Azfar Aziz
How much longer will it take for our policy-makers to wake up to the reality that the so-called old-scheme -- "kawmi" -- madrasas are as anti-people and anti-social in nature as anti-Islamic in spirit?
May be the governments since 1971 have all along been aware of their reactionary nature but none of them could muster enough moral and political courage or had enough integrity to ban them. But the recent proofs that many of these Kawmi madrasas are hotbeds of al-Qaeda-type, and probably al-Qaeda-linked, "Islamist" militancy gives utmost urgency to abolishing these breeding places of many social, political, economic, security, and religious evils.
Economically, kawmi madrasas are an unwelcome burden on the society as they produce a class of citizens who have no productive skill. The only work they usually do is that of an imam or a muezzin of a mosque, besides presiding over milad mahfils, all in exchange of money. These institutions, often occupying public land and consuming power and water without paying the bills, also run on social charity.
A poor economy like Bangladesh can ill-afford such schools that pay it back with nothing but numerous bigots and clergymen.
A poor economy like Bangladesh can ill-afford such schools that pay it back with nothing but numerous bigots and clergymen, who have no place in an Islamic society as perceived by its founder, Prophet Mohammed. It is in this aspect that kawmi madrasas go against the spirit of Islam. In Mohammed's lifetime and for many years after his death, Islam did not allow priesthood as a profession as it also discouraged monasticism.
In Islam, every Muslim prays, observes other rituals and carries out other religious duties for the sake of Allah alone and in exchange for no earthly gains which tantamount to Shirk or acknowledging something/somebody else as partner to His absolute monopoly on worship. But, as in the case of every other religion, Islamic norms started to degenerate soon after the death of the Prophet. For example, the second Khaliph, Omar Ibn Khattab, prohibited women from taking part in mass prayers, Jamaats, which had been a customary practice during Mohammed's lifetime, on the pretext that the changed social circumstances no more permitted that tradition to continue.
The circumstances changed indeed, and continued to change more and more, and, at one stage, priesthood, though much abhorred by the Prophet who held it as one of the major cause for the degeneration of Christianity, crept into Islam. The original practice was to elect/select the most knowledgeable, honourable and old person among the people gathered to pray to lead the congregation, and, of course, in exchange for nothing.
By Islamic tenets, every Muslim is also bound to earn his/her bread by working, whether as a manual labourer, a farmer, an artisan, a professional, a trader, or a miller. It is because Islam did not want any of its followers to remain unproductive and thus not contributing to the common social good.
By Islamic tenets, every Muslim is also bound to earn his/her bread by working, whether as a manual labourer, a farmer, an artisan, a professional, a trader, or a miller. It is because Islam did not want any of its followers to remain unproductive and thus not contributing to the common social good. That is why it discouraged also Rahbaniat or monasticism, another trait of many older religions.
So, from the point of view of both economics and religion, the unproductive clerical and parasitic life the products of the parasitic Kawmi madrasas live should not be permitted to continue as they are as much contrary to the essence, spirit and norms of the religion they sell unashamedly to the ignorant masses to earn a living as they are to the economic well-being of the nation, especially of the vast majority of its poor people.
The money wasted on these so-called educational institutes and their ill-educated graduates could be better utilised for ensuring healthcare and food security of the poor and the disadvantaged.
The money wasted on these so-called educational institutes and their ill-educated graduates could be better utilised for ensuring healthcare and food security of the poor and the disadvantaged.
Along with the students and graduates, the authorities of these kawmi madrasas and the quarters that have political, financial or other vested interests in them comprise a section of the society who, in keeping with its fanatic and reactionary tradition as was seen during the Liberation War, in recent times has emerged as the main population bank from which the Islamist militants draw their operatives to carry out the most atrocious acts like bombing innocent people to death in an attempt what it claims to establish an Islamic state.
Although the situation in Bangladesh is far different than that in Afghanistan or Iraq, these quasi-Islamist bigots have their own hidden political agenda under the anti-US stance and love for Laden and the late Saddam they preach. They use the kawmi madrasas as their strongholds and ruthlessly use the graduates, students and supporters of these institutions to realise their political ambitions. Recent intelligence reports show that last year's crackdown on the banned JMB has not succeeded in stopping their anti-state and anti-social schemes which have taken new channels, and they have become more alert and cautious and are preparing to pounce upon the nation once again at any opportune time.
Against this background, the people still having a sane mind feel the government should abolish these vice dens called kawmi madrasas, a number of which in Bagmara, Rajshahi had even been used as torture chambers of medieval cruelty, and thus deprive these regrouping militants of their safe havens and recruit banks and, at the same time, deliver the poor nation of an unwanted, and unwarranted, burden. For those who want to study Islamic theology there are plenty of institutions under the Madrasa Education Board which also offer their graduates opportunities to enrol in university or technical courses to acquire some professional skills and thereby become productive and worthy members of the society.
I should reiterate again -- it is high time, may be the last one, to take a bold strategic decision on this issue of utmost national interest, however tough and daring it may seem to be, because the consequence of not doing that may prove disastrous by many more degrees, recovering from which may even be impossible.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/13/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
There is a bit of stuff to wade through here. The writer never really addresses the "why" of the Albanian Jersey jihadists. He said that the jihadists in the Balkins were largely Arabs. The mission in the Balkans was to stabilize the region and to prevent further "ethnic cleaning." So why is there the hostility towards someone who saves you?
The unifying concept is religion. Islam unites many diverse Muslims in their hatred of the West. They can hate each other but they hate us more. Why? Because the fires of hatred are being fanned in the mosques and financed largely by the Saudis. The USA needs to be independent of the mideast and its oil. Let these guys sit on their oil and sand. See how long you can live eating sand or oil.
#10
Sarkozy had a mandate in the election. There must be quite a few remaining French in France that are tired of cars burning and want to see change. He might pull it off.
The electoral victory by Nicolas Sarkozy is the product of the French public's rejection of a decay eroding the foundations of the Fifth Republic since its inception in 1958. The country's insecure economy and the need for achange were among the reasons for Mr. Sarkozy's score. He has been promising a third path between the rigid left-wing agenda and the stagnating Chirac economics.
But Mr. Sarkozy's victory is also a silent-majority response to urban jihad. Despite the political and media elite attempts to dodge the debate for a long time, when given the opportunity, French electors responded to the establishment's tergiversation on the perceived threat to democracy and security. Since the 1970s, France has been an open field for terrorist activities. But as of the early 1990s,French urban centers witnessed the rise of radical Islamists migrating from the Maghreb and other regions, Salafi clerics engaged in jihadism-building around Paris and many other cities. By 2005 many suburban zones were practically "ruled"by a parallel ideological and gangster-like "powers."
Inaugurated by Charles de Gaulle in the 1960s, the "politique Arabe de la France," meant practically an accommodation by Paris of the wishes of foreign powers providing cheap natural resources to the country's industrial complex. Very smartly, the domestic jihadi web positioned itself under the shield of France's "good relations" with the Saudi and other Arab oil-producing regimes. Any reprisal by French authorities against the jihadi web inside the country would "hurt" these relations and thus would affect the "economic benefits" to the country. And to top it off, high-profile politicians, including President Jacques Chirac, became direct partners with Middle Eastern financial empires.
Hence, the silent majority in France was witnessing, powerless, the growth of the extremists in the banlieues (suburbs) and the provinces.For years, the popular mood was exacerbated by the "parallel society" expanded by the radicals in France. Wherever French police and social workers couldn't go, the jihadi networks would mushroom.
After the September 11 attacks in the United States, most Europeans felt it could also happen to them, but their elite dismissed the possibility because "America brought this to itself because of its foreign policy," as they argued. But soon enough Western Europe felt the ire of al Qaeda: Madrid on March 11, 2004, London on July 7, 2005 and the assassination of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh on November 2, 2004in Amsterdam were visible warnings. Between 2003 and late 2004, French diplomacy fought a fierce battle against America's involvement in Iraq, assuming -- wrongly -- they have insured safe at home and overseas.
Not supporting the United States in Iraq didn't shield France from this domestic threat. Al Qaeda and the Khomeinists do not reward infidels just for not joining other infidels in the fight. In 2004, the Syrian regime went after Chirac allies in Lebanon. In September Paris reacted by co-introducing with the United States, United Nations Security Council Resolution 1559 to pull Syria out. In retaliation the Assad regime launched an assassination campaign in 2005 killing many politicians including Mr. Chirac's close friend, Rafiq Hariri.
On October 27, a "gang uprising" spread to dozens of French cities burning ten thousand cars. The media, government and academia insisted on the "jobs-youth-socio-economic" dimension of the uprising. But the silent majority didn't buy the argument. People interacting with the "insurgents," including the security agencies, understood (in horror) that large urban zones around France's cities had slipped away from national sovereignty. The radicals have built their "societe parallele:" If the police can't go there, it is becoming suburban Taliban pockets. A national leader had to step in.
Acting fast, the Minister of Interior Nicholas Sarkozy stepped in. Using French laws he threatened to deport a number of non-citizens radical clerics. The November 2005intifadawas a response to the Sarkozy counter-Jihadi measures. Meanwhile the public found their man: In 2007, their votes brought him to the top job, hoping he will draw a line in the sand.
As a conservative, Mr. Sarkozy assures most French that national identity has to be protected. But he promotes progressive changes dealing with the environment and economy. However French instincts are about survival, about what they saw on TV from New York, Madrid and London, and what they saw from their balconies and on their streets later on. Mr. Sarkozy's image merged with France's need for a national resistance to Terror. Against Mr. Chirac's bureaucracy, Segolene Royal's charm, and the elite attacks against "Sarco l'Americain" he won the elections, swiftly.
This is a lesson to liberal democracies. If the dominant elite and media frustrate the public with anti-historical drives, the masses will ultimately find the right leaders to produce the change; and France just did it.The victory of Mr. Sarkozy is not just one more European election -- it is a benchmark in French politics and subsequently in the Western struggle in the war on terror. The change will affect France deeply, and also its relations on the continent, across the Atlantic and in the Greater Middle East.
From this angle at least, Mr. Sarkozy's victory can be viewed as a first step in the return of the French resistance, but this time against another threat: jihadism.
#1
de Gaulle was the worst thing that happened to France in the 20th century. Both Churchill and Eisenhower hated the impudent bastard. However, FDR favored holding the peacock up by his jockstrap to allow the French nation to rebuild some pride after their hideous performance in the war.One of FDR's serious mistakes. Another was giving birth to the United Nations. An abominable failure just like the League of Nations before it.
#2
Sarkozy's open admiration for America is a devastating blow to jihadists and moonbats. The elites have lost their hegemony over public opinion among the great unwashed.
#5
This is a lesson to liberal democracies. If the dominant elite and media frustrate the public with anti-historical drives, the masses will ultimately find the right leaders to produce the change
I'll pray right through November, 2008 that Mr. Phares is correct.
Most terrorists seem like bumbling losers if they're caught before the act: That's certainly true of the Fort Dix jihadists who took their terrorist training DVD to the local audio store to be copied. It was also true of the Islamists arrested in Toronto last year for plotting to behead the prime minister, one of whose cell members had a bride who wanted him to sign a prenup committing him to jihad. The Heathrow plotters arrested while planning to blow up U.S.-bound airliners included a Muslim convert who'd started out as the son of a British Conservative Party official with a P. G. Wodehouse double-barreled name and a sister who was a Victoria's Secret model and ex-wife of tennis champ Yanick Noah.
But then Mohammed Atta and the 9/11 gang would have seemed pretty funny if you'd run into them in that lap-dance club they went to before the big day where the girls remembered them only as very small tippers. Most terrorists are jokes until the bomb goes off.
So, when we're fortunate enough to catch them in advance, it's worth pausing to consider what they tell us about the broader threat we face. According to genius New York Times headline writers, "Religion Guided Three Held In Fort Dix Plot." You don't say. Any religion in particular?
Well, the trio were Muslims, but Albanian Muslims -- i.e., they weren't Arabs and didn't have names like Mohammed and Abdullah (though their accomplices did). Even if America were minded to profile, it's harder to profile against chaps with names like "Shain Duka" (Fort Dix) or "Richard Reid" (the shoebomber) or "Jermaine Lindsay" (a July 7 Tube bomber) or "Muriel Degauque" (a Belgian lady who self-detonated in a suicide attack on U.S. forces in Iraq) or "Jack Roche" (an Australian arrested for plotting to blow up the Israeli Embassy in Canberra).
Second, the young Duka brothers are "radical Muslim" sons in a family of otherwise "moderate Muslim" oldsters. That, too, fits a pattern of de-assimilation, of young Western Muslims far more implacable and hostile than their parents and grandparents. The London bombers were British subjects born and bred, radicalized in the vacuum of contemporary multiculturalism. One of the Toronto plotters had a father-in-law who was the pharmacist at the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry base. The Princess Pats have done sterling work in Afghanistan, and pop supports their mission. But his daughter doesn't, and she named his grandchild after a Chechen terrorist killed by the Russians.
Third, what then radicalized so many Western Muslims? Answer: in many cases, the Balkans. When Yugoslavia collapsed 15 years ago, Jacques Poos told the Americans to butt out: "The hour of Europe has come!" he declared confidently. Poos was the foreign minister of Luxembourg, a country as big as your hot tub, but he chanced to be holding the European Union's rotating "presidency" at the time and, as it happened, the Americans were very happy to butt out. "We don't have a dog in this fight," said then-secretary of state, James Baker.
Well, the hour of Europe came and went, and a couple of hundred thousand corpses later the EU was only too happy for Americans to butt back in again. So NATO bombed Christian Serbs in defense of Albanian Muslims, and a fat lot of good it did if the Duka brothers are any indication.
In theory, Baker was right. But out there in the Balkans, if you're one of the dogs in the fight, great-power evenhandedness can seem pretty one-handed by the time you hear about it. Don't take my word for it. Here's Osama bin Laden: "The British are responsible for destroying the Caliphate system. They are the ones who created the Palestinian problem. They are the ones who created the Kashmiri problem. They are the ones who put the arms embargo on the Muslims of Bosnia so that 2 million Muslims were killed."
Whoa, hold up there: How come a list of imperial interventions wound up with a bit of non-imperial non-intervention? Because, for serious nations, even not taking sides is seen as, in effect, taking sides. What was the single biggest factor in the radicalization of British Muslims? Omar Sheikh, convicted in Karachi for the kidnapping and beheading of Daniel Pearl, is British -- a Westernized non-observant chess-playing pop-listening beer-drinking London School of Economics student, until he was fired up by the massacres of Bosnian Muslims. And, while Europe dithered as the mountain of corpses piled up, Saudi money poured in, transforming the relatively mild Balkan Islam into something far more virulent. Look at the change in Muslim architecture in the region over the last 15 years: They build Wahhabist mosques now. Unlike the State Department complaceniks, the Islamists understand there is no stability.
Tough, you say. So what? Washington still has no dog in these fights. It's time to hunker down in Fortress America. Which brings me to the fourth lesson: What fortress? The three Duka brothers were (if you'll forgive the expression) illegal immigrants. They're not meant to be here. Yet they graduated from a New Jersey high school and they operated two roofing companies and a pizzeria. Think of how often you have to produce your driver's license or Social Security number. But, five years after 9/11, this is still one of the easiest countries in the world in which to establish a functioning but fraudulent identity.
Consider, for example, the post-9/11 ritual of airline security. You have to produce government-issued picture ID to the TSA official. Does that make you feel safer? On that Tuesday morning in September, four of the killers got on board by using picture ID they'd acquired through the "undocumented worker" network in Falls Church, Va. Half the jurisdictions in the United States issue picture ID to people who shouldn't even be in the country, and they issue it as a matter of policy. That's interesting.
The Fort Dix boys were pulled over for 19 traffic violations, but because they were in "sanctuary cities," any cop who suspected they were illegals was unable to report them to immigration authorities. Again, as a matter of policy. Can we have a list of "Sanctuary Cities, please?
On one hand, America creates a vast federal security bureaucracy to prevent another 9/11. On the other hand, American politicians and bureaucrats create a parallel system of education and welfare and health care entitlements, main- taining and expanding a vast network of fraudulent identity that corrupts the integrity of almost all state databases. And though it played a part in the killing of 3,000 Americans, leaders of both parties insist nothing can be done to stop it. All we can do is give the Duka brothers "a fast track to citizenship."
The Iranians already are operating in South America's Tri-Border area. Is it the nothing-can-be-done crowd's assumption that the fellows who run armies of the "undocumented" from Mexico into America are just kindhearted human smugglers who'd have nothing to do with jihad even if the price was right? If you don't have borders, you won't have a nation -- and you may find "the jobs Americans won't do" covers a multitude of sins.
Posted by: Bobby ||
05/13/2007 07:18 ||
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#1
An August 14, 2006 report produced by the Congressional Research Service listed 31 cities and counties that have dont ask, dont tell sanctuary policies in place. They are:
Anchorage, Alaska
Fairbanks, Alaska
Chandler, Arizona
Fresno, California
Los Angeles, California
San Diego, California
San Francisco, California
Sonoma County, California
Evanston, Illinois
Cicero, Illinois
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Orleans, Massachusetts
Portland, Maine
Baltimore, Maryland
Takoma Park, Maryland
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Durham, North Carolina
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Aztec, New Mexico
Rio Arriba County, New Mexico
Sante Fe, New Mexico
New York, New York
Ashland, Oregon
Gaston, Oregon
Marion County, Oregon
Austin, Texas
Houston, Texas
Katy, Texas
Seattle, Washington
Madison, Wisconsin.
* Alaska and Oregon both have state-wide policies that forbid state agencies from using resources to enforce federal immigration law. Oregon law, however, does provide an exception to allow law enforcement officers to share information on immigration status with federal authorities with those arrested for criminal offenses.
#2
There's only one profile needed. Muslim. A giant task force within the FBI ought to be investigating and documenting each and every Muslim in the US. Preparations for detainee camps should be in progress. The only way to deal with this group is harshly. Of course this is just imagination until they do succeed by trial and error in actually murdering thousands more US civilians. It's bound to happen. They are stupid, but the longshot odds will allow success eventually.
#1
Excellent article. At least two/three of his suggestions certainly sound familiar around here. Expand detention, use martial law, and get in the info/propaganda game. And hit Syria hard; he wimps out on Iran, given their greater heft, whereas I would conduct a war-in-all-but-name with such ferocity that it puts the Maliki govt. on the ropes or actually overturns it. (He doesn't mention using harsh measures selectively to disrupt and demoralize resistance, though he sort of hints at it).
Good that he mentioned the grumbling over the medals for Bremer, Tenet, and Franks (though I'm not sure about Franks - he seems to have succeeded in his assigned tasks rather well), and esp. Casey's promotion (that is ridiculous).
One thing he doesn't mention - he notes that Dubya has been far too tolerant of failure in the field. While true, my impression (only that, still waiting for a USEFUL "tell all" book by some senior retired knucklehead) is that the clearly inappropriate Casey approach had full civilian backing, not to mention support within the brass. The whole operation, mil. and civilian, went stupid on pacifying Iraq sometime in 2005, so it went way beyond tolerating individual failures.
#1
Sound bites are so much more effective than facts, Paul. Still, it was a good story, but waaaay to loooong. Joe Sixpack will never be able to get all the way through it, let alone Keith Olberman.
Posted by: Bobby ||
05/13/2007 12:04 Comments ||
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Feeling crowded? Paul Watson is. The founder and president of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society writes that human overpopulation is "a virus . . . killing our host the planet Earth," and so the number of people living in the world should be slashed by 85 percent. "No human community should be larger than 20,000 people," Watson insists in a new essay. "We need to radically and intelligently reduce human populations to fewer than one billion." He describes mankind as "the AIDS of the Earth," and calls for an end to cars, planes, and all ships save those powered by sail.
The views of a fanatic? Yes, but Watson is also a co founder of Greenpeace and a former member of the Sierra Club board of directors, not to mention one of Time magazine's 20th-century environmental "heroes." It is unlikely that his support for eliminating 5.5 billion human beings and most modern conveniences will hurt his standing among the green elite. On the contrary: Within the environmental movement, antipathy to population growth and technology is utterly conventional.
Bemoaning human fecundity has been in vogue at least since 1798, when Thomas Malthus wrote his famous essay arguing that since people multiply faster than the food supply, more babies eventually mean more starvation and misery. Malthus was wrong (as he later acknowledged), but two centuries later neo-Malthusian misanthropy is as fashionable as ever. A report published this week by the Optimum Population Trust, a British think tank, recommends population reduction as the "most effective" strategy to prevent climate change. "The greatest thing anyone . . . could do to help the future of the planet," announced OPT co-chairman John Guillebaud, "would be to have one less child." But that's not what the evidence shows.
Malthus wrote just before the turn of the 19th century, when the Earth was home to some 980 million human beings. The global population today is about 6.5 billion, a sevenfold increase. If the alarmists are right, our lives should be far more impoverished, degraded, and pitiful than those of our ancestors. But they aren't. By and large, human beings today are healthier, wealthier, safer, cleaner, better fed, and more productive than those who lived in 1800.
Anyone tempted to dismiss such a claim as naive should spend some time with Indur Goklany's "The Improving State of the World," a new compendium of data making the case that as nations grow wealthier, the quality of human life rises. Far from being a disaster for our species and the planet, Goklany demonstrates, economic growth and technological change have been a boon for both, making it possible for ever more people to live ever-improving lives in an ever-cleaner environment. And while the developed countries may outstrip the developing world in wealth, it is in the world's poorest societies that some of the greatest strides are being made.
Take food. Since 1950, the world's population has soared by more than 150 percent. Yet food has become so abundant that global food prices (in real terms) have plunged 75 percent. Over the past generation, chronic undernourishment in poor countries has been slashed from 37 percent to 17 percent, while in the United States, staples such as potatoes and flour have dropped in price (relative to income) by more than 80 percent.
Or take infant mortality. Before industrialization, children died before reaching their first birthday at a rate exceeding 200 per 1,000 live births, or more than one in five. "In the United States as late as 1900," Goklany writes, "infant mortality was about 160; but by 2004 it had declined to 6.6." In developing countries, the fall in mortality rates began later, but is occurring more quickly. In China, infant mortality has plunged from 195 to 30 in the past 50 years.
Life expectancy? From 31 years in 1900, it was up to 66.8 worldwide in 2003. Health? We are more likely to be disease-free today than our forebears were a century ago. And the onset of chronic illness has been significantly delayed -- by nearly eight years for cancer, nine years for heart diseases, and 11 years for respiratory diseases.
Education, child labor, clean air, freedom, famine, leisure time, global poverty -- Goklany shows that by almost any yardstick you choose, humanity thrives as never before. Living standards do not fall as population rises. On the contrary: Where there are free markets and free minds -- economic growth and technology -- human progress and hope are all but guaranteed. "Humanity, though more populous and still imperfect, has never been in better condition," he writes.
Our lives are better than our ancestors'. Our descendants' can be better than ours.
Keith Olbermann, MSNBC news anchor and co-host of the news channels recent coverage of the Democrat and Republican presidential debates, said in a speech Thursday "the people who are defending us" against the threat of terrorist attack are misguided or overzealous or suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder".
Olbermann drew nervous laughter for his remarks mocking law enforcement officials. Olbermann was speaking at the annual AAN Awards luncheon hosted by the Association of Alternative Weeklies in Manhattan. These are the dimwit trustafarian dilettantes and con-artists who publish that local "arts and culture" rag you find in the free racks outside your favorite supermarket. It should be known as the Association of Emergency Toilet Paper Distributors.
Olbermann received an award named for the late Molly Ivins. (emphasis added)
This is the second time in three days that Olbermann has mocked efforts of law enforcement officials who arrested six men for allegedly plotting to carry out a terrorist attack at a military base in New Jersey. On the Wednesday telecast of Countdown with Keith Olbermann, he derided the efforts of law enforcement official in rounding up suspects dubbed the "Fort Dix Six", saying "the FBI arrested six 'morons'". So, Keith, stupid terrorists should get a pass?
Only until they blow up something or kill someone. Then we need to 'understand their anger'.
In his speech to the fishwrap newspaper trade group, Olbermann said,
"I sit there with no doubt that there's a threat. I have no doubt that there are terrorists. I have no doubt that many of the motivations of the people who are defending us against these things are absolutely sincere and many of them are at worst misguided or overzealous or suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder."
NOTE: We could have just as easily commented on Keith comparing himself to a firefighter rushing in to rescue people from a burning building, whining about being "attacked in every almost every imaginable way personally" or that he is "still waiting for somebody to come back with a rebuttal to the facts that I have tried to elucidate" but calling our troops "misguided, overzealous" and mentally ill was so obviously the low point in an otherwise shameful speech we had to lede (sic) with Keith disparaging the troops. Overbight is arguably the most loathesome of the current crop of media beasts, though the competition is fierce. What is it with these sports geeks turned news-goebbelists, eg the Gold Standard of clueless narcissistic arrogance, Bryant Gumbel?
#2
I thought this guy was dead. Of AIDS. Oh, he has a show on MSNBC -- what's the diff?
Posted by: regular joe ||
05/13/2007 12:19 Comments ||
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#3
Mr. Olbermann is up to host the NFL pregame show for NBC this year. Might wanna let the Network, the League, and your local affiliate know how much you'll be watching him/purchasing products advertised on his show...just saying...
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/13/2007 13:01 Comments ||
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Posted by: Frozen Al ||
05/13/2007 13:44 Comments ||
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#6
Classic liberal asshole. Cry that we are being too heavy handed, then when they blow people up complain that the govt. should have done more to protect us.
#8
Olby is a Bot-Lib-Tard and is high up on my shit list.
Mr. Olbermann is up to host the NFL pregame show for NBC this year. Might wanna let the Network, the League, and your local affiliate know how much you'll be watching him/purchasing products advertised on his show...just saying...
#11
Just a note for Little Leith Olbermann. If your not behind out troops, try getting in front of them. He's an ass, hope he chokes on his food and no one helps.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
05/13/2007 22:42 Comments ||
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#12
Whoops! Keith not Leith, but who cares what he calls himself, he's still an ass.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
05/13/2007 22:45 Comments ||
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If I get the time, which I probably won't since it's Mothers' Day, I'll insert most of the text and argue against the premise. The short version of my arguments: Read the argument against kwami madrassahs on today's Opinion page. Add in Kurdistan, the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, and parts of southern and western Afgahnistan. Stir in Morocco — where the Islamists' war against a moderate, even reasonable king and his government is heating up, and Algeria where operations againts the bad guyz show the possibility of annihilating them. Add bits of the Gulf States.
#1
The mythical moderate Muslim the Muslim who embraces traditional Islam but wants a peaceful coexistence with the West is effectively non-existent because to the extent he exists, he has no voice.
Therefore he exists only in his own head. On thwe street, he has no effect either pro-west or anti-jihad. I think what the writer is saying is that unless and until they take a stand, they do not even count.
Myself, I think a moderate muslim is a civilian as opposed to a radical muslim who is a soldier.
Civilians can become soldiers when the need arises. But they can always be informers, supporters, enablers, financiers, and beneficiaries.
An x-muslim is a good muslim, even then I'd not trust the bastard.
#4
Of course muslim moderates exist, assuming you mean muslims who believe that the Koran does not require violent jihad.
There are millions of Ahmiyadis, millions of Averis, millions of Ismaelis who believe the age of violent jihad has passed, millions of secular muslims who have a financial interest in non violence, and a few free lance post modernist type muslims who believe in a pick-and-choose Islam.
Of course this doesn't make the problem of Islamic terrorism any better; indeed it makes it worse because the Islamic apologist has the example of the other groups to point to in discussions with infidel lackeys.
#6
If those millions of Ahmiyadis, Averis and Ismaelis all want to survive the coming purge, they'd damn well better start making themselves useful in the fight against jihadist Islam. Otherwise they'll just be more Islamic bathwater that finally gets thrown out with the jihadist baby. The only way that Muslims are going to survive is if they become radical reformists. If they cannot bring themselves to start stacking up dead jihadis like so much cordwood, their won't be too much sympathy for them. Anything less will not deflect the blame they deserve for helping to spread Islam's putresence.
To talk of moderating Islam is a blurring of this most important distinction. And, it is not a matter of semantics. Moderators will fail because there simply is no institutional or social base from which to operate. And, precisely because Islam (like Judaism) is a juridical religion based upon laws, legal decisions, precedent, legal schools of jurisprudence dating back hundreds of years, the effect of a policy to hunt out moderate Muslims to moderate this massive jurisprudence is beyond silly it is dangerous because it is a search based upon a false hope when time and effort is in short supply.
As a result, SANE [Society of Americans for National Existence] has staked out an approach which is to Know the Enemy by declaring the enemy historical, traditional, and authoritative Islam or Sharia and those men and women who support Sharia or Islamic law. We also actively support the Reformers and we ignore the call by mostly non-Muslims (and typically those of the so-called neo-con variety) who are in search of the moderate Muslim to reclaim his noble religion of peace from the extremists.
One more fine example of why Shari'a law must be flat out banned in all civilized countries. Advocacy of Shari'a law must become a punishable offense while being regarded as direct incitement of sedition and treason.
From comment #18, by the author:
I am not prepared to allow any Islamic Sharia based regime to have WMD. Period. If Musharraf goes and Pakistan goes Taliban, Pakistans nuclear arsenal must go. Iran should never be allowed this kind of destructive force. And, it has absolutely nothing to do with Israel. You are quite right on that score. Let Israel defend its own interests.
But even more importantly, and this you need to focus on, I simply dont accept the wanton sacrifice of American lives for the sake of some ideological purity. In that I am even more conservative than you. If I am going to err, it will be on the side of preserving American lives and American national security and existence. If we must war barbarically against Islam, so be it; they certainly have proven their bona fides in this affair.
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.
