Boilerplate leftist surrenderism

No surprises that this was originally written in the Guardian, or that the BBC welcomes it enthusiastically.

He said the right response to the threat was to champion law and human rights - not subordinate it.

That's why you want to hold us without charge for 42 days, invade our private property on even more flimsy pretexts, and use anti-terror legislation to persecute Enemies of the People, such as parents who want a good education for their children.

The BBC, after a post-Christmas famine of scare quotes and qualification, vomits up a pile of them in this next quote:

US President George Bush's administration, which has led the so-called "war on terror".

"So-called" and scare quotes! You can feel the Leftist, patrician derision from a thousand miles away. Shame the BBC didn't follow its guidlines and use qualification in stories such as this or this, the Dear Leader's plan to "create 100,000 jobs" (see, it's easy, anyone can do it).

Anyway, back to Milliband's articles of surrender:

Calling for groups to be treated as separate entities with differing motivations, he wrote that it was not a "simple binary struggle between moderates and extremists, or good and evil" and treating them as such was a mistake.

Milliband doesn't think that we are moderates and the Taleban, al-Qaeda etc are extremists. Let's just check the score here. Milliband thinks that people who do this, or this, or this, or this...we could be here for the rest of the day and the flow wouldn't stop. If Milliband thinks that these are not extremists, and that we are not moderates, then he is mentally ill. Obviously he gets all of his information about the world from the BBC, so it is likely that he is utterly ignorant of what is actually happening in Islam. He might think that he is practising nuanced and serious thinking, as against cowboy simplisme, but if it quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck, no amount of nuanced thinking is going to make it anything other than a duck. Nuanced thinking in the context of terrorism is simply the process of denying reality in more and more sophisticated ways. It goes down well in Paris and Hampstead but, sadly, it is suicidal.

the stance he now promoted was international "co-operation"

Co-operation with whom? Who are we not co-operating with that we should be? Is he referring to terrorist groups which he doesn't consider to be extreme?

Islam - trendsetter in convenience

While many parts of Islam are straining every sinew to return us to the 7th century, other parts are eagerly embracing the modern world. Divorce is often a tedious and exhausting process, so the innovation of being able to send an SMS saying "I divorce you" three times was a welcome and bold innovation.

However, even that was deemed to be too onerous for some. Now, you don't even have to send it! All you have to do is enter it into your phone, and Bingo! Allah takes care of the rest. That irritating chattel you were tied to is gone and a new, exciting and quite possibly above the age of consent chattel is yours.

I'm sure this convenience is open to women as well, of course...what's that? It isn't? WHAT!!! The International Sisterhood will be all over this, any minute now...tumbleweeds...

On a related note, more work for Feminism from Afghanistan. Western feminists might have a stroke over 'Trophy wives', but these are real, actual trophy wives, chattels stolen from their families and wedded to murderous maniacs. What a shame that the International Sisterhood doesn't give a shit about them, and in fact campaigns to get us out of Afghanistan. You see, the Taleban are no different from us really.

The BBC and Israel

Some snippets from their blanket anti-jewish coverage:

A vegan chef from Totnes is important enough to get an article on the BBC international website. Who'd have thought it? I'm sure that the fact she has stridently anti-Israeli views and is a member of an organisation dedicated to Israel's destruction is irrelevant. The BBC are currently interviewing non-entities from the West Country and writing long articles about them. Who knows, it might be a Jewish solicitor from Blandford tomorrow.

Where's the screaming racist murder attempt headline? Usually the BBC are pretty good at this when an ethnic minority is targeted. Of course, this only works if the target and source groups are correct - sadly, in this case, the target were Jews and the source a palestinian, so he could have chopped up their kids in plain view, screaming "death to the Jews", and the BBC would still report it as a legitimate political act.

Police said they were unsure what the motive was, but Danish media have speculated it may have been a protest against Israeli air raids in Gaza.

Hmm, yes, what could the motive possibly be?

The new plumbers

Plumbers are out; "NHS Doctors" are in - the latest must-have euphemism for avoiding at all costs the phrase "Muslim terrorist". In fact, the BBC does its usual trick of not mentioning the I or the M words AT ALL in the article.

Still, they did manage to get in the usual Lefty equivalence about "we are as bad as the terrorists", except of course they avoid using the word "terrorist" as well, in case it might offend. They only use it when an unimpeachable source (e.g. a terrorist) says it, and then they quote. The left-wing media in the court (i.e. most of it) must have creamed in their pants when the terrorist said:

he believed the British government and Army could equally be accused of terrorism for their actions in Iraq.

A dream quote for them; they so want to believe. Islamic terrorists know that all they have to do to get the Left onside (and it doesn't take much effort, believe me) is to say the correct slogans about Bush and Iraq. Never mind that their attacks are planned years in advance, often beginning before the events they 'blame' have ever took place. No, all it takes is for the slogan to be said, and it becomes real.

The story that just keeps on giving

I have blogged previously about this trial. It just gets better and better. Today's headline was almost as good as the "I'm a patriot, really" one from a few weeks ago.

One thing gets me though - does this show that British justice is good and impartial, or is it just taking the piss?

It's the Iraq War, stupid!

No doubt the Left will be along any moment now to blame this on the Iraq war, or Israel's 'occupation' of Palestine. You see, if we hadn't invaded Iraq, these people wouldn't have been forced to become terrorists (sorry, radicals) and lay waste to various parts of Bombay.

There's logic in there somewhere.

More Bollocks from the trial

This trial is coming out with some whoppers, fair play. Last week we had the one about how the defendant (another one) was a British patriot, who loved Britain so much he wanted to bomb Weegieland into small pieces. Now, apparently, another one of them is a pacifist. It's Taqqiya galore in Woolwich at the moment.

Now, I am by nature a cynic. However, you would have to be as credulous as a Guardian leader writer to believe his claim.

The fact checkers must have been away on diversity training

This article on the Islamic Broadcasting Corporation (though 'article' is a bit generous; hatchet job would be closer). Much of it is the standard BBC line on Islam - evasion of reality coupled with attacks on its critics. One line stands out though, defending Mohammed's marriage to this young girl:

I lost count of the references to "child bride". Even till relatively modern times, marriage for women in their early teens was completely natural and common in parts of the world, including Europe.

This is outstandingly mendacious. His bride was not "in her early teens", she was nine years old. This is not some weird fact which had to be dug up - it is freely available information. I knew it, but checked it anyway, an act which took approximately two minutes.

Let's leave to one side the lie itself. We can understand her motives, they are fairly clear. But what are the motives of the BBC in allowing this to pass them by? Does 'impartiality' mean not pointing out blatant lies in articles on their website?

Great Big Dirty Lie of the Week

Mark Thompson, BBC Director General, wins the first of a new, regular feature of the show, Great Big Dirty Lie of the Week, for this effort (HT: Biased-BBC). This is the winning quote:

Mr Thompson, who spoke at a lecture for think-tank Theos, said shows critical of Islam would be shown if they were of high quality.

Ahahahahaha! Am I cynical in thinking that the quality threshold for that genre will always be tantalisingly out of reach? Could that quality threshold be applied to the rest of their pisspoor output please? Contrast Thompson's mysterious and sudden commitment to 'quality' programming over Islam with the execrable piece of crap Bonekickers, which clearly had no quality threshold applied at all.