Monday, July 4, 2016
Two Nightclub Shootings: Two Very Different Outcomes
The shooting this week in a Lyman, South Carolina, nightclub will not receive the international publicity that the recent horrific Orlando nightclub murders have merited. This is understandable, considering the death toll in Orlando was 49, while no one was killed in the South Carolina shooting.
But perhaps there should be greater media attention to what occurred in South Carolina, because a wider knowledge of that event might prevent a future Orlando-like massacre.
According to deputies of the Spartanburg County sheriff’s department, 32-year-old Jody Ray Thompson pulled a gun just outside the Playoffz nightclub and fired several shots toward a crowd.
Lt. Kevin Bobo explained what happened. “His rounds struck three victims, and almost struck a fourth victim, who in self-defense, pulled his own weapon and fired, striking Thompson in the leg.” The man who shot Thompson held a valid permit to carry a concealed weapon. As such, he will face no charges.
Thompson was still on the scene when deputies arrived, but the initial scene was chaotic,” Bobo said. “It wasn’t until victims and witnesses were interviewed, and video from the scene was reviewed that Thompson was identified as the suspect.”
Thompson was charged with four counts of attempted murder, possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime, and unlawful carrying of a weapon.
It was yet another example of how a good man with a gun stopped a bad man with a gun. While deputies with the sheriff’s department did arrive at the scene and take control of the situation, had the man with the concealed carry permit not been present, or had he not had his gun with him and shot at the attacker immediately, the situation could have turned out far differently.
As the saying goes, "Often when law enforcement officers are needed in seconds, they are only minutes away."
While President Barack Obama, along with Democrats acting like children sitting in on the floor of the House of Representatives (making the U.S. look like some kind of banana republic), and his allies in the liberal media chose to focus on the need for more gun control laws after the Orlando massacre, others have expressed the opposite viewpoint.
One person doing so was the father of a victim in the Orlando nightclub shootings. In a letter to the Detroit News, Mark Bando blamed gun control for disarming people such as a his son Christopher, who was killed by the terrorist shooter.
“The killer was armed and his helpless victims were not," said the father, adding, "Yet the anti-gun politicians still want to disarm the populace, enabling these scenarios. It is likely such attacks will continue, until the victims start shooting back. That’s the lesson I take from this, for what it’s worth. When the shooting started Saturday night, I’ll bet there wasn’t a person in the club who wouldn’t have traded everything he owned in the world for a loaded gun.”
Bando had served in the Detroit police department for 25 years, and there is little doubt that he has much experience that helped form his support for the right to keep and bear arms.
Another example of a good man with a gun preventing additional murders is what happened two years ago in Moore, Oklahoma at Vaughn Foods. Alton Nolen, an employee of the food processing company, attacked two female co-workers with a knife, killing one, Colleen Hufford, whom he eventually beheaded. He attempted to do the same to Traci Johnson, but was confronted by the company’s chief operating officer, Mark Vaughn, with a gun.
Vaughn shot Nolen, ending the attacks. But had Vaughn not had a gun on the premises, it is uncertain how many others would have been assaulted and possibly killed in Nolen’s rampage.
Gun control laws actually prevent citizens from protecting themselves and others in such violent circumstances. In an instance from 1991, Suzanna Gratia Hupp and her parents were having lunch at Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas when a mass shooting took place in the cafeteria.
Hupp owned a firearm, but had left the gun in her locked car, fearing that she could have been arrested for violating the state’s draconian concealed weapon’s laws, in place at the time, which made such possession a felony. When George Hennard began shooting, Hupp reached for her purse to retrieve her gun, before realizing that she had left it in her car — “a hundred feet away.”
Unopposed, Hennard eventually shot 44 people inside the cafeteria, killing 24 of them, including Hupp’s mother and father.
This led Hupp to become an advocate of changing the Texas law, and she even to traveled to other states, arguing for the right of citizens to defend themselves. She expressed that she would have rather been found guilty of the then-felony of carrying a concealed weapon than to lose her parents in the murders at Luby’s.
Eventually elected to the Texas House of Representatives, she saw her work come to fruition when a bill allowing the carrying of concealed weapons passed the Texas Legislature and was signed by then-Governor George W. Bush. She has also written a book, From Luby's to the Legislature: One Woman's Fight Against Gun Control.
It is imperative that legislators across the country address the issue of firearms, but not in the way advocated by childish-acting Democrats sitting in on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives. Instead of passing laws that will only restrict the Second Amendment rights of Americans while doing nothing to stop these mass shootings, legislators need to examine ways in which more Americans can be armed in self-defense, so as to minimize Orlando-type attacks.
Many businesses fear lawsuits from any type of use of firearms on their property, so they place signs at the property’s entrance stating that guns are not allowed on the premises. These signs are a joke, however, as clearly no person intending to commit a violent crime with a gun would be deterred thereby. Only persons who are not a threat to anyone anyway are deterred by "No Guns' signs.
Legislators must pass laws protecting business owners from civil liability in situations in which a person uses a firearm in defense of either himself or others. Such laws would make future incidents more like what happened in Spartanburg County rather than what took place at Pulse nightclub and at Luby’s.
Sheriff David Clarke: Black “Lies” Matter
The Black Lives Matter movement “…doesn’t care any more about the lives of black people than the Ku Klux Klan…” Sheriff David Clarke asserted during an interview with Accuracy in Media. Clarke is the Sheriff of Miwaukee County, Wisconsin.
“Black Lives Matter, which I have renamed ‘Black Lies’ L-I-E-S Matter, it’s nothing more than an astroturf operation, it’s just the latest shallow disguised, confederation if you will, of community organizers and leftists that specialize in fostering disorganization and rebellion in ghettos and other struggling areas throughout the United States of America.”
Sheriff Clarke cited “a study done by Dr. Timothy Johnson of Toledo University…” that invalidates the widespread claim that police officers practice racial discrimination. He said the study found that twice as many white men “…are killed in police use of force situations” than black men.
“There is no research, there is not one bit of research or data that supports their lie—which is why I call them ‘Black Lies’—their lie about police use of force in the United States of America.”
Sheriff Clarke calls Black Lives Matter a “hate group,” saying, “These are nothing more than riot makers and they stoke up bitterness and resentment in people; and they use the police as a distraction from the staggering failure of liberal politicians in these large urban areas where these ghettos are contained.”
Comparing Chicago’s crime-ridden culture of death to “… some war-torn, sub-Sahara African nation that’s constantly under civil war with a tribal mentality,” Sheriff Clarke confronted the movement’s passivity on this issue.
“Where is Black Lies Matter? If they cared about the lives of black people they would be marching against the liberal establishment in these large urban areas and demanding a better quality of life and a better way of life. But no, that’s not what they’re doing. They’re instead using the police as a straw man…”
Describing Black Lives Matter as a “…political construct that’s developed and really turned out to be a get-out-the-vote and voter registration drive for the Democrat party…” Sheriff Clarke noted that while the Democrat Party did not found the group, the party views it as an “…opportunity…to enrage and energize black people to come out and vote…”
When questioned about the movement’s chief aim, Sheriff Clarke stated that “Their ultimate goal is to try to extract from…government, things that they have not earned…political power, they’re looking for money…and they’re trying to do it by force, by threats, by rioting, and other, I think, tawdry tactics.”In an unequivocal denunciation of the “Black ‘Lies’ Matter” movement, Sheriff Clarke declared, “…I don’t support anything that this fraudulent movement proposes.”
Turkey's Growing Influence over Islam in Austria
- The Berlin-based expert on Turkey, Ralph Ghadban, warns that the Islam being preached in Turkish-controlled mosques in Europe is a "Sharia Islam with strong Turkish-nationalist overtones" that calls for a "strict separation from Western individualistic values."
- In February 2016, the University of Vienna published study which found that Islamic kindergartens in the capital are dominated by "intellectual Salafists and political Islamists" who are contributing to the "theologically-motivated isolation" of Muslim pupils. The report calls into question claims by the IGGiÖ that anti-Western textbooks have been removed from Austrian schools.
- Muslim students now outnumber Roman Catholic students at middle and secondary schools in Vienna, according to official statistics, which show that Muslim students are also on the verge of overtaking Catholics in Viennese elementary schools. The data confirms a massive demographic and religious shift in Austria, traditionally a Roman Catholic country.
The selection of an ethnic Turk to lead the Islamic Religious Community in Austria (Islamischen Glaubensgemeinschaft in Österreich, IGGiÖ), the primary representative of Muslims in the country, is being challenged by Muslim groups opposed to Turkey's growing influence over the practice of Islam in Austria.
Ibrahim Olgun, a 28-year-old Austrian-born Islamic theologian with ties to the Turkish state, was quietly named on June 19 to replace 62-yer-old Fuat Sanac, who stepped down after serving as IGGiÖ president for five years.
Sanac, also a Turk, was reviled by Turkish authorities for helping the Austrian government draft a new Islam Law (Islamgesetz) that aims to promote an "Islam with an Austrian character." The law, which was promulgated in February 2015, seeks to reduce outside meddling by prohibiting foreign funding for mosques, imams and Muslim organizations in Austria. It also stresses that Austrian law must take precedence over Islamic Sharia law for Muslims living in the country.
Observers worry that Olgun — a member of the Turkey-financed Turkish-Islamic Union for Cultural and Social Cooperation in Austria (ATIB), an influential group that has vowed to challenge the Islam Law at Austria's Constitutional Court — will use his new position both to undermine the Islam Law and to increase further Turkey's influence over Muslims in Austria.
At least eight Austrian Muslim groups (representing Albanian, Arab, Bosnian and Sufi Muslims) are challenging Olgun, who was selected by the IGGiÖ's Shura Council (Schurarat), a rules committee (Shura is an Arabic word for consultation) whose five members all happen to be ethnic Turks.
IGGiÖ statutes require a person to be at least 35 years old to head the group, but the Shura Council secretly annulled that stipulation last December, according to Hassan Mousa, head of the Arab Religious Community in Austria (Arabischen Kultusgemeinde in Österreich). He said that Olgun's selection was "undemocratic" and "illegal" and added that his ties to ATIB would shift IGGiÖ's balance of power further in Turkey's direction.
ATIB, an umbrella group that operates more than 60 mosques in Austria, is directly managed by the religious affairs attaché at the Turkish embassy in Vienna, and the imams of these mosques are Turkish civil servants. ATIB and its German counterpart, the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs (DITIB), are financed by the Turkish government's Directorate for Religious Affairs, known in Turkish as Diyanet.
According to the Berlin-based expert on Turkey, Ralph Ghadban, the primary mission of ATIB and DITIB is to "install the Turkish government's official version of Islam" in Austria and Germany. He says the two groups are the "extended arms" of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who uses them to promote Turkish nationalism as an antidote to integration among the Turkish diaspora.
Ghadban warns that the Islam being preached in Turkish-controlled mosques in Europe is a "Sharia Islam with strong Turkish-nationalist overtones" that calls for a "strict separation from Western individualistic values." He also says that DITIB has been strengthening its ties to Milli Görüs (Turkish for "National Vision"), an influential Islamist movement strongly opposed to Muslim integration into European society.
Olgun, who studied Islamic theology at the University of Ankara, has vowed to represent all Muslims in Turkey:
In Austria, ATIB directly competes with the Vienna-based, Saudi-funded King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz International Centre for Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue, which, according to critics, is a permanent "propaganda center" in central Europe from which to spread the conservative Wahhabi sect of Islam.
Olgun also was an "inspector for Islamic religious instruction" (Fachinspektor für islamischen Religionsunterricht) for the IGGiÖ in Vienna, where he worked to ensure that Muslim children are being taught a version of Islam that presumably complies with standards established by the Turkish government.
The IGGiÖ, which represents more than 250 Muslim associations across Austria, supplies state-funded Islamic religious education at Austrian public and private schools.
In 2014, the IGGiÖ introduced new taxpayer-funded textbooks for the formal teaching of Islam in all public elementary schools across the country. According to the IGGiÖ, the new textbooks — called "Islam Hour" (Islamstunde) — are based on "secure and recognized sources of Islam" aimed at "embedding Islam into the lives of students."
Unlike previous versions of the books, which were criticized for being "overly martial in tone" and for not being "sufficiently oriented toward European values," the new books have been developed based a "completely new didactic model for competency-based education."
In February 2016, however, the University of Vienna published study which found that Islamic kindergartens in the capital are dominated by "intellectual Salafists and political Islamists" who are contributing to the "theologically-motivated isolation" of Muslim pupils. The report calls into question claims by the IGGiÖ that anti-Western textbooks have been removed from Austrian schools: "In many of their publications the Muslim Brotherhood and Milli Görüs reject the Western way of life as an inferior worldview."
Olgun rejects the criticism levelled against him: "They say that I am too young, that I am the extended arm of the Turkish state. That is not true. I was born in Austria. I grew up here and am an Austrian citizen. I am not a Turkish civil servant."
Olgun's supporters say it is time for a "generational change" at the IGGiÖ because Austria's Muslim community is young and growing fast. The Muslim population in Austria now exceeds 500,000 (or roughly 6% of the total population), up from an estimated 150,000 (or 2%) in 1990. The Muslim population is expected to reach 800,000 (or 9.5%) by 2030, according to recent estimates.
Muslim students now outnumber Roman Catholic students at middle and secondary schools in Vienna, according to official statistics, which show that Muslim students are also on the verge of overtaking Catholics in Viennese elementary schools. The data confirms a massive demographic and religious shift in Austria, traditionally a Roman Catholic country.
Ibrahim Olgun, a 28-year-old Austrian-born Islamic theologian with ties to the Turkish state, was quietly named on June 19 to replace 62-yer-old Fuat Sanac, who stepped down after serving as IGGiÖ president for five years.
Sanac, also a Turk, was reviled by Turkish authorities for helping the Austrian government draft a new Islam Law (Islamgesetz) that aims to promote an "Islam with an Austrian character." The law, which was promulgated in February 2015, seeks to reduce outside meddling by prohibiting foreign funding for mosques, imams and Muslim organizations in Austria. It also stresses that Austrian law must take precedence over Islamic Sharia law for Muslims living in the country.
Observers worry that Olgun — a member of the Turkey-financed Turkish-Islamic Union for Cultural and Social Cooperation in Austria (ATIB), an influential group that has vowed to challenge the Islam Law at Austria's Constitutional Court — will use his new position both to undermine the Islam Law and to increase further Turkey's influence over Muslims in Austria.
At least eight Austrian Muslim groups (representing Albanian, Arab, Bosnian and Sufi Muslims) are challenging Olgun, who was selected by the IGGiÖ's Shura Council (Schurarat), a rules committee (Shura is an Arabic word for consultation) whose five members all happen to be ethnic Turks.
IGGiÖ statutes require a person to be at least 35 years old to head the group, but the Shura Council secretly annulled that stipulation last December, according to Hassan Mousa, head of the Arab Religious Community in Austria (Arabischen Kultusgemeinde in Österreich). He said that Olgun's selection was "undemocratic" and "illegal" and added that his ties to ATIB would shift IGGiÖ's balance of power further in Turkey's direction.
ATIB, an umbrella group that operates more than 60 mosques in Austria, is directly managed by the religious affairs attaché at the Turkish embassy in Vienna, and the imams of these mosques are Turkish civil servants. ATIB and its German counterpart, the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs (DITIB), are financed by the Turkish government's Directorate for Religious Affairs, known in Turkish as Diyanet.
According to the Berlin-based expert on Turkey, Ralph Ghadban, the primary mission of ATIB and DITIB is to "install the Turkish government's official version of Islam" in Austria and Germany. He says the two groups are the "extended arms" of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who uses them to promote Turkish nationalism as an antidote to integration among the Turkish diaspora.
Ghadban warns that the Islam being preached in Turkish-controlled mosques in Europe is a "Sharia Islam with strong Turkish-nationalist overtones" that calls for a "strict separation from Western individualistic values." He also says that DITIB has been strengthening its ties to Milli Görüs (Turkish for "National Vision"), an influential Islamist movement strongly opposed to Muslim integration into European society.
Olgun, who studied Islamic theology at the University of Ankara, has vowed to represent all Muslims in Turkey:
"I myself have experienced what it is like to grow up in Austria and to question my own identity. What is religion and what is tradition? It is worthwhile to reflect on it and then do theological research. Today I feel at home as a Muslim in Austria, but I also do not forget my roots. Therefore I will build bridges."Olgun insists that he will not be Erdogan's puppet and will not allow himself to be influenced by ATIB. Until recently, however, Olgun was ATIB's point man for "interreligious dialogue," a key method of spreading Islam in the West by portraying it as a religion of peace and tolerance.
In Austria, ATIB directly competes with the Vienna-based, Saudi-funded King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz International Centre for Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue, which, according to critics, is a permanent "propaganda center" in central Europe from which to spread the conservative Wahhabi sect of Islam.
Olgun also was an "inspector for Islamic religious instruction" (Fachinspektor für islamischen Religionsunterricht) for the IGGiÖ in Vienna, where he worked to ensure that Muslim children are being taught a version of Islam that presumably complies with standards established by the Turkish government.
The selection of 28-year-old Ibrahim Olgun (left) as the new leader of the Islamic Religious Community in Austria has been criticized by other local Muslim leaders as "undemocratic" and "illegal." They believe Olgun will work to increase Turkey's influence over Muslims in Austria. At right, the Saudi-funded King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz International Centre for Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue in Vienna, which critics say spreads fundamentalist Wahhabi Islam.
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The IGGiÖ, which represents more than 250 Muslim associations across Austria, supplies state-funded Islamic religious education at Austrian public and private schools.
In 2014, the IGGiÖ introduced new taxpayer-funded textbooks for the formal teaching of Islam in all public elementary schools across the country. According to the IGGiÖ, the new textbooks — called "Islam Hour" (Islamstunde) — are based on "secure and recognized sources of Islam" aimed at "embedding Islam into the lives of students."
Unlike previous versions of the books, which were criticized for being "overly martial in tone" and for not being "sufficiently oriented toward European values," the new books have been developed based a "completely new didactic model for competency-based education."
In February 2016, however, the University of Vienna published study which found that Islamic kindergartens in the capital are dominated by "intellectual Salafists and political Islamists" who are contributing to the "theologically-motivated isolation" of Muslim pupils. The report calls into question claims by the IGGiÖ that anti-Western textbooks have been removed from Austrian schools: "In many of their publications the Muslim Brotherhood and Milli Görüs reject the Western way of life as an inferior worldview."
Olgun rejects the criticism levelled against him: "They say that I am too young, that I am the extended arm of the Turkish state. That is not true. I was born in Austria. I grew up here and am an Austrian citizen. I am not a Turkish civil servant."
Olgun's supporters say it is time for a "generational change" at the IGGiÖ because Austria's Muslim community is young and growing fast. The Muslim population in Austria now exceeds 500,000 (or roughly 6% of the total population), up from an estimated 150,000 (or 2%) in 1990. The Muslim population is expected to reach 800,000 (or 9.5%) by 2030, according to recent estimates.
Muslim students now outnumber Roman Catholic students at middle and secondary schools in Vienna, according to official statistics, which show that Muslim students are also on the verge of overtaking Catholics in Viennese elementary schools. The data confirms a massive demographic and religious shift in Austria, traditionally a Roman Catholic country.
Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute. He is also Senior Fellow for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter. His first book, Global Fire, will be out in 2016.
Sybaritic West Surrenders to Islamists
- The West should be proud of what the Islamists call "decadence." For the West, "decadence" is synonymous with freedom. The problem is that we, postmodern Westerners, have sacrificed the very values that ensure our survival, and have exchanged them for "decadence."
- The problem is that the West does not desire life. The West is ready to surrender its love of life to those who want to take it away from them.
- "Islam manifests what Nietzsche called 'great health': there are young soldiers ready to die for it. What are the values of our civilization? Supermarket and e-commerce, trivial consumerism and egotistical narcissism, vulgar hedonism or scooters for adults?" — Michel Onfray, French philosopher,
- In the Netherlands, the minister of education decided to impose the teaching of LGBT courses in migrant centers. Germany has published guidelines, leaflets and cartoons to communicate to immigrants the new sexual norms to follow. Is that all we have to offer to these people?
Omar Mateen did not choose the Pulse gay nightclub because it had few security guards or because it was an easy target. He could have targeted a supermarket or a school. No, Mateen chose Pulse because it is a nightclub, where he slaughtered 49 "infidels" and wounded 53 more.
Before murdering 2,977 people, the leader of the 9/11 terrorists, Mohammed Atta, along with four of the other hijackers, made several trips to Las Vegas during the summer before the attack, where they were entertained by dancers in nightclubs.
Fifteen years later, there was another country, another jihadist cell, another nightclub. Salah Abdeslam was dancing in a nightclub in Brussels with his brother, Brahim, and flirting with a blonde woman. A few months later, Brahim blew himself up in Paris at a concert in the Bataclan Theater. Nightclubs haunt the Islamist imagination with their mix of alcohol, sexual promiscuity, drugs and music. ISIS labelled Paris "the capital of prostitution and obscenity."
The London nightclub Tiger Tiger, located between Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square, was the target of a terror plot in 2007. Last February, the French intelligence service foiled a plot to attack swingers' clubs in Paris. Places such as Les Chandelles, which boasts a "fascinating journey into the heart of sensuality," or the Overside, which offers 250 square meters "dedicated to pleasure."
The most spectacular and bloody of these attacks at nightclubs took place in Bali, Indonesia, in 2002: 190 victims, mostly Western tourists, Australian surfers and girls in bikinis.
In 2008, Islamists attacked the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan, which they used to call "the den of Western decadence." Like the nightclubs, the hotels are ideological targets, places where men and women freely mix and guests can consume alcohol and enjoy music.
In July 2005, at least 88 people were killed by terrorists storming Sharm el Sheikh, the tiny Egyptian seaside village transformed by Hosni Mubarak into a global attraction for foreign tourism. In 2015, ISIS butchered British tourists on a beach in Sousse, Tunisia.
"We desire death more than you desire life," these Islamist terrorists have been telling us for the last twenty years. It seems they want to achieve a catharsis by spilling blood in our comfortable promiscuity, in the dark of a nightclub.
Senior Hamas official Fathi Hamad, addressing Israel, has said the same thing. Major Nidal Malik Hasan wrote, "We love death more than you love life" before murdering 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas. "We are going to win, because they love life and we love death," said Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, along with Osama bin Laden and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The West, however, should be proud of what the Islamists call "decadence." For the West, "decadence" is synonymous with freedom. The problem is that we postmodern Westerners have sacrificed the very values that ensure our survival and exchanged them for "decadence" -- pleasure. That is why Pim Fortuyn, the openly gay sociology professor and politician murdered in 2002, scorned Islam as a "backward culture" (an animal rights activist killed Fortuyn "to protect Muslims"). Fortuyn fought on behalf of what Islamists would consider "decadence," and he regarded permissiveness as the great glory of Western civilization.
The problem is that the West does not desire life. It seems tired of it. You can see that from the post-Orlando reactions which cannot even mention the word "Islam." The West is ready to surrender its love of life to those who want to take it away from them. To quote the French atheist philosopher, Michel Onfray:
In a fever of moralistic prudery, Italy recently veiled naked art at the Capitoline Museums in Rome during the visit of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. But we obligate other Muslims who arrive in Europe to see far more explicit naked images.
From Norway to Denmark, the Scandinavian nations have adopted compulsory sex education for migrants. In the Netherlands, the minister of education decided to impose the teaching of LGBT courses in migrant centers. Germany has published guidelines, leaflets and cartoons to communicate to immigrants the new sexual norms to follow. Is that all we have to offer to these people?
"The morally illiterate leaflets European local authorities are distributing to migrants reflect the problems that official EU culture has in the realm of values," wrote sociologist Frank Furedi. Europe already tried to integrate Muslims by offering them wantonness and libertinism. And it failed. Asked what drove them to convert to Islam, many Europeans talked of feeling their lives had been lost and lacking in purpose, citing "lack of morality and sexual permissiveness".
The "clash of civilizations" has turned into a war between those who cry, "We will not give up our lifestyle" and those who sing, "We desire death more than you desire life." It is a war between a decadent apathy with moral inertia and Islamist theological turmoil. The Caliphate is much stronger than our disarmed and self-righteous decadence.
ISIS's black banner, crying "No God but Allah" -- the banner of the people who kill cartoonists in Paris and gays in Orlando -- is marching over the ruins of our addiction to pleasure.
Before murdering 2,977 people, the leader of the 9/11 terrorists, Mohammed Atta, along with four of the other hijackers, made several trips to Las Vegas during the summer before the attack, where they were entertained by dancers in nightclubs.
Fifteen years later, there was another country, another jihadist cell, another nightclub. Salah Abdeslam was dancing in a nightclub in Brussels with his brother, Brahim, and flirting with a blonde woman. A few months later, Brahim blew himself up in Paris at a concert in the Bataclan Theater. Nightclubs haunt the Islamist imagination with their mix of alcohol, sexual promiscuity, drugs and music. ISIS labelled Paris "the capital of prostitution and obscenity."
The London nightclub Tiger Tiger, located between Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square, was the target of a terror plot in 2007. Last February, the French intelligence service foiled a plot to attack swingers' clubs in Paris. Places such as Les Chandelles, which boasts a "fascinating journey into the heart of sensuality," or the Overside, which offers 250 square meters "dedicated to pleasure."
The most spectacular and bloody of these attacks at nightclubs took place in Bali, Indonesia, in 2002: 190 victims, mostly Western tourists, Australian surfers and girls in bikinis.
In 2008, Islamists attacked the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan, which they used to call "the den of Western decadence." Like the nightclubs, the hotels are ideological targets, places where men and women freely mix and guests can consume alcohol and enjoy music.
In July 2005, at least 88 people were killed by terrorists storming Sharm el Sheikh, the tiny Egyptian seaside village transformed by Hosni Mubarak into a global attraction for foreign tourism. In 2015, ISIS butchered British tourists on a beach in Sousse, Tunisia.
"We desire death more than you desire life," these Islamist terrorists have been telling us for the last twenty years. It seems they want to achieve a catharsis by spilling blood in our comfortable promiscuity, in the dark of a nightclub.
Mohammed Atta (left) leader of the 9/11 terrorists, along with four of the other hijackers, were entertained by dancers in Las Vegas nightclubs several times during the summer of 2001. Omar Mateen (right) deliberately chose to attack the Pulse gay nightclub, where he slaughtered 49 "infidels." Many Islamist terrorist attacks around the world have seemingly aimed to achieve a catharsis, by spilling blood in our comfortable promiscuity, in the dark of a nightclub.
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Senior Hamas official Fathi Hamad, addressing Israel, has said the same thing. Major Nidal Malik Hasan wrote, "We love death more than you love life" before murdering 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas. "We are going to win, because they love life and we love death," said Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, along with Osama bin Laden and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The West, however, should be proud of what the Islamists call "decadence." For the West, "decadence" is synonymous with freedom. The problem is that we postmodern Westerners have sacrificed the very values that ensure our survival and exchanged them for "decadence" -- pleasure. That is why Pim Fortuyn, the openly gay sociology professor and politician murdered in 2002, scorned Islam as a "backward culture" (an animal rights activist killed Fortuyn "to protect Muslims"). Fortuyn fought on behalf of what Islamists would consider "decadence," and he regarded permissiveness as the great glory of Western civilization.
The problem is that the West does not desire life. It seems tired of it. You can see that from the post-Orlando reactions which cannot even mention the word "Islam." The West is ready to surrender its love of life to those who want to take it away from them. To quote the French atheist philosopher, Michel Onfray:
"Islam manifests what Nietzsche called 'great health': there are young soldiers ready to die for it. What are the values of our civilization? Supermarket and e-commerce, trivial consumerism and egotistical narcissism, vulgar hedonism or scooters for adults?"Pleasure has become sad in the West.
In a fever of moralistic prudery, Italy recently veiled naked art at the Capitoline Museums in Rome during the visit of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. But we obligate other Muslims who arrive in Europe to see far more explicit naked images.
From Norway to Denmark, the Scandinavian nations have adopted compulsory sex education for migrants. In the Netherlands, the minister of education decided to impose the teaching of LGBT courses in migrant centers. Germany has published guidelines, leaflets and cartoons to communicate to immigrants the new sexual norms to follow. Is that all we have to offer to these people?
"The morally illiterate leaflets European local authorities are distributing to migrants reflect the problems that official EU culture has in the realm of values," wrote sociologist Frank Furedi. Europe already tried to integrate Muslims by offering them wantonness and libertinism. And it failed. Asked what drove them to convert to Islam, many Europeans talked of feeling their lives had been lost and lacking in purpose, citing "lack of morality and sexual permissiveness".
The "clash of civilizations" has turned into a war between those who cry, "We will not give up our lifestyle" and those who sing, "We desire death more than you desire life." It is a war between a decadent apathy with moral inertia and Islamist theological turmoil. The Caliphate is much stronger than our disarmed and self-righteous decadence.
ISIS's black banner, crying "No God but Allah" -- the banner of the people who kill cartoonists in Paris and gays in Orlando -- is marching over the ruins of our addiction to pleasure.
Biafra: Where is the International Community?
- A new generation of Biafrans is now peacefully advocating for an independent Biafra. Muhammadu Buhari, the Muslim president of Nigeria, is fighting the nascent independence movement with military force.
- "I saw one boy trying to answer a question. He immediately raised his hands, but the soldiers opened fire ..." — Witness to the shootings, to Amnesty International.
- As for IPOB's leader, Nnamdi Kanu, director of London-based Radio Biafra, he was arrested in October 2015 and has been held since, illegally, despite meeting bail conditions.
- It is noteworthy that a peaceful situation, such as that of the pro-Biafra movement, apparently requires a "military option", whereas a lethal terrorist group, such as the Muslim Fulani herdsmen, who murder innocent civilians, does not. This tactic furthermore brings into question whether Buhari's efforts at curbing Boko Haram in the country are genuine or merely a play he puts on half-heartedly for the benefit of the international community.
On paper, the plight of Biafrans -- whose state in what is today southeastern Nigeria, lasted for only three years, 1967-70, before the Nigerian authorities ended it with a genocide against them -- should, for the international community, be an open-and-shut case.
Journalists, human rights activists, social justice warriors on campuses throughout the West, and organizations such as the United Nations and the European Union, all ostensibly claim to care deeply about human rights, especially for people whom the Europeans once colonized.
Biafra constitutes a textbook example of British colonization. The country's brief existence was cut short by the Nigerian government's genocide, which crushed all hopes for independence and self-determination. Biafrans, today, are denied their fundamental rights of assembly and free expression -- rights that are guaranteed by the Nigerian constitution. The Nigerian government continues murderously to oppress them and their movement for sovereign freedom.
The international community, headed by the UN, which preaches the gospel of human rights and self-determination, persistently ignores their national aspirations.
The territories that constitute present-day Nigeria came under colonial occupation as British protectorates around 1903. Nigeria is essentially an artificial construct, created as a colony by Great Britain in 1914, when it merged the protectorates. The country is made up of a number of different indigenous African peoples, among them the Biafrans, who are ethnically predominantly Igbo.
After Nigeria's independence from Great Britain in 1960, Biafra seceded from Nigeria, and in 1967 declared its own state. The Nigerian government refused to accept the secession and responded by launching a war on Biafra. The assault included a blockade of the nascent state, and resulted in the murder of more than two million Biafrans, many of whom were children who starved to death because of the blockade.
The Biafrans, watching the dissolution of their young state, surrendered to Nigeria in January 1970. They realized, perhaps, that the world's abandonment of them did not warrant any future for their cause.
Unlike others at that time, such as the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), Biafrans did not engage in hijacking and bombing airplanes, taking hostages and other forms of terrorist attacks against innocent civilians to further their cause. The international community responds obediently to terrorism. Whereas the PLO has now become the Palestinian Authority (PA) and is among the world's largest per capita recipients of international foreign aid, with a plethora of "human rights activists" championing its cause (as well as a UN body, UNRWA, exclusively for Palestinians), it would be hard to find a diplomat at the UN who even knows how to pronounce "Biafra".
The question inevitably comes to mind, why the ostensibly anti-racist, pro-self-determination international community of opinion makers and human rights advocates has neither the political goodwill, nor the treasure to spare for the Biafrans.
Although the genocide effectively ended Biafran independence, a new generation of Biafrans is now peacefully pressing for an independent Biafra again. In an example of extreme hypocrisy, Muhammadu Buhari, the Muslim president of Nigeria, has declared himself fully committed to a Palestinian state, while his military fights the Biafran movement for self-determination with brutal force.
On May 30, Biafrans commemorated Biafra Heroes Remembrance Day. According to Amnesty International, the only major human rights organization that has interested itself in Biafra,
Also, according to Amnesty, some of the dead and injured IPOB supporters were shot in the back, an indication that they were fleeing the scene when they were shot. In addition, soldiers stormed St. Edmunds Catholic church, where hundreds of people, who had come from other parts to participate in the pro-Biafran commemoration events, were sleeping. According to one witness:
According to Amnesty,
Thus far, Amnesty says , its research shows that,
By contrast, while President Buhari uses military force against the peaceful Biafran movement, including at events as innocuous as Biafran commemoration ceremonies, his government has stated that it will not use military force against Fulani herdsmen. The latter comprise a predominantly Muslim, semi-nomadic group, now deemed to be the fourth-deadliest terror group in the world according to the Global Terrorism Index (GTI). Between 2010 and 2013, they killed 80 people in Nigeria, but by the end of 2014, this figure had risen to at least 1,229 people, according to the GTI, which ranked the African nation as the world's third most terrorized country.
According to Buhari's Minister of Interior, Gen. Abdulrahman Dambazau, however,
The situation should at least give countries such as Germany serious reason to reconsider their involvement in the region. Germany has said that it will begin supplying military hardware to the Nigerian government to address "security challenges in its North East and Niger Delta regions" before the end of 2016. One has to wonder whether Germany, a country that has invited migrants into its country in order to show how tolerant it is, has considered that it risks supplying the Nigerian government with military hardware that could well be used to kill Biafrans.
Other countries in the process of selling, or planning to sell, weapons to Nigeria, include the United States, which refused -- bizarrely, out of "human rights concerns" -- to provide the former Nigerian president, Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, with weapons to fight Boko Haram, but apparently has no qualms about helping Buhari, a Muslim, whose murder of defenseless people in southeastern Nigeria is evidently considered unproblematic
Journalists, human rights activists, social justice warriors on campuses throughout the West, and organizations such as the United Nations and the European Union, all ostensibly claim to care deeply about human rights, especially for people whom the Europeans once colonized.
Biafra constitutes a textbook example of British colonization. The country's brief existence was cut short by the Nigerian government's genocide, which crushed all hopes for independence and self-determination. Biafrans, today, are denied their fundamental rights of assembly and free expression -- rights that are guaranteed by the Nigerian constitution. The Nigerian government continues murderously to oppress them and their movement for sovereign freedom.
The international community, headed by the UN, which preaches the gospel of human rights and self-determination, persistently ignores their national aspirations.
The territories that constitute present-day Nigeria came under colonial occupation as British protectorates around 1903. Nigeria is essentially an artificial construct, created as a colony by Great Britain in 1914, when it merged the protectorates. The country is made up of a number of different indigenous African peoples, among them the Biafrans, who are ethnically predominantly Igbo.
After Nigeria's independence from Great Britain in 1960, Biafra seceded from Nigeria, and in 1967 declared its own state. The Nigerian government refused to accept the secession and responded by launching a war on Biafra. The assault included a blockade of the nascent state, and resulted in the murder of more than two million Biafrans, many of whom were children who starved to death because of the blockade.
The Biafrans, watching the dissolution of their young state, surrendered to Nigeria in January 1970. They realized, perhaps, that the world's abandonment of them did not warrant any future for their cause.
Unlike others at that time, such as the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), Biafrans did not engage in hijacking and bombing airplanes, taking hostages and other forms of terrorist attacks against innocent civilians to further their cause. The international community responds obediently to terrorism. Whereas the PLO has now become the Palestinian Authority (PA) and is among the world's largest per capita recipients of international foreign aid, with a plethora of "human rights activists" championing its cause (as well as a UN body, UNRWA, exclusively for Palestinians), it would be hard to find a diplomat at the UN who even knows how to pronounce "Biafra".
The question inevitably comes to mind, why the ostensibly anti-racist, pro-self-determination international community of opinion makers and human rights advocates has neither the political goodwill, nor the treasure to spare for the Biafrans.
Although the genocide effectively ended Biafran independence, a new generation of Biafrans is now peacefully pressing for an independent Biafra again. In an example of extreme hypocrisy, Muhammadu Buhari, the Muslim president of Nigeria, has declared himself fully committed to a Palestinian state, while his military fights the Biafran movement for self-determination with brutal force.
On May 30, Biafrans commemorated Biafra Heroes Remembrance Day. According to Amnesty International, the only major human rights organization that has interested itself in Biafra,
"An on-the-ground investigation... has confirmed that the Nigerian army gunned down unarmed people ahead of last month's planned pro-Biafran commemoration events in Onitsha, Anambra state."Opening fire on peaceful IPOB supporters and bystanders who clearly posed no threat to anyone is an outrageous use of unnecessary and excessive force and resulted in multiple deaths and injuries. In one incident, one person was shot dead after the authorities burst in on them while they slept," said M.K. Ibrahim, Country Director of Amnesty International Nigeria. He continued, "This is not the first time that IPOB supporters have died at the hands of the military. It is becoming a worrying pattern and this incident and others must be immediately investigated".
"Evidence gathered from eyewitnesses, morgues and hospitals confirms that between 29-30 May 2016, the Nigerian military opened fire on members of the Indigenous people of Biafra (IPOB), supporters and bystanders at three locations in the town."
Also, according to Amnesty, some of the dead and injured IPOB supporters were shot in the back, an indication that they were fleeing the scene when they were shot. In addition, soldiers stormed St. Edmunds Catholic church, where hundreds of people, who had come from other parts to participate in the pro-Biafran commemoration events, were sleeping. According to one witness:
"At about midnight, we heard someone banging the door. We refused to open the door but they forced the door open and started throwing teargas. They also started shooting inside the compound. People were running to escape. I saw one guy shot in the stomach. He fell down but the teargas could not allow people to help him. I did not know what happened to the guy as I escaped and ran away."Another witness told Amnesty that on the morning of May 30, he saw soldiers open fire on a group of around 20 men and boys aged between 15 and 45. He said that five of them were killed. "I saw one boy trying to answer a question. He immediately raised his hands, but the soldiers opened fire...He lay down, lifeless. I saw this myself." The witness described how military officers loaded men with gunshot wounds into one van, and what appeared to be corpses into another. Later that morning, another witness described how police shot a child bystander as a group of young men protested the shootings.
According to Amnesty,
"Following the shootings, the military told media sources that the soldiers only opened fire after being shot at first, but Amnesty International's research has found no evidence to support this. All the people the organization interviewed said that the protesters were not armed; one young man said that he threw stones at the police and military after they shot teargas at the IPOB members. He said the military then fired live ammunition in return. Information gathered by Amnesty International indicates that the deaths of supporters and members of IPOB was the consequence of excessive and unnecessary use of force. International law requires the government to promptly investigate unlawful killings with a view to bringing the perpetrators to justice. Amnesty International is also calling for those IPOB supporters still held in detention without charge to be either immediately charged or released".Amnesty International began research into the violence and killings of IPOB members and supporters in southeast Nigeria in January 2016 and is expected to publish a comprehensive report on the matter in the near future.
Thus far, Amnesty says , its research shows that,
"Since August 2015, there have been at least five similar incidents in Onitsha alone where the police and military shot unarmed IPOB members and supporters. Amnesty has documented cases of alleged unlawful killings by the Nigerian army between August 2015 and May 2016. In August 2015, military officers opened fire on peaceful supporters of IPOB calling for an independent Biafran state. The killings and mass arrests of members and supporters of IPOB by joint military and police operations continued.... On 17 December 2015, for example, the military killed five people when they opened fire on members of the IPOB who were demonstrating in Onitsha in a celebration of a court order for the release of their purported leader, Nnamdi Kanu. In February 2016, the Nigerian military used excessive force to disperse a peaceful gathering in a school compound in Aba. At least nine people were killed and many more injured..."As for IPOB's leader, Nnamdi Kanu, director of London-based Radio Biafra, he was arrested in October 2015 and has since been held, illegally, despite meeting bail conditions.
Supporters of "Indigenous People of Biafra" (IPOB) protest in London against the Nigerian military's killings of civilians in Biafra, and call for the release of IPOB's leader, Nnamdi Kanu, November 13, 2015. (Image source: David Holt/Flickr)
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By contrast, while President Buhari uses military force against the peaceful Biafran movement, including at events as innocuous as Biafran commemoration ceremonies, his government has stated that it will not use military force against Fulani herdsmen. The latter comprise a predominantly Muslim, semi-nomadic group, now deemed to be the fourth-deadliest terror group in the world according to the Global Terrorism Index (GTI). Between 2010 and 2013, they killed 80 people in Nigeria, but by the end of 2014, this figure had risen to at least 1,229 people, according to the GTI, which ranked the African nation as the world's third most terrorized country.
According to Buhari's Minister of Interior, Gen. Abdulrahman Dambazau, however,
"This is a non-military issue that borders on law and order. It is not every security issue that you call in the military. It is the responsibility of the police to maintain peace. I believe that if we put the police in proper position in terms of discharging its functions, then there would be no need for military option. The police are equal to the task.... In any case, I do not even have the power to deploy the military for anything. It is only when the situation gets out of hand that you invite the military."It is noteworthy that a peaceful situation, such as that of the pro-Biafra movement, apparently requires a "military option", whereas a lethal terrorist group, such as the Muslim Fulani herdsmen, who murder innocent civilians, does not. This tactic furthermore brings into question, whether Buhari's efforts at curbing Boko Haram in the country are genuine or merely a play the Nigerian president puts on half-heartedly for the benefit of the international community.
The situation should at least give countries such as Germany serious reason to reconsider their involvement in the region. Germany has said that it will begin supplying military hardware to the Nigerian government to address "security challenges in its North East and Niger Delta regions" before the end of 2016. One has to wonder whether Germany, a country that has invited migrants into its country in order to show how tolerant it is, has considered that it risks supplying the Nigerian government with military hardware that could well be used to kill Biafrans.
Other countries in the process of selling, or planning to sell, weapons to Nigeria, include the United States, which refused -- bizarrely, out of "human rights concerns" -- to provide the former Nigerian president, Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, with weapons to fight Boko Haram, but apparently has no qualms about helping Buhari, a Muslim, whose murder of defenseless people in southeastern Nigeria is evidently considered unproblematic
The United States Of Europe: Germany And France Hatch A Plan To Create An EU Superstate
If you believe that the Brexit vote is going to kill the idea of a “United States of Europe”, you might want to think again. In fact, it appears that the decision by the British people to leave the European Union is only going to accelerate the process of creating an EU superstate. As you will see below, one of the largest newspapers in the UK is reporting that the foreign ministers of France and Germany have drafted “a blueprint to effectively do away with individual member states”. So even though men like George Soros are warning that the eventual dissolution of the European Union is “practically irreversible” after the Brexit vote, the truth is that the globalists are not about to give up so easily.For a very long time, advocates of increased European integration have dreamed of going all the way and creating a true “United States of Europe”, but Britain was always one of the stumbling blocks that stood in the way.
But now that Britain is out and there is great fear that the entire European project may be in jeopardy, there seems to be a rush to go for broke and try to complete the job of European integration. The Express is one of the biggest news organizations in the UK, and they are reporting that the foreign ministers of France and Germany already have a blueprint “to effectively do away with individual member states”…
The foreign ministers of France and Germany are due to reveal a blueprint to effectively do away with individual member states in what is being described as an “ultimatum”.When I read that earlier today I was absolutely stunned.
Under the radical proposals EU countries will lose the right to have their own army, criminal law, taxation system or central bank, with all those powers being transferred to Brussels.
Controversially member states would also lose what few controls they have left over their own borders, including the procedure for admitting and relocating refugees.
Did they come up with this blueprint before the Brexit vote or after?
And do they plan to allow the citizens of individual nations to vote on any of this?
It is being reported that the following paragraph comes from the preamble to the document…
“Our countries share a common destiny and a common set of values that give rise to an even closer union between our citizens. We will therefore strive for a political union in Europe and invite the next Europeans to participate in this venture.”Of course it would have been totally unrealistic to expect backers of European integration to go down without a fight. After all, what did we expect them to do – throw up their hands and admit that the British people are right and that the European Union is a failure?
No, that was never going to happen.
As I mentioned in the other article that I published today, the elite are going to make the British people pay for what they have done. The British pound has already been smashed, British stocks are getting pounded, and the UK economy is going to suffer greatly. In addition, the British people are being inundated by mainstream news stories telling them what a horrible mistake they made.
And as the crisis in Europe gets progressively worse, the “solution” that will be heralded by mainstream news organizations will be increased European integration. In fact, this is something that CNN is already promoting…
The elite are desperate to rescue a European project that is considered to be “dying” in the eyes of many. For example, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman just compared what is happening in Europe right now to the collapse of the Soviet Union…
The upheaval in the U.K. after its Brexit referendum in favor of leaving the European Union has similarities to the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, according to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman.So those that are in favor of European integration are in full damage control mode at this point. Just today, there was a report in the Daily Mail about how German Chancellor Angela Merkel is telling people that it is vital to keep any other members of the European Union from leaving…
While it’s “unreasonable to draw direct parallels,” it’s obvious that the U.K. is going through a “turbulent, confusing and unpredictable period,” Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call Monday. Russia “has gone through the collapse of the Soviet Union and many generations clearly remember the period of the Soviet collapse, that period of uncertainty.”
Mrs Merkel said the EU needs to stop other countries following Britain out of the door amid market fears that the bloc is ‘no longer governable’ after Brexit.The elitists that run the EU don’t really care about the will of the people, and they will work very hard to prevent more referendums from being held. In an age of “democracy”, the EU is one of the most undemocratic political institutions in the entire western world. I know, because I studied EU law when I was in law school.
The German Chancellor told her conservative party board in a conference call that it was necessary to prevent other European Union members going down the same path as Britain.
Merkel is also said to have revealed that international financial markets are concerned the EU is ‘no longer governable’ in the wake of Britain’s exit vote.
If you have any doubt about this, just check out this recent quote from European Parliament President Martin Schultz…
“The British have violated the rules. It is not the EU philosophy that the crowd can decide its fate“.Say what?
In the short-term, it is entirely possible that we could see more nations leave the EU. I would watch Greece in particular.
But in the long-term, we will see a major push for more European integration. Germany and France will be at the core of this movement, and other European nations will join them.
The British people may not participate any time soon, but the dream of a United States of Europe is far from dead.
And if the advocates of increased European integration have their way, we will be seeing their dream become a reality sooner rather than later.
On this day in 1776, the Continental Congress adopts our Declaration of Independence! It had already resolved on July 2 that “these United Colonies are, and, of right, ought to be, Free and Independent States . . . .” Now it formally adopted a written document, too.
It took nearly a month to write the Declaration! You may know that Thomas Jefferson was the primary author, but he had help, too.
What is the rest of the story?
On June 11, Congress nominated a “Committee of Five” to draft a declaration. This committee did not leave a written record of its deliberations. Instead, the accounts we have were written many years later, when memories had faded. Many of them were conflicting. We may never know exactly how our Declaration was drafted, but we can get a general idea of the series of events.
The Committee apparently started by holding several meetings in which it created a high-level outline of what the document should say. Then, according to John Adams’s later recollection, the Committee of Five appointed a subcommittee of Adams and Jefferson. Adams declined to draft the document. Jefferson remembered it a bit differently! He remembered being appointed, directly, by the Committee. (See July 2 history post.)
Diary entries and such partially support both men’s recollections . . . . and partially contradict both men’s recollections!
Jefferson later described the goals that he had in mind as he sat down to write. He was not trying to “find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of.” Instead, he wanted to “place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independant stand we are compelled to take.” He wanted it to be an “expression of the American mind.”
Again according to Adams, he and Jefferson met to discuss the first draft of the document. Adams later described himself as “delighted with its high tone and the flights of oratory with which it abounded.” This initial draft contained a “vehement philippic against negro slavery,” which also pleased Adams, although it was later struck. Jefferson’s draft was presented to the entire Committee of Five at some point. Some alterations were suggested. A draft was presented to Congress on June 28.
Congress made changes—naturally! Adams felt that “they obliterated some of the best of it.” Jefferson was also unhappy. He sent a copy of the original to Richard Henry Lee, who concurred that Congress had “mangled” the manuscript. However, Lee added cheerfully, “the Thing is in its nature so good, that no Cookery can spoil the Dish for the palates of Freemen.”
Once approved, news of the Declaration spread far and wide. George Washington had it read to his troops. It was published in newspapers, read before towns, and forwarded to Europe. Mere days later, it was read aloud in Philadelphia, as the city’s bells tolled to mark the event.
What must it have been like to stand in front of the Pennsylvania State House on that day in 1776, hearing the closing lines of our Declaration?
“We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America . . . solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; . . . . And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”
Happy Independence Day, everyone!
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If you enjoy these history posts, please know that it is important to LIKE, SHARE & COMMENT. This site’s algorithm will weed these posts out of your newsfeed if you do not interact with them. (I don’t make the rules! Just following them.)
Gentle reminder: History posts are copyright © 2013-2016 by Tara Ross. I appreciate it when you use the Facebook “share” feature instead of cutting/pasting.
It took nearly a month to write the Declaration! You may know that Thomas Jefferson was the primary author, but he had help, too.
What is the rest of the story?
On June 11, Congress nominated a “Committee of Five” to draft a declaration. This committee did not leave a written record of its deliberations. Instead, the accounts we have were written many years later, when memories had faded. Many of them were conflicting. We may never know exactly how our Declaration was drafted, but we can get a general idea of the series of events.
The Committee apparently started by holding several meetings in which it created a high-level outline of what the document should say. Then, according to John Adams’s later recollection, the Committee of Five appointed a subcommittee of Adams and Jefferson. Adams declined to draft the document. Jefferson remembered it a bit differently! He remembered being appointed, directly, by the Committee. (See July 2 history post.)
Diary entries and such partially support both men’s recollections . . . . and partially contradict both men’s recollections!
Jefferson later described the goals that he had in mind as he sat down to write. He was not trying to “find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of.” Instead, he wanted to “place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independant stand we are compelled to take.” He wanted it to be an “expression of the American mind.”
Again according to Adams, he and Jefferson met to discuss the first draft of the document. Adams later described himself as “delighted with its high tone and the flights of oratory with which it abounded.” This initial draft contained a “vehement philippic against negro slavery,” which also pleased Adams, although it was later struck. Jefferson’s draft was presented to the entire Committee of Five at some point. Some alterations were suggested. A draft was presented to Congress on June 28.
Congress made changes—naturally! Adams felt that “they obliterated some of the best of it.” Jefferson was also unhappy. He sent a copy of the original to Richard Henry Lee, who concurred that Congress had “mangled” the manuscript. However, Lee added cheerfully, “the Thing is in its nature so good, that no Cookery can spoil the Dish for the palates of Freemen.”
Once approved, news of the Declaration spread far and wide. George Washington had it read to his troops. It was published in newspapers, read before towns, and forwarded to Europe. Mere days later, it was read aloud in Philadelphia, as the city’s bells tolled to mark the event.
What must it have been like to stand in front of the Pennsylvania State House on that day in 1776, hearing the closing lines of our Declaration?
“We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America . . . solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; . . . . And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”
Happy Independence Day, everyone!
Permalink: http://www.taraross.com/…/this-day-in-history-happy-indepen…
-------------
If you enjoy these history posts, please know that it is important to LIKE, SHARE & COMMENT. This site’s algorithm will weed these posts out of your newsfeed if you do not interact with them. (I don’t make the rules! Just following them.)
Gentle reminder: History posts are copyright © 2013-2016 by Tara Ross. I appreciate it when you use the Facebook “share” feature instead of cutting/pasting.
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