A Sceptical Mind

Support freedom of speech!

Hello everyone,

I thought I would try something new today. I just bought a microphone a few months ago and haven’t really attempted to get it tested yet, so I guess it was about time. For this reason I’ve recorded a small message to the world, summing up the status of the world.. Enjoy!

The Status of the World

So, as most of you probably know, Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination this week. I have to be honest – I was kinda hoping he would, as I found him to be the most competent of the likely candidates. I really disliked Hillary Clinton from day 1 – She just came off as sad, whiny and untrustworthy – spilling out one unfair attack after the other.

So congratulations to senator Barack Obama – May you take back the white house and throw out all those whom have destroyed much of the peace we enjoyed on this earth (well – the little peace there were that is).

I actually tried to give a donation to your campaign only to find out that I couldn’t! Apparently only American citizens can donate money to candidates.. so I guess you’ll just have to live without my donation and if I were ever fortunate enough to meet you in person, perhaps I could then buy you a coffee and we could call it even

So I watched Jon Stewart today and once again I caught myself thinking: “Wow – this is probably the best thing for the US-image ever”. What could be better really? Here you have an extremely intelligent, articulate, witty comedian and skeptic – all of which benefit to a more sane image for the US – contradicting our view that all Americans basically have to be idiots!

Now if you hadn’t guessed – Yes I like The Daily Show! – I’m guessing most Danes do – specifically because many of us are very unlike Americans when it comes to politics.. I’m guessing if I actually knew every single opinion of Jon Stewart, I would probably still disagree with him on many fields.. So really he’s just the best American out there when it comes to politics – at least amongst the public figures.

So what’s the actual idea behind this post? Well there really isn’t one .. I just felt like making a tribute to Jon Stewart.. America’s coolest jew

Now if you’re reading this and you’re by some freak coincidence actually Jon Stewart – please do write me!.. I’d like to talk to you about any and all forms of politics.. specifically to see if there actually is a subject where I disagree with you.

And if you’re some other random person – well then write anyway.. Give your opinion of Jon Stewart perhaps?

Okay then – I watched Fitna 10 minutes ago and here’s my initial thoughts. While we should protect our freedom of speech at all costs, what Gert Wilders is doing is clearly manipulative. He’s deliberately taking quotes from the Quran and using these to portray Islam as being a violent religion – completely ignoring the fact that most Muslims don’t follow these extremist ideas.

So basically the film lacks reality and has clearly been made to attempt a fear frenzy. Especially the last part is very questionable, where Mr. Wilders shows how The Netherlands will be in the future, with women getting murdered, gays murdered and children raised as warriors in blood.

No doubt that the clips Mr. Wilders show are completely real – there’s no doubt there is a relatively small group of extremist Muslims believing the things he portrayed – and yes these should by any means necessary be defeated. Not for saying what they believe (as Mr. Wilders has at times suggested by wanting to ban the Quran), but for executing it. Whenever an extremist Muslim does anything which is against our laws, we should hit down on it hard and fast – however that’s in no way the same as saying Islam is a bad, dangerous or extremist religion.. Actually Islam and Christianity are much alike, and some of the extremist sections in The Quran are equally present in The Old Testament as well – yet you don’t see Mr. Wilders fighting to ban the Bible (which is especially hypocritical when looking at the level of Christian extremism in e.g. The United States of America).

So all in all Gert Wilders’ movie just lacks perspective. He apparently believes terrorists are terrorists due to Islam and not due to external factors like manipulation from government individuals and extremist anti-westerns.

We shouldn’t be fighting Islam as a religion – Islam is actually fine.. we should however be fighting terrorists for what they are – criminals! They should be treated like criminals and fought like criminals. Furthermore we should be doing more work into why these people decide to strap a bomb to themselves and try to fight these causes, instead of attacking the terrorist’s excuse for violence! Islam is being misused by terrorists world wide. Islam is not a religion of hate, it is merely being used as an excuse for violence and prejudice. As long as our Muslims don’t fight freedom, democracy and any other corner stone of our civilization, we should respect their right to believe what ever they want to believe – as we do any other religion.

That being said I still want to point out that Gert Wilders has complete freedom of speech and any attack on him is an attack on all of the Western world’s freedom – and it should treated as such! So no matter how little I agree with him, I deny any claims that he should be prosecuted and obviously any and all attempts to threaten his life or the lives of his family. Any attack on Mr. Wilders, successful or unsuccessful, should be viewed as an attack on all of the western world and the perpetrator(s) should therefore be imprisoned for life – with no exception!

I was watching TV today, when I suddenly stumbled upon a YouTube/CNN debate with the democratic candidates on CNN. Now – most Europeans probably don’t know much about the candidates in the US and many might even claim they don’t care because it doesn’t affect them. Well as a proud European let me just say : BULLSHIT! Anything in the US affects the rest of the world simply due to the fact that the US maybe over on another continent, but the US lifestyle and culture has spread to the whole world – oh yeah and of course because many Americans think they own the world

Now for the people interested in the current candidates:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Democratic_presidential_candidates

This is by the way only the democratic candidates – but seeing as you’re on my website, you’re probably not interested in the Republicans – plus who are we kidding, as if the republicans are going to win (thank God).

Now what was interesting to see here – most of these actually don’t have very European like opinions – a lot of these people are still pro death penalty, against same-sex marriage and such.. Sadly I might add! But then – out of the group of crappy propaganda idiots one person shined .. A candidate I would have imagined I would agree with. He’s one of the oldest candidates, yet he has some of the most modern and realistic ideas … So without further adieu I give you:

Mike Gravel:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Gravel

- Pro drug legalization (Drug use is a medical issue – not a criminal issue)

- Pro choice

- Pro national non-profit health care system (like we Danes already have)

- Pro same-sex marriage

- Pro elimination of the IRS and income tax (wants to replace it with a national sales tax of 19-23% on newly manufactured products and services)

- Pro immigration (supports the guest worker program)

- Wants to reduce dependency on carbon (not due to global warming – but rather the availability of the resources)

He is like the perfect candidate .. and he’s 77 years old! How weird is that? He has some of the same ideas we “Radical Youth”‘s have in Denmark – a social liberal political agenda (mostly liberal). Simple fantastic.. so to all Americans out there:

VOTE MIKE GRAVEL!

Oh yeah – I just took a look at this poll:

http://www.pollingreport.com/wh08dem.htm

And logically – most Americans disagree with me – Mike Gravel has 0% and the two other candidates I could support has 1% and 2% Go figure.