil to avoid such mistakes?

Devil Satan EvilI was listening to Dennis Prager this morning (something I can do now that I signed up for Pragertopia, which has a “first month for $0.99” sale), when Dennis touched upon “evil.” Sitting here now, I can’t really remember the context, but think I recall him saying “The Left doesn’t believe that evil exists.” Prager then said that it does exist, and cited to such familiar examples as the Nazis and Stalin. Another clear example of evil, if I were asked, would be Charles Manson or Jeffrey Dahmer. As is so often the case with Dennis’s monologues, I kept running through the issues he raised long after the show had ended.

Because I grew up in San Francisco public schools, went to UC Berkeley, and lived in my parents’ world, which was made up almost entirely of upper-class Democrat-voting Jews (academics, mostly), the mindset in my world was that “evil” was an antiquated notion. People had bad ideas. They were raised wrong. They were victims of ills that could be labeled such as psychopathy, narcissism or schizophrenia. Once labeled as psychological or glandular, you could no longer label the perpetrator as evil. He was merely acting out the chemistry of his brain or the damage of his upbringing.

This meant that, while the Communists did horrible things, one could not blame someone brought up in the milieu who didn’t know anything different. (For the Jews in my world, the exception to this modern thinking was the Nazis. The Nazis were evil — but Stalin and Mao were not; they were just bad.)

Perhaps because of the Nazi exception to the general rule around me, I still believed in evil. I certainly understood that the Nazis were evil. I also understood that part of what made them evil was that they raised up a generation of children who believed that the ultimate evil, namely genocide, was an appropriate act. In the same way, part of what makes fundamentalist Islam so evil is that it destroys the children under its care by turning them into genocidal maniacs. That the children started out innocent is eventually irrelevant. Once they have become soldiers in evil’s army, they must be destroyed.

What scares me about labeling things as “evil,” though, is how easy it is to err. Certainly the Nazis erred when they labeled Jews as evil, something the Islamists still do. I think the Left errs badly when it hysterically shrills that Trump and those who support him are evil. Considering that Trumpian norms are American norms from just over a decade ago, I fail to see any rational basis for this.

The real problem for me is knowing that I erred badly in my life in identifying evil where none existed. My mother and her sister had a fraught relationship. Naturally, I saw things through my mother’s eyes, something helped along by the fact that my aunt was no saint. But what I didn’t realize was that my mother wasn’t either. [Read more…]

California travel ban: Blatant hypocrisy about LGBTQ (etc.) rights

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The California travel ban against US states for claimed anti-LGBTQ laws follows its attack on the travel stay for Islamic countries that routinely kill gays.

Execution Gays Iran Sharia California Travel BanIn January and then again in March 2017, President Trump issued a temporary travel ban aimed at six countries that the Obama administration identified as terror sponsors. These countries are Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen.

In each of these six countries members of the LGBTQ etc. (hereafter “LGBTQer”) community are officially and/or unofficially physically abused, imprisoned, and murdered. Specifically:

  • In Iran, as in all other predominantly Muslim countries, LGBTQer conduct is punishable by death, with myriad lesser punishments (e.g., lashing and imprisonment) available.
  • In Libya, as in all other predominantly Muslim countries, LGBTQer conduct is illegal and is subject to stringent punishments such as limb amputation and flogging.
  • In Somalia, as in all other predominantly Muslim countries, LBGTQer conduct is punishable by imprisonment or death.
  • In Sudan, as in all other predominantly Muslim countries, LGBTQer conduct is illegal and, even if the government does not act, vigilante groups are known to attack or kill people accused of homosexuality.
  • In Syria, as in all other predominantly Muslim countries, LGBTQer activity is illegal and, depending upon the territory in which the LGBTQ etc. individual finds himself or herself, can be subject to violence or death, whether administered by state agencies or vigilante groups.
  • In Yemen, as in all other predominantly Muslim countries, LGBTQer activity is officially illegal, with punishments ranging from lashing, to imprisonment, to death.

The reason behind the universally violent, murderous hostility to LGBTQ identification or conduct in the above countries is sharia law, which is hardwired into Islam. After all, the Pulse nightclub terrorist attack did not happen in an ideological vacuum.

Also in January and, again, in March 2017, California officially and vociferously protested against the Trump administration’s temporary travel ban, a ban that affected terror-exporting Muslim countries that make LGBTQer conduct a capital crime, on the ground that the temporary ban was unconscionable, discriminatory, and ineffective: [Read more…]

Question: Why is a Progressive woman so afraid of Donald Trump?

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stupid-leftists-multicolored-vagina-protesters Progressive Woman WomenI read an interesting exchange on Facebook involving a Progressive woman who is terrified of Trump. The conversation started with a challenge to way in which women living under sharia law are brutally abused. While acknowledging this abuse in faraway places, the woman insisted that those were cultural issues and that here, at home, the real threat to women is Donald Trump. Think about that: she believes that Donald Trump’s presidency is worse for women than sharia law.

Since this involved a conversation between women I know here in my real-world, and was audited by other people I also know, I was disinclined to dig deeper into one Progressive Woman’s statement that Donald Trump is an existential threat to American women. Still, I could not get that statement out of my head: “I believe Donald Trump is a threat to American women.”

Working without that woman’s guidance, and relying instead on what women are saying in the media (new and old), I was able to come up with a few ideas that might explain her fear. Of course, each of those fears can immediately be exposed either as straw men arguments or as morally indefensible positions:

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The challenges of talking about rape in a post-modern, post-rational age

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Adam Baldwin on the travesty of sending men to do not rape classesI met up the other day with some friends whom I’ve known for years through our children. They are, without exception, decent, bright, extremely kind women. I think highly of them, even though they are Bernie supporters.

The conversation turned to the “rape culture” on American campuses. Although they were agreed that a woman who is proven to have falsely accused a man of rape should be punished, they differed from me in three significant areas: (1) They believe absolutely the CDC study saying 1 in 5 American women have been raped; (2) they think that, if a woman says she was raped, she should be believed absolutely; and (3) they think girls should not be given advice about how to protect themselves because, if they still get raped, having been armed against rape implies that any resulting rape was their fault. I’d like to spend a little time on each point.

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The Bookworm Beat 3/23/16 — the “catching up” edition and open thread

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Woman-writing-300x265Bush didn’t, Obama wouldn’t, but the next president should: Call into the Oval Office the leaders of Muslim communities throughout America to say, “Because of the First Amendment, the fact that you and the people in your community practice Islam is irrelevant to us in America. Your faith is your business. What is relevant to me as leader of this nation is whether you support America or not. When all of you leave this office, you need to carry a single message to your communities: ‘You are either supportive of America or working to undermine America. If you’re in the latter category, you are on notice here and now that my administration will use every constitutional means available to track you, capture you, prosecute you, and imprison or deport you.’ End of story. Thank you for coming. Goodbye.”

Having got that off my chest, I’m about to engage in a speed round-up, because I’ve got about 40 articles — really good articles — to share with you.

A Cruz convert explains why.  The most interesting point is that Trump started with something no other Republican has had since Reagan — vast name recognition.

Slowly catching on to the fact that Trump is the Republican Obama.  I’ve been saying from Day 1 that Trump is a white Obama.  He promises hope and change by using government power to shape America to his will.  And let me say, that is my sole problem with Trump:  That he’s all about big government, precisely as Obama is.  I find that unacceptable.  Jonathan Tobin is another one who’s finally figured out the whole Obama  Doppelgänger thing.

Trump is a special interest candidate.  And that special interest is Donald Trump.

Is the media sitting on big Trump stories?  Ted Cruz thinks that there are some horrible stories to be told about Trump, which wouldn’t surprise me given his sordid personal life and . . . ah . . . colorful business life.  Once Trump is the candidate, says Cruz, the media will “suddenly” discover stories that make Trump unelectable.  I think Cruz is right because we all know the media, don’t we?

Trump’s enemy list makes me like him.  George Soros has given money to 187 different special interest groups that are attacking Trump.  (To be honest, a lot of them are attacking Cruz too. Indeed, on Sunday, I heard a New Yorker news hour on NPR during which the speakers agreed that Cruz is the more dangerous of the two leading Republican candidates because he actually believes in the Constitution.) In other words, here’s a list of 187 Soros-funded organizations that try to destroy anything conservative.

Will Trump win the nomination?  Scott Elliott, an extremely astute election watcher and a man with a history of accurate election predictions, is not a Trump fan.  He’s therefore created the “Stop-Trump-O-Meter,” which tracks the outcomes of state primaries and projects the outcome at the convention.  Even if you’re a Trump fan, you’ll like Scott’s meter, because, if you ignore the name, it tells in a clear way where the candidates stand in the Republican primary.

If you destroy the polite people, you create room for the impolite ones.  Glenn Reynolds points out that the GOP, RINOS, and the Leftist media establishment did everything possible to destroy the happy, tidy, law-abiding Tea Party.  Now they’re horrified that destroying the Tea Party left rage in its place.

USA Today editors question Hillary’s fitness for office.  USA Today, in its quest to be “America’s newspaper,” the one read in more hotel lobbies than any other paper, is careful about taking strong partisan stands.  That’s why it’s impressive that the editors see Hillary’s penchant for secrecy, and the security-evading steps she took in pursuit of her paranoia, as a serious impediment to the presidency.

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Everyone is free to have his own opinion — so long as it precisely tracks Islam

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The Economist has a chart that tracks the data Pew gathered when it polled Muslims around the world about their beliefs.  It turns out (no big surprise here) that those of you who denied the existence of assimilated, “moderate” Muslims were right.  To the extent these MINOs (Muslims in Name Only) exist, they’re a very, very small minority.  Most other Muslims, given their dream world, see sharia as the answer, not the problem.

What I found amusing, in a grim, bitter way, was this statement from The Economist:

The report also reflects man’s infinite capacity to hold contradictory views at the same time. Almost 80% of Egyptian Muslims say they favour religious freedom and a similar number favour sharia law. Of that group, almost 90% also think people who renounce Islam should be put to death. Confused? So are they.

They don’t seem confused at all to me.  When the Muslims polled speak of religious freedom, they mean the freedom to practice Islam — or else.

The difference between a Sharia state and a Christian state

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The Daily Mail created a lovely matched set, showing side-by-side stories that perfectly illustrate the difference between life in a 21st century Sharia state and life in a 21st century Christian state:

Life in a Sharia state:  “We, the state, are going to kill gays.”

Life in a Christian state:  “I’d like to warn you (admittedly quite rudely) that, in the afterlife God is going to have problems with gays.”

If you’re gay, neither is very nice, but one is insulting, while the other is deadly.  Those who live within a minority community, whether because of race, religion, sexual orientation, etc., might want to think long and hard about whether they want to promote a culture that kills those it dislikes or a culture some of whose members yell at them.  I mention this because the Leftist collective backs the first type of culture; while the much-reviled Western conservatives support the second.

(P.S.  For those wondering why the Daily Mail is the most popular news website in the world, it might have something to do with the fact that it identifies Ihjaz Ali, Kabir Ahmed, and Razwan Javed as “muslim fanatics.” The American press would have wondered why these three men, who just coincidentally happen to have non-American names, suddenly turned against gays — and then would have posited, loudly and often, that Sarah Palin published an ad or made a speech using coded language that triggered this mass homophobia.)

A visit to New York Times world, a world where America is always wrong and the Muslim Brotherhood is a gentle organization

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I didn’t bother to read the entirety of an endless article about a bad thing happening in Mexico.  No, I’m not talking about drug cartels or about Mexican citizens being slaughtered by guns sent over courtesy of a Democrat Department of Justice attempting to prove that guns hurt people.  I’m talking about plants that process old batteries, releasing dangerous toxins into the surrounding country side.  Bad thing, right?  But the big irony is that this bad thing happened because of environmental zealots here in the US:

The rising flow of batteries is a result of strict new Environmental Protection Agency standards on lead pollution, which make domestic recycling more difficult and expensive, but do not prohibit companies from exporting the work and the danger to countries where standards are low and enforcement is lax.

Even when we’re trying to be good, we’re evil.

Americans may be evil, but Nicholas Kristof wants us to know that the Muslim Brotherhood doesn’t deserve its bad press, because, over dinner, a really nice 22-year-old girl assured him that it’s a peace-loving organization.  More than that, when he asked her about Israel, amongst other issues, she didn’t answer!  That proves that the Muslim Brotherhood is a force for good:

I asked skeptically about alcohol, peace with Israel, and the veil. Sondos, who wears a hijab, insisted that the Brotherhood wasn’t considering any changes in these areas and that its priority is simply jobs.

“Egyptians are now concerned about economic conditions,” she said. “They want to reform their economic system and to have jobs. They want to eliminate corruption.” Noting that alcohol supports the tourism industry, she added: “I don’t think any upcoming government will focus on banning anything.”

Apparently the charming young Sondos is a more reliable authority than the MB itself.  After all, who can forget the MB greatest hits, a list that includes this:

A senior cleric in the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood has declared that ordinary Egyptians are obligated to kill ‘Zionists’ whom they encounter.

This:

Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, which expects to win at least a plurality in Monday’s legislative elections, held a “kill the Jews” rally in Cairo Friday.

Thousands of supporters attended the pre-election rally at a mosque on the Muslim Sabbath, promising to “one day kill all the Jews” and wage war against Jerusalem’s “Judaization.”

And this, from a Muslim Brotherhood handbook:

“The Islamic Ummah [nation]… [is] the most exalted nation among men;…you are the masters of the world, even if your enemies desire your degradation…”

“Jihad and preparation towards Jihad are not only for the purpose of fending off assaults and attacks of Allah’s enemies against Muslims, but are also for the purpose of realizing the great task of establishing an Islamic state and strengthening the religion and spreading it around the world…

“…Jihad for Allah is not limited to the specific region of the Islamic countries, …and it shall continue to be raised, with the help of Allah, until every inch of the land of Islam will be liberated, the State of Islam will be established…

“Then comes the power of arms and weapons,… and this is the role of Jihad…, a religious public duty… incumbent upon the Islamic nation, and is a personal duty to fend off the infidels’ attack on the nation… (…)

The competition at the New York Times is always stiff, but I think that, today at least, Nicholas Kristof walks away with The Walter Duranty Award for most dishonest reporting to advance a political agenda antithetical to America, her values, and her allies.

Two must reads *UPDATED*

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American Thinker is a site I check regularly, at least twice a day.  It’s not just that the editors are kind enough to publish my work occasionally.  It’s because the articles that appear there routinely range from really good to out-of-the-park stupendous.

Today, there are two that fall in the latter category.  These are the kinds of articles that shouldn’t just be read, but that should be emailed to everyone you know.  Indeed, the one regarding socialism should be required reading in every American classroom.  So, without further ado, please, please, please read and discuss and forward:

What’s Wrong with Socialism, by Joe Herring

and

It Isn’t Political Correctness, It’s Shariah, by Pamela Geller

UPDATE:  Add military analyst Steve Schippert’s All the King’s Horses (about Afghanistan) to the list of things that will widen your horizons today.

This is what a truly unfree, misogynistic, totalitarian, theocratic press and nation look like

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Didn’t Obama bow to the king?

A Saudi court on Saturday convicted a female journalist for her involvement in a TV show, in which a Saudi man publicly talked about sex, and sentenced her to 60 lashes.

Rozanna al-Yami is believed to be the first Saudi woman journalist to be given such a punishment. The charges against her included involvement in the preparation of the program and advertising the segment on the Internet.

Abdul-Rahman al-Hazza, the spokesman of the Ministry of Culture and Information, told The Associated Press he had no details of the sentencing and could not comment on it.

In the program, which aired in July on the Lebanese LBC satellite channel, Mazen Abdul-Jawad appears to describe an active sex life and shows sex toys that were blurred by the station. The same court sentenced Abdul-Jawad earlier this month to five years in jail and 1,000 lashes.

Rapist praised for converting to Islam, because he’ll now respect women

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There is no bliss inherent in the ignorance displayed by one judge in England:

A judge lambasted a rapist for claiming his victim was a liar – then commended him for becoming a muslim.

Judge Anthony Goldstaub QC sentenced Stuart Wood for seven years for the attack, then told him: ‘You have turned to Islam and this promises well for your future, particularly as you are now an adherent of a religion which respects women and self-discipline.’

Apparently Goldstaub has never heard of honor killings, burkhas, systematic rapes of non-Muslim women, the whole Saudi/Taliban package (unveiled girls being forced to die in burning buildings, chronic house arrest, being beaten on the street for showing any flesh), etc.  To characterize Islam as a religion that respects women, when 90% of Islam’s energy is directed to the subjugation of women is such a travesty that it defies words.  It’s impossible to tell if the judge was motivated by ignorance or malice in making that kind of statement.

I’ll close this short post with a quote from my cousin, the prison chaplain, with his take on prison conversions to Islam:

It is not a contradiction to be a Muslim and a murderer, even a mass murderer. That is one reason why criminals “convert” to Islam in prison. They don’t convert at all; they similarly remain the angry judgmental vicious beings they always have been. They simply add “religious” diatribes to their personal invective. Islam does not inspire a crisis of conscience, just inspirations to outrage.

More on why Islam is a religion different from all other religions

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A few days ago, I wrote a post examining why I believe Islam is not a religion like other religions, so that pluralist societies should view it with a distrust they do not extend to other religions.  Daniel Pipes also tackles that issue.  I’ll give you the first and last paragraphs of his article.  You have to be sure to read the stuff in the middle:

Those of us who argue against Shari’a are sometimes asked why Islamic law poses a problem when modern Western societies long ago accommodated Halakha, or Jewish law.

The answer is easy: a fundamental difference separates the two. Islam is a missionizing religion, Judaism is not. Islamists aspire to apply Islamic law to everyone, while observant Jews seek only themselves to live by Jewish law.

[snip]

Returning to pork: both Islam and Judaism abominate the flesh of pigs, so this prohibition offers a direct and revealing comparison of the two religions. Simply put, Jews accept that non-Jews eat pork but Muslims take offense and try to impede pork consumption. That, in brief, explains why Western accommodations to Halakha have no relevance for dealing with Shari’a. And why the Shari’a as public policy must be opposed.