Although the Turkish riots in Rotterdam-and despite media portrayals of poor, victimized Muslims, that’s precisely what they were-were intended to help Recep Tayyip Erdoğan consolidate power within Turkey, they have had a corollary effect. Namely, serving as the best single advertisement for Geert Wilders becoming the next Prime Minister of The Netherlands. Can there be a greater indictment of the decades-long failed experiment in multiculturalism and Islamic immigration than what just occurred in Holland, which was witnessed by the entire world?

The fatuousness disguised as intellectualism peddled by frauds like Ian Buruma has turned a beacon of religious and political freedom into a place where ordinary Dutch men and women are menaced by violent Islamic mobs. Where a state-bankrolled “watchdog” says its permissible to send gay people death threats if you happen to be a Muslim. Where parliamentarians such as Geert Wilders himself are censured because they express disapproval of certain ethnic and religious groups. The notion that liberal, Enlightenment values can be reconciled with a retrograde, 7th century Arabian ideology is preposterous, and the only people who still believe in this fantasy are endangering the future of Europe.

Europeans did not resist Ottoman aggression for centuries merely to invite their enemies into their countries and submit to their whims. What happened in Rotterdam yesterday was not an aberration. It was a foretaste of what is to come.

Two recent articles are worth reading in light of the conviction of Geert Wilders for voicing uncomfortable truths. One is an interview with the EU ambassador to the United States, David O’Sullivan. It’s worth noting his final answer, which unequivocally rejects the idea that another member state will sever ties with the European Union-despite the this year’s election results in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Italy. Whether this is simply another case of wishful thinking, a la Jean-Claude Juncker, remains to be seen. However, the idea that what was once inconceivable will remain so indefinitely is a particularly bad mental tic cherished by our ruling class-something my friend Todd Seavey has refuted using several concrete examples, the most prominent among them being the unanticipated and rapid dissolution of the heretofore indestructible Soviet Empire.

Another worthwhile piece is Eugene Volokh’s blog entry questioning the assumptions of anti-Trump, open borders  critics. As loathe as I am to post a link to the Washington Post, the fake news paper of record, Professor Volokh’s observations are always worth noting. Not only does he reject the oft-repeated liberal canard that a proscription on Muslim immigration would violate the Establishment Clause, he raises the intriguing question of whether Muslim immigration in general is a wise idea. The conviction of Geert Wilders, the exile of Oriana Fallaci and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the assassinations of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh, and the persecution of countless European dissidents who run afoul of current year thinking, illustrate how consequential the decision to welcome millions of Muslim immigrants into our nations can be.

This is a choice that will have far-reaching consequences for all of us, and one of the most important results will be the delimitation of what we can and cannot say. We are surrendering our freedoms without even getting a vote on whether we should relinquish them. The problem isn’t so much Islam as the totalitarian thought police who exercise power at every level of our civilization and want to suppress dissent, however muted, to their grand project. Salman Rushdie was the canary in the coal mine, but we are now witnessing what our refusal to defend free expression, and to reject illiberal, undemocratic immigration policies, back then has sown.

Addendum: In order to grasp just how destructive mass immigration, in concert with state-enforced multiculturalism, is to social capital take a look at this British poll. As you’ll notice, people living in Northern Ireland-the part of the UK which has been riven by sectarian conflict for over a century-trust their neighbors more than those living in a post-English London. Food for thought. 

One of the chief misconceptions about my immigration views is that they’re born of willful intransigence. The conceit that my political philosophy was shaped years ago-true, to a large degree-and has been unyielding in the face of overwhelming evidence which logically refutes it-completely baseless-is surprisingly widespread among my critics. The truth is that I’m actually desperate to be persuaded, to be convinced that open borders is somehow a desirable-or even workable-state of affairs.

Admitting that you’re wrong, especially about sincerely, long-held convictions, can be psychically devastating for some individuals. One need only read David Horowitz’s disturbing memoir Radical Son to get a sense of how traumatic reevaluating your core ideological beliefs can be to a human being. That said, I am not by nature an ideologue. My identity and my sense of self worth are not wrapped up in the outcome of a particular domestic or international debate. Although not a consequentialist, I do accept reality as it is, which is why I find the intellectual defense of mass, 3rd world immigration to the West so utterly unconvincing.

I want to be persuaded that I’m wrong,  but over the past 2 decades I’ve yet to encounter an even minimally persuasive argument explaining why I am. The most compelling defense of open borders I’ve heard was offered by Julian Castro, the son of a ’60s Chicana militant whose children have been able to profit from the political cachet of faux multiculturalism and our country’s drastically altered demographics. Empty suit though he is, at least he had a rudimentary understanding of the issue being discussed, unlike almost every open borders libertarian I’ve tried to engage on this subject. To cite just one example of the fundamental ignorance they’re operating from, the writer David Marcus routinely extols the beauty of Ellis Island immigration in cliched essays, despite being blissfully unaware of the fact that almost all non-white immigration was prohibited during this halcyon period of American history.

Yevgeniy Feyman is a much more informed interlocutor, yet I came away from his discussion at The Irish Exit this past week with my beliefs, vis-a-vis immigration, fundamentally unchanged. Although an expert in health care policy, Mr. Feyman has a keen interest in the subject of immigration, which he believes should be unfettered. Echoing many of the same arguments used by open borders advocate Bryan Caplan-whose work he referenced-he asserted that there is an ethical and utilitarian case for unrestricted immigration to the West, neither of which I found terribly convincing.

One of my main problems with the latter argument was his insistence upon using gross domestic product as a proxy for economic growth and wealth creation, something that is genuinely perplexing coming from an ostensible proponent of free markets. According to Feyman, economists have postulated a 60% growth in GDP if Western nations completely opened their borders, while a 140% increase would result from global immigration restrictions being completely removed. Even if we were to accept these fantastic claims, it’s far from certain that this would be a good thing for our economy. Even the thousands of largely illiterate, unskilled Somalis imported to the interior of this country collectively boost our GDP. However, I’m sure that serves as scant comfort to the taxpayers forced to support their intergenerational welfare.

Contrary to Feyman’s assertions, immigrants use welfare programs at a greater rate than natives, as well as previous generations of immigrants. This was true in 1996 and it’s true today, despite the meteoric rise in American natives’ exploitation of the social safety net. The only reason the disparity between the 2 groups isn’t greater is because there are a host of programs to which illegal aliens are debarred, a distinction which would be erased were amnesty to be enacted as it’s currently envisioned. The idea that you can’t simultaneously take advantage of welfare programs while working is another myth promulgated by open borders advocates.

What’s more, even though most immigrants come to the United States at the peak of their earning power, one-eighth of the immigrants to this country are over the age of 55! In other words, less than a decade from retirement. Although most of these immigrants will never collect Social Security checks, as the speaker pointed out during his talk, they will still be eligible to take advantage of SSI, a program that is hemorrhaging money, shows no signs of being reformed, and whose costs will continue to soar well into the future.

Feyman seemingly praised the mid-90s efforts to “fence in” welfare use by legal immigrants, efforts now categorically rejected by the presumptive Democratic nominee it should be noted, even as he acknowledged that these attempts at reducing the social and economic costs of immigration had largely failed. Even so, he insisted that these barriers would need to be reintroduced under his proposed scheme of open borders. Why welfare restrictions would be more viable in an electorate with tens of millions more unskilled, welfare-dependent, enfranchised immigrants than it was during the Clinton administration was a question that remained unanswered.

The subject of crime proved similarly elusive, as the crime rate of 1st generation immigrants was touted as definitive proof that open borders would be a panacea, even as Feyman conceded that 2nd generation immigrants had a crime rate identical to, and in some instances exceeding, that of Americans. In a remarkable feat of rhetorical jujitsu, this unpleasant fact was used as a data point IN FAVOR of unfettered immigration, proving as it does that immigrants are assimilating to American culture. Why we should be comforted that foreign gangs which were heretofore unknown in the United States are proliferating, and targeting Americans for extermination, is another question that begs to be answered.

Furthermore, the astronomical crime rate among illegal aliens was only briefly alluded to-and dismissed-during this lecture. Even if you ignore the incalculable human cost of our government’s sanction of criminal aliens, the fiscal cost is staggering. While 2 billion dollars might seem like chump change to a federal government that burns taxpayer wealth at a clip which would make a Saudi prince blush, it’s an oppressive burden to the states and municipalities which have to bear nearly the entire bill. This doesn’t even touch upon the fact that nearly 37% of federal prison sentences in Fiscal Year 2014 involved criminal aliens, let alone the impact of criminal immigrants overseas.

Interestingly, the health care cost of having such a large immigrant population was never broached, despite it being-along with the education-the largest economic burden this group imposes upon state and local governments. A burden which will only increase as the population of immigrants-both illegal and legal-expands, as the rapidly collapsing state of California illustrates.

But even if all of these economic and social metrics supported Yevgeniy’s assertions-and, as I’ve tried to illustrate, they do not-he would still be wrong from a philosophical standpoint. For his proposals are not consonant with liberty as its commonly understood, and they’re certainly not pragmatic, by his own definition. They would eliminate the ability to freely associate and to discriminate, despite these being inherent features of both libertarianism and our republic as it was traditionally conceived.

It’s not surprising then that the only political philosopher he invoked during his lecture was not a libertarian in any sense of the word, but John Rawls, a man whose ideas are the antithesis of those espoused by the Founders. His emphasis on the difference principle and the egalitarian case for opening our borders to the developing world demonstrates the utopian nature of this cause. The idea that inhabitants of third world nations are entitled to the West’s wealth-and that Western societies have no right to deny them-is a popular notion among open borders libertarians, and finds its most ardent advocate in the form of Bryan Caplan, a person who, a la Kevin Williamson, would rather see Americans die than deny the wishes of hundreds of millions of foreign nationals. Call it the Make-A-Wish Foundation for the global village.

The hermetic nature of the discussion among open borders advocates can be seen in the comparisons made between immigration restrictions and government-imposed segregation during the Jim Crow Era. This was another trope invoked by Mr. Famin in order to defend the idea of open borders, one which has its roots in the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965, which was enacted on a wave of specious comparisons between the struggle of black Americans for civil rights and the desires of foreigners in the third world to relocate to the United States. While correctly citing Robert Putnam’s study demonstrating the negative impact multiculturalism and open borders have on social cohesion, civic trust, and private, communal associations, from that he extrapolated that opponents of open borders must also support segregation along color lines.

There are so many flaws in this analogy that it would be difficult to enumerate them all, so I’ll highlight one of the most glaring. Namely, while Americans have Constitutional, civil rights to equal protection under the law, there is no comparable right for non-Americans to immigrate, settle and exploit the benefits extended to American citizens. It bears repeating that the men who created the framework for our system of government were deeply skeptical of the sorts of free immigration schemes proposed by the likes of Caplan et. al.

Another fundamental problem with this chain of reasoning is the arrogant assumption that the cultures of North America, Europe, and Australia somehow need moral improvement-provided, of course, by an unceasing stream of migrants from the third world. Beyond the obvious paradox at work in this formulation, there is the ahistorical nature of this assertion. It presumes that we don’t already have ample evidence from numerous countries that third world immigration to the West is destructive, not simply eroding the public’s trust in its leaders-which is a good thing-but erasing the very capacity for self-governance.

But even if there were no empirical evidence to support our position, the burden of proof would still be on individuals like Yeveniy Famin to prove that their stance is correct. When someone makes extraordinary claims on behalf of an untested idea that will dramatically alter the status quo, it’s not incumbent upon his opponents to prove a negative. It’s up to him to demonstrate that his idea will result in a positive improvement for individuals and our society. When I brought up the case of A.Q. Khan, a Pakistani Muslim immigrant who gave us the world’s first Islamic bomb, it wasn’t merely a gotcha question intended to embarrass the speaker or a misguided invocation of the precautionary principle.

There is actually ample evidence that the experiment with Muslim integration in The Netherlands has been a complete failure, and that the cumulative impact of this monumental social change has been decidedly negative for that country and its inhabitants. My point was simply that the adherents to open borders dogmatism couldn’t present a narrative that emphasized a corresponding good that’s resulted from widespread Middle Eastern and North African immigration to Holland. The retort that there are native-born citizens who’ve helped appalling regimes acquire nuclear weapons isn’t quite the devastating rebuttal that its opponents believe it to be. Just like the “there are American scumbags” aphorism, it presumes that just because evil exists we must do nothing within our power to limit our exposure to its most baleful consequences.

This line of reasoning would dictate that a landlord who currently has tenants that are scofflaws and destroy his property allow prospective renters who pose the same threat to live in his building, based upon a rigid devotion to equality. The logical extension of this can be found in Germany, where paying tenants are being evicted in order to make way for refugees, i.e. invaders from the Global South that Angela Merkel, the socialists, and Greens are cultivating as Germany’s new polity.

Open borders is a terrible idea, from both a consequentalist and natural rights perspective. When and if all societies are based upon mutual consent and non-coercion, then by all means, invite whomever you want to live, work, and possibly exploit, your self-contained civilization. I have no problem with Bryan Caplan et. al. inviting downtrodden Haitians or Yemenis to live at his expense, but I vociferously object to them externalizing the costs of their philanthropy to those, like me, who do not share their utopian ideals.

Even as his party rides a wave of popular disgust at the Islamization-facilitated by the institutional bureaucracy of the EU and his own government-of his nation to the top of the polls, Geert Wilders is once again facing imprisonment for dissent. Simple, honest words which reflect the current reality of a country under siege. While Belgian police are busy excavating the terror network created by the logistical coordinator of the Paris terror attacks, recently apprehended within a warren of Islamism, The Netherlands is busy prosecuting a man accused of speaking discomfiting truths.

For the full video-and description-of the preliminary phase of this show trial, go to Gates of Vienna, which has been at the forefront of exposing the encroaching dhimmitude within Europe.

One of my heroes-and an inspiration for anyone around the globe fighting for humanistic, Western values-is Ayaan Hirsi Ali. A woman whose life is actually in peril for espousing her beliefs-unlike some media martyrs-Ms. Ali personifies courage in our modern age. She’s currently promoting her new work, Heretic: Why Islam Needs A Reformation Now, by making the rounds of cable chat shows, even deigning to visit Comedy Central’s repository of Koranic knowledge, Jon Stewart.

Even if you decide not to purchase her book, I would recommend watching the brief interview above, as well as some of her other recent media appearances. She articulates, with more clarity than any of the talking heads opining on the why and wherefore of global jihadists currently decamping for the Middle East, the reasons why multiculturalism as a governing political philosophy has failed, and why it needs to be wholeheartedly rejected by all rational individuals. The notion that we should accept an obscurantist, retrograde ideology based upon 7th century Arabian beliefs in 21st century Europe and North America is absurd, and it is one that needs to be consigned to the ash heap of history.

Even as people from around the globe have commemorated the Shoah, marking the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Europe’s Jews from the clutches of Nazi subjugation, there were those who decided to revel in their personal hatred of this world’s universal scapegoat. Pat Condell continues to expose the stunning hypocrisy of European leaders who beat their chests and proclaim never again even as they flood their own countries, ostensibly, with millions of immigrants whose opinion of the single worst atrocity in European history range from dismissal of the suffering of European Jewry, to denial that six million jews were systematically murdered, to regret that Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany didn’t finish the job.

As he makes clear in the video above, you can’t purport to love Jews while at the same time importing their tormentors.

The latest issue of Charlie Hebdo has finally hit the streets of France, no doubt displeasing genocidal Islamic sociopaths and their culturally Marxist, Islamophilic SJW sympathizers alike. The depth of fear of the poisonous, warped ideology which has paralyzed the gatekeepers of power is on full display, as the contemptible reaction of this Sky News anchor demonstrates. As James Kirkpatrick so succinctly puts it, this comes down to either identity or extinction.

It’s readily apparent which side the Kultursmog has chosen in this debate. One need look no further than a pathetic, cringing New York Times article praising the foresight of the overseers of the Appellate Division Courthouse, who removed a statue of Mohammed at the behest of a group of third world, Islamic backwaters during renovations in 1955. Reading that piece reminded me of nothing so much as the craven nature of the townsfolk in the classic episode of The Twilight Zone It’s A Good Life, who are cowered into submission to the will of a deranged, sadistic child with supernatural powers. 

Thankfully, the people who are bombarded by these messages have retained both their dignity and their hostility to an ideology responsible for a host of outrages both past and present. The most welcome development in this respect being the grassroots, spontaneous East German civic movement known as Pegida, which has drawn character assassinations from even the current chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany. Just like their slightly  more earthy counterparts in the anti-Islamization movement, these men and women are revolting against the totalitarian mindset which animates both Islam and the state-worshipping EUrocracy which has colonized public life on the European continent.

As exasperating and predictable as the reaction by the Mesozoic news media has been, we can’t ignore the organic, courageous response of individuals like those who comprise the membership of Pegida, or the steely determination of the writers and artists who continue to publish Charlie Hebdo, even as lickspittles and cowards who pose as journalists try to silence them. My faith in humanity dictates that these truth-tellers are the ones who are writing the first draft of history.

Update: As promised by Brit Hume, Fox News has republished the offending cartoons. If you’re waiting expectantly for other drive-by media to follow suit, don’t hold your breath. There’s only one religion in contemporary society whose mockery is verboten. 

Mark Steyn, as usual, cuts to the heart of the matter. The refusal by almost every North American media outlet of consequence-with one glaring exception-to republish the cartoons of Charlie Hebdo-like their choice to ban the Jyllands-Posten Mohammed caricatures, is an example of cowardice. This is a decision motivated by base, craven fear, masquerading as a sop to Muslim sensibilities. That said, the decision by most European newspapers to republish those same satirical cartoons shouldn’t be seen as an indication that the continental media have any firmer grasp of what’s at stake, as the  groupthink denunciation of grassroots anti-Islamization campaigns, as well as of those political figures who’ve criticized the multicultural ideology that contributed to Wednesday’s massacre, makes clear. The consistent obfuscation of who is responsible for the series of horrific anti-Semitic violence being but one example of how muddled the Fourth Estate’s evaluation of Islam’s relationship to the West is.

Unfortunately, I think that Steyn has hit upon a difficult truth to digest. The journalists who were assassinated by jihadists in Paris were not simply irreplaceable in terms of their unique talent for clarifying the relationship described above. They were irreplaceable in a much more immediate, practical sense. There are only so many people willing to place themselves in the crosshairs of the perpetually aggrieved religion before our reserve of martyrs is exhausted. And then, notwithstanding the faux solidarity of people who posture as journalists, the terrorists really will have won.
h/t Gates of Vienna.

Freedom as it’s been known and experienced since the Enlightenment is in a death spiral on the European continent, as we’ve explored on this website in the past. One of the most cherished freedoms-for both Europeans and Americans-is the ability to speak openly about anything and everything without fear of government suppression or reprisals.

The fight to achieve this ideal has been an arduous struggle that took Europe centuries to even approach, and whose history is embedded in Europe’s DNA. From the trial of Socrates, to  John Milton’s seminal refutation of censorship, Areopagitica, there has been a constant fight to defend the right of individuals to exercise their natural right to speak and write unmolested by the state. Unfortunately, that right has fallen victim to a pincer movement of centralized European Union bureaucracy and a revanchist, violent, muscular Islam unleashed by Europe’s lax immigration policies.

That’s why I’m pleased to bring you news of an upcoming talk by Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff, a tireless human rights activist who herself has been persecuted for expressing opinions that those in power view as inimical to political correctness, i.e. offensive to Islam. You can find out how to RSVP to this undoubtedly illuminating lecture by clicking upon her name-you must RSVP by the end of today.

Most New Yorkers-especially natives-are inured to the daily spectacle which makes their city something of a super-sized freak show. However, most of the time that sideshow is of the sort one normally expects to see in Coney Island, i.e. entertaining enough as a diversionary pursuit, but not so garish or mind-altering as to force you to reconsider your general opinion of humanity.

However, every year the United Nations General Assembly-the Mos Eisley Cantina of international diplomacy-convenes in Turtle Bay so that ostensible heads of state from around the world can make pompous, almost universally forgettable speeches before an assembled crowd of profligate diplomats, spies, Islamic terrorists, despots and indicted war criminals, among other political luminaries you would expect to find addressing an institution that was once headed by a man complicit in Nazi Germany’s numerous war atrocities in the Balkans.

Of course, because this collection of malefactors great and small decides to make New York City the backdrop for political theater-bankrolled by American taxpayers, of course-it means that the normally colorful streets of New York are graced with an even more eclectic selection of humanity. Including, as you’ll notice by glancing at the photograph atop this page, fans of newly elected Egyptian pharaoh and fan of sharia law Mohammed Morsi.

The first sight that greeted me before arriving at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza was, oddly enough, a group of fervent devotees-including the group of veiled women seen above-of the Muslim Brotherhood, i.e. the organization that’s served as the intellectual seedbed of virtually every pan-Islamic jihadist and/or terrorist movement that’s arisen over the past century. I know what you must be thinking at this point: “Ain’t multiculturalism grand?”

This being a free country, where everyone is allowed to voice his or her opinion-for the most part, at least-there were two bold Egyptian Christians willing to counter the Islamic supremacist perspective espoused by Mohammed Morsi’s New York welcoming committee.

One of the interesting aspects of this small band of counter-protestors was their devotion to their native land. Like Ashraf Ramelah, they obviously consider themselves true Egyptians, even if their Muslim countrymen vigorously disagree with that assessment.

A slightly more baffling sight confronted me as I made my way deeper into the protest pen cordoned off by the NYPD. I’m not quite certain why the man above chose the United Nations for his platform-which seemed to focus upon the inerrancy of Biblical prophecy-although he undoubtedly could have had a feisty conversation about millenarianism with one of the UN’s featured speakers this week.

Needless to say, there were individuals and groups there with a much less eschatological message, one of the most prominent among them being exponents of Falun Gong, or Falun Dafa teachings. In addition to practicing their meditative exercises, these Chinese men and women-most of whom probably can’t return to their homeland, for obvious reasons-highlighted the torture-such as that depicted in the drawings above-experienced by Falun Gong practitioners at the hands of the Chinese regime.

In addition to the routine harassment and imprisonment experienced by anyone in the People’s Republic of China expressing political, philosophical or spiritual beliefs not sanctioned by the ruling Chinese Communist Party oligarchy, Falun Gong adherents have the misfortune of being perceived as an organized political opposition.

Therefore, its followers are subject to a range of horrific penalties, such as the CCP’s penchant for organ-harvesting from those within China’s extensive laogai.

One need only glance at the starkness of contrast between the two photos seen above in order to grasp the horrors inflicted upon ordinary Chinese citizens who run afoul of the their government’s perverse political priorities.

While I don’t have enough information about the subject to state, without reservation, that Falun Gong is “good,” I do know enough to assert that the state which persecutes its followers-and is responsible for the tableau seen in the photograph below-is not.

And although Chinese dissidents were well represented on Wednesday, the vast majority of protestors were assembled to rally against the current Iranian regime, which most regard as criminal in nature, if not so ghastly as to invoke images of one of cinematic horror’s most reviled figures.

One of the more striking features of the anti-IRI activities this week was the artistic dimension of the protests. Some of the efforts seemed redolent of typical political agitprop, using a caricature of Ahmadinejad’s physical features while pointing out the bloody hands of the current president…

As well as his well-publicized Holocaust denial, which was tied into the Iranian regime’s somewhat implausible claims about its nuclear program.

That said, there were some clever, less obvious mockeries of Ahmadinejad, such as the “I’m with stupid” cut-out seen below.

As well as the doormat with the dictator’s face emblazoned upon it, created by United Against a Nuclear Iran, a nonpartisan organization founded by  former ambassador to the United Nations Mark Wallace, which is dedicated to preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

One of their campaigns, prior to Ahmadinejad’s arrival in New York, was a call to boycott the Warwick Hotel, which hosted the Iranian leader’s large entourage while he was staying in the Big Apple. Personally, I don’t find the Warwick’s decision nearly as objectionable as the one that allowed he and his cronies to set foot on American soil.

The “silent” partnership alluded to in the above poster is a reference to the unusual relationship between the Iranian regime and the leadership of Al Qaeda, much of which sought refuge in Iran after the September 11th attacks. Although the nature of this relationship is a matter of great dispute, the fact that Iran has been willing to support Afghan, Sunni insurgents-including the Taliban-with both tactics and weaponry is something to consider before dismissing the allegation out of hand.

One of the chief organizers of the protests against the clerical dictatorship of Iran was Iran 180. The UNwelcome campaign consisted of a combination of street theater and personal testimony from Iranian-Americans about the true nature of the Khomeinist regime.

FWIW, I felt some sympathy for the individual inside of the gigantic mock head, especially considering the unusually warm temperature that day. I do credit his enthusiasm-possibly the most entertaining part of this street theater being his pantomiming bass-playing on what I think was intended to be a machine gun as For Whom The Bell Tolls played in the background.

One of the costumed personages represented the real ruler of Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei. Under velayat-e-faqih, he-along with an equally undemocratic clique of obscurantist Shiite clerics and politically connected hacks-determines the course of Iranian domestic and foreign affairs, as recent events demonstrate.

One of the main, if largely unspoken, themes of the rally was the incestuous relationship between the IRI and the blood-soaked Baathist regime which currently rules Syria. Although the alliance between the government of Iran and that of Syria has been in place for over three decades-virtually since the inception of the Islamic Republic-the imminent threat of Bashar al-Assad’s political demise has forced that blood pact into the open. In fact, the symbiotic nature of the relationship has become so transparent that even Iran’s leading officials have trouble denying it.

Even though foreign policy played a prominent role in Iran 180’s demonstration, there was also a lengthy exposition of the domestic crimes of the Iranian regime, especially with respect to religious, ethnic, and sexual minorities. Gigi Nikpour, the woman seen above, described how the clerical regime which controls Iran had institutionalized many of the canonical aspects of Islam, including Koranic injunctions against homosexuality. These religious proscriptions are not merely theoretical points of discussion, as the scores of gay men and lesbians executed by the theocratic regime in Tehran illustrate.

This is yet another reason why the ubiquitous creeping sharia the rest of the country has just become aware of poses such an ominous threat. It seeks not only to regulate and/or circumscribe our thoughts and speech, but dictate the most minute aspects of our private lives and daily behavior, and eliminate those activities its enforcers deem contrary to the tenets of Islam.

In our next post we’ll explore one of the groups that helped propel these Koran-thumping megalomaniacs to power in Iran, but who soon found that the enemies of Islam are manifold, and subject to arbitrary changes depending upon the needs and political whims of the revolution.