He is one of those Austrians who drove the late Thomas Bernhard to maddened distraction, the kind who claim that Austrians were the "first victims" of Hitler (forgetting those cheering crowds, that delight at Anschluss).

"Those Austrians" are only echoing the statement issued by the foreign ministers of the US, UK, and USSR at the Moscow Conference of 1943, which referred to Austria as "the first free country to fall a victim to Hitlerite aggression."

What was ironic about this statement is that the Austrians who were most opposed to the Anschluss were the pro-Habsburg monarchists and the supporters of Dolfuss and Schussnigg, all of whom the Allies were determined to exclude from any signifcant political role in postwar Austria.

Posted by: Seamus at August 29, 2007 10:38 AM

It's a rapidly polarizing world, this mad, mad, mad, mad, muhammadan world.

Hugh,

who do you like in Israel:

Avigdor Lieberman or Ehud Olmert?

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at August 29, 2007 10:45 AM

Hugh-
I always enjoy reading your comments, and I usually agree with you. However, as an Auastrian, I have to disagree with you.
Waldheim was an elected President, a fact that the US has consistently chosen to ignore. It has also chosen to ignore numerous reports by historians about Waldheim's role in the Nazi era. He was not a thug. I am not a historian, far from an expert, but please: the man is dead, he repented, he asked for forgiveness. He never got over his being ostracized. He was a good man. I know, because he saved my life in August 1990 (remember the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait? I was there.)How many had the guts to do that in the wake of worldwide criticism? How many followed his example?

Concerning Jörg Haider: yes, he's a creep, but he's also democratically elected. That must be respected by all. However, in order to stave off Islam I personally don't care who is helping us win the fight, be in Haider or LePen.

Hugh- you seem to know some German: Lassen wir die Kirche im Dorf!

Posted by: Eurodhimmi at August 29, 2007 11:08 AM

What truly rankles me about Nazi-lite characters like Jorg Haider is that their anti-Semitism and other less-than-stellar characteristics give a bad name to the one worthy endeavor they promote--halting the Islamization of Europe. It's because of them that someone like Geert Wilders is routinely maligned as some far-right anti-Semite Nazi, even though he is nothing of the kind.

"However, in order to stave off Islam I personally don't care who is helping us win the fight, be in Haider or LePen."

I understand wanting Islam to disappear, but hate-spewing anti-Semites like Haider and LePen aren't the answer.

Posted by: GetBornAgain at August 29, 2007 11:14 AM

I have no problem with halting the construction of new mosques.

Posted by: Elric66 at August 29, 2007 11:48 AM

Yes, Hirsi Ali has indeed been implicated as belonging to the "far-right" . This was done by Ronald Plasterk, the current dutch Education and Science minister, in a column in the dutch neswpaper "Volkskrant" on 21 april 2006.

Posted by: Nicephoras phocas at August 29, 2007 12:45 PM

"I usually agree with you. However, as an Austrian, I have to disagree with you.
Waldheim was an elected President, a fact that the US has consistently chosen to ignore. It has also chosen to ignore numerous reports by historians about Waldheim's role in the Nazi era. He was not a thug. I am not a historian, far from an expert, but please: the man is dead, he repented, he asked for forgiveness. He never got over his being ostracized. He was a good man. I know, because he saved my life in August 1990 (remember the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait? I was there.)How many had the guts to do that in the wake of worldwide criticism? How many followed his example?"
-- from a posting above

1. You claim that "as an Austrian" you have to disagree with me. Oh no you don't. "As an Austrian" you are perfectly free to be ashamed, as a number of intelligent and educated Austrians I know are ashamed, of the way in which Kurt Waldheim managed to escape punishment for his wartime crimes and complicities, and rise high first in the Austrian diplomatic corps, and the all the way to the top of the U.N. You are perfectly free to choose what in Austrian history you wish to defend and what you wish to dplore.

You depict Waldheim as a victim, someone who "never got over being ostracized." What in god's name are you talking about? Half of Austria rallied around him when the stories about his wartime activities in the Balkans, piece by dreadful piece, came to light in the late summer and early fall of 1986. Many people in Austria deeply resented these attacks, and not a few engaged in antisemitic allusions, the usual "the Jews must be behind this" as if it were a) inconceivable that Waldheim might indeed have been covering up his wartime career and that b) non-Jews too might have a stake in finding the truth out, and be perfectly willing to expres their disgust as well -- for like all murders the Nazi murders are not to be deplored only by those most immediately affected, the descendants or relatives of those who were looted, tortured, killed in a thousand fiendish ways.

3. You say that Waldheim "saved your life" while you were in Kuwait? Did he stop a bullet? Push you away from a speeding tank? Or did he change your orders in Kuwait, so that you were not sent into Iraq during the Gulf War? One would like to know more about how Waldheim saved your life.

But in any case, so what? Does that make up for his war-criminal activities, his being in Salonika at the time of the great Aktion, when all the Jews (Salonika was heavily Jewish), were rounded up, and forced to stand for hours motionless under the Salonika sun, some of the collapsing, some dying, while German soldiers (and even the wives of those soldiers) jeered them? Kurt Waldheim was there. He was there, and he won a medal, during "Operation Kozara," which was a messy affair in which tens of thousands of civilians were deliberately, not accidentally, killed by the Nazi (German and Austrian) troops. Toward the end of the war, he was the Inteligence Officer in Unit I-C, and in up to his neck in the planning of atrocities. In 1947 a fellow officer in that unit, one Johan Mayer, testifed about what Waldheim had done. But in 1947, there were tens, even hundreds of thousands of such cases, and Waldheim was nothing special. Later, it appears that Tito found out about Waldheim's war record, and may even have used that information as blackmail to modify Waldheim's behavior both in the Austrian diplomatic corps and at the U.N. (Tito sometimes entertained Waldheim at his retreat on the island of Brioni). You write that you are not a "historian" but if you wish to make an informed judgment, rather than offer something based either on apparent group loyalty ("as an Austrian" -- as if many Austrians were not pefectly, serenely capable of denouncing, rather than defending, Waldheim) or on sentimental gratitude ("he saved my life") then you have a duty to fully inform yourself about exactly what Waldheim did -- he was no run-of-the-mill Wehrmacht conscript -- about exactly where he was, when, and what medals he received, and what duties he performed. I don't think you will continue to defend him after that.

And as to that "he saved my life" gratitude. Imagine that you are visiting Los Angeles, and about to cross the street, but being unfamiliar with the United States, you start out too soon, and a car is just about to hit you, when suddenly the same dark-skinned man with the most open and friendliest of faces, who had been standing near you on the curb, rushes out -- he's a very fast runner -- and athletically scoops you up and manages tocarry you right to safety. You'd be grateful to him for having saved your life." Would you also forgive him, and let bygones be bygones, when you discover that your samaritan-saver who had risked his life to save yours (unlike Waldheim, whom I presume did not personally risk his own life to save yours in Kuwait) is named O. J. Simpson.

I find morally intolerable the idea that if Nazi war criminals live long enough, or rise high enough, or as in Waldheim's case both live long enough and rise high enough, we should forgive them. And besides, you tell me that he repented. Did he? Did he ever make an admission as to his guilt? Remember -- or perhaps you don't -- how he kept claiming that he had been home in Vienna, taking exams, or working on his doctorate, in order to maintain that he was not at the site of various atrocities when all the evidence makes clear that he was, and that he was lying for exaclty that reason -- lying not long ago, but in 1986, when the story first broke, and continuing to lie.

You write that "the man is dead." So what? Should we rewrite his life because "the man is dead"? If so, since we will all die, we all deserve to have our lives re-written, or nothing bad said about us after our death.

And then you insist "he repented." Did he? What did he "repent" of? I'd like to see his public "repentance." I'd like to see what he admitted to having taken part in, or did he merely issue some kind of vague covering-all-bases "I'm sorry" that meant nothing, after so many years of lying, and in his run for the presidency of Austria, exploiting the pre-existing defensiveness (not unmixed, among some, with antisemitism and a feeling that "we Austrians have suffered enough" that leaves me, and hundreds of millions of others if they thought about it, cold)of Austrians rallying around them, no matter what antisemitic or other unpleasant coloration such a defensiveness took on, with that "we Austrians have suffered enough" attitude that so maddened Thomas Bernhard, and so maddens any morally sensitive Austrian, not to mention Germans, and other non-Austrians, today, and always will, and always should. If he "asked for forgiveness" I was unaware of it, but asking for forgiveness means nothing if he does not specify exactly those acts for which he is requesting "forgiveness." As for being "ostracized" -- he made out quite well, didn't he, really, being elected, even after this scandal, to the Presidency of Austria. Some ostracism. And then he lived very comfortably on that fat U.N. pension given to former Secretaries-General by the U.N. (and therefore paid, in great part, by American taxpayers). If you mean he wasn't quite so welcome to swan around the world, and visit the corridors of power, if you mean he wasn't invited to Davos -- well, yes, in that sense he was "ostracized" just like almost all the rest of humanity. But he had a gay old time at the Schonbrunn Palace, didn't he, long after every detail about his war record was avialable for public inspection.

And his crimes were of a different level altogether, than those of the "O. J. Simpson" used in my hypothetical above. O.J. Simpson, after all, unpleasant as he is, merely committed a frenzied and unpremeditated crime of passion, resulting in the deaths of exactly two people. Waldheim's crimes were committed over several years, during his active, be-medalled, and apparently enthusiastic participation in, not one but a series of mass-murdering (of Jews, of Serbian civliians) atrocities, in Greece and in the former Yugoslavia. And it is not an excuse to say that many people got away with it, many people were not punished. We know that. History knows that. It excuses nothing.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 12:51 PM

"Friends" like Jorg Haider do us more harm than good, as anyone saying anything about Islam will be lumped as Jorg-like acolyte.

One the reasons why the right is less whacky than the right in the US is that groups like the John Birch society were repudiated, while the left embraces the equivalent--an embrace that gets tighter by the day.

Posted by: JSobieski at August 29, 2007 1:04 PM

The poster "Seamus" has proven himself to be a constant, stout, and very quick defender of those he thinks I much malign, including the Sudeten Germans. He hates any mention of the Benes Decree, and keeps trying to find ways to call it into question, and also tries to make it appear that such mention \must necessarily constitute a thoroughgoing endorsement by me. But this is nonsense. The Benes Decree has been adduced as an example of the way in which not merely such regimes as those of Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Morocco, Algeria, and Libya, have expelled the nationals, but so too has a modern, advanced, tolerant, Western state, Czechoslovakia, when its tolerant and civilized leaders, Jan Masaryk and Eduard Benes, and many other Czechs, drew from the Czech experience just before and during World War II with the Sudeten Germans living inside Czechoslovakia, who for the most part, under their leader Henlein, willingly allowed themselves to be used by Hitler to promote his own war aims and demands on Czechoslovakia, and then after Czechoslovakia was occupied by German troops, those Sudeten Germs received the same rations as German soldiers, which was much better than what the Czechs and Slovaks received, and otherwise received special treatment (as did Volksdeutsche elsewhere, as in Poland), and many collaborated with their fellow ethnic Germans. The Benes Decree cannot be ignored for it raises an issue that needs to be pondered: what has a universally-recognized tolerant Western regime felt necessary in the recent past to do, by way of enlarging the historical consciousness and understanding of those who may not know enough even about that recent past). He also appears to have a penchant for putting in quick, darting remarks designed to explain away Muslim behavior, or to justify it on a Tu-Quoque basis, with the “Tu”in the Tu-Quoque ordinarily being, for Seamus, the endlessly invidious state of Israel, that Mighty Empire that doth bestride the world like a colossus.

I have looked over all of his past postings, and have noticed that his sympathies run deep, but also very narrow. Whatever else he is here for, he is not here to learn about Islam, or contribute to the discussion about ways to handle the world-wide menace of Jihad. And now, above on this thread, “Seamus” takes issue with my comments on Austria as phonily thinking of itself, presenting itself, as the “first victim of Hitler.” He adduces as proof that Austria was indeed the “first victim of Hitler” a statement that was apparently put into some communiqué issued by something he calls the Moscow Conference in 1943 (Yalta?), a conference held in the middle of World War II. Now it is obvious what happened. The Allies, in the middle of the war, put in some remark designed to appeal to some Austrians in the hope that they might be broken off from the alliance with Germany. It was merely a single statement, no more, and who at that point cared if it was an obvious falsehood if it might cause some Austrian soldiers to defect, and to cause greater disaffection with following Germany’s lead among Austria’s civilians.

But one has only to read the best accounts of the best historians – start with William L. Shirer -- about the Austrians in 1938, to understand just how enthusiastic so many of them were about the Anschluss; anyone who has seen newsreels of that period has seen those streets lined with those eager faces on so many screaming, hysterical, often heil-hitlering crowds; anyone who has studied World War II knows that the Austrians, on a per capita basis, contributed even more concentration camp guards than did the Germans. And everyone knows -- every decent historian has noted it -- that the Austrians were quick, after the war, to pretend to have been those "first victims" of Hitler, innocent, gemutlich, “tiny” – only ten million people -- Austria, and the Americans, pushing at that point the British and French (remember that Allied troops, along with Soviet ones, remained in Occupied Austria long after the war), were happy in those Dulles-brother days to pretend that they actually believed this, for it made going easy on the Austrians that much easier to sell at home. No different from the quick re-writing of the past of Wernher von Braun and Arthur Rudolf and other Peenemunde alumni, with Rudolf at least being accused much later of being a war criminal and having to leave the U.S., while von Braun had been made so much of that he was immunized by his own fame. But those days are over; implacable History remains, and the Truth can now be told.

"Seamus" refers to the Hapsburgs and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and tells us, in the un-misleading second part of his post, that the Old Conservatives of that past -- you can see their old-fashioned demeanors, their frac-tails, and their lorgnettes, and the stout women who all look like Margaret Dumont, in the photographs taken by Erich Salomon and collected in his “Portrait of an Age,” where fixed in amber one views the diplomatic salons and interminable meetings of the political class, especially in Germany and Austria (but also in Paris and London), during the entre-deux-guerres period, in that crazed Der-Mann-Ohne-Eigenschaften (Musil’s “The Man Without Qualities”) world. There was a lot to be said for the Austro-Hungarian Empire, no doubt, and its breakup after World War I may have contributed to the monstrousness that followed. But not every “conservative” was stoutly anti-Hitler; some, on the right, simply shifted to the far-right. However, Chancellor Dollfuss was assassinated by Hitler for being Jewish (though author of an anti-Semitic tract himself) and being resistant to Hitler’s aims, and Kurt Schuschnigg – not “Schussnigg” as in the post above to which I am replying) – resisted Hitler too, and spent part of the war in Sachsenhausen, being tortured by the Nazis.

The best of the “conservative” opposition to Hitler was to be found not only in Austria but in Germany. “Diary of a Man in Despair” by Count Friedrich Reck-Maleckzewen (murdered in 1945 at Dachau), for example, every page dripping with contempt for Hitler and the rabble, or the people who made themselves into a rabble in order to fit in and to follow him, is unforgettable. And then there are all those German-speaking exiles who arrived on these safe shores, and were rescued, and who included Joseph Schumpeter at the Center for Entrepreneurial History at Harvard (22 Mass. Ave., a rickety old structure, long torn down, with fireplaces in every office-suite, and wooden floors that slanted), and Friedrich von Hayek, and a thousand others. Real conservatives, yes, and therefore, of course, implacable enemies of Hitler and his hysterical followers, with their followers’ slave mentality.

The whole point of the article above was to make clear that while Infidels must make common cause, there are limits. And when someone such as Jorg Haider happens to be promoting the right thing, what will happen next is obvious: the Muslim lobby, and those non-Muslims who dangerously defend and promote them, will point to the support given to this measure by Jorg Haider to dismiss not only this measure, but other such measures that might, that indeed should be, supported by all sensible Infidels. It’s a danger, it’s a way for such groups as CAIR to wrap themselves in a moral mantle that they have no business putting on. It is therefore important for those who recognize Islam as a Total System (just as Nazism was a Total System), not make the mistake of embracing absolutely everyone who appears to have the right view of Islam, but is a defender, if not a believer in, one of the other unacceptable Total Systems, or mental totalitarianisms, of this unappetizing age.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 1:21 PM

I need a break for lunch. There's that famous lapidary remark by Brecht:

Erst kommt das Fressen, dann kommt die Morale.

Grub First, Then Ethics. Well, today I stupidly reversed the order. It was a mistake.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 1:24 PM

Franco was called both a Fascist and a benevolent dictator. For the better part, he was able to remember Spanish history and until he died in 1974, no mosques were erected in Spain.

If a modern European country can ban them, can't we try?

OT Thanks to all the dhimmis (especially the Reform Jews) in St. Louis who badgered the county council to reverse their decision disallowing a 25,000 sf mosque. You will build it, and they will come. Keith Ellison himself will visit the new mosque in Russ Carnahan's (D)congressional district. BTW, this is Dick Gephardt's(D) former district, and he laid the
groundwork with subsidized housing for Clinton's Somali and Bosnian 'refugees.'

Posted by: CapitalistGig at August 29, 2007 1:24 PM

Hugh wrote:
And as to that "he saved my life" gratitude. Imagine that you are visiting Los Angeles, and about to cross the street, but being unfamiliar with the United States, you start out too soon, and a car is just about to hit you, when suddenly the same dark-skinned man with the most open and friendliest of faces, who had been standing near you on the curb, rushes out -- he's a very fast runner -- and athletically scoops you up and manages tocarry you right to safety. You'd be grateful to him for having saved your life." Would you also forgive him, and let bygones be bygones, when you discover that your samaritan-saver who had risked his life to save yours (unlike Waldheim, whom I presume did not personally risk his own life to save yours in Kuwait) is named O. J. Simpson.

Without commenting on the whole of your Waldheim argument, Hugh, since I am neither comfortable nor qualified in swimming to the same depths of the historical sea as yourself, concerning Austria and the Nazis, and Waldheim in particular, I do recall learning however that one of my own American heroes sat rotting in the Bastille ignored by the realpolitik Jefferson and Madison because he, the hero Paine, Citizen Paine, apotheosized by the French people as the friend of liberty everywhere, would not sign the petition calling for the head of Louis XIV who Paine said was a friend who had aided America in her time of need against the English. He wasn't saying the king was blameless, but that he didn't feel that he could betray a friend by actively calling for his death.

My point? Sometimes a random act of kindness, or a lingering friendship might indeed trump some cold rational desire for revenge based on the rippling sensibilities of greater justice.

Of course, perhaps Paine was wrong.

Posted by: Gabriel_the_American at August 29, 2007 1:27 PM

Hugh - thanks for your reply. As you can imagine, I do not in any way agree with you. Believe me, I know plenty of what apparently happened in the Balkans and what he did or did not do there. I'm not going to defend any of his actions, I don't think anyone who wasn't there at the time can.
However, let me say this much: you as an American are biased, which is your right. But having lived through the frenzy during Waldheim's election in 1980's - both in the US, where I was schooled, and later in Austria - we as citizens were constantly kept abreast of Waldheim's past.
Just one question: Why didn't the Nazi hunters search for him and find him when he was elected Secretary General of the UN? Why did the famous Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal defend Waldheim, urging everyone back off? Where was Israel, not the US lobbyists, in the 1980's? Where were US historians when he was elected UNSC?

What about the different historians who said there's nothing to the US and US Jewish lobby claims? Do they count for nothing? Hugh, were you there in the 1940's? Right next to him?

Yes, Waldheim did repent. His political testament was published right after his death. Google it, I have a copy I could mail to you. In any case, the US should not be the first to throw a stone, after all, who courted Saddam, who was known even back in the early 1980's to have blood on his hands. I don't believe in tit for tat, but this discussion about a democratically elected president (a fair election, I might add!) should be stopped.

As far as his saving my life: I was a hostage, and he took it upon himself to free not only me, but all of my fellow Austrians. You know that life under Saddam was not considered sacred. Believe me, I was fully aware that I might not make it home alive. Just ask my parents how they felt at the time.

And yes, I would be grateful to OJ if he saved my life. And OJ was aquitted in a court of law (and I am NOT defending his actions in any way). US law, I might add.

Posted by: Eurodhimmi at August 29, 2007 1:28 PM

BTW, I also resent the implication that I am not intelligent and educated because I am not ashamed of Waldheim. I am NOT ashamed, there is no reason for me to be ashamed. I simply disagree with the way Waldheim was dealt with. That is my right.

However, this forum deals with Islam, and this is the danger we're facing today. The past is over. Let's learn from it and move on. That's the reason I am fighting Islam.

Can we agree on that, Hugh?

Posted by: Eurodhimmi at August 29, 2007 1:39 PM

PLEASE FEEL FREE TO POST THIS ANNOUNCEMENT AT OTHER WEBSITES

The Jihad Awareness Project currently has 64 volunteers in 34 states.

WE STILL ARE SEEKING CITIZEN VOLUNTEERS FROM ALL 50 STATES, ESPECIALLY FROM THE FOLLOWING 16:

Alabama
Connecticut
Delaware
Hawaii
Kansas
Louisiana
Michigan
Mississippi
Montana
North Dakota
Oklahoma
South Dakota
Utah
Vermont
West Virginia
Wyoming

I'm looking for at least two people in every state of the Union who would be willing to purchase, from Amazon or any other source, a copy of Robert Spencer's Religion of Peace? Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't and mail it, on an agreed upon date, to one of the senators in your state. I'm organizing an effort to get the book simultaneously to all 100 senators, in order to send a strong message. If we get more than two people per state, books can also be sent to the House of Representatives.

If you’d like to be involved, please write to me at traehnam@yahoo.com under the subject heading “Senate,” and tell me the state your senator represents, an email address where I can reach you, and a nickname. No need for your real name. And I will never share your email address with anyone, not even with other volunteers for this project.

And visit www.jihadawareness.blogspot.com to get more info on this project and to leave comments other volunteers can read. You can also see there the growing list of participants in this project, and the states their senators represent. I’ll try to update the list at least once a day. I've also designed a graphic that might amuse. Scroll down when you get to the site.

Once we have at least two people from every state, we can agree on a mailing date and then each of us can mail a copy of the book on that date.

Right before each of us mails the book, we can issue a press release to various media outlets in every state, and in that way announce and explain the mailing. And perhaps we can come up with some other ways of maximizing the effectiveness of this project and gaining as much positive attention as possible.

Congress is in recess until after Labor Day. But one of the project's volunteers suggested contacting Rep. Sue Myrick, who started the anti-Jihad caucus in Congress. I'll try to coordinate this project with Rep. Myrick to maximize its effectiveness. I've also been calling various congressional offices to get advice on how best to go about this. And I'll soon contact Regnery, Robert Spencer's publisher, to ask their advice and to see if we can coordinate with them in some way.

Posted by: traeh at August 29, 2007 2:27 PM

"And OJ was aquitted in a court of law (and I am NOT defending his actions in any way). US law, I might add."
--Eurodhimmi

Just curious...what's your point? Racial politics made a joke of that trial…but our laws nonetheless protect him from being retried… Ok, he got away with double murder (literally)...so what? What does that prove? That US laws and politics are not infallible? THAT is hardly a point that needs proving, if such was your aim -- and it is irrelevant (not to mention incomparable) to a discussion of the injustice of a Nazi war criminal avoiding prosecution...

Posted by: Rachel at August 29, 2007 2:32 PM

"The past is over. Let's learn from it and move on. That's the reason I am fighting Islam."
-- from a posting above

1) The past is never "over." It is simply past or as a famous wit once wrote even more forcefully and truthfully "it is not even past." But one has to have a good grasp of what that past actually was, and what it means, especially if that "past" was not 3000 years ago, or 800 years ago, but within living memory and the lives of people still alive.

2) Yes, let's learn "from it [that past]." Agreed. But how can we "learn from it" if we do not study it, and study it, and not engage in a refusal to do so because it might be vaguely unpleasant for us, or tell us things we have chosen to not think about too deeply, as for example the case of Kurt Waldheim, and the defensive reaction to it, of many Austrians, so clearly demonstrated. The spectacle did not impress -- and further attempts now by some to think that they can depict Waldheim as some kind of victim instead of as a repeated and willing participant in mass-murder and every sort of atrocity, and who wish us to take at face value, after his lying about his service, and then his exploitation of the attacks on him, in order to win votes when running for President, by appealing to the worst conceivable sentiments in Austria, which is not exactly a demonstration of "repentance." As for dropping a ready tear for Waldheim, as he cashed those fat U.N. checks on top of his pension as a former Austrian diplomat and Austrian president, because he could no longer swan about the White House or Davos, though he was perfectly welcome in Austria and all kinds of places -- I don't call that "ostracism."

I'm unclear as your statement "That's why I am fighting Islam." Why? Are you fighting it because it is doubly-totalitarian, in that it wishes to impose itself on the minds and in the lives of its adherents as a system of Total Regulation, to which it is not theirs to reason why but merely to obey? Is it because Islam encourages the habit of mental submission, and punishes free and skeptical inquiry, and thereby stunts mental growth? Is it because Islam severely limits the possibilites for artistic expression, banning all statuary, and all depictions of living creatures (hence, almost all of Western painting would be banned, or destroyed, under Islam), and music as well (in the strictest interpretation)? Is it because Islam divides the world in two, between Believer and Infidel, and insists that a permanent state of war must exist between the two, and that war can be conducted by Muslims, and it is their duty to conduct it, in order to remove any obstacles to the spread of Islam anywhere in the world (should those Infidels put up any obstacles, or already have in place legal and political institutions that flatly contradict the letter and the spirit of Islam), because the duty of Jihad is central, not tangential, and participation may sometimes be required of individuals, but is always required of the community as a whole, the umma al-islamiyya?

Islam does indeed stunt moral and mental growth. But it is not the only thing that stunts the moral sense. I would like to understand why you think forgetting about "the past" of Nazi war criminals is a good thing, and why we "must get over it," and why Waldheim saving you when you were apparently a hostage of Saddam Hussein (why were you there? What brought you to Kuwait, or was it Iraq?) entitles him to evade or avoid the moral judgment of others, of Posterity, of History? It strikes me as presumptuous for you to offer your own personal connection to Waldheim as a reason why all of us should join you in being so forgiving. We are talking, remember, about mass murder, not shoplifting.

Should I, if the government of Turkey invites me on an all-expenses paid trip, and woos me in every possible way (even mails me, after the fact, a very large rug which I only discover at my house when I return home), let “the past” about this pesky Armenian genocide business simply rest? Should I, because I have no personal connection to any of the mass-murders of the past century, simply forget about all of them, and let the past be the past. Don’t you think the Turks should forthrightly recognize that Armenian genocide, and aren’t you impressed with those Turks whom you meet personally who are willing to do so? And similarly, wouldn’t it be sensible, proper, just, to expect that Austrians might not be more defensive about Waldheim (“as an Austrian”) but make it a point of honor to investigate thoroughly not only Waldheim, but many others, and own up to all of it, and denounce it, and make a point of teaching young Austrians all about those years, and those many waldheims. I allow myself to believe that, upon much greater reflection, your answer – in the privacy of your own soul – will be Yes.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 2:39 PM

Ordinarily one has to be careful and sparing about the use of "right-wing" and "far right-wing," because these terms are used, by The Guardian (and the inimitable Robert Fisk in The Independent), to blacken the name of so many who have given no signs of being "far-right" but only signs of recognizing the menace of the Muslim presence in the tolerant, advanced, and so-far helpless-to-resist countries of Western Europe.

Why adapt the terminology of those who treat 'right-wing' and 'far-right' as slurs? Right-wing means a variety of things politically, depending on a country, from conservative, traditional/religious, open-market, individual liberty, et al: to simply accept the claim of those who've conflated its meaning with Nazism, for instance, is simply playing into their hands. NAZI stood for NAtionale soZIalist deutsch arbeiter partei - while 'nationale' and 'deutsch' may lend it the perception of being right wing, the 'sozialist' and 'arbeiter' parts of the acronym equally strongly suggest that it was a Left-wing party. In fact, given that Germany's was a command economy, and individual liberty did not exist, it's perfectly legitimate to claim that the Nazis, the Fascists and others who followed their footsteps were de facto Left-wing or even far Left-wing parties, despite their opposition to the Soviet Communists.

I agree with you that we should be selective in who we endorse as allies: I however don't agree that we should allow them to re-define political terms to their advantage. Right wing is something to be proud of, and does not include Nazism or Fascism under its umbrella.

Posted by: Infidel Pride at August 29, 2007 3:37 PM

Haider should not be defined as "right-wing" if "right wing" is also to be used, say, for Ludwig von Mises or Josef Pieper. He is beyond that, all the way around in the other direction. So these terms can be troublesome. And since the epithets are most often affixed by a press in a deliberately misleading manner -- what makes Pim Fortuyn and Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Ibn Warraq "right wing" other than their opposition to Islam? -- I think one gains byu trying to avoid their use, rather than trying hopelessly to carefully define them, which definition is a will-o'-the-wisp, endlessly receding further into the swamp or marecage of public life, in any case.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 3:44 PM

Hugh,

I am going to join in the disagreements here, for a simple reason.

During the Second World War, Churchill said, of the alliance with Stalin's Russia, "If Hitler invaded Hell, I would find something good to say about Satan." I suggest that the same principle is applicable here.

You yourself have said that setting the Shia and the Sunni at each others throats and thus weakening the Dar al-Islam is a good thing. By corollary, isn't it worth backing even such types as Joerg Haider in order to weaken the hold of Islam in the West?
A series of successes by far-right parties might even jerk the somanambulent mainstream into some degree of consciousness about the lethal threat posed by Islam.
In Germany, for example, 40% apparently support changing the constitution to ban Islam within Germany. Isn't this something we want to encourage? The first German amendment upholds human dignity, and it is impossible to disagree that Islam violates that.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal at August 29, 2007 3:45 PM

Before I retire for the night- thanks for all these postings, Hugh, but I still do not agree. Waldheim was a lot of things, a coward perhaps, but he was not a mass murderer. There simply was never any proof offered.

As for knowing my history: I'm learning more and more each and every day. I went to school in Austria as well and studied my Austrian history and that of the Nazi era. Believe me, I know plenty, there's no escaping from this in Austria. That is fine. And precisely for this reason do I stand up and fight Islam for its totalitarian nature, for freedom of speech (dying in Europe, I'm afraid), for my child's freedom. I think I'm being misunderstood here. I'm no Nazi, never was, never will be. Those who know me would cringe at the thought. But what I dislike is the equation Austrian = Nazi. This discussion saddens me because it diverts from the point: Islam. Let's return. Please. Let's agree to disagree.

Rachel- Waldheim was never dragged to court, an official court, that is.

Posted by: Eurodhimmi at August 29, 2007 3:48 PM

My two cents:

xenophobic:

suffering from xenophobia; having abnormal fear or hatred of the strange or foreign.

Haider's a hater, a xenophobe. But the enemy of my enemy is my friend. There.

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at August 29, 2007 4:05 PM

But when Churchill said that he would ally himself with Satan in order o defeat Hitler (and he did, and that Satan was Joseph Stalin), he was in the middle of a fighting war, and everyone in England and America knew what they were fighting, and why.

Right now there is not a firm understanding amon the Infidels. A great many of them have no idea what Islam is all about; some of them are wilfully refusing to recognize the nature and menace of Islam, some because they think it promotes "family values" and is an antidote to the decadence of the West (see Dinesh D'Souza), others because they think that Islam means "social justice" and is, now that Communism has come apart so obviously, the only major "social-justice" game in town. Others believe the pretend-universalist claim of Islam. All three groups are wrong. The first ignore the misogyny of Islam and the hysteria over women's sexual allure; the second group ignore the vast extremes of wealth in Islam, and the way in which in Muslim lands there is far less social solidarity even in the most capitalist of countries, with the rulers seizing and diverting as much of the nation's wealth to themselves and their family or tribe or sect as they can manage; the third group does not see that Islam is a vehicle for Arab imperialism.

And then there are others, merely settling their own scores, for example with Bush or "the Republicans" or "conservatives" who cannot or will not recognize the threat.

And Muslims, who are now all over the West, supplied with Saudi funds to conduct not just campaigns of Da'wa, but also to engage in nonstop propaganda to protect Islam's image, and delay the day of widespread Infidel recognition, the moment of anagnorisis, will in Europe if not here, use the fact of Jorg Haider's support for this bill as a way to club any other, perfectly decent opponents of mosques and madrasas elsewhere, and they may well be successful if those who, like you and like me, do not carefully and publicly distance ourselves from, declare our diffrences with, the likes of Jorg Haider, or Le Pen, or any others like that.

Le Pen is now out of the running forever, thank god. He prevented any coalition of the decent to be formed, and Sarkozy won some of his voters; others may be taking a look at Philippe de Villiers. The "Vlaams" group in Belgium is perfectly acceptable, and I wouldn't believe any of the attempts to blacken its name. I don't know enough about the BNP, but because I suspect it will never become respectable enough, those in Great Britain who sensibly are alarmed about Islam should do what the Muslims do: join the major parties and try to rise as high in them as they can.

Just imagine if I had not denounced Jorg Haider at this website. Just imagine that I, or Robert, had written quite otherwise. Just imagine that we had praised Jorg Haider to the skies for his "brilliant" and "brave" act, and also said that we thought anythiing he had done otherwise could be forgiven, or overlooked.

What would CAIR or other Muslim groups, or The Nation or Robert Fisk, have done with that? Thank god we don't thnk that way, so there was no need to dissemble. But what if we had been supporters of Jorg Haider? Do you think it would have been wise, at this point in history, when one can hardly get people to listen to what should be most obvious arguments (say, about Tarbaby Iraq and the need to exploit the pre-existing fissures within Islam that Iraq so obviously presents), if we had expressed that support?

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 4:07 PM

Huge you are defending than neonazie rightwinger like Jorg Haider who want to ban illegality mosque builting show me the Austian people are racist by electioning this criminal racist.

Posted by: DefenderofIslam at August 29, 2007 4:36 PM

Eurodhimmi's position is, I think, weakened by the fact that he himself does not pretend really to know what Waldheim did or did not do. How then can one have a firm position for or against the way Waldheim was dealt with? To have a chance of effectively counter Hugh's position, Eurodhimmi must try to do one of the following:

1. Demonstrate that all the evidence that seems to show that Waldheim participated in mass-murder is in fact not conclusive and doesn't really show that about him.

Or

2. Explain why a mass murderer should not have to answer for his deeds.

Perhaps Eurodhimmi is mixing up two things: At some point soon -- particularly now that most Germans and Austrians currently living had nothing to do with what happened in World War II -- it seems right that Germany and Austria should be relieved of the constant national burden of collective guilt, repentence and stigma under which they have labored for more than a generation. Germany seems to me incredibly impressive in the way it has so thoroughly integrated, into the German educational system, awareness of the horrors of German responsibility for the Holocaust and World War II. I don't know about Austria in that respect. I think Eurodhimmi would be right to support the easing of the constant collective self-flagellation to which Germans have submitted over their responsibility for Nazism. Most Germans today are innocent. But Eurodhimmi should not confuse that innocence with giving a blank check to actual war criminals from that time.

Posted by: traeh at August 29, 2007 4:41 PM

The poster ("As an Austrian") who is grateful to Kurt Waldheim for having helped arrange the freeing of him and 79 79 other Austrians held captive by Saddam Hussein, is a bit too grateful. Why shouldn't Waldehim have worked, as the chief Austrian diplomat for several decades, and at the time, I presume, the President of Austria (or was he then at the U.N.?), have negotiated the release of those captives? That was his duty, and he is owed nothing at all, and especially not an overlooking of his more-than-disturbing past.

The Americans seized in Tehran, and held for 444 days, were finally released when Warren Christopher went to Algiers, released not so much because the nightmare-team of Carter and Brzezinki and "Iran expert" Gary Sick had managed to convince the Islamic Republic of Iran to free them, but because Ronald Reagan had been elected, and was about to be sworn in, and the Iranians could tell he meant business, and wanted to head off trouble. Now, should those Americans be "grateful" to Jimmy Carter, and forever be loyal to him, and defend him, because his Administration worked "tirelessly" if largely ineffectually to get those hostages released? Why?

When the government does what it has a duty to do, no gratitude toward it is necessary. That is the attitude expressed to me by a winsome Russian girl, an Intourist guide, showing me around Moscow and explaining, in the interstices of her memorized tour, how eternally grateful she was to the Soviet state for giving her a free education, and free housing, and free medical care, and wasn't it all wonderful, and I expressed my doubts about her need to feel gratitude for living in a slave-state (I was a bit more diplomatic and circumspect than that -- after all, I could leave the country and she was stuck).

No need for gratitude to Brezhnev. Or to Carter. Or to Kurt Waldheim, who never got what he deserved, but instead was the recipient of a very great deal that he didn't deserve.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 4:46 PM

I did not claim that Kurt Waldheim was a mass-murderer. I did claim, and there is ample evidence, that he was right in Salonika the very day that the Jews of Salonika were rounded up, humiliated and treated roughly and jeered at by the Germans, and then sent off to death camps. There is evidence -- even a citation from the German Army -- that he took part in the infamous "Operation Kozara" which was almost exclusively a German army operation against civilians, and resulted in tens of thousands of deaths, many of the victims women and children. There is certain evidence that he signed certain antisemitic pamphlets. There is evidence that as the Intelligence Officer in a Unit I-C toward the end of the war, he took part in the planing of what can only be called atrocities against civilians and partisans. There is the testimony of a fellow soldier, Johan Mayer, who in 1947 -- long before Kurt Waldheim became famous, long before anyone gave him any importance, gave testimony against him.

There is the further evidence that he for decades concealed all of this, and that he delibeately made up a story about being back in Vienna, a story designed to hide the fact that he was, where he was, and when he was, in the Balkans.

There is still further evidence that he malevolently exploited the worst features of Austrian public life, when he ran for President, doing nothing to reject the nastiness of those resentments that congealed around the idea that Waldheim, loyal and good and straightforward and noble Kurt Waldheim, was being maligned by "the Jews."

You can look it all up. It will take time. It took me time. But if you wish to know, you have to take the time.

That is enough. That is more than enough.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 4:53 PM

Traeh, speaking of "collective guilt", I agree that the innocent should not be burdened with what their ancestors did...
However, as far as Germans (I’m talking about German Germans, not American/British/etc. Germans) are concerned, I’ve observed (at least amongst those in my acquaintance -- which is sizeable, and consists of individuals who are well educated and seemingly rational, intelligent people) that they tend to already separate themselves entirely from the Germans of WWII. Furthermore, they fancy that they (Germans as a whole) occupy the moral high-ground of the world, being far more understanding, tolerant, etc., etc., than most everyone else, especially Americans (who, by and large, are viewed as primitive, backwards, religious zealots and gun-wielding cowboys). I understand that a lot of the German desire to find a laudable German trait -- one superior to those found in other peoples -- is an effort to show that they’ve broken entirely with the terrible WWII legacy, but I still find it discomforting when listening to Germans allude to a supposed superiority -- albeit this new one is a “moral superiority” rather than the “racial superiority” of WWII...

Posted by: Rachel at August 29, 2007 5:06 PM

Hugh, I stand corrected.

Posted by: traeh at August 29, 2007 5:09 PM

Franco was called both a Fascist and a benevolent dictator. For the better part, he was able to remember Spanish history and until he died in 1974, no mosques were erected in Spain.

If a modern European country can ban them, can't we try?

Franco could get away with it because the constitutional principles of freedom of religion and nondiscrimination between religions now prevailing in Europe and the United States were not in force in his Spain. Under Franco, at least initially, "Roman Catholicism was the only religion to have legal status; other worship services could not be advertised, and only the Roman Catholic Church could own property or publish books."

http://atheism.about.com/library/world/KZ/bl_SpainReligion.htm

The 1945 Fuero de los Espanoles provided: "[T]he profession and practice of the Catholic religion, which is that of the Spanish state, will enjoy official protection. No one will be molested for his religious beliefs, nor for the private practice of his religion. No external ceremonies or manifestations other than those of the Catholic religion will be permitted."

Only in 1967 was a law passed permitting any public non-Catholic worship.

http://religiousfreedom.lib.virginia.edu/rihand/Spain.html
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,843451,00.html

I'm not sure whether, even under the 1967 law, non-Catholic denominations were permitted to own property.

Posted by: Seamus at August 29, 2007 5:11 PM

Nazis and Communist have a bad habit of getting bed together and I have a bad feeling that the Nazis or Communists of today won't think twice of hitting the sack with Islam.

The reasons I dislike Islam are the same reasons why I dislike communism and fascism. I will not be moralized to by an illogical inferior political/religious system that wishes to control everything from how we spend our money to how we enjoy a meal....

The only difference between Islam and the other two is Islam is older and more entrenched.

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at August 29, 2007 5:18 PM

Okay, fair point. I see that point of view.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal at August 29, 2007 5:21 PM

Further research indicates that it may have been premature to conclude that there were no mosques in Spain under Franco. According to this article http://www.emz-berlin.de/projekte_e/pj50_pdf/spain.pdf, "The first mosque [presumably, the first since the explusion of the Moors in the 17th century] was built in Cordoba by General Franco, in gratitude to the Rif soldiers who fought in the civil war."

Still, there's no indication that public worship by Moslems was permitted.

Posted by: Seamus at August 29, 2007 5:49 PM

Rachel, I've seen that too. Some Germans seem to think that the hell of going through Nazism has taught Germany the "wisdom" of absolute pacifism. But I don't want to start bashing the Germans or Europeans. They are potential allies in the struggle against totalitarian Islam, and of course we Americans are far from perfect ourselves. We need to befriend potential allies wherever possible. Of course that's very different from letting specific individual war criminals from World War II get away scot free.

Posted by: traeh at August 29, 2007 6:07 PM

With friends like Haider, you do not win anything, but just exchange bigotries.

And then have to fight the next batch.

Cranks come in all magnitudes.

Islam's are jumbo; Haider's, pismire.

All, noxious.

Posted by: profitsbeard at August 29, 2007 6:33 PM

"Haider's a hater, a xenophobe. But the enemy of my enemy is my friend." --Ynkedoodl2

I understand your sentiment but it might better be expressed as follows:

The enemy of my enemy is my temporary ally, unless or until other allies of greater repute come forward to fight alongside me, or until the situation deteriorates to the point where I can no longer afford to wait for those with purest hearts to stand up and join me.

Posted by: alexon at August 29, 2007 6:35 PM

There are third rails that should not be touched. Haider is a third rail.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 6:41 PM

But what if we had been supporters of Jorg Haider? Do you think it would have been wise... if we had expressed that support?

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 4:07 PM

Huge you are defending than neonazie rightwinger like Jorg Haider who want to ban illegality mosque builting show me the Austian people are racist by electioning this criminal racist.

Posted by: DefenderofIslam at August 29, 2007 4:36 PM

Looks like there's your answer... you'll be accused of supporting him anyway, irrespective of whether you do or not ;-)

defenderofislam

Methinks Haidar is a Muslim name - hear it a lot around Bangladesh. Given that, wouldn't you support him? ;-)

Posted by: Infidel Pride at August 29, 2007 7:40 PM

Alexon

That's a lot better said, except that I'd rephrase it as:

The enemy of my enemy is my temporary ally after the point that the situation deteriorates to the point where I can no longer afford to wait for those with purest hearts to stand up and join me, unless or until other allies of greater repute come forward to fight alongside me.

Posted by: Infidel Pride at August 29, 2007 7:45 PM

Sorry for so many posts, but looking up Carinthia, I see that Haidar is currently the governor of that province. This seems different from Le Pen or Nick Griffin who are simply marginal politicians: Haidar seems to be the elected governor of a province of Austria. I understand the desire not to touch him with a bargepole, but given the above fact, and that he would actually be implementing a law that presumably none of his more moderate opponents would, is he really worth going out of our way to condemn? I mean, why not just ignore him, but point to the laws that he pushes in Carinthia as examples of what may be implemented?

Posted by: Infidel Pride at August 29, 2007 7:52 PM

I did not go out of my way to "condemn" but used the clear example of Haider to point to a wider problem that exists because apologists for Islam are quick to blacken the names of their critics. Look at how they misrepresent, ludicrously, this website. If you had not come here, and often, yourself, might you not begin to believe the goebbelsian repetition about it? What Jorg Haider is proposing or supporting is not in this case offensive, but one has to be wary of such "allies." Stalin was useful during World War II, as Churchill made clear, but he was not a true ally, and the minute that war was over, the Americans and English should have, but did not, regard him as he was, and might have kept the Red Army out of Eastern and Central Europe, as they were capable of doing, but lacked the will and interest to do -- or at least might have pushed it out from where it was through all kinds of pressure. Two or three years went by, and the Red Army was not only in Germany, but also in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, even (I think) Rumania. A question of grievous mis-timing, and the learning curve that did not curve upward fast enough.

It's the same with Islam. For god's sake, six years have now gone by since 9/11/2001. Do you hear Bush, Cheney, Rice, or others in the Administration, or others who support in in Congress, or others who attack it in Congress, or any of the Presidential candidates save, at this point, Tom Tancredo, making sense about Islam? If you were to get our political class in a room, and force them to take just a multiple-choice test about the simplest, most obvious things, how do you think they would do? And what if not the political class, but the main television journalists, all those tough-minded reporters, and Hannify and Colmes and Wolf Blitzer and Christine Amanpour and all the talking-heads or mezzobuste who have little cults of personality around them, cultivated by their networks, so that one watches not the news, but "the news with Katie Couric" or someone else, possibly less obviouslly fatuous. What do they know about the tenets of Islam, the history of Islamic conquest, the treatment of non-Muslims in Muslim-ruled lands, over the past 1350 years, and especially now? They know nothing. And they are unembarrassed, and oblivious to their own ignorance, and see no reason to cure it.

It sticks in the craw.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 8:14 PM

Hugh-

A little crawfish with cocktail sauce takes the taste of the ascendant buffoonocracy off the palate for a while, at least.

The Derelection of the Clercs (media to politicos, churches & synagogues to Hollywouldn't) continues to appall.

More unknown people are "getting it" about Islam, though. Even in the face of the "creeping Sharia" (to use M. Steyn's phrase) at work in the cowering media, and are rising against the collective cultural seppuku of the talking heads (Chrissy Amanpourexcuseforareporter to Gary "A cartoonist mustn't insult Islam" Trudeau) who reflexively cringe when confronting even the mildest criticisms of Mohammad or the Koran. And approve of pre-censoring any little comic tweaks or sardonic mockings or satirical lampoons by, say, Danish or Swedish, or American artists or (dead) Dutch film-makers.

This Resistance is rising from below, not coming down from above.

Maybe that will give it stronger roots for the storms ahead.

Posted by: profitsbeard at August 29, 2007 9:42 PM

"Hollywouldn't"
-- from a posting just above

You've just given me an idea.

Posted by: Hugh at August 29, 2007 10:00 PM

Hugh-

"You've just given me an idea."

You've given me hundreds, so it's a start at balancing the tally.

Posted by: profitsbeard at August 29, 2007 10:27 PM

Yes I.P., you're right, that's better.

Posted by: alexon at August 29, 2007 11:56 PM

Hey you guys had a nice little sumpin' cooking here...

I am not confused about left and right. Right is right and wrong is wrong. If Haider blows his trumpet against the mosques he is doing the right thing. I don't have to like him to be on his side, but I'll back him here. Waldheini has found his judges and good riddance. No need to waste time...

But Hitler was not 'right wing'- he was a socialist, like all (or just about all) totalitarian lunatics pretend to be. He nationalized Industry, he wanted the Volkswagen to be a 'peoples car'- and the rest of 'mein Kampf) fits totally with the collective effort of socialism, especially when it comes to disowning the hated Jooozzz, the 'speculators and parasites who were destoying the innocent soul of the pure Germanic peoples...'

Is it different in Malaysia or Indonesia, where the Chinese and the Indians are driving the (still intact) economy, while being vilified, viewed with suspicion, harrassed and dhimmified (terrified) and jiziyaaahd before the next raid, (jihad) which is sure to come, along with the burning of their businesses, mass rape and killings?

And we are facing the same proletariat, along with the ummah that has now invaded western countries, a hostile, malignant cancer, a' fifth column, behind enemy lines.' ( in the words of Hugh Fitzgerald)

So two failed ideas joined together, both fanatical and irraional, one hellbent in bringing us a socialist paradise and the other the caliphate.

A deadborn child in the making. I don't know if the term 'tarbaby' applies here, but the strange alliance between socialists and Muhammedan madness is not going to last. The radicals always win and we know who is more radical by now, or not?

But coming back to Haider:

We don't have to like him. I suspect he doesn't like Jooozzz either. But if he stops the mosques from going up he is doing the right thing. And I'm not going to live in Austria anyway.

No mosques, no establishment of Muhammedansim.

It works. I am with Haider.

Posted by: sheik yer'mami at August 30, 2007 6:16 AM

"Looks like there's your answer... you'll be accused of supporting him anyway, irrespective of whether you do or not ;-)

"defenderofislam" probably never made it past the headline "A tribute to Jorg Haider." The mangled words he managed to type and post seem to confirm this.

Posted by: anti-uffe at August 30, 2007 7:58 AM

traeh -- agreed. :)

Posted by: Rachel at August 30, 2007 9:37 AM