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I've been looking for thepoliticalspinroom but all I could find was:<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=thepoliticalspinroom&ss=1">http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=thepoliticalspinroom&ss=1</a><br>
(the politicalspinroom2).<br>
<br>
Please advise.<br>
<br>
Gerry Reinhart-Waller<br>
<br>
<br>
Steve Hovland wrote:
<blockquote
cite="midBKELILMJLCPGPPBCGKNHEEKOCBAA.shovland@mindspring.com"
type="cite">
<title></title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; ">
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<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">I think it's a good summary of the right-wing
view,</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">but this is not the place to have a serious
argument</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">about it. </font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"></span> </div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">If anyone is hankering for a knock-down</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">drag-out approach to political debate they are</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">welcome to join us in thepoliticalspinroom on</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">yahoo groups. </font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"></span> </div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">Not a tea party, bit it is definitely one place</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">where the interface between left and right is</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">hyperactive. I go there to sharpen my teeth :-)</font></span></div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"></span> </div>
<div><span class="573011319-12112005"><font color="#0000ff"
face="Arial" size="2">Steve HOvland</font></span></div>
<blockquote>
<div class="OutlookMessageHeader" align="left" dir="ltr"><font
face="Tahoma" size="2">-----Original Message-----<br>
<b>From:</b> <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:paleopsych-bounces@paleopsych.org">paleopsych-bounces@paleopsych.org</a>
[<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="mailto:paleopsych-bounces@paleopsych.org">mailto:paleopsych-bounces@paleopsych.org</a>]<b>On Behalf Of </b>Lynn D.
Johnson, Ph.D.<br>
<b>Sent:</b> Saturday, November 12, 2005 10:56 AM<br>
<b>To:</b> The new improved paleopsych list<br>
<b>Subject:</b> [Paleopsych] Muslim riots in France<br>
<br>
</font></div>
[an interesting and likely correct view of the riots from the Wall
Street Journal]<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110007529">http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110007529</a><br>
<font face="Garamond, Times" size="5"><b>French Lessons</b></font> <br>
<font face="Garamond, Times" size="4">How to create a Muslim
underclass.</font> <br>
<font face="Verdana, Times" size="2"><br>
<i>Friday, November 11, 2005 12:01 a.m. EST</i> </font>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">Rioting by Muslim youth in
some 300 French cities and towns seems to be subsiding after two weeks
and tougher law enforcement, which is certainly welcome news. The riots
have shaken France, however, and the unrest was of such magnitude that
it has become a moment of illumination, for French and Americans
equally.</font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">In particular, some
longstanding conceits about the superiority of the French social model
have gone up in flames. This model emphasizes "solidarity" through high
taxes, cossetted labor markets, subsidies to industry and farming, a
"Ministry for Social Cohesion," powerful public-sector unions, an
elaborate welfare state, and, inevitably, comparisons to the alleged
viciousness of the Anglo-Saxon "market" model. So by all means, let's
do some comparing. </font></p>
<p align="center"><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2"><img alt=""
src="cid:part1.00010008.00060904@earthlink.net" align="middle"
border="0" height="6" hspace="0" width="88"></font></p>
<font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">The first thing that needs
illuminating is that, while the overwhelming majority of rioters are
Muslim, it is premature at best to describe the rioting as an
"intifada" or some other term denoting religiously or culturally
inspired violence. And it is flat-out wrong to claim that the rioting
is a consequence of liberal immigration policies.</font>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">Consider the contrast with
the U.S. Between 1978 and 2002, the percentage of foreign-born
Americans nearly doubled, to 12% from 6.2%. At the same time, the
five-year average unemployment rate declined to 5.1% from 7.3%. Among
immigrants, median family incomes rose by roughly $10,000 for every 10
years they remained in the country.</font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">These statistics hold
across immigrant groups, including ones that U.S. nativist groups claim
are "unassimilable." Take Muslims, some two million of whom live in
America. According to a 2004 survey by Zogby International, two-thirds
are immigrants, 59% have a college education and the overwhelming
majority are middle-class, with one in three having annual incomes of
more than $75,000. Their intermarriage rate is 21%, nearly identical to
that of other religious groups.</font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">It's true that France's
Muslim population--some five million out of a total of 60 million--is
much larger than America's. They also generally arrived in France much
poorer. But the significant difference between U.S. and French Muslims
is that the former inhabit a country of economic opportunity and social
mobility, which generally has led to their successful assimilation into
the mainstream of American life. This has been the case despite the
best efforts of multiculturalists on the right and left to extol fixed
racial, ethnic and religious identities at the expense of the
traditionally adaptive, supple American one. </font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">In France, the opposite
applies. Mass Muslim migration to France began in the 1960s, a period
of very low unemployment and industrial labor shortages. Today, French
unemployment is close to 10%, or double the U.S. rate. Unlike in the
U.S., French culture eschews multiculturalism and puts a heavy premium
on the concept of "Frenchness." Yet that hasn't provided much cushion
for increasingly impoverished and thus estranged Muslim communities,
which tend to be segregated into isolated and generally unpoliced
suburban cities called <i>banlieues</i>. There, youth unemployment
runs to 40%, and crime, drug addiction and hooliganism are endemic. </font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">This is not to say that
Muslim cultural practices are irrelevant. For Muslim women especially,
the misery of the <i>banlieues</i> is compounded by a culture of
female submission, often violently enforced. Nor should anyone rule out
the possibility that Islamic radicals will exploit the mayhem for their
own ends. But whatever else might be said about the Muslim attributes
of the French rioters, the fact is that the pathologies of the <i>banlieues</i>
are similar to those of inner cities everywhere. What France suffers
from, fundamentally, is neither a "Muslim problem" nor an "immigration
problem." It is an underclass problem.</font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">French Prime Minister
Dominique de Villepin almost put his finger on the problem when he
promised to introduce legislation to ease the economic plight of the <i>banlieues.</i>
But aside from the useful suggestion of "enterprise zones," most of the
legislation smacked of big-government solutions: community centers,
training programs and so on.</font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">The larger problem for the
prime minister is that France's underclass is a consequence of the
structure of the French economy, in which the state accounts for nearly
half of gross domestic product and roughly a quarter of employment.
French workers, both in the public and private sectors, enjoy GM-like
benefits in pensions, early retirement, working hours and vacations,
sick- and maternity leave, and job security--all of which is militantly
enforced by strike-happy labor unions. The predictable result is that
there is little job turnover and little net new job creation. Leave
aside the debilitating effects of unemployment insurance and welfare on
the underclass: Who would employ them if they actually sought work?</font></p>
<p align="center"><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2"><img alt=""
src="cid:part1.00010008.00060904@earthlink.net" align="middle"
border="0" height="6" hspace="0" width="88"></font></p>
<font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">For France, the good news is
that these problems can be solved, principally be deregulating labor
markets, reducing taxes, reforming the pension system and breaking the
stranglehold of unions on economic life. The bad news is the entrenched
cultural resistance to those solutions--not on the part of angry Muslim
youth, but from the employed half of French society that refuses to
relinquish their subsidized existences for the sake of the "solidarity"
they profess to hold dear. So far, most attempts at reform have failed,
mainly due to a combination of union militancy and political timidity.</font>
<p><font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">There are lessons in France
for the U.S., too. Advocates of multiculturalism might take note of
what happens when ethnic communities are excluded (or exclude
themselves) from the broad currents of national life. Opponents of
immigration might take note of the contrast between France's
impoverished Muslims and America's flourishing immigrant communities.</font></p>
<font face="Verdana, Times" size="2">Above all, those who want
America to emulate the French social model by mandating health and
other benefits, raising tax burdens and entrenching union power might
take note of just how sour its promises have become, especially its
promises to the poor. In the matter of "solidarity," economic growth
counts more than rhetoric.</font><br>
</blockquote>
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