Quick Roundup 26

Until Tuesday, I am going to have either limited or no time to post. You may see me here this weekend or Monday, but just in case: I'll see you Tuesday!

Twice this week, I saw things pertinent to blog entries I'd just made. So now, I'll connect the dots....

First Followup

When I last posted about Chinese censorship, I had Ayn Rand's essay, "The Comprachicos", in mind when I wrote the following:

But this is what I found truly appalling. This story also gives us, by accident, a vignette of a little girl, excited about the Internet, with a beast like the "no-nonsense Ms Chen" for a mother.

Ms Chen, a police technology veteran, says inspiration for the personal sites came from her 15-year-old daughter who keeps her up to date on new internet possibilities.

And as Ms. Chen learns of these possibilities, she systematically destroys them.... I wonder, sadly, what will become of her daughter.

When I finally made my way over to Noodle Food, though, I found the following excerpt from an Ayn Rand quote on Immanuel Kant quite apropos, although on a much smaller scale.

Suppose you met a twisted, tormented young man and, trying to understand his behavior, discovered that he was brought up by a man-hating monster who worked systematically to paralyze his mind, destroy his self-confidence, obliterate his capacity for enjoyment and undercut his every attempt to escape. You would realize that nothing could be done with or for that young man and nothing could be expected of him until he was removed from the monster's influence.

Second Followup

And then, shortly after I wrote this:

The biggest problem we face in the fight for freedom of speech is, I think, not so much the need to convince people of the value of free speech, but the difficulty in helping them appreciate that it is just as much under threat now as their homes were after Kelo. With Kelo, people knew that the government meant business, and they knew that that business meant they'd be out on the streets. How do we get people to appreciate that Moslems really believe that sharia is God's will? And how do we help them realize that, with the cartoons being mysteriously absent from their newspapers, that they have already been served with an eviction notice?

I saw this cartoon at Cox and Forkum. I had been wanting to write an editorial about this for some time and couldn't see how to do it. The cartoon (as partly explained by Update I) shows exactly how to do it.

I have written an editorial and am awaiting results of the "wife test". Even if it passes, though, it's nowhere near the blockbuster this cartoon is. On the one hand, I haven't a canvas at my disposal -- not that I would have come up with this if I had. And on the other, Cox and Forkum are so good they make it look a lot easier than it really is to convey that point.

A Bleg

If my editorial passes the "wife test" (i.e., conveys its point to an intelligent non-Objectivist), I plan to submit it to Capitalism Magazine and probably a few other places. I would like to run it by someone who has been published there already before submitting it, for constructive criticism. Please email me if you follow this blog, you've appeared in Capitalism Magazine, and you're willing to do this. Click on "Contact" at the upper right and follow the directions.

I may also bug a couple of my other regular readers. You have been warned!

Defend Freedom of Speech!

The Undercurrent is preparing pamphlets on the Moslem jihad against free speech and needs support and distributors. Please stop by if you're inclined to help.

Carnival of the Objectivists

This is an idea whose time has come.

Silly Friday Quiz

I miss Myrhaf and his (snicker) memes already. I made do with the quiz below. Here are the results.

You Are Lightning

Beautiful yet dangerous People will stop and watch you when you appear Even though you're capable of random violence You are best known for: your power Your dominant state: performing

What Type of Weather Are You?

Random violence? Riiiiiiight.

This is discouraging.

Via The Politburo Diktat, is news that Denmark will be hosting an inter-religious dialogue conference (which should have been called off) and that Germany has sentenced a 61 year-old man to a year in prison, 300 hours of community service, and a suspended sentence of five years for printing toilet paper with the word "Koran" on it. President Bush should offer this man political asylum immediately.

Found en route to other things....

1. Here's a BBC time line on the cartoon riots. Among other things, I counted 34 dead in about three weeks. It is incomplete, however. For one thing, it fails to note that the Malay Prime Minister closed a newspaper there for reprinting the cartoons.

2. This column describes the initial letter sent to the Danish Prime Minister by eleven Moslem ambassadors before the cartoon riots started. After first asking Anders Fogh Rasmussen to "take all those responsible to task under law", they delivered this thinly-veiled threat.

We strongly feel that casting aspersions on Islam as a religion and publishing demeaning caricatures of the Holy Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) goes against the spirit of Danish values of tolerance and civil society. This is on the whole a very discriminatory tendency and does not bode well with [sic] the high human rights standards of Denmark. We may underline that it can also cause reactions in Muslim countries and among Muslim communities in Europe.

Among the signatories are our "allies", the Saudis.

3. And, most chillingly of all, Power Line has this example of an American newspaper explaining why it will not publish the cartoons.

Our primary reason is fear of retaliation from...bloodthirsty Islamists who seek to impose their will on those who do not believe as they do...Simply stated, we are being terrorized, and ... could not in good conscience place the men and women who work at the Phoenix and its related companies in physical jeopardy. As we feel forced, literally, to bend to maniacal pressure, this may be the darkest moment in our 40-year-publishing history.

Blogroll Addition

I stopped by Alexander Marriott's Wit and Wisdom yesterday and was pleasantly surprised to find myself on his blogroll. His is one of those blogs you can safely tell someone to just go over and start scrolling. His latest post is a very interesting book review/recommendation.

Today I am recommending David M. Potter's seminal study of the crises and conflicts which prefaced the years before the Civil War, The Impending Crisis. The reason I think other, non-historians, would benefit from this book is very simple. Potter is perhaps one of the most gifted historians I have come across in terms of boiling down incredibly complex political actions and conflicts to their essentials, without losing their messiness. On top of that Potter writes in a very readable, logical, and clear style that will be very refreshing to all historians and non-historians alike.

That sounds very worthwhile already.

Enjoy your weekend!

-- CAV