Day: November 20, 2017

Talks collapse in Germany, specter of new election rises

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Talks between the leading political parties are in chaos as Angela Merkel attempts to find a ruling majority.

The two key issues are climate change and REFUGEES.

From the Malta Independent:

clinton-merkel1
One down, one to go!

German Chancellor Angela Merkel pledged early Monday to maintain stability after the Free Democratic Party pulled out of talks on forming a new government with her conservative bloc and the left-leaning Greens, raising the possibility of new elections.

Merkel told reporters that the parties had been close to reaching a consensus on how to proceed with formal coalition talks but that the Free Democrats decided abruptly to pull out just before midnight Sunday — a move she said she respected, but found “regrettable.”

[….]

It is at least a day of deep reflection on how to go forward in Germany,” Merkel said. “But I will do everything possible to ensure that this country will be well led through these difficult weeks.”

Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrats and sister Bavaria-only Christian Social Union, the pro-business Free Democrats and the left-leaning Greens had already blown past Merkel’s own deadline of Thursday to agree on a basis for opening formal negotiations on a coalition of all four parties, a configuration that has never been tried at a national level in Germany.

Key sticking points were the issues of migration and climate change.

[….]

On migration, the Christian Social Union wanted an annual cap on refugees, while the Greens sought to allow more categories of recent migrants to bring their closest relatives to join them.

If the Greens were truly concerned with the environment, they would be concerned about the impact of increased population in need of housing, roads, schools, food, water etc. Frankly, as migrants move to the first world they create more pollution and demands on resources. The fact that the Greens don’t care about that demonstrates they are first and foremost socialists/communists and it is about voting power for them.

The Independent continued:

Looking ahead, if it comes to a new election, polls currently suggest it would produce a very similar parliament to the current one, which would make efforts to form a new government similarly difficult.

More here.

You never know if the election would result in a different outcome—maybe more Germans have become aware of news like this—knife attacks on the rise as migrant numbers increase in Germany.

Go here for my ‘Invasion of Europe’ archive.

‘Hate’ crimes were fairly steady through most years of Obama Administration

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

And, religious ‘hate’ crimes were most often against Jewish people, not Muslims.

The Salt Lake Tribune published an article over the weekend in which they seem to reach for statistics to show that so-called hate crimes (mostly racial) are on the rise in Utah and elsewhere.

FBI
Learn about the Hate Crime data collection at the FBI here: https://www.fbi.gov/investigate/civil-rights/hate-crimes

One could easily conclude that yes, the ‘hate’ crimes were up a little in 2016 from the previous year, but about the same (or slightly lower) as Obama presided over in 2011.

Although they don’t say it, the implication is that Trump’s hateful rhetoric and followers are to blame for a trend.

We’ll wait for the 2017 data, since of course it was Obama (the peacemaker) presiding over the country for this data.

Here are the opening paragraphs of the Tribune article:

Incidents of hate crimes in Utah rose significantly for the first time in two years in 2016, and based on complaints and investigations this year, the local FBI believes those numbers will continue to rise.

Last year, local law enforcement reported 66 incidents to the FBI, ranking Utah No. 23 out of the 49 reporting states and the District of Columbia, according to recently released 2016 hate crime statistics.

Those 66 incidents encompass 72 offenses, or individual crimes, reported in 2016. The most common was simple assault, with 22 instances, followed by vandalism at 18 and crimes against society — drug, gambling, prostitution, weapons violation or animal cruelty offenses — at 13.

Sounds like just flat out criminal activity to me! (Did you know they were counting hate crimes against animals in this data?)

When you read the article don’t miss the part about how as a state becomes more “diverse” the hate crime incidents rise.

When I checked the data, here, sure enough the states with the most ‘haters’ were California, New York, Ohio, Michigan and Massachusetts also among the most diverse states in America. Wyoming, arguably with the least diverse population, was the least hateful state with only 3 incidents in 2016.

So could we make a case that diversity does not make us stronger, but in fact causes more strife and stress in society?

Here is an interesting chart showing the national ‘hate’ crime stats. The reporter says hate crimes were rising for the last five years (through 2016).  Yes, but she doesn’t mention the fact that they were slightly higher in 2011 than in 2016.

 

Screenshot (1107)

 

Here is an important takeaway: someone please tell CAIR Minnesota’s director Jaylani Hussein that in 2016 ‘hate’ crimes based on religion were more than twice as high against Jews than Muslims.

CAIR would have us think that all over America people were hating on Muslims. Gosh, who might be hating on all the Jewish people?

Jewish people were most likely to face the brunt of hate crimes targeting a person’s religion, with 684 reported incidents, about 54 percent of the total. Those incidents involved 862 victims, up nearly 18 percent from 2015 . Muslims were the target of 307 incidents….

There is lots of interesting data at the FBI’s Hate Crime Statistics for 2016.  I don’t have the time to explore it all, but you might.

Endnote:  I was just thinking about that 2016 Lake Calhoun incident in Minnesota, remember this. Was it categorized, by the FBI, as a ‘hate’ crime by Somalis against white people?  Heck it might fit in the racial category and the religious category!

If  that blatant incident isn’t in the data base at the FBI then you can throw out anything the FBI says about ‘hate’ crimes.

See my Utah archive here. See that the likelihood of their hate crimes increasing is pretty good as they continue to diversify through refugee resettlement.