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Politics : World Affairs Discussion -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (3759)	2/12/2004 4:14:22 AM
From: GUSTAVE JAEGER	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3959

Re: To many Australians, however, it seems bizarre. What are the French on about? They're on about nothing, I'm afraid... You Yanks want to make a fuss about France's anti-Muslim law because it somehow turns the tables on the French-Arab relationship. However, as I put it, that anti-Muslimwear ban will prove as difficult to enforce as a crackdown on jaywalking --and purposefully so. Hey, French officials are not THAT crazy, after all... We have a French turn of phrase that goes like this: "Dans sa grande sagesse, le legislateur a juge bon que...." It's all about "wisdom" (sagesse) --French lawmakers are wise. Gus

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (3759)	2/12/2004 7:43:20 AM
From: lorne	Respond to of 3959

Chinu. Good article. I came across a similar article a week or so ago. ......." The coming to power of Napoleon meant the repeal of much Jacobin anti-clericalism and for a time, there was peace between politicians and the church. However, in 1880 the militantly atheistic Jules Ferry (an ancestor of the present Education Minister, philosopher Luc Ferry) started the war with religion again, expelling all religious staff from public schools, and nuns from hospitals. France seemed set for turmoil again, but fortunately moderate elements intervened." ..... It appears to me that there is a similar move going on in the USA and other countries now.... I mean with the removal of any religious symbols from schools, court houses etc. I don't know about you but I don't want to see our governments controlled by any one religion. I don't want to see any one religion become the dominant and controlling religion in our countries such as is the case in muslim controlled countries. IMO France and other European countries have a real and legitimate concern and fear of religious violence. I say this because islam has proven through terrorism that they will use violence to reach their goal of dominance and with the ever growing population of muslim immigrants from violent religious countries into France and other European countries it is not surprising that fear has prompted action....maybe to late?? who knows. Question for you...Do you think that religion should play a role in the government of the USA?

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (3759)	2/13/2004 5:51:34 AM
From: GUSTAVE JAEGER	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3959

Black Power a la francaise: No place for French Muslims on party list Immigrants threaten to quit Chirac's UMP if they are not selected Jon Henley in Paris Friday February 13, 2004 The Guardian Leading immigrant members of France's ruling centre-right party threatened to leave politics yesterday unless candidates for next month's regional elections more fairly reflect the country's ethnic diversity. Militants in Jacques Chirac's party, the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), almost all second-generation immigrants of North African origin, said that despite the promises, candidate lists being drawn up this week suggested they would be "extremely lucky" to end up with even a dozen immigrant regional councillors out of a total of 1,720 electoral seats. The militants' revolt follows a heated debate in France about the country's failure to do more to integrate its six million-strong immigrant, mainly Muslim, people. Critics said the banning of Islamic veils in state schools failed to address the underlying problems of discrimation in education, jobs and housing. "We are enormously disappointed," said Rachid Kaci, a UMP activist who did not make it on to the party's list in the Ile-de-France region. "For months we have had grand speeches about equality of opportunity and an end to discrimination. But now that there is a real opportunity to send a powerful message, they do nothing. It is scandalous." Other militants said that while immigrant candidates had been included on the UMP's slates, they were rarely high enough up the list to be elected. "We refuse to be extras, to boost the party's image, just for the campaign," said Yazid Sabeg. "Are we really going to have to insist on quotas to achieve proper political integration?" Immigrant activists from the Socialist, Green and UMP parties have joined forces to launch a cross-party "civic rights movement". Their first aim, said the Green spokesman, Stephane Pocrain, was proper political representation. Mr Pocrain said: "Politicians here simply do not resemble the French population." A recent study by two university sociologists showed immigrants of North African origin held just seven seats on local and regional councils around France, and there were none in the national assembly. Aissa Dermouche, the only senior state representive of immigrant origin, was sworn in this week after being hauled from relative obscurity as head of a Nantes business school and hailed by Mr Chirac as a shining example of integration. In general, however, affirmative action is dismissed by politicians as an admission that the ideals of liberty and equality have not worked. France's High Council on Integration said last month that integration policy over the past 30 years showed "very serious failings". The body wrote this week to all the political parties asking them to ensure immmigrants got an equal chance to be candidates. Community leaders say the Socialists, punished by voters in 2002 for the failure of Lionel Jospin to include an immigrant in his 1997 government, have made a big effort for the March regional polls. Analysts believe that up to 40 Socialist regional councillors of immigrant origin should be elected. guardian.co.uk

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (3759)	2/13/2004 3:03:06 PM
From: lorne	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 3959

Now here is something interesting that could just catch on. 'Mad Vlad' urges West and Russia to destroy Islam By Julius Strauss in Moscow (Filed: 13/02/2004) news.telegraph.co.uk The West should unite with Russia against Islamic radicals and Chinese immigrants, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the flamboyant Russian ultra-nationalist, said yesterday. The firebrand politician, who is making a moderate political comeback in Russia, gave warning that if the former Cold War enemies did not form an alliance they would be overrun. In the West, the man who won the soubriquet "Mad Vlad" and who struck fear into the hearts of political leaders in the 1990s with his battery of threats, is considered a political has-been. Even in his homeland the former lawyer, who has called for the Russian army to invade Alaska and India, drop nuclear weapons on Japan and flood Germany with radioactive waste, is seen as a buffoon. But he also has a reputation as a political weather vane who skilfully mines a rich lode in the Russian popular psyche. The appeal of his brand of strong authority and ethnic nationalism was shown in last December's parliamentary elections when his party, and Rodina, another ultra-nationalist group, won more than 20 per cent of the vote. In the same poll Russia's liberal parties, which stood behind the reforms of the 1990s, sank almost without trace, failing to reach the threshold necessary to win representation in parliament. Perhaps significantly, Mr Zhirinovsky's scorching rhetoric is now directed less against the West and the Jews, his former bogeymen, but Islam and Asia. "The white race is perishing," he said. "Every day there are fewer and fewer of us. We are half as many as we were 40 years ago. We must unite against the yellow peril and the green menace. "We both have the same problem: the invasion of the Asians. You have Pakistan and India, we have central Asia and the Caucasus. "Washington, London, Moscow and Tel Aviv need to form a common front. If we don't, the terrorist attacks we see today will continue for another 50 years." Russians fear that the growing threat of militant Islam in the Caucasus and central Asia will strike at their soft and ill-protected underbelly. Asked about the threat presented by Chechen terrorists, who are thought to have been behind the bombing of an underground train in central Moscow that killed more than 40 people last week, Mr Zhirinovsky offered a radical solution. 'If I become president, I will let the entire Chechen community in Moscow know that, if there is a single terrorist attack anywhere in Moscow or in other cities in Russia, they will all be sent back to Chechnya. The attacks will stop immediately." The campaign opened yesterday for the presidential election due on March 14. But the contest is considered a one-horse race, with President Vladimir Putin likely to win more than 70 per cent of the vote and another four-year term. So certain is the outcome that rival heavyweights, including Mr Zhirinovsky and Gennady Zyuganov, the veteran Communist Party leader, have stayed out of the contest. Mr Zhirinovsky has nominated one of his bodyguards to represent his party, the Liberal Democrats. Asked about his record of violent outbursts, Mr Zhirinovsky said: "Putin is western, talks quietly, takes careful decisions and leaves the Russians in a torpor. His personal qualities cannot awake the Russian people."