Having just been named the recipient of something called the
International Four Freedoms medal German Chancellor Angela Merkel has found a
new way to suppress freedom of expression in favor of Islamist sensitivities. And
has found a way to kowtow to the president of Turkey, thus making Islam look strong and manly and making
Western Europe look weak and feminine.
At least, she is getting rewards from liberal foundations.
The International Four Freedoms Foundation lauded her for this:
She
shows great moral leadership as Chancellor of all Germans regardless of faith
and ethnicity in the face of the start of the anti-Islam movement Pegida
(Patriotic Europeans Against Islamisation of the West) in 2014. In the current
migrant and refugee crisis Merkel is committed to Europe’s humanitarian duty to
protect those fl eeing war and confl ict in the Middle East, Africa and Asia
and to tackle the causes of the crisis by working for peace in Syria and the
region.
Nothing quite like having strong, powerful women in charge.
The current ruckus was set off by a German stand-up comedian
named Jan Boehmermann. Said comedian made a mockery of notably thin-skinned
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. As one knows, Erdogan’s Turkey has been
a sworn enemy of free expression and freedom of the press.
Apparently, Erdogan was so offended by the jokes that were
made at his expense, that he asked Germany to invoke an old law that prohibits
anyone from mocking a foreign leader. In previous decades it was used to favor
the sensitivities of the Shah of Iran and Chile’s Augusto Pinochet.
The law, however, can only be applied when the German
Chancellor expressly allows it. Thus, Merkel could have shut down the
investigation on her own initiative. She did not. She allowed it to proceed and to move toward prosecution.
Everyone understood that she had
yet again bent over for Islam. The comedian, for his part, will be facing three
years in prison. To be fair, Merkel, upon allowing the prosecution said that she did not much like the law and would call for its repeal in 2018. No
defender of liberty was appeased.
This episode again showed a Western leader submitting to
Islam by showing a willingness to sacrifice basic freedoms to Islamist
sensitivities. In this way Merkel has encouraged the young jihadis who believe
that the West is weak and decadent. Watching the spectacle they conclude that
the feminized and feminist West is failing and that manly Muslims will take
over. Keep in mind that in Merkel’s Germany, when Muslim men assaulted and
molested German women in public in Cologne on New Years’ Eve, the police were
instructed to play it all down and not to call it sexual assault.
This is called human sacrifice: sacrificing your daughters
to depraved refugees on the altar of multiculturalism. As you know, Sweden is
leading the world in this pagan ritual.
German newspaper editor Anna Sauerbrey offered the best
report on what happened. Writing in the The New York Times, she said:
A few
weeks ago, the German TV program “extra3” satirized Turkey’s president, Recep
Tayyip Erdogan, in
song, which prompted the Turkish government to
call in the German ambassador to Ankara for a lecture, presumably, on
its views regarding the limits of free speech.
Not
long after, the comedian Jan Böhmermann, satirizing the ensuing debate over
what is allowed in political humor, read
a poem on his own show, “Neo Magazin Royale.” The poem, which he read in
front of a Turkish flag, was about Mr. Erdogan and, among other things, what he
might do with goats. It was a blunt provocation with an intelligent twist.
Well, at least he did not produce a YouTube video… because
then the ever-fearless Obama administration, with Hillary Clinton in charge would
have immediately thrown him in jail.
Why did Merkel cave in to Erdogan? Well, you see, she has a
problem. Having opened Germany to over a million refugees--who are producing
their own special kind of anarchy-- Merkel refused to walk back her policy. In
order to shut down some of the criticism she tried to negotiate a deal—great dealmaker
she—whereby Turkey would take some of them back, in exchange for financial
compensation.
Sauerbrey reports:
Why
would Ms. Merkel choose Mr. Erdogan over her own citizens’ free speech? One
reason: the recent agreement between the European Union and Turkey to
stanch the flow of refugees entering the Continent. Under the accord,
those caught crossing the sea between Turkey and the Greek islands are now sent
back in exchange for a payment of three billion euros and Europe’s commitment
to take in up to 72,000 additional Syrian refugees.
The
arrangement was supposed to solve everything: a relatively humanitarian answer
that would tamp down far-right sentiment in Germany and appease Turkey, at
little cost to the chancellor. It was a model of political realism — with a
touch of political cynicism. As Chancellor Merkel saw it, the alternative to
sending back the refugees was political inertia at best, political cataclysm at
worst.
But
what seemed like a policy breakthrough became a political albatross. Had Ms.
Merkel refused to prosecute Mr. Böhmermann, Turkey could have pulled out of the
deal. She has opted for the second, bad option, sullying her own liberal
virtues.
Obviously, the deal with Turkey did not solve the refugee
problem. Sauerbrey writes:
Nor
does it work as policy. There are still hundreds of thousands of refugees in
Europe and many more on the way, and still there is no agreement on how to
share the burden across the Continent. Meanwhile, human traffickers are
beginning to build new routes over Libya to Italy.
But
what the Böhmermann affair shows most impressively is that the deal was struck
for the wrong reasons at the wrong time. It was a panic reaction. Ms. Merkel
was under immense political pressure; her party, the Christian Democrats, had
just suffered setbacks in three state elections. Other European leaders are
facing similar problems.
Europe
came to the table quarreling and desperate — not as a partner, but as a beggar.
Now Mr. Erdogan continues to treat Europe as such. Political realists love to
cite game theory to justify their decisions; had they cracked open their
textbooks for a refresher, they could have easily predicted this outcome.
In Germany, Merkel has been roundly attacked for her
weakness and cowardice. Some say that this will end her political career.
Perhaps, it will. But, what will end the European habit of showing weakness and
appeasement when faced with Islamist savagery?
Meantime on the girl power front, the Belgian minister of
transportation, Jacqueline Galant has resigned her position. After the
terrorist attack at the Brussels airport someone noticed that Galant had been
warned over and over again that airport security was deficient and that it needed
to be drastically improved. She ignored the warnings.
The Wall Street Journal has the story:
Belgium’s
transport minister resigned on Friday amid allegations that she ignored
warnings over shortcomings in security monitoring and funding at Brussels
Airport, becoming the first member of the government to fall in the wake of last
month’s terror attacks.
Belgian
Prime Minister Charles Michel confirmed that he had accepted the resignation of
Jacqueline Galant, a member of his own centrist party. “I salute the dignity
she shows,” Mr. Michel said.
Pressure
on Ms. Galant had grown in recent days after leaked European Commission reports
showed that the European Union executive had repeatedly warned that the
country’s civil aviation authority wasn’t conducting sufficient checks at Belgian
airports.
Why are these women leaders—and we could have included the
insouciant attitude of the feminist prime minister of Sweden about the rapes of
Swedish women by Muslim men—so reluctant to protect people from
predators?
As for girl power, our own former Secretary of State,
Hillary Clinton was warned by Ambassador Chris Stevens that the security situation in Benghazi, Libya was deteriorating before it killed him. Of course, they could also have found this out by reading the evening news. He requested additional security. His request was turned down. Hillary’s state department chose to do nothing.
The Wall Street Journal reported the Hillary attitude:
Then-Secretary
of State Hillary
Clinton received emails from her top aides warning about dangerous
security conditions in Benghazi, Libya, in the run-up to the terrorist attack
that killed a U.S. ambassador and three other Americans there in 2012,
documents disclosed on Friday show.
The
messages were part of a batch of about 300 emails involving Benghazi that were
made public by the State Department. State officials already gave the emails in
February to a special House committee that is looking into the Benghazi attacks
and is expected to take testimony from Mrs. Clinton.
The
emails, in addition to what they reveal about the Benghazi attack, offer
glimpses into Mrs. Clinton’s thinking and executive style. In an exchange with
aides about to testify on Capitol Hill, she wrote: “Well, what doesn’t kill you
makes you stronger (as I have rationalized for years), so just survive and
you’ll have triumphed!”
Unfortunately, glib insensitivity does not make you look
tough. It makes you look weak and numb. And yet, Americans, especially those of the
Democratic variety, believe that Hillary is strong and tough. Clearly,
something is wrong with the American mind.
One understands why Hillary would have been so hell bent on
punishing the videographer for what happened in Benghazi. By the nature of her
position she was responsible for the security of the ambassador to Libya. She
failed miserably. Naturally, she wanted to shift the blame.
In these instances, Kipling is proved wrong about The Female Of The Species.
ReplyDeletePaglia makes some good points but doesn't get millennials, the worst generation of all time.
ReplyDeletehttps://youtu.be/HxoN4wTrnvs
I don't know why this has to be a gender problem.
ReplyDeleteIt is good to be reminded that the free speech is protected in America is not true everywhere.
I admit I don't know what to do with thin-skinned foreign leaders, or how you mock them personally while not the country they represent.
Mostly I don't see the point in heavy mocking people who get upset easily. So if I went over the top and Mr. Sensitive complained, I'd be glad to apologize, although only for the tone, not for the facts.
I'm not even against mocking in general. You just have to be careful to not generate undue sympathy for the person you don't like. You don't want to help a bully keep power because his country's voters see him as unfairly attacked. You need to be strategic.
Another demonstration of what would happen if women ruled the world. I would further define it as feminist women. Considering that feminism is based on abortion and ultimately on the death of those who would interfere with their desire for power it does make a bit of sense why Merkel et al would quail at anything that might lead to her ultimate demise. It is not unusual for feminists to use other women as "cannon fodder" to increase their own power. As Hillary said "What difference does it make?"
ReplyDeleteThe very casual attitude towards the death ,abortion, infanticide, heinous act committed on others and the problems that are the results of their quest for power have value as long as their lives are not at risk.
merkel is an omen of what we can expect from feminist power seekers.