Vatican backs TinTin

They focus on his alleged deeds rather than on his low opinion of blacks

"The Vatican has dubbed comic book character turned silver screen action hero Tintin a 'Catholic hero' and ridiculed suggestions he may be racist.

In its official newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican published a picture of the children's hero beneath one of Pope Benedict XVI and then carried a double page article inside praising Tintin and his faithful dog Snowy.

L'Osservatore said that accusing the fearless journalist of racism was the 'imagining of an integralist political correctness' after some bookshops in the UK banished Tintin in the Congo to the top shelf and wrapped copies in plastic.

Key to the row is the fact that Africans in the book are portrayed as simple and ignorant but the Vatican described it as 'politically correct delirium in the shadow of Big Ben.'

The book was not published in English until six years ago and shows the indigenous natives bowing down to the boy reporter Tintin after he smashes a diamond smuggling racket involving Al Capone - with the natives depicted as stupid and with thick lips.

Describing further as to why he was a Catholic hero, the newspaper, which is seen by the Pope before going to press said Tintin was almost an angel saying:'...he seems to have come to earth to defend widows and orphans. 'He challenges the arrogance of the powerful, veniality of the colonizers, protects the weak and oppressed.'

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Texas Won’t Punish Anti-Muslim Handgun Instructor

Backdown by gun instructor?

"The Texas Dept. of Public Safety will not revoke or suspend the license of a handgun instructor who ran a radio ad telling Muslims and non-Christian Arabs that he would not teach them how to handle a firearm.

The DPS statement said Crockett Keller affirmed that he would not refuse handgun instruction “to anyone based on national origin, race or religion.” The state agency declined to provide any further comment.

The Texas Council on American-Islamic Relations said the state’s decision “sounded funny.” “I thought he meant it,” Texas CAIR executive director Mustafaa Carroll told Fox News. “There’s a lot of hateful rhetoric in the atmosphere in America these days.”

He said many of the Muslims who contacted him just brushed off Keller’s statements. “We hear so much of it,” he said. “People find it distasteful. When they hear things like that they just write it off to another crack pot.”

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Florida Judge backs antisemitism coverup

There is a considerable Jewish presence in the ACLU so that is presumably why they are the ones pursuing this. It is a disgrace that the schools seem to think that Brownshirt behavior is a yawn. That they refuse to reveal their records makes it worse. It shows that they are trying to shield their antisemitic students from court prosecution over the racist attacks.

"The ACLU’s battle to obtain school records surrounding a 2009 incident in Collier County, Florida, referred to as “Kick a Jew Day,” have failed. A judge has dismissed the group’s lawsuit, which sought to obtain records detailing 10 middle school students‘ discriminatory plans and behaviors as well the school district’s investigation of the incident.

Two years ago, on November 19, 2009, the children decided to imitate a “South Park” episode — with a twist. While the fictional cartoon characters in the show targeted red-heded individuals with a “Kick a Ginger Day,” the Collier County students apparently did something similar — an effort to target and kick Jews. In the end, they were punished with a one-day in-school suspension, which some critics believe wasn’t enough.

Since the incident, the ACLU has continued to seek the documents in an effort to look further into the incident. While the group cannot refile the case, it may be heard by the Second District Court of Appeal. Once the judge signs the final order, the appellate court may offer a different decision regarding the students’ education records.

“Kick a Jew Day” events have occurred in other middle and high schools across America as well. Last December, a similar incident unfolded at Vestal High School in Vestal, New York.

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And what happened to the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009, that was adopted and signed into law as part of the 2010 Department of Defense Appropriations Bill (H.R. 3326)? That gives the Feds power to prosecute hate crimes where local authorities are remiss. But that clearly has not been done in this case. Incautious words by conservatives get great attention but actual physical attacks on Jews and East Asians in the schools are ignored.

Now it's even attractive men who are incorrect!

Attractive women are regularly hated -- presumably by plainer women -- but this takes it a step further. This time it's maybe women with an unattractive husband who are envious

Foxtel’s Xbox commercial which depicted four women ogling a new male flatmate who walked in wearing only boardshorts attracted an official complaint to the Advertising Standards Bureau.

“One of the women makes a comment saying she 'wants one of those' clearly directed at the man. Completely inappropriate. Is she implying that she wants a topless man with no name personality or identity to walk around her house? I think that is called prostitution."

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Can a school reach into your bedroom?

The 4th Circuit says that it can

This past summer, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled against student Kara Kowalski on her First Amendment claim. The case arose after Kowalski was suspended by her high school based on scurrilous remarks she had made about another student on a MySpace discussion page, while she was in her own home, on her home computer. Now, Kowalski is seeking Supreme Court review.

As with many First Amendment cases, the facts of Kowalski’s case aren’t pretty. First Amendment plaintiffs are typically a rogues’ gallery, and even courts that rule in their favor usually give their blessing to the principle, not the person. And surely, no one would defend what Kowalski said here—only her right to say it.

The MySpace webpage Kowalski created was called “S.A.S.H,” which, she testified in her deposition, stood for “Students Against Sluts Herpes.” However, a classmate who accessed the site said that “S.A.S.H” actually stood for “Students Against Shay’s Herpes”—with “Shay” referring to a fellow student who was discussed at length on the webpage.

At Kowalski’s invitation, about two dozen students from her high school joined the MySpace group associated with the webpage and thus accessed the webpage. Further discussion on the webpage then seemed to confirm that “S.A.S.H.,” and thus the herpes claim, in fact referred to the student known as Shay N., and not to “Sluts.” (Last names of juveniles are typically not used in judicial opinions in order to protect their privacy.) Shay N. was also called a “slut” on the webpage.

When Shay N.’s parents learned about the webpage, they filed a harassment complaint on their daughter’s behalf with the school. Kowalski was then suspended for violating the school’s rule against creating a “hate website” and its policy against harassment, bullying, and intimidation.

Thus, the core question the Fourth Circuit addressed was whether the policy could, consistent with the First Amendment, reach outside the school and into Kowalski’s home.

The Fourth Circuit held that it could. More specifically, it held that Kowalski’s suspension was constitutional because she “used the Internet to orchestrate a targeted attack on a classmate, and did so in a manner that was sufficiently connected to the school environment as to implicate the School District’s recognized authority to discipline speech which ‘materially and substantially interfere[s] with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school and collid[es] with the rights of others.’”

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It seems to me that this case should have been handled under defamation law without the school stepping in. And if the accusation was true, it should have been protected as free speech. Another interest is where does the school get the authority it assumed? Is it enshrined in State or Federal law?

Feds defeated in censorship issue

We read:

"An appeals court threw out on Wednesday a federal agency's decision to fine CBS Corp television stations $550,000 for airing singer Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction" during the 2004 Super Bowl broadcast.

A divided 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia said that in imposing the fine, the Federal Communications Commission "arbitrarily and capriciously" departed from prior policy that exempted "fleeting" indecency from sanctions.

In a statement, the FCC said it is disappointed by the decision, but plans to use "all the authority at its disposal" to ensure that broadcasters serve the public interest when they use the public airwaves.

CBS spokeswoman Shannon Jacobs said the New York-based company is gratified by the decision, and hopes the FCC will "return to the policy of restrained indecency enforcement it followed for decades."

Jackson's right breast was briefly exposed to almost 90 million TV viewers after the singer Justin Timberlake accidentally ripped off part of her bustier during a halftime show performance. CBS was fined $27,500 for each of the 20 stations it owned.

The 3rd Circuit in 2008 voided the fine, but that decision was vacated when the Supreme Court in 2009 upheld the FCC policy as rational, in an opinion involving News Corp's Fox TV stations. It did not decide whether the policy was constitutional, and returned the CBS case to the 3rd Circuit.

Writing for a 2-1 majority, 3rd Circuit Judge Marjorie Rendell said that the FCC had for three decades maintained a "consistent refusal" to treat fleeting nude images as indecent, and that there was no justification to change policy for CBS.

The Supreme Court is expected in its current term to decide whether the FCC policy is constitutional.

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Tin Tin in trouble again



We read:

"Fears that the book Tintin in the Congo could warp young minds have led publishers to market it with protective packaging with warning labels similar to those on explicit top-shelf magazines

The new film may be good clean family fun, but one of Tintin’s classic adventures has been banished to the adult shelves of bookshops because it is overtly racist.

With a new generation of fans enjoying Steven Spielberg’s movie, The adventures of Tintin: The Secret Of The Unicorn, enthusiasm for collecting all 24 of Herge’s original comic books has never been higher.

Unfortunately, Tintin In The Congo was written in 1930 and depicts African natives as ignorant, simple and backward people, who are far less intelligent than their white visitors.

Leading booksellers such as Waterstones have taken the book out of the children’s section, fearing it ‘could get into the wrong hands’.

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Mention of fairies now incorrect?

It's true that homosexuals are sometimes derisively referrred to as fairies but the guy below could equally well have been referring to the feebleness of the "Little People" (as they call them in Ireland)

A Premier League manager has been accused of homophobia after he criticised his team for playing 'like fairies'.

Furious viewers said the comment from QPR boss Neil Warnock on BBC sports show Match of the Day Live was a stereotype and should not have been screened.

The BBC's complaints department agreed the remark was unwelcome and apologised that it had not been redressed while the programme had been on air. It said it would not take any further action because programme-makers had already 'expressed regret'.

Warnock's comments came in a TV interview broadcast on April 23, after his team's 2-2 draw with Cardiff City. He said: 'We defended like fairies in the first half but the first two goals could have come straight out of the Premier League.'

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TX BBQ Owner Under Fire for Sign Depicting Iranian Man Being hanged



Since the Iranian government regularly hangs Iranians (particularly homosexual ones), one would think that this poster is fair comment

A Texas restaurant owner is under fire for his refusal to remove a poster that depicts a group of armed men posing underneath a Middle Eastern man being hanged. The black-and-white sign features the caption, “Let’s play cowboys and Iranians!”

John Nonmacher, owner of Nonmacher’s Bar-B-Q in Katy, Texas, said he’s been flooded with angry calls since a customer took a photo of the sign and put it on Facebook earlier this week. Still, he’s not taking it down.

“It’s my choice to have it up. It’s your choice to go where you want to go. But I’m not going to take it down,” Nonmacher told Houston ABC affiliate KTRK-TV.

Nonmacher said he put the poster up 30 years ago during the Iranian hostage crisis and has never had a complaint until now. He said a customer gave it to him and he put it next to several others that were meant to be humorous.

Ayman Wafai didn’t find it funny. He told the station he came in to eat and was disturbed by the poster. “You know it’s 2011, looking at it now, I see nothing really more than a display of racism and bigotry,” he said. “I don’t think something like this should really be accepted by any community.”

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Navy Vet Gets Eviction Notice After Hanging American Flag on Navy Day

We read:

"A Navy veteran says he’s being evicted from his Oregon apartment complex for displaying an American flag on Navy Day.

The apartment management company delivered the eviction notice to Edward Zivica after he hung the Old Glory in a common area at the Springfield, Ore., complex, KVAL.com reported. If he doesn't agree to refrain from any more such flag displays, the complex told him, it's anchors aweigh by midnight Nov. 29.

Zivica said he's been displaying the flag for at least a year on holidays such as Veteran's Day and Memorial Day.

Terry McDonald, the CEO of St. Vincent de Paul, the management company, told the station that the notice was for “hanging something outside the building without permission.”

“If you're going to live in a situation where there's lots of other tenants, you need to follow the rules that are set up,” McDonald said.

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It's a sick society where patriotism is against the rules and very sad when a veteran is not respected

America's Judeo/Christian traditions reaffirmed

If you don't know where you are coming from, you probably don't know where you are going either -- and America's origins were Christian.

The House on Tuesday passed a non-binding resolution reaffirming "In God We Trust" as the national motto.

The measure sponsored by Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., supports and encourages the motto's display in all public schools and government buildings. It was approved 396-9, with 2 abstentions.

Forbes said the resolution was needed because President Obama had once called "E pluribus unum" the national motto, and the Latin phrase meaning "from many one" was engraved in the new Capitol Visitors Center until Congress ordered that it be corrected.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., called the resolution a meaningless distraction from the nation's real problems. "Nobody is threatening the national motto," he said.

President Obama responded Wednesday by trying to shame the Republican-controlled House by accusing its leaders of wasting time during a jobs crisis with debates over commemorative baseball coins and reaffirming "In God We Trust" as the country's motto.

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Christians take a bit of a battering in the USA these days so this may encourage more outreach from them and delay the delegitimization of them that seems to be in train

Florida Pastor to Defy Prayer Ban

We read:

"A standoff over prayers at a school flagpole is looming between a longtime Baptist preacher and a Florida public school system. Ron Baker, the pastor of Russell Baptist Church in Green Cove Springs, said he plans to keep on praying, regardless of what happens.

Baker was referring to a legal opinion submitted by the Clay County School Board’s attorney and published in Jacksonville.com. The attorney determined that a series of prayers on the grounds of four schools was a violation of the U.S. Constitution.

“It is a violation of the United States Constitution for a teacher, school administrator or other school district employee to join in a prayer session during their work time,” wrote J. Bruce Bickner

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Joining in a prayer session is nothing like establishing a church so the legal opinion is absurd

Politically correct speech can kill

We read:

"It is all too easy to dehumanize the sick, the weak, and the disabled. A few days after the White Mass, Pulitzer Prize–winning commentator Paul Greenberg, addressing a crowd in Manhattan, said, “Verbicide must precede homicide.” To justify killing an unborn baby — whether it be a Down Syndrome baby, or one with a physical deformity, or the child of a mother who is desperate for one reason or another — one has to “speak of a fetus, not an unborn child,” Greenberg said. “Vocabulary remains the decisive turning point.”

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette columnist was speaking to an audience gathered together by the folks at The Human Life Review to hail him as a “Great Defender of Life.”

He had, you see, changed his mind. “When Roe v. Wade was first pronounced from on high,” he told the assembly, “I welcomed it.” But over the years, he recalled, it took “more and more effort to justify” his position. To stay steady, it was imperative not to “look too closely at those sonograms.”

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Holy Moly! The Swedes are even more politically correct than the English

"Massage" is a naughty word???

The Football Association has pulled an advert for an upcoming England match after it was branded racist. Sweden was outraged by the 'racial stereotypes' used in the ad for their friendly at Wembley.

It featured a fake Swede using sexual innuendo over an Abba-style backing track to promote the game on November 15.

A voice says: 'And now a massage from the Swedish football team: Listen up, English football fans...'

The Football Association removed the talkSPORT commercial after England's upcoming opponents reacted angrily to the advert

A similar method was used to promote a friendly with Spain last month.

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How the Patriot Act stripped me of my free-speech rights

Secrecy is always an invitation to corrupt practices

"Sometime in 2012, I will begin the ninth year of my life under an FBI gag order, which began when I received what is known as a national security letter at the small Internet service provider I owned. On that day in 2004 (the exact date is redacted from court papers, so I can’t reveal it), an FBI agent came to my office and handed me a letter. It demanded that I turn over information about one of my clients and forbade me from telling “any person” that the government had approached me.

National security letters are issued by the FBI, not a judge, to obtain phone, computer, and banking information. Instead of complying, I spoke with a lawyer at the American Civil Liberties Union and filed a constitutional challenge against the NSL provision of the Patriot Act, which was signed into law 10 years ago Wednesday.

In 2004, it wasn’t at all clear whether the FBI would charge me with a crime for telling the ACLU about the letter, or for telling the court clerk about it when I filed my lawsuit as “John Doe.”

For years, the government implausibly claimed that if I were able to identify myself as the plaintiff in the case, irreparable damage to national security would result. But I did not believe then, nor do I believe now, that the FBI’s gag order was motivated by legitimate national security concerns. It was motivated by a desire to insulate the FBI from public criticism and oversight.

In August 2010, the government agreed to a settlement, and I was finally allowed to reveal my name to the public in connection with my case, but I am still prevented — under the threat of imprisonment — from discussing any fact that was redacted in the thousands of pages of court documents, including the target of the investigation or what information was sought.

I don’t believe that it’s right for Americans’ free speech rights to be bound by perpetual gag orders that can’t be meaningfully challenged in a court of law. The courts agreed, but the NSLs and the gag orders live on.

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Model Vanessa Hessler fired for praising Gaddafis



We read:

"A German company has cancelled a major advertising contract with an Italian-American model after she described her passionate relationship with Muammar Gaddafi's son, Muatassim, and praised his family.

Telecommunications firm Telefonica Germany and its subsidiary, Alice, will stop working with 23-year-old model Vanessa Hessler and remove her face from its website within hours, spokesman Albert Fetsch said today.

"Vanessa Hessler has failed to distance herself from her comments on the conflict in Libya," Mr Fetsch said.

Hessler had been the company's advertising face for years, and giant posters featuring the model were a fixture in many German cities.

Talks between Telefonica and Hessler's agency did not yield a solution because Hessler stood by her comments, said Fetsch. "We and our clients have no comprehension for what she said."

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She's free to say what she likes but there is no obligation on anyone to employ her. She's probably a bit of a nit who thinks that the good treatment she got is the way everybody was treated by Gaddafi and his family

Satirical French magazine names Prophet Mohammed as editor-in-chief

The same magazine got into big hot water by republishing the Danish Mohammed cartoons a few years ago -- so this will probably be treated as an insult too. But it is more a compliment as far as I can see. The magazine is a generally Leftist one but with anarchist tendencies too

A French satirical weekly says it has named the Prophet Mohammed as "editor-in-chief" for its next issue to celebrate the election win of Tunisia's Islamist party.

The publication Charlie Hedbo also said the issue that comes out on Wednesday will be re-named "Sharia Hedbo" after senior transitional Libyan leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil said that Islamic sharia law will be the basis of legislation under the country's new regime.

"To fittingly celebrate the victory of the Islamist Ennahda party in Tunisia ... Charlie Hedbo has asked Mohammed to be the special editor-in-chief of its next issue", the magazine said in a statement.

"The prophet of Islam didn't have to be asked twice and we thank him for it," the statement said.

The publication's editor in chief and cartoonist Charb told AFP that "We don't feel like causing further provocation. We simply feel like doing our job as usual. The only difference this week is that Mohammed is on the cover and it's pretty rare to put him on the cover."

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UPDATE: As I expected, the magazine's premises have now been attacked

TN: Occupy Nashville arrests draw ACLU, legal flak

We read:

"The American Civil Liberties Union is working on a legal strategy to stop nightly arrests of Occupy Nashville protesters on the grounds that the state is violating their First Amendment rights.

The Tennessee chapter of the ACLU will ask the courts to bar enforcement of a newly imposed curfew on Legislative Plaza, where Occupy Nashville protesters have gathered for more than three weeks. A request for an injunction could be filed as soon as Monday.

While the legal teams maneuvered, protesters returned to Legislative Plaza to defy the state’s new curfew, which has led to nearly 50 arrests over two nights and countless man-hours for the Tennessee Highway Patrol. Both nights, a magistrate refused to approve troopers’ warrants and ordered the protesters released.

The arrests began after Gov. Bill Haslam’s administration announced Thursday that it had imposed a 10 p.m. curfew on Legislative Plaza for safety and sanitation reasons. State officials also announced all groups would have to purchase liability insurance and take out a $65 permit for each day they want to assemble on the plaza, making official what had been an informal policy.

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Since they are allowed to protest all they like until 10pm it would seem to be an issue not of free speech but rather whether they are free to camp overnight anywhere they like.

U.S. Marines: No Spitting Toward Mecca

We read:

"And who is Shafiq Mubarak? All I can find out is that he is a Pro Sol contractor (?) hired by the Marine Corps Center for Advanced Operational Culture Learningto help implement "the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, the winning of hearts and minds."At least that's how Col. Furness puts it.

According to the North County Times, Mubarak didn't come to the US until 2008 -- from where the story doesn't say -- but has been working with US troops in A-stan "for much of the past decade."

How is that? Why is that? Dunno. What the story does report is that Mubarak teaches the do's and don't's of sharia -- kind of, Islam for Leathernecks.

Mubarak teaches US Marines:

* Don't spit toward Mecca.

* Don't urinate toward Mecaa.

* Don't sleep with your boots toward Mecca.

In other words, Mubarak teaches US Marines to become intensely sensitized to the whereabouts of Mecca, and to be guided by that magnetic North for Muslims as a matter of the most personal habits and hygiene -- in accordance with sharia (Islamic law). This goes well, of course, with ISAF's guidance to all troops to revere the Koran and its teachings.

What next, prayer rugs?

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If only Christians got similar respect for their beliefs

Must not joke about breasts

Australia:

The NSW Government has confirmed action has been taken against a senior legal officer who gave a "boob-apron" to a colleague as a birthday joke.

The scandal in a D-cup was first revealed by The Sunday Telegraph after Nigel Hadgkiss, executive director of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, gave a novelty apron featuring a pair of fake breasts to a workmate who had described himself as a "big girl at heart".

The gift was an on-going joke between the pair, but one guest at the work function party took offence and complained. Mr Hadgkiss is a former federal policeman and holds one of the highest positions in the DPP.

It is only now that Attorney-General Greg Smith has confirmed a complaint had been received about Mr Hadgkiss, after it was raised in parliament by Shadow Attorney-General Paul Lynch after The Sunday Telegraph article.

Asked to elaborate on the matter during an Estimates Hearing on Wednesday, Mr Smith confirmed that Mr Hadgkiss was cautioned about the matter. "My understanding is that the director counselled him," Mr Smith said.

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