The latest Democratic game plan. "We Can't Just Call Him a Liar"? Why do I suspect the willpower will fail just when they need it most?

Pictures of Peace

Remember the quote from Pastor Niemoller on the holocaust?

First They Came for the Jews

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
Pastor Martin Niemöller

This is what it looks like in Turkey today after the synagogue bombings that seem to have once again killed more Muslims than Jews or Americans. At least there is some evidence the Turks may get it:

A shopkeeper near the site of one of the explosions had this to say:

"Muslim, Christian, Jewish, people are people. Today it's them, tomorrow it could be me."

It's a worldwide civil war folks -- both within the Muslim world and within the West. Those who cynically mouth words of condolences at attacks on peaceful people -- much less relief organizations -- while secretly harboring hatred and ill wishes for the West need only look in the mirror to see what corruption looks like...

No Evidence? Really?

WHOOPS!

And here's a summary if you don't have stamina to read it all. BUT YOU SHOULD! The most enjoyable commented version is here. (Hat tip Instapundit.)

And don't forget "No Evidence?"...

Borking X-rayed.

And then there's ol' laser-beam with a wicked pen Lileks -- enjoy!

I'm Norwegian, but close enough. Why I'm glad my Grand-daddies got on those boats! (As Muhammed Ali would say...)

Why They Call Him Spock, Redux

Stephen Den Beste cuts to the bone on our gulf with Bin Laden:

And that's why al Qaeda's plans seem idiotic to rationalists like Donald and me. bin Laden could not create and follow the kind of plan which we'd think was essential. If bin Laden's plan had been based entirely on temporal power and cogent strategy and real resources, and if such a plan did not rely on miracles, it would have demonstrated lack of faith. If there were no place in the plan for God, it would prove that bin Laden didn't truly believe God would help.

And it would therefore prove that bin Laden didn't deserve any help from God, because it would prove that his faith wasn't really pure. For bin Laden to create such a plan would be a heretical act.

Of course that entire issue is meaningless for an Atheist.

It isn't meaningless for a rationalist post-Enlightenment Christian, but he faces no crisis of faith in a similar situation. He can make rational plans which don't rely on miracles because his faith acknowledges that God doesn't usually work that way. Such a Christian doesn't pray for victory; he prays for the wisdom to create rational plans and the strength to carry them out.

But for bin Laden and other Islamic zealots bent on jihad, even that would be heresy. The only way to truly prove your faith is to rely on miracles, and that's what I think they're doing. I think that was bin Laden's strategy.

It's not enough for them to win or lose their crusade; they have to win it the right way, by showing the purity of their faith and by having God fight beside them. And they only can, and only should win by purifying themselves enough to once again deserve God's aid in the crusade. To demonstrate any doubt whatever in this is to prove that they are unworthy to be Soldiers of God.

And God will prove that by not aiding them, and permitting their enemies to triumph. [Emphasis added.]

The thing that amazes me about so many libs is their inability to discern this kind of stuff ... READ THE WHOLE THING. PERIOD.

And Mr. Totten weighs in with a beautiful round-house left (or was that a right?) on the jaw of Delay and crew. Nicely done!

(I sense heart palpitations in the readership. Heaven forfend -- an attack on the right in a running dog right-wing blog?)

Oh, brother -- Andrew is just rolling, rolling, rolling today ;)

Churchill again, more right than he knew again... in perpetuity... one more time... and not likely to be the last... count on it...

UPDATE: and again...

From the "When a man tells you that he intends to kill you ... believe him" De-nihilism File

The latest from the folks who only want to kill the Jews and Americans and therefore destroyed the Buddist statues at Bamiyan: (I think there's actually some problem with that sentence -- now what, oh, what could it be???)

100,000 Deaths Expected in An Imminent Attack Against the U.S.

In regard to rumors about a large-scale attack against the U.S. during the month of Ramadan, Al-Hijazi said that "a huge and very courageous strike" will take place and that the number of infidels expected to be killed in this attack, according to primary estimates, exceeds 100,000. He added that he "anticipates, but will not swear, that the attack will happen during Ramadan." He further stated that the attack will be carried out in a way that will "amaze the world and turn Al-Qai'da into [an organization that] horrifies the world until the law of Allah is implemented, actually implemented, and not just in words, on His land... You wait and see that the balance of power between Al-Qai'da and its rivals will change, all of a sudden, Allah willing."

Regarding Al-Qai'da detainees, Al-Hijazi said: "We follow their situation closely... the collaborating governments will pay the price for capturing these heroes who want to revive the glory of their nation and shake off the dust of humiliation and disgrace."

Al-Hijazi added that the "collaborating and treacherous" governments should know that Al-Qai'da has a long reach and its members enjoy popularity that will not end just because apostate governments detain hundreds of Al-Qai'da's members. "As soon as the governments detain one of our people, ten like him join us... this is no secret." [Emphasis added.]

Remember, the plan in WTC I was to topple one tower into the other with a goal of killing 250,000. Instead, the radical left laughs in racist condescension at these poor, hapless and oppressed Arabs. Apparently, the "horrifying" implementation of Sharia law is well within the bounds of rationality. Well, certainly MUCH preferable to those horrifying Christians and Jews and their hatefully repressive religions that brought us the enlightenment, democracy and scientific inquiry!

Ummm, this seems to need more research so it doesn't leak like a sieve...

Looking de-nihilism in the face -- this is why some call him Spock ... I just call him "The Best". (Good grief, of course there's a joke to be found in that comment -- surely you're adept enough to find it? It's not that hard -- I promise.)

Who is watching this as a neutral?

Darren Kaplan posts Christopher Hitchens' latest laser beam:

Since we're talking about our safety, I want to put a proposition to you," Hitchens said. "There's a tendency in these discussions, one which I very much reprobate, and one that I find a good deal in the New York Times, and also the Democratic Party, to watch this outcome as if to say, 'I wonder how it's going to work out? I wonder if Bush is going to win? I wonder if the Fedayeen Saddam or al-Qaida are going to? Some days it looks bad for one side, some days not so bad.'

"Who is daring to look at this as if they were a spectator? Who is watching this as a neutral?" [Emphasis added.]

Of course, that would be people who live in such a free country that they can literally do or say almost anything and get away with it -- all the while screaming in agony at their so-called persecution.

As my "No Kidding Sam..." post pointed out, even after WWII we didn't have our act together to even congeal a faint shadow of the punishment that should have been meeted out. If we couldn't even properly punish the Nazis then, it's almost beyond risible to claim that after more decades of swelling decadence we could meaningfully persecute the left-liberal establishment of our own society. In fact, Goebbels himself would smile at the "big lie" of using character assassination rather than rational argument against an opponent.

This is what it looked like from the master himself:

One could not understand this war if one did not always keep in mind the fact that International Jewry stands behind all the unnatural forces that our united enemies use to attempt to deceive the world and keep humanity in the dark. It is so to speak the mortar that holds the enemy coalition firmly together, despite its differences of class, ideology and interests. Capitalism and Bolshevism have the same Jewish roots, two branches of the same tree that in the end bear the same fruit.

Sound eerily familiar?

Today's Quote: "History will be kind to me for I intend to write it." -- Winston Churchill

... unfortunately his enemies made sure nobody read it ... and if more of us had read it we'd actually have a clue ...

No Kidding Sam...

Another new Iraqi blog called Hammorabi by someone named Sam has this instructive post:

Lot of news coming from Iraq indicates that many of the Baath members from the previous regime appointed in important posts with the new ministries like the Ministry of Electricity and Educations.
Also some of the previous members of the secret police and inelegances like "Mokhabarat" appointed in new important positions.

We don't know what the new Ministers are doing and why there is no trials for those who committed genocides and crimes against the Iraqis and the Humanity.
S H [Emphasis added.]

My dear Sam, Iraq has more in common with World War II than people realize. For instance, check out this snippet from an article on the Nuremberg trials:

But Maguire notes that it wasn't just American isolationists who opposed Nuremberg. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas described the trials as legally unprincipled, while George Kennan dismissed efforts to re-educate Germans and said the entire tribunal should be terminated.

Amidst the criticism and red baiting, the subsequent American trials at Nuremberg concluded in 1949 with some 142 convictions. Twenty four Germans were sentenced to death and many others got prison terms. But they would not stay behind bars long. To appease West German leaders, American diplomats in command of the U.S. occupation zone formed a review board to consider clemencies.

The man who appointed the review board, John McCloy, stressed that the board was not reconsidering judgments but would examine fairness in sentences imposed by the tribunal. Many prosecutors suspected that politics were involved, though John McCloy always denied that he was acting on any political directives from Washington, according to prosecutors and historians.

"Between 1949 and 1958," says William Caming, "all of the prisoners had sentences reduced and were then released. Including, surprisingly enough, four of the leaders of the Einsatzgruppen death squads. It was a political measure. No members of the prosecution staff and none of the judges at Nuremberg were even consulted." [Emphasis added.]

The similarities mount, don't they?

And yet more Deja Vu all over again...

Keith Burgess-Jackson is now blogging -- go visit!

An out and out 'steal' from OpinionJournal perfectly illustrates why Clark is a really bad, bad, bad choice to take on Bush over Iraq:

The Dems' Savior?
Attempting to explain why liberating Kosovo was a good idea but liberating Iraq was not, Wesley Clark, in an interview with The New Yorker, reaches new heights of incoherence:

In a speech at the University of Iowa College of Law, on September 19th, Clark had declared that chief among America's mistakes was that it had gone to war in Iraq without "the mantle of authority" bestowed by United Nations approval. But hadn't the Kosovo war also been conducted without the endorsement of the U.N. Security Council? Yes, Clark allowed, and in that regard the Kosovo war was "technically illegal." He went on, "The Russians and the Chinese said they would both veto it. There was never a chance that it would be authorized."

That situation did not seem entirely dissimilar from the prewar maneuverings regarding Iraq, when France and Germany said that they would oppose any Security Council resolution authorizing an immediate war; Bush bypassed the U.N. and resorted to an alliance with Prime Minister Tony Blair's Britain and sundry lesser members of the "coalition of the willing." But there was one more important difference, Clark said: the war against Serbia was waged to stop the imminent threat of ethnic cleansing in the disputed province of Kosovo; the war in Iraq, he said, was waged under false pretenses.

Got that? It was OK to wage an "illegal" war in Kosovo because of an "imminent threat" not to America or its allies but to the civilian population there--as if Saddam Hussein didn't pose an imminent threat to Iraqis.

Oh brother! Iraq is way, way, way out in the lead in the modern "mass grave accomodations for its citizens" race and Saddam wasn't a threat to them? (Much less us who he publicly professed to hate!)

Thank You

Special thanks to my cousin Paul for his service in Vietnam and a posthumous thanks to my uncle Luther who served in North Africa and Italy in WWII. More thanks than I can ever say...

Darren Kaplan notes that Afghanistan has started a trend after all: "Al Qaeda Bombs the Saudis out of the Stone Age".

Realistic Alaa

Check out Alaa again today:

I heard that General Abi Zaid has been talking to the Elders and Community notables of the Western region. This is right, there are sensible people, they must be talked to, reasoned with and brought to their senses. This approach must be escalated at the same time as firmness against the terrorists increased. They are after all our compatriots and brothers, if they have grievances, let them air them. If they accept the New Iraq and equality, freedom, and democracy it is in their interests. There is plenty for everybody. This is destruction of their country too. And I tell you the majority are not for this wantonness, I mean the majority of these regions so called "the triangle". They are just being used and misled by people who have not the least interest in the future and wellbeing of the country. They must be won back.

So Olive branch in one hand, and Sharp Sword the other. That in my opinion is the best course.

Salaam

Alaa

[Emphasis added.] Hang in there bud! We need you -- and with clear thinking like that you can even teach us a thing or two...

Krauthammer's cookin':

Sympathy is fine. But if we "squander" it when we go to war to avenge our dead and prevent the next crop of dead, then to hell with sympathy. The fact is that the world hates us for our wealth, our success, our power. They hate us into incoherence. The Europeans, Ajami astutely observes, disdain us for our excessive religiosity (manifest, they imagine, by evolution being expelled from schools while prayer is ushered back in)--while the Arab world despises us as purveyors of secularism. We cannot win for losing. We are widely reviled as enemies of Islam, yet in the 1990s we engaged three times in combat -- in the Persian Gulf and in the Balkans -- to rescue Kuwait, Bosnia and Kosovo, Muslim peoples all. And in the last two cases, there was nothing in it for the U.S.; it was humanitarianism and good international citizenship of the highest order.

The search for logic in anti-Americanism is fruitless. It is in the air the world breathes. Its roots are envy and self-loathing -- by peoples who, yearning for modernity but having failed at it, find their one satisfaction in despising modernity's great exemplar.

On Sept. 11, they gave it a rest for a day. Big deal. [Emphasis added.]

Any questions? Ayn Rand rests quite comfortably in her grave -- she didn't miss the mark...

A Gem On Military Reality in Iraq

If you can't read the whole thing then you should at least scan and hop around in it! Well worth it... (Hat tip Winds of Change.)

A Bodyguard Quote: "Then if any one at all is to have the privilege of lying, the rulers of the State should be the persons; and they, in their dealings either with enemies or with their own citizens, may be allowed to lie for the public good. But nobody else should meddle with anything of the kind". And research project -- it should be easy for you to figure out who said it, no?

Overdue Pointer: "The Story of This War"

Interestingly, "The Story of This War" was published the same day as Bush's speech. It's a follow-up to "The Six Dilemmas of a Moderate Islamist" -- and a nice tie-in to my note to the Mesopotamian. Gotta love all these "coincidences"...

Go get your OD of semiotics, take two aspirin and don't call me in the morning ;)

Havel On Western Leftist Hypocrisy

You wonder why Havel is out of step with the West's coddled and insular leftists? Try this choice little comment regarding the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 80s:

"How much trust or even admiration for the Western peace movement can we expect from a simple yet sensitive citizen of Eastern Europe when he has noticed that this movement has never, at any of its congresses or at demonstrations involving hundreds of thousands of participants, got around to protesting the fact that five years ago, one important European country attacked a small neutral neighbor and since that time has been conducting on its territory a war of extermination which has already claimed a million dead and three million refugees? Seriously, what are we to think of a peace movement, a European peace movement, which is virtually unaware of the only war being conducted today by a European state? As for the argument that the victims of aggression and their defenders enjoy the sympathies of Western establishments and so are not worthy of support from the left, such incredible ideological opportunism can provoke only one reaction -- utter disgust and a sense of limitless hopelessness." [Emphasis added.]

Sounds eerily familiar doesn't it? 300,000 mass graves and counting anyone??? But of course, personal animus has never driven the left -- or have I missed something? AND IT JUST GOT ADDED TO THE CLASSICS OVER ON THE RIGHT.

I Liked His Enthusiasm So Much ...

that I wrote a letter to Alaa:

Alaa,

Hang in there. You and Zayed are doing a great job!

Unfortunately, we in the West are experiencing something of a civil war ourselves. I apologize for both our leftists and rightists. They both let your suffering go on far too long and then when 300,000 mass graves are discerned, it's primarily only those on the right who start to get it. The left is too busy trying to twist it in some way to hurt Bush to care much about you. (It's pretty impressive how rampant Bush-hatred is in the Democratic Party.)

The irony is that we actually do have the talent to win the propaganda war, but most of that talent is on the left (a long story why but more true than I care to admit) and is sleeplessly focused on defeating Bush instead of actually putting their talent to positive use in the world.

I have also been suspicious all along of the bureacracy and incompetence of the CPA. The irony there is that given the freedom our country achieved before "big government" came into being in the middle of the last century, we have actually been somewhat content to accept this level of incompetence. It's a sort of "warehousing" of our incompetents -- most (not all of course!) of our really smart people are in the private sector, not the government bureaucracy. And the private sector is where our good "quality of life" stems from primarily.

I have linked you on my blog and will do all I can to support your cause!

My apologies for this mess and my pledge to do what I can,
Bob Gronlund

UPDATE: A very interesting comment I found on Alaa's blog:

I have faith in the Iraqi people. Six thousand years of history, the first written laws, the first writing, I don't think the first democracy in the Middle East is so farfetched.

And I would add the removal of their throats -- however tentatively -- from under one of the most horrific "metal boots" in the history of the planet! Why do you think the Eastern Europeans "got it" about Iraq far more than the Western Europeans? Could it be because they too know the clank of the metal boot? Check out Vaclav Havel for instance...

Promising New Iraqi Blog

Read it and weep:

Al Jazira, Al Arabiya and the like are still, after six months of the fall of the idol, the main sources of information in the country. The G.C. members, all accomplished speakers and orators, hardly talk to the people. They might appear occasionaly on the arab channels.

This is far more dangerous than what you think. These channels are almost directing operations of "insurgency". For instance, as soon as some information is broadcast about oil being pumped on a certain line, you can be certain it is sabotaged the next day, not to mention showing tapes from Saddam, Bin Laden, and various "resistance groups" colorfully poising for the photo holding their RPJ's and threatening every body with death and damnation. Even their method of reporting is highly subversive. For example: When IP stations are attacked, the reporter never fails to add that this is done because these are "collaborators".

An Iraqi Sattelite Station must immediately be started, and all the talented well known Iraqis who are eminently capable to run it and counter attack this massive propaganda campaign by the enemy, recalled and recruited. The Station should beam long hours and compete effectively and present the information in the flamboyant and spicy style appropriate to the mass taste of the iraqi populace. [Emphasis added.]

(Hat tip to Totten.) More illustration that our ossified bureaucracies are risibly incompetent at anything resembling a battle for hearts and minds.

Adding the Belmont Club to my links -- interesting stuff...

TODAY'S REMINDER: A holocaust survivor was asked what one lesson he had learned from those horrific events. His simple reply -- "When a man tells you that he intends to kill you ... believe him.".

Today the Israelis proved to the world that they did not learn anything from the Holocaust and are not committed to their own survival by agreeing to a hostage trade with a terrorist organization that is blatantly and loudly dedicated to the destruction of the Israeli state.

Oh, and did I mention that Hizb'Allah have the blood of at least 241 American soldiers on their hands? It's just laughable that Reagan is considered a hateful warmonger by the left when he didn't even do anything to fight back against the Marine barracks atrocity.

You may wonder why the name Mughniyah keeps popping up on this blog -- here's a summary:

Whenever someone says Hezbolla, remember this name: Imad Mughniyah- this man, and remember his name, is the head of Hezbollah's terror operations. He has a $25 million price on his head; he should, he is the most skilled terror operative in the world. Mughniyah murdered Robert Steatham on flight 847 and was the planner of a bombing attack that killed 241 US marines.

And I'll be greatly surprised if he doesn't turn out to be behind many of the largest atrocities in Iraq as well...

The other speech that day is not that long and you should read it.

Interesting panel this morning on Stephanopoulos' "thisweek" included Zacharia, Will, Perle and Holbrook. Good discussion and reasonably balanced and civil. They ended the program talking about the difficulty of building democracy in Iraq and Will pointed out analogously -- by way of illustrating the perilousness and long-term nature of the situation -- that we're still not done reforming Mississippi [in so many words].

Perle got the closing point in on the discussion: "It took a long time to reform Mississippi -- it took a war to free the slaves".

Then there's the most interesting parallel to this little meander in the discussion that drifted off into slavery: "Slavery is part of Islam". Read it and weep ... Abe Lincoln also took a "world-historical" gamble with the civil war -- he didn't have to do it and took massive grief and second guessing right up until final victory...

Just got around to reading Kagan's "Of Paradise and Power" which is primarily focused on the modern American / European relationship and how we got here. I should have promoted it in my stack a while ago. It's very much in the tradition of Aron and Bruckner. Very powerful and insightful -- probably the best book I've read this year! Watch for some killer references to start popping up...

More later...