Moscow lashed out at Washington and Warsaw on Friday, saying the plan to site a US anti-missile defence shield in Poland would undermine the global balance of power and put Poland at risk of nuclear attack.
Washington and Warsaw reached a preliminary agreement on Thursday to build part of the missile defence shield in Poland, station US Patriot missiles there and bolster the two countries’ military co-operation.
The US claims the shield in Poland, as well as a radar tracking base to be located in the Czech Republic, is designed to defend against “rogue states” such as Iran.
The timing of this week’s agreement, as relations between Russia and the US deteriorated over the Georgia crisis, has strengthened Moscow’s conviction that the move is anti-Russian.
“The deployment of new anti-missile forces in Europe has the Russian federation as its aim,” said Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian president, at a press conference with Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, on Friday.
The Medvedev doth protest too much, methinks. But let’s continue.
Second, Obama’s position on national security (H/T)
“I will set a goal of a world without nuclear weapons”? What world is he living in?
Bryan Caplan and Mark Steyn are betting. First, Caplan:
Here’s an especially specific claim in Mark Steyn’s America Alone:
The U.S. government’s National Intelligence Council is predicting that the EU will collapse by 2020. I think that’s a rather cautious estimate myself. Ever since September 11, I’ve been gloomily predicting that within the next couple of election cycles the internal contradictions of the EU will manifest themselves in the usual way.
I smell a bet. I propose the following terms to Steyn (or up to any three other people):
If any current EU member with a population over 10 million people in 2007 officially withdraws from the EU before January 1, 2020, I will pay you $100. Otherwise, you owe me $100.
Throwing caution and my children’s college fees to the wind, I’ve recklessly taken [Caplan's] bet . . . . Hey, why not make it a grand? A hundred bucks’ll barely buy you a falafel at the Tour d’Argent in the Paris of 2020.
I’m inclined to side with Steyn on this one. The EU usually loses whenever it faces actual voters in a referendum.
What I expect to happen is that states will start ignoring EU dictates, and eventually someone will decide that dealing with a super-nanny-state isn’t worth the effort, and will withdraw. If I had to guess which nation would be contrary enough to pull out, I’d say Italy.
ROME (AP) — Silvio Berlusconi and his conservative allies are quickly getting to work on lining up their team for Italy’s next government.
The billionaire media mogul triumphed in the country’s parliamentary elections and set him on what is expected to be a rapid path to his third premiership.
Helping Berlusconi on Tuesday to line up his government team are his right-wing allies, including an anti-immigrant party and a former neo-fascist grouping.
The ballots of Italian voters overseas still need to be counted. They could widen Berlusconi’s majority in Parliament.
Edit: “Yay” is just an exclamation, not Italian. I probably should have written “Vittoria!” or something.
Tom posted this at 12:50 PM EDT on Wednesday, April 16th, 2008 as Europa Universalis
I think, in that one picture, is an explanation for why Russia and most of its satellite states are collapsing. A book, frequently someone’s life work, should be treated with more respect. Books that are well taken care of are a necessary but not sufficient sign of civilization.
Respect for books alone is not sufficient for civilization because it is also possible for books to be treated with too much respect, as it were, and this leads to the second thing that bothered me. In Holland, they’ve turned a 13th century Domincan monastery into a book store. From Jonathan Glancey’s article:
But the Maastricht bookshop is Merkx + Girod’s finest work. And its transformation is, I think, a lesson to us all. Yes, we need to think up new uses for old churches, but we must also consider ways of converting them without altering their venerable fabric. A church is a prayer set in stone, and even if we do not use them as they were intended, their very presence is reassuring and comforting, reminding us that there is more to life than getting and spending, trade and toil. The Dominican church in Maastricht strikes just the right note. Its architects deserve a blessing.
It is peculiarly fitting that this abandonded church is in Maastricht, where they signed the treaty that lead to the Euro and started the road towards Europe’s godless constitution. I seem to recall Christ chasing money-changers out of the temple; one wonders what he would make of chic espresso machines replacing the liturgy of the hours.
Hilaire Belloc once argued, “Europe will return to the Faith, or she will perish. The Faith is Europe. And Europe is the Faith.” In Russia, they desecrate books; in Holland, a bookstore desecrates a monastery. Something is perishing, and the out of place books are only a symptom.
Peter Hitchens on a disturbing trend in Britain that I hope never comes here:
At what point does taxation become theft and the state a burglar? I think we may have passed it, in which case this country has not long to go.
Last week, we learned that 50,000 criminal drug abusers are claiming “incapacity benefit” — and no doubt a lot of other benefits on top, presumably including exemption from council tax.
They get the benefits because they commit the crime of illegal drug possession.
This is a wilful and voluntary act and however much they whine about so-called “addiction”, they have a choice, and picked the wrong and selfish path.
It is a defiance of the known laws of the land. And we reward them with pensions as if they had fought for their country, when all they’ve done is shame it, and all we owe them is a narrow cell and a bowl of porridge.
Worse, in a way, is the fact that the inadequate wages and pensions of postmen, school-dinner ladies and retired soldiers are plundered by the taxman and the town hall to keep these people idle in their squalid nests, where they no doubt bring misery to neighbours and to the thousands of children said (terrifyingly) to be in their care.
How did this happen? Who devised the regulations? Will anything bad happen to them?
When did we, as a people, sign this national suicide pact that rewards disgusting irresponsibility and punishes everyone else?
Of course, some of the rest of his rant (about school children and the teaching of the Spanish Armada) is happening here. Ugh.
The Archbishop of Canterbury has today said that the adoption of Islamic Sharia law in the UK is “unavoidable” and that it would help maintain social cohesion.
Rowan Williams told BBC Radio 4’s World At One that the UK has to “face up to the fact” that some of its citizens do not relate to the British legal system.
He says that Muslims could choose to have marital disputes or financial matters dealt with in a Sharia court. He added Muslims should not have to choose between “the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty”.
Dr Williams said there was a place for finding a “constructive accommodation” in areas such as marriage – allowing Muslim women to avoid Western divorce proceedings.
Hey, I’ve got a brilliant idea. If Muslims don’t relate to the British legal system, GET THE FRACK OUT OF BRITAIN. Why the HELL should we bend over backwards to accommodate a 12th century legal system in a modern western country? Leftists like Dr. Williams always tell us that we should be accepting of other cultures – well that door goes both ways.
If you want to live in the west and enjoy all the freedom and prosperity it provides you should live by our rules. If you want to live under sharia law – move to Saudi Arabia or Iran.
One of the more annoying tropes I see coming from the left is the insistence that Europeans are a sort of morally superior creature to Americans. I have two theories as to the origins of this myth:
American college students visiting Europe and hanging out with European college students, who seem so much more open-minded and progressive than the people they remember from their own hometowns
European socialism, which tends to evoke longing sighs from a certain type of American.
What this normally ignores, of course, is the rather disturbing racial dynamics that one sees in Europe, especially in countries that have had significant amounts of immigration from the Global South. This leads me to the story that prompted this post: Can you imagine something like thiscrap happening in the US?
SECONDARY school pupils are having their “every step traced” under a new monitoring system which sees a microchip embedded in their school uniform.
Currently ten pupils at Hungerhill School in Edenthorpe are having their movements monitored by radio technology, but its Doncaster makers hope the system could soon be attached to every school uniform in the country, if the pilot scheme proves successful.
Under the Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) surveillance system the Hungerhill pupils have a memory microchip discreetly embedded onto their school badge which produces a radio signal. It means the pupils can be identified the moment that they step into a classroom. Its inventor, Trevor Darnborough, says the technology has many advantages including; offering accurate and speedy registration of pupils, ensuring child security, providing visual confirmation of attendance to help cover teachers and easy data input for the school’s behavioural and reporting system.
But the system, which is believed to be the first of its kind in the country, has been slammed by civil liberty campaigners who believe radio surveillance should only be used on criminals and not on schoolchildren.
I seem to recall a Brit writing a pretty good book about the dangers of a “Big-Brother” state. Can anyone remind me what that book is? I’d love to read it.
I know I usually present you with examples of Star Trek Technology come to life – but I couldn’t resist this example of a real life Q.
Army tests James Bond style tank that is ‘invisible’
Last updated at 11:56am on 30th October 2007 Comments (2)
New technology that can make tanks invisible has been unveiled by the Ministry of Defence.In secret trials last week, the Army said it had made a vehicle completely disappear and predicted that an invisible tank would be ready for service by 2012.
The new technology uses cameras and projectors to beam images of the surrounding landscape onto a tank.
Remember the badass invisible Aston Martin from the abomination that was Die Another Day? (Actually if they ended the movie about 30min in it would have kicked ass.) Yeah well instead of leather seats and shot guns – imagine impenetrable armor and a giant cannon.
Germaine Greer (H/T) digs up Princess Diana and takes a few whacks:
The same foolhardiness was at work not only in Diana’s ill-starred sexual adventures but also in her orchestration of her public persona. After her separation, when she was making her bid to be queen of people’s hearts, she rushed into too many situations in which genuine angels would have feared to tread. Her habit of popping up in the midst of other people’s life crises must have startled some of her victims. It’s tough enough watching a relative die without having an immaculately groomed princess batting her mascaraed lashes at you, clutching your hand and fetching you cups of coffee. The media fell for it, even as they realised that this was a desperate woman seeking applause.
In death she has it, doled out in huge amounts. Her beauty has become legendary, mesmeric, dazzling, irresistible; at her funeral her brother made one of the 100 best speeches of the 20th century. He didn’t carry out his threat to remove his nephews from the royal madhouse. Instead he buried his unhappy sister on the family estate and charges her adorers £12.50 a visit.
Diana’s legacy is no more than endless column inches of adulation and speculation. The Firm is still in business. In the endless royal soap opera the Queen has taken to impersonating a sweet old granny — except when the showbusiness photographer Annie Leibovitz gets her goat. Meanwhile Camilla has been careful not to step into Diana’s shoes. She keeps a refuge in her own house in Wiltshire, doesn’t always take her place at her husband’s side, and hasn’t assumed the doomed title of Princess of Wales.
Dianaphobes will love all of Greer’s article. The Dianaphiles won’t get it because there’s no pictures.
It’s one thing for the Royal Navy to lose the press war while its sailors and marines are in captivity; it’s another to allow the downward spiral to continue once they are back home (taken from CNN.com’s main page 4/6/07):
For all I know, Operator Maintainer Batchelor is an exemplary and brave sailor but, in that picture, he looks like a nice little chap who missed his mum and auntie. Couldn’t the Royal Navy have briefed its sailors to make certain they knew the world was watching them? And then there is this gem:
Arthur Batchelor, the youngest sailor to be held captive, said Mrs Turney had been like a “big sister”. He said: “The day it happened Faye literally put her arms around me and said she would stay with me and look after me.”
Also, has anyone else noticed that at least a sizable amount of coverage of the fiasco hasn’t included the sailors’ ranks, as if they’re just private citizens? Not AP style.
Watching Tottenham Hotspur fans taking on the Spanish constabulary at a European soccer match the other night, I found myself idly speculating on what might have happened had those Iranian kidnappers made the mistake of seizing 15 hard-boiled football yobs who hadn’t got the Blair memo about not escalating the situation.
Instead, as we know, the mullahs were fortunate enough to take hostage 15 Royal Navy sailors and Royal Marines. Which were which was hard to say upon their release. The Queen’s Navee had been demobbed. The token gal was dressed up as an Islamic woman and the 14 men had been kitted out in Ahmadinejad leisurewear. Which is not just a ghastly fashion faux pas but a breach of the increasingly one-way Geneva Conventions. But they smiled and they waved. Wave, Britannia! Britannia, waive the rules!
The Associated Press reported the story as follows: ”Analysis: Hope For More Iran Compromises.”
Well, if by ”compromise” you mean Tehran didn’t put them up for a show trial and behead them, you might have a point. With this encouraging development, we might persuade them to wipe only half of Israel off the map, or even nuke some sparsely occupied corner of the Yukon instead. With the momentum of this “compromise” driving events, all manner of diplomatic triumphs are possible.
Horseplay between young Brits completed what might have been the end of a package tour as the 15 sailors and marines from HMS Cornwall were returned by the grace and favour of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It was the perfect media coup for the Iranians until the almost simultaneous slaughter of four of our soldiers (two of them women) and a local interpreter burst onto our screens. The blood-spattered helmets and effects of our troops made a horrid contrast with the homecoming of our sailors.
During the Iran statement in the House of Commons last week I seemed to be the only person asking about the fate of our soldiers rather than our sailors. While the world’s media has been grabbed by the mercifully bloodless crisis of our sailors, our troops have had to face increasingly lethal attacks from Iranian-provided weapons in southern Iraq that have left many dead.
What happens next? Mercer continues:
I doubt that Iran will swerve from her determination to build nuclear weapons or her declared intent to destroy Israel. While the maelstrom of Iraq continues with the US committing more troops yet Britain seeking to withdraw hers, so a power vacuum is bound to develop. As early as 2005, Blair’s Government showed its hand in terms of wanting to withdraw our forces from Iraq, and there seems little doubt that President Bush has similarly decided the game is up. Teetering on the edge of this is ambitious, dangerous and mendacious Iran.
I was awestruck on my last visit to the Iran-Iraq border to see just how much remained of their great war with each other in the 1980s. Burnt out tanks, half destroyed gun positions and the blackened trappings of battle lay everywhere, along with the graves of a generation of young men. We must have no doubt about the intentions of a country that was prepared to face such sacrifices and which, if anything, has become more unstable. Weakness in the face of such a threat will only be exploited and we must never put ourselves in the position again where we allow our servicemen and women to be used as pawns.
I hope the Brits behave better next time—because the next time is surely coming.
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