The Autocrats Club

The Arabs have a club .....

The Arab League

...... the Arab League. 

The Usual Suspects

The Axis of evil is exposed again at the United Nations, with just 4 countries backing Russia in a UN vote on Russia's attempt to land grab by military force the eastern Ukrainian regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, and declare them integral parts of Russia.

UN Annexation Vote

The evil 4 were Belarus, North Korea, Syria and Nicaragua ... everyone a democratic paradise ... NOT!

Cost Of Democratic Dreams

Looking at the world today one simply can't help noting that wherever Islam exists, so does dictatorship and chaos .... In part its in the nature of the religion, with its unstructured hierarchy, and the still resonating shock waves of its violent schism, but also because we in the West interfered. 

Syria Divided From Start .....

In the Middle East, the laughably named 'Arab Spring' was not a liberalising movement, with a slight religious flavour. It did not attempt to replace the authoritarian secular dictatorships, with secular Muslim orientated democratic governments (except possibly in Tunisia). No, what happened followed the same pattern time, and time, again ...

Trumps Travel Ban Travails

President Trump has reissued his travel ban list (minus Iraq), which of course is still essentially the same list of countries who were under extra scrutiny under President Obama (now minus one). Although you would never know this from the pro-refugee, pro-immigration liberals, who weep every time a refugee is refused entry.

Many Americans Remember Iranians Treatment
Of Hostages - Even Though Liberals Don't.

Now I am happy to admit that President Trump is possibly a tower short of a shopping mall, but in this area I actually think he's being rather restrained, as there are many more Islamic paradises he could have included in the list. So with his minimalist list of Iran, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen (six of the seven countries on the original 27 January order), the US have subjected the citizens of those countries to a 90-day travel ban and extra background checks.

From Elechek To Al Bakistan Again

The President of Kyrgyzstan, Almazbek Atambayev has launched a campaign against the "Arabisation of society [and the] deprivation of the Kyrgyz nation of its language and traditions".

This campaign included posters like this one ..... which portrays women wearing the traditional nomadic clothing of Kyrgyzstan (the Elechek) on one side, while the other side shows women in niqabs and burkas .....

Kyrgyz Women - No To Niqab

..... and which tried to dissuade Kyrgyz women from wearing Islamic clothing, notably the hijab, niqab and burka's.

Blind Backing

The West has more or less staunchly, backed the 'rebels' in the civil war in Syria, despite much evidence that they are at least as bad as the regime is, and very probably worse in relation to murder, rape and terror.

Spanish Journalists Kidnapped By Syria Rebels

However every now and then, the mask of lies that surround these 'rebels', and the true manner of their operations slips. One such moment came when in a story about the kidnap of two Spanish journalists (and its the fact that they are journalists, that is probably why the reporters at the BBC decided to be more frank in their report).

 

Jilted By Uncle Sam

How quickly the love dies ....  it seems the British aren’t in a 'special relationship' anymore ….

 

The Special Relationship

Apparently the US doesn’t love us anymore, and they have found a sexy new partner. ‘Cherchez la femme’ they used to say when your man started acting oddly or out of character, and now, thanks to the UK’s socialist Labour party’s little bit of politics (when not backing the government motion supporting action against Syria – after privately promising to do so), Britain is perceived by our main ally to have gone ‘a little wobbly’, with our ‘Special Relationship’, apparently counting for nothing, the moment we stop barking at the same time as the USA.

Strange Comment By Dictators

Over the last few weeks, as regime after regime in the Arab world has come under pressure from protesters, there have been strange utterances from each of the dictators who have been threatened. In  nearly every case they have said that the protesters were being misled by outsiders, or "armed gangs" of foreign-backed militants...... but also they are "drunk" or "drug addicts".


Libyan Drunks Marching ..... 

The Libyan woman lawyer who was gang raped by Gaddafi's men in Tripoli, and who in her distress went to the foreign press hotel to complain (before being bundled away by secret police, to not be seen again), was also described as "a drunk, a prostitute and a thief" by a regime spokesman.

Now, apart from the ludicrous nature of these statements, which are the same claims that these regimes have made against opponents for the last thirty or forty years, there is the strangeness that alcohol is illegal and prohibited to the Muslim faithful in any of these paradises on earth ..... alcohol is actually one of the principal rewards (along with sex) that is given to the faithful when they die (men only - women get nothing), so they only get to drink an alcohol beer when they are dead (which many of the regimes have tried quite hard to arrange).

All The Taste ... But None Of The Fun!

In fact alcohol is not sold anywhere openly in Libya, Egypt, Syria, Tunisia or Yemen where these protests broke out - only non alcoholic beers .... so just where are all these 'Drunks' coming from? 

I just can't work out where these dictators think all these are gangs of drunks were actually hiding for the last thirty years, nor where they were getting their drinks from to become 'Drunks'?

Post Script: The woman lawyer, Iman al-Obeidi ended up in Colorado USA, where she was later charged with a number of violent offences, including a February 2014 assault on two patrons at a down-town bar in Boulder, Colorado for which she was convicted in May 2015 of a Class 4 felony - she was sentenced in Boulder District Court to 6 years in prison. So she was in fact a violent drunk after all. Life is odd sometimes.

The Winds Of Change

In Syria there is a wind of change blowing, well a light breeze anyway, and some freedoms are being allowed in the radio at least .... in 2005, the government passed a law allowing private stations to be set up.

Honey al-Sayyed - al-Madina FM

Sham FM's daily talk show Hiwar al-Youm (Today's Discussion) regularly focuses on local government issues, with phone-ins and interviews with politicians, including ministers.