Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Blowback

Glenn Reynolds writing at MSNBC wonders aloud whether a public opinion tipping point has been reached in the war on terror. But it's not the tipping point you think.

With the Cartoon Wars giving way to the ports imbroglio, Jim Geraghty, blogging from Turkey, wonders if we're seeing a tipping point in Western attitudes toward Islam. Geraghty collects a lot of quotes, and writes of "my sense that in recent weeks, a large chunk of Americans just decided that they no longer have any faith in the good sense or non-hostile nature of the Muslim world. If subsequent polls find similar results, the port deal is dead."

One of the keystones of President Bush's strategy has been to distinguish very carefully between Islam, the religion of peace, the mass of whose adherents we want on our side, and extremists with whom we are really at war. Geraghty is suggesting that public opinion now sees the clash as one of a more general nature: between "us" and "them". Although no one is suggesting the West is yet at war with Islam, twelve public figures have issued a Manifesto calling "Islamism" the new totalitarian threat of our time. Atlas Shrugs has the text of the declaration which says in part:

After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism. We, writers, journalists, intellectuals, call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all. The recent events, which occurred after the publication of drawings of Muhammed in European newspapers, have revealed the necessity of the struggle for these universal values. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the ideological field. It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats.

The Manifesto has been signed by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Chahla Chafiq, Caroline Fourest, Bernard-Henri Lévy, Irshad Manji, Mehdi Mozaffari, Maryam Namazie, Taslima Nasreen, Salman Rushdie, Antoine Sfeir, Philippe Val, Ibn Warraq.

This represents a substantial -- but not a total -- departure from the strategic idea of treating Islam as a religion of peace and focusing on a narrow group of miscreants within it as the true enemy. The Manifesto shifts the definition of the enemy from a group of people to an ideology. If Jim Geraghty is right the threat to the President's original strategic focus comes not from a single party or even from the his traditional opponents on the Left, but a kind of populist mood swing engendered by a cumulative disenchantment.

Gateway Pundit points to a new ad campaign being undertaken in Poland by an organization called the "Foundation of St. Benedictus" which calls attention to ordinary men and women being killed for religious reasons all over the world by a militant Islam. They are plastering posters on Polish public transportation. Some examples are shown below.


George Shahata, thirteen years old, killed by Muslims in Egypt


Nache Achi was killed by Muslim fundamentalists in Africa.


The Cartoon Wars are not dead; they are just mutating in form at an increasing rate.

Commentary
If the Left had not been so relentlessly politically correct it might have been able to shape the debate according to its avowed (or should I say "so-called") principles. But they gave that chance up in exchange for the cheap thrill of anti-Americanism. Now even they find themselves decrying the Dubai Ports World deal because -- although they will never put it that way -- President Bush is a fool to trust these people with the gateway into America. They may even be conscious of the tightening of the logical rope around their necks even as they pull on it. But though they've hit bottom they keep digging. The New York Times has announced that it will sue the DOD to force the federal government agency to turn over classified material in connection with its NSA surveillance stories. At one level they may think this is clever, but strategically it is (in my opinion) very, very stupid.

Time will tell whether the war on terror remains within the bounds of limited confrontation with rogue elements within the "religion of peace" or whether -- due to some conceptual fault in the campaign or the persistent obstruction by the politically correct -- it morphs into a more general confrontation between belief systems and civilizations.


posted by wretchard at 7:01 PM | 85 comments  

Nor knew the force o' powder

I'm reprinting in full, the manifesto signed by 12 writers asserting that the new totalitarianism is Islamism, together with the background of the signatories. A reader writes to say that the first regular newspaper to reprint the manifesto in full is the Jyllands-Posten.

Together facing the new totalitarianism After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism. We, writers, journalists, intellectuals, call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all. The recent events, which occurred after the publication of drawings of Muhammed in European newspapers, have revealed the necessity of the struggle for these universal values. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the ideological field. It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats. Like all totalitarianisms, Islamism is nurtured by fears and frustrations. The hate preachers bet on these feelings in order to form battalions destined to impose a liberticidal and unegalitarian world. But we clearly and firmly state: nothing, not even despair, justifies the choice of obscurantism, totalitarianism and hatred. Islamism is a reactionary ideology which kills equality, freedom and secularism wherever it is present. Its success can only lead to a world of domination: man’s domination of woman, the Islamists’ domination of all the others. To counter this, we must assure universal rights to oppressed or discriminated people. We reject « cultural relativism », which consists in accepting that men and women of Muslim culture should be deprived of the right to equality, freedom and secular values in the name of respect for cultures and traditions. We refuse to renounce our critical spirit out of fear of being accused of "Islamophobia", an unfortunate concept which confuses criticism of Islam as a religion with stigmatisation of its believers. We plead for the universality of freedom of expression, so that a critical spirit may be exercised on all continents, against all abuses and all dogmas. We appeal to democrats and free spirits of all countries that our century should be one of Enlightenment, not of obscurantism. Signatories and their backgrounds Ali Ayaan Hirsi, from somilian origin, is member of Dutch parliement, member of the liberal party VVD. Writter of the film Submission which caused the assasination of Theo Van Gogh by an islamist in november 2004, she lives under police protection. Chahla Chafiq, writer from iranian origin, exiled in France is a novelist and an essayist. She’s the author of "Le nouvel homme islamiste , la prison politique en Iran " (2002). She also wrote novels such as "Chemins et brouillard" (2005). Caroline Fourest Essayist, editor in chief of Prochoix (a review who defend liberties against dogmatic and integrist ideologies), author of several reference books on « laicité » and fanatism : Tirs Croisés : la laïcité à l’épreuve des intégrismes juif, chrétien et musulman (with Fiammetta Venner), Frère Tariq : discours, stratégie et méthode de Tariq Ramadan, et la Tentation obscurantiste (Grasset, 2005). She receieved the National prize of laicité in 2005. Bernard-Henri Lévy French philosoph, born in Algeria, engaged against all the XXth century « ism » (Fascism, antisemitism, totalitarism, terrorism), he is the author of La Barbarie à visage humain, L’Idéologie française, La Pureté dangereuse, and more recently American Vertigo. Irshad Manji is a Fellow at Yale University and the internationally best-selling author of "The Trouble with Islam Today: A Muslim’s Call for Reform in Her Faith" (en francais: "Musulmane Mais Libre"). She speaks out for free expression based on the Koran itself. Née en Ouganda, elle a fui ce pays avec sa famille musulmane d’origine indienne à l’âge de quatre ans et vit maintenant au Canada, où ses émissions et ses livres connaissent un énorme succès. Mehdi Mozaffari, professor from iranian origin and exiled in Denmark, is the author of several articles and books on islam and islamism such as : Authority in Islam: From Muhammad to Khomeini, Fatwa: Violence and Discourtesy and Glaobalization and Civilizations. Maryam Namazie Writer, TV International English producer; Director of the Worker-communist Party of Iran’s International Relations; and 2005 winner of the National Secular Society’s Secularist of the Year award. Taslima Nasreen is born in Bangladesh. Doctor, her positions defending women and minorities brought her in trouble with a comittee of integrist called « Destroy Taslima » and to be persecuted as « apostate » Salman Rushdie is the author of nine novels, including Midnight’s Children, The Satanic Verses and, most recently, Shalimar the Clown. He has received many literary awards, including the Booker Prize, the Whitbread Prize for Best Novel, Germany’s Author of the Year Award, the European Union’s Aristeion Prize, the Budapest Grand Prize for Literature, the Premio Mantova, and the Austrian State Prize for European Literature. He is a Commandeur of the Ordre des Arts et Lettres, an Honorary Professor in the Humanities at M.I.T., and the president of PEN American Center. His books have been translated into over 40 languages. Philippe Val Director of publication of Charlie Hebdo (Leftwing french newspaper who have republished the cartoons on the prophet Muhammad by solidarity with the danish citizens targeted by islamists). Ibn Warraq , author notably of Why I am Not a Muslim ; Leaving Islam : Apostates Speak Out ; and The Origins of the Koran , is at present Research Fellow at a New York Institute conducting philological and historical research into the Origins of Islam and its Holy Book. Antoine Sfeir Born in Lebanon, christian, Antoine Sfeir choosed french nationality to live in an universalist and « laïc » (real secular) country. He is the director of Les cahiers de l’Orient and has published several reference books on islamism such as Les réseaux d’Allah (2001) et Liberté, égalité, Islam : la République face au communautarisme (2005).

Commentary

The intellectual gauntlet has been flung full in the face of Islamism by an unlikely group which includes a Somalian woman, Bangladeshis, exiled Iranians, Lebanese, fugitive British writers of subcontinental origin and an assortment of individuals with a vague left-wing background, none of whom would have been granted admittance to a London gentleman's club in the 19th century. And their manifesto has been printed, not in the New York Times, Le Monde or the Times of London, but of all places, in a provincial Danish newspaper of no particular fame.

Never has free speech in the West seen so unlikely a league of defenders. Kipling understood how full of themselves the famous of the world sometimes are. His short story, the Drums of the Fore and Aft, fictionally describes how a renowned regiment ran before the onslaught of Afghan tribesmen until they were saved by their drummer-boys.

He slipped the drum-sling over his shoulder, thrust the fife into Lew's hand, and the two boys marched out of the cover of the rock into the open, making a hideous hash of the first bars of the "British Grenadiers." .. The tune settled into full swing and the boys kept shoulder to shoulder, Jakin banging the drum as one possessed. The one fife made a thin and pitiful squeaking, but the tune carried far ... "Come on, you dogs!" muttered Jakin to himself. "Are we to play forhever?" Lew was staring straight in front of him and marching more stiffly than ever he had done on parade. ... The men of the Fore and Aft were gathering thick at the entrance into the plain. The Brigadier on the heights far above was speechless with rage. Still no movement from the enemy. The day stayed to watch the children. ... The Fore and Aft were pouring out of the valley. What officers had said to men in that time of shame and humiliation will never be known; for neither officers nor men speak of it now. "They are coming anew!" shouted a priest among the Afghans. "Do not kill the boys! Take them alive, and they shall be of our faith." But the first volley had been fired, and Lew dropped on his face. Jakin stood for a minute, spun round and collapsed, as the Fore and Aft came forward, the curses of their officers in their ears, and in their hearts the shame of open shame.

I'll wait for the New York Times.


posted by wretchard at 11:48 AM | 48 comments  

Voice of the Martyrs has been reporting on Christian Persecution for years their website is persecution .com

Tag.

Tagged before the lock

The holy wars have already begun/never ended. This time may not be so limited as in the past. The PC movement will not stop this

There certainly will be a tipping point:  the next major act of terrorism on US soil.  I wouldn't want to be a Muslim or even appear to be Middle-Eastern here at that point.  A lot of unpleasant things will happen.

An acquaintence of mine, working on a scenario for a novel,  suggested, using "what if" and putting himself in the place of an enemy, that an enemy trying to create terror couldn't do better (or worse, depending on perspective) than attacking a school.  "What would hurt people more that doing something to their children?"  ANd, what would anger a nation more?

I remember my mother commenting about some of the things that happened here (in NYC) during WWII, especially as regards storekeepers and the games they played during shortages and rationing.  Years later (I wasn't alive during the War), when the gasoiine games were played in the 1970s and again around 1980-81, she recalled the War events and said:  "If what happened in Europe in the 1920s ever happens here, the Americans will make the Germans look like Boy Scouts."  The point was, we will put up with a lot, but when we have had enough, look out!  Admiral Yamamoto made a similar comment to the General Staff about . "awakening the sleeping tiger."

Again, it might not be fair and might not be right, but it will happen.

The tipping point hasn't been reached yet.  It will begin to be reached when the American people realize what the war truely is, and that decisions made by our government allow attacks to happen not prevent them.  When terrorists or their materials have come across the southern and northern border due to them being wide open, or come through the ports managed by UAE, or come through the increase in student visas given to Middle Eastern countries and an attack happens, then maybe things will change.

It's a big maybe though, as we have pretty much destroyed ourselves from within and only want to watch TV and buy Chinese materials from Walmart..

March 02, 2006
billroggio.com/archives/2006/03/saudi_arabia_and_jor_1.php]Saudi Arabia and Jordan Strike at al-Qaeda
The Saudis kill six involved in Abqaiq attack, including three on the most wanted list; Jordan thwarts an al-Qaeda plot, the Long War grinds on


Saudi security forces have killed five members of al-Qaeda and captured one after the unsuccessful suicide attack on the massive oil facility in Abqaiq. During the strike, two suicide car bombs detonated after the drivers were unable to breach ARAMCO's security ring. A third vehicle, which was carrying three senior members of al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia, including its former commander, fled to Riyadh. Saudi security forces tracked the vehicle to a safe house in Riyadh. Asharq Alawsat provides the details:

Early on Monday, security forces besieged the house and exchanged fire with the five militants who were armed with machine guns and hand grenades. The militants barricaded themselves behind two cars, one of which was later identified as having been used in the attack on the oil production facility. Born in al Zulfi, the 36-year-old Juwair was number two on the list. He took over the leadership of al Qaeda in Saudi Arabia in July following the death of Younis al Hayari, a Moroccan, in a shootout in Riyadh . No 11 on the list of most wanted, Ibrahim al Mutair was a computer expert while Abdullah al Shammari, No 15, who assisted al Qaeda with transportation, had previously been detained by the authorities but released after he and his family promised to distance themselves from extremism. For his part, Jaffal al Shammari, aged 28, was previously arrested for his links to al Qaeda and was known to be obtaining information about bomb making. The Ministry statement added that 21-year-old Suleiman al Talq had been active on extremist internet forums.

Saudi security forces have dealt al-Qaeda in the Kingdom a blow, as this is the sixth al-Qaeda commander killed since the hot war began in Saudi Arabia in 2003. Senior commanders are at a premium in the Kingdom, as Saudi Security forces have ravaged the ranks of the organization. Regardless, al-Qaeda will continue to attempt to disable Saudi Arabia's oil infrastructure. The target is far too tempting, and Osama bin Laden has made this a high priority target.

The Kingdom of Jordan is another target-rich environment for al-Qaeda. After two al-Qaeda inmates are rumored to have been sentenced to death, prisonors started a riot in a Jordanian jail, and captured Jordan's cheif of prisons along with six security guards. In the wake of last November's multiple suicide strikes on hotels in the capital of Amman, which killed 57 and wounded over 100, Jordanian intelligence has uncovered another suicide plot against an undisclosed “a critical civilian installation." A Libyan would-be suicide bomber and two Iraqis providing logistical support were arrested. Three other Iraqis and a Saudi national are currently sought by the Jordanian police and are believed to be in hiding in Syria. While there is no word if this was a Zarqawi-inspired plot, he was behind the Amman bombing in 2005 and the spolied chemical weapons attack against Jordanian intelligence and government installations in April of 2004.

While al-Qaeda has been largely unsuccessful in its efforts in Saudi Arabia and Jordan, and attacks in both countries have resulted in a backlash against the brutal tactics of suicide bombings targeted against Muslims, al-Qaeda continues to press the fight in the hopes the government's ties with the West can be damaged or broken, and the downfall of the 'infidel' regimes follow. This is the strategy as laid out by Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda's second in command, Saif al-Adel, al-Qaeda's military commander and strategist.

Incidentally, Saif al-Adel modified his twenty year plan for conquest of the Middle East, and extended the timeframe to fifty years. This tells us two things: 1) al-Qaeda does not believe things are going well in the short term. Iraq has not turned into a terrorist haven, and the governments of Jordan, Syria, Lebenon, and Saudi Arabia are no where near collapse; 2) while down, al-Qaeda is not out. The organization defines the jihad in terms of decades and centuries. Many western terrorism and military experts refer to the struggle against militant Islam as the "Long War" because al-Qaeda is committed to a multi-generational fight.

tag

March 02, 2006
International Islamist Front’s Bangladeshi Commander Captured
Abdur Rahman, one of the original signatories of Osama bin Laden’s 1998 fatwa declaring war against the West, is arrested; CNN obscures his ties to al-Qaeda

In late January, reports indicated Indian police arrested Sheikh Abdur Rahman, the spiritual and ideological leader of terrorist groups Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB), in the province of Bengal. The reports were incorrect. While the January reports turned out to be incorrect, Bangladeshi police announce that Abdur Rahman has been arrested after a 30 hour standoff between police at his hideout in the city of Sylhet.

The Bangladeshi newspaper Independent reports on the standoff and capture of Rahman, which included “repeated warnings over loud speakers and spraying of water and tear gas shells by armed commandos.” Rahman’s family surrendered, “But the supremo of militant group Jamatul Mujahedin Bangladesh (JMB) who is said to have exchanged hot words with the approaching RAB commandos, refused to surrender and threatened to blow himself up with explosives strapped around his body, did not come out the house till late in the day.” It seems Rahman believes suicide in the cause for jihad is only appropriate for the foot soldiers.

CNN irresponsibly obscures Rahman’s ties to al-Qaeda, “According to the security official, Bangladeshi security forces have been searching for Rahman since August and believe that he has ties with al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden.” The fact is Rahman is intricately tied to Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, as reported here last January; “Abdur Rahman is not your run-of-the-mill local Islamist terrorist leader. Rahman is one of the select signatories to the 1998 fatwa that created the International Islamic Front, the umbrella group of Islamist terrorist groups that declared war on the West. The signatories include: Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri [amir of the Jihad Group in Egypt and second in command of al-Qaeda], Abu-Yasir Rifa'i Ahmad Taha [amir of the Egyptian Islamic Group] and Mir Hamzah [secretary of the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Pakistan].” Thomas Joscelyn dissects the 1998 fatwa and explains its importance in light of events in today's fight against al-Qaeda.

While Rahman’s capture is a high profile arrest and a defeat for al-Qaeda, Grim warns his arrest could lead to the destabilization of Bangladesh, as the opposing political parties of the Awami League and Jamaat-e-Islami descend into destructive political fighting, strikes, the crippling of Bangladesh’s nascent democracy, and the creation of a failed state in which al-Qaeda can flourish. The Awami League believes Jamaat-e-Islami and the government are behind the terrorism in Bangladesh, while “J-e-I and [Industries Minister] Nizami have maintained that really, it is Indian and Israeli intelligence behind the terrorist campaign.”

By Bill Roggio | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists.

It's a government that masquerades as a religion.

Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion.

That IS what the extremists WANT the west to think.
The key is to force them to produce the muscle to back up the threats.  Right now they are running on intimidation value alone.

If they are forced to actually try to act on their threats, we may find they have far less support, and therefore muscle, even in the Islamic world.

And if they cast to far and fail their reputation is shot and they will never get it back.

Thing is even if they convince most of the Islamic population to follow them?  They can still easily be defeated.  

Either contingency however depends on the West growing a backbone.

I think the tipping point is at least one large scale attack similar to 9/11 on US soil before the scale will tip against Islam as a whole for US.

Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion.

No it hasn’t.

Expansionist conflict is the natural state of Islam… Islam has been an aggressive, expansive, imperialistic, oppressive political force throughout its history. From day one the expansion started… from Spain to India and beyond… and was only halted when the entire World had had enough… in the last couple hundred years the World has forgotten what it knew about the expansive nature of Islam.

Is this like Martin Luther posting the 95 theses on Wittenburg Church?

I agree with RjRoberts; when the s**t hits the fan, it will not be pretty.   A relatively small number of extremists have hijacked "Islam" and defined Islam's agenda.  The extremists are speaking for the entire religion without any real challenge from other leaders who might believe in more moderation/peaceful cooexistence in keeping with life in the modern world.  

If "moderate" Islamists don't reign in the extremists, all things Islam will suffer once the west has had enough.  The power to crush Islam exists in the west, only the will to do so prevents it (at this time).  It is just a question of what happens first, moderation of Islam or a kneejerk response by the west.   I don't see moderation occuring...

Quoted: Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion. No it hasn’t. Expansionist conflict is the natural state of Islam… Islam has been an aggressive, expansive, imperialistic, oppressive political force throughout its history. From day one the expansion started… from Spain to India and beyond… and was only halted when the entire World had had enough… in the last couple hundred years the World has forgotten what it knew about the expansive nature of Islam.

Actually thats not exactly it- however it is part of the jihadi propaganda.  They do idolize the era of Islams violent expansion.

However, this is really a defensive struggle for Islam.  Those who are at the top of the islamic social structure are threatened by the expansion of open Western society, knowledge of which is carried by our media and our trade relations.  Increased knowledge of how we in the West live- how much BETTER we live- without Islam will cause its decline.  Those at the top of Islamic culture are at the apex of a culture of exploitation that is justified to the exploited through Islam.  They will therefore lose their wealth and prestige-perhaps violently- if the public excepts Western mores and realizes that being exploited is NOT divinely ordained.

The only way to stave this off is to go to war with the west and humble it.  Prove that western freedom and material wealth is meaningless since it allows you to be easily killed by your enemies.  Prove that loyalty to the islamic way is more powerful than technology.  If people remain true to their version of Islam their own econimic and social position is secured.  Keeping them true is convincing them that the West was defeated by the will of Allah expressed through the violence of the Jihadi.

That is the REAL reason why they are attacking the West.  Otherwise Islam will dissolve.  They already had one near miss, not 30 years ago most of the worlds "Islamic" population were living under Stalinist rule and these true belevers were on the run from the secret police.  Sadat (and Nasser before him), Quedaffi, Assad, Saddam, all allied with the Soviets and suppressed radical Islam.  When the socialists workers paridise failed to improve their lot, when these leaders lead them to defeat after defeat at the hands of Israel- and then the Soviets went bankrupt and cut them off- this caused the population to embrace the opposition- radical Islam.

What I'm afraid of is that Americans have lost the will to fight.

If that's the case, we're doomed.

Quoted: What I'm afraid of is that Americans have lost the will to fight. If that's the case, we're doomed.

I agree.  The war is over, but there will be a shitload of dead ROP'ers in the county before the end.

Quoted: There certainly will be a tipping point:  the next major act of terrorism on US soil.  I wouldn't want to be a Muslim or even appear to be Middle-Eastern here at that point.  A lot of unpleasant things will happen.

One reason I love the 2nd amendment: if some person aching to kill some Muslims comes after me, I definitely have the means to defend myself.

Quoted: What I'm afraid of is that Americans have lost the will to fight. If that's the case, we're doomed.

It's been that way for a long time.........since the 60s.
As long as their TVs work, they have cars to drive, cell phones, ipods, video games, food in the grocery stores and every demand and whim is met by govt and the free market, they don't care what happens in the world.
The majority of Americans are dumb sheep who know nothing about their own countries history but could tell you the most minute trivial tidbit about pop culture.
We are doomed.

Quoted: What I'm afraid of is that Americans have lost the will to fight. If that's the case, we're doomed.

If you would stop watching TV and spend more time on the Internet, and made it your first source for information.  You would see that it was not true.

The news media is trying the same thing they did back in 1994 when they conspired with the DNC and the Clintons to convince moderates in Congress that Americans wanted gun control.

They are doing the same thing they did back in 1973 when they intimidated the Congress into passing the Church Amendemnt and cutting off Vietnam, when in fact the war had been won with the failure of the Easter Offensive the year before.

Quoted: Quoted: What I'm afraid of is that Americans have lost the will to fight. If that's the case, we're doomed. If you would stop watching TV and spend more time on the Internet, and made it your first source for information.  You would see that it was not true. The news media is trying the same thing they did back in 1994 when they conspired with the DNC and the Clintons to convince moderates in Congress that Americans wanted gun control. They are doing the same thing they did back in 1973 when they intimidated the Congress into passing the Church Amendemnt and cutting off Vietnam, when in fact the war had been won with the failure of the Easter Offensive the year before.

For one thing, I never, EVER, watch TV news anymore. My news comes from the radio (normally via Rush and the like), and the internet.

I'm STILL worried. I agree that the MSM is doing the things you described, and fortunately (due to the new media) they are not nearly as effective as they used to be, but it's still pretty scary.

I sincerely hope I'm wrong, and that we're not nearly as bad off as I fear we may be getting...

tag

Mohammed was a terrrorist and a pedophile and his religion is one of terror.

Quoted: Mohammed was a terrrorist and a pedophile and his religion is one of terror.

and IBTL

Quoted: Mohammed was a terrrorist and a pedophile and his religion is one of terror.

Someone will be along shortly to escort you to a re-education facility.

I don't think Americans have lost the will to fight.  They have learned to cherish today's modern conveniences & lifestyle without having to make hard choices or working hard to get it (compared to the rest of the world).  If/when Americans decide their entitlements are in danger, its go time.   That doesn't mean that they are willing to actually fight themselves, it just means that thay will support other people doing the heavy lifting, instead of opposing it as in the past.  

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: What I'm afraid of is that Americans have lost the will to fight. If that's the case, we're doomed. If you would stop watching TV and spend more time on the Internet, and made it your first source for information.  You would see that it was not true. The news media is trying the same thing they did back in 1994 when they conspired with the DNC and the Clintons to convince moderates in Congress that Americans wanted gun control. They are doing the same thing they did back in 1973 when they intimidated the Congress into passing the Church Amendemnt and cutting off Vietnam, when in fact the war had been won with the failure of the Easter Offensive the year before. For one thing, I never, EVER, watch TV news anymore. My news comes from the radio (normally via Rush and the like), and the internet. I'm STILL worried. I agree that the MSM is doing the things you described, and fortunately (due to the new media) they are not nearly as effective as they used to be, but it's still pretty scary. I sincerely hope I'm wrong, and that we're not nearly as bad off as I fear we may be getting...

I am glad to hear it!  Yeah it is still scary.

To tell you the truth, I think the real struggle is in fact the domestic one between the established media and the Internet, the domestic battle for information.  We have always had the means to crush Islam, what is needed is the will.  The question is not really will the internet win though, its is "How bad will things get BEFORE the Internet becomes dominant".  Once it does, the Islamic problem will be settled in short order.

Quoted: Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion. No it hasn’t. Expansionist conflict is the natural state of Islam… Islam has been an aggressive, expansive, imperialistic, oppressive political force throughout its history. From day one the expansion started… from Spain to India and beyond… and was only halted when the entire World had had enough… in the last couple hundred years the World has forgotten what it knew about the expansive nature of Islam.

By this man a beer, he gets it.  Islam divides the world into Dar al Islam and Dar al harb.  "Domain of peace" and "domain of war," respectively.  Guess which part we're in.

the major difference between islam and 30's/40's facism is that at least the facists tried to provide for their people, or at least the people they saw fit.

islam (the radical kind) is out only for itself.  it benefits a very select few individuals, while driving the rest into crippling poverty, mal nutrition, persecution, and global marginalization.

i do still think there MIGHT be a true ROP out there, but it is so stifled and trampled by the radicals that it does not appear to casual observers.


ETA: IBTL

Quoted: Actually thats not exactly it- however it is part of the jihadi propaganda.  They do idolize the era of Islams violent expansion. However, this is really a defensive struggle for Islam.  Those who are at the top of the islamic social structure are threatened by the expansion of open Western society, knowledge of which is carried by our media and our trade relations.  Increased knowledge of how we in the West live- how much BETTER we live- without Islam will cause its decline.  Those at the top of Islamic culture are at the apex of a culture of exploitation that is justified to the exploited through Islam.  They will therefore lose their wealth and prestige-perhaps violently- if the public excepts Western mores and realizes that being exploited is NOT divinely ordained. The only way to stave this off is to go to war with the west and humble it.  Prove that western freedom and material wealth is meaningless since it allows you to be easily killed by your enemies.  Prove that loyalty to the islamic way is more powerful than technology.  If people remain true to their version of Islam their own econimic and social position is secured.  Keeping them true is convincing them that the West was defeated by the will of Allah expressed through the violence of the Jihadi. That is the REAL reason why they are attacking the West.  Otherwise Islam will dissolve.  They already had one near miss, not 30 years ago most of the worlds "Islamic" population were living under Stalinist rule and these true belevers were on the run from the secret police.  Sadat (and Nasser before him), Quedaffi, Assad, Saddam, all allied with the Soviets and suppressed radical Islam.  When the socialists workers paridise failed to improve their lot, when these leaders lead them to defeat after defeat at the hands of Israel- and then the Soviets went bankrupt and cut them off- this caused the population to embrace the opposition- radical Islam.

and

Quoted: To tell you the truth, I think the real struggle is in fact the domestic one between the established media and the Internet, the domestic battle for information. We have always had the means to crush Islam, what is needed is the will. The question is not really will the internet win though, its is "How bad will things get BEFORE the Internet becomes dominant". Once it does, the Islamic problem will be settled in short order.

+ 1

I am very proud of the Polish campaign to expose fanatical Islam for what it really is.  I wonder if we could get some of those posters translated and distributed here.

Quoted: I agree with RjRoberts; when the s**t hits the fan, it will not be pretty.   A relatively small number of extremists have hijacked "Islam" and defined Islam's agenda.  The extremists are speaking for the entire religion without any real challenge from other leaders who might believe in more moderation/peaceful cooexistence in keeping with life in the modern world.   If "moderate" Islamists don't reign in the extremists, all things Islam will suffer once the west has had enough.  The power to crush Islam exists in the west, only the will to do so prevents it (at this time).  It is just a question of what happens first, moderation of Islam or a kneejerk response by the west.   I don't see moderation occuring...

Then these so called moderates need to get off thier fucking asses and deal with the extremists before they ALL get lumped into the same pile and the rest of the world deals with them as a whole.

Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion.

Yep.

March 02, 2006
The Key Strategic Question
Is Islam compatible with a free society?

This is the key strategic question of our day.

In October, William Buckley wrote:

The moment has not come, but it is around the corner, when non-Muslims will reasonably demand to have evidence that the Muslim faith can operate within boundaries in which Christians and Jews (and many non-believers) live and work without unconstitutional distraction. [h-t to a Belmont Club commenter]

Buckley is correct that this is a question demanding an answer, but he misjudges the timing of its asking and answering. The truth is that assumed answers to this question have been fundamental in developing our strategies in the war on terror, and that we have yet to answer it definitively.

Is Islam compatible with a free society? A 'yes' answer offers a far different set of strategic imperatives than a 'no' answer.

In his book The Universal Hunger for Liberty, Michael Novak notes the tone of discourse in the beginning of our war:

"Surely," the proposition was put forward, by many Islamic voices as well as by the president, "a modern and faithful Islam is consistent with nonrepressive, open, economically vital societies."

To say yes to our question, one assumes that there are aspects of being Muslim and faithful to Islam, that can coexist peacefully with liberty, tolerance, and equality. The strategy that follows is one of identifying the groups and sects within Islam that adhere to these notions of their religion, and then encouraging them, favoring them, propagating them, and splitting them off from the elements of Islamic practice that are all too incompatible with the portions of modernity that invigorate men's souls: free inquiry, free association, free commerce, free worship, or even the freedom to be left alone.

To answer no, one states that Islam itself is fundamentally irreconcilable with freedom. This leads to a wholly different set of tactical moves to isolate free societies from Islam. They might include:

-detention of Muslims, or an abrogation of certain of their rights;

-forced deportation of Muslims from free societies;

-rather than transformative invasions, punitive expeditions and punitive strikes;

-extreme racial profiling;

-limits on the practice and study of Islam in its entirety

And even some extreme measures if free societies find the above moves to be failing:

-forced conversion from Islam, or renunciation;

-colonization;

-extermination of Muslims wherever they are found.

These last are especially ghastly measures. But a society that thought Islam incompatible with freedom might in the long term slip towards them.

Since 9/11, the assumption of our government has been that Islam can be compatible with freedom. The Bush administration has been exploiting all manner of divides within the Muslim world, not to conquer it, but to transform it such that a type of Islam compatible with freedom -- and therefore the West and the US, the wellspring and birthplace of modern individual liberty -- will come to the front at the expense of a type of Islam that is irreconcilable. Every institution of government answers our key question with a resounding yes. The Pentagon, in its Quadrennial Defense Review, makes a distinction between "bin Ladenism" and moderate Muslims, our would-be allies. Bush makes speeches in praise of freedom in general and especially in the Muslim world. The defense establishment is addressing what it calls a 'war of ideas':

The U.S. government is also focusing more attention on the intangible but vital dimension of the "war of ideas" between radical Islam and moderate Western and Islamic thought. The Pentagon's September 2004 National Defense Strategy stressed the need to counter ideological support for terrorism to secure permanent gains in the war against terrorism. It stated the importance of negating the image of a U.S. war against Islam, and instead, developing the image of a civil war within Islam, fought between moderate states and radical terrorists. This kind of imagery will feed into the broader debate beginning in the U.S. on how to win such a war of ideas and how to cultivate moderate democratic Islamic states.

A yes answer to the question requires Red State Christians in the US to tolerate an Islam that tolerates them. A no answer to the question requires an abandonment of belief in the universality of ideas originating in the west, because it becomes clear that a large portion of humanity -- a fifth perhaps -- follows an incompatible religion. A yes answer forces one to attack totalitarian elements within Islam. A no answer forces a clash of civilizations, a Great Islamic War, as it assumes that all Islam is totalitarian.

A yes answer might lead to the establishment of something like the Congress for Cultural Freedom, as discussed in a recent piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education:

The idea of the congress, however, grew out of a feeling among independent intellectuals on the non-Communist left, as well as American officials, that the West after World War II faced a huge Soviet commitment to propagandizing and imposing Communism, and might lose the battle for European minds to Stalinism. So the congress — established at a 1950 Berlin meeting at which the writer Arthur Koestler declared to a crowd of 15,000, "Friends, freedom has seized the offensive!" — launched magazines, held conferences, mounted exhibitions, and generally sought to expose Stalinist falsehoods from its liberal position. At its height, according to Coleman, the CCF "had offices or representatives in 35 countries, employing a total of 280 staff members."

One principle of the CCF's founding document was, "Freedom is based on the toleration of divergent opinions. The principle of toleration does not logically permit the practice of intolerance."

A no answer might disparage the notion that Westerners can say anything of import to those practicing Islam. I'm not sure if Bruce Thornton would answer no to the key question, but he doesn't seem to like the idea of Westerners trying to convince Muslims of anything new about their religion:

If, then, you are in possession of this truth that you are absolutely certain holds the key to universal happiness in this world and the next, why would you be tolerant of alternatives? Why should you tolerate a dangerous lie? Why should you “live and let live,” the credo of the spiritually moribund who stand for everything because they stand for nothing? And why wouldn’t you kill in the name of this vision, when the infidel nations work against God’s will and his beneficent intentions for the human race? This is precisely what the jihadists tell us, what fourteen centuries of Islamic theology and jurisprudence tell us, what the Koran and Hadith tell us. Yet we smug Westerners, so certain of our own superior knowledge that human life is really about genes or neuroses or politics or nutrition, condescendingly look down on the true believer. Patronizing him like a child, we tell him that he doesn’t know that his own faith has been “hijacked” by “fundamentalists” who manipulate his ignorance, that what he thinks he knows about his faith is a delusion, and that the true explanation is one that we advanced, sophisticated Westerners understand while the believer remains mired in superstition and neurotic fantasy.

A yes answer to our question might force us to reexamine the religious roots of our own conceptions of freedom, in order to figure best a way to help Muslims look for such roots in their faith. This might resemble the efforts of David Gelernter in his recent Bradley Lecture at the American Enterprise Institute, "A Religious Idea Called 'America'"

The most important story in and for American history is the biblical Exodus; the verse “let my people go” became the subtext of the Puritan emigration to America in the seventeenth century, the American revolution in the eighteenth, and--in significant part by Lincoln’s own efforts--of the Civil War in the nineteenth. It became important, also, to the twentieth century Americanism of Wilson and Truman and Reagan and W. Bush--Americanism as an outward-looking religion with global responsibilities. In the end we do need to know the real character of Americanism. The secular version is a flat, gray rendition--no color and no fizz--of this extraordinary work of religious imagination: the idea that liberty, equality, and democracy belong to all mankind because God wants them to.

A yes answer might say that if God gave Biblical antecedents for the freedom of all mankind, He might have put some in the Koran as well . . . A yes answer would try to figure how to play our own religion-based beliefs into a conversation with Islam, as Henry Jaffa seems to argue in the Claremont Review:

We [are], in short, engaged in telling others to accept the forms of our own political institutions, without reference to the principles or convictions that give rise to those institutions. Unless we as a political community can by reasoned discourse re-establish in our own minds the authority of the constitutionalism of the Founding Fathers and of Lincoln, of government devoted to securing the God-given equal rights of every individual human being, we will remain ill equipped to bring the fruits of freedom to others.

A no answer, on the other hand, might first start with Islam as anathema to free society, then move to other religious creeds, seeing them through a lens of general suspicion.

Is Islam compatible with a free society? Like a Zen koan, this is the question that vexes us.

Our answer of course, might change. The Bush administration has been answering yes for five years. But, inhabiting a democracy, it is of course reflective of and responsive to public sentiment. Several commentators believe that sentiment may be shifting. A piece by Jim Geraghty on his National Review blog wonders if Americans' answer to the key question is changing:

This strikes me as the fallout of the Tipping Point™ - my sense that in recent weeks, a large chunk of Americans just decided that they no longer have any faith in the good sense or non-hostile nature of the Muslim world. If subsequent polls find similar results, the port deal is dead.

Perhaps the people's answer to the question is changing.

And what to make of the Manifesto from a dozen European intellectuals, Muslims or former Muslims many of them? How are they answering the key strategic question?

It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats . . . Islamism is a reactionary ideology which kills equality, freedom and secularism wherever it is present. Its success can only lead to a world of domination: man’s domination of woman, the Islamists’ domination of all the others.

In Glenn Reynolds' podcast interview with Claire Berlinkski, author of Menace in Europe: Why the Continent's Crisis is America's Too, she relates this story:

Reynolds: You have this wonderful scene in your book where you talk about this, this Englishman of Bengali descent, and he said that when he traveled to the United States, he saw all these immigrants who were US citizens being welcomed by the INS and told, "Welcome home!" And he said, you know, if I ever got that kind of treatment you know when I returned to England, I'd happily lay down my life for England right there . . . Berlinski: I would have died for England on the spot, that's what he told me. If ever once, someone had said "welcome home" when I showed them my passport at customs and immigration, I would have died for England on the spot.

In a dissenting statement to the above-mentioned manifesto, Paul Belien in Brussels Journal quotes Dr. Jos Verhulst:

And now he stands at the dawn of the 21st century: the maligned individual, unsteady on his own feet after executing the inner breach with every form of imposed authority, uncertain, blinking in the brightness of the only god he is willing to recognise – Truth itself, stretching out before him unfathomably deep – full of doubt but aware that he, called to non-submission, must seek the road to the transcendent, carrying as his only property, his most valuable heirloom from his turbulent past, that one gold piece that means the utmost to him, his precious ideal of complete freedom of thought, of speech and of scientific inquiry. That is the unique advance that he received to help him in his long and difficult quest. Meanwhile he is being beleaguered and threatened on all sides; from out of the darkness voices call him to submit and retreat; they shout that the gold in his hands is worthless, while the brightness ahead of him still makes it almost impossible for him to see what lies in store. In short: what this contemporary individual needs most of all is courage, great courage. And the will to be free and to see, which is tantamount to the will to live.

When I was in Iraq, one Iraqi told me he wished Iraq could be the 51st state in the union. Our experience in both Iraq and Afghanistan seems to indicate that there are many Muslims who would prefer that we answer the key question with a yes, saying to those Muslims who can find Islam compatible with freedom, "Have courage!" and once they've achieved their freedom, "Welcome home!"

To what fate are we assigning them if we answer no?


UPDATE: Welcome Instapundit readers! Even though I had no direct quote above, this piece, like most that I do, had a lot of influence from Belmont Club, especially Blowback.

UPDATE2: There seems to be some problem posting comments. The server must be a little slow. It took me several tries to post last night. Thanks for your patience.

Posted by Chester at March 2, 2006 12:26 AM

"We, writers, journalists, intellectuals".......


So, how did they go from being the dumbest people at the university, if they went to one,  to being "intellectuals"  after they graduate??

Do they really believe that  "intellectuals"  choose one of the easiest,  least rigorous courses of study?

Do people with superior intellect really come from the bottom of the academic barrel?

No wonder it is so easy for them to lie.  They have been lying to themselves each and every day for a long time.

I pity the fools.

Quoted: Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion. That IS what the extremists WANT the west to think. The key is to force them to produce the muscle to back up the threats.  Right now they are running on intimidation value alone. If they are forced to actually try to act on their threats, we may find they have far less support, and therefore muscle, even in the Islamic world. And if they cast to far and fail their reputation is shot and they will never get it back. Thing is even if they convince most of the Islamic population to follow them?  They can still easily be defeated.   Either contingency however depends on the West growing a backbone.

You are correct, they could be easily defeated and it is contingent on the West getting a spine.  

However, most Americans don't have the stomach to easily defeat them and don't have the spine needed for admission.  We still get all sorts of cry babies over here bitching about all the "civilians" being hurt and killed.  Until the vast majority of Americans understand - there are no Civilians in war - there are only two kinds of people in war.  Soldiers of that country directly in the fight, and people living in that country directly supporting the state and the soldiers.  Support is provided through taxes and votes, thereby, civilians are as much in the fight as the others.  And most importantly, they are, therefore, legitimate targets.

And like I said, until America figures this one out, we cannot ever win another war.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion. No it hasn’t. Expansionist conflict is the natural state of Islam… Islam has been an aggressive, expansive, imperialistic, oppressive political force throughout its history. From day one the expansion started… from Spain to India and beyond… and was only halted when the entire World had had enough… in the last couple hundred years the World has forgotten what it knew about the expansive nature of Islam. By this man a beer, he gets it.  Islam divides the world into Dar al Islam and Dar al harb.  "Domain of peace submission" and "domain of war," respectively.  Guess which part we're in.

Fixed it for ya!

America cas reached the tipping point. The more the islamists demonstrate fanatacism and disproportionate acts of non-secular hatred the less the MSM has been willing and able to cover for them. The catalyst has been the islamists attack on the MSM - from threatening the newspapers to kidnapping of their journalists. This has been the wake-up call for the lefty MSM now that they have been directly targeted. They have been reluctantly forced to pick a side since they no longer have "immunity".

tag

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: There is absolutely no doubt Islam has been hijacked by extremists. It's a government that masquerades as a religion. No it hasn’t. Expansionist conflict is the natural state of Islam… Islam has been an aggressive, expansive, imperialistic, oppressive political force throughout its history. From day one the expansion started… from Spain to India and beyond… and was only halted when the entire World had had enough… in the last couple hundred years the World has forgotten what it knew about the expansive nature of Islam. By this man a beer, he gets it.  Islam divides the world into Dar al Islam and Dar al harb.  "Domain of peace submission" and "domain of war," respectively.  Guess which part we're in. Fixed it for ya!

Wrong.  It is a bunch of farely welthy men who do no work for that wealth who are organizing this in order to keep their position because they see the handwriting on the wall and the inevitable decline of Islam.  They are doing the only thing that they are able to do to stay in their privlaged positions.

Dar al Islam and Dar al Harb crap is just some of the propaganda they use to get poorer, lower class Muslim men to go out and die for them.

Islam has been in collapse for about a thousand years.

Where is the Ottoman Empire now after all?

But dragging out the memory of the few times when they WERE successfully and aggressively expansionistic is a good recruiting tool.

Quoted: America cas reached the tipping point. The more the islamists demonstrate fanatacism and disproportionate acts of non-secular hatred the less the MSM has been willing and able to cover for them. The catalyst has been the islamists attack on the MSM - from threatening the newspapers to kidnapping of their journalists. This has been the wake-up call for the lefty MSM now that they have been directly targeted. They have been reluctantly forced to pick a side since they no longer have "immunity".

I agree that its rocking.  But the "tip" has not happened yet.

If they keep this up though, I agree it will eventually tip.

Then the Main Stream Media will still deny how they have helped terrorists for the last 5 years and will blame it all on Bush.

Ports, Autarky, Gated Communities, and BBQ
by Armed Liberal on March 4, 2006 12:03 AM NO this is NOT the same person as ArmdLbrl that posts here on AR15!

Tim Oren points me at a well-written comment over at the Belmont Club that ties – indirectly – to Chester’s excellent post of the other day. On wretchard’s great post on Blowback, commenter Wanda says:

Going back to Geraghty's comments and Wretchard's followup, I think that if this shift in Western opinion is happening (and I think it is) much more than just the ports deal is dead. President Bush is in imminent danger of finding himself left behind by the American people, and he doesn't seem to realize it. He could soon be in the same position as the leaders and spokesmen of the EU - a font of noble-sounding platitudes and maxims that nobody pays attention to anymore. Meanwhile, he will have lost his ability to sway his own people's hearts and minds, because he invested everything in the cause of winning the enemy's hearts and minds. All the emphasis has been on persuading Muslims to change; how was it possible that nobody thought that WE might change too? That never entered into the calculations; it always seemed to be a given that the West would be eternally patient, open, and willing to woo the reluctant Muslim world. But while President Bush has been anxiously hovering over his delicate Islamic plant, watching for any promising little green shoot that might repay all his efforts, behind him his own garden has changed into a dangerous, bristling jungle. When he finally turns around, he won't know where he is anymore.

Now, does this suggest that Tom, Trent, Charles Johnson and the LGF community are bellweathers for a future national majority? Can we expect antimuslim rants on Kos and MyDD?

Maybe not so soon.

Let me suggest a likely outcome, based on a humble metaphor. Food. Specifically, my favorite food, BBQ.

Here in Los Angeles, we periodically get upscale BBQ restaurants in fashionable locations - The Pig on La Brea is an example - But I tend to look down on the food in places like that (because it usually sucks) and prefer places like Phillip’s, Woody’s, and The Pit.

I’ve got an eclectic group of friends, but one core group who live on the Westside (yes, they’re all far wealthier and more successful than I am but I love them anyway), and we wander around and do friend-type things that often involve food or culture. Many of them are stereotypical, LAWeekly-liberal in their politics; they have a kind of reflexive progressivism. On matters of race policy, they’re probably more progressive than even I am.

But none of them will come to South–Central with me to get BBQ.

And I can watch them go on alert like pointers when we’re walking in Santa Monica and they see a group of two or three fashionably-thugged out black kids.

Their kids go to private schools, rather than the racially mixed schools of Venice or Santa Monica.

So for them, progressive, egalitarian views are great – at arm’s length. Imagine if you would a Michael Moore who lives in an exclusive co-op, and sends his children to private school – wait a minute, he does.

This isn’t about dissing their views; because I don’t (another post on that soon), I understand them. But it is a model to consider as we talk about the notion that a sea-change in “the Western Street” could take place which involves a fundamental belief that we can’t deal with the Arab world, and that what we need to do is to disengage fast and hard.

In essence, it’d be a position that said “we’re washing our hands of you”, bulked up border and internal security, and made it a point never to drive through ‘those neighborhoods’ without locking the doors, and never, under any circumstances, to stop there. It solves that whole messy “war” thing, and makes sure that no one says bad things about us in our hearing. We'd be clean-handed liberals, and feel secure.

And it would be a disaster.

It would first and foremost be a moral disaster, because we’d be condemning billions of people to a battle with a homicidal tyranny that we had a hand in creating (indirectly, through our policies in the Middle east from the 1900’s onward). We’d be condemning Israel to become even more of a besieged outpost than it is today. We’d be condemning Europeans to a bitter struggle with an increasingly empowered minority.

And while we’d have told them all ‘not our problem’ – to quote Atrios:

Certainly an Iran-with-nukes could blow the hell out of a city or two, but an Iran that did such a thing would pretty much cease to exist. It isn't mutually assured destruction, it's you fuck with us a little bit and YOU NO LONGER LIVE BITCHES!

Not our problem, because we’d hide behind our wall of nukes.

And it’d be a practical disaster.

It’d be a practical disaster, because the war within the Muslim world would wind up being won by either brutal oligarchs or by homicidal fascists. If the oligarchs win, we’ll have trading partners, for a while, until they need an outside enemy to whip up their population against. If the fascists win, we’ll have a war right away.

Now Atrios may he happy with bombing the Arab world into oblivion. But I’d really like to avoid that if I can.

The last person to propose anything like this in detail was Jim Henley. My response to him pretty much sums up my response to this whole idea:

Maybe I'm just too tired right now; it's been a heckuva week, on many fronts. But when I was pointed to Jim Henley's Grand Plan, I just lost the capacity for reasonable thought; it was so dumb, such a dorm-room, bong-hit driven idea of how the world ought to be that I almost left it alone. Then I got a link to it from a non-blog person, and realized that I had to Go Back In There and wrestle with it. Because for many of the folks on my team - the left - this is what foreign policy ought to look like, and in a big way my fear is that this could become something actually thinkable. And I'm not sure if I'm more scared that Trent's vision of the world or this one will come to pass. Actually, it’s because I believe that this one leads, almost inevitably, to Trent’s.

It’s a fantasy that we can all move to a gated community and leave our troubles behind. If nothing else, what would we do for good BBQ?

« ok, I'm done now

Our Darkening Sky: Postcards from the Edge
by Joe Katzman on March 5, 2006 06:02 PM

David Warren, "Oncoming":

"Even after the experience of the Great War, and the Depression, people on the eve of the Hitler war could not appreciate what was coming. It is only in retrospect that we understand what happened as the 1930s progressed -- when a spineless political class, eager at any price to preserve a peace that was no longer available, performed endless demeaning acts of appeasement to the Nazis; while the Nazis created additional grievances to extract more."

Dr. Hasan Bolkhari, Professor and advisor to the Iranian Ministry of Education, doing his best imitation of a Columbia University faculty member:

"The Jewish Walt Disney Company gained international fame with this cartoon. It is still shown throughout the world. This cartoon maintains its status because of the cute antics of the cat and mouse - especially the mouse. Watch Schindler's List. Every Jew was forced to wear yellow star on his clothing. The Jews were degraded and termed 'dirty mice.' Tom and Jerry was made in order to change the Europeans' perception of mice... It should be noted that mice are very cunning...and dirty. Tom and Jerry was made in order to display the exact opposite image. If you happen to watch this cartoon tomorrow, bear in mind the points I have just raised, and watch it from this perspective. The mouse is very clever and smart. Everything he does is so cute. He kicks the poor cat's ass. Yet this cruelty does not make you despise the mouse. He looks so nice, and he is so clever... This is exactly why some say it was meant to erase this image of mice from the minds of European children, and to show that the mouse is not dirty and has these traits. Unfortunately, we have many such cases in Hollywood shows."

Gerald Van Der Leun, "The Dulcet Tones of the Iranian Fascist":

"And that is exactly what we can witness here: A well-groomed, well-tailored, soft-spoken man sitting in a room lecturing to attentive students on the "deeper" meaning and purpose of an inane cartoon. His message that oozes out of every word. "Don't be fooled by the charm of the 'mice.' Don't be taken in by their winning, humorous ways. Mice are Jews. Jews are dirty. Jews are filthy. Jews are vermin. Jews must be exterminated. And they are only the first on our list. After them the rest will be easy." "This is what he says and this is what he means down to the last lingering atom of his being. Believe him and remember what he looks like and sounds like. You have heard it for years. You will hear it again. Men like Hassan Bolkhari cannot be persuaded out of their madness. Hassan Bolkhari believes he is sane and his views are right. Men like this cannot be appeased. They will take the time and the space and the money and any other bribes offered them by the weakened culture of the West, and use every second, every inch and every penny of it to prepare the grave of the West."

David Warren, "Oncoming":

"I do not doubt the great majority of Muslims, in Canada and around the world, are decent, “moderate” people, who want no part in a “clash of civilizations”. But it has become obvious they can do nothing to stop the triumph of “Islamism” internationally, or oppose the fanatics proselytizing in their own communities. Germany was full of moderate Germans, as Hitler rose; Stalin drove his oars through a sea of moderate Russians. While we must not forget that the Muslims are the first victims of “Islamism”, and may suffer most from its triumph, we are beyond the point where we can do more for them than destroy the tyranny by which they are enthralled. Indeed, many Muslims, by birth or faith, remain our best allies, warning us as many fine Germans did of what is coming our way."

Gary Metz: A few pictures worth 1,000 words or more.

Gerald Van Der Leun, "The First Terrorist War" (October 2003):

"Beyond victory in the First Terrorist War is a greater goal. What we must seek is not merely the "control" and "containment" of terror, for terror in this guise cannot be controlled or contained. We must come to the deeper understanding that only a complete victory over the global Radical Islamic forces can prevent the onset of a confrontation more terrible than the current war. What we must press for in the Terrorist War is a victory so decisive that we can, in the end, avoid the larger war lurking on the not-so-distant horizon - - a true war between civilizations. That war, should it come, will not take the name of The Terrorist War, but of The Islamic War."

Jim Geraghty, "Polls, Ports, Governments, and Cartoons":

"This strikes me as the fallout of the Tipping Point™ - my sense that in recent weeks, a large chunk of Americans just decided that they no longer have any faith in the good sense or non-hostile nature of the Muslim world."

Robert Tracinski, "Publish or Perish: Lessons from the Cartoon Jihad":

"Now, seventeen years later, the Muslim fanatics are making it clear: you don't have to come to our country, you don't have to be a Muslim. Even in your own countries and under your own laws, you will not be safe from our intimidation. For the whole Western world, this is an opportunity to learn an important truth about the goal of the Islamists. Their goal is not to achieve any specific political demand or settlement. Their goal is submission: our submission to their will, to their laws, to their dictatorship—our submission, not just to one demand, but to any demand the Muslim mobs care to make."

Doubt it? Try this:

"A student's column in the Oregon State University campus newspaper has prompted protests by Muslim students, who say it is offensive to their faith. The piece headlined "The Islamic Double Standard" was written by OSU microbiology student Nathanael Blake and published in the Daily Barometer on Feb. 8. ...Senior editors have met with the Muslim Student Association.... [the Barometer's editor-in-chief] said editors have been checking copy with Muslim students, and on Tuesday deleted one paragraph from a piece scheduled to be published the next day."

Islamism's auxiliaries on the Left have prepared the ground well. Of course, The "Muslim Students Association" is a Saudi-created group that espouses their hate-filled Wahabbi version of Islam and advocates Shari'a Law. Which brings us to this note of mine from "Trans-Shipments, Toons, and Tipping Points":

"Wittman [of the DLC] is dead-on. The alternative to moral seriousness will be growing anger stemming from a correct belief that we are under attack, and facing a very real threat to our way of life here that will only end when our enemy does. But if the "sensitivities" (which is now read as "threats") of undifferentiated "Muslims" are all it takes to get the North American media to submit to religious edicts and lie by omission and commission about a major public controversy - then the source of the threat to our way of life isn't just al-Qaeda, is it? It's precisely the opposite of the behaviour the media had intended to mold, of course. But it's also completely logical, and completely their fault. As voices like Karim Elsahy are lost in the wind."

John Farren, commenting in "Trans-Shipments, Toons, and Tipping Points" (c#52):

"...some figures from a You.gov poll in the UK from 12 February in the Sunday Times [1,600 respondents]: [snip]...52% were now less tolerant of Muslims 63% believed relation between Muslims and others would grow worse 62% expect violence by non-Muslims against Muslims 45% believe the West can never co-exist peacefully with mainly Muslim nations.

Gerald Van Der Leun, "The Dulcet Tones of the Iranian Fascist":

"....The viral madness of the Muslims is not subject to being reasoned with when it is surrounded by millions who share the same dementia. We've seen their deep cultural insanity manifest itself around the world for weeks now. It is not the sad plaint of the "victim," but exactly what it appears to be -- a willful festival of unrestrained violence against any and all that do not share their ghastly vision of a stunted and medieval religion; a religion of peace and toleration, but of brutality and subjegation. And what they learn with every passing day is that the world, so far, is more than willing to let them get away with it. What the world learns with every passing day is that the moderate Muslim is the one who will not burn you until tomorrow or the day after. This is the message that is coming out of this culture in word and deed, while many are deaf and blind to it. And so their voices and their actions grow ever bolder. This is always the case with Fascists. History is clear on this point. History is also clear that, when it comes to the Fascists of Spain, Italy, Germany, Russia, Iraq, Iran, and a host of other countries large and small, nothing but fire will finish them. Bolkhari is the suave face and voice of the new postmodern Holocaust. He embodies, with his talent for emulating Western smarm, the enemy of all that we value and our fathers fought to preserve. This is our enemy not because we wish it so, but because he wishes it so. What he wants most now is to possess nuclear weapons. When he has those everything else will follow and follow quickly."

IAEA Report, a body much inclined to understatement:

"Although the Agency has not seen any diversion of nuclear material to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices, the Agency is not at this point in time in a position to conclude that there are no undeclared nuclear materials or activities in Iran. The process of drawing such a conclusion, under normal circumstances, is a time consuming process even with an Additional Protocol in force. In the case of Iran, this conclusion can be expected to take even longer in light of the undeclared nature of Iran's past nuclear programme, and in particular because of the inadequacy of information available on its centrifuge enrichment programme, the existence of a generic document related to the fabrication of nuclear weapon components, and the lack of clarification about the role of the military in Iran’s nuclear programme, including, as mentioned above, about recent information available to the Agency concerning alleged weapon studies that could involve nuclear material. 54. It is regrettable, and a matter of concern, that the above uncertainties related to the scope and nature of Iran's nuclear programme have not been clarified after three years of intensive Agency verification. In order to clarify these uncertainties, Iran’s full transparency is still essential. Without full transparency that extends beyond the formal legal requirements of the Safeguards Agreement and Additional Protocol — transparency that could only be achieved through Iran’s active cooperation — the Agency’s ability to reconstruct the history of Iran’s past programme and to verify the correctness and completeness of the statements made by Iran, particularly with regard to its centrifuge enrichment programme, will be limited, and questions about the past and current direction of Iran’s nuclear programme will continue to be raised."

Did we mention those pictures?

"Who's in charge of the clattering train?
The axles creak and the couplings strain
And the pace is hot and the points are near
And Sleep has deadened the driver's ear
And the signals flash through the night in vain
For Death is in charge of the clattering train."


« ok, I'm done now

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Quoted: Quoted: Mohammed was a terrrorist and a pedophile and his religion is one of terror. and IBTL

And so it begins...............

Attn: ArmdLbrl: ARe you a troll???? ??????? Or just trying to get all of us banned???????????
Dont you know anything about ARFCOM? Salafism is now the mainstream here. Ever notice how many Salafist apologists have suddenly sprung up, While people who Critisize "them" get the axe??
In America as elsewhere we have had salafists put in positions of power, infiltration if you will, quiet and slow. It's the only way to prevent "racism" and Islamophobia. Of course so many people point out the hypocracy that now ALL critism of any relgion is verboten, just like how Pakistan is trying to get an "international law" passed that makes "blasphemy" a crime. try to keep this in mind when you.........................................................

Bump

INCHING TOWARD "NO"

In a previous post where I explored the musings of Chester regarding the strategic issue of our time--Is Islam compatible with a free society--I wrote:

President Bush has been acting on the basis of a YES answer to the question and our entire strategy in the Middle East is based on it. What is astonishing about this essay is that the author unflichingly looks at the logical consequences that are inherent in answering NO to the question-- and finds them pretty frightening for any civilized person or nation. This is why Bush has insisted on formulating our strategy based on YES. This is why he has been very circumspect in what he says about Islam and how he characterizes the war. This is why he is so adamantly supportive of the Dubai ports deal -- because the opposition to it does reflect a "tipping point" in which people no longer believe that a moderate, reasonable Islam is possible. I think the insane reaction of the Muslim world to a bunch of inoffensive Danish cartoons has crossed a threshold; and the free, mostly-tolerant people of the world are finally digging a line in the sand, jutting out their chins, and more or less defiantly daring Muslims to cross it. This explains the inexplicably moderate response of the White House to the cartoons. They must negotiate a path that will still answer YES to the strategic question. I don't think Muslims will like what they discover about the West if they decide to cross that threshold. They will not be safe behind the PC rhetoric and blustery resort to cries of "victimization" that have protected the extremists thus far in acting out their fantasies of worldwide domination.

Today I read David Warren's column at Real Clear Politics:

In this view -- which I hold to be Mr Bush’s -- we are dealing with what amounts to a planetary civil war, between those who accept the state-system descended from the Treaty of Westphalia (1648), and an emergent Islamist ideology that certainly does not. To Mr Bush’s mind, only legitimately-elected governments, presiding over properly-administered secular bureaucracies, can be trusted to deal locally with the kind of mischief an Osama bin Laden can perform, with his hands on contemporary weapons of mass destruction. But Mr Bush was staking his bet on the assumption that the Islamists were not speaking for Islam; that the world’s Muslims long for modernity; that they are themselves repelled by the violence of the terrorists; that, most significantly, Islam is in its nature a religion that can be “internalized”, like the world’s other great religions, and that the traditional Islamic aspiration to conjoin worldly political with otherworldly spiritual authority had somehow gone away. [...] The question, “But what if they are not?” was never seriously raised, because it could not be raised behind the mud curtain of political correctness that has descended over the Western academy and intelligentsia. The idea that others see the world in a way that is not only incompatible with, but utterly opposed to, the way we see it, is the thorn ever-present in the rose bushes of multiculturalism.

And via Atlas Shrugs, this recent MEMRI Report threatening massive destruction and death in the US and other western countries is relevant:

"Despite the fact that the New York, Washington, Madrid, and London expeditions have been carried out a few years back. The search for clues on how they were conducted in such a successful manner is still going on and reports upon reports are still being written about them. However, the next expedition might not find someone who can provide analysis for. The top intellects, strategists, and analysts, will be totally clueless as to how to explain what occurred. Let me also inform you that we are talking about two operations, not one. The scale of one of them is larger than the other but both are large and significant. However, we will start with the smaller, and temporarily put the larger on hold to see how serious the Americans are about their lives. Should you value your own life and security, accept Muslims’ demands, but if you shall prefer death (over giving in to Muslims’ demands). Then, we, by the grace of Allah, are the best in bringing it (death) to your door steps.

You must read the entire MEMRI transcript. Despite it being the braggadocio of some depraved adolescent bully trying to pump up his pathetic ego; one cannot help but reflect that this is a bully who really really desperately wants to kill you and your loved ones. He has something to prove about his manhood, and by Allah, he intends to prove it though it be the last thing he ever does. Thus, it is wise to take him and his fellow punks seriously.

In contemplating these pieces of a larger puzzle, it strikes me that more and more people (from the conservatives who now question the Iraq war; to the ordinary citizens adamant that it is not safe to have any muslim country--ally or no-- manage out ports; to independents like myself who have resolutely supported President Bush) are beginning to inch slowly toward a negative answer to the strategic question. While some muslims are decent, tolerant and yearn to be free; Islam itself does not appear to be compatible with a free society.

This ultimate conclusion is breathtaking--and heartbreaking-- in its implications. And if you doubt the seriousness in which I say this, revisit this post.

If you have not read this post from September, 2003 from The Belmont Club, you should do so. In it, Wretchard lays out three conjectures:

Conjecture 1: Terrorism has Lowered the Nuclear Threshold

These obstacles to terrorist capability are the sole reason that the War on

Terror has not yet crossed the nuclear theshold, the point at which enemies fight each other with weapons of mass destruction. The terrorist intent to destroy the United States, at whatever cost to themselves, has been a given since September 11. Only their capability is in doubt.

Their capability is no longer in doubt. The British now say that Iran is only months away from nuclear capability; and even if that is overly-optimistic; we know that the day is coming when we can no longer pretend that we have lots of time to stop the mullahs. Even as the international community ineptly moves toward some useless sanctions; there are too many among the world powers whose indifference will thwart any positive benefits such sanctions might have--as they did with Saddam. I would say that the Criteria to exceed Conjecture 1 have been satisfied. The threshold was lowered and terrorists have nuclear weapons or will have them imminently.

Conjecture 2: Attaining WMD's Would Destroy Islam

This fixity of malice was recognized in President Bush's West Point address in the summer of 2002, when he concluded that "deterrence -- the promise of massive retaliation against nations -- means nothing against shadowy terrorist networks with no nation or citizens to defend." The enemy was equally indifferent to inducement or threat. Neither making nice -- Jimmy Carter's withdrawal from Iran, Reagan's abandonment of Lebanon, Bush's defense of Saudi Arabia, Clinton's rescue of Albanian Muslims from Serbian genocide, the payment of billions in aid to Egypt and Pakistan -- nor the gravest of threats would alter the enemy's intent to utterly destroy and enslave America. Allah had condemned America. The Faithful only had to find the means to carry out the execution. Because capability is the sole variable of interest in the war against terrorism, the greater the Islamic strike capability becomes, the stronger the response will be. An unrepeatable attack with a stolen WMD weapon would elicit a different response from one arising from a capability to strike on a sustained and repetitive basis.

As we see from the MEMRI article from a few short days ago quoted above; this position has continued to be promoted by Islam's radicals, who appear to speak not only for themselves, but growingly form most muslims. You also might want to check out this map from an Islamic website; and this documentation of the bloody borders of Islam's expansion since 9/11.

I think it is fair to say that all bets will be off when Iran's nuclear capability becomes not just a threat, but a reality. I suspect that Ahmadinejad's defiant and bellicose position indicates that they already have some limited capability which they will not hesistate to use if the West attempts to destroy their long-range capability.

The second conjecture posits that there will be an escalating exchange of nuclear attacks that will inevitably result in the destruction of Iran and other muslim nations, possibly Pakistan or Syria; but since the threat of terrorism is transnational, the threat's full eradication of necessity will escalate beyond Iranian borders.

Does Islam care about this possibility? In the almost three years since the conjecture was written there are clear signs that some Islamic countries are concerned and risking quite a bit to prevent this scenario. But the great majority welcome it as "Allah's will" and some even have intentions of precipitating it to give credibility to their own little religious sect. Events are moving too slowly in Iraq (though I grant that they are proceeding far more rapidly than anyone thought possible a few short years ago).

The problem is that for the kind of change envisioned by Bush, decades is not too long a time to hope for some of the seeds to grow; and for rigid Middle Eastern minds to evolve and flourish within a democratic medium.

But time is not on our side as Al Qaeda and their allies rush toward their apocolypse; and as our own internal appeasers are more intent on bringing down Republicans than they are are preventing a devastating clash between the forces of civilization and the forces of barbarism.

Conjecture 3: The "War on Terror" is the Golden Hour -- the final chance

It is supremely ironic that the survival of the Islamic world should hinge on an American victory in the War on Terror, the last chance to prevent that terrible day in which all the decisions will have already been made for us. That effort really consists of two separate aspects: a campaign to destroy the locus of militant Islam and prevent their acquisition of WMDs; and an attempt to awaken the world to the urgency of the threat.

President Bush has bet everything on the hope that Islam can be changed if it is infused with some democratic opportunities and freed from some of the political and religious tyranny that has dominated the Middle East. If such a democratizing process had been started--and carried through-- a decade or two earlier, well who knows how much the situation might have changed by now? But it only began after a devastating attack within our borders finally spurred us to mobilize our resources and fight back both militarily and strategically.

And, as I said in an earlier piece, contrary to the infantile imaginings of the antiwar and so-called "peace" movements, Bush's strategy actually represents the best possible hope for peace; even if it is slight.

It is a strategy that faces the grim reality of Islamic contradictions and historical brutality; yet has enough optimism and goodwill in it to be genuinely worth the price we are paying in Afghanistan and Iraq. If it works--and I haven't entirely given up hope yet-- millions of deaths might still be prevented. And if the peace crowd really cares about peace, then they would do well to reconsider their own perverse antics; and the Democrats their knee-jerk opposition.

Because, if they succeed in their determination to undermine American policy as it is now formulated; or if the extremists succeed in eliminating any voices for moderation and tolerance; then there will be only one strategic option open.

Whether it is appreciated or not, these last few years have indeed been our "Golden Hour" --the short time we have to deal with the threat that is represented by the radical elements of Islam. So much of the last three years has been wasted and frittered away by the left and their carping and undermining of Bush's strategic ploy. The continual appeasement, encouragement and cover given to those who would destroy us without mercy, has markedly diluted what we might have accomplished up to now with our aggressive pursuit of the YES Strategy.

The Golden Hour is down to only a few minutes at most. As the clock ticks down to answering NO to that fundamental strategic question; and as we creep closer and closer to the ultimate confrontation with a medieval, uncompromising and fanatically ruthless religion; there will be no deus ex machina --and no pointless protest march with clever placards--that will be able to save the millions of lives lost in that conflagration.

ANSWER,Code Pink, most of the Democratic Party and all the other leftist nutjobs are already preparing to blame Bush if the worse happens. Others will recognize the truth-- that Bush has chosen a strategy and done everything possible to change the course of history. That the strategy was implemented too far along in the process to be able to wholly succeed; or that the enemy is even more nimble and eager to embrace death than western sensibilities could have possibly predicted-- are painful realities that must be faced.

One ought never to turn one's back on a threatened danger and try to run away from it. If you do that, you will double the danger. But if you meet it promptly and without flinching, you will reduce the danger by half.- Sir Winston Churchill

- Diagnosed by Dr. Sanity @ 12:43 PM Comments (2) | Trackback (0)    

To say yes to our question, one assumes that there are aspects of being Muslim and faithful to Islam, that can coexist peacefully with liberty, tolerance, and equality. The strategy that follows is one of identifying the groups and sects within Islam that adhere to these notions of their religion, and then encouraging them, favoring them, propagating them, and splitting them off from the elements of Islamic practice that are all too incompatible with the portions of modernity that invigorate men's souls: free inquiry, free association, free commerce, free worship, or even the freedom to be left alone. To answer no, one states that Islam itself is fundamentally irreconcilable with freedom. This leads to a wholly different set of tactical moves to isolate free societies from Islam. They might include: -detention of Muslims, or an abrogation of certain of their rights; -forced deportation of Muslims from free societies; -rather than transformative invasions, punitive expeditions and punitive strikes; -extreme racial profiling; -limits on the practice and study of Islam in its entirety

Here the problem as i see it in this whole "yes" or "no" idea.
Any time the Muslims are given a FREE CHOICE in a FREE ELECTION they always and i do mean ALWAYS Choose a Fundmentalist religious party to run the Gov't. And only when the "elites" stop this and call in the army does it get prevented. We've seen it time and time again in Algeria, Egypt, Jordan , Pakistan and more importantly Turkey. Tukey is the one "shining star" that people point to and say "see?" a Muslim country can be democratic. Well First off they are not Arab and second they are hardly what you would call a democracy! Have people already forgoten that only 5 years ago they elected a "Islamic" party only to have the military cancel the elections? Some democracy!! This also unmines the notion that Islam has been highjacked by a small "radical" minority, and that the rest yearn for Democracy and freedom. If this is so then why do a vast majority go to the polls and elect Fundamentalist parties?? Bringing "democracy" to the ME will only allow fundamentalist regimes to take over. But propping up Dictators is what got us in trouble in the first place. The solution? TOTAL DISENGAGEMENT , till they sort out their own problems. I once thought that what Isreal was doing by building that wall and having nothing to do With negotiations was stubborn and stupid, now i see that is the only real solution for now. Given the chance, the Palis chose a terroristic Political party. Once they withdrew from Gaza, all they got in return was Rockets and snipers.  I see Isreal first then Russia then Europe as the "bell weathers" as to the future of engagement with the Muslim world. All of them have hardened their stance against Islam. Simply because they are closer to the ME and have a larger immigrant minority. Look at the once tolerant Dutch and Scandinvian countries, They now have shut down immigration and passed laws making it harder to live as a "sharia" Muslim in their land. In france there has begun a "blue scarf" revolution in which people are wearing a blue scarf in protest against what they see as lies coming from the GOv't in relation to the Muslim immigration problem. Belive me, Iraq is just a sideshow in relation to this "long struggle". And the future looks worse not better.