Leadership Lessons from Gen. James Mattis (Ret.), Marines via YouTube, October 13, 2016
Archive for December 3, 2016
Leadership Lessons from Gen. James Mattis (Ret.)
December 3, 2016“Nothing to do with Islam”?
December 3, 2016“Nothing to do with Islam”? Gatestone Institute, Judith Bergman, December 3, 2016
Until religious leaders stand up and take responsibility for the actions of those who do things in the name of their religion, we will see no resolution.” — The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby.
“The Islamic State is a byproduct of Al Azhar’s programs… Al Azhar says there must be a caliphate and that it is an obligation for the Muslim world. Al Azhar teaches the law of apostasy and killing the apostate. Al Azhar is hostile towards religious minorities, and teaches things like not building churches… Al Azhar teaches stoning people. So can Al Azhar denounce itself as un-Islamic?” — Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah Nasr, a scholar of Islamic law and graduate of Egypt’s Al Azhar University.
The jihadists who carry out terrorist attacks in the service of ISIS, for example, are merely following the commands in the Quran, both 9:5, “Fight and kill the disbelievers wherever you find them…” and Quran 8:39, “So fight them until there is no more fitna [strife] and all submit to the religion of Allah.”
Archbishop Welby — and Egypt’s extraordinary President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi — has finally had the courage to say in public that if one insists on remaining “religiously illiterate,” it is impossible to solve the problem of religiously motivated violence.
For the first time, a European establishment figure from the Church has spoken out against an argument exonerating ISIS and frequently peddled by Western political and cultural elites. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, speaking in France on November 17, said that dealing with the religiously-motivated violence in Europe
“requires a move away from the argument that has become increasingly popular, which is to say that ISIS is ‘nothing to do with Islam’… Until religious leaders stand up and take responsibility for the actions of those who do things in the name of their religion, we will see no resolution.”
Archbishop Welby also said that, “It’s very difficult to understand the things that impel people to some of the dreadful actions that we have seen over the last few years unless you have some sense of religious literacy”.
“Religious literacy” has indeed been in short supply, especially on the European continent. Nevertheless, all over the West, people with little-to-no knowledge of Islam, including political leaders, journalists and opinion makers, have all suddenly become “experts” on Islam and the Quran, assuring everybody that ISIS and other similarly genocidal terrorist groups have nothing to do with the purported “religion of peace,” Islam.
It is therefore striking finally to hear a voice from the establishment, especially a man of the Church, oppose, however cautiously, this curiously uniform (and stupefyingly uninformed) view of Islam. Until now, establishment Churches, despite the atrocities committed against Christians by Muslims, have been exceedingly busy only with so-called “inter-faith dialogue.” Pope Francis has even castigated Europeans for not being even more accommodating towards the migrants who have overwhelmed the continent, asking Europeans:
“What has happened to you, the Europe of humanism, the champion of human rights, democracy and freedom?… the mother of great men and women who upheld, and even sacrificed their lives for, the dignity of their brothers and sisters?”
(Perhaps the Pope, before rhetorically asking Europeans to sacrifice their lives for their migrant “brothers and sisters” should ask himself whether many of the Muslim migrants in Europe consider Europeans their “brothers and sisters”?)
A statement on Islam is especially significant coming from the Archbishop of Canterbury, the senior bishop and principal leader of the Anglican Church and the symbolic head of the Anglican Communion, which stands at around 85 million members worldwide, the third-largest communion in the world.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby (left), recently said that dealing with the religiously-motivated violence in Europe “requires a move away from the argument that has become increasingly popular, which is to say that ISIS is ‘nothing to do with Islam’… Until religious leaders stand up and take responsibility for the actions of those who do things in the name of their religion, we will see no resolution.” (Image source: Foreign and Commonwealth Office)
Only a year ago, commenting on the Paris massacres, the Archbishop followed conventional politically correct orthodoxy, pontificating that, “The perversion of faith is one of the most desperate aspects of our world today.” He explained that Islamic State terrorists have distorted their faith to the extent that they believe they are glorifying their God. Since then, he has clearly changed his mind.
Can one expect other Church leaders and political figures to heed Archbishop Welby’s words, or will they be conveniently overlooked? Western leaders have noticeably practiced selective hearing for many years and ignored truths that did not fit the “narrative” politicians apparently wished to imagine, especially when spoken by actual experts on Islam. When, in November 2015, Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah Nasr, a scholar of Islamic law and graduate of Egypt’s Al Azhar University, explained why the prestigious institution, which educates mainstream Islamic scholars, refused to denounce ISIS as un-Islamic, none of them was listening:
“The Islamic State is a byproduct of Al Azhar’s programs. So can Al Azhar denounce itself as un-Islamic? Al Azhar says there must be a caliphate and that it is an obligation for the Muslim world. Al Azhar teaches the law of apostasy and killing the apostate. Al Azhar is hostile towards religious minorities, and teaches things like not building churches, etc. Al Azhar upholds the institution of jizya [extracting tribute from non-Muslims]. Al Azhar teaches stoning people. So can Al Azhar denounce itself as un-Islamic?”
Nor did Western leaders listen when The Atlantic, hardly an anti-establishment periodical, published a study by Graeme Wood, who researched the Islamic State and its ideology in depth. He spoke to members of the Islamic State and Islamic State recruiters and concluded:
“The reality is that the Islamic State is Islamic. Very Islamic. Yes, it has attracted psychopaths and adventure seekers, drawn largely from the disaffected populations of the Middle East and Europe. But the religion preached by its most ardent followers derives from coherent and even learned interpretations of Islam”.
In the United States, another establishment figure, Reince Priebus, Chairman of the Republican National Committee and Donald Trump’s incoming White House Chief of Staff, recently made statements to the same effect as the Archbishop of Canterbury. “Clearly there are some aspects of that faith that are problematic and we know them; we’ve seen it,” Priebus said when asked to comment on incoming National Security Adviser former Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn’s view that Islam is a political ideology that hides behind being a religion.
In much of American society, Flynn’s view that Islam is a political ideology is considered controversial, despite the fact that the political and military doctrines of Islam, succinctly summarized in the concept of jihad, are codified in Islamic law, sharia, as found in the Quran and the hadiths. The jihadists who carry out terrorist attacks in the service of ISIS, for example, are merely following the commands in the Quran, both 9:5, “Fight and kill the disbelievers wherever you find them…” and Quran 8:39, “So fight them until there is no more fitna [strife] and all submit to the religion of Allah.”
The question becomes, then, whether other establishment figures will also acknowledge what someone like Archbishop Welby — and Egypt’s extraordinary President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi — has finally had the courage to say in public: that if one insists on remaining “religiously illiterate,” it is impossible to solve the problem of religiously motivated violence.
Geraldo: Trump’s ‘outrageous’ Taiwan call may be brilliant
December 3, 2016Cartoons of the Day
December 3, 2016
Netherlands: Government-funded watchdog says it’s ok for Muslims to send death threats to gays
December 3, 2016(What happened to the “Nothing to do with Islam” notion? — DM)
“The disgraceful stance came to light when a member of the public complained about death threats posted to an online forum which called for homosexuals to be ‘burned, decapitated and slaughtered.’” Yet this “anti-discrimination watchdog” refused to pursue the case, writing: “The remarks must be seen in the context of religious beliefs in Islam, which juridically takes away the insulting character.”
In their globalist ardor to appease and accommodate Islamic supremacists, there seems to be no absurdity that is out of bounds for the political elites.
“Fury as watchdog says it’s OK to send gay people death threats – but only if you’re Muslim,” by Nick Gutteridge, Express, December 3, 2016:
FURIOUS Dutch MPs have demanded an immediate public inquiry after a government-backed watchdog said it was acceptable for Muslims to send gay people death threats.
In a shocking move, the taxpayer-funded hotline said it would not pursue a criminal complaint over horrific messages from radical Islamists because the Koran says gay people can be killed.
The disgraceful stance came to light when a member of the public complained about death threats posted to an online forum which called for homosexuals to be “burned, decapitated and slaughtered”.
Dutch MPs today reacted with horror to the revelations, demanding an immediate inquiry into the remarks and calling for the hotline to be stripped of public funding.
According to Dutch media advisors from the anti-discrimination bureau MiND said that, while homophobic abuse was usually a crime, it was justifiable if you were Muslim due to laws on freedom of religious expression.
They argued that the Koran says it is acceptable to kill people for being homosexual, and so death threats towards gay people from Muslims could not be discriminatory.
In a jaw-dropping email explaining why they could not take up the complaint, they wrote: “The remarks must be seen in the context of religious beliefs in Islam, which juridically takes away the insulting character.”
They concluded that the remarks were made in “the context of a public debate about how to interpret the Quran” and added that “some Muslims understand from the Quran that gays should be killed”.
And they went on: “In the context of religious expression that exists in the Netherlands there is a large degree of freedom of expression. In addition, the expressions are used in the context of the public debate (how to interpret the Koran), which also removes the offending character.”
The death threats had been made in the comments section for an article about a Dutch-Moroccan gay society, which had been posted to an online platform for Holland’s large Moroccan community….
Trump speaks with “president” of Taiwan, harasses her sexually
December 3, 2016Trump speaks with “president” of Taiwan, harasses her sexually, Dan Miller’s Blog, December 3, 2016
(The views expressed in this article are those of Pajama Boy’s father and do not necessarily reflect my views, those of the other editors, or Warsclerotic. — DM)
This is a guest post by a well-known political commentator, the father of Pajama Boy. He is a true “Obama patriot,” whose views should matter little after mid-day on January 20th.
Here are the thoughts of President Reject Obama:
President Elect Donald Trump violated all known rules of common decency by accepting a telephone call from Taiwanese “President” Tsai Ing-wen without My permission. Indeed, Ms. Tsai did as well by placing the call without My permission. Obviously, I would not have granted permission because it was just a trick, intended to embarrass Me and My fundamentally transformed country.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Saturday the call between Taiwan’s president and Trump was “just a small trick by Taiwan,” according to Hong Kong’s Phoenix TV.
Both should be ashamed and both are on the wrong side of both history and herstory. I will continue to treat the renegade Chinese province of Taiwan as an outcast from the community of well-behaved nations, while reassuring Chinese President Xi Jinping of My continued fealty. He is My good friend, the powerful leader China — and indeed our entire climate change ravaged world — needs.
Taiwan is not even a country. As noted here,
The call is widely believed to be the first between a U.S. president or president-elect and a leader of Taiwan since 1979, when diplomatic relations between the two were cut off. China regards Taiwan, a nearly 14,000 square-mile island off its coast, as a renegade province which should be returned to China ever since Gen. Chiang Kai-shek fled mainland China to Taiwan in 1949. [Emphasis added.]
The U.S. adopted a “One China” policy to help facilitate diplomacy with Beijing in 1972, and President Jimmy Carter formally recognized Beijing as the sole government of China in 1978. The U.S. embassy in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, was closed in 1979. [Emphasis added.]
Since Ms. Tsai is merely the “president” of a rogue province of China not recognized by America, she is a make-believe president and a mere peon. It should be beneath the dignity of even a pitiful excuse for a President Elect like Trump even to consider talking with her.
Moreover, it is my understanding that Trump may well have attempted to harass her sexually, just as he does every female he encounters. Since they had “only” a telephone conversation and were probably separated by thousands of miles, it is possible that he did not attempt to grab her pussy, as he would have done had it been within reach.
Nevertheless, Trump doubtless lusted after her and “committed adultery” in what passes for his heart.
It is my sincere hope that, for as long as I am your President, America will continue to look up to, greatly admire and, in every other way possible, kowtow to the glorious People’s Republic of China, her generous leaders and her happy industrious workers. Our own workers should look up to and emulate them with great admiration, rather than childishly disparaging them and the products of their wholesome industry.
Editor’s comments
Since Taiwan is not a “real country” recognized by America, but is instead merely an estranged province of the People’s Republic of China, with no legitimate president other than Chinese President Xi Jinping, what’s the big deal? Had Trump accepted a phone call from (the ghost of) Homer Tomlinson, the self-proclaimed King of the World, would it have been seen as catastrophic?
Oh well.
President Elect Trump is committed to unraveling unfair trade deals with China and helping American businesses to compete fairly with Chinese businesses. China won’t like it, but as Pajama Boy’s father remarked a few years ago, “elections have consequences.” If that entails selling Taiwan more than we presently do, so be it.
Though the leaders of the U.S. and Taiwan in the last few decades have not been in contact, the U.S. has sold the island nation with weapons that the Chinese have perceived as an illegal act according to international law. In 2015, the U.S. sold $1.83 billion worth of weapons to Taiwan, which included anti-aircraft and anti-ship systems.
The more the merrier.
How about recognizing Taiwan as a sovereign nation, as we did until 1978 when President Carter withdrew recognition to appease China? Surely, Carter was not slighting the indigenous people of Taiwan. Was he?
“Taiwanese original inhabitants“) is the term commonly applied to the indigenous peoples of Taiwan, who number more than 530,000 and constitute nearly 2.3% of the island‘s population. Recent research suggests their ancestors may have been living on Taiwan for approximately 8,000 years before a major Hanimmigration began in the 17th century.[2]Taiwanese aborigines are Austronesian peoples, with linguistic and genetic ties to other Austronesian ethnic groups, which includes those of the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Madagascar and Oceania.[3][4] The issue of an ethnic identity unconnected to the Asian mainland has become one thread in the discourse regarding the political status of Taiwan. [Emphasis added.]
For centuries, Taiwan’s aboriginal inhabitants experienced economic competition and military conflict with a series of colonizing newcomers. Centralized government policies designed to foster language shift and cultural assimilation, as well as continued contact with the colonizers through trade, intermarriage and other intercultural processes, have resulted in varying degrees of language death and loss of original cultural identity. For example, of the approximately 26 known languages of the Taiwanese aborigines (collectively referred to as the Formosan languages), at least ten are now extinct, five are moribund,[5] and several are to some degree endangered. These languages are of unique historical significance, since most historical linguists consider Taiwan to be the original homeland of the Austronesian language family.[2] [Emphasis added]
Taiwan’s Austronesian speakers were formerly distributed over much of the island’s rugged central mountain range and were concentrated in villages along the alluvial plains. The bulk of contemporary Taiwanese aborigines now live in the mountains and in cities.
The indigenous peoples of Taiwan face economic and social barriers, including a high unemployment rate and substandard education. Since the early 1980s, many aboriginal groups have been actively seeking a higher degree of political self-determination and economic development.[6] The revival of ethnic pride is expressed in many ways by aborigines, including the incorporation of elements of their culture into commercially successful pop music. Efforts are under way in indigenous communities to revive traditional cultural practices and preserve their traditional languages. The Austronesian Cultural Festival in Taitung City is one means by which tribe members promote aboriginal culture. In addition, several aboriginal tribes have become extensively involved in the tourism and ecotourism industries with the goal of achieving increased economic self-reliance and preserving their culture.[7] [Emphasis added]
China’s dominion over Taiwan, and therefore over her indigenous people, seems likely to hasten their cultural genocide. Might that be why “The issue of an ethnic identity unconnected to the Asian mainland has become one thread in the discourse regarding the political status of Taiwan?” Where are the leftists, who loudly and routinely bemoan the ill-treatment of indigenous peoples elsewhere — except, of course, the indigenous Jews of Israel whom they seek to replace with Arabian Palestinians who want to eliminate them as part of their final solution to the “Jewish problem?”
Haim Saban: Keith Ellison ‘an anti-Semite and anti-Israel individual’
December 3, 2016Source: Haim Saban: Keith Ellison ‘an anti-Semite and anti-Israel individual’ | The Times of Israel
DNC chair hopeful would be ‘a disaster for relations with the Jewish community and the Democratic Party,’ says Jewish billionaire
December 3, 2016, 2:55 am
Haim Saban speaks at the Friends Of The Israel Defense Forces 2014 Western Region Gala at The Beverly Hilton Hotel on November 6, 2014 in Beverly Hills, California. (Tiffany Rose/WireImage)
WASHINGTON — Jewish billionaire megadonor Haim Saban lashed out at Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison Friday, calling him “clearly an anti-Semite and anti-Israel individual.”
At the Brooking Institution’s annual Saban Forum, which is hosted and funded by the media mogul, Saban chimed in from his seat in the audience during a question-and-answer session between CNN’s Jake Tapper and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman. Tapper had earlier in the session asked the Israeli minister about Ellison’s controversial bid to chair the Democratic National Committee.
While he prefaced his remarks by saying Ellison’s Muslim faith was a “non-issue” and that some of his statements now have been more Zionist than that of Zionism visionary Theodore Herzl, Saban designated Ellison as fundamentally hostile to Jews and the Jewish State.
“If you go back to his positions, his papers, his speeches, the way he has voted, he is clearly an anti-Semite and anti-Israel individual,” he said. “Words matter and actions matter more. Keith Ellison would be a disaster for the relationship between the Jewish community and the Democratic Party.”
Haim Saban (back to camera) stands to make a point at the Saban Forum, December 2, 2016 (Courtesy)
Saban, an Egyptian-born Israeli-American, is a major donor to the Democratic Party. He and his wife Sheryl gave more than $12.5 million to former secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s latest bid for the White House.
Since 2007, Saban has been well known as one of the highest individual contributors to the Democratic Party. In 2002, he wrote a $7 million check to fund the DNC’s headquarters building in Washington, D.C.
Since Ellison formally announced he would run for the DNC chair opening on November 14, he has ignited a vibrant response from both supporters and detractors regarding his past positions and rhetoric on Israel.
Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minnesota, speaks during the first day of the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia on July 25, 2016. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
On Friday, Tapper asked Liberman to react to the Anti-Defamation League’s statement Thursday that said comments he made in 2010 were “disqualifying” for the open DNC chair post.
Ellison later penned an open letter in response to ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt insisting his words were “taken out of context.”
Earlier this week, an audio recording was published by the Investigative Report on Terrorism in which Ellison, speaking at a private fundraiser, argued that “United States foreign policy in the Middle East is governed by what is good or bad through a country of seven million people,” referring to Israel.
“A region of 350 million all turns on a country of seven million,” he went on, with the larger number a reference to the Arab Middle East. “Does that make sense? Is that logic? Right? When the Americans who trace their roots back to those 350 million get involved, everything changes.”
Ellison said the audio was manipulated.
“The audio released was selectively edited and taken out of context by an individual the Southern Poverty Law Center has called an ‘anti-Muslim extremist,’” he said, referring to Steven Emerson, who has claimed the Obama administration “extensively collaborates” with the Muslim Brotherhood.
“My memory is that I was responding to a question about how Americans with roots in the Middle East could engage in the political process in a more effective way,” he said.
Kerry: People can’t tell ‘what’s real and what isn’t’
December 3, 2016Kerry: People can’t tell ‘what’s real and what isn’t’, Washington Examiner,
(Alas, soon John Kerry will not have an official podium from which to tell us, the stupid little people, what’s true and what’s false. — DM)
Kerry lamented Friday that technology has allowed the quick spread of false information. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
“There are divisions and places where they divide, but there’s a fundamental oneness, sameness, body of basis,” he said. “And I would respectfully submit to all of you that every single major philosophy, every single major religion, all have a basis in some pretty fundamental things like the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Love other people. You can run the list of the verses or — I think we all refer to them as verses, actually — that are of a common foundation.”
**********************
Secretary of State John Kerry lamented Friday that technology has allowed the quick spread of false information to the point that people are struggling to “know what’s real and what isn’t.”
“This is one of our chief challenges today, is to manage information and to do it in a way that average folks at home can know what’s real and what isn’t, what’s true, what’s false, and try to build consensus around a common set of understandings,” Kerry said during the Mediterranean Dialogues Conference in Rome. “Technology has brought the world closer, yes; but it’s also enabled bigots and demagogues to spread messages of divisiveness and hate with the click of a button, with the push of a finger.”
That focus on misinformation was apparent whether he was talking about the risk of jihadist recruiters propagandizing young Muslims or pushing back against the trade skepticism now regnant in the United States. “Now, none of us should have any illusion about the challenges that we face. They are real, and frankly, they require our collective courage,” Kerry continued. “And, I might add, they require all of those things based on truth.”
He offered counterarguments to such ideas throughout his talk, beginning with the problem of terrorist propaganda. Kerry argued, contrary to jihadists, that all the great religions of the Mediterranean world share a common set of ethics.
“There are divisions and places where they divide, but there’s a fundamental oneness, sameness, body of basis,” he said. “And I would respectfully submit to all of you that every single major philosophy, every single major religion, all have a basis in some pretty fundamental things like the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Love other people. You can run the list of the verses or — I think we all refer to them as verses, actually — that are of a common foundation.”
More broadly, Kerry faulted media outlets for contributing to an unnecessary degree of fear among their audiences and lamented the skepticism of trade agreements and climate change science that undermined some of the Obama administration’s top second-term priorities. “Despite what some pundits write in the daily headlines that cause people a lot of fear, the world today is not falling apart,” Kerry said. “On the contrary, I think it is in many respects coming together. But it’s coming together with this clash of modernity and culture and religion and the fear of the dislocation that comes with it.”
Environmental policy and trade policy were two areas where Kerry suggested misinformation had taken hold in the west. “There are some truths, folks. Hard sometimes for people to discern, but it is true that the Earth is warming even as we have climate deniers in the world today,” he said.
He seemed particularly annoyed at “politicians running today damning the concept of trade,” following an election year that saw both Hillary Clinton and President-elect Trump campaign against the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement that he helped negotiate.
“Ladies and gentlemen, 85 percent of the job loss in the United States of America comes from technology, not trade,” Kerry said. “But if you think we’ve seen dislocation to date, just wait ’til artificial intelligence comes down the road. We have challenges that we need to get ahead of, and we have an extraordinary breach, if you will, between those who want to sort of take the simplistic road of pretending they have answers for these things but shooting at the wrong target versus those who are willing to think about facts and deal with science and build on experience and talk reality to the people of whatever country it is that they’re talking in.”
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