Precis som väntat gör nu de muslimska personerna som känner sig hånade över en kritstrecksritat hund, flaggbränning och brännande av docka föreställande statsminister Reinfeldt.

Utanför Nerikes Allehanda demonstrerar man och säger: - Väldigt många är upprörda, men vi har uppmanat alla att genomföra en lugn demonstration. Vi lever i det här samhället och kräver samma respekt som vi visar alla andra medborgare i det här landet, förklarar Abdul Rahman.

Japp. Respekten ni får av mig är: tyck vad ni vill, det är er rätt. Men att bränna flaggor och dockor föreställande statsministern är lågt och ointelligent, lite grann "där hjärnan tar slut tar nävarna vid".

Jag är personligen inte direkt förvånad över att det ska brännas flaggor och demonstreras och krävas ursäkter till höger och vänster, det verkar vara det sättet man anser vara det korrekta i sammanhanget. Nu väntar jag bara på attackerna mot ambassaderna med brandbomber och kanske en och annan bomb mot andra liknande länders (vars flaggor ser lite liknande ut) ambassader eller företag. För det är ju egentligen det det handlar om tror jag. Islam har visat sig vara en ganska enkelspårig religion som egentligen inte vill nåt annat än att alla andra måste dö i Allahs namn. Respekt för andra ingår inte i Islam, det finns bara ett rättesnöre att hålla sig efter, och hur vi än vrider och vänder på oss så sitter vi på fel sida om den. Vi ligger ju inte med näsan i mattan flera gånger om dagen, våra kvinnor är fria varelser med egen sexualitet bland annat.

Om man nu tittar noga på dessa människor som står och bränner flaggorna så uppkommer en fråga i mitt huvud. Dessa männsikor verkar inte ens veta vad Sverige är, inte ens att det är ett litet skitland i norra delarna. Kanske är det därför som Svenska flaggan är grön med gult kors.

Dock, härmed måste jag erkänna att jag känner mig oerhört kränkt när man inte ens kan skilja mellan blått och grönt på svenska flaggan och jag undrar nu vad jag ska hitta på för att få utlopp över att min landskänsla har kränkts så oerhört. Ska jag kanske måla en flagga i blått för att likna Pakistans flagga och gå ut och bränna den? Ska jag måla plakat och demonstrera mot flaggbrännande/skändandet genom att bränna en niddocka av Mohammed? Gör det mig mindre kränkt? Nej, naturligtvis inte, det får mig ju bara att framstå som ganska korkad, samt att det hela sjunker till sandlådenivå.

Det har dock fått en reaktion hos mig, och om det var det man var ute efter så var det effektivt. Jag har numera tappat näst intill allt förtroende för Islam och börjar se den med nya ögon som en människofientlig religion, samt att jag kommer att hjälpa till att upprätthålla nya nidbilder och förhåningar av Mohammed, den hunden!

The madness continues:

Two American priests were consecrated Thursday as Anglican bishops in Kenya, the latest in a string of conservative priests who are defecting to African churches in a dispute over gay clergy.

Bill Atwood of Texas and William Murdoch of Massachusetts left the Episcopal Church—the U.S. branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion—because it allows the ordination of gay priests.

"The gospel ... must take precedence over culture," said Archbishop Drexel Gomez of the West Indies, one of 10 Anglican leaders or representatives who attended the ceremony in Nairobi's All Saints Cathedral. "Homosexual practice violates the order of life given by God in Holy Scripture."

Note the Archbishop's choice of words. Homosexuality has nothing to do with culture. Religious scriptures, on the other hand, have everything to do with culture. The defecting Anglicans pick the Bible before God's creation.

Ahead of Australia's first national conference on Muslim university students, Tanveer Ahmed, a psychiatric registrar and a graduate of the University of Sydney, urges universities to resist politicized Islamist groups seeking special treatment on campus. These groups are very quick to cry racism, he says, and it's now clear that British universities have inadvertently lent support to the growth of home-grown radicalism by giving in to this kind of campus pressure:

Politicised Muslim groups might seek to build their profile by pressuring a university to allow a certain speaker on campus, for example.

Dr Ahmed said another pattern was for these Muslim groups and leftists to ally themselves.

"I remember going to a protest (in Sydney during the recent Hezbollah-Israel conflict in Lebanon) and seeing environmental groups going Allah Akhbar (God is great) in harmony with some Lebanese groups,'' Dr Ahmend said.

"The God is great line wasn't about religion, it was about social protest."

It's a well-known fact that socialists are joining forces with radical Islamists. We see the same thing in Europe. Anyone who dares to speak up against Islamic fascism is labelled a racist by leftist groups. The risk of being stigmatized silences people, and that lays the ground for true racism to flourish in a near future. To hardcore socialists these might be irrelevant fears as class warfare is their main priority, but to liberals who wish to protect universal civil liberties it is.

Are you a fan of 24? The New Republic publishes parts of the manuscript for the seventh season.

Senator Craig signals a moral stand against gay marriage from his toilet cubical.

Cartoon by Tom Toles of the Washington Post.

Background: "Senator Craig's Handsome Policeman"

According to the news agency Reuters, Chinese officials say the country's one-child policy has helped the fight against global warming by avoiding 300 million births. Are we beginning to see a wave of totalitarian legislation justified by climate alarmism?

Pakistan joined Iran today and issued a statement protesting the cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad published by a Swedish newspaper on 18 August. According to the statement, Swedish Chargé d'Affaires Lennart Holst has said Sweden "fully shared the views of the Muslim community". From the Pakistani statement:

"Regrettably, the tendency among some Europeans to mix the freedom of expression with an outright and deliberate insult to 1.3 billion Muslims in the world is on the rise."

Nonsense. The only true insult is opportunist rulers' deliberate distortion of civil liberties.

With the exception of Texas, the United States turns against the death penalty. The Economist reports:

Asked by pollsters whether they think murderers should be put to death, two-thirds of Americans say yes, down from four-fifths in 1994. If asked to choose between the death penalty and a life sentence with no chance of parole, however, they are evenly divided. Life that means life is relatively new. Before the 1990s, juries used to worry that if they did not send the man in the dock to his death, he would be freed to kill again after a decade or two. Now nearly every state allows the option of life without parole (Texas introduced it only in 2005). For the first time last year, a Gallup poll reported that a slim plurality of Americans found this option preferable to a capital sentence (48-47%).

Campaigners against the death penalty have been making their case state by state, with little fanfare but some success. The number of executions has fallen by 46% from its modern peak in 1999, to 53 last year (see chart 1). Two-thirds of states executed no one last year, and only six carried out multiple executions. The number of death sentences has fallen even more sharply, by 60% from a peak of about 300 a year in the mid-1990s.

I welcome this trend. The death penalty is cruel and brutalizes the society that practises it. It might be argued that a person who has killed someone else deserves to die, but the problem with this strict contractarian argument is that the only one entitled to perform the act is already dead.

(Photo shows the lethal injection table at San Quentin State Prison in California.)

From The Local:

Sweden's Chancellor of Justice Göran Lambertz has ruled that it is perfectly acceptable to insult the dialect spoken by most people in the south of the country. 
Skånska—often known as Scanian in English—is a guttural dialect bearing many similarities to Danish. With its uvular fricatives and pharyngeal diphtongs, the dialect can often appear impenetrable to outsiders.

To Aftonbladet columnist Alex Schulman, however, the dialect is not just difficult to understand—in a recent column he described the speech patterns of residents of Skåne as being somewhat akin to vomiting.

"To speak Skånska is to puke a little", he wrote.

To be honest, I only speak Scanian when I talk to my parents. In most situations, the communication is smoother when I use Standard Swedish with its slightly nasal pronunciation.

Here we go again, yet another conservative politician known for his anti-gay "family values" has been arrested after a sordid attempt to live out his hidden passion for men. They just never learn, do they? Well, it's become apparent to me that many conservative leaders are in fact talking about themselves and their secret hobbies when they speak of the "homosexual agenda". When they warn the public of irresponsible promiscuity they really know what they are talking about. The problem is that they use psychological projection to hurt ordinary gay men.

The Senator has good taste though. Sergeant Dave Karsnia of the Minnesota Police is a real looker.

The Sloggi campaign has been cancelled in Sweden. ECPAT and other social conservatives won; liberty and the many Swedes who enjoyed the advertisements lost. As a Swedish national, I am truly ashamed. Sweden has become a haven for stuck-up puritans.

Background: "The Swedish War on Immorality"

The Netherlands has seen increasing political and religious extremism is the past few years. Now the government has decided to tackle the problem. Toby Sterling of the Associated Press reports:

The Dutch government will spend $38 million over the next four years to prevent both the growth of Islamic fundamentalism and right-wing nationalism, an official said Monday.

The emphasis will be on funding existing programs at the neighborhood and school levels for what the government sees as a "growing problem" of the radicalization of Dutch youth, said Interior Affairs Minister Guusje ter Horst.

The number of racist incidents in the Netherlands spiked sharply after the November 2004 murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a Muslim extremist, according to the Anne Frank Institute, which monitors hate crimes. A cycle of retaliatory attacks between native Dutch and Moroccan immigrants ensued.

But from 2005 to 2006, the number of reported racist attacks fell 10 percent to 265. There were 62 recorded attacks against Muslims and Islamic buildings—the most targeted group, the institute said.

Ter Horst said the goal was not to combat extremist groups—a job for law enforcement and intelligence agencies—but to prevent them from forming.

About time, if you ask me. The political climate in the Netherlands turned nasty after the brutal killings of Pim Fortuyn and van Gogh. However, I don't think it's the government's job to fix the public opinion. What is needed is a new start, a way back to the liberal attitude so closely associated with the Netherlands.

Yesterday, Iran's government made a formal complaint about Swedish artist Lars Vilks's drawings of the prophet Muhammad. The Iranian foreign ministry said the sketches are offensive to the Prophet.

Background: "New Muhammad Drawings Banned from Gallery"

In a week from today, I begin a new course in Religious Studies at Lund University. I will not become a theologian; my goal is to specialize in the Philosophy of Religion. While most contemporary philosophers in secularized Europe show little interest in this field, I think it's one of the most interesting, not least because world politics is still influenced—perhaps even controlled—by religious beliefs. Furthermore, it's a fact that religion in the number one motivator for many totalitarian leaders—and their opponents.

Last week I received an email from a reader in Britain. He asked me if I think God can exist logically. I wanted a few days to think about his question, and decided over the weekend that I will take the opportunity to write down my thoughts on God and religion before I begin my new course. In the next few days, I will post a series of entries entitled "On God and Human Ontology".

Here is the reader email:

I have just read your latest blog and notice that you are taking a course in philosophy. Unfortunately I am not a philosopher, but I am interested in becoming one (after all, wouldn't most people like to believe they existed for a reason?) To this end I have just read "Philosophy for dummies" by Dr Tom Morris, who uses the book to represent his theist point of view. I was going to write to Dr Morris to tell him why I do not agree with some of his arguments and conclusions (I am currently reading "Logic for dummies" to help me support my reasons for disagreeing with him) but I doubt I shall ever get a reply to any letter I send as very rarely get replies to letters, or emails I send to people, but I still have hope, hence this email.

Do you believe in God? I hope you don't mind me asking, but I believe the answer to have a profound effect on "the meaning of life". Dr Morris obviously does, but I found his reasoning as to why God exists to be lacking. I found Mark Rowland's athiest arguments in "The Philosopher at the end of the universe" much more convincing, but his conclusion that the meaning of life is to be "beings towards death" totally meaningless. Dr Morris relies on Pascal's wager to ultimately persuade his reader to start believing in God, but I think this is dogma in disguise: "Believe in God or you shall go to hell". I was sent to Roman Catholic schools and this is what was taught and you could not question it. I found this out at an early age when I asked my first question born from logic to my Religious Education teacher. My question was based on this logic:

• Both God and the devil exist.
• God made everything.
• Therefore God made the devil.

When I asked where did the devil come from if God made everything the response I got was one of extreme anger. That was not a question I was allowed to ask. You must believe in God without question or you shall go to hell.

Further logic can be used to strengthen an atheist position in the following way:

• Theist argument—God exists because so many people believe he does.
• Athiest counter argument—if God exists, howcome not everybody believes he does, especially if he is omnipotent and omniscient. Sending his only son to die so that everyone would believe does not make sense, especially as it has not worked—atheists exist (and agnostics). If God is omniscient, atheists and agnostics would not exist.

Can the only sensible conclusion to this argument be that God is not omniscient, or that he does not exist?

This leaves the theist in a weak position. He would not concede that God is not omniscient—his only argument would be that God has a reason for not wanting everyone to believe in him—God wants to test people.

But if he is omniscient this does not make sense.

Conclusion—on the surface, logic hands victory to the atheist. The theist has to resort to fear tactics (Pascal's wager).
 
So what am I? Do I believe in God? Answer:
No. I don't believe in God.
I know he exists.

Would you be interested to find out why I know this (it's a very long story)? What do you believe the meaning of life is?

I learned from the news yesterday that Greece struggles with several enormous forest fires caused by arsonists, but I could not imagine the massive scale until I saw this satellite picture. It is truly unbelievable. John F. L. Floss of the Associated Press reports:

Firefighters backed by aircraft dropped water and foam on the birthplace of the ancient Olympics Sunday to stop wildfires from burning the 2,800-year-old ruins, one of the most revered sites of antiquity.

But the fires burning for three straight days obliterated vast swathes of the country and the death toll rose by 11 on Sunday to 60. New fires broke out faster than others could be brought under control. Desperate residents appealed through television stations for help from a firefighting service already stretched to the limit and many blamed authorities for leaving them defenseless.

"Fires are burning in more than half the country," said fire department spokesman Nikos Diamandis. "This is definitely an unprecedented disaster for Greece."

For about 10 years I smoked cannabis regularly if not excessively. In the evenings I'd get home from work and have a joint to unwind, and I smoked about the same amount at weekends. I used it to help me relax and sleep better. About five years ago I stopped doing it—I just got out of the habit. Now I keep reading about the effect that strong grass like skunk can have on mental health and all the reports have got me worried about the long-term health implications of dope. I'm a 39-year-old woman and recently have had quite unpleasant bouts of anxiety and insomnia—might this be caused by my smoking? Can you have a delayed reaction, and are there any other long-term effects?

The Guardian has let three experts on cannabis answer this question sent to the newspaper by a worried reader. It strikes me how sensible the answers are, and how very far from the Swedish hysteria and scare tactics the British debate on cannabis is. I would especially want to highlight Psychiatry Professor Robin Murray's answer. Dr Murray's research is often deliberately distorted by Swedish prohibitionists who wish to exaggerate the harmful effects of cannabis use. Here is the Professor's answer in full:

The risk of smoking cannabis is a bit similar to that of drinking alcohol. Most people who drink alcohol, and most people who smoke cannabis, don't come to any harm. However, just as drinking a bottle of whisky a day is more of a hazard to your health than drinking a pint of lager, so skunk is more hazardous than traditional forms of cannabis, such as herb or resin, because it may contain three times as much of the active ingredient tetrahydrocannabinol (THC).

The adverse effects of cannabis use are different to those you describe. They usually start with either memory difficulties or paranoid and suspicious ideas, and can progress to psychotic symptoms such as hallucinations and delusions. These symptoms usually come on while the individual is still smoking, and there is no good evidence that smoking cannabis can cause either anxiety or insomnia.

In World Net Daily, I read about David Parker, a hero of the Christian Right and a man so filled of rage against gay people that he is prepared for martyrdom—or possibly psychopharmacological treatment. From the article:

A Massachusetts man handcuffed and hauled to jail after he objected to a public school teaching his kindergarten-age son about homosexuality and refused to leave a meeting has gone to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals seeking justice.

The man, his wife and another family are battling what they describe as a court order for segregation, after a judge ruled if they didn't like the school's advocacy for homosexuality, they could take their children and leave.

They also are arguing that U.S. District Judge Mark Wolf's statement that "as it is difficult to change attitudes ... after they have developed, it is reasonable for public schools to attempt to teach understanding and respect for gays and lesbians," actually is unconstitutional.

How can teaching children to respect homosexuals be unconstitutional? Well, according to a spokesperson for the anti-gay organization Mass Resistance, the reasoning goes something like this:

"Wolf makes the odious statement that the Parkers' only options are (1) send their kids to a private school, (2) home-school their kids, or (3) elect a majority of people to the School Committee who agree with them. Can you imagine a federal judge in the Civil Rights era telling blacks the same thing—that if they can't be served at a lunch counter they should just start their own restaurant, or elect a city council to pass laws that reflect the U.S. Constitution?"

Eh?! No one is refusing the Parker family anything. The issue here is that they want less than others. In my book, discrimination is the exact opposite. When "blacks" were denied access to the same restaurants as whites, they were deprived of something offered to everyone else. The Christian Right is offered a place at the same table as everyone else but refuses to accept it. That is their choice.

(Seen in picture are David Parker with his wife Tonia.)

The Christian Right is weak in Sweden. Less than ten per cent of the population attend church every week. This doesn't mean that the ideas of the Christian Right are absent in Sweden. Far from it. The best example is ECPAT, an organization whose members are mostly Christians and socialists. The combination might seem odd, but it's logical since the Swedish Social Democrats tend to be social conservatives.

ECPAT says it's working to protect children from sexual abuse and exploitation, but like many branches of the American Christian Right, this organization does more than care for children. In fact, it's a conservative campaign centre that has more in common with the late Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority than a regular human-rights organization. ECPAT never misses an opportunity to warn the public of gay men, pornography, and a liberal attitude towards sex. Normal human sexuality is portrayed as dangerous and immoral.

The latest example is general-secretary Helena Karlén's (picture above) tongue-lashing at underwear manufacturer Sloggi. She says that paedophiles will take advantage of an advertising campaign with people taking pictures of themselves in Sloggi underwear.

Although both men and women are invited to post pictures on Sloggi's website, Sweden's state-sponsored feminists have joined ECPAT's war on immorality by labelling the Sloggi advertisements "a sexist porn trap for young girls". It's as if the boys did not exist. Ironically, many of the protesting feminists are known for their objection to heteronormativity.

The Local has more.

British human-rights campaigner Peter Tatchell is considering the arguments.

Swedish newspaper Norra Skåne has gone public with an announcement of Fidel Castro's death. However, these are still unconfirmed rumours, probably originating from exiled Cubans in Florida. NBC reports:

Nothing unusual has been reported from Havana. However, Miami is ablaze with rumors, NBC News reported.

On Thursday, Cuba's foreign minister, Felipe Perez Roque, said rumors about Fidel Castro's deteriorating health are untrue. Roque told reporters in Brazil that the 81-year-old was still in charge of Cuban affairs. He said Castro is "being informed and consulted constantly."

Roque made the comments to reporters while attending the Forum for East Asia-Latin American Cooperation in Brazil.

Cubans were hoping Fidel would make a public appearance during his birthday celebrations nearly two weeks ago.

Castro has not been seen in public for over a year since he transferred power to his brother after surgery.

Damn this! My husband and I were planning a trip to Copenhagen later today for the annual Pride Parade, but now I've been up all night listening to the Chemical Brothers and a bunch of international radio programmes from the past week. My husband has slept through it all and will probably want to party with the Danish queers. I don't think I can find the strength to join him. It's not my fault. I blame the MP3-format and my iTunes. I had nothing to do with this. I'm a slave to a structure—it's beyond my control.

Most Swedish parliamentarians treat the political and moral dilemma of Internet piracy as a no issue, but to young Swedes it is probably the most important political issue of all. The opponents' arguments are often trivialized by activists on both sides. Today, Bobbie Johnson, the Guardian's technology correspondent, paints a portrait of three Swedish piracy activists:

Filesharing and illegal downloading has been a big issue for media companies since the late 1990s. But while pioneering services such as Napster and Kazaa were closed down by the courts, the campaign against The Pirate Bay has failed to make a breakthrough.

The crux of the defence is that The Pirate Bay operates like any internet search engine: it points to downloads, rather than hosting any illegal content itself. Under Swedish law this has so far made it immune to prosecution.

"I don't like the word untouchable, but we feel pretty safe," said Mr Sunde. He thinks that European enmity towards the Bush administration has bolstered support. "The US government is losing popularity every day in Europe, and people don't want to see us give in to them."

Their apparent invulnerability to prosecution has made them heroes of the internet piracy movement, but not everybody feels the same way.

"I certainly don't see them as romantic pirates: it's out and out theft," says John Kennedy, chief executive of the international music industry body IFPI. "It's pure, ruthless greed—or total naivety."

But the group's supporters around the world say they are vexed with what they see as the "corruption" of the media industry.

"This is already happening—you cannot stop it," says Magnus Eriksson of Piratbyran, the Swedish thinktank which helped start the website in 2003. "But the thing is that the people who download the most are also the ones who spend the most on buying media. Media companies already know that they have to change."

Folkpartiet är i farten igen. Denna gång med ett förslag om tvångsvård av gravida missbrukare. Från dagens ledare i Expressen:

Men tvångsvård och polisjakt på missbrukare, parad med vårdbrist, har skapat en fasansfull svensk modell. Vi har legat i Europatoppen vad gäller dödsfall bland narkomaner.

Att föreslå ännu mer tvångsvård i ett läge då man inte ens kan tillgodose den vård missbrukarna frivilligt söker, är antingen mycket cyniskt eller mycket dumt.

En av ledamöterna i fp:s partistyrelse är Birgitta Rydberg, sjukvårdslandstingsråd i Stockholm och hård motståndare till sprutbytesprogram. Hellre att narkomaner dör av aids än att de får en enda ren spruta av staden – på något annat sätt kan man inte tolka hennes politik.

Sprutbyten till gravida efterlyser vi inte. Men sprutbyteskliniker tycks fylla en viktig social funktion. Vårdgivare och missbrukare får en förtrolig och kontinuerlig kontakt. Det borde vara guld värt när det gäller att hjälpa gravida missbrukare.

Men sådan pragmatism och humanism är ingenting för fp:s partistyrelse. Tvång, tvång och åter tvång är liberalernas osannolika melodi.

Det är så ledsamt att bevittna hur "liberaler" solkar ner liberalismen med repressiva idéer.

Seen above is the painting The Death of Socrates by French artist Jacques-Louis David. I found it on a website when I searched for some information about Plato. As I saw the picture, I instantly remembered a discussion about the importance of heroic death I once had with one of my teachers. I remember arguing that the main reason Jesus became the central figure of a new religion sprung from Judaism was his decision to sacrifice himself. I know I exemplified this with Socrates's death, how his decision to voluntarily drink a mix of the poisonous hemlock made such an impression on his followers that they wrote down everything he had taught them. I told my teacher that I suspected Jesus knew about Socrates and in fact was a copycat. Now I know that Greek philosophy was studied by many in Jerusalem at the time and that Jesus, a student of historic text material, must have known about Socrates's shortcut to academic stardom.

Speaking of radical feminism. From Reuters:

A woman set fire to her ex-husband's penis as he sat naked watching television and drinking vodka, Moscow police said Wednesday.

Asked if the man would make a full recovery, a police spokeswoman said it was "difficult to predict."

The attack climaxed three years of acrimonious enforced co-habitation. The couple divorced three years ago but continued to share a small flat, something common in Russia where property costs are very high.

"It was monstrously painful," the wounded ex-husband told Tvoi Den newspaper. "I was burning like a torch. I don't know what I did to deserve this."

Several times have I heard radical feminists announce that males are no longer needed in human society. With modern technique, women can manage reproduction by themselves. Only a handful of males are needed to produce enough sperm to fertilize many thousands of women. On the other hand, men who wish to become biological parents are dependent on women willing to give birth to their children. Nature has made it impossible for males to become pregnant. But maybe things are about to change?

P. Z. Myers, a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota Morris, has written a truly interesting article on male pregnancy. "I started this by speculating that it would be possible for human males to play a much greater role in childrearing," he writes. "Now I'm beginning to think this could actually have some dramatic effects on human society and human biology. Science should frighten the conservatives!" I bet it will.

It sounds feasible to me. Zygotes are aggressive little parasites that will implant just about anywhere in the coelom—it's why ectopic pregnancies are a serious problem—so all we need to do there is culture a bit of highly vascularized tissue in the male abdomen that will serve as a secure home for a few months. We'll have to play some endocrine games, too, which may effect his love life but will also prepare him to lactate post-partum. There's the minor anatomical problem that the vagina is a unique tissue, and no, the urethra is not homologous or analogous (fortunately; we wouldn't want to have to push an 8 pound baby through the penis, even if female hyenas can manage it)—but that's what c-sections are for. Given money, time, and a few weird volunteers, it could be done.

Venezuela's dictator Hugo Chávez claims Aruba and the Netherlands Antilles (Curaçao and Bonaire). The Caribbean islands are situated less than forty nautical miles off the Venezuelan coast and form autonomous parts of the Netherlands since the seventeenth century. In a speech on 15 August, Chávez told his puppet parliamentarians that everything within 200 nautical miles from the coastline is Venezuelan territory. The Dutch government strongly dismisses Venezuela's claims on the islands.

(Via Johnny Rosengren.)

The situation for gays and lesbians in Nigeria, Uganda, and Cameroon are getting worse as the governments step up their efforts to fight homosexuality. Groups of Christians and Muslims have launched homophobic riots, which has resulted in many arrests and death threats. Suspected homosexuals are denied legal counsel and are forced to confess under torture.

American journalist Doug Ireland has more.

Ours is bigger than yours—flag that is.

Arthur Schopenhauer on truth:

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."

On nationalism:

"Every nation ridicules other nations, and all are right."

On human shortcomings:

"Everyone takes the limits of his own vision for the limits of the world."

On marriage:

"In our monogamous part of the world, to marry means to halve one's rights and double one's duties."

On martyrdom:

"Martyrdom is the only way a man can become famous without ability."

On painful intelligence:

"Nature shows that with the growth of intelligence come increased capacity for pain, and it is only with the highest degree of intelligence that suffering reaches its supreme point."

Advocate General Juliane Kokott has advised against Internet providers revealing the identity of people suspected of illegally sharing copyrighted material, which could result in the European Court putting a stop to Swedish plans to crack down on online piracy. But the Swedish government refuses to back down. A spokesperson for the Minister for Justice made a statement to The Local:

"We believe that our proposal is compatible with the directive. We are now awaiting the result of the case in the European Court of Justice. We are also waiting for responses to our consultation exercise."

Background: "EU Court May Protect Pirates' Identity"

From an article by Gerald M. Steinberg in the Jerusalem Post:

For years, the United Nations and the European Union have provided major funding and assistance for radical Palestinian NGOs and their supporters, allowing them to exploit the rhetoric of human rights, "civil society," international law and peace to promote the opposite.

An illustration of the damage that results from this combination is provided by the meeting, scheduled for the European Parliament in Brussels on August 30-31, to be run by the UN's Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. This committee is "the main UN forum where all NGOs interested in the Palestine issue can meet."

The title is certainly high-sounding—International Conference of Civil Society in Support of Israeli-Palestinian Peace. But, as noted by UN Watch, "the UN's Palestinian Division runs a tightly-controlled operation that accredits only anti-Israel NGOs and speakers. Without altering the virulently anti-Israel nature of their meetings, the organizers instead seek to mask their activities." Moreover, to add credence to their cover, they invite specially approved Israelis—a select group of radicals who openly espouse hatred of Israel, claiming the license to do so because of their citizenship.

And:

The speakers list is secret, but in previous years it included Jeff Halper from the EU-funded Israeli Committee against House Demolitions (ICAHD), allied with Sabeel, a center for Palestinian liberation theology; Raji Sourani from the Palestinian Center for Human Rights; Michael Warschawski of the Alternative Information Center; and Jamal Juma Ja'afreh from the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign.

To their credit, the Polish members of the European Parliament from different parties have announced that they will not participate. Bronis aw Geremek, a Polish MEP, was quoted by the Polish Web site, Europa21, as declaring: "Although there is no official statement that Israel must be pushed down to the sea... the choice of subjects and the attitude toward the problems show that it will be a biased, conflict-generating conference. Actually we can call it anti-Israeli."

Europe's taxpayers pay for this nonsense. It's embarrassing.

New research published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry shows drug taking is not a matter of choice for long-term users:

Drug users who can't kick the habit can blame a dysfunctional brain for their addiction, according to new research.

A study by the University of Melbourne has found long-term drug users have difficulty controlling impulses because their frontal cortex is impaired. The two-year study found opiate users needed to use more of their brain to resist impulses in a test of self control than those who were clean.

The findings shed new light on why drug addicts find it so hard to quit, despite the health consequences. "Drugs can capture and hijack some parts of the brain," said Dr Murat Yucel, a lead researcher in the study. "In this study we found the frontal cortex, an area that is essential for exercising control over thoughts and behaviours, was working inefficiently. These findings may help explain why it takes addicted individuals enormous effort to exercise control over their drug taking behaviour in the face of adverse consequences and why they are vulnerable to relapse into uncontrolled, compulsive patterns of use."

Next, researchers will examine whether reduced brain function is a consequence of addiction or a contributing factor that makes some people more vulnerable to drug abuse. Earlier studies have suggested that the risk of addiction is in fact due to individual, biological characteristics of the brain.

From the Guardian:

The Iraqi prime minister declared today that his country could "find friends elsewhere" after the US president, George Bush, said there was "frustration" with his government's slow progress.

Nuri al-Maliki hit back after both Mr Bush and the US ambassador to Baghdad, Ryan Crocker, bluntly said the Iraqi government had to do more to end sectarian bloodshed and accommodate Sunni rivals in power.

The war of words capped another bleak day for the US military in Iraq which saw 14 soldiers die in a helicopter crash blamed on mechanical failure.

Speaking in Damascus on the final day of a trip to Syria, Mr Maliki scathingly dismissed the criticism and warned the US not to interfere in Iraqi politics.

"No one has the right to place timetables on the Iraq government. It was elected by its people," he said.

Mr Maliki is right. His government is elected by the Iraqi people. Democratization and human rights legitimized the war, so if the democratically elected leaders believe they can create a state that guarantees basic civil rights, then they should be left to handle the situation. Unfortunately, I don't think the Iraqis could manage the war against the terrorists by themselves just yet. On the other hand, the US troops don't seem too successful either.

Here we go again. According to news agency AFP, the wanted terrorist ring leader is still with us:

A top Taliban commander said Al-Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden is alive and well, according to US-based analysts monitoring extremist publications.

"All praise be to Allah, he is extremely healthy and active," the commander Mansour Dadullah said in a video interview, according to a transcript of the video's English subtitled translation, released Tuesday by the analyst IntelCenter.

Dadullah, whose brother Mullah Dadullah was also a top commander in the Afghanistan-based militants and was killed this year, said he had been contacted by Bin Laden, the man blamed for the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

"I received a message from him in which he advised me 'I must follow Mullah Dadullah and continue the same activities so that the mujahedeen (Islamic fighters) may not weaken,'" he said, according to the transcript.

The video is dated June 15, 2007, IntelCenter said.

The rumours of Osama bin Laden's health and whereabouts are now almost as tedious as the buzz surrounding junkie-starlet Lindsay Lohan.

År 1658 ockuperades Skåne av svensk militär. Under decennierna som följde plundrades och brändes skånska byar. Drygt tusen år av historia slogs sönder av en systematisk svensk statsterrorism. Kyrkor förstördes, gravar grävdes upp, böcker brändes, folkbokföring raderades ut, släktklenoder beslagtogs, språket kriminaliserades och kulturföremål fördes till Stockholm. De svenska härjningarna fortsatte in på 1720-talet. Men ända in på 1900-talet fanns ett folkligt motstånd som bland annat yttrade sig i att skånska barn fick lära sig läsa med hjälp av danska biblar och att man i folkmun envisades med att använda gatunamn från den danska tiden.

Nu, nästan 350 år senare, publicerar en stockholmsk antisemit ett inlägg på sin blogg i vilket han liknar dagens konflikt i Mellanöstern vid en fiktiv dansk attack mot Skåne. Av texten gissar jag att personen i fråga inte ens vet att Skåne är ockuperat område och skåningar som fördömer palestinsk nationalism faktiskt vet vad de talar om när de säger att man tyvärr måste acceptera att länder sällan skapas genom demokratiska processer. Invånare i tidigare Ostpreussen, Nordirland, Sönderjylland och Sicilien är andra exempel på folk vars land blivit ockuperat och som, om än motvilligt, efterhand kommit att acceptera den nya nationsbildningen.

Även om bloggarens liknelse haltar rejält kan det vara intressant att titta närmare på den:

I ett flyganfall dödades minst en Moderat-medlem i Skåne nära gränsen till Danmark på onsdagen, sade andra moderater och boende i närheten.

En talesman för den danska krigsmakten bekräftade ett flyganfall mot en grupp skåningar i gränsområdet. "Vi sköt och träffade dem", sade han.

På tisdagen dödade danskarna tre vuxna skåningar och två unga pojkar vid robotattacker mot staden Malmö. Dagen före dödades sex moderatmedlemmar av robotar.

En medlem i Folkfronten för Skånes befrielse dödades i en strid med dansk militär nära Höganäs vid kusten på tisdagen, uppgav svenskt säkerhetsfolk enligt nyhetsbyrån AFP.

Sedan det senaste skånska upproret började hösten 2000 har över 5800 människor dött i våldsamheter, den allra största delen av dem skåningar.

Är man sådär lagom ytlig så fungerar det kanske, men för att den fiktiva konflikten mellan skåningarna och Danmark verkligen ska likna den mellan palestinierna och Danmark så måste vi göra några tillägg. Den kanske viktigaste komponenten är att Folkfronten för Skåne har som uttalat mål att utrota det danska folket och därför regelbundet skickar självmordsbombare till Köpenhamn i syfte att döda civila. Helst på bussar, bröllop, skolor och marknadsplatser. En annan sak vi inte får glömma att lägga till bilden är att skåningarna blivit erbjudna danskt medborgarskap men att Folkfronten för Skåne vägrat acceptera Danmarks rätt att existera. Folkfronten för Skåne menar att hela Danmark tillhör Skåne och vägrar acceptera några kompromisser som inte gör Köpenhamn till huvudstad i det nya landet Skåne. Vidare menar Folkfronten för Skåne att samtliga de tjugo miljoner människor som har skånska förfäder ska få "återvända" till Danmark och ersättas ekonomiskt för den egendom som deras förfäder förlorade när de valde att emigrera istället för att stanna och sköta om sin markegendom.

Som sagt, liknelsen haltar. Den fungerar inte riktigt eftersom den framstår som så absurt. Men å andra sidan är de palestinska terrororganisationerna precis så absurda i sina krav. De vill ha något som inte är deras med argument som härhör från metafysiska vidskepelser snarare än rättmätiga egendomskrav. Såväl palestinierna som stockholmska antisemiter borde istället lära av exemplet Skåne såsom det ser ut i verkligheten. Men det är nog att hoppas på för mycket.

Yesterday, Swedish media reported that Sweden has more cancer survivors than any other country in Europe. The welfare-state propaganda spin machine immediately tried to link the survival rate to high taxes and government investment in cancer care. I listened to the news broadcasts and read a handful of newspaper articles about the study, yet I found no one reporting that the United States has the most cancer survivors in the world. Well, I suppose that would kill the spin.

(Click on picture to see the table in full size.)

I am getting old. I realize that after reading that Oasis released their third album, Be Here Now, ten years ago today. I remember buying the album in a Stockholm record shop on the day of its release. It feels like yesterday. I still enjoy listening to it from time to time. However, I have always favoured their first album, Definitely Maybe, which was released in August 1994.

Strange feeling this—getting old.