First this:
And then this:
‘Jihadi Bonnie and Clyde’ teens charged with planning Sydney terrorist attack
Followed by this:
And finally this:
So how surprised are you by this?
SHOCK POLL Collapses Media Narrative – Overwhelming EU Support for a Muslim Ban…
The Patriots had the coldest first half and ultimately they were down 3-28 until they then ended up scoring the last 31 points of the game. And because of a missed extra point, they had to score a pair of two-point conversions to tie the score from when they had been 16 points down. The video is of The Patriots last drive to tie the game.
And I know I shouldn’t say it, but it was like watching Trump win an impossible election against all expectations.
UPDATE: But it seems everyone is saying it: Trump supporters see a kindred spirit in Patriots’ come-from-behind victory.
AND FOR THE LONG TERM RECORD: Just so if I want to this is always available. Mot surprisingly, Edelman’s catch of the ages is the frozen moment on both the above vide of the Superbowl itself, and below on the video of the Patriots entire season.
And now here is a documentary on Brady’s season.
This is the description of the movie Patriots Day:
An account of the Boston Marathon bombing, PATRIOTS DAY is the powerful story of a community’s courage in the face of terror. In the aftermath of an unspeakable attack, Police Sergeant Tommy Saunders (Mark Wahlberg) joins courageous survivors, first responders and investigators in a race against the clock to hunt down the bombers before they strike again. Weaving together the stories of Special Agent Richard DesLauriers (Kevin Bacon), Police Commissioner Ed Davis (John Goodman), Sergeant Jeffrey Pugliese (J.K. Simmons) and nurse Carol Saunders (Michelle Monaghan) this visceral and unflinching chronicle captures the suspense of one of the most sophisticated manhunts in law enforcement history and celebrates the strength of the people of Boston.
Everything you might want to see except some kind of analysis of the motivation of the bombers. Definitely not recommended.
More interesting, however, is the Superbowl which is Sunday night in the US but kicks off at 10:30 on Monday. It has the Boston Patriots v Atlanta Falcons. An unusually political contest since Boston has Tom Brady as its quarterback, the greatest who has ever played the game. But in very left wing Boston he is known for his friendship with Donald Trump and has even been known to wear the MAGA hat. Even more, the owner is Robert Kraft about whom this story is told:
Friendship and loyalty mean a lot to New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, which explains why he happens to be such a huge fan of President Donald Trump.
After Kraft’s wife passed away from cancer six years ago, only a very few people were thoughtful enough to stick by the Patriots owner’s side as he struggled with adapting to a life without his partner of 48 years. One of those people was Donald Trump.
“When Myra died, Melania and Donald came up to the funeral in our synagogue — then they came for memorial week to visit with me,” Kraft told the New York Daily News in an interview.
“Then he called me once a week for the whole year — the most depressing year of my life when I was down and out,” Kraft added. “He called me every week to see how I was doing, invited me to things, tried to lift my spirits. He was one of five or six people that were like that. I remember that.”
What an amazing gesture. It is no wonder that Kraft has stuck by Trump’s side through thick and thin, including at Indiana Inaugural Ball on Jan. 19, where the then-president-elect acknowledged their friendship in front of the whole world.
“In the audience we have somebody that’s under no pressure whatsoever because he’s got a great quarterback named Tom Brady and a great coach named Belichick — Bob Kraft,” Trump said at the dinner. “Your friend Tom just called, he feels good. He called to congratulate us, he feels good. Good luck. You’re going to do great things.”
Unlike his enemies, Trump is a man of pure decency. Go Pats!
That one’s from Canada, and this is from an old mate in the US: “What does the Australian press have to say about this?” These were their entire messages.
What “it” and “this” are no one needed to tell me. But truly how stupid do you have to be to have made an arrangement with Obama after the election to send boat people from Nauru and Manus to the US? If Malcolm believed he was going to get points for having stood up to the US against Trump, as clueless as I have always thought him, he has plumbed levels of stupidity and political incompetence until now unimaginable. From The Australian:
Australia’s alliance with the US has hit its lowest point in decades, in a clash over a divisive refugee deal that led Donald Trump to berate Malcolm Turnbull in private before staging a public retreat from the agreement.
This morning the President has said he loves Australia and will “respect” the deal, but that nations are taking advantage of the US. White House spokesman Sean Spicer said his boss was “unbelievably disappointed” about the “horrible deal” and that refugees will only be allowed in the US if they pass extreme vetting. But Mr Trump’s top officials have tried to smooth over the rift, holding a meeting with ambassador Joe Hockey.
For Malcolm apparently to have tried to push Trump, by telling him that as a fellow businessman that a deal is a deal, must rank as politically incompetent as anything I have ever seen. That Trump now thinks of Malcolm as a flea-weight no-account fool only means he has the same assessment of the PM as the rest of us.
UPDATE WITH COMMENTS ON THE ARTICLE FROM THE OZ: There are now 830 comments on the linked article, and these are the top 22 in order from the list ordered according to “Top Comments” and there was no need to stop there.
1) Chronology is important here.
1. 10 months out from US presidential election, Turnbull visits US. He meets Hillary and snubs Trump.
2. In the weeks leading up to US presidential election, Turnbull does a deal with a dead duck President.
3. Turnbull and Obama agree to not announce it (hide the deal) until the US presedential election is over. They both want Hillary to get up, and the deal would be excellent ammunition for Trump in a campaign dominated by illegal immigration.
4. Trump wins. Turnbull panics.
5. Turnbull has to call Greg Norman to find out how to get in touch with Trump.
6. Turnbull announces deal publicly 5 days later, and before he has spoken to Trump about it.
7. Trump understandably gives him a smack down on the phone.
8. Turnbull spins the phone call, and in desperation to announce something good in his otherwise failing Prime Ministership, announces the deal as done.
9. Trump is annoyed that Turnbull couldn’t keep quiet. Trump has been placed in a contradictory position that could damage him politically.
10. Trump gives Turnbull a smack down on Twitter, and leaks the phone call to return the favour.
The problem exists because of Turnbull, and Turnbull alone.
– At no point has Turnbulll invested in a personal relationship with Trump. Mostly because he exists in the same elitist bubble as people who predicted a thumping Hillary win.
– He did a sneaky deal with left wingers and helped hide it from voters in the US.
– He then tried to pump his own political fortunes up and didn’t care about the damage it might do to Trump.
Turnbull has to go. He is damaging the Liberal party and the nation.
2) I feel sympathy for Trump. Why should he in the American interest accept these illegal boat people who came to this country largely for economic opportunism, they have rampaged, trashed Manus island, we won’t take them, so why should Trump call on the American taxpayer to live in America?
3) Greg Sheridan in his column today notes, Trump’s reluctance to commit to actual numbers to be resettled in the US from Manus Island or Nauru is no different from Obama’s. The Obama administration gave Turnbull an “announceable”, a media event, a virtual solution to the resettlement issue which itself did not guarantee that the US would take a single person unless it was satisfied through its own vetting procedures.
Trump is right to ask “why”? What’s in it for America? He should take all the time he needs to scrutinise this “virtual solution”.
4) Australia just keeps creating more problems for itself, by not enforcing its border laws on illegal immigrants. If they have been vetted and found to be unsuitable they should be deported.
5) This was a deal cooked up by Turnbull and Obama in the interim period between Trump winning the US election and actually taking up Office. It was very similar to Gillard’s NDIS policy, made just before she went out the door, a little bomblet if you like, to tickle up the new lot when they get in. Gillard was never going to have to take responsibility for the NDIS much like Obama with the refugee deal. What Turnbull didn’t reckon on was how Trump was going to react to what he knew was a stitch up. You are the one who blew it Malcolm, you knew Obama was gone, why did you make this deal with a bloke who was literally gone? Also, where the hell us Bishop in all this? Attending gala functions???? That will help!
6) Aubsolutely. Why Turnbull would do a deal with a outgoing President, knowing full well the incoming President’s attitude to illegal immigration, is anybodies guess. You don’t have to be real smart to work out Obama left it as a time bomb, why didn’t Turnbull recognise that? So the new President gets a call from a PM who arrogantly ignored him, as a Clinton Supporter, and on Trump’s win, asks Australia to ” stay calm” and then expects Trump to be jolly and happy about piling a bunch of economic refugees Australia does not want, into the US? Turnbull once more has shown his inability to judge the scene, and his arrogance in not being able to get it. How embarrassing for our country.
7) Of course this is a super Dumb deal. If Trump takes refugees then its a Green light to refugees to flee to Australia in hope of to getting to USA . If Trump vets and refuses to take them then nobody else in the world will take. Turnbull actions during President Elect period, fully knowing Trump stance on refugees showed no respect to incoming new President Trump and has turned a good relation to a shaky relationship. It is Turnbull who is sneaky and tricky , his Obama deal during President Elect period was poor timing, disrespectful to an incoming President and whatever the outcome not in the interest of Australia in any way.
8) This agreement was made after Trump was elected. Obama signed off on it to cause trouble for Trump. For such a highly intelligent person, couldn’t Turnbull see how this would affect Australia once Trump took charge.
9) I think Obama agreeing to the deal was a practical joke aimed at his successor, and it has worked. Turnbull thinks he was clever to get it through but he was a stooge in a practical joke.
10) I’m embarrassed as an Australian because it seems to me that Turnbull took an opportunity to offload the costly and potentially dangerous fallout from the ALP/Greens’ huge mistake onto a friendly neighbour by cynically enabling Obama’s typically unpatriotic, petulant lefty ploy to leave a landline for Trump. Like any good neighbour, Trump has to accept the steaming bucket of poop because it would be rude not to. Too clever by half, Turnbull. Did I mention that I feel embarrassed? Ashamed might be a more apt description.
11) Smart move now is for Turnbull to ring Trump and unilaterally revoke the deal. Why should we call on the US to bail us out of a relatively simple problem just because Turnbull can’t face up to The Greens and the rest of the open border mob? He’s putting the civil rights of 1250 detainees ahead of the security of the electorate. These are illegal immigrants, not refugees. If they don’t pass our security clearances, ship them back to their countries of origin. If the country of origin won’t take them, send them to the first country that gave them residency before they travelled onwards to Australia.
12) Just deport them. They flew into Indonesia then ditched their documentation before setting sail for Australia. They are criminals. What about the genuine refugees sitting in tents all over the world with no food or air conditioning.
13) Of course it’s a dumb deal for America. You have to wonder why Obama did it? What advantage is it to America?
14) This is not the first time Obama threw Australia under the bus for his own domestic political agenda. Remember his speech at University of QLD in 2014 with its thinly veiled castigation of the Abbott government for it’s stance on global warming while comparing it to the US’ achievements in carbon abatement? All conveniently neglecting to mention that a significant reason for the US’ carbon reduction was the use of coal seam gas obtained through hydraulic fracturing.
The goal was to use Australia as a whipping boy (wanting his daughters to be able to visit the barrier reef in the future) so he could prove his climate change credentials back home. But at the same time, he ruled out any show of political support for the efforts of the democratically elected government of his closest ally to do exactly what the US was doing…fracking!
15) It IS a stupid deal. It shows the Liberal Government caving in to the refugee industry. People on Nauru and Manus can go home or stay where they are.
16) Obama set this up as timebomb, and Turnbull walked into it. There is no point in blaming Trump, for the arrogance and stupidity of Obama and Turnbull, two men who knew well the attitude Trump has towards illegal refugees. Once more poor judgement from Turnbull, as Obama has the last laugh. We don’t want a bunch of economic refugees dumped on us, nor surprisingly does the US. Yet because of this deal by these two fools, they have to take them. Angry? Trump has every right to be outraged.
17) I would keep out of it Bill. Trump would make mincemeat of you. Even your Union thugs would look like choir girls, up against this bloke. Just sit back and watch the fun.
18) This is not about Trump. It is about Turnbull and Bishop with the connivence of Obama trying to pull a swifty after Trump was elected, and to leave a behind a hand grenade to embarrass him into accepting the refugees. Their arrogance is astounding.
Well, it back fired and will sound the end of Turnbull. He was less than honest with the people on reporting his conversation with Trump. This will force Corey Bernadi’s hand as the liberal/national coalition is domed. Pauling Hanson is now likely to win a majority in both Queensland and WA. People have had enough, one nation may not be the complete answer, but it is an answer. I feel extremly sorry for Peter Dutton in all this, the unsung hero of the government.
Its telling that Bishop has gone into hiding.
19) Never going to be easy in the first few months when you have to clean up Barack Obamas mess.Who would take 1250 people without passports…I agree with Trump it is a Bum deal. Turnbull is fortunate Trump has said he is prepared to proceed.
We should not forget Turnbull on his first visit to America laughed at the thought of Trump becoming President. Malcom met with Clinton and Rubio.
20) Oh get over it ! If we are so touchy that we can’t take a robust phone call from a new and besieged President over what is not an inconsiderable number of illegals, then it is we who need to toughen up. Political correctness is out and straight talking is in, and about time. At least Trump didn’t call Turnbull, barking mad, as Shorten called Trump. I would say that Turnbull was used by Obama to get one in on Trump, and Turnbull believed him.
21) Its all an act .
Donald Trump will Honour it as he knows a deal is a deal .
He doesn’t want to upset Australia so he is pretending to be outrage so it will look good domestically for him.
He has to look tough on refugees no matter where they come from
22) While the media choose to write negative articles about Trump, the real story in all of this is that Turnbull is so thoroughly out of his depth he is in danger of drowning. It was Turnbull who went to the US cozying up to Obama and Clinton (not even understanding the Trump just might win the election); it was Turnbull who did this deal with a President who was packing up to leave!
Who is the incompetent politician in this debacle – his name is Turnbull.
Comment 55 from an interesting thread at Ace of Spades on, Are Western Pluralistic Societies Incompatible With Islam?
When Muslims are a tiny minority in a population, they tend to be peaceful and keep to themselves. They may be upstanding members of society. They say, “We just want to be left alone to practice our religion in peace.”
As their numbers grow, they begin making demands on the majority population. They will use the infidels’ sense of tolerance against them. They will demand that Muslim cabdrivers not be required to pick up fares with alcohol or seeing-eye dogs, that Muslim checkout clerks in grocery stores not be required to handle pork products, or that Muslim-style footbaths be installed in public restrooms. Any resistance to their demands is met with accusations of bigotry or “Islamophobia”.
When their numbers climb above 5% or so, they begin to get violent. It starts small, with scattered incidents that gradually become more organized and frequent. Above 10%, conditions really begin to deteriorate. They become openly threatening and aggressive towards kaffirs in public. Muslim political leaders get elected to more and more government offices, and begin to influence public policy. They start putting loudspeakers on mosques, forcing everyone to hear that caterwauling five times a day, every day, for the rest of their lives. There is no escape.
As their numbers climb higher, violent incidents become endemic. They begin to attack churches and synagogues filled with worshippers. Non-Muslims start to flee the violence, causing the Muslim percentage of the population to grow even faster.
Above 50%, it’s “Convert, pay the jizya, or die, infidel.”
Then the Muslim percentage of the population explodes, as terrified people convert with a literal knife held to their necks. The conquest is complete.
Islam teaches that Muslims are superior to all other people. Non-Muslims are technically “tolerated” in a majority Muslim nation, but under sharia law they are legally second-class citizens. They must pay a special tax (the jizya) and there may be additional restrictions placed on their behavior. Historically, these have taken various forms in different times and places. For example, a non-Muslim may not be allowed to build his house taller than the house of a Muslim, or he may not be allowed to look a Muslim in the eye but must keep his eyes downcast, or he may be required to wear special clothing to advertise his status as a dhimmi. (Where do you think Hitler got the idea of making Jews wear a yellow Star of David? Yep.)
In a Muslim majority nation, non-Muslims may be subject to being beaten, raped, or killed by Muslims, at a whim or on a slender pretext, and there are often little or no legal consequences for doing so. Rape of uncovered women by Muslim men has reached epidemic proportions in parts of Europe, and they’re not even a majority. Yet.
While it may take decades or longer to play out, this pattern has repeated time and time again in countries that have been conquered by Islam. It is as predictable as the sunrise. The only way to avoid it is to make sure that Muslims remain a tiny minority in the population. Once they gain a foothold, the progression is inexorable.
From Mark Steyn discussing the need for more bollards in relation to Australia in general and Malcolm Turnbull in particular.
One radio show and two TV shows in a little over 24 hours is almost like a real day’s work. But not quite enough apparently:
Mark,
Has your enthusiasm for writing insightful, erudite, and thoroughly entertaining commentary disappeared? Between quoting yourself, reprising episodes of your failing TV show, and entertainment reviews there is very little reason to click anymore.
Angelo DePalma, PhD
Newton, New JerseyTo be honest, I’m not sure where insightful erudition gets a chap these days. Last month, apropos an Islamic maniac mowing down Christmas shoppers in Germany, I wrote:
The less obviously evasive responses were almost as dispiriting. An English tourist visiting from Birmingham complained that in his native city ugly bollards line the sidewalks to obstruct any similarly homicidal lorries in the vicinity, but that Berlin had none. The Christkindlmarkt is a German tradition dating back to the Middle Ages: Munich’s is over 700 years old. A society that can only hold three-quarters-of-a-millennium-old traditions behind an impenetrable security perimeter is a society that will soon lose those traditions. My own preference, as I’ve stated, is that, if free countries have to have unsightly security controls, why don’t they have them around the national borders rather than around every single thing inside those borders?
I then asked:
Why do people like that Birmingham tourist think the answer to more and more Muslims is more and more bollards?
I don’t think I type the word “bollard” more than once a decade. So it was what passes, more or less, for an original thought these days, rather than the self-quoting Mr DePalma decries. The column was prominently published in Melbourne’s Herald Sun and other influential Australian newspapers. Indeed, The Herald Sun is the highest-circulation newspaper in Australia, with over a million and a half readers in a nation of less than 25 million people. What the paper says is read by almost everyone who matters in Melbourne, throughout Victoria, and in Canberra.
Nevertheless, a few days ago, in Melbourne, another maniac, self-described as a “Greek Islamic Kurdish Angel of Cult” for whatever that’s worth, used his vehicle to mow down another bunch of pedestrians, three fatally. Is the Melbourne motorist really an “Islamic Kurd”? Or just a nut riffing on the fashions of the day? Either way, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull immediately called for more bollards:
The Prime Minister pointed to boosting the number of bollards, which prevented the Bourke Street driver from entering a certain area, as a measure to be seriously considered…
‘A vulnerability we need to address’: Malcolm Turnbull calls for more bollards in busy pedestrian areas
We’re gonna need a lot more bollards!
The Premier of Victoria, Daniel Andrews, agrees. More bollards!
While a lot of work had already been done to safeguard the city – including the use of bollards – “if we have to do more, then absolutely we will,” he said….
“A lot of bollards have gone in, in recent times, but if we have to do more, then absolutely we will.”
I think open societies hunkering down behind ever more bollards is pitiful. But I argued all that last month in Australia’s biggest-selling newspaper, and a fat lot of good it did. So much for insightful, erudite commentary, in the most influential press outlets in a comparatively small market.
And yes, Mr DePalma has, I’m sure, noted that I quoted myself yet again. That’s because I’ve said it all before.
What does Malcolm actually believe that will allow him to deal with our problems? He leads a party of the right none of whose values he shares, but they are onto him. He will do the right thing because doing the wrong thing will upset more than half the party he leads. A stupid way to run a government, but when all is said and done, it is better than having the other side run things who would be infinitely worse.
Two articles from today that make a nice pairing. First this: German Official: We Regret Open Borders. And then this: American Jewish Movements Unite to Warn Trump Against Religious Tests. From the first of the articles.
Says growing Muslim population a challenge for open-minded society.
Berlin made mistakes with its “open-door” refugee policy, which “went off course” and saw hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers entering the country over the past two years, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble admits. . . .
He wrote in an October article for Die Welt that “the growing number of Muslims in our country today is a challenge for the open-mindedness of mainstream society.” Addressing the role of Islam in society, a hot issue in Germany, he vowed to create a “German Islam” compatible with the values of liberal democracy and pluralism.
And then from the second:
Organizations representing the three largest denominations of American Jewry – the Orthodox, Conservative and Reform movements – all issued warnings to the White House by Sunday night against institutionalizing religious tests at America’s borders.
The Jewish community urged US President Donald Trump to tread carefully between protecting the nation and encroaching on core American values after the new president issued an executive order on Friday banning all Syrian refugees and citizens from seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the United States.
And then a bit of explanation from the President:
“This is not about religion – this is about terror and keeping our country safe,” Trump said in a response to the crisis on Sunday. “There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order.”
“America is a proud nation of immigrants,” he added, “and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border.”
The bottom line is that even though Trump understands what needs to be done, there is no constituency that will allow him to do it.
Having just been to Birkenau-Auschwitz, which I did reluctantly but am not sorry that we did, the ignorance of anyone comparing Trump to Hitler, or American immigration policy to the Final Solution, is not just ignorant but sickening to a level that is hard to fathom. Here is how it was then. Any Jew that the Nazis could get their hands on was murdered, some on the spot in mass shootings, others in industrial-sized gas chambers in specially constructed death camps, and the remainder by being forced to work in conditions designed to lead to death in a relatively short period of time. Jews were not trying to enter German-occupied Europe. They would have left for anywhere else if they would have been allowed to go without a word of complaint wherever they might have ended up. Being sent to Nauru would have been the dearest wish for every one of them with no exception. Do these protestors not know anything at all?
Similar thoughts on all those ignoramuses who think of themselves as so brave in standing up to that “Fascist” Trump. The life expectancy of anyone publicly criticising Hitler anywhere within Occupied Europe would not have been 24 hours. These people know nothing about any of this. You can argue about immigration policy and what to do with the tens of millions of refugees found across the world, for which there are no easy answers. But to compare the situation today with the 1930s and 1940s is sickening. These people are personally repulsive.
Meanwhile, the left will use any device for its immoral purposes. Yesterday was Holocaust Memorial Day and Trump issued a press release that did not specifically refer to the Jewish deaths for which he is being criticised. Do these morons really think Trump is unaware of this terrible tragedy or that he wishes to ignore its significance. The left truly does become more repellant every day. They stand for no discernible principle. Nihilism truly is at the core of their worldview.
Don’t worry if you haven’t, but it is coming to a country near you. It is the opposite of one country, under God, indivisible. This is from a reasonably positive description:
The millet system was developed to protect the rights of the “tolerated clients of the Muslim community” as Ahl al-dhimmi (Bates, Rassam, p. 101) as designated People of the Book in the Quran and institutionalized after the fall of Constantinople by Sultan Mehmet II in 1453. However, the great expanse of the Ottoman Empire also leaves room for each community, geographically and culturally, to interpret and implement the rules and regulations of the empire differently, if they were respected at all. This applies not only to the term but to the millet system as well.
Israel sort of has one now, as do France and Sweden, but these are places which are not Muslim-majority nations. Here is something from a less positive view of the millet system:
I don’t think even at its height though you could say the Ottoman empire had more liberty than the most law governed and tolerant places in ‘Christendom’ and certainly while European thinkers respect the Ottoman system at its height it very much looked like an example of strong orderly monarchy, not decentralised liberty.
This is where things are heading and which the forces of the left are doing all they can to ensure. Not in my lifetime, but if you are young enough, almost certainly in yours.
A great interview with Kelly-Anne Conway: ‘They never saw this coming’: A Q&A with Kellyanne Conway. All to be read, but this stood out for me.
I don’t consider myself a feminist. I think my generation isn’t a big fan of labels. My favorite label is mommy. I feel like the feminist movement has been hijacked by the pro-abortion movement or the anti-male sentiments that you read in some of their propaganda and writings. I’m not anti-male. One does not need to be pro-female and call yourself a feminist, when with it comes that whole anti-male culture where we want young boys to sit down and shut up in the classroom. And we have all of these commercials that show what a feckless boob the man in the house is. That’s not the way I see the men in my life, most especially my 12-year-old son. I consider myself a postfeminist. I consider myself one of those women who is a product of her choices, not a victim of her circumstances.
Everyone is a product of our choices and the circumstances we find ourselves in. There is clearly no reason that any woman cannot reach any level in the societies of the West.
Law of Markets 