Last word on the cartoon crisis
Last word on the cartoon crisis from Sisu quoting Laurence Simon.
I think the Danish ambassador should issue an apology. In the largest Christian church in Saudi Arabia.
Who's to blame for the caricature of Mohammed? According to a cartoon from Bahrain, the Zionists of course. (Volokh Conspiracy)
(From Michelle Malkin) Read this CNN report very carefully:
The international storm over cartoon drawings of the Prophet Mohammad published in European media gathered pace across the Islamic world Thursday with angry demonstrations and the shutting down of the EU office in Gaza City.In Paris, the daily newspaper France Soir fired its managing editor after it republished the caricatures Wednesday, and in Pakistan protesters marched chanting "Death to Denmark" and "Death to France."
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as saying the cartoons -- one depicting the founder of Islam wearing a turban resembling a bomb --showed press freedom should have its limits.
Muslims consider it sacrilegious to produce a likeness of the Prophet Mohammad. CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons in respect for Islam.
The offending cartoons from the Danish newspaper. All of them. The rest are spurious.
Commentary
Heh.
posted by wretchardthecat at 2/02/2006 06:59:00 PM
121 Comments:
Thanks for the link. For the record, the quotation is from the estimable Laurence Simon, who left it in my comments.
I'll break my coloered pencils and never draw another Muhammad cartoon the day there's a Christian church in Mecca.
I'm all for freedom of speech but doesn't the old adage "think before you speak" apply anymore?
Why give the militants more fuel and reason to want to kill us "infidels"?
Or do we do these cartoons because they do it themselves? And why do we ever want to be like them?
Wretchard says "Heh" but he speaks Blasphemy!
Mooiness,
Yes, there is a certain amount of walking into a black bar and dropping the N bomb feel to all of this.
However, we do have this notion of freedom of speech. Lord knows Christianity is never spared, why in the world should Islam expect to be spared by the Western media? I can see the papers in the UAE, Saudi, Kuwait etc being thus restricted.
Up until now all sides of this issue are drawing their lines in the sand and making their opinions known. In fact the Muslims have a right to make their opions known just the same as anyone else. Once Hamas, or whomever, kills someone, as has been threatened, things will change.
We're not talking about Havarti or sugar cookies here. If a European is killed by the muslims then the Europeans will have to respond.
Mooiness -
It's not like we're adding more fuel to the fire here - as an unbeliever the Islamists would love NOTHING more than to kill you or convert you - and I think they get more pleasure out of killing than converting. To justify their anger at you (and the West) they're perpetually looking for ANYTHING they can take offense to.
There is no grudging tolerance of other opinion, no give-and-take, no willingness to compromise. There's no Bibles allowed in Saudi Arabia, no churches - yet they demand tolerance of their religion. Riots, demonstrations, beating up of Danes who haven't anything to do with the cartoons - it's all justifiable. There's ALWAYS something to be offended about. And because you offend them, you must die.
There is no way to come to an understanding with someone who is fully intending to kill you - and sees absolutely not a damn thing wrong with that - if they have the chance. You can bend over backwards for them, to avoid causing offense, and they'll demand you bend further. And further. The demands will get more and more unreasonable - to the point where you censor yourself in word and deed to avoid possibly causing offense.
Would you give up everything - including a pig-shaped stress releiver (http://www.expressandstar.com/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi?archive=32&num=81092) because a muslim says it offend them? Would you ask your local store to stop carrying pork, hams and bacon because it might offend a Muslim?
Where do you say "Enough!"? They're not looking for 'equal rights' - they're looking to be the only ones who have rights.
To think otherwise is to ignore a lot of history.
I nominate mooiness 7:59 PM as the stupidest comment of the Cartoon Series
(so far)
I second that, Doug. Except that mooiness may really not understand why it is important to take a stand and say that we will protect freedom of speech in our own countries even if it bothers muslims.
I believe the editor of the Danish newspaper the printed the cartoons said today something to the effect of "we have lost. No one is going to draw Mohammad for a generation". It is more important than ever that we start to draw Mohammad, satirize Mohammad, and openly and continuously criticize this primitive religion of Islam than ever before. Our very civilization depends on it...this is a watershed moment in our history. Do we stand up together and say that we will not be cowed? Or do we say, eh, this one's not worth getting them all upset over...we'll wait until later before we stand up for freedom in our own countries.
These muslims are really beyond belief. Their touchiness, their insistence that the rest of the world change so as not to make them "feel offended" is so adolescent that the fact that it doesn't embarrass them to get worked into a snit about it says a shocking lot about what kind of a civilization they are.
They are our mortal enemies is what they are. Can you imagine the situation we would be in if we didn't have an overwhelming economic and military advantage over them? We must maintain that advantage at all costs.
mooi,
Free Speech, Muslim Style:
---
DANISH IMAM CAUGHT LYING TO EURO-MEDIA
A religious leader of an Islamic group in Copenhagen - Abu Laban - has been CAUGHT speaking with two tongues:
In the Danish media he is quoted as saying he is against the widespread boycott of danish goods in the middle east.
An hour later on Al Jizeera TV he says that he thinks it is a great thing that the arab nations and people defend islam through the boycott.
I guess this is the Imam's idea of free speech! Heh. Actually, this is an old Arab Muslim trick which Arafat and Abbas used all the time.
It plays upon the "willing suspension of disbelief" of Left-wing doves and appeasers.
Smart people don't fall for this trick because smart people know how to tell when these folks are lying. HOW?! THEY'RE LIPS ARE MOVING!
"Except that mooiness may really not understand why it is important to take a stand"
---
Mark, right.
I thought of that after my intemperate and insensitive remark:
Mooi needs to learn that free speech except when it offends is no free speech at all in the end.
Learned that lesson well from the
Politically Correct Nazis in this country.
8:49 PM is a comment from Polipundit.
Looks like it's up to the blogosphere (once again) to Preserve Real America:
The MSM done chickened out: (again)
Comment at Sisu's:
I wonder if Newsweek will publish them.
AFter all the fake "Koran flushing" incident was deemed newsworthy.
Let's see what they do when their butt is on the line.
So far CNN and NBC have chickened out...
Posted by: Patricia
mooi,
Did Google Retain "Free Speech"
in China?
...or is "a little"
(whatever the government wants)
censorship not a bad thing?
This is what so many so-called liberals do not understand. The jihad is about THEM, much more so than it is about, say, conservative westerners (e.g. evangelical Christians, etc.). They support the independence of women. They support freedom of speech and of belief. They don't hate homosexuals. They don't kowtow to traditionalism and obsolte social structure. And the jihadists hate that. Because the world and worldview of the jihadists is founded on the firm bedrock of a rigid traditionalism which encompasses, in part, forced subservience of women, violent hatred of homosexuality, and tight restriction of public and private life (ranging from business, to family, to politics, to friendships). In comparison to modern 21st century western liberal democracy it is unbelievably archaic and outmoded. But it's what they have and, more importantly, what they've decided to dedicate themselves to. And dedicate they have. Our system is like a plasma torch to theirs (as, incidentally, theirs is to ours, though ours is infinitely more potent), so they are faced with a choice of admiting their system is wrong and learning a new way of doing things (which, by human nature, is not easy for anyone to do) or of hunkering down and fighting back like a cornered animal.
The jihadists have chosen door #2 and have thus set their sights on rolling back the influence of liberal culture on their society. Meanwhile, those same liberals have no clue how corrosive their ideology is to islamic/arabic traditionalism. In America a movie like "Brokeback Mountain" is a minor controversy, it's a dinner party discussion topic. Maybe a heated discussion topic. Yet it's still playing in theaters, it's still going to be on sale in the DVD section of walmart, and it's still been nominated for our most prestigious movie award (the Oscar). Yet showing such a movie in, say, Saudi Arabia would be an offense punishable by execution, harking back to the days in the west (called "the dark ages", if you'll remember) when heretics could be burnt at the stake for nothing more than questioning Church dogma or flaunting public mores. "Liberals" would do well to remember that and to not let their multiculti blinders prevent them from seeing the bad guys as the regressive anti-liberty thugs they are.
Bat one wrote:
"As both Wretchard and Baron Bodissey have noted, this is a very old war, even if our recognition and acknowledgment are dangerously recent."
Indeed - and the fiction over at CNN is that they are champs at walking on eggshells. In reality nobody in the West is good at walking on eggshells; we've heard nothing but the crunch of shell underfoot for the past 200 years!
But facing jihad Islam the left is giving it the old college try; to the left culture is immutable; they would claim that Muslim strictures are Culture not and not Religion. Therefore we'd all better knuckle under and cut the cartoons of Mohammed; and no micturated Korans either.
Meantime there's this:
http://beautifulquran.blogspot.com/
MOThugRecords.com
Retecool
Thanks, das, I needed that.
In the name of Awwah, the Beneficent, the Mewcifuw.
(Elmer Fudd reads to us...)
I will venture to say that the West is being treated with contempt because it has merited scorn. The Muslims have learned -- all too well -- what earns the respect of liberal elite. We should not blame them for wanting deference. Rather we should ask ourselves why we are not similarly treated.
Islam is blameless in this respect: they have upheld their side well. The same can't be said for our cultural leaders who are all too eager to shame, abase and degrade themselves. And now it has come to this.
Friday's lead editorial in the Press-Enterprise in So. California addresses this question, and includes one of the cartoons, with a link to the rest. Here's the editorial. (Onerous registration is required, sadly.) As far as I know, the Press-Enterprise is only the second U.S. paper (after the New York Sun) to publish one of the cartoons. Where the hell is everyone? First Amendment, my foot...
And so it begins.
Muslims attack Danish embassy building in Jakarta
About 300 militant Indonesian Muslims went on a rampage inside the lobby of a Jakarta building housing the Danish embassy on Friday in protest over cartoons that Muslims say insult Islam and the Prophet Mohammad.
"This two-faced approach is one the things that most concerns me."
Whit,
Did they learn it from Clinton, or Vice Versa?
Google Obviously Learned from Congress, Clinton, and the rest.
I think it's time the US gave Israel the operational go for operation Alon Plan plus. From sea to sea to sea to sea to sea. Mediterranean to Black to Caspian to Persian to Indian.
Just kidding about Google, of course, not about Clinton and Congress, however:
"The unpleasant reality is that doing business with an authoritarian regime is inherently dirty. In exchange for market access, American companies like Google must make the necessary compromises to operate in a police state.
These compromises are not pretty, but they are not necessarily corrupt. The Chinese Internet, with no small help from American capital and know-how, has become one of the most exciting mediums in Chinese society. Though terms such as freedom and democracy are censored, the Internet nevertheless makes known the Chinese people's thoughts on and responses to everything from the pain of unemployment to the exhilaration of entrepreneurship, from the frustration of urban pollution to the confusion of Internet romance.
No one knows if the partial opening of China to Western information and values will ultimately deliver China into freedom's sweet embrace. Google is hoping that it will.
Google may or may not be right. This makes no difference to human-rights purists who do not believe in subordinating immediate human-rights concerns to long term or different sorts of gains. It is, however, highly hypocritical of Congress to complain about this, for Congress too has made, much like Google, the same compromise with, and holds out the same hope for, the same police state.
"
If the press and governments cave in on this issue (press freedom, completely apart from the issue of whether or not these caricatures might have been offensive), what comes next?
To a fundamentalist Muslim, depictions of the other prophets are no less harram than of Mohammed. So what do we do when Islamic fundamentalists start going ballistic about Western depictions (drawings, paintings, statues, films), and even so-called idolatry of their beloved prophet Issah?
Just askin'
DRK
Mika,
Linky Loo?
(I know, trick of the Joo.)
davek,
Issah Thomas?
Whata Playah.
Quite a Coach Too.
Doug,
You must first graduate to be worthy of the Magic Hat. Have you been studying Kabbalah as you were instructed?
Or you can use google. :P
I can learn Kabbalah through Google?
Cool!
How you think Madonna does it?
I thought she did it with this guy:
JAMES BOND DIRECTOR ARRESTED IN DRAG DURING PROSTITUTION STING...
Of course that would exclude your name from that special list of recipients. Those whose paychecks are underwritten by Mel Brooks.
Don't forget, folks, that the Islamicists are simply using the playbook of the Western Left with their enraged response to the slightest imagined insult.
That they enhance their performance by waving AK's around and threatening death is just their appendix to said playbook. Or maybe it's not even theirs; remember the Black Panthers?
"Our" Left taught them what sort of tantrum works in upsetting Western society. That the Left are the ones most inclined to take their absurd complaints seriously is hardly a surprise.
That for many in the West the response to these tantrums is not to scramble to assuage them but rather to think "We should turn the yield settings on the B-61 nukes all the way up." is something I have no idea how to explain to them. Until it is too late.
Gotta see Albert Brooks,
"Looking for Humor in thd Muslim World"
---
Your pics of you and your mom reminded me of
"Lost in America"
Hey!
Mika has a magic post eraser!
WTF?
Wot you talkin' bout, Willis?!!
Did I miss the Islamic outrage at video images of screaming, begging hostages having their heads hacked off by Islamic savages screaming "God is great"?
You said,
"You just made my point"
I saw it.
Last time you said...
WT...?
How do them Joos Do It?
2164th,
That wasn't a Cartoon.
That was reality TV.
Different Stuff.
How do them Joos Do It?
Do what? Believe in a godless universe?
There must be a God for you to be able to magically erase posts in two different threads.
I don't expect you to tell your token Gentile friend, tho.
Sniff.
Go backwards, twice. THAT will bring youz to where youz started.
No time for time travel.
Time for my 2 hour beauty sleep.
(It works as advertised: Proportionally)
Later
3:38 AM HST
(at least I went back 2 minutes, plus the 2 hour time zone correction factor, of course.)
There are Pictures of he who must not be pictured at http://smoothingplane.blogspot.com/
Keep this quiet though, or the boycott will spread to Nokia cellphones
Kerry,
Well I'll be a Dirty Bird!
Peter Marshall: What are "Do It", "I Can Help" and "Can't Get Enough"?
George Gobel: I don't know but it's coming from the next apartment.
Peter Marshall: Can breathing in and out of a paper bag help stop anything?
George Gobel: If it's filled with wine it can stop me from shaking.
Peter Marshall: True or false...a pea can last as long as 5,000 years.
George Gobel: Boy it sure seems that way sometimes...
Peter Marshall: What is the definition of the word "Gobbledygook?"
George Gobel: That's the stuff that crusts over in turkeys' eyes when they're asleep.
Peter Marshall: According to an old song, you should "Wrap all your troubles in..." What?
George Gobel: Furs...and tell her to stop calling your house!
Peter Marshall: Does the Secret Service have any women?
George Gobel: Of course, who do you think performs the secret service?
زوروا شبكة بي Nokiaبي سي الإخبارية على الإنترنNOkia!ت للاطلاعNOKIA!!! آخر الأخبار
Peter Marshall: "Do you think anyone on the planet will tell our jokes 50 years from now?"
George Gobel: "Maybe some pineapple-likkered-up Hawaiian."
Peter Marshall: "Ha ha ha ha!"
George Gobel: "Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!"
The Satanic Verses controversy back in Sept'88 caused outrage among Moslems worldwide due to it's irreverent depiction of Prophet Mohammad by India'a renowned author Salman Rushdie.The late spiritual leader of Iran,Ayatollah Khomeini condemned his book as blasphemy against Islam and called for his execution with a US3m tag on his lifeline which still stands today.
The slanderous caricature of the prophet is indeed an unmindful and deliberate act by the Danish daily based on the principle of press freedom to incite resentment from the Moslem world.
A group (or individual) displays freedom of press when it does not oppose by force, does not oppose by rhetoric, or actively supports religious beliefs or activities of which it is not a part. Religious tolerance does not mean one must view any or all other religions as equally valid to theirs but simply that one accepts other's right to hold religious beliefs different from one's own and practice their religion as they see fit, within reason.
Last night, I asked my wife if she was aware of the 'cartoon' controversy. She said no, and I explained the situation to her.
After thinking a moment, she said 'Have you heard about the 'Book of Daniel' controversy?
I had not.
It seems there is a TV show called 'The Book of Daniel' which features an Episcopal Minister
with a gay son and a host of 'living' issues. It seems a regular character on the show is Christ, who helps our troubled minister deal with these difficulties. The Jesus character spouts out greeting card platitudes instead of actual advice.
Christian conservatives have organized a boycott campaign which has gotten the show pulled.
I felt like we were ships passing in the night.
Moonbattyness,
Doug is correct. Thou art appeasement! If we give ANY quarter whatsoever to these raging Islamic lunatics we will have lost an important battle. The papers of the USA should be reprinting these cartoons to flush out the loonies here and to deomonstrate to those of your ilk the spirit of absolute intolerance that prevail in the hate cult called Islam.
Notice how apologists for the over-top-reaction to 'cartoons' reflecting obvious realities are simply using the tools the Western Left has handed them:
- Criticism of me is 'hate speech.'
- Disagreeing with my complaint is 'stifling my dissent.'
- My grievances are always and automatically legitimate.
- Your guilt is presumed.
- How I feel is more important than what you think.
And on and on and on.
Pragmetism is our enemy in all this.
Where are the men with chests? Men that will lead consistantly, following the rule of law are a rare commodity.
In my mind, there is a thought that I am afraid to acknowledge. If western press agencies become submissive to the boot of islamic threats, would it be true that the only way for christianity to get respect from the same is to utilize the tool of violence?
"Defining deviancy down", so to speak, in Danial P. Moynihan's lucid phrase, while commenting on the cultural domino-effect, AKA the 'broken window' principle?
enscout,
A majority (5 members) of the Supreme Court will now be Catholic. Shouldn't that freak out the Evangelicals?
A cartoon rumbles through the Muslim rabble
Mohammad’s minions taunt the crass
European gentry class
Ergodan closes Muslim Ranks
EU membership? No thanks!
Death to Denmark! death to France!
Europe caves to Muslim Rants!
A cartoon reveals Islam’s Right
They wont abide a Western Slight
I promise to give more respect
When Muslims learn to genuflect
jaf:
You've touched on the West's primary dilema when facing enemies that observe no rules and will go to any length to either destroy or subjugate us.
How do we stop them or destroy them without becoming like them?
Previous generations seemed to have fewer qualms about wading into the unspeakable barbarism of, say, the Pacific theatre during WWII, without losing their souls.
Critiques of the West's use of fire to fight fire during the Cold War, echoed today in purists' complaints about our relationships with countries like Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan signal a failure to understand that showing up at a gun battle with a switchblade will get you killed. And even if it could be described as noble, in some naive way, it would still be stupid.
Or say some words that makes some sense
When jihadis murder innocents
I should clarify:
In my mind, there is a thought that I am afraid to acknowledge. If western press agencies become submissive to the boot of islamic threats, would it be true that the only way for christianity to get respect from the same (LIBERAL PRESS/ HOLLYWOOD) is to utilize the tool of violence?
Who's to blame for the caricature of Mohammed? According to a cartoon from Bahrain, the Zionists of course
According to Nafez Assam, a leader with the Palestinian Islamist movement Islamic Jihad, It's all Bush's fault
bat
the woman, of course.
That is the nature of their Rules. Women are wrong, men are right.
The Women DO NOT get to drive in the KSA, let alone take their clothes off in the Public Square.
The Men are not denuding themselves, the woman is attempting to lure them to Satan's Way. The fault lies with her.
Brittney Spears, Ms Hilton & Ms Jackson's very public wardrobe malfunction are all actors of a Satanic West, and any actions that are required to keep Satan away are to be lauded.
They do not see a "Moral Equvilency" in the Cultures.
They see their's as being Morally Superior to the West's. God has told them so, through self annointed Agents here on Earth.
Carridine can tell US about fighting fire with fire, using his Prophet as the counter force to Mohammed, so to speak.
I do know that the Mullahs execute people that preach the Bahai message, so he may well be on to something.
At least I think that is what he's been saying. My apologies if I misrepresent your ideas, carridine.
To bad our Rules would keep US from endorsing or promoting such a plan.
mooiness and to all others who feel like we are provoking them. Absolutely we are provoking them! We will continue to provoke them! We are at war, it is a religious war, it is their religion of hatred and murder against our religion. I don't speak of Christanity since that is not our highest common denominator, I speak of our religion of Freedom. We are the greatest evangelists the world has ever seen with the most terrific gift ever given, Freedom. If we retreat one step away from the greatest gift ever given we will have to recapture some idiocy spoken so long ago at the beginning of the war, we will have allowed the terrorists to win.
This is a test for Islam. If they cannot deal with our highest freedom that being our freedom of speech then we are truly in a war to the death. If somehow they can find a way around this then another step will have been taken by their side to finding some common ground in ending this war.
I doubt that will happen. For the same reasons the Pope doubts it will happen. interview with Father Fessio
Appeasing them and worse giving up on our religion to do so will not lead to peace but to further bloodshed. I fear that the only way through this is out the otherside of a very dark tunnel filled with death and woe. Sorry to be so bleak.
It may be that the only way to avoid such bleakness is to let it be known that we are now ready for it--and mean it.
"Arm to parley" as Churchill said. In this case the "arm" is mental, as the hardware is in inventory. the country is having a poker fad--more and more people must be learning that a bluff only works if there is a very good chance it's not a bluff.
Of course, GWB has already put us there--he has said over and over in no uncertain terms that we cannot let the Iranian government acquire the bomb. So what we need to do now is coalesce around the office of the president--regardless of whether or not the person holding it meets one's aesthetic requirements.
Since the Islamists are using the weapons of the "multiculti" Left, perhaps they can both be defeated by the same tactic. It's a simple one. Demand freedom and fight for it.
Hey nonomus-
Maybe getting a show preempted in a few small markets might have occurred due to a call in campaign, but I think the big problem was the show stunk.
This from the Hollywood Reporter:
"NBC has pulled the plug on the midseason drama "The Book of Daniel." The religion-themed show, starring Aidan Quinn as a conflicted Episcopalian priest grappling with modern-day work and family issues and occasional visits from Jesus, will be taken off the schedule effective immediately. On Friday, NBC will air a rerun of "Law & Order" in "Daniel's" Friday 10 p.m. slot. On Feb. 3, the 10-11 p.m. hour will accommodate an extended two-hour edition of newsmagazine "Dateline." "Daniel," which drew criticism from conservative groups for portraying Christianity in an unflattering light and was dropped by several NBC affiliates, failed to connect with an audience, most recently drawing a paltry 5.8 million viewers"
Don't worry though, we'll all still have a chance to mock Christians when Britney Spears guest stars on Will and Grace playing Jack's Christian Conservative sidekick who has a food show that offers'Cruci-fixin's' Hi-larious stuff, no?
Maybe Kanye West will have a cameo?
Cheers - Dinah
Robert I believe you are on to something! Notice how often the Left attempts to silence debate by claiming they are offended by this that or the other. Exactly the same tactics as our Muslim Brothers.
I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
Does God = Mahmud?
If God = Mahmud, was God wearing underwear? If so, why? If not, why not?
That would depend, buddy, if GWB is doing the "right" thing.
Is he winning the War?
Is he rolling back the Mohammedan Horde?
Is he keeping his word, to both US and the Terrorists?
Mr Negroponte said, just yesterday, that the Iranians are years from a nuclear device. He speaks to & for President Bush on this matter. Mr Bush can do nothing and remain true to his word, kicking the can down the road. If US estimates are correct.
Major General Robert H. Scales, U.S. Army (ret.), a past Commander at the War College says the US Military is ill equipped to take on Iran, successfully. That it would take a couple of years to get ready, if we began purchasing Light Armoured Vechicles today. They are not in the Budget. Air to Air fighter plane are.
We will have guarenteed air speriority over those Iranians, when a truck borne Pakistani or North Korean nuke goes off in Palistine.
As Victor Davis Hanson puts it so well
"... The architects of September 11, by general consent, hide somewhere on the Pakistani border. A recent American missile strike that killed a few of them was roundly condemned by the Pakistani government. Although a recipient of billions of dollars in American aid and debt relief, and admittedly harboring those responsible for 9/11, it castigates the U.S. for violating borders in pursuit of our deadly enemies who, while on Pakistani soil, boast of planning yet another mass murder of Americans.
Pakistan demands that America will cease such incursions — or else. The "else" apparently entails the threat either to give even greater latitude to terrorists, or to allow them to return to Afghanistan to destroy the nascent democracy in Kabul. American diplomats understandably would shudder at the thought of threatening nuclear Pakistan should there be another 9/11, this time organized by the very al Qaedists they now harbor. ... "
VDH Private Papers
What if Mr Bush and his Striped Pants Corp is wrong about the stability of Pakistan and it's General President? It is not like the US has not been wrong, before. Especially about Military Dictators and their stability as well as longevity.
I believe Mr Bush is totally wrong on the subject of Pakistan and, really, the entire Mohammedan issue. He and Mr Cheney have put US at a Strategic disadvantage.
Now the Mohammedans KNOW they have Sanctuary, dispite the Rhetoric from the Oval Office.
In the mean time, no major US Daily will print the Mohammed cartoons.
No Tribune Paper, no Knight-Ridder, No Gannett.
Wonder why?
I for one will not sit by and support defeatist Government Policies that are not in the best interest of the US.
Even if the "mainstream" think he is already acting to aggressively.
mika:
I don't know why evangelicals would fear a supreme court with Roman Catholics on it. (Seems like there is a joke lurking in there somewhere.
I think what they would fear more is a court with Michael Moore, J F Kerry, Hillary Clinton, Teddy Kennedy, Harry Reid, Howard Dean seated with R V Ginsburg.
P.S. I am a practicing Protestant married thirty years plus to a Roman Catholic. We've learned that we can get along without killing each other.
Right there with you desert rat and just wondering do you get accused of being a leftist moonbat as much as I do when you point out President Bush's failings?
We are further from winning than
losing right now and that this does not appear on anyones radar is terrifying. My wife and I are considering how to prepare our children for a world substantially different from the one we grew up in. A world with considerably less hope and far more death...just exactly how f&%king cheery is that!
I am so disgusted with our Government I have a hard time putting it into words. Just now our State Department condemned the publishing of those cartoons.
We need a war fighter in the Presidents office not some appeasing wuss.
Rat, in the vast list of ongoing ops, some are working better than others, granted. What I meant by my post above is that nations must have leaders, and if GWB is not ideal, then half a loaf is better than none, and none is what the enemy wants us to have. But I really think GWB may've moved beyond concern for his polls, where Mullah nukes are concerned.
enscout,
I was just responding to your 707 post..
Men that will lead consistantly, following the rule of law.. :)
buddy,
You're right about Mr Bush & the Polls. Mr Negroponte laid it out, yesterday. The Iranians are years away from capacity.
Granted they could BUY capacity. But then they'd only be a facilitator, not a Principle.
The Principles are Pakistan and NK.
If you were to believe that Dr Khan was operating like a rouge field agent, selling plans, equipment and other materials required for nuclear development, without Pakistani Government knowledge, you'd never ever be able to represent me adequately.
In Pakistan is where the threat is, today. Perhaps someday Iran will bubble up, but the balloon is already in the air, in Pakistan.
Where Osama finds continued Sanctuary.
Pierre, I feel your pain, but the State Dept sorta has to be diplomatic--the people have to carry the ball on the other stuff. We're trying to build alliances in Islam, obviously--so we gotta do the thing almost exactly as we are--a 'wuss' political leadereship which gives Islamic moderates cover, and a people who're getting fed up with the jihad. we gotta flip one card at a time, and try to keep everyone in the hand, for the big payoff--no WWIII.
Pakistan policy is a disaster only if a stronger hand would work better for our ends--but we can't know that prior--and we don't want to end up with no gain and to've also yanked the rug out from under the pro-west faction, which does, after all, control the central government, armed forces, and nuke inventory.
And the cementing alliance with India--how would that be working with us clobbering Pakistan? We're already sweating out another 50s nightmare--a russo/chinese military alliance tempted toward the mideast--so the India alliance is really kind of a feather in the administration's cap--for which little credit is ever given.
That is a lousy analogy, buddy.
At the end of the card game, the Pot goes to the winner.
In this game the Dead & Wounded are not retrieved with the Pot. They are lost or damaged, forever.
I know you are not, like Mr Toles, belittleing the sacrifice of our Soldiers, but it could be taken as such, by the hyper-sensitive.
Another 70 BILLION will be requested for Operations in Iraq, where we work hard to "Manage & Contain" the Insurgency.
Victory and Winning being beyond our mental grasp and removed from the lexicon.
The choice is pretty stark--either incrementalism, or mobilize, declare war on non-democracies, and do the world-cleanup that Patton/MacArthur/LeMay wanted to do after 1945--when we had the nuke monopoly. Anything in-between is problematic.
Doug,
Larsen is the cluballah wizlizard mastah.
"Christian conservatives have organized a boycott campaign which has gotten the show pulled.
I felt like we were ships passing in the night. "
6:44 AM
---
nonomous,
Don't be silly:
It wasn't the boycott, it was them Fatwahs, Death Threats, and Car Bombings.
Right again, buddy.
For US and the West,
it is either War or something else.
Today, it is something else.
Could you imagine WWII without cariticures of Hitler & Tojo?
It is a problem, that's for sure.
Mika, I'm jus' moderatin' the panel for a turn--
OK, OK,
I know how to make double posts.
Larsen thinks I see double.
You ain't no moderate, you right wing extremist, you.
You and that Joo!
I guess what I'm trying to suggest to Rat is that the India alliance--which includes some bitch-ass weapons systems--is already the heads-up to the Paki rads.
That is a given, the Indians have been at War with Mohameddans since what, the beginning of time?
If nuclear proliferation is a real issue, stop the Proliferation.
The last one in the Club, first one out. Again, that's Pakistan.
Call our friends our friends and our enemies by name.
If the General President cannot control his hinterlands, we should for him. At least until the threat is destroyed. While 140,000 US Troops chase mini-Z with arrest warrants, 300,000 Armed Mohammedans threaten the General President and the Government in Afghanistan.
The threat exists today in Pakistan.
It does not exist in Iran, according to Mr Negroponte.
If he doesn't know, who does?
"I am so disgusted with our Government I have a hard time putting it into words. Just now our State Department condemned the publishing of those cartoons. "
---
I don't think that can be rationally explained or excused,
cluballah wizlizard mastah or not!
---
Bush should have cleaned house and told them to keep their mouths shut, BEFORE S... like that came out.
But i understand--just like the VDH piece up today--throw out a picture, and say, what's wrong here? So, moving to the hawk side of the administration actually is incrementalism. VDH calls our relationship with Paki 'lunacy' but notice he doesn't call for any change in policy, just more and better of the same--energy independence so that we can hammer the shit out anyone threatening the internationbal order.
Better Lunacy?
Desert Rat want to be Dublin Down!
Doug's Irish--he's gone to Dublin'.
Ok, Joo Boy, let's see you match a pre-post like that!
Good idea--better lunacy.
Here's one for ya,
cluballah wizlizard mastah:
re:
Mika's post about the Supremes.
Seems to me true academic depth in this country comes to a great degree from Catholic educated folks.
Given that Catholic Schools are disintegrating, who's going to replace them?
ABC reports that Steven Zunes, professor of politics @ University of San Francisco, says that USA has inflamed Islam, therefore USA must continue to inflame Islam.
I dunno, Doug--it will likely be a grass-roots abandonment of the government school system. Or at least enough movement to discredit the status quo.
Grandmastah, you tellz dat drunk irish semen we no even play checkhers, and he wants us play pokher?!
Wo, Mika--I've misjudged you. I've seen plenty of Jewish dentists, and that's no Jewish dentist. And, ya can't play pokher if you've gone to Dublin'.
Drunk Irish Semen
Rule Kosher Semen.
Doug said:
Mika's post about the Supremes.
Seems to me true academic depth in this country comes to a great degree from Catholic educated folks.
Given that Catholic Schools are disintegrating, who's going to replace them?
Homeschoolers! Am amazed by how rewarding it is to teach my own children. Wifey handles Science, Math, Mythology and I handle the rest. We are getting ready to start Latin with my 3rd grader.
Pierre,
Our 21 year old never went to a class until this year when the Air Force sent him to DC for a Security Seminar!
(But I can't say he got as much of the Classics as a lot of Catholic kids used to.)
As far as rewarding:
Nothing matched it.
I only wish I was still doing it so I could keep on learning, among other things.
I bow to your superior numbers.
Didn't partially grow up in time to have more.
I salute, and bow deeply to, you folks' commitment.
No one Sees like an Irish Semen.
quote - It's possible to regard the cartoon crisis as either a strategic disaster or boon for the War on Terror. /quote
----
Like so much of the last few years, these cartoons are one more chance to choose sides.
Mika,
More of your posts have disappeared!!!
Does C-4 run Wretchard's servers or what?
Otherwise, please enlighten this Gent.
That's very interesting. They show with one browser, and not with another. I also had them posted using different browsers. Not sure why that would make a difference, but apparently it does.
You got one of them J.. Browsers?
One for the Gents, one for...
You guys sure are sneaky.
How will I ever know if I'm the Pawn of some subtextual scheme going on here between you guys?
If western countries can ban Martin's Scorsese's depiction of Jesus as a normal man with sexual desires in the Last Temptation of Christ on grounds of blasphemy, then the same western countries should also ban publications of the caricatures depicting Prophet Mohammad. If they don't, then the question is not one of freedom of speech but one of respect and human rights!
For the record: On 1988, October 22, a French catholic fundamentalist group launched molotov cocktails inside the Parisian saint Michel movie theater to protest against the film projection. This terrorist attack injured thirteen people, four of them where severely burned.
Just tell me which religion has no extremist?
All religions are good, its the people that make them bad!
Doug,
Check out wormie. Now, you tell me who's the snakee one.
Huh?
What's "wrong" with that?
All Calories are good, only Fat People make them bad.
Have you seen James Dobson's latest Fatwah on Jimmy Carter?
Doug,
LOL! So true.
Btw, did I introduce you to my good friend, Mr. sugarcoated floss?
Doug,
That Dobson fellow scares me. His Christ Army might be coming after me and me mommy. :--/
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