The luxury of public affairs ignorance supports cheating elites.

Two weeks ago the writer posted a piece here to discuss some overlooked reasons for bad governance. The essay assigned some responsibility to an electorate without an interest in its own fate, an indulgent political culture based on ignorance, and the neglected ability to render rational decisions. Since then, what is conveniently tagged to be the Greek crisis, has become a festering sore. Newly, the puss had broken through the bandages that, by catering to unconcerned citizens, political healers have applied in lieu of a genuine remedy. The purpose of the maneuver was not to help Greece but to hide the helper’s political responsibility.

Vidal Sassoon

I first became aware of Vidal Sassoon’s rise to prominence about 45 years ago as a young student at Cambridge University. It was the age of Beatlemania, the heyday of the fashion designer Mary Quant and her mini-skirts, of the celebrity photographer David Bailey, the spirit of Carnaby Street and the slightly hysterical excitement of “Swinging London.” Vidal Sassoon was part of that universal “Youthquake,” of a newly affluent and style-obsessed Western consumer society.

The wisdom of burning bridges one wishes to use to cross the river.

Some weeks ago, a German TV station showed a program about the American Dream. Regardless of rather pessimistic personal expectations, the program could not be skipped. Indeed, true to form, the long report concluded that the American Dream, once the key to general satisfaction, integration, and social peace, has faded. Accordingly, the certificate of death of the sustaining social myth and with it for the US was issued. 

Denial is leading to collective economic suicide in Europe and the United States. The French elected a socialist president who wants to raise taxes on those elusive rich and keep spending as if there is no tomorrow. 

Many on the left, including European socialists in tandem with the New York Times and its economist Paul Krugman, are falsely claiming that Europe and even the United States are being saddled with "austerity." Their claim is that governments are not spending enough to reduce unemployment. They want higher taxes on the most productive plus bigger government. 

Why most of the time we have our collective selves to blame.

We like to blame government for our troubles. This tells that government’s role might be overestimated. Nevertheless, many problems would not exist if statists had not fixed what worked before their interference.

Apparently, government power is limited when it endeavors to repair something it declares to be broken. A case can be made that it is a force whose intentions tend to be misdirected, its goals falsely identified, and the means chosen unfit to solve the problem. 

Only seldom will vacation travel sharpen the mind. More often than not, the exercise brings little relaxation. Much of the activity degenerates into dutifully checking off “must see” items and the pictures taken serve as the proof that the assignment had been completed. Your correspondent’s visit of Andalusia netted “results” that in part confirm the thesis. 

My book about Islam (Marked for Death: Islam’s War Against the West and Me) is being launched in New York on Tuesday. It posits that the Koran is not a book that was written by Allah, but on the contrary, one that was written by Muhammad. That is the truth, but to Islam that is outright blasphemy.

Islam claims that the Koran was written down by Allah in person before the beginning of time. It was written in Arabic, says verse 20:113. The original copy of the book – the Umm al-Kitab, the “Mother of the Book”- lies on a golden table in heaven. Consequently the Koran is of a totally different order than the Jewish or Christian bibles, which were written down by prophets or apostles. The Koran was written directly by Allah himself.

A review of Geert Wilders' latest book: Marked for Death - Islam's War Against the West and Me.

Following the defeat of fascism in World War II and the collapse of Soviet communism in the late 1980’s, Fukuyama and others posited the ‘End of History’ thesis, by which was meant that ideas of freedom and liberal democracy had won the day. How wrong they were! During the long years of the ‘Cold War’ and of the ‘Pax Americana’ in Europe and East Asia, cultural changes were gradually taking place in sheltered countries whose cultural elites in media, academia and politics, began to lose touch with the realities of the world. Deep resentments, born from both envy and free-rider guilt, were taking hold in many minds and, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, anti-Americanism raised its ugly head even in official policies of various West-European countries. Freed from the fear instilled by an immediate external threat, Europeans came to believe in illusory ‘soft power’ and that freedom could be ‘free’.  

Joseph B. Soloveitchik

On Good Friday I was a guest at an orthodox Seder evening in my local Synagogue, which is located somewhere at the far end of Germany between the three corners of Germany, Poland and Tchechia, where the echoes of the bygone era of communism won’t die. As everywhere in Germany these days this small Jewish community is dominated by Jewish refugees from Russia whose religious credentials and rituals where all but extinguished by Stalinism. By contrast the Rabbi got his orthodox training in Israel and works this bunch of secularized Jews, seemingly unable to remember any of the traditional cants, with utter devotion. This moving scene offered a lively demonstration of what it takes to get a civilization running. Jewish exceptionalism having survived over three thousand years nearly everywhere around the world has been utterly extinguished only in the Soviet Paradise of Russia. As sure as the German national socialist brand of secularism aimed at the physical termination of Jews the Russian international socialist brand aimed at the spiritual extinction of Judaism. In Germany today the remains of both secularizations are epitomized in a poem by Nobel Laureate Gunter Grass, who warns us of all nations about Israeli aggression threatening the rest of the world with annihilation.

It is elementary, that when you write about a term you should give its definition. In the case of corruption, we all know what is meant. This agreement does not help to get closer to a precise meaning that satisfies everybody at all times. Those that admit this and persist to give a definition are either fools or they write a weekly column. It is quite likely that the “or” can be omitted. 

Its omnipresence is what makes “corruption” as slippery as a freshly caught fish. We often become unaware participants because an innocent aspect is implied. This can make actions that open privileged opportunities not legally actionable and these are therefore not criminal. When I got my Swiss citizenship an official had to determine whether I am integrated. Due to assumptions he had reason to make in the light of my training, he skipped the obligatory questions about society and politics. Once he found out that I am a member of a local pistol club, being a participant himself, he visibly concluded that I “belong”. The case gets more complicated once other shared interests are exploited to pull the cart of a firm. For good reason, retired politicians are in demand as lobbyists. For the same reason, many countries limit their lobbying.