Morning Blog-3-11-10

Wow, the Tories really are taking a page from the GOP. That’s strikingly familiar.

And, can you really blame the PA? On the other hand, this is exactly what Bibi and his extremist allies calculated and banked on.

They are an execrable lot.

Night, and agreed. First two paragraphs spell everything out. But it was interesting later to see the 80% for her party.

I can’t help but be reminded of another government’s tactics in stemming pro-democracy forces.

“I said to my staff, ‘Why is he talking?’ because our experience of Irish prisoners and terrorists was that they never said anything,” she said.

I think someone once pointed out that even Thatcher’s response to terror, was in stark contradistinction to the grand “War on Terror”. Most Americans need to listen to the UK more. They have experience in spades.

Interesting on the LibDems in the first article. I’ve always had a hard time pinning them down – seem to me to be more of a protest vote, especially in Wales and Scotland form the two main parties. I’ve seen a LibDem convention and gone over their platform, but the best description a Scottish webquaintance ever gave of them is wishy-washy. I’m not quite clear on how Clegg is different from Campbell. They still seem to me to be basically still small government/socially liberal to my eye. Was it saying that the old SPD faction is all gone?

I also liked the different tents in Labour.

On that, did you already do this, Kalima? It’s where Cameron is asked about Palin:

Wow I just wrote a pretty long reply, and have no idea what happened to it… *sigh*

In any case, some more on British politics:

Cameron Obscura
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2010/04/david-cameron-201004?currentPage=1

Hung Parliament?
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5hjerfo-9giD8tT7urgOBLMpLSG1w

For you, Kalima. “I don’t like Mondays”

Hi Kalima! Oh Boy– Poor Gordon Brown!

I love lemon curd too! I really appreciate your inclusion of recipes. I’ll have to add some of my own. I have thought about having a recipe section from time to time, since I occasionally see that someone posts about a dish they made.

Oh heck–This might be the right time! I’ll add a very yummy winter soup:

Harira– Moroccan Bean and Vegetable Soup (NOT Vegetatrian!)

1 lb (500g) lamb or beef cut into small cubes
3 or 4 marrow bones
18 cups (4 1/2liters) water
1 1/4 cups (250 g)brown or green lentils
1 1/4 cups (250 g)chickpeas, soaked at least an hour
3 onions, chopped
2 tblsp sunflower oil
salt
1 1/2 tsp black pepper
2 lbs (1 kg) tomatoes, peeled
1/2 tsp powdered ginger
1/2 tsp saffron
2/3 cup (100 g) flour
4 oz (100 g) vermicelli broken into small pieces
Large bunch (~ a cup) flat leaf parsley chopped
large bunch of cilantro (~ a cup) chopped
Juice of AT LEAST one lemon

Put the meat and bones into a very large pot with the water and bring to boil. Remove the scum, then add the lentils and chick peas.

In a frying pan, fry the onions in oil til golden; add them to soup. Simmer 1 1/2 hrs adding salt to taste and the pepper after 1 hour. Blend the tomatoes to a cream in a processor and pour into the soup. Add the ginger and saffron and more water if needed.

Mix the flour to a paste with cold water and add to the soup, stirring vigorously until the soup thickens and gets velvety. Add the vermicelli and simmer 15 mins. Then add the parsley, cilantro and lemon juice until the pasta is finished. Serve.

VARIATION: Instead of meat, use chicken ; instead of chick peas use fava beans; instead of vermicelli, use rice.)

Good morning, Kalima!

I so agree that time flies and the weeks just zip on by.
They say the older you get, the faster time flies, and I can’t imagine it going any faster.

Holy smokes!
So, the UK has it’s own neocons, and I wonder how well that’s going over there with them trashing their national health care system.
I’ve read rumors from a UK blog that warned about certain elements wanting to stop the socialized health care in Europe, and now I understand the source of those rumors.
Sadly, some Brits are blaming the Yanks for interfering in their government.

Obviously, Mr. Brown isn’t coming clean about Iraq.
Something doesn’t smell right in that story.

I love collecting recipes and have a collection of cookbooks, but oddly, I rarely use them!
That Pulla and Chickpea, potato and kale curry sure looks good.
Now I’m hungry!

Interesting that the El Nino has brought relief to the drought in the southwest, but causes drought elsewhere.
We’ve had a wet winter and we are loving it, since we’ve needed rains for some time.

The flying fox made me smile!
Sticking his tongue out for the camera.

Good morning, Kalima!
Hope you are well this evening.

The naked snow sculpture reminds me of a recent story in the valley, whereby a dead tree in someone’s front yard had a phallic look to it.
Some people complained, and the police did say that the homeowners weren’t breaking any laws but the people had the tree cut down to avoid more complaints.
People need to find something else to do rather than looking for nakedness and sin everywhere.

The dog and kids in Haiti is a cute photo.
That Kaleidoscope looks interesting.

Kalima, the pictures today seemed particularly poignant. ~~sigh~~ When will the human race realize we have to look out for each other? That’s how it works!

Pics: Chinese hostage was scary, owl was cute.

Jordan and Egypt do have their Muslim Brotherhood problem – historically linked with Hamas. Still, I’ve heard it was a message to Iran. The speculation really does give some a hard-on. I’m not immune to the intrigue, but…

The fatwa is nothing new, except in its scope. I’ll sit down with this and read it further. LOL! the article mentioned Junoon!

A Perfunctory look at past fatwas against terrorism, some, as was mentioned, not as categorical in their denunciations as others, and one categorical one coming from Supreme Leader Khamene’i, so… . It all gets really technical, as you can imagine; but often include justifications or exceptions – such as occupation and fight against injustice (i.e. Palestine, Kashmir, occupation of Iraq/Afghanistan, etc).

http://www.juancole.com/2008/11/6000-muslim-clerics-endorse-fatwa.html

http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/muslim_voices_against_extremism_and_terrorism_part_i_fatwas/0012209

The biggest silence I see, is the media reporting this. The scary Muslim gets more ratings than the one calling for reason and peace. I’m glad to see this article all the more for this reason.

I also forget the date, but there hasn’t been a Shi’a suicide attack since the early 90’s, I think (80’s?). Grand Ayatollah Sane’i has gone so far as to call them wild dogs (read: Sunni terrorists).

Saw an interesting item on Daily Kos today about the Repub Reps (and 8 Dems) who voted AGAINST HR 4246, Preventing Harmful Restrain and Seclusion in elementary and secondary schools. Every time I think they’re reached the bottom, they dig a new one, achieving what I thought was impossible: an endless nadir. Here’s a link for names and states/districts of the usual suspects.

http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h4247/actions_votes

Hi everyone! Good morning to all.

Kalima – the North American Muslim community issued an anti-violence fatwah about four years ago! I know that for sure since I was WITH them at the press conference about it. It was directed against all violence and harm against innocent lives committed in the name of Islam and especially against suicide bombings. Why did you not know that? Because it got about one inch in the Sacramento Bee and was carried nowhere else. We had TV cameras there. The clip was not shown. So. I believe there were press conferences across America. I saw nothing at all about it. Double So.

I have been in similar press conferences several times, and the media do show up – but nothing gets reported. We might as well be talking to the walls. I’d really like to know who makes the decisions NOT to report the persistent and magnificent stands of the Muslim community against their own people on behalf of peace. Apparently that simply is not news. Then, of course, anti-Muslim forces can say “they” never denounce violence. (And NO I am NOT saying that about YOU – you are part of the public who could not know these things.)

But it has occurred, it has been public, and it just fell on the floor and lay there. Only now has this international fatwah been reported, and I knew about it months ago and passed it around our members, but it’s just getting “out” finally. CNN had it buried until a bunch of us hollered that it was MAJOR news.

If an imam pronounces peace, and no reporter tells you, did the imam actually SAY anything? The old tree in the woods conundrum.