Ralph Diamond writes us from Annapolis, MD about assimilation in Australia — and here, too, we suppose.

His parents, Eddy and Samira, who have lived in Australia since 1972, said their five children would be allowed to go to the beach again only when the 'conflict is resolved and peace is restored' in the Sutherland shire region. 'If there's no more conflict, I will let him go,' Samira, 42, told the Australian in Arabic."

In Arabic? Let's suppose that Cate Blanchett got her wish and a tidal wave of tolerance washed into all those "dark corners of Australian society" taking the chill off the chilling glimpse Squires got. How are even the most impeccably diverse multicultural types supposed to welcome into the bosom of their boundlessly tolerant family a woman who prefers to speak the language of the land she left at nine? When it comes to "racism by exclusion", who's excluding whom?

— Mark Steyn in the UK Telegraph

My paternal grandfather came here from Italy in 1921. His mom had just died but he left behind his father and two younger brothers. His dad remarried and had three more sons.

All five of my dad's uncles immigrated to Australia between 1949 and 1953 and made wonderful lives for themselves.

In 1996 one of my dad's cousins and her husband came for a visit. She was born in Italy but moved to Australia while an infant. She is as lovely as only Italian women can be but her accent if pure Crocodile Dundee and her loyalties are all Oz.

My dad mentioned that his older brother fought in the Philippians. She immediately launched into a litany of complaints against the British for leaving Australia defenseless after Pearl Harbor, including permitting 'one of our divisions to go into the bag at Singapore.' This from a woman whose maternal uncle spent the last two years of the war as a POW in America.

If one people can successfully assimilate in the homeland of their former enemies (remember Tobruk) why the hell can't Muslims assimilate into the lands of unbelievers? Whether we have the courage to answer this question truthfully will determine if we have the resolve necessary to defeat Islam resurgent.

Thanks, Ralph.