We don't care! Really?

 

So there was a post last August where I was told that, generally speaking, Americans couldn’t care less about Bill Clinton entertaining Miss Lewinsky (unless it was the other way round). Ok then, I leave it to people who know better than me.

Let's have another try though... 

The former French president has been married thrice and the current one has been living in sin ever since he lost his pucelage some 40 years ago (I don't know the exact date). After he's lived 30 years with the former Socialist candidate to the presidency 5 years ago, he now is the companion of a twice divorced woman with three children of her own.

Now, next month there will another presidential election in the US. Am I invited to believe that both the GOP and the Dem. one would have without any hesitation picked up a candidate who would have been married thrice (and counting)  and another one with four children out of wedlock? 

Too bad they didn't have anybody filling the requirements then...

The speed of light

Get lost, you jerk!

This front page is that of the French daily Libération published in Paris and created by Jean-Paul Sartre in 1973. It is on the left side of the political spectrum and has made a point ever since its first issue to print provocative front pages with word plays and puns, witty and sometimes very elaborate. Readers often have to be in the know to understand them.  

The audience is mainly intellectuals and definitively made of what is called "Parisian bobos". Though a leftist outlet, the working class doesn't read Libé which is far too intellectual and full of cultural references to be understood by people with no or poor education. Would the New-Yorker be an appropriate comparison? 

Now the context needs further explanation.

The man we see is Bernard Arnault, first European fortune and 4th in the world with US$41 billion. He is a close friend to Sarkozy, was his best man when said Sarko married and it has been announced that he has just made an application to be granted the Belgian citizenship. The reason of this move is that Arnault doesn't want to pay the surplus income taxe rate that the socialist government has decided to implement on the super riches. I haven't done any research but the supplement the man would have to pay would be probably in the range of some millions €.

As Ned explains in the comments section, four years ago Sarko retorted a classy « Casse-toi pov’ con » to a man who didn't want to shake hand with him.     

So when Arnault, again a close friend of Sarko, has made it known he will leave France the staff at Libé had the good idea to reuse Sarko's insult but with a small change in the phrasing. It no longer is « Casse-toi pauvre con » but instead « Casse-toi riche con ». A tit for a tat so to say.

Of course it is a good example of why the French generally speaking  (those on the right don't objet even when they're workers or employees, their super egos do the job to maintain them in a state of mental submission) loathe capitalism and its great priests who always play the same old card of threatening to leave the country and let the French fall into poverty. 1789 anyone?

Arnault has made his fortune on high end products of century old French craftship, fashion, perfumes, jewellery etc. He personally is not an artist, hasn't created anything and is just taking advantage of what has been in existence long before his great-great-great-grand-parents were born. He is the very incarnation of the capitalist making a fortune out of other's work and skills.

Now, the interesting part of the story is that Libé reportedly has lost something in the range of 600,000 € of advertisement revenue when luxe companies have cancelled their orders and contracts out of sympathy for Arnault who they deem has been insulted the very same way Sarko insulted a French citizen four years ago.

It is also worth knowing that the major shareholder of Libération is another millionaire (but far from being a billionaire) Edouard de Rotschild, another friend of Sarko and a bi-national French Israeli businessman...

With a millionaire as main financial support, the loss of 500,000 US$ is not the end of the newspaper but it shows what conscience de classe is.

Let me explain: When these companies buy advertisement spaces in the paper, it is not out of generosity for a an outlet that defends values that are opposed to theirs (they have none but making as much money as they can) but more simply because their potential customers read this newspaper. But since their products also are high end ones, the market is limited and the customers don't have much choice if they want to buy Rolex, Mercedes or Christian Lacroix' marvellous jackets.

The companies which have decided to (temporally) boycott Libé run no risk to see theirs benefit be dented in the least, they just want to say to Bernard "We're on your side pal". It's called conscience de classe.Sarko was the embodiment of this world whose envoy he was at the Élysée palace and half the French regret him... 
Are there still some gulags available in Siberia?

Two slits on my head

Err... Did I mention I underwent surgery last year? Oh no, not the time when my right forearm was on fire, that was in December. In November I also entered the operating theater and it was my eyelids that were very much on the forefront of my concerns.

Like everybody when our eyes are going to experiment some treatment, I assume we all have some qualms and concerns. Won't the surgeon sneeze at an untimely moment?

So when they woke me up I was relieved to perceive the white gleam of... but of what exactly? All - and not everything - was immerged in an indiscernible white fog and a voice told me (probably, I don't exactly remember) not to worry, I just had been blindfolded and it will last until tomorrow. I hadn't been forewarned.

So the funniest part of the intervention was over and I was brought back to my room where I stayed stuck in my bed with a perf on my left forearm for the next 24 hours.

Oh boy, let me tell you that was like a life changing experience. Being blind isn't precisely like closing one's eyes for a few seconds or even a few minutes just to "see" how it feels to walk in one's apartment without seeing anything.

Lying on a bed on which you are blind and tied, you are then not much more than a mere living object relying 100% on others. Of course forget about Sudoku, cross words, Rubik's cube and their likes. Why didn't you listen to the radio some may ask? Just, try to use any smart phone when you can't see the keyboard, the touches and you don't even know whether you're holding it in the right position...

And one has to be very careful with where the few objects you need are positioned since if you let them drop... well you simply can't retrieve them, they're gone and you're more alone that you previously were.

So basically, you're confronted with your inner thoughts and you discover that isn't much really to keep you busy. 

Since I always have tablets of Lexomil with me I took what it takes to sleep as much as I could. Yet, I felt twice like bouts of anxiety which were quickly overcome since I knew I will be freed at 4 pm the day after. It is possible that I asked the nurses three times which time it was

And also, I shouted in the middle of the night because I needed some bodily fluids to be evacuated and I couldn’t reach the alarm device which was gone somewhere along the bed. That is when the nurse, who was just a voice to me, said: “Look, I put it here” (verbatim).  And it was a reminder of how different it is when one is still present to the world whereas the other isn’t. A world of difference indeed, unless it is a different world... 

Speaking of world... This experience led me once again to the conclusion that the world and the universe too only exist as long as they are perceived by a reflecting consciousness. A process that can happen only with light reaching my brain through these two slits on my head. Behind and covered by said slits, are two drops of water which permit opsins to be kept alive and allow light to activate the cells which in the end create in my mind a representation of the world, and not the world itself of course.

The proposition seems paradoxical I know but yet, there's no mountain and no trees to the blind, no Moon and no planets and no galaxies and no black holes, save metaphorically speaking. The very existence of the world depends on the possibility that it may be perceived with light as the ultimate medium that enables the formation of images upon which we accommodate our skills in order to survive.

And every morning when we wake up, we thoughtlessly rub our two drops of water like they weren’t the very condition that permits the world to exist. The universe is so fragile indeed and it is at our command and most of us don’t realize.

…what he knows is not a sun and an earth, but only an eye that sees a sun, a hand that feels an earth; that the world which surrounds him is there only as representation, i.e., only in relation to something else, the consciousness… 

(to be followed here)

The day I felt embarrassed

All along the 60s the space race really enthralled me. Gagarine, (yes, I was there...) the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs. What a hell of excitement that was for a teenager then!

After their feat, the three Americans who made history were on a world promotion tour. And then they arrived in Paris to be introduced live on French television from the Palais de Chaillot, on October the 8th of 1969.

Man! And you thought they'd performed the hardest part of their mission... How wrong you were!

They had to endure an endless speech by no other than Maurice DRUON, of the French Academy. Why was this man chosen to welcome the American astronauts will for ever remain a mystery.

I still can vividly remember the three stoic men standing in row behind the talkative peacock and I couldn't help thinking what their thoughts might have been...

"Boy, they didn't warn us back home that the French leg would be that painful!"

No, really, I was so embarrassed that these men would be given such a cogent confirmation of what the French are renowned for among Americans: pretty good at making lengthy speeches and totally impotent when push comes to shove...

And Druon would go on and on and on and I was saying to myself: "Will he ever shut his big mouth?".

I had to admire the patience and fortitude of Armstrong, Collins and Aldrin for keeping a permanent smile floating on their lips while this buffoon was making a fool of himself. And to be polite and courteous enough to nonetheless thank him when their ordeal had come to an end.

Every time I remember this sinister episode of French stupidity I hope someone at least came to them and apologize for the despicable show they had been dragged into.

43 years later, I still feel embarrassed...

They say it wasn't you

 

No introduction needed right? Bill went into some problems after he... but I diverge.

Only in America do you think? Oh no, the very same thing happened in the Elysée palace some months ago but about nobody knows about it.

Nobody? Not exactly though.

The facts have been reported in a book, Le monarque, son fils, son fief, on sale in every bookstore (I've just seen it no latter than yesterday) whose author is the former (female) assistant of a rightist politician of Armenian descent, another French politician from the extreme right who's held several ministerial posts under Chirac and Sarkozy.

The author, Marie-Cécile Guillaume was hostess of the Canal+ TV channel and spoke on another radio station here.

As far as I know, the only politician who (slightly) protested but didn't really deny Sarko asked and received a favor from another woman of his party is no other than the thug who's been previously mentioned here, another very rightist politician (of Hungarian descent like Sarko), another French rightist politician who's been convicted some years ago.

The whole media/politician world knows about it of course and that's it. 

Now the question is: Why hasn't this episode made the front pages of all French media?    

The answer is twofold in my opinion: 

- The overwhelming majority of French journalists is composed of entertainers who are completely ignorant of what journalism is supposed to be. Also, they're simple employees of media which is very dependant on politicians. They risk lose their job if they ask too precise questions or are slightly irreverent like the most famous anchorman in France has experienced with Sarko.

Also, after 40 years of Gaullism, Pompidolism, Giscardism and Sarkozism, there's a tradition of submission to the powerful ones among French journalists. This is a historical/societal issue but that is another topic yet.

- Globally speaking, I think Americans - as a whole of course - have it right when they see the French (toujours as a whole) as being very laxist about all things related to sex. There's simply no way the episode which took place in the Elysée palace could have stirred the passions like the affair between Bill and Monica did in the U.S. Indeed, in general the French wouldn't have been scandalised or shocked whatever, they would have considered this as a private affair between adults.

The fact that it took place in the Elysée Palace wouldn't have been much of an issue either and this may be questionable yet.

When the DSK affair broke out, it isn't so much the mere sexual part of the story which was the focus point of attention here but rather the accusation of rape and the way the American judiciary system would handle the case. For some months, some French media has tried to whip the interest of their audience with the sequel of the affair but rapidly said audience was fed up so the media let it at that.

So, to make a long story short, isn't it interesting to consider how two nearly identical cases are dealt with according to the country (read cultures) they took place in?

The overall depravity Americans (as a whole) consider the French society to be impregnated with may not be a completely erroneous appreciation after all.

Locks of love

 

So there is this article in the NYT today with the usual clichés about Love and the French so that Americans continue fantasizing.

Another example of over generalisation: the phenomena which is described here is mainly a Parisian thing for what I know and 99,9% of the French (outside Paris I mean) don't know about it.

But even in Paris with say 2 million inhabitants, I'm not sure more than 1 % of them know about this tourist's habit which seems to be less than a few year old.

The only place where I saw these padlocks was on the Pont des Arts. It took me a while to understand what it was all about until I put two and two together.

Bon, ça ne mange pas de pain et la Ville de Paris les enlève régulièrement, otherwise there would be grappes of padlocks over the River Seine.

The interesting thing though is that a practise which in the first place probably started with one young man having an idea to have his girlfriend marvel at how he was in love with her, has been imitated God knows how and has now become the thing to do for dozens of thousands couples, whether Americans/Japanese/Chinese etc. and seems to epitomize in the eyes of millions from the world the way "the French" approach the notion of love.

But now I notice the name of the author of the article is Agnès Poirier which is as French as you get and I wonder if she's not on a secret mission commanded by some sort of French Tourist Department (North-America section) in order to perpetuate some myth re. the French and love.

Her theory about how "the French" regard love as essentially being free and not bound in the wedlock's of marriage most probably appeal to all males in the world, notwithstanding their nationality. I for one am of this opinion too ;-)

But I'm not so sure females the world over, again notwithstanding their nationality, share this purported sense that love means being free and open to the mille et une opportunities that everyday brings along though...

Submission

The idea for this post comes from a regular who twice, if not thrice, wrote: "The Israelis don't threaten to cut off the heads and hands of the infidels until the non-believers drown in a sea of blood and their seed is wiped out from the earth." 

If I'm not mistaken, the hidden message here is that the innate-Jews-hater-Muslims do actually threaten to cut off etc.

So, am I invited to understand that 2.6 million American citizens are potential murderers and fanatic zealots threatening to cut off the heads and hands etc?

 

Well, as usual it's all a matter of context and circumstances but the interesting point is that the foundation of Judaism - and not Islam but I may be wrong about that - is based on the story of an attempted infanticide. Talk of a message of peace and love for a start!

This foundation myth of Judaism is as {{mode ironic on}} elaborate and sophisticated {{mode ironic off}} as the pledge (retarded) teen-agers engage reciprocally into when they stitch each other's fingers and press together their two tiny drops of blood, swearing an eternal friendship or even love. Until the girl meets a handsome guy with a brand new Japanese moped two weeks later, unless it is the boy who meets a girl with bigger bumpers. Ah, love...

This notion of engagement through blood, with all the symbolic that is attached to it, is a universal archaic meme that corresponds to an early stage of mental development. No need to expand here, all the details are available on the Internet. 

Just remember the people for whom the Old Testament was written many, many years ago, were mere illiterate uneducated peasants whose maturity would compare to that of 7 year-old contemporary children. The message had to be simple and striking: Dady could kill me and was about to but wew... God intervened at the very last second. Wow, thank God, I owe you my life.

Now, there are two types of persons here: 

- Those who do really believe the scene as depicted in the Genesis is one that actually took place. Alas, these people are beyond any possible rehab I'm afraid.

- Those who do not dare think it is a fabrication since the Jewish law holds that it was dictated by God (no less) to Moses (yes, himself in person) on top of Mount Sinai. Not much different from the former methinks...

Quoiqu'il en soit, aucun parent, hormis peut-être les pires des fanatiques avec trois lignes de coke dans le pif (et encore), n'est prêt à jouer la scène d'Abraham et d'Isaac. Le Judaïsme ne leur demande d'ailleurs pas mais par contre ce qu'il attend des fidèles c'est une obéissance absolue et incontestée même et surtout vis-à-vis de l'incompréhensible. Juifs ou Chrétiens, "les voies du Seigneur" etc..

Apprentissage de la soumission dès la naissance en parallèle à l'affirmation d'une différence d'avec les autres fondée sur leur nature essentiellement différente et marquée définitivement par la circoncision. And they complain and lament that they've been rejected and ostracised by all other peoples of the earth for the past 2000 years. 

Hmmm... I wonder why really.

Court-martial

- So, you were responsible of the HMS Victoria and eventually there happened a little incident and the battleship sank and 357 of our brave British sailors perished at sea. Certainly you're innocent but yet, we'd like to hear from you what went wrong.

This question could have been asked to George Tryon, just he drowned with the ship. Too bad but yet, had he survived, one may imagine he would have had to face a court-martial upon his return from the shores off Lebanon.

The interesting thing (among others) with the military is the notion that every man is accountable for his conduct and for the consequences of his decisions.

A warship costs a certain amount of money and the loss of the sailors, regardless of the sensitive aspect of things, also is a loss for the military institution.

When one considers how the military, whatever the nationality, handles this concept of personal accountability when the occasion arises in the real world, one cannot fail to wonder if the military institution isn't a model of morality when compared to the world of politicians .

I've been told about a president who deliberately lied to his country and engaged the military he's the commander in chief into two wars which finally cost the lives of over 6.400  of his countrymen soldiers, notwithstanding the soldiers of his allies, let alone the lives of over 100.000 civilians of the countries he attacked 

Of course, the financial impact on the economy of his country of such foolish and criminal misconduct can be counted by the billions of € (I chose this currency as a red herring so that the person I’m thinking of eludes the guessing game).

And the same goes of course for a certain Prime Minister, his accomplice who would also be held for a war criminal if he had been captured by the Brits or the Americans, should he'd been on the ennemy's side.

As a matter of fact, this also works for all the politicians who betrayed their own country's interests and people such as Havel, Berlusconi, Aznar and the entire clique.

But the total and absolute unaccountability of politicians goes far beyond their bellicose proclivity and extends to about all the fields of their activity.

They can behave like plunderers and profiteers like Sarkozy and his gang have been acting for the last five years, leave the country on its knees and on the verge of bankruptcy, no matter what, they will always be immune of any questioning, let alone the slightest reprimand, and there always will be millions of voters ready to vote them again in office.

The tragedy is twofold here: The simple fact that this state of affairs is commonplace in "democracies" and also that next to everybody simply takes it for granted that politicians are above any trivial interrogation and accountability the sort of the military demands from its members.

Les tribunaux militaires certainement n'inspirent pas plus confiance que les tribunaux civils but yet, the notion of personal accountability seems not to be a completely unheard of concept.

Who would have though the military institution was the last guardian of morality?

(ps: The HMS Victoria and George Tryon aren't the examples I wanted to use but I can't remember the details of something similar which happened in the North Sea during naval manoeuvres - perhaps with the Tsarist marine- at the beginning of the XXth century.)

Free Will

For billions of years everything on Earth has just been another atom of solar dust and billions of people believe they're free and possess some sort of free will... Oh well...

---------------

Comme je sentais une certaine lassitude relativement au dernier thème chez certains des habitués, j'ai voulu changer d'air et for whatever reason, the souvenir of this movie by Allen and the topic of free will coalesced within 3 tenth of a second in my mind.

But, in the above video I couldn't see the segment with the black man asking twice "What am I doin' here?" which of course is extremely funny and another indication re. determinism. So I looked up again for another video and I found the one with Allen fatalistically saying in relief: "At least he's Jewish".

It probably has to do with stream of consciousness and synchronicity but we're back to our last theme, that is Judaism...

The line by Allen is funny but actually, would we had found it so funny had he said "at least he's Muslim" or "at least he's Christian" or if a Muslim or Christian actor had pronounced their respective line? Well, honestly no, we would have found the joke very poor and in these times of P.C, disturbing and on the verge of being "racist".

Now, this is very interesting because Allen, candidly, both with his joke and in the situation he's in, gives another obvious illustration of what makes Judaism different of all other religions.

He just refers to the simple fact that the very basis of Judaism is genetics and biology which leads to the core of the issue and also the basics of philosophy that is the distinction between Nature and Culture.

Nature is a given order of things and a universal one at that, whereas Culture is a construction realised by every human group and all possible specific cultures identify each and every human group for what it has done out of its original natural environment.

For what I know, no civilisation has ever claimed it was different from any other for any other reason than its achievement in whatever fields of human activity. From that starting point, yes each civilisation has considered itself superior to the next one for its culture but not for some natural given superiority over anybody else.

L'essentialisme du Judaïsme remonte au-delà de la Culture et tient qu'il y a un antécédent naturel à l'existence du "peuple juif" dont l'identité perdure pour des raisons biologiques et génétiques avant toute chose. If that isn't the very definition of racism I ask the question: what is racism then?

Even slave holders, whether 2000 years ago in Greece or Egypt or in America during the XIXth century, didn't so much believe that their slaves were naturally and by reason of their genes different from them but "rather" that their culture was superior to that of their slaves. African slaves were even evangelised by their white owners who still - globally speaking - kept the separation between Nature and Culture more or less distinct. Isn' it Thomas Jefferson who didn't mind having children with his black slave?

Philosophy isn't mere pipe dreams and we're back again to Plato's allegory of the cave whose message is still more than ever alive and relevant. 

When hundreds of millions in the West have been exposed for half a century now to a one way propaganda showing the Jews as the very embodiment of Good per se and the victims of discrimination wherever they've been going, like the prisoners of the cave they're just absolutely incapable to recognise the other image which is shown to them and they return to the cave convinced someone tried to dupe them into believing in something different from the only image they've ever known.

They have eyes and they cannot see, even if it's up their nose like E.A Poe's letter.

The irony of all this is that the U.S which preaches the whole world against racism, which in itself may be laudable, is protecting and putting all its strength in the defence of the most racist country in the world whose existence is based on the vilest racist religious lunacies.

And the current mantra in the West is "against racism and anti-Semitism". When head is tail and black is white... Oh the fools... oh the slaves of the cave.

Head is tail and black is white

Depuis une quarantaine d’années l’antisémitisme est le schibboleth de la conscience morale occidentale, la pierre de touche infaillible de la moralité occidentale contemporaine qui autorise la mise en œuvre éhontée d’une aptitude acquise à la culpabilité permettant de distinguer selon un critère exclusif et irréfragable les salauds irrécupérables (les antisémites dont je suis, ceux qui n’adhèrent pas) des autres (ceux qui se taisent).

Être « anti-raciste » c'est un slogan qui se veut universel, tous les hommes, quoique différents, sont égaux (on le croit ou pas, c'est autre chose) et par definition il n'y a pas d'exception et pas d'hommes ou de groupes plus « égaux » que les autres.

Toute adjonction et/ou singularisation est logiquement impossible, il n'y a dans la nature qu'une race humaine avec de nombreuses variantes, et toute différence entre les hommes ne peut être que culturelle et là encore c'est universel, effectivement il y a une multitude de groupes sociaux très différents les uns des autres à tous points de vue.

Nous vivons maintenant dans un registre de valeurs où s'est établie l'équation Juifs = le Bien au sens quasi platonicien which is beyond any scrutiny or critics. Just to be sure, Judaïsm is nothing else but a religion carried on by the purported descendants of a sect of shepherds and fruit pickers living in a small portion of the Middle East some twenty five centuries ago. A religion which is a closed system based on the law of blood contrary to all other religions in the world as far as I know.

The law of blood is the very definition of racism since it doesn't acknowledge someone's merits and value on h/h achievements but only according to the genes h/h biological body is made of. Which is scientifically a complete lunacy of course but the sort of which that makes the same distinction as that the Pures make between them and the Dalits.

Contre le racisme et l’antisémitisme. L’expression est consacrée, l’un ne va pas sans l’autre. Pourquoi pas Contre le racisme et l’anti-sinisme? Ou l’anti-slavisme? Ou l’homophobie? Qu’est-ce donc que cette catégorie tellement différente des autres hommes qu’il faut l’identifier et la singulariser comme telle? Serait-ce parce qu’il s’agit du peuple élu? Mais alors qui est “raciste” dans ce cas si ce n’est ceux qui insistent pour se voir différencier de la communauté humaine?

Qui ne voit que cette association Contre le racisme et l’antisémitisme - qui est maintenant devenue pavlovienne - est très exactement une contradiction interne qui affirme précisément le contraire de ce qu’elle prétend signifier?

The association "against racism and antiSemitism" is an utterly nonsensical one since it pretends to combat racism (what is it? by the way)  on the one hand and protect its very existence and practice on the other hand. What about "against racism and in favour of racism" then?

By mean of some sort of linguistical entryism, Judaism, which is a minuscule racist and excluding sect, has associated itself with a universal message of tolerance and open mindedness. And guess what? Since two or three generations have been continuously brainwashed and immersed in the belief that Judaism = Good per se and criticism of Good = Bad per se, hundreds of millions people in the world in total good faith and no less total ignorance and whose critical thinking has been castrated make theirs a cause which basically exclude them like the Pures exclude the Dalits.  

So when I state that I am an avowed anti Semite what else do I say but that I'm against racism and discrimination? Just that it will be translated like I am an accomplice of Auschwitz et al. Guilt anybody?

Moins les mots sont précis, plus leur signification originelle est diluée jusqu'à être détournée et remplacée par son contraire, plus est facile la manipulation des esprits qui n'ont plus d'appuis sûrs pour étayer un raisonnement ou exprimer des opinions raisonnablement fondées. Which is which when head is tail and black is white?

A conspiracy of silence speaks louder than words

Jolies mélodies

A catching melody isn't it? But have you noticed how it is built on a sequence of just three notes repeated on and on at different levels with the usual few notes that permit the transition from one scale to another? So it works wonder but basically the melodic line is at its simplest. Of course it had to be found though.

Like everybody, I am very sensitive to melodies but I mean real melodies, not just some sort of gimmick that certainly is efficient and powerful but yet somehow unsatisfying musically wise.

Now consider the difference between the stuff Macca used to come out with and that of Mick and Keith. One is a brilliant melody maker whereas the others are brilliant musicians. 

Think of that masterpiece whose first melody spans over 8 bars! And the second melody also spans over 8 bars!!! Two extraordinary melodies in one single song. Certainly Paul had received a visit by the Gods of music when he composed that piece.

Now listen to that one by Keith. Of course it's a wonderful song but note how it's nonetheless based on repetitions and the different parts have to be piled up in order to make ends meet, so to say.

To each his own of course and everyone has a special place in one's heart for such and such tune but globally speaking, consider the respective titles of the two groups and the melodies that come to your mind. It's not a matter of who's the best but just comparing the lenght of the melodies.

The name of Gérard Lenormand is totally unheard of in America of course but I give the link to that song which was an enormous hit in France 40 years ago and whose melody I've always found a long and sophisticated line worth the ones that are met in operas.

And compare with this one which also was a huge, huge hit in 1970. Lovely but the melody is rather simple, yet efficient and catchy.

Anyway, as is the case with books and films and songs that are recommended by the friend of the friend etc. our reception is usually tepid to say the least, the usual fear-of-the-unknown reaction. Also there's no accounting for taste as we all know.

There are thousands of such examples here but I admit I've lost contact with the modern production in the French songs department.

Soumission

Le Judaïsme se distingue de toutes les autres religions en ce qu'il est exclusif et fermé sur lui-même. Ne peuvent en effet appartenir à la religion juive que les descendants des bergers et des cultivateurs d'une secte apparue il y a vingt-cinq siècles. Un système social fondé sur un critère génétique, like it or not, that's the very definition of racism.

L'Islam et le Christianisme, pour s'en tenir aux monothéismes, ont pu croître et se développer précisément parce que ces religions sont englobantes, ouvertes à tous et prosélytes. De ce point de vue, ce sont véritablement des religions universelles dans la mesure où elles sont susceptibles d'accueillir toute l'humanité. Raison pour laquelle la plus récente d'entre elles, l'Islam compte plus d'un milliard de croyants quand le Judaïsme qui le précède d'un millénaire n'en compte pas même 15 millions.

L'essence même du Judaïsme, lui interdit toute croissance et expansion. Or toute entité vivante, quelle qu'elle soit, tend à persévérer dans son être et même à se développer si aucune entité d'une puissance supérieure ne s'y oppose (Spinoza as well as Darwin).

La Shoah a paradoxalement servi de déclencheur à cette force latente en toute chose à prendre le dessus sur tout ce qui se rencontre. Bien que légèrement antérieur à la Shoah, le sionisme a trouvé en celle-ci un point d'appui "inespéré" et imparable pour avancer et légitimer ses exigences.

Ce point d'appui c'est la culpabilité que les Sionistes mettent en œuvre depuis 60 ans de façon systématique auprès du monde entier (hormis l'Asie) et tout particulièrement de l'Occident, qui est tenu responsable de ce qui est arrivé aux Juifs et qui doit dès lors intérioriser cette culpabilité.

Nietzsche, avant Freud, a exposé comment la culpabilité était mise en ouvre par les faibles pour dominer les forts et combien elle était térébrante puisqu'elle conduit celui qui en est victime à l'oubli et même à la haine de soi. Il suffit d'observer l'attitude de F. Hollande relativement à la pseudo responsabilité de la France dans la rafle du Vel d'Hiv. 

Le fait que tous les chefs d'État se sentent tenus, sans même qu'il soit nécessaire de le leur suggérer - tellement ils en ont intégré la pseudo évidence - de porter la kippa quand ils se rendent en Israël ou même dans leur propre pays à l'occasion de telle ou telle cérémonie commémorative, témoigne de la parfaite réussite de cette politique de culpabilisation. 

I have made a quick research but I've failed to find one single pic of W. Wilson wearing a Kippah. And the same goes for Abe Lincoln, the first American Jewish president. Eisenhower, Kennedy? So now it seems it is mandatory for American presidents to wear the kippah out of respect for Judaism and the Jews. Who's next? The Queen of England?

One hundred years ago, Judaism was already here but there was no Zionism, American prezs were mostly Christians from European descent who were probably utterly uninterested with the pretention of the so called "chosen people". But things have changed now. Apparently the process of resorting to guilt in order to submit the other to one's will has worked wonders and as I once read in a British newspaper: In America you can criticize Jesus and God all you want but dare not say anything negative about the Jews.

Indeed, the guit machine is so powerful that as soon as the questions of Israel and Judaism arise, they are mostly met with embarrassed silence. The "at the ready trump card" of the Zionists is to suggest you're an anti Semite (yes, me personally I am an anti-Semite and then what?) and probably a potential accomplice of what happened in Germany 70 years ago.

Actually, not all American are happy with this situation, here, or according to the readers' comments I read in the NYT when the USA/Israel issue is questioned. 

Buddies

Je suis tombé sur l'info par hasard, les députés ont dans leur écrasante majorité refusé la proposition de loi d'un élu de droite (de Courson) visant à instaurer un contrôle de leurs frais de représentation ainsi qu'une fiscalisation desdits.

Socialistes et U.M.P. main dans la main quand l'essentiel est en jeu, à savoir on est dans le fromage et on se gave sans fin puisque ce sont eux qui décident de leurs rémunérations et de légaliser ce qui n'est ni plus ni moins qu'un vol de fonds publics.

On fait mine de se combattre sur scène et dans les coulisses on se tape sur le ventre entre bons copains qui se soutiennent mutuellement quand il est question de toucher au syndicat des exploiteurs de la Res publica. Vous avez voté il y a deux mois pour que cela change, très bien, but we rule and now you shut the f. up for the next five years until we fool you again like has been the case for the last two hundreds years and there's nothing you can do about it.

Cela me fait penser aux rabbins et imams en Israël il y a six ans lorsque les homos du pays avaient souhaité organiser une marche des fiertés à Jérusalem.

Ça n'avait pas fait un pli, les représentants des trois monothéismes étaient bien d'accord, c'était une abomination qui les faisait se retrouver sur leurs fondamentaux : Don't touch the rules we've set up for you and whose gardians we are cos' that's our raison d'être (and also this is a painless situation and you go to the factory in our place).

The same bastards who occasionally tell the ordinary citizens to go and kill their neighbours in the name of the gods they've invented.  

Chopping off some heads in 1789 wasn't such a bad idea after all..

How did their mothers raise them?

 

In my opinion, comedies are much closer to reality than are dramas. We may, to a certain extent, identify with the characters of dramas but we know dramas are fictions and we next to never actually live situations like those represented in, say, Casablanca, Rain man, Gone with the wind etc. you name them.

Everybody is supposed to be amused with comedies and generally is because comedies resort to a theme that is several thousand years old (to say the least), that is relations between men and women and, contrary to dramas, more or less everybody's concerned here.

In particular, there's an absolute and universal constant within this theme and it is the incredible propensity of men - whatever their age - to behave like they were 15 year old kids if not rightly 7 year old children.

Think of the Simpsons for example where Marge rolls her eyes about ten times in each episode (granted, Homer is hmmm... "different" but yet).

Or TV ads, where men are so often portrayed like irresponsible kids who would be lost without their wives and women are depicted as the real and only grown ups.

Why is it that men are so easily prone to regress and act like helpless creatures who want either to impress their wives/girls friends or arouse the maternal instinct of their partners? Haven't their mothers loved them enough?

And women? Why do they next to never regress and only for several months perhaps but certainly not to the point men do when they eventually act like toddlers? Have their fathers loved them all enough?

Could it be that mothers refuse to hand their sons over to other women and program them like time bomb other women will have to deal with?

Hmmm... life is so complicated. I know what I'm talking about anyway, I'm a great offender myself!