Winston Churchill, 77 Years Ago: "We Shall Fight"

As the United Kingdom reels from yet another terrorist attack, today marks the 77th anniversary of one of Winston Churchill's greatest orations -- his We Shall Fight speech to the House of Commons.

"We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, and if, which I do not for a moment believe, this island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old."

This seems like a fitting response to the threat posed by the new radicalism threatening Europe and the Western civilization.

Bobby Jindal's Response and Oratory in General

If you haven't seen it yet, here is Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's response to Barack Obama's recent address to Congress (apparently, the first 'State of the Union' for a new president is not called the 'State of the Union'):



I did not get to see his rebuttal live. Now that I've heard it, I have to say I was somewhat disappointed. The content of the speech was great, but the delivery was poor.

Now, I know that Jindal has never been on a stage like this before, giving the Republican rebuttal to a State of the Union, especially when it is delivered by a smooth (teleprompter-enhanced) speaker like Barack Obama. But, it sounded like Bobby Jindal was talking to a class of schoolchildren.

In that line of thinking, here's a great post by Matthew E. Miller at Race42012. He refers to a paper written by Winston Churchill in 1897, which is quite interesting to read. The Republican Party has not had a great orator since the Great Communicator.

Bobby Jindal has many years ahead of him to improve his speaking abilities. He has some massive intellectual firepower, and if he would polish his oratory skills, he could become a powerful speaker.

Sudetenland 2.0?

Following up on the 'Netanyahu vs. Ahmadinejad = Churchill vs. Hitler' story; is Bahrain the new Sudetenland?

History buffs will remember Sudetenland as the predominately-German region of Czechoslovakia ceded by Great Britain and France to Hitler's Germany, without the consultation of the Czech government. Hitler claimed that after the Sudeten question was resolved, Germany had 'no more territorial ambitions' in Europe. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, upon returning to Great Britain, claimed that the ceding of Sudetenland to Germany brought 'peace for our time'. History shows what happened. Hitler took the rest of Czechoslovakia within six months, and Poland within a year, starting World War II.

Bahrain is a predominately Shiite Muslim island-nation, ruled by a Sunni monarch. Iran is also mostly Shiite. Bahrain has been a part of the Iranian/Persian lands for millenia, but in 1971 Bahrain became an independent state.

Now, an excerpt from a Reuters article:

Bahrain has criticised as irresponsible reported remarks by an Iranian official that questioned the Gulf Arab kingdom's sovereignty and caused a diplomatic furore in the region.

According to media reports, Ali Akbar Nateq-Nouri, a close adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said earlier this month that Iran had sovereignty over Bahrain.

"If these statements are meant to test the waters then the response was clear internally and externally, and this was affirmed by the magnitude of Gulf Arab and international condemnation to these irresponsible statements," Bahraini Interior Minister Sheikh Rashed bin Abdullah al-Khalifa told the Saudi-owned Asharq al-Awsat newspaper.

Here's another possible reason for the rhetoric coming out of Tehran:

The Islamic island country, populated by 500,000 people, has recently made many pro-Jewish gestures, despite the fact that only 50 Jews currently reside there.

In 2008, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa issued a royal decree appointing female Jewish lawmaker Hoda Nono to the post of ambassador, making her the first Jew in the modern Arab world to become an ambassador. The businesswoman and mother of two, who serves as one of two Jews on the king's 40-member legislative upper chamber, is stationed in Washington.

In November, the king extended an invitation for all Bahraini expatriate Jews to return to live in Bahrain, saying "It's open, it's your country."

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, alternatively, has repeatedly called for the destruction of Israel, claiming that the Jews manipulated the Holocaust to gain sympathy for the Jewish state, calling Israelis the "most detested people in all of humanity."

(from IsraelNationalNews.com)

We shall see how President Obama and the rest of the world leaders deal with this situation, should Iran begin to press for annexation at any point. Thank God that Bibi is going to be Israel's Prime Minister.