I knew nothing about this until I read the article by Paul Belien linked from VFR.
This is absolutely horrifying, and every conservative, especially every conservative interested in stopping jihad in America, needs to know about it.
Libya has engaged in acts against Switzerland which, in a different era, might very well have been regarded as causes of war. As Belien tells the story, it all started when the son of Libya's dictator beat two of his servants savagely while staying in Switzerland. The Swiss put him in jail for (gasp!) two nights and then released him. Libya took two innocent Swiss businessmen in Libya hostage in retaliation, and one of them (the one who was ethnically Swiss, of course) is still being held in a Libyan dungeon.
Libya has called for the "dissolution" of Switzerland in response to the Swiss minaret ban and took it as a dire insult when Switzerland consequently decided not to allow 188 extremist Libyans to enter Switzerland (which also meant they couldn't enter other parts of the EU). Terrified, the rest of the EU has been groveling to Libya and trying to get Switzerland ousted from the Schengen zone of the EU. Apologies and cave-ins from Switzerland, the U.S., and, especially, other EU countries are scattered throughout the sorry tale. Meanwhile, Swiss citizen Max Goldi continues to be held a hostage in Libya lest anyone else should have the temerity to stand up to the Libyans anywhere in the world.
Hannibal Gaddafi beats up his wife in public in the UK and his girlfriend in France. His guards beat up a photographer in the UK. But of course, he now suffers no repercussions. Some French or British citizens might want to travel to Libya without being kidnapped and held in durance vile world without end.
Please note: Libya is asserting its right to tell every other country in the world that they a) may not enforce their own reasonable laws against Libyan big-wigs and b) may not exclude dangerous Libyans from their countries. The message is clear: You must let anyone we send into your country. You must allow anyone we consider important to behave as he wishes while in your country. If you do not, your citizens will be captured by us and held in prison on trumped-up or trivial charges for an indefinite period as hostages for your compliance. Everybody grovel. We're in charge.
Fortress America begins to look better and better. And American citizens travel at their own risk.
Comments (4)
Lydia,
I don't know about fortress America, I like the idea of being able to travel and trade freely around the globe. Perhaps we need another Jefferson to order the marines to lead the charge "to the shores of Tripoli" again...although check out what La Wik has to say about the conclusion of that war, which got America's prisoners back but also required us to pay a "tribute":
Posted by Jeff Singer | April 12, 2010 11:19 AM
Jeff, _everybody_ likes the _idea_ of being able to travel freely. But what I do refuse to do is to say, "Oh, okay, so we have to let Libyan 'princes' come into our country and beat everybody up, and we can't restrict immigration, so that our citizens can travel freely to Libya."
Posted by Lydia | April 12, 2010 11:25 AM
We need another Ronald Reagan to kick Qaddafi back in his place. That the world's powers cower before a deranged tin-pot dictator is absurd and shows the madness of our age.
Posted by Daniel | April 12, 2010 4:29 PM
I like the idea of being able to walk through a "bad section of town" without being attacked. I don't consider unfettered freedom of travel to be worth making the police powerful enough to enforce it...
Posted by Mike T | April 14, 2010 12:16 PM