MORE PROOF FROM THAILAND: WW4 = GLOBAL JIHAD

GATES OF VIENNA:

Can we compare the effects of the Iraq and Thai insurgencies? Probably. The population disparity between the USA and Thailand means, in my opinion, that the impact on Thailand of a single death in the southern insurrection is almost five times as great as the impact on the USA of the death of a single US warrior in Iraq. If we multiply Thai deaths by 4.5 in order to show what is happening to Thailand, we can see how the suffering of the two nations actually compares:

USA: 2,619
Thailand: 9,363

Adjusting for population size allows us to get some insight into the true level of Thailand’s misery.

Now consider the duration of each conflict, remembering that the USA has been in Iraq almost a year longer than the violence in Thailand has persisted:

USA, actual deaths per month, four years: 55
Thailand, adjusted deaths per month, 37 months: 253

RELIAPUNDIT: THE THAI JIHAD IS MORE VIOLENT THAT THE IRAQ JIHAD. AND IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH JEWS OR ISRAEL OR HALLIBURTON OR BUSH OR NEOCONS... IT'S GLOBAL JIHAD, STUPID!

THE THAI JIHAD IS MORE VIOLENT THAT THE IRAQ JIHAD: AND YET, THE DEFEAT-O-CRATS, AND THEIR COMRADES IN THE EU AND THE UN, ARE SILENT. DO YOU WONDER WHY!? IT'S SIMPLE: NEITHER THE USA OR ISRAEL ARE INVOLVED. WHICH PROVES THE "ANTI-WAR" CROWD IS REALLY ANTI-AMERICA AND ANTI-ISRAEL.

RTWT.

WHY NO INTERNATIONAL PRESSURE ON THAILAND TO CEDE TERRITORY?

SINCE 9/11, MORE BUDDHISTS HAVE BEEN SLAUGHTERED BY JIHADISTS IN THAILAND THAN ARABS KILLED BY ISRAELIS.

IHT (2/07):

Some are already calling it war, a brutal Muslim separatist insurgency in southern Thailand that has taken as many as 2,000 lives in three years, with almost- daily bombings, drive-by shootings, arson and beheadings.

It is a conflict the government admits it is losing.

AFP, TWO DAYS AGO:

No end in sight as south Thai rebellion enters fifth year

Brutal killings have reached unprecedented levels in Thailand's Muslim-majority south, experts say, as the region enters the fifth year of a separatist insurgency that is tearing communities apart.

A government policy of reconciliation in the region has backfired, analysts told AFP, with rebels beheading, mutilating and even crucifying victims to try to spark a backlash and create divisions between Buddhists and Muslims.

"They kill in such brutal ways: beheaded, hacked to death, set on fire ... the idea is to provoke a strong reaction of the Buddhist Thais against Muslims," said Sunai Phasuk, a Thailand consultant with Human Rights Watch.

"The Buddhist Thais feel that they have become subject of atrocities, and many of them even feel that ethnic cleansing is going on."

The pace of deadly violence has picked up since militants raided a southern army base on January 4, 2004, reviving long-running tensions and triggering an insurgency along the border region with Malaysia.

About 1,800 people were killed in the first three years of the insurgency. By the end of the fourth that has now risen to more than 2,800.

• WHY THE CONSTANT FOCUS IS ALWAYS ON ISRAEL AND WHY SHE MUST SURRENDER LAND TO JIHADISTS?
• WHY NOT FORCE THAILAND TO CEDE THEIR SOUTH TO THE JIHADISTS THERE?
• WHY NOT SEND DUBYA AND CONDI TO BANGKOK?

YEAH: IT'S JUST A RHETORICAL QUESTION, BECAUSE WE KNOW THE ANSWER:

• THAI'S AREN'T JOOOOZE, AND ISRAEL IS HELD TO A DIFFERENT STANDARD THAN THE REST OF THE WORLD - NO ONE ELSE IS EXPECTED TO CEDE TERRITORY TO JIHADISTS, ONLY JOOOOZE;
• ACKNOWLEDGING THAT THAILAND IS UNDER ASSAULT BY JIHADISTS WOULD MEAN THE MSM AND THE LEFT WOULD HAVE TO ADMIT THE EXISTENCE OF GLOBAL JIHAD.

UNLIKE THE SEEMINGLY INCOMPETENT THAI ARMY, THE IDF HAS THINGS UNDER CONTROL - FOR THE TIME BEING.

• THAT'S WHY THE USA SHOULDN'T BE FORCING ISRAEL TO DESTABILIZE THE REGION BY APPEASING ABBAS AND THE JIHADISTS.
• WE ARE NOT PRESSURING INDIA TO GIVE UP KASHMIR.
• WE ARE NOT PRESSURING IRAQ TO GIVE UP ANBAR.
• WE ARE NOT PRESSURING LEBANON TO SURRENDER TO HIZBALLAH AND SYRIA.
• WE ARE NOT PRESSURING ALGERIA TO GIVE UP THE THE GSPC.
• WE ARE NOT PRESSURING KARZAI TO SURRENDER TO THE TALIBAN.
  
• WE ARE NOT PRESSURING TURKEY TO SURRENDER THEIR EASTERN TERRITORY TO THE PKK.
• WE ARE NOT PRESSURING SARKOZY TO SURRENDER THE BANLIEUES.
• WE SHOULDN'T PRESSURE ISRAEL TO SURRENDER TO FATAH.
  
• BUSH IS GOING TO ISRAEL ON WEDS. I HOPE HE DOESN'T TAKE FATAH'S SIDE - AS CONDI HAS.

WE'LL SEE. STAY TUNED...

RELIGION OF PEACE STRIKES AGAIN IN THAILAND

IHT/AP:

YALA, Thailand: Suspected Muslim insurgents detonated a bomb hidden in a motorcycle near a morning market Tuesday in southern Thailand, injuring at least 20 people, police said.

At least seven people were wounded from the blast while others sustained injuries in the ensuing panic in the capital of Yala province, said police Col. Phumphet Phiphatphetphum.

He said the explosion occurred shortly after a young Muslim man parked the motorcycle near the busy market.

The attack occurred a day after suspected Muslim insurgents ambushed an army patrol in neighboring Narathiwat province, killing all eight soldiers in the group and then beheading one.

Entering its fifth year, the Muslim rebellion in Thailand's southernmost provinces has taken the lives of more than 2,800 people. Many in the predominantly Muslim area feel unfairly treated by the country's Buddhist majority.

DAWN:

Eight soldiers killed in Thailand blast


NARATHIWAT, Jan 14: Suspected Muslim insurgents killed eight soldiers and beheaded one of them in a bombing and shooting attack on Monday in restive southern Thailand, army and police officials said.

The soldiers were on a routine morning patrol in the Chanae district of Narathiwat province when a bomb hidden on the road exploded as their military vehicle passed, said the spokesman, Col Akara Thiprote.

After the blast, suspected insurgents attacked the vehicle with a barrage of gunfire, leaving no survivors, he said.

“One of the soldiers was beheaded. His head was found 50 meters away from the scene of the attack,” said police Lt-Col Chakkrote Nongmanee, who inspected the blast site.

An initial investigation indicates that about 20 suspected insurgents were hiding behind brush along the roadside, Chakkrote said.

• THE TARGETS WEREN'T JOOOOZE OR NEOCONS OR BUSHIES.
• AND THE PERP WASN'T A MORMON OR A BUDDHIST OR A BAPTIST.
• GLOBAL JIHAD IS REAL AND IT'S KILLED HUNDREDS OF THOUSAND SINCE 9/11 IN OVER 10,000 ATTACKS - WORLDWIDE.

• THERE ARE TWO WAY WE CAN HAVE PEACE:
• DO WHAT THE DEMOCRATS WANT AND SURRENDER - ALL AT ONCE OR IN BITS AND PIECES, BY APPEASING THE ENEMY - AND THEN LIVE IN SHAMEFUL DHIMMITUDE;
• OR WE CAN FIGHT BACK WITH ALL WE'VE GOT AND DEFEAT THE ENEMY.
• THE CHOICE IS OURS.

THE GREAT BENEFIT TO FIGHTING BACK IS THAT WE GET TO KEEP OUR FREEDOM.

THAILAND SIGNS ON TO "PEACE" TALKS WITH ISLAMISTS

Thailand's government has signed its first-ever peace talks deal with Muslim rebels aimed at ending a decades-long conflict in the south. The deal was signed in Malaysia by the National Revolution Front (BRN), one of several groups operating in Thailand. More than 5,000 people have been killed since the conflict reignited in the Muslim-majority region in 2004.

IDIOTS: THIS IS APPEASEMENT AND ALL THEY'LL GET IS A HUDNA. AND THEN MORE VIOLENCE AND JIHAD-TERROR THAN EVER.

ASIDE: 

MORE HAVE BEEN KILLED IN THAILAND THAN IN THE ISRAELI-ARAB CONFLICT, OVER THE SAME TIME-SPAN, BUT THERE HAVE BEEN ZERO U.N. ACTIONS TO QUELL THAILAND'S WAR.

GEE, I WINDER WHY? COULD IT BE BECAUSE THE THAIS FIGHTNG JIHAD ARE NT JEWISH?

YES.

THAILAND: AUTONOMY FOR MUSLIMS?

As Reliapundit posted here at THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS on January 14, 2008, Thailand is another of the fronts in the global jihad.

According to this item in the February 13, 2008 edition of the Washington Post,

Thailand is considering granting partial autonomy to its Muslim-majority southern provinces, which for the past four years have been the scene of a radical Islamic insurgency, the new interior minister said Tuesday.

More than 2,900 people have been killed since early 2004 in nearly daily drive-by shootings and bombings in the three provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat, the only ones with Muslim majorities in Buddhist-dominated Thailand.

A recent escalation in violence presents a major challenge to Thailand's new government, which took office last week. Military and political measures imposed by previous governments had little success in curbing the violence.

While conceding that some degree of self-rule in the south "is a possibility," Interior Minister Chalerm Yoobambrung said independence for the region was out of the question.

Regional independence may be out of the question as far as the interior minister is concerned. But when Muslims are on the march, independence from the infidel government is what they have in mind and work toward as their goal. Granting jihadists "some degree of self-rule" will only serve to convince them that they are executing the will of Allah.

JIHAD-APPEASING THAI JUNTA SCREWS UP THAI ECONOMY

Oh what a week for the jihadist-appeasing Leftist Thai junta - (and it's only three days old!):

THE GUARDIAN (UK)/12/19:

...investors took fright at a plunge in the Thai stock market. The country's market fell by 15% overnight as the Bank of Thailand and the finance ministry announced currency controls to curb the strength of the baht currency. The baht had reached a nine and a half year high before the bank's move. To nervous investors, this all evoked memories of the Asian crisis of 1997. A later move by the Thai authorities to remove the restrictions as far as stock market investments are concerned only caused more confusion.

AFP - 12/20:

Thai share prices rebounded after the military-installed government was forced to dump draconian capital controls that sparked a 15-percent collapse on Tuesday, dealers said. ... The rebound on Wednesday helped the region as a whole recover from Tuesday's shock when Thailand, trying to protect export earnings from a rising baht, required 30 percent of most incoming foreign funds to be effectively impounded for a year. The move spooked investors fearful that other regional countries with similar concerns over their export-led economies, might adopt similar measures to Thailand, the epicentre of the devastating 1997-98 Asian financial crisis.

THE NATION (Thai - 12/21):

Market recovers, govt reels ... But central bank chief says government's relaxation of capital-control measures may make it difficult to control baht surge The Bank of Thailand yesterday said the abrupt reversal in its capital-control policy to exempt portfolio and foreign direct investment might make it harder to rein in the galloping baht. The relaxation of Monday's measure subjecting capital inflows to a 30-per-cent deposit caused the baht to weaken more slowly than expected against the US dollar, but it was still less volatile and weaker than earlier, she said. ... Stock investors hailed the central bank's change of heart to spare the Stock Exchange of Thailand. Local investors, mostly, returned to the bourse, allowing the exchange to salvage most of the market capitalisation that went up in smoke on Tuesday.

Dec. 21 (Bloomberg) --

The Thai baht declined the most since the military seized control in September as overseas investors sold shares on waning confidence in the country's monetary policy after the government partially reversed some currency controls. The baht has dropped about 3 percent since Dec. 18, when the central bank imposed penalties on overseas investors who take out money in less than a year. A day later the rule on stock investments was canceled after the SET index tumbled 16 percent.

The jihad-appeasing Leftists who took over the Thai government have quickly mucked-up the entire economy. WHY?! Because they have everything exactly BASS ACKWARDS: they are fighting investors and appeasing jihadists; they should be appeasing investors and fighting jihadists!

TSUNAMI ORPHANS EASY PREY FOR JIHADIST SEX SLAVE TRADE

Three things make me very worried about the orphans of the tsunami, and that they may be targeted for kidnapping by Jihadis, and then put into the sex-slave trade in Thailand and elsewhere:

First, this news item from the BBC about a Swedish child who was kidnapped from a hospital in Thailand points out the factual basis for claim that children who were orphaned by the tsunami in Thailand are easy prey for the sex-slave trade.

EXCERPT:

Swedish police have arrived in Thailand to investigate reports that a 12-year-old survivor of the tsunami has been kidnapped from a hospital. Two officers are helping Kristian Walker's family and Thai police search for him, amid fears he may have been taken by child sex traffickers.

Second, this article (from January 2004 - and principally about the convergence of Jihadism and the sex-slave trade in Iran) points out the relationship between the sex-slave tade and the Jihadis - simply put the sex-slave trade (especially in kaffir/dhimmis/non-Muslims) is a big source of revenue for the Jihadis; (this should come as a surprise to no one: people who would behead some innocents would certainly use others as sex-slaves for profit).

EXCERPT:

Joining a global trend, the fundamentalists have added another way to dehumanize women and girls: buying and selling them for prostitution. Exact numbers of victims are impossible to obtain, but according to an official source in Tehran, there has been a 635 percent increase in the number of teenage girls in prostitution. The magnitude of this statistic conveys how rapidly this form of abuse has grown. In Tehran, there are an estimated 84,000 women and girls in prostitution, many of them are on the streets, others are in the 250 brothels that reportedly operate in the city. The trade is also international: thousands of Iranian women and girls have been sold into sexual slavery abroad.
[...]
Some may think a thriving sex trade in a theocracy with clerics acting as pimps is a contradiction in a country founded and ruled by Islamic fundamentalists. In fact, this is not a contradiction. First, exploitation and repression of women are closely associated. Both exist where women, individually or collectively, are denied freedom and rights. Second, the Islamic fundamentalists in Iran are not simply conservative Muslims. Islamic fundamentalism is a political movement with a political ideology that considers women inherently inferior in intellectual and moral capacity. Fundamentalists hate women’s minds and bodies. Selling women and girls for prostitution is just the dehumanizing complement to forcing women and girls to cover their bodies and hair with the veil.

Third, the areas in SE ASIA principally hit by the tsunami were Muslim - and in many parts there is rampant Jihadism. The beach resorts of Thailand are all in Muslim regions were there has been a lot of unrest recently. SO: ruthless people are in the area, and they are in dire need of money. Children are easy prey for them.

Fourth, the sex-slave trade is a well-known part of Thai tourism.

THEREFORE, special efforts must be made by INTERPOL and other international and national law enforcement and anti-terror authorities - AT ONCE - to prevent the child survivors of the tsunami from being victimized again by being kidnapped and forced into the sex-slave trade. This means cracking down at the hospitals, and in Bangkok (and other cities in the region with rampant child prostitution), and at the airports.

THE FRUITS OF APPEASEMENT - PART 5: THAILAND REELS FROM 23 SIMULTANEOUS BOMBINGS

AP/BREITBART - (VIA PJM):

At least 23 bombs exploded Sunday in apparently coordinated attacks in parts of southern Thailand plagued by a Muslim insurgency, killing three people and wounding more than 50, the military said.

The bombings targeted electricity transmitters, hotels, karaoke bars and markets in the country's southernmost provinces, the only parts of predominantly Buddhist Thailand with Muslim majorities. Two schools were torched.

Violence in the south has been escalating in recent months despite a major policy shift by the military-imposed government, which is trying to replace an earlier, iron-fisted approach in dealing with the rebels with a "hearts and minds" campaign. [Umph added]

To defeat the islamofascists - everywhere - they must be met with harsh retribution and utterly destroyed. The Bush Doctrine should be adopted by every liberty loving democracy in the Free World - and by nations yearning to be free to - like Iraq and Thailand!

JIHADISTS DAMAGING DEMOCRACY IN THAILAND AND PAKISTAN

These two nations are experiencing major political upheavals and disarray because of jihadists.

In Pakistan they were partly responsible for the Musharraf coup and are now destabilizing the government.

In Thailand they are partly responsible for the recent coup - (the ousted PM was a hawk and was ousted by appeasers) and their continued war in the south (in which thousands have been brutally murdered by the jihadist enemy) threatens to become a full scale civil war there.

Neither of these nation's problems with jihadists has anything to do with Zionism or Bush

They have everything to do with the proactive plan of the enemy: to reestablish a global caliphate under sharia.

Pakistan and Thailand are nations which occupy important strategic positions for the Free World and we must help them both defeat the religious fanatics/totalitarians who threaten them.

This is NOT USA hegemony - as the Left and the jihadists BOTH argue; it is standing up for universal human rights.

We all know about the instability in Pakistan because of the recent assassination of Bhutto.

Thailand is in nearly the same straits - and they appear to be getting worse. (More here and here and here.)

If the USA elects a Democrat than these two nations will most certainly NOT get the support they need to defeat the jihadists and the jihadists will stand a much better chance of winning in both countries - and thereby establish sharia totalitarianist states which would become safe havens and bases for expanding their jihadist hegemony.

That's why the future of the Free World depends on YOU AND ME WORKING OUR BUTTS OFF TO DEFEAT THE DEMS IN 2008.

We must do it for children and our children's children.

MORE JIHADO-TERROR IN THAILAND: I BLAME BUSH AND THE JOOOOOOZE!

IHT/AP:

Two bombs killed four people in Thailand's insurgency-plagued south Wednesday, as schools in the area mourned the loss of two teachers targeted by suspected Muslim rebels, officials said.

One powerful explosion took place as a police bomb squad inspected a suspicious object buried near a bridge in Pattani province, said Sub Lt. Attaphon Kullawongmanaso.

The blast killed three policeman, blowing two of them into a canal, Attaphon said. Another officer was seriously wounded.

In a separate attack in nearby Yala province, suspected Muslim insurgents attacked an army patrol truck with rifle fire and a bomb, killing an army officer and wounding two soldiers and three civilians, said police Col. Sompien Eksomya.

More than 2,600 people have been killed in Thailand's deep south — the overwhelmingly Buddhist country's only Muslim-majority area — since a long-simmering Islamic insurgency flared there in January 2004. The Muslims have long complained of discrimination by the central government.

IF THE "INSURGENCY" IN THAILAND AIN'T BUSH'S FAULT OR ISRAEL'S THEN WHAT IS IT!?

COULD IT BE GLOBAL JIHAD!?

YES, IT'S THE GLOBAL JIHAD, STUPID!

AND WE'LL NEVER DEFEAT THEM WITH JUST COPS AND LAWYERS.

THE FRUITS OF APPEASEMENT - PART 3: THAILAND

CNN (VIA PRAIRIE PUNDIT):

Thai authorities have canceled all major New Year's celebrations in Bangkok after at least seven explosions ripped through several areas of the capital, killing two people, police and hospital officials say. At least 12 other people were wounded in Sunday's attacks, which appeared to have been coordinated, and took place hours before New Year's Eve celebrations at midnight (noon ET). Major events in Thailand's second largest city, Chiang Mai, have also been canceled.

... Bombings occur on a regular basis in Thailand's three southernmost provinces of Yala, Narathiwat and Pattani, where an Islamic insurgency that flared in January 2004 has killed more than 1,900 people. But Ajirawit said the insurgents were probably not behind Sunday's attacks, AP reported.

ABC (AU):

This is the first time anything like this has taken place within Bangkok. The government had warned of an attack over the New Year holiday, but it was widely believed the warnings related to the troubled southern provinces of the country, where insurgent groups have waged an ongoing battle against the government for many years.

The latter news item seems to contradict the prior as it relates to the probable perps; IOW: IN VIEW OF THE EASRLIER PUBLIC WARNING, it is very LIKELY these were jihadist attacks.

IN A LARGER SENSE, IT MATTERS NOT WHICH TERRORIST GROUP "TAKES CREDIT" FOR THESE ATTACKS; THE FACT THAT THEY HAVE OCCURRED AT ALL IS A DIRECT RESULT OF THE FACT THAT THAILAND NOW HAS A REGIME WHICH HAS MADE IT CLEAR THEY WILL APPEASE ANYONE WHO THREATENS THEM. AND THIS POLICY OF APPEASEMENT OF COURSE ONLY INVITES MORE ATTACKS.

UNLESS AND UNTIL THE THAIS HAVE A GOVERNMENT COMMITTED TO COUNTER-ATTACK AND ENFORCE THE RULE OF LAW, TERRORISM WILL INCREASE.

More HERE and HERE. And here and here. UPDATE: MORE HERE AT GATEWAY.

THAILAND'S JUNTA - LED BY A MUSLIM - DECIDES TO ALLOW SHARIA

UK TIMES: Coup regime backs Islamic law -

Surayud Chulanont, Thailand’s Prime Minister [PM MY ASS! HE'S AN UNELECTED DICTATOR WHO HAS COME TO POWER THROUGH A MILITARY COUP D'ETAT which was led by General Sonthi - A MUSLIM!!], has publicly apologised for the former government’s hardline policies against an Islamic insurgency. In an unexpected initiative, Mr Chulanont also said that he would urge the limited use of Islamic law in the Muslim- majority south to settle some disputes, especially over inheritance and family affairs.

FT:

The dramatic gesture reflects the military’s concern over the deepening alienation of its Malay-Muslim minority, angry at its second-class treatment by the Buddhist-dominated Thai government.

THAI NATION:

In reaching out to the religious community, Surayud vowed to strengthen the institution of the Islamic courts, known as Sharia, and promised to work with clerics in producing more competent Islamic judges.

THIS REVEALS THE INHERENT FLAW OF ALL ACCOMMODATIONIST POLICIES AIMED AT QUELLING "MUSLIM UNREST":

IT'S PREDICATED ON THE BELIEF THAT MUSLIM UNREST IS A RESPONSE TO THEIR ALIENATION FROM THE WEST, AND THEIR DESIRE TO BECOME LESS ALIENATED AND MORE ASSIMILATED. IN FACT; THEY ARE AGAINST ASSIMILIATION, AND THEIR JIHAD IS - AND ALWAYS HAS BEEN - AIMED AT GETTING US TO ASSIMILATE OR CONVERT TO ISLAM.

THIS IS AS TRUE IN FRANCE AS IT IS IN THAILAND. AND IRAN AND IRAQ. THAT'S WHY WE MUSTN'T APPEASE THEM. AS THAILAND IS DOING. [More here from LGF, and here, a previous post from TAB.]

THAI JUNTA PROMISES MORE APPEASEMENT AS JIHADISTS MURDER THAI SOLDIER

"Reuters": Thailand's Junta will ...

"... drop some charges against 58 Muslims involved in a 2004 protest in the restive far south that led to 78 Muslims dying in army custody, Defence Minister Boonrawd Somtat said on Friday. The move would be a major gesture [APPEASEMENT] by the mainly Buddhist administration [NOW LED BY A MUSLIM GENERAL] in Bangkok to the Muslim majority in the three southernmost provinces, where more than 1,700 people have been killed [MOSTLY BUDDHISTS MURDERED BY MUSLIMS] in nearly three years of separatist violence [JIHAD]. It would also signal a break with the "iron fist" policy of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who refused to censure army, police or government officials after the incident in the town of Tak Bai.

And how do the Thai Jihadists greet the announcement of more appeasement!? AFP:

A soldier was shot dead by suspected insurgents Friday while patrolling a busy morning market in southern Thailand's restive Muslim-majority provinces, police said. The militants stole his M16 semiautomatic rifle before fleeing the market in Pattani, one of three provinces hit by a nearly three-year insurgency that has left more than 1,500 dead.

Time and time again, history has proven that appeasement only emboldens the enemy. This news from Thailand is simply MORE proof. This enemy cannot be appeased or contained. They must be attacked and defeated. Utterly. And everywhere: Gaza; Anbar; Khandahar; Pattani; Darfur; and in Gothenberg and London and Paris. If governments - from France to Iraq, and from Afghanistan to Thailand - won't combat the jihadists, then soon - and more and more - the people will do whatever they feel they have to to defend themselves... but by then, it might be too late.

SURVEYING THE HEADLINES MAKES ME WONDER: IS THE WORLD HEADED OVER A CLIFF?

CURRENT HEADLINES:

RIOTING IN VENEZUELA, UKRAINE, AND THAILAND... INSTABILITY IN GREECE, ITALY - FRANCE FLOUNDERING... CHINA'S HOUSE OF CARDS MAY BE ABOUT TO FALL, BUT THEIR SABER-RATTLING IS ON THE RISE... GOLD IS UP 7% THIS YEAR... TALIBAN RISING IN AFGHANISTAN.... AL QAEDA RISING IN LIBYA AND SYRIA AND IRAQ AND THE VIOLENCE IS ON THE RISE IN EGYPT.... TURKEY IS EDGING TOWARD TOTALITARIANISM.... ARGENTINA IS ABOUT TO COLLAPSE.... IRAN ABOUT TO GET A NUKE.... KIM JUNG UN UNBRIDLED... THE US ECONOMY IS SLIPPING BACK INTO THE ABYSS - PROPPED UP ONLY BY THE FED'S QE.....

IS THERE SOMETHING SOMEWHERE GOING RIGHT AND DOING WELL???

HERE'S AN ECONOMIC LIST VIA TYLER:

The following are 20 signs that the global economic crisis is starting to catch fire...#1 The unemployment rate in Greece has hit a brand new record high of28 percent.
#2 The youth unemployment rate in Greece has hit a brand new record high of 64.1 percent.
#3 The percentage of bad loans in Italy is at an all-time record high.
#4 Italian industrial output declined again in December, and the Italian government is on the verge of collapse.
#5 The number of jobseekers in France has risen for 30 of the last 32 months, and at this point it has climbed to a new all-time record high.
#6 The total number of business failures in France in 2013 was even higher than in any year during the last financial crisis.
#7 It is being projected that housing prices in Spain will fall another 10 to 15 percent as their economic depression deepens.
#8 The economic and political turmoil in Turkey is spinning out of control.  The government has resorted to blasting protesters with pepper spray and water cannons in a desperate attempt to restore order.
#9 It is being estimated that the inflation rate in Argentina is now over 40 percent, and the peso is absolutely collapsing.
#10 Gangs of armed bandits are roaming the streets in Venezuela as the economic chaos in that troubled nation continues to escalate.
#11 China appears to be very serious about deleveraging.  The deflationary effects of this are going to be felt all over the planet. The following is an excerpt from Ambrose Evans-Pritchard's recent article entitled "World asleep as China tightens deflationary vice"...

China's Xi Jinping has cast the die. After weighing up the unappetising choice before him for a year, he has picked the lesser of two poisons.
The balance of evidence is that most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong aims to prick China's $24 trillion credit bubble early in his 10-year term, rather than putting off the day of reckoning for yet another cycle.
This may be well-advised for China, but the rest of the world seems remarkably nonchalant over the implications.
#12 There was a significant debt default by a coal company in Chinalast Friday...

A high-yield investment product backed by a loan to a debt-ridden coal company failed to repay investors when it matured last Friday, state media reported on Wednesday, in the latest sign of financial stress in China's shadow bank sector.#13 Japan's Nikkei stock index has already fallen by 14 percent so far in 2014.  That is a massive decline in just a month and a half.
#14 Ukraine continues to fall apart financially...

The worsening political and economic circumstances in Ukraine has prompted the Fitch Ratings agency to downgrade Ukrainian debt from B to a pre–default level CCC. This is lower than Greece, and Fitch warns of future financial instability.
#15 The unemployment rate in Australia has risen to the highest levelin more than 10 years.
#16 The central bank of India is in a panic over the way that Federal Reserve tapering is effecting their financial system.
#17 The effects of Federal Reserve tapering are also being felt in Thailand...

In the wake of the US Federal Reserve tapering, emerging economies with deteriorating macroeconomic figures or visible political instability are being punished by skittish markets. Thailand is drifting towards both these tendencies.
#18 One of Ghana's most prominent economists says that the economy of Ghana will crash by June if something dramatic is not done.
#19 Yet another banker has mysteriously died during the prime years of his life.  That makes five "suspicious banker deaths" in just the past two weeks alone.
#20 The behavior of the U.S. stock market continues to parallel the behavior of the U.S. stock market in 1929.
Yes, things don't look good right now, but it is important to keep in mind that this is just the beginning.
This is just the leading edge of the next great financial storm.
The next two years (2014 and 2015) are going to represent a major "turning point" for the global economy.  By the end of 2015, things are going to look far different than they do today.
None of the problems that caused the last financial crisis have been fixed.  Global debt levels have grown by 30 percent since the last financial crisis, and the too big to fail banks in the United States are 37 percent larger than they were back then and their behavior has becomeeven more reckless than before.
As a result, we are going to get to go through another "2008-style crisis", but I believe that this next wave is going to be even worse than the previous one.
So hold on tight and get ready.  We are going to be in for quite a bumpy ride.

BUMPY RIDE? AT BEST!

MORE LEFTIST THUGGERY FROM BRAZIL: THEY'LL STEAL WHAT THEY CAN'T BUY

One of the MANY reasons leftist economies always do less well than more free economies is that leftists do not respect intellectual property.

When you don'T respect intellectual property you create DISINCENTIVES to anyone creating new intellectual property. As a result, there is less innovation.

Today, the leftists running Brazil gave us another example [all umph added]:

REUTERS:

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Friday authorized Brazil to break the patent on an AIDS drug made by Merck & Co. Inc. ... and import a generic version from India instead.

It was the first time Brazil bypassed a patent to acquire cheaper drugs for its AIDS prevention program, a step recently taken by Thailand. Other countries, including Canada and Italy, have also used a clause in World Trade Organization rules to flout drug patents in the name of public health.

BLOOMBERG:

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva broke the patent on Merck & Co's AIDS drug Efavirenz after the company's offer to cut prices failed to satisfy demands from the country's health ministry.

Lula, in a presidential palace ceremony today in Brasilia, signed a law allowing the government to buy a generic version of Efavirenz from laboratories certified by the World Health Organization. The government would consider a new proposal from Merck should the company choose to make one, Health Minister Jose Gomes Temporao said in an interview.

"Our decision today involves this one drug, but we can take the same steps with any other that we consider necessary,'' Lula said. "It doesn't matter if it's a U.S., German, French, Brazilian or Argentine company.''

MSNBC/AP:

Silva issued a “compulsory license” that would bypass Merck’s patent on the AIDS drug efavirenz, a day after the Brazilian government rejected Merck’s offer to sell the drug at a 30 percent discount.

A compulsory license is a legal mechanism that allows a country to manufacture or buy generic versions of patented drugs while paying the patent holder only a small royalty.

Brazilian law and rules established under the World Trade Organization allow for compulsory licenses in a health emergency or if the pharmaceutical industry uses abusive pricing. ... It was the first time Brazil has bypassed a patent.

After Thailand moved to override patents on three anti-AIDS drugs, including those made by Abbott Laboratories Inc. and Merck, the United States placed Thailand on a list of copyright violators.

“As the world’s 12th largest economy, Brazil has a greater capacity to pay for HIV medicines than countries that are poorer or harder hit by the disease,” Merck said in a statement after Silva’s announcement.

RANT ALERT:

TO THE LEFT, MAKING A PROFIT IS AMORAL AND ABUSIVE. BUT WITHOUT A PROFIT MOTIVE THERE WOULD BE NO WONDER DRUGS.

I WOULD ALSO ADD THAT AIDS IS A SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASE WHICH NO RESPONSIBLE PERSON SHOULD BE GETTING ANYMORE.

THE USA AND OUR COMPANIES SHOULD NOT BE FORCED TO SUBSIDIZE SEXUALLY PROMISCUOUS, IRRESPONSIBLE PEOPLE JUST BECAUSE THEY CLAIM TO BE POOR.

WE SHOULD BE AS GENEROUS AS WE CAN BE IN OUR AID TO THE POOR ALL OVER THE WORLD IN COMBATING INFECTIOUS DISEASES WHICH ARE A TRUE PUBLIC HEALTH THREAT - LIKE MALARIA.

AIDS IS NOT AS PREVALENT AS MALARIA OR SCHISTOSOMIASIS AND IS LESS TRANSMISSIBLE THAN FLU - WHICH KILLS MORE PEOPLE IN EPIDEMIC YEARS. THEREFORE, IT DESERVES LESS STATE SUBSIDIZATION THAN THESE OTHER DISEASES, NOT MORE. (WHAT INDIVIDUALS AND PRIVATE ORGANIZATIONS WANT TO DO IS THEIR BUSINESS.)

MALARIA EFFECTS 500 MILLION PEOPLE PER YEAR - KILLING 1,000,000! AND OVER 200 MILLION PEOPLE HAVE SHISTO. 100 MILLION MAY HAVE HIV - THOUGH SOME SUSPECT THE NUMBERS HAVE BEEN INFLATED BY THIRD WORLD KLEPTOCRACIES LOOKING FOR AID.

BUT IF PEOPLE WOULD JUST HAVE SAFE SEX, THEN THEY WOULDN'T GET HIV. IT'S UP TO THEM, NOT A MOSQUITO (AS IN MALARIA) OR A SNAIL OR A FLATWORM (AS IN THE CASE OF SCHISTO').

AGAIN I ASK: WHY SHOULD MY TAX DOLLARS GO TO PEOPLE WHO CAN'T CONTROL THEIR SEXUAL HABITS - (IN EFFECT SUBSIDIZING THEM)!?!? WHY SHOULD A COMPANY'S PROFIT BE HURT BECAUSE POOR PEOPLE CAN'T CONTROL THEIR SEX-LIVES!?

AND WHO IN THE EFFIN' WORLD DIED AND MADE THE FRIGGIN' W.H.O. POWERFUL ENOUGH TO OVERRIDE MY NATION'S PATENT LAWS AND INTERNATIONAL PATENT LAW!?!

SHEESH. TALK ABOUT UNELECTED WORLD GOVERNMENT. THIS IS TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION. IT'S TYRANNICAL.

NEITHER MERCK OR THE USG SHOULD STAND FOR IT.

I FAVOR GIVING HEAVILY SUBSIDIZED - OR EVEN FREE DRUGS TO PREGNANT WOMEN WITH HIV IN ORDER TO PREVENT THE CHILD FROM GETTING AIDS. THE BABY IS INNOCENT.

BUT LET THEM PAY WHATEVER THE DRUG COMPANIES WANT THEM TO PAY IN ORDER TO GET DRUGS FOR THE REST OF 'EM.

THAILAND: More Proof That Appeasement Just Invites More Terror

CT: 6 Months After the Thai Coup, Islamist Insurgency is Raging

Last week a group of militants in southern Thailand threw a small bomb in front of a small passenger van, disabling it, opened the side door, and shot all nine passengers, including three women and a young girl, execution style. Though several suspects have been arrested, the attack was reminiscent of the savagery of Algeria or Kashmir, and portends a bloody year in the restive south. The attack was also the latest in a string of more audacious and provocative attacks from Muslim insurgents.

Few realize the extent of the conflict in the south. So many have bought into the Thai government’s complacency and general sense of denial. The conflict in southern Thailand dwarfs any other conflict in Southeast Asia. ... More than 2,100 people have been killed in 38 months, and the government has proven completely incapable of responding to the situation and stemming the violence. That has given the insurgents considerable momentum, and caused a greater number of moderate Muslim civilians to be more supportive of the insurgents. ...

While the justification and rationale for the coup is still debated, people across the political spectrum placed considerable hope that the Council on National Security (CNS) and the government that they installed would do a better job than the Thaksin administration in stemming the violence.

Yet, the exact opposite has been true: the daily average rate of killing has more than tripled in the past six months, from 1.6 people a day in 2006 to almost four per day. Over 400 people, roughly 19 percent of the 2,100 people killed since January 2004 have died since the coup. Attacks have become more sophisticated and coordinated. Sadly the junta leaders remain oblivious to the reality on the ground and show precious little resolve in dealing with the insurgency, they remain mired in petty political squabbles in Bangkok and blind to the reports from their field commanders.

Besides the dramatic escalation in the number of people killed, there have been six discernable trends since the coup.

RTWT. ROUND UP HERE.

THE FRUITS OF APPEASEMENT IN THAILAND

The German Press Agency reports:

Insurgents shot a school director Friday afternoon in southern Thailand, then set his vehicle on fire, killing him in the flames, the English-language Bangkok Post newspaper website reported.

Police said the director of a school in Pattani province, 750 kilometres south of Bangkok, was shot in his pickup truck while driving out of school. He was wounded but not killed in the shooting before insurgents set his pickup truck on fire. He was burned alive inside the truck.

Thailand's three predominately Muslim southernmost provinces have been increasingly restive the past three years, but no insurgent groups are claiming responsibility for the violence or making demands in exchange for stopping it.

Bangkok's new military-installed government has apologized to the people in the southern provinces for past injustices and is making a new approach to ending the violence peacefully a top priority.

It doesn't seem to be working out that way, does it?

IS THE WEST RETREATING FROM THE ENEMY?

I disagree with the hopeful AUSITN BAY that the Gates appointment might signal a more vociferous stance in the GWOT. In fact, I see Rumsfeld's resignation and the mid-war/mid-term defeat for the GOP as additional instances of the West retreating in the face of the resolve of the enemy - as examples of appeasement. It's as if we are in an age of appeasement. Here's my list of worldwide appeasement:

• Thailand just had a coup, in part so that they could APPEASE the jihadists in the south of Thailand - jihadists who have slaughtered 1700 non-Muslim Thai's since 2004.
• India has done NOTHING - as in NADA, BUPKUS, ZILCH - since finding evidence of Paksitan's complicity on the recent terror attacks there.
• NATO and the Afghan government have failed to eradicate the Taliban.
• Pakistan has ceased attempting to gain government control of Waziristan.
• North Korea has tested a nuke - and the West can't agree on any action.Iran is violating every rule of the IAEA as it steadily moves toward becoming a nuclear armed rogue nation, too - and the West cannot agree on any strategy.
• Syria and Iran assassinate Hariri, and illegally arm Hizballah (in violation of UNSCR#1559) and try to overthrow the elected government of Lebanon - and the world does nothing - (except STOP Israel's attempt to neutralize their presence in Lebanon, thus SAVING Hizballah).
• Israel allows elections in the so-called occupied territories, and allows a jihadterrorist group on the ballot, and withdraws from Gaza, and is then met with constant rocket attacks. When they retaliate for these rocket attacks - and the kidnapping of its citizens, the world stops them before they can deliver a coup de grace.
• France suffers a permanent intifada and responds by promising more aid to the rioters and even erects a statue to 2 of them!
• Spain elects a socialist after the Atocha bombings.
• Blair is forced from leadership.
• The GOP suffers the loss of Congress in the mid-term.

ALL OF THESE ACTIONS ARE - IN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER - WITHDRAWALS, RETREATS AND APPEASEMENTS. It's as if we are in an age or retreat. The urge to retreat is pretty basic. Retreat doesn't have to be taught; IT'S A NATURAL IMPULSE. Standing and fighting is what has to be taught. And it helps, if you have something you feel is worth defending. Because today's Left is post modernist, they don't feel that the West has anything worth defending by going to war, and this is why we are in trouble. The Left says - in effect - the jihadists are not so bad, and the anti-jihad wingnuts are worse than you believe; therefore elect us and it'll all go away; the enemy won't bother us once the Bushies are gone.

And because many MANY people are tired of the GWOT - and take their liberty and lives for granted- and most love peace, theY wishfully trust the Left-wing appeasers. This is nothing new. Remember, Chamberlain was hailed as a hero and greeted by throngs of people when he returned from Munich with "PEACE IN OUR TIME!" He was greeted this way because people love peace. And they think it can be purchased cheaply. It cannot. Peace must be won - and defended. I hope that the USa and the UK and Israel and India and Thailand and the EU WAKE UP - and I pray that it doesn't take another horrific attack to wake them up.

THAILAND PROVES ONCE AGAIN: "IT'S THE JIHAD, STUPID!"

BBC:

At least nine villagers have been shot dead and nine others wounded in a raid by suspected Islamic militants in Thailand's troubled south. ... About 1,000 people have died in the Muslim-majority south since early 2004.

Were these villagers Zionists or Republicans? OOOPS: they were Buddhists. I wonder how they came to deserve this treatment? Were they NEO-CON Buddhists? Why had they made their Muslim neighbors so angry? GEEZ: 1,000 dead in Thailand since last year!? That's more than in the Middle East - the well-known center / "Square 1" - of all the trouble? I don't get it?

Sarcasm off. The Left doesn't get it: It ain't about "occupied Iraq" or Israel or the banlieues. It's the Jihad, stupid!

MORE PROOF THAT GLOBAL JIHAD IS PROACTIVE, NOT REACTIVE

ASIA NEWS (hat tip LGF):

Suspected Muslim insurgents shot and then beheaded a local official in southern Thailand on Wednesday in an attack believed to be part of ongoing sectarian violence in the area, police said. Surin Somchit, an employee of the community water authority, was shot and wounded by four bullets fired near his office in Narathiwat province’s Rangae district, police Capt. Songphol Juimanee said. The as yet unknown number of attackers then cut off their victim’s head with a machete and dumped it by the roadside, he said. ...

The beheading was the sixth carried out this month and the second to take place in daylight hours. Only three other beheadings have taken place in the 18-month wave of violence, one in May last year in Narathiwat, and two others in November.

Now would the Dem/Lefties PLEASE explain to me what these beheadings in THAILAND have to do with either: Bush; Israel/Zionism/the Likud/neocons; oil; Iraq; or the Crusades?

They cannot because it DOES NOT. Global Jihad is a proactive program of terror against all infidels (including, but not limited to): Buddhists (Thailand); Hindus (India); Muslims (Shias and Sufis); and of course "Jews and Crusaders."

The neojihadists have killed more Muslims than anyone EXCEPT Saddam. The neojihadists have killed more Americans than anyone since Vietnam.

They are the ENEMY, and they have chosen to make war on ALL infidels.

It's really LONG PASSED TIME folks on the Left accepted that neither Bush or the West is to blame for the GWOT. We didn't start this war. And attempting to appease the enemy will only embolden them. It's long passed time the Left abandoned their idiotic attacks on Bush and UNAMBIGUOUSLY support military efforts to defeat the enemy.

I'm waiting, but I'm not holding my breath. I have long held that the Left is not anti-war (that's a sham); they're on the other side. Which is why they're NOT the "loyal opposition" - because they're NOT loyal.