Flit(tm)

Muslim Missionaries, Christian Missionaries

I've no idea whether this Pajamas Media story on breaking the oil/Al Queda link is accurate but this caught my eye:

The Saudis account for 1% of planet’s Muslims, but provide 90% of the funding for Islamic institutions and charities world-wide. In keeping with Saudi Arabia’s official version of Islam, the kingdom’s billions flow to mosques and charities that espouse a Wahabi doctrine.

If true, breaking Saudi Arabia's oil wealth by moving off oil is going to have a tremendous impact on the religious balance of the planet. Mosques will close, muslim charities will drastically cut back operations and the muezzin's call to prayer in some places may have to revert back to good old lung power. Christianity will not be similarly discomfited. That's going to be an interesting factor in the struggle over Africa among other places.

Immigration Reform II

This July 4th, I read the Declaration of Independence it didn't strike me at the time but one of the reasons we broke away from England seems a bit apropos regarding immigration:

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

Programs for 'temporary workers' with long stays in the US and no path to citizenship isn't exactly the same thing, but it rhymes. We need to do better than that.