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2004-04-23 Iraq-Jordan

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Posted by tipper 2004-04-23 11:44:12 AM|| || Front Page|| [3 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 no!no!no! it's the jeeeewss! we are billion people being subjugated by 3 million blood thirsty jeeees!

Posted by Dan 2004-04-23 12:12:23 PM|| 2004-04-23 12:12:23 PM|| Front Page Top

#2 :(

Can someone post some good news?
It's so dark...

Posted by Anonymous4021 2004-04-23 1:00:10 PM|| 2004-04-23 1:00:10 PM|| Front Page Top

#3 at last we know dot coms real name.

Posted by Shipman 2004-04-23 1:12:25 PM|| 2004-04-23 1:12:25 PM|| Front Page Top

#4 I'm glad that Peters still has hope. I lost mine during the looting. There is no sense of civil obligation in that civilization. Just naked self interest and tribal bonds enforced only by fear.

Some will bring up the bloggers. Well there is always a thin veneer of Westernized folks in these cultures. We turn to them because they speak our language. They say soothing things to us and we believe them. But when you rip away the veneer, we see a very different picture. Every unit in society is based on oppression: from the "nation" through the neighborhood down to the family. Some hate the oppression and, as Steven den Beste might say, were born Americans. We tend to identify with these also since they are like us. They are not the majority.

What about the Sufis? They are more spiritual, right? More spiritual but just as likely to fight to preserve tribalism and oppression as this article shows.

What about the Turks and Indonesians? Their cities are Westernized and they seem to be progressing. Yet their countrysides are filled with Islamic violence and 7th century ignorance. The Islamist seem to do some of their best recruiting in these Westernizing countries. Why? In times of trouble, cities die fast. Famine and disease spread quickly. What would have happened in Bagdad if any other conqueror had taken it? Perhaps the millions of dead that the fringe left had predicted.

I'm sorry if I bring anyone down. This is the enormity of the task that confronts us. The Islamists know that we cannot coexist. That's why they vow to destroy us. Our civilizations are not miscible like the Confucian civilizations of the Far East and our own. To Westernize Arab civilization, one must first destroy the the authority and power of every sheikh and Ayatollah. One has to force dozens of nations to open banks that allow the masses to invest, not just the 1% that owns all the fertile land. Then you have to convince that 1% that it would be better for them to invest in factories and utilities rather than rent producing land -- in other words to sell their land to the peasants.

We cannot do these things any more than a communist can truly manage an economy. Here is where I absolutely disagree with Peters. The only people that can change their civilization are the Arabs and their satellite Turkic, Magrehbi, Pakistani, and Malay societies. The collapse of Arab civilization will be violent no matter what we do. The more we are engaged with them, the more violence that will spill over to our countries.

Posted by 11A5S 2004-04-23 1:49:40 PM|| 2004-04-23 1:49:40 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 Here is where I absolutely disagree with Peters. The only people that can change their civilization are the Arabs and their satellite Turkic, Magrehbi, Pakistani, and Malay societies.

This is why we are there, to give them the opportunity to pick up the ball and run with it. To build something new, and in the process wash away the past. We provide the tools and knowhow, and they provide the effort. If the Iraqis succeed, excellent. If not, then separate the known elements that do want to succeed (read: Kurds) from those that don't. And those that don't should be warned to squabble only among themselves and not to attempt to export their misery, lest they risk being finally ground into dust.

Posted by Bomb-a-rama 2004-04-23 2:05:01 PM|| 2004-04-23 2:05:01 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 Arab civilization has been in decline for a long time, since the fall of Granada in 1492 and their defeat at Vienna in 1683. Bernard Lewis outlines in "What Went Wrong? : The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East", the Arab world's withdrawal from contact with the West and the resultant disastrous stagnation their societies. Although European imperialism forced physical contact with the West in the 19th and 20th centuries, by then the Arabs had lost the capability for independent thought and action. The Arab world hasn't produced anything but trouble for the last 600 years, so why are we surprised that it is so hard for them to become part of our modern reality.

Posted by RWV 2004-04-23 3:35:00 PM|| 2004-04-23 3:35:00 PM|| Front Page Top

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