Sunday, 23 November 2008


Re-Education by the State

This poster from the French government is aimed at reassuring young people who are "discovering" themselves that there is no difference between homosexuality and heterosexuality. It reads:

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Duly Noted: Tenacious Myths

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George Handlery about the week that was. An advance for the President of Hope? The end of the Zionist conspiracy. Katyn, once more. What “it cannot happen” guarantees. Flee from information into the underbrush of fads. Old terrorists do not fade away, they dive under.
 
1. The new American President stands to benefit from a period during which, exploiting his universal popularity, diplomatically much will be possible. A number of old positions that allegedly prevented settlements can now be given up. The claim can be made that the new and uncompromised President of Hope has changed all equations. This makes it for the US side and her opposite possible to abandon hither hard positions that might have played to a home audience without having a chance on the interstate level. For the old deadlock Bush can be made responsible and, therefore, old positions can be surrendered without loss of face. In the case of those “hostiles” who secretly feel that they have painted themselves into a corner this will bring results. However, the genuine hard-liners will miss the chance as they try to harness the new wind that blows to further their cause.

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The Turkish Question

Geographically Turkey is not a European state, apart from the tiny northwestern edge of the country. Last October, however, Turkey was elected for a two-year term in the United Nations security council by winning one of the two non-permanent seats set aside for European countries. While the other candidate, Austria, barely won the required two-thirds majority, Turkey won its seat hands down. In the UN, Turkey belongs to the regional group of the Western European and Others Group (WEOG).

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