Via Joe at urbanfarmhouse, some news out of Iraq that simply can’t be honest. Why? Because we’ve lost the war—as everyone who is honest already knows—so any good news is by its very nature a lie.
But as a notorious Kultist running a site for blinkered true believers, I continue to provide you, my fearful, deluded, irrational minions, with straws at which to grasp.
You can thank me later.
Yeah, whatever Goldstein. Your facts are hardly a match for my polls.
I’d just as soon thank you now.
– Josh,
Right from the onset, this was a war we could only loose…a war that only has two victors: Israel and Iran, for whom innocent kids from Oklahoma and Kansas have played the unglorious part of unpaid mercenaries.
The New York Times reports that the Dutch government has decided to upgrade the compulsory “cultural integration†exams prospective immigrants have to take before obtaining a visa to the country of Erasmus…in order to “filter away all unwanted religiously conservative individualsâ€Â
“A lesson, about the Netherlands’ nude beaches, is followed by another: homosexuals have the same rights here as heterosexuals do, including the chance to marry.
Just to make sure everyone gets the message, two men are shown kissing in a meadow.
The scenes are brief parts of a two-hour-long film that the Dutch government has compiled to help potential immigrants, many of them from Islamic countries, meet the demands of a new entrance examination that went into effect on Wednesdayâ€Â
Or course citizen of certain countries with high numbers of “religious conservatives†such as Israel and the US are exempted from taking the exam…but the Dutch government wants us to believe this shouldn’t be interpreted as blatantly racist double-standard directed at Arabs and Mohammedans!
But there’s even worse that sheer racism at work here: ironically, by focusing its message on nude beaches, swingers clubs, hash bars…etc. the Dutch government is contributing to the distortion and debasement of Western culture in the eyes of its critics, thus reinforcing their prejudices.
Just like their Neocon friends in Washington and Tel-Aviv, the Muslim-bashers of Amsterdam and The Hague are useful idiots feeding the anti-Western narrative of Osama Bin Laden and Ayman Al-Zawahiri.
Instead of promoting humanistic and secular values by building schools and universities with modernist secular curricula in the Middle-East and South Asia, instead of telling prospective immigrants the world over that Europe is a beacon of humanism and democracy, we’re content with provoking Muslims gratuitously.
In Hitler’s Germany, Jehovah’s Witnesses were forced to accept blood transfusion and force-fed ham so they could become “good Germansâ€Â.
In Guantanamo’s prisons, Arab and Muslim detainees were routinely forced to watch gay porn movies while listening to the Israeli national anthem.
I guess this must have paved the way for the Dutch government’s new immigration law…
Iew. What a steaming pile.
Dr. de la Vega’s powers of self-persuasion are impressive.
TW: I’m sure we’ve just scratched the surface of what he’s convinced himself of.
Dr. V–Justin always seems to be such a pleasant fellow, does he not? It’s about THE ANGER, baby.
Who is this “Josh” of whom you speak?
This was a nice line from the link.
Just 40! Thats it. They’ll come to their senses that they’re all iraqis, like the brits told them more than 40 years ago.
“In Guantanamo’s prisons, Arab and Muslim detainees were routinely forced to watch gay porn movies while listening to the Israeli national anthem”
There is Brokeback Moutain in there somewhere.
“In Guantanamo’s prisons, Arab and Muslim detainees were routinely forced to watch gay porn movies while listening to the Israeli national anthem”
There is a Brokeback Moutain joke in there somewhere.
The next time some leftist informs you about how the rest of the world hates America, forward them this article to really shut them up decisively.
*Just 40! Thats it. They’ll come to their senses that they’re all iraqis, like the brits told them more than 40 years ago. *
The difference, of course, is the modern Western influence and the actual chance to have their own democracy, things which the British could not offer.
Why are you so intent on the war being a failure- if its ultimately a failure, all of us lose, not just Bush and conservatives.
Because Democrats view American failure as their victory.
I might be busy later, so I’ll do it now.
Thank You Jeff.
If I wanted the war to be a failure, I’d be promoting the making of mistakes, not correcting them.
Why is that a problem? Really, seriously, why would that be a big deal? It’s not going to hurt them. They already hate us enough to go to war against us. I’m just not seeing the downside here. The gay porn and recording industries make a few bucks, the prisoners get a few hours of entertainment, what’s the problem?
Wake me up when we start, you know, torturing them or something.
But actus does want the war to be a failure. That has been painfully obvious from his comments over the last few years. He is a moral bigot,the likes of which jerry Falwell has never known. Opposing Bush and the war was the only morally correct position. Anyone who was for the war and the preemptive strike foreign policy is an evil imperialist. What is killing them is the painfully obvious fact that we are clearly winning the war with the overwhelming support of the Iraqi people. So they revert to howls of “imperialist” and “racism” as the U.S. as the scourge of western nationalism. (See Dr. V. above)
This is stressfull to the actus’ of the world. Their imperialist memes can not survive rational discourse, so they are left with the intellectually bankrupt debating tactic of attacking the percieved motives of those that dare disagree with them. Somehow the “poisoned” motives of a Goldstien discredits his viewpoint or the facts of a situation. (You’re a BushKultist, so what you actually observed is tainted) Jeff’s point about an intellectual civil war in another post is prescient. Listen to the hate of an actus towards those who disagree or Dr. V’s conclusory statements and tell me how it is avoidable.
Thanks, Jeff. Very informative in that Q&A format.
The only way to deal with the actholes that squat and defecate on this site is to ignore them. You know the old saying, “You can’t reason with an unreasonable person.” No since wasting your time.
I don’t get the rush to verify a “civil war” in Iraq (other than the obvious political motives of the left). All reliable sources say we are in a crisis stage. But that’s been true since 2003.
A blogger named Soldier’s Dad provided a great analogy over at Roggio’s.
I think the parallels are in the reactions of various people on an airplane flying thru turbulance.
The pilot says everything is fine. Some of the seasoned travellers continue their naps, some tense a little bit…then their are the novice travelers that start screaming “We are all gonna die”
The quote that makes the 6 o’clock news is the traveler screaming “We are all gonna die”.
The very nature of “Scoop Journalism” is that it ignores the seasoned traveler that slept thru the turbulance as an “Uninformed idiot” and the pilot as a “Company Shill”.
This morning I read an AP “analysis” quoting an academic “expert” that the marker for a civil war was 1000 deaths from sectarian violence. Hindus and Muslims in India have inflicted those kinds of casualties on each other often over the last 50 years.
*If I wanted the war to be a failure, I’d be promoting the making of mistakes, not correcting them. *
Actus, with all due respect, you’re not correcting them. You’re a guy commenting on a blog. I still have no idea what mistakes you’re talking about but quite honestly, there’s going to be mistakes in war, sometimes alot of mistakes. Expanding that further, every single donk out there criticing the administration’s every move are also “just guys”. I was driving for a doctor’s appointment today and heard (I think Bortz) have a commentator who indicated that b/c a certain poll showed indicated that some majority of Americans thought we should just “bring the troops home now” and that b/c a poll indicated something, well then the president should start governing based on polling.
Chuck Schumar, Ted Kennedy, Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, John Kerry and Russ Feingold- these are the people who have the clout to actually try to implement policy changes in Iraq- unfortunately, they’re hung up on “getting” the president and serve no purpose in this country but giving motivation to our enemy.
You can’t affect any real change unless you win an election. My personal opinion is democrats won’t win another election until they free themselves of this notion that Bush hates everyone and is worse then Hitler.
What?
Right. And here’s a blog post where someone is saying that things are going well because, well, its just hard to overcome 40 (not 1200 or 1400) years of enmity. And that sort of thing should be corrected. Lest we make the mistake of thinkign that that is what is going on. And then base our assessments of policy on the opinion of those that are “over there” and “Get it” more than us pundits and blog posters.
Actus,
With respect to the notion of supporting the war by commenting on shortfalls, there is a degree of balance that I think many “dissenters” have completely missed.
Because of all this talk of analogy elsewhere, let me try one out here:
If Person A is interested in dating Person B, and you, the loyal friend Person C, are trying to help A succeed.
Telling A that there’s spinach in his teeth, or that they should wear something different, or avoid that movie, is being helpful by correcting mistakes. Similarly, you can also help out A by telling them that they should do well, or that they are making reasonably good progress.
However, if, as A is walking out the door, you tell him that he’s a bag of crap who began his life without measurable bowel control who will be lucky if all Person B does is smack him, that too is criticsm, but unhelpful. And while you could say things that are ostentiably helpful, like at least Person B isn’t so ugly that Person A has to be ashamed of their interest, or that Person B might get drunk enough to find Person A amusing, these bits of helpful advice and encouragement aren’t real useful either.
So, do you sense why it is that people might be quite convinced that you’re eager for America to lose, and as is implied by that, for American soldiers to die, based on your unrelenting critique of the war?
Unrelenting? and “of the war”? I’m saying that the guy that thinks ethnic strife in iraq is 40 years old, and that the people that live in the borders britain draws are ‘their own people’ is full of it. If that is criticism of the war, then we’re not going to be able to talk about much.
actus, you’re right, but you’re right in a limited sense: the quoted soldier is stating the Sunni/Shi’ite conflict in overly simplistic terms. But since he’s actually serving in Iraq, working with actual Iraqis, is it not possible that his statement accurately reflects his sense of the sentiments of the Iraqis he’s working with? Maybe, just maybe, there are more “liberal” Iraqis in Iraq than we’re led to believe, more people who accept the borders drawn up a few decades ago as a fait accompli and are willing to work within those bounds. Maybe, just maybe, Iraqis are “ready” for democracy…
Actus,
There’s a difference between, this is going to be tough and we need to figure out how to handle this, and this effort is foredoomed.
I get a lot bigger sense of doom from than any notion that things might turn out well, or even better yet, any suggestion or comment on reasonable practicable ways to make things actually turn out well.
You’re by no means alone on this count, but it’s the reason that many who have supported the war don’t percieve much of the criticism to be anything other than cheap shots and backbiting.
I’m sure his statements accurately reflect his sense. Thats why I’m saying we shouldn’t listen to him.
I don’t see what being ready for democracy has to do with accepting boundaries drawn by the brits. I’m guessing this guy thinks iraq is ready for multiculturalism: soon sunnis, shias and kurds will decide that they are all ‘their own people.’ Hope it works!
I didn’t say it was foredoomed. I said we shouldn’t listen to the good news of the guy that thinks this is a 40 year old conflict we’ve stepped into.
Actus,
In general, the tenor of the commentary of much of the anti-war crowd is, and has been, unrelentingly negative. If there’s good news, it’s misinformation or propaganda. If there’s bad news, it must be true, because it highlights the folly of the whole enterprise from the get go.
Regardless of your intent in this one specific point, I don’t recall a lot of voices of the anti-war folk ever suggesting that, perhaps, there are ways we can improve the rebuilding process, enhance stability more effectively, or whatever.
I see a lot of telling folks they’re wrong, or that they don’t “really” understand what’s going on. Not a lot of good faith sincere suggestions.
Whether or not it’s appropriate in this post, I guess is something else, but the response to your commentary is the broader response to the flavor of commentary that you have come to represent in some people’s minds.
And actus,
by the way you said no such thing as:
The original actus link
Just 40! Thats it. They’ll come to their senses that they’re all iraqis, like the brits told them more than 40 years ago. </blockquote>
So you’ll also have to pardon us for sometimes thinking that you can be, on occasion, a bit disingenuous.
Bush gave some under-noticed good news on monday: he proposed a benchmark for success. Over half of Iraq patrolled by iraqis by the end of the year. That’s not propaganda. Thats a good sign that we’re getting benchmarks.
Really? I read atrios sometimes, and he linked the other day to the under-utilized state department plans for reconstruction. I thought the tone there was these should have been used. You know, suggesting ways to improve the rebuilding process or whatever.
I thought it was obvious that someone that thinks we’ve stepped into a 40 year old conflict is wrong. Sorry.
And lord knows that a man that makes one mistake on the length of the current ethnic strife should never be listened to on any subject ever again. When he speaks we should openly castigate him with taunts of 40 year, 40 years, 40 years. Because that’s what adults do when people make mistakes, harp on them again and again until we are satisfied that they have seen things the way we want them to be seen.
Now, harp on my use of the word we.
Well, when he’s talking about how soon people will get over the 40 year strife, maybe we shouldn’t listen to that. But if he’s got a recipe for BBQ pork ribs, that might be worth inquiring about.
That’s fairly close to some of Bin Laden’s declarations.
Sorry, you’ve trod into pompous elitist ass territory there. But I knew all along you would.
What? just because I had some tasty ones earlier this week from the neglected pre-gentrification eatery in my neighborhood, now I’m an elitist?
You needn’t play dumb. I think you know what was objectionable about your post.
TW: read it again.
spell it out for me. sometimes i’m accused of being roundabout, and now it seems that deeper meanings are being found.
I must have missed your submissions to the Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL) last time I was there. Or was it at that last USAID after action review that I heard you sound off? Wait, wait, I got it – it was that CERP project sheet you handed in. Right.
Some of us are really correcting mistakes, at least out in the real world.
Maybe some rest this weekend will help you get it back together.
Don’t you know, its not just what the army does, the war is fought at home too.
Yeah, you oughta see the battles that take place on and around my commode every day. Oh, the humanity.
I see. You were praising the man for likely being an excellent roaster of meats, notwithstanding the fact that his knowledge of geopolitics fell short of your standards over a turn of phrase.
How charitable of you. I bet he digs a mean ditch, too.
I have no idea how good a roaster of meats he is. But I do have some idea of how much he knows about hte roots of the conflict in iraq.