FREE SPEECH – Use It or Lose It

It looks like Iran’s holocaust conference worked like a charm!

People all over the world are gathering to discuss the controversy.

But, once again, those who ‘hate our freedoms’ make themselves known.

Held on April 17-19 at the University of Teramo in central Italy, the event gathered historians, journalists, lawyers and writers to analyze Holocaust denial.A UCEI press release slammed the conference, entitled “The gag history” and part of a master’s degree on Middle East issues, expressing their “bitterness and concern for how the media ignored the event.”

Lecturers included renowned historians and representatives of the extreme right wing organisations, along with fiercely anti-Zonisti personalities from the far left.

Professor Claudio Moffa, a speaker at the seminar, responded by condemning the “media’s slander, the economical damage, the judicial persecution and the professional ostracism imposed on those historians who are considered to be negationist”.

Entry Denied

Speakers included Robert Faurisson, a leading personality among those who deny the Holocaust, who gave his contributions to the seminar via a video conference as he has been denied entry in Italy because of his negationist views.

Notice that according to the Union of Italian Jewish Communities (UCEI), Italians are not “anti-democratic” for denying one human being the right to assemble with other human beings, but are “anti-democratic” for allowing Italians to do it!

On his personal blog website Faurisson published a series of documents on the “Jewish exploitation of the Holocaust” alongside some solidarity email messages he received which slam UCEI’s communiqué as “a sign of the strong Jewish lobby in Italy”.According to UCEI’s president, Renzo Gattegna, “what has really surprised us is the fact that accredited historians who may have historical views and analyses we do not share, but whom we know have nothing to do with negationist lies decided to take part in this initiative, thus legitimating racist political and anti-democratic positions.”

I can see how these people might erroneously label misgivings about the official Holocaust narrative as being “racist” given that it involves a particular group of people (i.e., Jews) – even though we all know Zionists are NOT Jews.

BUT, how in the hell can peaceful assembly to “analyze” the controversy be characterized as “anti-democratic???”

Let’s face it, these people aren’t upset that it’s “racist” or “anti-democratic” to “analyze” the holocaust.

THEY ARE UPSET THAT PEOPLE ARE AWAKENING to discover what FREE SPEECH is all about.

USE IT or LOSE IT

THAT is what it’s about.

Now, go out there and USE IT before it’s too late!

Source: WakeUpFromYourSlumber.

The Israel Prize scandal

The Israel Prize this year was a scandal. Had I been sitting in the hall at the Jerusalem Theater and not watching the award ceremony on television (Channel 1, Tuesday, 19:25), I am not certain that I wouldn’t have stood up and shouted at the panel of dignitaries, never mind how common it might have sounded: “Where are the Mizrahi ethnic groups” (referring to Jews with origins in the Muslim countries), or: “Where are the Sephardim?”This isn’t a demand for reverse discrimination, but rather for fairness and reasonableness, because how can it be possible that in the 15 prize categories not a single place was found for a worthy candidate who is not Ashkenazi? And if so, what does this say about us – a country that has pretenses to equality – if among the more than half of the population that comes from the countries of Asia and Africa (as the statistical bulletins put it), there is not a single person who is worthy of receiving the Israel Prize, and there is no one whose life’s work is worthy of note and has contributed something to the state?

What should concern an individual who takes the messages of this important official prize seriously is not only that the cultural and academic elite in Israel, 59 years after its founding, is still purely Ashkenazi, but rather that the official institutions and personages responsible for and in charge of the prize did not find anything wrong in that it is given only to unsere – that is, to one of “us” Europeans or to people born in this country whose parents came from Europe.

I did not see, for example, that this bothered the socialist Education Minister Yuli Tamir, who sat at the end of the podium and looked to be thoroughly enjoying herself during the ceremony. Of all those who were sitting there, it seems to me that the prize and its significance should have been the most obvious to her from the ministerial perspective, but also from the personal perspective. And now, the message transmitted by the education minister on this Independence Day was that she has no problem with the fact that most of the country’s population would feel alienated by and unconnected to this ceremony. And the implication was that it will feel alienated and disassociated in the long term, as though it does not belong to this country at all.Section 2 of this scandal was the thank-you speech in the name of all the recipients of the prize, which was delivered by the former president of the Manufacturers Association, Dov Lautman. Lautman chose to say things about the importance of education in Israel, and about the need to invest in it for the sake of the future. All of this was said at the time of a prolonged strike by university students and at high schools, which is part of a struggle against astronomical tuition fees that is threatening to make mincemeat of the current academic year. Is this what Lautman was referring to in his speech? No, he was talking about the education of children. The people who are able to solve the crisis with the students sat behind the table on stage and applauded him, perhaps out of gratitude that he didn’t mention this distressing issue.

Altogether, I have grave doubts as to whether it is at all educational to choose men of finance for the Israel Prize. The prize, after all, is awarded to honor exceptional knowledge and research, for devoting one’s life to a scientific, artistic or national goal, without thought of material profit. And business people are rewarded in any case by the sale of their products. Moreover, if my memory is not playing tricks on me, at Lautman’s Delta factories the greater part of the production is not done on Israeli soil.

But in the atmosphere of the pursuit of lucre, which is represented by the prime minister himself, who sat at the center of the table, it is easy to understand how rich people, however veteran and involved they may be, rise to the level of national heroes and win the right to sit in the same place as author S.Y. Agnon, for example, who was one of the first winners of the prize (and even won it twice).

Section 3 of the Israel Prize scandal is the puzzle of why they decided to award two prizes for architecture and another prize for design in a single year, which means three prizes in almost identical fields. Did Israeli architecture (or design) have special achievements this year that justify this unexpected homage to the profession? No, because Israel is one of the ugliest countries in the world when it comes to both public and private construction, with respect to the lack of harmony between the building and the environment, with respect to the nouveau-riche taste and with respect to the rapid degeneration of structures because of the use of cheap building materials. As for design, there is no discipline that equals it in the acute expression of the spirit of the times, a spirit of dealing with images, with packaging and with the presentation of things at the expense of the substance and the truth – and also often at the expense of art.

Last on the list of elements that made the evening a scandal is the need, which has become automatic, for every respectable ceremony in our country to be accompanied by Hebrew song, a performance by a group of instrumentalists and “the dance.” The source of this, no doubt, is what used to be called, at public cultural evenings, an “artistic program.” But what connection is there between the laureates of the prize – some of whom wore skullkaps, and many of whom were close to 80 – and the performance by Alon Oleartchick, for example, with a glittering and wailing maiden, who bared her legs? Or the ballet troupe that suddenly burst forth from somewhere and capered before everyone in scanty lace underpants? Or the Hakol Over Habibi group? What would have been wrong, during this serious event, with a chamber trio or quartet playing a piece by Schubert, say? Alas, it is not certain that the state will be ready for a daring program like that – even in its 100th year.

Source: Haaretz.com.

Racism Against Hispanics Among U.S. Army Lines

The commander of New Mexico’s National Guard is demanding an apology from the Army brass after dozens of his soldiers in a mostly Hispanic unit were ordered to strip to their gym shorts and searched for gang tattoos while on duty in Kuwait.

Army officials said the searches last May of 58 New Mexico National Guardsmen in a unit called Task Force Cobra were proper and legal.

But Brig. Gen. Kenny Montoya, head of the state National Guard, said he believes ethnicity played a role in the episode — the unit is 55 percent Hispanic.

“I said something wrong was done there, and it was because of race, and I want to make sure it will not happen again,” Montoya said.

The search, in which the soldiers were ordered to take off their shirts, shoes and socks and then were looked over for tattoos, was prompted by an unsubstantiated allegation from a soldier in another unit who complained about gang activity among soldiers in Kuwait.

At the time, several members of Task Force Cobra objected that the searches were racially motivated, and within days, Montoya asked his Army bosses to apologize. When that didn’t happen, Montoya wrote an apology and had that read and posted at their barracks.

Montoya, in a June 1 letter to Gen. Peter Schoomaker in the office of the Army chief of staff, said the unit “was racially targeted and illegally searched for body tattoos just because the unit consists of a large number of Hispanic-surnamed soldiers. An Army CID agent without any credible evidence, and armed only with information about an individual soldier from a different base and in a different unit, made a decision to target my unit.”

“All I asked was that someone with equal rank to me would go over to these great Americans and apologize — this still has not been accomplished.”

After the Albuquerque Journal reported the incident this week, New Mexico’s congressional delegation demanded that acting Army Secretary Pete Geren order a full investigation. Gov. Bill Richardson, the nation’s only Hispanic governor and a Democratic presidential hopeful, said he supports an investigation into the “degrading searches.”

The New Mexico chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens also expressed outrage.

“This is no way to treat our troops that are sacrificing their lives for the cost of our freedom. Racial profiling is reprehensible and should not be condoned,” said Paul A. Martinez, the group’s executive director.

The issue affected everyone in the unit, Hispanic or not, Montoya said. “They’re all brothers in arms. Most had come out of Iraq, where they were in immediate danger.”

The incident began after a Chicago Sun-Times article quoted Army Reserve Sgt. Jeffrey Stoleson of the 127th Infantry at Camp Navistar, Kuwait, about alleged gang activity among troops.

Stoleson, a corrections officer in civilian life, complained he was “tired of serving and putting his life on the line with gang bangers,” Montoya said. Later, the sergeant told Army Criminal Investigation Division agents that a soldier with a Hispanic surname, Morales, in the 127th Infantry and unnamed soldiers in the 111th Air Defense Artillery — to which the security force Cobra belongs — had gang tattoos.

On May 25, CID agent Paul McGuire ordered the Guard members at Ali Al Salem Air Base, Kuwait, to checked for tattoos. The inspections quickly came to the attention of Montoya back in New Mexico. He telephoned up the chain of command; another round of searches set for the next day was stopped. When Montoya asked, he was told no other units were searched.

“The only tie with Morales was my guys were the only unit with 50 percent Hispanics,” the general said.

McGuire found no gang tattoos. A later investigation said Morales denied being a member of a gang and even explained the meaning of his tattoos.

The Army forbids extremist, racist, sexist or vulgar tattoos. Army regulations don’t specifically forbid gang membership, but do prohibit membership in any extremist organization.

Several members of the targeted unit were current or former police officers who would have picked up on any signs of gang activity, said Maj. Kenneth Nava, a spokesman for the New Mexico Guard.

Maj. Anne Edgecomb in the Army’s public affairs department in the Pentagon said in an e-mail Wednesday to The Associated Press that the Army had just received the congressional delegation’s letter calling for a full investigation and that no response had yet been sent.

“The U.S. Army, one of the most ethnically diverse organizations in our nation, provides equal opportunity to all our soldiers regardless of race, ethnicity or gender,” she said.

The Army’s inquiry to date has found the CID and officers of the 111th “approved and coordinated the plan” for searches. An attorney with the military’s Judge Advocate General said having soldiers remove their shirts to verify gang tattoos was legal.

Nava said that plans as described and plans as executed are not always the same.

The inquiry recommended discipline against three New Mexico soldiers who objected to the searches. Nava said those three were counseled, but there was no long-term discipline that would hurt their careers.

Source: newmexican.com.