Speedkill

Strangeness abounds. Women have the highest freedom in Iran and there are no gays. Who knew?

He also tried the standard Holocaust denier rhetoric of “questioning, not denying.” It’s pretty transparent. He also waffled on his alleged comments about wanting Israel to be destroyed, which isn’t that surprising.

I don’t really care that he spoke at Columbia. We have nothing to be afraid of by having him speak here. Judging by the comments attributed to him in media reports, his image probably won’t improve.

Jeff Iran

Disclaimer: There are two obvious objections to the post that follows: I’m assuming without evidence that the Bush administration’s stated reasons were not the reason for the war and that these sorts of arguments are no longer relevant. The first is wrong, but it’s another subject and I won’t answer such arguments on this post. The second is true, but I don’t really care.

With that out of the way, on to the substance.

Read more…

Jeff Iraq

Petraeus and Crocker have begun their Congressional briefings in the past two days and it’s really not impressive. I’m a fan of this nonsense:

Petraeus’s plan would rotate 2,200 Marines out of Anbar province in western Iraq this month without replacing them, then begin pulling out 17,500 Army troops and 2,000 more Marines starting in mid-December. If logistics personnel and other supporting troops are also withdrawn, that would return force levels to the “pre-surge” number of 130,000 by mid-July. The general asked Congress to defer decisions on further reductions until March to get a better sense of the political and security situation.

…

“What I recommended was a very substantial withdrawal,” Petraeus countered.

A substantial withdrawal…that we essentially have to do, as our current troop level isn’t sustainable. Which is why it’s a “surge” and not a permanent increase. So the substantial withdrawal is the unavoidable withdrawal of the troops we sent in temporarily. I’m satisfied, aren’t you?

And of course, Iraqis don’t think the surge is working and there doesn’t actually appear to be a decrease in violence.

Finally, the overriding message of these briefings seems to be this: don’t make any decisions yet. After a surge that was supposed to work by now. The surge appears to have had only a minor effect and they have nothing else to offer. If we keep doing the same thing over and over, eventually we’ll get a different result, right?

Jeff Bush, Iraq

A new bin Laden tape came out on Friday and since I was traveling, I couldn’t comment on it.

It’s sort of an interesting tape. Lots of reports have noted how topical (if that’s the right word) it is, mentioning global warming, the subprime mortgage collapse, etc. His rhetoric resembles that of the anti-war crowd at points (at times the extreme edge of that crowd, at others the mainstream). This has, of course, prompted stupid comments from people like Dinesh D’Souza:

Why, you may ask, would Bin Laden praise these leftist critics of U.S. foreign policy? First, he recognizes that there are many on the left who hate Bush as much as he does and who share his desire that Bush’s war in Iraq, and Bush’s foreign policy more generally, end in complete failure. Surely Bin Laden doesn’t share the permissive social values of the left, but he has figured out that the enemy of his enemy is his de facto ally, working with him toward a common goal. Second, Bin Laden recognizes that he couldn’t possibly convince Americans to pull out of Iraq. Fortunately for him he doesn’t have to. There is already a political movement in America, led by the pundits and activists of the left, who are working overtime and without pay to secure Bin Laden’s chief objectives. Thus the chief architect of 9/11 can simply refer Americans to their own homegrown leftists in order to get the Bin Laden line.

This isn’t a new tactic. Anytime bin Laden says something that resembles a criticism of the war, it’s used as a smear by the Right. Why, bin Laden believes we should end the war and so does the Left! They must be working together to destroy America! It’s a cheap shot for intellectual lightweights who are desperately trying to avoid the obvious conclusion that the war is a complete and utter failure.

It also brings out the moron in the people who want to lead us. Case in point, Mitt Romney:

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney says the recent release of a video tape featuring comments from Osama bin Laden shows how “deluded” bin Laden really is.

“His comments as a radical jihadist and the idea of people converting to Islam under the threat of coersion — these kinds of principles are not in line, if you will, rational thought in my view,” Romney says.

…

“I think the whole radical jihadist movement is extraordinarily misguided and evil and is a form of delusion but I believe that the people of the world recognize that,” Romney said. “I think when he makes tapes like this, it hurts his effort. It doesn’t help it.”

Good heavens, I just can’t imagine how that bin Laden guy believes such things! It’s just too much for my little brain to handle.

Oh please. The guy who believes that the Garden of Eden was in Missouri is criticizing someone’s rationality? It’s just too much for me (yeah, it’s cheap shot, sue me). For fuck’s sake, I would think a religious person could figure this out. Bin Laden is a theocrat. It’s really not hard to figure out his train of thought if you start with a few basic assumptions taken on faith. It’s rather easy to justify just about anything doing that.

Anyone who dismisses Jihadism as nothing more than an evil delusion has no business running our foreign policy. These are people with goals and reasons for their actions, just like most other people. That isn’t to say they can be reasoned with, but if you refuse to understand your enemy you will lose. If we cling to a shallow, myopic view of this conflict as the good, rational people vs. crazy, evil delusional people, we’ll just continue bombing innocent brown people and making more terrorists.

Jeff Iraq, The Right

Al Qaeda is pretty obviously a bad group of people, but do they barbecue children and feed them to their parents? I’m with Wulfgar; that’s a bit sketchy. Yon’s reporting is from an anonymous Iraqi official who apparently heard it from someone else. Not much more than a rumor in a region filled with vile rumors.

There’s a stranger part in Andy’s post, however:

This, along with their (al Qaeda) beheadings and Saddam’s evil atrocities is not reason enough to wipe these monsters out? I’m sure most of the Soldiers, Marines, Sailors and Pilots fighting in Iraq right now would love to kill one of these al Qaedas.

Who’s saying we shouldn’t wipe out al Qaeda? I don’t think there’s a lack of will here. It always perplexes me when people are roused to fierce denunciations of groups like al Qaeda and claim they should be wiped out. Don’t we sort of already know this? The problem is the how, not the why. There isn’t some magic policy that we can just implement and starting wiping these people out without bringing death and destruction to lots of people who don’t deserve it (and who we’re ostensibly trying to protect).

It’s curious to me.

Jeff Iraq

Religious scholar Karen Armstrong is offended by ignorance of Islam:

RELIGIOUS scholar Karen Armstrong says she is defending Islam as it has been portrayed inaccurately in many ways, particularly in western countries.

She said when Islam, a religion professed throughout the world, is portrayed inaccurately and misrepresented, it offended her intellectually.

“When Islam is projected incorrectly, inaccurately and distorted, it also gives rise to fundamentalism among certain people.

Let’s just back up here. Islamic fundamentalism was quite strong before 9/11, which was before Islam became an issue to most people. After 9/11, our fuck up in Iraq has done a solid job of keeping fundamentalism strong. Inaccurate criticism of Islam is hardly something to worry about with regard to creating fundamentalists.

Armstrong, a well-known author on world religions, said owing to prejudice and hatred, millions of Jews were killed due to Germany’s Nazi atrocities during the Second World War.

This dark history happened in Germany, a western country which prides itself as being very enlightened.

“But we (the western world) seem to learn nothing (from this) as after that there were concentration camps in Yugoslavia. We seem to be heading for greater darkness,” she said.

Call me crazy, but I don’t think we’re particularly close to tossing Muslims in ovens. In fact, it looks to me like Islamic regimes are far closer to that point. Of course, it would be unfair of me to conflate radical Islamic fundamentalists and your average Muslim.

On the other hand, Armstrong has her priorities out of whack here. The fundamental barrier to a good relationship between the West and Islam is Islamic fundamentalism. What does Armstrong’s hand-wringing do to help that situation? Absolutely nothing. She’s whining about the symptoms when she should be working on defeating the cause.

Jeff Foreign Policy, Religion

There was a shooting in Idaho and it turns out that the gunman has ties to the Aryan Nations. Jay comments and Craig responds.

Let’s start with Jay’s post. He quotes Dave Neiwert to claim that the this was “certain[ly]” a political statement:

What’s clear is that Hamilton fully intended to take as many people with him as possible; that’s why he began by targeting the dispatcher’s office, where he knew he would get police response. And considering his extremist background, it is certain this was intended as some kind of political statement. It was, by most definitions, an act of domestic terrorism.

It’s not certain. That’s a completely absurd statement. As Craig points out, that’s where the shooter’s wife works. It’s perfectly consistent with a personal rampage. It’s absolutely not anything approaching “certain.”

Jay then tries to spin the whole thing into a lesson that we should take Islamic terrorism less seriously:

Furthermore, 42% of Christians consider themselves “Christians first,” not “Americans first.”

And in a post today, Greenwald notes that Americans in general are much more likely to support the killing of civilians for political purposes (51%) than U.S. Muslims (13%) and even Iranians (16%).

Do I think that all American Christians are sadistic terrorists? Of course not. That would be a simplistic generalization based on a few isolated events. In other words, the same type of generalization that has created the idea of a worldwide “culture war” pitting “Islamicists” against “civilized nations.”

Yes, the most repressive regimes on the planet are Islamist and Islamist terrorist groups are by far the largest that are bent on attacking us. Just a few isolated incidents, ya see. No cause for alarm.

You can make the case that terrorism in general is over-hyped. It is, to some degree. But to inflate right-wing terrorism in the U.S. to anything approaching radical Islam is completely asinine. To say that Islamist thought is not in conflict with the values of civilized (I don’t like using that word here, but it works) nations (you know, human rights, liberty, democracy…) is extremely myopic.

Jay ends with some happy and useless platitudes about the fight against terrorism:

So let’s fight terrorism realistically. Through policing, not culture wars. Through prevention, not eradication. And, above all, let’s remember that the best path to fighting terror lies not through anger and authoritarianism, but with civility, diversity, and democracy.

Nonsense. Civility, diversity, and democracy have never stopped suicide terrorism. It’s been stopped by ending the conflicts at the root of it. Policing is nice, but it’s simply treading water. At least he gets points for being against authoritarianism. Curbing Islamism will take cultural reform in the Muslim world.

Now, Craig’s response. He rightly attacks the characterization of the Idaho incident. Actually, it’s a generally correct post. Except for one thing:

Now, apply Occam’s Razor to the situation. He was a violent guy with a history of domestic violence and animal cruelty. He killed his wife, and people who were associated with her. It just so happened that she worked at the courthouse. I’d put odds that if she worked at Pizza Hut, that’s where he would have gone instead of the courthouse.

But, that explanation does not fit with the left’s narrative, namely that right-wing extremists are a far worse danger than Islamists.

Where did that come from? Jay’s post? Nope. Hey, it was pulled out of thin air! It’s a fuckin’ miracle!

Another thing to note, acting like a violent asshole generally and making a violent political statement are not mutually exclusive courses of action. This could be an act of terrorism. Or it might not be. Who knows? I’ll just say that I doubt it. It is possible, however.

Let’s put it this way: yes, there are right-wing terrorists in this country. No, they shouldn’t be ignored. Yes, Islamists are a bigger threat. No, right-wing terrorism is not an equivalent danger to Islamism.

Was that so hard?

Jeff Foreign Policy, The Left

This is one of the most stunning things I’ve read in quite a while. I’ve been meaning to post about the recent PEW poll, but I wasn’t aware of those particular statistics.

Jeff Foreign Policy

Well, fuck. I realize I have plenty of time to think about the Democratic nominees for President, but this really throws a monkey wrench into things. I’m inclined to agree with Colby. If Congress is simply going to roll over when Bush vetoes the spending bill, what good are they? Granted, the Democrats can’t override his veto and no one wants our soldiers hanging in the balance while two branches of government are in a stand off, but there’s no other choice. Continuing the war is the greater negative here.

That is, by the way, me saying I’m in favor of withdrawal. The date proposed is a bit far off, perhaps, but we need to be out. I’ve been avoiding saying we should withdraw out of concern for the events that will follow. At this point I’d have to say that all we’re doing is delaying the inevitable. The best we can do is attempt to withdraw as cleanly as possible. Which, of course, isn’t going to be successful, but have to try (and that means handling the massive increase in refugees fleeing the renewed violence, too).

I believe Dave (who, I have on good authority, is still alive and actually completing a course of reformative therapy at the hands of David Sirota) warned of the consequences for American foreign policy if we withdraw a while back. I’m not entirely sure such consequences are bad, however. If we never try something on the scale of what we’re doing in Iraq again, is that a bad thing? Transforming an entire society appears to be out of our reach (and unsurprisingly so). How many more lives would we waste of further endeavors of this kind? Full-on nation building via military force is something to avoid, not regret our inability to summon the support for it.

Back to the Democrats. With Obama making empty threats, do I have anyone to turn to? Clinton is simply not impressive. I don’t believe she’d be a bad president, but she wouldn’t be more than average. Then again, I’d be happy with average at this point. John Edwards? I admittedly need to do more research, but I’m not entirely sure about his economic policies. The word “populist” is bandied about quite a bit, which makes me a little wary. Perhaps there’s no good reason for that, but there it is. Those are the big three. Richardson is appealing, but doesn’t appear to have a shot. So at this stage in the game, I’m not entirely impressed. There’s a lot of time left, however, and anything could happen. We’ll just have to see.

Jeff 2008 elections, Bush, Iraq

You probably already know this, but I’m apparently an enemy of the U.S. I don’t normally take people named “Buzz” seriously, but this one may have a point.

“You’ve got a situation where the American Left is choosing to side with Islamo-fascists,” says the Clinton aide. “What does that tell you about what their true intentions are?”

You can’t argue with that logic. I remember the day I chose to side with the Islamo-fascists. I thought to myself, “wow, these people are against everything I value: reason, secularism, liberty, democracy…that’s the side for me!”

The author is concerned about what that portends for the nation. “I think we will never win another war militarily,” he says. “We will lose our way of life, we will lose the freedoms … and liberties we have in this country if we don’t defeat the enemy from within — and that’s the American Left.”

I will not be defeated! You’ll have to do far more that detain me for protesting the war. Come on, bust out the internment camps already!

Patterson says “secular liberals and secular progressives” hate America and everything it stands for, and would much rather see the U.S. defeated than victorious in Iraq.

There’s just something about being secular that makes you hate a country built on the separation of church and state.

Jeff Iraq, The Left, The Right