Friday, April 08, 2016



Offensive Muslim officer in the Australian navy being cosseted



Note the Muslim headgear.  A believing Muslim cannot fully integrate into mainstream Australian culture and it's just a pretence to present her as having done so. Both she and Christian Maj. Gaynor disapprove of homosexuals.  Maj. Gaynor was fired from the army.  He must be watching this with great interest

The military establishment launched into a flurry of alarmed and secretive activity over incend­iary social media posts by its most senior Muslim officer late last year, with Chief of Navy Tim Barrett ordering a subordinate to ­investigate and “keep close hold”.

Emails between senior officers, released under Freedom of Inform­ation laws, reveal they considered whether Captain Mona Shindy should be sacked, with a legal assessment comparing her case to another in which a ­reserve officer had been expelled from the service for speaking out.

The crisis reached the top, with the Chief of the Australian ­Defence Force, Air Chief Marshal Mark Binskin, asking “did she ­actually say what is alleged?” and “did she really re-tweet this?”.

The moves followed a wave of controversy, detailed in The Australian, over articles, tweets and re-tweets by Captain Shindy, who is Vice-Admiral Barrett’s strategic adviser on Islamic affairs.

The tweets included remarks mirroring claims of Grand Mufti Ibrahim Abu Mohamed after the Paris terror attacks in November, in which he said factors such as Western foreign policy in the Middle East, the media and lack of ­opportunity were fuelling Islamic extremism. Captain Shindy mocked Tony Abbott after the leadership coup in September by pointing to pro-Muslim statements by Malcolm Turnbull, and tweeting: “Looking forward to a #PM that unites #auspol & #OZ”.

The emails, released on the ­Defence website following an FOI request, show Air Chief Marshal Binskin took an intense interest in the issue, often seeking updates, with one email asking: “Any feedback?”

In another email in relation to a letter of complaint about Captain Shindy, Air Chief Marshal Binskin wrote “any answer is going to have to be well crafted”.

The emails show that apart from having her official ­Defence Twitter account closed down, and being “counselled”, Captain Shindy has been cosseted by ­Defence spin doctors in her role as Telstra Australian Business Woman of the Year, so that on the speaking circuit her message can be, in Vice-Admiral Barrett’s words, “cleared and controlled”.

The emails also include ones from Captain Shindy to her ­superiors in which she attempted to ­explain her actions, complained about a “bombardment” of ­adverse emails and social media attacks on her, which she ­described as “ill informed, misguided and offensive ranting”, and asked for a personal assistant.

In an email with the subject line “External Email Bombardment and Request for Support” to Vice-Admiral Barrett and his chief of staff, dated December 4, Captain Shindy wrote: “I would very much appreciate a dedicated media, communications savvy personal assistant who can help me selectively accept high-impact engagements, assist with speech writing and effective messaging, help manage my diary to balance work commitments and my personal wellbeing, and protect my personal and professional interests when it comes to managing me as a ‘commodity’ and addressing the inevitable vitriol.”

Captain Shindy also once wrote in a published article that Western governments had a “double standard” of not bringing ­Israel to justice over its occupation of Palestinian territories while being quick to go to war in Iraq, and retweeted Mufti Musa Ismail Menk, the top Islamic cleric of Zimbabwe, who had taunted gays as being lower than animals, ­describing him as “always a source of wisdom”.

The documents show Captain Shindy sent an email to Vice ­Admiral Barrett, saying she had “no idea” about the “totality” of the Mufti’s Twitter feed, and that now that she knew of his comments about homosexuality being “filthy” she did not agree with them.

But she said a line she quoted from Mufti Menk following the Paris attacks, which said in part “the noise around us often makes it hard to know what’s going on ... So speak less & listen more”, was “to my mind ... a pretty harmless piece of commonsense”.

Captain Shindy is a respected 26-year veteran of the navy and until recently the head of its ­Guided Missile Frigate Program.

The documents include what appears to be a legal assessment comparing Captain Shindy’s case with that of a reservist officer whose name was redacted, but who is thought to be Major Bernard Gaynor Jnr, who was sacked for what Defence said were unacceptable remarks relating to gay and transgender people.

Major Gaynor won a wrongful dismissal case, which Defence is appealing. The assessment says that in both cases, “Defence determined that public comments were being made and social media used that was not in accord with ­Defence Policy” and the officers were ordered to stop making them.

But it says a key difference is that while the unnamed officer “did not desist from making further comments”, Captain Shindy “has ceased making inappropriate public comments”. The assessment concluded that no further action against her was required.

In another email Vice Admiral Barrett wrote of the “need (for) a review of our own social media products”. A Defence spokesman said yesterday a communications manual that would include policy on social media use was under ­development.

SOURCE





Illegal Immigration Boosts African-American Unemployment

While the Obama administration continues to brag about the drop in the national rate of unemployment, it ignores a glaring contradiction in the president’s policies: Illegal immigration is a key factor in the high rate of unemployment among African-Americans.

The national unemployment rate for March came in at 5 percent. For African-American men above the age of 20, the rate was 9.2 percent; for African-American women above the age of 20, the unemployment rate was 7.8 percent. For African-American men and women age 16 to 19, the unemployment rate soared to 21.4 percent.

Testifying before a Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee, U.S. Civil Rights Commissioner Peter Kirsanow documented the disproportionate negative effect of illegal immigration on African-Americans, particularly African-American men. Kirsanow testified in a personal capacity.

Kirsanow pointed out that illegal immigrants and African-American men often share the same disadvantages of low skills and low levels of academic achievement. Therefore, they compete in the same labor market. In the hospitality, service, construction, and agricultural markets, African-Americans can be excluded by employers who favor illegals for jobs that pay cut-rate wages in substandard working conditions.

SOURCE






The Rainbow Mafia's Corporate Hitmen

PayPal canceled its plans this week to create a global operations center in Charlotte, North Carolina, after the state passed a law requiring people in the state to use the bathroom appropriate for the equipment God gave them. In doing so, the company joined the legions of other big corporations that have become hitmen for the Rainbow Mafia. More than 120 corporations have demanded that North Carolina repeal its bathroom law, a number unheard of nearly a decade ago, according to Washington Post columnist Jena McGregor. “Corporate America’s evolution on gay rights appears to have reached a tipping point, one where so many companies have taken a stand on the issue that the risk of speaking out has been superseded by the risk of not doing so,” McGregor wrote. “What was once exceptional has become, in other words, almost expected.”

These corporations wield real power to do the bidding of a tiny fraction of the population. It was the corporate influence sitting on the board of the Boy Scouts of America that overturned the scouts' longstanding ban on homosexuals serving as leaders. The mafia took out Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich for supporting traditional marriage in California, after having attempted to do likewise with Chick-fil-A. Such examples brought to heel big-brand monoliths like Disney, Apple, Time Warner, Intel, the NFL and the NCAA, which exerted enough pressure on Georgia Governor Nathan Deal that he vetoed the state’s bill protecting religious liberty in the face of same-sex marriage policies. The businesses are hopping on board the homosexual agenda because they find it good for business. Rights, Liberty and the tolerance of diverse opinions don’t matter when the irate leftist minority is threatening boycotts at every turn.

SOURCE






Mississippi Moves to Protect Religious Freedom on Marriage

Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant signed House Bill 1523 into law on Tuesday

This morning, the Mississippi House passed a bill, HB 1523, protecting religious freedom. If the House disposes of a procedural maneuver that has delayed a final vote until Monday, the bill will go to the governor’s desk for his signature, as the Senate passed the bill earlier this week. The bill is good policy and the governor should sign it.

HB 1523, “Protecting Freedom of Conscience from Government Discrimination Act,” is based on the principle of protecting minority rights after major social change. In other states where marriage had been redefined, citizens and religious organizations who continued believing that marriage was a union of husband and wife have been penalized by the government. Bakers and florists have been fined, adoption agencies shuttered. So the citizens of Mississippi have acted to make sure it never happens in their state. In the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s redefinition of marriage, they’re working to protect their civil liberties.

It’s what Americans did after Roe v. Wade, too. Congress and the states have passed a variety of laws that protect pro-life conscience. In Roe v. Wade the Supreme Court invented a right to an abortion. But after Roe legislatures made clear that government cannot require a pro-life doctor or nurse to perform an abortion—that they, too, had rights that required specific protections from hostile judges and bureaucrats.

Likewise, in the Obergefell decision, the Supreme Court redefined marriage throughout America by mandating that governmental entities treat same-sex relationships as marriages. The Supreme Court did not say that private schools, charities, businesses, or individuals must abandon their beliefs if they disagree, but some governments are acting as if it did.

That’s what HB 1523 would prevent. It protects the freedom of conscience for people who believe any of the following three things: 1) that marriage is the union of husband and wife, 2) that sexual relations are reserved for marriage, and 3) that our gender identity is based on our biology. It doesn’t say anyone has to believe these things, it just says that if someone does believe them, the government can’t discriminate against them. So the bill takes nothing away from anyone, it simply protects pluralism.

HB 1523 specifies types of people and types of organizations for particular protections—including religious organizations, medical professionals and professionals working in the wedding industry, and government employees. It crafts careful protections for each type of entity.

For example, HB 1523 says that the government can never discriminate against a religious organization because it declines to solemnize or celebrate a same-sex wedding, or because it makes employment decisions in keeping with their religious beliefs about marriage. It prevents the government from discriminating against religious organizations that do adoption or foster care work in keeping with their religious beliefs about marriage as the union of husband and wife.

When it comes to professionals, HB 1523 says that the government can never discriminate against a surgeon, psychiatrist or counselor because they decline to do sex-reassignment surgery or decline to do marriage counseling for a same-sex marriage. The bill makes clear, however, that it cannot be used to deny visitation or proxy decision making to a same-sex spouse, nor to deny any emergency medical treatment required by law. Likewise, under HB 1523 the government could never penalize a photographer, baker or florist who declined to help celebrate a same-sex wedding.

As for government employees, HB 1523 strikes a reasonable balance. It says that the government cannot discriminate against employees for speech or conduct they engage in in their personal capacity outside of their job responsibilities when it comes to these three beliefs.

Inside of work, it says the government can’t signal out these viewpoints for particular sanction—that employees must abide by common “time, place, and manner” regulations, but no content restrictions on speech at work. It also says that a government employee may seek a recusal from issuing marriage licenses, provided they do it ahead of time and in writing, and provided they “take all necessary steps to ensure that the authorization and licensing of any legally valid marriage is not impeded or delayed.” A commonsense win-win outcome.

Finally, the bill makes clear that the government cannot take any adverse action against any organization that makes access to sex-specific facilities such as bathrooms and locker rooms based on biological sex.

Hopefully we will not see a repeat of Indiana and Georgia in Mississippi. Big business and special interests should not attack the state or this bill.

When the bill reaches his desk, the governor should sign it into law, and other states should follow Mississippi’s lead.

SOURCE

*************************

Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here

***************************



No comments: