The Watcher’s Council

The Council has spoken, the votes have been cast and the results are in for this week, carved eternally in the akashic records of cyberspace.

Both our winners seemed to echo a common theme this week.

In our Council category, this week’s winner, The Noisy Room‘s Book Burning – It’s All The Rage, is a great piece that dealt with an old curse getting a new life, the destruction of knowledge and the burning of books with ‘improper’ and dangerous ideas… dangerous, that is to certain ideologies. Here’s a slice:

As echoes of: ‘This is what Democracy looks like! reverberate across the Middle East, Egypt has fallen to the Muslim Brotherhood as a direct result of the Arab Spring. Now, the Royal Library of Alexandria in Egypt, one of the greatest libraries of the ancient world, is the target of The Muslim Brotherhood who want to burn it to the ground and build a mosque on its literary ashes.

The library was burned once before accidentally by Caesar. It has been damaged and restored numerous times since then. The library dates from the time of Alexander the Great:

The Royal Library of Alexandria, or Ancient Library of Alexandria, in Alexandria, Egypt, was the largest and most significant great library of the ancient world. It flourished under the patronage of the Ptolemaic dynasty and functioned as a major center of scholarship from its construction in the 3rd century BC until the Roman conquest of Egypt in 30 BC. The library was conceived and opened either during the reign of Ptolemy I Soter (323–283 BC) or during the reign of his son Ptolemy II (283–246 BC).

Plutarch (AD 46–120) wrote that during his visit to Alexandria in 48 BC, Julius Caesar “accidentally” burned the library down when he set fire to his own ships to frustrate Achillas’ attempt to limit his ability to communicate by sea. After its destruction, scholars used a “daughter library” in a temple known as the Serapeum, located in another part of the city.

Intended both as a commemoration and an emulation of the original, the Bibliotheca Alexandrina was inaugurated in 2002 near the site of the old library.

In 2004, a Polish-Egyptian excavation team announced that they had discovered the remains of the Library of Alexandria.

Radical Islamists call the library a den of depravity because of its arts programs in music and dance. They want to destroy this historic monument to knowledge and intellect and rejoice while it burns baby, burns to the ground. The current dictators in Egypt are either supportive of, or willfully negligent of, The Brotherhood who could well shift into becoming the controlling power through parliament there in Egypt in the next election.

And this is just the beginning of a new dark age that could spread across the planet and will certainly consume Egypt and other Islamic nations if it is not stopped and soon. The rise of the Caliphate is now a very real possibility and before some liberal envisions Arabian Nights or some other such nonsense, remember, this is a militant coalition of Islamists. They are warriors and conquerors and in their wake of conquest and rule, they will leave blood and death as their calling card. Liberals, you are at the top of the ‘death’ list for these guys.

The government in Egypt has already curtailed free speech at the library. The destruction of the library will most assuredly mark the beginning (if not the ongoing escalation) of Egypt’s fall into the hands of the Islamists. The elections will take place on Nov. 28th and the prognosis currently is not good for avoiding a capitulation to The Muslim Brotherhood.

In our non-Council category, the winner was Gates Of Vienna’s “An Iron Burka Has Descended Across the Continent” submitted by Joshuapundit. It’s an unusual and inventive piece on a similar falling shadow by Council alumnus Baron Bodissey that imagines the ghost of Winston Churchill re-delivering his famous ‘Iron Curtain‘ speech in our own time – but slightly altered, with a very different foe of freedom in mind. Do read it.

Without further ado, here are this week’s full results:

Council Winners

• *First place with 2 2/3 votes! – The Noisy Room – Book Burning – It’s All The Rage
• Second place with 2 1/3 votes – Bookworm Room – Penn State and the slow death of American self-reliance
• Third place *t* with 2 votes – The Razor – The Clash of Western and Islamic Values – Part 1
• Fourth place with 1 2/3 votes – Joshuapundit – The ‘Peace Process’ R.I.P.
• Fifth place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – The Right Planet – ‘Fundamental Transformation’: Recreating the Soviet
• Sixth place *t* with 1 vote – The Political Commentator – #OWS and Zuccotti Park: Have you ever been to Christiania, Woodstock or a Further concert at Red Rocks?
• Sixth place *t* with 1 vote – Simply Jews – A fairy tale for the kids of Tehran
• Seventh place *t* with 2/3 vote – Rhymes With Right – Something For All The Romney-Hating Conservatives To Consider
• Seventh place *t* with 2/3 vote – Right Truth – Causing Undue Hardship
• Eighth place *t* with 1/3 vote – New Zeal – Conyers Addresses Atlanta Marxists on the “Occupy” Movement and “Broken” Capitalism
• Eighth place *t* with 1/3 vote – The Glittering Eye – No Heroes
• Eighth place *t* with 1/3 vote – GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD – Vicious Rumors

Non-Council Winners

• *First place with 1 2/3 votes! – Gates Of Vienna – “An Iron Burka Has Descended Across the Continent” submitted by Joshuapundit
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Whatever – Omelas University submitted by Rhymes With Right
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – American Thinker – De-Christianizing Dr. King submitted by The Right Planet
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Victor Davis Hanson – “Rage On — and On and On…” submitted by The Watcher
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Sarah Palin – Fire Eric Holder submitted by The Watcher
• Second place *t* with 1 1/3 votes – Justin Timberlake – My Night At The Marine Corps Ball submitted by Bookworm Room
• Third place *t* with 1 vote – Charles Cameron/Zenpundit – One Hadith, One Plan, One Video, And Two Warnings submitted by The Glittering Eye
• Third place *t* with 1 vote – The Passing Parade – UNCLE PADDY AND THE CRAPPING HAT, AND OTHER ADVENTURES IN THE UNKNOWN submitted by Simply Jews
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Arabist – Mapping Egypt’s Political Parties submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Sultan Knish – The Devil’s Smile submitted by The Noisy Room
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Commentary – #OWS Supporters Confirm: Violence an Essential Component submitted by The Political Commentator
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Patterico’s Pontifications – After The Green Rush submitted by Right Truth
• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Way North – Veteran’s Day 2011 submitted by The Mellow Jihadi

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