† Deconstructing Obama’s Cairo Speech: The French National Assembly has created a panel of 32 lawmakers who will spend the next six months examining whether the burqa violated the country’s secular constitution, reports CNN:

 

Last week 57 lawmakers - led by communist legislator Andrè Gerin - signed a petition calling for a study into the feasibility of legislation to ban the burka in public places.

 

On Monday Sarkozy declared in a keynote parliamentary address that the burka, which covers women from head to toe, is "not welcome" in France.

 

"The problem of the burka is not a religious problem. This is an issue of a woman's freedom and dignity. This is not a religious symbol. It is a sign of subservience; it is a sign of lowering. I want to say solemnly, the burka is not welcome in France," Sarkozy told lawmakers. …

 

Some lawmakers have called for burkas to be banned completely, claiming they are degrading to women. They also include housing minister Fadela Amara, a Muslim-born women's rights campaigner, who has called the garment "a kind of tomb for women."

 

"We cannot accept in our country women trapped behind a fence, cut off from social life, deprived of any identity. This is not the idea that we have of a woman's dignity," Sarkozy said Monday.

 

Now, compare Sarkozy’s unequivocal defense of women’s rights with Obama’s craven capitulation to Islamofascist extremism under the guise of religious freedom :

 

[F]reedom in America is indivisible from the freedom to practice one's religion. ... That's why the United States government has gone to court to protect the right of women and girls to wear the hijab and to punish those who would deny it. ...

 

Freedom of religion is central to the ability of peoples to live together.  We must always examine the ways in which we protect it.  ...

 

Likewise, it is important for Western countries to avoid impeding Muslim citizens from practicing religion as they see fit - for instance, by dictating what clothes a Muslim woman should wear.  We can't disguise hostility towards any religion behind the pretence of liberalism. ...

 

 I reject the view of some in the West that a woman who chooses to cover her hair is somehow less equal

 

The Christian Science Monitor takes note of the yawning chasm between these two - male – Western leaders on what constitutes “freedom” for women:

 

The difference broadly comes down to one of "freedom to" versus "freedom from." Obama is defending a woman's right to dress as she chooses, especially when it comes to expressing her religious belief. Sarkozy, too, is motivated by a vision of a woman's right, but in his case it's a freedom from coercion by those who would impose a symbol of second-class status. …

 

In the US, Obama faces criticism from some Muslim women, like Karima Bennoune, an Algerian-American teaching at University of Michigan Law School, who sees Obama's words as accommodating the "law of the Brothers" - family members and community fundamentalists who would impose a symbol of subservience on sisters and other women. …

 

For some US observers, Obama's stand on the scarf and the burqa has simply been too one-sided. In his Cairo speech, Obama "talked about the right of Muslim women to wear the veil, particularly in the West," says James Phillips, a Middle East expert at the Heritage Foundation in Washington. "What he didn't talk about was their right not to wear the veil."

 

As The Stiletto has pointed out before (second item), the burqa is not a silken Hermès scarf or the much humbler babushka. The burqa is essentially a funeral shroud that covers every square inch of a woman’s body, impeding walking – it’s impossible to run in a burqa - and peripheral vision. As always, Obama is being too cute by a half when he likens being trapped under, and trussed by, yards and yards of cloth as “hair covering.” His wife and daughters should try wearing a burqa for a month and then tell him what they think of their “freedom.” Bet MO won’t last 24 hours – after all, she’ll have to cover up her bionic arms.

 

For her part, Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum gives weight to Sarkozy’s insistence that the burqa is a cultural constraint and not a religious obligation - the Koran only requires that women (and men) dress “modestly” – by highlighting the struggles of the feminist movement in Iran:
 

In the United States, the most America-centric commentators have somberly attributed the strength of recent demonstrations to the election of Barack Obama. Others want to give credit to the democracy rhetoric of the Bush administration. Still others want to call this a "Twitter revolution" or a "Facebook revolution," as if zippy new technology alone had inspired the protests. But the truth is that the high turnout has been the result of many years of organizational work, carried out by small groups of civil rights activists and above all women's groups, working largely unnoticed and without much outside help. …

 

Not Obama, not Bush and not Twitter, in other words, but years of work and effort lie behind the public display of defiance and, in particular, the number of women on the streets - and their presence matters. Their presence could strike the deepest blow against the regime. For at the heart of the ideology of the Islamic Republic is its claim to divine inspiration: Its leadership is legitimate, as is its harsh repression of women, because God has decreed that it is so. The outright rejection of this creed by tens of thousands of women, not just over the past weekend but over the past decade, has to weaken the Islamic Republic's claim to invincibility, in Iran and across the Middle East.

 

Beneath the radar of NOW and other women’s rights groups in the U.S., feminists in Afghanistan, Iraq and other Muslim countries are fighting for equality and the freedom not to wear the burqa if they don’t want to (and only a minority want to, BTW).

 

† The Right To Bear Arms Belongs To Us All: Part II: A Prince George's County woman fatally shot her husband, Richard Marcellous Wilson, 30, after he violated an active protective order and attacked her, reports The Washington Post:

 

The circumstances of the incident are unclear, but police think that the shooting "appears to have been in self-defense," said Cpl. Mike Rodriguez, a spokesman for the Prince George's police department. Wilson, police said, had 

 

Rodriguez declined to name the shooter because she is a victim in the case and has not been charged. Online court records list her name as Tamiko Buchanan and Tamiko Wilson, and neighbors confirmed her identity. She could not be reached yesterday. [Emphasis, The Stiletto.]

 

Note that the police wanted to protect the identity of the woman because they view her to be a victim, but because a gun was involved The WaPo took it upon itself to out her. So in the eyes of the WaPo she is guilty of exercising her Second Amendment rights and therefore does not deserve the protective cloak of anonymity.

 

 

† Who Says TV Isn’t Educational? (second item): Another Discovery Channel TV show is credited with saving a life, reports The Associated Press:

 

When he realized he'd been separated from his family on a weekend hike in a northern Utah forest, 9-year-old Grayson Wynne's thoughts turned to television.

 

Grayson watches "Man vs. Wild" on the Discovery Channel every week with his brothers and his dad. On the show, host and adventurer Bear Grylls strands himself in the wilderness and then shows viewers how to survive the sticky situations. …

 

Grayson started tearing up his yellow rain slicker, despite the intermittent downpours, and tying pieces to trees.

 

"I just used my hands," said Grayson, who was found safe Sunday after spending 18 hours lost in the forest. "I don't know how many times I tore the thing but quite a lot." …

 

Grayson created a small shelter overnight under a fallen tree. The next day, he decided to follow a creek in hopes of finding help.

 

The Daggett County sheriff's office credited the searchers, volunteers and Grayson's common sense for the positive outcome.

 

The bottom line: You can either waste your time watching TV or invest your time by learning stuff that could save your life – or at least improve it.

 

 

† Protected Class Warfare: Black Eyed Peas tour manager Polo Molina gave Perez Hilton a black eye outside a Toronto nightclub after the celebrity blogger and bandmember will.i.am had words, reports The Associated Press:

 

"He was like 'You need to respect me.' He was in my face. He was obviously trying to intimidate me and scare me," Hilton said. "I was like 'I don't need to respect you. I don't respect you and I did say this, and I knew that it would be the worst thing I could possibly say to him because he was acting the way he was. I said 'You know what, I don't respect you and you're gay and stop being such a faggot.'"

 

GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) is not amused, reports Los Angels Times blog “The Dish Rag,” and is demanding an apology from Hilton:

 

These are vulgar anti-gay slurs that feed a climate of hatred and intolerance toward our community. For someone in our own community to use it to attack another person by saying that it is, quote, ‘The worst possible thing that thug would ever want to hear,’ is incredibly dangerous. It legitimizes use of a slur that is often linked to violence against our community. And it sends a message that it is OK to attempt to dehumanize people by exploiting anti-gay attitudes.”

 

GLAAD has also asked the media not to repeat the slur when covering the story. Good luck with that – it’s not as though the Hilton-will.i.am hissy fit warrants a total media blackout, like a kidnapped New York Times reporter.

 

For his part, Molina turned himself in and has been charged with assaulting Hilton; he is due in court August 5^th.

 

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (What Al Gore Hath Wrought, second item): After a judge’s ruling on a single disputed ballot in a contested election for the Spearfish, SD, City Council failed to break the 126-126 tie between incumbent councilwoman Shawn Dardis and challenger David Baker, town officials consulted state law and discovered that a game of chance is required to determine a winner, reports CNN. The two candidates first rolled dice to see which would get to stick his or her hand inside a purple Crown Royal bag that contained one black marble and a white one. Baker ended up with even odds of extracting the winning white marble or throwing the race to his rival by default. And the winner is …

 

[Hat Tip: The Heel, an Ivy-educated attorney with a prestigious New York firm, and occasional contributor to this blog.]

 

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (Empire State Repubs Rise Again): Open warfare has broken out in the NY State Senate over control of the podium, reports WCBS-TV (Channel 2-NYC), describing footage shot through the window of a Senate door: 

                                                                                          

After talks of a power-sharing arrangement broke down, Democrats locked themselves in the Senate chamber, Republicans tried to conduct business on their own and none of the "people's business" got done. …

Yonkers Sen. Andrea Stewart Cousins [stood at the podium] to prevent the Republicans from taking over. The move came shortly after Democrats said talks of establishing a bi-partisan operating agreement fell through because a Republican coalition insisted the Senate president be Bronx Sen. Pedro Espada. …

What happened next was equally incredible. With the Democrats in their seats, the Republicans marched in and tried to take the podium. They were rebuffed, so they held a session form the well of the chamber and passed dozens of bills by acclamation.

The odd thing was when Republican senators start the session with the pledge of allegiance. The Democrats didn't stand to participate and when one tried to stand, he was pulled down. [Emphasis, The Stiletto.]

 

Gee, could this be why some people think Dems are, um, unpatriotic?

 

Meanwhile, here is failed Repub presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani’s opening salvo in his expected challenge of accidental incumbent David Paterson for the governorship.

 

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (last item, Why We Need Gitmo): Hell, no, Uighurs won’t go! To Palau, that is. The Associated Press reports:

  

Palau consented to President Barack Obama's request to take the Turkic Muslims as part of plans to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center in Cuba. …

 

Palau sent a fact-finding team to the Guantanamo Bay detention center last weekend to assess their needs. But five of the 13 Uighurs declined to meet with the delegation out of concerns that it could not protect them from the Chinese, said Ngiraibelas Tmetuchl, special assistant to President Johnson Toribiong. …

 

The remaining eight Uighurs expressed similar reservations, but were open to the idea of resettling in Palau.

 

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (third item, Your Butt Will Look Good In These Jeans): It’s OK to gush over Michelle Obama’s “buff arms,” but Canadian magazine Maclean’s reports that a comedian can’t make MO’s butt the butt of jokes without some people being offeded. Tough. Until the MSM gets over its obsession with MO’s muscular arms, The Stiletto is willing to take the risk. Nothing against MO per se – The Stiletto herself has a juicy figure, though she is luckier than MO in that her rounded hips, thighs and butt are balanced with an ample bosom thus all her weight is not concentrated from the waist down – her beef is more with the media.

 

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (last item, 10 Reasons Michelle Obama Should Be Proud – Really Proud – Of America): This latest installment in The Stiletto Blog’s ongoing series meant to help instill the necessary pride of country in Michelle Obama’s consciousness to enable her to serve as an unofficial ambassador focuses on how the passengers on the two star-crossed Washington Metro commuter trains helped each other physically and spiritually after the fatal crash. The Washington Post reports:

 

In the moments after the crash, passengers made tourniquets out of T-shirts, struggled to pull debris off others and sought to calm the hysterical and the gravely wounded. Inside the worst-hit car, waiting on ambulances and the "jaws of life," an Anglican priest led a group in the Lord's Prayer. On the ground below, a civilian Pentagon employee told a wounded girl that he wouldn't accept her last wish, that she was going to live.

 

Inside the car, there was dust and broken glass and blood. Seats had been ripped from the floor and thrown around: One man was trapped between two of them, with a leg that appeared broken. A woman was screaming, invisible, buried beneath a pile of seats. …

Dave Bottoms, 39, had just left his job as an Army chaplain at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. The Anglican priest was in the back of the front car that slammed into the stopped train. When he saw the train buckling, it looked just like it would in the movies, he said. …

 

In the chaotic moments after the crash, he went to a young woman who had been pinned between seats. She was hysterical, he said, but he began calming her. …

 

When first responders arrived, Bottoms and two others initially refused to get off the train, wanting to continue to comfort the young woman pinned between the seats.

 

"I just talked with her," he said. "I told her to pray." …

 

Mike Corcoran, 39, who was in another car, said someone burst into his section after the impact and said help was needed at the back of the train. He ran back and saw a man and woman pinned between seats.

 

Blood splattered the train's windows, he said. Another woman was standing, he said, but her foot was bleeding profusely.

 

Corcoran pulled off his polo shirt, quickly yanked off his undershirt and tied it around the woman's foot as a tourniquet. He told her to keep pressure on it until help arrived.