Daily Archive

The New York Times:

President Bush sought anew on Tuesday to draw connections between the Iraqi group Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and the terrorist network responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks, and he sharply criticized those who contend that the groups are independent of each other…

…Democratic lawmakers accused Mr. Bush of overstating those ties to provide a basis for continuing the American presence in Iraq. The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, said Mr. Bush was “trying to justify claims that have long ago been proven to be misleading.”…

I’ve never quite understood the unending parsing of what constitutes “links” between global al Qaeda.  Indeed, one wonders how the Senator happens also to define “misleading”?  Especially given that the Iraq group chose to name itself after the 9/11 group (which seems to indicate a happy degree of ideological alliance and perhaps more fundamental coordination insofar as possible), according to the Senator’s evident interpretation of both words, it appears also to be similarly misleading for anyone today to assert that homegrown Norwegian Nazis were linked to German Nazis.

The NYT headline is odd in itself:

President Links Qaeda of Iraq to Qaeda of 9/11

Indeed, given that phrasing, one well might ask the same questions of that paper.  Would The NYT have also considered it “misleading” for President Truman to have “linked” the German Luftwaffe, which dropped bombs on British cities in 1940, to SS units composed mostly of non-Germans, fighting in Berlin in April and May 1945? Or did one have absolutely nothing to do with the other?

President Links SS battling in Berlin to Luftwaffe of 1940

Does The NYT today believe that a headline like that in May 1945 would not have reflected reality?  Why the studied obstinacy on this matter?  Why is an ideological and perhaps global alliance among al Qaeda so hard for MSM to swallow, especially considering the jihadists themselves keep yelling of their “brotherhood” at the very top of their lungs?

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UPDATE, Reuters:

A group of young British students who collected a huge library of al Qaeda propaganda and intended to travel to Afghanistan to fight coalition forces, were jailed for a total of 13 years on Thursday…

Ah, yes, “young British”. Again, in any other war situation, they would be tried for treason for such plans . . . to go abroad and fight British soldiers. But, in their minds, though, they aren’t British . . . when it serves them not to be.

Their “youth” is immaterial. “Young” Americans and “Young” (actual) British of those same ages, drive tanks in Iraq and Afghanistan.

…Schoolboy Irfan Raja had run away from home in February last year when he was just 17, leaving a suicide note.

“If not in this dunyad (world) we will meet in Jannat (paradise),” the note said.

When his parents looked on his computer they found speeches by Osama bin Laden calling for Muslims to take revenge on the West for invading Islamic lands and other extremist speeches, the Old Bailey heard.

HDSEW: “Hyper-developed self-esteem warning“.  How blinkered and arrogantly self-centered these men are . . . that their being Muslims living safely and utterly freely in an (officially) Christian land and are able to meet at a university in that same land and engage in planning such, totally eludes them.

“Any disbeliever, Jews and Americans were the prime targets,” said prosecutor Antony Edis.

Raja had gone to meet four students from Bradford University who he had made friends with via the Internet and who intended to go to training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan…

Had they been unfortunate enough actually to have gotten to Afghanistan, survived an engagement or two there with coalition forces (which is rather tougher than making a 9:30 class at Bradford in September), and then found themselves captured and sent to Guantanamo, you would hear nothing but howls from every direction in British media about how “British” they truly are . . .

. . . and how this is all another (…”If this account is to be believed then these three are either the luckiest or unluckiest men in Britain, and certainly among the stupidest…”) huge misunderstanding; that they were actually there studying computers, building wells, learning Arabic, teaching in schools, planning a wedding, when the horrid Americans grabbed them for no reason whatsoever . . . and even if they did visit a training camp or two, well, they were only there “observing” . . .

…Raja, now 19, Aitzaz Zafar, 19, Usman Malik, 20, Akber Butt, 20, and Awaab Iqbal, 20, were all found guilty of possessing articles for terrorist purposes…

Look at their ages, too. They were 13 or 14 in 2001. So this bunch has had 6 years of post-9/11 education about how we are all supposed to “get along”, and how this is not a war on Islam but rathers aims to free Muslims from the oppression of other Muslims.  Obviously, all that made a stellar impression.

Lastly, does Senator Reid and The NYT think there is a link between their cell, bin Laden and Iraq? Or would it be misleading to suggest such a thing?

Jeff at Protein Wisdom has offered to debate the merits of just about anything.  One can only wish Jeff the best of luck.  Because I’ve tried.  Calmly.  It almost never goes well; more often than not, the “debate” ends up (much as he’s noticed in his own comments) with the other person resorting to the likes of truly sublime Ciceronian retorts such as:

…because of those buttheads.  You can’t possibly believe such b-lls-it!

Yes, yes, I know.  We haven’t seen the likes of such since Douglas said almost the same exact thing to Lincoln. 

Of course I’m kidding.  Douglas didn’t use any such phrasing.  Neither did either man’s supporters.  In comparison, while they did lots of laughing, applauding, jeering and occasionally fired questions (which might also have been planted, of course) . . .

…A VOICE- “Then do you repudiate Popular Sovereignty?”

MR. LINCOLN-Well, then, let us talk about Popular Sovereignty! [Laughter.] What is Popular Sovereignty? [Cries of "A humbug," "a humbug."]…

. . . people did so from the outside, looking in, NOT as a means of trying to project themselves into the arena as direct participants also.  

That distinction is important.  Those audiences generally respected a “glass divider” between themselves (as the all-important voters) and the candidates (as those seeking their votes).  That is not to say that “mob-ism” didn’t exist, just that, even in that (in many ways far more trying) passionate political era, it was not common practice for “Mr Anyone” to believe it was somehow his right to try to supplant ”Mr Candidate”.  Or, failing in that, then to shout down or even threaten that candidate.  (That latter sort of elevated behavior was reserved for the floor of Congress itself.)

Today, of course, we are vastly more civilized: people now scream obscenities regularly at those with whom they disagree, and even scream directly at the candidates themselves.  CNN’s “Political Ticker”:

A woman screaming “you’re not a real conservative, sir” was removed by police from a welcoming reception for likely GOP presidential candidate Fred Thompson Wednesday morning. A second protester was also taken from the room…

I don’t care at whom that is directed: since when did that sort of public behavior become routinely acceptable?  Why have we allowed our public discourse to degenerate into a “Jerry Springer” episode? 

…The woman questioned Thompson as he talked to reporters. She asked him why he was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and noted that the organization supported the North American Union with Canada and Mexico.

After the woman interrupted Thompson by questioning his conservative credentials, the likely candidate said, “Don’t fuss at me. You asked me a question. Let me answer it.” He told the woman, “I try to learn as much as I can from all viewpoints.”…

So I refuse to get drawn into similar “debates” that are really nothing more than an excuse for a slagging match.  Don’t like what you see here?  Fine.  There are plenty of other sites out there. 

Similarly, you don’t like Mr Thompson, or whomever?  Don’t like what he or she is espousing?  That’s your privilege, too.  Go home, and then later vote for someone else; because no one else is fundamentally interested in your opinions, owing to the small fact that it is not you seeking office. 

Bottom line: no one is there to hear what emanates from YOUR big gob, rather than his.

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UPDATE: Then, there are the real “activists”.  Not for them, mere shouting when it comes to that with which they “disapprove”; bats and knives are apparently preferred.  The Washington Post, July 18 (via American Digest):

On a narrow, leafy street in Northwest Washington, where Prius hybrid cars and Volvos are the norm, one man bought a flashy gray Hummer that was too massive to fit in his garage.

So he parked the seven-foot-tall behemoth on the street in front of his house and smiled politely when his eco-friendly neighbors looked on in disapproval at his “dream car.”

It lasted five days on the street before two masked men took a bat to every window, a knife to each 38-inch tire and scratched into the body: “FOR THE ENVIRON.”…

Incidentally, how dare the WaPo insult all Volvo owners in that manner, by including a reference to them in a report like that!  (We own a Volvo.  It is our only car.)