Comments Posted By Jim Harrison
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"NOBODY HERE 'CEPT US INCOMPETENT JIHADIS..."
The fact that these guys were obviously pretty incompetent doesn't mean that they weren't a threat. Most criminals are none too bright, after all, but they can still shoot the place up, especially in a country awash in guns. What doesn't make a lick of sense, however, is to pick out nutcases that happen to be Muslim as if they are all that different from nutcases of any background. Many of our homegrown American terrorists have been Fundamentalists, for example, but that doesn't mean we should treat Southern Baptists as crazed assassins.
It simply isn't the case that Islam is some unitary ideology that commands all believers to go medieval. And the proof of that is the extreme rarity of cases like the Fort Dix episode. There are many, many Muslims in the U.S. and very, very little terrorism. Claiming that every member of a large and heterogenous group harbors the same malevolent essence is pretty much a definition of racist thinking. How does this paranoia make anybody safer? After all, if, as a garden-variety Muslim, I'm going to be despised anyhow, I might as well live up to the stereotype imposed upon me.
Comment Posted By Jim Harrison On 9.05.2007 @ 12:43
BUSH VETOES CONGRESSIONAL INVITATION TO AL QAEDA TO SLAUGHTER IRAQIS
Reading sites like the aptly named Right Wing Nut House, you get the impression that only Iraqi government acceptable to Bush supporters would be one utterly submissive to American interests as defined by the Republican party and its private supporters. Thus the President and his people have pretty much stopped talking about "democracy" as a goal, but the oil bill currently moving through the Iraqi "government" remains a priority. The only thing that units the various insurgencies is the perception, which is quite accurate after all, that their country is under occupation by an imperial power that will never permit real self-government. Changes of tactics, presidential speeches, additional money, surges, and the rest are like dumping antibiotics on an infected toe. What is obviously needed is the removal of the ingrown nail, i.e. us.
It's pretty ironic that the pathologically patriotic American rightists, with all those flags and eagles on their websites, don't notice how our policies in Iraq do perpetual injury to the pride of its inhabitants. Apparently, "Don't Tread on Me" doesn't apply outside of the U.S.
Comment Posted By Jim Harrison On 2.05.2007 @ 11:49
