Peter Mulherin :Thinking About the West

When cultural relativism flowed from university campuses to the broader society and venturing unpopular or unfashionable opinions began to incur a certain risk, many found it easier to shrug, scoff and do nothing. That was a huge mistake, perhaps a fatal one
Western civilization is adrift in the world of ideas. Uncoupled from religion for over a century, the Judeo-Christian ethical tradition which endured—albeit, once it had been absorbed into a secular, modernist rationale—is under existential threat from within. The Twitter-lynching of Chris Gayle, the asylum seeker crisis in Europe and connected sexual violence in Cologne and other cities on New Year’s Eve, and the increasing frequency of attacks by Islam-inspired jihadists are all in their own and disparate ways symptoms of the same ailment.

Although perhaps well intentioned, the groupthink of Left orthodoxy is accelerating the demise of liberal values on which Western culture was built. While the Left may be more purposeful in severing the links that tie the West to its philosophical and religious past, the ‘right’ is not without fault. Its silence as liberal values become corrupted and discredited implies complicity; its retreat to behind the walls of neoliberal economics concedes defeat as fiscal short-termism is prioritised at the expense of reflecting on the the power and importance of ideas.

The dilution of Western values can be seen most prominently in the mainstream media and its role as a censor, rather than facilitator, of public debate. Pick any contentious topic — from gay-marriage and abortion to the role of Islam in terrorism or issues of race or gender — and you will hear only one side of the story, the politically correct angle. Dissenters beware, presenting an alternative view, or even questioning why the dominant view is dominant, will result in outrage and judgement. There is no such thing as truly free speech under such circumstances — no dialogue, no alternatives to the impulsive and dogmatic Left’s cause du jour, whatever its promoted crusade of the month might happen to be.

Oregon State University to Hold Segregated Workshops on Race A similar program was halted by determined students at Hamilton College. Can this one be stopped? By Mary Grabar

This month, to relatively little outrage or public notice, Oregon State University is holding segregated “diversity” sessions for students, staff, and faculty. At “retreats,” students and faculty will learn about identity and micro-agressions (for example: expressing a belief in merit, wearing an offensive Halloween costume, or having someone feel like she does not belong).

The Daily Caller reports that a total of four workshops will be held: one for non-white students, another for white students (to educate them about their “white privilege”), one for multi-racial students, and one for white faculty and staff called “Examining White Identity.”

The testimonials at the university’s website indicate that the sessions are sure to foster more “cry-bullies,” as we saw on campuses across the country in 2015. And it seems that among Oregon State’s 30,000 students, none raised significant objections to funding being spent on segregated sessions.

This same outrage almost happened in 2013 at Hamilton College, too. But that proposed segregated “dialogue” never went forward, thanks to students affiliated with the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization (AHI).

In 2013, from the lavishly funded on-campus Days-Massolo Center (ironically founded “to embrace the importance of supporting a diverse and inclusive community”), an email was sent inviting students to participate in a “dialogue about internalized racism.” The “dialogue,” however, was for “people of color” only. Another dialogue for white students and faculty was promised for the following semester, and the program would have culminated in a non-segregated session.

AHI students, led by senior Dean Ball, got the administration to back down.

Turkey: Is It Religiously All Right to Lust for My Daughter? by Burak Bekdil

The Directorate for Religious Affairs, or Diyanet in Turkish, enjoys an annual budget bigger than those of more than 10 other ministries combined — and its president, a government-appointed cleric, enjoys a $400,000 chauffeur-driven car.

Turkey accuses those who protest lusting for one’s daughter of hating religiosity.

“[G]ossip and holding hands, not allowed in Islam.” — Fatwa from Turkey’s Directorate of Religious Affairs.

Turkey has a government agency that regulates “religious affairs” [read: Sunni Muslim Affairs]. It is run by the country’s top Muslim cleric and reports to the prime minister. The Directorate for Religious Affairs, or Diyanet in Turkish, enjoys an annual budget bigger than those of more than 10 other ministries combined – and its president, a government-appointed cleric, enjoys a $400,000 chauffeur-driven car.

Among its duties is to issue “fatwas,” or to tell Muslim Turks what is religiously permissible and what is not. Its current president, the top cleric, also enjoys making long, doctrinaire speeches. Sometimes they sound reasonable, sometimes not.

ISIS Followers Plan to Take over Gaza Strip by Khaled Abu Toameh

In the video produced by the pro-ISIS Palestinian Islamic Army (PIA), Hamas leaders are denounced for aligning themselves with moderate Arab leaders in the Gulf, who are described as “criminals and enemies of Islam.”

Apparently, Hamas has been too kind to Christians living in the Gaza Strip. The narrator blasts Hamas leaders for offering greetings to Christians on their holidays.

It seems that there may be valid reasons for Egypt’s reluctance to reopen the Rafah border crossing with Gaza, as well as to Israel’s opposition to lifting the naval blockade on Gaza — initiated to prevent weapons from being imported to Hamas and other extremists in Gaza. The PIA video provides proof that the Gaza Strip has become a hub for jihadi groups posing a murderous threat not only to Israel and “the West,” but also to Muslims who are deemed by the terrorists as lacking in religious standards.

A new group calling itself the Palestinian Islamic Army (PIA) has popped up in the Gaza Strip, signaling incontrovertibly the growing influence of the Islamic State (ISIS) among Palestinians.

A thirty-minute video put out by the PIA shows its followers pledging allegiance to ISIS “Caliph” Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, and paints Hamas leaders as “apostates” and “infidels” for failing to implement Islamic sharia law in the Gaza Strip. The video constitutes proof positive that the ISIS ideology has infiltrated Gaza — a truth that Hamas has unsuccessfully been trying to conceal for the past year.

Germany’s 21st-century descent into hell By Carol Brown

Merkel once again exposed her seemingly incurable madness when she made a series of asinine, stupid, absurd, ridiculous, insulting, threatening, idiotic, dangerous, misguided, off-the-mark, lying, crazy remarks

More and more news is pouring out of Germany on the coordinated violence that Muslims perpetrated on New Year’s Eve, as the scale of what unfolded slowly comes to light. (For prior coverage see here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.)

The number of cases that have been reported in Cologne has passed 500 and is climbing by the hour. Nearly half of the reports are for sexual assault. The police have confirmed the focus of their investigation is on people from North African countries and that the majority are “asylum seekers” and people who are in Germany illegally.

Information continues to emerge regarding the coordination of these attacks that brought colonizers from outside Germany to partake in the violence. Jihad Watch, reporting on an AFP article, writes:

Germany’s Justice Minister Heiko Maas said Sunday that the shocking spate of sexual assaults during New Year festivities in Cologne was organised.

“For such a horde of people to meet and commit such crimes, it has to have been planned somehow,” he told Bild am Sonntag newspaper.

“No one can tell me that this was not coordinated or planned. The suspicion is that a specific date and an expected crowd was picked,” he said, adding that if confirmed, that would “take on a new dimension”.

Quoting confidential police reports, Bild am Sonntag said some North Africans had sent out calls using social networks for people to gather in Cologne on New Year’s Eve.

Young men not only from Cologne, but as far as France and Belgium responded to the call to travel to the western German city, the newspaper said.

The enemy that’s out of sight By Carol Brown

ISIS is a threat, but the Muslim Brotherhood is an even greater threat, moving among us and transforming America bit-by-bit, cut-by-cut.

The threat of Islamic terror is constant. Violence may erupt anywhere. Unexpectedly. That’s the nature of terror. And it’s happening more and more, with less and less time between events. Most recently, as AT readers know, a Philadelphia police officer was shot by a Muslim barbarian who pledged his allegiance to ISIS. And now it appears he may be linked to a terror cell. Reuters reports:

Philadelphia police said on Sunday they were seriously pursuing a tip that the man suspected of shooting and wounding a police officer had ties to a group with “radical beliefs.” (snip)

The Philadelphia Inquirer and television station NBC10 in Philadelphia quoted police sources on Sunday as saying that according to the tip-off Archer was associated with three other men and was not the most extreme of the group. The sources said police were warned the threat to them was not over, the two media outlets said. (snip)

People who knew the gunman told Reuters he was a devout, quiet Muslim who became more “combative” after trips to Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

The Israeli Left Scrambles in the Wake of A Stunning Video By Steven Plaut

Israel has been rocked by sort of a Middle Eastern Bizarro version of the Dred Scott decision. In that famous American Supreme Court case from1857, it was decided to send black escaped slave Dred Scott back to slavery in the South. This triggered enormous public outrage and paved the way for Lincoln’s election. In the Israeli analogue, Jewish leftists are collaborating with the Palestinian Authority of the PLO and turning over to it innocent Arab Dred Scotts, who have done business with Jews, so that the PLO will torture and murder them.

The “star” of the story is a leftist extremist named Ezra Nawi, who has become something of a poster boy for the radical Left. “Nawi” is a well-known and ordinarily distinguished surname among Jews who came from Iraq. Most of these are patriotic Zionists, but a small minority of them were communists back in Iraq in the 1940s/1950s and have remained such. A few of these Iraqi Jews continue to embrace communism, like the radical anti-Zionist sociologist from Tel Aviv University, Yehouda Shenhav.

Nawi famously was convicted of pedophilia and rape of a minor boy some years ago. Later he was also convicted of violently attacking police as part of a riot of violent Palestinians he helped lead. He speaks Arabic and likes to dress as an Arab. He is active in small far-leftist anti-Israel NGOs operating in Israel that pretend to be “human rights groups,” including B’tselem and Taayoush. These are foreign-funded subversive groups that have never heard of any human right for Jews worthy of being defended and certainly not the right of self-defense against genocidal terror and Islamofascist aggression. They are also notoriously indifferent to violations of free speech rights of anyone not from the far Left.

In Foreign Policy, a Grim State of the Union By Aaron David Miller

Presidential rhetoric is much less effective in a final year, after a leader’s statements and approach have become rooted in reality. And in his final State of the Union address, Barack Obama will have a tough time persuading a skeptical nation that the world he inherited eight years ago is somehow more manageable and secure as a result of his efforts.

In his speech Tuesday, Mr. Obama is likely to claim success on a number of issues. He has reached out to Cuba, concluded an agreement to contain Iran’s nuclear ambitions, and negotiated a trade accord with Pacific nations as well as a historic framework on climate change. But all of these accomplishments are works in progress; the first two depend on changes in the behavior of authoritarian regimes; the latter on (uncertain) congressional approval and the compliance of numerous international actors. The success or failure of these endeavors won’t be determined until long after Mr. Obama leaves the White House, and a Republican successor might well try to undermine, delay, or alter some or all of them.

When it comes to terror attacks at home, Mr. Obama will seek to reassure but it’s going to be a heavy lift. Two-thirds of the public disapproves of his approach to Islamic State. Mr. Obama can point to recent successes by the Iraqi army against ISIS in Ramadi, but that victory is less a turning point than a successful turn in a long and winding road. The image of a president who underestimated the rise of ISIS and has been reluctant to use more military muscle is increasingly criticized by the many Republicans running for president. Mr. Obama’s former secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, has sought to distance herself from the president on the issue of a “no-fly zone” for Syria. Fair or not, more San Bernardino-style attacks, a Paris-like assault, or the downing of a U.S. commercial airliner could undermine Mr. Obama’s foreign-policy legacy.

Donald Trump Vows to Slash Funding for Education, EPA In interview at local diner, Trump pledges ‘tremendous cutting’ if elected By Heather Haddon

MANCHESTER, N.H.—Republican front-runner Donald Trump said Monday he would slash funding for the Department of Education and Environmental Protection Agency if he is elected president.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal and New Hampshire’s WMUR at a local diner here, the businessman said he would do “tremendous cutting” of the federal government. Education policy, he said, should be returned to the states, and he said he would end the Common Core education standards, which conservatives view as federal overreach.

“Education should be local and locally managed,” said Mr. Trump, who also attacked the administration’s environmental policies. “The Environmental Protection Agency is the laughingstock of the world.”

Mr. Trump’s focus on domestic budgetary issues is a new plank in his presidential policy proposals. It is also one likely to appeal in New Hampshire, where voters have long rewarded candidates who promise fiscal restraint and to reduce federal government spending.

Obama’s Empty Chair The State of the Union and the president’s taste for the grand but futile gesture. By Willilam McGurn

As Barack Obama puts the finishing touches on his final State of the Union address, a White House teaser reveals one of his planned props for the evening: “We leave one seat empty in the First Lady’s State of the Union Guest Box for the victims of gun violence who no longer have a voice.”

Blame Woodrow Wilson.

Until Wilson, presidents stretching back to Jefferson had been content to fulfill their constitutional requirement to inform Congress about the state of the union in writing. In 1913, alas, Wilson elected to deliver his assessment in person. Speechwriters of both parties (I served my time in the George W. Bush years) have been embellishing ever since.

The spectacle is made for President Obama. After all, this is the man who strode out on a stage of foam Greek columns when he accepted his party’s nomination for the presidency. How appropriate that in his last State of the Union he now opts for the empty chair routine used to such derision by Clint Eastwood at the last Republican National Convention.

Then again, for Mr. Obama the maneuver has always been the message. From his 2008 campaign appearance before the Berlin Wall (where he declared himself “a fellow citizen of the world”) to his decision to accept the Nobel Peace Prize before he had in fact done anything, the stage has always upstaged the substance. Unfortunately, Mr. Obama’s penchant for the beau geste carries a high price for Americans, not to mention other, less fortunate citizens of the world.

Start with foreign policy. Though Candidate Obama inveighed mightily against the U.S. intervention in Iraq, he also campaigned on the idea that Iraq had distracted us from winning “the necessary war” in Afghanistan. When he announced to the American people his own surge of 30,000 troops to Afghanistan in December 2009, the cadets at West Point were drafted to serve as the dramatic backdrop.