And that might be a good thing, insofar as it will draw clarifying lines that may — and I stress may — prove to reframe the War on Terror in a way that is far less nebulous, and that certainly is far less politically correct.
I have, on various occasions, criticized President Bush — mildly — for an unwillingness to frame this war in a way that specifically identifies the enemy, namely radicalized Islam and those who support it, be that support active or tacit.
And this is because I believed that Bush was being careful not to set up a Clash of Civilizations paradigm that would play right into the hands of al Qaeda, who would certainly use such language to invoke the Crusades, and in doing so appeal to an honor culture — forcing those on the ideological fence to tip to the side of the pan-Arabists and radical Muslims.
In short, I believed Bush’s strategy was measured and pointed — less “politically correct” in the pejorative sense than it was tactically pragmatic.
Still, the foray into Iraq — coupled with the hazy language surrounding the specific enemy in the “War on Terror” — has muddied the rhetorical waters and, as a result, diluted American resolve, and left us collectively unsure about just who are enemies really are.
Couple this with an active anti-war movement whose own rhetorical tactics are based around emotionalism and a narrative consensus born of ideology rather than empiricism, and perhaps the time has come for pointed attacks such as this:
For years, CAIR has claimed to represent millions of American Muslims. In fact, they claim to represent more Muslim in American than … there are in America. This has alarmed Americans in general as the group often seems to be more aligned with our enemies than us  which isn’t surprising as it spun off from a group funded by Hamas. As you know, Hamas has been waging a terrorist war against Israel and calls for its total destruction. It also promises to see America destroyed. Nowadays, Hamas is busy murdering its Palestinian political rivals.
Even with this history, and CAIR’s conspicuous failure to condemn Hamas by name, it has been treated as if represents Muslim Americans by our own government. The good news is that the financial support CAIR claims to have among American Muslims is a myth. We know this because The Washington Times got hold of the group’s IRS tax records.
CAIR’s dues-paying membership has shrunk 90 percent since 9/11  from 29,000 in 2000 to only 1,700 last year. CAIR’s annual income from dues plunged from $733,000 to $59,000. Clearly, America’s Muslims are not supporting this group  and I’m happy to hear about it.
Thompson’s public criticism of CAIR accomplishes several things. First, it minimizes — intentionally, and I believe strategically — CAIR’s institutional reach in an effort to minimize its political influence. Like many other identity group mouthpieces, CAIR’s political power draws from its ability to convince others that it speaks for a collective that most of us wish not to offend or demonize. Which is to say, it plays on our good intentions, on our true liberal sense of tolerance (which manifests itself in pluralism — though the attempt is being made to force it to manifest itself perversely by way of speech codes, FAIRNESS Doctrines, “cultural education” seminars, and other Orwellian attempts to turn actual tolerance into enforced censorship designed and policed by individual identity groups).
Secondly, it lets Americans know that, while CAIR pretends to speak for most American Muslims, it in fact does not — which has the effect of demystifying the American Muslim community, the vast majority of whom have actively distanced themselves from CAIR. And this is important precisely because, though our politicians have continued to court CAIR and our press has continued to present the group as representing the beliefs of the American Muslim community, non-Muslim Americans have grown increasingly concerned about CAIR’s prior ties to terrorist groups, as well as its inability to truly distance itself from the Islamist agenda.
By revealing CAIR as fringe group with political clout completely incommensurate with its membership, Thompson has effectively taken away their greatest weapon — the suggestion that they speak on behalf of a growing Muslim population whose concerns are not being met.
And finally, this decline in membership — if one can believe it to be based on an ideological break rather than on some other factor (like, say, fear of public intimidation or government scrutiny) — presumes to locate for us all those “moderate Muslims” we’ve been calling out for.
Even if, as a whole, the Muslim population in the US is far smaller than it has been made out to be.
And so, from a strategic standpoint, what Thompson offers is a rhetorical gambit designed to weaken the propaganda efforts of those Muslims most sympathetic to the radical fringes of the Islamist movement.
Which, to borrow a phrase, certainly sets CAIR up as the “weak horse” here.
Of course, it remains to be seen if the media, the academy, and the current administration will cooperate in this (necessary, I’d argue) marginalization.
(h/t Hot Air)
The interesting thing is the absolute collapse in CAIR’s membership, post-9/11. That actually says some reassuring things about assimilation. I hope.
I think it is less about being a hardliner, and more about being plain-spoken with the American public. That was part of President Bush’s appeal, that he did not come off like a stuffed shirt, and that trait was magnified by his opponents.
His detractors hated it, but his supporters really appreciated it.
Jeff touches on what I consider to be the base appeal in Thompsons yet-to-be-announced candidacy, and that is his ability to face the single most important issue we have faced as a country in over 60 years and call a spade a spade.
I supported Bush during his presidency after 9/11 because I felt he would not falter at this moment of truth, and we needed a leader to stand up and say "no, that’s quite enough Mohammed, we are not going to just sit here and take it anymore". And he did that. But since he was re-elected, Bush has shied away from confronting the realities of our struggle against Islamofascists.
Thompson has made it quite clear up to this point that he is not afraid to say that we are being attacked by muslim fundamentalists, and these people cannot be negotiated with. They need to be beaten down to the point that they don’t think it’s worth it to attack us anymore.
I think Rudy has some of this, and Mitt too, but Thompson seems to be more direct in his refutation of the PC bullshit surrounding the issue. As a Tennessee resident who watched Thompson act this way his entire time in office, I can tell you that this is not an act, and what you see now is what we will get if he is elected.
I’m surely old enough to know that politicians will never be the salvation of the Republic. Still, I am more excited about Fred Thompson’s impending candidacy than I’ve ever been about any presidential hopeful. Lord, please let Tman be right about Mr. Thompson’s plainspokenness. He says so very many things I like to hear…
Tman, just curious, but just say the threat from some dudes with car bombs is the "greatest threat we’ve faced in 60 years."? I mean, the Soviet Union with its billions in cash, millions in soldiers, and thousands of ICBM’s were a LESSER threat than bin Laden?!?!?!!?!?!?
For years we checked under our beds for Commies, black-listed them from jobs, hounded them across the world, saw them in Vatican 2, spent billions preparing defense forces to meet them on the battlefield, developed an international security structure to confront them, lost over 75,000 men fighting "surrogates" in various Asian nations, killed over a million Vietnamese (because it’s better to be dead than Red), and scared generations of American children….and they weren’t the threat that some amorphous group which claims no territory, has no army, no people, and whose main contribution to its end on the "War on Terror" is a) blowing up Iraqi civilians or b) planning to attack Fort Dix (allegedly) with pizza deliverymen?
Where do you guys get this rhetoric?
By the way, here’s an excellent story on your straight talker http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/archives/9612.cottle.html
Weird. Tim makes a good point about the relative strengths of the Communist and the Islamofascist threats, and then links to "an excellent story" that really is a very good article (10 years old, but it doesn’t suffer much from staleness).
When the worst criticism I can level against Tim is for superfluous punctuation, I begin to worry…
timmah seems pretty riled up today. Link goes to the standard lefist pitch about how Thompson I fake, he is an actor, blah blah blah
Tman, just curious, but just say the threat from some dudes with car bombs is the "greatest threat we’ve faced in 60 years."? I mean, the Soviet Union with its billions in cash, millions in soldiers, and thousands of ICBM’s were a LESSER threat than bin Laden?!?!?!!?!?!?
Threats have two components: intent and capability. The Soviets were a threat by virtue of their capability, but they were essentially a conservative (temperament-wise) bunch when it came to using that threat. Sure they backed terrorists like the JRA, Baader-Meinhof, Red Brigades and such, but the threat was containable.
Contrast this with today’s Islamic terrorists who, despite having a significant capability manage to kill thousands every year with little more than a white-hot intent and whatever is at hand. As soon as they get the capability, it will be used, simply put. There is no possibility of deterrance (politically-feasible deterrance, that is).
timb,
I understand your point about the soviet union, and I’m not arguing that they were not a threat, but they never attacked us on US soil, and they never openly declared war against us. Then you have to take in to consideration that Islamic Fundamentalists are not confined to caves in Afghanistan. They are also deep in the heart of several large nations governments in places such as Egypt, Iran and Pakistan.
Then think about this- the USSR had thousands of ICBM’s, yet due MAD they never used them. Now compare that to Islamic fundamentalists- do you honestly think that if the crazier among them get hold of a large enough arsenal that they would feel the same apprehensionas the soviets? Iran has a president who openly declared his desire to eradicate Israel through a nuclear strike. Don’t you think we should take them seriously? Are you confident that Iran will ONLY nuke Israel? Clearly the Islamofascists are a bigger threat when you place things in context.
And that garbage article you linked to is easily debunked by anyone who has lived in Tennessee udring Thompsons tenure. In fact, the funniest part about the idea that Thompson is "just an actor who plays the part but really isn’t like that" conveniently omits the fact that the first movie role Thompson was cast for was to play……………….himself.
And actor, who plays himself. Kinda hard not to act like yourself, don’t you think?
Tman – I find it interesting that they were beginning to go after Fred! almost 4 years ago. They mock his blue collar roots, yet exalt the same in the Silk Pony.
Isn’t it interesting that actors as a group are predominantly, yet when one actually has enough spine to run for office, they are Republicans?
Communication is one of the primary reasons Reagan was so damn good, and Thompson has no problems in that department.
I was only using the article to detail the fakery of the pick-up truck/"straight talking country guy" from a man who has spent most of his professional life in either Washington or Hollywood, is/was a professional lobbyist, and was an awesome admiral in Hunt for Red October.
Personally, his radio address thing is a rip-off of Reagan and his opinions are less interesting and less controversial than the Gipper or Paul Harvey.
Fact is, timmah, we don’t give a rat’s ass what you think about Thompson.
timmah – You illustrate exactly what I was pointing out. I think Sen. Thompson scares the Left. Unlike Hillary and Edwards, he connects with people, resonates with them.
President Clinton had similar qualities, as much as I disliked him, and he was a great communicator,and like it or not, a sensational politician.
The true bellweather for how much Fred! scares the left is to observe the absolute hysterics people go in to when trying to detract from his formidable resume.
I’m telling you guys, he is the real deal. I’ll give you an example- there is a coffee shop here in Nashville called "Bongo Java" that my best friend manages (yes, the one with the "Nun Bun"-it was my friend who discovered it). Fred! used to come in all the time when he was dating Lorrie Morgan, and he was just like the guy you see on TV. He never acted holier than-thou, he was always polite and a good tipper.
Those from the left expecting to find some dirt about Fred are in for a very disappointing surprise. They tried to do this when he ran for senate, and were unsuccessful then. He hasn’t done anything since then that would change this reality.
I know that historical analogies are lost on the Timster; but here goes. Radical Islam is on the whole like Soviet Communism was in 1917-1919. At the time it seemed excessive to send an allied expeditionary force including the ‘Wolfhound’ marines to Russia, but they had been one of the forces that had pulled the Russians making World War longer and incidentally forcing our entry. That motivated the work of Sidney Reilly& Robert Lockhart to try to overthrow Lenin, with the help of the old former Social Revolutionary firebrand Savinkov. One member of these cadres did get close enough to wound but not kill Lenin%
FDR did it first, and was later ripped off (ineptly of course) by Carter. Reagan got it right.So if Thompson is ripping off Reagan, he must be doing it right too.
Let’s say you are in a room jammed full of explosives, timmy. Just you and an absolutely hated enemy, both of you armed only with flame throwers. Also in the room is a batshit crazy, rabid wharf rat. Which is the greater threat?
Um, Um, wait, I know this one. Oh!
GLOBAL WARMING!!!!!
Whee, doggy! What do I win?
A cee-ment pond, BJTexas!
In Beverly Hills!
OT: Remember the episode where Jed was going to buy a yacht and wore a yachting costume that was a US Admiral’s uniform? And Jethro loks at the yacht basin "Those aren’t yachts," he drives on and spots nested destroyers, "Those are yachts!"?
I am uncomfortable with how much I had to think about BMoe’s example. I think I should go get a smoothie.
Soviets and Islamists are/were both significant threats – but I am not sure you can directly measure if one was more "threatening" than the other. Communism cost us a whole lot more blood and treasure – but, as you say, it is a difference in ability vs. desire.
Personally, I joined up as an enlisted Infantry guy in 1985 to keep Ivan from rolling to the Rhine…now I stay in to keep #$%&*@# like Hekmatyar Gulbuddin, AQ, OBL, et al., from expanding their reach. What a strange 23 years I chose to be in the service…
I hope the terrorists love their children too.
Nope. Not working for me.
Speaking as an interested alien, I think Thompson is very good news indeed.
Now that all those nice Muslims have stopped sending their dollar bills to CAIR, do we know how they are keeping their little nappy heads above the surface?
That explosives / flamethrowers / rat analogy is excellent.
Jeff – You might want to change the title of the post to include quotation marks around "hardliner," since the title seems to be misleading given the content. All of us here know that Thompson is essentially NOT taking an extreme position, but will probably be painted as such in his ability to "call a spade a spade." Just saying. And for the record, I’m not even sure what the hell a wharf rat is, but flamethrowers rock harder than ninjas.
Jeff –
You might want to change the title of the post to include quotation marks around "hardliner," since the title seems to be misleading given the content. All of us here know that Thompson is essentially NOT taking an extreme position, but will probably be painted as such in his ability to "call a spade a spade." Just saying.
And for the record, I’m not even sure what the hell a wharf rat is, but flamethrowers rock harder than ninjas.
Yeah…error message with Firefox, yet my comment still shows up. Methinks there are some further bugs/compatibility issues, perhaps?
Comment by narciso on 6/21 @ 2:34 pm #
I
know that historical analogies are lost on the Timster; but here goes.
Radical Islam is on the whole like Soviet Communism was in 1917-1919.
At the time it seemed excessive to send an allied expeditionary force
including the ‘Wolfhound’ marines to Russia, but they had been one of
the forces that had pulled the Russians making World War longer and
incidentally forcing our entry. That motivated the work of Sidney
Reilly& Robert Lockhart to try to overthrow Lenin, with the help
of the old former Social Revolutionary firebrand Savinkov. One member
of these cadres did get close enough to wound but not kill Lenin%
You’re kidding, right? You try to use an analogy and get everything ass-backwards?! The Russian peace treaty had nothing to do with US entry into the war. The US declared war on April 6, 1917 in response to the Germans resuming unrestricted submarine warfare and the Zimmerman telegram. There is, hint coming, narcisco, a reason why the Russians refer to the Communist Revolution as the October Revolution. Any idea why. Come on, you can do it.
Anyway, the Russians and Germans signed their peace treaty on December 15, 1917, roughly 8 months after America entered the war. Oddly enough, you were wrong about why America entered that war. Comparing Islamic fundamentalism to Communism is akin to comparing the Jeff to Amanda Marcotte. It’s true, they both hold strong opinions, but that’s where the similarity ends.
Hopelessly off-topic, but Major John, Hekmatyar and friends have been killing people for 30 years and show no signs of breaking out into World Domination (curious, as to why you only chose one fundamentalist, corrupt mujahideen commander when you could have also named Dostum or Ismael Khan? Is that, and maybe I guessing here, because Dostum and IK are "our bastards"? In other words, warlords who pledge fealty to the US, despite the fact that they resist the Karzi government’s power and authority and make their living growing poppies?
Just curious.
PS when the Dept of Defense complains about "Iran supporting the Taliban" do they ever mention how those guns get through IK’s territory, i.e. Herat, and into the Southern part of Afghanistan? Seems to me, we should bomb IK, instead of Iran. But, then again, my approval rating is not at 29%.
It looks like I have almost reached the expiration date on this post, one of the disadvantages of having a life. And I really would like to comment on Fred’s comments about CAIR. Actually, I am proposing a new blog law: The expiration date of a post is determined by comments left by a troll. If normal commenting on said post is suspended to chase the rabbit left by said troll, the post should be considered dead.
But I got here late once again, so…
Here’s a thought. Fred is setting up CAIR as a Democrat paper tiger. The Dems have claimed the “moderate” Muslims by their acceptance of CAIR as a CAIRing, patriotic organization solely dedicated to religious diversity instead of promoting the hijinks of the Hamas terrorists that spawned them.
Should Fred run, you know, play himself in 2008 as a conservative Republican candidate with a varied background that includes roles such as Senator, co-chief counsel on the Senate Watergate committee, and actor,
(take a breath)
then Fred could legitimately ask Hillary!® Soprano why the Dems have promoted the success of such a questionable organization that even Muslims are leaving the sinking ship. Wazzup, Hillary!®?
Plus, Fred might actually think that CAIR is some sort of ACLU-lite that is determined to muck up the nation by lawsuits and shrill shrieks of “Bigotry!” and “Discrimination!’ and, you know, that kind of stuff. Works for Rev Al and Rev Jessie, should work for them. At least, with Dems.
Of course the ex-religious, TIMMAH, comes in and attempts to explain away the threat of the islamofascists. Timmah, part of the problem with the islamofascists as opposed to the Soviets, who were indeed checked by MAD, is that they are so nebulous. Also, because I believe you have abdicated your sense of religion and/or faith (I could be wrong. I get you guys mixed up), you cannot understand that these nebulous "willing to die for allah" islamofascists are far more dangerous than the "not wanting to die" atheist communists. One is a spiritual/political battle my boy, the other was purely a political one. Of course, maybe to you, the U.S. over reacted to the communist threat, too? I’m betting you do. That would be the whole "Iraq is arabic for Vietnam" thing. Both are/were existential threats to the U.S.
Narciso: timmy got you on that one. That makes one (hee.)
However…
The initial comparison has merit and what you need to do is separate desire from means. The USSR shared a desire with our current jihadists for world wide hegemony, albiet for entirely different philosophical reasons. We know that the likelyhood of Islamic Jihadists actually accomplishing this feat is very small, given the resources and numbers available. The Soviets had a larger chance to accomplish their goals but still relatively small compared to the whole, wide world. Their capacity for destruction was much greater but was tempered by the doctrine of MAD. Even some of the batshit crazier idealogues in the Politburo recognized that absolute power was not worth having aboslutely nothing left to rule.
The threat from Jihadists need not be framed in terms of World Domination to develop it’s own legitimacy. While Jihadists lack the country wide resources of a superpower they just don’t fraggin’ care about reprisals or punishments as long as the damage is done. While the scale is limited, it does not limit the devastation that can be visited upon our country, both in human and structural terms and in economic impacts. This has been a guiding force in al qaeda’s strategies, clearly laid out in various public fatwas and private documents. They see all of America’s power flowing ceaselessly from our robust , "materialistic" economy. The 9/11 attacks were a 3 pronged political/religious statement; The Towers represented the Economic power, whcih feeds the Pentagon, the Military might. The third prong, despairing the people by taking out a historical leadership symbol, was foiled by those heroes on flight 93.
The threat is real and no amount of mall visits by young muslim girls or radiation detectors in ports of entry is going to insure that we’ll be safe. My biggest concern with those on the left who pooh-pooh the terrorist threat is their willful or ignorant blindspot when it comes to the Economic damages of hundreds of different scenarios. So, yes, Jihadists are a threat similar to the Soviet Threat, not from World Domination but in their uncaring capacity to potentially wreck our ewconomy and cause major difficulties for millions of our citizens as well as hard acsualties.
Quite frankly that concerns me more than our "standing in the world" or a .2 degree celsius rise in global temperatures.
Thompson was right about Cair, they are islamist and pretend to speak on behalf of the Muslims of America. They do not belong in a democracy. But he needs to start talking about the Israel lobby also. Or else he is just like the rest of them.