Creeping world government

Following on my last posting is an appeal by a European for America to stand steadfast behind its Consititution. And the second link takes you to a commentary on how that Constitution could be eroded to infect the United States with the same anti-free speech laws that prevent criticism of Islam in European states, and nearly in Canada.

Learning from the mistakes of others, or not

The battles in Canada with the forces of multi-culturalism and political correctness to preserve free expression have been well publicized in the United States, the one country in the world that truly enshrines in its laws the unfettered right of free speech (unfettered by government fiat).

So you would think Americans would have learned something from us.

Nope.

The Obama government appears to be going down the same path that we took nearly two decades ago that has left us today with a tattered and nonsensical notion of human rights as they apply to free expression.

As part of Obama’s outreach program to Muslims, the U.S. has joined the odious United Nations Human Rights Council, dominated by the Islamic states who regularly engineer resolutions condemning the state of Israel and who have supported resolutions in the General Assembly calling for members of the U.N. to criminalize the “defamation of religion”, meaning the defamation of Islam, since Islam regularly defames other religions and non-religious beliefs.

As a counter to that resolution the U.S. has initiated a resolution that says the following, among other things:

Also expresses its concern that incidents of racial and religious intolerance, discrimination and related violence, as well as of negative stereotyping of religions and racial groups continue to rise around the world, and condemns, in this context, any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence, and urges States to take effective measures, consistent with their international human rights obligations, to address and combat such incidents.

The resolution was passed at the Council and presumably is sent up the ladder to eventually be passed into U.N. law.

This poisonous stew is understood by Islamic nations to be a prescription whereby Muslims can use the government organs of non-Islamic states to prosecute criticism of Islam within those states, or they wouldn’t have supported it.

The key phrases in this paragraph for Muslims are “negative stereotyping of religions” and “advocacy of … religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination…”

Religions ought not to be exempt from criticism, especially a religion that is also a political ideology like Islam.

Consider these words in Canada’s Human Rights Act.

13. (1) It is a discriminatory practice for a person or a group of persons acting in concert to communicate … any matter that is likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt by reason of the fact that person or those persons are identifiable on the basis of a prohibited ground of discrimination.

Religion is one of the prohibited grounds of discrimination under this statute.

These words justified several human rights agencies in Canada taking action against two news publishers; one who published the Danish cartoons and the other who published an excerpt from a book by author Mark Steyn who wrote about the rise of Islam in Europe. These actions were prompted by Muslim activists who claimed they were “likely to be exposed to hatred or contempt” because of these publications.

It would be easy to contemplate exactly the same actions being processed by the human rights regimes here on the grounds that these publications were advocating religious hatred that constituted incitement to discrimination.

It may also have unintended consequences. For example, if a secular advocacy group wanted to challenge the ritual of prayer in government legislatures, could that group be accused of inciting discrimination because it hated the idea of religion mixing with government? Would complaining about the separation of church and state become off-limits?

This is a slippery slope Mr. Obama’s “feel good” diplomacy has led America to and we know better than anybody what is at the bottom of it.

Sir Barnes Neville Wallis

With Alfred Nobel, the Scandinavian munitions maker, much in the news lately after the surprise award of the Nobel Peace Prize to American President Barack Obama, it is worth reflecting on another munitions wizard who died forty years ago this month.

His name was Barnes Wallis (September 26, 1887 – October 30, 1979). He was a British scientist, engineer and inventor. He was also a school dropout, although he later obtained his engineering degree through university extension courses while still working. While most of his fame related to aircraft, he was actually a marine engineer.

He is credited with being the first to utilize geodesic design in engineering. This was employed in the construction of the R-100, the largest dirigible in its day. He is also responsible for being the first to use light alloys and production engineering while working on the R-100.

When Wallis moved to Vickers aircraft, his geodesic designs were already incorporated into the Wellesley and Wellington bombers produced by that company. This resulted in both a light and strong airframe. This engineering marvel was often the only thing that stood between life and death for the aircrew.

WELLINGTON BOMBER WITH FUSELAGE SHOT AWAY AND GEODESIC AIRFRAME INTACT

In the Second World War, he advocated strategic bombing to take out the enemy’s infrastructure, rendering it incapable of waging war.

Of course, when Israel does this against its enemies it is now branded by the U.N. Human Rights Council as committing war crimes. But that is for another posting.

Wallis recognized that a new type of bomb would be required to effectively implement his strategy. He devised the “earthquake bomb”. The idea was not to hit the target directly, but to penetrate to a deep level close to the structure and create a mini-earthquake that would undermine the foundation and render the structure useless.

This was a bomb that was huge, aerodynamically pure, very heavily constructed to provide maximum penetration before detonation, and intended to be dropped from a high altitude (40,000 feet) to obtain maximum terminal velocity of 320 miles per hour. His original design called for a bomb of ten tonnes.

Unfortunately, there were no bombers at the time capable of carrying such a monster. Undaunted, Wallis proposed a new aircraft to be called the Victory Bomber. It would weigh in 45 tonnes and be powered by six engines. It was rejected by the Air Ministry because the idea of having a single aircraft for single purpose of carrying a single bomb disturbed its idea of maximum flexibility in aircraft design.

Wallis then turned his attention to the idea of barrel-shaped bouncing bombs in marine attacks. These were bombs that did not immediately explode on impact with the water, but would skip across the surface much like a skipping stone and strike a target at its base underwater, like a depth-charge, using the water to concentrate the force of the bomb on the target.


BOMBER UNLEASHING THE BOUNCING BOMB

This required great precision in bombing and the idea only worked when Wallis discovered that putting backspin on the bomb caused it to fall behind the aircraft and gave it greater distance and prevented it from bouncing off the target.

These bombs were used against three dams in the Ruhr valley. The development and attack were documented in the British film, The Dambusters.

These dams were heavily protected and since the bombers were required to approach just above the surface of the water to create the skipping effect there was a heavy loss in aircraft and aircrew to anti-aircraft fire.

One of the pilots was an American, Joe McCarthy, who had enlisted in the RAF at the outset of the war. I knew McCarthy because he stayed in the Royal Canadian Air Force after the war and was my father’s commanding officer for a time. When the motion picture, The Dambusters, was shown on the air base, there was quite a lot of excitement and McCarthy got up and gave a speech before the film ran.

His story is that his airplane had engine trouble, and, as a result, he took off ten minutes after his squadron had left. As a result, he was able to sneak in a get off his bomb load since the German gunners had stood down thinking the raid was over.

Barnes Wallis was appalled at the aircraft losses in this attack. He subsequently became a pioneer in the use of remote controlled aircraft to test out designs without endangering aircrew. The extensive use of drone aircraft today can trace back to him and this raid on the Ruhr.

His big bomb idea became feasible when improvements were made to the Lancaster bomber. The Lancaster was the work horse of Bomber Command and could carry the largest payload prior to the advent of the B-29.

A LANCASTER BOMBER RECENTLY PHOTOGRAPHED AT WINNIPEG, THE ONLY ONE IN CANADA

The first big bombs were called “Tallboys” and they weighed 5 tonnes. When it was determined that the Lancaster could carry even heavier loads, if stripped of its armor and most armaments, the “Grand Slam” was produced, coming in at 10 tonnes. These bombs were used quite effectively against a number of stationary targets and there was a consequential benefit from the high level bombing of fewer aircraft losses.

A GRAND SLAM BOMB

These bombs could not be mass produced and were so expensive that aircrew were ordered to return to base with them if they could not be dropped on a target rather than jettisoning the load into the sea, which was the normal procedure for safety in landing. In short, the value of the bomb outweighed the value of the lives of the crew.

When the Americans calculated the cost/benefit of dropping one atomic bomb from one aircraft thereby minimizing aircraft losses, they had the benefit of the experience with Wallis’s big bombs.

After the war, Wallis worked on swing-wing designs that were eventually passed over to the Americans, who then incorporated them into the F-111 and tried selling the aircraft back to Britain.

He proposed the development of large nuclear-powered submarines to carry cargo. He calculated these could travel faster and more efficiently than a surface vessel and be immune to ocean storms.

He also experimented with rocket-propelled torpedoes.

He was knighted in 1968 and retired from Vickers in 1971.

Simcoe's eternal rest is disturbed

JOHN GRAVES SIMCOE, FOUNDER OF THE CITY OF YORK (NOW TORONTO), ONTARIO

I don’t have a problem with Canada’s immigration policy as we seem to be attracting immigrants of good quality, but sometimes you have to wonder.

There is a story in today’s Toronto Sun about a British couple with two children who want to immigrate to Canada and applied under the skilled worker category. They were turned down because they only scored 65 points and they needed 67 to make the cut. They are appealing the decision to the Federal Court of Canada.

Apparently, they scored low on the section called “Adaptability”.

I live in a part of the country where women walk around in Burkas. There are whole neighbourhoods that, except for the quality of the housing, look like they were transplanted from Dacca or Delhi, judging by the dress commonly worn by the residents and the nearby houses of worship. Other communities have every street sign and store window written solely in Chinese. Many of these people don’t speak a word of English, or prefer to converse in their native language. Government notices are printed in about 7 different languages.

But the British couple failed on adaptability???

Simcoe must be rolling over in his grave.

Getting what you deserve

A number of people are scratching their heads today over the announcement that U.S. President Barack Obama has been given the Nobel Peace Prize, nominations for which closed just two weeks after he was sworn in as the American President.

Much too much is made of this award. It is not that important in the great scheme of things. It is not given out every year in case there are no obvious candidates.

It is worth keeping in mind that, aside from some embarrassing mistakes in awarding the prize, to Yasser Arafat, for example, the people who have been overlooked for this award speaks volumes about the subjectivity of the process and the debasement of the concept of awarding a prize for the advancement of peace.

The most memorable omission was Mahatma Ghandi, who was nominated in 1937, 1938, 1939, 1947 and 1948. Another lifelong, influential, and tireless advocate for peace was British philosopher and mathematician, Bertrand Russell. He never won the Peace Prize either.

Some credit Obama’s attempts to curb the spread of nuclear weapons for his favourable ratings with the Nobel Committee.

Other than stating what he would like to see happen, and making some overtures to other interested parties, it is difficult to attribute any measure of success to his wishes. In fact, he has been sitting on his thumb with respect to Iran and sending that country love letters and happy-face videos that appear not to have moved it one jot in the direction of giving up on a bomb.

Consider his efforts and achievements compared with that of the 1962 winner, Dr. Linus Pauling, considered to be one of the two greatest scientists of the 20th century (the other being Albert Einstein), as outlined in Wikipedia.

In 1958, Pauling began a petition drive in cooperation with biologist Barry Commoner, who had studied radioactive strontium-90 in the baby teeth of children across North America and concluded that above-ground nuclear testing posed public health risks in the form of radioactive fallout. He also participated in a public debate with the atomic physicist Edward Teller about the actual probability of fallout causing mutations. In 1958, Pauling and his wife presented the United Nations with a petition signed by more than 11,000 scientists calling for an end to nuclear-weapon testing. Public pressure subsequently led to a moratorium on above-ground nuclear weapons testing, followed by the Partial Test Ban Treaty, signed in 1963 by John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev. On the day that the treaty went into force, the Nobel Prize Committee awarded Pauling the Nobel Peace Prize, describing him as "Linus Carl Pauling, who ever since 1946 has campaigned ceaselessly, not only against nuclear weapons tests, not only against the spread of these armaments, not only against their very use, but against all warfare as a means of solving international conflicts."

I not only have no objection to Obama pursuing the limitations on nuclear weapons I hope he succeeds. But Pauling worked for 16 years on the anti-war file before being recognized by the Committee and after he was successful in bringing public pressure to bear on ending nuclear weapon testing.

Let’s see what the young fellow can do before handing him an award that Alfred Nobel intended to be for success, not just for hopes and dreams.

"Mosques are our barracks, domes our helmets, minarets our bayonets, believers our soldiers."

"Mosques are our barracks, domes our helmets, minarets our bayonets, believers our soldiers."

This is a line from a poem by Turkish writer, Ziya Gökalp. Ironically, he was a staunch Kemalist. However, the sense of this thought has prompted some interesting political protest posters in Switzerland which is going to have a referendum on November 29 that may stop the construction of minarets.




The picture above shows a minaret displacing the historic water tower in Lucerne.

Some maintain that the minarets are an unnecessary architectural feature since the faithful are not called to prayer as they used to be from the top of these towers. Others claim the minaret is a structure deliberately intended to remind the population of a community of the supremacy of Islam.




This last one has now been ruled "racist" by the municipality of Basel, presumably because it also contains the image of a burqa-clad person.

A spokesman for the construction and traffic department of the half-canton of Basel City said the decision to ban it in publicly-owned spaces was based on a law against spreading racist ideologies or classing groups by ethnic, religious, cultural or physical characteristics.

Apparently, it is alright for a Muslim woman to classify herself as a member of religious or cultural group and wander around the streets of Basel dressed in this obscene costume and that is not a racist act, but if you put a likeness of her on a poster that is racist.

Thanks to the Gates of Vienna for the story.

Tipping points and climate confusion

What is a “tipping point”?

Malcolm Gladwell wrote a best-selling book with that title. He says it is the point at which something takes off and becomes a runaway phenomenon whose growth is exponential. He gives examples of everything from Paul Revere’s famous ride, to the spread of STDs, to the popularity of Hush Puppies.

I suspect Harry Potter would fit that category. It started out as a book that was rejected by every publisher in the U.K. but one. Eventually, people began talking about it and news of it spread. That is how I first heard about it, a friend raved about it over lunch. By the time I got around to reading it, everybody was into it.

That brings us to the use of the expression tipping point in the climate change debate.

James Hansen, the leading Chicken Little in the global warm-mongering camp, uses the term quite often. He says it is the point at which climate changes cannot be controlled by man, that nature’s feedback mechanisms take off and become like a shark feeding frenzy.

Think about that statement for a minute. It implies that we can manage climate. Not that there is any historical precedent for such a conceit. In fact, it is probably the most monumentally foolish idea of the 21st century.

We can have an impact on the climate, for sure, but we cannot manage something we barely understand.

For about 800,000 years the CO2 level has been about 280 ppm, sometimes a little higher, sometimes a little lower, but that is the order of magnitude. In the past century it has climbed to around 380 ppm; hence the alarm. It is generally agreed amongst the Hansenites that most of the cause of this climb in CO2 is related to the release of carbon into the atmosphere by humans. The real debate is that not all scientists buy into the idea that CO2 is the main driver of climate change.

To add further confusion, there is now a contradiction around the concept of tipping point that needs clarification if one wants to persist in claiming CO2 as the key.

Hansen claims that the maximum CO2 level that would preserve the status quo is 350 ppm. He says that at 380+ ppm we have already past the tipping point, and points to high Arctic and glacier ice melting as proof. This means that even if we substantially reduce our carbon contribution it is too late, nature is now in a runaway mode to much higher global temperatures that will see all the ice melt and the oceans rise. He also claims that 450 ppm is probably the maximum safe level.

However, in a just released study, a team of scientists from the U.K. and the U.S. have determined that declining CO2 in the atmosphere led to ice forming over the continent of Antarctica about 34 million years ago, a continent that had previously experienced a tropical climate. On its face, that result would not seem to contradict anything James Hansen says; except when you start talking about tipping points.

The new CO2 study determined that 34 million years ago the CO2 level dipped to 760 ppm. This was considered the tipping point for ice formation.

So which is the real tipping point: 350+ ppm when ice melts or 760 ppm when ice forms?

And what about the claim that CO2 levels are unsafe after 450 ppm? All kinds of new life forms emerged on other continents in an atmosphere of 760+ ppm.

This is far from a “settled science”.