Universal Declaration of Fascist Rights

Human rights – ah, what a wonderful concept! If you like the Western ideas about human rights – the ones found in the US Constitution and Declaration of Independence – you’ll love the Arab Charter on Human Rights, especially because it is about to be adopted as official policy by the United Nations.

Take this sentence for example, right there in paragraph 5 of the introduction:

“Rejecting all forms of racism and Zionism, which constitute a violation of human rights and a threat to international peace and security..."

But not to worry, the Arab states have all agreed to:

“To place human rights at the centre of the key national concerns of Arab States, making them lofty and fundamental ideals that shape the will of the individual in Arab States and enable him to improve his life in accordance with noble human values.” [1,1]

Well, that’s a relief. I really like that part about “noble human values”. What might those be?

‘All peoples have the right to national sovereignty and territorial integrity.” [1,2]

Sounds good, no? We could really go for that. But …

“All forms of racism, Zionism and foreign occupation and domination constitute an impediment to human dignity and a major barrier to the exercise of the fundamental rights of peoples; all such practices must be condemned and efforts must be deployed for their elimination.” [1,3]

We all know what “elimination” means. Ask Adolf if you’ve forgotten.

And let’s not forget the fundamental human right to blow people up and behead them, practice polygamy and Female Genital Mutilation, protect the family by “honor killings”, stone rape victims, chop off the hands of thieves, and, most important of all, to videotape the noble exercise of Arab human rights.

“All peoples have the right to resist foreign occupation.”

Now, before you catch a nasty case of Islamophobia, check out this:

“Men and women are equal in respect of human dignity, rights and obligations within the framework of the positive discrimination established in favour of women by the Islamic Shariah, other divine laws and by applicable laws and legal instruments. Accordingly, each State party pledges to take all the requisite measures to guarantee equal opportunities and effective equality between men and women in the enjoyment of all the rights set out in this Charter.” [3,3]

I really am impressed by the 1984-style Newspeak here, the way familiar words take on exactly the opposite meaning. First of all, what does an Arab Charter on Human Rights have to do with Islam and Shariah? Are all Arabs automatically Muslims? Well, if they aren’t yet, the jihadis are already out there in Lebanon, Israel, Iraq and the Palestinian-administered (there’s an oxymoron for you – “Palestinian” and “administered”) hard at work blowing people up to make sure it is true real soon now.

What about this lovely phrase “positive discrimination”? It doesn’t mean “affirmative action”, that’s for sure. It means a lot of religiously-sanctioned negative action, like shooting women who don’t cover themselves up in public from head-to-ground (as in Iran by the government and in Iraq by jihadi vigilantes). It means denying non-Muslims jobs, education and even cemeteries (Iran again, as well as Malaysia, Indonesia and a few other places).

As for “effective equality”, this means, among other lofty concepts, no jail time for brothers who murder their twelve year old sisters who “dishonor” the family by refusing to marry sixty year old Uncle Ahmed.

Did you know that, as late as the early 20^th century, Jews in Iran were not allowed to go out during the rain because the rainwater would become “unpure” when it landed on them and then good Muslims would be unable to drink it from the wells. That’s what “positive discrimination” and “effective equality” mean.

There’s a lot more, and you can read the whole pathetic document at http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/instree/loas2005.html?msource=UNWDEC19001&tr=y&auid=3337655.

And it is not one bit surprising that the United Nations is planning to adopt this Declaration of Fascist Rights as an official document, thus excusing all Arab states from complying with the UN’s own Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Another double standard favoring Islamic supremacism: dictatorship, oppression of women and no freedom of speech or press or anything else for Muslims, and democracy, equality for women and basic freedoms for everybody else, but only temporarily -- until the Islamic jihad overtakes us all.

The Audacity of Dopes

Hillary Clinton wants you to vote for her because of how good things were the last time she was President. John McCain wants you to vote for him because he is a genuine war hero.

And Barack Obama wants you to vote for him because he will bring “hope and change” into your life.

Why is it that laundry detergent commercials treat their viewers like intelligent people who can make reasoned decisions, but politicians, who are after all talking about issues slightly more serious than the mud stains on little Jimmy’s favorite Elmo T-shirt, treat voters as though they can’t understand a sentence with more than three words in it?

How stupid do these guys think voters are?

Did Obama really think nobody would notice the people he hangs around with? That his spiritual leader, that “cranky old uncle” of a pastor, is a rabid hate-monger racist who thinks that Louis Farrakhan is a role model for young people and that America got what it deserved on September 11^th? That no one would care that Obama has been at this church with this pastor for over twenty years, that he was married in this church by this pastor, that his children go to Sunday School in this church, that he asked for this pastor’s blessing before he decided to run for President, and that he donated $22,500 to the church in 2006? No sane person would listen to the race-baiting Reverend Wright for five minutes without walking out but Obama has been listening to him for more than twenty years, and he and his family are still listening.

Did Obama really think that nobody would wonder how it was that he had no problems buying land at a very favorable price from Tony Rezko, who he knew was under investigation by the U.S. attorney’s office and who has since been indicted for allegedly trying to collect nearly $6 million in kickbacks from government deals and trying to shake down a Hollywood producer for $1.5 million in campaign contributions. Obama and Rezko have been friends since 1990, and Rezko raised as much as $60,000 in campaign contributions for Obama. Why did the candidate of “hope and change” accept campaign contributions from Rezko and some of the other shady figures in the case?

Did Obama think nobody would ever wonder how an unknown, unheard-of, inexperienced minor politician could go in only three years ago from the Illinois Senate to the Democratic front-runner in the Presidential race? That nobody would ask who helped him along the way and why?

Did Obama think nobody would notice that among the $740 million of earmarks he requested, in only 3 years (!) in the US Senate, was $1 million for the hospital where his wife Michelle works, at about just the time she was promoted to VP (at a salary of over $300,000 a year), just about the time she finally decided she could be proud to be an American? That Obama cynically switched positions and voted for reforming the earmark privileges he had until only yesterday been so energetically abusing. Does Obama think nobody will demand to see the list of his earmarks from his days in the Illinois Senate?

Did Obama think nobody would ever ask him to spell out what exactly he means by “hope and change”?

Every once in a while an Eliot Spitzer comes along to remind us of Lloyd George’s observation that politicians are like monkeys; the higher they climb up the tree, the more revolting are the parts they expose.

Obama is exposing his contempt for the American people, his cynical belief that they are too stupid to ask the right questions, that they will swallow whole his meaningless slogans and empty promises, and that they will vote for him for no better reason than that he makes them feel good all over.

Now there’s audacity for you, the audacity of dopes.

The First War Israel Lost

by Samuel Z. Anvil

At the beginning of this latest chapter in Israel’s resistance to the global jihad – and let’s not be naïve: this war began with Mohammed’s conquest of Mecca fourteen hundred years ago and will continue until either there are no more infidels or no more Moslems – Nasrallah ridiculed Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and IDF Chief-of-Staff Dan Halutz as beginners, too inexperienced to outsmart the wily Nasrallah. Olmert’s impassioned speech to the Knesset a few days later, in which he set forth the country’s goals in the war and promised to fundamentally change the balance of power in the region, suggested that Nasrallah had miscalculated.

A month later, it looks like it was Olmert who miscalculated: he badly overestimated his own abilities to deliver on his promises. He is, after all, merely a well-oiled backroom politician who rose to his present position thanks to his skills in fighting the “wars of the Jews” – the endless internal squabbles of Israeli politics – and thanks too to the timing of Ariel Sharon’s stroke. His wife and daughter are prominent opponents of the political ideals he claims to represent, his sons did not bother to serve in the IDF, and his own IDF service consisted of writing for the puffy monthly Bamachene. He is no Winston Churchill.

Nasrallah may have been surprised by the initial ferocity of Olmert’s response to Hizballah’s kidnapping two Israeli soldiers, but he was not surprised by Olmert the man. Only the Israeli public was. Ever the weak-kneed politician, Olmert hesitated when he should have acted decisively, leapt in headfirst when he should have hesitated, in the end betrayed every one of the principles he vowed to fight for, and will surely claim a hollow victory in the face of abject defeat.

Some unanswered questions for Olmert:
· Why, despite repeated warnings by commanders in the field that the site of the kidnapping was an easily-exploitable blind spot, did the IDF continue to send useless patrols to that spot? Was there anything that these patrols were supposed to achieve that could not have been achieved equally well by a camera-equipped drone, or was it the IDF’s intent to lure Hizballah into a trap? And if so, who trapped whom?
· Why, when every child knows that Hizballah had massively mined the roads in South Lebanon – Nasrallah made no secret of it and many times proclaimed that Israeli tanks would be lured to their destruction – did the IDF send a tank (a slow moving tank!) in pursuit of the kidnappers, who everyone knew were long gone from the area and already out of reach?
· Why did the IDF bombing begin immediately? Why were no delaying tactics – for example, ultimatums and high-pressure diplomatic efforts – employed to give the IDF time to properly prepare the offensive? Did Olmert think Nasrallah was still setting at his desk, being interviewed by Mike Wallace, in the range of the IDF’s missiles? Did no one know about the Hizballah’s huge network of well-fortified bunkers?
· Why did Olmert bombastically declare that Israel would seek very ambitious goals, and did he base his confidence that these goals would be achieved on the assumption that the Lebanese people would get rid of Hizballah, that the Lebanese government, beholden as it is to Syria, would sacrifice Lebanese soldiers for the benefit of Israel?
· Why was the IDF unable, even after a month, to take Hizballah television and radio off the air? Should not this failure have suggested to the IDF that the Hizballah was very well prepared for this war, even if they were surprised by the timing?
· Why did Olmert ignore the simple truth that terrorist organizations are defeated only when they are totally defeated, not when they are only 90% or 80% defeated? Did he really expect that an air campaign would totally defeat Hizballah: kill every one of their soldiers, blow up every one of their bunkers and dry up every penny of their financing? Didn’t Olmert understand that all their losses – people and buildings and dollars – would be replaced within a year?
· Why did Olmert back down from every one of his declared goals? The prisoners have not been returned, Hizballah is still alive and well with all its weapons, still entrenched in the south, and the world order has not been changed in the slightest, except to Israel’s disadvantage.

Some unanswered questions for Olmert’s predecessors:
· Why was Hizballah allowed the luxury of six years to leisurely build its infrastructure? Were successive Israeli governments unaware of what Hizballah was doing, what it was preparing for? Was nobody listening when Nasrallah was talking? He spoke often and explicitly about his “hopes and dreams.” Did no one believe he was serious?
· Why was the lesson of “one sided concessions only make thing worse” learned only after the disengagement from Gaza? Was the withdrawal from Lebanon so successful that the Israeli government viewed it as a model for the future?

And finally, some unanswered questions for Olmert’s successor, who will probably take up office very soon:
· Mr. Prime Minister, since Hizballah has declared it will go on fighting as long as a single Israeli soldier remains in Lebanon – its commitment to the cease fire being restricted to firing missiles into Israel – how will Israel respond to the inevitable attacks on its soldiers while they wait to be replaced by the promised multi-national force?
· Do you really believe that the multi-national force or the Lebanese Army will fire a single bullet and endure a single casualty in pursuit of their commitment to disarm Hizballah? What will Israel do a few months from now, when it becomes clear to everyone – except perhaps to Shimon Peres – that Hizballah is staying right where it is, missiles and all, and that the international community is going to do absolutely nothing about it?
· The lesson the jihadis will learn from this war is that though Israel cannot be defeated by a conventional army of tanks, planes and infantry mounting a large scale invasion, Israel can be defeated by an entrenched irregular force which (1) fires missiles into Israeli cities, killing large numbers of civilians and doing massive damage to infrastructure, (2) lures Israeli soldiers into enemy territory in pursuit and kills large numbers of them with mines and hand-held anti-tank missiles, (3) enlists the aid of the main stream media – whether by threats or by just taking advantage of their built-in anti-Israel bias – to ensure the perception of a high number of “innocent civilian” casualties that will bring international pressure to bear, (4) retreats to a network of heavily fortified bunkers when threatened and (5) violates with impunity all agreements made to end the hostilities. The question: Mr. Prime Minister, our enemies have learned this lesson; have you?
· Will you also apply the lesson to the failed Gaza campaign?
· What will you do to restore the IDF’s image as a strong fighting force, the best in the world as some say?
· How will you restore Israel’s credibility with the US, which must surely be disappointed at the IDF’s defeat by Hizballah and regret its own support for the failed effort?

And finally, let’s not forget our kidnapped soldiers, even if the Israeli government has forgotten them.

In the end, the IDF underestimated Hizballah and the Israeli public overestimated Olmert and Halutz. The long knives will be coming out soon, and one can only hope that the smoke-filled back-rooms of Israeli politics will produce better leadership for the inevitable next round of this fourteen hundred year long war.

Yitzchak Rabin - Opening the Door to 9/11

by Sam Z. Anvil
It’s been ten years since Yitzchak Rabin, the Israeli Prime Minister, was assassinated by a right-wing zealot who thought Rabin’s death would put an end to the Oslo process.
Of course, the assassin was wrong. Instead of halting Oslo in its tracks, the murder galvanized it, because any criticism of Oslo, no matter how justified, was immediately recast into a justification of the crime of political murder and thus rejected out of hand. Oslo’s enthusiasts no longer had to defend the thinking behind Oslo or explain away its disastrous results (for example, Shimon Peres’ memorable “victims of peace”). They only had to point an accusing finger at the critic and cry “Murderer!”
Rabin’s assassin achieved exactly the opposite of his goal, just as Oslo achieved exactly the opposite of its goal: peace.
But although Oslo has been a complete failure, it did lead to something none of its proponents (except perhaps the wily mass-murderer Arafat) could have imagined: the attacks of September 11. Oslo was a great victory in the global jihad, proof that the little Satan Israel could be brought to its knees, so why not the Great Satan? Islamic terrorists all over the world got that message, even if Bill Clinton did not.
The accelerating decline and fall of the infidel: the massacre of American troops in Mogadishu, the surrender of the most powerful military force in the Middle East to a ragtag collection of “freedom fighters,” the humiliating handshake on the White House lawn between the Israeli chief-of-staff in the Six Day War and the unshaven unrepentant jihad warrior, the daring attack on the USS Cole – for this is the only “narrative” into which a Moslem would possibly fit these events – could mean only one thing: the once-mighty infidel empire was stumbling, and it was time to strike a blow to bring about the inevitable final victory.
Hence, 9/11.
For what else could have emboldened a religious fanatic to undertake an insane scheme of hijacking four airliners with box-cutters and crashing them into the symbols of infidel political, military and economic power? Only the belief that the act would not stand alone, that it would be another blow in a great jihad that was already succeeding, that there would be many more such blows, and the Great Satan and its puny client-state Israel would collapse under a hailstorm of crushing humiliating defeats and the era of Islamic world rule would be ushered in.
The fashionable politicians who gathered yesterday in Tel Aviv to mark the tenth anniversary of Rabin’s death could only repeat the timeworn cliché that peace in the Middle East is the legacy of Oslo.
But they are wrong. Oslo’s real legacy Oslo is 9/11.

Fear and Suspicion of “The Other” on the Rise in Nazi Germany

by Samuel Z. Anvil

This is how the liberals media might have reported from Nazi Germany toward the end of World War II.

Fear and Suspicion of “The Other” on the Rise in Nazi Germany

BERLIN (November 5, 1944) – Nazi Party officials have expressed fear that the stream of embarrassing revelations from relocation camps in Poland could further endanger the precarious rapprochement slowly emerging between German Jews and the much beleaguered political leadership of this country, now suffering through the fifth year of a devastating war with its increasingly militant neighbors.
Nazi Party officials are reluctant to speak publicly about what many perceive as a delicate problem – how to respond to the Jewish community’s criticism of camp management, and the whispered anonymous charges, thus far unsubstantiated, of the alleged mistreatment of Jewish workers.
But off the record, party officials are increasingly pessimistic about the future of Jewish-Nazi relations. “I wonder,” one senior official told me over a mug of watered-down rationed lager in the darkened air raid shelter of a local tavern as we awaited the deafening onslaught of what has become the nightly ritual of Allied carpet-bombing, “if we will ever be able to restore the level of happy trust and optimism of the first few months of the Thousand Year Reich.”
“There have, unfortunately,” he continued, as we listened for the drone of Allied bombers overhead, circling before dropping their thousands of tons of deadly payload on the frightened civilians huddling in crowded subway stations and dank air raid shelters below, “always been elements among the Jews who have not been eager to grasp the hand of friendship. We have tried, through re-education, through encouraging Jews to move with all their belongings to areas where they might be better able to isolate these extremists and prevent their poisonous hatred of the Fatherland from infecting all the Jewish people, but as you know, the definition of extremist is that nothing you do for him is ever enough. And now, with these so-called scandals emerging from the re-education facilities, I fear that the little progress we have made will evaporate - poof! This is a great danger for the Jews as well. They have to be strong, and resist these manipulations, or we cannot be held responsible for what might happen.”
“The stories we’ve been hearing,” I asked, trying as best I could to ignore the tension – thick enough to be cut by a knife – in this dark underground room where women and crying children held each other tight among the scurrying rats as they waited for the terrifying bombs to fall around them in what the League of Nations might have called War Crimes, “suggest that there are serious problems of mismanagement of human resources at these industrial campuses, or as the Jews call them, 'concentration camps.'”
“Always,” the official replied modestly, “in any industrial effort of any size, there are problems of mismanagement that are eventually corrected through the good faith efforts of all people to work together for the common good. But it seems that the Jews are focusing on the negative, and using these temporary problems as an excuse to throw up their hands and to give up. If they will only wait patiently, I assure you that soon there will be no more Jews to complain, I mean, that there will be no more for the Jews to complain about. Forgive please my bad English. You understand what I mean of course.”
“Of course,” I reassured him. “English can be a confusing language. I humbly and sincerely apologize that I don’t speak the noble German language of Goethe and Schiller.”
Our conversation was cut short by the first bomb that fell, perhaps not more than a few hundred feet away, possibly a direct hit on what might be a nearby orphanage, probably traumatizing the next generation of little Germans, ending forever the feeling of good will that once pervaded this long-suffering society, still reeling from the staggering indemnification penalties imposed by the triumphalist militaristic coalition that tore the ancient Prussian Empire to shreds and left in its place a people forever scarred by its brutal encounter with the rampant, merciless unbridled patriotism of the American heartland.

Imagine …

by Samuel Z. Anvil

Last week a Kasam missle fired by Palestinian terrorists in Gaza (a Palestinian-controlled area) killed two toddlers in the Israel town of Sderot. In response, Israel sent a force into Gaza and killed dozens of terrorists and their accomplices, including a number of UN employees.
Imagine if Israel were to adopt John Kerry’s approach to defense (http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/04/kerry.global/index.html):
“But I can do a better job of protecting America's security because the test that I was talking about was a test of legitimacy, not just in the globe, but elsewhere.”
This is what Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon would have done if he were following the Kerry doctrine.

1. Call President Jacques Chirac of France and tell him how upset he was, of course waiting until after President Chirac finished his croissant so as not to further strain the Israel-France relationship.
2. Hold a press conference and ask CNN to mention that there were Israeli victims too in the “cycle of violence”.
3. Withdraw Israeli troops from Israel and send them to Afghanistan to fight the “real war against terrorism”, and while they are there, to help OJ find the “real killer”.
4. Throw his military medals into the sea and accuse Israeli solders of raping Palestinian women.
5. Ask Kofi Anan to call an emergency session of the UN Security Council to please allow Israel to use the “terrorist” word.
6. Swear that he did not have sex with … sorry, that was the Clinton Doctrine.
7. Reduce Israel’s defense budget so as not to further enflame Palestinian public opinion.
8. Invite Yasser Arafat to a “hug the tensions away” sensitivity breakfast.
9. Find out what people are thinking “not just in the globe, but elsewhere” by contacting the little green men on Mars.
10. Ask German Prime Minister Schroeder to forgive the Jews for all the terrible things they said about German leaders during World War II and for Israel’s negligence in allowing the Munich massacre to take place on German soil.
11. Send his sister to Israeli expatriate communities and urge them to overthrow the Israeli government.
12. Ask Yasser Arafat for permission to breathe Palestinian air.
13. Demand that people stop questioning his patriotism.
14. And tomorrow, define a new "Sharon Doctrine".

President John F. Kerry

by Samuel Z. Anvil

With the liberal media falling all over themselves pushing the "hate America first" message, it’s time to confront the possibility that John Forbes Kerry will be the next president. What can we expect?
Let’s try to imagine what things will be like on November 4, 2005, a year after the election. President Kerry is having his hair blow dried, anxiously preparing for his 37th news conference, which he wants to devote to clarifying some of the things those damned Republicans claim he said at his 36th news conference last week, while he was trying to clarify his answers to questions at the 35th conference the week before that … you get the idea.
What’s troubling President Kerry? Well, things didn’t work out exactly as he had hoped, and he can’t understand why. He did everything he said he would – the first politician in US history who kept his campaign promises, but the polls are full of bad news.
President Kerry appointed a Michael Moore clone as Secretary of State and a Howard Dean clone as Secretary of Defense. He withdrew US troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, and apologized to the poor oppressed people of these countries for the crimes of George Bush. He sought dialogue with France and Germany and the United Nations, and the UN appointed European-approved governments for those “victim” countries. He carefully avoided fueling Islamic rage and held back judgmental criticism of Iran’s nuclear program.
President Kerry rolled back the Bush tax cuts, forced American companies to keep jobs in the United States, and abolished NAFTA. He packed the Supreme Court wall-to-wall with activist judges who see their role as legislating what Congress is too scared of those fundamentalist religious fruitcakes to do. He did everything the New York Times said he should do.
But after the election, people are still not happy. But why do they blame him? Sure, not everything that happened was 100 percent wonderful, but all those bad things were legacies of George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. It was so obvious that things like this were going to happen after that cowboy in the White House, who spent four years dividing America from its friends in Europe. There’s a limit even to the miracles the second president with the initials “JFK” can manage, even if he did serve in Vietnam, to undo the damage Halliburton did in its mad race for profits at any cost.
Now even the New York Times is unhappy. Go figure.
It’s just not fair that the polls show people are blaming President John Kerry. Don’t people understand that foreign policy is like ketchup? The good stuff moves very slowly, but eventually everything comes out OK. No use banging on the bottle.
As for Iran, those Bible-thumping evangelists are still whipping up emotions against that poor country, whose people suffered so much under the Shah. Nobody ever proved to anybody’s satisfaction, well to anybody that mattered anyway, that the missile had a nuclear warhead. Was there a UN resolution specifically forbidding Iran from firing missiles at Israel? Those poor Iranians went through a very painful war once, started by a Republican President. And for God’s sake, the missile landed in the ocean, missed Tel Aviv by miles, maybe killed a few fish – let Greenpeace worry about the damned fish. It’s not like any whales were killed.
So what if the International Atomic Agency whatever that certified that Iran is nuclear free -except for a few peaceful reactors - is headed by a guy named Mohammed? Does that mean you can’t take his word for it? We stopped doing profiling when we got rid of John Ashcroft.
And why did those trigger-happy Israelis have to react like that? Guess who they learned that from? Now President John Kerry has to clean up the mess.
The worst is that thanks to George Bush, the Islamic “terrorists” haven’t given up. They haven’t said “OK, we got what we asked for and now we’ll leave you alone.” They’re keeping up this jihad talk and bombing all over the place, burning schools and blowing up buses everywhere from Chechnya to Manila. They used to torch only Jewish schools but now they’re going after the Buddhists too. George Bush fueled so much Islamic rage it will take those poor people years to get over it.
Why doesn’t anybody give President John Kerry the credit he deserves? Who got rid of that stupid cretin in the White House? Could John Dean have done that?
Hell, the way people are complaining non-stop, you’d think that Osama bin Laden was President of the United States.

Tyranny of the Minorities

by Samuel Z. Anvil

Question: What do the Shiite extremist leader Moktada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army have in common with the liberal columnist Thomas Friedman? Answer: More than you think.
Both self-appointed prophets of the Truth combine fanatical devotion to dubious, unproven ideas (actually to ideas repeatedly proven wrong) with a total disdain for anybody that disagrees with them, and enjoy the sympathy of the liberal media, which provides a ready platform for disseminating their bankrupt ideologies.
I won’t go into detail about Moktada al-Sadr’s shortcomings. Suffice it to say that he is the latest bearded specimen of a family that has spent generations sitting on their rear ends in the mosques of Islam’s innumerable “Holy Cities,” telling the true believers how to live their lives and arranging the murders of those who fail to take the family’s holy advice to heart, and that chubby little Muqtada is considered, even by his most loyal fans, to be the least distinguished scion of that know-it-all family.
Thomas’s intellectual shortcomings can be summed up in fewer words: “it’s all America’s fault.” He had a tough moment there on September 11, 2001, when Moslem "terrorists" handed him a real hot potato – how do you blame America for this? To give Thomas credit, it took him only a few days to recover from the shock of seeing the New York Times display sympathy for Americans, but he quickly wrenched his brain back into the politically correct way of thinking and figured out why “they” hate us, and what we can do to make “them” love us, and helpfully explained how we can fix our image problems in the Islamic world.
According to Thomas and his friends in the liberal and terrorist establishments, it’s all Israel’s fault. It’s those settlers. If only they hadn’t settled. They are the devil incarnate, those settlers. After all, the Middle East is not America where people of different races and religions can live on the same block without killing each other. The Middle East is full of “them,” the downtrodden, the desperate, the hopeless, the poor (with rich relatives in Saudi Arabia, some of whom are even real princes) and when a Jew (not a good Jew like Thomas but one of those religious fanatics) moves into the neighborhood they become … well, they can’t help themselves, can they? They’re enraged. Those settlers just go around “fueling Islamic anger” all day.
Thomas knows that the Arabs started the Six Day War (their third attempt to destroy Israel) when the “occupied territories” were occupied by Jordan and Egypt, and there were no settlers in them. He knows that his friend, poor misguided Yasser Arafat, founded the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1965, two years before Israel drove the occupying Arab armies from the West Bank and Gaza, and that the “Palestine” Arafat meant to “liberate” was what the rest of the world called “the State of Israel.” And he knows that to Arafat there’s no difference between the “illegal settlements” and Tel Aviv. Arafat wants it all, and he wants to drive all the Jews into the sea (Thomas of course excepted; he will be allowed to live in America until Islam conquers that too).
Thomas knows all that, but he’s decided that none of it matters. Arafat had him over for tea one day, you see, and Thomas can feel that Noble laureate’s pain. Thomas is studying how a Nobel laureate feels, just in case he should one day need to know.
But the worst thing is, that even though Thomas writes for the New York Times (a newspaper of record no less), and even though some of those real princes in Saudi Arabia have invited Thomas into their luxuriously appointed homes, there are still people who have the nerve to disagree with him. Why, there are whole newspapers and even a TV news network that disagree with him, that show no respect for the liberal ideology and even ridicule it. What kind of a country is this that allows such a thing?
So you see, Shiite extremist leader Moktada al-Sadr and New York Times extremist columnist Thomas Friedman have quite a lot in common. They both represent minorities terrified that their bankrupt ideologies will be exposed, who are prepared to use all the means at their disposal to impose their will on the silent majorities around them.
The big question in both Iraq and the United States (and Israel) today is the same: will the silent majorities in both countries finally turn against these extremist minorities to save their future?