Burger King Returns to le Pays de la Gastronomie, Its Marseille Outlet Attracting 2,000 Customers Daily

While McDonald's has prospered in le pays de la gastronomie (France is now the second market for the Golden Arches, after only the United States itself), Burger King has had a much more ambivalent experience, which ended 15 years ago, when its last remaining "resto rapide" in France, on the Champs-Élysées, joined its almost 40 other outlets and closed its doors.

December was the season of revival, with the opening of the first new Burger King in 15 years, at the airport of Marseille, no less. The outlet attracts as many as 2,000 people daily, the Morandini website reports, and the customers sometimes have to wait up to as much as one hour to get served in the "fast-food" restaurant.

Movie Star Depardieu Has Long Phone Conversation with French President Hollande

While the French government's (foxy) spokes(wo)man declined to make any comments regarding Gérard Depardieu's being granted Russian citizenship, France's president has had a long telephone conversation with the actor.

Nounours told Flanby — to use the two mens' respective nicknames —that he was sickened by what was happening at the moment and that media had been dreadful with him.

Depardieu added that the fiscal aspect of his grievances was only one detail thereof, and that his main gripe was with the fact that, "in France, people who are successful and who take initiatives are spat upon."

This interesting item from Gégé's friend, who commented about the conversation to the Morandini website:

Toujours selon Arnaud Frilley, le Président a été à l'écoute, car "quand on est un politique on écoute toujours une personnalité populaire qui vous parle". 

"When you are a politician", says Arnaud Frilley without the least bit of protest or even of surprise, "one always listens to a popular figure who speaks to you."

In other words, it is far from abnormal for élites to listen to, and to pay attention to, each other, and it is just as far from abnormal that the little people are far from their concerns. 

Meanwhile, learning of Vladimir Putin's decision, Beligum has started digging in its heels: "Nationalities is not something that can be collected," opined one federal deputy.

It turns out that in 2012, 126 Frenchmen asked to become citizens of Belgium, exactly twice (!) as many as in 2011 (63).

Not helping the French government's case is the fact that a tennis star who was bestowed a significant ribbon (Jo-Wilfried Tsonga was named Chevalier dans l'Ordre National du Mérite) turns out himself to be a fiscal exile, albeit one living in Switzerland.

What are Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault's morality lessons to Nounours worth, asks the Moranidini web site, when the prime minister bestows a decoration on a sports star who provided the film actor with a blueprint for his actions?

Related: Check out the meaning of the last name Depardieu
and why it is particularly appropriate for the movie star

Gérard Depardieu Granted Russian Citizenship

A few days after Vladimir Putin offered a Russian passport to Gérard Depardieu, the (now ex-) French movie star, disgusted with French taxes and offended by his treatment from France's ruling socialists and cultural élites, has accepted and, according to the Kremlin, become a Russian citizen.

Go to the BBC link to see Moscow residents commenting on Depardieu becoming a Russian citizen ("Let the president of France tax [wonderful French actors] even more, so they'll all come to live here", 01:45).

Update:  Depardieu Has Long Phone Conversation with French President Hollande

In related news, it emerges that at least one of the places that the name de Pardieu ("by God") comes from is Normandy and that the family's motto was Win or Die, i.e., Victory or Death. More interesting, according to some (rare) French libertarians, Nounours (or Teddy Bear, as Gégé has been known since gaining weight) has an extremely appropriate name, as Depardieu can also come from la Part-Dieu (God's Portion), an expression referring to the place where, in the Middle Ages, one went to to pay one's tithe — "an iniquitous tax" not abolished until the 1789 revolution.

Gérard Depardieu porte bien son nom. "Depardieu" désignait, au Moyen-Âge, le lieu où l'on payait la dîme, impôt inique aboli en 1789. 

Indeed, according to Wikipedia,

Ce toponyme désignait soit une terre ecclésiastique, soit le lieu où étaient recueillis les produits de la dîme.

Pat Buchanan puts it this way:

Socialism creates and exacerbates a conflict in loyalties. A regime that takes three of every four dollars a man earns is an enemy of what that man works to accomplish for himself and his family.

… Californians flee to Nevada, Arizona, Idaho and Colorado to escape Golden State taxes. Are they disloyal to their home state, or are they doing what is right by their families, their first responsibility?

… For many successful Americans, over half of all they earn is now taken by government.

… Can a man love his country and hate its government? Of course. Ask Alexander Solzhenitsyn. Ask the patriots of '76.

Non?! Is Le Monde's Plantu Celebrating One of No Pasarán's Blogggers?!

Plantu in Le Monde

The breakdown of the family drives government spending because you and I then pay the bills for welfare, after school programs, and a host of other expensive (and unsuccessful) federal efforts to replace the nuclear family

Richard A. Viguerie's post came out at Yuletide, but it is timeless, and as the new year begins, along with the attendant resolutions, it bears reprinting:

… if Christmas is a celebration of the family, today, as First Lady of the conservative movement Phyllis Schlafly reminded us in her column, the American family is in serious trouble.

Last year, 41 percent of all babies born in the U.S. (including 53 percent of babies born to women under 30) were born outside of marriage. “It is obvious,” said Schlafly, “that when the mother of these children has no husband to support her and her babies, she calls on Big Brother Government.”

This is an important point to keep in mind as we take a holiday break from the battle over the fiscal cliff, taxes and spending.

America’s urban liberal elite, who are the arbiters of popular culture, constantly promote the idea that the family is irrelevant, motherhood is demeaning and stay-at-home mothers are a burden on the state.

After forty-five years of the sexual revolution, urban liberal feminists, the media and an amoral government-run education system have convinced less educated Americans that marriage and the “role of father or husband or wife” are not only unnecessary to emotional fulfillment and economic advancement, getting married will get in the way of the activities celebrated in the popular media, such as partying and casual sex.

Establishment Republicans don’t want to talk about marriage and the family. It all sounds so judgmental around the bar at the country club.

However, as Phyllis Schlafly noted, the breakdown of the family drives government spending because you and I then pay the bills for welfare, after school programs, Head Start and a host of other expensive and largely unsuccessful federal efforts to replace the nuclear family.

This is very much what Rick Santorum was saying out on the campaign trail during the Republican primary elections, but it is a truth that disappeared from the political conversation as soon as Santorum suspended his campaign.

This Christmas, please join me in celebrating the family and, in the midst of our battle over federal spending, let’s re-dedicate ourselves to helping to solve our government’s fiscal crisis by solving our nation’s family crisis.

In this context, it is never a bad idea to bring up the writings of Stephen Baskerville…

We get more illegitimate babies supported by taxpayers every year; This striking change in our social structure is the primary reason that government budgets are so bloated

Contrary to politicians who want to call a truce about social issues, there is absolutely no way to separate social and fiscal issues

wrote Phyllis Schlafly last spring (echoing Stephen Baskerville);

they are locked in a tight political embrace. Politicians who say we can ignore social issues, or avoid talking about them, are really saying that they have no plan to cut federal spending and the growing national debt.


That's because the social issue of marriage, and its importance to our society, has become a tremendous fiscal issue. The problem of marriage absence is now costing the taxpayers even more than national defense.

We used to have a social structure in the United States where husbands and fathers provided the financial support of wife and children. Last year, 41 percent of all babies born in the U.S. (including 53 percent of babies born to women under 30) were illegitimate, growing up without their own fathers.

It is obvious that when the mother of these children has no husband to support her and her babies, she calls on Big Brother Government. You and I then pay the bills for what is labeled welfare.

It's not poverty that causes broken families; it's the absence of marriage that causes poverty and puts kids below the designated poverty line. Social issues cause fiscal expenses. 

I grew up during the Great Depression of the 1930s, and the American family, white and black, was not broken. It stayed together to face life's reversale.

The massive national problem of having babies without marriage started with Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty in the 1960s. LBJ Welfare channeled all the money and benefits to the woman, thereby making the husband and father unnecessary.

I'm not saying anything new; Charles Murray laid this all out more than 20 years ago. He said "Illegitimacy is the single most important social problem of our time ... because it drives everything else," imposing gigantic costs on the taxpayers.

After Barack Obama became President, he increased federal welfare spending by a third because, as he told Joe the plumber, Obama wants to "spread the wealth around." This was a conscious political strategy; it promotes dependence on government and more votes for the Democrats.

Most Americans are unaware that nearly $900 billion a year of federal taxpayers' money is handed out to non-taxpayers allegedly below a designated poverty line. Americans' lack of knowledge of the enormity of these handouts is why we sometimes hear reference to the "hidden" welfare state.

The Heritage Foundation reports that more than 70 types of federal means-tested handouts, in cash or benefits, are distributed. Half of Americans (47 percent) pay no income tax and depend for their living expenses in whole or in part on government handouts paid by the other half who do pay income taxes.

This federal welfare apparatus includes 12 programs providing food, 10 for housing assistance, 10 for social services, 9 for educational assistance, 8 programs giving cash, 8 for vocational training, 7 for medical assistance, 3 for energy and utility assistance, and 2 for child care and child development. Welfare recipients are eligible for a free cell phone with monthly minutes from the Universal Service Fund that the rest of us pay into.

So we get more illegitimate babies supported by taxpaying Americans every year. This extraordinary change in our social structure is the primary reason that government budgets, both federal and state, are so bloated. 

The Rasmussen Poll reports that 78 percent of American adults rate marriage as at least somewhat important to U.S. society, 60 percent consider it very important, and 77 percent say it's better for children to grow up in a home with both their parents. So why are we using tax dollars to discourage marriage and subsidize illegitimacy?

We should ask our presidential candidates who are worried about extravagant government spending, unbalanced budgets, and repeated raising of the debt ceiling, how they will stop the flow of money that promotes more and more dependency on government. Welfare spending is a major cause of our unbalanced budgets and colossal debt.

This hidden welfare state is the fastest growing component of government spending. And these figures do not include Social Security or Medicare payments.

Nor do the Heritage Foundation figures count the social and fiscal costs of the expensive problems that come mostly from female-headed households. These include drug addition, sex, suicides, school dropouts, runaways, and crime.

Welfare spending is a failure; it doesn't advance us toward any constructive goal, such as helping recipients to get on their feet economically. It merely increases dependence on government handouts and increases votes for big-spending politicians.

French Youth Poverty Rate Reaches 23%

While the French attack capitalism and America's way of life as being nightmarish — as compared to Europe's (oh-so-) compassionate economy and (oh-so-) generous society — the rate of French youth living in poverty has reached… 23%.

The diagnosis is critical.

That is Le Monde's interpretation given to the conclusion in the latest French report on the nation's youth.

Articles by Pascale Krémer and Catherine Rollot along with an interview of sociologist Olivier Galland, and filling the entire second and third pages of the French daily of reference along with the top four fifths' width of the front page, point out that "the young are the primary victims of the recession." And because "all youth do not suffer the recession as violently as their neighbors", the government's December report points out that the fracture is increasing between two castes of youth growing ever further apart.

Car les jeunes sont bien les premières victimes de la récession. Tous ne la subissent pas aussi violemment. Plutôt que le portrait d'une génération sacrifiée, ce rapport dessine la ligne de fracture entre deux jeunesses qui s'éloignent l'une de l'autre.

La première est dotée de diplômes, ils continuent bon gré mal gré de la protéger. La seconde en est dépourvue, elle est guettée par la pauvreté. Ce sont ces 15 % de jeunes qui ne sont ni en études, ni en formation, ni en emploi. Nulle part. Et que la puissance publique aide peu. Le taux de pauvreté des 18-24 ans atteint 22,5 %. Depuis 2004, il a progressé de 5 points. Au total, plus d'un million de jeunes sont désormais confrontés à une situation de grande précarité.

That's right: it's something we see over and over again: it turns out that — oui, even in Europe's compassionate© and generous™ societies — it is the rich who come out well and the poor who turn out not to be getting any aid (probably because, as usual, the poor are the ones paying for the rich).

Meanwhile, continues Pascal Kremer, 15% of people 15 to 29 are NEET (Neither in Employment   nor in Education and Training). Indeed, Pierre Cahuc, the author of The Pigeonholing Machine: How France Splits Its Youth in Two, tells Jean-Baptiste Chastand and Claire Guélaud that "we [French] have just about a million young people without a diploma and out of work, [and] half of those have stopped looking."

… on a quasiment un million de jeunes sans diplôme et sans emploi, et leur accès au travail est extrêmement compliqué. La moitié d'entre eux ne recherchent même plus un emploi... Ces jeunes sont dans une situation dramatique en France.

The Year 2012 in Images

From the International Herald Tribune, the year in images …

In the rest of the world, 75% of humans live their lives being ransacked by mafias, cops, and the military

Something I never see mentioned as an argument for an armed citizenry: look at the everyday life of regular people in the rest of the world, outside of the West and other developped nations. Until today, 75% of humans live their lives being ransacked by mafias, cops, and military. That's why I've always been suspicious of law enforcement and military: these people should never been allowed to outgun the citizenry.

 Thus writes Hervé as he sends us this National Review piece from Kevin D. Williamson. (When you're done reading it, be sure to check out the No Pasarán post on the Sandy Hook shooting).

Regulating the Militia

The Second Amendment is about protecting ourselves from the state.
My friend Brett Joshpe has published an uncharacteristically soft-headed piece in the San Francisco Chronicle arguing that in the wake of the massacre at Sandy Hook, conservatives and Republicans should support what he calls “sensible” gun-control laws. It begins with a subtext of self-congratulation (“As a conservative and a Republican, I can no longer remain silent . . . Some will consider it heresy,” etc.), casts aspersions of intellectual dishonesty (arguments for preserving our traditional rights are “disingenuous”), advances into ex homine (noting he has family in Sandy Hook, as though that confers special status on his preferences), fundamentally misunderstands the argument for the right to keep and bear arms, deputizes the electorate, and cites the presence of teddy bears as evidence for his case.

Brett, like practically every other person seeking to diminish our constitutional rights, either does not understand the purpose of the Second Amendment or refuses to address it, writing, “Gun advocates will be hard-pressed to explain why the average American citizen needs an assault weapon with a high-capacity magazine other than for recreational purposes.” The answer to this question is straightforward: The purpose of having citizens armed with paramilitary weapons is to allow them to engage in paramilitary actions. The Second Amendment is not about Bambi and burglars — whatever a well-regulated militia is, it is not a hunting party or a sport-clays club. It is remarkable to me that any educated person — let alone a Harvard Law graduate — believes that the second item on the Bill of Rights is a constitutional guarantee of enjoying a recreational activity.

There is no legitimate exception to the Second Amendment for military-style weapons, because military-style weapons are precisely what the Second Amendment guarantees our right to keep and bear. The purpose of the Second Amendment is to secure our ability to oppose enemies foreign and domestic, a guarantee against disorder and tyranny. Consider the words of Supreme Court justice Joseph Story — who was, it bears noting, appointed to the Court by the guy who wrote the Constitution:

The importance of this article will scarcely be doubted by any persons, who have duly reflected upon the subject. The militia is the natural defence of a free country against sudden foreign invasions, domestic insurrections, and domestic usurpations of power by rulers. It is against sound policy for a free people to keep up large military establishments and standing armies in time of peace, both from the enormous expenses, with which they are attended, and the facile means, which they afford to ambitious and unprincipled rulers, to subvert the government, or trample upon the rights of the people. The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them.

“Usurpation and arbitrary power of the rulers” — not Bambi, not burglars. While your granddad’s .30-06 is a good deal more powerful than the .223 rifles that give blue-state types the howling fantods, that is not what we have a constitutional provision to protect. Liberals are forever asking: “Why would anybody need a gun like that?” And the answer is: because we are not serfs. We are a free people living under a republic of our own construction. We may consent to be governed, but we will not be ruled.

The right to keep and bear arms is a civil right. If you doubt that, consider the history of arms control in England, where members of the Catholic minority (and non-Protestants generally) were prohibited from bearing arms as part of the campaign of general political oppression against them. The Act of Disenfranchisement was still in effect when our Constitution was being written, a fact that surely was on the mind of such Founding Fathers as Daniel Carroll, to say nothing of his brother, Archbishop John Carroll.

The Second Amendment speaks to the nature of the relationship between citizen and state. Brett may think that such a notion is an antiquated relic of the 18th century, but then he should be arguing for wholesale repeal of the Second Amendment rather than presenting — what’s the word? — disingenuous arguments about what it means and the purpose behind it.

If we want to reduce the level of criminal violence in our society, we should start by demanding that the police and criminal-justice bureaucracies do their job. Massacres such as Sandy Hook catch our attention because they are so unusual. But a great deal of the commonplace violence in our society is preventable. Brett here might look to his hometown: There were 1,662 murders in New York City from 2003 to 2005, and a New York Times analysis of the data found that in 90 percent of the cases, the killer had a prior criminal record. (About half the victims did, too.) Events such as Sandy Hook may come out of nowhere, but the great majority of murders do not. The police function in essence as a janitorial service, cleaning up the mess created in part by our dysfunctional criminal-justice system.

We probably would get more out of our criminal-justice system if it were not so heavily populated by criminals. As I note in my upcoming book, The End Is Near and It’s Going to Be Awesome, it can be hard to tell the good guys from the bad guys:

For more than twenty years, NYPD detectives worked as enforcers and assassins for the Gambino crime family; in 2006 two detectives were convicted not only of murder and conspiracy to commit murder but also on charges related to such traditional mob activity as labor racketeering, running illegal gambling rings, extortion, narcotics trafficking, obstruction of justice, and the like. This was hardly an isolated incident; only a few years prior to the NYPD convictions more than 70 LAPD officers associated with the city’s anti-gang unit were found to have been deeply involved in gang-affiliated criminal enterprises connected to the Bloods street gang. Their crimes ranged from the familiar police transgressions of falsifying evidence, obstructing justice, and selling drugs seized in arrests to such traditional outlaw fare as bank robbery — they were cops and robbers. More than 100 criminal convictions were overturned because of evidence planted or falsified by officers of the LAPD. One scholarly account of the scandal concluded that such activity is not atypical but rather systemic — and largely immune to attempts at reform: “The current institution of law enforcement in America does appear to reproduce itself according [to] counter-legal norms . . . attempts to counteract this reproduction via the training one receives in police academies, the imposition of citizen review boards, departments of Internal Affairs, etc. do not appear to mitigate against this structural continuity between law enforcement and crime.”

The Department of Homeland Security has existed for only a few years but it already has been partly transformed into an organized-crime syndicate. According to a federal report, in 2011 alone more than 300 DHS employees and contractors were charged with crimes ranging from smuggling drugs and child pornography to selling sensitive intelligence to drug cartels. That’s not a few bad apples — that’s an arrest every weekday and many weekends. Given the usual low ratio of arrests to crimes committed, it is probable that DHS employees are responsible for not hundreds but thousands of crimes. And these are not minor infractions: Agents in the department’s immigration division were caught selling forged immigrant documents, and DHS vehicles have been used to transport hundreds (and possibly thousands) of pounds of illegal drugs. A “standover” crew — that is, a criminal enterprise that specializes in robbing other criminals — was found being run by a DHS agent in Arizona, who was apprehended while hijacking a truckload of cocaine.

Power corrupts. Madison knew that, and the other Founders did, too, which is why we have a Second Amendment.

Related: What Is to Blame for the Connecticut Shooting? Does the Blame Lie with the Right to Bear Arms Or Can It Be Found Elsewhere?

If I Were the Devil by PAUL HARVEY

Duncan Hill sends us the following:

For those unfamiliar with Paul Harvey, he was the most popular radio commentator of his time … in the US. In 1965, he broadcast this message. Amazing how clear things were for him. Thank goodness we have Obama to prove him right.

Valerie adds that several

versions of the text can be found

for the message was rebroadcast over the years, again and again, slightly rewritten at times from its original form, in 1964.
 

Lincoln's Gettysburg Address Quoted During Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech for European Union

Should one feel impressed? And flattered? Or amused?

(And should we put the question to Nigel Farage?)
While accepting the Nobel Peace Prize for the European Union in Oslo’s City Hall a couple of weeks ago, Herman Van Rompuy quoted Abraham Lincoln in his acceptance speech.

As reported by Andrew Higgins in the New York Times, the president of the European Council said: “If I can borrow the words of Abraham Lincoln at the time of another continental test, what is being assessed today is whether that union, or any union so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”

Besieged by economic woes and insistent questions about its future, the European Union accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on Monday with calls for further integration and a plea to remember the words of Abraham Lincoln as he addressed a divided nation at Gettysburg. 

The prize ceremony, held in Oslo’s City Hall and attended by 20 European leaders as well as Norway’s royal family, brought a rare respite from the gloom that has settled on the European Union since the Greek debt crisis exploded three years ago, unleashing doubt about the long-term viability of the euro and about an edifice of European institutions built up over more than half a century to promote an ever closer union. 

Unemployment — now at over 25 percent in Greece and Spain — and sputtering economic growth across the 27-nation bloc are “putting the political bonds of our union to the test,” Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council, said in his acceptance speech. “If I can borrow the words of Abraham Lincoln at the time of another continental test, what is being assessed today is whether that union, or any union so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”

The European Union, said Mr. Van Rompuy, will “answer with our deeds, confident we will succeed.”

“We are working very hard to overcome the difficulties, to restore growth and jobs,” he continued.

Aside from economic misery, the most serious threat to the bloc so far is growing pressure in Britain for a referendum on whether to pull out of the union. The British prime minister, David Cameron, did not attend the ceremony, but most other European leaders showed up, including Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and the French president, François Hollande, who sat next to each other and whose countries, once bitter enemies, have been the main motors driving European integration. 

Mr. Van Rompuy’s comparison of the European Union to the United States is likely to irritate critics of the European Union, who reject efforts to push European nations to surrender more sovereignty in pursuit of what champions of a federal European state hope will one day be a United States of Europe. 

Just how far Europe is from such a goal, however, was made clear by the presence of three Union presidents in Oslo. In addition to Mr. Van Rompuy, whose European Council represents the leaders of the union’s member states, there was José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, the bloc’s main administrative and policy-making arm, and Martin Schulz, president of the European Parliament. 

Instead of the customary Nobel lecture delivered by the winner, Mr. Van Rompuy and Mr. Barroso each read parts of what Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, described as “one speech but two chapters.” 

Hailing the European Union for helping bring peace to Europe after repeated wars, Mr. Jagland said, “What this continent has achieved is truly fantastic, from being a continent of war to becoming a continent of peace.”

Mr. Barroso spoke of the horrors of past wars and tyranny and Europe’s efforts to overcome them through the building of supranational institutions, which began in 1951 with the establishment of the European Coal and Steel Community by France, Germany and four other countries. But he also cited the current conflict in Syria, describing it as a “stain on the world’s conscience” that other nations have “a moral duty” to address. The European Union’s member states are themselves divided about how far to go in supporting opponents of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president.

The decision to honor the European Union with the Nobel Peace Prize stirred widespread criticism in Norway, whose citizens have twice voted not to join the union. On the eve of Monday’s award ceremony, peace activists and supporters of left-wing political groups paraded through the streets of Oslo, carrying flaming torches and chanting, “The E.U. is not a worthy winner.”

Many peace activists say they have no problem with European integration but question whether the union has lived up to conditions laid down by Alfred Nobel, the 19th-century Swedish industrialist who bequeathed the peace prize and four other Nobel Prizes.

How do You Say the Word "Kafka" in African?

A poster showing foreigners how the system works:
What leads to work documents (papers) is a pay slip;
what leads to a pay slip is work;
what leads to work are… work documents…
What leads to work documents is a… Etc…
(In the center of the poster: You are here!)
• Bureaucrat to colleague: How do you say the word "Kafka" in African?

While the Europeans are, as usual, denouncing racism in America, as well as its heartless system (capitalist or otherwise), and giving them lessons in civility and honing their society in a humane manner, while asking that the country's clueless inhabitants look toward their shining shores for the type of society that would be ideal for everybody, it turns out that the system which allows for foreigners to obtain papers in France is hardly more humane, or generous, than elsewhere — and that, even under a socialist government…

Indeed, a better word is Kafkaesque, for while "the holy grail" for getting settled legally through work is the pay slip, as Elise Vincent and François Béguin explain in Le Monde, the cartoon points out that things ain't that simple…

Related: The above does not invalidate the simple fact that
• It So Happens That Every Illegal Alien (in America or elsewhere) Already Does Have Papers

• "Undocumented Worker": The Left's Preferred Expression for "Illegal Alien" Is False and Misleading

Adolf Hitler in Religious Surroundings: Is There Really Evidence That the Führer Was a Christian?

On Christmas Eve, No Pasarán posted an article giving evidence that Adolf Hitler wanted to replace Christianity with the "religion" of National Socialism.

A couple of readers have taken issue with this (as you can see among the comments section), and, between them, they offer more than a dozen photos of der Führer or other Nazi leaders in religious settings (a couple are listed twice or show the same event from different angles) in order to show, apparently, that Christianity was an integral element in the Nazis' seizure of power and in their scheme of power proper.

I think that anytime a blogger (or anyone else) makes a mistake, he or she should not be fearful but should own up to it.

Having said that, I am not going to admit to any mistakes before examining the evidence.

Truth is, I kind of suspect the two or three readers of being militant atheists, but I don't know this, I have no way of knowing this, and anyway I am open to examining their evidence and assume that they are objective observers, perhaps (but not necessarily) mistaken observers, entirely open to dialogue one way as well as the other.

So let us take an in-depth, dispassionate look at the evidence they bring.

Let us dissect the 14 photos and the half-dozen quotes they have, and be unafraid to make the appropriate conclusions thereto.

One photo can be disposed of straight away: One of the pictures allegedly demonstrating that Hitler was a Christian or pro-Christian shows the Führer in the company of an admiring nun. But take a closer look: Unless I am very much mistaken, what is actually happening is that a political celebrity is doing nothing more than — briefly — interrupting his outdoor lunch, or a snack, or drinks, to sign an autograph for a fan. A fan who happens to be a nun (let us assume that she is one, even though that there is the — admittedly, remote — possibility that she may simply be a traditionally-dressed peasant). Indeed, even the person who uploaded the photo doesn't see fit to mention the nun, calling the image simply HitlerWithFan.jpg. Is it unfair to say that it is likely that the fan, or the nun, stopped by the table — possibly invited thereto by the Nazi propaganda service — and spent maybe 20 seconds there while Hitler signed his name on a head shot (one provided the nun by his services a few moments earlier?) while his personal photographer snapped a picture?

Taking issue with the statement that a photo and a video of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem "seem to show the only time Adolf Hitler has met any religious leader of note", Writeby and John link to several pictures.

Let us see what they show:

One of them shows a formal meeting with various dignitaries, one of whom is some kind of bishop or cardinal. (The other people seem to be various types of ambassadors.)

Two other photos show "Hitler shaking hands with a bishop (a cardinal in this one)". It's actually two photos, taken from a different angle, of the same bishop (or the same cardinal) at the same event at almost the same moment.

In any case, these photos indeed seem to pretty much destroy the following phrase of mine, which Writeby quotes:

no pictures seem to exist with any Catholic priest or Protestant preacher, German or foreign. 

Do these photos not disprove that? (Und nein, the "seem to" phrase will not help you out of this one, Herr Svane…)

But wait a minute!

Look at the lack of a capital letter at the beginning of the phrase "quoted" (it is not "No pictures" with a capital N): It turns out that Writeby — deliberately — decided not to quote the entire sentence!

Check out the beginning thereof:

Of course, another reason a Nazi leader might meet with a religious leader might be for reasons of diplomacy with an ally [I might have added "with an ally, domestic or foreign"] …

What is the main purpose of these meetings of Hitler's with these religious people?

Is it for respect for the religious sphere and Adolf's concern for, say, his personal spiritual path? Or is it for diplomatic reasons — internal and external? And/or for show?

We do not know, do we? We cannot say… Actually, I'm pretty willing to bet that it has more to do with diplomatic reasons and/or for propaganda purposes…

Now take a look at the other pictures of religious men in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s that John and Writeby link to.

In every single one, with or without the presence of the Führer, the religious men are giving the Heil Hitler salute or, to be more precise, they are joining the neighboring crowd to give the Heil Hitler salute.

Alright, so what I should have written was that

"no pictures seem to exist with any Catholic priest or Protestant preacher, German or foreign" unless it were for reasons of diplomacy (foreign or domestic) [which in fact, I had already written] or — unless the latter agreed, willingly or otherwise, to forfeit their independence, to follow the brain-washed crowds, and to submit to the Nazi state.

My mistake.

In the meantime, let us note that in the 12 years of the Third Reich, or over 4,380 days, our Christian detractors have managed to find photos from only a couple of events of Hitler meeting some religious authority (none of whom seem to be specially "of note") along with a couple of photos (some of which may predate Hitler assuming power) of brain-washed priests giving the Hitler salute.

This brings us to the Göring church wedding "with his best man (Hitler)".

Is this not damning evidence?!

I wish it were, but unfortunately for John, we cannot tell, because people have gotten married in churches for centuries whether feeling religious or not. And in this case, the question is, Was the church wedding done for the sake of belonging to, and respect for, the Christian religion? Or was it done for the usual totalitarian reasons — for propaganda and spectacle? A full description of the events in April 1935 provide a clue:

During the early 1930s Göring was often in the company of Emmy Sonnemann (1893–1973), an actress from Hamburg. They were married on 10 April 1935 in Berlin; the wedding was celebrated on a huge scale. A large reception was held the night before at the Berlin Opera House. Fighter aircraft flew overhead on the night of the reception and the day of the ceremony.

"Finding [this information took] literally seconds on" Wikipedia via "google [name] search", John. If you don't mind me saying so: "The internet is really cool that way, you should try it some time."

This brings us in turn to the prominent presence of a majestic church in several photographs. But as John himself notes, they are (here too) "propaganda shots". If they are propaganda, what purpose does the majestic building have? Is the Church of Our Lady "a potent symbol" to denote the Christian religion? Or is it "a potent symbol" to symbolize the majesty of the Nazi movement, of the Aryan race, of the anointed leader, of the Christian religion submitting to, and standing behind, the Führer? In addition, at least one (1928) is, and possibly both are, from before the Nazis took power in 1933.

This brings us to a major problem regarding all the photos that John and Writeby — photo after photo turns out to be taken during the 1920s and early 1930s, when the Nazis were not in power, i.e., during campaigns for the hearts of the German people.

Why should early news reports from the Nazi movement disprove later ones, such as the 1937 reports showing that the Nazi neo-pagans wanted to replace the words of Christian hymns with paeans to the glory of the Aryan race?!

When are the pictures of Hitler exiting a church taken? When Hitler is the chancellor of Germany? When he has become the dictator of the German Reich? Is he the Führer? With full powers?

No, again unless I am mistaken, Dolfi seems to be young, a civilian, wearing a hat, and he seems to be in Bavaria. He seems, indeed, to be what he still was in the 1920s, a politician trying to gain power — through (as we later will find out) whatever means necessary…

Do we know for sure that they are "pictures of him walking out of church after worship"? Was he really in there to worship and, if so, did he do so in his soul or did he just go through the "motions"? Have we never heard of people going to church without feeling particularly religious? (It was in Tess of the d'Urbervilles, if my memory doesn't fail me, that the main reason for young people going to church turned out to be not to commune with the higher power, but to "check out" and meet young people of the opposite sex…)

For certain politicians, young or old, the reason comes to being seen by, being checked out by, and meeting the populace. Have we never heard of politicians, past or present, engaging in activities they didn't particularly care for because it was necessary with regards to the electorate or to a certain segment of the population?

Specifically, have we never heard of politicians, past or present, claiming to be Christian when it was obvious they weren't so or when the extent of their commitment was doubtful?

This brings us to the photo of "Hitler in prayer".

Not only don't we know if the Führer is really turning to his religious side, we don't even know if he is praying — or to what.

We don't know if this shot is taken after the Nazis came to power or while they was still vying for the soul of Germany. (It might not be for propaganda, might it?)

Is Adolf even in a church? If so, it is one whose purpose has been radically transformed by a (great) number of swastika flags hanging from its walls…

If the photo is from the latter part of his career, Hitler may be showing respects towards a dead Nazi, or towards dead Germans in a battle that just ended.

But in any case, what he is doing is not necessarily Christian, as Romans, vandals, Vikings, and samurai, among many others (not least Goths and Teutons as well as a number of neo-pagans), have behaved the same way in the same type of formal events, and have done so long before they ever heard of Christianity.

Some may say I am splitting hairs.

I would say that, given what we know about the Nazi state — given what we now know about the fact that neo-pagans had started replacing the words of Christmas carols with paeans to the glory of the Aryan race — isn't it rather posting these (rare) photos which amounts to splitting hairs?!

Speaking facetiously of his hyperlinks to the religious images, John quips

Finding these too [sic] literally seconds on google image search. The internet is really cool that way, you should try it some time. 

Guess what, John. Taking a good, hard look at some of the evidence before one's eyes takes a little longer and demands more use of one's brain cells.

That's something you might want to try some time…

Caption: Why no Christian symbols at events like this? —>
In order to prove something, it is not sufficient to point out evidence in your favor, you must also explain away (if possible) things that do not prove your point — for instance, the absence of Christian symbols at Nazi gatherings in Nuremberg as well as in most of the NSDAP's gatherings as well as in the ensuing propaganda records such as Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will…

For an answer as to who is splitting hairs, let us go to the quotes that Writeby provides.

Might it be that the very words that he quotes — i.e., the words of Hitler, Göring, et al — turn out to prove the exact opposite of what he and John are claiming? (I.e., that Christianity is an integral part of the Nazi creed…)

Could it be that the very words that Writeby quotes confirms what we are saying on No Pasarán?

Writeby and John seem to think that I wrote, or that I think, that Nazi leaders were atheistic and/or — overtly — anti-Christian. Ergo, any photos with religious leaders and any quotations about God and/or Jesus prove that I am wrong.

As it happens, you cannot note what seems like a damning quote of Hitler's — that "The National Government … regards Christianity as the foundation of our national morality" — without noting the date he made the "Proclamation to the German Nation".

February 1, 1933 is the day after he finally was appointed chancellor — against the better judgment of President Hindenburg and with less than 40% of the vote. Is it any wonder he would make a uniting statement like that?

(Muhamed Morsi —not that he should be compared to Adolf, the Egyptian is just being used as an illustration — also sounded good in his first weeks in office, waiting until months later to show his true side.)

Writeby goes on to give us two quotes from Hitler, which are even older, from the 1920s, both when he was a struggling politician, again when he was a politician vying for the hearts of the German people.

Might it be revealing that in one quote, Hitler does not call Jesus "the Son of God" but, non-commitally, "the founder of Christianity"? And in the other, while he mentions the "Lord and Savior", does he not speak more of himself — while comparing himself to Jesus?!

The tenor of both the Mein Kampf quote and the 1922 Munich quote is hardly one of respect and love for Jesus Christ or as someone attempting to be a (fellow) humble follower of the "true" religion. It is one of hatred for a group or a policy (the Jews). Adolph [sic] Hitler is in no way trying to give an interpretation of the Bible, or of a Bible story, for his readers or listeners; he is claiming that evidence from the Bible, for which he seems to have little interest per se, supports the policies of he himself and of his party.

Is Hitler saying anything to the effect that "in order to be good Christians, you, we, must do such and such"? No, Hitler is saying "Christians, if they (if you) are good and sensible, ought to (you ought to) join the Nazi party and follow us"!

In fact, quotations from other German leaders do not support Writeby and John's contention at all. What the Nazis are saying is "Christianity is good — insofar as its members bow to, and support, Adolf (literally, our Lord Adolf Hitler) and his Nazi policies" (see the photos of the brain-washed priests doing the Hitler salute).

"Hermann Goering" [sic]:

"God gave the savior to the German people. We have faith, deep and unshakeable faith, that he [Hitler] was sent to us by God to save Germany." 

Robert Lay:

"We believe on this earth in Adolf Hitler alone! We believe in National Socialism as the creed which is the sole source of grace! We believe that Almighty God has sent us Adolf Hitler so that he may rid Germany of the hypocrites and Pharisees."

What is it that you don't understand, Writeby, in that this disproves your point altogether?

What is it that you don't understand, John, when Christianity is turned on its head and reinterpreted, in a self-serving manner, so that, say, humility and the need to own up to your mistakes (sins) are done away with, while the messiah becomes whoever is the leader of your political party and of your nation?!