Andrew Sullivan makes a plea to gay voters:

This is telling to me:

An interesting moment came when he was asked a question about LGBT rights and delivered an answer that seemed to suit the questioner, listing the various attributes—race, gender, etc.—that shouldn't trigger discrimination, to successive cheers. When he came to saying that gays and lesbians deserve equality, though, the crowd fell silent.

So he took a different tack: "Now I'm a Christian, and I praise Jesus every Sunday," he said, to a sudden wave of noisy applause and cheers.

"I hear people saying things that I don't think are very Christian with respect to people who are gay and lesbian," he said, and the crowd seemed to come along with him this time.

To hear someone defend gay and lesbian dignity and equality from a Christian perspective and to do so in the context of a largely African-American crowd, is much, much more than any candidate for the presidency has ever done. It's a break through. If it were just words, it would be one thing. But he has now done this repeatedly in front of black crowds, when he didn't have to. And he has put his specific commitments in writing in an open letter.

It's time to be candid about this—because gay voters, in my judgment, could make the difference in Ohio and Texas and Vermont and Rhode Island. There are very large gay communities in Texas' cities, and Ohio has the sixth largest gay community in the country. A plea: Do not sleep-walk into that voting booth with vague good feelings about the Clintons. Walk into that booth with eyes open and see what gay people have in front of them.

Now you may have many reasons not to vote for Obama, and no gay voter should vote on one issue. But solely with respect to gay matters, there is simply no choice here. Obama's positions, candor, courage, generation and religious embrace of us are dispositive.

(Photo by Shannon Stapleton, via Reuters.)

The Swedish Social Democratic Party has bought the domain name "borgarsvin.se", Björn Pedersen reports. "Borgarsvin" is a pejorative word and an insulting epithet often used by hardcore communists. It derives from the term Bourgeoisie, which is synonymous with "middle class" and found in the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

Sweden's Social Democrats are very fond of negative campaigning. In the 2006 election they ran blogs that discredited the opposition leader by insinuating he is a paedophile.

I think we can expect an even dirtier election campaign in 2010. The name-calling has just begun.

Yesterday, Barack Obama published an open letter to gay Americans. I quote a paragraph I think is particularly important:

As your President, I will use the bully pulpit to urge states to treat same-sex couples with full equality in their family and adoption laws. I personally believe that civil unions represent the best way to secure that equal treatment. But I also believe that the federal government should not stand in the way of states that want to decide on their own how best to pursue equality for gay and lesbian couples—whether that means a domestic partnership, a civil union, or a civil marriage. Unlike Senator Clinton, I support the complete repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)—a position I have held since before arriving in the U.S. Senate. While some say we should repeal only part of the law, I believe we should get rid of that statute altogether. Federal law should not discriminate in any way against gay and lesbian couples, which is precisely what DOMA does. I have also called for us to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell, and I have worked to improve the Uniting American Families Act so we can afford same-sex couples the same rights and obligations as married couples in our immigration system.

Read Obama's letter in full here.

Portrait of Heath Ledger by Vincent Fantauzzo, nominated for the Archibald Prize.

More in Swedish here.

Mark Fiore is concerned.

From Wonkette:

To most American political fanatics, Ron Paul is just a goofy hobbit whose hilariously doomed online presidential campaign provided standout entertainment in a year that offered a wealth of hilariously doomed campaigns.

But to many of his constituents in Texas Congressional District 14, Ron Paul is just a blame-America-first attention whore who completely ignores the people who put him in office. There are no Democrats running in the 14th District primary next Tuesday—so if Ron Paul loses, he will have the honor of being a double loser in the eyes of his beloved constituents. With this in mind, Wonkette enthusiastically endorses Chris Peden for Congress.

Of course, Wonkette is not serious about its endorsement, but I couldn't resist paying Peden's website a brief visit. I only had to read the first paragraph to realize the man is no friend of mine. I quote the paragraph, with my own elucidations in square brackets:

My name is Chris Peden. I'm a Pro-Family [he hates gay people and single parents], Pro-Life [he puts foetal rights before women's rights] Christian conservative [meaning: his church is right, yours is wrong] who believes in free markets [good], smaller government [good], and individual responsibility [but not individual liberty!].

Not only Wonkette endorses Peden, so does a bunch of Texas pastors. A letter of endorsement is published on the website. I just love the opening phrase, "Greetings! Jesus is Lord!"

I wonder if Jesus, too, endorses Peden?

(This is the kind of silly writing the combination of Wonkette and good wine makes me do.)

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: "Everybody has understood that Iran is the number one power in the world. Today the name of Iran means a firm punch in the teeth of the powerful and it puts them in their place."

Unfortunately, he's right. The cowardice of the democratic world results in a walkover victory for tyrants like Ahmadinejad.

The answer is, no one knows for sure. McCain was born to American parents in the US-controlled Panama Canal Zone. That makes him a US citizen, but does it make him a natural born one? From the New York Times:

Mr. McCain's likely nomination as the Republican candidate for president and the happenstance of his birth in the Panama Canal Zone in 1936 are reviving a musty debate that has surfaced periodically since the founders first set quill to parchment and declared that only a "natural-born citizen" can hold the nation's highest office.

Almost since those words were written in 1787 with scant explanation, their precise meaning has been the stuff of confusion, law school review articles, whisper campaigns and civics class debates over whether only those delivered on American soil can be truly natural born. To date, no American to take the presidential oath has had an official birthplace outside the 50 states.

"There are powerful arguments that Senator McCain or anyone else in this position is constitutionally qualified, but there is certainly no precedent," said Sarah H. Duggin, an associate professor of law at Catholic University who has studied the issue extensively. "It is not a slam-dunk situation."

I fear the worse. Imagine the entire election campaign being about a forthcoming Supreme Court ruling on the issue.

(Seen in picture is a fragment of a historical map of the Panama Canal Zone.)

As most young gay men in Stockholm in the mid-1990s, I was a regular visitor to the nightclub Huset. The club does not exist any longer, but QX commemorates its twentieth birthday anyway.

Did people really look like this in 1988?

For the first time ever, a euro buys one dollar and fifty cents. It's good for Europe's self-esteem, not so good for Europe's export and tourist industries.

I'm too busy for blogging today, running between meetings and lectures. Even so, I take a minute to recommend an article by Anders Wallner published in Swedish newspaper Sydsvenska Dagbladet. He writes about the mishandling of asylum cases in the Swedish court system. He explains how he as a juror has witnessed how colleagues have made racist remarks and voiced prejudiced opinions about the people they are supposed to hear in a fair trail. Although I have no experience from asylum cases, I do recognize the bias attitude from criminal court.

I did not have an opportunity to watch last night's debate between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. However, taking from the many comments I have read on blogs and in the press, I think Clinton lost. If so, I think we now see the beginning of the end of the Clinton campaign.

The New York Times has more.

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times writes about an interesting poll that suggests John McCain is a likely winner in November:

In head-to-head contests, the poll found, McCain leads Clinton by 6 percentage points (46% to 40%) and Obama by 2 points (44% to 42%). Neither lead is commanding given that the survey, conducted Feb. 21-25, has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

The Arizona senator is viewed favorably by 61% of all registered voters, including a plurality of Democrats.

Early this morning, my husband and I went to the opening of the annual book sale. Among other books, we bought Julius Widemann's Logo Design. Not surprisingly, it's a book about the design of logos. In it we found a hilarious picture of Zion Graphics's design for Pee & Poo, which are stuffed toys for children.

The Swedish blog Rogntudjuu! has an entry on Palestinian propaganda and media stunts that is well worth reading. With plenty of pictures to show how the Pallywood producers operate.

On two occasions, I have written about Palestinian authorities deceiving international journalists. If interested, you find my two entries here and here.

In an attempt to combat American "cultural imperialism" and the "dictatorship of Hollywood", Venezuela's despotic ruler Hugo Chávez has decided to root out the English language. From the International Herald Tribune:

President Hugo Chavez's government is taking its battle against U.S. "imperialism" into Venezuelans' vocabulary, urging state phone company workers to eschew English-language business and tech terms that have crept into the local vernacular.

Through a campaign launched Monday, newly nationalized CANTV hopes to wean employees and others from words like "staff" ("equipo"), "marketing" ("mercadeo") and "password" ("contrasena").

Stickers and banners printed up by the company exhort Venezuelans to "Say it in Spanish. Say it with pride."

The Communications and Information Ministry said in a statement that Venezuelans must recover Spanish words that are "threatened by sectors that have started a battle for the cultural domination of our nations."

Other English words targeted include "mouse" ("raton"), "meeting" ("reunion") and "sponsor" ("patrocinador")—all of which have become acceptable in business circles in various Latin American countries.

Señor Chávez is truly the Don Quixote of Latin American politics.

I'm staying up late to watch the Oscars. It's a commercial break right now, so I thought I could take the time to link to an interesting article about the film industry and the Internet. DVD sales figures are down, and so are the download times.

"A Virgin Atlantic jumbo jet has flown between London's Heathrow and Amsterdam using fuel derived from a mixture of Brazilian babassu nuts and coconuts," BBC News reports.

I wonder what the anti-capitalism environmentalists will come up with next? The global-warming scare gave them a new set of arguments against commercialism and air travel, but if competition in the free market generates an environmentally friendly solution, the eco-Marxists must rethink their arguments. But I'm not worried, I bet they will find some other problem that only a socialist command economy can solve.

More in Swedish here.

The Associated Press and the Washington Post report about the latest violation of the religious laws in the world's number-one theocracy:

Saudi Arabia began interrogating 57 men Saturday who were arrested after allegedly flirting with women in front of a shopping mall in the holy city of Mecca, a local newspaper reported.

The country's religious police arrested the men Thursday night, alleging behavior that included dancing to pop music blaring from their cars and wearing improper clothing, according to the Okaz newspaper, which is deemed close to the government.

The Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice runs the religious police, who are charged with enforcing Saudi Arabia's strict Islamic lifestyle.

Its members patrol public places to make sure women are covered and not wearing make up, the sexes don't mingle, shops close five times a day for Muslim prayers and men go to the mosque and worship.

We can't have men flirting with women willy-nilly in the Prophet's hometown, can we?

On a serious note, could it be more obvious that religious law derives from a political ambition to control natural human needs?

Egypt's government has ordered the cancellation of a planned match between the Egyptian and Danish youth football teams. The cancellation is a protest against Danish newspapers republishing a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad.

When will the totalitarian regime in Cairo learn that democratic governments don't control the media like they do? I'm getting tired of silly fascists.

Ralph Nader could be poised for another third-party presidential campaign.

I'm sure John McCain would welcome that.

Listen to these moving testimonies from survivors of ex-gay ministries and therapies.

Every year, thousands of young men and women are forced by their parents and religious leaders to undergo unscientific therapy in order to cure their homosexuality. A few of them decide to lead a heterosexual life, many more are traumatized for life, no one is "cured". This ongoing torture of young gays is, in my mind, one of the most immoral aspects of contemporary Christianity. It is conducted and legitimized by people who refuse to accept that every individual is as much part of the creation as any other.

"Sharia is nothing but a human concoction of medieval religious opinion, largely archaic and outmoded and irrelevant to life today. Most sharia contradicts the letter and spirit of the Koran, distorts the transcendental text," says Taj Hargey—who is an Islamic theologian at the Muslim Education Centre in Oxford—in an excellent article by Yasmin Alibhai-Brown.

I think Hargey is right. Sharia is politics, a tool used by Islamists who wish to use the religion in order to control the people.

How he went from Jesus-loving Christian to a fun-loving infidel in one afternoon.

Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten runs a series of articles on the increasing number of people convicted for using or growing cannabis. Money and resources that could have been used to curb violent criminality are burned on harmless pot smokers. This is a result of the zero-tolerance policy on drugs.

Alan Wolfe has written an interesting article published in the March issue of The Atlantic. Accompanying the article is a graph showing the link—if any—between wealth and religiosity. I quote a part of the article that comments on Europe:

Last October, the Pew Global Attitudes Project plotted 44 countries according to per capita gross domestic product and intensity of religious belief, gauged by the responses to several questions about faith (a rendition of the Pew data appears on the opposite page). The pattern, as seen in the Pew study and a number of other sources, is hard to miss: when God and Mammon collide, Mammon usually wins.

Toward the right edge of the graph—in the realm of the most-prosperous countries—and at the very bottom lies western Europe, where God, if not dead, has only a faint pulse. Islam, to be sure, is increasingly prevalent in countries such as France and Great Britain, and one can also detect a slight uptick in Christian religiosity across much of the Continent in the past decade or so. But at the same time, the region's last significant pockets of concentrated religiosity are collapsing. Fifty years ago, Spain and Ireland were two of the most religious countries in Europe; now they are among the least. Not long ago, Spain was governed by a fascist dictator in close collaboration with the Catholic Church; now it allows both gay marriage and adoption by gay couples, making it as liberal as Massachusetts. Ireland once gave us, in the form of James Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, one of the most chilling depictions of damnation in world literature; these days, Dublin's churches are emptying out, and the few parishioners are apt to be Polish immigrants, most of whom presumably came to Ireland to nourish their bank accounts, not their souls.

Eastern Europe lies to the left of western Europe on the graph. Poland is of course well known for its religiosity; the Communists who governed the country for nearly half a century tried to suppress the Church but were ousted by Solidarity, in large part a faith-based movement, with the encouragement of a native-son pope. But most of the countries of eastern Europe, though poorer than their counterparts in the West, are not very different from them in religious terms. And increasing prosperity in eastern Europe may lower religiosity even more.

Alan Wolfe's article in full here. Click on graph to enlarge it.

President Bush dances alongside President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf while visiting Liberia on 21 February 2008. Video clip from Reuters.

Update: I just remembered an earlier blog post with a video clip of President Bush dancing.

"Sweden's chief heraldists remain dissatisfied with a decision by the Nordic Battlegroup to remove a lion's penis depicted on its coat of arms," The Local reports.

Background here.

The debate is over. In my opinion, Clinton won the debate. I think she won on her experience in foreign affairs and firm stand on Cuba. Obama's eagerness to talk to dictators makes him weak in my eyes. The democratic world shouldn't make life easier for tyrants.

Although Clinton won the debate, I don't think it's enough for her to win the party's nomination.

(This entry ends my live commentary on the CNN debate in Austin, Texas.)

What if the superdelegates don't choose the Democratic nominee favoured by voters?

Clinton: The party will unite behind whomever is elected.
Obama: I think it is important the primaries and caucuses count for something.

Corny question, predictable answers.

Is Obama ready to be Commander in Chief?

Clinton: I have experience from a number of international conflicts. I am ready to make difficult decisions from day one.
Obama: I would not be running for president if I did not think I was ready to be Commander in Chief. I think Clinton was wrong to support the Iraq war. At that moment I was better suited to be Commander in Chief.

Silly question in my opinion. Of course both of them think he or she is the better candidate.

Would you consider stopping raids on undocumented immigrants?

Clinton: Yes, but let us do it the right way. I would like to see more federal help to places like the border area in Texas. I would introduce a bill to legalize immigration in my first hundred days as president.
Obama: It is absolutely crucial that we tone down the rhetoric on immigration. We need a reform that includes border control and crack down on employers who hire illegal immigrants. We need a reform that makes it possible for immigrant to apply for legal status. We need to improve our relationship with Mexico and make sure jobs are not lost on their side of the border.

If elected president, would you be prepared to sit down with the new Cuban leader?

Clinton: Yes, if there is evidence that change is happening in Cuba.
Obama: Yes, would talk with the Cuban leader. However, I would not meet the new leader until we have seen some progress in Cuba.

(This entry begins my live commentary on the CNN debate in Austin, Texas.)

A man complains to Dr Helen Smith:

We're tired of the way the media portrays us as either abusive, career-driven, slovenly, or one of the myriad of other male stereotypes. We're tired of the barrage of abuse that we may or may not deserve.

I feel the frustration of my straight brothers. No kidding, I think it's time for a masculinist response to feminist man bashing.

My take on the subject here.

By cartoonist Dick Locher.

"The American Civil Liberties Union has joined a Naperville high school student in her fight to wear a T-shirt that expresses opposition to homosexuality on moral grounds," the Washington Blade reports.

What will all those conservatives who hate the ACLU more than Satan say about this?

Shlomo Benizri, a Shas member of the Israeli Knesset, blamed gays for recent earthquakes in a debate yesterday. He said, "A cost-effective way of averting earthquake damage would be to stop passing legislation on how to encourage homosexual activity in the State of Israel, which anyways causes earthquakes."

I like the response he got from Mike Hammel of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Association:

"This is a sad competition that shows how dark Shas MKs are," he said. "On one had, it is said that a religious MK doesn't believe that earthquakes are caused by God," he added. "On the other hand, it is flattering that he attributes supernatural powers to us."

Gay people rock the world. I knew that.

Wolf Blitzer:

The political momentum is clearly with Barack Obama. He has been impressive. But don’t count Hillary Clinton out yet—she has a formidable political machine and lots of ardent supporters.

Obama has won ten contests in a row—almost all of them by significant margins. But Clinton still has time to come back between now and March 4, when there are major contests in Texas, Ohio, Vermont and Rhode Island. There is no doubt she is facing an uphill struggle, but it would be premature to say it’s over.

I say that as a reporter who has seen Bill and Hillary Clinton bounce back before.

I think Blitzer is right. Clinton is the underdog, and popular psychology tells us that people tend to sympathize with struggling underdogs. Obama's winning spree might hurt him at the end of the race.

According to the New York Times, John McCain had a romantic relationship with a female lobbyist eight years ago.

Good for him.

Professor Ted Goldberg of Stockholm University has written an excellent article on Sweden's failed drug policy. The article is in Swedish and available here.

This hilarious reader comment accompanies the article:

Jag åkte runt i skolor och höll föredrag om narkotika/amfetamin tillsammans med närpolisen. I en skola höll vi en kväll föredrag för föräldrar. För att demonstrera hur hasch ser ut hade polisen med en haschkaka. Den fick gå runt. När vi packade ihop, kom vi på haschkakan. Den var borta. Tacksamt kändes då vårt arbete mot narkotika!

(Bilingual blogging is no hit, I know. I apologize to my non-Swedish readers for the inconvenience.)

Foreign Policy and the Centre for a New American Security have surveyed more than 3,400 active and retired officers at the highest levels of command about the state of the US military. Among other things, they were asked what steps they were prepared to take in order to tackle the alarming shortage of new recruits. It turns out they would prefer foreign nationals to gay Americans. To me, this is one clear example of the devastating effect irrational fear of homosexuality has on society.

From Seattle Times:

Barack Obama cruised past a fading Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Wisconsin primary Tuesday night, gaining the upper hand in a Democratic presidential race for the ages.

It was Obama's ninth straight victory over the past three weeks—with results unknown from the Hawaii caucuses—and left the former first lady in desperate need of a comeback in a race she long commanded as front-runner.

And:

Clinton made no mention of her defeat, and showed no sign of surrender in an appearance in Youngstown, Ohio.

"Both Senator Obama and I would make history," the New York senator said. "But only one of us is ready on day one to be commander in chief, ready to manage our economy, and ready to defeat the Republicans. Only one of us has spent 35 years being a doer, a fighter and a champion for those who need a voice."

In a clear sign of their relative standing in the race, most cable television networks abruptly cut away from coverage of Clinton's rally when Obama began to speak in Texas.

If Hillary Clinton doesn't win Texas on 4 March, she must admit defeat.

He's the winner.

I just read about Jim and Anna Marie's unconventional marriage on CNN's website:

When her husband of more than a decade revealed he was gay, Anna Marie Will was surprised—but not shocked.

Her husband, Jim, had never fit her stereotypical idea of the sports-loving, macho, straight guy, and the two had even gone to gay bars with a friend who was gay. But that didn't mean she was prepared for the news.

"Neither one of us had a clue—he didn't know what being gay meant for him. ... He needed to figure that out," recalls Anna Marie Will, of Sacramento, California. "I needed to figure out what his being gay meant for me, and whether I could incorporate that into my life and my marriage."

What they did know was that they believed in their marriage and wanted to make it work. Jim Will's revelation in 2001 began a three-year process during which they sorted out their feelings for each other. Ultimately, the couple, whose daughter turns 15 in March, decided to stay together.

This arrangement is not as uncommon as one might think. Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet ran a series of articles on the same topic only a week ago. Seven people were interviewed about their homosexuality and how coming out affected their families. I link to the articles, which are written in Swedish:

1. En andra pubertet
2. Livet vände på en fest
3. Vill bara vara queer
4. Unik insyn i mäns hemliga liv
5. Pappa, kom ut
6. Eva avslöjade sin man på homosajt
7. Regnbågspappa i radhuslängan

This just in: John McCain and Barack Obama win Wisconsin primaries.

At a visit to the European Parliament, Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said it might be time for a new referendum on Sweden joining the single European currency.

In the event that Denmark joins, I think a large majority in southernmost Sweden will be in favour of a currency changeover. That would probably be enough to overtake the Eurosceptic votes of northern Sweden.

I would welcome a new referendum if the Danes vote in favour of joining the euro.

More in Danish here.

At last! The 81-year-old dictator leaves office. To bad he didn't retire decades ago.

The day after Europe witnessed the birth of a new Muslim nation, Andreas Malm, one of Sweden's most notorious defenders of Islamist terrorism, writes an article in Dagens Nyheter accusing the democratic world of Islamophobia. As most liberal-bashing communists in Europe, Malm refuses to see any humanitarian motive for European and American intervention in the Middle East. Every action taken to halt totalitarian tyranny of states like Iran, Afghanistan, and Iraq is reduced to some sordid demand for cheap oil.

It's unfortunate that many people fall victim of this rhetoric, because what Malm and others like him refers to as Islamophobia has rarely anything to do with genuine dislike of Muslim. In fact, it's the other way around. To people like Malm, the suffering of millions of Muslims is irrelevant. Instead, it's the sovereign of nations that matters. In other words, citizens of totalitarian nations own no rights unless granted by the dictatorial regime.

To liberals, humans have rights because they are humans. It doesn't matter where you are born, who rules your country, or who you are as a person. No one has the right to force you to submission by torture and religious subjugation. But this is what politicized religion tends to do, and it is what defines undemocratic Islamism.

Andreas Malm builds his case on deliberate distortion. He points the finger at liberals and human-rights activists and labels us Islamophobes because we don't accept that Muslims are treated as anything less than human beings. We don't accept Europeans being treated as subhuman creatures, so why should we accept our fellow human beings having to put up with this treatment in Muslim countries?

Cultural relativism is closely related to racism. Malm's article is yet another example of this relationship; he is prepared to accept the Islamist torture seen in the pictures above because he believes human rights are dependent on the cultural context. As a libertarian, I strongly oppose any such idea. If that makes me an Islamophobe in the eyes of Andreas Malm, so be it.

Read Malm's article in Swedish here.

debate
A contest to see which candidate can answer the fewest questions.

democracy
A moderately representative plutocracy.

voter apathy
The reason most American politicians are able to achieve and maintain office.

More useful definitions here.

As regular readers now, I'm a part-time juror at the Malmö City Court, which means I listen to many defence lawyers who try to excuse whatever their clients stand accused of even when the evidence against them is overwhelming. It's not uncommon with defendants who make up some really spectacular stories to explain for their actions. But even though I have heard a lot of imaginative defence stories in the courtroom, nothing comes even close to this one: Mark Dixie, a suspected British necrophiliac, says he didn't know his victim was dead until after he stopped having sex with her corpse despite finding her in a pool of blood. From the New Zealand Herald:

Dixie says he stumbled on the blonde's naked body by chance as he staggered home drunk after celebrating his birthday that same night. Prosecutors have said sex acts were performed as Bowman lay dying or was dead in a pool of blood, including sexual intercourse.

Bowman, who was working as a hairdresser and part-time model at the time of her death, was discovered about two hours later by a neighbour who saw her legs sticking out.

Before Dixie took the stand in his defence on Monday his barrister, Anthony Glass, addressed the jury in a bid to explain his client's "disgusting conduct".

"It is, you may think, a very unattractive defence," he told the jury. "He did not know she was dead until intercourse was concluded. Even though you may think his conduct is disgusting, he allowed his lust to get the better of him."

From Christopher Hitchens, God Is Not Great, chapter 11:

If you want to maintain your respect for city aldermen, or your appetite for sausages, you should take care not to be present when the former are being groomed or the latter are being manufactured.

Great advice.

Barry Moody of Reuters reports from President Bush's ongoing visit to Africa:

Unpopular at home and in much of the world during the last year of his presidency, George W. Bush is basking in rare adulation on his African tour.

Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete poured praise on Bush in Dar es Salaam on Sunday, the second day of his five-nation African tour, each compliment applauded warmly by members of the east African country's cabinet.

Although around 2,000 Muslim demonstrators protested against Bush on the eve of his visit, many thousands more cheering, waving people lined his road from the airport on Saturday.

Banners across the route, decorated with Bush's image against a backdrop of Tanzania's Mt. Kilimanjaro, read: "We cherish democracy. Karibu (welcome) to President and Mrs Bush."

Others read: "Thank you for helping fight malaria and HIV." Dancers at the airport and at Kikwete's state house to greet Bush on Sunday, wore skirts and shirts decorated with his face.

Well deserved, if you ask me. George Bush has made some really bad decisions in regards to the global fight against AIDS, but he has done more good than any other US president.

Johan Ehrenberg:

Bara tanken att opera, teater, poesi eller klassisk musik skulle överleva utan pengar från våra skatter är lika dum som tanken att polis eller brandmän skulle finansieras genom försäljning av deras tjänster.

Snobbvänsterns folkförakt är ingen nyhet, men Ehrenberg är ovanligt tydlig. Hans budskap är att samhällets toppskikt vet bäst vad folket vill ha. Vanligt folk är för dumma för att köpa riktig kultur, därför måste en socialistisk statsmakt tvinga dem att betala.

I couldn't sleep, so began to browse iTunes Store for some old music. It didn't take long before I realized how very addictive this service is. I'm not complaining, just amazed at how easy it is to get caught up in an online shopping spree. Anyhow, here's the video to one of the old favourites I bought tonight:

The Knife is a Swedish group with some disturbing political ideas (hardcore communism). I don't care much for their work, but I think this particular video is superb. The song itself is odd and only suitable for a particular kind of mood.

Why are some of us obese while others are not? Is it caused by genetics or environment? No one knows for sure, but Slate's William Saletan has written an interesting article on the subject.

Kosovo is now an independent state:

Kosovo declared independence from Serbia on Sunday, ending a long chapter in the bloody breakup of Yugoslavia.

The proclamation was made by leaders of the breakaway province's 90 percent ethnic Albanian majority, including former guerrillas who fought for independence in a 1998-99 war which claimed about 10,000 civilian lives.

"We, the leaders of our people, democratically elected, through this declaration proclaim Kosovo an independent and sovereign state," said the text read out in Parliament by Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim Thaci.

Kosovo will be a "society that respects human dignity" and is committed to confronting the "painful legacy of the recent past, in a spirit of reconciliation and forgiveness."

All 109 deputies present at the session in the capital, Pristina, voted in favor with a show of hands. Eleven deputies from ethnic minorities, including Serbs, were absent.

Congratulations!

The Advocate has an interview with the 21-year-old super-Democrat.

A British government health advisory body suggests smokers should pay for a licence before they lit up.

The Economist comments on the Archbishop of Canterbury's suggestion about Britain adopting Islamic sharia law:

It makes no sense in a pluralistic society to give one church special status. Nor does it make sense, in a largely secular country, to give special status to all faiths. The point of democracies is that the public arena is open to all groups—religious, humanist or football fans. The quality of the argument, not the quality of the access to power, is what matters. And citizens, not theocrats, choose.

Exactly.

Background: "Archbishop Wants Islamic Sharia Law in Britain"

The democratic side has no clear winner to date, but the trend seen in the latest metapoll from Pollster suggests Barack Obama will win the party's nomination:

The republican side has a clear winner in John McCain. No one threatens his big lead, and there is no doubt he will be the GOP nominee. Metapoll from Pollster:

A 53-million-euro software filter aimed to protect the youth from online pornography has been declared a failure by the Australian government. From the Sydney Morning Herald:

Sixteen-year-old Tom Wood, aka "The Porn Cracker", who shot to national prominence when he showed the new NetAlert filters could be bypassed by any savvy teenager in a matter of minutes, said the scheme had been a waste of time and money.

"Although these are amongst the best PC-based filters available, it didn't take long for teens to work out how to bypass them," said the schoolboy with a passion for cyber-safety.

Australian politicians are idiots if they think the government could ever deny teenage boys access to online pornography. I would suggest information instead. In most cases, pornography is nothing but harmless sexual entertainment. However, there is a lot of disturbing pornography on the Internet, so the best thing a parent responsible for a teenager can do is to calmly inform about this. The teenager will find it sooner or later anyway.

The Young Greens—the Swedish Green Party's youth organization—elected a new spokesman today. His name is Jakop Dalunde, and although I strongly oppose the semi-communist politics of the organization he now heads, the aesthete in me makes me a big fan.

(Photo taken from Dalunde's flickr homepage.)

"The America Song" by T. Moore:

(Via Andrew Sullivan.)

More here.

Yesterday, I learned that Copenhagen Gay Pride might be folded this year due to lack of funding. Today, I found something for frustrated people to do instead. Masturbate-a-Thon is coming to Copenhagen in May:

Hot on the heels of San Francisco and London, Copenhagen is to host a Masturbate-a-Thon in May which organisers hope will help break lingering taboos about self-love, an organiser said today.

Pia Struck Madsen, a sexologist in the Danish capital, said her goal was to see men and women from all backgrounds come together—pardon the pun—and join an event that promises "pleasure, relaxation and sexual self-discovery".

"Masturbation is positive, safe and an erotic alternative," she said ahead of the event on May 31, to take place at a yet-to-be-decided venue with separate rooms for men, women and those who don't mind mingling.

Swedish Defence Minister Sten Tolgfors: "NATO membership is, for the Moderates, a natural step in the long-term. But the [government] coalition's agreement that the issue is not on the political agenda during our mandate still stands."

I am all in favour of Sweden joining NATO, but I would prefer a common European defence.

More in Swedish here.

Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard and his wife are in hiding from Islamist fascists who wants to kill him for drawing a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad. Flemming Rose, a friend of the Westergaards, tells their story:

Kurt Westergaard, my colleague and good friend, has been on the run for the last three months. This is because Danish police received information about a plot to kill the 73-year-old cartoonist, who drew the now-infamous cartoon of Mohammed with a bomb in his turban for Jyllands-Posten in 2005.

I have known about the difficult situation of Kurt and his wife Gitte for some time, and I have to say that I am amazed by the way he has handled himself. While it has been a depressing time for Kurt and his family, he insists that he will not be intimidated.

"The toughest part of it has been to watch the anxiety of my children and other close relatives," Kurt told me last week before the story broke. "I haven't been able to help them out, and that bothers me."

He added that anger has overtaken the sense of shock, though he understands that he will have to live with death threats for the rest of his life.

"I am old and it's too late to threaten me into silence. I do not fear for my life, but I am really angry that people are going after me just because I have done my work as a cartoonist."

No wonder Islamization scares people throughout the world.

Read Mr Rose's article in full here.

Pakistani Islamists are burning the Danish and Swedish flags in protest against a controversial Muhammad cartoon reappearing in several Scandinavian newspapers this week. What these silly fools don't understand is that neither Danes nor Swedes care about flag desecration; we are used to much worse from artists and performers in our own countries. Moreover, we take pride in our tolerance of people who wish to express themselves this way. So keep them flags burning, morons!

(Seen in picture is Desecrate the Flag (1967) by Swedish artist Carl Johan de Geer.)

Lack of funding could cancel the annual Pride Parade in Copenhagen. I think this is God's way of telling me I ought to attend Provincetown Bear Week instead.

"Sweden has moved up to a ninth place tie with Denmark in the 2007 prosperity rankings by the Organization for Economic Growth and Development," The Local reports.

Kosovo, now an autonomous province of Serbia, is expected to declare itself a fully independent state this weekend. After two decades of war ands unrest, this new statehood just might bring with it a peaceful future for the Kosovoans. The problem is that the Serbs are far from pleased with what is about to happen, and they are currently the second largest ethnic group in Kosovo. And to many Serbian nationalists, Kosovo is a symbol of their country's historic victory over the Muslim Turks and Albanians—in the nationalistic propaganda, Serbs portray themselves as the saviours of European Christianity.

Europe is holding its breath, hoping Serbia will come to grips with the former province declaring itself a sovereign state. German weekly magazine Der Spiegel has an interesting article on Kosovo's independence. I quote the opening paragraph:

A tense quiet holds in Kosovo a few days before the expected declaration of independence. NATO peacekeepers say they have the situation under control. And the EU mission, which is supposed to foster social harmony, is already standing at the ready.

Read the article in full here.

(Via Tim Blair.)

From 365gay.com:

"I welcome the decision," said Welfare Minister Isaac Herzog. "There is no reason why same-sex couples who meet the criteria for adoption should not be able to join the process of adoption and of parenthood. We must adapt to the spirit of the times and the changes that are afoot."

Israel has moved quickly on gay civil rights since the Knesset decriminalized homosexuality in 1988. There have been no restrictions on gays serving in the military since 1993. In 2000, the age of consent for gays was lowered to 16, to match the legal age for consensual sex for heterosexuals.

Gay couples are given most federal rights in Israel, although gay marriages (which are only religious marriages in Israel) are not permitted. Gay marriages performed abroad, however, are recognized as of 2006.

(Via tip from Johan.)

The latest national opinion poll from Rasmussen:

Obama 49% (46%)
Clinton 37% (41%)

Yeasterday's figures are shown in parentheses.

(Via Drudge Report.)

No surprise really. Ann Coulter is a political jester. But still, to make Barack Obama's middle name an issue is beyond ridiculous.

His name is Hussein, so he must resemble Saddam, right?

There you have it—the logic of a dimwit.

Barack Obama and John McCain (picture) were the two winners in yesterday's primary elections in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington DC. Obama was first of the two to give a victory speech. He was enthusiastic about the federal government providing health care for all Americans, and I bet many of those living without sufficient health insurance liked what they heard. And I do not blame them—I, too, like Obama and his positive message of change. What bothers me, though, is the way he wants to change things. Therefore I appreciated what McCain said on government in his victory speech:

We do not yet know for certain who will have the honor of being the Democratic Party's nominee for President. But we know where either of their candidates will lead this country, and we dare not let them. They will promise a new approach to governing, but offer only the policies of a political orthodoxy that insists the solution to government's failures is to simply make it bigger. They will appeal to our dreams of a better future for ourselves, our families and our country, but they would take from us more of the wealth we have earned to build those dreams and assure us that government is better able than we are to make decisions about our future for us. They will promise to break with the failed politics of the past, but will campaign in ways that seek to minimize their exposure to questions from the press and challenges from voters who ask more from their candidates than an empty promise of "trust me, I know better." They will paint a picture of the world in which America's mistakes are a greater threat to our security than the malevolent intentions of an enemy that despises us and our ideals; a world that can be made safer and more peaceful by placating our implacable foes and breaking faith with allies and the millions of people in this world for whom America, and the global progress of our ideals, has long been "the last, best hope of earth."

We will offer different ideas, based in a better understanding of the challenges we face, and the resolve to confront them with confidence in the strength and ideals of free people. We believe that Americans, not our detractors and certainly not our enemies, are on the right side of history. We trust in the strength, industry and goodness of the American people. We don't believe that government has all the answers. We believe that government must respect the rights, property and opportunities of the people to whom we are accountable. We don't believe in growing the size of government to make it easier to serve our own ambitions. We believe that what government is expected to do, what we cannot do for ourselves individually, it must do with competence, resolve and wisdom.

It's difficult not to like a man who stands up for liberty and small-government politics in an era where more politicians seem to be the popular approach to every problem in society.

McCain's victory speech in full here. Obama's victory speech here.

(Photo by Marc Nozell.)

A gay and lesbian centre in Austria has issued a Europe-wide poster competition targeting homophobia in football:

All poster submissions must reach Qwien Kultur by the end of May 2008. A pre-selection jury will select the best 50, after which a jury of well-known experts will decide on the best three. The announcement of the winner and the presentation of the prize money will be made public through media partners. During the UEFA EURO 2008 and till the Rainbow Parade in mid-July 2008, the best 50 posters will be exhibited in a public venue.

More in Swedish here.

Slate gives an in-depth look at the terminology.

From The Local:

Previously, it was thought that Viking ladies wore a long garment held up by braces, made of square pieces of wool whose front and back sides were contained with a belt. The characteristic decorative circular buckles, a common find at many Viking-era grave sites, were believed to have been worn at the collarbone.

"The excavations which were done way back in the 1800s showed that this is not correct, and that the buckles instead were placed centrally over each breast. The traditional interpretation is that the buckles fell down to the waist after the body decomposed, but that is a prudish reconstruction," says archaeologist Larsson.

[...]

Larsson's theory that the well-dressed Viking woman's garment was open at the front and had a train is supported by a gilded bronze figure discovered in the county of Uppsala. She feels that some aspects of the heathen fashion were too much for Christian missionaries.

"One might imagine that the Christian church had some misgivings about a style of dress which emphasized the breast and in addition revealed the front of the linen blouse underneath. It is also possible that this outfit was associated with pagan rituals and was therefore forbidden," Larsson speculates.

Or could it be a case of wardrobe malfunction?

Chelsea Clinton eats breakfast with 21-year-old super delegate.

From the New York Times:

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and her advisers increasingly believe that, after a series of losses, she has been boxed into a must-win position in the Ohio and Texas primaries on March 4, and she has begun reassuring anxious donors and superdelegates that the nomination is not slipping away from her, aides said on Monday.

Mrs. Clinton held a buck-up-the-troops conference call on Monday with donors, superdelegates and other supporters; several said afterward that she had sounded tired and a little down, but determined about Ohio and Texas.

They also said that they had not been especially soothed, and that they believed she might be on a losing streak that could jeopardize her competitiveness in those states.

"She has to win both Ohio and Texas comfortably, or she's out," said one superdelegate who has endorsed Mrs. Clinton, and who spoke on condition of anonymity to share a candid assessment. "The campaign is starting to come to terms with that." Campaign advisers, also speaking privately in order to speak plainly, confirmed this view.

A few years ago, I had one of those really good conversations that sticks in one's mind. It was well past midnight and a friend and I talked about our plans for the future. My friend wanted to make music and had written some new lyrics. He hesitated to show them to me, fearing I would laugh and ridicule him because they were "pathetic love songs". And they were pathetic, but brilliant because of it. I remember saying that the best writing always borders on the pathetic. And I meant it. The best writing, the kind that makes people respond the most, is often pathetic in the sense that it appeals to our emotions rather than our intellect.

I came to think of this when I read about Helen Crompton's reaction to the news of Heath Ledger's death. I recognize her reaction in myself. I, too, can get very emotional about people I don't know. It's pathetic, but it's human, so it's OK. The tragic death of a celebrity touches us the way a really good love song does. In my lifetime I have seen the same phenomenon several times: River Phoenix, Olof Palme, Princess Diana—famous people ripped from life and idolized posthumously by people who never really knew them. We remember them like we remember a melodramatic love song and a tear-jerking novel. It's that sad.

Apparently, this was a popular T-shirt motif at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington last week. Says more about the mental state of Republican grassroots than about John McCain.

I managed to overcome my writer's block and finish my paper on free will in time to meet the deadline. I felt an incredible sense of relief when I handed in the paper two hours ago. I'm fully aware of the fact this is far from the best writing I have done, but my professor seemed pleased enough when he read it through. In any case, thanks for the tips, advice, and inspirational discussions that followed from my frustrated blog entry on Saturday.

Academic writing is hard, especially when you are new to the subject you are supposed to discuss. But I think Calvin makes a really good observation in this comic strip:

Now she cries again.

(Photo by Carolyn Kaster.)

Venezuelan ruler Hugo Chávez is a professional liar, so it will hardly come as a surprise to anyone that he rewrites the history of the man he says he admires the most. But friends of the truth are onto his lies. In this week's issue, The Economist tells the true story of Simón Bolívar—a man devoted to enlightened ideals and free-market liberalism:

In Latin America it often seems that the past is of more moment than the present, and nowhere more so than in Venezuela. Hugo Chávez, the country's leftist president, invokes Simón Bolívar, the liberator of northern South America from Spain, as his inspiration. He claims to be leading a "Bolivarian Revolution" and has renamed the country the "Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela".

Last month Mr Chávez took this cult of the past a step further. On January 28th the official gazette carried decrees setting up two investigative committees. The first will look at (deteriorating) public health in the capital. The second, composed of the vice-president, no fewer than ten ministers, the attorney-general and the head of the cultural institute, has a weightier mission: its job is to "clear up the important doubts woven around the death of the Liberator". In December, Mr Chávez said that Bolívar might have been poisoned by his Colombian opponents. That is not his only extravagant claim. He has implied that Bolívar was a socialist or even a communist, comparing him to both Mao Zedong and Che Guevara.

Bolívar was indeed a great military leader. He believed that the newly liberated countries should stick together. In that sense he is rightly held up as an early champion of Latin American integration, even though sticking together proved impossible. Yet many of his political ideas were very different from Mr Chávez's.

Bolívar was a Venezuelan aristocrat who inherited estates and mines. He was a man of the Enlightenment, a reader of Adam Smith and John Locke as well as of Voltaire and Rousseau. He was an economic liberal who freed his own slaves, but a political conservative. He believed the new republics needed strong government. He admired the United States, although he feared its potential power. He was a devoted Anglophile—hardly the attitude of an "anti-imperialist".

Apparently, football (soccer) was a popular sport in ancient Greece. It was called Episkyros or Phaininda, and the players were naked.

"If any modern day footballers tried to recreate that scene today, charges would probably be filed. It was a different time, two millennia ago," writes Dave Warner.

Well, yes, probably... I still think we ought to go back to that good old custom though. Naked footballers would bring a new dimension to the game.

What will Ann Coulter make of this? From The Economist:

Four days before Super Tuesday, Mr McCain addressed a crowd in Chicago. He was unpolished but pugnacious. He spoke of terrorists who put explosive vests on mentally disabled women. He spoke of Democratic leaders who want to surrender in Iraq. He promised to reach out to Democratic, libertarian, vegetarian and even Trotskyite voters. He promised to beat either Mrs Clinton or Mr Obama like a drum. He barely mentioned his Republican rivals.

I'm panicking. I have a really important paper on free will to write. The deadline is noon on Monday. I should have done about half of it by now, but I'm unable to write even a single sentence. The topic is not any of my specialities, and now I realize I don't know where to begin. The more I try to sort my thoughts, the more confused I feel.

God, if you exist, could you please give me some inspiration—or at least a first sentence to work with!

Carl Stanley McGee, a married Massachusetts official, has been arrested after performing oral sex on a 15-year-old male in a Florida steam room. In most counties in Europe this would not be a crime. But in Florida, the age of consent is eighteen, so Mr McGee now risks being sentenced as a child molester.

Anon: "The Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky story was sadly underplayed."

In a recent interview, the Vice-President of the European Commission said she is fed up with the "reign of old men" in Brussels corridors. "It is very bad for public opinion. The people see male politicians scheming behind closed doors, and that old men choose old men, as always," she said. "Just look at the 'family photos' at the EU summits. It's almost all only men that are lined up. Gee, humanity consists of fifty per cent women!"

I absolutely do not know where Mrs Wallström got this idea. She's deluded. The EU "family photo" seen above ought to prove her wrong.

Hillary Clinton is furious after MSNBC anchor suggested daughter Chelsea has been "pimped out".

A new poll from the Associated Press suggests President Bush and the Congress has never been this unpopular with the American people:

It's almost as if people can barely stand the thought of President Bush and Congress anymore. Bush reached his lowest approval rating in The Associated Press-Ipsos poll on Friday as only 30 percent said they like the job he is doing, including an all-time low in his support by Republicans. Congress' approval fell to just 22 percent, equaling its poorest grade in the survey. Both marks dropped by 4 percentage points since early January.

I will spend the weekend writing a paper on free will. I might publish parts of it here as I go along. If I decide not to, the next few days will not see much blogging.

From the Onion.

From the Onion.

Mitt Romney: "We need to teach our children that before they have babies, they get married."

Why not teach the children that the most important thing is to always make sure babies are welcome and brought up in a safe environment, being this is a traditional nuclear family or not?

Mitt Romney drops out. Good! I think it's only a matter of days until Mike Huckabee does the same. The question now is if Ron Paul will run as an independent.

Tonight I listened to a lecture by Swedish free-marketeer Johnny Munkhammar. In his latest book, The Guide to Reform, he explains how he thinks liberal reforms are possible despite those obstacles many politicians may find overwhelming. Mr Munkhammar gave an inspiring lecture, although I think many politicians lack the much-needed courage to challenge those who benefit from the status quo.

I snapped this photo during the lecture. Not a flattering picture perhaps, but I didn't want to turn on the flash.

This is truly disturbing:

The Archbishop of Canterbury has today said that the adoption of Islamic Sharia law in the UK is "unavoidable" and that it would help maintain social cohesion.

Rowan Williams told BBC Radio 4's World At One that the UK has to "face up to the fact" that some of its citizens do not relate to the British legal system.

He says that Muslims could choose to have marital disputes or financial matters dealt with in a Sharia court. He added Muslims should not have to choose between "the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty".

Dr Williams said there was a place for finding a "constructive accommodation" in areas such as marriage - allowing Muslim women to avoid Western divorce proceedings.

Other religions enjoyed such tolerance of their own laws, he pointed out, but stressed that it could never be allowed to take precedence over an individual's rights as a citizen.

Does anyone think Sharia laws would not violate the rights of citizens? If the Archbishop's proposal were to be implemented, any person who happens to be born into an Islamic minority group would be the subject of religious laws resembling those Europe had in mediaeval times. In other words, Muslim women should be forced to accept conditions unacceptable to Christian, Jewish, and secular women.

The autopsy was inconclusive, but now the test results are in. Ellen Borakove, director of public affairs at the New York Chief Medical Examiner's Office, has confirmed Heath Ledger died of acute intoxication by the combined effects of oxycodone, hydrocodone, diazepam, temazepam, alprazolam, and doxylamine. "The New York Medical Examiner ruled out suicide," writes the West Australian.

It's old news by now, but Hillary Clinton won California and New Mexico. When I signed off this morning, the final results were not in. On the chart below you can see how many delegates the candidates have at this moment. It's still a close tie between Clinton and Obama in the democratic race, while John McCain is well ahead in the republican race.

He managed to quit the sinful—yet adorable—homosexual lifestyle for a year, but then relapsed into queerness. At least that is what some people think after Ted Haggard issued a press release announcing he is leaving the New Life Church Restoration Team (a turn-gay-men-straight programme).

Ted Haggard's leadership of New Life Church for many years was extraordinary and the depth of spiritual maturity that is found today in the church is in large part attributed to his leadership as the founding senior pastor.

In January 2007, Ted Haggard voluntarily agreed to enter a process of spiritual restoration. He has selected Phoenix First Assembly and Pastor Tommy Barnett as his local church fellowship and is maintaining an accountability relationship there. He has recently requested to end his official relationship with the New Life Church Restoration Team and this has been accepted by them.

New Life Church recognizes the process of restoring Ted Haggard is incomplete and maintains its original stance that he should not return to vocational ministry. However, we wish him and his family only success in the future.

Because spiritual restoration is a necessarily confidential process, the church does not anticipate that it, or its Overseers or Restorers will make further comment about it.

More here.

3:02: Welcome! After a later-than-expected logon, my commentary on tonight's events in the United States begins. Twenty-four states and American Samoa hold either caucuses or primary elections for one or both parties. The results are coming in, as more states are about to close the polls.

3:25: This chart doesn't say anything about the actual result coming in later tonight, but to Ron Paul fans it's probably nice to see him on top even if it's only for a short while.

5:11: Everyone is waiting for California. Here's the results so far. Democratic candidates and the states they have won or are predicted to win:

Barack Obama
Alabama
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Georgia
Idaho
Illinois
Kansas
Minnesota
North Dakota

Hillary Clinton
Arizona
Arkansas
Massachusetts
Missouri
New Jersey
New York
Oklahoma
Tennessee
Utah

5:17: Republican candidates and the states they have won or are predicted to win:

John McCain
Arizona
Connecticut
Delaware
Illinois
Missouri
New Jersey
New York
Oklahoma

Mitt Romney
Colorado
Massachusetts
Minnesota
Montana
North Dakota
Utah

Mike Huckabee
Alabama
Arkansas
Georgia
Tennessee
West Virginia

6:23: CNN's exit polls suggest Hillary Clinton will win the Democratic primary in California. According to the same exit poll, John McCain will win the Republican primary.

6:54: Obama wins Alaska and Utah. Clinton wins Mew Mexico.

7:48: Obama wins Missouri, North Dakota, and Mew Mexico.

8:18: The Democratic primaries in New Mexico and California are still too close to call. It could take a few hours before we know for sure. One thing's for sure though, it's not over yet. Clinton and Obama are neck and neck, so their campaigning will probably continue for another two months.

That's it for now. I'm signing off.

It has been a mad day of endless meetings. Now it's time for a three-hour nap before I begin my "Super Duper Tuesday" blogging.

I'm a bit annoyed after reading a quote from Swedish magazine Axess on Dick Erixon's blog. What annoys me is the deliberate abuse of the word "nihilist". To many conservatives, the term is now used to discredit anyone who doesn't share their devotion to God and tradition. In context, the word is used merely as a meaningless insult, but by using it they are suggesting that everyone with a sceptic mind is amoral.

Aidsmap reports that Swiss HIV experts have produced the first-ever consensus statement to say that HIV-positive individuals on effective antiretroviral therapy and without any other sexually transmitted infection are sexually non-infectious.

Government authorities in Europe and elsewhere are reluctant to discuss the issue because they fear people might get it wrong and assume unprotected sex is safe. I think that is wise. However, the new knowledge stresses the importance of people with HIV obtaining working medication. People not getting the right medical treatment in time to halt the infection effectively is an effect caused by the Swedish legislation I wrote about yesterday. Many people in this country avoid taking a HIV test because they fear the legal consequences. I know quite a few who never seek help at Swedish hospitals when they think they might test positive. Instead, they take the test at some private clinic while on holiday abroad.

A few years ago, the Swedish Association for Gay and Lesbian Physicians and Dentists urged the government to rethink its policy on HIV, as more people did not seek medical advice until they had developed the first sign of full-blown AIDS. I have met doctors who confirmed this situation, although I am not sure how common it is.

In any case, the Swiss report should add to the criticism of Sweden's counterproductive disease-control legislation. People should not have to fear penalties for being HIV-positive.

Rex Wockner has more.

The religious moralists are on the move. Now they have forced a shop in Virginia to remove two posters of youths revealing too much skin. From the United Press International:

An Abercrombie & Fitch store manager in Virginia was given a ticket by a police officer who found two advertising posters too sexually provocative.

The two large posters, one showing part of a male butt and the other showing a woman topless with her hands covering her nipples, were confiscated from the Abercrombie & Fitch store in Lynnhaven Mall by Virginia Beach Police Saturday, the Newport News (Va.) Daily Press reported.

The manager was issued a citation on obscenity charges.

The confiscation was sparked by several citizen complaints about the displays, said police spokesman Adam Bernstein.

"An officer went and looked at them, and thought himself that they were pretty racy," he said.

The store manager also was given a copy of City Code Section 22-31, which specifies that it is illegal to display any obscene material in a business that is open to juveniles.

The picture seen above is not one the confiscated ones, but I liked this one the most. If you want to see the forbidden pictures, they are still available in Abercrombie & Fitch's photo gallery.

(Via Svenska Dagbladet.)

The wall separating Gaza from Egypt came down for a few days, which was enough for Palestinian terrorists to sneak into Israel. Today, a suicide bomber killed an innocent civilian in Dimona while Palestinians in Gaza City celebrated the death in the streets. Haaretz reports:

Negev Police Chief Yossi Porianta said that there had been two suicide bombers, but only one managed to detonate his explosives belt; the other was shot dead by security forces before he could blow himself up.

The second bomber had apparently been knocked out by the force of the first blast and was about to detonate his own belt, when rescue teams noticed the explosives and alerted police, who shot him at point blank.

The suicide bombers entered Israel from Egypt after Gaza militants blew
up the Gaza-Egypt border wall, a Palestinian militant said.

Abu Fouad, a spokesman for the Fatah-allied Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades - which claimed responsibility for the attack - said the operation had been planned for a month, but was made possible after militants violently opened Gaza's border with Egypt on January 23.

Security forces had been on high alert due to fears that the breach in the border fence between Gaza and Egypt would lead to an increase in terrorist attacks against Israel.

Soroka Medical Center in Be'er Sheva said that one person was in critical condition, with apparent head injuries; two people were moderately wounded and eight others had light wounds.

The woman killed in the attack was identified as a resident of Dimona.

I don't want to alarm my readers, but I would urge you to immediately stop inhaling those microscopic flecks of pig brain you like to get high on. It's not good for you.

OK, I admit I couldn't refuse the headline. Just had to use it.

P. J. O'Rourke writes a droll letter explaining the American election to Europeans:

America's political parties are indistinguishable to the European eye. A British journalist once described the situation thus: "America is a one-party state, but just like Americans they've got two of them." (I forget which British journalist said that. But there are so many British journalists who should be forgotten. Maybe it was Alexander Cockburn.)

The difference between American parties is actually simple. Democrats are in favor of higher taxes to pay for greater spending, while Republicans are in favor of greater spending, for which the taxpayers will pay.

(Via Kulturrevolution.)

Barack Obama has voiced two contradictory opinions on the legal status of cannabis. At a college debate in 2004 he said, "I think we need to rethink and decriminalize our marijuana laws." However, during a televised presidential debate last year he said, "I'm not somebody who believes in legalization of marijuana."

What is it to be? Well, it seems he has now decided to go for legalization. From the Washington Times:

Asked about the two different answers, Mr. Obama's presidential campaign said he in fact has "always" supported decriminalizing marijuana as he answered in 2004, meaning the candidate mistakenly raised his hand during the presidential debate last fall.

That position leaves Mr. Obama as the lone presidential candidate among the four leading challengers in either party who supports eliminating criminal penalties for marijuana. Mr. Obama's chief rival for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Hillary Clinton, opposes decriminalization, Clinton campaign spokesman Phil Singer said.

I begin to really, really like this man. I never thought I would favour a big-government "liberal" over Reagan-like John McCain, but a man who stands up for gay rights and decriminalization of cannabis is hard to resist.

(Via Cannabis.se.)

Later today, hunky quarterback Tom Brady of the New England Patriots will be the centre of attention at the University of Phoenix Stadium in Arizona.

It's Super Bowl! Better get the drool bucket.

The number of newly infected Swedish gay men with HIV has doubled in a year. Never before has there been this many people living with the virus. But people are still extremely unaware of this. In fact, if one reads the mainstream media, it's easy to get the impression that HIV is extremely rare and only affects a handful of people. As a result, the media is making headline news whenever a man or a woman with HIV is caught having sex. This, in turn, is a result of Sweden's unique disease-control legislation, which gives the authorities the right to imprison a person with HIV on suspicion that he or she might have unprotected sex in the future. (No kidding, only Cuba has similar laws!)

Swedes like to think that HIV doesn't concern them. Unfortunately, this attitude has spread to the gay community, where a new generation of teenagers and twenty-somethings have unsafe sex on the naïve assumption that someone with HIV will tell them before having sex.

In the public debate on this issue, it's assumed that a person with HIV is always a superhuman who never gets drunk, takes drugs, has one-night-stands, or offers sex for money. This is a potentially lethal naivety.

Queer activist Tomas Hemstad has written an excellent article about this. I recommend it to anyone able to read Swedish. Here is an extract:

Av de större städer, städer med en homosexuell infrastruktur, som jag har vistats i, är Stockholm sämst på hiv. Det finns ingen dialog, ingen öppenhet, ingen solidaritet, hivpositiva finns i stort sett inte annat än som statistik. Detta är förödande. Hiv är kanske ingen bögpest men om vi inte erkänner sjukdomen i bögvärlden, så kommer aldrig den strejta världen haka på.

(Via Slog.)

Stephen H. Miller: "I distrust charisma, especially when it's not accompanied by a record of leadership and competence."

Eva Hagberg of Esquire writes about the a North Korean monstrosity:

It's the Ryugyong Hotel in North Korea, where the world's 22nd largest skyscraper has been vacant for two decades and is likely to stay that way ... forever.

A picture doesn't lie—the one-hundred-and-five-story Ryugyong Hotel is hideous, dominating the Pyongyang skyline like some twisted North Korean version of Cinderella's castle. Not that you would be able to tell from the official government photos of the North Korean capital—the hotel is such an eyesore, the Communist regime routinely covers it up, airbrushing it to make it look like it's open—or Photoshopping or cropping it out of pictures completely.

Even by Communist standards, the 3,000-room hotel is hideously ugly, a series of three gray 328-foot long concrete wings shaped into a steep pyramid. With 75 degree sides that rise to an apex of 1,083 feet, the Hotel of Doom (also known as the Phantom Hotel and the Phantom Pyramid) isn't the just the worst designed building in the world—it's the worst-built building, too. In 1987, Baikdoosan Architects and Engineers put its first shovel into the ground and more than twenty years later, after North Korea poured more than two percent of its gross domestic product to building this monster, the hotel remains unoccupied, unopened, and unfinished.

대약진 운동?

It could be one of those afternoon programmes on God Channel.

From a leader in this week's The Economist:

Who would have thought that a friendless theocracy with a Holocaust-denying president, which hangs teenagers in public and stones women to death, could run diplomatic circles around America and its European allies? But Iran is doing just that. And it is doing so largely because of an extraordinary own goal by America's spies, the team behind the duff intelligence that brought you the Iraq war.

It doesn't take a fevered brain to assume that if Iran's ayatollahs get their hands on the bomb, the world could be in for some nasty surprises.

Iran is the biggest threat to world peace. Of course, the looniest people of the Left will deny that fact. To them, America is always the number one enemy no matter what. But to sane and reasonable people, a future Iran with the ability to launch nuclear missiles against Israel and Europe is a truly horrific idea. However, The Economist is right: had it not been for the faulty intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, the world would not hesitate to act decisively against Iran.

Who needs a kitchen when we've got twenty-four-seven drive-through restaurants? I snapped this picture while waiting for my food at the local burger place less than an hour ago. I thank God—or whoever is in charge—for living in this time an age. But most of all I praise capitalism for making this progress possible.

The longest and loudest applause line of yesterday's debate came when CNN's Wolf Blitzer noted that many Democrats have said they would like to see a Clinton-Obama or Obama-Clinton ticket in November. That is an interesting thought, but what about an Obama-Oprah ticket? The home-alone housewives would love it.

Ett tidigare inlägg genererade en hel del epost. Här är ett brev från en gammal bekant:

Jag har faktiskt inte tidigare tänkt tanken att det ju är du som är den store fobikern av oss. Jag är inte rädd för homosexuella, alltså är jag inte homofob.

Du, däremot är klart rädd för heterosexuella som inte tycker att hetero- och homosexualitet kan jämnställas. Du lider alltså av en allvarlig heterofobi.

Till detta kan paras din djupa avsky för allt som är kristet, oavsett vi talat Åke Green eller Kyrkan och kyrkans läror genom åren. Vips, så får vi fram din kristofobi.

Att det är du själv som upplever dig mycket utsatt och kränkt är bara löjligt. Du tillhör alla lämpliga militanta gaylobbys man kan tänka sig och en vacker dag vinner ni över oss heterosexuella.

Då kanske ni kan ha utställningar där Muhammed suger av Buddha till ex. Det är ju bara fin konst och visar manlig kärlek, eller hur?

Kämpa på Christopher! Du har ett fint följe i din kamp. Ledarna för alla stora partierna utom Kd. Men även de ändrar sig snart. Ingen vågar trotsa alliansen.

Trevlig helg!

Stefan Sanneskär

If you missed last night's debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, here's a good summation.

Några helnyktra homosexuella kände sig kränkta för att nykterhetsorganisationen IOGT-NTO hade rikshomofoben Åke Green som medlem. Nykterhetsorganisationen beslöt därför att låta avlägsna cancersvulsten och lät meddela att Green inte längre var önskvärd som medlem. Green såg en chans att åter få synas i media och tryckte därför på snabbvalsknappen. Några sekunder senare är Greens alltid lika kränkta kompis på Ölandsbladet i luren. Budet om homolobbyns senaste attack på de gudfruktiga hade snart nått varenda nationalistisk/slash/bibeltrogen hemsida i landet. Uteslutningen blev en stor nyhet.

Som ett synkroniserad PMS-utbrott kände sig nu varenda bibelgubbe kränkt för att deras favoritpastor inte längre fick festa utan alkohol tillsammans med de andra nykteristerna. En flod av tårar väller fram över det kristna landet Sverige.

– Hur kan de göra såhär mot den snälle predikanten? Den gode gubben Green ville ju bara hjälpa de där äckliga AIDS-bögarna som suktar efter barn och djur!

Stackars Åke!
Stackars nykterister!
Stackars alla kränkta människor!
Snyft.

(Somliga skulle behöva lära sig att koppla av. Starköl brukar hjälpa.)

2:13: Welcome! I will post comments during the debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, which began only a few minutes ago with some very modest opening statements by both candidates.

2:49: How would you address unemployment and low wages for African-Americans related to immigrant labour? Hillary could not refuse the opportunity to blame the employers for offering jobs to low-skilled immigrant. We have the exact same debate over here, with millions of illegal immigrant seeking a future in the European Union. Hillary Clinton's answer could be a replica of the camouflaged xenophobia some European populists on the Left thrive on. To blame the employers for the failures of the state is typical for leftist politicians who want the semi-racist, working-class vote.

3:02: Clinton thinks she will be the better president because she helped some poor children after graduating from university. Again, pure populism...

3:34: In my opinion, both candidates have a very naïve view on the Iraq war. It's one thing to say that America shouldn't have liberated the Iraqis from Saddam Hussein's regime back in 2003, but to say that America should now withdraw from Iraq within sixty days is simply irresponsible.

3:47: Could a Hillary Clinton White House "control" former president Clinton? Hillary's answer seems to be no.

3:52: The debate is over.

4:03: I would say Obama is the debate winner. He came across as a calm and reasonable man. However, it would not be fair to say that Clinton’s performance was bad. They did both pretty good.

This ends my running commentary on the first one-to-one debate between Clinton and Obama.

(Photo by Stephen Voss.)