A.LOEWENSTEIN ONLINE NEWSLETTER

• Wikileaks tells us the biggest stories of the year
• British tax dollars going to the Serco beast
• Simon Wiesenthal Centre is tone deaf
• It’s Christmas

Wikileaks tells us the biggest stories of the year Posted: 25 Dec 2010 05:11 AM PST The sound and fury directed at Wikileaks in the last month has (largely) been against the group itself rather than the revelations in the cables. Salon’s Glenn Greenwald outlines what we now know and why many in the political and media elites are afraid of the public learning of crimes committed in their names: As revealing as the disclosures themselves are, the reactions to them have been equally revealing.  The vast bulk of the outrage has been devoted not to the crimes that have been exposed but rather to those who exposed them:  WikiLeaks and (allegedly) Bradley Manning.  A consensus quickly emerged in the political and media class that they are Evil Villains who must be severely punished, while those responsible for the acts they revealed are guilty of nothing.  That reaction has not been weakened at all even by the Pentagon’s own admission that, in stark contrast to its own actions, there is no evidence — zero — that any of WikiLeaks’ actions has caused even a single death.  Meanwhile, the American establishment media — even in the face of all these revelations — continues to insist on the contradictory, Orwellian platitudes that (a) there is Nothing New™ in anything disclosed by WikiLeaks and (b) WikiLeaks has done Grave Harm to American National Security™ through its disclosures. It’s unsurprising that political leaders would want to convince people that the true criminals are those who expose acts of high-level political corruption and criminality, rather than those who perpetrate them.  Every political leader would love for that self-serving piety to take hold.  But what’s startling is how many citizens and, especially, “journalists” now vehemently believe that as well.  In light of what WikiLeaks has revealed to the world about numerous governments, just fathom the authoritarian mindset that would lead a citizen — and especially a “journalist” — to react with anger that these things have been revealed; to insist that these facts should have been kept concealed and it’d be better if we didn’t know; and, most of all, to demand that those who made us aware of it all be punished (the True Criminals) while those who did these things (The Good Authorities) be shielded.

British tax dollars going to the Serco beast Posted: 24 Dec 2010 09:37 PM PST Sigh: 684 payments from government totalling £169,479,414 (showing 10 largest, see all) £3,982,623 from NOMS on 2010-09-20 (details) £3,931,259 from NOMS on 2010-08-12 (details) £3,770,493 from NOMS on 2010-06-18 (details) £3,754,305 from NOMS on 2010-07-20 (details) £3,680,296 from NOMS on 2010-06-04 (details) £3,493,239 from DEPARTMENT FOR EDUCATION on 2010-05-13 (details) £3,453,153 from Department for Work and Pensions on 2010-07-09 (details) £3,453,153 from Department for Work and Pensions on 2010-06-10 (details) £3,117,516 from Department for Work and Pensions on 2010-08-10 (details) £2,266,845 from UKBA – UK Borders Agency on 2010-07-26 (details)

Simon Wiesenthal Centre is tone deaf Posted: 24 Dec 2010 09:11 PM PST On a day where we’re supposed to feel kindness to all, why not show the profound hypocrisy of the Zionist and Jewish establishment? At the end of July, The Independent carried a piece by Christina Patterson in which she observed that many of her fellow inhabitants in Stamford Hill were intolerant of her presence. “I didn’t realise that goyim were about as welcome in the Hasidic Jewish shops as Martin Luther King at a Ku Klux Klan convention,” she wrote. “I didn’t realise that a purchase by a goy was a crime to be punished with monosyllabic terseness, or that bus seats were a potential source of contamination, or that road signs, and parking restrictions, were for people who hadn’t been chosen by God.” Thanks to these words, Patterson has earned herself a place in the Top 10 Anti-Semitic Slurs of 2010 compiled by the Simon Wiesenthal Centre. Patterson’s words are apparently so offensive, that she is placed above these entries, taken from Yahoo Finance’s Goldman Sachs Message Boards and Facebook: “Stinking Jews finally getting what they deserve Burn all the jews up [sic]“, “Kill a Jew Year” and “Kill a Jew Day”. As one might expect, Patterson is far from delighted at being labelled one of the world’s top anti-Semites. What, precisely, is so wrong with what Patterson is saying? First, it is clear from her biography that she is hardly likely to be chummy with Nick Griffin and David Irving. According to The Independent’s website, she is a “former director of the Poetry Society, and literary programmer at the Southbank Centre”. With these credentials, I hope it is not bigoted of me to assume that Patterson is perhaps not a member of the BNP. For heaven’s sake, she writes a column for The Independent. Secondly, the Wiesenthal Centre has resorted to that old trick of selective quotation – always a top tactic for someone with an agenda. If you read the rest of her column, it’s clear that Patterson’s beef is not just with the behaviour of Hasidic Jews – she doesn’t like little girls wearing hijabs, or young women wearing niqabs. She also has little time for the revolting practice of clitoridectomy, which is inflicted on some 500 to 2,000 British schoolgirls every year. Taken as a whole, the entire column is about the limits of multiculturalism, and examines how, in her words, “certain practices, in different religious communities […] conflict with some of the values in British society”. Patterson makes it clear that she can just about tolerate bad manners in the name of multiculturalism, but not much more than that. That seems a reasonable position to take, and is an opinion that should be freely expressed. Thirdly, is there any reason to suppose that Patterson is lying? In her column, she cites the example of a black friend being made to feel unwelcome in a local fishmonger’s shop. Does that sound an unlikely scenario? I think not. Hasidic Jews have a reputation for being intolerant of those outside their world. It’s clear, that by moving to Stamford Hill, Patterson witnesses this intolerance every day. Let’s get this straight: Patterson is telling the truth. Besides, she’s hardly the first person to say it. Look at the question posed on this website: “Why are hasidic jews so mean and rude? I’m from NYC and they are the rudest group of people I have ever come across. They never say “excuse me”, “please”, “thank you”. They have no social graces at all…” Should the poster of this be put on the Wiesenthal’s Centre’s pop chart of anti-Semitic nasties? Is the question completely without foundation? Labelling Patterson as an anti-Semite is manifesting far more intolerance than anything she ever wrote. Yes, calling for Jews to be burned to death is anti-Semitic, but asking Hasidic Jews in Stamford Hill to be a little more polite is not. Victimhood status should never confer an automatic exemption from criticism.

It’s Christmas Posted: 24 Dec 2010 09:00 PM PST So happy holidays to all and yet occupation isn’t going anywhere: Church leaders in Bethlehem have called for peace and reconciliation at the annual Christmas mass held at what is said to be the birthplace of Jesus. Tens of thousands of Christian pilgrims are in Bethlehem for Christmas, in a record year for tourism. Only a lucky few scored tickets for the traditional midnight mass near the spot where Jesus was said to be born. Church leaders used the mass to renew calls for peace. Latin patriarch Fuad Twal appealed for the church bells to drown out the noise of weapons in the Middle East, and expressed a hope that Jerusalem would become a model of co-existence between Christians, Jews and Muslims.