Conservatives deal with facts and reach conclusions; liberals have conclusions and sell them as facts.
It’s a tragedy, but it’s also an interesting look at England today, since this is a story that could not possibly have happened at any time other than the first decade of the 21st Century: Britain’s first Muslim peer, Lord Ahmed [a Muslim peer is an entirely new thing in
Continue readingTwo stories from today’s British news: I Two young men pounced on a stranger on a London street, stabbed him, slit his throat, and ran off, leaving him to bleed to death on the street. That’s sad, but that’s not the news. This is the news: Britain’s most senior judge,
Continue readingWhen I lived in England, the mail arrived twice a day, six days a week. (Maybe only once on Saturdays; I can’t remember.) Within town, you could mail something in the morning, and know that it would arrive at its destination in the evening. It put the American postal service
Continue readingWhile the ordinary English resident freely ignores the fact that his every move is being monitored by CCTV, so that crime remains unaffected by the government’s watchful eye, police are hard at work treating as hardcore criminals people who drop apple cores — an unsavory, untidy act, perhaps, but not
Continue readingI am a huge Georgette Heyer fan. I consider her one of the most amusing, sophisticated novel writers ever, and think it’s a shame that she got labeled as a pure romance writer, a genre that puts her in the “I browse that section wearing sunglasses and a scarf” category
Continue readingIn Britain, it’s impossible to go anywhere without being spied upon. England has spend billions of pounds setting up the densest CCTV (close circuit TV) network in the world. Or perhaps I should say in the semi-free world, because I’d go odds that North Korea has a pretty good CCTV
Continue readingWARNING: British bloggers — do not write about this story. In England, a convoluted case played out in which the government froze funds in British banks that were to be sent to Al Qaeda, the funds’ owners challenged that action, and the court held against the government. As a result
Continue readingPlease study the above photo very carefully. Doesn’t that look like a nice room? You can see that it’s fairly spacious and well fitted out, with nice colors, lots of light, and pretty curtains? I bet a lot of dorm students are looking at it enviously, as are a lot
Continue readingEngland is becoming an increasingly alien place in terms of modern values. Two articles from today’s Daily Mail (a useful repository for stories the other papers are embarrassed to print): 1. A man was charged as a criminal for over filling his garbage can. 2. Families that refuse even to
Continue readingSome months ago, the British papers were filled with the story of Shannon Matthews, a little girl who vanished from her home in West Yorkshire, sparking a huge manhunt. She was eventually found, 24 days later, at the home of her stepfather’s uncle. The big shocker, though, was the fact
Continue readingMy mother-in-law’s parents died in Auschwitz. She wasn’t around for that horror because her parents, in a tremendous (and prescient) sacrifice, boarded her onto the Kindertransport, which took young children out of Nazi countries. As with my mother-in-law, most of these children never saw their parents again. Because the fact
Continue readingIn the world of presidential elections, we’re watching the fascinating spectacle of clashing identity politics. Neither Hillary nor Obama has a strong resume (or even a medium resume). Each is distinguished from the other, and from others in the field (remember Silky Pony?) solely because of gender or race. He’s
Continue readingThe accepted wisdom is that the intense hatred the Palestinians feel for Jews is a direct result of Jewish annexation of the West Bank and Gaza after the 1967 War. Of course, as with most propaganda, this is false. Aside from conveniently ignoring the 1956 and 1948 Wars, not to
Continue readingThis morning we read about the Minneapolis high school that turned away the Vets for Freedom bus. It turns out that this attitude, in its most extreme form, is epidemic in England: Teachers today vowed to oppose military recruitment campaigns in schools that are based on Ministry of Defence “propaganda”.
Continue readingI watched a pretty good movie last night, that was very pro-military; that showed the Iraqi military as being inefficient; and that showed Iraqis as being unbelievably brutal, both in terms of mob violence and in terms of the military’s and the secret police’s capacity for sadistic torture. Surprisingly, it
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