Archive for April 2011
Can Europe’s tea parties up-end EU?
The looming battle over raising the debt ceiling has demonstrated that political brinksmanship is now a central element in Washington, even as it puts U.S. financial credibility at risk. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has gone to great lengths to reassure financial markets that it would be raised - despite tea party opposition.
While the tea parties’ devotion to ideological purity roils Washington, a similar phenomenon is rupturing the traditional way that European countries are governed and putting at risk the Continent’s future prosperity.
The True Finns Party, for example, emerged as a clear winner in the Finnish elections on Sunday, with 19 percent of the vote. This anti-European Union political party capitalized on Finnish voters’ growing exasperation with what they view as the feckless profligacy of their southern neighbors. The True Finns campaigned on a platform of denying Portugal an EU bailout, though the country is at the precipice of default.
This Nordic result is a growing trend in Europe. From Finland to the Netherlands to Belgium to Hungary, reactionary anti-establishment parties and factions are on the rise. Though created by differing political cultures, the gaggle of anti-establishment, right-of-center movements across Europe is united by several common issues.
Video: White Women Being Sold as Slaves to “Diverse” Men
NAACP official convicted of voter fraud
In Tunica, Mississippi, ten guilty verdicts of voter fraud were returned yesterday against NAACP officer Lessadolla Sowers. She was sentenced to five years for each count without the possibility of parole and will serve the terms concurrently. Sowers manipulated the absentee ballot process in the 2007 election. Absentee ballots in Mississippi are notoriously subject to voter fraud. The District Court opinion in United States v. Ike Brown provides another outrageous example of systemic voter fraud in the casting of absentee ballots in Mississippi. Brown was also a NAACP and Democratic party official. The Tunica Times is the only media outlet covering Sowers’ conviction. No surprise there. And don’t expect the voter fraud deniers at the Brennan Center or Tova Wang at Demos to devote much attention to Sowers and her five year vacation in the pen.
Almost one in eight people living in UK are born abroad
The figures, which were compiled by the Office for National Statistics, were disclosed amid a renewed debate on immigration.
The proportion of the population born overseas almost doubled in two decades to more than 11 per cent, according to data seen by The Daily Telegraph.
It meant that just under seven million people living in Britain were immigrants – enough to fill a city the size of London.
The rise was largely down to Labour’s “open door” immigration policy, under which three million foreigners were added to the population during the party’s 13 years in power.
The figures, which were compiled by the Office for National Statistics, were disclosed amid a renewed debate on immigration.
David Cameron warned yesterday that uncontrolled immigration had undermined some British communities and led to “discomfort and disjointedness” in neighbourhoods.
Alabama nears final approval of immigration crackdown
Alabama Governor Robert Bentley speaks during a news conference at the Arthur R. Outlaw Convention Center in Mobile, Alabama February 24, 2011.
Following in the footsteps of the Alabama House of Representatives, the state Senate on Thursday passed a measure to crackdown on illegal immigration, bringing the measure close to becoming law.
If minor differences between versions of the bill are ironed out and Republican Governor Robert Bentley signs it, Alabama would join a handful of states enacting major immigration legislation this year.
The Alabama law is similar to an Arizona measure that stirred national controversy and was blocked in the courts. Like Arizona, Alabama state and local police would have broad powers to check the immigration status of people detained on other charges.
Under the Alabama legislation harboring, concealing, transporting or employing illegal immigrants would be against the law and any employer doing business with the state will be required to check the legal status of workers.
One Law for Them and Another for Us
Muslims chanting ‘BNP burn in hell’ and waving placards stating ‘The Koran will destroy man-made law’ and ‘Islam will dominate the world’ demonstrated outside a mosque on St. Helen’s Road, Swansea, on Good Friday.
Muslims from an organisation called the ‘Ummah of Muhammad’ distributed leaflets intended to incite the 1,000 Muslims attending the Swansea mosque yesterday. Police boxed in the marchers outside the Rowlands Exchange & Mart store; however, it is understood that no Muslims were arrested by Swansea police for incitement.
This is, of course, in sharp contrast with the politically motivated arrests of two British National Party candidates by Swansea police in a night raid by ten plain-clothes police officers in unmarked cars who ransacked their home, seizing computers, mobile phones, satnav equipment, election material and personal belongings.
As reported earlier on this site, Sion Owens, a British National Party candidate in the current Welsh Assembly election, was one of thousands of people internationally who is alleged to have burned a book, in his garden, last 11th September, on the anniversary of the 9/11 Islamic terrorist atrocities which caused the deaths of nearly 3,000 innocent victims. Joanne Shannon, the British National Party candidate for Swansea East in the Welsh Assembly election, was also arrested once police realised she too was a British National Party candidate.
Although Swansea police were forced to withdraw charges against Sion Owens, their reckless and irresponsible action directly placed both Sion Owens’ and Joanne Shannon’s lives in danger, not least as a result of an Islamic ‘fatwa’ being issued against them.
Vladimir Putin reveals plan to boost Russia birth rate
Vladimir Putin warned against the risk of being weak and overly dependent on the outside world
The government will spend 1.5tn roubles ($53bn; £33bn) on raising the birth rate and extending life expectancy.
He announced the plan in a key speech to the Duma on the economy ahead of presidential elections in March 2012.
The prime minister has hinted he may seek to return to the presidency, but it is unclear whether the incumbent Dmitry Medvedev would make way for him.
Mr Putin, widely seen as the power behind the throne in Russia, stood down as president at the last election because of a constitutional limit on his term in office, and backed Mr Medvedev - a close political ally - as his successor.
Video: Richard Spencer Speaks at Providence College (Antifa Fail)
Pentagon: Central America ‘deadliest’ non-war zone in the world
People protest against violence, on April 6 in Mexico City. The continuing tide of drug-related killings in Mexico has drawn thousands of protesters into the streets of Mexico’s capital and several other cities. The sign reads in Spanish “Not one more of our young men!”
The drug war has grown to rival the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, as the scale of violence, spending, and weapons in Mexico and Central America have made it one of the most dangerous areas in the world, say US military officials.
Even as the Pentagon struggles with how best to help the Mexican government, US drug users are funding the cartels, senior US commanders told the Senate Armed Services Committee, enabling narcotics gangs to build mini-submarines that they use to transport millions of dollars worth of drugs with every trip.
American consumers of narcotics drive the drug trade, and US weapons arm narco-criminals, says Andres Martinez, a fellow with the New America Foundation think tank.
US drug users contribute roughly $40 billion a year to Latin American cartels, Admiral James Winnefeld, head of the US Northern Command, in charge of US homeland security, added in testimony. The amount of US money that goes to Mexican cartels is so considerable that “if you ranked it among the world’s militaries, it would come into the top ten.”
