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Sparks from the Telegraph

Paris--A French periodical has revealed an odd moment in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq. When George Bush was attempting to persuade Jacques Chirac to support his planned attack on the oil-rich nation, he seems to have argued that Gog and Magog were at work in the Middle East, and that the ancient prophecies of Ezekiel were on the verge of being fulfilled. The French President had no idea what the crazed Texan was talking about, and promptly called a theologian at the University of Lausanne for an explanation. Thomas Römer filled him in on these obscure figures from ancient near-Eastern mythology. As we all know, Jacques Chirac was unimpressed. Neither Weapons of Mass Destruction, nor the terrible Gog and Magog, were enough to convince him to join the Coalition of the Willing. And French fries would become freedom fries in the Washington cafeteria. (Rue 89; English translation at Truthout)

Logan, West Virginia--Raging Red reports: "Megan Williams, a 20-year-old mentally challenged black woman from Charleston, was held captive in a shed for a week in Big Creek, WV (about an hour southwest of Charleston) and was raped, beaten, stabbed, choked, forced to eat animal feces, and tortured in various other ways, until police received an anonymous tip and found her. Six people, all white, were arrested and charged with sexual assault, kidnapping, malicious wounding, battery, and lying to the police, among other charges. The group of six includes a mother and her son and another mother and her daughter, plus two other men." Although her captors are said to have repeatedly used racial epithets in addressing her, local pundits are reluctant to call it a hate crime. "Racists? Possibly," editorializes the Charleston Daily Mail, "But emblematic of Logan County's people, of West Virginia 'culture' or 'American race relations,' as some inevitably claimed? No. ... Distortions of that nature are a disservice to Megan Williams, whose suffering deserves the full attention of the justice system." And from Create West Virginia we learn "On WCHS-AM Charleston 580 radio's afternoon call-in show on Wednesday, an African-American man called in to share his frustration. He described himself as a well-educated professional who often runs into intolerance and racism in our state. The hosts had little patience for his attempt to connect the dots between other acts of intolerance in WV with the current Logan County situation. 'Right now, it's about Megan and helping her, not politicizing the situation. We can talk about that other stuff later.'" So it seems talking about racism or the nature of this hate crime is apparently "politicizing" matters. Somehow. Go figure. (From Raging Red