Just ask a pundit
So as part of this here ‘Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week’ the very scholarly and thoughtful Ann Coulter spoke at USC.
“There’s always a conflict of interest when people who hate America are asked to lead it,” Coulter said about the Democrats’ midterm election victory…Organizers of the week, both at USC and across the country, said the goal of such speeches is to increase discourse on an issue of national importance.
By inviting Ann Coulter? She’s a (bad) stand-up comic; she doesn’t do discourse, she does silly trash-talk.
Though organizers praised Coulter for her brash personality and bold, attention-grabbing statements, some critics say these characteristics are a detriment to promoting thoughtful discourse on controversial issues…Some attendees said Coulter’s polemic remarks are appropriate for a political pundit. “She’s not a centrist,” Ceren said. “Her job is not to persuade; it is to speak to the faithful … Her job is to express a conservative viewpoint.”
Her ‘job’? She doesn’t have a job, at least not at USC she doesn’t. And what’s a political pundit? And what makes her one? She’s not a ‘pundit,’ she’s just an entertainer.
And a somewhat confused one.
Coulter, self-admittedly notorious for making controversial and offensive remarks,…addressed the threat of religious fundamentalism….Coulter has recently been in the press for comments on converting Jews to Christianity that many interpreted as anti-Semitic. Coulter told CNBC anchor Donny Deutsche that Jews need to be “perfected” by becoming Christian.
Well, that’s the threat of religious fundamentalism dealt with then.
From my view at the far end of the Earth I’m surprised Anne Coulter is taken so seriously. Although she is free to express her own opinions, I’ve never read anything from her that makes much sense. I suggest B&W does the smart thing and ignore her. Why bother to comment.
Well, one reason to comment is that it’s very topical: David Horowitz has been getting a lot of press for his “Islamofascism Awareness Week,” and the collection of mostly extremist right wing ideologues and war-mongers he gathered to speak for the event betray an agenda that has more in common with fascist political ideals than opposition to them. I’d say that’s worth talking about.
Well, of course only those moslems on the other end of the planet can be fundamentalists. People like Ann Coulter are just good old-fashioned salt-of-the-earth Christians.
See?
What G said – that’s why. I don’t normally pay any attention to Coulter, but at the moment she’s relevant.
G. Facist ideals dont you ever give it a rest!
dzd The only flaw in your position is that Coulter dosnt go of like a fire cracker in crowded piza parlours.
I’ll give it a rest when the hate-filled, war-mongering forces of the right (Coulter is just an especially fine example) give it a rest, Richard. Until then, I’ll continue to analyze and criticize their inhumane ideology, dishonest rhetoric, and audacious lies. And you, no doubt, will continue to swallow their lies whole cloth as long as those lies agree with your preconceptions.
And has it occurred to you that the mere fact that Ann Coulter only advocates killing people rather than personally killing people is not really much of a defense of her character? Most ideologues don’t personally kill anyone, after all: They prefer other people to do the actual killing and dying, for the most part.
KB, extremist ideals are so much more simple, they come already perverted. It is when you are advocating, let’s say… a more nuanced approach that you risk being co-opted by the kooks.
And then you are still being accused of pandering to the extremists… by not being extremist enough I suppose.
Galloway is in many ways a very good example of a Coulter for the left, media friendly, very good debater and rhetorician and the embodiment of the lowest common moral denominator of his political wing.
It’s depressing really, one would have hoped that the advent of the “information age” would have produced a more media savvy generation, one less receptive of the old mass manipulation techniques.
Richard, you’re commenting a lot so I’m going to ask you again: please use Word to write your comments and use it to correct your spacing and spelling, then copy the comment here. Your comments are harder to read than they need to be. Please don’t tell me you don’t know how to copy and paste: it’s very easy to find directions, by googling for instance. (I would email you but you don’t leave an address, so I can’t.)
You know, Richard, when it comes to the likelihood of terrorist attacks in America, I would be several times more worried about white male right-wingers (e.g. Tim McVeigh, Ted Kaczynski, Terry Nichols than Ann’s dusky boogeymen.
Not to mention that there are much more insidious and effective ways of destroying a nation’s ideals than with bombs.
“Galloway is in many ways a very good example of a Coulter for the left.”
Who would be most annoyed by the comparison, do you think? Galloway or Coulter?
dzd you didnt notice that aeroplane thing then on 9/11? O.B I will try but to me this stuff is as hard as it would be for most people to fit their own bathroom or plaster a ceiling.
G. look for some reason you seem to mis my point you dont have to hate or label people you disagree with, tell me other than say Chuck Hagel do you think any centre right figure in the U.S is not a hate filled extremest? apart from anything else your labels are usualy inacurate, for instance you have labeled me a white working class bigot,a theocrat,right wing Hannity clone,someone who wants the goverment to restrict abortion,where as I vote labour I am agnostic and pro choice.
Finally, a solid example. Yes, Richard, I would say that Senator Chuck Hagel (R – Nebraska) is a good example of someone who actually IS on the center right, and with whom I can *respectfully* disagree. Arlen Specter would be another. David Horowitz – who, before he got on the Islamofascism bandwagon, was campaigning to enact state laws that would force universities to hire more right wing ideologues in the name of “balance” and “free speech” – is not an example of someone on the center right.
And Richard, I never “label” you as anything: I respond to the things you actually write. Sometimes, if I respond repeatedly, you’ll say something clearly enough that I can agree with some of what you say. But mostly I disagree, and you respond to my often painfully clear and detailed explanations of why I think you’re mistaken by spouting more unclear rhetoric. If you genuinely think my disagreement is based on a misunderstanding, you should try to say what you meant more clearly instead of accusing me of twisting what you say or “labeling” you: You admit that you don’t express yourself clearly, then you blame others for misunderstanding you. Do you really wonder why I (and OB, and others) often just lose patience with you?
This is very frustrating, because I suspect that you really are trying to engage in a dialog – but you refuse to follow any of the rules that govern a meaningful exchange of ideas. I present facts and arguments, you respond with rhetorical questions and irrelevant comparisons. I try to clarify my position and define terms, you respond by confusing the issue and bringing up some point that seems entirely unrelated (to anyone outside the confines of your skull). That’s why I mostly stopped arguing with you entirely, unless I can use your comments as a springboard to say something that’s on my mind.
Which brings me back to this “labeling” accusation…
I use strong words about people and ideas when I’ve already shown that their own words and actions deserve those strong words: I didn’t just *call* David Horowitz an extremist right wing political hack, I talked about and linked to things Horowitz has said and done that *show* he is in fact an extremist right wing political hack – such as his ridiculous claims that Ann Coulter is just a satirist and doesn’t really mean the crazy things she says; and that Rick Santorum doesn’t have an ounce of hate in his whole body; and so on.
When you accuse me of “labeling” my enemies, you apparently mean to imply that I am attaching these words – war-monger, ideologue, extremist – to people who don’t really deserve those labels. But they DO deserve those labels, and I generally only use such strong language when either the context of discussion or my own arguments have already SHOWN that they deserve those labels. So if you disagree with my “labels,” it is your responsibility to offer some ACTUAL REASONS WHY I’M WRONG instead of just whinging about it.
If you really do want to engage in dialog, Richard, you MUST offer some kind of argument to support your disagreements. Otherwise, you’re just sounding off like a confused right wing parrot: And I say “right wing” because, no matter how many times you’ve voted labour, you keep writing things in these comments that might as well be direct quotes from right wing radio or websites. If you don’t mean what you write to sound that way, then take more time to think about how to write what you mean – or don’t write anything.
G. so just two centre right figures are not hate filled extremests, no your links show nothing of the sort they show centre right people advancing their agenda,by your reasoning they would label you as a left wing shill and hate monger, look I am well aware that I have the writing skills of a 12 year old and that is why I get so pissed of when someone with your gifts resorts to name calling,for example O.B only ever scorches ideas not people and that I like!
Also G. it is counter productive for example a while back I had a discusion with you about faith based belief and belief based on reason, In that discusion for some reason you avoided personal insults and labels and I was all but convinced by your argument, although I didnt agree with all your conclusions it gave me a great deal of food for thought. In my opinion terms like facist, hate monger ect should be reserved for the likes of Phelps,Irving,Duke,Farakan and other such low life pond scum it should not aply to twits like Santorum or right wing shills(appropiate label) like coulter otherwise the terms become meaningless!
Richard: ” In my opinion terms like facist, hate monger ect should be reserved for the likes of Phelps,Irving,Duke,Farakan and other such low life pond scum it should not aply to twits like Santorum or right wing shills(appropiate label) like coulter otherwise the terms become meaningless!”
The important thing to realise is they ARE meaningless, to you and me Richard, because the people using them are indulging the usual projection of the self-righteous activist.
The role of the words is less to create descriptive meaning than to display the high moral status of the speaker. The speaker defines his ‘acceptable’ people by those who agree with using them, and the rest of us are henceforth either irrelevant or enemies. What the PC call ‘Othering’.
I find Coulter every bit as shrill and empty as that anti-war activist lot, because she is doing the same as them. HOWEVER, she has not directly profiteered from Saddam’s stolen Oil for Food money or perverted the course of justice as he has. She is probably more harmful, because while everyone but the loonies have written off Galloway, Coulter has standing among some people.
Fair point Cris.
“so just two centre right figures are not hate filled extremests”
No, Richard, I didn’t say that just those two people count. Rather, I agreed with you that you finally found a legitimate example of the right center position, whereas everyone you described as “center right” previously had struck me – because of their own rhetoric – as being much more of an extremist right winger. I not only agreed with your example, I then offered another example. If I think Hager and Specter are good EXAMPLES of center right politicians (as I showed by my repeated use of the word “example”), then I obviously must think there are MORE than just those two who qualify.
So your response constitutes another example of the kind of crap I am sick to death of reading from you. I say something very simple and clear, and you attribute something else entirely to me. You accuse me of doing that to you, but you can never give a clear example of me doing so. (There’s that word again, example.) Now I am giving you a clear example of the dishonest rhetoric you engage in, and no doubt you will deny it, or ignore it, or offer excuses of how you’re just a bad writer, or claim to have misunderstood. I am not inclined to accept any more excuses, though. Your cheap tricks are just too darned obvious, and too often repeated.
ChrisPer: Does every person who ever has strong opinions and states those opinions in straightforward language count as someone engaged in “self-righteous progection” according to your standards? Or just people you disagree with? I’m curious, because it seems to me that the accusation of self-righteousness and projection can easily be nothing more than a cheap rhetorical move – especially when it doesn’t actually accompany any kind of argument. The way you phrase it here, it seems as if anyone actually passionate enough to be an activist in the first place would display what you call “the usual projection of the self-righteous activist.”
“Projection,” in case you’re unclear, means accusing someone else of displaying behavior or character traits that you clearly display yourself. So where have I done even one of the things I have accused David Horowitz or Ann Coulter or whomever of doing? I could understand saying, for example, that George Galloway would definitely be projecting if he were to accuse someone else of engaging in empty rhetoric or ignoring unpleasant realities. Indeed, I’d be the first to agree. But I certainly don’t think I’ve said anything to indicate that I agree with George Galloway, or think like he does about any subject. So please, enlighten me with your insights about where I am engaging in projection. Again, I’m curious.
G, I am just othering the class of people who use those terms about people who in the plain meaning do not merit them. As a purported Right-wing death beast and KKK-loving racist atavistic gun monkey, I am used to people thinking their language is normal because everyone they know thinks the same way.
If your writing exhibits the characterisics i am speaking of, you are welcome to examine your attitudes and decide for yourself if they include elements of projection. Mine do… it goes with activist attitudes.
Very neat bit of circular silliness there, ChrisPer. Keep that sense of humor.
No really, keep it. It’s all yours. No need to share.
;-)
G
G. Sorry that was a cheap shot you are right you did say examples.
G: “Projection,” in case you’re unclear, means accusing someone else of displaying behavior or character traits that you clearly display yourself.
Actually, it is a lot bigger than that. It is a defense mechanism, ie not a mental illness. In defining allegiances to groups people assign evils (including their own) to groups seen as ‘outside’, and good (even undeserved) to their own ‘side’. Human bodies deliver a rush of delicious brain chemicals when we attack the ‘other side’ – a psychoactive reinforcement of aggression, and the ‘fight or flight’ thing is quite thrilling.
The reward comes whether or not you are just or truthful.
The more emotion, the better the reward for activists of every allegiance.
I don’t buy that explanation for several reasons, ChrisPer – but I’ll limit myself to a few of them.
(1) Your explanation is firmly rooted in the science of making-it-up-as-you-go-along. You are reducing complex sociological and psychological phenomena to a vastly oversimplified but plausible-sounding neurochemistry just-so story. Real neurochemists, sociologists & psychologists know it ain’t that simple. Yes, little bits and pieces of the science are in place – but nothing like the vast swathes of knowledge of the workings of human brains individually and human groups collectively that would need to be in place to justify the off-the-cuff explanation you just gave.
(2) Even if neurochemistry had advanced to the point where it could actually back up the story you tell, it would still be the wrong level of explanation. ALL human behavior must necessarily be associated with rushes of brain chemicals in various regions of the brain – some of which have been identified. But that in and of itself isn’t a distinction. The rush of seratonin (or whatever) might come to the exact same part of the brain for any behavior that helps establish group identity, not just attacking an out-group – so it would not be an explanation of the particular sub-heading of projection you’re talking about.
(3) Also, this kind of reductionist explanation ignores distinctions that are not merely significant, but crucial. You gloss over every difference in HOW one goes about establishing group identity that we do and ought to care about. Your explanation makes no distinction: Some might define their allegiances by deception of the in-group and slander of the out-group, while others define their allegiances through collective pursuit of worthy goals and engaging those who oppose those goals in reasoned debate – and lots and lots in between. Your “rush of delicious brain chemicals” would happen identically inside the skulls of Ann Coulter and the Dalai Lama.
The reward may come whether or not you are truthful, but that doesn’t mean that being truthful doesn’t matter. An explanation that doesn’t make any distinction or acknowledge any difference between honesty and deceit just isn’t relevant to the discussion that we were having about political pundits and such, which was all about deception and manipulation.
In short, truth matters.
Ya know, someone oughtta write a book about that…
Excellent post G!
All true. EXCEPT that you imply that I need to have the entirety of brain science down to justify over-simplified claims like mine above.
It isn’t necessary. I may have only a layman’s knowledge, but I think Pinker’s and Cialdini’s books (for instances) were a pretty good start, and pop-psy like ‘Families and how to survive them’ gave me some good hints on where to start reading. The psychology of activism and social conflict became my interest some years ago, and if you have some good book/paper recommendations I will be pleased to learn more.
Meanwhile, I agree that truth does matter and its great that someone wrote a book about it.
Pity that activists can be so sloppy with truth, framing it so aggressively – I wonder what the physiological and evolutionary bases of that are?
I don’t mean those oversimplified claims should be enough to satisfy you,G. I mean that this is a comment on a blog, not Letters to ‘Nature’. It represents my opinion, that there is a clear behaviour pattern in activism (left and right) that has nothing to do with truth or justice, and is driven at several levels by non-rational reward systems.
I didn’t mean that YOU personally have to justify those claims: I was more saying that the scientific evidence necessary for your claims to be justified by anyone – by the collective efforts of scientists in general – do not currently exist and may never exist. I was using the word “justify” in a strong sense of scientific justification for conclusions, not the ordinary sense of providing an argument to back up a claim in conversation. But I wasn’t all that clear on that point – so I’m clarifying now. :-)
As to the rest of your response: I have real problems with Pinker and most of the ev psych crowd. Lots of bad science going on there. But you’re right, these are blog comments and there’s only so deep one can go – and the critique of ev psych is WAAY too complicated to go into here. Maybe after the dissertation, and that other book project I’ve been thinking about…
There’s one aspect of this where I’m not sure whether you just disagree or you’re missing my point. It hinges on this notion: “there is a clear behaviour pattern in activism (left and right) that has nothing to do with truth or justice, and is driven at several levels by non-rational reward systems.”
At one level, I don’t have a problem with that. I mean, activism as a social/collective activity is bound to have some aspects – indeed not just “some,” but “many” or “most” – that have nothing to do with truth or justice, and are driven by all sorts of non-rational things (not just reward systems). I still think that glosses over a crucial point. Let me try to explain it another way…
Goals matter. In the U.S. in the 50s and 60s, a great deal of activism focused on race, and there were activists of many different types using many different approaches on both sides. Ultimately, for all the variety in activist methodology and such, there were two basic sides: There were activists fighting for equal rights for all citizens regardless of their skin color, and activists fighting to maintain a system of racial segregation and second-class citizenship for blacks. The truth and justice in that (or any other) sociopolitical conflict isn’t primarily found in what you call “behaviour patterns” of the activists engaged in it, it’s found in the GOALS of their activism.
So far, I think you’d agree. But that ain’t all there is to it, because GOALS necessarily influence means. For example, creationist activists aren’t liars because they’re people of bad character or whatever.* It’s just that the nature of their goals is such that honest means cannot possibly achieve those goals: Creationists MUST lie – about the nature and practice of science, about concrete facts, about what scientists say, about the law, and on and on.
I think that being on the side of truth (the creation/evolution battle) and justice (the battle for civil rights) gives one both the means and the motivation to take the high road in terms of behavior as well. (And I mean not just believing that you are – because each of us is the hero of our own story – but actually being on the side of truth and justice.) So while there may be certain patterns of behavior that are shared by activists on both sides of a political conflict, there are lots and lots of actual behaviors (lying, lynching) that will not be and cannot be shared by activists on both sides. Oh, not everyone who has the high road available will take it, and not everyone limited to the low road will get equally muddy – but in general, it makes a difference that I think you’re mistaken to gloss over with your insistence that all activists are basically alike.
If I’m on the side of right, I don’t need to vilify my opponents (although I may occasionally do so for the exercise): I just need to point out the horrible things my opponents are actually saying and doing.
*I certainly don’t rule out that bad people are attracted to bad goals, but that’s quite beside the point I’m pursuing here.
G, all good again; nothing wrong with any of that.
I would merely add that there are a lot of activists fields where being ‘right’ becomes a status display not a matter of objective truth.
You used the words “if I am on the side of right I don’t need to vilify my opponents” and this is true. But surely these terms have a certain something:
-mostly extremist right wing ideologues
-in common with fascist political ideals
-hate-filled
-war-mongering forces
-inhumane ideology
-dishonest rhetoric
-audacious lies
-swallow their lies whole cloth
-advocates killing people
-ideologues (who) prefer other people to do the actual killing and dying
These terms are loaded with emotion, calling mere opposition views by words suitable to regimes that produce genocide, mass political imprisonment and torture of their own citizens.
Well, we are agreed its just a blog comment and not a big deal but to me that is language of vilification. The words ‘on the side of right’ are actually pretty symbolic of what I am talking about. Its that language of alignment and identity; “I am on the side of right, so…”.
My social rewards are the same, my excitement and involvment are the same whether my claims are true or not; indeed in monocultures there is more social and physiological reward for higher conflict levels, and complex truths are unwanted when slogans can be more effective in sharpening the conflict.
You say vilification, I say accuracy. If people with the aims and ethics of Horowitz and company actually were to end up in charge of things, I believe that it would lead to mass genocide and political imprisonment and all the rest. In brute point of fact, people with their ideological perspective are already in charge, and torture is being carried out by the U.S. right now – which is morally reprehensible, period. (I find it interesting that you qualified your mention of torture with “of their own citizens” as if that mattered a great deal. It doesn’t.)
One cannot accurately describe some ideas and behavior without using words loaded with emotion. Emotionless clinical detachment and altogether morally neutral terminology used in response to or description of vile behavior that advances self-serving & other-harming goals is itself be a form of manipulation and deceit – and I have seen it used as such many times.
And notice that I used the phrase “the side of right” with a conditional: If one is on the side of right, deceitful manipulation and slander of one’s enemies is not necessary. The flip side of that is, in my experience, that you can spot the people with evil goals by how much deceit and slander they engage in. Those ellipses in your phrasing are the important part, not the introductory clause: When someone says anything that has the implication of “I am on the side of right, so..,” what follows the “so” is where the actual content lies that will tell you whether or not the speaker is indeed on the side of right.
Every time I bring up morality in any way in this discussion, you either dodge it or reduce it to mere positioning and rhetoric and the psychology of group identity. I begin to get the impression that deep down inside (or maybe right at the surface) you think that all moral language – and morality itself – is merely a matter of opinion or perspective. I think that way madness and chaos lie.
G:”I begin to get the impression that deep down inside (or maybe right at the surface) you think that all moral language – and morality itself – is merely a matter of opinion or perspective. I think that way madness and chaos lie.”
I don’t get nearly enough opportunity to exchange rational talk with people who disagree with my politics, so I appreciate your effort with me G.
Now, you have moved by suspicion from my ‘some’ to be ‘all’ moral language is subjective.
As I said to someone when I made it clear I had picked a side in Middle East politics, its pretty easy to decide which side is moral when you see disembowelled women, a baby’s head bashed in with a rifle butt, and civilian innocents blown to pieces in the marketplace. The side that does that is the OTHER side. The side that supports that is the OTHER side.
Whereas in the case here, neither of us are either committing or supporting such crimes. Instead, I have looked for a reason why so many people seem to think they are speaking truth when they accuse people of that level of moral culpability, merely for being a person who might screw up an attempt to STOP those crimes.
It is – or was – a puzzle, but I think my model explains it OK. The phrase that seems to work is ‘moral status display’.
“Instead, I have looked for a reason why so many people seem to think they are speaking truth when they accuse people of that level of moral culpability, merely for being a person who might screw up an attempt to STOP those crimes.”
Well that’s a very tendentious way to characterize the situation. Firstly, there is no “might screw up.” The Bush administration, their neocon backers and cheerleaders, and all the people I’ve been railing against quite simply HAVE ALREADY screwed up (or supported and advised those who screwed up). They largely abandoned Afghanistan (where they had actually done some good and were doing ongoing good) for a military adventure in Iraq that has created far more terrorism than it has stopped, not to mention killing of tens of thousands of ordinary Iraqis who were just trying to live their lives. And then there are the tortures and murders, both by the U.S. forces directly and by their unsupervised, unaccountable, and highly profitable paramilitary employees. (Blackwater is just the tip of that ugly iceberg, I guarantee you.) And now they want to spread those crimes to Iran – and there is every reason to think (and no reason to doubt that I’ve seen) that Islamofascism Awareness Week’s primary purpose was to drum up support for that Iran war.
Secondly, your claim that the reasons for my attack (or really, anyone’s attack) on Horowitz/Coulter/Hannity/Santorum/etc. and their IAW bash is merely the belief that they might screw up in their attempts to oppose terrorism is not merely false, it’s an absurd caricature. In fact, I think it’s my cue that this discussion is no longer worth my time and effort.
“As I said to someone when I made it clear I had picked a side in Middle East politics, its pretty easy to decide which side is moral when you see disembowelled women, a baby’s head bashed in with a rifle butt, and civilian innocents blown to pieces in the marketplace. The side that does that is the OTHER side. The side that supports that is the OTHER side.”
The problem with this argument is that both sides in the various conflicts currently underway in the Middle East do these kinds of things. From bombs in crowded marketplaces to bulldozers deliberatelym running over peace protestors. Terrorist attacks on convoys versus entire cities leveled by aerial bombing campaigns. I’m afraid your formula is simplistic and doesn’t offer much guidance.
As for the accuracy of G’s labeling of much of the far right wing, I might heartily recommend the Orcinus blog, whose proprietor monitors the eliminationist rhetoric coming out of the far right wing in the United States. Coulter and her ilk ARE calling for elimination of opponents. Michelle Malkin is calling for all Arab-Americans to be rounded up into camps. They don’t even hide it very well anymore, because they know that one more terrorist event will stampede this country into becoming another Gilead.
Well, G, I agree that the ‘might screw up’ was tendentious, but I was trying to avoid implying they were effective and humanitarian, which would not fit with your descriptive framework at all.
Just curous – do you use labels like that about the so-called insurgents? Do you describe their actions and ideals in terms of fascism, mass murder, rape and crimes against humanity?
Brian, do Orcinus also monitor the sly calls for assassination of Bush and Cheney?
I have read Michelle Malkin from time to time, and there is a long walk from her positions to your assertion. I never read Coulter if I can help it, but she would have no support whatever among the centre righties if she called for eliminating political opponents. That is a (rare) blog comments kind of thing, not to be confused with headline calls by the blog owner – whether its Malkin, LGF, Kos or Huffpo.
As for the middle east, you say
“both sides in the various conflicts currently underway in the Middle East do these kinds of things. From bombs in crowded marketplaces to bulldozers deliberatelym running over peace protestors. Terrorist attacks on convoys versus entire cities leveled by aerial bombing campaigns.”
I turned against Israel after Mohammed al Dura was martyred. Then over the years since, I have got a clearer picture of the effects of selection bias and media framing. Our news system is creating a false picture based in engineered indignation, not founded on reality. Where I had said “A pox on both their houses” I now believe the media have chosen neutrality between good and evil. It is unintentionally effective to facilitate evil.
ChrisPer: What insurgents? Do you mean the terrorists in Iraq? I find it odd that someone of your perspective would use the sanitized terminology of the mainstream media to describe people who are in fact engaging in violence (everything from bombings to old fashioned murder in the streets, aimed at other Iraqis as often or more often than foreign troops) intended to terrorize people into doing what they demand – the very definition of terrorism.
You ask the question, but you ask it in a particularly rhetorical fashion that makes it seem as if you’re assuming an awful lot about my views on matters I haven’t addressed. Or at least, that I haven’t addressed in this particular discussion. Clearly you missed my argument with someone else in the comments on this post about why Islamofascism is in fact an accurate descriptive term. I now agree that the term is tainted by those who are making political hay with it, but that doesn’t make it any less accurately descriptive.
This is what a black and white, enemies and allies perspective on complex political issues gets you, ChrisPer: You put people in little pigeonholes that shapes how you think of them much more than the views and arguments they actually express. Just because I’ve concluded (based on the evidence of their own behavior) that Horowitz et al are deceptive manipulators with evil goals doesn’t mean that I support the Islamofascists.
Stalin opposed Hitler, but that didn’t make him a good Joe. ;-)
“I have read Michelle Malkin from time to time, and there is a long walk from her positions to your assertion.”
What are you talking about? She wrote an entire book arguing that internment of the Japanese was justified and should be extended to Arabs today! Abd no, I refuse to admit that she” has a point.” Look at who really helped the rise of Nazism (or Tojo) and it would be many members of our business elite who should have been interned at Manzanar, not some Japanese gardener!
Thanks G; I stand illuminated, though not necessarily chastened.
Well Brian I hadn’t heard that she advocated internment for all muslims.
I read a review of that book, though, and it appeared that she challenged the Snow Falling on Cedars style pc version of history, that there was no justification for the internment of the Japanese residents/citizens, and that they were horribly oppressed by that.
My impression was that the book made a case that there was another side to that story, based on historical evidence.
We had similar in Australia in WWII. It was certainly true that there were agents and local fascist enthusiasts among the interned and that many were completely innocent.
Also cris the intelligence that F.D.R was getting at the time was telling him that Japanese spys had provided imformation for Pearl Harbour (could be some truth to this)and that a Japanese invasion of the west coast was imminent, it wasnt untill 1944 that the American military and their intel understood the logistics involved in mounting an amphibious asault on a hostile coast,looking back of course the Japanese could not have mounted such a masive operation at that time, but that is with the benefit of hind sight which is always 20/20.
Again, though: look who helped fund the Nazi Party and were vocally in favor of Germany up until the eve of War. (Hint: the grandfather of a gentleman currently commonly known as “W” was closely tied to german industrial interests and the rise of the Nazi Party.). Yet, somehow, the Henry Fords and the Prescott Bushes, and the Alfred Sloans were not interned, it was the Japanese.
I don’t care if there were scattered Japanese agents. One does not throw an entire population, including thrid generation citizens, into a camp because of racist imaginings and the likes of Malkin. Or, the geopolitical goals of FDR.
Heck, given the abortion clinic bombings, the Timothy McVeighs, the operation Rescue histrionics, should’t the United States be currently rounding up fundamentalist Baptists, along with the dusky hordes you right wingers are so fearful of?
Sorry to be so histrionic, but I cannot believe anyone would actually entertain the thought that Manzanar was in any justifiable. That just buggers my imagination.
What’s Manzanar? Never mind I’ll google it.
As for rounding up fundie Baptists, whats with the ‘eliminationist rhetoric’? It might be more effective to intern sub-editors and TV news producers to reduce terrorism, for they acitvely choose behavoiours that facilitate, reward and teach it.
Yesterday a woman jumped from her apartment building holding her child, killing the child; and an Australian soldier suicided in barracks in East Timor. Why? Because the media the day before threw out the suicide prevention guidelines over a pretty newsreader who jumped off a cliff in Sydney. The massacres in schools, family suicide-murders and ordinary suicides are all ideated partly via media reporting.
Intern news producers! Its for the CHILDREN!
It’s not for nothing that, here in the states,
USC=University of Spoiled Children