Letters 9

What can I say, Clark. Absolutely spot on. We cannot possibly equate the threat to burn a copy of that literary masterpiece called the Koran, with the massacre and beheading of people. That is the basic issue with Islam, where many Muslims tell us that it’s the religion of peace, but this claim is belied by the actions of mad men.
The more we draw attention to this barbarity, so far ignored by politicians of all colours, the better.
 
George L.

Gentlemen, let me buy in.
 
I have written many a rant about these issues in the past as I have known and worked with these people since I was a boy.
 
There ARE some good Muslims - few and far between albeit, but when we ask why the so-called tolerant muslims (whom our politicians will insist are in the majority) do not exercise their majority control over the minority miscreants, we forget what they are up against themselves.
 
The miscreant types have no regard for human life, not even their own, and if motivated to extreme and inhuman (to us!) behaviour by the actions or words of an infidel, imagine how their reaction would affect a fellow muslim who spoke sternly about their behaviour?
I have recollection at Malaysia Airlines, where I spent a few decades, of people who spoke out against the application of Islamic principles being applied to the airline operation. e.g. advocation of flight attendants without head cover; advocation of alcoholic drink services (when the fundamentalists in management were considering these restrictions). These men, whose only interest was to promote the airline as a forward thinking carrier and encourage acceptance in the wider western-oriented industry, lost their jobs. Motivation wasn't the thing, it was that they had spoken against the Islamic practice being proposed. And they suffered job loss - not only that but a vindictive witch-hunt that saw them have to leave the industry all together! Some never recovered and from high paid executive positions some were impoverished, one I know became a taxi driver. He was lucky. All because they questioned Islamic principle.
 
So muslims who enjoy their lifestyle while remaining true to Islam are terrified to speak out vigourously against anything their less-than-fortunate Islamic brothers are doing or saying.
 
These bastards are capable of anything and their influence is wide through the mosque network. We, our media, may never hear of it, but retribution occurs quietly, if delivered with some stark reminder that they are around, and the victims accept it quietly for fear of worse.
 
Believe me when I say there are no good muslims. This is the reason, any good intention is quickly excised if the intention is against any Islamic practice or opinion.
 
There is no way to hold back this Tsunami other than to face it, fight it and drive it back. There isn't a politician in the world with the cojones to act against the flow, They don't believe that the majority of voters would support them because they are surrounded by appeasers who fill the inner sanctum and feed them with Liberal Socialist claptrap about integration and multiculturalism which, to your average Islamist, is a load of claptrap and just the sort of thing they need to assist them in their goal of the worldwide Caliphate.
 
Here endeth the rant
 
Bill in Oz
 

Subject: Forest article in "The Scotsman"

What an indictment of the land tenure system in Scotland the article of 29th November on forest ownership contains. It is a testimony to the failure of the 2003 land reforms brought in by the then Labour Executive and it is an equally judgement of the last two SNP administrations in their continued disengagement with the land reform agenda.

 Scotland still has one of the most intensive systems of private ownership of land in Europe, if not the world, and it contrasts strongly with the more extensive, democratic systems in the favourite analogy countries of the SNP in Scandinavia and Europe. The SNP can't or rather just, will not, see the incongruity of even national parks being owned privately, with some of the owners not even being UK residents, whilst accepting the normality of state ownership in the very countries they suggest that Scotland could emulate.

However the issue goes much deeper than that and indeed to the very core of national being and economic function. The intensity of private landownership, as exemplified by rural estates is only the surface manifestation of a pervading land monopoly that sucks the very life blood of the nation through its parasitism of land rental value(LRV). The key to redressing the stifling of an extensive property owning democracy in Scotland and without expensive and totalitarian state expropriation, is the 100% collection of this LRV as the basis of public revenue to replace recession causing taxes.

My experience of raising this issue with senior SNP members over the last decade or so suggests that they prefer to protect land monopoly vested interests rather than advance the interests of the people of Scotland.

Ron Greer