There really is racism in this world. There are within the USA groups like the KKK with their sheets, the "American Nazi" subintellects with their propensity for playing dressup, and the Aryan Nations with their impressively subneanderthal brows. The speeches and actions of Robert Mugabe and his henchmen show what racism, naked and unashamed, looks like. And the Arab press triggers the gag reflex on a regular basis.
Trying to tag anything one doesn't like or agree with as "racist" cheapens the term. If the tagged item is set next to any of the above and can't be seen in the glare, there might be something wrong with either the definition or the definer. If an instance of "racism" can only be detected by trained observers then so also can its effects; people who lose a lot of sleep over it probably also lose sleep over being watched by the CIA and think they know who the other shooter was on the Grassy Knoll. They should consider getting some professional help and possibly medication. Calling something "racist" when no one else can make out even its outline also means that people aren't going to listen really closely the next time the speaker has a hissy fit. Eventually they won't listen at all, not even if he's being beaten up by armband-wearing Aryans.
Afghanistan isn't a nice place, but except for the Hazaras and maybe one or two other tiny minorities that no one's ever heard of, its people are Caucasians. The Hazaras, descended from the Mongol hordes, are on our side, so what's the beef there? The northern tribes speak various Turkic languages - Uzbek, Tadjik and Turkmen - and use Dari, related to Persian as a lingua franca (as Alan Dershowitz will attest, that means they speak French). The Pashtuns are the same color, as close to the northerners physically as, say, Italians are to Greeks, and speak an Indo-European language. The place has been afflicted with tribal wars, not race riots.
I guess the Pakistanis and "Arabs" who flooded into Afghanistan and colonized it could make some sort of a claim of racial motivation in our taking action against them to assist the real owners of the country, but they're the bad guys. And we never did sort them out by race - we bombed them all indiscriminately. Admittedly, as the kiddies of U of W whined, ''There are a lot of innocent people in Afghanistan." Usually there are a lot of innocent people in any given locality. The problem never was with them. The problem in fact lay with the gunmen, thugs, sadists and thieves who were preying upon them. The good ol' USA should take immense pride in killing as many of them as it could, so they would stop shooting, beating, torturing and stealing from the innocent folk. But racial motivation with regard to the Bad Guys is only visible to trained observers. If it was there at all (and I say it wasn't, but I'm not a trained observer), it was overshadowed by opposition to naked Evil.
The Bad Guys' wives and kiddies? Ah, now that does represent a tragedy. The women and children were innocent. Trouble is, we didn't bring them to Afghanistan. Perhaps they should have left them home in Chechnya and Saudi Arabia and Yemen and Kuwait. Or at least someplace other than the front lines.
A war against Muslims? Afghanistan is one of a tiny handful countries in the world which are effectively 100% Muslim, the other of comparable size being Saudi Arabia. If you stand anywhere in Afghanistan and throw a rock, you'll hit a Muslim. The Bad Guys were Muslims, the guys on our side were Muslims. What's the beef?
The U of Washington kiddies' positions are really based on an antiwar philosophy and don't have anything to do with racism. Having short attention spans, they're pretty hazy on what happened three, now almost four months ago in New York, which is after all on the other side of the country and, like, close to New Jersey or Ohio or someplace. Having decided that war must be bad, they argue backward to find the reasons for its badness. Having started from a false premise ("all war is bad") they find themselves trapped in a balogna mine and attempt to dig themselves out using whatever materials are lying around, whether suited to the purpose or not.
Hey, U of Washington kiddies! Grab your crayons and make note of the following: "Socrates was a man, therefore all men are Socrates." This is an example of faulty logic. "One war was bad. Therefore all wars are bad." Is there any similarity? (C'mon, now. Think hard...)
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 09:07 pm ||
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A leader of Afghanistan's Taliban militia was critically injured in a U.S. airstrike last month and may be dead. Jalaluddin Haqqani and five bodyguards were seriously wounded in the U.S. bombardment on Nov. 16 outside Khost, and is reported to have died of his wounds. Never liked him anyway. Glad he's gone.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Osama bin Laden warns the United States in his latest video message that it will soon collapse, regardless of whether he lives or dies, as Muslims around the world "awaken to its tyranny." The Criminal Mastermind said that "It is very important to concentrate on hitting the American economy with every available tool... the economy is the base of its military power. The United States is a great economy but at the same time it is fragile." Well, damn. I'm gonna move somewhere stable. Like Pakistan, or Chechnya.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 09:13 pm ||
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An armed Arab-American Secret Service agent heading to Texas to protect President Bush was barred from an American Airlines flight Tuesday after the pilot questioned his paperwork. Better safe than you-know-what. If I was a crazed terrorist killer, I'd be on my controllers to forge me some documents saying I was a Secret Service agent and free to pack a rod on an airliner.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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French sources said Reid spent 10 days in Israel in July of this year, and went on from there to Cairo. From Cairo he visited Turkey, from where he went to Pakistan in August and made his unsuccessful attempt to enter Afghanistan. The report did not say why Reid would have failed to get into Afghanistan. After his stay in Pakistan he returned to Europe, going first to Amsterdam, where he was based, and then to Brussels, where he obtained the new British passport that he used to take the Paris-Miami flight last weekend. The shoe bombs (The thought makes my arches hurt!) were picked up in Amsterdam.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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The court-appointed lawyers for Maxwell Smart "Richard Reid", the man suspected of trying to blow up a Paris-to-Miami flight with explosives in his shoes, said they had no evidence connecting his acts to a wider plot, ignoring the obvious.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Pakistan says it has ruled out nuclear war. Maj-Gen Rashid Qureshi stated at a press briefing that "one gets surprised how some people jump to a nuclear situation in the event of Indo-Pakistan conflict. Pakistan and India are responsible nations and nuclear option is something which none can realistically even think of. These [nuclear capabilities] are deterrences which are meant to be no more than that. World is very conscious, and so are India and Pakistan. It is not anything one should even consider." That's a relief to all of us. Just to be on the safe side, though, how about backing off your war preparations?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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A senior leader of the All Party Hurriyat Conference lashed out at foreign militants fighting in the region, saying their presence undermined the Kashmiri people's "indigenous" freedom struggle. "Ours is an indigenous struggle for freedom and national salvation and the presence of foreign mujahideen here only twists it out of the frame," said Abdul Gani Lone, an executive member of the organization. Yeah, good idea. Get rid of those out of town boys. You see how much they helped the Taliban.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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For the first time in five days, the Pakistani Army lowered the intensity of firing and shelling against Indian border positions. People continued fleeing border hamlets, with migration figures crossing the 7,000. The number of rounds fired dropped from 14,000-16,000 to 3,000-4,000. Good idea. Back off. Take a deep breath. Don't do anything hasty.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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The Indian government has decided to reduce the strength of staff in high commissions -- both Indian and Pakistani -- by 50 per cent within 48 hours. The movement of Pakistan high commission staff including the Pakistani high commissioner has also been restricted to the Delhi municipal limits. Overflight facilities for Pakistan International Airlines have been withdrawn effective January 1, 2002.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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The Afghan government alleged that Osama bin Laden was now living in Pakistan under the protection of Jamaat Ulema-i-Islam chief Maulana Fazlur Rahman. Mohammad Habeel, spokesman for Defence Minister Mohammad Qasim Fahim, said "reliable intelligence sources" reported Osama had crossed from the Tora Bora region of eastern Afghanistan into Pakistan about a week ago. "He's everywhere! He's everywhere!" On December 16th, the Rantburg Street erupted at speculation he'd skipped to Pakland and was having a nice visit with Gen. Hamid Gul before heading for Saudi Arabia to visit the folks. Still think that's most likely.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Leaders of the Afghanistan and Pakistan Defense Council, a conglomerate of Pakistan's hard-line religious parties, condemned the Musharraf government for taking action against the activities of fundamentalist groups and announced plans to hold protest demonstrations. They demanded that the government release all arrested Islamic leaders to bring out the country from its current crisis. "The US military must be pulled out from the country as soon as possible because now they have no justification for their stay in Pakistan after the fall of Taliban regime." The group criticized the government for taking Pakistan towards (horrors!) "secularism". And this is a bad thing because...?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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President Pervez Musharraf said the government was not planning any crackdown on the madrassahs. He said that the government would not impose anything on the religious schools but encourage and support those willing to introduce subjects like English, mathematics, science and geography in their syllabus. This would seem to contradict what he said last month. Or was that only for foreign consumption?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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The president of Pontland district in Somalia, Jum'a Ali Jum'a, has denied the existence of any camp for terrorists in Somalia. He called on the US not to launch attacks against the region. In a statement he made before he returned to Pontland from Nairobi, Jum'a said there is no groups that can threaten the interests of other countries in the world. He said that targeting Somalia, which is torn by war, would not be a wise decision by the US if it actually wants to fight terrorism. Perhaps not from a cost/benefit point of view. But I used to know a few Rangers who would like to come back for a visit.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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At least 11 people were killed and dozens more injured in fighting between militia gunmen split over loyalties to Somalia's fledgling national government. The dead included at least five civilians caught in the cross fire. The gunbattle began late Wednesday and continued into Thursday in the central Medina district, and pitted militiamen loyal to powerful faction leader Musa Sude Yalahow against those loyal to his senior commander, who agreed to join forces with the government. Cmdr. Omar Mohamed Mohamud signed a deal with President Abdiqasim Salad Hassan's government last week. Yalahow, one of two Mogadishu faction leaders opposed to the government, refused to attend the talks. The fighting broke out when large numbers of militiamen prepared to welcome Mohamud back from Kenya. The battle involved several hundred gunmen and more than 10 pickups fitted with anti-tank and anti-aircraft guns. At least six gunmen were killed. AFP put the toll at 22 dead and 50 wounded. Hey, you guys just fight it out. Let us know when you're done, okay?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Jamal Khashoggi, deputy editor of Saudi Arabiaâs Arab News, writes that: "The best solution from the Arab point of view is for a completely new type of peace process to be launched in the Middle East; a peace process that would free them from American pressure and from the efforts of trying to defend a PA that is under occupation; an operation that is not based on the Oslo, Hebron, Sharm el-Sheikh, or Wye River Plantation agreements and their commitments to the security of Israel. Arabs have realized through bitter experience that giving such commitments is embarrassing in the extreme, since no one can prevent a people under occupation from fighting back. The only way a new type of peace process can be introduced, however, is by abandoning the PA and leaving it to wither away. Most Arab foreign ministers meeting in Cairo last week would likely have agreed to this. Letâs put this issue to a vote. Are there any supporters besides Syria and Lebanon?" Ummm. Yes, probably so. Arafat's proven himself to be a mediocrity, not militant enough for one side, too corrupt for his own people to tolerate, and too dishonest in his negotiations to please the other side. The only factor in his favor is the known devil versus unknown, which translates into nothing but inertia. A push from the Arab side would probably see him living in Monte Carlo while the balance of power readjusts.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Israeli troops entered Palestinian-controlled areas of Hebron and arrested seven suspected members of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad groups. The detainees were students at a Hebron university.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Nineteen members of an Islamic cult were found guilty of treason for planning a "holy war" to oust Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and could now face the death penalty. Judge Zulkefli Ahmad Makinudin announced he was satisfied the prosecution had proven the guilt of the leader of the Al-Ma'unah cult, Mohamed Amin Mohamed Razali, and his 18 followers.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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The European Union has released a new list of organizations it considers as supporting or engaging in terrorist activities. Groups appearing on the new list include: the external security organization of the Hezbollah in Lebanon; the Spanish leftist group GRAPO; four Northern Irish Protestant groups -- the Loyalist Volunteer Force, the Orange Volunteers, the Red Hand Defenders and the Ulster Defense Association/Ulster Freedom Fighters -- and three Greek organizations -- November 17, Revolutionary Cells and Revolutionary Popular Struggle, or ELA -- the Continuity IRA and Real IRA.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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At least six Russian soldiers were killed and another 17 wounded in rebel attacks and land mine explosions in Chechnya. Russian troops launched new security raids throughout the region. 14 rebels were killed in air and artillery strikes over the past 24 hours. Mi-24 helicopter gunships and heavy artillery targeted suspected rebel bases in Chechnya's southern mountains, while federal forces searched for rebels in foothill towns and villages. More than 50 residents were detained over the past 24 hours on suspicion of being linked to the rebels. A Chechen official said rebels shelled federal outposts 24 times, killing three troops and wounding another 13.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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President-for-Life Yasser Arafatâs Fatah representative in Lebanon said that he had recently escaped an assassination attempt ordered by hard-liner Abu Nidal. Sultan Abul-Aynayn told a news conference that his group was holding a Palestinian, Ibrahim Abdel-Aal, 25. Abul Aynayn said Abdel-Aal was operating on the orders of Abu-Nidal, leader of the Fatah Revolutionary Council, and was planning to assassinate him with a car bomb in the Rashidieh camp in south Lebanon. Abu Nidal gets its funding from Iraq and Libya and is headquartered in Iraq. We tend to forget they're still around. Bet Abul Aynayn wishes he could.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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The Jammu and Kashmir Police claimed to have come across the first al-Qaeda link in the Kashmir Valley with the arrest of a terrorist in Srinagar. Ghulam Qadir Najjar was closely associated with the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen and al-Qaeda terror outfits. An al-Qaeda operative, Qamar Ayub, who was arrested in Jammu last week, had stayed at Najjar's safe house for over a month. Terrorists of the Harkat had also been using Najjar's house as a hideout. 20-25 Al-Qaida members were reported to have sneaked into the Kashmir Valley and a close associate of Osama bin Laden, Molvi Abrar, is said to be their chief. A massive campaign has been launched to bust the network. This is not a good time to be an al-Qaeda anywhere, but Kashmir's a worse bet than most.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Two extremist views have sprouted up since the Sept. 11 atrocities. One is the Western view of the Muslim world. This view sees the Muslims as intolerant of other religions and a safe-haven for terrorists. Then there are those extremists who call the West "The Big Satan" which has done little â if anything â to promote good standards of living for mankind. One little mistake in politics can blow right up in oneâs face... so whoâs at fault? Who cares? Like it matters to sit and worry about who our next enemy will be. Havenât we made enough of those already in the world? Peace is what we crave and peace we shall have. Let us unite and put the past behind us. Move on, help and let others live.
(Italics are mine.) Does that mean you're dropping your program of subversion and attempted world domination? Gonna stop the schools for terrorists? Good idea. We really aren't a vindictive people.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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Foreign ministers of India and Russia have spoken against "double-standards" in combating international terrorism, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. In their conversation over phone, Jaswant Singh and Igor Ivanov said terrorism has become the most dangerous challenge of the modern times and it was inadmissible to adopt double-standards in combating it. And they're right. If the Bad Guys aren't stomped they'll continue to grow. To quote a famous Russian: "That which ceases to grow begins to rot." Quit pussy-footing and let the rotting begin.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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The Pentagon has chosen Guantanamo as the "least worst" place to hold Taliban and al-Qaida prisoners after they are removed from Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said. Thought they were going to Wake Island?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
12/27/2001 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
