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Heading South... Mark Steyn
Steyn Online ^
| 3 Jan 2014
| Mark Steyn
Posted on 01/13/2014 6:13:18 AM PST by Rummyfan
Whether or not Nelson Mandela was emblematic of the new South Africa, his memorial service certainly was. Thamsanqa Jantjie, the lovable laugh-a-minute sign-language fraud who stood alongside President Obama gesticulating meaninglessly to the delight of all, was exposed in the days that followed as a far darker character. A violent schizophrenic charged over the years with burglary, rape, kidnapping, and murder, he was also a member of a "necklacing" gang necklacing being the practice of placing a gasoline-filled tire over the head of the victim and setting it alight.
...
Before Mandela's, the last South African funeral to have commanded international attention was that of Field Marshal Smuts, the greatest South African of the pre-apartheid era and the only man to sign the treaties ending both the First and Second World Wars. He is a forgotten figure now, but he was the only South African with a statue in Parliament Square at Westminster until Mandela's was put up, and his funeral in 1950 attracted numbers comparable to and perhaps even surpassing those in Soweto. Smuts would have been astonished by the chaos and ill discipline of Mandela's farewell six decades later. He took it for granted that South Africa was a First World nation, on a par with her sister dominions in Canada and Australia. The line between these two funerals is one of racial progress, and precipitous decline by every other measure.
(Excerpt) Read more at steynonline.com ...
TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: steyn
Didn't see this otherwise posted....
1
posted on
01/13/2014 6:13:19 AM PST
by
Rummyfan
To: Rummyfan
Jan Smuts and Nelson Mandela met just the once, when the general came to Mandela's college to talk up Britain's cause in the war against Germany. It would amaze Smuts, who had fought in the Boer War against Britain and whose comrades had clung fiercely to their identity during the enforced Britishization that followed, to see how swiftly even the most tenacious culture can be swept away. Yet Mandela's benign rule in the 1990s was likewise only an interlude. South Africa is disintegrating, and what's left is headed nowhere good.
2
posted on
01/13/2014 6:16:25 AM PST
by
Rummyfan
(Iraq: it's not about Iraq anymore, it's about the USA!)
To: Rummyfan
Brilliant, as usual.
I wish I could go to see Steyn on his Florida tour, but alas, I am chained to a cubicle somewhere in the chilly Northeast.
3
posted on
01/13/2014 6:23:21 AM PST
by
rightwingintelligentsia
(Democrats: The perfect party for the helpless and stupid, and those who would rule over them.)
To: Rummyfan
In a way, the following statement can be rewritten about the US:
Yet Mandela's Reagan's benign rule in the 1990s 1980s was likewise only an interlude. South Africa The United States is disintegrating, and what's left is headed nowhere good.
4
posted on
01/13/2014 6:25:21 AM PST
by
YankeeReb
To: Rummyfan
“South Africa is disintegrating, and what's left is headed nowhere good”, followed closely by the United States after 150 years of the Progressive Theology that is now dominating the government at all levels.
5
posted on
01/13/2014 6:28:13 AM PST
by
Tupelo
(I am feeling more like Philip Nolan every day)
To: FRiends
HOW ABOUT A LITTLE HELP FILLING THE TANK?
Click the Pic
Support Free Republic
6
posted on
01/13/2014 6:41:55 AM PST
by
deoetdoctrinae
(Gun-free zones are playgrounds for felons.)
To: YankeeReb
Yes, Your adaptation is accurate!! Sadly!
7
posted on
01/13/2014 6:45:55 AM PST
by
maica
(We are seeing an interesting mixture of malice and incompetence at healthcare.gov)
To: Bigg Red
8
posted on
01/13/2014 7:28:40 AM PST
by
Bigg Red
(Let the lying lips be dumb, which speak insolently against the righteous in pride and contempt.--Ps3)
To: rightwingintelligentsia
I wish Steyn would challenge Jeanne Shaheen for the senate. If Land is up by anywhere close to 8 points in Michigan, Steyn would be a shoe-in in NH.
9
posted on
01/13/2014 7:42:51 AM PST
by
Viennacon
To: Rummyfan
The line between these two funerals is one of racial progress, and precipitous decline by every other measure so is it worth it?
10
posted on
01/13/2014 10:13:00 AM PST
by
wardaddy
(wifey instructed me today to grow chapter president beard back again....i wonder why?)
To: Rummyfan
11
posted on
01/13/2014 11:44:39 AM PST
by
Mrs. Don-o
("Faith with love is the faith of Christians; without love, it is the faith of demons." - Ven. Bede)
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