oceanside politics

2007-10-20T15:13:00.001-07:00

I've moved here.

Post-modern Spin

2006-04-08T16:40:00.000-07:00

"I'm not going to rule it out.”

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on whether the president had authorized a domestic wireless wiretapping program from the Times.

"The attorney general's comments today should not be interpreted to suggest the existence or nonexistence of a domestic program or whether any such program would be lawful under the existing legal analysis."

Department spokeswoman, Tasia Scolinos the next day.

The Religious Left fights back

2006-04-08T16:34:00.000-07:00

"Mainline Protestant and Orthodox churches have been pounded into irrelevancy by the media machine of a false religion; a political philosophy masquerading as gospel; an economic principle wrapped in religious rhetoric and painted red, white and blue."

Rev. Michael Livingston, the new president of the National Council of Churches of Christ U.S.A from the NYTimes

The Barbarity of the West

2006-04-08T16:30:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since my last post. I’m busy with a project I’m working on. For more, check out this.

But I’ve been getting back into my news-reading habits recently. And I’ve come across a few nuggets. In an otherwise typical conservative screed against Iran, Victor Davis Hansen makes a case for Western irrationality and barbarism. He explains the probable negative consequences of military action against Iran: “further Shiite madness in Iraq, an Iranian land invasion into Basra, dirty bombs going off in the U.S., smoking tankers in the Straits of Hormuz, Hezbollah on the move in Lebanon.”

But his column still tries to make the case that invading Iran would be both rational (a possible scenario he imagines is that Iran would b humiliated and therefore shunned) and irrational (arising out of a kind of pique). His article seems to be addressed to Ahmandinejad, as he suggests that Bush might invade despite all rational and political hurdles. “Mr. Bush is capable of anger and impatience as well,” Hansen explains. Of course, any president who might decide to go to war out of anger and impatience does not deserve the office, but that is an objection for a different time. Hansen is trying to make a point. He then goes on to take a position that seems to me at the heart of contemporary conservatism intellectualism: an embrace of the most primitive stereotypically male instincts coupled with a sense of the superiority of reason and Western civilization:

It is time for the Iranian leaders to snap out of their pseudo-trances and hocus-pocus, and accept that some Western countries are not merely far more powerful than Iran, but in certain situations and under particular circumstances, can be just as driven by memory, history, and, yes, a certain craziness as well.

Ever since September 11, the subtext of this war could be summed up as something like, “Suburban Jason, with his iPod, godlessness, and earring, loves to live too much to die, while Ali, raised as the 11th son of an impoverished but devout street-sweeper in Damascus, loves death too much to live.” The Iranians, like bin Laden, promulgate this mythical antithesis, which, like all caricatures, has elements of truth in it. But what the Iranians, like the al Qaedists, do not fully fathom, is that Jason, upon concluding that he would lose not only his iPod and earring, but his entire family and suburb as well, is capable of conjuring up things far more frightening than anything in the 8th-century brain of Mr. Ahmadinejad. Unfortunately, the barbarity of the nightmares at Antietam, Verdun, Dresden, and Hiroshima prove that well enough.
So far the Iranian president has posed as someone 90-percent crazy and 10-percent sane, hoping we would fear his overt madness and delicately appeal to his small reservoirs of reason. But he should understand that if his Western enemies appear 90-percent children of the Enlightenment, they are still effused with vestigial traces of the emotional and unpredictable. And military history shows that the irrational 10 percent of the Western mind is a lot scarier than anything Islamic fanaticism has to offer.

So, please, Mr. Ahmadinejad, cool the rhetoric fast — before you needlessly push once reasonable people against the wall, and thus talk your way into a sky full of very angry and righteous jets.

This is certainly the most powerful expression of this particular conservative ideal I have seen—and it is so because it manages to be both moving and true.
Hansen manages to convey the hidden power and barbarity that lies beneath every ipod wearing denizen of this overflowing land. He uses the mythology of “the Good War” with its citizen soldiers called from their jobs as farmers, accountants, teachers, and mill workers to defend freedom, and transports this sense to today’s youth—complete with ipods and earrings. (I generally use mythology in the positive sense that does not relate to a story’s truth value.) He sees these youths are as capable of barbarism, violence, and awfulness as their predecessors, capable of waging war with a ferocity, totality, and ingenuity that is uncommon. (Shouldn’t we call this by its right name, evil? Arguably necessary evil, but evil nonetheless.) It seems to me that conservatives need a far more complex scale to judge morality with—beyond good versus evil.

Quick links

2006-02-11T11:17:00.000-08:00

It will be light blogging for the next few days, but a quick round-up of interesting and worthwhile pieces:
Andrew Sullivan, as usual, making sense:

“…when mass-murderers specifically cite Muhammad as the inspiration for their terror, are cartoonists the actual blasphemers for depicting that connection - or the murderers they are criticizing? If Islamists blaspheme their own faith on a daily basis, then the West has every right to illustrate that fact. With no apology needed. What we're seeing here is the emergence of a special dispensation for Islam in the West - to be free from the kind of rough treatment accorded every other faith. The only rational justification for such a double standard is that Islam is somehow more sacred than Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, and the like.”

And from across the ocean, an excellent article on the difference between Islamists and Rush Limbaugh fans.

Logic and plain English

2006-02-07T23:41:00.000-08:00

Senator Specter to Attorney General Gonzales towards the end of his testimony after an especially dexterous session of doubletalk:

That just defies logic and plain English.

That about sums it up.

Opposing viewpoints

2006-02-07T23:30:00.000-08:00

Ted Rall and the editorial board of the Christian Science Monitor pose two directly opposing views of the cartoon jihad.

Rall, though not my favorite writer, here makes the argument for free speech in as extreme a manner as possible. He takes the position any good liberal must:

What if millions of people take offense? What if some of them turn violent, even murderous? So what? No one can make you angry. You decide whether or not to become angry. If journalistic gatekeepers worry about the mere possibility of prompting outrage, they'll validate mob rule and undermine our right to a free press, one that covers the controversial along with the bland.

While deciding what goes into the paper and the evening news, good journalists ought to be guided by only one consideration: Is it news? If the answer is yes, send it out. Even if it's tasteless as all f---.

Ironic, isn’t it, that in an article on censorship, the word “fuck” is censored?

The Christian Science Monitor on the other hand makes this off-base analogy:

His plethora of illustrations was a cultural assault akin to staging a neo-Nazi rally in a Jewish neighborhood. It bordered on yelling "fire" in a crowded theater - not a matter for censorship but judgment.

Did they see the cartoons? (And if it bordered on the fire hypothetical, wouldn’t that mean it almost should be censored, and that something worse, like cannibalistic rabbis, should be prohibited?) Though the article condemns violence it sidesteps every question raised by this ruckus. Shame on them.

Post Opinions

2006-02-07T23:10:00.000-08:00

David Ignatius in the Washington Post gets the solution to the FISA debate correct but buys Rove’s spin about the “liberal position”. From Senator Feingold to the diaries over at the Daily Kos, the main liberal position has been to castigate the president for overriding Congress and the courts while acknowledging that stopping terrorism is primary. Ignatius claims that “both the administration and its critics are pursuing absolutist agendas—insisting on the primacy of security or liberty”—creating a false dichotomy. He source for this is apparently that he has been “told” that “liberal interest groups” are pressuring Democratic congressmen not to amend FISA.

Ignatius apparently does not realize that this debate has little to do with liberty versus security. Democrats and Republicans agree that wiretapping terrorist suspects is necessary. Ignatius ignores the Post’s own reporting of Senator DeWine’s attempts pass legislation allowing a broader interpretation of FISA which the White House opposed.

I have the feeling that Ignatius knew all this but felt his column would look better if he was coming down on both sides of the debate, placing himself in the middle as the reasonable observer. He took the extreme views of the left and set it against the White House’s views—that ploy that Rove has pulled off many times. Except this time, the extremists on the left come out about as unreasonable as the White House.

It’s time to be honest, David. Stop pretending to be the mediator between two teams of absolutists and stand up for the Democratic and Republican critics of the Bush administration. If you took the time to listen—perhaps to Senator Feingold’s speech—you might notice that he has almost the exact same position as you. No more mediation. Take a side.

Applebaum slams the right-wing blogosphere

Also on the Post’s opinion page today, Ann Applebaum on the hypocrisy of the right-wing blogosphere in blaming Newsweek for the rioting and violence regarding the Qur’an story and then rallying to support the Danish cartoonists:

“We defend press freedom if it means Danish cartoonists' right to caricature Muhammad; we don't defend press freedom if it means the mainstream media's right to investigate the U.S. government.”

An epidemic of outrage

2006-02-07T22:41:00.000-08:00

The whole cartoon jihad insanity seems to me to be a perfect example of a social epidemic reaching a tipping point, as Malcolm Gladwell talked about in his 2000 bestseller (that I only got around to last year.)

Based on my GoogleNews searches, no one seems to have brought this up yet, but the point is fairly obvious.

Gladwell postulates that ideas need certain characteristics in order to form the foundation of a social epidemic.  One is stickiness—which essentially means that the idea needs to either reinforce a stereotype or fit in within an already present understanding of the situation.  Another is the “Law of the Few” which explains how small number of people with particular skills (the relevant people in this case would be connectors and salesmen) cause epidemics.

A small number of outraged Muslims try to get others outraged.  This fits perfectly into already present Muslim anger at the West as well as stereotypes of Westerners disrespecting Islam.  The idea is sticky, so people listen to the Danish Muslims and pass it on to friends and acquaintances.  The likely reason this epidemic took so long to take off would be explained by the fact that the initial Danes were not well-connected in the Arab Muslim community.  The idea was sticky enough that it kept growing though—like a flu virus that has an extremely high rate of transmission, but few symptoms.  Another example of an idea epidemic with few symptoms would be the conspiracy theories about America’s actions in Iraq which are common in the Arab world.  They reinforce stereotypes.  But their potency is diminished by the fact that the only people who feel empowered by them are those unhinged enough to become terrorists.  Distrust of America is a sticky idea, but with few conspicuous symptoms generally.  Suddenly though, in the past few weeks, the outrage over the cartoon snowballs and leads to riots and countless news stories, probably creating a bigger ruckus than such significant events as the US invasion of Iraq or Afghanistan.

What caused this epidemic to reach its tipping point and not the others?  I would suggest that it was the call for a boycott of Danish goods.  Up until that point, the idea was sticky but useless.  Suddenly, an action was associated with the idea and it became all the more attractive and empowering.  At the same time, a boycott made news headlines all over and fanned the flames more.  The unknown face of this cartoon jihad, the person perhaps most responsible for the current chaos, would be the Egyptian who convinced his fellow businessmen to boycott Danish goods.

Based on Gladwell’s theory, this new super-virus idea of anger coupled with the empowering action of the boycott led directly to the recent chaos.

The sex lives of squids

2006-02-07T22:17:00.000-08:00

Due to “bizarre mating methods” (to use the scientific term), female giant squid become inadvertent cannibals, eating pieces of male squid. Insert joke here.

A Hell of a Speech

2006-02-07T22:15:00.000-08:00

Russ Feingold gives a hell of a speech on the President’s warrantless wiretapping program. Some highlights:

The President suggests that anyone who criticizes his illegal wiretapping program doesn't understand the threat we face. But we do. Every single one of us is committed to stopping the terrorists who threaten us and our families.

Defeating the terrorists should be our top national priority, and we all agree that we need to wiretap them to do it. In fact, it would be irresponsible not to wiretap terrorists. But we have yet to see any reason why we have to trample the laws of the United States to do it. The President's decision that he can break the law says far more about his attitude toward the rule of law than it does about the laws themselves.

***

The President was right about one thing. In his address, he said "We love our freedom, and we will fight to keep it."

Yes, Mr. President. We do love our freedom, and we will fight to keep it. We will fight to defeat the terrorists who threaten the safety and security of our families and loved ones. And we will fight to protect the rights of law-abiding Americans against intrusive government power.

As the President said, we must always be clear in our principles. So let us be clear: We cherish the great and noble principle of freedom, we will fight to keep it, and we will hold this President - and anyone who violates those freedoms - accountable for their actions. In a nation built on freedom, the President is not a king, and no one is above the law.

I would have stressed a bit more the acceptance of wiretaps and the necessity of fighting terrorism. But an almost pitch perfect message. Read the whole thing.

Gonzales's word dance

2006-02-07T22:07:00.000-08:00

Thanks to georgia10 over at dKos for highlighting this nugget in the transcript of Gonzales’ testimony, responding to Joe Biden:

“Well, Senator, obviously if Congress were to take some kind of action, and say the president no longer has the authority to engage in electronic surveillance of the enemy, then I think that would put us into the third part of Justice Jackson's three-part test, and that would present a much harder question as to whether or not the president has the authority.”

As georgia10 points out, didn’t Congress already take such action in 1978 with FISA?

Gonzales is trying to get around this by maintaining that FISA has to do with non-enemies like criminals, the mafia, etc. But this is an entirely extralegal reading that has no basis in current law to my knowledge.

The mythogenesis of Ronald Reagan

2006-02-07T22:01:00.000-08:00

William F. Buckley quotes Lance Morrow in his most recent column about Ronald Reagan’s mythogenic status:

“Reagan—completely American, uncomplicated, forward-looking, honest, self-deprecating—became American innocence in a 73-year-old body.”

This strikes me as a good description of Reagan the myth. The description is good because it shows how easily any of these qualities can be looked at in a negative light. “Uncomplicated” is good, but simplistic is bad. Being “completely American” is good, but limiting. Innocence is often dangerous. This Reagan myth is almost cartoonish, but in a mainly positive way.

Whatever else can be said of him, Reagan was a great American.

Disappointed with McCain

2006-02-07T21:49:00.000-08:00

I have always thought highly of Senator John McCain, as an independent-minded Democrat. In 2000, I was willing to support (and did support with countless annoying e-mails) McCain and Bill Bradley. I wanted anything but Bush vs. Gore.

(I recently browsed through my high school senior yearbook and noticed a message to me from some girl I barely remember saying that she was glad that we got along even though I was a “conservative Republican” and she was a “socialist feminist”—she based this ideological profile entirely on my McCain endorsement; little did she know that I would go on to star as one of only two men in my college’s production of The Vagina Monologues.)

But McCain’s actions today have led him to diminish in my view. First—I have heard the allegation that McCain promised no Republicans would be indicted in his Abramoff hearings, and this makes me suspect his motives. How can he promise this before the hearings, and still go on with said hearings in good faith?

Second, McCain appeared on the tv show 24, the show which has done so much in recent years to portray torture as a positive thing. This might be unfair—I oppose torture, and I’m a fan of the show. But I would feel conflicted about appearing on the show given

Finally, his spat with Obama has left him looking like a jackass. As best as I can tell from the letters that have been made public, McCain is concerned that the Republican party will be hurt by the scandal and has sponsored a bill that will allow Republicans to save face while making some real changes. Obama is supporting a bill which has no chance of passage, but more clearly responds to the Republicans’ “indiscretions”. Overall, Obama has showed real class, and McCain, has just acted like a jackass.

I still consider myself to be a fan of McCain—and more, a fan of his prospects. I think the ideal candidate in 2008 would be a one-term moderate Republican in order to cool down the country and allow national security and the War on Terror to become bipartisan (rather than wedge) issues. But all this has me doubting his judgment.

Well, on the upside, I will just be less disappointed come 2008 when McCain tries to run for president as a Republican and fails because of the rabid right-wing base.

Cartoon jihad updates

2006-02-07T21:25:00.000-08:00

Chechnya's acting prime minister announced a ban Monday on all Danish organizations. Smart, because Chechnya is doing pretty well right now. This ban includes the Danish Refugee Council, one of the largest aid groups in the region, which feeds 250,000 Chechnyans monthly.

Over in the United Kingdom, a student editor of a college newspaper has been suspended and the issue recalled.

Meanwhile, the Islamic protests have extended to the internet where over 600 Danish websites have been attacked, as well as sites in Israel and Europe. Many have been defaced with Arabic graffiti (and an English translation) condemning the cartoons. One posted an image of the London bombings and threatened an attack “very soon.”

On an indirectly related note, over at the Strategy Page, the US Marines apparently now “advertise themselves” as the “Jihadi Travel Agency”, “capable of quickly dispatching holy warriors to paradise.” As with all jokes about death and the beliefs of others, I am not quite sure whether to judge this funny or quasi-offensive. In any case, it is an interesting tidbit revealing a bit of the morale of the troops in Iraq.

And for all of you trying to catch up, here is the best comprehensive chronology of the whole affair that I have found.

Mr. & Mrs. Smith

2006-02-07T20:20:00.000-08:00

Just saw Mr. & Mrs. Smith last night. Despite all the semi-negative reviews I read, I thought the film was brilliant. Perhaps it could have gone for some deeper emotion—but it didn’t. It was a parody that had more honesty in it than most serious films. But it was never about emotional resonance, but rather cleverness—clever acting, clever lines, clever situations. An excellent movie.

Dog Eat Doug by Brian Anderson

2006-02-07T20:11:00.000-08:00

A funny new comic strip that is just getting syndicated. A little cutesy, but always good for a smile or chuckle nevertheless. And two more links, here, and here.

One Sentence Jihad

2006-02-07T12:19:00.000-08:00

Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff, bureau chief of the German newsweekly, Die Zeit , in the Washington Post with the best one-sentence description of the cartoon controversy:
In this jihad over humor, tolerance is disdained by people who demand it of others.

National security v. the War on Terror

2006-02-06T14:32:00.000-08:00

Nothing much new here, but worth skimming: Alberto Gonzales’ Wall Street Journal piece. I plan on bringing this out more later, but demonstrates Gonzales shows the problem with conceiving national security concerns as a War on Terror. Essentially, Gonzales argues that intercepting calls of American citizens is fine because they are not calls, but enemy communications:

In the days following Sept. 11, 2001, President Bush charted a course of action to respond to the worst attack on our homeland in history. He promised to use every tool available to defeat al Qaeda and pledged to take the fight to the enemy abroad as he worked to prevent another attack. As he said in the State of the Union address, "Our country must remain on the offensive against terrorism here at home." The president has the constitutional responsibility—and authority—to lead this response…The use of signals intelligence—intercepting enemy communications—is a fundamental incident of waging war.

The key concepts here are: remaining on the offensive and war. I have been loathe to describe the fight against terrorism as something other than a war—at least in part due to Andrew Sullivan’s influence. It is true that our enemies are evil and ruthless, and that their ideology precludes our free existence. But it is precisely this conception of “war” that the Bush administration uses to muddy the waters.

Terrorism and Islamism are threats—but they are not threats that should be met with open warfare. We have not yet invaded Saudi Arabia, and we should not. We do not seek to destroy every Islamist, and we should not. Terrorism is a weapon we must prevent, punish, and make unacceptable. But none of these can be the aims of “war”, which seeks to destroy an enemy. In this war, we have no enemy except terror; it is a war without an end. War begets terror and extremism rather than prevents it. Most of our military efforts today do not involve fighting terrorists but insurgents; the efforts Bush describes as the War on Terror are really a war on the fringes of terror, and though in the long-run it may have beneficial effects for the Iraqi and Afghani people, it will not stop Islamism or terrorism.

Given the Bush administration’s commitment to remaining on the offensive, I am becoming more certain that they feel the need to open a new front in the War on Terror. Bush does not seem to know how to act if he is not on the offensive.

What we need

What we need is not an offensive war on terror whose main goal is the idealistic drainage of the swamps of tyranny (a worthy goal to be sure, but only connected to terrorism at best indirectly). But rather we need a national security strategy that is built primarily on directly preventing, punishing, and combating terrorism; and secondarily on defensive measures in our society—protecting weak points, running counter-terrorism drills, and passing laws that allow our counter-terrorist forces to effectively combat the enemy without making Americans themselves fearful of governmental interference.

Santorum

2006-02-06T13:53:00.000-08:00

So, Santorum is taking a morally hollow but politically expedient path, which is surprising only in that he portrays himself as one of Washington's great moralists.

Let me make a suggestion. The Santorum camp keeps calling for televised debates with Casey. I think it's too early for that.

How about a series of televised events where Santorum debates himself on the two sides he's been taking on issues? Heck, I'd pay to watch that.

Tom Ferrick, Jr. of the Philadelphia Inquirer lambasting Santorum in his home state.

The courge of soldiers and the cowardice of a president

2006-02-06T12:43:00.000-08:00

On the day before President Bush's eminently disposable State of the Union speech, I heard a story that I'll never forget. It was told by Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack, who was addressing a small audience in Washington. A military helicopter pilot from Iowa, serving in Iraq, was killed when he noticed a ground-to-air missile headed his way and, in a split-second reaction, swerved his chopper so that he and his co-pilot would take the hit and his 18 passengers would be spared. Vilsack placed a condolence call to the widow, who stopped him in midsentence. "I think about it this way," the woman said. "Those 18 men needed my husband more in that split second than I'll need him for the rest of my life."

Vilsack, who is probably running for President—and should be—used the story to illustrate the sacrifice and sense of community that is at the heart of a successful democracy. The current Administration, he said, "is ripping away at the fabric of the American community." The story lingered as I listened to Bush once again ask nothing from the American people in his speech and, worse, issue his annual call for lower taxes.

***

Perhaps Democrats should nickname estate-tax repeal the Paris Hilton Empowerment Project. Whatever you call it, it is an obscenity to ask nothing of heiresses while helicopter pilots are giving everything.

Joe Klein in Time magazine. Read the rest. An unpretentious column that simply exposes the shallow politics of our callow president.

Weekly quotations

2006-02-05T23:48:00.000-08:00

I will study and get ready, and perhaps my chance will come.

I have come across that quote several times—first in a biography on Lincoln, and more recently in Bill Clinton’s autobiography. This coupled with Robert E. Lee’s imagined words as spoken by Martin Sheen in the early nineties version of Gettysburg:

The issue is in God’s hands. We can only do our duty.

form an almost complete picture of my current state of mind. I have worked hard—preparing, reflecting, planning, strategizing, e-mailing, calling, writing, reading—and now, I am hoping to reap some benefits.

Perhaps one more short quote is needed to fully capture my feelings, a short prayer of fishermen from a small island in Nova Scotia:

Dear God, be good to me;
the sea is so wide
and my boat is so small.

I feel I must accomplish something soon, if only through sheer will—and I desperately need a more normal job on top of it all. I have come about as far with preparation as I can alone, and now I need to begin doing. Here’s to hoping, and praying.

At least, let us hope and pray that Christopher Hitchens doesn’t crack and come after me with some sort of combination of tantrums and random violence.

Kubrick's The Killing

2006-02-05T23:28:00.000-08:00

Just saw an excellent film post-Super Bowl: Stanley Kubrick’s The Killing. According to IMDB, the film is cited as a huge influence on such modern day classics as Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction—and I could see it perfectly. Tarantino barely improved upon or added Kubrick’s formula—or at least, all he managed to add was flashes and bangs rather than anything more of substance.

Kola Kwariani, a professional wrestler who appeared only in this film, stole every scene he was in with these philosophical musings and a quirky delivery as he played a down on his luck wrestler whose favorite haunt was a chess club.

My favorite sequence (aside from the inevitable way in which such a perfect plan becomes spoiled—think of the original Ocean’s Eleven) is this little bit of dialogue between Kola and a minor character:

Kola: I'd like you to call this number and ask for Mr. Stillman. Tell him that Maurice requires his services.

Acquaintance: Sounds pretty mysterious. What's it all about?

Kola: There are some things, my dear Fisher, which bear not much looking into. You have undoubtedly heard of the Siberian god Heather who tried to discover the true nature of the sun; he stared up at the heavenly body until it made him blind. There are many things of this sort, including love, and death, and...maybe we'll discuss this later today. Please remember to make that call if I'm not back at 6:30.

The best writer I despise

2006-02-05T00:14:00.000-08:00

Christopher Hitchens is the best writer that I despise. He is able to make a lucid argument while exposing his own inner bigotry. He is pompous, asinine, despicable, in general, a prick, and also, brilliant. I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that he must be a very unhappy person—because his prose always sounds bitter. But I wander off topic.

As is typical, Hitchens wrote a relevant and interesting piece on the “cartoon jihad”.

He captures almost perfectly the Islamist attitude towards Western values:

But if [a Muslim] claims the right to make me abstain as well, he offers the clearest possible warning and proof of an aggressive intent. This current uneasy coexistence is only an interlude, he seems to say. For the moment, all I can do is claim to possess absolute truth and demand absolute immunity from criticism. But in the future, you will do what I say and you will do it on pain of death.

And he very clearly explains another element of the idiocy of the State Department’s response (as well as Clinton and many other observers):

[A]nother reason for condemning the idiots at Foggy Bottom is their assumption, dangerous in many ways, that the first lynch mob on the scene is actually the genuine voice of the people. There’s an insult to Islam, if you like.

But of course, no piece is complete without some pompous posturing whereby Hitchens demonstrates how much he hates all those fetishistic religions, and suggests a kind of equivalence between “suicide-murders” and the pope:

It is revolting to me to breathe the same air as wafts from the exhalations of the madrasahs, or the reeking fumes of the suicide-murderers, or the sermons of Billy Graham and Joseph Ratzinger.

I wish I understood where this hatred of religion comes from. It seems so quirky, so pronounced, so irrational, so visceral. But I cannot understand Hitchens’ revulsion at sharing human nature with religious people anymore than I can understand how Islamist terrorists dehumanize their victims. At least I can give credit to Hitchens for not “wreaking random violence on the nearest church” or erupting into “babyish rumor-fueled tantrums”; instead, he writes persnickety columns. And good for him.

A useful and joyous polemic

2006-02-04T22:51:00.000-08:00

On a more positive note, Der Speigel has an article by a dissident Muslim living in America defending the freedom of expression. Some highlights:

A democracy cannot survive long without freedom of expression, the freedom to argue, to dissent, even to insult and offend. It is a freedom sorely lacking in the Islamic world, and without it Islam will remain unassailed in its dogmatic, fanatical, medieval fortress; ossified, totalitarian and intolerant. Without this fundamental freedom, Islam will continue to stifle thought, human rights, individuality; originality and truth.

Unless, we show some solidarity, unashamed, noisy, public solidarity with the Danish cartoonists, then the forces that are trying to impose on the Free West a totalitarian ideology will have won; the Islamization of Europe will have begun in earnest. Do not apologize.

***

Why do they all want to immigrate to the west and not Saudi Arabia? They should be taught about the centuries of struggle that resulted in the freedoms that they and everyone else for that matter, cherish, enjoy, and avail themselves of; of the individuals and groups who fought for these freedoms and who are despised and forgotten today; the freedoms that the much of the rest of world envies, admires and tries to emulate." When the Chinese students cried and died for democracy in Tiananmen Square (in 1989), they brought with them not representations of Confucius or Buddha but a model of the Statue of Liberty."

Freedom of expression is our western heritage and we must defend it or it will die from totalitarian attacks. It is also much needed in the Islamic world. By defending our values, we are teaching the Islamic world a valuable lesson, we are helping them by submitting their cherished traditions to Enlightenment values.

I have a few quibbles with Ibn Warraq’s approach. He seems to let off the West too easily by comparing the West’s record with that of Islamic empires in the past and with Muslim societies today rather than comparing the West’s record to the West’s ideals. Both approaches are needed for balance. But Ibn Warraq here is not striving for balance, but rather he writes a useful and joyous polemic, a reminder of what the West stands for at its best.

Side note: Ibn Warraq is not the author’s actual name, but a traditional pen name used by dissidents that the author has used in writing several books previously.

Selections from Arab news

2006-02-04T22:34:00.000-08:00

Well, if you’re sick what better thing do I have to do than post a few more times on a Saturday night. It’s better than trying to sleep.

One thing I always try to do is to read and understand the perspectives of those who disagree with me—that’s why the National Review is one of my most read sources. It is also the reason I read the Arabic dailies Dar al-Hayat and Al Jazeera. As I have no understanding of Arabic, I am forced to read the English versions. Based on this, Al Jazeera is the more moderate—though my guess is that the site is merely more professional and caters more to an English reading audience. A number of the pieces are written explicitly for non-Arabs, and it is remarkable at how similar the site’s headlines are to CNN’s. Dar al-Hayat on the other hand, is a site in which every piece feels translated. It makes for a more unpleasant reading experience. (“The Israeli and US campaign waged on Hamas, along with its European upshots, abounds with hypocrisy,” begins an opinion piece.) But I believe it gives a more honest view of Arab views.

side note: I am thinking of making this the first in a weekly series of pieces that go over opinion pieces in Arab newspapers. I am still experimenting here with what is the best method, and what is the end purpose of going over this. It is often frustrating, but I think when done properly, it is worth it. I will try to explain and make sense of these pieces without indignation (all my energy would end up being wasted in indignation otherwise), but with a critical eye aimed towards understanding these works in context. I do not assume that any author represents all Muslims or Arabs, but merely that their views represent some portion of them--that their views are common and strong enough that a newspaper editor saw fit to publish them.

The racist agenda of Europe

Recently, I have come across a few articles that struck me as especially revealing in one way or another. The first is from Al Jazeera and is by a researcher for the University of London. She makes a number of very strong statements and a number of compelling points about Western hypocrisy, but overall her argument is held together by a strong feeling rather than a coherent point. The article is titled: “Europe should accept its Muslims.” The main point of the piece is to equate the right-wing politics of Europe and America with the West as a whole while accusing Westerners of hypocrisy and blaming Europeans for not integrating Muslims into their society. She is especially incensed at the West’s reaction to 9/11:

Instead of driving European governments to forge more open relations with their socially deprived and institutionally marginalised religious and ethnic minorities and to review their policies of illegitimate military expansionism, September 11 has turned into a pretext for clinging to a right wing aggressive agenda at home and an arrogant foreign interventionism.

She blames Europe for not integrating Muslims economically into their society, suggesting that Muslims would “acquire the necessary linguistic tools” and have a “greater openness” if more native Europeans reached out to them; but unfortunately, Europeans are too caught up in racism, ignorance, prejudice, and stereotypes to do this. She believes the current struggles over multiculturalism and what she calls “essentialism” embody this antagonism towards Islam. She is furious at those who try to state that Europe’s society is based on certain values, claiming that any attempt to do so reeks of a revival of the “white man’s burden.” She portrays the Muslims of Europe as people who just want to integrate, but are faced with prejudice and hate:

Europe’s minorities are in other words the cause of all its social, political and economic deficiencies. The remedy lies in suffocating them through stringent legislations and ruthless practices, from stop- and- search and surveillance, to control orders and shoot- and- kill police tactics.

They and their faith have been reduced to a security problem to be dealt with exclusively by the intelligence services. However much Europe’s Muslims attempt to prove their allegiance to the nation-state, they remain in the eyes of its strategists a fifth column and a threat to homeland security.

Her penultimate statement is a puzzling one, and I am not sure if I understand what it might mean—though I can sense the strong sense of indignation behind it, I cannot fathom what she is trying to say.

Some liberals are particularly fond of the following question: How, they ask, is it possible to be tolerant with the intolerant? But with the recent assaults on civil liberties and the drive to police the public sphere and encroach into the private realm of the citizen in Europe and the US, this inherently flawed question has been reversed.

How does one reverse the question: "Is it possible to be tolerant with the intolerant?" The only possibility I find for the reverse is: "Is is possible to be intolerant with the tolerant?" In which case the answer is a resounding, "Yes", but I find no greater point made.

Reading this, I do begin to wonder if she might be right—that the biggest problem in Europe is not that Muslims are intolerant, but that Europeans are. But how then does one explain the vehement response to all the cartoons? How does one explain the deaths of Pim Fortyun and Theo van Gogh? The terrorist incidents in Madrid and London? The chaos in France? She cannot ignore all this in making her case and expect to be taken seriously.

Whatever the case, I would bet that Soumaya Ghannoushi’s feelings are representative of many Muslims—somewhat confused, indignant, angry, perceiving hypocrisy in the squishy concepts of multiculturalism, tolerance and freedom. What some in the West seem to have forgotten is that these are only public values within a broader framework of other values. There are many who speak as if these values were good unto themselves, but how easily can tolerance of difference turn into tolerance of evil, and how quickly can freedom balanced with responsibility turn into mere anarchy. Multiculturalism values other cultures, but if we are to have any values at all, we cannot treat all cultures as equals.

Poor Palestine

Next are two pieces from Dar al-Hayat. The first piece again accuses the West of hypocrisy for its dealings with the Palestinians. Abdallah Iskandar explains:

This hypocrisy was manifested in two main issues. The first pertains to twisting the meaning of territory in exchange for peace, so that Israel can enjoy peace while the Palestinians are left with nothing. The second is related to the free choice and democracy entitled to the Palestinians in conformity with the meaning of this twisted peace.

The author believes that Hamas is a reasonable and pragmatic organization and “part of the peace process”. The only people who are unreasonable are the Israelis and the West for trying to force the Palestinians to leave Israel in peace while Israel has a “policy of invasion and killing.” Iskandar makes a more interesting (that is, unusual) point towards the end of his piece: that if the West stops funding Hamas, then it may become more radical:

It is obvious that the best way to fend off "Hamas" from the promised pragmatism is to let it handle single-handedly its affairs during the expected crisis, and leave it under the mercy of the new financing sources and their policies, which are not necessarily pragmatic.

Of course, it is difficult to see how Hamas could become more radical, but I am sure it is possible. The author in making his point though starts from an assumption that I would wager most Arabs agree with: Israel is, and always has been the aggressor in this conflict, and the Palestinians are only victims. With that assumption unassaibly in place, the rest of the piece makes more sense.

Conspiracy Theories

The second piece by Abdel Wahab Badrakhan verges into the territory of conspiracy theory. The piece is interesting to me less for its argument (if there is a thread connecting these disconnected thoughts) than for its possible insight into how the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is viewed. The common theme in every one of these works has been the accusation of the hypocrisy of the West, and it is repeated several times in this piece as well. Here is a selection of interesting passages:

It is weird that elections marked by violations and forgery, are considered with understanding and disregard, while elections, deemed to be free and acceptable by everybody, are met with threats.
***
Europe seems to be more concern and remote from the humane "principles" attributed to it. If not, what does this insistence on cutting off aid means? According to many observers, it is part of premeditated agendas to carry out a starvation plan. They wanted to announce to the Palestinian people that it will pay the price for voting for "Hamas" by inflicting to them starvation, upsetting their living, and restricting the fare, education, and future of their children. In other words, the West is not only striving to be on a par with the Israeli war criminals but to outperform them.
***
It is irrefutable that the Western, European and American, stances are free to call on "Hamas" to "recognize Israel" but they never called on Israel, openly, to recognize the Palestinian people and their rights.

Notice—by cutting off international aid, the Europeans are trying to outperform the “Israeli war criminals”. The author also denies that Hamas wants to destroy Israel and suggests that this is merely an Israeli ploy to discredit them. The most interesting part of the piece is the ending where Badrakhan suggests that as the West rejects as a partner each extremist group, a more extremist one comes into its place:

Of course, they will reject "Jihad" tomorrow, just as they rejected "Fateh" and "Hamas," to probably open the way for "al-Qaeda". The latter cares less to be accepted or rejected, its only concern is to resume war, just Israel and the US wish to do.

Somehow, within all this web of conspiracy, there seems to lie a desire for peace, or at least an acknowledgement that peace is better than war. But it is well-hidden, and covered by anger, resentment, and fatalism.

Reading these is a bit like looking at an alternate universe; it is confusing to see so many things that seem familiar turned upside down. I hope to find some more coherent pieces in the future, but as with most newspapers, the opinions end up being fluff rather than substantial. Most non-columnists who write op-ed pieces—both in Arab publications and Western ones—seem to hold their pieces together with emotion rather than reason. This makes true analysis difficult, but I think such pieces provide a more true insight into the minds of the author. I feel I barely scratched the surface with these musings, but I will do better next time.

Liberals and the "cartoon jihad"

2006-02-04T12:56:00.000-08:00

Georgia10 over at the Daily Kos has an oddly neutral post about the “cartoon jihad” as Der Spiegel is calling the whole conflagration. Though titled, “The Art of Free Speech”, she only lukewarmly takes the side of the liberal artists against the violent fundamentalists. She seems to equate this scandal to NBC’s canceling of “The Book of Daniel” and other religious protests in America. She neglects to point out that in America, the scandal was not about whether any particular people have a right to publish such things (as is the case of the cartoon jihad), but rather whether or not the government should fund anti-religious art (in the case of the Virgin Mary covered in dung) or whether or not a commercial television station could air a show that many of its viewers found objectionable (in the case of “The Book of Daniel” and “Nothing Sacred”). No one has challenged the right of NBC to produce these shows. (Though I do believe the latter example is disturbing for numerous reasons.)

Georgia10 concludes her piece:

“Should the restrictions or sensitivities of a specific faith--whether it be Christianity or Islam or whatever—act as a muzzle on freedom on expression? Even if the artist is not a believer of that faith? What level of deference—if any—should artists accord to religious considerations? The recent controversy is just another chapter in this debate, a debate all nations have engaged in—and a debate without a clear answer.”

What liberalism?

This is, I believe, an astounding conclusion to come to for a liberal. How can a liberal so easily abandon free speech?! What does liberalism stand for if Georgia10—as a prominent liberal on a prominently liberal site—cannot say: We believe in free speech. I would bet that she opposed the attempts of Christians in the case of “The Book of Daniel” and to withdraw all public funding from the dung Virgin. The Daily Kos is a sanctuary for the most vile anti-religious bigotry, virtually all of it anti-Christian and anti-Catholic. There are many users who are not bigots in this way, a large majority are not—but those who are bigots are given a wide latitude in expressing their contempt for God, Jesus, religion, Christianity, evangelicals, etc.

To me, this awkward stance by a quality commentator such as Georgia10 indicates the extent to which liberalism has lost its way. Tolerance has come to mean a hatred of the opinions of majority; multiculturalism, an embrace and defense of the bigotry of other cultures; liberalism to mean a hatred of one’s self. (I simplify in my annoyance.)

Liberalism is not yet the caricature that Ann Coulter and other morons of the right portray it as—an ideology that favors anarchy, totalitarianism, and anything that opposes tradition and America. But I am distraught (can you tell?) when I see such hand-wringing over whether or not to oppose a religious group that threatens violence when a person exercises their right to free speech in a free society. We live in a free society—that means any cartoonist can lampoon whomever they wish; and any religious figure may condemn the cartoonist. These Muslims who are so angry over these caricatures do not share the values of the West—the values of a free society. The question is not—as Georgia10 put it, whether restrictions should be placed on artists because of religious sensitivities. The answer to that for any conservative, or especially any liberal, is clear: No. Christopher Hitchens has as much right to mock the Pope and Mother Teresa as some jerk-off in New York has to mold the Virgin Mary out of shit; and cartoonists in Denmark have just as much right to draw Muhammad with a bomb as his turban; and Muslims in Denmark have a right to protest and be angry and demand apologies. But all of this only makes sense if the Muslims living in this free society share the value that our society places on free public discourse. And from the actions and words of many of these Muslims, they do not--threatening violence, demanding the government apologize, trying to prohibit similarly blasphemous art.

The question that Georgia10 should be asking is not the one she poses, but rather, whether and how a free society can allow a minority to exist in its midst that shares so few of its public values. How can a free society value free speech if a group denies the right of any speech that offends them? How can a free society value tolerance if a group denies its obligation to tolerate anything that offends them? These are the questions liberals should be struggling with—not half-baked questions about what free speech is, and how much of it we should give up.

Why I am scared of right-wing politics

2006-02-04T12:17:00.000-08:00

Here’s Glenn Reynolds excerpting an interesting and rational point by Lee Harris, and taking the precise opposite lesson from it that any reasonable person would. After an analysis of why a madman swinging a gun around his head is scarier than a policeman, he suggests that:

“the United States probably needs to be scarier and less predictable itself.”

Then of course, Reynolds links to some kook who uses the phrase “warmongering pacifists”—in quasi-jest it seems, but such an Orwellian turn of phrase can do no good.

I was always shocked when my friends from grammar school would casually suggest that we nuke China and get it over with. The suggestion was generally made in half-jest, but it underscores an indifference to the lives of others that is disturbing, and most of all, an indifference to the delicate nature of international relations. But what can you expect from children?

The sentiment reminds me of a quotation from a favorite author of mine about a person who, if you overloaded him with information, “would just kill you to make things simpler.” I think that a portion of the base of the Republican party is merely a grown-up version of these kids who casually suggest nuclear war. As kids, they do not really know what this entails; they do not try to appreciate the waste and evil; it’s all really too silly to dispute—they know nothing about these people halfway around the world, except that they are making trouble for America and we are capable of destroying them. As adults though, the attitude is manifest in a seemingly more benign attitude: the assumption that America has a right to act in whatever way it sees fit while the rest of the world must watch helplessly. The same principle is at stake, and the same disdain for the respect of the people of the world. Reynolds, in his more childish moments, shows this immature disdain, as so many of the UN bashers (but not all—there are real problems there). This visceral sense of American entitlement and just-ness in doing whatever it pleases is precisely what the neo-conservatives appeal to in their domestic strategy to buttress foreign policy; and it is also precisely what has led to the worldwide drop in how well people view America.

2006-01-31T00:01:00.000-08:00

Dahlia Lithwick on the Bush administration's modus operandi

A lot of people have linked to this already--I found it courtesy of Andrew Sullivan. But the article really is excellent. Dahlia Lithwick is a great writer who is able to make obscure and not so obscure legal stories interesting and to tease out their ramifications. She has a great piece over at Slate on the meaning of Bush's use of presidential signing statements.

His signing statements are not aimed at persuading the courts, but at
reinforcing his claim that both courts and Congress are irrelevant.

She makes the point that even though Bush's signing statements may not have legal authority, they have a direct effect on the executive branch for whom these statements indicate how Bush intends them to implement, or not, legislation.

I'm certainly not doing the piece justice here, but I want to post it up. It's well worth a read.

2006-01-30T15:18:00.000-08:00

Edmund Burke on genuine conservatism

Our institutions are the results of a kind of natural selection: they are the
ones that continue to work. If they falter in our time, they need
reform. Only if they collapse totally or work iniquity under these new
circumstances should they be replaced, for total innovation is a chancy business,
and men's lives are at stake. In guiding and reforming institutions, and
in innovating, if it comes to that, we must be guided by reflection on history,
for that is the way to learn the lessons of the human race.

How many Republicans today would defend this notion? Certainly, the leftist radicals of the 60s undermined many institutions, but now so-called conservatives embrace change just as extreme to root out this "aberration". These "conservatives" do not deserve the appellation--rather they are right called only reactionaries with respectability and power. They have no claim to the mantle of Edmund Burke and the rest of the conservative tradition.

2006-01-30T14:38:00.000-08:00

Defending Google on China

I've always been a big fan of Google, and the company's action in regards to opening its new China search portal certainly made me want to find out what the whole deal was. I read too many pieces condemning Google outright for any concessions made to the Chinese government; I read too many sanctimonious pieces explaining how Google has betrayed it's users and fans around the world. More than all that, I've read too much from Google about how its motto is that a business can make a profit without doing evil and seen how for Google, this is not just a meaningless phrase, but a way of doing business--from offering free products to producing the best results for customers, Google is more than just a business. It represents a way of doing business. And so, I was wary when I began to read all these bloggers and columnists and congressmen deciding that Google had betrayed its values.

Sebastian Mallaby in the WPost

After I did a bit of research, I found that I was at least partially right. A great column in the Washington Post makes a great case for why Google's engagement with China is not just good business, but the best decision the company could have made for the Chinese people. He explains that Google stands out for it's nuanced position on China:

Google's answer to the China dilemma is better, and more subtle, than that of other Internet firms. It does not simply assert that engagement with China is always good. It recognizes the arms race between China's repressive state power and China's liberating economic growth, and it accepts the conclusion that follows: Some forms of engagement hasten liberal trends; others empower jailers.

Sebastian Mallaby, the author of the piece, then goes on to compare how Google tried to ensure that its service would be a positive force in China--making sure that it would not be in a position like Yahoo! was where the company tracked down a democracy activist through its e-mail; making sure that Google would not be helping to create the Great Firewall of China as Cisco Systems did. Google has agreed to engage with China, but not to aid the government in oppressing its people. A small but important concession Google extracted from the government was that users would be notified if information they were searching for was withheld:

Google has negotiated the right to disclose, at the bottom of its Chinese search results, whether information has been withheld -- a disclosure that may prompt users to repeat their search using google.com instead of google.cn. Of course, the second search might be frustrated by Cisco's routers. But disclosing censorship is half the battle. If people know they are being brainwashed, then they are not being brainwashed.

It's a good op-ed piece overall, and worth a read. And it reinforces my growing suspicion of all "purists" who oppose compromise or engagement in all spheres of public life. So many of those people who were quick to declare that Google had gone over to the dark side reeked of that streak of Puritanism that Rebecca Solnit identified as one of the scourges of the left.

Contemporary Puritanism

That is certainly one of my obsessions--contemporary Puritanism in general, and especially in politics. Puritanism is not the most accurate term, but it is a useful one within the American context. More specifically I am referring to fundamentalists, traditionalists, orthodox, reactionaries, neo-conservatives, radicals--people of both the left and right, atheists and believers who adopt a "purist" approach politics and other human endeavors--an approach I believe is, in the end, a denial of what it means to be human.

And this entry must end here as the new family puppy is calling my name--that is, barking incessantly.

2006-01-29T11:47:00.000-08:00

Political Teen: Just a Partisan Hack?

I'm not sure. I came across this kid's site while voting in the "Sixth Annual Weblog Awards". I thought: politics is cool; I should check this site out. (My thoughts generally are this profound.) I was expecting something different than what I got though--so far as I have looked, this kid's site is little more than brainwashed talking points sent to him by the RNC. Or more likely, imbibed more naturally from overexposure to Fox News.

But, being the "dialogue freak" that I am, I thought I would try to suggest an alternate interpretation of the "facts" this kid laid out. He seems very keen on repeating the misleading fact that Abramoff clients contributed to both the Democrats and Republicans--true, but misleading because as Joshua Micah Marshall points out, American Indian tribes have historically supported Democrats, and still do; Abramoff clients though suddenly gave large amounts to Republicans while their Democratic support was reduced or stayed the same. So, I tried to post this in a comment--which I had to register to be able to do as well:

I'm a bit confused here. I didn't see Howard Dean, and I'm not a big fan of his, but it seems to me that your attacks on him here are little more than partisan bs.

First, Bush has admitted to surveilling Americans without approval of the FISA court. The details are sketchy, and contradictory, with a Pentagon source saying that the program involved specific wiretaps and an NSA operative claiming that he wasn't able to state precisely what was going on, but that it was a "vacuum"; he said this in an interview with the libertarian Reason magazine, along with other comments that suggest that Bush has authorized the use of the top-secret Echelon to spy on Americans with connections to terrorism (connections meaning anything from calling numbers associated with terrorists to calling numbers associated with people who called numbers associated with terrorists.) The former NSA guy was also the source for the NYTimes story that said that millions of Americans had been surveilled without a warrant. This also fits with the WPost story in which the FBI claimed that it followed up thousands of leads generated by the program that led to nothing.

So, basically, I'm not sure why you're objecting to Dean on this point.

Secondly, the Abramoff scandal is a Republican scandal. Abramoff has been considered a top Republican operative for years now--by himself among others. Democrats certainly aren't all pure and good when it comes to accepting favors and money from lobbyists--but since the K Street project focused on excluding them, they have had much less to be corrupted by.

Looking at the evidence, Abramoff cannot be said to have directed funds to Democrats. It is true that a number of American Indian tribes that were Abramoff clients contributed to Democrats; but these tribes (like virtually all tribes) donated previously almost exclusively to Democrats. The Abramoff clients continued to give to Democrats, but the levels stayed the same or went down in almost all cases. The contribution to Republicans, though, went up several hundred percent.

Abramoff was a conservative Republican. And the Democrats have no power today. Couple that with the evidence above (which is reported in bits and pieces all around, but compiled by TalkingPointsMemo.com) and you can't honestly say that the scandal is a bipartisan one.

Abramoff did not direct his clients to donate money to Democrats. And it insults people's intelligence to suggest so.

This comment doesn't seem able to post on Political Teen's site. So, I thought I'd give him the chance to respond by posting it here.

As I see it, the main difference between a hack and a partisan individual who is involved in politics is that a hack has no interest in dialogue except as a means of bludgeoning his or her opponent. A partisan individual, though, wants his or her party to be the best, and is willing to look at how and where it fails honestly.

The question now is this: is the Political Teen a hack, or is he an honest partisan?

2006-01-26T21:36:00.000-08:00

Do these people read what they write before they publish it?

Over at the right wing Washington Times, the editorial board published this odd little nugget:

Precisely what the Bush administration's National Security Agency wiretap program is, technically speaking, remains unknown to all but perhaps a few people in Washington. Certain aspects of it are becoming clearer by the day, however, and no doubt more will emerge in congressional hearings. In the meantime, the more that emerges, the less the program looks like Big Brother than it does a powerful antiterrorism tool that scans millions of communications. That tool could be abused in theory, but instead already appears to be responsible for successes in the war on terror. (italics added)

Oh yes. It's not big brother--its just a tool that scans millions of innocent communications (presumably, unless there are millions of terrorists). The line about successes is, in fact, based on nothing. The only story that has commented on tips from the program said that it sent the FBI on several thousand goose chases.

2006-01-26T21:29:00.000-08:00

Quality editorial of the day

A clever argument from Katrina vanden Heuvel of The Nation. She connects the Bush administration's reluctance to make their own records private with their insistence on the executive authority to wiretap extralegally, saying: "I'll show you mine if you show me yours." A selection from her piece:

I'm happy to let Dick Cheney analyze my Google records and discover that my most frequently searched terms are "Brad," "Angelina," and "baby," if the NSA will data-mine his computer for the keywords: "Joseph," "Wilson," and "wife." The White House can eavesdrop on my cell phone calls to my daughter, if it gives a detailed accounting of its dealings with Jack Abramoff. I don't even mind if George Bush learns the title of the last book I checked out of the library, if the FBI will tell me when the last time W. was in a library.

If NSA spying were really an issue of security, as the all-out media assault by the Bush administration claims it to be, it should accept the deal. But it's not. Rather this is all part of their neocon dream of an American Empire. You see, in a republic the lives of private citizens are private while the workings of public servants are public, but in an empire, Caesar's dealings remains shrouded in secrecy while he spies on citizens looking for threats to the regime. It is up to the Congress to put a stop to this idolatry: the emperor as God, mysterious and omniscient.

2006-01-26T21:21:00.000-08:00

Misusing the War on Terror

On September 11, 2001, George W. Bush spoke to a stunned nation from the Oval Office and reconvened

America

’s on-again, off-again “war against terrorism.” Beginning in the shock of that moment, and continuing through the elections of 2002 and 2004 and on to today, the administration has conflated the “war on terror” with an existential battle for our survival. This was a change from when Ronald Reagan had talked about the winning “war on terrorism” to the United Nations in 1986 and when Bill Clinton declared “war on terrorism” after the al-Qaeda bombings in Africa. Both men were using a very particular definition of war. Like the war on poverty, the war on crime, the war on drugs, and the war on music piracy, they portrayed the war on terrorism as an attempt to mobilize our society’s resources against an intractable problem.

The “war on terror” has remained just this type of rhetorical war, despite the Bush administration’s constant attempts to portray it otherwise. The administration has acknowledged this in their strategy: making incremental enhancements to the safety and security of America, trying to undermine the causes of terrorism in the Middle East, and pursuing

America

’s long-term economic and strategic interests. This is no “war” as it is commonly understood, but, instead, is a campaign to reduce a threat. This is shown most clearly by Bush’s decision to invade only

Iraq

rather than to eliminate the entire “axis of evil”. Though North Korea and Iran posed more imminent and more dangerous threats, Iraq was seen as the key to affecting the Middle East tactically, economically, and politically. And so we invaded

Iraq

and left the rest alone.

World War IV

Many defenders of this administration, though, have called the “war against terrorism” World War IV. They claim that we are in a fighting against evil and for our existence. They speak of this “war” as if it were more like World War II than the War on Drugs; yet despite their attempts, they have no convincing enemy that poses a genuine threat to

America

itself, only groups of terrorists. Bush himself has often given the impression that the “war against terrorism” is a fight for our survival, rather than a “limited war” for strategic interests. He explained that the terrorists hate our democracy, our freedom, and our liberty insinuating that they seek to destroy these ideals—and this may be so, but they attacked us because of our role in the Middle East, not to stop us from voting.

Why is it that the Bush administration and its supporters continue to insist that this war is an existential one rather than a strategic one? The answer lies in the many political strengths that an existential battle confers on those who wage it, especially in a democracy. In a war for a nation’s survival, democracies confer great power to those who try to protect it; dissent is minimized; the entire country is mobilized for war; and the “rally around the flag” effect solidifies support for the Commander in Chief. By contrast, “limited war” has always been unpopular in democracies and subsequently has been undermined by protests and dissent.

Ambiguities and Mis-Leading

To all those champions of the administration who insist that the “war on terror” is necessary and good, I say: yes, it is a benefit to the world that we are removing the shackles of oppression and allowing democracy to take hold in the Middle East; yes, removing Saddam Hussein was a great good; yes, many of the forces that oppose us know no bounds of human decency and often glory in the nihilism of suicide bombings; yes, there is a significant threat to America’s cities and it’s citizens abroad, and the awful specter of a mushroom cloud over Washington or New York that Vice President Cheney has often invoked must be prevented by any means necessary; yes, yes, yes.

But none of this justifies misleading the public by conflating the idea of an all-out existential war with our attempts to undermine the sources of terrorism and advance our interests. The “war on terror” is being used as a rhetorical excuse to consolidate power domestically and advance

America

’s strategic interest abroad. There is nothing wrong with the latter. But unless the American public is clear that the steps we are taking and the troops that are dying do so to advance our strategic interests rather than to counter an imminent danger, then democracy is lost. Would the American people accept their sons dying to protect America’s role in the Middle East? Is it worth one American life to ensure our economic primacy in the world? Do our long-term strategic concerns justify the death of a single American? A single Iraqi? These are questions worthy of the oldest surviving democracy in the world. But they are questions that have never been asked.

Next time you hear a politician justify some decision saying: “We are a nation at war…”, think again about what war he is talking about. If we give up our real liberties in the face of phantom threats, if we allow our nation to commit evils in the name of our protection, if we allow our leaders to lie in order to accomplish their goals, no matter how noble, then democracy itself is in peril.

2006-01-26T21:18:00.000-08:00

Politics as a ballgame without an umpire

I wrote this piece for the Daily Kos, but want to develop it further...

Kos wrote an interesting piece responding to Andrew Sullivan's charge that there are few things more valuable to GWB and the Religious Right than dKos. I understand where he is coming from—as Sullivan's charges as non-specific, broad, and immensely insulting.

But Kos's response, as well as many of the comments to his response, reveal the partial truth in Sullivan's point. (Please read on before you write a comment.) Sullivan is certainly blind to the value of a community like dKos--which manages to be an enormous fact-checking resource, a great place to organize political action, a place to vent, and a place to test political arguments. But much of the site's potential is obscured for anyone to the site's political right by the extremist rhetoric of so many diarists.

Pragmaticism

While many Americans may oppose Bush and much of the Republican agenda, they are basically happy with the way things are--as a character on West Wing said of the status quo: "It should be hard. I like that it's hard...But it should be a little easier." That is what people want--not radical change, but modest progress. There us an electoral majority in this country that wants a party that fights for the little guy, that pushes for modest but real social and political progress, that favors a strong and practical position on national security—and the Republicans are not that party.

If the strength of dKos is its activist, passionate (and currently extremely frustrated) community, then its weakness stems from its attempt to fight the Republicans on the Republican's terms. The time for discussion is never over in a political community. The left needs to fight back—but if the best we can do is to meet every right-wing attack with one equally vicious, if the best we can do is to let our contribution to the public debate settle into the mirror image of the extremist language that Republicans use, then we might as well give up; for the right wing has won.

(Much of the rise of the Republicans has been a direct result of their ability to portray Democrats as extremists and themselves as practical conservatives. The rhetoric that comes from dKos about fascism, theocracy, etc. only reinforces this Republican propaganda.)

The errors of dKos and attacks on MSM

Right wing groups set out to systematically undermine the mainstream press beginning in the late 1960s as part of a larger plan. These groups wanted to take out the "umpire" who could give an objective assessment of political stories. And in this, they have succeeded. The MSM has been reduced to reporting controversial stories in a "he said, she said" manner—the Swift Boat coverage is a perfect example of this. Even when the media does take a strong stance, much of the public has been taught to regard it as a biased source. We are now playing a ballgame without an umpire.

Republicans took advantage of this change in public perception before the Democrats and began to launch smears, cite blatantly partisan reports, engage in character assassination, and otherwise take advantage of the situation. Without an umpire, the public assumed that both sides bore some measure of the blame.

The second part of the right wing plan was to begin building a conservative brand centered a kind of "Team Republican". Rather than building a party on policy positions, Republicans had the novel idea of building it by creating an attractive brand. The brand was based on an emotional attachment and a kind of pure partisanship common to sports fans. At the same time, they created as their mascot a kind of “identity conservative”—a traditional white Christian (which happens to represent a large portion of the population).

Liberals have yet to find a credible means of responding to this identity conservatism. Some at dKos have settled on trying to create a mirror “Team Democrat” to respond to the partisan attacks of the right. This brand of politics might win a few battles, but it will never win the war because this war is being fought in an environment created by the right wing.

2005-07-13T19:54:00.000-07:00

Liberals and American Power

In the leftist British paper, the Guardian this past Sunday, Nick Colson writes regarding the liberal understanding of Islamic terrorism: “the twin vices of willful myopia and bad faith…have disfigured too much liberal thought for too long”. There is much evidence of this in the comments and posts on the Daily Kos, especially in response to the London bombings; but there also is an increasing number of individuals who have begun to break loose from these “liberal” habits who are also active on the Daily Kos.

There are many sources for and reasons why these habits are prominent in liberal circles. They stem from a number of thoughtful insights into America and American power that most conservatives willfully turn a blind eye to: namely, the moral ambiguity that comes with the enormity of America’s power in the world today and the evil that is always unleashed in any violence and especially in any war. One of the basic principles of what passes for conservatism today is that “American power [is] a force for peace and security” (from Sean Hannity’s Deliver Us From Evil, page 277). This phrase is echoed by Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, the National Review, and on and on. The point is, many conservatives see American power as a force for good. Democrats, they say, see “American power as a source of arrogance and violence”. This is a simplistic view that works well in a 15 second spot even as it distorts the reality of what many liberals actually think. American power is a source of violence in the world—no one can deny that. It has often been seen as arrogant in the hands of this administration. At the same time, American forces have worked around the world for peace and have historically provided security in a number of troubled regions—from Kosovo to Haiti.

The problem that liberals tend to appreciate that many conservatives are blind to is that even when we intend to do good, any use of power creates unintended consequences. We drive Saddam out of Kuwait leading an enormous coalition and backed by the entire world; Bin Laden is infuriated that the Saudi government did not call of him to expel Saddam and declares jihad on America.

On the other hand, many liberals seem to have a purist attitude towards American power. As a conservative commentator once mimed his impression of liberal foreign policy: America can only use power when it is against our self-interest. Some liberals demand that America’s intentions be pure and unselfish before it acts. Looking back on history, they see how American economic and strategic interests have led us to support tyrants and overthrow democratically elected leaders. They rightfully rail against this rank hypocrisy.

Re-Imagining the Opposition

I believe that we as liberals and progressives need to re-think and then re-formulate our opposition to Bush’s war on terrorism. Because Bush’s war is flawed; his administration’s execution of it has been feckless. The conspiracy theories building up around why we went into Iraq giving Bush and company nefarious motives distract attention from the stupidity of the move: Iraq was a reckless gamble with American lives; but it is one that we must now ensure succeeds—there is no pulling back. It was a war of choice against an evil dictator without whom Iraqis are better off; but Bush did not prepare the American people for a long war; he did not supply our troops adequately for their forthcoming task; he did not commit enough resources to win the peace.

Liberals and progressives should be encouraging Bush’s foreign policy successes. We must praise Bush’s role in the many peaceful democratic revolutions in the Middle East. We should be determined to leave Iraq and Afghanistan firmly in the hands of democratically elected governments. We should applaud when Bush pledges to bring morality back into foreign affairs. We should encourage the use of American power to promote democracy. We cannot attack America for acting in its self interest. We cannot rule our war and other violent means as a last resort. We should not affix blame on our policy-makers for provoking the terrorists by not responding to their blackmail.

This is not what we need to say to be taken seriously on national security. This is what we need to believe, and believe deeply, in order to have any moral authority or coherence in criticizing and eventually running America’s national security policy. If we do not honestly acknowledge the successes of our opponents, then people will believe we exist only to oppose. If we believe a peaceful democratic revolution is tainted by the American government’s influence, then we have no business proposing any government programs at home. If we reject morality in foreign affairs in favor of real-politik, then how can we defend progressive taxation and Medicare at home?

2005-07-13T19:28:00.000-07:00

Liberal Responses to Terrorism

I have noticed a number of common threads and assumptions in most liberal arguments against the “war on terrorism”. Though I should have been sourcing these and identifying particular articles, posts, and opinion pieces, I had not before conceived of writing a definite response to them. But I believe many of you will easily recognize these arguments as being basic to a number of liberal arguments attacking Bush’s “war on terror”. I certainly found a number of examples of this in my regular perusing of the Daily Kos.

I am not really sure to what extent these various arguments reflect the opinions of most liberals or progressives. So, let me be clear that I make no claims that these positions represent those that are typical. But they are present and often dominant—in George Galloway’s response to the Madrid bombings, in the writings of Noam Chomsky and Joan Didion, all over the Huffington Post, in the British Guardian, in the Nation magazine, and also in many postings on the Daily Kos. As I mentioned above, I believe these assumptions are often the result of the liberal impulse: to view all people as equals, to believe in the essential good-ness of human beings, to view all actions as the result of environmental pressures and thus often morally exculpable (following from the previous), to see morality as a series of subtle distinctions rather than merely good and evil, and to view an uneasy peace as preferable to war. These are all rather commendable beliefs, and I share them. But they must be balanced with a hard look at the reality of terrorism and Islamic fanaticism. We are reminded that though liberalism has been an inspiration for great positive changes in the world, as well as a source of personal inspiration, it is not complete.

Some other beliefs seem to be more of a result of partisanship than any particular understanding of liberalism.

Seven Theses and Responses
So, here they are, seven responses to various “liberal” arguments against the war on terrorism:

1. Thesis: The “war on terror” is merely a cover for a power grab by Bush and his cronies.

Alternate thesis: Terrorism is a minor problem that we should just ignore; without attention, the problem will go away.

Response: The fight against terrorism is both necessary and just.

Though I do not doubt the Bush administration has used the War on Terror to pursue other strategic goals for America and themselves, and that numerous other people have used it to enrich themselves and their corporations—no reasonable person can deny that terrorism is not a major problem.

First of all, there is the terrible specter of a biological or nuclear attack. This would be a disaster of epic proportions. And the mere possibility of this should be enough to justify the allocation of serious resources and attention to preventing it. Though it is entirely possible this type of disaster may not be able to be prevented, there is no excuse for not trying.

Secondly, terrorism attacks the very basis of any society—the trust that is implicit in leaving one’s fortified home. A society in which people are terrified of terrorism is one which cannot survive indefinitely. This is precisely the understanding that those who wish to ignore it accept. But ignoring an obvious problem will not make the fear of it go away—rather it will become a shadowy force, a secret nightmare passed along as gossip and conspiracy theory. No—free dialogue, an affirmation of the ideals of a civil society—this is the answer to terrorism, both morally and strategically.

Finally, there is the decidedly conservative idea that as terrorism is inevitable we should avoid wasting resources combating it. Though this argument has a certain basic appeal—let me ask this: what liberal would accept an argument concerning racism or poverty based on this principle? Every individual and every government has a moral duty to try to eliminate these evils, whether or not it is possible to actually do so. This is the heart of progressivism. Even when it is unimaginable, progress is possible; the problem is not inherent in the world, but rather in the imagination.

2. Thesis: Terrorism is a legitimate or at least understandable response of people who lack power lashing out against those who are too powerful to be challenged directly. Terrorism may be immoral, but sometimes it is understandable in response to great injustices when there is no alternate course of action.

Response: There are no moral excuses or justifications for these acts of terror.

Terrorism directly targets the defenseless. It violates every fundamental principle of ethics and morality. It does so explicitly and flagrantly. The main purpose of terrorism is to cause fear and destruction. In order to accept terrorism as acceptable or understandable, one must first deny the humanity of fellow human beings. It violates the fundamental principle of liberalism: that all people are created equal. Terrorism explicitly regards the people who are its victims as beneath human care. Islamic terrorism justifies its victims by claiming that they are heathens. They even classify many fellow Muslims as heathens—Shiites, Sufis, and in the most extreme cases, all non-Wahabbi Muslims are considered to be beneath humanity. There is no defense of terrorism. And certainly, there can be no defense based on liberal principles.

3. Thesis: Even if terrorism is morally repugnant, it can be prevented by acceding to the demands of those who use it—it is merely used as a political instrument to gain specific objectives.

Response: Islamic terrorism, as practiced today, is not a course of action taken by rational self-interested individuals.

This point is especially strong and is perhaps the most compelling argument put forth against Bush’s War on Terror. Its appeal is in the fact that it is partially true.

When one considers the many prominent historical examples of terrorism that we have: the Irish Republican Army, the Jewish groups in Palestine before the founding of Israel, and the many disparate groups that threw off European rule in the period between the two world wars. These groups had a specific political goal and were willing to kill innocent people for their goals. The insurgencies and some of the terrorist attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan can be in this fashion, though it does not in any way excuse the use of terrorism.

However, Islamic terrorism today—whether by Palestinians against Israel or by bombers in London—is an entirely different phenomenon. Suicide terrorism especially exemplifies this: these are acts of men and women who wish to define themselves by death and destruction. Their ostensible political goals are a mere fig leaf for their spiritual desperation and self-hatred. These acts of terrorism are an end to themselves.

Look at the everlasting changing of the rationale for these attacks—first, the presence of American troops in the Holy Lands; then when they move from their, for their presence in Afghanistan. When we were attacked on 9/11 it was not because we were free as Bush asserted—it was, at root, because radical extremists like Bin Laden believed that the liberalism and the West were slowly infiltrating their societies. If one reads Sayyid al Qutb and other founders of radical Islam who gave their inspiration to Bin Laden, one sees that these men’s hatred of the West is only eclipsed by their hatred of their fellow Muslims who have embraced the West.

Islamic terrorism is an attempt to reverse history through unjustifiable destruction; it is an attempt to make present in others the hate and impotence the individual terrorists themselves feel. The only possible political purpose that would explain these acts is an attempt to provoke a religious war with the West which would unite and rejuvenate the Muslim world. This is precisely what Bin Laden and other extremists have portrayed Iraq and Afghanistan as the beginning of—and if they have their way, it will be.

Rational self-interested individuals do not kill themselves and as many others as possible in the attempt to start a war that would most likely destroy their native lands. Giving in would only embolden the fanatics.

The “liberal” position holds that if we were able to convince them that America and the West had stopped those practices that they found to be unjust and hurting Muslims—supporting Israel, keeping troops in the region, occupying Iraq and Afghanistan, supporting the totalitarian governments in the region, and a number of other smaller complaints—then we would deflate the causes of terrorism and it would gradually end. But this thesis includes one incredible assumption: that any reasonable person could hold that any of these above factors could drive someone to terrorism and even suicide terrorism.

4. Thesis: Religious conservatives in America are our domestic equivalent of extremist Islamic groups.

Response: Our domestic political opponents share far more values with us than do those who resort to terrorism or who fail to reject it.

This seems obvious when it is stated. Yet there have been dozens of posts about the American Taliban and how the religious right is America’s equivalent to Islamic fanatics. Comparisons like this can always be fun—it’s always good to label your opposition as Nazis, Communists, terrorists, whatever—simplifying a complex situation usually leads to a more reasonable response. But the fact is, we share more with out political enemies—a belief in individual rights, democracy, some form of economic freedom, free speech, the right to assemble, the separation of church and state, and the benefits of science—than we do with any Islamic extremist. There are disagreements, but they have always been a matter of degree. No one debates whether church and state should become one; but we disagree on where the line should be drawn. No one debates whether or not all people have specific rights; but we dispute what those rights are.

5. Thesis: The wars against and occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan have failed. The War on Terror has failed. In reality terrorism has increased as a result of these attacks.

Response: The attacks in London and other terrorist attacks prove nothing about the Bush and Blair administration’s strategy for fighting terrorism.

6. Thesis: George Bush’s Iraqi adventure is a result of his conservative politics; either he just wants oil and to solidify America’s strategic position in the Middle East or he is seeking to initiate a religious war with Islam.

Response: Bush’s rhetoric and justifications for the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan rest on liberal grounds, even if his methods often clash with liberal sensibilities.

7. Thesis: Our troops are being killed. Our presence in Iraq is provoking the terrorists. We have already handed over official sovereignty. Our presence there is not right—occupations don’t work. We must leave now, or set a timetable to leave soon.

Response: We must stay in Iraq and Afghanistan until the situation is secure. Leaving these countries to civil war and extremism would be far more irresponsible than the invasions themselves were.

(I’ll post explaining my responses later, but I wanted to put it up before it became dated.)

2005-07-13T14:20:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow's Republicans

Just read an article in an older copy of the New Yorker. And I realized how dramatically the political landscape was changing. It seemed to me that these young men and women (mainly men) were the future of the Republican party--and that their prominence is something that George Bush will come to regret.

First of all, I have never bought Bush as a religious conservative--despite the Left's attempts to smear him as one and the Right's attempts to claim him as one. He just doesn't have the right profile. I do believe that he has been significantly influenced by his adulthood conversion--and that he believes God has played an important part in his life. More importantly, it seems Bush has accepted most of the "founding myths" of the evangelical movement in America. He believes in a very personal God who acts directly in the world and in his life. He believes that his faith (understood practically to mean his intention) is more important than his works. He believes that evil is plain, and that God directs him to see it. He believes that we all participate in a great battle between Good and Evil. In general, with regard to the more specific aspects of mainstream evangelical beliefs, it seems to me that he accepts them and does not seek to contradict them, though he does not especially believe them. Following that, it seems there are a number of areas in which Bush consistently overlooks or disagrees with aspects of evangelicalism: homosexuality, divorce, the duty to evangelize, and perhaps abortion. Most significantly, the one belief that I see as at the heart of many of the religiously conservative movements of modern times is the belief that we are in the End Times. It does not seem to me that Bush accepts this. All of this is my conjecture, based on reading several biographies of Bush and, by this point, tens of thousands of articles. I think it would prove rather accurate.

At the same time as Bush does not seem especially religious, he has certainly empowered a number of people who are. Though he may not be one himself, he is held up as an example of a "true believer". And his politics have moved politics to favor the true believers over their doubting colleagues. The heart of the modern world is skepticism; and evangelicals are part of a growing worldwide movement to answer skepticism with unyielding belief. When liberal critics equate Islamic extremists to Christian evangelicals, they go too far. But both movements share a common rejection of modern skepticism. And more a rejection of the general ordering of the world today--neither are truly conservative; instead they are radical. They are also the future--not the entire future, but an increasing part of it. Alternatives to accepting uncertainty as a part of life will continue to grow in prominence until a new understanding of human existence and meaning is proposed. Instead, the reaction of those too afraid of uncertainty to try to understand their existence as it is will embrace a radical rejection of it--building elaborate mythologies to explain their particular dilemma.

These believers are of the left and of the right. Sartre once explained that in order to create meaning in one's life, one needed to dedicate one's self to a project. He chose Communism. The evangelical and Islamist movements both grasped this essential truth about the search for meaning in a world founded on skepticism. They chose their religions. And refuse to acknowledge the void which drives them to blind belief exists. But like the desert that the young Kafka must cross in Haruki Murakami's recent novel, Kafka on the Shore, it does exist, even if only in our minds.

These men and women are the new Republicans--who reject progress because progress would indicate that they do not know everything. They are the "true believers".

2005-07-10T14:19:00.000-07:00

A thought-provoking editorial in the Guardian
Nick Cohen writes a powerful editorial in the Guardian today, in many ways echoing Paul Berman's take on Islamic fanaticism in Terror & Liberalism:

Whether you are brown or white, Muslim, Christian, Jew or atheist, it is uncomfortable to face the fact that there is a messianic cult of death which, like European fascism and communism before it, will send you to your grave whatever you do. But I'm afraid that's what the record shows.

And in conclusion:

But the greatest [task in these coming days] is to resolve to see the world for what it is and remove the twin vices of wilful myopia and bad faith which have disfigured too much liberal thought for too long.

Exactly.

2005-07-10T12:40:00.000-07:00

Terror & Liberalism
Sometimes, I wonder at the sheer lunacy of it all--in the aftermath of the London bombings, in the wake of every suicide attack in Iraq or Israel, after the shock of the September 11 attacks had worn off, far too many liberal bloggers, editorialists and other commentators on the political scene reacted not with morally justified anger towards the extremists who perpetrated the acts, but instead by blaming their opposition at home. (This happened with conservative commentators as well, but that I'll get to later.)

This is really quite insane. I find it difficult to see how liberals can find themselves in this position--even as I too feel the emotional pull to side with them and feel more justified in an all-consuming anger against the Bush administration. I, too, believe that the Iraq war was a war of choice--a reckless gamble on the part of those in power to change the nature of the Middle East. In the short term, there is almost no grounds to deny that the invasion of Iraq has inspired more terrorism than it has prevented. The so-called "flypaper" theory--that American forces in Iraq would attract the terrorists there so that we would not have to deal with them here--seems rather ill-conceived on so many levels. Terrorists in Iraq are being trained how to conduct urban warfare, how to get around American checkpoints, and how to exploit American weaknesses, while they are able to inflict a heavy loss of life on our troops and drain money from our economy. The Iraqi conflict has proved to be the best recruiting material for Islamic extremism next to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

But even as I bemoan our current situation in Iraq, and correctly see how it has aided the cause of Islamic extremists, I cannot understand how anyone--whether they be Noam Chomsky or George Galloway--can blame any of these acts of nihilistic terror on anyone but Islamic fanatics...

Galloway
Galloway, speaking on July 7, explained:

No one can condone acts of violence aimed at working people going about their daily lives. They have not been a party to, nor are they responsible for, the decisions of their government. They are entirely innocent and we condemn those who have killed or injured them. The loss of innocent lives, whether in this country or Iraq, is precisely the result of a world that has become a less safe and peaceful place in recent years...Tragically Londoners have now paid the price of the government ignoring such warnings. We urge the government to remove people in this country from harms way, as the Spanish government acted to remove its people from harm, by ending the occupation of Iraq and by turning its full attention to the development of a real solution to the wider conflicts in the Middle East.

Is this a liberal statement? How can people who call themselves liberal on sites like the Daily Kos for example, accept this rhetoric? "By George, I think he's got it," one member responded.

But read the statement again, and you begin to fully see the lunacy of the position many on the left have taken: obviously some people can condone, indeed they can carry out, "acts of violence aimed at working people going about their daily lives." These people are the terrorists who Galloway should be focusing on. Galloway then states that these members of a democratic society are in no way responsible for the decisions of the government they elected--again, Osama Bin Laden has explicitly disagreed with this in this pre-presidential election statement to America. And I hate to say it, but Bin Laden has a point--members of a society are responsible for the actions of their government, the content of their culture, and the structure of its society--that is precisely the argument that liberalism is built on. We all have a responsibility to the least among us. We have a responsibility to make sure our justice system is fair and treats all individuals as equals. We have a responsibility to make sure our foreign policy is just. Those are the responsibilities of each citizen living in a democracy.

Following from this, it seems that Galloway believes that his own government is a legitimate target of terrorism--but that instead ordinary Londoners have "paid the price of the government." This is a position that is not entirely indefensible, but is shocking nevertheless--and I am sure it is a position Galloway would deny he has ever embraced. But that is precisely the implicit message of his speech--that the problem with these terrorist attacks is that they were directed at innocents rather than Blair and company.

Moral Acrobatics
What kind of moral acrobatics are needed to justify equating acts of terrorism with a profoundly flawed but necessary temporary occupation of Iraq? There is a world of difference between searching for the roots of Islamic hatred and fanaticism and giving in to the demands of the extremists. While it is important that we deplore the violence in Iraq perpetrated by our own troops--especially when it results in the deaths or injuries of innocents--and that we hold ourselves to a higher standard, we must not lose sight of the depravities of the method of terrorism itself. Have American and British troops killed innocent people--accidentally or recklessly, even in some cases maliciously? Probably. That is the evil of any way. Have American and British troops performed or tried to perform difficult and even impossible tasks with honor and distinction? From almost all reports, it seems so. The situation in Iraq is awful and morally ambiguous for our soldiers: how to tell a friend from a foe; how to balance protecting one's own life with the need to trust people in order to build up a society; how to maintain a sense of professionalism and morality when the enemy is entirely depraved...

But how, in God's name, can any individual confuse this supremely flawed occupation in which innocent people accidentally die with a campaign of terror in which killing innocent people is the sole target? How can some liberals say that because Bush and Blair acted in such a way as to anger the terrorists, the attacks are somehow their responsibility? It's like blaming people who support abortion for the bombing of a clinic. Or more precisely, blaming Gandhi for the violence the British inflicted on his followers. Bush and Blair did not inspire Islamic terrorism; terrorist attacks are not properly understood as a justified or even a direct result of particular actions. Their intent is to be disproportionate; they are acts of nihilistic destruction rooted, in this case, in a perverted vision of Islam.

At worst, the war against Iraq can be seen as a strategic bid by the United States to find a platform to project power from in the Middle East in which too many innocent Iraqis have died. But even in the worst scenario, we have removed a malevolent dictator who oppressed and murdered his own people and are trying to replace him with a representative liberal government. What, on the other hand, was the purpose of the 9/11 attacks? Or the 7/7 attacks? What is the good that these terrorists are trying to accomplish with their power? What is their justification?

2005-07-10T00:31:00.000-07:00

A Progressive’s Manifesto

Every world view is built upon a set of shared beliefs, a common ground among a community. This manifesto is my attempt to begin to forge a new “common ground”, a new consensus in America. The liberal ideas that inspired my parents’ generation have now run their course, and today the Democratic party’s politics is, properly understood, reactionary and conservative–they only wish to preserve the advances they have made. The conservative movement that also began in the sixties, but culminated in the Reagan, Gingrich, and Bush revolutions much later, was created in opposition to the liberal ideas that dominated in the sixties. These ideas are fundamentally flawed as they never attempted to reconcile the justness and truth of their liberal antitheses. What is needed is a Third Way, one that unfortunately, Bill Clinton was never able to fully articulate during his presidency. This third way is appropriately labeled, “progressive”.

This is an attempt on my part to combine the best points of the American conservative and liberal movements into a single coherent vision.

I believe...

THAT each individual has a God-given right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”, free from the hackles of unnecessary governmental or societal restraints.

THAT each individual has an equal right to satisfy their basic physical needs: to have food, to have shelter, to live in relative safety, and to have access to competent health care.

THAT moreover, each individual has a right to attain those skills that are needed to thrive in a modern economy; and further that providing quality education not only benefits each individual, but also is necessary for any contemporary society to compete.

THAT the free market is the best means of organizing an economy;
THAT global free trade is essential to worldwide progress;
THAT there must be minimal government interference in the markets; but that the government must enforce the “rules of capitalism” and police the market.

THAT the free market is the only economic model compatible with democracy and personal liberty.

THAT America’s relations with other nations must be both moral and pragmatic; but most of all, that America must be humble.
THAT we must never forsake our founding ideals: of democracy, liberty, and equality.

THAT America’s unprecedented power in the world presents a moral quandary, as a government accountable merely to five percent of the global population has direct or indirect control over the lives of every human being;
THAT because of this quandary, America has a responsibility to use its power and vast resources to benefit the rest of the world as well as its own citizens.

THAT there is a collective wisdom to the actions of a healthy society;
THAT a healthy society can only exist where:
high quality education is universally available,
all individuals are equal before the law,
industry only uses sustainable environmental and other practices,
nothing impedes the free flow of information,
poverty has been eliminated,
and where each individual can rise as far as their talents can take them.

THAT the best government is as local as possible, as little as possible.
BUT THAT government can be a powerful force for good in society; and more, that it is our duty to push the government to be a force for the good.

THAT it is morally imperative that we try to end such pernicious evils as poverty and terrorism, even as these problems defy any easy solution.

THAT our politics need not be pure, that our ideas need not be perfect, that our politicians need not be saints, but that always, as we strive to do good and avoid evil, we are honest and humble, pragmatic yet idealistic.

(this is just a rough draft; it lacks poetry, proofreading, and unity, but otherwise, it seems ok--i'll update it periodically...)