This article hits the nail on the head: the Right is its own worst enemy. It has allowed the Left to put it on the defensive to such a degree that whenever establishment conservatives take a stand against the Left, such as in this case defending Ayaan Hirsi Ali against the Hamas-linked CAIR smear campaign that got her honorary degree rescinded by Brandeis, they believe that they have to give their stand legitimacy by denouncing someone else the Left hates. The idea is that they will establish their bona fides by acquiescing to the Leftist character assassination of one person, thereby showing that they’re really good guys after all, not “racists” or “bigots,” and so therefore the Left should go easy on them when they come out against them regarding a different person or issue.
This triangulation tactic is increasingly common. The craven and self-serving British professional moderate Muslim Maajid Nawaz does the same thing when he comes out against Islamic jihad terrorists while denouncing Pamela Geller and me for “Islamophobia”: he thinks that he saves himself from charges of “Islamophobia” himself by joining in on the smear campaign against us (he doesn’t). The anti-Semitic Communist ex-Muslim Maryam Namazie and the Council of Ex-Muslims in Britain does the same thing, trying to buy themselves a spurious legitimacy by joining the defamation against us, thinking the Left will not then defame them.
“What’s Wrong with the Right,” by Pamela Geller, American Thinker, April 18:
National Review Online took another gratuitous shot at me Thursday in an article defending Ayaan Hirsi Ali, saying: “Hirsi Ali is no Pamela Geller. On the contrary, for her whole life, Hirsi Ali has used anger as a catalyst to great good.” Is it necessary to smear me in order to defend Hirsi Ali? And this is not the first time that NRO has allowed insults and defamation against me and other freedom fighters to run unedited. I hardly know why. But I do know that NRO has no guts, no spine, and no conviction.
What’s more, Hirsi Ali has said things about Islam that I have never said, yet somehow she is acceptable and I am not. How does Rogan intellectually wrestle with the irreconcilable? His premise is completely and utterly false; on what does he make these ugly assertions?
Each time NRO gratuitously smeared me, I politely asked Kathryn Lopez for an opportunity to respond, and was ignored. By contrast, in similar circumstances, even the most left-leaning sites have responded to my queries. Take, for example, the National Post and Haaretz: both ran vicious attack pieces on me and while they didn’t give me the same space or column inches, I was able to respond in 250 words. NRO won’t deign even to answer me.
The author of the latest NRO piece, Tom Rogan, retails sly slurs and baseless insults that are the stuff of CAIR fiction. Rogan seems to think that I have not “used anger as a catalyst to great good” because I opposed the Ground Zero Mosque. Yet so did 70% of Americans; are they wretched souls as well? Rogan also lambastes the now mortally wounded English Defense League (EDL), implying that I applauded its worst excesses and ignoring the fact that I publicly called for a cleansing of their ranks from actual racists and other unsavory characters. I supported their opposition to British jihadists and Islamic supremacists who were verbally attacking returning soldiers with cries of “Baby killers,” “Murderers” and the like. This is something British people should have just passively accepted?
Mark Steyn has parted company with NRO as well. He wrote in January: “As readers may have deduced from my absence at National Review Online and my termination of our joint representation, there have been a few differences between me and the rest of the team. The lesson of the last year is that you win a free-speech case not by adopting a don’t-rock-the-boat, keep-mum, narrow procedural posture but by fighting it in the open, in the bracing air and cleansing sunlight of truth and justice.”
Once again, the establishment right takes its marching orders from what the destroyers on the left dictate. The right consistently allows the left to destroy our most effective voices – Sarah Palin is a major example. Unequivocal voices like Palin’s are tarred and smeared, while the right instead offers up weak and meandering fools like John McCain – and stands by him even when he poses with al-Qaida leaders in Syria and insists that they’re “moderates.”
We see many come out in a burst of light, political supernovas like Allen West, Palin, and now Ted Cruz. But we also see the right abandon these same people when the left goes after them like the jackals and the vultures they are. Did the GOP establishment have Palin’s back? What did the GOP establishment do to defend Palin from the attacks by vultures in the media like the affable Eva Braun, aka Katie Couric, and the contemptible Charlie Gibson?
The leaders of the conservative establishment are clearly more comfortable with the weakest and most liberal figures on the right than they are with genuine conservatives. And then they abandon their flavor of the month as soon as the leftist sharks start circling.
This is how the establishment right makes it bones: on the bones of the principled right. This is how the establishment right gets legitimacy: by pandering to the left and selling out the clear, uncompromised voices on the right. Instead of destroying our philosophical enemies in the war of individualism vs. statism, the establishment right trims its message, then trims it some more, desperately hoping to appease leftists and their media lapdogs.
Is it any wonder that we can’t win elections? McCain? Romney? We can’t win until we find our spine. NRO best represents the abject failure on the right.
Why was NRO wrong to defame me in particular? Because I am fighting against the leftist/Islamic war against free speech – a topic of immense significance that I am sure gets scant mention at NRO. I am embroiled in three free-speech lawsuits at home and two abroad. I have successfully sued and won (with the able legal counsel of American Freedom Law Center). We have set precedent and written into history good law in the defense of freedom. The First Amendment is the foundation of this country and the conservative movement. NRO’s indifference to all that speaks volumes about where it really stands.
There’s a war raging, and the right thinks that if it doesn’t engage or doesn’t show up, then that war doesn’t exist. How irrational. If you don’t show up, you forfeit, and the right is forfeiting. Anytime someone takes a bold or brave stance against statism or collectivism, or against jihad and Sharia, they suffer withering attacks from both outside the movement and inside the movement.
The leadership on the right does not understand its own philosophy. They do not understand free markets, capitalism and individual rights. If they did, they would be more ferocious, fiercer and more courageous in the fight for freedom and equality of rights before the law against the second-handers, moochers, and looters on the left.
The right appears to be waiting for Godot. But he ain’t coming. The right is on life support at a time when it should be standing in defense of free speech. This most certainly should be our issue, our moment. There have been these moments in American history when right and wrong, good and evil were very clearly defined. The Republican Party was born at such a moment. We elected Lincoln at such a moment, and we took the country back from the slave party, the Democrats, at such a moment.
We need a moral and rational force to push back. We need a true “New Right.” NRO had an opportunity to start building it. Instead, it has been snuffed out and stifled by cowards, trimmers, and RINOs.
We need a fierce offensive under a banner of individual rights and morality. I believe that such an intellectual movement would seize the collective conscience of this country. But when that movement arises, it will be no thanks to NRO.
John C. Barile says
I am also looking for effective and consistent leaders in this Age of Obama.
May the LORD Almighty continue to bless you, Pamela.
WVinMN says
The GOP is controlled by establishment mouthpieces that take their marching orders from crony capitalists (as opposed to actual free market capitalists) such as the US Chamber of Commerce, the Wall Street Journal, etc. Therefore, until and unless creatures including Boehner, McConnell, Cantor, Ryan, Cornyn, McCain, etc. are removed from the GOP, Obama and the Dem’s will continue to essentially run the US unopposed. To put in another way, a vote for an establishment republican (i.e. little “m” marxist) yields practically the same results as voting for a modern day democrat (Marxist).
John C. Barile says
I’m tired of spineless sell-outs, too.
Beth says
For the Christians who claim to be conservatives who are sitting on the fence…
Rev 3:16
So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I (Jesus) will spue thee out of my mouth.
We are commanded to speak the Truth out loud: Eph 4:25 – Zec 8:16
The command is to “execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates”
Islam does not preach peace. Islam has declared war on free speech – and is winning – because too many Christians are silent – not knowing what to do. Well here it is – the command from the sole Supreme Authority – to do the right thing – and start speaking the truth out loud before all.
Kepha says
Beth, what do you want me to do? Hit Muhammad and Fatima on the head when they come inquiring about Christ because of a dream or a stray New Testament in their native language? Or spit on Reza Ali for not rushing to the font, even though he and his wife Betty Baptist of umpteen childless years of marriage plan to take their little adopted Rachel to church rather than mosque? The last are a couple (names changed to protect people–and I read the home study) whose foreign adoption case I actually handled when I was a diplomat. The former are more common than you think. I’ve taught kids from West African immigrant families (Hausa, Mandingo, and Soussou) that are seeing members leave the mosque for the church.
We (Evangelicals, at least) are fighting with the weapons God gave us–prayer, the Word, and love–not sitting on the fence. it’s reaped us new churches in the Maghreb and parts of Anatolia which were spiritually barren for centuries. If that Libyan mullah of a few years back was shocked and scared because so many Muslims in Africa are turning to Christ daily, we, too were shocked–and grateful.
RCCA says
I’m sure the Right will figure it out when they get over their obsession with social issues.
John C. Barile says
What obsession? The Left frames the debate and dominates it. More reason for craven capitulation to the “respectable” opinions of Polite Society; i.e.: the prevailing orthodoxy of Leftist elites.
WVinMN says
Your statement lends even more support to Pamela’s thesis. “It must be the social issues (as opposed to running milquetoast ass-hats like Romney and McCain) that prevent the GOP from winning national elections! I mean, that’s what Chris Matthews claims.”
Rob Crawford says
Social issues like liberty, eh?
RCCA says
Social issues like gay marriage (“gays in the military” — somehow the military has not exploded after all) and abortion rights. It boils down to the Right wanting to qualify rights and personal liberty on the basis of traditional religious doctrine. The Left fought for change, the majority ruled and the culture changed, so how about let’s move the discussion onto issues of preserving individual liberty, freedom of speech, etc.?
richard Sherman says
Why Don’t you sit down with the 3000 people murdered by Muslims on 9/11 who were just following the plain meaning of the Koran and lectures them about their rights. Pamela Geller understands that the only right that matters today is the right not to be murdered by Muslims…of course you could lecture the thirteen people murdered at Fort Hood or the three murdered at the Boston Marathon..or those folks murdered on the London Subway..or those people murdered on the Madrid train…
voegelinian says
Spencer’s introduction and Geller’s main essay together constitute an important analysis from two perspectives of an important if curious sociopolitical phenomenon that has been going on a long time and which, I believe, has been exacerbated (if not in many ways formed) by the intrusion of Islam on our sociopolitical radar, forcing Westerners on all points of the sociopolitical spectrum to deal with the culturally ingrained hot buttons and hot potatoes of issues incoherently triggered by, and amorphously revolving around, race (insofar as Muslims have been generally (if semi-consciously) perceived as an “ethnic” people or as a wonderful diversity/stir-fry/mosaic/tapestry/quilt of “ethnic” peoples).
I take issue, however, with Spencer’s use of Maajid Nawaz and Maryam Namazie as examples:
“…he [Nawaz] thinks that he saves himself from charges of “Islamophobia” himself by joining in on the smear campaign against us (he doesn’t). The anti-Semitic Communist ex-Muslim Maryam Namazie and the Council of Ex-Muslims in Britain does the same thing, trying to buy themselves a spurious legitimacy by joining the defamation against us, thinking the Left will not then defame them.”
While these motives we may reasonably suppose are motivating non-Muslims (including non-ex-Muslims — i.e., those who don’t retain the psychocultural effects of the Islamic pathology), it is too generous to impute such a Western consideration to Muslims and ex-Muslims whenever we see them ostensibly advancing Islam in one way or another (whether directly, or indirectly as Nawaz and Namazie do).
I.e., given all that we know about Muslims by now, it is more reasonable for us to withhold the benefit of the doubt from them, and rather to suppose that Nawaz and Namazie aren’t concerned to save themselves from the charge of ‘Islamophobia’ but are more cleverly doing Islamic deception in a war-of-ideas jihad of the mouth and pen, cleverly assessing where the sociopolitical fashions and winds are currently continuing to blow and jockeying, maneuvering and parsing their positions accordingly.
voegelinian says
P.S.: In the light of the motives I reasonably impute to Muslims like Nawaz and Namazie, there seems to have evolved a new subspecies of Muslim — a new mutation of the Moderate Muslim who pretends to be more radically concerned about the “problem of Islam” than Muslims heretofore have been. This is a clever move, because they recognize that the PC MC paradigm of the West is beginning to show ominous signs of strain around the edges, from an unstable internal process of tension which cannot remain stable forever, given the pressure of metastatic Islamic data impinging on it which, no matter how seemingly airtight and watertight PC MC Denial may seem to be, cannot be perfect and is, in fact, showing signs of incipient fissures. In the concern to stave off such a potential, what better way than to manufacture the New and Improved Muslim Moderate who shares our concern about Islam and dares (or seems to dare) to expand self-criticism of his own culture, boldly going where no Muslim has gone before?
Geordie says
<>
On the contrary, their “evolution” is the direct result of our Western influence. In the case of Namazie, she has progressed further than Nawaz in her intellectual development. Not only has she left Islam and works to undermine it’s traditions. She has abandoned the whole sky friend deity concept, while maintaining a highly developed humanitarian disposition. The only things I worry about are firstly her reluctance to work with opponents of Islam who still cling to alternative deity mythologies. Often described as the “religious right.” Also she has not abandoned her “cultural” anti-Israeli stance. Something I find difficult to understand.
Nawaz is different but may still prove useful converting rabid islamic religionists to a more peaceful revised form. It’s too early to tell. One thing is clear. Via his network, he has already provided the security forces with useful intelligence and hopefully that will continue. I would feel much happier if he too became an atheists.
dlbrand says
Yup. Indeed.
mortimer says
Facile. NRO is facile. It takes 10 years to learn the BASICS about Islam and 20 years to learn Islam-in-depth.
There is no Reader’s Digest version of Islam.
Lazy. The NRO editors are lazy as are their writers.
Bradamante says
What do you think of Bill Warner’s introductory texts? I’ve been finding them helpful in getting some basic concepts down. But you may have a larger concept of “the basics” than I do, so I’m curious what you think needs to be learned as part of the basics.
Definitely agree on the laziness of NRO — and the rest of the media.
WestwardHo says
10 YEARS? What?
Let’s see. Interest started 9/12/01 (of course).
Read on the web but kept sensing something mentally incoherent with all the information I encountered, yet I continued reading through a variety of sources I found on the web.
At the end of September 2001 (3 weeks now!), I came upon a review of Bat Ye’or’s “Islam and Dhimmitude: Where Civilizations Collide” I Read that fine book. That changed my whole world view. Correctly, wrt Islam, its doctrine, its historical impact, its social implications.
After all the other reading I did later, including probably every word of JihadWatch its first couple years, some Koran and Hadith, and much else, I can say that everything I needed to know was succinctly explained in “Islam and Dhimmitude.” In the first few chapters, in fact.
All the talk of difficulty learning the subject leaves me mystified. Unless I perhaps lacked some common mental tick that prevents people from just absorbing what’s plain to see. (Hesperado/Voegelinian has researched that angle quite interestingly). The new information initially was truly disorienting, I do admit.
I did marvel at the incomprehension that stubbornly prevailed then, as now. And I very wrongly initially expected that *lots* of other people would respond to 9-11 by learning about Islam via reading its sources. In fact, virtually no one did.
I saw any difficulty as stemming from needing not 1 nor 2 but three(3) understandings, which then need to be related to one another.
1) Islam’s scriptural doctrines dehumanizing non-Muslims, and mandating war upon them.
2) The history of Jihad as implementation of these religious mandates.
3) Modern Jihad messages as expressing the completely parallel Koranic impulse, and modern global jihad as the implementation of that same war impulse, no different than in Mohammad’s story and the history of Islamic Imperialism. And that any “explanation” lacking that is seriously ignorant.
Appreciating each of these three leads naturally to encompassing the whole picture.
I don’t get why others, such as the journalists on both sides, find it *SO* elusive.
Others ought to grasp what the reality is by halfway through the info in Islam and Dhimmitude, (or its equivalents found in so many other sources) as I see it.
John Magee says
The right does not know how to act like winners when they win. The left does and they take full advantage of the perks when they win. Add to that they have no conscience and will lie, cheat, and steal to keep office.
Salah says
Both parties are in bed with the enemy. The people, and ONLY the people, have the power to take his country back.
There’s only one way to do it PEACEABLY: the Egyptian Way.
http://crossmuslims.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-end-of-muslim-brotherhood.html
Wellington says
I’d sum it up this way: The Left has lost its mind and the Right has lost its guts.
dlbrand says
Well stated.
Bradamante says
You have such a way of hitting it on the head.
thomas_h says
” The Left has lost its mind and the Right has lost its guts.”
Yet it is only the Right that has lost its voters.
Wellington says
That’s true, thomas_h, about the wusses now leading the Right (for the most part) and the disenchantment with them by true conservatives. As for the Left and its retention of voter support and the reason why, your comment reminded me of that old joke (hope I haven’t already told you this one), to wit, what does the lost continent of Atlantis and a liberal mind have in common? Well, both have been rumored to exist but there’s really no hard evidence for either.
Hope you’re doing optimally, thomas_h. And may your Spring be pleasant and may your beer be fine. Take care, my friend.
thomas_h says
No, Wellington, you haven’t told me the joke until now. I like it very much, thanks! Watch me spreading it around.
Ah, spring is here finally! We had 16 Centigrade in Copenhagen today and expect 17 tomorrow. The past few hundred years suggest the trend will continue until the beginning of August.
Ah, the beer, the beer…”Fine” is a fine word, but the beer is finer!
Skål, my friend!
RonaldB says
Milton Friedman was once asked if he preferred the Republicans to the Democrats. He replied that the Republicans don’t follow any principles, any more than the Democrats, but at least the Republicans understood what he was talking about when he talked about the free market.
Unfortunately, at this point, the purpose of a national party is to win elections. The Supreme Court and the Congress have modified the original constitution enough that any Senator or Congressman has to campaign full time, and engage in non-stop fund-raising. Also, the requirement for proportional representation, and the abrogation of the rights of individual parties to select their own members and candidates has severely damaged a true represenative Republic.
As a result, no viable national candidate for office can openly follow any coherent philosophy, and no national party dependent on funding can come down too strongly on any specific issue. The Republicans love lavish conventions and plush hotel rooms as much as Democrats.
As some earlier posters have stated, it takes some time and effort to appreciate the Islamist threat. Islam itself takes on a multiplicity of forms, and past terrorists and funders of terrorists have a variety of names that run together for the average American. The Muslim Brotherhood specializes in covert influence-peddling, as does the Saudi government. In point of fact, this is an opportune time to weaken Islamic power and influence, as the Saudis and Egyptians are engaged in a death-struggle with Iran, with the Muslim Brotherhood siding with Iran.
But, what viable national candidate has the time or inclination to learn the complex relationships involved? Running for office is now a mindless exercise in endurance, and any candidate inclined to intelligent reflection would likely be eliminated early on.
I distinguish between liberal socialists, or liberals, and the totalitarian left. The liberals will gladly engage in discussions. The totalitarians won’t, as they are only interested in gaining power through the mechanisms of government. Socialists of the right or left persuasion have the common feature that they are incompetent to gain power through productivity or competence, and so look to co-opt the police power of the state for their authority.
It goes without saying that the National Review Online tracks political power and money, rather than ideas. It so happens that the money on which Republicans depend for elections, as well as for plush conventions, come from sources that likely are beholden to Islamic treasuries.
The only way to insure that real American interests are represented in the political process is to reform the political system to reflect the original constitution: do away with gerrymandering, proportional representation, legislative intrusion on party rights, limits on campaign contributions, and most important of all, make ANY accepting of foreign campaign contributions by any local or national politician a first-class felony, including financing by foundations, or indirect contributions.
PJG says
It never fails to make my heart sink when “conservative” writers who are against speech restrictions (and/or the Islamisation of the West) come out in wildly uncharacteristic language against “hate”, “racism” and “bigotry”. They don’t define any of these emotive and questionable terms, just fling them into their otherwise rational arguments, presumably to show how they are on an even MORE “high moral ground” than the posturing poseurs of the Left, yet validating that ridiculous poseurism. The Leftist conservative (as I suppose he could be called) Brendan O’Neill did this just the other day, suddenly wringing his hands about “racism”. And Andrew Bolt frames his argument against softness on “asylum seekers” in the same Left-virtuous way, as if “compassion” towards illegal immigrants were the main issue rather than national borders and security; “1000 deaths at sea!” he cries histrionically.
It ends up looking like the most dismal of competitions: who can be the most PC, the Left, the Right, Conservatives…? There are not many out there who don’t want to play this game. Thank God for the likes of Pamela Geller.
Geordie says
Why the obsessive fixation on Left wing versus Right wing politics when the matter in hand is a religion?
I don’t like the way Maryam Namazie and the Council of Ex-Muslims in Britain choose to distance themselves from Pam and Robert but I still value their input. We should strive to unite all who oppose islam, regardless of political views, religious affiliations or any other divisory concerns. Just accept that people are different and start to work together.
The strength of this forum is the diverse views of the contributors. We only have one thing in common and consider it so important that we choose to ignore other points of contention.
Robert Spencer says
Geordie
With respect, you don’t have a clue. Namazie and Nawaz and the CEMB denounced me before I ever said a word about them. They are the ones you should be scolding and admonishing to work with me, not the other way around. There is no indication that they’d be willing to work with me, and they are the ones responsible for the breach.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
bill says
I think in this case Mr Spencer, you are the one without a clue. I am British and take a close interest in UK matters
thomas_h says
“I am British and take a close interest in UK matters.”
You sound exactly like D. Cameron, Tony Blair… Baroness Warsi and the rest of the British ruling class.
In other words, your declaration doesn’t make a terribly convincing argument.
Jay Boo says
bill said
“I think in this case Mr Spencer, you are the one without a clue. I am British and take a close interest in UK matters”
Bill your lead-in sentence just stops
You IMPLY you are about to make a point …
I could say much more but I will just leave it at that
Geordie says
Hi Robert. Pleased you commented.
I fully appreciate that Maryam Namazie, Nawaz and the CEMB are to blame for the rift between two camps that should be allies. I’m also aware that if we all could work together we would be much stronger. It’s a no-brainer.
I’ve already been a thorn in the side of Maryam Namazie and some others at the Council of Ex-Muslims in Britain on that very subject. I objected to their publication denouncing you, Pam and the EDL as enemies and not allies. They had the nerve to lump everyone together with the BNP, NF and other racist groups.
E-mail I received to my enquires were very enlightening and for the most part intelligently argued. Rest assured that not all at the Council of Ex-Muslims feel that way about your efforts and one (fellow atheist) openly acknowledged using your un-PC guide to Islam as a reference book. We had a lengthy exchange on the subject. Apparently he uses it daily to counter comments submitted by Islamists. That should make you smile.
The rift is the result of other issues, not the common recognition of the islamic threat. Public opinion and political policy is changing in the UK, we may see a willing acceptance of the blatantly obvious quite soon. Certainly before the next election.
Stay well and safe, cordial back at you.
Geordie
E. Alexandra Pierce says
I disagree completely about Maajid Nawaz. Lefty? Yes. Unfair criticism of Spencer and Geller? Yes, and that’s a bummer, but that kind of attitude is so widespread now that it’s no longer a reliable indicator of insincerity in anti-Islamists.
He is far from being the insincere, cookie cutter “moderate,” and he’s not an apologist for the crappy content of Islam. If you ask him if he condemns Hamas as terrorists, he does. If you ask him about the misogyny and antisemitism in Islam, he cops to it unequivocally. You won’t hear him spouting the same kind of crap you hear from Reza Aslan, or Mehdi Hassan and the like. He actively seeks reform in Islam (his foundation, Quilliam, now has some clerics on their side who seek to enact reformation). He’s pro-west, and isn’t wishy-washy about it. He doesn’t say one thing in Arabic to Muslims, and another in English to non-Muslims. He’s consistent, earnest, and effective, and has landed a place on the hitlist of tons of Islamist groups. He delights in undermining them whenever he gets a chance.
I think Nawaz is basically a good egg.
Geordie says
Quilliam, is a phenomena I’m still assessing before making a decision. It’s early days but things are looking positive. They could be part of an interim solution without bloodshed, rather than adding to the problem.
We will see how they contribute to the investigation of the MB.
voegelinian says
One suspects that the vulgar misspelling of “phenomena” is one clue as to why poor Geordie is still earnestly troubling his small brain to labor to “assess” whether or not Quilliam is doing taqiyya.
Geordie says
Phenomena has been use in English as a singular for more than 400 years and its plural phenomenas for more than 350. As for my assessment of Quiliam, I will judge it’s value, character, etc., when I have time to evaluate it’s efforts for myself.
No simple minded blind faith here!
In light of the few views we have in common, I wish you well voegelinian
voegelinian says
I’ve never heard that one. What proof do you have that “phenomena” has been used as a singular for centuries, and that “phenomenas” as a plural?
My American Heritage College dic●tion●ar●y — an unremarkably standard and mainstream English dictionary — says only that “phenomenon” is the singular and that “phenomena” is the plural, and that sometimes “phenomenons” has been used as a plural.
phenomenon is from the Greek, and English in this regard follows the Greek rule for singulars and plurals, whereby the -on ending is neuter singular, which can only be made plural by changing it to -a (similar to the Latin -um to -a).
voegelinian says
As for the Quilliam Foundation, there’s nothing to “assess” or “evaluate”. Given the mountains of data we have about the monstrous catastrophe of Islam, and the oceans of dots screaming to be connected about the grotesque pathology of Muslims (including their psychotically fanatical divinely mandated mendacity), we must reasonably begin from the position of clear-eyed prejudice and assume that any Muslim organization that does not condemn Mohammed and the Koran and the Sunna is automatically suspect at fucking best. Oh, but then they wouldn’t be “Muslim”, would they? Have the two wires of the light bulb in your head connected yet?
Geordie says
Usage note in England
As with other plurals of Latin or Greek origin, like media and criteria, there is a tendency to use the plural phenomena as a singular ( This phenomena will not be seen again ), but such use occurs infrequently in edited writing. The plural form phenomenas, though occasionally seen, has even less currency.
Origin:
1595–1605; < Late Latin phaenomenon < Greek phainómenon appearance, noun use of neuter of phainómenos, present participle of phaínesthai to appear, passive of phaínein to show.
I recall a very amusing interlude from the late very great wordsmith Christopher Hitchens on that very subject.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/phenomena
Geordie says
As for the Quilliam Foundation ….
I stand by my original assessment if not critique. They could be part of an interim solution without bloodshed, rather than adding to the problem.
Perhaps I should explain the meaning of interim solution for you. Better still look it up in your unremarkably standard and mainstream English dictionary.
Muslim religionists will not magically dissipate in red mist any time soon. Unlike you, I have a vested interest in keeping the peace on British streets.
It’s becoming difficult to wish you well but I will, nonetheless.
voegelinian says
No, Nawaz is just a cleverer egg; clever enough to fool the likes of E. Alexandra Pierce (though I have no idea if that takes all that much cleverness).
At least three things undermine Nawaz: the way he treated Ayaan Hirsi Ali — e.g.:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2prB3weT4c
— (one has to be somewhat perspicuous to pick up on the smooth sophistry of his colubrine slickness here); secondly, the conspicuously thematic fact in his Moderate-Muslim apologetics that he is providing cover for some Islam that is supposed to be not only separate from the mountain ranges of data about the connection between Islam and violent jihad over the centuries and between Islam and the metastasizing terrorism that is assailing various parts of the world today (including the West) but also supposed to be the true Islam normative for the majority of Muslims.
And thirdly, what Spencer said.
No: the atrocities in language and in deed which Muslims perpetrate all over the world, and which are only getting worse, and the atrocities in language and in deed which typifies Islamic culture and history for 1400 years ought to lead us to be extra cautious when along comes a Nawaz. Extra cautious: not so prone to acquiesce (as is E. Alexandra Pierce) at the sweet taqiyya (and kitman) he whispers in our ear. One suspects that an asymptotic instinct or reflex predisposes those who swoon at the assurances of Nawaz — the instinct or reflex derived from an anxious (if not desperate) wish to find at least a few instances of that species we shudder to think is no less fantastic than the fabled unicorn, the Homo mohammedensis moderatus .
E. Alexandra Pierce says
Are you always this pretentious?
thomas_h says
No, but quite often, though not always, this right.
Jay Boo says
— occasionally a bit coy but some useful information if one has the time to sort through the ornate decoration.
voegelinian says
Lives are on the line — the lives of our friends, loved ones, fellow citizens. This is no time to complain about style or to indulge one’s ethical narcissism while ignoring the monstrous substance of the danger.
thomas_h says
Hesp,
This is no time to complain about style or to indulge one’s ethical narcissism, …or to pack simple things in ornate decoration.
Jay Boo is not complaining about the style. He is only observing you could make yourself more readable.
voegelinian says
thomas,
My comment was to E. Alexandra Pierce, not to Jay Boo.
thomas_h says
Hesp,
I see it now. I’m sorry.
Still, I think Jay Boo expresses truth about your comments obvious to so many.
Wishing you well,
Thomas
mouseworqs says
has anyone read “Liberal Fascism” by Jonah Goldberg ? puts the American left-v-right equation into spectacular historical perspective
PJG says
Yes, I read it while travelling through Europe. I just got into trouble with a man by mentioning “Euro-nihilism”. After being offended he didn’t know the term, he said I had an “agenda”, especially as I had talkedabout the rape epidemic in Scandinavia (doesn’t exist, he said.)
Geordie says
“has anyone read “Liberal Fascism” by Jonah Goldberg ? puts the American left-v-right equation into spectacular historical perspective.”
I think I should because American politics is something of a puzzle. The two party system seems over simplified for such a huge and diverse population.
Theo Prinse says
Senior editor Jerusalem Post Caroiine Glick too questions the will of the Washington political elite. Glick together with Netanyahu demanding the impossible from the Organization of the Islamic Conference front (Clinton’s) Palestinan Authority to accept the Jewish religious nature of the state of Israel thus are causing a stale mate towards those atheists world wide to fight supremacist Islam.
Anyway. What started of as a mere formal liberation back in 1776 by the American People from British colonialism ended as a multi culture immigrant American imperialism replacing European colonialism worldwide. The Edward Mandell House, John Dulles embryonal CIA under Richard Helms from 1950 absorbed hundreds of national socialists in MKULTRA and NASA.
Richard Helms interviewed Hitler in Berlin during the Olympic games and Hitler received the grand Mufti of Jerusalem in Berlin.
Working within the CIA these Nazi’s later connected with tens of thousands of Nazi’s that fled with operation Odessa to Syria, Egypt, Irak Argentine, Uruguay etc.
The Nazi’s within the CIA up to the Frank Church committee in 1974 influenced the US position towards their Orient nazi war in 1956, 1967 and 1973 against Israel.
Richard Helms was convicted and became ambassador in Persia where Helms, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Pakistani Zia ul Haq set up a policy to replace the western oriented secularists in Pakistan, Persia, Afghanistan by islam fundamentalist in order to prevent the former Soviet Union to expand its geo-political sphere of influence.
The Reagan Brzezinski backed Afghan Mujahedeen trough Zia ul Haqs secret service ISI caused the Red Army such a defeat that as a result Reagan, Thatcher, Kohl, Woytilla, Martens, Lubbers annexed eastern Europe from the Soviet Unions sphere of influence.
This annexation gave birth to the Moloch of the European Union of the political elite in Belgium Saxe Goburg Gotha, frm prime minister Guy Verhofstatdt and conjunction with Berlin.
2. Like the US the annexation caused a huge outsourcing and a huge wave of immigrants among them a huge number of Muslims form all over the Islam world.
3. The US out source caused the economic rise of China expanding its space and military presence.
4. The London and Washington intelligence elite proceeded with their secular replacement by Muslim fundamentalist entities and among many evil trained agent Osama bin Laden who later flew into the Twin Towers.
The CIA choose among their many Manchurian candidates Husein Obama who had Stalinist pedophile and later collaborating with the CIA Frank Marshal Davis as his mentor to become senator and then US President.
As president Husein Obama merely pursues the Clinton Muslim Brotherhood policy which is a prolongation of the Richard Helms and Zbigniew Brzezinski’s geo-political replacement policy
Theo Prinse says
The Second Vatican Council from 1965 in the third part of its document Nostre Aetate in formulating issues that Islam and Christians have in common like the same god declares Chirstian submission to Muslims. .
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nostra_Aetate
The English version has no remarks on this subject
bill says
. The anti-Semitic Communist ex-Muslim Maryam Namazie and the Council of Ex-Muslims in Britain
I am very disappointed to see your slurs on these people who are one of the few organisations fighting Muslim extremism in UK. I have not seen any evidence that they are anti semitic either.
I support them as I do you but I think you diminish your own cause by turning on those who should be considered to be your allies.
voegelinian says
Spencer is right about Namazie and the CEMB. As I wrote on the Faith Freedom site back in 2009, a couple of weeks after I had joined the CEMB discussion forum and had logged numerous posts to get dialogue going there:
“I discovered to my exceeding dismay that the overwhelming response to my initial posts at CEMB — posts which were no-nonsense tough anti-Islamic posts — was one of hostility to me, hostility to my positions, and a generally knee-jerk defense of Muslims.”
The most generous interpretation for why CEMB ex-Muslims indulge in this nonsense is that their hearts and minds are, on a psychocultural level, profoundly compromised by a need to defend Muslims (sometimes laced, as with a Namazie, with a deep-seated prejudice against the West) because they evidently haven’t fully exorcized the Mohammedan demon from their viscera.
Given the mountainous and massive affronts to human rights which Islam and which Muslims around the world are polluting the world with (and only getting worse in our time), a “council” of “ex-Muslims” needs to do and to say a hell of a lot more to gain our trust.
gizz118 says
NRO was once a great magazine. I no longer read it.
thomas_h says
“I no longer read it.”
Ditto here.
BTW, Mark Steyn has dropped it too.
voegelinian says
On my blog, I noted that back in 2006 Buckley made a serious — but, alas, all too common — error about Islam:
http://hesperado.blogspot.com/2011/01/buckley-and-islam.html