Earlier today, a tribunal in Fredriksberg near Copenhagen acquitted Lars Hedegaard from charges of "racism". For the background and the context of this trial, see Diana West's excellent article from three weeks ago.

While I feel relieved and glad for Mr Hedegaard, this court ruling is no victory for free speech.  Mr Hedegaard was acquitted because of a circumstantial technicality.  While speaking his allegedly "racist" words, he could not have known that his words would be published. His words were not intended for public use, hence he was acquitted. But the court still considered his words offensive to muslims and therefore "racist".

The newest negotiations between “Iran and the world” have ended. Regarding the result of trying to convince the Mullahs to abandon their military nuclear project, the result is the usual one. The “Perms” of the SecCouncil, enhanced by the EU and Germany, came to talk turkey to Istanbul. In a way, so did Iran. Only Tehran demanded before taking its seat that its nuclear project be accepted as its natural right. As the cherry on the topping, the sanctions imposed to dissuade her from her undertaking were to be lifted. Thereafter, so Iran, the talks could begin.

By a hard-nosed judgment, in the case of theoretical postulates, their proof is not the abstract logic of their conjectures. All depends upon whether, if applied, the theory does or does not work. If one goes easy on the assumptions below the floating iceberg of speculation, Socialism is convincing as a theory. The creed’s durable popularity and resistance to reverses substantiate the claim. The doctrine’s only problem is that when and where it is implemented, the performance fails to live up to the theory. Shame and curse on politically prejudiced reality! 

Obama’s popularity is on the rise. According to Gallup, the growth in sympathy for the man is the largest with Independents (+7%) and with Republicans (+5%). These voters give the impression they think to have stopped his socialism in the recent elections, and now they want to offer him their hand while he is down. Americans are the most generous and forgiving people of the world. Americans are also extremely proud to have elected an African American as their President. That’s how they bought off the racist label forever.

This is Part 4 (A) of "'I See Further Than Others': Reflections On Oswald Spengler's The Decline of the West and The Hour of Decision", a serial essay by Steve Kogan.

Like speaks to like. In a singular observation on The Decline, Jorge Luis Borges remarks on a rare quality of Spengler's "virile pages, written between 1912 and 1917," which "were never contaminated by the hatred peculiar to those years" (1). It is a striking comment to make about a philosophy of history, for it does not address Spengler's ideas or scholarship but the moral character of the work in relation to its times. In this respect, Borges’ "Capsule Biography" belongs to the genre of the exemplary portrait and is closer to the spirit of Plutarch's Lives than to modern criticism.

In a perused weekly, a picture depicting a posing bin Laden has caught your correspondent’s attention. The man is shown with his crutch, which is a Kalashnikov. Properly so. Without the philosophical and theological arguments that the gun supports, the ideas of the movement would not score on the free market place of ideas. The struggle to implement heaven on earth according to the taste of the Prophet, would be unlikely to succeed if its best supporting claim would be discarded. At this juncture, through an association, another “impossible” comes to mind. A system with bin Laden’s preferences as its basic guideline would have never developed his essential Kalashnikov. Swords are slightly out of date since the time of last-ditch banzai attacks on tropical islands. Therefore, that assault rifle is the precondition of the global attention the Prophet’s warrior now commands. Oddly, to have it he had to import it. That from a culture whose most outstanding fundamental spiritual products, which are its driving force, he consciously condemns and rejects.

Interesting post by Nicu Popescu, on whether the EU's soft power is merely freeloading, on the European Council on Foreign Relations website.

The EU is proud that it is a ‘soft power’ (when you make others what you want through attraction, rather than coercion). It also thinks this is the most sophisticated and benefic way to exercise power (‘post-modern’ in other words). It might be true, but seen from the outside the logic of soft power might not be that appealing for others. In fact if you sit in Dushanbe, Caracas or Karachi why would you care for someone’s soft power?

Contrary to what the Algerian ambassador in Paris told RTL radio today, the defining criteria for a democratic regime are not different from country to country. This is what ambassador Missoum Sbih said this morning in an interview by Jean-Michel Aphatie:

G.C. Wallace, the last of the mainstream Southern Populists, always claimed that there wasn't a “dimes worth of difference” between Republicans and Democrats. Wallace's quip is also a beginning theme from Dr. Sean Gabb's book, Cultural Revolution, Culture War: How Conservatives Lost England, and How to Get It Back [on-line for download or purchase at http://www.libertarian.co.uk/]. Gabb offers an ideological explanation for the current British social-political environment, and then offers suggestions as to how the situation may be reversed. Although ostensibly writing about Great Britain, Gabb acknowledges that his insights hold throughout the West. At the time of writing Tony Blair's government, described as an “evil” regime, was in power. However Gabb recognized in Blair nothing original, but simply, “a working out of principles established before 1997. There was no break in continuity between the Blair and the Thatcher and Major Governments. It is notorious that no bad act of government since 1997 has been without precedent.” One often asks why, if governments and parties change, the course of social-political events never appreciably does? It is because, as Wallace noted above, political parties, whether Labour or Conservative, Democrat or Republican, typically share similar foundational cultural assumptions and goals. Gabb writes, “We can imagine a Conservative Government. It is much harder to imagine a government of conservatives.” Here, then, begins Gabb's historical analysis.

There are different conclusions that different people can arrive at from the Tucson massacre. From the event, after some cosmetic corrections, not a few of us can confirm conclusions that they had always needed to have verified. As so often, frequently the concept came first, the convenient and creative corroboration could be picked off the shelf thereafter. Some of the twisted interpretations that circulate support the thesis.  The news-management of the event tells less about the facts than about the way stories are built. One of the popular containers into which the tale is stuffed has to do with the “hate” which allegedly obsesses America. Accordingly, especially in Europe, “hate propaganda” is when someone criticizes Obama or some of the Democrats. The civic duty postulated by the fans abroad is that, by adhering to civility and good political manners, one is to support Obama. The enthusiasm is to be as ardent as is the officially sanctioned approval here.