<a href="http://www.euobserver.com/index.phtml?aid=11645">New transatlantic row looms over war crimes court</a>
<div style="width:500px;text-align:left;
padding:10px;background-color:white;
border:1px solid silver;font-size:11px;">The US is set to table a resolution in the UN to prolong immunity for its troops from prosecution by the International Criminal Court, (ICC), as a one year exception for Americans serving in UN-authorised military operations is up for renewal by 1 July.
The resolution might face opposition from European Union member states and could cause a new transatlantic row, according to the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A37014-2003Jun9.html">Washington Post</a>.
In a confidential note to EU governments, the Bush administration threatened last week to complicate the United States' relations with its European allies over the issue.
"This will undercut all our efforts to repair and rebuild the transatlantic relationship just as we are taking a turn for the better after a number of difficult months," said the note obtained by the Washington Post.</div>
Of course the weasel twins, Germany and France, believe that the United States is actively seeking to undermine the power of the court.
It's hardly surprising that EUObserver.com edited the source article to fit their point of view...they're EU toadies. However, one wonders why they didn't publish the money graf?
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U.S. officials grew alarmed when the European Union issued a letter in April to the new EU members urging them to honor the Sept. 30, 2002, guidelines, according to Richard Dicker, an expert on the court at the New York-based advocacy group Human Rights Watch. "The European Union is asserting the principles they have adopted and urging those states that want to join the EU to keep those principles in mind," he said. "It's the U.S. putting those governments that have ratified the treaty between a rock and a hard place."
</div>
Principles? Bwahahahahaha! Right.
Who fired up the Wayback Machine?
<div style="width:500px;text-align:left;
padding:10px;background-color:white;
border:1px solid silver;font-size:11px;"><b>"APARTHEID ISRAEL" EXHIBIT AT EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT </b>
According to the <a href="http://www.wiesenthal.com/social/press/pr_item.cfm?ItemID=7680">Simon Wiesenthal Center</a>, The European Parliament is hosting an exhibition entitled "The New Doors of Jerusalem: Apartheid Israel".
In a letter to the President of the European Parliament, Pat Cox, the Simon Wiesenthal Center's International Liaison Director, Dr. Shimon Samuels, noted that, "Not only does the display focus on so-called 'Israeli colonialism', the 'sociocide' of the Palestinian people, 'coerced' land sales to Jewish settlers, it also includes personal attacks on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and features Jews through racial and religious stereotypes."
Samuels continued, "The timing of this exhibition, when Israel has accepted 'the Roadmap' and its Prime Minister has demonstrated his willingness to take immeasurable risks for peace, is politically and morally repugnant." The Center demanded "the immediate removal of this exhibit and the public condemnation and disciplining of whoever authorized it."
Email Pat Cox, the President of the European Parliament at pcox@europarl.eu.int
<SUB> via <a href="http://zioneocon.blogspot.com/">Broker Tov, Boulder!</a></SUB></div>
This mental image is just so wrong.
"I don't want to freedom kiss my wife," says Woody Allen in a new ad spot. "I want to French kiss her."
Eew, eewww, eeewww.
French tourism is down an estimated $500 milllion so far this summer due to anti-Semitism and Chirac's back stabbing in the UN.
Mon Dieu! What to do? Zee 'otels, zay are eemptee!
What else? Hire a famous Jewish-American comedian to do a très chic commercial and when all else fails play the race card. Que?
Jean-David Levitte, France's ambassador to the United States whines:"It goes beyond calls for French products," Levitte said. "When you insult the French people, simply because they are French, then it's a kind of racist campaign."
M'excuser! I know the French think their Merde pas l'odeur, but when did Gaelic become a racial category?
Silly me, all this time I thought they were shallow white people with poor hygiene, questionable toilet habits, tacky comedic taste and an inability to parallel park.
This proves beyond a doubt that the French have
a) no taste,
b) no clue,
c) are over.
This is mean...not.
<a href="http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2003/5/7/124825.shtml">Deck of Weasels Exposes America's Worst</a>
<img src="http://foolsblog.com/images/weasels.jpg" width="450" height="293">
It is distressing to note that the SF Bay Area has the makings of a flush with the <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/weasels/images/Q-diamonds.gif">Queen</a>, <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/weasels/images/9-diamonds.gif ">Nine</a> and <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/weasels/images/4-diamonds.gif">Four</a> of Diamonds...on the other hand a flush is exactly what we need.
...has begun in Cannes. A steady parade of self-righteous, sycophantic entertainment types will seek to curry favor and publicity in the French press by claiming they are being unfairly censored or oppressed in the US by the Bush administration. Film maker Wim Wenders seems to think that consumers refusing to buy products produced by people with whom they disagree is "McCathyism". Funny, all this time, I thought it was freedom of association and a free market place.
The 50's blacklisting was a cowardly, shameful response by the movie/entertainment industry. The studios didn't have the balls to stand up to the govt...even though they controlled the PR machine. Blacklists are only effective when the people who hold the means of production/distribution enforce them. The blacklisting was done to protect profits. Who do these people think they are fooling, Hollywood has zero integrity. They'll fold like a cheap suitcase if the product doesn't produce the expected grosses.
Buy a clue, asshat, a free market decides what they will endorse/buy...not whiny liberals.
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<b>Wim Wenders slams "almost McCarthyist" atmosphere in US</b>
CANNES, France (AFP) - German film director Wim Wenders said he was wondering whether to pack his bags and leave the United States because of the poisonous "almost McCarthyist" atmosphere there.
Wenders, who lives in the United States and was at the Cannes film festival to present his new film "The Soul of Man", said "right now I really feel like it" when asked whether he wanted to leave the country.
There was an "almost McCarthyist" response to critics of President George W. Bush's administration, he said. "Perhaps I should stay," Wenders said. "I don't know, I'm split about it."
Wenders previously quit New York in the early 1980s and gave back his "green card" working and residence permit because of anger over the administration of former US president Ronald Reagan.
"I have the same feelings at the moment, it's very disagreeable," he said.
Wenders will head a jury that will award the festival's Camera d'Or prize for best first feature-length film during his stay at the May 14-25 festival.
His film about Blues music is being screened out of competition at the festival.
</div>
Boo-fucking-hoo.
Lileks does it again: "France is like someone who’s been given a glimpse of the future, sees himself committing suicide, and resolves to spend his remaining days making it look like murder. "
Chirac is in trouble when the Socialists openly diss him:
US seizure of Baghdad provokes political crisis in France
American military successes in Iraq have provoked severe factional conflict within the French ruling elite. The government, mostly backed by the official left parties, faces violent feuding within its own right-wing UMP (Union for a Popular Majority). The foreign policy of President Jacques Chirac and Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin is itself in disarray, seeking simultaneously to appease the US and build up an independent European position.
After it was clear that Iraqi resistance in Baghdad was failing, President Chirac lost no time in praising the slaughter and the occupation of Iraq. Chirac announced on April 10 that he “rejoiced” at the fall of Baghdad to US troops. He subsequently added that a “democracy” could never fail to rejoice at the fall of a dictatorship. In his speech to the United Nations on April 7, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin stated: “The American and British military presence in the region enforces our collective will.”
French ruling circles have not completely abandoned hope that they will be able to profit from the occupation of Iraq and whatever reconstruction takes place there.
<A HREF="http://www.lileks.com/bleats/archive/03/0403/042103.html" target="-blank">Lileks</A> does it again: "France is like someone who’s been given a glimpse of the future, sees himself committing suicide, and resolves to spend his remaining days making it look like murder. "
Chirac is in trouble when the Socialists openly diss him:
<A HREF="http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/apr2003/fran-a21.shtml" target="_blank">US seizure of Baghdad provokes political crisis in France</A>
American military successes in Iraq have provoked severe factional conflict within the French ruling elite. The government, mostly backed by the official left parties, faces violent feuding within its own right-wing UMP (Union for a Popular Majority). The foreign policy of President Jacques Chirac and Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin is itself in disarray, seeking simultaneously to appease the US and build up an independent European position.
After it was clear that Iraqi resistance in Baghdad was failing, President Chirac lost no time in praising the slaughter and the occupation of Iraq. Chirac announced on April 10 that he “rejoiced” at the fall of Baghdad to US troops. He subsequently added that a “democracy” could never fail to rejoice at the fall of a dictatorship. In his speech to the United Nations on April 7, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin stated: “The American and British military presence in the region enforces our collective will.”
French ruling circles have not completely abandoned hope that they will be able to profit from the occupation of Iraq and whatever reconstruction takes place there.
Emperor Chirac's naked ambition is revealed:
Chirac Again Warns East Europeans to Toe EU Line
ATHENS (Reuters) - French President Jacques Chirac, who outraged east Europeans in February by slamming their support for the U.S.-led war on Iraq, warned the new EU members on Wednesday to do more to find common European stands.
Speaking as 15 EU member states and 10 mostly ex-communist new members signed a treaty sealing the expansion of the bloc, Chirac said the new Europe must clarify its political ambitions to avoid the splits that emerged over the war.
In his stunning tirade in February, Europe's leading opponent of the war denounced east European countries as "not very well behaved and reckless" for siding with Washington and declared they had "missed a great opportunity to shut up."
His more diplomatic approach at the signing ceremony at Athens' ancient Agora or marketplace, the birthplace of democracy, clearly aimed at the east Europeans with its call for the expanding Europe to maintain unity in its growing diversity.
"This new Europe will not be able to fulfil our citizens' expectations if, as we are seeing in the current crisis, its political ambitions are not clarified and its running is not extensively rethought," he said.
"The European Union is about more than just a large market, common policies, a single currency and free movement," he said pointedly. "It is more importantly about a collective ambition, shared disciplines, firm solidarity and naturally looking to the European family."
Emperor Chirac's naked ambition is revealed:
<A HREF="http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=5QB4TVLOXYP0ECRBAE0CFEY?type=worldNews&storyID=2577948" target>Chirac Again Warns East Europeans to Toe EU Line </A>
ATHENS (Reuters) - French President Jacques Chirac, who outraged east Europeans in February by slamming their support for the U.S.-led war on Iraq, warned the new EU members on Wednesday to do more to find common European stands.
Speaking as 15 EU member states and 10 mostly ex-communist new members signed a treaty sealing the expansion of the bloc, Chirac said the new Europe must clarify its political ambitions to avoid the splits that emerged over the war.
In his stunning tirade in February, Europe's leading opponent of the war denounced east European countries as "not very well behaved and reckless" for siding with Washington and declared they had "missed a great opportunity to shut up."
His more diplomatic approach at the signing ceremony at Athens' ancient Agora or marketplace, the birthplace of democracy, clearly aimed at the east Europeans with its call for the expanding Europe to maintain unity in its growing diversity.
"This new Europe will not be able to fulfil our citizens' expectations if, as we are seeing in the current crisis, its <B>political ambitions</B> are not clarified and its running is not extensively rethought," he said.
"The European Union is about more than just a large market, common policies, a single currency and free movement," he said pointedly. "It is more importantly about a <B>collective ambition</B>, shared disciplines, firm solidarity and naturally looking to the European family."