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from the oh-good-stronger-copyright-laws-/s dept.
French president challenges 'inward-looking nationalist selfishness' in Europe:
Emmanuel Macron has outlined his vision for the future of the European Union in Strasbourg. The 40-year-old, who secured the French Presidency in May on a pro-EU platform amid a populist surge in the bloc, delivered his highly anticipated speech to over 700 MEPs in the European Parliament on Tuesday.
Macron challenged "inward-looking nationalist selfishness" amid populist sentiment in the bloc and pushed for a more united and reinvigorated Europe. "Nationalism will lead Europe into the abyss. We see authoritarianism rising all around us," he said. "The response should not be authoritarian democracy but the authority of democracy."
Macron also sought to tackle the "poisoned debate" on migration, proposing the creation of a European programme that could subsidise local authorities which host and integrate refugees.
In a speech which touched on a range of issues, Macron recommended that copyright law be tightened to protect artists' "genius" and reiterated his support for tougher environmental legislation.
Meanwhile, Macron wants to "reform" Islam:
Speaking alongside the flag-draped coffin of a police officer killed in a terrorist attack in southern France, President Emmanuel Macron last month lay blame on "underground Islamism" and those who "indoctrinate on our soil and corrupt daily." The attack added further urgency to a project already in the works: Macron has embarked on a controversial quest to change Islam in France — with the goal of integration but also preventing radicalization.
He has said that in the coming months he will announce "a blueprint for the whole organization" of Islam. And those trying to anticipate what that will look like are turning their attention to Hakim El Karoui, a leading voice on how Islamic traditions fit within French culture.
It's hard to miss that the man who appears to have Macron's ear on this most sensitive of subjects cuts a similar figure. Like the president, El Karoui is an ex-Rothschild investment banker with an elite social pedigree who favors well-tailored suits, crisp white shirts and the lofty province of big ideas. The latest of those ideas is this: that the best way to integrate Islam within French society is to promote a version of the religion "practiced in peace by believers who will not have the need to loudly proclaim their faith."
Also at BBC.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Thursday April 19 2018, @03:05PM
Hell yes, I'd surrender, and hope for mercy and generous terms. Constantinople was doomed. It had been on borrowed time for about an entire century by then. There was no conceivable path to a military win, or even a standoff that would allow the city to continue as it was for many more years. No Crusade, no friendly navy (sure, the Venetians wanted to help but they weren't enough, not by a long stretch), nor anything else capable of doing so was on the way to lift the siege, and there was no hope of raising a Byzantine army, not with almost all the former Byzantine territory lost. Walls have never lasted long. They are only good for buying a little time for relief to arrive, or for ill prepared attackers to run short of supplies or be distracted by some other problem and have to leave or never even show up in the first place, and that had already happened a couple of times and saved Byzantine asses for several decades. It wasn't going to happen again. Walls hold only a few months at most, and then the attackers will be able to do anything they want. Sure, the attackers might refuse to honor the terms of a surrender and slaughter everyone anyway, but history records that they didn't negotiate in bad faith if anything it was the Byzantines who did that. They were infamous for their treachery. And the attackers would soon be able slaughter everyone regardless, and without being guilty of breaking an agreement.
Constantinople was a capital without an empire. The writing was on the wall, had been on the wall for decades by then, decades in which the Byzantines totally failed to find or take any way out of their predicament. By then, holding out was stupid, fanatic refusal to give even one inch, worse stubbornness and fanaticism than that displayed by the Muslim attackers. They were too wrapped up in their Christian dogma, and the pride of being the capital of one of the greatest empires in history, the Roman Empire.
For a contemporaneous comparison, consider the Fall of Granada in 1492. The Muslims surrendered, and walked out.