Just to sing
The European blog Barcepundit reports the EU is preparing regulations to restrict speech to prevent angering religious communities.
I'm afraid the esteemed Victor Davis Hanson was a tad too optimistic when he wrote that the cartoon controversy might mean an European awakening against Islamic fascism. Turns out that the European Union is planning a press code of conduct:Plans for a European press charter committing the media to "prudence" when reporting on Islam and other religions, were unveiled yesterday.
According to Instapundit, Sweden is shutting down websites which publish the Mohammed cartoons. Following the related link yields this information:
According to Dagens Nyheter, the Swedish security services (Säpo), in collusion with Foreign Minister Leila Freivalds, have forced the website SD-Kuriren offline for publishing the Jyllands-Posten cartoons (SD-Kuriren is the house organ of the hard-right Swedish Democrats). “We think that this was the best decision after we were contacted by the Foreign Ministry and Säpo,” Anna Larsson, vice president of hosting compant Levonline, told DN. Freivalds told DN that “it is terrible that a small group of extremists are exposing Swedes to danger [by reprinting the cartoons].”
Only Europe's gonna fold right? Wrong. Here's news from Canada from Angry in the Great White North.
Shocking. Not surprising, perhaps, given Canada's tradition in recent years to value inoffensiveness over individual freedom, but I'm idealistic enough to to still be shocked:
The Cadre, UPEI's student newspaper has published the twelve infamous editorial cartoons that criticized aspects of Islam.
At the request of president Wade MacLauchlan, university administrators have removed all 2,000 copies of the paper from campus.
My God! It is something straight out of George Orwell's 1984. Thought police rounding up newspapers in order to suppress knowledge and keep the populace in peaceful complacency:
“When we realized that they were in circulation, we acted to round up the copies that were in circulation,’’ said UPEI president Wade MacLauchlan.
“We see it as a reckless invitation to public disorder and humiliation.’’
Update
Hat tip: Anointiata Delenda Est. The EU's Frattini has issued a clarification on the statement to restrain speech pertaining to religious communities. It is quoted in full from the Daily Telegraph:
"Following the publication of an article in the 'Daily Telegraph' of today, I want to clarify any possible misunderstandings about my position in regard to the so-called "cartoons" issue.
"As Commissioner responsible for the respect for and promotion of fundamental rights I have from the very outset underlined that the freedom of press, of expression and speech, including the right to critique, constitutes one of they key pillars upon which the EU is founded.
"I do not have the legal powers nor did I ever have the political intention to limit this fundamental right in any manner whatsoever.
"Since September 2005 I am in close contact with various representatives of the media, including the European federation of journalists, on issues linked to freedom of speech. I have offered to facilitate a dialogue between the media representatives and between them and faith leaders if that would be found useful by both parties.
"In their statement of 7 February 2005 the EFJ stated that it 'has encouraged the European Commission to support a professional dialogue among media professional groups and that they welcome the fact that Commissioner Frattini is doing just that'.
"Such a dialogue would aim at discussing a number of pertinent questions which we are confronted with nowadays. One of them being 'How are we to reconcile freedom of expression and respect for each individual's deepest convictions?', a relevant question as formulated by many actors , including the International Federation of Journalists.
"It is a dialogue on such a question which I would be wiling to facilitate but I will not impose such a role on any party if such a need would not be felt. Finally, I have never suggested imposing a code of conduct on the press, it is up to the media themselves to self-regulate or not, and it is up to the media to formulate such a voluntary code of conduct if it is found necessary, appropriate and useful by them.
"There have never been, nor will there be any plans by the European Commission to have some sort of EU regulation, nor is there any legal basis for doing so."
However, the Telegraph's journalist David Rennie goes on to reproduce the unedited transcript of a tape recorded interview he had with Mr. Frattini, the relevant portions of which are quoted below.
"Also we are organizing a round table, that I have scheduled for May 2006 between myself and all the representatives of the European media, the EFJ, the European Newspaper Publishers' association, the European Publishers' Council.
"I expect to address exactly the issue of the possibilities of reconciling the principle of freedom of expression, that cannot be limited of courser, with the principle of responsibility of journalists, and press in general. We will talk also about the so-called code of conduct, which I mentioned in the communication on radicalisation, but of course the point will be, when I talk about a code of conduct, I don't talk about an instrument to limit the freedom of expression. But I will try to offer to the press, to journalists, an instrument to self-regulate.
"The first point is, any kind of unilateral imposition coming from institutions should be avoided, but if you agree, and I speak to a very key sector in touch with public opinion, if you agree to the need to reconcile these two key pillars for example, freedom of expression on one hand, and full respect of religions on the other hand, if you agree on the importance of preventing and eradicating the roots of violence, please, help me, that's my new approach, because of course it is not through laws and imposition that we can solve this very difficult problem.
"Now, we are in this very difficult situation, why? Because there was a violent reaction to an expression of the fundamental freedom of the press. The publication [of the cartoons], and particularly the republication was, in my view, imprudent. Because probably they didn't calculate, they didn't think exactly of the consequences, and the risks of inflaming the situation, immediately after the victory of Hamas, immediately after the very serious threat posed by the president of Iran.
"So what I believe is that even in this very difficult moment, our first statement should be, freedom of expression should be granted, to everyone. But, in candour, of course violent reactions should be condemned, but that said, if you want to reconcile those two principles, please help me to find the best way.
"That is my political approach, it is not a bureaucratic one. If I have to condemn violence, obviously I condemn violence, but that said, after having condemned violence, what should we do? We should do something more, and we should together, journalists and editors, and European institutions address this together, because it is a matter of fact that this publication inflamed a very difficult situation in the Middle East. ...
"One suggestion is that this very difficult challenge ahead of us is to get involved the Muslim world. I cannot give them a privileged role, of course, I am the first to stress that human lives, the refusal of violence, and human dignity will be at the heart of European policy, and cannot be forgotten. But at the same time, if I were a journalist, I probably would have thought about the real context that one particular religion, one of the three big monotheistic religions, bans the publication of images of God, it's an element you have to consider.
"That's why I would suggest this concept of prudence. Prudence involves of considering all the elements. It is a relative concept, prudence. I should be prudent given the very difficult situation in the Middle East, I can be less prudent in a different moment, where all these very sensitive issues are not on the same table. I cannot create a privileged [ranking] among religions. But how can we treat one sentiment of religiosity, or another, it could depend on the context.
Comment
Nineteen eighty four was a fictional year to conjure with. Another year but a real one was 1968 when Neil Young wrote a song which became an anthem for a generation of protesters. Those who sang it then can still sing it today; if they can still carry the tune, not in earnest but irony.
Though your brother's bound and gagged
And they've chained him to a chair
Won't you please come to Chicago
Just to sing
In a land that's known as freedom
How can such a thing be fair
Won't you please come to Chicago
For the help that we can bring.
Events are picking up pace and maybe 2006 will be another one of those years.
Updated comment: It is obvious from the tape recorded transcript of Rennie's interview with Frattini that the EU official was aware that he had no legal power to censor. Neverthless it is abundantly clear in the interview that Frattini was preparing to appeal to publishers to self-censor. In his delicate phrase, "that is my political approach, it is not a bureaucratic one". Now I've heard this kind of speech before in trips to small mountain towns where a government representative is at pains to say that while he cannot officially encourage the headmen to pay the "revolutionary tax" levied by the insurgents he 'understands' that the rules of natural hospitality do not preclude making gestures of good will to all comers. But the government message to the headmen was really we cannot protect you and you will have to look out for yourselves though we will never officially admit it. As I said, I've heard this speech before but never expected to hear it spoken in the heart of Europe.
posted by wretchardthecat at 2/09/2006 06:44:00 PM
310 Comments:
The kids from the University of Illinois just threw the B.S. Flag.
The only thing likely to unite us is the absolute certainty that the Islamists and Muslim tyrants will push their luck too far, outraging in the end even all these people clucking around trying to find someone to surrender to.
It's as sure to happen as day follows night.
old mcdonald had a farm
eeyai eeyai oh
and on that farm he had a (censored)
eeyai eeyai oh
with a (censored) (censored) here
and a (censored) (censored) there
old mcdonald had a farm
eeyai eeyai oh
old mcdonald had a farm
(censored) (censored) oh
and on that farm he had a (censored) (censored) (censored) oh
with a (censored) (censored) here
and a (censored) (censored) there
old mcdonald had a farm
(censored) (censored) oh
old (censored) had a (censored)
(censored) (censored) oh
and on that (censored) he had a (censored) (censored) (censored) oh
with a (censored) (censored) here
and a (censored) (censored) there
old (censored) had a (censored)
(censored) (censored) oh
Man, what a pillar of sand freedom of expression was perched on! Washed away by the smallest waxing of the tide.
Freedom of expression was built, first of all, on the certainty that Western governments would never punish people for expressing an opinion. There is hardly a more eloquent testimony to the falsity of the Bush=Hitler meme or the Clinton=Hitler meme for that matter, than the contrast between abject kowtowing we now witness with the heroic poses the media used to strike. I feel ashamed for the academics and the media. Not of them, but for them. God help that I should never have to look myself in the mirror the way they must do now ...
But it would be unjust if we didn't recognize the courage of the Arab newspapermen who published these cartoons. We see their quality now.
Don't worry, when they look in the mirror they see the same "Hero"/"Heroine" they've always seen. Except, now, they can marvel at the new-found wisdom being radiated back at them.
hmmm ....
there is usually a difference between drafting a resolution and making it law.
if i was a eurotician then I would be working to create a draft with no chance of passage.
My intent would be to show the media the gravity of their situation while giving the muzzies a false impression that there was a genuine effort to buckle under their intimidation. Of course the buckling part will embolden them, but by the time they figure out the decpetion the politicians will be ready to play hardball (well, okay it's europe .. they at least figure out where the bats are). At the same time the press will have gently nudged the people closer to confronting their fears.
nah, forget that crap. I'm american. I'd tell the radicals to shove it up their collective asses until it comes out the slits in their burkas. Freedom is sacred ground. non-negotiable.
Franco Frattini, the EU Commissioner for Justice, Freedom and Security has issued a statement where he says he won't do anything to limit press freedom.
Here.
I suspect nothing will happen. The mood is moving against him.
ADE
Good CSNY lyrical memory,Wretchard.Those songs were naive("Almost Cut my Hair"'"Wooden Ships")They were the product probably of a little too much lysergic acid dithalimide,but heartfelt no doubt.
Ironically,nowadays Abbie Hoffman is in Yippie paradise,Bobbie Seale runs a barbecue joint,Rennie Davis followed some guru down the yellowbrick road,Tom Hayden sued Hanoi Jane for alimony and most of the various hipsters,cool cats and Che wannabes are fat old lefties wetting their pants over the threat of global jihad and demanding Bush and Cheney play nice.Another sixties icon,The Firesign Theater nailed it with their album"We're all bozos on this bus"
Perhaps my cynicism about the intellectual depth and honesty of our elites has insulated me from any sense of shock or disappointment with these developments. Yes, I can feel some sense of relief that I do not live in Europe and that I live in the U.S.A. However, we have a vocal, influential minority who would also go down this road of muffling even legitimate criticism of Islam. I have seen the cartoons. My artistic and literary sense, in conjunction with my intellectual formation and grasp of history, tell me that they are wildly exaggerated in categories of "offensive" and "in poor taste." Not that THAT should even matter, since cartoonists are entitled to express their critiques in the styles to which they are suited.
The West is behaving like a good, little Dhimmi. And this disgusts me. We would dillute our values to suit their sensibilities. Shame on those who would betray us this way. It certainly will not buy us any protection in the long run. It only emboldens the enemy and convinces them that they can press home the attack.
When are the rest of us going to wake up?
Whatever happened to all those children of the sixties whose attitude was defiance and whose working motto was always: Question Authority?
They stopped a war.
They brought down a president.
They believed freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.
Where and when did it all go so wrong?
Sirius sir,
"Where and when did it all go wrong?"
I met a girl who sang the blues
and I asked her for some happy news
but she just smiled and turned away,
I went down to the sacred store
where I'd heard the music years before
but the man there said the music wouldn't play
and in the streets the children screamed,
the lovers cried, and the poets dreamed
but not a word was spoken, the church bells all were broken
and the three men I admire most,
the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost,
they caught the last train for the coast,
the day the music died
""That's why I would suggest this concept of prudence. Prudence involves of considering all the elements. It is a relative concept, prudence. I should be prudent given the very difficult situation in the Middle East, I can be less prudent in a different moment, where all these very sensitive issues are not on the same table. I cannot create a privileged [ranking] among religions. But how can we treat one sentiment of religiosity, or another, it could depend on the context."
---
That pretty well sums up part of Hewitt's argument.
Why folk cannot just extrapolate a tiny bit to see where this leads from where we've already been is beyond me.
Maybe Free Speech IS Free Afterall?
Hillary would know.
(also helps when your own history can be deleted at will and the watchdogs go right on acting like you have clothes on)
Maybe we should just get ahead of the curve and submit now.
A "press code of conduct" is not a law. Everyone who has published these cartoons has known that they are provocative and that they violate some "code of conduct." They've published them anyway.
All is not lost, yet.
This is described as a "voluntary code of conduct." This is an attempt by the Europeans to defuse this crisis without giving up their rights.
I don't think the muslims will buy it. They want more. This is a political atack on Europe by Iran and fellow travelers. They are not going to say "thank you very much for your sensitivity" and go home. They want their pound of flesh and I don't think they've gotten it yet.
What will the Euros do when this attempt at reconciliation isn't enough?
SiriusSir.They turned thirty.Actually,when the Viet Nam war draft was replaced by the draft lottery,attendance in antiwar demonstrations plummeted.Much of the youthful idealism was pure unadulterated self preservation or cowardice depending on your point of view.
Most of the convictions of that generation leaned more toward partying and the moral laxity so prevalent in the day.Any old lefties,gray headed and pony-tailed still on the barricades may be morons but at least they're sincere morons.
I am not familiar with Franco Frattini. But, here is his website:
See: Frattini website
[Agenda]
My agenda: Thursday 9 February 2006:
Mr. Frattini meets Mr. Alexander Pechtold, Dutch Minister for Government Reform
[Policy]
We need to reconcile two fundamental requirements : to tackle effectively the threats to people's everyday life in Europe and at the same time to protect the fundamental rights which have been spelt out both at national and European level...
Team:
Carlo Presenti: Head of Cabinet (click name for email)
Diane Schmitt (click name for email): Deputy Head of Cabinet, Civil Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship
Antonio Bettanini (click name for email): Information and Communication,
Relations with the European Parliament
Lorenzo Salazar: Internal Security and Criminal Justice
Stefano Bertozzi:Immigration, Asylum and Borders
Stefano Signore: Strategic Policy and Evaluation
Karolina Kottova: External Relations, Enlargement and Development Aid
Donatella Soria: Assistant to the Cabinet
Friso Roscam Abbing: Spokesperson
See: Team
[Media Team]
Friso Roscam Abbing
tel: +32 2 296 6746
Fax: +32 2 296 0625
email: friso.roscam-abbing@cec.eu.int
Constantina Avraam
Press officer media team Justice, Freedom and Security
tel: +32 2 295 9667
email: Constantina.Avraam@cec.eu.int
Denise Clarembaux
Secretary media team Justice, Freedom and Security
tel: +32 2 296 0539
Email: Denise.Clarembaux@cec.eu.int
See: Media Team
[Contact]
Should you wish to contact the Vice President [Frattini] you may send your mail at:
Vice President Franco Frattini
EUROPEAN COMMISSION
B-1049 BRUSSELS
For general questions concerning the European Union, please contact Europe Direct or use the free-phone number 00 800 6 7 8 9 10 11 from anywhere in the 25 Member States and you will reach an operator who speaks your language.
(also see his links for email information)
See: Contact Frattini
[Most of text from press release]
Statement by Vice-President Franco Frattini on cartoons published by a Danish newspaper
As European Commissioner responsible for integration policy as well as the promotion and respect of fundamental rights, integrating communities with different religions, cultures and political affiliations is an objective that I strive for in my everyday activities. This is an objective that flows from the liberal principles that govern the European Union and its institutions, and indeed the life and history of our continent. I can understand the feelings of indignation, frustration and sadness of the Muslim communities over the last few days as they viewed the cartoons published by a Danish newspaper. Such events do not facilitate dialogue between faiths and cultures and provide barriers to the integration process to which the Member States of the Union are committed.
However, one of the founding principles of our Europe is freedom of expression, including the right to criticise.
A difference of opinion, even if it is bitter and disrespectful, often feeds into free polemic debate, in which satire plays a full part. We often discuss matters, sometimes passionately or even rudely, not only in our Parliaments or in the press, but in all manner of public arenas. This is the rule now, replacing armed and violent conflict, using words and ideas to create a society bound by the rule of law.
...Consequently, I personally regard the publication of the cartoons as somewhat imprudent, even if the satire used was aimed at a distorted interpretation of religion, such as that used by terrorists to recruit young people to their cause and turning them into fanatics, sometimes to the point of sending them into action as suicide bombers.
...I am not offering these common sense remarks with even the remotest intention of justifying the reactions that are currently being expressed against Denmark and others, including the European Union. Quite the contrary, it should be crystal clear to all that violence, intimidation, and the calls for boycotts or for restraints on the freedom of the press are completely unacceptable and will not bring about a constructive discussion between communities. Indeed, no dialogue is possible with those who would threaten fundamental human rights, nor with those who would resort to terror. The fact is that deprivation of freedom has always generated suffering and sorrow, so we must defend freedom even when that means letting those we disagree with have their say. Preserving freedom is the foundation for dialogue.
See: Press Release
Mr Fattini is big on immigration:
...The 7 new thematic programmes regroup the 15 current programmes. The aim is to simplify the delivery of foreign assistance and achieve more and better results with the resources available. One of the new 7 programmes covers Migration and Asylum. This programme will contribute to enable the EU to assist third countries in the areas of migration and asylum through an integrated
'Cooperation in practice - EU funding opportunities in the area of justice, freedom and security'
To help legal pratictioners, law enforcement officials and representatives of victim assistance services from the EU Member States...
So, who is really our worst enemy? Is it the rantings of a delusional 7th century egomanaical misogynist, or is it the vapid faux intellectual deconstructionists of our own modern culture? Do we still have the benefit of time? If we do, then which enemy do we take on first? The latter one is actually harder to defeat, since ideas have a long shelf life - enduring long after they are dead as a doornail - and our war with our intellectual enemies cannot have the quick, linear progression of an actual military campaign. And they have the bully pulpit right now.
How much time do we have? If we have lots of it, then it is high time we deal with the nihilist deconstructionists and socialists first. Once they have been ideologically neutered, we would have more freedom to simultaneously criticize Islam and also wage a military, economic, and cultural war against them. The end game is to save civilization from the Gotterdammerung the Islamists and the Leftists want to dance to together.
There is little room to "rag on" on the Europeans when hardly an American Paper has carried the offending cartoons. The US media will not show pictures of people jumping from the world trade towers. It reports someone using the "n-word", the"f" bomb. It spins with contradictions. The National Association fot the Advancement of Colored people requires a gymnastic manouvre to advance "people of colour". Personally, I am offended by anyone, who never wore a dog tag, refering to Guantanamo as Gitmo. Chris Mathews in particular. The quickest way to end a career in US broadcasting is to touch anything that does not comply with a rigid racially correct perspective. The most recent boldest public outburst I have heard is "Merry Christmas". The Europeans have affectively reduced Islamic immigration to zero and the French and Dutch have started to expel radical Islamic offenders. The US cannot stop Mexican Army intrusion into Texas and most US police departments cannot even question someone's immigration status. Please let's reduce the 1776 BS to a respectful muffle.
For any of wretchard’s readers who are over 55 or 60, you probably remember the Berkeley Free Speech Movement of the mid 60’s; the point in time where all of the political nonsense started. The irony of what is happening now is that the Free Speech Movement was all about being able to say offensive things. Speech and journalistic codes in those “bad old days”, forbid the use of words like n****, kike, dyke, various four letter words and so on. The students at UC Berkeley went out and protested these codes and demanded the right to say whatever they wanted, regardless of how offensive it may be to anybody. The local police even went to the extent of confiscating publications like Zap Comics at the stores around town. Now we have come full circle and the kids at UC Berkeley who demanded the right to say whatever they wanted have now become the very censors of “offending speech” that they protested those 40 years ago.
"The Europeans have affectively reduced Islamic immigration to zero and the French and Dutch have started to expel radical Islamic offenders.
The US cannot stop Mexican Army intrusion into Texas and most US police departments cannot even question someone's immigration status"
---
Kinda hard to say we're taking action and they aren't, isn't it.
Lies are destructive of Freedom, DC lies to us every day about this.
Congress investigates Google for things they have already submitted us to.
Would be nicer if 1984 was just an old book.
Likewise Brave New World.
Muslim Brudern,
Here I am in "Die Holle" (Hell) watching all of you follow in my jackboot footsteps. I am so proud of you!
Mein Freund Goebels and Mein Bruder Goering are doing well, although from time to time Der Teufel (The Devil) likes to chew into their intestins for laughs.
Let me give you some free advice - watch out for those nasty Amerikaner! DumpBacke! Don't you know not to get them pissed off at you?? Liebe Muslimischen Freunden, du you have das Scheiss in der Kopf?? You are so Stupid. You make nothing- nichts! You can't even get the oil out of the ground yourselves! And you are Lazy fauler Sack.
Die Amerikaner are not even fighting mit zwei Handen!! They are having still die Ferien! Afghanistan ist Ferien! Iraq ist Ferien!
Bitte, Please mein Brudern, take my advice - watch your backs. When Die Amerikaner Erwachen, you will be sorry.
Oh, I must go now. Der Teufel is pulling me away.
Heil Mohammed!
Heil Islam!
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
As I read the weasel words, I got a terrible feeling of dread.
Of the many subjects and events "The Belmont Club"
has covered - most are struggles. And most of us are optimistic that the good guys will win.
But the surrender words, made me think of those on your header:
"History and History in the Making"
A foreboding of History in the making.
I wonder if this elite fellow has any children or grandchildren he cares about - or is it only his own comforts and perks that he wants to protect.
Is that part of the real problem with Europe, so few children that focus is here and now. No concern about leaving it better than you found it when you do not have grandchildren that you care about.
You see, I am a grandparent
which is part of the reason I felt the dread. Without that concern for a future, I
may have scanned the post
and shrugged, "what me worry, I'll be dead".
Larwyn
There is good news and bad news about the sixties generation. The good news is that they soon will pass. The bad news and to my deeper regret, I will be one of them.
dhimmitude cannot exist without tryanny in the dhimmi's nation.
that's what is happening now - the table is being set for european dhimmitude.
intimidation breeding intimidation.
i think the euros who don;t like it will leave.
and then europe will become half muslim half dhimmi.
and no part free.
a new dark age.
"Actually,when the Viet Nam war draft was replaced by the draft lottery,attendance in antiwar demonstrations plummeted.
Much of the youthful idealism was pure unadulterated self preservation or cowardice depending on your point of view."
---
Which prepared them well for entry into politics, Govt. work, and re-education and parental remediation specialties.
AKA "Educators"
"Without that concern for a future, I may have scanned the post
and shrugged, "what me worry, I'll be dead"."
---
Lawryn,
Exactly, fundamental connections with life were severed by those who had the hubris to believe that only what they believed mattered.
History had come to an end, and there were no costs associated with re-inventing the wheel.
The individual is God, love is free, consciences are clear(ed).
I keep asking myself if the Muslim street-rioting will spread to America, and if it does what will be our reaction.
So far, the Muslims here haven't really had the impetus to head for the streets because of the craven-ness of our print and broadcast media. They *must*, however, be aware of the flood of anti-Mohammad cartoons swarming throughout the internet and are choosing to ignore them.
Which makes me think that maybe, perhaps, American Muslims aren't as nuts as Muslims elsewhere in the world.
The other factor, of course, being in my initial question: what would happen if 100 or 1,000 or 10,000 Muslims felt the need to swarm down a Main Street in Springfield, AnyState, USA, carrying banners telling their fellow Americans that the needs of Islam are more important than the Constitutional guarantees this country was built upon ... including the right of individual citizens to bear arms.
"I keep asking myself if the Muslim street-rioting will spread to America, and if it does what will be our reaction."
---
Someone brought up the 2nd Ammendment being a buffer when things get really out of hand at the border.
Hewitt feels assured we won't descend into "civil disobedience" or some such.
I guess like Bubba and Reno he would feel no compunction not to call the Feds down on Citizens, in this case for treating our neighbors rudely, and of course disobeying the law.
Har de har.
I'm sure the GWB team could come up with a rousing condemnation of
Vigilantism and lesser sins against the state.
Might even throw in Hewitt's favorite put-down:
"Nativists"
wildiris' point is a fascinating one, which hadn't occurred to me.
When the Berkeley Free Speech Movement was underway, I was only in my early teens and in Chicago, but I recall the media depictions of its guiding spirit, Mario Savio, as a wild-eyed lunatic.
When I was a medical student, I got to sit and talk with him for a long time. He was actually a very gentle, extremely thoughtful person.
Not at all like what the media had made him out to be.
Should have been a lesson to me.
Jamie Irons
"telling their fellow Americans that the needs of Islam are more important than the Constitutional guarantees this country was built upon ..."
---
They don't have to:
The Govt. Schools, and Media are doing it for them.
Wretchard, your last few sentences of each post have always been Kipling-scary, but this one kicks it!
But the government message to the headmen was really we cannot protect you and you will have to look out for yourselves though we will never officially admit it. As I said, I've heard this speech before but never expected to hear it spoken in the heart of Europe.
Last time it was spoken in the heart of Europe, it was the Red Menace, it was called Communism. East Germany in particular.
As a kid in the big Catholic grade schools in Philly in the Sixties, the nuns told us the stories of Tom Dooley, how the Commies in China came and cut the teacher's tongue out and pounded pencils into randomly selected students' ears. The Roman Catholic nuns told us that.
Then we'd practice 'duck and cover' drills next to window walls through which we could see the huge refineries and their burn-off flaming stacks, knowing we lived next to the strategic targets of the looming WWIII.
It's been worse than this in the recent past for us paper tigers, you know. Before we became hippies, we built bomb shelters under our front lawns.
The Commies did a lot less than the Islamofascists have done to declare their deathly hatred of us, and we responded to them in a relentless, remorseless aggression.
The West is going to wake up. Right?
Doug - how long you suppose all that palavering would take before our elected officials could issue an official "stance statement"?
How many cops/soldiers do you figure would show up to enforce it, should it be too civilized?
"When I was a medical student, I got to sit and talk with him for a long time. He was actually a very gentle, extremely thoughtful person"
---
Jamie,
I was there, but didn't pay much attention to his politics.
From what I recall about what I learned later, he was probably not unlike David Horowitz's father:
An honest, sincere, thoughtful and educated person, but a committed Communist.
Comments about the media remain true, of course.
Yeah, hope you're right, Nahncee.
But if the Pres Orders the Military in, who's to say?
Don't have to kill too many, just put down the insurrection and deliver the property to it's rightful owners.
Make those Elian Cuban Abduction pictures look like child's play.
2164th said...something pretty darn true and also sad. Yes the performance of the United States in this sad affair from the Dhimmi In Chief President Bush on down has been shameful. That two Jordanians have shown the way should make everyone simply pause and consider what sort of people they are.
Pierre
What would have happened to the West if not for this existential test of Islam? Would we have succumbed to centuries of somnolent senescence until we just faded away? Would we have awoken one day to find our lives filled with diversions, devoid of substance and freedom?
The West had embraced the deadly sin of licentiousness as a substitute for the virtue of freedom. We were on our way to going out with a whimper.
Then a man named Osama bin Laden rudely interrupted our sleep. Like Marx before him, he also may have been correct in analysis: we were decadent, and lazy, and narcissistic. But his predictions became obsolete the moment those planes hit the towers.
History has no determination, perhaps, but direction? I believe it does.
We will win, and Europe will be there with us (if a tad bruised).
Continuing to teach the Spainish/Mexican version of history, of course.
Aristedes,
Our demographic curves are simply behind theirs:
They have begun to address it, we haven't.
Well said Aristides, well said.
Aristides (OT),
The other day your mentioned (IIRC) that you were reading John Lewis Gaddis' The Cold War: A New History. By chance I happened to get it the other day myself; though I lived through the whole thing and thought I understood a fair amount about it, having read George Kennan and others, Gaddis certainly casts a lot of new light on the subject.
Doug,
I think your comparison of Mario Savio to Horowitz's father (not that I am any kind of expert on either man) is apt.
Jamie Irons
An interesting article on the blogosphere in the beeb;http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/4696668.stm
the article ednds with.....
Richard Sambrook, head of the BBC World Service and Global News Division (who runs a blog himself) accepts that the BBC needs to do more.
"The BBC should proactively engage with bloggers. This is a new issue for us. Some departments look at blogs, though haphazardly. But it pays dividends. The BBC is a huge impersonal organisation. It needs to come out from under its rock," he says.
As for using blogs as a source he says: "The key is careful attribution. It would be a big mistake for the MSM to try to match the blogs, but they can teach us lessons about openness and honesty. The MSM should concentrate on what it can do - explain, analyse and verify."
At first on the field of battle one thrills at the sound of mighty and unearthly forces loosed, but in the din we suddenly realize that boys are dying all about us, and that these guns bear swift death and mangling to suffering men. Between us and the enemy are just a few deep shell holes and a thin red line of flesh and blood, as a human rampart, formed of men who hold their lives in their hands, ready to make the great sacrifice. Behind us are the hidden guns and the support trenches in the narrow strip of hard-won territory. Behind these are the moving columns on the long roads, the pulsing arteries of traffic, and the moving troop trains on the rails. Behind these in turn are the plying ships, the millions of toiling workers, and the suffering hearts of the nations in arms. Whole nations---yes, almost the whole of humanity---are organized for war and dragged into deadly conflict as by some devil's behest, instead of being organized for brotherhood and the building of a better world. Oh, not for this devil's work were men made. Surely mankind must come to its own in these birth pangs of a new era. Never, never again must a whole humanity of the free-born sons of God be dragged into the hell of war....
God proves He loves America by giving us Predators
I personally believe that the proof is that he gave us oceans, but that's just me.
(Letter from my perch in Hell)
Heil Islam!
Mein Friends-Islamic Fascist Volk,
I have to speak softly because Der Teufel Devil now wants to chew on my liver.
You must must read Herr Doktor Spengler, it is so in-te-resting:
www.atimes.com/atimes/others/spengler.html
www.atimes.com/atimes
/Middle_East/HA24Ak01.html
Stupid dummkopf islamic brothers, you are doing it all wrong.
Drang Nach Westen ist Kaputt!
greer rants: As I read the weasel words, I got a terrible feeling of dread.
Yes, so did I. It would appear that the attacks in London, Spain, and France have instilled fear on the EU.
Or, Mr. EU Big Shot is on the Muslim's pad. Either way it bad.
fred: So, who is really our worst enemy?
I would say both the people who are making death threats to us and those who fail to protect us.
If this is a clever state sponsored ruse to gain nuclear weapons, then those who hold power should expose said ruse and neutralize the perpetrators.
If it is an unrelated bunch of nuts threatening to behead people - the threat should be reversed (by any and all means).
Reliapundit:
dhimmitude cannot exist without tryanny in the dhimmi's nation.
intimidation breeding intimidation.
I agree, the smell of fear is in the air. It's must be removed.
NahnCee:
I keep asking myself if the Muslim street-rioting will spread to America, and if it does what will be our reaction.
I don't know but I would guess it would not be pretty.
Doug:
I guess like Bubba and Reno he would feel no compunction not to call the Feds down on Citizens, in this case for treating our neighbors rudely... Vigilantism and lesser sins against the state.
I wonder if our American culture has the fight necessary to do the job. I also wonder if it has the wind knocked out of it by one-sided "hate crime" laws and the threat of police force against citizens who are on the receiving end of the Muslim's threats.
It's one thing for a politician to comfortable sit back and make decisions with a detail of security guards - it's very different thing for the average Joe on the street without much protection. I am sure Mr. Frattini has security men. Those who preach tolerance should have some introspect as they sit protected.
Tony: Last time it was spoken in the heart of Europe, it was the Red Menace, it was called Communism.
Fascism has not changed just the name is different.
As for doing something about it, there are some high level people and email addresses which could be used to show your displeasure.
"What would have happened to the West if not for this existential test of Islam? Would we have succumbed to centuries of somnolent senescence until we just faded away? Would we have awoken one day to find our lives filled with diversions, devoid of substance and freedom?"
Aristides,
You're a shameless drama queen.
With no real part in the drama.
What a shame. We've got 20 years to fill.
Question, what is the shelf life of a story or a cartoon? It took six months for this to hit the fan, how does anyone know what the next load looks like? How can one be prudent while ignorant?
They're still out there picking and choosing, phishing for a live one.
Has everyone here read JB Kelly (Arabia the gulf and the West)? No? Well get a copy right now. I just read him today and I am stunned; Kelly saw it all coming and diagnosed it back in 1979 just as the sheisse was hitting the fan in Iran.
The spell of fear cast by the idiots who proclaim "don't call me violent or I'll kill you" must be dispelled in America by our courageous political cartoonists - where are they? I MEAN this is prize material = a large clown's red nose waiting to be honked.
We've got sixty years invested in leftist, politically correct ideologies. It won't be easy to overcome the carefully inculcated pc sensitivities but as meme chose said at 6:53, we can depend on the Islamists to overplay their hands.
The question I would ask is how long until the arab street strikes out against bars in heavily populated muslim neighborhoods? All they have to do is burn a couple of them down, protest outside some of them, hassle and attack potential patrons and the bars would be out of business in a month's time. What about stores that sell pork in muslim neighborhoods? Same thing. How about protests demanding there be no porn shops within 1500 meters of any mosque? How about violent protests against gay bars in the vacinity of muslim neighborhoods? What is to stop the arab street from intimidating customers away from a bar in close proximity to a muslim housing project? The prophet forbids booze, pork and porn you know. Who is going to say they don't have a right to protest in such a manner when such things are so offensive to their religion?
These cartoons I think are just the tip of the iceburg.
He was managing editor for a mid-sized regional paper, a slightly-balding man of sixty who even now believed he and his generation had changed the world for the better.
He remembered Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers. He remembered Woodward and Bernstein. He believed the press had to be both brave and free to serve as a bulwark against tyranny. (He had once actually written those very words in an editorial.) He used to be so proud and sure of himself, but as he shaved he looked searchingly in the mirror and softly sang: Na, na, na, na, na, na...
Once upon a time he would have sided with his news staff, but it was he who had made the final decision not to publish. Half the staff had quit in protest. And just this morning came news that authorities at UPEI, a university in that vast land to the north once synonymous with freedom and salvation for so many of his generation, had confiscated all copies of a student newspaper that had dared carry the offending cartoons.
Na, na, na, na, na, na...
Gotta get down to it.
...
Should have been done long ago.
...
How can you run when you know?
Na, na, na, na, na, na...
It strikes me that much of our action is reactionary and defensive. Why not go on the attack? For one,
Why not transform the current Kyoto idiocy into something more intelligent and productive. If the goal is to reduce green gas emissions, why not tackle the problem at the source -- that is, fossil fuels. Create a "Kyoto" global fund dedicated to alternative energy research.
Kyoto funding to the universities would dilute funds going to these institutions from Jihadist sources. Perhaps it would even eliminate the need to accept these funds and the Jihadist political subversion tied to it.
Solving our dependance on fossil fuels should also disentangle us from related geopolitical problems. And with no oil market to export to, perhaps Russia would change its destabilizing policy. Though knowing the bastards as I do, that might be a bit of a stretch.
Goesh,
An Andrew Sullivan
"Free Booze BBQ and Review"
every month would be nice.
Glad you brought up alcohol:
Muzzies plus Drinkers will never go as softly into the night as smokers and global warmers.
(on a related note: one of Hewitt's Heros, Rick Warren of
"A Purpose Driven Life"
has joined the Global Warming Brigades)
Next Book:
"God Wants You to Play God"
...problem is, while he's praying for the earth to cool down, I'll be praying for
Hell on Earth for our Muslim brothers.
...the Sisters all get Asbestos Hijabs.
After the boys are gone they can don their Sonia Suits.
Mika,
Here ya go, VDH, read the whole thing.
Finding our footing where lunacy looms large
---
The only mystery is not how bizarre the news will be from the Middle East, but why the autocratic Middle Easterners feel so confident that any would pay their lunacy such attention.
The answer? Oil and nukes — and sometimes the two in combination.
By any economic standard, most states in the Middle East — whether characterized by monarchy, Baathism, dictatorship, or theocracy — have floundered. There are no scientific discoveries emanating from a Cairo or Damascus. It is tragic and perhaps insensitive, but nevertheless honest, to confess that the contemporary Arab world has lately given the world only two new developments: the suicide-bomb belt and the improvised explosive device. Even here there is a twofold irony: The technology for both is imported from the West. And the very tactic arises out of a desperate admission that to fight a conventional battle against a Westernized military without the cover of civilian shields, whether in Israel or Baghdad, is tantamount to suicide.
Meanwhile, millions of Africans face famine and try to inaugurate democracies. Asia is in the midst of economic transformation. Latin America is undergoing fundamental political upheaval. Who cares? — our attention is glued instead on a few acres near Jericho, the mountains of the Hindu Kush, the succession patterns of Gulf Royals, and the latest ranting of an Iranian president who seems barely hinged, and without petroleum and a reactor would be accorded the global derision once reserved for Idi Amin.
So take the dependency on oil away from Europe and the United States, and the billions of petrodollars the world sends yearly to medieval regimes like Iran or Saudi Arabia, and the other five billion of us could, to be frank, fret little whether such self-pitying tribal and patriarchal societies wished to remain, well, tribal. There would be no money for Hezbollah, Wahhabi madrassas, Syrian assassination teams, or bought Western apologists.
The problem is not just a matter of the particular suppliers who happen to sell to the United States — after all, we get lots of our imported oil from Mexico, Canada, and Nigeria. Rather, we should worry about the insatiable American demand that results in tight global supply for everyone, leading to high prices and petrobillions in the hands of otherwise-failed societies who use this largess for nefarious activities from buying nukes to buying off deserved censure from the West, India, and China. If the Middle East gets a pass on its terrorist behavior from the rest of the world, ultimately that exemption can be traced back to the voracious American appetite for imported oil, and its effects on everything from global petroleum prices to the appeasement of Islamic fascism.
Without nuclear acquisition, a Pakistan or Iran would warrant little worry. It is no accident that top al Qaeda figures are either in Pakistan or Iran, assured that their immunity is won by reason that both of their hosts have vast oil reserves or nukes or both.
The lesson from all this is that in order to free the United States from such blackmail and dependency, we must at least try to achieve energy independence and drive down oil prices — and see that no Middle East autocracy gains nuclear weapons. Those principles, along with support for democratic reform, should be the three pillars of American foreign policy.
In the meantime, until we arrive at liberal and consensual governments that prove stable, there will be no real peace. And if an Iran, Saudi Arabia, or Syria obtains nuclear weapons, there will be eventually war on an unimaginable scale, predicated on the principle that the West will tolerate almost any imaginable horror to ensure that one of its cities is not nuked or made uninhabitable.
Yet if billions of petrodollars continue to pour into such traditional societies, as a result they will never do the hard political and economic work of building real societies. Instead their elites will obtain real nuclear weapons to threaten neighbors for even more concessions, as they buy support at home with the national prestige of an "Islamic bomb." Saddam almost grasped that: Had he delayed his invasion of Kuwait five years until he resurrected his damaged nuclear program, Kuwait would now be an Iraqi province, and perhaps Saudi Arabia as well.
In the long-term, democratization in the framework of constitutional government has the best chance of bringing relief. But for the foreseeable future the United States and its allies must also ensure that Iran, and states like it, are not nuclear, and that we wean ourselves off a petroleum dependency — to save both ourselves, the addicts, and even our enemies, the dealers of the Middle East.
Small correction. The song "Chicago" was actually written and sung by Graham Nash, not Neil Young.
It's dying - if you believe in justice
It's dying - and if you believe in freedom
It's dying - let a man live it's own life
It's dying - rules and regulations, who needs them
Open up the door
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
I never thought I would live to see the day that we would voluntarily give up our right to freedom of speech on the threat of violence. I always thought we would recognize threats to our rights and fight to uphold them. And now, after all that has happened these last few years, for the first time I am truly frightened. Not of the threats of violence, but of our own growing capacity for surrender without a struggle.
therealswede,
Whit said,
"whit said...
We've got sixty years invested in leftist, politically correct ideologies. It won't be easy to overcome the carefully inculcated pc sensitivities"
...but he's counting on the muzzies to overplay their hand.
A safe bet, but are we too dumbed down, fat dumb happy and lazy to really care?
Just pay your illegal Mexican worker and use the savings to buy a larger screen TV to watch some young slut like Spears.
Yuck.
...at least the Sullivan BBQ would be more likely to result in Street Violence:
Spears will just have the suicide bombers entertained until they go to meet her in Neverland.
(with Jackson, of course)
Yeah. As always, Victor Davis Hanson provides articulate and salient commentary. Thanks Doug.
Yeah, big whups: No Honking Clown Nose for me?
Doug, how 'bout a hulahoop?
HulaLooped
Wretchard said:
"Freedom of expression was built, first of all, on the certainty that Western governments would never punish people for expressing an opinion."
This is rather inaccurate. "Freedom of Press" was an accident of birth. There was no notion of 'Freedom of Press" when Gutenberg started printing Bibles. The 'press' wasn't a notion the instiutions of the day worried about. Contemporaries of Guttenberg might be burned-at-the-stake for saying the earth circled the sun, but the publishers of Galileo's tracts were not threatened with the same.
English notions of 'Freedom of the Press' emerged during the civil war. It developed from Cromwell's decision to build an army of hot-head protestant radical common-folk. Cromwell developed something of a "don't ask, don't tell" policy which has been passed down as 'freedom of religion" and eventually 'freedom of press'. Of course, this was really 'freedom of protestant interpretation', but that is another matter.
Cromwell's policy produced a revolutionary military unit, and nothing more powerful has been found to replace it.
To sum this up, "Freedom of Press" is a corruption of "Freedom of Conscious", and this later notion provides the foundation for a type of military unit. Cromwell's military unit then decided questions of government.
NahnCee said...
"Which makes me think that maybe, perhaps, American Muslims aren't as nuts as Muslims elsewhere in the world."
NahnCee, I am teaching business strategy this year in an American University in the Middle East, in the United Arab Emirates. I have had all my students create blogs. About 50 of them wrote about the cartoon controversy in the context of the Danish boycott. I have summarized and excerpted about 30 of their posts on my blog. If you are interested in what moderate Muslim 22 year old business students at an American University in the Middle East think about this matter, look no further.
thoughtfully,
starling
retro - good catch. I was about to post the same correction when I saw yours - Doh! (though the other 3 may have contributed a sound or two to the song '4-Way Street').
nonomous - I was ridiculed for bringing Cromwell's example into yesterday's thread, so you might want to think twice before using historical references here.
Great Stuff, Starling, thanks.
---
Summary
My students wrote nearly fifty posts about this controversy. Based on my understanding of what they have written, I can say that, on the whole, they believe that:
1) The Danish government and the paper that published the controversial cartoons should apologize to Muslims.
2) If necessary, Danish businesses should use their clout to get the government and the newspaper to do so. failing to do so, they stand little chance of regaining any of their lost market share in the Middle East and, most likely, elsewhere.
3) Despite well known brand names, very low switching costs, only moderately differentiated products, and sufficient excess capacity among local producers all combine to leave Danish dairy producers with relatively little of what Michael Porter calls "supplier power."
4) The actions of grocery stores lke the one mentioned in the article are admirable and correct. Still, they and other dairy manufacturers are motivated by principle and profit and will make the most of the situation economically if the opportunity arises.
5) The importance of the institution that the West calls "freedom of speech" is less important than the "right" of Muslims not to have their religion insulted, mocked, or disrespected. From that, it follows that
6) Freedom of speech and expression should have limits when it comes to religion and religious sensibilities.
As anyone who has read this far can see, I have a very interesting and informative semester ahead of me. And I wouldn't trade it for the world.
---
BUY DANISH!
" Freedom of speech and expression should have limits when it comes to religion and religious sensibilities"
...I'd die for that one (AGAINST) in a heartbeat.
opotho,
That was just because your so damned argumentative!
Starling's post makes Hansons even more relevant:
Follow the Money!
i am contacting my local tailor, does my yellow star go on my left or right sleeve?
2) If necessary, Danish businesses should use their clout to get the government and the newspaper to do so. failing to do so, they stand little chance of regaining any of their lost market share in the Middle East and, most likely, elsewhere.
Maybe those couragous danes that were supporting the boycott of Israel and selling to the arab world will now want to sell to ISRAEL? I doubt it...
Ah, I do love to argue yes.
But dismissing someone's argument due to nothing but the perceived remoteness of an historical reference is bush league [he argued].
I'm just tickled as hell to find Cromwell again, today! ...
"To hell or Connaght!"
Hanson in a nutshell:
Pay folks so they can revert the World to Pre-Galileo Times.
WITHOUT US !
Probably already covered above, I can't help but wonder if yesterday's speaker in Beirut, Hezbollah leader Nasrallah, wasn't fully up to date on these proposed "rules of conduct" when he demanded that Europe pass laws forbidding insults of the Prophet?
Always demand something you know you're going to get anyway.
Correction:
"The Profit"
Atavism for Fun and (the) Profit
It all goes back to a lack of any serious articulated Goals in the Mohammedan Wars, thus far.
No definition of Victory
No identification of the actual Enemy
No effective War Leadership
If the Bush Administration could remedy those errors in both style and substance there could be a Banner for the Free World to rally to.
As it is both the Mr Rumsfeld & Ms Rice have named Iran and Syria as Terroist Sponsoring States.
Yet both continue to export terror, unmolested by US.
The Bush Doctrine has gained US no respect, half hearted efforts rarely do.
Instead, whether reading the "Conservative" Pundits, or the "Blues" makes a reasonable reader shake their head in wonder about the competency of US leadership.
The Iranians and their agents are running a disinformation campaign and the State Dept's first reaction is to support the Enemy's propaganda.
Not only is the Federal Government not at War, it often supports the Enemy's efforts.
But for all means,
"Stay the Course"
We'll win in ten or twenty years, or so says Mr Cheney.
OK,
Long as you guard the border, come Hell or the Feds.
(Instead of fleeing to some Tropical Island, Jeesh)
Goesh, FYI: many (most?) local zoning ordinances already prohibit adult use businesses (strip clubs, book shops) within a certain range of a house of worship.
This site has a roundup of political cartoons on the cartoon war. Those Muhammad Cartoons.
HulaLooped? Pineapple boi, don't you mean HulaWhooped?
It is kind of funny reading all the comments railing against the offense some muslims are taking with 'depictions of Mohammad'. Take a look in the mirror and ask yourself if you aren't one of the many posters here who took offense at the 'lefts anti-war stance' who moaned about the 'fifth column' the 'biased press' speaking of the treasonous acts of the dissenters. Are your previous words simply empty, devoid of action? Is your offense at those that question what you hold 'true' and 'sacred' somehow different from the Muslims whom also take offense? As far as I'm concerned both of these groups can take a flying f*** at the moon with your righteous attitudes.
a lack of any serious articulated Goals in the Mohammedan Wars, thus far.
No definition of Victory
No identification of the actual Enemy
No effective War Leadership
DR - that's what I've been saying each time I hear that some Islamic uber-strategy is supposedly in play.
But how to exploit that fact?
Last night I dined with a man who unapologetically claimed to believe in "empire", and who is nothing but contemptuous of the Bush administration's "incompetance" at mastering his idea of empire-building.
ash - my sense of "the sacred" is not what's offended when the MSM abuses its priviledge to serve the common good in order to promote its own political agenda.
I would be all for violent protests against non-muslim women going about muslim neighborhoods with uncovered heads, if I were a fundamentalist that is. Who would stop me, irate bloggers? If I were a fundamentalist, I would torch a bar near my neighborhood too. Who would rat me out, another believer? I know! Let's get a blog petition going that says we will only tolerate violence directed against freedom of speech. Let's draw the line with pork and alcohol consumption and if necessary to keep the peace, you women should start to look around wal-mart for cheap headscarves to wear if you have to pass through a muslim community and pretty sacks to wear at the beach. Ain't it grand being free?? Hey! It's just a whole lot easier, cheaper and hassle-free to identify with the aggressors when the victims won't fight.
ash,
while many, both here and away,
" ... took offense at the 'lefts anti-war stance' who moaned about the 'fifth column' the 'biased press' speaking of the treasonous acts of the dissenters. ... "
There were no reported deaths, riots, building burned or lives threatened due to those moans.
You are right, from Belmonters there were no actions taken, only words.
Many bemoaned Mr Toles's WaPo cartoon. I believe that Mr Toles still has a job and, most likely, walks the streets of DC with the same sense of physical security that his readers enjoy.
Not so for Mr Rushdie,
Mr Van Gough, or these cartoonists, the newest members of the Jihadi's target group.
DR, I agree, most took no action even though they urged it - empty words, they didn't have the courage of their convictions - whatever. Both groups are on the wrong side of the issue.
optho wrote:
"MSM abuses its priviledge to serve the common good i"
hmmm, so you think they should muzzle themselves in order to serve this "common good"?
ash,
I realize I'm probably wasting my time, but few who take offense at the position of left-wing protesters in this country, will deny their right to that protest. And I doubt that there are many left-wing protesters who have felt the need to self-censor out of fear of harm to themselves. Do you begin to see the distinction? Or is it too much for you to comprehend?
Ash,
You're right. And from now on I not only intend to boycott your offensive posts, I intend to issue a couple of fatwas concerning your offensive behavior.
Fatwa 1/ Massacre all Trolls on sight.
Fatwa 2/ Take everthing belonging to chauvinist Trolls.
Ash, your holocaust will come.
wretchard,
Freedom of expression was built, first of all, on the certainty that Western governments would never punish people for expressing an opinion.
Freedom of expression is built on two pillars: (1) government would not punish people for expressing an opinion, (equally important) (2) Government will protect people from any violent response from people who do not like their speech
As you've noted, what the EU bureaucrat is really saying is that if a publication says something that the Islamists don't like, their lives are forfeit. Which is a bigger potential sanction than any EU court is likely to give
A year or so ago many posters, here, thought we were embarked on a Clash of Civilizations, Cultures & Religions, or a Quest for Empire.
turns out to have been, none of the above.
9-11 change everything, alright. Especially commuter traffic patterns in NYC. It certainly has made short hop air travel an unattractive option.
opotho,
To exploit the Enemy's weaknesses the "West" or US needs to do all those "nonmilitary" options that the Government is bad at.
But first an Authority has to define Victory. Once there is a Goal, one that can be articulated and visualized, that Goal would be readily achieved. But there is no Vision of Victory.
The first President Bush had a "Vision" problem, to bad it was a genetic trait.
I am drawn to comparisons between the mid to late 1930’s and now. In the 1930’s the threat to world peace was a growing authoritarian movement that included fascists, Nazis, Imperial Japan, and lesser dictatorships. At that time, the movement was primarily centered in Europe. The comparable threat today is Islamofacism that includes radical Islamic fundamentalists and lesser dictatorships and theocracies. The new movement is centered in the Middle East.
In the 1930’s, European leaders not caught up in the authoritarian movement, recognized the threat from the movement, but were recovering from the devastation of WWI and were unable to face the harsh realities of the times. European leaders of today also recognize the modern threat and are also unable to bring themselves to face the harsh realities of the times. This is because today’s European leaders have experienced 50 years of relative peace, freedom, and prosperity brought about by the American commitment to protect Western Europe from communist Russia. The American security blanket has created a false sense of security and a naïve belief in international law or norms.
European intellectuals of the 1930’s rationalized appeasement and apologized for Nazi anti-Semitism to avoid another world conflagration. European intellectuals today rationalize terrorism, apologize for Arab anti-Semitism, and deride American international efforts as cowboy diplomacy. They do this to avoid becoming involved in what appears to be a coming world crisis.
American intellectuals of the 1930’s did not attempt to rationalize the depredations of Nazi Germany or Tojo’s Japan, but they argued that the actions of these countries did not impact America and therefore America need not involve herself. American intellectuals today make similar arguments. For instance, Iraq was not a threat to the US and the American invasion was unwarranted; American military efforts exacerbate Islamofascist terrorism, not deter it; America should pull our troops out of Iraq to surrounding countries and eventually out of the region.
In the 1930’s America had a strong leader who recognized the threat early on and responded to it, within the limits of domestic political constraints. This is also true today. I would argue American leadership today is even more aware of the threat, than in prior times.
I believe the early stages of a new confrontation are upon us. The confrontation is between western democracies and fundamentalist theocratic states and lesser entities centered in the Middle East.
The time for American action is now, while our enemy is weak, largely unarmed, largely un-mobilized, and poorly coordinated. American action should include diplomatic efforts to crystallize support among current and former allies, military efforts to prepare our armed forces for a new, unconventional, and protracted struggle, domestic political efforts to prepare the American electorate for the coming struggle, and military dispositions around the world to allow for rapid and overwhelming response to crisis points.
Afghanistan and Iraq were the opening American salvos in this protracted struggle. Both operations had short term tactical and long term strategic implications. Allowing one’s thoughts to becoming mired in day-to-day terrorist bombings in either country is a mistake. Our short term tactical goals were achieved in each case and the same may be said of the initial strategic goals. We have a good plan, it is working, and we must stay on course.
As a side note, I generally refuse to purchase or listen to any Neal Young work product, song, or performance no matter how aesthetically pleasing they may be. I reject his politics totally.
Some good posts here recently, though I don’t agree with all of them.
Doug Santo
Pasadena, CA
Nahncee asks at 10:04 PM
"I keep asking myself if the Muslim street-rioting will spread to America, and if it does what will be our reaction."
from the ITM blog -
Subject: Are You A Democrat, Republican, or Southern Republican?]
Are you a Democrat, Republican or Southern Republican?
Here is a little test that will help you decide.
The answer can be found by posing the following question. You're walking down a deserted street with your wife and two small children.
Suddenly, an Islamic Terrorist with a huge knife comes around the corner, locks eyes with you, screams obscenities, praises Allah, raises the knife, and charges at you. You are carrying a Glock cal .40, and you are an expert shot. You have mere seconds before he reaches you and your family.
What do you do?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Democrat's Answer:
Well, that's not enough information to answer the question!
Does the man look poor? Or oppressed?
Have I ever done anything to him that would inspire him to attack?
Could we run away?
What does my wife think?
What about the kids?
Could I possibly swing the gun like a club and knock the knife out of
his
hand?
What does the law say about this situation?
Does the Glock have appropriate safety built into it?
Why am I carrying a loaded gun anyway, and what kind of message does
this
send to society and to my children?
Is it possible he'd be happy with just killing me?
Does he definitely want to kill me, or would he be content just to
wound me?
If I were to grab his knees and hold on, could my family get away
while he
was stabbing e?
Should I call 9-1-1?
Why is this street so deserted?
We need to raise taxes, have a paint and weed day and make this
happier,
healthier street that would discourage such behavior.
This is all so confusing! I need to debate this with some friends for
few
days and try to come to a consensus.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Republican's Answer:
BANG!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Southern Republican's Answer:
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! click .....
(sounds of reloading).
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! click.
Daughter: "Nice grouping, Daddy! Were those the Winchester Silver
Tips or
Hollow Points?
Son: "Git-r-Dun, Pop! Can I shoot the next one?!"
Wife: "You ain' t taking that to the Taxidermist!"
dcat/still at it ® - 8:05 pm | #
threalswede, if you dig through the archives you will see plenty of examples of posters here making the treason claim. Treason is a serious crime with serious penalties. Any assertion that dissent is treasonous is ludicrous. Take a look at venom spewed over the NY Times publishing of the wiretap story for example.
I agree one shouldn't be forced to censor, nor should one be forced to self censor out of fear. The sword cuts both ways and hence my inclination to point that out here.
The Capital of the EU is not in Brussels it is in Mecca. Sweeden's capital is Damascus, the Ukraine's in Tehran.
It seems the people get it, lets hope the people in Europe can shake their leaders out of their subservient and SUBMISSIVE nature or at least elect new leadership that listens to the people.
ash,
I have read & participated on this site for many months.
And while there have been calls to "Nuke" cities, destroy economies, raze cultures and a variety of other man made disaster scenarios.
No one called for burning down the WaPo. Bombing the NYTimes, nor killing Dan Rather. No fatwa was issued demanding Mr Tole's job or head.
You are right, though, there are many impotent words.
The Mohammedan's words are not empty, there in, ash, is the Challenge.
No Belmonteer will come to your home and stab you to death, ala Mr Van Gough.
They may talk a meaner game then the Iranian President, but the posters here have even less capacity to wreck havoc or loose the dogs of War then he does.
None of us have access to a nuclear device, either, I hope.
America's self censorship is appalling; what, one major daily has printed the cartoons? NPR's and CNN's declarations of Respect make me laugh. What the press respects can fit on a dot visible by electron microscope. Someday, after many bodies and buildings gone, we will look back on this cowardice;we will wonder why we lay down so quickly for these maniacs. And especially in America. We just assume American Muslims have not imbibed any American "take it easy" spirit; we just assume that they will react like terrorist savages this early in the game.And so we shield them from the cartoons on a mass scale.
I feel ashamed for the academics and the media. Not of them, but for them. God help that I should never have to look myself in the mirror the way they must do now ...
/////////////
I really enjoy history. But when it came time to think about making a career of it--decades ago--...I heeded the warning I heard at the time that I'd wind up in really really bitter arguements about things that were inconsequential. And these arguements would scale. The more inconsequential the arguement the more bitter it would be.
We are in the midst of such an arguement. Only I think it is the Western liberal establishment academics who are being called on the carpet by Moslem religious academics.
Why indeed did Melville begin his novel Moby Dick with the line "Call Me Ismael."
so you think they [MSM] should muzzle themselves in order to serve this "common good"?
ash - when Dan Rather uses public airwaves to disseminate things he believes are as good as true, because according to him they ought to be true, then 'muzzling' is too tender a word. (Want to revisit that story?)
I'm with das on today's MSM: "America's self censorship is appalling."
desert rat - agreed: the problem with 'the vision thing' added to that problem with the 'communication thing'. Oy.
(Letter from my foxhole in Hell)
Heil Islam !
Liebe Muslim Fascist Brothers,
Today mein gut freind Herr Doktor Goebbels was sitting next to me and he had time to give some advice before the Teufel Devil would come back to chew on his intestins. Mein other gut freind Qutb was sitting next to him but he was silent since the Teufel Devil cut out his tongue.
Goebbels: Mein Freunden, I beg you please, always repeat:
Islam is a religion of PEACE!
Islam is a religion of PEACE!
Islam is a religion of PEACE!
In the end the masses will believe vat you repeat.
Heil Islam !
Heil Islam ! SIEG HEIL !
Charles,
Ishmael concludes, "Do thou, too, live in this world without being of it."
charles - my edition of 'Moby Dick' has a sixteen page introduction by none other than Edward Said. Can you imagine?
I haven't read the Said intro in years, but I turn to Melville always.
(Vintage Books, 1991)
I forgot to add that Rather is still employed by CBS, and continues to broadcast in a frequency which the public provides him free of charge.
So ash, will you be dropping today's line of thought after all?
optho wrote:
"ash - when Dan Rather uses public airwaves to disseminate things he believes are as good as true, because according to him they ought to be true, then 'muzzling' is too tender a word. (Want to revisit that story?)"
How about when the President of the United States uses the State of the Union address to talk about Yellow Cake from Nigeria. (Is this a story worth revisiting? - oops, it seems we are, in a sense)
Ex-Cheney Aide Testified Leak Was Ordered, Prosecutor Says
"There's SOMETHING happening here,
What it is, ain't exackly clear...
There's a man with a gun over there,
Telling me I got to beware!
I think its time we
STOP!
Children, what's that sound?
Everybody look what's going down...
There's BATTLE LINES being drawn,
Nobody's right, if EVERYBODY's wrong
Young people speakin' their mind,
Getting SO MUCH RESISTANCE
From behind...
The Youngbloods, circa 63-64
Gummint can't protect me now...
I think it is an act of war when middle east nut cases threaten the west provided their collective ability to carry out the threats are credible.
I think it is treasonous when western press threatens the security of the west by exposing classified programs that are being carried out to counter middle east nutcases that are threatening the west.
The ME are against western powers.
The MSM are against western powers.
One is a threat to freedom.
One is threat to survival.
The NYT doesn't ballyhoo Islam.
Al Jazeera doesn't ballyhoo Islam.
Both ballyhoo the US.
Hmmm.
@ Ash
How about when the President of the United States uses the State of the Union address to talk about Yellow Cake from Nigeria. (Is this a story worth revisiting? - oops, it seems we are, in a sense)
Do you really want to get spanked on this issue?
It occurs to me (I'm sometimes surpassingly slow) that in one sense the power of these cartoons derives from their not being seen. The imams (and others) can control the meaning of these images as long as they are not seen. But as soon as they are seen, the individual may make an alternative evaluation--and for the imams that is a problem.
They say these images are exceedingly insulting, and maybe it is so. But at least in the case of the cartoon mocking the suicide bombers lined up at the gates of heaven, I would argue the insult is well-placed.
I don't think anyone wishes to give gratuitous offense, nor was that the original purpose of the cartoons. But I don't see anything wrong with a commentary directed against those who would strap bombs to their bodies with the intention of blowing up others who have done them no wrong.
I think most muslims are mature enough to accept such a commentary. Why not at least give them a chance to prove it?
ash - we were talking about the perfidy of the MSM because of your initial 8:01 post above:
posters here who took offense at the 'lefts anti-war stance'
who moaned about the 'fifth column'
the 'biased press'
the treasonous acts of the dissenters
I cited the Dan Rather/CBS example as an abuse of a priviledge they enjoy to serve the common good.
But since you will only lose that argument you've conveniently and predictably shifted the discussion to an entirely new analysis, while hoping that no one notices that you changed the venue on us.
That is intellectually dishonest. Address and defend your 8:01 post, please.
Sirius,
You are addressing the false argument used by so many.
(Heard Mike Gallehger use it last nite.)
If the Cartoons were false, their argument would carry more weight, but they aren't.
"I don't think anyone wishes to give gratuitous offense, nor was that the original purpose of the cartoons."
Unfortunately,
The Truth Hurts,
and not just
The Mohammedans/Our Enemies.
Same with Rathergate if I'm reading Opotho right.
(how could ash not be wrong?)
Re: "American Pie"
Good God, Wretchard. For the first time in my life, the lyrics to that song mean something to me, and I'm feeling scared.
yesterday,
all my troubles seemed so far away
Now it seems they're here to stay
oh I believe in yesterday.
Namely, the MSM deals in LIES constantly,
and some folks have nothing better to do than to toke up and sing old Beatles Songs.
I forgot which stinging/biting animal you said you have in Texas sized doses, 'Rat.
Was going to wish it on you, but senor moment interrupted me.
Damn Mexicans.
as soon as [the cartoons] are seen, the individual may make an alternative evaluation--and for the imams that is a problem.
And what sort of problem would that present for the MSM? Everyone I know who's finally seen the cartoons are dumbfounded at how mild they are.
Mightn't it be in the Western and free press's interests, let alone their job descriptions, to teach Muslims what ought to be seen as offensive or inoffensive to them?
Insensitive? Well it's the obvious point that everyone's dancing around: the fear that we'd need a philosophical justification to be seen telling someone else what should or shouldn't be offensive to them.
Well I say that delicacy is b.s. I had excellent examples to look up to in my upbringing. It's time that Islam had some good examples too.
annoy mouse - I still like the idea that the state-sponsored attack on the Danish embassy in Damascus was an attack on the soil of a fellow NATO member!
well man, if we're going back to the future.
There are some benefits to living near the open border.
You talk about a guy running off to a tropical island to hide from Reality, at least I'm planning to maintain a land bridge, back to civilization.
I hear the pokalolo is really something, there in the islands.
...toke up and sing old Beatles Songs.
Do people still do that?
"the fear that we'd need a philosophical justification to be seen telling someone else what should or shouldn't be offensive to them.
Well I say that delicacy is b.s. I had excellent examples to look up to in my upbringing"
---
If the PC Police have not taught us that yet, who will?
What are you refering to in your upbringing, warped as it was?
"Just to Sing"
"You talk about a guy running off to a tropical island to hide from Reality, at least I'm planning to maintain a land bridge, back to civilization."
---
Every time they bring down another building we can live in peace and harmony with nature again here.
...Long as I can teach the Sugar Lobby Subsistence Farming in Time.
Well, they ARE "Subsistence Farming"
but you know what I mean.
AOL Hell
SING, sing a song
make it simple
make it loud
so the Whole World can sing along
then-
When the lyric don't fit
we'll have to admit
It is with dread
we sing of Mohammed
Hey!
Ash can keep Opotho busy arguing, and the rest of us can have fun!
SING, sing a song
make it simple
make it loud
so the Whole World can sing along
then-
When the lyric don't fit
we'll have to admit
It is with dread
we sing of Mohammed.
The Left has quit,
the right don't know s...
were in a snit
uh...
Maybe Condi and GWB will just turn Mohammed into Pallidin.
Stranger things have not yet happened.
Das,
8:43 AM
Take it Easy,
Take it Easy,
Don't let the sound of your own wheels drive you craaazy.
---
Sounds like the DC Choir
But what we gonna do when the well runs dry?
optho wrote:
"That is intellectually dishonest. Address and defend your 8:01 post, please."
I'm sorry, I did not intend to "shift the venue" but rather the two issues seem intricately entwined to me. You seem to think that since CBS broadcasts on the public airwaves they are beholden to tell the 'truth'. Well, the truth is a slippery fellow and we all iterate our version of it. We can guess as to the motive. (Rather or Bush purposely lied, or, they simply got the story wrong – whatever - their 'truth' was disseminated and which would be the more egregious lie, the one told by the President in a State of the Union Address or the one told by the newsman? Which is the more egregious mistake or lie? It seems the president should be held to a higher standard, especially in a State of the Union address.
I fail to see how, as you wrote “MSM abuses its priviledge to serve the common good” The MSM parses the tea leaves and reports the truth as they see it, they are not abusing their privileges by getting the story wrong, it is a fact of life and people are necessarily influenced by their biases, and we as consumers of the media need to keep this in mind.
"rather the two issues seem intricately entwined to me."
---
That ain't all, unfortunately, but I digress.
Frattini’s balancing act is ludicrous -- and quintessential oily eurocrat double speak, too.
We won’t know what’s ‘offensive’ until it is arbitrarily declared so, after publication, by people interested more in intimidation than in curbing genuine offense.
The only ‘solution’ to this ‘problem’ would be approval prior to publication, and I don’t even want to think about that . . .
Consider this new standard of acceptability for free speech:
'How are we to reconcile freedom of expression and respect for each individual's deepest convictions?'
What if 'my deepest convictions' means no one is free to disagree with me? And if I can back it up with violence, I get my way, right?
And why is it always assumed that the cartoons are 'insulting or 'offensive'? Simply declaring them so doesn’t make them so.
Why do we always concede the terms defining the debate to the opposition?
Who wants to bet that the people now demanding we suppress the Danish cartoons will be the same ones expecting us to show our goodwill by publishing the results of Ahmadinejad's effort to mock Jews and the holocaust?
I only hope people will notice this discrepancy, and one other: The Danish cartoons speak to a truth that Ahmadinejad's do not.
Notice the assumptive assignment of blame in the following statements:
a) “it is terrible that a small group of extremists are exposing Swedes to danger [by reprinting the cartoons].”
b) “We see it as a reckless invitation to public disorder and humiliation.’’
c) "the importance of preventing and eradicating the roots of violence"
d) “the republication was, in my view, imprudent. Because probably they didn't calculate, they didn't think exactly of the consequences, and the risks of inflaming the situation”
Question: Would such pandering and solicitousness be extended to any other group? Or is it only extended to those – like gangsters – capable of threatening violence?
Seems those spouting off the most about free speech will defend it only if there is no price to be paid.
but, ash, even as Mr Wilson's report from Niger showed, the Iraqis had been attempting to aquire the Yellowcake. That they had been unsuccessful in the attempt does not alter the fact they had made the attempt.
Mr Bush and his Staff have spun the truth a few times, flat out lied at least a couple, and continue to mangle the English language in their attempt to figure out what to do, next.
Does that put them on the same footing as Mr Rather, in our System, it can.
In the Mohammedan System, Mr Rather would have died, one way or the other. The Syrians and their negotiating style in Lebanon comes to mind, quickly.
There is no equivilency between the two Systems, which goes back to the outrage over Cartoons.
The Scope of the Actions is what defines the crime. Not the strokes on the keyboard.
When some in the West begin to behave like the Mohammedans are behaving, acting out their frustration and rage in a recriprical manner.
In France, Denmark, Holland, Germany or England, that is when to watch the News, and the US Public will wonder, WHY?
Out of respect for the Combatants the NYTimes will be unable to tell US.
The contradiction, as usual with you, is that you actively appluad censorship in the corporate media in relation to something like the occupation of Iraq.
No free speech for the media when it means showing an American soldier's corpse after it's been ripped into 20 pieces, with blood oozing out of the decapitated skull, after being hit with an explosive device. Censorship of the true number of Iraqis killed by illegal US aggression. Absolutely no coverage of opposing views in the lead up to the war, even to the point of having Pentagon plants (Judith Miller) posing as journalists.
Seriously now, do you EVER tire of massively contradicting yourself? I begin to wonder how you do it, it must take a concerted effort to be such a hypocrit. But of course when annoying voices like me pop up to expose contradictions and hypocrisy I'm quickly censored and marginalized, paid no attention to, eliminated from record, personally attacked, character assasinated, faced with childish attempts to hijack my blog. But hey freedom of speech right?
Give me a fucking break!
opotho said...
charles - my edition of 'Moby Dick' has a sixteen page introduction by none other than Edward Said. Can you imagine?
I haven't read the Said intro in years, but I turn to Melville always.
///////////
Melville was writing in the 1830-40's when theological arianism was all the rage on both sides of the atlantic--under the guise of higher criticism. (Now it is dogma in liberal seminaries on both sides of the atlantic--placing them in theological agreement with the moslems as to the person of Jesus.)
Arianism -- named after the Alexandrian Egyptian, Arius, was the third century heresy that held that Jesus was fully Man but not fully God.
This Arian heresy was denounced at the council of Nicea in 325 AD. From it we get the Nicean Creed. However, its said that many of the christian churches in the mideast followed this path up to the time of Mohhamed and this is the form of christianity that mohhamed encountered. And in fact, the moslem take on Jesus does have some resemblance to the Gnostic Gospels. These were found in December 1945 near Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt, this collection of 13 ancient codices dates from AD 390.
The great historical accomplishment of Jesus from one end of the earth to the other was that it was Jesus ultimately who caused the abolishion of the ancient sacrificial system.
It was a grisly business the world over -- and Jesus stopped it.
In order for him to do it however, men had to believe that he was also fully God. Because only God himself could be sufficient to atone for the sins of man.
When men stopped believing that Jesus was fully God then sacrifices had to resume.
This is what the killing of the whale was about--and this is why Melville began is tome "call me ishmael"--because sacrifice of all types -- is the the consequence of believing that Jesus is not fully God--that is, one who is fully sufficent to atone for your sins.
btw All this business is in the midst a massive sea change. Part of the reason for this change is coming from Mathematics where arianism got it first great boost ...from the person of Issac Newton. We are in the midst of a golden age of mathematics because with the computer -- mathmaticians finally have a tool they can do some kool stuff with. For practical reasons, you want to encourage your kids to learn statistics and algorithms. But the top side of Math has been completely sheered away. The certainties of Newten which underpinned the theological writings of the 19th century are gone.
Sirius_Sir: the 60's radicals were protesting the Vietnam war to avoid being put in a very dangerous situation. That is rational enough. Now they are avoiding this argument because it would put them in a dangerous situation again. That is rational enough. Not brave, not honorable. But not contradictory to their previous behavior.
mika. said...
Charles,
Ishmael concludes, "Do thou, too, live in this world without being of it."
9:11 AM
///////////
where is this quote from.
ash - The "two issues" [Rathergate and Yellowcakegate] are not necessarily entwined, but only for your own convenience.
I don't believe anything as naive as 'The Truth', nor do I expect the MSM to reproduce it for us. I do, however, expect them not to lie.
There is no equivilency between a lying politician and a lying press, though the first evidently justifies the second in your sophistic world.
(Do I dare add - at the risk of diluting the preceding argument - that of the two cases at hand, the only unequivocal lie was the one manufactured by Rather.)
11:01 AM Cosmo,
You hear that crap over and over from the mouth of Hewitt.
It's like in just this special situation we'll censor speech.
...as if that will be the end of it.
11:00 AM Sirius
"I only hope people will notice this discrepancy, and one other: The Danish cartoons speak to a truth that Ahmadinejad's do not."
---
So far, unfortunately, Cosmos' list of "reasons" still blank out the importance of that critical reality for far too many.
(9-11 can't happen again if we just stop telling jokes)
...even for educated folk like Hewitt.
Mearcstapa, noted, and thanks.
The Sixties and what they brought forth have always seemed to me contradictory in that it was never about "love" except, perhaps, self-love. Maybe that's an irony that only grows deeper with time.
Sirius,
And an infantile attachment to "fairness" which causes them to be at constant war with any legitimate authority.
AS ARE THE OVER THE HILL DEMS OF TODAY.
Wretchard--this issue is not unrelated to your post last March about Jean-Paul Sartre's cigarette. Prescient then, prescient now. Let the air-brushing of history begin...
11:07 AM Well, I guess we all just lost that argument to Superior Intellect:
Were F.....
Opotho 9:52 AM,
I misread your upbringing paragraph, sorry.
Charles,
Chapter 68. Ishmael reads the whale's "hieroglyphs".
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
charles - a very interesting discussion on Arianism. I recently came across the term in Charles Freeman's book 'The Closing of the Western Mind" (2002; Vintage Books, 2005).
"Few areas of church history have been so completely rewritten in the past twenty years as the 'Arian controversy.'"
He goes on to describe and document the history of a belief that at one time, especially in the Platonic outlook, equated Jesus with Logos, which would have made him a Demi-Urge. I'll read this section more closely now that you've brought the pagan idea of sacrifice into it, though Augustine and I (not to mention the Sufis) would be wary of dumping the Platonic baby with the proverbial bathwater.
As for Mathematics, I keep hearing that our current "golden" computerized age is a mirage, aside from the boost it provided in solving Fermatt's theorem.
I always remember Rene Thom's dismissal of the Bourbekis' drive to make mathematics "rigorous". "When you strive for rigor, then you sacrifice meaning", Thom explained.
"And may God us keep from single vision and Newton's sleep" - Blake
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
One of them being 'How are we to reconcile freedom of expression and respect for each individual's deepest convictions?'
No such reconciliation is necessary or even positive. What we are bound to do is recognize each individual's right to have the deepest convictions of their choice. We are not in any way bound to respect specific convictions.
Shame they don't bother to make that distinction.
There is no doubt in my mind. Karl Rove did it, how I don't know but the results are there, plain to see. Even Bush's pious blathering adds fuel, the more the Islamo-Fascists think they are getting concessions, the more they are going to over reach. Fortunately it makes little difference what the inept Europeans do they are becoming totally irrelevant.
Doug 11:36 AM,
Shh... we were doing such a good job of ignoring it.
Optho wrote:
"There is no equivilency between a lying politician and a lying press, though the first evidently justifies the second in your sophistic world."
Are you seriously trying to maintain that a President delivering the State of the Union Adress is equivalent to any politician giving a speech? In fact, isn't the President "under oath" when he gives that address?
Two things that, to me, landed with a thud.
Frattini said, "So what I believe is that even in this very difficult moment, our first statement should be, freedom of expression should be granted, to everyone."
Second, from this article in the BBC, Abdullah Badawi said, "The West should treat Islam the way it wants Islam to treat the West and vice versa. They should accept one another as equals."
The first quote says freedoms are granted by someone. Note the fundamental difference between this position and Jefferson's in the Declaration of Independence:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.
If rights are granted by a government, they can be taken away. Frattini's formulation worries me, as does much of what he says.
As for the assertion that Islam is equal to the West, and should be treated as an equal, I would like to know what values and metrics Abdullah is using to make this judgment. In every measure I can think of, the West is superior to Islam (except, perhaps, in fanaticism, murder, and cultural ugliness).
An Islam that resides in the West, enjoying the protections and comforts the West provides, is not equal, much like an organ is not equal to a body. This talk of "equals" masks a fundamental truth: Muslims who freely choose to emigrate to the West are subsumed therein. Their values are of a lesser kind than the values of their host.
This is not even mentioning the assertion of superiority by Muslims who don't live in the West, when they try to tell those that do what they can and cannot say. Their behavior belies this talk of "equals". They think Truth is on their side, that God is on their side, and that history is on their side.
Screw 'em (as another blogger might say).
Opotho,
Please cite the Proverb that references your Platonic Baby.
Sirius 11:57 AM,
Damn You!
(see 11:58)
Jamie Irons (and whoever else may be interested).
I agree. I had read many things on the Cold War, but Gaddis's short (relatively) and insightful book is excellent. I strongly recommend.
I just finished it, actually, reading it in conjunction with these other eye-opening books:
Tony Judt's Postwar, which is a book about perspective. Totally fascinating.
Jung and Halliday's Mao: The Untold Story, which was also recommended by Bush, I believe.
William Taubman's seminal work Khrushchev, which is a fascinating look inside Soviet Russia, and at the man who almost pulled the temple down on our heads.
Other honorable mentions:
Applebaum's Gulag: A History.
A documentary called The Fog of War - Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara.
Like Jamie, I thought I knew a lot about the Cold War. After reading these books, I realized I was wrong.
ash - for a President to lie is a serious matter: he'd better have a damned good reason. In matters of national security, he may.
There is no reason I can think of for a journalist to lie, unless he believes that he is as important as the story.
The two situations are not even nearly equivalent. Yet you believe they're interchangeable, and that the latter justifies the former. (In fact, the atmosphere brought on by people like Rather and by your own reasoning would justify the reverse for me in some situations, i.e., when prudence dictates it's in the national interest not to let the press know something, even if that leads to the appearance of dissembling.)
Like Rather, you believe that there's more to the story than can be derived from the infamous 16 words, so you allow yourself to put your mere conviction ahead of the facts, and thus add to the soiling of your discipline.
You build on the mistake of Pangloss, who assumed that their were reasons for things that he couldn't yet explain. You assume the reasons and even provide a cause, because you just know.
See, how did we get here? In your initial remarks above you were accusing people of being hypocrites about the cartoons on the basis of their past attacks on the MSM. Now you have people arguing Yellow Cake.
I have to say, this transformation of the dialogue still smacks of a dishonesty on your part (unless 'everything is about everything', or some such nonsense).
Aristides, but don't you know? You're not really 'endowed' until you get an 'endowment'--unless you were naturally born that way, like Miss Parton. (Which, I guess, kinda makes your point.)
2, actually
opotho,
before you engage in argument you should find out if this is the same ash who posts on ITM. If so then it is pointless. The moon is made of green cheese. Nothing you say will convince him otherwise and he has tons evidence including testimony of mice who have been there.
opotho 12:27 PM,
"You build on the mistake of Pangloss, who assumed that their were reasons for things that he couldn't yet explain. You assume the reasons and even provide a cause, because you just know."
---
When he believes in things
he don't understand,
then we suffer.
Ms Parton is a surgically enhanced model, though I'm sure the stock version was adequate to the tasks at hand.
"When men stopped believing that Jesus was fully God then sacrifices had to resume."
---
Kanye West comes to mind.
Yes, arguing Yellow Cake is getting off track though you introduced the MSM's public duty.
The hypocrisy lies in the outrage so many had with "treasonous leftist anti-war arguments/MSM publishing secret warrantless wiretapping" or IOTM's rant about images of the fallen, followed by outrage over Muslims being offended by cartoon depictions of prophet Muhammed.
Those hypocrisies remain, and I reiterate that both are wrong, we should be free to express ourselves.
You know, when Miss Parton would show up to sing at the Grand Ole' Opry, they would fly a prop-plane around the city trailing a gigantic bra.
Swear to God.
You never got to my stinging/biting Ariz animal question, 'Rat.
I said something about brown recluse, I think.
...not refering to bin Laden, btw.
Can't we just slash its throat and be done with it? After all, we don't want to be called hypocrites.
12:41 PM,
Tony won't be impressed until they do it with an SR-71.
Mika, 12:42
"When men stopped believing that Jesus was fully God then sacrifices had to resume."
btw,
I derive great pleasure skimming Ash's posts, reading about every tenth word.
---
Some of you might give that a try.
Ah yes Doug, now some more memories of my warped upbringing...
[And btw, I believe that the prohibitions of the p.c. police require abstract justifications for the kinds of things that the rest of us came to recognize and accept through custom. The amazing thing about the Rationalist thought-machine and its assumptions, and the reason I will continue to claim that there are two kinds of people, is the ineluctable compulsion towards self-hatred.
In the case of telling Muslims in a 'cross-civilizational' dialogue what does and doesn't constitute civilized behavior, we're not required to follow any rules of conduct towards this "other" save those dictated by expediency. Since the French Revolution have we seen a clearer situation whereby the conceits of Rationalism can be understood as potentially suicidal?]
Proverbs - wha ....? I guess I could look something up but why do you want to know? I can't take all this scriptural talk. I was raised a Catholic for God's sake!
Who uses violence and the threat of even more violence in the future when a differing viewpoint is broadcast.
Many a rant are just ignored, or just counter ranted. No harm, no foul.
Many a charge of "Treason" are rants as well, ventings of frustration at the current System. But no violence entails, post rant.
Is there outrage that the Mohammedans are offended?
I think not.
The concern is over how that outrage is expressed.
If my outrage at Mr Bush is expressed here, as misgivings to his Policies. All well and good.
If I were to take a weapon to the White House, to make sure my point was taken "seriously", it'd be off to Jail with me.
The Mohammedans are free to be outraged, free to run "counter" cartoons. They should, if outraged, take those actions that are appropriate in Civil Society.
To step beyond the Civil, to the Criminal, well that is beyond the bounds of Modern Society.
The is no equivilence to the differences between Civil and Criminal behaviour.
And there are no hypocrisies in that, at all.
LOL
Presbyterian here:
Try harder, even when it doesn't work!
(blame the Joos)
12:57 PM
hmmm, maybe that's Hewitt's Problem.
Ms Parton is a surgically enhanced model...
As Johnny Carson used to say: I did not know that.
The things a person learns here.
No, no, no Ash. You're not getting it.
The right to free expression encompasses the right to be offended. Coupled with the right to speak is the right to receive speech as one will. Flowing from this is the right to respond to the offensive speech as one will.
Therefore, being offended is not the issue. Please stop saying it is.
What's at issue is the curtailment of these rights. The right to be offended and the right to respond to an offense are subsumed under the right to free expression. What's not included in these freedoms is the right to intimidate, the right to threaten bodily injury, the right to incite a riot, the right to incite murder, etc. It's when people, in this case Muslims, marry their right to be offended with proscribed actions--threats, intimidations, rioting--that one must stand up and register an objection.
The reason, to me, is obvious. The blowback from incorporating the "right to threaten" within the "right to respond" is that the initial speaker's freedoms are curtailed. Being threatened with bodily injury for speaking is as effective, if not more effective, than having a law that proscribes the same type of speech. Therefore it should be fought with as much fervor as you would an anti-speech law. For all the fuss the Left makes about freedom of expression, this should be obvious.
Which means you should object to the Muslim reaction, because they have surpassed the "right to respond", superceded it really, by venturing into the off-limits area of intimidation.
To talk of hypocrisy in being offended is to completely and entirely miss the point. Everybody has a right to be offended. In fact, everybody has a right to be hypocritical in how they take offense. There is not, however, a right to intimidate, a right to threaten, or a right to silence someone else.
This is what the Muslims are doing. This is why they must be confronted.
Well said, 'Rat.
"To step beyond the Civil, to the Criminal, well that is beyond the bounds of Modern Society"
---
Hewitt thinks we can accomadate that.
Folly.
(actually he thinks too cute by half might work)
Of course I'm outraged, to have been so cruelly deceived.
But I'll get over it.
Sirius,
With Aristedes and Opotho on board, we can just sit behind the curtain and think up Snarky things to say.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Now these things were thus ordained; he not like the high priest, which he offers for himself, and for the errors of the people, in time of darkness over all the land; shall offer gifts and sacrifices.
Micah 1:09 - AM I THAT AM I -
Confronted, I might add, with more offensive speech.
If their delicate sensibilities cannot handle it, let them react rabidly. Then we can put them down like Old Yeller.
(Was that too dramatic, Trish?)
Hey!
Queens are offensive to Muslims!
Off with Yher Head!
If images of Mohammed are out of bounds does that also mean his criminal record is taboo?
'Rat beat me to it:
The concern is over how that outrage is expressed.
As he says, mode of expression is the alpha and omega of the issue.
have any idea what this is, Mika?
Came up in a desktop search for something else.
It goes on, with a video of the one handed exhibitionist.
---
>so about a week ago someone rings me up at home.... 'is that Emmanuel
>Goldstein?' then he phones back the following day and goes 'huaaaagh' on
>the phone before dropping the handset in excitement
>
>and a day or two later, just coming out of our house to put something in
>the rubbish bin, a pair of blokes over the other side of the road, again
>start making orgasmic noises
>
>I'm not paranoid enough to record minidisc when I pop out for a few
>seconds...... but perhaps I should be
The video clip, which was captured on 1/September/2000, is the culmination of that thread of harassment. You have to understand that MI5's abuse is in threads; they choose a topic, and then continue with it for months and years. Sometimes they drop a topic, usually to be replaced by a worse one, and you never hear of it again.
If the person in the video clip were not an MI5 agent, then he would deserve privacy, despite carrying out a real or feigned act in a public place. But I am almost 100% sure, because of context, that this man was one of their operatives, which removes any consideration of privacy from his act. He is facing away and cannot be clearly identified from this clip. I've never seen this man before or since, but that is true of most other such incidents.
If images of Mohammed are out of bounds does that also mean his criminal record is taboo?
Reminds me of that scene in Liar Liar:
Carrey: I object!
Judge: Your reason, counselor?
Carrey: Because its devastating to my case!
ash - thank you for your candor about "getting us off the track". It is a perhaps unconscious tactic which I have no respect for.
I reacted to the conflation of the MSM's and a politician's public duty, which are different in nature.
For the record, I never personally yielded to the charge that anti-war protestors were "treasonous" for the same reason that I'm careful when I objectify evil (since one unwittingly pays a psychological toll).
Where others use words like "treasonous", I'm more than likely thinking of phrases like "wrong-headed", "misguided", and my personal favorite, "in error" (in the manner Socrates had in mind when he showed people who believed they'd been reasoning all along that they were in error.)
As for the MSM's constant reflex to act out on their errors, they are surely guilty of something when their prudence is found wanting, and that is no small matter in a time of war.
For example, in wartime one would be in error to conflate the "images of the fallen" with images which might be offensive to OUR ENEMY.
About the cartoons themselves, images of Mohammed exist that are acceptable to certain Muslims, so it's up to Muslims to sort out those messes and has nothing to do with us.
That you conflate the two previous examples - inoffensive cartoons aimed at the enemy and images of US soldiers killed by that same enemy - shows your confusion. You're not sure who the enemy is. As far as I'm concerned that makes you a liability, but unless you provide the enemy with tangible means I certainly don't think of you as 'treasonous'.
Whew, for a moment there - a half a thread's length - I thought you were accusing me of being a hypocrite!
"The male imagination is always on the prowl, always trying to imagine the figure underneath - especially nice when the wind whips up and you get a revealed cast of an entire beautiful (sometimes) female frame. "
---
The thing that worries me about Das is that he seems to imply that although a male frame is not *especially* nice...
I'm totally sick of hearing the repeated admission that any one of those 12 cartoons are "offensive".
People should be made to explain why each time they mindlessly repeat the charge, and then to explain again after anyone with common sense challenges them.
I forgot that I haven't mentioned on this forum that prior to 9-11, I used to go to beach down at the Wailea Resort, and watch tall slender women in white robes walk by, as their LARGE yacht bobbed offshore.
Rumor was it was bin Ladens.
Arabs are now trying to by the Fairmont Hotel Enterprise,
Here that would mean the
"Kea Lanai" resort, which is where The Yacht was parked.
Maybe I'll see bin Again.
(When will I...)
You get a prize if you can deliver his liver.
Sandy or not, I suppose?
If only they had a Mary figure:
Cartoon would show her delivering Laden's Liver.
Chopped, of Course.
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