A quote from Expatica, 27 November 2007

The area around the Champs-Elysees in central Paris has seen an alarming increase in violent crime, according to new figures Monday which appear to confirm the declining reputation of the world's most famous avenue. In its latest annual report, France's National Crime Observatory (OND) says that the number of personal assaults in the eighth arrondissement (district) of the capital, which includes the Champs-Elysees, increased by 32 percent in 2006 to more than 1,500.

A quote from former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing at his blog, 23 November 2007

I have taken on the work of comparing the draft of the new Treaty of Lisbon with the Constitution on the ‘nine essential points’ published on this blog.  To my surprise, and, to tell the truth, to my great satisfaction, these nine points reappear word for word in the new project. Not a comma has changed! The only thing is that you have to really look for them because they are dispersed in the texts the new Treaty refers to, namely the Treaties of Rome and Maastricht. The only difference is that the qualified majority voting is put off until 1 November 2014, while with the Constitution, it would have come into force straight after ratification. I do not see the interest of this delay and I think we could have done without it.

H/T Open Europe

Villiers-le-Bel, where French immigrant youths have been rioting for two consecutive nights, and Survilliers-Louvres are two suburbs to the north of Paris. They are only 10 kms apart. Last Sunday evening, Anne-Lorraine Schmitt, a 23-year old journalism student, the eldest of five children from a devout Catholic family, was stabbed to death on the RER suburban metro train. The stabbing happened at Survilliers, between the RER stations of Louvres and Fosses. Anne-Lorraine’s body was discovered in the RER terminus at Creil, 25 kms to the north. A few minutes later the French police arrested 43-year old Thierry Dève-Oglou.

A quote from George Orwell, “Wells, Hitler and the World State,” Horizon, August 1941

What has kept England on its feet during the past year? In part, no doubt, some vague idea about a better future, but chiefly the atavistic emotion of patriotism, the ingrained feeling of the English-speaking peoples that they are superior to foreigners. For the last twenty years the main object of English left-wing intellectuals has been to break this feeling down, and if they had succeeded, we might be watching the S.S. men patrolling the London streets at this moment. Similarly, why are the Russians fighting like tigers against the German invasion? In part, perhaps, for some half-remembered ideal of Utopian Socialism, but chiefly in defence of Holy Russia (the ‘sacred soil of the Fatherland’, etc. etc.), which Stalin has revived in an only slightly altered from. The energy that actually shapes the world springs from emotions – racial pride, leader-worship, religious belief, love of war – which liberal intellectuals mechanically write off as anachronisms, and which they have usually destroyed so completely in themselves as to have lost all power of action.

Yesterday evening, three young people died in the suburbs to the north of Paris. Mouhsin (15) and Lakamy (16), two immigrant youths, were killed in Villiers-le-Bel when their motorcycle, which is said to have been stolen, collided at high speed with a police vehicle. The two youths, who were not wearing compulsory crash helmets, died on the spot. A few hours later, Anne-Lorraine (23), a young journalist, was stabbed to death on a suburban train near Creil, whilst resisting a man who was trying to rape her. The man had already been convicted for violent sexual assault in 1996.

A quote from Spengler in The Asia Times, 26 November 2007

My long-held view is that we have not had nearly enough violence yet in the Middle East (see More killing, please!, June 12, 2003). The United States can do nothing to foster stability in the Middle East, because the slow-motion collapse of Islam makes the region inherently unstable.

A quote from Tony Blair in The Daily Telegraph, 26 November 2007

It’s difficult if you talk about religious faith in our political system. If you are in the American political system or others then you can talk about religious faith and people say ‘yes, that's fair enough’ and it is something they respond to quite naturally. You talk about it in our system and, frankly, people do think you’re a nutter.

A quote from The Boston Globe, 26 November 2007

"There is a concern that if and when the European Parliament is engaged, it is not going to be helpful to law enforcement," said Stewart Verdery, who was the Bush administration's top homeland security policy official from 2003 to 2005. He added, "Clearly the Parliament has been to the left of the European governments' structures as a whole."

A quote from Expatica, 25 November 2007

A memorial to the millions of Germans expelled from Eastern Europe at the close of World War II has fallen prey to inter-departmental wrangling and is likely to be delayed, the newspaper Die Welt reported Saturday. The government has committed itself to a "visible symbol" to mark the sufferings of up to 15 million ethnic Germans expelled as the war ended, but there has been vocal opposition from Poland and the Czech Republic, from where many were forced out. Die Welt said the Finance Ministry was unhappy with the site chosen, while the Foreign Office was insisting on the close involvement of Poland and the Czech Republic. The Foreign Office is reported to be against using the term "German victims."

A quote from Der Spiegel, 23 November 2007

The EU's inspectors are keeping themselves busy coming up with more and more regulations to govern even the most hidden corners of human existence, and that will cover the length and breadth of the EU – from northern Finland to Limassol on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus. Current regulations already run the gamut from protections against fine dust and noise to soil conservation to protections for workers against solar radiation and protections for non-smokers. A green paper for a "smoke-free Europe" is under discussion.