imkittymyers at hotmail dot com
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
MUSLIMS STILL REVOLTING
Cartoon by Sean Delonas
8 Riots losing steam? I suppose all things are relative.
French Rioting Appears to Lose Strength: The extraordinary 12-day state of emergency went into effect Tuesday at midnight, giving special powers to authorities in Paris, its suburbs and more than 30 other cities from the Mediterranean to the German border _ an indication of how widespread arson, riots and other unrest have become in nearly two weeks of violence. … Overnight Tuesday-Wednesday, youths torched 617 vehicles, down from 1,173 a night earlier, police said.
88 Map of France on fire.
8 And to think that the French sneered at America and called us racist!
PARIS' HARVEST OF SOCIALISM: For a North African or Middle East immigrant in France, there are few avenues that offer a prospect of upward mobility — in stark contrast to the plethora of choices available to immigrants in the United States. Instead of gearing itself to job creation and upward mobility — as the American system does — the French economy, society, labor regulations, tax laws and social structure are all designed to provide a high-quality life to the traditional, white population without allowing the growth and expansion so necessary for the swelling ranks of immigrants. While the United States was built to absorb people from other lands, France was never designed to accommodate immigrants. Its system was built only for the French.
8 The Vichy Solution: French habits of appeasement and its commitment to secularism now cut against each other: the Vichy-style, power-sharing solution to which French pols are drawn will cost them their secularist state but could perhaps give them just enough peace to pursue their secularist pleasures. French politicians had arrogantly assumed they could delay this choice by secularizing Islam. Hence their desperate project to form and spread "French Islam." But the hopelessness of the project is obvious; instead of soothing tensions, it inflamed them, clear in the contempt Muslim rioters feel for the Imams Chirac has been trotting out as peacekeepers.
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