Account: (login)

More Channels


Share |
Are you the publisher? Claim this channel

Search in 110,605,274 RSS articles:

Channel Description:

The latest items valence has commented about on current.com

Latest Articles in this Channel:

  • 07/21/11--20:41: Why 107-degree overnight temperatures should freak you out (chan 1637319)



    • Government conspiracy heat wave or no government conspiracy heat wave, this summer is setting records -- not just record maximum temperatures, but also record minimums. On June 27, Oman recorded the world’s highest ever minimum temperature when the mercury failed to drop below 107.1 degrees F, even overnight. And that’s more important, in a global sense, than the record highs.

    A few things too-often glossed over in discussions of what climate change is doing to temperatures the world over:

    1. In many cases, nighttime minimum temperatures are rising faster than daytime maximums, narrowing the gap between average daytime and nighttime temperatures even as both rise. And here's an excellent map-based representation of what this is doing to the U.S.

    2. It's nighttime temperatures, not daytime highs, that kill people.

    The biggest concern for heat-related illnesses and deaths isn't during the daylight hours when temperatures can penetrate triple-digits, but rather overnight when the mercury doesn't fall below 80 degrees, said Zachary Thompson, Dallas County Health Department Director.
    "Everybody normally focuses on that daytime temperature, but that nighttime temperature brings us to a deadly level that is a concern, because at night, there's no cooling off," he added.
    This is the reason 5,000 people died in Paris in 2003. And the more people use air conditioning, the worse the urban heat island effect that kills people becomes.

    3. Up to a point, higher daytime temperatures actually increase yields of rice, which is the staple food for billions of people. But higher nighttime temperatures decrease those yields. Like people, growing rice needs to cool off overnight.

    Increasing nighttime temperatures are therefore a double threat, to both public health and food security, and they are rising faster than daytime highs. While new maximum temperatures grab the headlines, it's the record-breaking minimums that are more likely to be one of the four horsemen of the coming climate apocalypse.

    http://www.grist.org/list/2011-07-21-nyc-mayor-bloomberg-gives-50-million-to-fig...


  • 07/22/11--07:19: Why 107-degree overnight temperatures should freak you out (chan 1637319)



    • In reply to XOXMSperfect:

    Government conspiracy heat wave or no government conspiracy heat wave, this summer is setting records -- not just record maximum temperatures, but also record minimums. On June 27, Oman recorded the world’s highest ever minimum temperature when the mercury failed to drop below 107.1 degrees F, even overnight. And that’s more important, in a global sense, than the record highs.

    A few things too-often glossed over in discussions of what climate change is doing to temperatures the world over:

    1. In many cases, nighttime minimum temperatures are rising faster than daytime maximums, narrowing the gap between average daytime and nighttime temperatures even as both rise. And here's an excellent map-based representation of what this is doing to the U.S.

    2. It's nighttime temperatures, not daytime highs, that kill people.

    The biggest concern for heat-related illnesses and deaths isn't during the daylight hours when temperatures can penetrate triple-digits, but rather overnight when the mercury doesn't fall below 80 degrees, said Zachary Thompson, Dallas County Health Department Director.
    "Everybody normally focuses on that daytime temperature, but that nighttime temperature brings us to a deadly level that is a concern, because at night, there's no cooling off," he added.
    This is the reason 5,000 people died in Paris in 2003. And the more people use air conditioning, the worse the urban heat island effect that kills people becomes.

    3. Up to a point, higher daytime temperatures actually increase yields of rice, which is the staple food for billions of people. But higher nighttime temperatures decrease those yields. Like people, growing rice needs to cool off overnight.

    Increasing nighttime temperatures are therefore a double threat, to both public health and food security, and they are rising faster than daytime highs. While new maximum temperatures grab the headlines, it's the record-breaking minimums that are more likely to be one of the four horsemen of the coming climate apocalypse.

    http://www.grist.org/list/2011-07-21-nyc-mayor-bloomberg-gives-50-million-to-fig...


  • 07/22/11--21:54: Impeach President Obama (chan 1637319)



    • It's time to impeach President Obama and urge candidates who stand for peace to run in the upcoming presidential primaries.

    President Obama is no Democrat in the traditional meaning of the word. He has not only failed to tackle the nation's unemployment woes and retraining needs, as a real Democrat would do, but he's been a player in the Bankers' Bailout and he's indicated his willingness to compromise Social Security and Medicare, two highly successful, humanitarian systems that are a lifeline to the vast majority of the nation's elderly, sick, and infirm.

    Mr. Obama has also failed to lift his hand effectively in behalf of the struggling poor, particularly our Hispanic, African-American and rural poor. Again, as in the time of Franklin Roosevelt, we see one-third of a nation ill-housed, while true unemployment hovers at Depression Era levels, closer to 20 per cent than 10 per cent and college graduates cannot find jobs.

    Yet worse than anything Obama has done or not done domestically, are the illegal wars he's waging across Asia and Africa, several of which he inherited from the preceding criminal in the Oval Office and to which he might have made a speedy end. Quite on his own, however, he has expanded the war in Pakistan and has initiated new wars in Libya, Sudan, and Yemen. These wars are being pushed despite a building majority opposition of Americans who are telling Congress and the pollsters they want the return of our troops from distant battlefields and bases.

    Read more at Political Fail Blog:

    http://www.politicalfailblog.com/2011/07/impeach-president-obama.html

    • added by: Valence  
    • valence commented on Impeach President Obama 4 months ago

      Doesn't something scream narcissism in the back of peoples heads? It does in my mind. Every time Obama does something or doesn't do something his "Approval Rating" goes down, i didn't see this much butt-hurt when President George Bush was taking a gigantic Shit on the Face of Mrs. Liberty.

      I don't know about anybody else, but i am for one completely fed up with this whole Bandwagon thing of Hating Obama... "Obama's not doing this, Obama's not doing that, Obama promised this and Obama is not doing that." Shut The Front Door and as in front door, i mean that Hole that spouts Shit ever chance it gets about the President of the United States of America.

      Whens the last time any freaking politician has given a 100% Follow through with their campaign remakes?As the President he is doing what he can do, how about many of you A-Hole's go give some of the congressmen and women some of the Hate because guess what, THEY ARE BEHIND THE SCENES! Whatever power the President has is checked by Congress, so President Obama cannot just do shit with his Fucking Magical Elder Wand. Go pick up a Goddamn Social Studies Book, learn about your own Freaking Government.

      Story Voted Down. G.T.F.O.H

    • 63 comments

  • 07/22/11--21:55: CNN Poll: Drop in liberal support pushes Obama approval rating down (chan 1637319)



    • By: CNN Political Unit

    Washington (CNN) – President Barack Obama's approval rating is down to 45 percent, driven in part by growing dissatisfaction on the left with the president's track record in office, according to a new national survey.

    A CNN/ORC International Poll also indicates that the Republican "brand" is taking a beating in the minds of Americans.

    Read full results (pdf).

    The survey's Friday release comes as the Obama administration and top congressional officials continue talks on a potential deal tying roughly $3 trillion in new savings over the next decade to an increase in the nation's debt ceiling. If Congress and the President fail to raise the country's $14.3 trillion limit by August 2, Americans could face rising interest rates, a declining dollar and increasingly jittery financial markets, among other problems.

    According to the poll, the president's 45 percent approval rating is down three points from June. Fifty-four percent of people questioned disapprove of how Obama's handling his duties, up six points from last month. His 54 percent disapproval rating ties the all-time high in CNN polling that the president initially reached just before last year's midterm elections.

    "But drill down into that number and you'll see signs of a stirring discontent on the left," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Thirty-eight percent say they disapprove because President Obama has been too liberal, but 13 percent say they disapprove of Obama because he has not been liberal enough - nearly double what it was in May, when the question was last asked, and the first time that number has hit double digits in Obama's presidency."

    Looking at that figure another way, roughly one in four Americans who disapprove of the president say they feel that way because he's not been liberal enough.

    Obama's approval rating among liberals has dropped to 71 percent, the lowest point in his presidency. And the number of Democrats who want the party to renominate Obama next year, now at 77 percent, is relatively robust by historical standards but is also down a bit since June.

    "It's likely that this is a reaction to some of Obama's recent actions, including his willingness to discuss major changes in Social Security and Medicare as part of the debt ceiling negotiations," adds Holland.

    Some congressional Democrats appeared to be on the verge of open revolt against their own president Thursday night after hearing some of the details in the $3 trillion plan - a package many of them contend does not do nearly enough to ensure wealthier Americans share in the burden of stemming the tide of Washington's red ink.

    Those Democrats are desperately trying to protect some of their party's primary legacies - entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare, programs forged at the height of the New Deal and Great Society.

    On the other side of the negotiating table, the poll indicates that GOP is also not faring all that well. Fifty-five percent say they have an unfavorable view of the Republican party, a seven-point increase since March. The Democratic party's favorable rating is not much better, but it has held steady.

    And only 37 percent say the policies of the Republican leaders in Congress would move the country in the right direction - a nine-point drop since the start of the year, when the GOP took over control of the House of Representatives.

    "Although most Americans say that Obama is not doing enough to cooperate with the GOP, even more say that the Republicans need to cooperate more with the president," says Holland.

    The poll was conducted for CNN by ORC International on July 18-20, with 1,009 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

    – CNN Deputy Political Director Paul Steinhauser contributed to this story.

    http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/22/cnn-poll-drop-in-liberal-support...

    "D'Oh!!!" "WhodaThunk???"

    • added by: Valence  
    • valence commented on CNN Poll: Drop in liberal support pushes Obama approval rating down 4 months ago

      Doesn't something scream narcissism in the back of peoples heads? It does in my mind. Every time Obama does something or doesn't do something his "Approval Rating" goes down, i didn't see this much butt-hurt when President George Bush was taking a gigantic Shit on the Face of Mrs. Liberty.

      I don't know about anybody else, but i am for one completely fed up with this whole Bandwagon thing of Hating Obama... "Obama's not doing this, Obama's not doing that, Obama promised this and Obama is not doing that." Shut The Front Door and as in front door, i mean that Hole that spouts Shit ever chance it gets about the President of the United States of America.

      Whens the last time any freaking politician has given a 100% Follow through with their campaign remakes?As the President he is doing what he can do, how about many of you A-Hole's go give some of the congressmen and women some of the Hate because guess what, THEY ARE BEHIND THE SCENES! Whatever power the President has is checked by Congress, so President Obama cannot just do shit with his Fucking Magical Elder Wand. Go pick up a Goddamn Social Studies Book, learn about your own Freaking Government.

      To think i actually liked CNN, with them pushing this B.S.

    • 201 comments

  • 07/22/11--22:00: CNN Poll: Drop in liberal support pushes Obama approval rating down (chan 1637319)



    • In reply to timelord999:

    By: CNN Political Unit

    Washington (CNN) – President Barack Obama's approval rating is down to 45 percent, driven in part by growing dissatisfaction on the left with the president's track record in office, according to a new national survey.

    A CNN/ORC International Poll also indicates that the Republican "brand" is taking a beating in the minds of Americans.

    Read full results (pdf).

    The survey's Friday release comes as the Obama administration and top congressional officials continue talks on a potential deal tying roughly $3 trillion in new savings over the next decade to an increase in the nation's debt ceiling. If Congress and the President fail to raise the country's $14.3 trillion limit by August 2, Americans could face rising interest rates, a declining dollar and increasingly jittery financial markets, among other problems.

    According to the poll, the president's 45 percent approval rating is down three points from June. Fifty-four percent of people questioned disapprove of how Obama's handling his duties, up six points from last month. His 54 percent disapproval rating ties the all-time high in CNN polling that the president initially reached just before last year's midterm elections.

    "But drill down into that number and you'll see signs of a stirring discontent on the left," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Thirty-eight percent say they disapprove because President Obama has been too liberal, but 13 percent say they disapprove of Obama because he has not been liberal enough - nearly double what it was in May, when the question was last asked, and the first time that number has hit double digits in Obama's presidency."

    Looking at that figure another way, roughly one in four Americans who disapprove of the president say they feel that way because he's not been liberal enough.

    Obama's approval rating among liberals has dropped to 71 percent, the lowest point in his presidency. And the number of Democrats who want the party to renominate Obama next year, now at 77 percent, is relatively robust by historical standards but is also down a bit since June.

    "It's likely that this is a reaction to some of Obama's recent actions, including his willingness to discuss major changes in Social Security and Medicare as part of the debt ceiling negotiations," adds Holland.

    Some congressional Democrats appeared to be on the verge of open revolt against their own president Thursday night after hearing some of the details in the $3 trillion plan - a package many of them contend does not do nearly enough to ensure wealthier Americans share in the burden of stemming the tide of Washington's red ink.

    Those Democrats are desperately trying to protect some of their party's primary legacies - entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare, programs forged at the height of the New Deal and Great Society.

    On the other side of the negotiating table, the poll indicates that GOP is also not faring all that well. Fifty-five percent say they have an unfavorable view of the Republican party, a seven-point increase since March. The Democratic party's favorable rating is not much better, but it has held steady.

    And only 37 percent say the policies of the Republican leaders in Congress would move the country in the right direction - a nine-point drop since the start of the year, when the GOP took over control of the House of Representatives.

    "Although most Americans say that Obama is not doing enough to cooperate with the GOP, even more say that the Republicans need to cooperate more with the president," says Holland.

    The poll was conducted for CNN by ORC International on July 18-20, with 1,009 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

    – CNN Deputy Political Director Paul Steinhauser contributed to this story.

    http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/22/cnn-poll-drop-in-liberal-support...

    "D'Oh!!!" "WhodaThunk???"


  • 07/22/11--22:02: Why 107-degree overnight temperatures should freak you out (chan 1637319)



    • In reply to Buddha2112:

    Government conspiracy heat wave or no government conspiracy heat wave, this summer is setting records -- not just record maximum temperatures, but also record minimums. On June 27, Oman recorded the world’s highest ever minimum temperature when the mercury failed to drop below 107.1 degrees F, even overnight. And that’s more important, in a global sense, than the record highs.

    A few things too-often glossed over in discussions of what climate change is doing to temperatures the world over:

    1. In many cases, nighttime minimum temperatures are rising faster than daytime maximums, narrowing the gap between average daytime and nighttime temperatures even as both rise. And here's an excellent map-based representation of what this is doing to the U.S.

    2. It's nighttime temperatures, not daytime highs, that kill people.

    The biggest concern for heat-related illnesses and deaths isn't during the daylight hours when temperatures can penetrate triple-digits, but rather overnight when the mercury doesn't fall below 80 degrees, said Zachary Thompson, Dallas County Health Department Director.
    "Everybody normally focuses on that daytime temperature, but that nighttime temperature brings us to a deadly level that is a concern, because at night, there's no cooling off," he added.
    This is the reason 5,000 people died in Paris in 2003. And the more people use air conditioning, the worse the urban heat island effect that kills people becomes.

    3. Up to a point, higher daytime temperatures actually increase yields of rice, which is the staple food for billions of people. But higher nighttime temperatures decrease those yields. Like people, growing rice needs to cool off overnight.

    Increasing nighttime temperatures are therefore a double threat, to both public health and food security, and they are rising faster than daytime highs. While new maximum temperatures grab the headlines, it's the record-breaking minimums that are more likely to be one of the four horsemen of the coming climate apocalypse.

    http://www.grist.org/list/2011-07-21-nyc-mayor-bloomberg-gives-50-million-to-fig...


  • 07/22/11--22:06: Impeach President Obama (chan 1637319)



    • In reply to Pfailblog:

    It's time to impeach President Obama and urge candidates who stand for peace to run in the upcoming presidential primaries.

    President Obama is no Democrat in the traditional meaning of the word. He has not only failed to tackle the nation's unemployment woes and retraining needs, as a real Democrat would do, but he's been a player in the Bankers' Bailout and he's indicated his willingness to compromise Social Security and Medicare, two highly successful, humanitarian systems that are a lifeline to the vast majority of the nation's elderly, sick, and infirm.

    Mr. Obama has also failed to lift his hand effectively in behalf of the struggling poor, particularly our Hispanic, African-American and rural poor. Again, as in the time of Franklin Roosevelt, we see one-third of a nation ill-housed, while true unemployment hovers at Depression Era levels, closer to 20 per cent than 10 per cent and college graduates cannot find jobs.

    Yet worse than anything Obama has done or not done domestically, are the illegal wars he's waging across Asia and Africa, several of which he inherited from the preceding criminal in the Oval Office and to which he might have made a speedy end. Quite on his own, however, he has expanded the war in Pakistan and has initiated new wars in Libya, Sudan, and Yemen. These wars are being pushed despite a building majority opposition of Americans who are telling Congress and the pollsters they want the return of our troops from distant battlefields and bases.

    Read more at Political Fail Blog:

    http://www.politicalfailblog.com/2011/07/impeach-president-obama.html


  • 07/22/11--22:35: Twitter rages: Murdoch's Times of London famine cartoon 'most offensive' thing yet? (chan 1637319)



    • If you thought the outrage over the phone-hacking scandal was starting to die down, The Times of London, one of Rupert Murdoch's own papers, may have brought it straight back into the spotlight.

    An editorial cartoon published Thursday morning in the paper with the title "Priorities" shows starving people in Somalia saying "We've had a bellyful of phone-hacking ... " It's causing quite a firestorm on Twitter. You can access the newspaper's site here, but you won't be able to get past the pay wall without a subscription. The paper has not yet returned calls for comment.

    The Guardian's Deputy Editor Katharine Viner (@KathViner) tweeted a link to a photo of the cartoon this morning and asked what people thought of it.

    And boy, did she get a response. From regular citizens in the U.S. and UK, to politicians, media specialists and PR folks, the responses are rolling in at a mile a minute.

    The responses generally fall in one of two directions: utter disgust or the notion that while the cartoon makes a point, having it come from a Murdoch-owned newspaper makes it just straight ridiculous. For some, it's being seen as an attempt to try to get readers to move away from the story and focus on something else.

    The cartoon does come a day after the questioning of British Prime Minister David Cameron, who has also become a part of the phone-hacking story, during which several UK lawmakers argued that perhaps it was time to move on to more pressing issues.

    Emma Gilbey Keller, who is married to New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller and is a contributor to Vanity Fair Daily, had one of the most retweeted responses to the cartoon.

    She tweeted the following: @EMMAGKELLER: "Anyone else wondering if this cartoon from today's London Times is part of the Edelman strategy? http://yfrog.com/kezx9np"

    Keller is referring to the giant public relations firm that is now working with Murdoch and his team to try to repair their damaged image after the phone-hacking scandal.

    There's been a lot said in the media and online about how the Murdoch empire has handled the scandal. In a post on media blog Mediaite about the cartoon, writer Alex Alvarez calls it a "tacky, potentially offensive cartoon" and says it probably isn't the right way to divert attention.

    "There are several methods of dealing with a much-publicized scandal, some less advisable than others. Issuing a public apology for mistakes or poor judgment? Pretty much always a good idea. Holding individuals responsible for their roles and dealing with them accordingly? Usually works out pretty well," she writes. "Publishing a tacky, potentially offensive cartoon making light of serious allegations AND life-threatening poverty? Oddly enough, that rarely ever works."

    She does, however, agree that more attention needs to be paid to the crisis in Somalia and elsewhere - and she's got a suggestion for what The Times of London may do to really make a statement about the issue.

    "We agree that eradicating childhood hunger is still a global priority and that outlets diligently, even obsessively, covering the phone hacking scandal were probably not devoting too many headlines to the plight of starving, saucer-eyed children in the first place? Although, hey. Maybe the Times of London can change the tide by donating to charities fighting to end hunger, or devoting an issue to poverty instead of offering up condescending, out of touch editorials that only work to reflect poorly on its already beleaguered employer."

    And there is indeed a major problem in Somalia. The president has issued an urgent appeal for international aid as his drought-stricken country faces a famine that has left half of the population in dire need.

    Anna Holmes, founder of the popular news blog Jezebel.com, which caters to women, acknowledged in response to someone else that she believes there's truth in the cartoon that the famine news has been buried. But she tweeted (@AnnaHolmes) "the media/public can walk and chew gum at the same time. They can talk about hacking *and* famine."

    Ryan Bourne, an economic and statistical researcher at the UK Centre for Policy Studies, tweeted (@RyanCPS) "I know the point The Times are getting at, but I find this cartoon very distasteful."

    Was it an attempt to guilt-trip readers into changing their focus? Political Scrapbook, a political blog, tweeted (@psbook) that the cartoon was an attempt to tell us to "move on," and in an post on its site, it said "the third and most tasteless prong of resistance has come from a graphic in The Times depicting children in Somalia, suggesting that talking about phone hacking has prolonged their starvation. No one is stopping The Times covering both stories."

    Jeff Jarvis, well-known media critic, journalism professor and creator of the BuzzMachine blog, (@jeffjarvis) simply tweeted: "Good God. Murdoch's troops no bounds" in response to Viner's search for feedback on the cartoon.

    Others, like Tim Karr, campaign director of the Free Press, a media reform group, called it "shameless." A lengthy search through the responses finds similar synonyms and sentiments, including that it was "brutal."

    One of the most retweeted comments in response to Emma Gilbey Keller's tweet was from (@TeresaKopec), who said the "Cartoon in Murdoch's London Times may be most offensive thing they've done yet."

    There's no doubt the comments will keep coming, and in a variety of forms, just as the tentacles of the story continue to grow and the implications of the scandal continue to murk the media waters.


  • 07/23/11--07:35: CNN Poll: Drop in liberal support pushes Obama approval rating down (chan 1637319)



    • In reply to timelord999:

    By: CNN Political Unit

    Washington (CNN) – President Barack Obama's approval rating is down to 45 percent, driven in part by growing dissatisfaction on the left with the president's track record in office, according to a new national survey.

    A CNN/ORC International Poll also indicates that the Republican "brand" is taking a beating in the minds of Americans.

    Read full results (pdf).

    The survey's Friday release comes as the Obama administration and top congressional officials continue talks on a potential deal tying roughly $3 trillion in new savings over the next decade to an increase in the nation's debt ceiling. If Congress and the President fail to raise the country's $14.3 trillion limit by August 2, Americans could face rising interest rates, a declining dollar and increasingly jittery financial markets, among other problems.

    According to the poll, the president's 45 percent approval rating is down three points from June. Fifty-four percent of people questioned disapprove of how Obama's handling his duties, up six points from last month. His 54 percent disapproval rating ties the all-time high in CNN polling that the president initially reached just before last year's midterm elections.

    "But drill down into that number and you'll see signs of a stirring discontent on the left," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Thirty-eight percent say they disapprove because President Obama has been too liberal, but 13 percent say they disapprove of Obama because he has not been liberal enough - nearly double what it was in May, when the question was last asked, and the first time that number has hit double digits in Obama's presidency."

    Looking at that figure another way, roughly one in four Americans who disapprove of the president say they feel that way because he's not been liberal enough.

    Obama's approval rating among liberals has dropped to 71 percent, the lowest point in his presidency. And the number of Democrats who want the party to renominate Obama next year, now at 77 percent, is relatively robust by historical standards but is also down a bit since June.

    "It's likely that this is a reaction to some of Obama's recent actions, including his willingness to discuss major changes in Social Security and Medicare as part of the debt ceiling negotiations," adds Holland.

    Some congressional Democrats appeared to be on the verge of open revolt against their own president Thursday night after hearing some of the details in the $3 trillion plan - a package many of them contend does not do nearly enough to ensure wealthier Americans share in the burden of stemming the tide of Washington's red ink.

    Those Democrats are desperately trying to protect some of their party's primary legacies - entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare, programs forged at the height of the New Deal and Great Society.

    On the other side of the negotiating table, the poll indicates that GOP is also not faring all that well. Fifty-five percent say they have an unfavorable view of the Republican party, a seven-point increase since March. The Democratic party's favorable rating is not much better, but it has held steady.

    And only 37 percent say the policies of the Republican leaders in Congress would move the country in the right direction - a nine-point drop since the start of the year, when the GOP took over control of the House of Representatives.

    "Although most Americans say that Obama is not doing enough to cooperate with the GOP, even more say that the Republicans need to cooperate more with the president," says Holland.

    The poll was conducted for CNN by ORC International on July 18-20, with 1,009 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

    – CNN Deputy Political Director Paul Steinhauser contributed to this story.

    http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/22/cnn-poll-drop-in-liberal-support...

    "D'Oh!!!" "WhodaThunk???"


  • 07/26/11--08:23: Killings in Norway Spotlight Anti-Muslim Thought in U.S. (chan 1637319)



    • The man accused of the killing spree in Norway was deeply influenced by a small group of American bloggers and writers who have warned for years about the threat from Islam, lacing his 1,500-page manifesto with quotations from them, as well as copying multiple passages from the tract of the Unabomber.

    In the document he posted online, Anders Behring Breivik, who is accused of bombing government buildings and killing scores of young people at a Labor Party camp, showed that he had closely followed the acrimonious American debate over Islam.

    His manifesto, which denounced Norwegian politicians as failing to defend the country from Islamic influence, quoted Robert Spencer, who operates the Jihad Watch Web site, 64 times, and cited other Western writers who shared his view that Muslim immigrants pose a grave danger to Western culture.

    More broadly, the mass killings in Norway, with their echo of the 1995 bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City by an antigovernment militant, have focused new attention around the world on the subculture of anti-Muslim bloggers and right-wing activists and renewed a debate over the focus of counterterrorism efforts.

    In the United States, critics have asserted that the intense spotlight on the threat from Islamic militants has unfairly vilified Muslim Americans while dangerously playing down the threat of attacks from other domestic radicals. The author of a 2009 Department of Homeland Security report on right-wing extremism withdrawn by the department after criticism from conservatives repeated on Sunday his claim that the department had tilted too heavily toward the threat from Islamic militants.

    The revelations about Mr. Breivik’s American influences exploded on the blogs over the weekend, putting Mr. Spencer and other self-described “counterjihad” activists on the defensive, as their critics suggested that their portrayal of Islam as a threat to the West indirectly fostered the crimes in Norway.

    (much more at link)