Fausta's blog

Sununu for Veep?

Via Maria, Obama’s biggest general election liability: His bitter half

On the stump, she warmed up (or rather, berated) supporters by complaining about how her husband is an underdog even after he keeps winning primary and caucus after primary and caucus. With a scowl etched on her face, she bellyached that "the bar is constantly changing for this man." Call the waambulance, stat.

Reminds me of Teresa's shifting bar.

Embedding with the enemy

But in fact my religious beliefs are entirely separate from my political beliefs: the only connection is that I'm willing to buck the trend in both arenas.

Two posts on Israel at 60:
Via the Astute Bloggers, Israel at 60: The Hope,
After 60 Years, The 'Lamp Unto The Nations' Flourishes

Two suspicious Seattle ferry riders were "just businessmen"

Vote for Mamacita.

Japan has no kids

From the Terror Finance Blog-A PDF of the Comprehensive Survey of U.S. Efforts Against Threat Financing-MUST READ

Franco had better things to do with his time.

"The threat of a new ice age must now stand alongside nuclear war as a likely source of wholesale death and misery for mankind"

Platypus genetic code unravelled, which reminds me of Ogden Nash

I like the duck-billed platypus
Because it is anomalous.
I like the way it raises its family
Partly birdly, partly mammaly.
I like its independent attitude.
Let no one call it a duck-billed platitude.

Cross-posted at PoliGazette


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Labels: Barack Obama, France, Iraq, Israel, Japan, Republicans, Spain

Via Jim, who in turn thanks Marvin "for the bowel-loosening link."

Labels: Spain

at Spanish Pundit

Labels: Spain

Two days before the general election, ETA murders a former councilman.

Spanish Pundit: ETA killed Isaias Carrasco, former councilman for the Socialists, by shooting him point-blank in front of his family. Spanish Pundit has lots of links at her post.

Iberian Notes explains,

Carrasco had just gotten into his car to go to work at 1:30 PM when the ETA gunman fired five shots at him through the windshield, hitting him in the chest with two and in the neck with one. His wife and daughter heard the gunfire and rushed outside as Carrasco got out of his car, stumbled halfway across the street, and fell, still conscious. The gunman, who was tall, wearing a fake beard, and dressed in black, ran to a silver Seat Cordoba in which a getaway driver was waiting, and they escaped. Carrasco died in the hospital less than an hour later.

Carrasco had lost his city council seat in the last municipal election, and had decided to give up his police bodyguard at the end of last year. Most politically active anti-ETA Basques, especially those who hold public office, need official bodyguards.

The mayor of Mondragón, known in Basque as Arrasate, belongs to the ETA-front party ANV; when she arrived at the hospital, Carrasco's wife told her to get lost.

Gates of Vienna has a Letter from Spain: The E.T.A Steps in Spanish Elections:

Let us remember the first rule of Spanish politics: the result of Spanish national elections is determined by the vote of the “volatile left” a group of two million voters that vote for the PSOE, but only when they want to avoid a government by the right. If they vote, the PSOE will get a majority in Parliament and then the government, if they do not, the PP may manage to get the government. This attack will decide this people to vote; therefore it will benefit the PSOE. Moreover, it is also the interest of the ETA to keep the PSOE in government. El Pais (our NYT) has already called their readers to the voting stations in its headlines today.

Read the rest: their prognosis is not positive.

Iberian Notes states that the lastest survey shows the PSOE (Zapatero's party) ahead of the PP 43.0% -39.0%.

I'll post on the results tomorrow evening.

UPDATE
Spanish socialists claim victory . Gateway Pundit has roundup.



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Labels: ETA, Spain, terrorism

Fourteen men have been arrested in Spain for planning terrorist attacks in Spain, Portugal, France, and Germany. The operation was credited to Pakistani Islamist al-Qaeda warlord Baitullah Mehsud, the man behing Benazir Bhutto's murder.

Via Iberian Notes,

Al Qaeda in Catalonia update: Police throughout Europe are looking for at least six uncaptured members of the Barcelona terrorist cell. The leader of the Barcelona cell, Maroof Ahmed Mirza, is linked to the chief of Al Qaeda in Pakistan, Amir Baitula Mehsud, and to other cells in Europe, which are thought to be hiding the six men on the run. The authorities are currently tracing down all the phone calls made by suspected cell members.

Everything the confidential informant (who was to have been one of the suicide bombers) says checks out, except the cops can't find the 100 kilos of explosives he says they had. Very similar to Saddam's chemical weapons: we know he was going around acting like he had them, we took action based on his bluffs and threats, and then we just couldn't find the weapons.

Get this: El Pais says that the terrorist cell that murdered Daniel Pearl was financed by a Barcelona Pakistani cell that got its money running shops and call centers in the Raval neighborhood of Barcelona; the money was transferred to Asia through the hawala money-lending network. They also report that the CIA and FBI believe that jihadists have been using Spain as a logistical and financial center for years.

El Pais has two articles (links in Spanish): Los detenidos tienen idéntico perfil que los autores del 7-J (The detainees have identical profiles to the London July 7 bombers) and La CIA alerta del constante traslado a España de 'yihadistas' desde Pakistán (CIA warns of constant transfer of "jihadists" to Spain from Pakistan).

Ed Morrissey links to Detained extremists planned attack wave

A GROUP of alleged Islamist extremists were planning a wave of suicide attacks across Europe before they were detained in Barcelona last weekend.

The group intended to carry out three attacks in Spain and one each in Portugal, France and Germany, an unnamed man who infiltrated the group told top-selling daily El Pais.

As Ed points out, none of the EU countries are involved with the US in Iraq.



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Labels: Spain, terrorism

He came, he pitched a tent, he conquered, and now he's in Spain.

The EUropean's favorite tyrant du jour arrived in Spain, along with 300 attendants. 30 bodyguard babes and a camel, and pitched his tent at the Palacio del Pardo, but first he stopped by Hacienda La Boticaria hotel, 11 miles southeast of Seville, smack in the heart of Al-Andalus.



Apparently some in France were relieved to see him go, particularly after

Gaddafi also took a boat trip down the Seine, after insisting that all the capital's bridges be closed to traffic and pedestrians. On Thursday his bodyguards came to blows in the lobby of the Ritz Hotel with security personnel accompanying former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Never mind that pseky torture lawsuit; Muammar's been immune from prosecution in France since 2001.

It's not clear whether the French deals involved 10 billion euros, or 3 billion euros. What's interesting is that this tour is part of a planned "Mediterranean Union", one of Sarko's pet projects:

To Sarkozy Libya is a linchpin in his plan for a "Mediterranean Union" to defuse tension with Muslim countries.

But back to Gaddafi/Gadhafi/Kadhafi, or however you spell it, he pitched his tent in the King's back yard, so to speak:

He visited France last week and paid a private visit to the Andalusia region of southern Spain over the weekend. On Monday he held talks with Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and King Juan Carlos and on Tuesday he is scheduled to meet business representatives. It is the Libyan leader's first official trip to Spain.

He was greeted at Madrid airport by Defense Minister Jose Antonio Alonso. He then traveled to El Pardo palace on the Spanish capital's outskirts where he was greeted by the king.

In keeping with the desert tradition of his region, Gadhafi has had a green Bedouin tent set up in the gardens of the Pardo to receive guests. The Pardo palace is the official residence for dignitaries visiting Spain.

Borrowing a page from Hugo, Gaddafi's danging the oil money carrot:

Spanish firms could also secure bids for 10 billion of the 50 billion dollars which Libya plans to spend to develop its infrastructure, the statement added.

As Aquiles reminds us, Dealing with ex-pariahs is a ticklish business.

We'll see how this 3-ring circus turns out.

1988 is a century away...

UPDATE
Via the Baron, it turns that Gaddafi's a champion of women: FRANCE-LIBYA: I WANT TO SAVE THE EUROPEAN WOMEN, GADDAFI (I took the liberty of highlighting how much of an Alan Alda he is)

PARIS, DECEMBER 13 - Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi showed himself as champion of women's rights, including of European women, denouncing their "tragic condition" during a conference in Paris yesterday.

On the third day of his controversial visit in France, the Colonel spoke of the 'Situation of the Women in the World' in front of one thousand women, almost all of African origin and almost all veiled, in a luxury hall of the Gabriel palace on the Champs-Elysees. "Welcome, Your Excellency," hundreds of women said in chorus when Gaddafi entered the hall.

"Gaddafi wants the French women to rise at his arrival," warned Khadija Khali, president of the French Union of Muslim Women and of a pro-Libyan association, who organised the meeting.

Applauded when he denounced "the injustices" towards the African women, the Libyan leader received softer applause when he criticised the "tragic conditions of the woman in Europe, forced sometimes to do work which she refuses", such as mechanic or bricklayer. "I want to save the European woman who is struggling," assured the leader of the Libyan revolution.

The audience were invited to ask questions, but without making Gaddafi "angry", Mrs Khali reminded.

After the end of the conference, France Presse collected some critical opinions. "I came here to see what he had to say," commented for example Catherine Chastenet, president of the association 'Femmes et libertes'. "How can he say he has done much for women in the world when he tortured the Bulgarian nurses?" she asks herself. (ANSAmed).

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Labels: France, Libya, Spain

Spanish Pundit has the post and round-up:
ETA "men of peace" have killed again

A Spanish Civil Guard has been killed by a shot in the head and another one has been gravely hurt in an ETA terrorist attack in Capbreton, a village in the South of France. Both of them were taking part in a watchout operation against ETA in the south of France and were unarmed at the moment.

Spanish Pundit adds,

This happens after the President of the Terrorist Victims' Association has been criminally accused of insulting Mr.Zapatero. Mr. Alcaraz said that Zapatero was the best ambassador of ETA, and an obscure Lawyers' Association has been the chosen one to do the bad work... Blaming the victims while the Government was negotiating with the same people who has attacked from the back these two Civil Guards.

Again, appeasement never works.

Labels: Spain

King Juan Carlos of Spain has started a wave:

Via Babalu:

A banner goes up in downtown Caracas
Spanish Smack-Down at Investor's Business Daily explains,

Spain's King Juan Carlos delivered the repartee heard 'round the world Saturday by ordering Venezuela's abusive dictator to "shut up" at a summit. Drawing the line there may mark a turning point.

That's because Spain isn't just any country, and its monarch isn't just any figurehead. In asking "why don't you shut up" to Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, Juan Carlos signaled that time has run out on democracies' tolerance of anything a boorish dictator seeking to dominate the region can dish out.

That's no small thing. Chavez's manners reflect his leadership. At the Ibero-American summit of Spain, Portugal and their former colonies in the Americas in Santiago, Chile, he unloaded a raft of loutish insults. Meanwhile, Venezuelans rioted in the streets back home over his ongoing domestic power grab.

And now they put up the banner, too.

There's even a Facebook group: ¿Por qué no te callas? and a new domain name.

The Beeb's inagurated a page of
Chavez's colourful quotations. 'twas about time someone told him to shut up.

Daniel and Andres Oppenheimer both wonder if the Chavez-King fight might be a distraction maneuver by Chavez so we do not discuss anymore the repression in Venezuela.

UPDATE, Wednesday 14 November:
Via Pajamas Media, Chavez Demands Spanish King Juan Carlos Apologize for Verbal Slap, Hints Investments Could Be at Risk


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Labels: Chile, Hugo Chavez, Spain, Venezuela

Via Miguel and Daniel:



Meanwhile, back at the ranch...


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Labels: Hugo Chavez, Spain, Venezuela

Editor and Publisher looks at a machine translation of a transcript of a conversation and jumps to conclusions.

The transcript was published by El Pais this week.

The conversation took place on February 22, 2003, at President Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas. President Bush, Spanish President Jose Maria Aznar, and Condoleezza Rice were discussing Saddam Hussein.

Let me point out that from the looks of it, the transcript, then, is a transcript of a conversation that took place in English. I realize that President Bush speaks Spanish, but the transcript has him speaking with the vosotros form (Quizá os sirva.), which is used in Spain. While Pres. Bush is fluent in Spanish, I have never heard him use the vosotros form in his speech. I expect that the conversation took place with Bush & Rice speaking in English, Aznar in Spanish.

On top of that, Editor and Publisher used an atrocious machine translation to write their article. Think Progress and others have picked up the story based on E&P's article.

Barcepundit, who is fully bilingual (and I can attest to that, because I talk to him daily), has read the transcript and reached different conclusions from E&P's:

If anything, the transcript proves precisely the opposing point that critics want to make. The conversation shows both Bush and Aznar trying to avoid war; that they were concerned of its human toll, and that Saddam wanted to flee with money... and WMD information. I guess all the people who are trumpeting this will stop sying now that Bush lied and mislead us on the WMD issue. Won't hold my breath, though.

Barcepundit is working on a full translation but for the time being, read his post.

Update: Jules Crittenden:

What the leaked memo doesn't do is indicate bloodthirsty lust for war at all costs. What it does do is underscore that Bush believed, quite correctly, that Saddam posed a threat to the world. That Bush believed, naively, as it turned out, that Iraq was ready to embrace democracy. That Bush preferred to see Saddam go quietly, but understood that there was no chance he would go, or set aside his ambitions, in the absence of a credible and imminent threat of force. It also indicates that Bush, then a year and a half into war, did not relish having to inform mothers and fathers of the deaths of their sons and daughters in battle, or the strain on the American exchequer that war would create. But he did not want to go down in history as someone who flinched, avoided his responsibilities and allowed a murderous dictator to pursue his dreams of domination of the world's primary oil reserves.

Update 2: Michael Goldfarb raises a good point:

This begs the question: why would Saddam attach so much importance to information on Iraq's WMD program? The mainstream media, the Democratic party, and many others have accepted that Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction, and that there is no reason to think that Iraq's program posed a threat to anyone at the time of the US invasion. Small caches of WMD and evidence that Saddam intended to reconstitute the program at some point in the future have been downplayed in light of the failure to find the stockpiles of weapons that most intelligence agencies believed to exist.

Yet if the dominant narrative is correct--that Iraq posed no WMD threat--then why did Saddam stake his life on concealing information about the program? After all, he had to think that if he did not leave Iraq, there was every chance that he would be killed during or after the invasion. Why would it have been so important to hide evidence that merely confirmed the lack of any threat?

The only logical reason for making this a condition of his agreement to exile was that he believed the program was more advanced than it really was, or that he intended to augment it. In either case, it further bolsters the case that Saddam remained a threat to the region (at least), and that it was wise to depose him.

Welcome, Weekly Standard readers! Please visit often.



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Labels: George W. Bush, Spain

Bloggers United for Cuban Liberty
BLOGGERS DENOUNCE SPAIN IN NEW ADVERTISING CAMPAIGN

Billboards to Highlight Spanish Complicity in Cuban Exploitation
May 18, 2007, Miami, FL – The Spanish government is being denounced by Bloggers United for Cuban Liberty (http://bucl.org) in a new advertising campaign aimed at educating the public about oppression in Castro's Cuba.

The multimedia campaign, unveiled today, consists of bus shelter panels that target areas near the Spanish consulate and the Spanish Cultural Center, both in Coral Gables, Florida. An online component, launching today, will steer readers searching for certain information about Cuba and Spain to BUCL.org.

"This effort marks the first of several coordinated activities aimed at exposing those countries, companies and institutions that aid and abet the Castro regime in oppressing the Cuban people," said Henry Gomez, the spokesman for Bloggers United for Cuban Freedom. Gomez continues:

"Spanish businesses are dealing directly with the Castro regime and are helping perpetuate Cuba's totalitarian system by complying with that country's unfair labor laws and enforcing an apartheid system in which Cubans are not allowed to use the same facilities as tourists. From the Spanish perspective, there is no reason to pursue change in Cuba, they are benefiting from exploitation of Cuban workers and would like to see the status quo perpetuated."

The Socialist Spanish government of Jose Luís Rodríguez Zapatero has been leading an effort to normalize relations between the European Union and Cuba. Those relations have been strained since the Castro regime's crackdown on and jailing of 75 dissidents and independent journalists in 2003. In April of this year, Spain's foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos visited Cuba and met with Raul Castro, while noticeably snubbing Cuban dissidents that had requested a meeting with him.

"It's important for the Spanish government and business interests to know that freedom-loving Cubans will not forget who conspired with the Castro brothers and against their liberty when the inevitable fall of the dictatorship comes," said Val Prieto, editor of BabaluBlog.com and member of Bloggers United for Cuban Liberty.

Bloggers United for Cuban Liberty is a confederation of blogs and web sites that pool resources and ideas for use in campaigns that raise awareness of the Cuban reality.
Current campaign sponsors include: Los patrocinadores actuales de la campaña incluyen: BabaluBlog.com; CubanAmericanPundits.com; BlogforCuba.typepad.com; Claudia4Libertad.com; jluix.com; TheRealCuba.com; the26thparallel.blogspot.com; CubaCompanioni.blogspot.com; LaContraRevolucion.blogspot.com; MarcMasferrer.typepad.com; TomasEstradaPalma4Today.blogspot.com; TrenBlindado.com; NelsonGuirado.com; Cubanology.com; AbajoFidel.blogspot.com; albertodelacruz.com; and Fausta's blog.

If you want to see how Spanish advertising sees Cuba, take a look at this ad posted at the BUCL website

I wonder if the NAACP has a chapter in the Iberian peninsula...



Update, Monday 21 May: Lady Godiva (in Spanish) and Gateway Pundit have more.

Labels: Bloggers United for Cuban Liberty, Communism, Cuba, Spain, tourism, travel

Blast at Spanish opposition office, no one hurt

An explosive device damaged the regional headquarters of Spain's main opposition party in the city of Valencia on Saturday, the emergency services there said.

No one was injured in the blast outside the building housing the Popular Party office, they said. Police cordoned off the area but there was no immediate word on who was responsible.

Spain is due to hold municipal elections across the country on May 27 and campaigning started in earnest on Friday.

According to the article, the explosion might be related to ETA.

Whether it is or not, it certainly has to do with the elections; obviously, to intimidate the opposition.

Labels: news, politics, Spain

And now for a change of pace:
My Blog Talk Radio guest John Chappel, another Friend I Haven't Met Yet, of Inside Europe: Iberian Notes has been posting on Spanish singer/media celebrity Isabel Pantoja, who's been for decades a tabloid favorite from back in the days when her bullfighter husband got killed on the job.

The Spanish media has been portraying her life as a long-winding soap opera, and they aren't about to stop now that things got interesting.

Tawdry reporting on tawdry characters is not exclusive to the US or the UK, and this story involves a singer, undeclared earnings, a real estate developer, and yet more bullfighting. The only missing ingredients are a couple of Democrats and the story would make it to Fox News.

La Pantoja has as least as much stage "attitude" as Queen Latifa, and she knows how to work the audience. Here she is in action,


I'll be posting later today on the French election. We are blessed with another beautiful day, so until then, enjoy the day.

And for your weekly insanity fix, visit The Carnival

Labels: bloggers, Carnival of the Insanities, DrSanity, Friends I Haven't Met Yet, Inside Europe:Iberian Notes, media, Spain

From the International Herald Tribune, the EU branch of the NYT: EU's satellite navigation system loses its way, by Judy Dempsey

BRUSSELS: Talk to satellite officials in Brussels and the mood is one of frustration and bitterness. The reason is that the European Union's most ambitious technological project, a satellite navigation system designed to provide users with unprecedented accuracy, faces disaster.

Galileo, as it is called, was supposed to have challenged the Pentagon's Global Positioning System. There were even hopes it would eventually provide a crucial security component for Europe's defense ambitions. Galileo, alas, has become mired in vicious disputes among the eight companies chosen to build and operate the system.

As the article points out,

It is not as if the EU had no experience in big projects: witness the most recent example of Airbus and its new A380 aircraft.

Because it was initially subsidized, and because the EU needed companies to build Airbus, it allowed the biggest shareholders, France and Germany, to decide in which city and country parts of the aircraft would be built. The soaring costs and missed deadlines for the A380 recently forced the resignation of its chairman. Thousands of jobs are threatened and big international orders are at risk. Despite that, France and Germany are still squabbling over which will bear the brunt of job losses.

Then there is the Nabucco gas pipeline project, the EU's attempt at having a common energy policy that would reduce its dependence on Russia. Conceived in 2002, the consortium consisting of Austrian, Hungarian, Bulgarian, Romanian and Turkish companies has yet to deliver the final feasibility study that will allow financing to be arranged. Again, there is fighting inside the consortium. Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány of Hungary prefers to support a Russian pipeline project that would undermine Nabucco. Ankara wants to use Nabucco so that Turkey can become an energy hub.

There is also uncertainty over orders for the Eurofighter jet, which is being built by Britain, Germany, Italy and Spain. Austria's new coalition is embroiled in a corruption scandal about placing orders and Saudi Arabia agreed to finalize a €14.7 billion contract this year only after the British government dropped a fraud inquiry into previous fighter jet sales to the kingdom.

And so to Galileo.

You'd think that after all that, someone would have thought of figuring out the financials ahead of time, would you?

But noooo,

Spain's Hispasat and Aena have been chosen to operate the satellites. But Spain wants a big slice of the jobs and profits.

Now come the 5 stages of failed EU projects:
Denial:

"What problems?" asked Marta Navarro, its spokeswoman.

Anger:

"Get rid of them," said one official.

Bargaining:

"Let's have enhanced cooperation,"

Depression:

Commission officials who have spent years nursing Galileo said it was time to stop creating consortia whose members lobby more for their national interests than the bigger European goal.

Acceptance:

Galileo, at some stage, will get off the ground because too much money, time and prestige have already been invested.

Good luck on that, folks.

(h/t No Pasaran)

Labels: EU, news, science, Spain

Nancy Pelosi is Playing With Fire

All that Pelosi's trip can accomplish is to advertise American disunity to a terrorist-sponsoring nation in the Middle East while we are in a war there. That in turn can only embolden the Syrians to exploit the lack of unified resolve in Washington by stepping up their efforts to destabilize Iraq and the Middle East in general.

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My Blog Talk Radio guest Michael Fumento writes about Defeating Malaria with both High- and Low-Tech

Tren calls for a holistic approach in fighting the disease. That includes full rehabilitation of the use of the insecticide DDT.

I've been posting about why I favor the use of DDT for malaria for years now.
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Video: U.S. troops rescue kidnapped Iraqi man
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UCLA "Covering Lebanon" Conference: Media Criticism or Israel Bashing?
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86 RSC Members Sign Letter to President Bush Pledging to Sustain Veto on Pork-Corrupted War Spending Bill. Cassandra found one instance of Real Democrat Support For The Troops

Transparency takes a hit: With Democrats at the helm of Congress, the Congressional Reseach Service has decided it no longer needs to track the pork in spending bills.
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Maria sent me a link saying that Web MD's symptom checker just got better. I don't know what its symptoms were, but I tried that site once and ended up with symptoms for defective organs I wasn't born with.
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Jeremayakovka first blogbirthday's today. He's been discussing Cuba.

Here's my old post on Ricardo Arenas, originally posted on Oct. 11, 2004 (you might have to go to October archive and scroll down):

Saturday I wrote about The Motorcycle Diaries and its obsecene lyricism in idolizing a mass murderer. A commenter wrote,

Don't forget all the Gays he had killed

Carlos Eire's book deals with the subject (page 256),

He thinks about that cruel ritual he has witnessed so many times, when the guards strip all the prisoners naked and parade the most handsome in front of the newly arrived inmates to find out who among them is gay. He thinks about how anyone who gets aroused is taken away for a special mandatory "rehabilitation" program that includes the application of electrical currents to the genitals.

Reinaldo Arenas was one among many gay men who were sent to Cuban concentration camps. Arenas's work portrays Cuba as one big prison, "where sodomite hedonism is a clear protest against the cruel Castro regime". A Gay News review of Arenas's autobiography, Before Night Falls explains,

Gay men have indeed been persecuted in Cuba, but luckily things are a bit better these days. Authors add excusingly that Fidel Castro has done a lot of good for the Cubans as far as education and health-care are concerned. An important question is where the homophobia of Castro`s regime comes from. With nuances all authors point at traditional Latin-American machismo, though they also have to admit that socialism didn`t do much for the breaking down of male megalomania and hatred against gays.

The cowardice and half-heartedness of left wing, sometimes even homosexual Cuba adepts we`d better forget. Meanwhile it's beyond a doubt gays have been imprisoned en masse in the so called UMAP camps: the military units supporting the production. Jan Lumsden cautiously objects these camps weren`t for gays in the first place, but has to admit gays were its main population. All boys and men unfit for military service, arrested for homosexuality or considered unsocial in any other way, ended up in the UMAP camps where they carried on forced labour in for instance the sugar cane crop. The camps were in existence from 1965 till 1970. Since then queers who were dangerous to the state landed in jail again or in a regular work camp. The mass escape of maricones" during the Mariel exodus to the paradise of capitalism and decadence, North America, in 1980 was not accidental

For Arenas's prison experiences in his own words, go to Amazon click on the book icon with "Search Inside", and do a "Search inside this book" for keyword "prison".

Arenas, as many hundreds of other gay men and lesbians, suffered from Che's and Castro's revolution. Arenas's work, angry and hard-hitting, will endure, and he will be remembered. The names of those who died in the concentration camps are written on sand, washed by the tides.

Meanwhile, in Spain, it is business as usual when it comes to Cuba

Labels: books, Cuba, Democrats, Iraq, Lebanon, Michael Fumento, Nancy Pelosi, Republicans, science, Spain

Utrecht Riots: Neighbourhood Closed Off

The Dutch police deny that the police officer who killed Rinie Mulder is of Moroccan or Turkish descent. Esther, a Dutch blogger, refers to a post on a Moroccan website saying the police officer is Turkish, not Moroccan. The post has, however, been removed. Yesterday, we reported, relying on sources in Ondiep, that the officer was a Moroccan woman.

Crickets chirping at Google News and Beeb

Klein Verzet (h/t No Pasaran) has a post on the second night of serious riots in Utrecht:

But unlike the Paris riots, the rioters are not Muslims. The rioters are all native Dutch. Just like the Dutch man shot by the police. So what is going on? Dutch national media is very, very silent about the reasons for the shooting and seems to suggest that the riots are just the work of football hooligans.

Go read the rest, and follow their links.
Update: At Islam in Europe, Utrecht: Ondiep roundup
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Richard catches a demonstration and ponders the EU.
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Bad habit: ZAPATERO SURRENDERED AGAIN
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Terrorists Proving Harder to Profile
European Officials Say Traits of Suspected Islamic Extremists Are Constantly Shifting

European authorities said the trait patterns of those arrested on terrorism charges are constantly shifting. In the Netherlands, officials said they are seeing an increase in the number of young teenagers and people of Turkish descent, two groups that used to be low on their radar. Among the key players in the Hofstad group, a cell of Islamic radicals that targeted Dutch politicians and cultural figures, was Jason Walters, the teenage son of a U.S. soldier.

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Chirac's retiring and the French are upset that the American news venues aren't carrying this as a top story as they have - L'Escroc has been France2's top story for the last 2 days. As underwhelmed as I am by all this, I recommend Nidra Poller's article on Chirac's carreer.

He gets to keep 'ees lunch money, too.

Meanwhile, A Moderate Male Chauvinist gets stopped at the airport. Said male chauvinist has been banned from the USA for his contextually explicable (his words, not mine) positions on stoning women to death and the killing of innocent children.
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In lighter news,
Literati celeb feud of the day: Vargas Llosa gave Garcia Marquez black eye in 1976 (h/t Iberian Notes).

Labels: EU, France, Holland, Islam, Jacques Chirac, literature, Spain, terrorism, UK

Remember the Dolce & Gabanna ad I posted about last Friday?

Well, Dolce and Gabbana stops all advertising in Spain

Tue Mar 13, 1:58 PM ET
Italian fashion house Dolce and Gabbana said on Tuesday it would stop all its advertising in Spain after it was forced to withdraw an advert for "justifying" violence against women.

Also on Tuesday another Italian fashion icon, Giorgio Armani, expressed surprise over similar criticism in Spain for one of its advertisements.

"Following the harsh criticism levelled by the Spanish authorities against an image in (one of our) publicity campaigns .. Dolce and Gabbanna announces the withdrawal from Spain of all its advertising campaigns to protect the creative freedom that has always characterised the brand," the company said in a statement.

"Recently, Spain, with its climate of censorship, has shown itself willing to negatively interpret all messages even when there is no reason to do so," the Dolce and Gabbanna statement said.

"Even though it goes against the interests of Dolce and Gabbana, the decision to halt brand advertising in this country has become unavoidable," it added

The offending advert showed a woman pinned to the ground by a bare-chested man holding her wrists, with other men in the background looking on impassively.

In February D and G was forced to pull the advert after the Women's Institute of Spain, a government agency, and a consumer association said it glorified "chauvinist violence".

It was also banned in Italy in March and subsequently pulled from the world market.

The spanish women's institute said the advert allowed people to think it was "justified to use force against women."

In a reference to similar criticism in Spain of an advert by Giorgio Armani, D and G said it "hoped other stylists ... will take measures against Spain, which is not only the first country to make illegitimate accusations, but which has also helped spark controversy in other countries."

A local Madrid official said last week that an Armani advertisement showing two young girls wearing lipstick was "borderline," indicating that he would seek to have it banned.

"I do not consider it normal that two girls so young should appear with make-up on their lips," Arturo Canalda told Spanish media, claiming the advert could promote "sexual tourism."

Hat tip: Jeremayakovka, who is also posting TownHall

Labels: fashion, France, Italy, magazines, media, news, Spain

In Spain, March 11, 2004, the date of the terrorist attacks on the Madrid trains is referred to as "once eme", i.e., "11 M".

Barcepundit has a list of the people who died, including their nationalities and ages. He also links to a Wall Street Journal article, Terror's Spanish Legacy

The aftermath of 11M -- once eme, as that day in known in Spanish -- has been anything but tasteful. If America unified following 9/11, Spain split along sharply sectarian lines within hours of the commuter-train bombings. An election swung from the ruling and favored center-right Popular Party, whose support for the Iraq war the left quickly blamed for inviting terror, lost to the anti-American Socialists. The Islamist architects couldn't have hoped for a better result in striking three days before polling day. But those traumatic events have been followed by others, shifting the course of Spanish history in ways no one then imagined possible.

Opposition protest accuses Spain of ETA surrender

Gateway Pundit posts on the hundreds of thousands of protesters rallied against "surrendering to the terrorists" in Madrid on Saturday.

Inside Europe: Iberian Notes

The West is at war with Al Qaeda and Islamist terrorists, in New York, London, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Spain too, a war we did not start. Zapatero does not recognize this. He honestly believes that if the West does not meet the Islamists' demands, some of which he considers legitimate, then the consequent struggle is our fault. And, twenty years ago, he believed that if the West did not meet the Soviets' demands, some of which he considered more than legitimate, then the consequent struggle was our fault.

Publius Pundit: SPAIN PROTESTS ZAPATERO

Spaniards are fed up with leftist Prime Minister Luis Rodriguez Zapatero´s coddling of ETA terrorists, who´ve made quite a return appearance since the brutal terror attacks of March 11 on Spanish trains.

Clearly, they´ve taken to heart the lesson from that alqaida experience, a bad one, that terrorism pays in Spain.

Toasted Bread has photos and round-up. Among the many items she touches on is the question of the use of the Spanish flag, which is an issue among those who consider themselves first and foremost EU citizens. Go to Toasted Bread and scroll down.

Labels: 3/11, Barcepundit, Inside Europe:Iberian Notes, Spain, terrorism

Yesterday was International Women's Day

Celebrated on 8 March, International Women's Day (IWD) is the global day connecting all women around the world and inspiring them to achieve their full potential.

Well, that's a nice sentiment, but I for one believe that all people should be inspired to achieve their full potential.

Women don't need to look to the UN for inspiration. Or to the government, or, least of all, to the thought police.

As it happened, yesterday morning I was discussing women with Spanish journalist Maria Blanco. Maria's latest article (in Spanish) deals with a weird Dolce & Gabbana ad that has caused quite a furore in Europe, and the thought police are calling for more government intervention to protect us from ourselves.

Here's the ad in question:

Considering D&G's prior ads, this is pretty mild.

The ad has caused a huge controversy in Spain, France2 was scandalized into reporting on it, and now Amnesty International in Italy is asking that the ad be pulled from Italian magazines.

Think about that for a moment: millions of men, women, and children are opressed around the world, abused, enslaved, and executed, and AI/I finds time to protest an ad in a fashion magazine.

As Maria explains in her article, D&G's ad features their characteristic

transgresion, provocation, the erotic wink, and as they themselves explain, the ad campaign is about images "that explore the thin border between morality and immorality, two parallel dimensions that coexist and divide the world".

As it turns out, the Spanish government's Instituto de la Mujer (IM) (Women's Institute) is being pressured to ban the ad by the Green party, the leftlist Facua - a consumer organization affiliated with the University of Havana, that bastion of free thought - and others, because of a possible violation of section 3 of the Advertising Law (oh, yes, the Spanish have advertising laws) banning advertising that might exploit women, shows women as stereotypes, or promotes violence against women.

Maria Blanco looks at the ad and explains

In the first place, the woman in the ad is a model who has voluntarily agreed to the use of her body in a photographic composition

On the second issue, Maria explains that what raises the feminists' hackles is the highlight on the woman's desireable body.

So the feminazis [Maria's word] that indoctrinate us for our own good and that penalize what they so unfortunately describe as the "objectifying of women", are only rebroadcasting the idea that our bodies are shameful and shouldn't be shown off as we will. We can show our other gifts, particularly those that make us like men... but not our sexual gifts.

Additionally, the Spanish Green party is also criticizing the ad because one of the guys is holding a glass (the photo above is cropped and doesn't show it, not because I wanted to but because this is the one I could find), which would incite people to consume alcohol.

I kid you not: the Greens believe that showing a photograph of someone holding a glass is going to drive you to drink.

No wonder they think this overstylized picture will incite the masses into a frenzy.

Maria continues

The picture mainly portrays a woman's sexual fantasy... She's calmly offering herself to one or several, voluntarily, in front of other good looking men. There's no violence at all, no pornography.

As Maria sees it,

What there is, is eroticism, fantasy and subtlety.

But there is a larger issue here:

In all, this preocupation with our well-being shows the immaturity of our female leaders. They didn't get past the image of the neolithic man that kidnapped women from other tribes to rape and to replicate his genes. As a (male) friend said, they have remained in the ideological adolescence of the 1960s and 70s. By doing so, they have becomen women's worst repressors, the worst agressors against the sexual freedom of each of us women.

The political comissariat indoctrinating us is missing out on a great deal of pleasures.

France2's reporter in Italy interviewed several people on the street, and the one man they talked to said, "I don't like it, but if you don't want to look at the ad, don't buy the magazine". Of course, the ideologues would never ever think of that, because it's all about the ideology. They know what's good for you.

But, as Maria later asked in an email,

And what about us women who like tenderness, with imagination, fantasy, and dreams but without going too far beyond... are we stupid?

Hay que defenderse y dar la cara, la cara tierna, libre, imaginativa, femenina y, de nuevo, por si alguien tiene dudas... la libre, la cara libre de la mujer.

We must stand up for ourselves, and show our faces, the tender, free, imaginative, femenine face, and again, if anyone has any doubt, the free face of a woman.

Brava, Maria.
-----------------------------------------------
As a postscript, in the evening I was watching France2 news and they were talking about women in power while saying that Margaret Thatcher didn't bring about progress and "was on the masculine side".

That's what happens when you are not popular with the bien pensant, even on International Women's Day.

Update, Saturday 10 March: Atlas Shrugs and The Hill Chronicles are posting about it.

My friend Laura posed an interesting question,

In view that it's leftist groups asking for censorship, I wonder what the reaction would have been if Christian groups or the Vatican had been doing the asking?

Labels: fashion, France, Italy, magazines, media, news, Spain

I had a great time doing this morning's podcast with John Chappell of Inside Europe: Iberian Notes and Jose Miguel Guardia of Pajamas Media and Barcepundit. As promised, we talked about the March 11 terrorist trials, and illegal immigration into the EU.

The trial of 29 people accused of planning, supporting, and carrying out the March 11, 2004 explosions in the Madrid trains started eleven days ago on February 15. Missing from the trial are the four suspects who blew themselves up in a Madrid apartment during a police raid

Among the dead is the alleged ringleader of the Madrid bombings, Sarhane ben Abdelmajid Fakhet, a Tunisian named in the international arrest warrants, the authorities say.

Brett Stephens explains the rules under which the suspects are investigated when in a Napoleonic code judiciary, as Spain has.

The BBC has an article discussing some of the issues surrounding the trial. The International Herald Tribune takes A brief look at the 29 suspects in Spain's March 11 Trial.

During the podcast we also talked about the possible sentences. The way the Spanish laws work, no matter how long a sentence, the culprit serves only a maximum term of forty years.

You can listen to the podcast here:


How are the subjects of terrorism and immigration related?

Europe, however, is also a magnet for immigration: It will attract up to 1 million newcomers this year. But the European experience with immigration is quite different from that of America. Part of the reason is that many immigrants to Europe end up on welfare, while in the United States, almost all immigrants take one or more entry-level jobs and work their way up the economic ladder. Welfare is simply not the American way.

Islamic Conquest of Europe?

Moreover, most immigrants to the United States are fully integrated into American society by the second generation, regardless of their country of origin. By contrast, most immigrants to Europe are Muslims who refuse to assimilate and instead tend to cluster in marginalized ghettos on the outskirts of cities across the continent.

Here, too, the American experience is quite different. The best available estimates show that there are between 1.9 million and 2.8 million Muslims in the United States. And unlike their European counterparts, American Muslims generally do not feel marginalized or isolated from political participation. According to a 2004 Zogby Poll, American Muslims are more educated and affluent than the national average, with 59 percent of them holding at least an undergraduate college degree. Moreover, the majority of American Muslims are employed in professional fields, with one in three having an income over $75,000 a year.

But back to Europe: The Muslim population of Europe has more than doubled since 1980, and according to some estimates, there are some 25 million Muslims living on the continent today. Demographers predict that this figure may double by 2015, and that the number of Muslims could outnumber non-Muslims in all of Western Europe by mid-century. This prompted Princeton University's Bernard Lewis to tell the German newspaper Die Welt that 'Europe will be Islamic by the end of the century.'

This reality is already influencing European foreign policymaking and does not auger well for the future of transatlantic relations. Indeed, many analysts believe that the steady weakening of Europe is the underlying cause for the widespread anti-American and anti-Israel bigotry found among Europe's elites, many of whom are bowing to pressure from Muslim residents as a way to buy a fake peace with radical Islamists. Says Fouad Ajami, a well-known authority of the Arab world: 'In ways both intended and subliminal, the escape into anti-Americanism is an attempt at false bonding with the peoples of Islam.'

John links to Aaron Hanscom's interview with Professor Javier Jordan of the University of Granada, and of Jihad Monitor, who explains further,

The analysis of personal profiles of more than 300 jihadists arrested in Spain shows that there is a significant proportion that belong to the middle-class, have family, are fluent in Spanish and have even obtained Spanish citizenship. For example, in the Abu Dahdah network, an Al Qaeda cell dismantled at the end of 2001, half of the members would be classified as "socioeconomically integrated."

Social exclusion, imprisonment or arriving to Spain without family and work are factors that can make an individual even more vulnerable to the recruitment process. Under these circumstances, the jihadist group offers friendship, camaraderie and material support, while inculcating the subject with radical ideas. Nevertheless, the process can occur without any material favors being offered. To explain it in simpler terms, the key ingredient is the "bad company" one keeps. In most cases, jihadist values are spread through confidential ties and friendships.

Follow Barcepundit's links for more background on the trial.

Botched investigations, feeble sentences, massive unrestrained illegal immigration into a welfare state, and social isolation of immigrants add up to an explosive mess.

We'll do a follow-up podcast as the trial develops.

Labels: 3/11, Barcepundit, illegal immigration, Inside Europe:Iberian Notes, Islam, Madrid, Spain, terrorism

Pamela has a post, ATLAS EXPOSE: ISLAMIC CHARITY SHAM! MUSLIM ABUSE SHELTER TAX SHELTER? regarding the North American Islamic Shelter for the Abused.

The HILL Chronicles Exclusive: McCain will run for President in '08

Pajamas Media's running a straw poll, and the first results are in.

Shooting the messenger - reactions to "Undercover Mosque"

A truly beautiful and interesting blog, Blogging in Paris, posts about Gitta and Roza by the river

The weather in Spain is so cold (how cold is it?), Barcepundit's wondering if Al Gore's in Barcelona. John Ast posts press reactions to the recent gang activity by the Latin Kings.

From Maria
Black racism

Labels: blogs, politics, Spain

In Spanish, Libertad Digital TV.
Also at the website, films, documentaries, and more.

Will visit daily!
(h/t Narpo)

Labels: news, Spain, TV

Pan's Labyrinth, El laberinto del fauno, is the second movie I've seen by director-writer-producer Guillermo del Toro. His El espinazo del diablo (The Devil's Backbone) was an extraordinary allegory on the Spanish Civil War told as a ghost story. Both films are true works of art. Like The Devil's Backbone, Pan's Labyrinth is not going to be everybody's cup of tea, but I loved it.

First and foremost, it is a feast for the eyes. The natural settings are beautiful, the sets and special effects are sumptuous, and every period detail is authentic and exactly as it should be. The photography, lighting, design and composition further contribute to a masterpiece. This is what cinematography should be: truly an art. While most of the action takes place in darkness, it is darkness that is clear and beautiful. Indeed, the trailer says, "in darkness there can be light", and the film delivers. (I could only wish they'd use these artists in the Harry Potter movies.) The score uses a traditional lullaby theme evocative of sorrowful longing and lost love.

Art history majors will have a great time comparing the images with Spanish art, from Goya to Un Chien Andalou. The motifs of ruins of Celtic Spain are integral part of the highly stylized fairy tale setting.

While there are a lot of symbolic elements (a blank book, a broken watch, a mandrake root, and so on) and a plethora of fairy tale imagery, the movie is not bogged down with them, unlike Children of Men. Elements of magical realism, and children caught up in the emergence of a fascist society reminiscent of The Tin Drum are handled deftly and do not obscure this marvelous tale.

Another good thing: the movie is not dubbed, and the actors' voices are extraordinarily rich and beautiful, with no exception.

While on the surface there appear to be two story lines, there is in the end only one, involving the central character, Ofelia (Ivana Baquero), a beautiful 11-yr old girl living in 1944 post-Civil War Spain. Olivia's mother is suffering from life-threatening pregnancy complications as the two of them head to her mother's new husband's headquarters. Ofelia's too old for dolls but holds close to her heart the fairy tales of her childhood as she meets her stepfather, the sadistic Capitan Vidal (Sergi Lopez), who might have killed her father or might possibly even be her natural father.

As her mother becomes more ill and the environment gradually reveals itself to its true cruelty, Olivia becomes a princess embarking on three quests. In addition to the fairy tale princess and the monstrous stepfather, there is a heroic woman and a courageous doctor. Mercedes the housekeeper (Maribel Verdu) nearly steals the movie but all the actors rise to the challenge. The movie increasingly develops tension and suspense: you care for these people.

I must emphasize that this is not a film for children because of violence, language, and adult themes. The fairy tale indeed is the way this helpless child can cope with the horror around her, and it's up to you to decide if it exists or not. Thinking of this movie as exclusively a fairy tale is missing the point.

I know of no other Spanish film that has dealt as graphically with Spain's descent into 20th Century totalitarianism. The ruins shown during the initial sequence are what remains of the town of Belchite in Zaragoza, which was destroyed during the Spanish Civil War and never rebuilt. As the descendant of Spaniards who swore never to return after the Civil War, the plot packed a big emotional punch for me.

(Update: I'm discussing the propaganda aspect with Spanish bloggers and will post on this at another time)

While Peter Paul Martin found Pan's Labyrinth "primarily a fantasy film with a human story woven into it", I consider it the reverse: a human story with a fantasy element woven in. It has great emotional depth.

Peter Travers of Rolling Stone said,

Del Toro never coddles the audience. He means for us to leave Pan's Labyrinth shaken to our souls. He succeeds triumphantly.

I was completely spellbound by this film and hope you will enjoy it as much as I have.

Pan's Labyrinth is a masterpiece.

Don't forget to bring Kleenex - you're going to need it.

PS, my apologies to Paul Martin for the error.

Rated R for violence, disturbing images, and language.
In Spanish with English subtitles. The subtitles were easy to read, and accurate.

Labels: El laberinto del fauno, entertainment, Guillermo del Toro, movies, Pan's Labyrinth, Spain, Spanish Civil War