Mark Steyn Was Visiting Lecturer at Berkeley -- Here He Is Interviewed During that Time

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Ukulele Version: ‘Button Up Your Overcoat’ (1928)

Suggested by Pundette's musical get well card for Mark Steyn.

Mark Steyn on Obama Regime's Never Ending Defense of All Things Muslim

The great thing about Steyn is that he always gets right to the heart of the matter. Here are a couple of relevant quotes.


. . . if I had to summon up Gitmo in a single image, it would be the brand-new copy of the Koran in each cell: To reassure incoming prisoners that the filthy infidels haven't touched the sacred book with their unclean hands, the Korans are hung from the walls in pristine, sterilized surgical masks. It's one thing for Muslims to regard infidels as unclean, but it's hard to see why it's in the interests of us infidels to string along with it and thereby validate their bigotry. What does that degree of prostration before their prejudices tell them about us? It’s a problem that Muslims think we’re unclean. It’s a far worse problem that we go along with it.
Take this no-name pastor from an obscure church who was threatening to burn the Koran. He didn’t burn any buildings or women and children. He didn’t even burn a book. He hadn’t actually laid a finger on a Koran, and yet the mere suggestion that he might do so prompted the president of the United States to denounce him, and the secretary of state, and the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, various G7 leaders, and golly, even Angelina Jolie. President Obama has never said a word about honor killings of Muslim women. Secretary Clinton has never said a word about female genital mutilation. General Petraeus has never said a word about the rampant buggery of pre-pubescent boys by Pushtun men in Kandahar. But let an obscure man in Florida so much as raise the possibility that he might disrespect a book – an inanimate object – and the most powerful figures in the Western world feel they have to weigh in.
Aside from all that, this obscure church’s website has been shut down, its insurance policy has been canceled, its mortgage has been called in by its bankers. Why? As Diana West wrote, why was it necessary or even seemly to make this pastor a non-person? Another one of Obama's famous "teaching moments"? In this case teaching us that Islamic law now applies to all? Only a couple of weeks ago, the president, at his most condescendingly ineffectual, presumed to lecture his moronic subjects about the First Amendment rights of Imam Rauf. Where's the condescending lecture on Pastor Jones' First Amendment rights?
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It is a basic rule of life that if you reward bad behavior, you get more of it. Every time Muslims either commit violence or threaten it, we reward them by capitulating. Indeed, President Obama, Justice Breyer, General Petraeus, and all the rest are now telling Islam, you don’t have to kill anyone, you don’t even have to threaten to kill anyone. We’ll be your enforcers. We’ll demand that the most footling and insignificant of our own citizens submit to the universal jurisdiction of Islam. So Obama and Breyer are now the “good cop” to the crazies’ "bad cop." Ooh, no, you can’t say anything about Islam, because my friend here gets a little excitable, and you really don’t want to get him worked up. The same people who tell us "Islam is a religion of peace" then turn around and tell us you have to be quiet, you have to shut up because otherwise these guys will go bananas and kill a bunch of people.

Mark Steyn on CAIR: "They Are Not Interested in Dialog"

originally aired March 20, 2007

'Kikeroach' Acceptable in Canada But 'Ride A Camel' Is More Than They Can Handle???

From the Headlines section at Hot Air I got sent to this column by Mark Steyn in Maclean's. A long and a short quote:
"As George Jonas wrote, “Ottawa’s finest exemplified Canada’s definition of moral leadership by observing neutrality between lawful and lawless.”"
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"Oh, c’mon, you pussy. Where’s your commitment to social justice? As in Ottawa, law enforcement declined to enforce the law, the OPP remaining in the wings as thugs rushed the stage. “The police, I’m told, were urged not to intervene,” Paikin explained, “lest pictures of demonstrators being hauled off by the cops show up all over YouTube.”

"True. You might haul off a Muslim or a lesbian and find yourself in “human rights” hell. Better just to linger nonchalantly by the side until it’s all over: O Canada, we stand around for thee. Her Majesty’s Constabulary seem to be sending the message that violence pays—at least for approved identity groups. That doesn’t seem a prudent strategy.

"As for the media, they’ve long been too cowed by political correctness to do even elementary research. It took the blogger Blazing Cat Fur to discover that Fatima Al Dhaher, the poor wee thing traumatized by Ann Coulter’s camel joke at the University of Western Ontario, was a member of a Facebook group called “It’s Called Palestine Not Israel,” committed to the elimination of the Jewish state and regarding its present occupants as “subhuman” “zionazis/kikeroaches.” I have no objection to Miss Al Dhaher pursuing her extracurricular enthusiasms, but she would seem, even for Canada, too parodic a poster gal for “restraint” and “civility.”"

The little Muslim girl is OK with calling Jews 'kikeroaches' but is emotionally scared by Ann suggesting that she ride a camel? Canadian law seems to create an incentive to feel and carry on about deep pain caused by normal human self expression.

A Discussion with Mark Steyn and Victor Davis Hanson

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This is an excellent podcast. It starts out a little slow with discussion of health care legislation. But there is also discussion of when or if we can expect taxes to stop increasing. There's a little primer on how to read a NYT editorial. A bit on the condescension or the Obamabots. Steyn shares that national health services employees in Canada and the UK do not talk to you about your physical problem but will rather give you explanations of how or wether you fit the bureauacracy's needs. There is the unsettling fact that as is always the case with socialist health care there will be a two tier system in which the politically privileged will have no rules or quotas applied to their care and everyone else will slowly have covered servises decreasing to save cash. There are also passing observations from VDH on the never ending farm subsidy rip off.
Here's a link to the site, Ricochet podcasts. There is also one with John Yoo on this page. I have not listened to it yet. But I am looking forward to it.

Mark Steyn - "Kiss Your Blooody Arse G'bye"

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What If They Held a Fed Bond Auction and Nobody Came???

A few choice selections from Mark Steyn's latest.
". . .according to USA Today, when the economic downturn began, the U.S. Department of Transportation had just one employee making over $170,000. A year and a half later, it has 1,690.

"Happy days are here again!

"Did you get your pay raise this year? What’s that, you don’t work for the government? Yes, you do, one way or another. Good luck relying on Obama, Pelosi, Frank, and the other Emirs of Kleptocristan “taking action” to “resolve” that. In the last month, the cost of insuring Greece’s sovereign debt against default has doubled. Spain and Portugal are headed the same way. When you binge-spend at the Greek level in a democratic state, there aren’t many easy roads back. The government has introduced an austerity package to rein in spending. In response, Greek tax collectors have walked off the job.

"Read that again slowly: To protest government cuts, striking tax collectors are refusing to collect taxes. In a sane world, this would be a hilarious TV comedy sketch. But most of the Western world is no longer sane. It’s tough enough to persuade the town drunk to sober up, but when everyone’s face down in the moonshine, maybe it’s best just to head for the hills."
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"And where’s the president getting all this money to “pour” into his “fight” against high unemployment? Would it perchance be from the same small businesses that might be hiring new workers if the president didn’t need so much money to “pour” away? Heigh-ho. Maybe we can all be striking tax collectors. It seems a comfortable life . . . "
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"It’s not the “debt” or the “deficit,” it’s the spending. And the only way to reduce that is with fewer government agencies, fewer government programs, fewer government employees, lower government salaries.

"Instead, all four are rocketing up: We are incentivizing unsustainability, and, when it comes to “some collapse down the road,” you’ll be surprised how short that road is."

More Steyn

The Fall of Europe and Coming of Eurabia




No doubt Napolitano would tell Steyn, "The system is working." And then she would return to looking for right wing threats.

The Fall of Europe and Coming of Eurabia - Mark Steyn

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This interview is in four parts. I will post the other two parts tomarrow.

Mark Stein Vists Goldwater Institute

Mark Steyn - "Kiss Your Blooody Ar*e G'bye"

Conversation with Mark Steyn

“the fluffy cloud of multi-cultural complacency”

“When the president has said you’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists, the short answer to that is that Saudi Arabia has checked the both of the above box . . . They are the principle funders of our enemies around the world.”

More Good Reading on the Net

Jo-Joe Politico has story about three newly commissioned US Navy ships. To give a little of the flavor, the USS BARACK OBAMA has, “An onboard Type One DNC Universal Translator can send out messages of apology in any language to anyone who may find America offensive. The number of apologies are limitless and though some may seem hollow and disingenuous, the Navy advises all apologies will sound very sincere.”
Jane Q. Republican has a clip from the Rachel Maddow show. Rachel seems unbelievably self-satisfied that she just happens to have joined a political party that is presently in the ascendancy. She seems to be under the impression that there is some kind of direct relationship between truth and number of people claiming membership in a party this week. I wonder if she will make a similar connection between herself generally being FOS and tne mass migration of viewers away from her show. Reminds me of the Democratic Party days of being an offshoot of the KKK throughout the South and so many Democrats felt especially smart for having been born white. She probably acts especially smug also because this is not one of those days that her Mercedes had to be hauled into the shop. During most of the clip she is interviewing Ron Paul.
Stop the ACLU has a fascinating clip of the Democrat members of the House Judiciary Committee voting to protect pedophiles from hate crimes. Then one of the Democrats gets all uppity and nasty because she feels it’s an insult to pedophiles and others to propose that the legislation also protect veterans. The money quote: “If a mother hears that their child has been raped and she slaps the assailant with her purse, she is now gone after as a hate criminal because this is a protected class. There are other protected classes in here. I mean simple exhibitionism. I have female friends who have told me over the years that some guy flashed them, and their immediate reaction was to hit them with their purse. Well now, he’s committed a misdemeanor, she has committed a federal hate crime because the exhibitionism is protected under sexual orientation.” Truly the nuts are now running the walnut factory, they just call themselves Democrats and members of congress.
Pundit and Pundette have a post titled ‘Obama and henchmen accused of Mafia-like Tactics’ which is about the reports coming out of the Chrysler reorganization talks. They provide some good links. They have a couple of good quotes from Mark Steyn. And then a clip of the Oklahoma Full Auto Shoot and Trade Show which will appeal to fans of sniper rifles and fully automatic weaponry titled ‘Video: Just for fun, shooting at a minivan filled with explosives.’ Finally P & P have a post about some communication between the president and Senator Orin Hatch about the coming SCOTUS nomination. “On Monday, Obama presented him with a decoder ring in the form of a phone call to assure the conservative Hatch that the court pick wouldn’t be divisive or dangerous — and would attract bipartisan support“ But in Obama‘s brave new world, who knows what this means, so P & P give it some context.
Suzanna at Insert clever s,logan here has a post titled ‘Punk-smacking the Beyotch, er Behar’ about a recent interview of Ann Coulter by Joy Behar in which AC owns Behar who was left with a confused look on her face. Then comes a post titled ’The Dark Side’ that is about Wolverine. Suzanna hasn’t seen it yet but I have little doubt that she will.
And So It Goes In Shreveport has a post about Saxbe Chambliss’s effort to make sure none of the Gitmo detainees are released onto US soil. Why, you might wonder, does Chambliss have to go to a lot of trouble to enact what is plainly common sense? Read the post, I highly recommend it. Pat also has a little post about the presidential--plane NYC flyover fiasco (also known as the $328,835 snapshot that caused many in DC to exclaim. “Who me? No not me?” but left me wondering if anyone is both responsible and accountable). This is followed by a piece titled ‘An Empathetic Judge' that I would subtitle ‘SCOTUS, Empathy. Code Words and what drives those in Washington to never say what the truly mean” and the subsubtitle would be “I was a fool to trust you or anyone like you.’ If you’re picking up a lot of attitude here, it’s from me not Pat. She tends to traffic more in the objective world. At least until she talks about goats. She likes them. The last recent thing is a nightmare inducing post about someone recommending Algore to replace Souter. Thankfully I feel certain that our advocate for the polar bears would not take that low a salary or accept that heavy a workload.
Betsy’s Page tells us that, in spite of Reid’s support, Specter was not allowed any seniority in the Democrat’s caucus for time served as a Republican. Then Betsy, who is a high school teacher, has a long post critical of tenure for teachers. This was occasioned by a story in the L. A. Times that points out tenure is bad for kids, schools and education. Her quote from Mickey Kaus is worth relaying, “It's worth saying again: If the twittish, PC L.A.Times is now going after the teachers' unions, those unions have lost the PR battle in the mainstream press. Does President Obama ("We can afford nothing but the best when it comes to our children's teachers") know this? Do the Republicans who are desperately looking for an issue to use against the Dems?”

“The Only Guy Who Did Anything About It Was George W Bush”

In an old quote Mark Steyn exposes the superficiality of lefty American feminists. He then points out that they have turned their backs on the hundreds of millions of women in the Muslim world truly in need of liberating: "The trivia of identity-group politics in America is beyond parody: Women are now so dominant at, say, U.S. law schools that feminist groups are reduced to complaining about the lack of female pipe-fitters. If this keeps up, circa 2015 NOW will be complaining that there are too few female wait staff. And circa 2020 that there are too few female prostitutes. Meanwhile, in Afghanistan women were prevented by law from feeling sunlight on their faces and the only guy who did anything about it was George W Bush. We have “honor killings” now not just in Jordan and Pakistan, but in Britain and Germany and Scandinavia. Where are the feminists on that? This is the biggest lever we have in the Muslim world — the fact that half their populations are chattels. They don’t want to be navel-pierced Britneyized slatterns but a lot of them want something other. That’s a huge opportunity."

ht/Pundet & Pundette

Tertiary Stimulus

This is a few paragraphs from Mark Steyn's latest column in the Orange County Register.

"How," asks the lady from CBS, "does $335 million in STD prevention stimulate the economy?"
"I'll tell you how," says Speaker Pelosi. "I'm a big believer in prevention. And we have, er… there is a part of the bill on the House side that is about prevention. It's about it being less expensive to the states to do these measures."
Makes a lot of sense. If we have more STD prevention, it will be safer for loose women to go into bars and pick up feckless men, thus stimulating the critical beer and nuts and jukebox industries. To do this, we need trillion-dollar deficits, which our children and grandchildren will have to pay off, but, with sufficient investment in prevention measures, there won't be any children or grandchildren, so there's that problem solved.
The more interviews Speaker Pelosi gives explaining how vital the STD industry is to restarting the U.S. economy, the more I find myself hearing "syphilis" every time she says "stimulus." In late September, America was showing the first signs of "primary stimulus" – a few billion lesions popping up on the rarely glimpsed naughty bits of the economy: the subprime mortgage racket, the leverage kings. Now, the condition has metastasized in a mere four months into the advanced stages of "tertiary stimulus," with trillions of hideous, ever more inflamed pustules sprouting in every nook and cranny as the central nervous system of the body politic crumbles into total insanity – until it seems entirely normal for the second in line of presidential succession to be on TV gibbering away about how vital the federalization of condom distribution is to economic recovery.
The rules in this new "post-partisan" era are pretty simple: If the Democratic Party wants it, it's "stimulus." If the Republican Party opposes it, it's "politics" – as in headlines like this: "Obama Urges GOP To Keep Politics To A Minimum On Stimulus." These are serious times: As the president says, it's the worst economic crisis since the Thirties. So politicians need to put politics behind them and immediately lavish $4.19 billion on his community-organizing pals at the highly inventive "voter registration" group ACORN for "neighborhood stabilization activities."
"Neighborhood stabilization activities." That sounds like a line item from the Baath Party budget when Saddam sends the lads in to gas the Kurds. What does it mean in a nontotalitarian sense? Do you need a federally subsidized condom to do it? If so, will a pathetic $4.19 billion be enough?

Mark Steyn Nails It Again: MUMBAI MASSACRE

Three paragraphs from Steyn's recent column about the Mumbai massacre summarize the most relevant points about that event and so much else.

Last week, a Canadian critic reprimanded me for failing to understand that Muslims feel "vulnerable." Au contraire, they project tremendous cultural confidence, as well they might: They're the world's fastest-growing population. A prominent British Muslim announced the other day that, when the United Kingdom becomes a Muslim state, non-Muslims will be required to wear insignia identifying them as infidels. If he's feeling "vulnerable," he's doing a terrific job of covering it up.

We are told that the "vast majority" of the 1.6 billion to 1.8 billion Muslims (in Deepak Chopra's estimate) are "moderate." Maybe so, but they're also quiet. And, as the AIDS activists used to say, "Silence=Acceptance." It equals acceptance of the things done in the name of their faith. Rabbi Holtzberg was not murdered because of a territorial dispute over Kashmir or because of Bush's foreign policy. He was murdered in the name of Islam – "Allahu Akbar."

I wrote in my book, "America Alone," that "reforming" Islam is something only Muslims can do. But they show very little sign of being interested in doing it, and the rest of us are inclined to accept that. Spread a rumor that a Quran got flushed down the can at Gitmo, and there'll be rioting throughout the Muslim world. Publish some dull cartoons in a minor Danish newspaper, and there'll be protests around the planet. But slaughter the young pregnant wife of a rabbi in Mumbai in the name of Allah, and that's just business as usual. And, if it is somehow "understandable" that for the first time in history it's no longer safe for a Jew to live in India, then we are greasing the skids for a very slippery slope. Muslims, the AP headline informs us, "worry about image." Not enough.

Hick-Burg Mayor Palin, hillbilly know-nothing permapregnant ditz

from Mark Steyn on NRO

Thursday, September 04, 2008

Credit where it's due [Mark Steyn]

I would like to thank the US media for doing such a grand job this last week of lowering expectations by portraying Governor Palin - whoops, I mean Hick-Burg Mayor Palin - as a hillbilly know-nothing permapregnant ditz, half of whose 27 kids are the spawn of a stump-toothed uncle who hasn't worked since he was an extra in Deliverance.

How's that narrative holding up, geniuses? Almost as good as your "devoted husband John Edwards" routine?

CHANGE ! ! !

"My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you’ll join with me as we try to change it."






Written by John Gross of Quebec and borrowed from Mark Steyn in NRO.

It All Depends on Whose Steyn Is Being Gored

Mark Steyn recently wrote a column that identified a new civil right: the right to not be offended. A little thought about this leads me to wonder if, before I speak, I am expected to go to every person in the world and make sure every one of them is OK with what I’m about to say. Just joking. I know those who enforce this ‘civil right’ really don’t care about me suffering offense from other’s remarks. These enforcers are only interested in the thoughts and feelings of a few. What atheists and many nonChristians feel is especially important. The feelings of the members of certain racial groups are trotted out to limit the speech of others. But nuance is important here. Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice might think they are black and I might even think they are. But their feelings are not of any interest to the enforcers: except bonus points are offered to anyone who will offend Condi and Colin.
There is a basic test of someone’s alleged beliefs. If you are willing to extend the benefits to all mankind, not just your friends and allies, then I might be able to accept that it is a truly and firmly held belief. But if the right to not be offended is only extended to a slice of humanity then it begins to look like just another weak assed rhetorical device.