Many will already have read of Jessie McBeth, the young imposter who attempted to pass himself off as a former Army Ranger. McBeth had a number of stories of atrocities that supposedly occurred in Iraq.
This caused a number of people to think of the Winter Soldier investigation of 1971, in which John Kerry was a participant.
The remarkable thing about the accounts of that event is that you can pick from one of two completely different accounts depending on your political affiliations. Either the WSI was a gathering of over 100 veterans who were carefully selected and screened for authenticity by the organizers or it was a pack of lies told by people many of whom were imposters, not even veterans.
And looking back now, 30 years later, it's hard to be certain of which account is the most accurate. Clearly, some of the participants were fake including the fellow who wrote the book that inspired the whole thing and the principle organizer of it, a veteran who exaggerated his status and participation in events in Vietnam. But it's still possible that many or most of the rest were legitimate.
By one account, the Naval Investigation Service (NIS) attempted to track down and interview soldiers who testified at the WSI, and this resulted in refusals to grant interviews. In some cases it was discovered that the veteran who supposedly was there at the WSI was not there at all.
Others reject that account on the basis that no record of this Naval investigation that took place after the WSI can be found. The man who recounts the story, however, is a respected historian and Professor Emeritus, now probably up in his 70's, who says that he no longer has the documents he based his account on, now almost 30 years after he wrote the book. (Indeed, if I were asked to produce the the notes and source material for stuff I published just 15 years ago I couldn't do it.)
Moreover, it's a little difficult to believe that there was no investigation of the WSI allegations by the military. The claim being made frequently during the 2004 campaign was that there were such investigations and they could find no evidence to substantiate the WSI allegations. The anti war types claim that about 30 of the veterans testified to the NIS about atrocities. (So there must have been an NIS report, right? If so, it's apparently still classified.)
In any case, you've got the right-wingers with one account of the WSI with annotations and references and left wingers with a completely opposite account, also documented, and both sides discount the others' account as "propaganda." And it's been over 30 years now.
What is most likely the most balanced analysis that I've read was from a veteran who was there for 3 years and saw no evidence of atrocities, but he admits with so many men, so many guns, so much conflict, so much pressure that some of that is going to occur. He said that people in different units in different parts of Vietnam probably had completely different experiences. The WSI probably accurately recounts some incidents or experiences but it does not reflect the experience of most veterans who were there. Just as in this conflict there is a tendency on the part of anti-war people to try to generalize these events to the whole military and make exaggerated or false claims in an effort to bring the war to an end.
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Saturday, May 20, 2006
John Conyers Lies Through His Teeth
And this guy, basically a gangster and a thug who abuses and intimidates his own Congressional staff, would be the Chairman of the Judiciary Committee if the Donks take over the House.
Last year he held a mock impeachment hearing against President Bush where he served as the Chairman and paraded a series of kookburgers in as witnesses who testified to the effect that the President had broken the law and deserved impeachment. Oh, what a grand old time was had by all, including the mainstream media people who gleefully reported on it, and the upshod of it was that Conyers decided and declared then and there that he intended to see to it that Bush was impeached.
And now he says, in effect, that none of this happened, that he didn't say any of this, that Republicans are being paranoid to say that he is intent on impeaching the President.
Well, John, you can't unring a bell, and your idiotic, thuggish words will be used against you and your party again and again.
The other day I got a letter from the RNC asking for funds. The letter went over the whole history of Conyers and his intent to impeach Bush, and, I swear to God, my pen jumped out of my pocket and into my hand and proceeded to write a check out for a substantial contribution that I sent in to the RNC forthwith. No doubt my pen will be doing the same in the future whenever it hears the word "impeachment" or someone evokes a mental image of Conyers holding committee hearings.
Last year he held a mock impeachment hearing against President Bush where he served as the Chairman and paraded a series of kookburgers in as witnesses who testified to the effect that the President had broken the law and deserved impeachment. Oh, what a grand old time was had by all, including the mainstream media people who gleefully reported on it, and the upshod of it was that Conyers decided and declared then and there that he intended to see to it that Bush was impeached.
And now he says, in effect, that none of this happened, that he didn't say any of this, that Republicans are being paranoid to say that he is intent on impeaching the President.
Well, John, you can't unring a bell, and your idiotic, thuggish words will be used against you and your party again and again.
The other day I got a letter from the RNC asking for funds. The letter went over the whole history of Conyers and his intent to impeach Bush, and, I swear to God, my pen jumped out of my pocket and into my hand and proceeded to write a check out for a substantial contribution that I sent in to the RNC forthwith. No doubt my pen will be doing the same in the future whenever it hears the word "impeachment" or someone evokes a mental image of Conyers holding committee hearings.
Feminists Lie About Saddam
Women and children died and feminists lied about it.
This is an execrable lie fostered by blind hatred of the President.
The truth is that after the first Gulf war Saddam reverted to tribal Islamic traditions concerning women. Women lost their jobs, were not allowed to drive, and were not allowed to leave their homes without a male relative escort. The practice of honor killings was reinstituted and men were excused for killing female relatives in such matters. An estimated 4000 women died in honor killings in the following years. Women were not allowed to attend school, and literacy among women fell to 23% by 2000.
In 2000, Saddam's Islamofascist brigades killed 200 women's rights activists, calling them prostitutes, and dumped their heads on their relative's doorsteps for public display.
And then there are the hundreds of thousands of people killed and dumped in mass graves including infants with their mothers. And there was the common practice of raping and torturing women in order to extract information from male relatives, which occurred tens of thousands of times, thousands of cases where women were raped and tortured to death.
Some radical feminists and anti-war liberals have very short memories. It's just three years after Saddam Hussein's ouster and some would have us believe the tyrant was in fact a protector of women's rights in Iraq. That Iraq under Saddam actually had progressive, pro-women policies that are now being "rolled back" thanks to the Bush administration.
This is an execrable lie fostered by blind hatred of the President.
The truth is that after the first Gulf war Saddam reverted to tribal Islamic traditions concerning women. Women lost their jobs, were not allowed to drive, and were not allowed to leave their homes without a male relative escort. The practice of honor killings was reinstituted and men were excused for killing female relatives in such matters. An estimated 4000 women died in honor killings in the following years. Women were not allowed to attend school, and literacy among women fell to 23% by 2000.
In 2000, Saddam's Islamofascist brigades killed 200 women's rights activists, calling them prostitutes, and dumped their heads on their relative's doorsteps for public display.
And then there are the hundreds of thousands of people killed and dumped in mass graves including infants with their mothers. And there was the common practice of raping and torturing women in order to extract information from male relatives, which occurred tens of thousands of times, thousands of cases where women were raped and tortured to death.
A brutal dictator who tortures his own people cannot be a champion of women's rights. To pretend otherwise is to dishonor the memory of the thousands of innocent Iraqi women who died in a senseless brutal reign of terror. It also does a grave disservice to the men and women of this country who died or were injured to liberate Iraq.
Friday, May 19, 2006
Remember the End of Apartheid?
With regard to this story in the New York Times...
Remember the end of Apartheid in South Africa?
Did the New York Times run stories almost every day describing the plight of whites there, how they were being killed and oppressed, how they were trying to leave the country? Were some white portrayed oh so sympathetically, about how they were hiding now in their upscale neighborhoods afraid to go out, amusing themselves with their piano and flute lessons as they made plans to leave the country? How they were applying for passports and pulling their children out of schools in record numbers? Did they seize on this as evidence of how violent South Africa after apartheid had become, about how things were so bad for "South Africans"? Did they write about how whites were being thrown out of their farms and killed while the authorities did nothing? Did they seize upon this as a failure of international policy toward South Africa?
Or, did they pretty much ignore the plight of the erstwhile oppressors in South Africa. Did they celebrate the rise in power of the new mostly black government and write about how well ordered it was and how things were going very well considering. Did they write about how whites were being treated well by the black government while white corpses piled up in the morgues?
I think it was the latter scenario much more than the former. I think that expressing concern for South African whites at all in those days was a good way to evoke a derisive laugh. And yet now, in Iraq, the New York Times and the rest of the mainstream media are on the side of the oppressors. The Sunni occupied the same position under Saddam that the whites did in South Africa under apartheid -- they were privileged, wealthy, able to get an education, get jobs, and do many things that Kurds and Shia were not allowed to do. The Sunni kept the majority in their place by violent means and with laws worse even than those used in South Africa. But it's only the Sunni that the Times now has any sympathy for.
Remember the end of Apartheid in South Africa?
Did the New York Times run stories almost every day describing the plight of whites there, how they were being killed and oppressed, how they were trying to leave the country? Were some white portrayed oh so sympathetically, about how they were hiding now in their upscale neighborhoods afraid to go out, amusing themselves with their piano and flute lessons as they made plans to leave the country? How they were applying for passports and pulling their children out of schools in record numbers? Did they seize on this as evidence of how violent South Africa after apartheid had become, about how things were so bad for "South Africans"? Did they write about how whites were being thrown out of their farms and killed while the authorities did nothing? Did they seize upon this as a failure of international policy toward South Africa?
Or, did they pretty much ignore the plight of the erstwhile oppressors in South Africa. Did they celebrate the rise in power of the new mostly black government and write about how well ordered it was and how things were going very well considering. Did they write about how whites were being treated well by the black government while white corpses piled up in the morgues?
I think it was the latter scenario much more than the former. I think that expressing concern for South African whites at all in those days was a good way to evoke a derisive laugh. And yet now, in Iraq, the New York Times and the rest of the mainstream media are on the side of the oppressors. The Sunni occupied the same position under Saddam that the whites did in South Africa under apartheid -- they were privileged, wealthy, able to get an education, get jobs, and do many things that Kurds and Shia were not allowed to do. The Sunni kept the majority in their place by violent means and with laws worse even than those used in South Africa. But it's only the Sunni that the Times now has any sympathy for.
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Democratic Party Criticism of the President
Members of the Democratic party have called him the worst President we've ever seen and said that history will judge him harshly for the way in which he has abused power. They have called him a despot, and, in effect, a fascist. They have railed against him for starting a bloody and unnecessary war, which they have called a "failure." They have been critical of what they thought were mistakes in the way the war was conducted. They have accused the President of starting the war over commercial interests rather than over national security. They have criticized the President for illegally overextending the powers of the Presidency, spending money without authorization, telling his generals how to fight the war, unlawfully imprisoning people and mistreating prisoners. They complain that people who criticize the administration are accused of being treasonous or of undermining the war effort. They have been aghast at his use of military tribunals to deal with Americans who he suspected were working for the enemy. When a military veteran ran against him in the contest for his second term in office he was accused of being a chickenhawk who committed people to fight a war when he had never done so himself (even though he served in the state militia he never saw combat.)
This was, of course, President Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln went a little further than that, though:
Lincoln's policy was to have treasonous federal lawmakers arrested and tried before military tribunals, and exiled or hanged if convicted. Treason, in Lincoln's view, included criticizing his administration on the conduct of the war.
Lincoln had tens of thousands of political opponents in the North arrested, including dozens of opposition newspaper editors.
In one case he had a congressman from Ohio, Clement L. Vallandigham, arrested, tried in a military tribunal, and deported. The congressman's treason was to criticize Lincoln from the floor of Congress for abuse of power.
Lincoln also considered arresting a member of the Supreme Court. So, Lincoln basically intimidated critics in Congress and in the Court into silence for the duration of the Civil War.
It appears that the northern Democrats critical of Lincoln had some legitimate beefs. It's hard to find that out by reading most history books today, though, which should give Democrats today, who are confident that history will see Bush the way they do, some pause.
This was, of course, President Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln went a little further than that, though:
Lincoln's policy was to have treasonous federal lawmakers arrested and tried before military tribunals, and exiled or hanged if convicted. Treason, in Lincoln's view, included criticizing his administration on the conduct of the war.
Lincoln had tens of thousands of political opponents in the North arrested, including dozens of opposition newspaper editors.
In one case he had a congressman from Ohio, Clement L. Vallandigham, arrested, tried in a military tribunal, and deported. The congressman's treason was to criticize Lincoln from the floor of Congress for abuse of power.
Lincoln also considered arresting a member of the Supreme Court. So, Lincoln basically intimidated critics in Congress and in the Court into silence for the duration of the Civil War.
It appears that the northern Democrats critical of Lincoln had some legitimate beefs. It's hard to find that out by reading most history books today, though, which should give Democrats today, who are confident that history will see Bush the way they do, some pause.
Al Qaeda Runnin Scared in Iraq
From the Pittsberg Post Gazette:
Zarqawi is running scared. He can no longer hide in urban areas, his people are being turned in when they try that. He can no longer recruit enough suicide bombers. In apparent desperation he is attempting to return to more conventional military tactics with bases in the countryside and organizaed military strikes, but every attempt at this has been an utter disaster for him since it plays to coalition strengths. In the last such exchange 100 Al Qaeda were killed vs 2 Iraq Army and no Americans.
Sunni tribes once supportive of the insurgency have formed the "Anbar Revenge Brigades" to hunt down al-Qaida operatives in the province.
The Anbar Revenge Brigades were formed in response to the assassination of tribal leaders by al-Qaida in a futile effort to keep Sunnis from cooperating with the government.
That this heavy-handed intimidation of erstwhile allies has backfired is indicated by the al-Qaida announcement April 2 that "the Iraqi resistance's high command asked Mr. Zarqawi to give up his political role ... because of several mistakes he made."
Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who served as President Clinton's drug czar and has been sharply critical of the Bush administration's conduct of the war, recently returned from a trip to Iraq.
He concluded: "The foreign jihadist fighters have been defeated as a strategic and operational threat to creation of an Iraqi government."
This opera ain't over, but the fat lady is warming up.
With Al Qaeda mostly gone the insurgents remaining are ex-Baathists who are mainly trying to win consessions from the new government. Many of them or some of them have already entered negotiations with the Iraqi government and the coalition.
Zarqawi is running scared. He can no longer hide in urban areas, his people are being turned in when they try that. He can no longer recruit enough suicide bombers. In apparent desperation he is attempting to return to more conventional military tactics with bases in the countryside and organizaed military strikes, but every attempt at this has been an utter disaster for him since it plays to coalition strengths. In the last such exchange 100 Al Qaeda were killed vs 2 Iraq Army and no Americans.
Sunni tribes once supportive of the insurgency have formed the "Anbar Revenge Brigades" to hunt down al-Qaida operatives in the province.
The Anbar Revenge Brigades were formed in response to the assassination of tribal leaders by al-Qaida in a futile effort to keep Sunnis from cooperating with the government.
That this heavy-handed intimidation of erstwhile allies has backfired is indicated by the al-Qaida announcement April 2 that "the Iraqi resistance's high command asked Mr. Zarqawi to give up his political role ... because of several mistakes he made."
Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who served as President Clinton's drug czar and has been sharply critical of the Bush administration's conduct of the war, recently returned from a trip to Iraq.
He concluded: "The foreign jihadist fighters have been defeated as a strategic and operational threat to creation of an Iraqi government."
This opera ain't over, but the fat lady is warming up.
With Al Qaeda mostly gone the insurgents remaining are ex-Baathists who are mainly trying to win consessions from the new government. Many of them or some of them have already entered negotiations with the Iraqi government and the coalition.
New York Times Makes Excuses for Zarqawi
The US military in Iraq recently released a grimly amusing blooper reel of Zarqawi as he fumbles with an automatic weapon, seemingly unable to get it to work.
But the New York Times is quick to jump to Zarqawi's defense. The Times interviewed "former and current" military officers who offer explanations for Zarqawi's difficulty with the weapon -- it's a complicated weapon, Zarqawi's probably not used to it, etc.
The bottom line is that the Times want us to think that Zarqawi really is the ferocious master fighter that he protrays himself to be despite his lack of knowledge of a basic weapon. We really shouldn't be making fun of him, says the Times.
Would that the Times were as charitable in their assessment of our own military leaders and as quick to jump to defend their competence.
Do we imagine that if it were Rumsfeld shown fumbling with the weapon that the Times would be taking pains to explain to us how difficult the weapon is to operate and how we shouldn't be making fun of Rumsfeld just for that?
The truth is that Zarqawi has proven to be just as inept as the video seems to show. Al Qaeda has essentially been defeated in Iraq, unable to do much of anything, having alienated the entire Iraqi population, and Zarqawi's blunders are not the least of the reasons for that.
The cracks in the New York Times' picture of the situation in Iraq are becoming more and more obvious, and the Times, rather than reassess their position, is scambling to paint over the flaws.
But the New York Times is quick to jump to Zarqawi's defense. The Times interviewed "former and current" military officers who offer explanations for Zarqawi's difficulty with the weapon -- it's a complicated weapon, Zarqawi's probably not used to it, etc.
The bottom line is that the Times want us to think that Zarqawi really is the ferocious master fighter that he protrays himself to be despite his lack of knowledge of a basic weapon. We really shouldn't be making fun of him, says the Times.
Would that the Times were as charitable in their assessment of our own military leaders and as quick to jump to defend their competence.
Do we imagine that if it were Rumsfeld shown fumbling with the weapon that the Times would be taking pains to explain to us how difficult the weapon is to operate and how we shouldn't be making fun of Rumsfeld just for that?
The truth is that Zarqawi has proven to be just as inept as the video seems to show. Al Qaeda has essentially been defeated in Iraq, unable to do much of anything, having alienated the entire Iraqi population, and Zarqawi's blunders are not the least of the reasons for that.
The cracks in the New York Times' picture of the situation in Iraq are becoming more and more obvious, and the Times, rather than reassess their position, is scambling to paint over the flaws.
Tuesday, February 14, 2006
The Echo Chamber of the Left
I've said all of this before, but this fellow says it so much better:
Much of Democratic politics seems to now consist of embracing and fanning similarly comforting, but ultimately deceptive, liberal memes. Enron has fatally damaged Bush, Abu Ghraib has fatally damaged Bush, Katrina has fatally damaged Bush, Abramoff has fatally damaged Bush, the Plame investigation will fatally damage Bush--you can catch the latest allegedly devastating issue every day on Huffington Post or Daily Kos (and frequently in the NYT). If you believe the hype--if you don't compare Michael Moore's box office with Mel Gibson's box office, in effect--you'll believe that Democrats don't need to change to win. They just need to push all these hot memes forcefully. If you don't believe the hype--if you think that netroots Dems are too often like the Iraqi Sunnis who think they're a majority--you'll look for a Bill Clinton-like alternative with greater red-state appeal.
But there's no hope of them ever getting wise, certainly not in time for 2008, anyway. They are in the process of trying to rid themselves of apostates like Lieberman who actually might appeal to a majority of voters.
Republicans are not prone to this. They've got the mainstream media disrespecting them all the time and spinning things to make Republican policy sound out of the mainstream. Their problem is exactly the opposite -- they are a majority without the confidence to act like it.
Much of Democratic politics seems to now consist of embracing and fanning similarly comforting, but ultimately deceptive, liberal memes. Enron has fatally damaged Bush, Abu Ghraib has fatally damaged Bush, Katrina has fatally damaged Bush, Abramoff has fatally damaged Bush, the Plame investigation will fatally damage Bush--you can catch the latest allegedly devastating issue every day on Huffington Post or Daily Kos (and frequently in the NYT). If you believe the hype--if you don't compare Michael Moore's box office with Mel Gibson's box office, in effect--you'll believe that Democrats don't need to change to win. They just need to push all these hot memes forcefully. If you don't believe the hype--if you think that netroots Dems are too often like the Iraqi Sunnis who think they're a majority--you'll look for a Bill Clinton-like alternative with greater red-state appeal.
But there's no hope of them ever getting wise, certainly not in time for 2008, anyway. They are in the process of trying to rid themselves of apostates like Lieberman who actually might appeal to a majority of voters.
Republicans are not prone to this. They've got the mainstream media disrespecting them all the time and spinning things to make Republican policy sound out of the mainstream. Their problem is exactly the opposite -- they are a majority without the confidence to act like it.
Saturday, February 11, 2006
Nazism = Socialism = Totalitarianism
This is a scholarly article written by a free market economist, a "classical liberal:"
My purpose today is to make just two main points: (1) To show why Nazi Germany was a socialist state, not a capitalist one. And (2) to show why socialism, understood as an economic system based on government ownership of the means of production, positively requires a totalitarian dictatorship.
The article makes these points, among others:
1. Capitalists under the Nazis were capitalists in name only, stripped of the power to control what was supposedly their own property. Their actual status under the Nazis was one of sharecroppers or of government pensioners.
2. De facto socialism in Nazi Germany was established with the establishment of wage and price controls, which cemented central control of the economy. The effects of wage and price controls, which lead to shortages and other problems, produced a series of events whereby the Nazis ended up with control of all aspects of the economy, i.e., prices, wages, production, capitalization, etc.
3. Establishment of de facto socialism leads inevitably to totalitarianism.
In sum, therefore, the requirements merely of enforcing price-control regulations is the adoption of essential features of a totalitarian state, namely, the establishment of the category of "economic crimes," in which the peaceful pursuit of material self-interest is treated as a criminal offense, and the establishment of a totalitarian police apparatus replete with spies and informers and the power of arbitrary arrest and imprisonment.
Once the elites decide that they know better than the free market how to run the economy and know better than the people how to run the government one is put on a path that invariably ends up at the same place, i.e., totalitarianism. Whether you call that path Nazism, communism, socialism, or fascism makes little difference.
Left leaning historians have two lines of argument that supposedly distinguishes Nazism from socialism. The first is the issue of motivations. For example, the Nazis were nationalists, meaning they were mainly motivated by an interest in bettering the lot of the German people and cared nothing or less than nothing for anyone else while the Communists and Socialists were motivated by a concern for all people, were internationalist and somewhat more pluralistic. However the central definition of the term "socialist" says nothing about nationalism vs internationalism.
Second is the way in which German capitalists and conservatives worked in favor of the Nazis, an association that scholars would like to say brands Nazis as capitalists and right wingers. However, faced with the rise of Communism in Germany, clearly the more powerful of the contending political ideologies in Germany at the time, which would have thrown capitalists and other property owners out on the street or would have them lined up and shot, and the Nazis, who were willing to leave the middle class alone or even help them out even while taking control of the economy and providing the common German people with welfare, employment, and benefits, who does one suppose that capitalists and other property owners were going to favor? That association says nothing about what the Nazis actually were, only about what was perhaps the dilemma of the propertied classes of Germany at the time.
My purpose today is to make just two main points: (1) To show why Nazi Germany was a socialist state, not a capitalist one. And (2) to show why socialism, understood as an economic system based on government ownership of the means of production, positively requires a totalitarian dictatorship.
The article makes these points, among others:
1. Capitalists under the Nazis were capitalists in name only, stripped of the power to control what was supposedly their own property. Their actual status under the Nazis was one of sharecroppers or of government pensioners.
2. De facto socialism in Nazi Germany was established with the establishment of wage and price controls, which cemented central control of the economy. The effects of wage and price controls, which lead to shortages and other problems, produced a series of events whereby the Nazis ended up with control of all aspects of the economy, i.e., prices, wages, production, capitalization, etc.
3. Establishment of de facto socialism leads inevitably to totalitarianism.
In sum, therefore, the requirements merely of enforcing price-control regulations is the adoption of essential features of a totalitarian state, namely, the establishment of the category of "economic crimes," in which the peaceful pursuit of material self-interest is treated as a criminal offense, and the establishment of a totalitarian police apparatus replete with spies and informers and the power of arbitrary arrest and imprisonment.
Once the elites decide that they know better than the free market how to run the economy and know better than the people how to run the government one is put on a path that invariably ends up at the same place, i.e., totalitarianism. Whether you call that path Nazism, communism, socialism, or fascism makes little difference.
Left leaning historians have two lines of argument that supposedly distinguishes Nazism from socialism. The first is the issue of motivations. For example, the Nazis were nationalists, meaning they were mainly motivated by an interest in bettering the lot of the German people and cared nothing or less than nothing for anyone else while the Communists and Socialists were motivated by a concern for all people, were internationalist and somewhat more pluralistic. However the central definition of the term "socialist" says nothing about nationalism vs internationalism.
Second is the way in which German capitalists and conservatives worked in favor of the Nazis, an association that scholars would like to say brands Nazis as capitalists and right wingers. However, faced with the rise of Communism in Germany, clearly the more powerful of the contending political ideologies in Germany at the time, which would have thrown capitalists and other property owners out on the street or would have them lined up and shot, and the Nazis, who were willing to leave the middle class alone or even help them out even while taking control of the economy and providing the common German people with welfare, employment, and benefits, who does one suppose that capitalists and other property owners were going to favor? That association says nothing about what the Nazis actually were, only about what was perhaps the dilemma of the propertied classes of Germany at the time.
Dhimmitude
Here's a new word for you to learn: dhimmitude.
The Dhimmi are the non-Muslim peoples, Jews and Christians, who have been subjugated by Muslims. There are Dhimmi all over the world, and their experience and their treatment by Muslims, not just radical Muslims but ordinary, every day Muslims, has always been the same.
Wherever Islam conquered, surrendering dhimmi, known to Muslims as "people of the book [the Bible]," were tolerated, allowed to practice their religion, but at a dehumanizing cost.
There were literal taxes (jizya) to be paid; these bought the dhimmi the right to remain non-Muslim, the price not of religious freedom, but of religious identity. Freedom was lost, sorely circumscribed by a body of Islamic law (sharia) designed to subjugate, denigrate and humiliate the dhimmi. The resulting culture of self-abnegation, self-censorship and fear shared by far-flung dhimmi is the basis of dhimmitude. The extremely distressing but highly significant fact is, dhimmitude doesn't only exist in lands where Islamic law rules.
And we have seen the once proud Western tradition of a free press kneel down in submission to an Islamic law against depictions of Muhammad. That's dhimmitude.
Not that the press will admit it. They dress it up in language about tolerance, responsibility, and sensibility and congratulate themselves on their good judgment and pluralism. The Wall Street Journal, CNN, ABC, BBC, NBC, numerous other papers including the New York Times all joined in this cowardly dodge. Left unmentioned is the understanding that "gratuitous offense", which they don't hesitate to offer about Christianity or Judaism, might lead to gratuitous violence.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/dwest.htm
The Dhimmi are the non-Muslim peoples, Jews and Christians, who have been subjugated by Muslims. There are Dhimmi all over the world, and their experience and their treatment by Muslims, not just radical Muslims but ordinary, every day Muslims, has always been the same.
Wherever Islam conquered, surrendering dhimmi, known to Muslims as "people of the book [the Bible]," were tolerated, allowed to practice their religion, but at a dehumanizing cost.
There were literal taxes (jizya) to be paid; these bought the dhimmi the right to remain non-Muslim, the price not of religious freedom, but of religious identity. Freedom was lost, sorely circumscribed by a body of Islamic law (sharia) designed to subjugate, denigrate and humiliate the dhimmi. The resulting culture of self-abnegation, self-censorship and fear shared by far-flung dhimmi is the basis of dhimmitude. The extremely distressing but highly significant fact is, dhimmitude doesn't only exist in lands where Islamic law rules.
And we have seen the once proud Western tradition of a free press kneel down in submission to an Islamic law against depictions of Muhammad. That's dhimmitude.
Not that the press will admit it. They dress it up in language about tolerance, responsibility, and sensibility and congratulate themselves on their good judgment and pluralism. The Wall Street Journal, CNN, ABC, BBC, NBC, numerous other papers including the New York Times all joined in this cowardly dodge. Left unmentioned is the understanding that "gratuitous offense", which they don't hesitate to offer about Christianity or Judaism, might lead to gratuitous violence.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/dwest.htm
The Stupidity and Cowardice of the News Media
It is stupid and base to gratuitously insult the beliefs or symbols of religious people. That is the sort of thing that civil organizations like newspapers would do best to avoid. But once that line has been crossed, as is the case with the Danish cartoons of Mohammed fiasco, then it is even worse to cave in to terrorist's demands for censorship.
When the average person looks at what has gotten the Muslims all upset, to the point of burning embassies and threatening to behead people, I have to imagine that they see these radical Muslims as completely crazy, liable to be sent into paroxyms of rage and violence by anything or nothing.
My God, my God, a person might say, these people are damned dangerous.
Meanwhile, in newspaper land we're off into another round of revelations about how the US is being mean to detainees at Gitmo. And we've got Democrats who insist that the President listening in on the phone conversations of foreign terrorists is grounds for impeachment.
And the Democrats and their media friends wonder why they keep losing on the issue of national security.
And what must it say to the average person that newspapers are afraid to publish these cartoons? The newspaper's respect for religious beliefs has hardly kept them from being unfairly critical of or even contemptuous of other's beliefs, especially Christians.
The New York Times issued an editorial that explained why they had decided not to publish the cartoons of Mohammed out of "respect for Muslims." And then the very next day printed a reproduction of the famous painting of the Madonna with elephant sh*t all over her.
No, it's pretty obvious that the newspapers have been cowed by the terrorists. And so can we ever trust the newspapers to have the courage to report on the tough stories?
What else have they been afraid to tell us? We know, for example that CNN had an office in Baghdad for years and never reported what they knew about violations of human rights in that country for fear of what Saddam might do.
When the average person looks at what has gotten the Muslims all upset, to the point of burning embassies and threatening to behead people, I have to imagine that they see these radical Muslims as completely crazy, liable to be sent into paroxyms of rage and violence by anything or nothing.
My God, my God, a person might say, these people are damned dangerous.
Meanwhile, in newspaper land we're off into another round of revelations about how the US is being mean to detainees at Gitmo. And we've got Democrats who insist that the President listening in on the phone conversations of foreign terrorists is grounds for impeachment.
And the Democrats and their media friends wonder why they keep losing on the issue of national security.
And what must it say to the average person that newspapers are afraid to publish these cartoons? The newspaper's respect for religious beliefs has hardly kept them from being unfairly critical of or even contemptuous of other's beliefs, especially Christians.
The New York Times issued an editorial that explained why they had decided not to publish the cartoons of Mohammed out of "respect for Muslims." And then the very next day printed a reproduction of the famous painting of the Madonna with elephant sh*t all over her.
No, it's pretty obvious that the newspapers have been cowed by the terrorists. And so can we ever trust the newspapers to have the courage to report on the tough stories?
What else have they been afraid to tell us? We know, for example that CNN had an office in Baghdad for years and never reported what they knew about violations of human rights in that country for fear of what Saddam might do.
Of Course the Nazis Were Socialists
As one of my left leaning friends said,
But [Hitler] was no Socialist, and anyone who takes his word for it that he was a Socialist, shame on you.
And shame on you, I replied, for refusing to acknowledge the plain facts:
1. For years and years the Nazis ran on a platform indistinguishable from any other socialist party (see below).
2. When they took power they followed through on many of those policies.
Such as:
3. The Nazis controlled the German economy, including taking control of the Board of Directors of large corporations "for the benefit of the people" essentially stripping the company owners and stockholders of their rights to control their own property.
4. They put in place an extensive social welfare system.
5. Through command control of the economy they forced an end to unemployment and made many other changes to increase overall prosperity.
6. Just as the Communists in Russia did, they refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of any labor organization outside of the state, thereby bringing an end to strikes and other such impediments to their policy. Just as the Communist Party in the Soviet Union was the only true voice of the proletariate, against which no opposition was tolerated, the Reich was the embodiment of the will of the German people, and nothing was allowed to impede that will, not corporate interests or union interests or the press or anything. As has been the case in every other leftist totalitarian state, dissention was dealt with harshly.
Many have said that Hitler only took on the coloration of socialism in order to win power and discarded those policies once he had it. But in fact he actually made good on many of his promises. Besides that, the same accusation could be made about every other major leftist regime in the 20th century since they started off with promises of a socialist utopia and always seemed to end up with somthing quite different.
The Nazis stated goal was to bring forth a nation-state as the locus and embodiment of the people's collective will, geared to serve the interests of the German people. Their success toward that end is probably the main reason for continued support by most German people right up to the end.
The Third Reich was not democratic. It was controlled by strongmen. As has been the case with every other leftist totalitarian state.
The Third Reich was viruently anti-Semetic, as was most of the rest of Europe, as was Soviet Russia.
The contortions that left leaning historians go through to draw a sharp line between the Reich and "real" socialist states get to be quite amusing.
Many, but not all, socialist ideologies oppose the idea of nations altogether, which they see as artificial divisions that support the status quo and oppression. The Nazis were not internationalists, and if you weren't German you couldn't be in the club. But that distinction has little to do with whether or not they are socialists since the definition of socialism doesn't include the presence or absence of an internationalist outlook.
Leftists today want to distance themselves from all of the failed socialist states of the past, insisting that socialism as practiced then has nothing to do with their current ideology. So all the millions and millions of citizens of socialist states killed by those states do not accrue to their balance sheet. But there is no real difference between the ideologies of the leaders of Soviet Russia, or Cambodia, or Communist China and the American left of today. They can pretend a difference only by being willfully blind to the past.
The Policy Manifesto of the National Socialist German Workers Party, written by Adolf Hitler, 1920:
All citizens of the State shall be equal as regards rights and duties.
The first duty of every citizen must be to work mentally or physically. The activities of the individual may not clash with the interests of the whole, but must proceed within the frame of the community and be for the general good.
Therefore we demand:
That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.
Since every war imposes on the people fearful sacrifices in life and property, all personal profit arising from the war must be regarded as a crime against the people. We therefore demand the total confiscation of all war profits whether in assets or material.
We demand the nationalization of businesses which have been organized into cartels.
We demand that all the profits from wholesale trade shall be shared out.
We demand extensive development of provision for old age.
We demand the creation and maintenance of a healthy middle-class, the immediate communalization of department stores which will be rented cheaply to small businessmen, and that preference shall be given to small businessmen for provision of supplies needed by the State, the provinces and municipalities.
We demand a land reform in accordance with our national requirements, and the enactment of a law to confiscate from the owners without compensation any land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the prohibition of all speculation in land.
But [Hitler] was no Socialist, and anyone who takes his word for it that he was a Socialist, shame on you.
And shame on you, I replied, for refusing to acknowledge the plain facts:
1. For years and years the Nazis ran on a platform indistinguishable from any other socialist party (see below).
2. When they took power they followed through on many of those policies.
Such as:
3. The Nazis controlled the German economy, including taking control of the Board of Directors of large corporations "for the benefit of the people" essentially stripping the company owners and stockholders of their rights to control their own property.
4. They put in place an extensive social welfare system.
5. Through command control of the economy they forced an end to unemployment and made many other changes to increase overall prosperity.
6. Just as the Communists in Russia did, they refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of any labor organization outside of the state, thereby bringing an end to strikes and other such impediments to their policy. Just as the Communist Party in the Soviet Union was the only true voice of the proletariate, against which no opposition was tolerated, the Reich was the embodiment of the will of the German people, and nothing was allowed to impede that will, not corporate interests or union interests or the press or anything. As has been the case in every other leftist totalitarian state, dissention was dealt with harshly.
Many have said that Hitler only took on the coloration of socialism in order to win power and discarded those policies once he had it. But in fact he actually made good on many of his promises. Besides that, the same accusation could be made about every other major leftist regime in the 20th century since they started off with promises of a socialist utopia and always seemed to end up with somthing quite different.
The Nazis stated goal was to bring forth a nation-state as the locus and embodiment of the people's collective will, geared to serve the interests of the German people. Their success toward that end is probably the main reason for continued support by most German people right up to the end.
The Third Reich was not democratic. It was controlled by strongmen. As has been the case with every other leftist totalitarian state.
The Third Reich was viruently anti-Semetic, as was most of the rest of Europe, as was Soviet Russia.
The contortions that left leaning historians go through to draw a sharp line between the Reich and "real" socialist states get to be quite amusing.
Many, but not all, socialist ideologies oppose the idea of nations altogether, which they see as artificial divisions that support the status quo and oppression. The Nazis were not internationalists, and if you weren't German you couldn't be in the club. But that distinction has little to do with whether or not they are socialists since the definition of socialism doesn't include the presence or absence of an internationalist outlook.
Leftists today want to distance themselves from all of the failed socialist states of the past, insisting that socialism as practiced then has nothing to do with their current ideology. So all the millions and millions of citizens of socialist states killed by those states do not accrue to their balance sheet. But there is no real difference between the ideologies of the leaders of Soviet Russia, or Cambodia, or Communist China and the American left of today. They can pretend a difference only by being willfully blind to the past.
The Policy Manifesto of the National Socialist German Workers Party, written by Adolf Hitler, 1920:
All citizens of the State shall be equal as regards rights and duties.
The first duty of every citizen must be to work mentally or physically. The activities of the individual may not clash with the interests of the whole, but must proceed within the frame of the community and be for the general good.
Therefore we demand:
That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.
Since every war imposes on the people fearful sacrifices in life and property, all personal profit arising from the war must be regarded as a crime against the people. We therefore demand the total confiscation of all war profits whether in assets or material.
We demand the nationalization of businesses which have been organized into cartels.
We demand that all the profits from wholesale trade shall be shared out.
We demand extensive development of provision for old age.
We demand the creation and maintenance of a healthy middle-class, the immediate communalization of department stores which will be rented cheaply to small businessmen, and that preference shall be given to small businessmen for provision of supplies needed by the State, the provinces and municipalities.
We demand a land reform in accordance with our national requirements, and the enactment of a law to confiscate from the owners without compensation any land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the prohibition of all speculation in land.
Wednesday, February 08, 2006
History and Hatred of Israel
There is an astonishing amount of ignorance these days about how Israel go started, and the way that the antique media portrays current events doesn't help much, spinning things so that Israel is transformed into an occupier and oppressor of the poor Arabs around them.
Israel's Arab opponents have declared that it has no right to exist, and they have done nothing but attack Israel without letup from the day of its creation. It's either eternal war or extinction, so eternal war it is.
The State of Israel was created by an act of the United Nations mostly out of land that Jews already owned, having bought the land from the mostly Arab Palestinians over many years. By the time the State was created there were already more than a half million Jews living there on their own land. Great Britain, who controlled Palestine at the time, had been trying to keep Jews out of Palestine, sending them back to Europe when they attempted to leave to join the Jews in Palestine, or esle there would have been many more. Many of those turned back, of course, were subsequently slaughtered by the Nazis, and so Great Britain bears some of the responsiblity for those deaths, as do many nations that restricted Jewish attempts to leave anti-semetic Europe. So, it was partly out of a sense of redressing a great injustice that the United Nations created the State of Israel.
Arabs had been attacking the Jewish settlements in Palestine even before Israel was created. The Arab nations refused to accept Israel's creation and immediately attacked. From that day to this it has been war, and the myth of Israel as an occupier who ejected Palestinians from the land was born. Subsequent parcels of land like Gaza were those won from the enemy in various wars.
When a nation loses land in a war caused by their own aggression and hatred then they've got no right to complain and no one to blame but themselves.
Most of the land lost by Arabs was lost in the 6 days war of 1967.
In 1967, the President of Egypt, Nassar, declared that he intended to destroy Israel and that the Egyptian people wanted war. He ordered UN peacekeepers out of the Sinai, he remilitarized the Sinai and put 7 divisions of troops (100,000) and tanks (800) on the border with Israel. Egypt closed the Strait of Tiran to Israeli shipping, which in and of itself was an act of war. Jordan started massing troops (55,000), tanks (300), and planes at their border with Israel, and then Jordan and Egypt signed a mutual defense treaty in which Jordanian troops were put under the command of the Egyptian generals. Thus, Jordanian and Egyptian troops were poised to cut Israel in half in a matter of minutes.
And so Israel, after appealing to the UN and the international community for help in vain, rather than waiting to be destroyed, decided to seize the initiative and attack.
In the end the Arabs lost a lot of land and lives (21,000 dead) vs less than 1000 Israeli soldiers killed. Such are the fortures of war.
Egypt later got the Sinai back through peaceful negoiations with Israel, a development despised by the rest of the Arab world and that led to the assasination of the Egyptian President.
And from that point on Israel has been trying to get the Arabs to negotiate a peace and recognition of Israel by offering in various degrees to give land back to the Arabs and return to the 1967 borders. Events have shown that many Arabs have no interest in ever doing this, their only interest is in seeing Israel destroyed, and any concession is little more than a temporary truce in the ongoing war.
Since well before Israel was created both sides of the conflict, Arab and Israeli, have been using terroristic tactics, attacking the other side's civilian population whenever they found themselves in an assymetrical situation. But it is Israel that is the democratic state. It is Israel that has a viable justice system and whose strong men adhere to the rule of law, and it is Israel that has been a friend and ally of the US since the beginning.
Israel's Arab opponents have declared that it has no right to exist, and they have done nothing but attack Israel without letup from the day of its creation. It's either eternal war or extinction, so eternal war it is.
The State of Israel was created by an act of the United Nations mostly out of land that Jews already owned, having bought the land from the mostly Arab Palestinians over many years. By the time the State was created there were already more than a half million Jews living there on their own land. Great Britain, who controlled Palestine at the time, had been trying to keep Jews out of Palestine, sending them back to Europe when they attempted to leave to join the Jews in Palestine, or esle there would have been many more. Many of those turned back, of course, were subsequently slaughtered by the Nazis, and so Great Britain bears some of the responsiblity for those deaths, as do many nations that restricted Jewish attempts to leave anti-semetic Europe. So, it was partly out of a sense of redressing a great injustice that the United Nations created the State of Israel.
Arabs had been attacking the Jewish settlements in Palestine even before Israel was created. The Arab nations refused to accept Israel's creation and immediately attacked. From that day to this it has been war, and the myth of Israel as an occupier who ejected Palestinians from the land was born. Subsequent parcels of land like Gaza were those won from the enemy in various wars.
When a nation loses land in a war caused by their own aggression and hatred then they've got no right to complain and no one to blame but themselves.
Most of the land lost by Arabs was lost in the 6 days war of 1967.
In 1967, the President of Egypt, Nassar, declared that he intended to destroy Israel and that the Egyptian people wanted war. He ordered UN peacekeepers out of the Sinai, he remilitarized the Sinai and put 7 divisions of troops (100,000) and tanks (800) on the border with Israel. Egypt closed the Strait of Tiran to Israeli shipping, which in and of itself was an act of war. Jordan started massing troops (55,000), tanks (300), and planes at their border with Israel, and then Jordan and Egypt signed a mutual defense treaty in which Jordanian troops were put under the command of the Egyptian generals. Thus, Jordanian and Egyptian troops were poised to cut Israel in half in a matter of minutes.
And so Israel, after appealing to the UN and the international community for help in vain, rather than waiting to be destroyed, decided to seize the initiative and attack.
In the end the Arabs lost a lot of land and lives (21,000 dead) vs less than 1000 Israeli soldiers killed. Such are the fortures of war.
Egypt later got the Sinai back through peaceful negoiations with Israel, a development despised by the rest of the Arab world and that led to the assasination of the Egyptian President.
And from that point on Israel has been trying to get the Arabs to negotiate a peace and recognition of Israel by offering in various degrees to give land back to the Arabs and return to the 1967 borders. Events have shown that many Arabs have no interest in ever doing this, their only interest is in seeing Israel destroyed, and any concession is little more than a temporary truce in the ongoing war.
Since well before Israel was created both sides of the conflict, Arab and Israeli, have been using terroristic tactics, attacking the other side's civilian population whenever they found themselves in an assymetrical situation. But it is Israel that is the democratic state. It is Israel that has a viable justice system and whose strong men adhere to the rule of law, and it is Israel that has been a friend and ally of the US since the beginning.
Thursday, November 10, 2005
Democrats Behind the Curve Again
Some Democrats in Congress have hit upon what they think is a way to explain why so many elected Democratic leaders voted for the War in Iraq: "We were duped." I't not their fault, they are easily fooled. In pursuit of this strategy they stepped up demands for the administration to "come clean" on their handling of pre-war intelligence, saying that the indictment of Libby "raises questions" on that issue.
Meanwhile, the Democrats are heedless of the way in which the increasing rioting in Paris is undermining their whole strategy. The worse things get in Paris the more anxious people here get about our national security in the face of worldwide radical Islamic belligerence. The American people see the proud French being humbled by a situation gone out of control and wonder if the same could not spread to the rest of Europe and to America.
In other words, the worse things look in Europe the more it looks like Bush has been right all along to take a tough stand. For, after all, here in America radical Islamic unrest does not threaten the peace and there have been no serious terrorist attacks since 9-11, unlike Europe, where despite the fact that governments have generally tried to appease the Islamofascists there and in the Middle East terrorist attacks continue and radical Islamic unrest threatens to put ordinary citizens and their property in danger in their own communities.
And, of course, the genesis of the rioting in Paris is complex and rooted in a raft of social problems, but talking about how rioters in France are the victims is going to win NO support from the American people.
Once again the Democrats have positioned themselves on the wrong side of events. They are working hard to gin up a case against the administration with the help of their friends in the mainstream media, but they may end up finding that the people are not behind them. They may find themselves in a tough position in 2006 if the people want tough talk tough about the threat of global and radical Islamic unrest.
Lefties fret about how the rioting in France only works to the advantage the right. Yeah, that's true, because the rioting is darn good evidence that the conservatives have been right about this all along and the lefties with their pacifism, multiculturalism and appeasement have been disastrously wrong.
Meanwhile, the Democrats are heedless of the way in which the increasing rioting in Paris is undermining their whole strategy. The worse things get in Paris the more anxious people here get about our national security in the face of worldwide radical Islamic belligerence. The American people see the proud French being humbled by a situation gone out of control and wonder if the same could not spread to the rest of Europe and to America.
In other words, the worse things look in Europe the more it looks like Bush has been right all along to take a tough stand. For, after all, here in America radical Islamic unrest does not threaten the peace and there have been no serious terrorist attacks since 9-11, unlike Europe, where despite the fact that governments have generally tried to appease the Islamofascists there and in the Middle East terrorist attacks continue and radical Islamic unrest threatens to put ordinary citizens and their property in danger in their own communities.
And, of course, the genesis of the rioting in Paris is complex and rooted in a raft of social problems, but talking about how rioters in France are the victims is going to win NO support from the American people.
Once again the Democrats have positioned themselves on the wrong side of events. They are working hard to gin up a case against the administration with the help of their friends in the mainstream media, but they may end up finding that the people are not behind them. They may find themselves in a tough position in 2006 if the people want tough talk tough about the threat of global and radical Islamic unrest.
Lefties fret about how the rioting in France only works to the advantage the right. Yeah, that's true, because the rioting is darn good evidence that the conservatives have been right about this all along and the lefties with their pacifism, multiculturalism and appeasement have been disastrously wrong.
Second of Two Views: The New World War
In 732 AD, Moorish forces under the command of Abd al-Rahman advanced from Spain toward the capital city of Paris. They met a force of Franks under the command of Charles Martel. Three days later the Islamic commander was dead and his much diminished army was heading back to the South. This was the Battle of Poitier, and if it had gone the other way it is likely that all of Europe would now be Muslim and history would be very different.
But in present day Europe the Islamic forces have advanced much further than Abd al-Rahman. In France there are Muslim communities where the police will not go, and now the violence from those communities is spreading into central Paris. In Belgium the police are told not to be seen drinking coffee during Ramadan. In Sweden there are communities where ambulances need a police escort to protect them from radical Muslim violence. In Spain Islamic studies are now taught in the public school curricula. In Denmark radical Muslim youths are burning cars and torching shops and threaten the lives of newspaper reporters and editors critical of Islam. In Holland the native Dutch are beginning to leave their own country in fear of the radical Muslim communities there that are no more integrated with Dutch society than they were three decades ago when they first arrived, members of which have murdered prominent Dutch critics of Islam.
It is a pattern seen all over Europe, all over the world. Radical Muslims move in, taking advantage of the liberal immigration laws, but won't integrate with the rest of society and eventually stop respecting the existing government. They form de facto governments of their own responsive to them and their own traditions and eventually press for seperation as an Islamic state, as was the case in Nigeria, or a complete takeover. And they are often murderously violent toward the host culture, seemingly unwilling to get along with their neighbors.
Of the dozen or so major conflicts in the world today, almost all of them involve Muslims who can't get along with their neighbors. And in almost all cases the Muslims are the aggressors.
It's a World War, and we are losing it. Our nominal allies, the Europeans, have in some cases already bowed to the inevitable and are suing for peace. Europe is descending into a new Dark Ages with permanent conflict.
The French government thought that a policy of appeasement, such as in refusing to join in the Iraq war, would win them peace and keep the problems confined to the ghettos, but the radical Muslims saw that for what it was, a sign of weakness. In fact, the violence has been going on for months now with 9000 police cars stoned since the beginning of the year and three dozen cars torched even on a quiet night. But now the violence has spilled out into Paris itself, and it will not stop in the forseeable future. The French police have already declared themselves overwhelmed.
But in present day Europe the Islamic forces have advanced much further than Abd al-Rahman. In France there are Muslim communities where the police will not go, and now the violence from those communities is spreading into central Paris. In Belgium the police are told not to be seen drinking coffee during Ramadan. In Sweden there are communities where ambulances need a police escort to protect them from radical Muslim violence. In Spain Islamic studies are now taught in the public school curricula. In Denmark radical Muslim youths are burning cars and torching shops and threaten the lives of newspaper reporters and editors critical of Islam. In Holland the native Dutch are beginning to leave their own country in fear of the radical Muslim communities there that are no more integrated with Dutch society than they were three decades ago when they first arrived, members of which have murdered prominent Dutch critics of Islam.
It is a pattern seen all over Europe, all over the world. Radical Muslims move in, taking advantage of the liberal immigration laws, but won't integrate with the rest of society and eventually stop respecting the existing government. They form de facto governments of their own responsive to them and their own traditions and eventually press for seperation as an Islamic state, as was the case in Nigeria, or a complete takeover. And they are often murderously violent toward the host culture, seemingly unwilling to get along with their neighbors.
Of the dozen or so major conflicts in the world today, almost all of them involve Muslims who can't get along with their neighbors. And in almost all cases the Muslims are the aggressors.
It's a World War, and we are losing it. Our nominal allies, the Europeans, have in some cases already bowed to the inevitable and are suing for peace. Europe is descending into a new Dark Ages with permanent conflict.
The French government thought that a policy of appeasement, such as in refusing to join in the Iraq war, would win them peace and keep the problems confined to the ghettos, but the radical Muslims saw that for what it was, a sign of weakness. In fact, the violence has been going on for months now with 9000 police cars stoned since the beginning of the year and three dozen cars torched even on a quiet night. But now the violence has spilled out into Paris itself, and it will not stop in the forseeable future. The French police have already declared themselves overwhelmed.
First of Two Views: France's Problems
Is France a socialist state? The definition of socialism usually includes the central ownership of the means of production and control of the economy, and France is not to that point yet. France still has a strong element of capitalism and reliance on markets despite the chunk of the national product gobbled up by the government and redistrubuted as various services and benefits. All democratic nations have to decide how much of their resources are going into the government and how many services the government will provide, and France certainly has more of that than America, but that doesn't make France socialist. It may be more correct to say that France has some characteristics of socialism in that the government does control a big chunk of the economy.
But because France is not really socialist doesn't mean that it's the residual capitalism that's to blame for France's social unrest, either. It's not capitalism that's at the bottom of that unrest, quite the opposite, and a more vibrant econonomy and less reliance on government transfer payments may turn out to be the best solution to the current set of problems.
But no system of government is going to work without basic social fairness.
Despite all the social programs what is missing from the French approach to dealing with minorities is a means of making sure that they are treated fairly in terms of access to jobs and education and in integration to the rest of French society.
The French government, secular and afraid of religious expression, has attempted to impose standards of conformity on the immigrants in terms of being more French, but they have not encouraged the blending of immigrant populations and native populations. They want the immigrants to be more French and to share French values, but they want them to do it in the ghettos, away from the rest of French society. The French government has combined the worst aspects of socialism -- disrespect of traditional values and beliefs and excessive government intervention that breeds dependence. Coupled with the overall poor performance of the economy which further stifles the dreams of young generation Muslims.
The idea that because the French government is racist and intolerant of social diversity that it is therefore really "right wing" is silly. Socialism and racism are hardly mutually exclusive, and every leftist government that has ever existed has included a strong element of racism and has been intolerant of cultural diversity, especially when it comes to the expression of religious beliefs. French elites seem to think that since North African immigrants are housed and fed by the government that they are being treated fairly and France is a grand and big hearted country. The immigrants themselves know that's not the case.
The immigrant communities around Paris have been deeply alienated from French society for many years. They consist of miles and miles of depressing concrete public housing where the police have long since stopped policing. Muslim young people have long known that they don't dare venture into central Paris for fear of being picked up and beaten or killed by police. Most of the young people there know that they have no chance of ever getting a good job or of moving up in society because of deeply ingrained French racism, the same racism that led Chirac to sniff that America is wasting it's time trying to establish democracy among a people incapable of it.
In the 70's and 80's these communities were communist, but now communism has become less attractive with the fall of the Soviet Union. Islam has to some extent filled the vacuum created by the end of the Cold War.
What a lot of Americans don't understand about the French newspapers and newspapers in many other European countries is that they don't have the same sort of adversarial relationship with their own countries that newspapers in the US do. If something is an embarressment to France then they just don't cover it or report it. And the existance of these ghettoes created mostly by the poor attitude of the French toward these immigrants is a big embarressment to French intellectuals, especially those fond of looking down their noses at other's problems.
This violence is not new. It has been going on for decades. Dozens of cars were being burned in an average week even when things were supposedly peaceful. The only thing new is the larger scope and range of the violence.
The unrest in France may indeed be taking on a more radical Muslim aspect, and it would be naive to think that this does not play a part, but this would never have started if not for the seperation of the cultures in France that has grown worse with every decade. In those countries where Muslims have a decent chance of bettering their lives within the existing culture there has been much less trouble.
Nevertheless, the point at which the problems go from being mainly about French policies and more about a global war on Western culture is hard to pin down. Clearly, the Arab youths who leave the dispossessed communities of Saudi Arabia to fight in places like Iraq, Afghanistan and even Spain and the US have made it a global war. It is not clear that this sort of thing has happened in France yet, but the radicals are certainly out there to push this process along.
In America, once the problems of racial segregation were recognised and aired out, the majority of whites got behind the effort to make reforms, to promote civil rights. Even Republicans, or more especially Republicans, got behind this effort, because even if they didn't think much of minorities they knew that fair is fair, and unfairness is ugly and evil regardless of all else. The same could happen in France where people are no less offended by unfairness than Americans, but they will first have to stop hiding the problem.
But because France is not really socialist doesn't mean that it's the residual capitalism that's to blame for France's social unrest, either. It's not capitalism that's at the bottom of that unrest, quite the opposite, and a more vibrant econonomy and less reliance on government transfer payments may turn out to be the best solution to the current set of problems.
But no system of government is going to work without basic social fairness.
Despite all the social programs what is missing from the French approach to dealing with minorities is a means of making sure that they are treated fairly in terms of access to jobs and education and in integration to the rest of French society.
The French government, secular and afraid of religious expression, has attempted to impose standards of conformity on the immigrants in terms of being more French, but they have not encouraged the blending of immigrant populations and native populations. They want the immigrants to be more French and to share French values, but they want them to do it in the ghettos, away from the rest of French society. The French government has combined the worst aspects of socialism -- disrespect of traditional values and beliefs and excessive government intervention that breeds dependence. Coupled with the overall poor performance of the economy which further stifles the dreams of young generation Muslims.
The idea that because the French government is racist and intolerant of social diversity that it is therefore really "right wing" is silly. Socialism and racism are hardly mutually exclusive, and every leftist government that has ever existed has included a strong element of racism and has been intolerant of cultural diversity, especially when it comes to the expression of religious beliefs. French elites seem to think that since North African immigrants are housed and fed by the government that they are being treated fairly and France is a grand and big hearted country. The immigrants themselves know that's not the case.
The immigrant communities around Paris have been deeply alienated from French society for many years. They consist of miles and miles of depressing concrete public housing where the police have long since stopped policing. Muslim young people have long known that they don't dare venture into central Paris for fear of being picked up and beaten or killed by police. Most of the young people there know that they have no chance of ever getting a good job or of moving up in society because of deeply ingrained French racism, the same racism that led Chirac to sniff that America is wasting it's time trying to establish democracy among a people incapable of it.
In the 70's and 80's these communities were communist, but now communism has become less attractive with the fall of the Soviet Union. Islam has to some extent filled the vacuum created by the end of the Cold War.
What a lot of Americans don't understand about the French newspapers and newspapers in many other European countries is that they don't have the same sort of adversarial relationship with their own countries that newspapers in the US do. If something is an embarressment to France then they just don't cover it or report it. And the existance of these ghettoes created mostly by the poor attitude of the French toward these immigrants is a big embarressment to French intellectuals, especially those fond of looking down their noses at other's problems.
This violence is not new. It has been going on for decades. Dozens of cars were being burned in an average week even when things were supposedly peaceful. The only thing new is the larger scope and range of the violence.
The unrest in France may indeed be taking on a more radical Muslim aspect, and it would be naive to think that this does not play a part, but this would never have started if not for the seperation of the cultures in France that has grown worse with every decade. In those countries where Muslims have a decent chance of bettering their lives within the existing culture there has been much less trouble.
Nevertheless, the point at which the problems go from being mainly about French policies and more about a global war on Western culture is hard to pin down. Clearly, the Arab youths who leave the dispossessed communities of Saudi Arabia to fight in places like Iraq, Afghanistan and even Spain and the US have made it a global war. It is not clear that this sort of thing has happened in France yet, but the radicals are certainly out there to push this process along.
In America, once the problems of racial segregation were recognised and aired out, the majority of whites got behind the effort to make reforms, to promote civil rights. Even Republicans, or more especially Republicans, got behind this effort, because even if they didn't think much of minorities they knew that fair is fair, and unfairness is ugly and evil regardless of all else. The same could happen in France where people are no less offended by unfairness than Americans, but they will first have to stop hiding the problem.
Friday, July 01, 2005
Marx's Critical Errors
I don't know if this is original, I'm certainly not an expert in this field, but I'd like to share some of the observations I've made about socialist ideology. A lot of this is obviously garnered from bits and pieces of stuff I've read but don't want to go back and organize. Regardless, it's only a blog, and so I will argue in this and subsequent posts that Marxists have made 3 critical errors in the formulation of their political theories. These are:
1) They failed to recognize the difficulty of efficient allocation of material resources in a society.
2) They made incorrect assumptions concerning the malleability of human nature and human conduct.
3) Closely related to #2, they failed to turn their analytical tools toward the examination of themselves and their own movement.
In my opinion, these errors have led directly to the failure of one socialist state after another in the last 100 years and cement the impracticality of Marxist ideals.
Point #3 is covered in this previous post of mine.
Regarding the first point:
In capitalist market societies, the most severe penalties are reserved for those who allocate capital in an inefficient manner. The investor who makes an unwise investment will be severely penalized through the loss, in some cases the total loss, of their wealth. As a result, capital is allocated very carefully and with meticulous attention to detail. The task of allocating capital is usually left to super-specialized experts in that field directly related to the project at hand. The effect of this is that very little capital is wasted, and this accrues to the good of all citizens in the society. The worker in a capitalist society can usually rest assured that his or her efforts will go toward the elevation of living standards for the whole society whether it be his or her own living standards or those of others. Very little of their effort will go to waste, and so everyone receives more of the benefit of that wealth creation.
By contrast, the centrally controlled economies of Soviet style governments are usually very wasteful of capital. Allocation of capital is often political and is done by bureaucrats with agendas other than efficiency. The workers can see this and are therefore not motivated to achieve optimal productivity. The overall effect is a lower standard of living for most people than might have been possible. Often the entire economy eventually collapses under this inefficiency.
The error that Marx made and that Marxists continue to make is to assume that capital allocation is a trivial matter. Their assumption is that once capital is in hand it is a simple matter to turn it to good use, but the very opposite is manifestly the case. It is hard to imagine a more motivated group of managers than capitalists who are under the threat of economic ruination if they make a mistake. It is hard to imagine how a group of bureaucrats with a government sinecure could possible match the performance of capitalist investors, and yet that is just the bet that Marxists have always made.
This is an impossibly intractable problem for Marxists. The whole point of Marxism is that allocation of excess wealth produced by workers would be under the authority not of capitalists but of the workers themselves in a "democratic" fashion. But this kind of politics is absolutely the worst way to make critical decisions of capital allocation. The fatal inefficiency of Marxists economies is therefore inevitable.
1) They failed to recognize the difficulty of efficient allocation of material resources in a society.
2) They made incorrect assumptions concerning the malleability of human nature and human conduct.
3) Closely related to #2, they failed to turn their analytical tools toward the examination of themselves and their own movement.
In my opinion, these errors have led directly to the failure of one socialist state after another in the last 100 years and cement the impracticality of Marxist ideals.
Point #3 is covered in this previous post of mine.
Regarding the first point:
In capitalist market societies, the most severe penalties are reserved for those who allocate capital in an inefficient manner. The investor who makes an unwise investment will be severely penalized through the loss, in some cases the total loss, of their wealth. As a result, capital is allocated very carefully and with meticulous attention to detail. The task of allocating capital is usually left to super-specialized experts in that field directly related to the project at hand. The effect of this is that very little capital is wasted, and this accrues to the good of all citizens in the society. The worker in a capitalist society can usually rest assured that his or her efforts will go toward the elevation of living standards for the whole society whether it be his or her own living standards or those of others. Very little of their effort will go to waste, and so everyone receives more of the benefit of that wealth creation.
By contrast, the centrally controlled economies of Soviet style governments are usually very wasteful of capital. Allocation of capital is often political and is done by bureaucrats with agendas other than efficiency. The workers can see this and are therefore not motivated to achieve optimal productivity. The overall effect is a lower standard of living for most people than might have been possible. Often the entire economy eventually collapses under this inefficiency.
The error that Marx made and that Marxists continue to make is to assume that capital allocation is a trivial matter. Their assumption is that once capital is in hand it is a simple matter to turn it to good use, but the very opposite is manifestly the case. It is hard to imagine a more motivated group of managers than capitalists who are under the threat of economic ruination if they make a mistake. It is hard to imagine how a group of bureaucrats with a government sinecure could possible match the performance of capitalist investors, and yet that is just the bet that Marxists have always made.
This is an impossibly intractable problem for Marxists. The whole point of Marxism is that allocation of excess wealth produced by workers would be under the authority not of capitalists but of the workers themselves in a "democratic" fashion. But this kind of politics is absolutely the worst way to make critical decisions of capital allocation. The fatal inefficiency of Marxists economies is therefore inevitable.
If FDR Had Been Republican
Dateline: Hawaii, April 28, 1945.
Well into the third week of the invasion of Okinawa, congressional Democrats criticized the President for poor planning and execution of the invasion.
"The troops are bogged down in the southern part of the island, we haven't made any progress in days. How could this have happened?" said Theodore Kennedy, Mass. Democrat.
Other Democrats questioned the reasoning behind the decision to attack the island in the first place. "It makes no sense to attack this island, everyone knows the Japanese are on the mainland," said one congressional staffer. "The War in Okinawa has turned into a quagmire. We need to get the troops out and turn out attention to what's really important, like finding Tojo."
Democrats expressed their alarm at the magnitude of American casualty figures. "This is completely crazy," said one. "We are losing thousands in one day."
Other Democrats expressed doubt about the likelihood of winning against such an intractable and fanatical foe. "This war is unwinnable. We've lost dozens of ships to suicide rocket-bomb pilots, we can't possibly continue at this pace."
Some even insisted that the President had lied about the reasons for the invasion. "He said that we needed that island as a launching point for air attacks on the Japanese mainland, but we are already attacking the mainland from other air bases."
Meanwhile, reports of prisoner abuse continue to crop up from interviews of Japanese prisoners of war. "It is well known throughout the Japanese Empire that American soldiers rape and kill their women prisoners and eat the livers of Japanese children," a Red Cross representative reported.
In a related matter, for the forth week in a row Democrats demanded hearings into overcharging of the Government by Boeing for high altitude bombers. "Everone knows this war is nothing more that a scheme to enrich the President's friends," said an unnamed source.
Democrats also renewed their demands for disclosure regarding the super secret Manhatten Project. "Hundreds of millions of dollars have gone into a secret military project that we aren't even allowed to examine. As far as we can tell not one dime of that money has gone to anything practical for the war effort."
Well into the third week of the invasion of Okinawa, congressional Democrats criticized the President for poor planning and execution of the invasion.
"The troops are bogged down in the southern part of the island, we haven't made any progress in days. How could this have happened?" said Theodore Kennedy, Mass. Democrat.
Other Democrats questioned the reasoning behind the decision to attack the island in the first place. "It makes no sense to attack this island, everyone knows the Japanese are on the mainland," said one congressional staffer. "The War in Okinawa has turned into a quagmire. We need to get the troops out and turn out attention to what's really important, like finding Tojo."
Democrats expressed their alarm at the magnitude of American casualty figures. "This is completely crazy," said one. "We are losing thousands in one day."
Other Democrats expressed doubt about the likelihood of winning against such an intractable and fanatical foe. "This war is unwinnable. We've lost dozens of ships to suicide rocket-bomb pilots, we can't possibly continue at this pace."
Some even insisted that the President had lied about the reasons for the invasion. "He said that we needed that island as a launching point for air attacks on the Japanese mainland, but we are already attacking the mainland from other air bases."
Meanwhile, reports of prisoner abuse continue to crop up from interviews of Japanese prisoners of war. "It is well known throughout the Japanese Empire that American soldiers rape and kill their women prisoners and eat the livers of Japanese children," a Red Cross representative reported.
In a related matter, for the forth week in a row Democrats demanded hearings into overcharging of the Government by Boeing for high altitude bombers. "Everone knows this war is nothing more that a scheme to enrich the President's friends," said an unnamed source.
Democrats also renewed their demands for disclosure regarding the super secret Manhatten Project. "Hundreds of millions of dollars have gone into a secret military project that we aren't even allowed to examine. As far as we can tell not one dime of that money has gone to anything practical for the war effort."
Thursday, June 30, 2005
Decline in International Terrorism
Except for certain parts of the Middle East, there has been a decline in international terrorism the world over since the invasion of Iraq.
http://www.tkb.org/Home.jsp
Tuesday, March 22, 2005
The Truth and Terri Schiavo's Brain Are Both Wrecked
You know, after the 2000 and 2004 elections I really had begun to think that it was the people on the left end of the political scale that habitually ginned up crises, distorted the facts, ignored established law in favor of their own emotional take on a given situation, constantly wanted to change the rules or ignored the rules to suit their own whims, and so on.
How totally un-cynical to think that way. I am embarrassed.
With the Terri Schiavo case I am forcefully reminded that right-wingers are capable of exactly the same sorts of things.
Ginning up a crisis? Ignoring ethical guidelines for the sake of emotionalism? Boy, you should hear some of these talk radio people hitting the emotional hot buttons or look at conservative online forums. That a person has the right to refuse any treatment has been established law for many years now, that a person's autonomy should not be violated is a conservative ideal, and yet they want to throw this out the window.
Refusing to face the truth? There is no therapy, there is no test, and there is nothing whatsoever that is going to make any difference in her condition. An MRI of her brain will tell us nothing that will do any good. She has been this way for fifteen years. The way she is now, however you want to describe it, is the way she'll be for the foreseeable future. That's just the fact of it whether some people want to face the truth or not. The possiblity of some sort of miraculous recovery is nill.
Distorting the issues? We are getting one red herring after another from the right-wingers on this matter. Whether or not Terry is actually in persistent vegetative state, whether or not she got an MRI of her brain, whether or not a miracle is possible, whether she got this or that type of therapy are all irrelevant. The only thing that has any relevance is what Terri would want to have done if she could tell us.
Unfairly smearing people? The way in which the husband has been smeared is despicable. He has been accused of neglecting Terri, of refusing to provide "necessary" treatment, of refusing to have "necessary" tests done, of wanting her dead for his own selfish reasons. All of these allegations have been shown to be false in the courts.
Refusing to abide by the rules? Disregard of due process? The whole issue of whether the husband is the one to tell us what her wishes would be given his current situation is relevant, but the court has considered that very matter carefully already. We ought to respect that process. The people who in good faith spent the hours actually going over all the evidence of her status and attendant issues have been denigrated by the idiotic, ill-informed second-guessing that some conservatives have been doing.
How totally un-cynical to think that way. I am embarrassed.
With the Terri Schiavo case I am forcefully reminded that right-wingers are capable of exactly the same sorts of things.
Ginning up a crisis? Ignoring ethical guidelines for the sake of emotionalism? Boy, you should hear some of these talk radio people hitting the emotional hot buttons or look at conservative online forums. That a person has the right to refuse any treatment has been established law for many years now, that a person's autonomy should not be violated is a conservative ideal, and yet they want to throw this out the window.
Refusing to face the truth? There is no therapy, there is no test, and there is nothing whatsoever that is going to make any difference in her condition. An MRI of her brain will tell us nothing that will do any good. She has been this way for fifteen years. The way she is now, however you want to describe it, is the way she'll be for the foreseeable future. That's just the fact of it whether some people want to face the truth or not. The possiblity of some sort of miraculous recovery is nill.
Distorting the issues? We are getting one red herring after another from the right-wingers on this matter. Whether or not Terry is actually in persistent vegetative state, whether or not she got an MRI of her brain, whether or not a miracle is possible, whether she got this or that type of therapy are all irrelevant. The only thing that has any relevance is what Terri would want to have done if she could tell us.
Unfairly smearing people? The way in which the husband has been smeared is despicable. He has been accused of neglecting Terri, of refusing to provide "necessary" treatment, of refusing to have "necessary" tests done, of wanting her dead for his own selfish reasons. All of these allegations have been shown to be false in the courts.
Refusing to abide by the rules? Disregard of due process? The whole issue of whether the husband is the one to tell us what her wishes would be given his current situation is relevant, but the court has considered that very matter carefully already. We ought to respect that process. The people who in good faith spent the hours actually going over all the evidence of her status and attendant issues have been denigrated by the idiotic, ill-informed second-guessing that some conservatives have been doing.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)