An eye-opening chart. Of course we all know this to be the case, but the graphic drives the point home. Meanwhile, in the world of Malkin, Hot Air, Chuckles Johnson, Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler et. al., there are sleeper cells in your backyard and every Moslem is a potential terrorist and they are coming to get you and your children and the only way to react is to be constantly hysterical. Every story of the latest terrorist threat, although later proven inevitably to have been absurdly overstated, causes an explosion, an orgy of hysteria among our friends on the far right. Then when it’s all proven to have been vastly exaggerated if not downright false, they simply move on to the newest “threat” and start all over. There are never any corrections or apologies. But back to the chart… It begs the simply question, why aren’t we equally hysterical over guns, or hernias? No one questions the awful tragedy of 911 and the need to remain vigilant. But is perpetual fear, based on the most questionable of rumors, really the answer? Does it save any lives? And if we are so concerned over one another’s lives, why not focus on the stuff at the top of the list as opposed to the very bottom?

A Muslim American speaks out against Muslim butchery, and it isn’t pretty. But then again, it is.

The leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, Abu Hamza al-Muhajer, recently issued a decree to its supporters: Kill at least one American in the next two weeks “using a sniper rifle, explosive or whatever the battle may require.”

Well, Abu Hamza al-Muhajer, I am an American too. Count me as the one of those you have asked your supporters to kill.

I am not alone, there are thousands of Muslims with me in Las Vegas, and many more millions in America, who are proud Americans and who are ready to face your challenge. You hide in your caves and behind the faces of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq. You don’t show your faces and you have no guts to face Muslims. You thrive on the misery of thousands of Muslim youth and children who are victims of despotism, poverty and ignorance.

During the past two decades, you have brought nothing but shame and disaster to your religion and your world.

We should see more stories like this, and I hope we do. American Muslims, well integrated into Americdan society, have rejected the dogma of Bin Laden and see him for the monster he is. More of them should speak out more often.

When I tell you guys to go after a story, I expect you to snap to it. Or else I’ll “whine.”

Well, allow me to take the bait – it is an extraordinary story. And eswn does us a great service presenting it with such meticulous detail. From the article he cites:

Crowds angered by alleged police mishandling of a school teacher’s death attacked government offices in a southern Chinese city, sparking arrests and beatings by riot troops, newspapers and a local hospital said Monday.

Students and local residents of Rui’an’s Tangxia township claimed police falsified a report and colluded with the husband of high school English teacher Dai Haijing, 30, to have her death classified as a suicide, according to Hong Kong newspapers Ta Kung Pao and The South China Morning Post.

The demonstrators also staged a protest at the husband’s factory where they damaged cars and other property.

The protests reflect widespread perceptions that China’s weak and largely opaque legal system is tainted by communist officials’ abuse of power and susceptible to influence by the country’s newly moneyed classes.

For some startling photos, see eswn’s two posts. This isn’t a little protest outside a police station – this is a real riot, and the rioters are surprisingly young and angry. And, if you have the stomach for it, don’t miss the extremely graphic picture he links to; I haven’t seen photos of that many suicides, but does this look like suicide to you? It looks like an awfully inconvenient way to kill oneself.

Watch it. Don’t forget the lies. They’re all right there, if you really want to know the extent to whch were were sold a bill of goods..

When I want to remember, I watch this. And I can’t help crying every time, even five years later. Every time. Despite some of its jingoism, despite knowing how we were to squander that precious sympathy we enjoyed for one brief shining moment from the entire world, I still cry.

Feel the love.

I don’t think they should have whited out the faces. Those young people would be well served with a dose of shame.

A must read. I’ll give a snip, but due to time constraints I can’t say another word.

The founder of Wikipedia, the online encyclopaedia written by its users, has defied the Chinese government by refusing to bow to censorship of politically sensitive entries.

Jimmy Wales, one of the 100 most influential people in the world according to Time magazine, challenged other internet companies, including Google, to justify their claim that they could do more good than harm by co-operating with Beijing.

Wikipedia, a hugely popular reference tool in the West, has been banned from China since last October. Whereas Google, Microsoft and Yahoo went into the country accepting some restrictions on their online content, Wales believes it must be all or nothing for Wikipedia.

His stand comes as Irrepressible.info, a joint campaign by The Observer and Amnesty International for free speech on the web, continues with the support of more than 37,000 people around the world. The campaign calls on governments to stop persecuting political bloggers and on IT companies to stop complying with these repressive regimes.

‘We’re really unclear why we would be [banned],’ Wales told The Observer. ‘We have internal rules about neutrality and deleting personal attacks and things like this. We’re far from being a haven for dissidents or a protest site. So our view is that the block is in error and should be removed, but we shall see.’

Wales said censorship was ‘ antithetical to the philosophy of Wikipedia. We occupy a position in the culture that I wish Google would take up, which is that we stand for the freedom for information, and for us to compromise I think would send very much the wrong signal: that there’s no one left on the planet who’s willing to say “You know what? We’re not going to give up.”‘

Wikipedia’s entry on the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 includes the government’s official claim that 200-300 died and the Chinese student associations and Chinese Red Cross’s estimate of 2,000-3,000 deaths….

‘One of the points that I’m trying to push is that if there’s a small town in China that has a wonderful local tradition, that won’t make its way into Wikipedia because the people of China are not allowed to share their knowledge with the world. I think that’s an ironic side-effect and something the people in the censorship department need to have a much bigger awareness of: you’re not just preventing information about Falun Gong or whatever you’re upset about getting into China, you’re preventing the Chinese people speaking to the world.’

More follows. I know this isn’t very useful, slapping up the article with no comment. But it’s a great story, I couldn’t leave it unmentioned.

I can’t blog for more than a few seconds today (and tomorrow). Suffice it to say it’s clear that 9/11 has now become for most of us another day. For me, for the first time in five years, September 11 arrived without fanfare, aside from a few pangs of relatively distant memories. Relatively. Because the first couple of years these memories were so vivid. And then time works its wonders, and the day breaks down into a series of snapshots and associations and miscellaneous memories, finally becoming a thing of the past.

Every year on this date I listen to the same long radio broadcast, which evokes to me the curiosity and unfathomability of what happened. (It’s been playing in the background in my office the past hour.) At first, no one can put their arms around it, and on the hourly news at 9 a.m. they go ahead reading about ordinary things going on, not willing to admit yet that the whole world had changed, and everything else they were announcing would soon seem utterly meaningless. (“Today Libby Dole is expected to announce she will run for the US senate…”) And then, as more and more information becomes available, the implications of the day become clearer. It’s an interesting thing to listen to, hearing the reporters trying to think through the unthinkable. Listen to the strain and exhaustion in their voices as they try to figure out which reports are true or not. It’s not dramatic or sensational, which is what makes this broadcast so good. Keeping sane at a moment of insanity; I really admire good reporters when they live up to their charter, as these reporters do.

I’ll be busy on a big project for the next two days. Very limited access to the Internet for at least two days.

Whatever Happened to the America of 9/12?
By FRANK RICH
Published: September 10, 2006

‘THE most famous picture nobody’s ever seen’ is how the Associated Press photographer Richard Drew has referred to his photo of an unidentified World Trade Center victim hurtling to his death on 9/11. It appeared in some newspapers, including this one, on 9/12 but was soon shelved. ‘In the most photographed and videotaped day in the history of the world,’ Tom Junod later wrote in Esquire, ‘the images of people jumping were the only images that became, by consensus, taboo.’

(more…)

You simply have to read this mind-boggling article to believe it. I have never given these “theories” any mind, but when nearly 40 percent of the American public says they believe them, we know some odd phenomenon is at work. And when you read the names and titles of many of those leading the movement, includng former Bush appointees and academic luminaries, and when you read about all the startling contradictions in the 911 report – well, take a look at the article, then respond.

I am not endorsing the crackspot theories. Far from it. But there is no denying that they could never have gained this much traction if the government had been more forthright about what actually happened. Again, read the article, which is the single best roundup piece I’ve seen on the subject. I was shaking my head the whole time in dismay. Sure, the conspiracy freaks are nuts, but when you take a look at the force behind their movement, you realize just how powerful
they are becoming. (The proof is all the ink they’ve garnered over the past two weeks alone.) What’s going on?