by Paul Jacob

Seems the recent gubernatorial election made a difference in New Jersey. There’s change there. Also hope.

Last November, running on a platform of fiscal sanity, Republican challenger Chris Christie defeated the Democratic Governor Jon Corzine. And it seems that, unlike a certain U.S. president, Christie has every intention of following through.

In early February, Christie told lawmakers that the state’s finances remain a mess and that the budget passed eight months ago is full of “all of the same worn out tricks of the trade” that have driven New Jersey to the edge of bankruptcy.

He said that the legacy of “irresponsible budgeting of the past, coupled with failed tax policies which lie like a heavy, wet blanket suffocating tax revenues and job growth” require extraordinary steps to bring the budget back into balance.

So on his own initiative, Christie is freezing spending across an array of programs. For example, he is cutting the subsidy to New Jersey Transit and urging managers of public transportation to “improve efficiency . . . revisit its rich union contracts,” be more fiscally responsible and efficient. He’s also targeting bloated government pensions and education funding.

Can Governor Christie complete the pivot to fiscal common sense despite the hurricane of opposition he faces? Time will tell. But it would be hard to imagine a better start.

Editor's Note - Paul Jacob is the former National Director for the Libertarian Party, and former longtime President of US Term Limits. His blog is ThisisCommonSense.

United Kingdom, France, German, Denmark, Sweden

New video chronicles:

Police in retreat in face of Muslim mauraders on the streets of London.

Riots in Paris. Cars being set a blaze.

Protests against Jews and Israel in Copenhagen.

At two minutes in, Muslim rioters giving the Nazi salute.

by Clifford F. Thies

The systematic attack on Christians around the world is mostly under the mainstream media's radar screen. The mainstream media goes crazy over church burnings when they perceive it's white on black violence, and this is a good thing. Hate, in all of its expressions, is to be surpressed through the legitimate use of force by the state.

But, what about Muslim on Christian violence, Muslim on women violence, and Muslim on gay violence?

Reports on the increasing violence in Nigeria are just starting to come in. From The Christian Post, Feb. 27:

The Redeemed Christian Church of God building in Tudun Wada was partly burnt on Jan. 25, and Christian Faith Bible church and the Living Faith Foundation Chapel, both in Gusau, were partly burnt in attacks on Jan. 20 and 24 respectively. Zamfara state, one of the predominantly Muslim states in northern Nigeria, was the first in the country to implement Islamic law (sharia).

The association alleged that those who attacked the Zamfara churches were emboldened because officials made no serious move to arrest those who carried out the Jos attacks. Two pastors and 46 other Christians were killed in the outbreak of violence in Jos on Jan. 17, triggered when Muslim youths attacked a Catholic church; 10 church buildings were burned, and police estimated more than 300 lives were lost in the clash.

Concerning these things, are we supposed to be in denial?

Here's what is going on: The radicals within the Muslim community are not being policed by their co-religionists. The "silent majority" within the Muslim community is still ambivalent about ratting out their fellow Muslims to non-Muslims. The critical uncertainty is if and when the current "silent majority" within the Muslim community will actually do something about the radicals, more than merely blather how Islam is a peaceful religion, as though Christianity being a peaceful religion means we didn't have to actually do something about the KKK. If they do, then this is not "a conflict of civilizations," but merely another police matter, albeit on a global level, as we will always have to deal with violent elements within our midst. If they do not, they we will have to see how many of them we can convert.

We cannot have a billion people within an open, global society, who condone and harbor, if not out-rightly support violence against peaceful, law-abiding persons. There are indications that increasing numbers of Muslims are getting with the program, that all peaceful and law-abiding people must stand together against all who are violent. Mainly, this is because of Arab-Persian animosity that predates Islam, scaring the bejesus out of the Arabs.

We are working in both overt and covert operations with Saudi, Iraqi, Jordanian and Gulf State Arabs to counter the growing threat posed by Iran which has joined with Al Qaida and spontaneously-arising radical Islam. The radical Muslims in Northern, Western and Eastern Africa, most notably in Nigeria and Darfur, are something of a side-show to what is going on in western and central Asia. I suspect that, at some point, when we are no longer concerned about their Arab and Chinese protectors, we will just crush the radical Muslims in Africa like so many cockroaches.

Photos of church burning in Kenya, 2008, by Muslim extremists connected with current Prime Minister Raila Odinga, and a church burning by Muslim radicals in Pakistan.

It is estimated that more than 800,000 Kurds were murdered under Saddam Hussein's regime. Many of them were gassed during the Iran/Iraq war during the 1980s. Now, the Kurdish provincal government has located three mass graves of genocidal victims.

The Hawler Tribune, (Iraqi Kurdistan) Feb. 27:

Three mass graves were discovered in the sub district of Dubiz in Kirkuk. Announced the Kurdish daily news paper ASO on Sunday, Feb.21st. These graves are to be excavated by the Ministry of Anfaled and Martyrs of Kurdistan regional government in a near future.

“The graves are holding remnants of children from both Chamchamal and Garmyan areas”. Sayd Fazil Amin the head of KRG martyrs office in Kirkuk told ASO, these kids were taken into captivity during 1988 Anfal campaign against the Kurds.

Anfal genocide was a campaign against the Kurds in 1980s. It was aimed at the elimination of the Kurds in Iraq, by destroying and burning Kurdish villages down. Killing and burying alive the people of these villages. It costed over 200,000 lives of innocent Kurds.

The US House will vote on a resolution in committee on March 4 recognizing World War I-era killings of Christian Armenians by Muslim Turks as "genocide," according to sources on Capitol Hill.

Pamela Geller from the libertarian/human rights blog Atlas Shrugs gives some background, "Muslim Congressman Ellison won't call Armenian Genocide" Feb. 26:

It was the genocide that preceded the Holocaust. The Mufti of Jerusalem practiced genocide first in the Armenian genocide -- the systematic genocide of the Armenian population under the Islamic Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I. The use of massacres and deportations involving forced marches under conditions designed to lead to the death of the deportees led to a total number of Armenian deaths of one-and-a-half to two million. Mufti Amin Al-Husseini swore allegiance to the Ottoman Empire during the Armenian genocide [i] . [ii] He was an officer stationed in Smyrna and participates first-hand in the Armenian genocide. One and a half million Christians were slaughtered under the sword of Islamic Jihad by the Ottoman Army. Allegiance to Ottoman Empire and Islamic world take-over was echoed by Osama Bin Laden in his post-September 11 declaration. Osama Bin Laden makes direct reference to the end of Ottoman Empire and thus proclaims his allegiance to its notion of Islamic dominion.

Now from the (Turkish) Hurayet, Feb. 19:

A resolution calling for U.S. recognition of World War I-era killings of Armenians as “genocide” will likely be endorsed in an early March vote in a U.S. congressional committee, according to analysis of domestic politics.

The non-binding resolution would call on President Barack Obama to ensure that U.S. policy formally refers to the Armenian killings as “genocide” and to use that term when he delivers his annual message on the issue in April – something Obama avoided doing last year...

This time the measure is expected to pass. In 2007, it failed due to opposition from some Republican concerned with relations with then Iraq War ally Turkey.

Continuing:

amid the political fight between the Democratic Obama administration and the Republicans, some Republicans on the committee might be tempted to vote for the “genocide” measure.

Ironically, Rep. John Murtha's death seems to have given the Armenian lobby renewed optimisim. Democrat Murtha was the leading proponent in Congress for Turkey, and against the resolution.

There's some controversy over how the only Congressman Keith Ellison of Minnesota will vote. He is the only Muslim in Congress. He happens to sit on the House Foreign Relations Committee. He recently said, "I am still developing my position..."