"Don't compare apples to terrorists"

Kathy Shaidle commenting on Charles Krauthammer's comparison of present day German Nazism with Islam.

Advice for CAGW hysterics - "Remain calm"

Via FOS:

In The Globe and Mail, columnist Neil Reynolds refers to Stanford University physicist, and 1998 Noble Prize winner, Robert Laughlin's article in the summer edition The American Scholar. Prof. Laughlin says that the geologic record suggests that the climate is beyond our power to control. Excess CO2 in the atmosphere will be dissolved in the oceans, which already hold 30 trillion tons of it. Then the excess will be transformed into limestone rocks.

From the comments to the Globe article it appears that a lot of readers prefer to remain alarmed. Though, happily, more do not.

Canadian Muslims oppose Ground Zero mosque

Raheel Raza of the Canadian Muslim Congress appeared on the O'Reilly Factor this afternoon to condemn the project to build a huge mosque near NYC's Ground Zero. She said, among many other things, that NYC "Mayor Bloomberg and other bleeding-heart white liberals don't understand ... ". An amazing performance by Raza:




Update: Five Feet of Fury, Dr. Roy, BCF, sda, The Right Scoop, LexisNexis News,

And where's the Canadian MSM on this? A search came up with zip, except for the CBC which had previously interviewed Raza. Good for the CBC (for a change). Otherwise, only on Fox!

Sexy ideas

A very interesting lecture by Matt Ridley at TED:



[via, and]

Capitalist charity

Peter Foster has fine food for thought regarding the Gates/Buffet billonaire charity giveaway:

... the week’s big news on the philanthropy front. Forty U.S. billionaires have very conspicuously pledged to give away half their fortunes, a sum which could amount to US$160-billion.

... The “Giving Pledge” initiative was announced in June by bridge buddies Bill Gates and Warren Buffet ... Mr. Buffet noted ... that “We just want the general level of philanthropy to step up.” He also revealed that the 40 pledges had come as a result of approaching “70 or 80” people on the Forbes list of billionaires.

This implies one criticism, and raises an inevitable question. The implied criticism is that businessmen have not traditionally been charitable enough. The question is: What about the contacted billionaires who didn’t pledge?

... The criticism is wide of the mark. Throughout history, the greatest capitalists have traditionally been the greatest public benefactors. ... But the central ungrasped fact was that capitalists did the most good in the process of earning their fortunes.

... As for that inevitable question about those other 30 or 40 billionaires, what did they say to Messrs. Gates and Buffet? If it was "Thank you, but I’ll take care of my own charitable contributions without being morally strong armed by you," then more power to them.

... The market system that enables certain individuals to earn billions without injuring others is almost incomprehensible to minds that still carry many primitive moralistic assumptions. These include the zero-sum suspicion that if somebody is very rich, others must have been impoverished in the process. Related to this is an almost universal tendency to bemoan income and wealth "gaps." But if capitalist wealth differentials are oppressive, then it stands to reason that the world would be a better place if Messrs. Gates and Buffet — and indeed all business billionaires — had never been born.

... several great observers of capitalist society, including Joseph Schumpeter, Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, have noted how muddle-headed businessmen can be outside their sphere of expertise, and how easily they can be persuaded to subscribe to, and support, subversive notions.

Bill Gates in particular has wandered into the dangerous territory of "Global Salvationism," ... Mr. Gates has also allied himself with government aid programs which have been notorious failures for decades.

... what could have persuaded Messrs. Gates and Buffet to put such conspicuous pressure on their fellow billionaires, apart from making themselves look good. Perhaps it was a well-intentioned attempt to "give capitalism a good name." They might devote a tiny part of their fortunes to investigating — and addressing — why it still has such a bad one.

Pitiful Palestinians

Speaking of contemptible Muslims, here's Robert Fulford's excellent take on the perennially pitied Palestinians:

... only the Palestinians cling to their “refugee” status decade after decade. They present themselves as helpless victims of Israeli aggression. They await rescue .

..Members of other history-battered groups choose to live by an urgent ethic: Get up, get going, make a new life. Palestinians have a different approach: Sit down, wait, stay angry till the world provides for you.

... Arab governments “are rich enough to have economically solved the Palestinian refugee problem decades ago.” The 5,000 or so members of the Saudi royal family could probably handle it by themselves.

... Why haven’t they done so? They much prefer to let Palestinians remain poor. Every wretched, ill-fed and ill-housed Palestinian can be used as a living rebuke to Israel.

...The enemies of Israel have taught the world to pity the Palestinians and grant them an almost sacred position among the victims of colonialism. They deserve pity, of course, but pity for what their fellow Arabs have done to them.

However, as scummy as the Arabs have been towards them, the Palestinians are authors of their own fate. They have the power to improve their own lot, but don't because they have the same motives as their Arab sponsors and manipulators.

Malicious Muslims

Great column by George Jonas:

The much-disputed mosque near Ground Zero has been described as a test
of our commitment to liberty. ... I think it is a test of our commitment to the
wrong question.

... The question isn't whether people should be able to build whatever they like on their private properties. To this, the answer is a simple yes ... Except this isn't the question to ask about the Cordoba Initiative ... Described in news reports as a nonprofit organization whose stated goal is to promote cross-cultural understanding between Islam and the West

... The question to ask is: Can any group genuinely believe that building a mosque two blocks from where jihadists pulverized 3,000 New Yorkers nine years ago will promote cross-cultural understanding between Islam and the West?

... The answer to this question can no longer be yes for anyone non-delusional with a measurable IQ.

... So the question isn't whether Ground Zero's mosque-builders have a right to what they do, but is what they do right? The first is an obvious yes. The second, if you ask me, is a no.

... Certain plans are too insensitive and provocative to proceed from
anything but malice. Seeking to build a mosque and Islamic community centre two blocks from where the Twin Towers used to be "to promote understanding" can only be intended to add insult to injury.