Monday, July 25, 2005

Cassandra

The Economist offers this appraisal of the literary journey of Oriana Fallaci.

There is nothing al-Qaeda would like more than for Europeans to turn on Muslims in their midst, uniting fundamentalist militants with those who are neither fundamentalist nor militant. In that sense, Osama bin Laden won yet another victory this week with the publication of another hate-filled, anti-Islamic diatribe by an Italian writer who has become noted for such diatribes: Oriana Fallaci. Over the past three years, the 76-year-old Ms Fallaci has carved out a role as the voice of what might be a new European racism ....

The Digital Divide warns us in particular against her new book "Il Nemico che Trattiamo da Amico" (The Enemy we Treat as a Friend).

Excerpts from Oriana Fallaci's "Il Nemico che Trattiamo da Amico" (The Enemy We Treat as a Friend") are being circulated online: they make it seem like a manifesto in "Defence of the Christian Western World", which was so dear to the colonels who imposed their dictatorship upon Greece in 1967-74. However, the full article (1) irresistibly evokes Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Bagatelles pour un massacre, in a more violent tone: same stereotyping, same obsessiveness, same rambling prolixity praised as literary talent by their fans. But Céline's writing was more controlled.

As a consequence of her writing, the Guardian reports Fallaci may be in real trouble.

A radical Muslim leader, Adel Smith, told the Guardian he was bringing a civil action for damages against the writer and journalist Oriana Fallaci. He has already succeeded in getting Ms Fallaci committed for trial next year in criminal proceedings for blasphemy. Last month a judge in the northern Italian city of Bergamo agreed that the 76-year-old Ms Fallaci should answer to claims of abusing Islam in her book The Strength of Reason. Since then, her cause has become a rallying point for mainly rightwing intellectuals and politicians in Italy and the US, where Ms Fallaci lives.

Article continues Mr Smith said he would be seeking damages for libel on the grounds that the author had claimed in a recent essay that he had issued death threats against her. Ms Fallaci, who is ill with cancer, could not be contacted for comment.

"The Enemy We Treat as a Friend" does not seem to be posted online, except in Italian.  But a circulated email contains extensive excerpts in English translation, parts of which are quoted below without vouching for the accuracy of translation. (Hat tip: K) Fallaci seems to take the position that a hostile civilization has entered Europe and that the clashes cannot long be delayed. She finds scant difference between 'moderates' and 'extremists' in "The Enemy we Treat as a Friend".  Fallaci argues that her warnings to a city under siege have been vindicated by events yet society refuses to see what this implies.

Yes, it's true: In newspapers that in the best of cases pharasaically opposed me with a conspiracy of silence now appear titles using my concepts and words. - "War Against the West."; "Cult of Death"; "The Suicide of Europe"; Wake up, Italy! Wake up!" Yes, it's true: Though without admitting I wasn't wrong, the ex-secretary of the Democratic Left now submits to interviews in which he declares that "these-terrorists-want-to-destroy-our-values"; that "this-slaughter-is-facist-in-nature-and-expresses-hatred-for-our-civilization". Yes, it's true: In speaking of Londonistan ...  are now saying what I did when I wrote that in each one of our cities exists another city. A subterranean city; equal to Beirut when it was invaded by Arafat in the 70s. A foreign city that speaks its own language and observes its own customs; a Muslim city where terrorists go about their business undisturbed and, thus undisturbed, plan our deaths. ... Yes it's true: Now, even the fifth columnists and the imams express their hypocritical condemnations, their mendacious loathing, their false solidarity with the relatives of the victims. Yes, it's true: Now, thorough searches are being made in the cases of the accused Muslims; suspects are arrested; perhaps it will even be decided to expel them.

But in substance, nothing has changed. ... I am also troubled because it goes along with, and thereby reinforces that which I consider the error committed by Papa Wojtyla: not to fight as much as he should have, in my opinion, against the illiberal and anti-democratic - no, cruel - essence of Islam. During these last four years, I have done nothing but ask myself why a warrior like Wojtyla, a leader so singular who contributed more than anyone else to the downfall of the Soviet empire and, therefore, of Communism, showed himself to be so weak towards a disease worse than the Soviet empire or Communism. A disease that, above all, targets Christianity (and Judaism) for destruction. I have done nothing but ask myself why he did not inveigh openly against what was happening (and is happening), for example, in Sudan where the fundamentalist regime was practicing (and is practicing) slavery. Where Christians were eliminated (are eliminated) by the millions. Why he was silent about Saudi Arabia where anyone with a Bible in hand or a cross around his neck was (and is) treated like a scum to be put to death. Still today, there is that silence I don't understand ...

Will the massacre touch us too? - will it really touch us the next time? Oh,  yes. I haven't the slightest doubt. I've never had the slightest doubt. I've been saying this,  too,  for the last four years. And I add: They have not yet attacked us [only] because of their need for a landing zone,  a bridgehead,  a handy outpost named "Italy." ... But soon,  they will go on a rampage. Bin Laden himself has promised it - explicitly,  clearly,  precisely. ...

To all appearances Fallaci pulls out the stops and regards Islam itself as an imperalistic enterprise, bent on conquest and incapable of coexistence with others. In her phrase it has obtained "a bridgehead" in preparation for further advances. The Belmont Club pointed out that the problem with this argument is that Muslims themselves are the most frequent victims of Jihadi violence; and the second that Muslims comprise the most numerous allies of America against organizations like the Al Qaeda. By turning Islam into a black box, the inside of which we are unable to understand or alter, Fallaci dooms the conflict into an external clash between two irreconciliably opposed civilizations. There is no significant room for an Islamic liberation movement. Fallaci expects nothing from within Islam itself. The "bridgehead" builds from Islam outward. No counter-landing is possible within the Ummah.

But even if Europe finally confronts "the monster with honor, courage; and by remembering the words that Churchill said to the English when he went to war against Hitler's Nazism," as Fallaci puts it, the history of the Balkans suggests that the West would pay a price so high it would be wounded for centuries. Medieval Serbia was once a pinnacle of Europe in the mid-14th century. But after their defeat by the Ottomans Serbia fragmented into brooding ethnic enclaves. And in the end it was not defeat which they could not transcend, but the smallness of mind which they learned day by day, in the atmosphere of unending mutual suspicion. Serbia never rose to its height again.

Since the Ottoman Empire was an Islamic theocratic state, Christian Serbs lived as virtual bond servants - abused, humiliated and exploited. Consequently they gradually abandoned the developed and urban centers where mining, crafts and trade was practiced and withdrew to hostile mountains living on cattle breeding and modest farming. ... This historical defeat of this Christian Empire against the invading Muslims has however, produced numerous legends, poems and stories that have preserved the Serbian distinct nationality for the centuries to come under Muslim rule, with the Serbian Orthodox Church being the "guardian of the medieval times".

The danger of waiting until the cultural divisions grow too great within the West is that any struggle fought to preserve its values is bound to destroy them in the cataclysm. Mark Steyn shows how the process of destroying tolerance in order to save it is already happening.

That's the great thing about multiculturalism: it doesn't involve knowing anything about other cultures ...  Instead, it just involves feeling warm and fluffy, making bliss out of ignorance. And one notices a subtle evolution in multicultural pieties since the Islamists came along. It was most explicitly addressed by the eminent British lawyer Baroness Kennedy of the Shaws, QC, who thought that it was too easy to disparage "Islamic fundamentalists". "We as western liberals too often are fundamentalist ourselves. We don't look at our own fundamentalisms." And what exactly would those western liberal fundamentalisms be? "One of the things that we are too ready to insist upon is that we are the tolerant people and that the intolerance is something that belongs to other countries like Islam. And I'm not sure that's true."

Hmm. Kennedy appears to be arguing that our tolerance of our own tolerance is making us intolerant of other people's intolerance, which is intolerable. Thus the lop-sided valse macabre of our times: the more the Islamists step on our toes, the more we waltz them gaily round the room. ... tolerance of intolerance gives an even more intense frisson of pleasure to the multiculti masochists.

The saddest thing about Steyn's brilliant essay is that he understands that multiculturalists don't even want to know Muslims as people; whether they bleed from car bombs; whether they look up at the sky and long to rise with the wind. Those who would disparage Oriana Fallaci's monolithic portrayal of Muslims should remember how happy some Liberals are to have Muslims as cardboard cutout figures on their own dilapidated historical stage. When on September 12 President Bush vowed "to find those folks who committed this act"  -- many commentators laughed at the word "folks" -- he may have intuitively understood that the War on Terror would be waged not only on the battlefield, but for the hearts of men. But it is precisely this redemptive aspect which we are so unwilling to believe in; so willing to mock. I think Auden came nearest our own opinion of ourselves in his classic poem, September 1, 1939.

I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn,
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return. ...

Faces along the bar
Cling to their average day:
The lights must never go out,
The music must always play,
All the conventions conspire
To make this fort assume
The furniture of home;
Lest we should see where we are,
Lost in a haunted wood,
Children afraid of the night
Who have never been happy or good. ...

The first requirement of survival is to become worthy of it.

61 Comments:

Blogger desert rat said...

Oriana Fallaci sees more people stopping by Rick's. They are starting to spread the message the Mohammedans are coming, the Mohammedans are coming!
I would suggest she stay here in the US, blasphemy being a guaranteed right amongst US. As to rendition to an Italian court, well another ancillary reason not to ratify the ICC.
Stay here in the US, Ms Fallaci and enjoy the winds of freedom while you can.
You are welcome here.

7/25/2005 10:12:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

"... Instead, it just involves feeling warm and fluffy, making bliss out of ignorance."
---
Hewitt's guest from CAIR was more than happy to oblige those pursuing continued ignorance, insisting there were no radical Imams in our Mosques, then showing he knew the details of the examples Hugh's callers came up with, in order to "refute" the charges.
The folks that want to continue to feel superior to Hugh's audience only have to continue to accept the lies as truth.
...and ignore small items like his refusal to declare that Israel has a right to exist.

7/25/2005 10:19:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

greer rants,

The crazy thing is that Oriana's prediction of an outrageous attack in Western Europe is probably going to come true. Some museum, cathedral, school or performance hall is going to get hit in the coming months or years. Why not? Osama's mind is dirty enough for anything.

But its the ergo from that probable event that is really slippery. For the the Left, the 'therefore' will be "therefore we must give Osama what he wants". For others it will be "therefore we must put every man jack behind the wire". It's like being trapped in a manic-depressive state. One of the ironic things about reading Milblogs based in Afghanistan or Iraq is how little undirected bloodthirstiness their authors have. They have Muslim friends. They have Muslim enemies. That almost sounds normal.

In contrast the syllogisms with 'All' and 'Every' and 'For Each' acquire an insane absolutist edge into which it surprisingly easy to fall. The real tragedy of the current ideological debate is that blocking common sense action makes people paint themselves into 'final solution' corners.

7/25/2005 11:46:00 PM  
Blogger sam said...

3rd group claims responsibility for Egypt bombs:

A third previously unknown Islamist group has claimed responsibility on the Internet for the bomb attacks on Egypt's Sharm el-Sheikh resort in which at least 64 people were killed.

The claim by the Tawhid and Jihad Group in Egypt could be more credible as it was posted on an Islamist Web site often used by the al Qaeda Organization in Iraq, but it was not possible to verify the authenticity of the undated statement.

http://today.reuters.com/News/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2005-07-26T054634Z_01_N2677115_RTRIDST_0_INTERNATIONAL-EGYPT-EXPLOSIONS-CLAIM-DC.XML

7/25/2005 11:48:00 PM  
Blogger brett_mcs said...

The Economist is sprouting rubbish. A robust, up-front discussion at this stage can go a long way to defusing tensions later.

7/26/2005 12:18:00 AM  
Blogger Charles said...

What americans don't quite understand about europe is that they are their own indians. when they dig in the soil and find arrow heads--those arrowheads were made by their own ancestors. When they go to the mountains and find rock drawings--those rock drawings were made by their own ancestors.

The europeans will not give up their birthright any more than the chinese or the japanese would in the same situation.

However, given the nature of the problem and reality of politics--this cannot end smoothly. It must end badly. There will come a day when Europe in some great spasm will expell all moslems.

This is nothing new. they have done this sort of thing before.

The big thing that americans must ensure--is that these moslems expellees return to their countries of origin.

If they come to the USA they will murder this country--as it will be filled with mortal enemies of the type who kicked them out and humiliated them-- white christians and jews.

7/26/2005 12:35:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Wretchard,

It has been some time since you've chose a bit of poetry to bring a post to a close. I'd almost forgotten how pleasant it was. I've never been much of a poetry reader, but I've always liked your choices.

Generally I never liked The Economist's politics, but it seems that post-7/7 many former BDS sufferers have shocked out of the worst of their symptoms. They've also achieved a clearheaded view of the true 'root causes' of terror.

Quote: "[Jihad] is not a program, really. It’s a wraparound justification for a violence whose real end is the expiation of shame through massacre,” says BBC editor Mark Urban :End Quote

Islamic beliefs may be unique to Muslims, and perhaps they may complicate an already complicated situation, but shame is part of the human condition. If shame, and other human frailties, are understood to be the 'root cause' of terror, then Islam is off the hook.

"Ergo", all humans are capable of terror (another Belmont thread) so we better find a solution that works for all humankind. Oh wait, we've already got that: democratic liberalism. Better get the Middle East a double dose of that, stat!

Wait, did a Beeb editor just agree with Bush?

7/26/2005 12:35:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

ADE:
Multicult Demands it be you.
---
"A seminar at the UK's (BBC sponsored) technology conference 'Open Tech 2005' (organised by the fantastic 'Need To Know' (NTK) team as a follow on to last year's "Notcon 2004"event) posed the question 'Where is the British EFF?' The answer, as prompted by those attending the seminar was, of course 'Nowhere! So why don't We create it?'
A PledgeBank page was set up within a few hours (available here) which states that the pledging person will donate £5 (GBP) per month to the support of a British EFF-style organisation provided that 1000 others also agree to do so. There is considerably more information at Danny O'Brien's Oblomovoka.

7/26/2005 02:56:00 AM  
Blogger al fin said...

The more viciously they attack Oriana Fallaci, the more obviously her prophecies will be seen to be fulfilled. The islamist attack dogs and their servants on the left are perfect illustrations of the point Ms. Fallaci is making.

She is shaping herself into a martyr for western civilisation, a very public martyr who will rally millions to her cause. The decorticate, reflexive attacks against her only make her more powerful.

7/26/2005 03:17:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

Is Old Europe finally learning that it must join the global war on terror?
.
BY PETE DU PONT

7/26/2005 04:32:00 AM  
Blogger goesh said...

The duties of islam are quite clear all througout al qur'an. Read it and weep, or read it and act. People can dream all they want about islamic reform but the words of the text are not going to be deleted or altered, and as long as economic and political inequity can be blamed on the other side, the conflict will rage. The qur'an makes it quite clear who is to blame for said inequity, after all, isn't that what infidels do? Oppress, exploit, blaspheme??

7/26/2005 05:04:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

Just think of the advancement the Mohammedans have already made, culturally, in just the last decade.
They attempt to muzzle Ms Fallaci with Courts and legal processes.
Salmon Rushdie, another writer that blasphemies Mohammedism was sentenced to death in an Iranian fatwa.
What progress they are making.
Don't worry, be happy. There may be hope yet.

7/26/2005 05:26:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

Execution for Theft and inciting public disorder.
Iran

7/26/2005 06:01:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

At least they did not amputate their hands.
A long drop, short rope.
Do death sentences deter crime?
Only Mohammedans know for sure, but you'd think that anti Capital Punishment crowd in the 'West' would be up in arms over public hangings in Iran.
What were the 'root causes' of those young men's road to the gallows?
As rick ballard posted yesterday, perhaps we should take a page from their book. I doubt, though, that anyone will be dancing the jig in England over those London bombings.
Such a shame

7/26/2005 06:10:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

"What were the 'root causes' of those young men's road to the gallows?"
---
HBIWC Syndrome:
Humans Born in Wrong Country.

7/26/2005 06:17:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

The Waiting Room

7/26/2005 06:21:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

notice the guy with the video camera? I can't wait for blog tv. Oh the short clips we'll see then.The fellow on the left seems to be quite unhappy, dispair would seem an adequate word.
I doubt that Richard Reid looks so down beat, he is in line for three hots and a cot for the rest of his natural life. His crimes make theft and inciting public disorder pale in comparison.
What a benevolent land we live in.

7/26/2005 06:35:00 AM  
Blogger ShrinkWrapped said...

Wretchard,
You are correct up to a point. I liken the state of Islam today with the condition of Germany in the 1930's. In the early years of the Nazi party, only a very tiny minority supported Hitler. Most Germans were indifferent, some were silently in opposition, a very small minority actively opposed the Nazis (and were at risk of being assaulted and killed for their temerity.) Once Hitler gained momentum, he still had only a minority of support but the opposition remained silent and he eventually was able to gain power; the outcome was predictable in the mid-1930's but the Churchills of the world were marginalized and rejected.
Today, a small, vocal, powerful community actively supports violent Jihad against the West (and against "apostate" Muslims). A large minority (a majority in some places) vocally and financially supports al Qaeda; a large, silent majority takes some pleasure in seeing the "arrogant" West humbled by 9/11 & 7/7 attacks. At this point, a small part of Islam is struggling to modernize and reform their religion. We should all hope they succeed but time is against them, and us.
Every attack on the West, especially another attack on the scale of 9/11, makes further polarization of the West versus Islam more likely (an outcome only desirable to al Qaeda, as you suggest.)
This is why the information war being fought in our MSM is so crucial. We need to "name" our enemy; we need to maximize our chances of establishing a functioning democracy in Iraq, and we need to expose and delegitimize those who support our enemies. We need the time to achieve this and the MSM works against us in both undermining support for the war effort and undermining our efforts to protect ourselves at home.
Fallaci may indeed be alarmist and extreme, however, she forces the key question that no one here can answer, and no one in Islam has yet been able to answer: Is Islam compatible with liberal democracy? Obviously, many Muslims support democracy and tolerance; is that enough? I would suggest that we will not know this for some time and every success by al Qaeda makes the answer less certain to be in the affirmative.
Fallaci is less of a risk than the Imam who is threatening her and is white washed by the Italian media and the Italian legal authorities. Her over-the-top rhetoric is unlikely to become a "self fulfilling prophecy"; what will make the prophecy more likley is our denial that so many in Islam agree with her that they are our enemies. As long as multi-culturism prevents us from recognizing that our culture is worth defending and is better than the 7th century culture being offered in its stead, we will make a greater atrocity more likely; and with each atrocity, the three conjectures gets nearer.
To amend my question: Does Islam have enough time, and the will, to reform itself and destroy the culture of Jihad that has been nurtured within it before a disaster occurs on such a scale that a war of civilizations is unavoidable?
I do not think we are any closer to answering that question now than we were in 2001.

7/26/2005 06:39:00 AM  
Blogger Jamie Irons said...

Wretchard,

While Fallaci's writing at time seems "extreme," it never seems -- to me -- "racist." (I know, I know... Islam is not a "race," but I'm adopting the position of her detractors for a moment.)

I get the feeling she would be perfectly happy to acknowledge any movement from within "the Monster" to reform itself. It's just that she doesn't see much evidence of such a movement.

Neither do I.

But I fervently hope both Ms. Fallaci and I are mistaken.

And Wretchard, I continue to be impressed not only by your tough-mindedness and erudition, but by your humane and generous mind, as in this statement:

But it is precisely this redemptive aspect which we are so unwilling to believe in; so willing to mock...

And this observation, from your comment above, also gives one hope:

One of the ironic things about reading Milblogs based in Afghanistan or Iraq is how little undirected bloodthirstiness their authors have. They have Muslim friends. They have Muslim enemies. That almost sounds normal...

Jamie Irons

7/26/2005 06:51:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

dean
Do you belief that the "West' will put up with terror bombings and global unrest for the next four decades, while the Mohammedans bring forth an enlighten generation of leaders?
I think that will try our patience. This is not like the Cold War where MAD thinking kept US from acting for years. No, there is no equality of force in this equation. There is no counter balance to our strength, other than our reluctence to use it. How long we remain passive to multiple assualts is an open question, but forty years seems, to me, beyond the reasonable.

7/26/2005 07:18:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

Somewhat off topic but within the realm of discussion
In an article at washingtonpost.com announces
"A new study by a liberal Washington think tank puts the cost of forcibly removing most of the nation's estimated 10 million illegal immigrants at $41 billion a year, a sum that exceeds the annual budget of the Department of Homeland Security. ... estimate of costs associated with arresting, detaining, prosecuting and removing immigrants who have entered the United States illegally or overstayed their visas. The total cost would be $206 billion to $230 billion over five years, depending on how many of the immigrants leave voluntarily..."

Maximum Rendition

So for half of what Operation Iraqi Freedom costs annually we COULD remove the criminal migrants from our midst. I am not sure that we should, but it Could be done.
The costs are affordable, if we were to decide to do it.

7/26/2005 07:28:00 AM  
Blogger Annoy Mouse said...

Ship of Fools
Let Fallaci be tried in a Sharia court. The outcome would be most telling. It is sad when Western Civilization must hide behind the skirt of an ailing 76 year old lady. Who would be so bold as to welcome unpopularity on the Left and to be marked for death by Fascists? The term “the enemy we treat as a friend” rings of that other famous Italian, Cicero’s oft quoted diatribe on those who would infect the body politic, “The enemy within”;

‘"A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself.’


The greater danger that Fallaci certainly sees is that we of democratic values would invite unassimilated strangers, who do not share our values, to a place in our governing institutions. The ruling elites selfish desire to make our democracy attractive to foreign interests is an abrogation of responsibility in the protection deserved by the incumbent Westernized populace. A ship of fools will endure its careless ramblings until it is dashed against the rocks of cold, hard reality.

7/26/2005 08:00:00 AM  
Blogger exhelodrvr1 said...

FYI, Fallaci is not a Christian. She sees this as a struggle between the West and Islam, not Christianity per se and Islam.

7/26/2005 08:34:00 AM  
Blogger Evan said...

The europeans will not give up their birthright any more than the chinese or the japanese would in the same situation.

Charles,

I disagree. I see the bulk of Europeans as so crippled by senescence, so in love with (for those who are not unemployed) the life of ease promised by the ultimately unsustainable welfare state, and so in thrall to multiculturalism that if their civilization were at risk they would be hard-pressed to defend it. Indeed, anti-Americanism for its own sake as the primary ideology of many Europeans is so intense that I could even see more and more European opinion-makers lining up international support over time for accommodating the "legitimate grievances" of the Islamists. It is this peculiar combination of self-loathing, multiculturalist contempt for the strangers among them and the long-term decline of society and economy that in my judgment makes European Muslims the bull market for jihad.

I don't live there, and most of what I know is only my interpretation of what I read. But that's how it looks to me on this side of the Atlantic.

7/26/2005 09:39:00 AM  
Blogger Oscar in Kansas said...

"(T)he problem with (Fallaci's)argument is that Muslims themselves are the most frequent victims of Jihadi violence." Russians were the most frequent victims of Soviet violence, Chinese of Mao's, Cambodian's of the Khmer Rouge's violence.

1) Just because most victims of our enemy's violence happen to be in some way closer to the enemy in terms of nationality or religion does not in anyway argue that our enemy is more tolerable or any less committed to our destruction.

2) You may be making a distinction that our enemy does not share. Jihadist ideology accuses Westernized Muslims, the Saud family and their supporters, Shias and Sufis of being heretics, blasphemers, enemies of Islam. They are as bad, or in the case of the Shia worse, than the Western 'cross worshipers' and Jewish pig-monkies.

Her style may be bombastic and offensive but Fallaci has a point. While individual Muslims may be fine upstanding Western citizens, as recent polls in Britain show, enough Western Muslims are sympathetic to our enemy to pose serious questions not about integration or assimilation but even simple coexistence. One basic problem is that we can't tell the fanatics from the regular Joe Muslim. And here's the scary part - neither can Muslims, neither can family members of the suicide bombers. How can a society tolerate millions of people when apparently any male between 15-50 can, at any time and without any signs even to those he lives with, transform into a suicide jihad killer? When any Muslim can be a jihadi, suspision of all Muslims is only rational, isn't it?

Not every Japanese was a fanatic Shito-imperialist bent on Asian domination yet we levelled their cities all the same. We blasted them into submission and set about radically changing their culture and their religion. What exactly were our choices?

7/26/2005 12:23:00 PM  
Blogger M. Simon said...

I like her term "Islamic Nazis". It fits.

7/26/2005 12:33:00 PM  
Blogger NahnCee said...

Doug said, "HBIWC Syndrome:
Humans Born in Wrong Country"

I read it as Humans Born in the Wrong CENTURY.

As to the concept of moderate imams, just remember that *if* they can bring themselves to agree that maybe the Koran could be rewritten to take out the "kill the infidels" parts, they must at the same time acknowledge inside themselves that they will be giving up power. Currently, if it's in the book, it's a "do it or die" situation, with the Imam's being the ones who get to make those sorts of pronouncements.

IF they agree to moderate themselves (on threat of annihilation otherwise) they'll be giving up that authority and therefore that power. Even in Saudi Arabia, the Wahhabi's have sufficient power to do anything they damn well please and the Princes are *not* going to do anything about it. Be a big step to take to give away the stick that makes you a big frog in a small pond.

Finally, different topic, it seems to me that we MUST do something about this tendency of Muslims to abuse our legal system by suing everything and everyone in sight in an attempt to DEMAND respect. I see no reason why someone like Fallaci should be hauled off to court by every pea-brained CAIR-backed nutsoid in a hijab, in what is essentially a campaign of harassment.

Either our legislators need to legislate against this -- enact laws that would, for example, forbid any lawsuits predicated on an "insult to Islam", or we need to start suing the hell back at ALL Islamists and CAIR-types, and/or whenever a Muslim-based lawsuit is lost or thrown out of court a HUGE judgment needs to be socked against the person who brought the frivolous lawsuit in the first place.

Bankruptcy can be marvelous as a way of defining perspective although we'd probably have to listen to a lot of victim-y whining first.

7/26/2005 12:35:00 PM  
Blogger M. Simon said...

anybudee,

I like the fact that Jesus never quit being Jewish.

Christians ought to take that fact to heart.

Past time to get back to the old time religion.

7/26/2005 12:39:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

In the end the what will happen will be that the hydrogen research ongoing currently will kill the cost of hydrogen enabling cars driven by water. As well, current research work will kill the cost of water desalination and water trasportation.

the result will be that the habitable size of the earth will double and there'll be a lot more green to suck up carbon dioxide. And the eyes of desert people will lose their squint.

7/26/2005 02:42:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

In the end the what will happen will be that the hydrogen research ongoing currently will kill the cost of hydrogen enabling cars driven by water. As well, current research work will kill the cost of water desalination and water trasportation.

the result will be that the habitable size of the earth will double and there'll be a lot more green to suck up carbon dioxide. And the eyes of desert people will lose their squint.

7/26/2005 02:42:00 PM  
Blogger Utopia Parkway said...

Cardozo Bozo 12:35 AM,

In your quote:

"[Jihad] is not a program, really. It’s a wraparound justification for a violence whose real end is the expiation of shame through massacre,” says BBC editor Mark Urban.

The shame the writer refers to is the shame of the Honor/Shame society. To the member of this kind of society personal Honor is the most important thing in life. To be shamed is to have that honor taken away. In Arab societies the way to restore that honor is to take it back from whoever has taken it away, by killing them if required. Whenever you read the ravings of Hamas, for example, you will always see the words Humiliation and Revenge figure prominantly. This is why.

The Arab Honor/Shame culture is responsible for honor killings and honor rapes. These are things we in the West find incomprehensible.

Not all Honor/Shame societies demand violence in response to Shame. The Japanese Samurai society was an H/S society but its response to shame was suicide.

While it is clear that many actions of the Jihadis are simply revenge and envy, as the writer suggests, I don't think that it explains everything. I think that OBL is a megalomaniac. He wants POWER. Islam is his method for gaining it, most likely because he had no other method and because Islam does lend itself to supremacism and violence.

I do think that Islam can be separated from the H/S nature of the Arab culture. It will require major changes in the Arab societies though and I don't know if there is enough time for them to change before we must respond very harshly to their provocations.

7/26/2005 03:09:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

disagree. I see the bulk of Europeans as so crippled by senescence, so in love with (for those who are not unemployed) the life of ease promised by the ultimately unsustainable welfare state, and so in thrall to multiculturalism that if their civilization were at risk they would be hard-pressed to defend it.

///////////////
in order for the europeans to pay for the welfare state--and their old age --they have to either reproduce or import more people.

these are really hard facts that are impossible to ignore.


the current regime is souring their view of imported people.

that leaves reproduction. in order to reproduce social and personal courage on a great scale is required. you only get that from religion. when their religion returns so will their historical memory.

then they will kick out the moslems in their midst because the moslems will become symbolic of the decadence they will have eschewed.

the moslems have assumed the part of the arians in the civil wars of the 4th century rome.

the grievous thing is that the USA currently is going the other way. while the USA population is growing at a rate faster than replacement the native white population is growing at a rate that's half of replacement. replacement is 2.x. current white population growth is under 1.

the reason for the current alliance between christian conservatives and jews is that they have seen what abortion has done in the USA and Israeland they have read the old testatment prophet jeremiah. they believe that judgement is coming if the countries of the west don't turn from abortion which they believe is just the same as child sacrifice against which Jeremiah prophesied before the destruction of solomon's temple in 589 bc. the old hebrews took up the abominable practices of their neighbors the caananites and sacrificed their children in the valley of hinnom--which is near Jerusalem
///////////////
Jeremiah 7:30-32 (New International Version)
New International Version (NIV)
Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society



The Valley of Slaughter
30 " 'The people of Judah have done evil in my eyes, declares the LORD. They have set up their detestable idols in the house that bears my Name and have defiled it. 31 They have built the high places of Topheth in the Valley of Ben Hinnom to burn their sons and daughters in the fire—something I did not command, nor did it enter my mind. 32 So beware, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when people will no longer call it Topheth or the Valley of Ben Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter, for they will bury the dead in Topheth until there is no more room.
///////////////
nor would this be the first time that child sacrifice provoked slaughter from neighbors. the caananites were phonecians but the romans called them punic. that's why the roman wars agaist carthage were called the punic wars. the cannanites were cartheginians. the romans were appalled by the cartheginian practice of child sacrifice so they leveled and salted their city so nothing would grow there.

7/26/2005 03:13:00 PM  
Blogger M. Simon said...

Charles,

Suppose the answer is methanol/ethanol?

It is way too early to pick the next transportation technology.

7/26/2005 03:43:00 PM  
Blogger M. Simon said...

Abortion is a good thing.

It reduces the number of Democrats and eliminates from the gene pool those who do not wish to reproduce.

I'm doing my part. My first mate and I have four lovely children.

7/26/2005 04:17:00 PM  
Blogger diabeticfriendly said...

Oh, amen, m. But I wonder if His followers among ethnic Jews would be considered Jewish by those who believe Him.

well actually, the 1st followers of "jesus" were jews, but then it stopped when the early christians sided with rome as not to piss it off, the early christians had 2 opportunity to "continue to be jews" and failed and choose "christianity - followers of christo" as for what they believed, who knows, but all who study that period of jewish history understand that the "messiah" was an earthly king (not son of g-d or g-d) so believing an ass kicking king has shown up for the party aint a sin, just misguided...

7/26/2005 04:25:00 PM  
Blogger desert rat said...

jerry
While I agree we have to hunt the bad guys down and kill them, I am also sure that we can identify the real targets and eliminate them and those that are in their immediate vicinity. We do not have to, at this point, resort to indiscriminate death. The is more to be gained by pinpoint accuracy then by carpet bombing.
At this point anyway.

7/26/2005 04:46:00 PM  
Blogger Engineer-Poet said...

Hydrogen for cars is a blind alley; the most efficient and cheapest sources for hydrogen are natural gas, oil and coal, the very things we are running short of or have to cut back on due to pollution.

The solution is not alcohol of any kind, it's batteries.  You can make electricity from far more "raw materials" than can make carbonaceous fuel, and the losses from source to wheels are far lower than with hydrogen.

Watch my blog, an analysis is coming.

7/26/2005 05:02:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Wretchard,
The on scene bloggers live in a real world, albeit a tough one.
The homefront suffers daily assaults of insanity such as Norman Minetta, Dick Durbin, Ted Kennedy, Pelosi, Boxer, and being told we are "mocking" and unworthy if we simply disagree.
It does get old.
---
CAIR BS ARTIST was completely outed by Frank Gafney on Hugh Hewitt today: Transcript will be at radioblogger.
IMO it is the most important interview I have ever heard, as he is put on record as refusing to acknowledge that Israel has a right to exist as well as other such fine points:
AND IF WE CONDEMN HIM FOR ANY OF HIS POSITIONS WE ARE INFRINGING ON HIS FREE SPEECH RIGHTS AND ARE RACIST TO QUESTION HIS PATRIOTISM.
(also Israels running dogs, but he does not explicitly put it that way.)

7/26/2005 05:48:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

M. Simon said...
Charles,

Suppose the answer is methanol/ethanol?


/////////////////
I think an interem answer is methanol/ethanol. and maybe even those will account for another layer of fuel...especially for cars.

what I don't think either you or engineer poet are looking at is that the methodologies used for genetics has jumped the fense over into materials research.

what these guys are doing is running thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of simulations of combinations of elements/charges/spins to get cheaper/faster/better catalysts and semipermiable membranes.

When they get something they like they shake and bake.

Its amazing but a company as stodgy as GM is saying that they'll get the cost of a fuel cell down by a factor of 10 from $500 a kilowatt to $50@ kilowatt in 5 years.


Why would the research officials be so confident?

The answer is that whole materials research community has become confident in their methodologies.

In a year or two the same kind of work will begin with water desalination. The research problems are very similiar--except they're scaled up by 1000 times. But in the end they're still looking for faster/smarter/cheaper semipermiable membranes and catalysts.

As to turning the desert green--the technology that will enable it will be a pipe that people stick in the ocean. One end of the pipe will consist of a semipermiable membrane that allows only fresh water through a shark skin (ie no maintenance) semipermiable membrane. after water passes into the pipe some of the water will go into a hopper where the hydrogen will be cracked out of the water and the hydrogen fuel will be used to pump the water inland for 1000 miles at a cost similiar to that of water in Pennsylvania or Ireland or Poland or Tokyo.

This will happen. Its happening now but in a kind of dreamlike fashion. The Global WOT could be ended in a few years if the president said that one of the goals in killing the cost of hydrogen production is to kill the cost of water desalination so as to turn all the worlds deserts green and double size of the habitable planet.

Basically Bush would do to the Moslems what Reagan did to the Russians. Radiacally alter their assumptions about the future.

7/26/2005 06:20:00 PM  
Blogger Engineer-Poet said...

Charles, everything you're talking about can be done today.  You want to turn seawater into hydrogen?  Set up a potassium hydroxide electrolysis cell with the electrolyte slightly hypertonic to seawater, and circulate it past a semi-permeable membrane with seawater on the other side.  Voila, water goes from NaCl solution to KOH solution and thence to hydrogen and oxygen.

That's never been the problem.  The main problem is where to get the energy to drive the electrolysis.  I see you have no answers there.

Another problem is the low efficiency of PEM fuel cells.  The numbers I'm seeing from the RMI says 60%; electrolyzers are around 70% at this point.  Combined efficiency is 42% or less; compare this to batteries at 90%.

Hydrogen is easy to produce from the same fossil fuels we're running out of; if you are starting with sunlight or electricity instead of hydrocarbons, just about every other route except direct photosynthesis or photodissociation has far greater losses than batteries.  The "hydrogen economy" is a boondoggle.

7/26/2005 06:46:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Poet, I deleted my text, but here it is again:
Quantities Charles, Quantities:
That pipe into the ocean must be of a certain size.
The size of the semi permeable membrane depends on the flow through that pipe.
At the quantities necessary, the semi permeable structure itself becomes highly problematic, and far from maintenance free, even if it was possible to implement it.

7/26/2005 07:04:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

BTW Poet,
Do you know of any accurate/reliable sources of info on things like real world Prius mileage
WITH AIR CONDITIONING ON?

7/26/2005 07:05:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

Engineer-Poet said...
Charles, everything you're talking about can be done today.
///////////
agreed. But its way too expensive. The whole point of the work in the next couple years will be to kill the cost.
////////////////
The main problem is where to get the energy to drive the electrolysis. I see you have no answers there.

imho this problem will be solved by converting sunlight/water directly into hydrogen rather doing the two step electrolsys biz. There's probably several dozen groups around the world working on this. I've seen progress reports from maybe 6 by typing in photovoltaic research or hydrogen research into google news. But I also think that the problem will be attacked from the other end as well. ie catalysts are being developed which will lower the energy needed to break hydrogen out of its O2 bond. Anyhow that's what the modern labs are working at modeling.

///////////////////

7/26/2005 08:01:00 PM  
Blogger Engineer-Poet said...

Doug:  Probably not dissimilar to the difference you get in a Lupo WITH AIR CONDITIONING ON.

Charles:  if you think that a catalyst can reduce the energy required to produce hydrogen from water, you are into perpetuum mobile loony-land.

7/26/2005 08:08:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

At the quantities necessary, the semi permeable structure itself becomes highly problematic, and far from maintenance free, even if it was possible to implement it.
/////////////
well the semi permiable membrane would only be at the end of the pipe and stuck out far enough in the ocean so there's a current going by. The rest of the pipe would be made of some material that was coated with sharkoate.

for some friggin interesting reading check out this piece on Sharkote. some guy asked the question: why don't barnicles algae grow on sharks. so he made a material called "Sharkote" that protects ships hulls from barnicles and algae. Seems to me this stuff would work for pipes too.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66833,00.html

7/26/2005 08:14:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

Charles: if you think that a catalyst can reduce the energy required to produce hydrogen from water, you are into perpetuum mobile loony-land.
///////////////
Well I agree that water--as we know it-- is very very very stable. but water is also very very very mysterious.

here's a piece called The New Mystery of Water that says:

Water was thrust into the scientific limelight this past April, when a team of scientists led by Anders Nilsson from the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center presented evidence that water is more loosely bound than previously thought.

http://www.livescience.com/forcesofnature/041201_water_bonds.html
.................
here's another piece called "Water IS Wierd" that says

"We still don't quantitatively understand the physics of liquid water," says
Richard Saykally, a world-renowned chemist at the University of California
at Berkeley.
http://www.water-consciousness.com/must/must_article30.htm
//////////////////////
my only point is that there's interesting stuff happening

7/26/2005 08:25:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

hmmm yes you're right--judging by this link. but even here at the link you provide--the average birth rate among whites in the USA is below replacement. see the quote.

///////////////////////////

The federal National Center for Health Statistics reported that in 2002 the average white woman was giving birth at a pace consistent with having 1.83 babies during her lifetime, or 13 percent below the replacement rate of 2.1 children per woman. This below-replacement level has not changed dramatically in three decades.
http://www.isteve.com/babygap.htm

7/26/2005 08:46:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Hey, Poet,
I can understand how you might take it otherwise, but I was actually being serious:
I am truly interested, and I think you can understand WHY the figures I am interested in are w/AC on.
(or at least you will upon reading my greeting)

Greetings from Maui.

7/26/2005 08:47:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

"well the semi permiable membrane would only be at the end of the pipe and stuck out far enough in the ocean so there's a current going by. The rest of the pipe would be made of some material that was coated with sharkoate."
---
Charles,
Unless I am missing something, it would seem that if you only have the area of the end of the pipe to work with for the membrane, you'd be talking VERY low flow rates, certainly not city/irrigation supply quantities.

7/26/2005 08:53:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

Doug said...
"well the semi permiable membrane would only be at the end of the pipe and stuck out far enough in the ocean so there's a current going by. The rest of the pipe would be made of some material that was coated with sharkoate."
---
Charles,
Unless I am missing something, it would seem that if you only have the area of the end of the pipe to work with for the membrane, you'd be talking VERY low flow rates, certainly not city/irrigation supply quantities.
////////////////
true: the semi permiable membrane hasn't been developed yet that could deliver fresh water in volume at coastal ocean pressures. current semi premiable membranes take a lot of energy/money to force water through the membrane. The focus of research for the next bunch of years is to develop cheap membranes that enable substantial flow rates at low pressures. that's what the computer modeling is about.

7/26/2005 09:00:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

7/26/2005 10:33:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

"Doug said...
"In Afghanistan we are already well on our way toward winning, but we must remember who our friends are."
"
---
I just read somewhere that our friends mostly just reside around Kabul:
I could not reconcile that with reports of how the election went in widely dispersed areas.
---
We do have a lot of protecting to do, however, on the Pakistan border areas, so our friends remain free.

7/26/2005 11:34:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

7/27/2005 12:28:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

Engineer Poet,
Please read my 8:47 PM post.
I am assuming Prius would take a bigger hit from AC due to the fact that the combustion engine must run all the time for the AC Compressor?
...but at any rate, I am just looking for real world figures on it for the reason given in 8:47 PM post.
I've read Maintenance on it has been extremely low.
Thanks,
Doug

7/27/2005 01:28:00 AM  
Blogger Engineer-Poet said...

Doug:  the latest Prius has electric A/C that can and does run off the battery alone.  The Hondas don't have this option, and won't until the next .

But this is all off-topic for Wretchard's post.  The only reason I'm bringing up energy stuff here is to try to keep the people who decide that something needs to be done from running down conceptual blind alleys or buying into scams.  (Ethanol and hydrogen are scams; click through to my blog.)

7/27/2005 05:08:00 AM  
Blogger Ardsgaine said...

The answer to the question of whether Islam is compatible with liberal democracy is 'yes, so long as Muslims are willing to reinterpret, gloss over or ignore those passages of the Koran advocating violence against sinners and unbelievers.' This shouldn't be too hard. Christians do it all the time. When was the last time we stoned anyone in the US?

Religious texts are notoriously open to variable interpretations. How did medieval Christians go from 'love they neighbor as thyself' to slaughtering the Cathars? It's all in the interpretation.

The thing about Islam is that it developed out of the same traditions as Christianity, but at a time in history when monotheistic theocracy had taken over the Roman Empire. Islam translated into theory what Christianity had developed as practice. That is why theocracy is a more integral part of Islam than of Christianity. Christianity began as a spiritual rebellion against government, and only later co-opted the government and morphed itself into theocracy. Can Islam do the reverse? Sure. There is no limit to the ability of the religious mind to ignore inconvenient facts. When the Koran's exhortations to conquer and subjugate the infidel become inconvenient, Muslims will learn to ignore them.

We just have to make them inconvenient.

7/27/2005 05:19:00 AM  
Blogger Jrod said...

Doug,
re: your posts linked to pictures of Iranian youths about to be hanged. Their crime was being gay --Andrew Sullivan has quite a bit on the subject last week.
http://gayorbit.net/index.php?p=2459

7/27/2005 08:31:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

jrod

Public hanging for being happy, who'd believe such a thing could happen.

7/27/2005 12:03:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

As you noted, they didn't look happy in that cage, and could the devil come up for anything fit for the guy w/the video camera?
---
The thing that struck me was the stark contrast of the Sterile Evil of the black hooded, black gloved hangmen with the very young, clean cut youth in their care.
Did you notice the hand in the foreground?
...just the fingers, looks almost like a loved one grasping for one last time.
Very nice Democracy, that.

7/27/2005 03:01:00 PM  
Blogger desert rat said...

They made a movie about that poor fellow tied to a fence and beat to death in Colorado a few years ago.
Quite a big deal made about it, as I recall, that killing.
Wonder if someone will tell these fellows story on film. Perfect Hollywood story, Homophobic Theologians take over the Government and persecute those outside the Faith.
To bad the theologians are Mohammedans and not Christian, would have made a great film.
But the could always make it about Christians, inaccurate but true.

7/27/2005 05:01:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Those who argue for toleration of a supposedly moderate Islam will never convince me until they address the ninth sura of the Quran. It's a commission to convert or kill the unbelievers and to use "every strategem" of war to do so; even the sura's milder-seeming passages dissolve into murderous license on close inspection. I'll never believe we can come to terms with Islam as long as the ninth sura is still part of the Quran, yet even commentators on the right ignore it.

7/29/2005 02:59:00 PM  

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