Posted on Wednesday, September 08, 2010 - 10:02 am:

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. . . did you catch that soon to be declawed Obama's speech yesterday? This guy has the thinnest skin of any President I have ever seen.

"They talk about me like a dog", said Obama. How presidential. What a wimp this guy is. President George W. Bush endured blistering criticism and never flinched. Like him or not, Bush has a moral backbone that the Messiah could only aspire to have.

Obama did make a mistake about his criticism of us Conservative Republicans. He said we are the party of no. He got that wrong. We proudly and loudly proclaim that we are the Party of HELL NO! Funny how this soon to be ex-president failed to mention that the Democrats control the Executive and both houses of Congress.

This guy has got to exit the stage and we have to repeal the continued attack on the American People by this human wrecking ball. Everything this guy touches turns to caca.

Expect to see mass resignations from his Cabinet after November.

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Posted on Wednesday, September 08, 2010 - 11:52 am:

School textbooks are one of the most crucial means by which a nation passes on to the younger generation a certain worldview, determined according to parameters set by the educational establishment. As such they open a window on to what the education system in a specific country wishes to instill in the students’ minds.



Founded in 1998, the CIPM has been researching the school textbooks and teacher guides of Middle Eastern countries since 2000 as a means of deciphering educational attitudes toward peace and toward the "Other" in general. It has issued 11 reports in this key field, in regard to the Palestinian Authority, Israel, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

CMIP criteria of analysis:
1. The image of other peoples, religions and communities: Are they recognized, accepted as equal and respected; or are they presented in a stereotyped and prejudiced way?
2. Peace and the peace process: Does education foster peace? Does it support the peace process? Is there any room for improvement in this respect.



Let me start with the Saudi Arabian School textbooks: The CIPM survey broadened its perspective to include the Saudi Arabian outlook on Christianity and the West. The report also dealt with Saudi notions of government, women’s status and children’s rights as taught in schools. For the purpose of their research, 93 Saudi textbooks on various subjects for grades 1-10 (6 to 16 year-olds) were examined, mostly from the years 1999-2000, and some from 2001. All books except one were published by the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Education, the exception being a book issued by the female inspectors of the lower grades of girls’ education in the Riyadh Province.



The Report makes extremely distressing reading. Islam is presented as the only true religion, while all others are presented as false. Islam leads its followers to paradise, whereas all others lead their believers to destruction in hell. Saudi children are taught that they are superior, as Muslims, in both this world and the next. Christians and Jews are explicitly denounced as infidels, and are called the enemies of Islam and Muslims. They should not be befriended, nor emulated in any way, as this is forbidden. The West is the source of evil that has afflicted the Muslim world. Western democracy is totally rejected.



As for the Jews, they are a wicked nation, both in their relations with Arabs and Muslims, and in the context of world history. Their disappearance is, therefore, desirable. Even the fraudulent Protocols of the Elders of Zion still holds an honored place in the curriculum, for Grade 10 (2001), under: Hadith and Islamic Culture (pp. 103-04), with that classic of racial hatred by Abdullah Al-Tall, The Dangers of World Jewry (Arabic), cited as an authoritative work of reference (p. 81, in CMIP Report). Israel is not recognized and a Middle East peaceful solution is not advocated. Rather war, Jihad and martyrdom is exhorted as a religious duty .



A French edition of CMIP’s Report on Saudi Arabian schoolbooks (compiled, translated and edited by Dr. Arnon Groiss) has just been published: La démocratie en danger: l’enseignement scolaire saoudien (Paris: Berg International, 2004) with a preface by Antoine Sfeir, director of the Cahiers de l’Orient and author of Dictionnaire mondiale de l’Islamisme [Paris: Plon, 2002], in which he gives a grave warning:

“At a time when the Islamist terrorist threat to Europe is becoming clearer, it is urgent to fully understand one of its essential components: the Islamic Wahhabite ideology. This ideology, whose principal target is Western civilization – that is to say, democracy and modernity – is known only to a few specialists. It seems to be largely ignored by the media, as it is by the political class.”

The Report on Egypt surveys 103 textbooks published by the Education Ministry for use in primary, preparatory and secondary state schools, as well as 16 textbooks in preparatory and secondary schools under the supervision of the Al-Azhar Religious Institute. They cover the top five grades (7-11). The majority of the books were published in 2002, and the others, between 1999-2001. The books have been carefully scrutinized in accordance with specific criteria set by both UNESCO and CMIP.


A description of Jihad in Grade 11 from an al-Azhar religious schoolbook makes compelling reading, as do two other descriptions of Jihad in Egyptian State schools, Grade 9 & 10, that are also reproduced here, and in more detail in our written statement NGO/27 to the UN Sub-Commission:

“[One] of the rules derived by the [religious] scholars from these [Qur'anic] verses is the following: Obligation to fight the infidels with utmost vigor and power until they become weak, their state disappears and they submit to the rule of the law of Islam.” – Commentary, the Surahs of Muhammad, Al-Fath, Al-Hujurat & Qaf, Grade 11 (2002, pp. 312), p. 24 (al-Azhar)

And now two more ordinary quotations from books in the State schools:

“Jihad is honour. Inability to perform it is a cause for grief.”

– Islamic Education, Grade 10, (2002, pp. 111) p. 69 (State school)



“Jihad is one of Heaven's gates. Whoever desists from it willingly is humiliated by God...” – Arabic Literature: Literature, Texts, Eloquence, Grade 9, (2002, pp. 201) p. 144 (State school)

But it is once again the al-Azhar teaching that goes to the core of this gruesome subject. Pious justifications are offered to Grade 11 students concerning the reasons for beheading infidels:

“When you meet them in order to fight [them], do not be seized by compassion [toward them], but strike the[ir] necks powerfully…Striking the neck means fighting, because killing a person is often done by striking off his head…This expression contains a harshness and emphasis that are not found in the word “kill”, because it describes killing in the ugliest manner, “i.e. cutting the neck and making the organ – the head of the body – fly off [the body]” – Commentary on Surahs of Muhammad, Al-Fath, Al-Hujurat, Qaf, Grade 11 (2002), pp.19-20.

This was the tragic fate of Daniel Pearl in Pakistan 2 years ago and is now commonplace in Iraq, where about 130 foreigners have been abducted as hostages since April. 30 have been slaughtered, 20 – it is reported – being ritually beheaded by Abu Musab al-Zarkawi, to the shouts of “Allah u-Akhbar” by hooded adepts. One should note that al-Zarkawi studied for many years at al-Azhar University in Cairo.

Another passage explains to the future jihadist the sacred justification for this behavior:

“Encouraging the faithful to perform jihad in the path of Allah, to behead the infidels, take them prisoner, break their power, and make their souls ’s humble (…) You see that in His [Muhammad’s] words: “When you meet the unbelievers in the battlefield strike off their heads and, when you have laid them low, bind your captives firmly. Then grant them their freedom or take a ransom from them, until war shall lay down its burdens.” – Commentary, ibid, Grade 11 (2002), p. 9

It is well-known to scholars that beheading the infidel can be, and is often, associated by Islamic jurists with a warlike jihadist tactic. The classic text is from The Laws of Islamic Governance [al-Ahkam as-Sultaniyyah] by [Abu’l-Hasan] al-Mawardi, famous 11th century [Shafi’i] jurist of Baghdad – considered “The most judicious of Qadis.” (trans.into English by Cambridge University scholar, Dr. Asadullah Yate a Muslim; published by Ta-Ha Publishers Ltd. London, 1996, where the scriptural source is provided (p.76): “When you encounter those who deny [the Truth] then strike [their] necks.” - Qur’an 47:4).