Today it was proudly announced that the citadel of French culture has fallen — just as the Bastille did two centuries ago. The Louvre Museum proudly yet cravenly proclaimed that it has accepted a $20 million donation from  Saudi oilyarch* Walid bin Talal to build an entire new wing for Islamic art .

This is the Saudi prince who attempted to literally and metaphorically paper over any anger America felt over Saudi involvement in 9/11 and other attacks with a measly and insulting $10,000,000 check handed to New York City Mayor Rudy Guiliani. When the prince attempted to rationalize (and thus justify) these attacks against America by linking them to American policies, Rudy instantly handed him back the check.

Rudy would not accept blood money.

Yet the French, so concerned about the corruption of their culture by American language, music, art, and McDonalds, proudly takes money from a member of this corrupt family in order to further plant an appreciation for Islam into the sacred ground of their culture: the Louvre.

This donation/investment follows Jimmy Carter's Habitat for Humanity acceptance of similar oil money from bin Talal  . To be noted is that this money may have also come from profits from bin Talal's ART TV network, which broadcasts anti—American, anti—Semitic pro—jihad messages across the world. Undoubtedly this is a profitable sideline for the Prince.

Here are a few of the things the network has broadcast:

a 3—year old Saudi girl calling Jews 'apes and pigs";

• tirades (what passes for liturgy in Saudi Arabia) by leading Muslim clerics such as Aed al—Qarni calling for victory against the West by "slitting of throats and shattering skulls";
• a former Saudi Embassy official who said that spreading Islam by the sword is justified by "these stupid acts of these Jews and Christians";
• people peddling conspiracy theories about 9/11;
• programs for children pleading for mothers to raise their children to be martyrs, willing to sacrifice their lives to kill infidels.

By the way, the New York Times did not make mention of bin Talal's ownership of this hateful network, a fact I found with a minute or two of internet searching. Instead they call him a "reformer."
 
To give you an idea of how hopeless the French are, I provide for your delectation the translated words of the French Minister of Culture as he accepted the "gift":

'In a world where violence expresses itself individually and collectively," he added, "where hate erupts and imposes its expression of terror, you dare to affirm the conviction that is yours — that is ours — that the dialogue of peoples and cultures, the richness of patrimonies, the values of sharing are the responses of intelligence to the bitter experience of conflicts."

What does that mean?
 
Yes, Walid bin Talal will surely find France a congenial environment in which to spread his idea of Islamic culture.

These French are the same people who find Americanisms and McDonalds threats to their culture. Gimme a break. They have not seen anything yet.
 
* a portmanteau word: oil and oligarch with an allusion to this prince being a very oily type of man.

Ed Lasky   7 28 05