"Bin Laden's boy Omar: Dad, please stop blowing things up"
-- title given to an article at Jihad Watch

Kids say the darndest things.

“The poll, carried out across 21 countries, found “widespread anti-immigration sentiment”, but warned Europe’s Muslim population will treble in the next 17 years."
-- from this news article

"Will treble?" Is this simply a given? There is nothing Europeans can do about this to protect their own legacy, their own art, science, legal and political institutions, their own physical security? Nothing?

Many things can be done. By god, I could list a hundred:

1. Halt Muslim migration. If you seek its justification, circumspice.

2. Deport all Muslim non-citizens. They have no divine right to remain.

3. Make naturalization tests much stiffer, requiring knowledge of the history and culture of whatever European nation is giving the test. A loyalty oath to the nation-state should be required, one which makes express the foreswearing of all other loyalties, and that includes a phrase about perjury being grounds for the stripping of citizenship so obtained.

Make sure the oath is written so as to expressly exclude a higher loyalty offered to Islam or to fellow members of the Umma throughout the world.

4. Put much more effort and money into enforcing the laws that exist (or if those laws are not strong enough, make them stronger) so that those who fraudulently receive benefits, and who have been violating the law (say, on polygamy), or who refuse to work (and receive unemployment benefits) though able-bodied, are subject not only to being permanently deprived of all such benefits provided by the Infidel state (free health care, free education, free or greatly-subsidized housing) but that the property such people may have accumulated is seized by the state. There have been too many cases of very large sums being accumulated by Muslims who officially have been on the dole. This problem is not confined to one European country, but can be found everywhere.

5. Make conviction for violence or threats of violence that are prompted by a refusal to accept freedom of speech as understood in the West to be grounds for immediate deportation of non-citizens and of deportation, after a hearing (before special courts, with judges versed in Islamic ideology), of those who managed to acquire citizenship in countries for which they do not feel, and cannot possibly feel, any real loyalty.

6. Interdict, by seizure (with no return), any sums that are sent from abroad by Muslim governments or groups to pay for mosques and madrasas within the lands of Western Europe. Make it very difficult for such buildings to be erected, and use the opposition of local communities, and the zoning laws, to prevent more such buildings from going up.

7. Make sure that the race-relations industry is not roped into defending what has nothing to do with "racism" but with a clear and distinct set of ideas, inculcated by Islam. To wit: the duty of Jihad to remove all barriers to the spread, and then dominance, of Islam, and the view of the universe as being divided in two, between Believers and Infidels, with the former required to see themselves as in a permanent state of war (though not always and everywhere in a state of open warfare -- not if the Infidels are too strong) with Infidels.

8. Do everything to encourage, in and out of schools, the study of the real Islam, and everything to discourage, to expose and to mock, the presentations of Islam by the sly apologists, whether the apologist is a sweetly-smiling hijabbed Muslimah prepared to explain the "real Islam" at some interfaith-racket Outreach to Infidels at some Mosque Open Night, or at the local library or meeting-hall.

9. Make sure that members of the political and media elites are vigilantly observed by those whom they presume to instruct and protect, to see if they themselves understand Islam sufficiently. Do not let them continue to get away with ignoring this subject, acting as if "of course" Islam is "moderate" or to pretend that real, detailed knowledge, both of what is inculcated in the Qur'an, Hadith, and Sira, and what the 1350-year history of Muslim conquest and subjugation of every kind of Infidel, is somehow unnecessary for their own functions and duties, a waste of time, an irrelevancy. It is not.

10. This one I leave to you.

11-100. And these too.

"Visualize whirled peas."
              -- from a reader

Yes, I know what you mean. A kind neighbor gave me, a few days ago, her special recipe for whirled peas. Last night I tried, for the very first time, to follow her recipe. But I had come home late, and friends were expected, and I was rushed, and I had run out of one of the spices the recipe called for, and the result was a dish of whirled peas that disappointed.

I ran into my neighbor this morning and she explained that it was very important not to leave out any of the ingredients she mentioned, but also to stir the dish, over medium heat, for as long as she had specified. Then the whirled peas, she assured me, would have come out just fine.

She's a marvellous cook and I'm sure she was right. Had I but whirled enough and thyme.

Islamic banking is a con. I'll repeat a post from a few months ago in which I argue that, when it comes to sukuk, Muslims are all mouth:

Gentlemen, if you're offered this, turn it down. As with so-called "Islamic mortgages", these bonds are a fiddle.

Sale and leaseback of this kind is, according to UK accounting standards, a secured loan. The difference between the value of the assets leased back and the total amount paid to lease them back is interest. If you account for the substance of the transaction rather than its legal form, this is a loan with interest. There is nothing wrong with that, except that Islam forbids it.

In financial matters as in morality, Islam places form over substance.

By the way, I wonder if an Islamic bond market is called a sukouk.

Do you like nuts with your in-flight drink? How about a sausage, melons or a nice pear? From The Telegraph:

German nudists will be able to start their holidays early by stripping off on the plane thanks to a new service from an eastern German travel firm.

A travel agency website - Ossiurlaub.de - is to start taking bookings from Friday for a trial nudist day trip from the eastern town of Erfurt to the popular Baltic Sea resort of Usedom, planned for July 5 and costing £370.

"I wish I could say we thought of it ourselves but the idea came from a customer," said Enrico Hess, the managing director. "It's an unusual gap in the market."

The 55 passengers will have to remain clothed until they board, and dress before disembarking, said Mr Hess. The crew will remain clothed for safety reasons.

Mr Hess admitted the flight was expensive but said it was due to using a small plane. Naturism, or "free body culture" (FKK) as it is known in Germany, was banned by the Nazis but blossomed again after the Second World War.

"I don't want people to get the wrong idea. It's not that we're starting a swinger club in mid-air or something like that," said Mr Hess. "We're a perfectly normal holiday company."

The hell you are. Why do so many Germans want to take their clothes off? Nobody else wants them to, as the Telegraph Leader points out:

Air travel is tiresome enough as it is, but a German enterprise adds a fresh hell to flight, with the idea of a nudist service.

Passengers might pass through security a little quicker, but the scene in the aeroplane is best left unimagined, unless a sick-bag is within easy reach.

A bulgy German is seldom a welcome neighbour in narrow airline seating, even clothed. Rubbing more than shoulders unclothed is statistically unlikely to be an agreeable experience.

Could one rely on personal effects being safely stowed before take-off? Would not one's own direct contact with sticky faux-leather seating prove uncomfortable after an hour or so?

In any case, wouldn't nudist passengers object to the compulsory donning of seat-belts? Wouldn't any exit down escape-chutes guarantee friction burns? These questions demand not so much answers as a cover-up.

Had Muslims not kicked up such a fuss about those cartoons, they would have been forgotten. Now they'll be preserved for ever. From The Telegraph:

Denmark's Royal Library is risking the wrath of Muslims with plans to display controversial cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed that sparked violent protest throughout the Islamic world two years ago.

The 12 caricatures of Islam's founder were published in Danish newspapers in September 2005 triggering riots and violence which claimed the lives of over 50 people.

Copenhagen's Royal Library – founded by King Frederik III in 17th century – is courting a new controversy by classifying the cartoons as “historic” objects alongside other Danish treasures, such as original manuscripts by Martin Luther.

Risking the wrath of Muslims? That's so easily done. Every thought, word and deed of a free infidel risks the wrath of Muslims. Every song he sings, every picture he paints,  every step he - and particularly she - takes. Muslim wrath is worth the risk, though, wouldn't you say?

From an article, or rather, a book-review and summary by Daniel Pipes of  Professor Timur Kuran's indispensable study, "Islam and Mammon":

"Islamic economics increasingly has become force to contend with due to burgeoning portfolios of oil exporters and multiplying Islamic financial instruments (such as interest-free mortgages and sukuk bonds). But what does it all amount to? Can Shari'a-compliant instruments challenge the existing international financial order? Would an Islamic economic regime, as an enthusiast claims, really imply an end to injustice because of "the State's provision for the well-being of all people"?

To understand this system, the ideal place to start is "Islam and Mammon," a brilliant book by Timur Kuran, written when he was (ironically, given heavy Saudi backing for Islamic economics) King Faisal Professor of Islamic Thought and Culture at the University of Southern California.

Now teaching at Duke University, Kuran finds that Islamic economics does not go back to Muhammad but is an "invented tradition" that emerged in the 1940s in India. The notion of an economics discipline "that is distinctly and self-consciously Islamic is very new." Even the most learned Muslims a century ago would have been dumbfounded by the "Islamic economics."

The idea was primarily the brainchild of an Islamist intellectual, Abul-Ala Mawdudi (1903-79), for whom Islamic economics served as a mechanism to achieve many goals: to minimize relations with non-Muslims, strengthen the collective sense of Muslim identity, extend Islam into a new area of human activity, and modernize without Westernizing.

As an academic discipline, Islamic economics took off during the mid-1960s; it acquired institutional heft during the oil boom of the 1970s, when the Saudis and other Muslim oil exporters, for the first time possessing substantial sums of money, provided the project with "vast assistance."

Proponents of Islamic economics make two basic claims: that the prevailing capitalist order has failed and that Islam offers the remedy. To assess the latter assertion, Kuran devotes intense attention to understand the actual functioning of Islamic economics, focusing on its three main claims: that it has abolished interest on money, achieved economic equality, and established a superior business ethic. On all three counts, he finds it a total failure.

1) "Nowhere has interest been purged from economic transactions, and nowhere does economic Islamization enjoy mass support." Exotic and complex profit-loss sharing techniques such as ijara, mudaraba, murabaha, and musharaka all involve thinly disguised payments of interest. Banks claiming to be Islamic in fact "look more like other modern financial institutions than like anything in Islam's heritage." In brief, there is almost nothing Islamic about Islamic banking which goes far to explain how Citibank and other Western majors host far larger Islam-compliant deposits than do the specifically Islamic banks.

2) "Nowhere" has the goal of reducing inequality by imposition of the zakat tax succeeded. Indeed, Kuran finds this tax "does not necessarily transfer resources to the poor; it may transfer resources away from them." Worse, in Malaysia, zakat taxation, supposedly intended to help the poor, instead appears to serve as "a convenient pretext for advancing broad Islamic objectives and for lining the pockets of religious officials."

3) "The renewed emphasis on economic morality has had no appreciable effect on economic behavior." That's because, in common with socialism, "certain elements of the Islamic economic agenda conflict with human nature."

Kuran dismisses the whole concept of Islamic economics. "[T]here is no distinctly Islamic way to build a ship, or defend a territory, or cure an epidemic, or forecast the weather," so why money? He concludes that the significance of Islamic economics lies not in the economy but in identity and religion. The scheme "has promoted the spread of antimodern currents of thought all across the Islamic world. It has also fostered an environment conducive to Islamist militancy."

Indeed, Islamic economics possibly contributes to global economic instability by "hindering institutional social reforms necessary for healthy economic development." In particular, were Muslims truly forbidden not to pay or charge interest, they would be relegated "to the fringes of the international economy."

In short, Islamic economics has trivial economic import but poses a substantial and malign political danger. "

Here is a story about James Baker's famous "mission" in 2004 to persuade Iraq's creditors to forgive it its debts. Infidel states, and Arab ones, both agreed to take part. But for some reason only the Infidel states appear to have actualy cancelled those debts, in the tens of billions. One has not heard more about those Arab promises to "cancel" Iraq's debts.

Why not?

A follow up to Esmerelda's post comes from the Toronto Star:

A controversial study looking at Islamic banking by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. has ignited protest from some sectors of the Muslim community.

But despite opposition from the Muslim Canadian Congress, the federal housing authority said yesterday it is going forward with the study looking at banking that adheres to Islam's guiding body of rules, or sharia.

Tarek Fatah, founder of the Muslim Canadian Congress, which bills itself as a progressive Muslim group, said in an interview he was "shocked" to learn that "a Crown corporation is using taxpayers' money" for faith-based banking.

Fatah calls sharia banking the "biggest con job ever. What are we going to have next, Buddhist banking?" he asked...

However there is a growing market in Canada for sharia-compliant mortgages.

Under sharia rules, it is not permissible for institutions to charge interest on loans. However, the deal is usually structured so that the homeowner ends up leasing to own the property, essentially paying rent instead of interest. As a result, those mortgages end up costing the homeowner the equivalent of an extra one percentage point or more. That is what concerns the congress.

"You are taking advantage of the most disadvantaged people. You are telling them that we will charge you more for your total mortgage and when you die you will go to heaven," Fatah said. "They are using the holy books to prey on a vulnerable market."

Sharia-based banking is already available in Canada, but not through major banks. Sharia banking is widely available in the United Kingdom and is offered by some U.S. banks that see a major financial opportunity.

The global market for Islamic finance has grown more than 20 per cent annually since 2001, and is currently the fastest growing segment of the financial services industry, said a report this month by the law firm Stikeman Elliott LLP.

By 2017, Muslims are expected to make up between 3.7 and 4.9 per cent of Canada's population, which should provide a "tremendous opportunity for financial firms prepared to serve the growing market."...

"Turin, 29 Jan.(AKI) - The Union of Arab Writers has written a letter of protest at the designation of Israel as a guest of honour for the next edition of the Turin International Book Fair, Italian daily Corriere della Sera reports....

"'In any case, this is a book fair, this is not the United Nations, it is not a political office. The Israeli writers that we invited are usually critical toward their government,' said the director of Turin's book fair, Ernesto Ferrero in a response."
-- from this news article

Everybody should get into this, starting with writers in Corriere della Sera and Il Foglio.

As a free, advanced, Western country, heir to a history much longer than the 60 years of its modern existence, and peopled by the People of the Book, Israel is a perfect guest to be honored in that sixtieth year of the State's existence. Those putting on the Festival should be proud to have done the right thing, and to have given a schiaffo to the U.N., to the E.U., and to all those who have allowed their minds to be poisoned by the mendacious reporting, drip-by-drip-by-drip, that has done such damage to Israel while Israel is only trying, believe it or not, to stay alive, to withstand the Lesser Jihad that has been waged, is being waged, will forever be waged, against it, though Israel's own leaders seem determined not to recognize or name that Jihad. Ferrero seems to understand that he should be unapologetic about the Turin Book Festival's choice. He titles one reply to critics "La Fiera e fiera di Israele." (The Festival is proud of Israel.)

But it is wrong to defend the choice in a way that concedes what should not be conceded. Israel, and Israel's best writers, should be invited because they deserve to be, and not because some or perhaps most, or even all, of those writers are critical of their own government. Indeed, it is unfortunate that the choice appears to have been limited to those who are full-time critics of Israel, all on the left, and all of them political naifs, who enjoy their moral preening, and certainly find it makes things much easier for them when abroad to join in attacking their country (why, it's the easiest thing in the world), not that they don't also thoroughly enjoy doing the same thing when they are home.

Ferrero should not have drawn attention to these writers being critics of Israeli policies. He had only to say that Israel is a civilized nation, with freedom of thought and speech, and an impressive literary tradition. He might have mentioned Agnon, or Appelfeld, or any number of poets who do not share the political stance of Yehoshua-Oz-Grossman, just to make clear that the Festival was not about to "honor" Israel by inviting only Israeli critics of Israel, even if they happen, by dint some suspect (I suspect) that not literary merit but political acceptability accounts for their relative fame abroad.

And he might not have indicated, as apparently he has, that soon enough brave little non-existent "Palestine" would be similarly honored, in a time-honored tocca-a-te-tocca-a-te approach to what should be untouchable matters of literary taste and historical judgment. The celebrated Arab poet Adonis claims there is no longer any Arab literature; it is all propagandistic trash. He said this in a famous interview a few years ago. He surely meant, above all, the "Palestinian" writers whose subject, only subject, is the wickedness of the Israelis and of the unparalleled suffering -- why, there's just nothing like it in human history -- of the "Palestinian people" about whom not a word was said, for they did not yet exist, before the Six-Day War.

To balance a real country, with a real literature and real freedom of the mind, by then inviting a non-existent country, that is merely one subset of the Arab Muslim people, a place that has never had, and never will have, freedom of thought and freedom of speech, is monstrous. “Palestinian” writers are not critics, but remain silent about the warlords (the Fast Jihadists of Hamas, the Slow Jihadists of Fatah), those "Palestinian" lords of misrule. Their loyalty is not to literature, but to politics, to saying nothing that would ever endanger the "sacred cause" -- which turns out, upon inspection, to be nothing but the old Muslim cause of eliminating any Infidel nation-state that stands in the way of the Greatest Cause of All. Not "Palestine" (that's trivial), but Islam.

Whatever else “Palestine” may be, it does not produce literary works but political propaganda ill-disguised as literature. That includes the much-rewarded (Lannan Prize, the whole works) and celebrated "star" of "Palestinian" literature, that downmarket mayakovsky, that sweet swinger of the Lesser Jihad against Israel, the execrable poet (just try to read his stuff) Mahmoud Darwish.

And so what might have been an act of moral heroism will inevitably be leached of its initial heroism when, in a few months or in a year, or in two, at the Fiera del Libro in Torino, a place tendentiously called "Palestine" becomes -- not on literary merit but by way of atonement or making up for, or "balancing," the act of inviting Israel to be the Torino Bookfair's Guest-Country of Honor -- the next "guest."

This is not "balance." One side kicks the beam.

Can't think why. From the Daily Express (hat tip: Jihad Watch):

AN “overwhelming majority” of Europeans believe immigration from Islamic countries is a threat to their traditional way of life, a survey revealed last night.

The poll, carried out across 21 countries, found “widespread anti-immigration sentiment”, but warned Europe’s Muslim population will treble in the next 17 years.

It reported “a severe deficit of trust is found between the Western and Muslim communities”, with most people wanting less interaction with the Muslim world. 

Last night an MP warned it  showed that political leaders in Britain who preach the benefits of unlimited immigration were dangerously out of touch with the public.

 

The study, whose authors include the former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey, was commissioned for leaders at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

 

It reports “a growing fear among Europeans of a perceived Islamic threat to their cultural identities, driven in part by immigration from predominantly Muslim nations”.

And it concludes: “An overwhelming majority of the surveyed populations in Europe believe greater interaction between Islam and the West is a threat.” Backbench Tory MP David Davies told the Sunday Express: “I am not surprised by these findings. People are fed up with multiculturalism and being told they have to give up their way of life.

 

“Most people in Britain expect anyone who comes here to be willing to learn our language and fit in with us.” 

 

Mr Davies, who serves on the Commons Home Affairs Committee, added: “People do get annoyed when they see millions spent on translating documents and legal aid being given to people fighting for the right to wear a head-to-toe covering at school.

 

“A lot of people are very uncomfortable with the changes being caused by immigration and politicians have been too slow to wake up to that.”

That's the understatement of the week.

The report says people have little enthusiasm for greater understanding with Islam and attempts to improve relations have been “disappointing”. 

The first comment on this article says: "In Britain and in the U.S., we are no longer "uninformed" about islam. Thanks to blogs and even the leftist news media, we have read about islam, even read the koran. PURE EVIL. Luckily in the U.S., we don't have retarded folks calling us racist because we are anti-islam (what race is islam?). I am anti-nazi, anti-klan and anti-islam."

And with the EU Muslim population expected to reach 15 per cent by 2025 it predicts: “Any deterioration on the international front will be felt most severely in Europe.”

 

But leading Muslim academic Haleh Afshar, of York University, blamed media “hysteria”  for the findings. She said: “There is an absence of trust towards Muslims, but to my mind that is very much driven by an uninformed media.

 

“To blame immigration is much harder because the current influx of immigrants from eastern Europe are by-and-large not Muslim. 

 

The danger is that when people are fearful of people born and bred in this country it is likely that discrimination may follow.”

Right. The real danger is Muslims might be discriminated against. That's what all right thinking people worry about.

USAToday: WASHINGTON � Nearly five years after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, allied countries have paid 16% of what they pledged to help rebuild the war-torn country, according to a report scheduled for release today.

Foreign countries have spent about $2.5 billion of the more than $15.8 billion they pledged during and after an October 2003 conference in Madrid, according to a new report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.

The biggest shortfalls in pledges by 41 donor countries are from Iraq's oil-rich neighbors and U.S. allies: Saudi Arabia spent $17.4% and Kuwait 27% of the $500 million each had pledged more than four years ago, according to a separate report released last month by Congress' Government Accountability Office. Spokesmen at both countries' U.S. embassies did not respond to repeated messages seeking comment.

The United States, so far, has spent $29 billion to help rebuild Iraq, the inspector general's report says. Congress has approved an additional $16.5 billion.

Errata: for re-build, read build. And this is just what we are spending on construction projects alone. Meanwhile, our own infrastructure is falling apart, we're carrying a huge national debt and our vulnerable banking system is being steadily purchased by these same Arab "allies."

The lack of aid from Arab countries in particular infuriates Rep. Gary Ackerman, who heads the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on the Middle East.

"They're charging $100 per barrel of oil, making record fortunes, lecturing everyone else, and then they stiff everybody, including their cousins who they contend to be so very concerned about," the New York Democrat said in an interview.

From 2003 through 2006, Saudi Arabia exported about $95 billion in crude oil to the USA, as its average price more than doubled from $25 to $56 a barrel, according to the U.S. Energy Department.

President Bush met with Saudi, Kuwaiti and other leaders two weeks ago during a trip to the Middle East. Bush discussed "the need for countries in the region to offer their support" during those talks, and the Arab leaders all pledged their help, National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said in an e-mail.

The United Arab Emirates, one of the countries Bush visited, has spent about $62.6 million of the $215 million it pledged, UAE Embassy spokeswoman Nora Abusitta said in an e-mail....

But "international governments" are the best kind. So much more representative and effective than those silly "national governments" that for some reason we still keep hearing so much about.

In fact, given that the United States contains only 5% of the world's population and uses 20% of the world's energy, and since what the American government does has such an effect on the rest of the world, wouldn't it make sense to have the voters all over the world elect the government of the United States? Let's consider the American election a kind of state primary. Yes, it will reflect the (idiotized by the mass-media) will of the people in one place, America. But shouldn't the will of the people everywhere be heard, with equal force and dignity, in the election of this all-important government.

Perhaps, just to get things started, the United States could have a special trusteeship created for it, and entrusted to oversight by the U. N. Secretariat, channeling the instructions of the General Assembly.

That will give meaning to the slip-of-the-mental-lips at Lipscomb -- oh, there's many a similar slip now being made, twixt poisoned chalice-cup and lip --  a meaning that I'm sure will please many, from the dagger-wielding Al-Saud, to the  bow-and-arrow-wielding Luo and Kikuyu, to the nuclear-weapons-wielding denizens of Pakistan. Yes, they should all have a say

Western Europe, as so often, is far ahead of us. The English, the French, the Italians, the Spanish, the Dutch, the Germans, and so many others are now having their own go at it, at the non-national but still localish-- that is, European -- level. If it all works out , and of course it will, then since "Europe" too, just like the United States, uses up more of the world's energy than its population entitles it to, and since it has had and still has an effect on the world much greater than its size would suggest, then "Europe" too should come under another U.N. "trusteeship," also to be run by the world's assembled representatives, at the U.N. General Assembly.

Two trusteeships, for the two parts of the world that offer the most difficulty  for all the other parts -- the United States (with Canada possibly attached, in an addendum) and Western Europe, held in a kind of trusteeship until their benighted, possibly still-slightly-recalcitrant populations, agree to become part of that Coming Thing, an "international government."

 It's about time.

Here is a comment bemoaning the release of the Wilders film by someone in an army magazine. The dismissal by Fred Roggio is warranted. Of course there will be some kind of trouble if, and when, the Wilders film is released. Muslims have been attempting to blackmail the Dutch, and the entire Western world, not to have it released, using that same argument. So what? This will always be the case.

The American military man or civilian who wrote that little comment apparently is not thinking straight about Islam. He is thinking only of the way in which Muslims can be so easily whipped up, and assumes they will be whipped up if the Wilders film is released.

But he is missing several points. One is that Muslims can always be whipped up. They don't need a film or cartoons. They are very good at manufacturing their own reasons for being whipped up. They stage atrocities -- see the Al-Dura case, see all the pictures on Al-Jazeera of American "Nazi-like" behavior in Iraq, with that hideous Arab score playing as the camera pans over what are supposed to be victims of "American aggression" and that could be pictures taken from anywhere, or for that matter made up. It doesn't matter.

The person who said that the Wilders film should not be released (and could he have been, by the way, a Muslim or someone who listened a bit too credulously and naively to local Muslims in Afghanistan) manages to overlook all the made-up stories about "American soldiers destroying Qur'ans" that have been broadcast in Afghanistan, and that, though denied and obviously false, have led to the usual predictable and hysterical riots and lunacy.

But what that comment points to is the narrowness of vision of American military men. In Iraq, Petraeus and company are so intent in applying those "laws" about "insurgencies" so beloved of those "military intellectuals" -- those Kansas colonels who think it makes sense to come up with such laws as "on average, insurgencies last ten years." [This is as helpful as the statement that "on average civil wars last 4.7 years" or "on average wars last 11.3 years."] It ignores the most important things: that there is not one "insurgency" but many different groups competing for power and loot in Iraq, and that while all but one -- Al-Qaeda -- are willing to use the Americans to their own advantage, all of them, but possibly one (the Kurds) cannot conceivably offer the Americans real, unfeigned, and lasting friendship, and even the Kurds, possibly unduly romanticized, have to be our friends because it is only the Americans who have rescued them in the past, or can offer them the necessary diplomatic and other support, to an dependent Kurdish state, in the future.

The American military in Iraq, like that in Afghanistan, sees the task it has been assigned, and is attempting to fulfill that task. It does not see, the generals do not see, the larger picture. They do not calculate the economic cost to the United States, of the effort in Iraq or Afghanistan. They do not ask themselves about the other theatres of war, in the campaign of self-defense against the world-wide Jihad, because most of them do not think in those terms at all. How can they? The very fulfillment of their task, and their day-to-day dealings with the local "good" Muslims, brings them ever further into personal entanglements, a confusion of being impressed with this or that local Arab or Afghani who may indeed appear to offer real friendship, or at least prove helpful, and so beyond that immediate helpfulness, that slogging "side by side" with "our Iraqi allies" or "the brave Afghans," it is easy to forget about such things as exactly what those "Iraqi allies" are doing, what they are doing it for, how much bribing they need to continue doing what they do (for if the American bribes stop, they stop), and whether, from an American perspective, the whole thing really makes sense, or if, beyond the local "victories," the real victory to be achieved is best accomplished by coolly, hard-headedly, recognizing what has been going on in Iraq and Afghanistan is pursuit of an ignis fatuus, a will-'o-the-wisp or feu follet that keeps receding into the distance, the goal of a "stable" and "unified" and (with American taxpayers' largesse, signed over by the tens of billions, by an Administration that has no other thoughts as to how to obtain Muslim cooperation, for it does not understand what deep hostility Islam inculcates toward non-Muslims, and is fearful of finding out, of recognizing this immutable truth and basing a policy on awareness of that truth).

Even if, here and there, at enormous American and, in Afghanistan, other NATO cost, there can be local "victories" over Al Qaeda, or over the Taliban, so what? Their ranks are endlessly replenishable. And the local "allies" are not really "allies" at all. The Anbar Province tribes, should they succeed in remaining bribed, still have no intention of doing America's bidding, and still, as Sunnis, have no intention of acquiescing in the main consequence of the toppling of Saddam Hussein: the transfer of power, now and likely forever, from the Sunnis to the Shi'a of Iraq.

What the American generals must do if they are to avoid confirming that "war is too important to be left to the generals" is to begin to see what used to be called the Big Picture. Petraeus, in Iraq, should be thinking about the malevolent Saudis, and the Money Weapon that pays for mosques and madrasas deep inside the West. The generals in Afghanistan should be thinking about the attempt of Geert Wilders to instruct, and rouse, people in the Netherlands by dint of a mere ten-minute film, instead of worrying about the "effect" on the local Muslims and its relation to them, the NATO troops. If the local Muslims can be so whipped up, and so easily turn on the American and other NATO troops, it is that fact that is telling, and should be understood by the Western military as one more reason why, instead of the squandering of men, money, and matériel -- in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in meretricious and hopeless Pakistan -- Western money should be saved, Western soldiers should be spared, and war matériel reserved not for "nation-building" efforts but for war-making, and emphasis now placed on what should always have been seen, about a trillion dollars ago, as the most intelligent strategy: to recognize, to do nothing to lessen, to exploit, whatever pre-existing fissures exist in the Camp of Islam. In Iraq there are two: the sectarian and the ethnic. In Afghanistan, save for the Shi'a Hazara, the country is riven by rivalry between Tadjiks, Uzbeks, and Pashtuns. Use it, use it to divide, and to keep constantly unsettled, the re-emergence of the Taliban, where possible. Do not build roads or schools or do anything that will help the Taliban and local Muslims to emerge from a hardscrabble existence. It is that hardscrabble subsistence farming or raiding that is the surest guarantee that people will be kept so busy staying alive that they won't have time for Jihad, which is what you do once your minimal needs are taken care of. Don't take care to help with those minimal needs.

And while the spectacle of internecine warfare, not necessarily at a high level -- in Iraq, the Shi'a will simply make clear that they have no intention of re-admitting Sunnis to Baghdad, and whatever attacks on Shi'a take place after the Americans withdraw, will be met with further attacks on Sunnis in Baghdad. Meanwhile, in the north, the Americans for reasons of realpolitik reasons could be supporting the Kurds, because the more powerful the Kurds, the more likely they will obtain an independent state. The great inhibiting factor is apparently the government of Turkey, which is in the hands of Erdogan. But the Turkish army's opposition, which does worry, can be overcome, if it can be demonstrated that an independent Kurdistan will have to rely on American support, and the Americans, in turn, will be the guarantors, who can withhold arms and diplomatic support, that Kurdish irredentism will apply, with a vengeance, to Iran and to Syria, but not in eastern Anatolia. There are ways to make this case, but they require taking a different tack with Turkey, or at least with its military.

The use of Iraq as a permanent fault line for Sunni-Shi'a clashes, the loss to the "Persian" Shi'a of Baghdad, for four hundred years the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate, so central to the history, real or imaginatively reconstructed, that history-haunted Arab Muslims (returning, again and again, to imagined past glories of culture, munificence, and power -- often greatly exaggerated -- which can never be acquiesced in by those Sunnis, -- suggests that an Iraq without the American presence will be a source of permanent tension between Shi'a Iran (and its succursales among the Shi'a of who form the majority in Bahrain, 20% of the population in Pakistan, and a plurality of the population in Yemen, not to mention Syria, where the Alawites have been attempting to legitimize themselves as Muslims by use of a Shi'a fatwa, when the Sunni Arabs know perfectly well that the Mary-worshiping syncretistic Alawite despots are not real Muslims, and could, should, would be slaughtered -- not an Alawite village would be safe -- should the Alawite regime ever fall.

The consequences of an American withdrawal would be, to save money, lives, even rescue the American officer corps from further shrinkage -- all those non-reupping captains, by now 15,000 -- them who cannot be easily replaced -- that leads to a decline in morale and in quality. And then, the precipitous attack on Iraq, followed by the years of staying stuck to Tarbaby Iraq, with -- at the top -- every evasion, every distraction, every short-term task of what is ludicrously called "winning" in Iraq, would no longer be possible, and harder heads would reconsider the ideology of the Total System of Islam, reconsider the amazing failure to consider the main instruments of Jihad -- the Money Weapon, campaigns of Da'wa and, especially in Western Europe, inexorable demographic conquest, if the Infidels remove almost all of their troops, but watch the spectacle of internecine warfare from afar, able to intervene, from afar, with intelligence (spy satellites, drones) and with weapons, when and if necessary -- essentially, what the Americans did, to a degree, during the Iran-Iraq War. That war should have gone on forever. Sunni-Shia conflicts can go on forever, if only the Americans leave Iraq. Non-Arab Muslims can better be inspired to see islam for what it is -- a vehicle of Arab linguistic, cultural, political and economic imperialism -- if they have an example of a non-Arab Muslim people throwing off the Arab yoke. An independent Kurdistan fits the bill.

But as long as those military men, like the one in Afghanistan deploring the Wilders movie -- in other words, demonstrating his ignorance of, or indifference to, the need to rouse the people of the Netherlands, where a million Muslims now unsettlingly have settled (in 1970 there were 15,000) -- think only of what is right in front of them, and not of the larger war of which Iraq or Afghanistan are very small theatres, the squandering and the waste, and the wasted opportunities will continue.

Do you suppose they'd welcome the expertise of a few Hebrew Nationals?
-- a reply to this post

If that is the all-beef frank that has the ad about "We Listen To A Higher Authority" I'm afraid that the "Higher Authority" that the Hebrew National hot-dog people listen to is not, despite all the Muslim blague about the "three Abrahamic faiths having so much in common," quite the same as Allah. No, Christians and Jews and Muslims may all be monotheists, but they do not worship the same god, and the odd man out in this group definitely is made up of the implacable believers in the necessity and right of Islam to dominate, and Muslims to rule, everywhere.

MADRID (Reuters) - A group of Islamist extremists in Frankfurt was planning an attack in Germany, according to a would-be suicide bomber captured by police in Spain, Spanish newspaper El Pais reported on Sunday.

The Frankfurt cell was one of several in European cities with orders to attack targets in Spain, France, Portugal, Germany and Britain, according to the would-be attacker turned police informant, El Pais reported.
--from this news article

Maybe the police are looking in Frankfurt am Main when they should be looking in Frankfurt an der Oder. Or vice-versa.

If you and I can't tell those cities apart, because we link both Frankfurts to our stadium-and-barbecue hot dogs, why should Muslims in Spain be able to tell them apart? Were I in charge of Interpol, I'd want to blanket both cities.

Which reminds me of a song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkbLZrndttA

"A NEW crop of home-grown jihadis, groomed to step up and replace the leaders of Australian terror cells who have been arrested or jailed..."
-- from this news article

And this is true everywhere: in Iraq, where the Bush Administration thinks it can "destroy Al Qaeda"; in Afghanistan, where the Bush Administration thinks it can "wipe out" the Taliban; in Australia (see above), in France and Great Britain and Spain and Germany and the Netherlands and Denmark and Sweden and Norway and Belgium and indeed, in Canada and the United States. There is not some finite number of members of a finite number of groups (my god, I feel as though Hilbert and Cantor will be joining us any minute for a nightcap), but an endlessly replaceable, fungible group of Believers, just doing what Muslims are supposed to do, but taking it a bit more seriously, and themselves taking on the task, for the whole community, the Muslims of the Umma, of participating directly in violent Jihad against the Infidels, while other Muslims support them, thus participating only indirectly, or participate in the Jihad by employing instruments other than terrorism, other than qitaal (combat).

In America, the non-stop electioneering, accompanied on radio and television by non-stop solemn discussion by psephologists and pseuds-in-suits of the candidates, discussion that amounts to mere racetrack touting (Who Will Win, Who Will Place, Who Will Show), in which nothing is explained, nothing of value imparted, nonetheless, does teach something.

Apparently there are these things that "people worry about." They are called "Issues." And one issue is "Iraq." And another issue is "the economy."

And not a single commentator, in all that breathless round-the-clock reporting on opinion polls, and who's at the post, and how Willie Shoemaker is doing, and who's coming up fast on the outside as they are coming down the stretch, with...no it's....and look, my god....oh, luck be a lady tonight...has bothered to say that "Iraq" and the "Economy" are not two issues. They are one.

First, some music. Click here for Liza Minelli and Joel Grey singing "Money" in Cabaret:

"Money" - strictly speaking "Money Money Money" - is also a song by ABBA, and, more to the point, a book by Martin Amis. Martin Amis, as I acknowledge here and here, has been saying some sensible things about Islam lately. Sensible, that is, not brilliant or original. His knowledge and understanding of Islam is inferior to that of all contributors to New English Review, and many of the readers. Still, he is learning, and heading in the right direction.

Martin Amis is also an acclaimed novelist. For what it’s worth, having read three of his novels, I think he’s quite good. Critics, who have read all his work and really know about these things, say he’s very good.

But is he worth £3,000 an hour? From The Times:

Just like Wayne Rooney, he earned global fame as an outrageously gifted young tearaway, became a magnet for controversy as he matured, and secured a transfer to a leading Manchester institution. But until yesterday no one suspected that Martin Amis earned more per hour lecturing at the University of Manchester than England’s finest footballer does playing up front for United.

The celebrated author, who once wrote that “weapons are like money; no one knows the meaning of enough”, is contracted at just under £3,000 per hour to teach creative writing at the university. His £80,000 salary obliges him to work a distinctly achievable total of 28 hours a year.

£3,000 an hour to teach creative writing sounds like a lot. How creative are his students at the end of that hour? That will depend on how creative they were to begin with, but if I were paying £3,000, I’d expect to be at least 20% more creative at the end of the hour than at the beginning. Actually there are 150 students on his course, which works out at £20 per student. At that rate, I’d probably be happy if Amis made me 2% more creative. Anyway, with all that money – and the £80,000 salary is only one of his income streams – Amis is going to need a creative accountant.

Amis’s salary is peanuts, though, as Craig Brown points out in The Telegraph:

Compared with his fellow Martins, Amis is among the lower paid. The actor Martin Clunes costs between £6,000 and £10,000, as do the former EastEnders actor Martin Kemp, the Rugby League player Martin Offiah, and someone I've never heard of called Martin Raymond ("editor of Viewpoint magazine"). The only Martin to fall within Amis's price range is Martin Peters, the former England footballer, who charges between £2,500 and £5,000. The only female Martin - Martine McCutcheon - would set you back £25,000-plus.

[…]

And most of the speakers on offer would set Manchester University back far more. Philanthropists seem to be at a particular premium. The Dalai Lama ("he has made numerous appearances in interfaith services, imparting the message of love, compassion, kindness and universal responsibility") charges £25,000-plus and Sarah Ferguson ("The Duchess of York and committed humanitarian") comes in the £50,000-plus category, along with Mikhail Gorbachev ("former president of the Soviet Union"), Donald Trump ("the entrepreneur's entrepreneur") and Anne Robinson ("established TV presenter, currently famous for presenting The Weakest Link").

When you look at the list of personalities cheaper than Amis, you begin to realise quite what a bargain Manchester University has snapped up. In the lowest, "under £2,500", category come Adrian Riddell ("Pierce Brosnan lookalike)", Amusing Nuns ("two nutty nuns causing total and utter mayhem") and Debbie McGee ("classically trained ballet dancer and wife/assistant of magician Paul Daniels").

I dare say one or two of the above acts might be more entertaining than Martin Amis, but which of them would be able to tell you quite so much about the future of the modern novel?

All in all, Manchester students and staff alike should count their blessings. Instead of Amis, they might easily have ended up with the Rt Hon Dr John Reid MP. Reid offers as his special topics "leadership", "leading and transforming poorly performing organisations" and "terror threat". For this, he charges up to £15,000; for the same sum, you can get a full five Martin Amises.

How much did Nabokov get for translating Alice in Wonderland into Russian? Five dollars, was it? Things were different then, for some at least.

If any readers are thinking of hiring the Dalai Lama, or John Reid, or even the Nutty  Nuns to speak at their next dinner party, don’t. Give the money to New English Review instead – you’ll get much more sense out of us, and we really need it.