The Republic of Dissent

Soros on the War on Terror

Soros criticizes the war on terror in an article. He argues that the war on terror has three essential weaknesses. The first weakness is that “even if the targets are terrorists, the victims are often innocent civilians, and their suffering reinforces the terrorist cause.” The second is that “it relies on military action and rules out political approaches.” The final weakness is that the war on terror “lumps together different political movements that use terrorist tactics.” Soros is implying that the war on terror is not only an erroneous concept, but that more importantly it is a limited one, which doesn't identify the issues of the world and therefore cannot help leaders to address them. It is an interesting article, but the problem is that Soros doesn't offer an alternative vision to the war in terror, which has the advantage of being easy to understand and being easy to remember. For more, you can read Steve Clemons take on Soros's article or Brian Vogt from the Partnership for a secure America. President Bush promised victory in the War on Terror in a speech to the American Legion National Convention and Martini Republic contrasts it with some of his other speeches on the war on terror.

The best of Yesterday

The best article I read yesterday was the one by Theo Hobson in the Guardian arguing that Muslim alienation is just exposing what is wrong with British culture and the fact that it is too permissive and too disrespectful to value common decency. I think that Theo Hobson's points apply not just to British culture and society, but also to Western Culture in general even though I strongly disagree with them:

The strange fact is that the problem of Muslim alienation is slowly but surely reviving these questions about common culture, public decency. The issue of Muslim integration has provoked liberal commentators into asking whether too much freedom has corrupted us. Perhaps the question of public decency is not just the concern of prudish old ladies after all.

In a recent Guardian article Timothy Garton Ash suggested that one factor in the rise of Muslim alienation is the fact that Britain is "one of the most libertine societies in Europe". […] Instead of dismissing young Muslim puritans as backward, we should ask whether they "might actually be putting their fingers on some things that are wrong with our modern, progressive, liberal, secular society". The point is that we liberals lack the earnestness to voice our objections to the drift of culture: we lack all conviction. We have been raised to believe that freedom of expression is sacred, that taking offence is what Mary Whitehouse does, not with-it young people. We have also been taught that pornography, and the glorification of promiscuity, is fine as long as it has a vaguely feminist agenda. We dare not be taken for sexists, squares or irony-free zones. So we sit tight, and fret in secret about the pornification of the world. And this is where the Muslims come in. We leave it to them to do the earnest objecting, and occasionally, when it feels safe, we murmur that we sort of agree. Maybe they have a point, we say.

I don't like the way Hobson frames the issue as to argue that the choose is between a permissive culture and Muslim Alienation, which is going to cause terrorism and a less permissive and more traditional culture, which is going to reflect the need that some fundamentalists have for a purer culture and society. I prefer the way Amanda Marcotte from Pandagon phrases the issue by pointing how wrong those who argue that permissiveness and pluralism are a threat to the West. The best thing about living in a free society is that it is constantly seeking a balance between liberty, justice and more morality and constantly reevaluation old norms and old traditions. The world will become less dangerous and will avoid a clash of civilizations because precisely the fact of the permissiveness of Western culture. It will be a powerful weapon in the fight against terrorism. It will end the world defeat it by enabling the West to understand the people who threaten its societies and by enabling the people who live in less permissive or totalitarian societies to challenge traditions and to create a culture, which reflects not their past, but their present and their hope for the future. The hope for the world isn't thus westernization or Americanization, but rather cosmopolitism and métissage, which is the mixture of heritages, culture, and races.

Sanctions against Iran won't work

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is expected to issue its report today, which is going to confirm the fact that Iran hasn't and will not put an end to its nuclear program. The US and its European allies are expected to try to impose "targeted" sanctions on Iran; unfortunately pursuing such a course of action will not achieve the goal, which is to do everything possible to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear power. History shows that sanctions rarely achieved their stated objective especially when they are not followed by a large party of the world and especially when time is of the essence. The world is divided not only Iran not only because it is an oil-rich country but also because there are different opinions on how close Iran is to acquire nuclear and how to stop it. Russia and China are going to have to be convinced to follow the US on sanctions and it is going to be difficult for them to agree to them without some reassurances and compensation. More importantly, there is the overwhelming reality that Iran has the power to destabilize the Middle East as it shows with his strong support of Hezbollah and with its increasing influence in Iran. Can sanctions change that reality and more Iran less powerful? I don't think that they can. If sanctions couldn't make Saddam Hussein's Iraq and Gaddafi's Libya bend to the will of the United Nations, it isn't going to stop Ahmadinejad's Iran. The Iranian regime has framed the nuclear issue as one about the dignity and the grandeur of the Iranian nation, which deserves the respect of not only the United States, but of the world. Yielding, retreating now without gaining something in return would be a defeat for the Iranian regime that would stop the rise of Iran as the superpower of the Middle East, but also putting a shameful dent in the new Shia's revival. The only question with Iran is does the US bargain with the Devil or does it try to annihilate it even though pursuing such a strategy would be extremely dangerous and closely and may not even at the end work? There are no good choices.

Food For thought

“Forcing defenceless women into marriage is not all right. It is rape, for a start.” Camilla Cavendish, “With this ring I thee enslave.”

Ignatius on Ahmadinejad

David Ignatius, in his column in the Washington Post, psychoanalyzes Ahmadinejad and I am not sure what to make of his conclusions:

My strongest feeling at the end of his performance was: He may be cocky and eccentric, but don't underestimate him.With a Thursday deadline looming on the nuclear issue, you might expect that Tehran would feel like a garrison town. But it's surprisingly relaxed, and I think that's because most Iranians expect the crisis will be defused somehow. The regime has been putting on a show of defiance as the U.N. deadline approaches, shooting off new missiles in Persian Gulf war games, opening a new heavy-water reactor and festooning downtown streets with banners of Lebanon's Hezbollah leader, Hasan Nasrallah. But this isn't a militarized country, and it certainly isn't eager for confrontation with America.

There aren’t any good options when it comes to Iran. Philippe Douste Blazy, the French Foreign Minister said that France was ready to talk with Iran provided the focus is on the Nuclear issue. The point is that talking, discussing is the only option available to the "West" and to Nations, which rightly fear that a Nuclear Iran would mean a more dangerous world. It is also true that talking to Iran can only be constructive if the talks are open and if the United States agrees to get involved to bargain with devil in order either to avoid or to postpone confrontation.

The roots of Homegrown terror ?

I just ran across this interesting article by Vijay Prashad titled, “I'm British, but…” which also attempts to understand why there is such a thing as homegrown terrorism and especially about its causes. The article has this quote of Robert Pape, an expert on Suicide bombings, which I find fascinating:  “What nearly all suicide terrorist attacks have in common is a specific secular and strategic goal: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists consider to be their homeland. Religion is rarely the root cause, although it is often used as a tool by terrorist organizations in recruiting and in other efforts in service of the broader strategic objective.” 

Ridicule

Don Rumsfeld gave a provocative and in my opinion shameful speech yesterday, which defended the war in Iraq and the Bush administration’s conduct of the fight against terrorism. In that speech, he argued that those who are against the war in Iraq and who criticized the way his administration fight terrorists group haven’t learned the lessons of history and are doing the same thing that the people who argued that it was possible to talk to and to bargain with Hitler did, that is appeasing a new kind of fascism. Here is an excerpt of what he said:

[…] Indeed, in the decades before World War II, a great many argued that the fascist threat was exaggerated -- or that it was someone else’s problem. Some nations tried to negotiate a separate peace -- even as the enemy made its deadly ambitions crystal clear. It was, as Churchill observed, a bit like feeding a crocodile, hoping it would eat you last.
There was a strange innocence in views of the world. Someone recently recalled one U.S. Senator’s reaction in September 1939, upon hearing that Hitler had invaded Poland to start World War II. He exclaimed: “Lord, if only I could have talked with Hitler, all this might have been avoided.” Think of that! I recount this history because once again we face the same kind of challenges in efforts to confront the rising threat of a new type of fascism. Today, another enemy -- a different kind of enemy -- has also made clear its intentions -- in places like New York, Washington, D.C., Bali, London, Madrid, and Moscow. But it is apparent that many have still not learned history’s lessons. But this is still -- even in 2006 -- not well recognized or fully understood. It seems that in some quarters there is more of a focus on dividing our country, than acting with unity against the gathering threats. The struggle we are in is too important -- the consequences too severe -- to have the luxury of returning to the old mentality of “Blame America First.”

Rumsfeld has the right to believe that the war in Iraq is a struggle against fascism; he doesn’t have the right to say that those who don’t agree with him and with his characterizations would have wanted to talk to Hitler. The problem Rumsfeld isn’t that he uses History to defend the indefensible and to delegitimize serious criticisms, but the fact that he doesn’t know anything about History for he is too blinded by ideology.

Tit for tat

“The new imperialism which will for ever be linked to the names Bush and Blair has taken just five years to hit the buffers of popular opposition and moral ignominy. Imperialism has moved from the realm of political jargon to be the central issue of our time - and is seen as such everywhere beyond the ramparts of the neoconservative-New Labour alliance. In Iraq, the great testing ground for "liberal interventionism", the pitch of resistance to the armies of occupation, along with the failure of a parade of hand-picked premiers to deliver even a facade of stability, is, according to the New York Times, leading George Bush to consider abandoning his "democratic" experiment in favour of, presumably, a dictatorship. In Afghanistan, to which British troops were rushed nearly five years after regime change was imposed, the Karzai government is floundering in epic levels of corruption. […] And despite Blair's determined green light to Israel's attack on Lebanon, the "long, strong arm of the US" in the region - as the Israeli commentator Sima Kadmon describes his country - has had to retreat with its objectives unmet. No one seems to be rushing to pick up the white man's burden there either.” Andrew Murray, chair of the Stop the War Coalition

“When does a UN-mandated peacekeeping force become an imperialist army of occupation? […]For Andrew the democratically elected government of Afghanistan does not deserve support because the country still suffers from corruption and human rights violations, but by that logic the UN should also pull out of most Africa. […]But trying to reduce the complexity of every individual conflict to a simple question of "whose side are you on" contributes little - although Andrew's claim that Hizbullah is now backed by "the Latin American left", did at least make me laugh. […]both the "anti-imperialists" and the "liberal hawks" share a similar disregard for those on the receiving end of humanitarian crises if they do not fit within their own particular ideological framework. But Andrew's analysis is worse than the "politics of the guilt-trip". It is lazy, simplistic and stupid.” Conor Foley.

A Complex of Inferiority?

David Aaronovitch argues in an article in today's London Times that there are three basic reasons, which explain why some Brits are willing to blow up other Brits in buses, trains, and airplanes and they are lack of sympathy, envy, and self-pity. He argues that alienation and humiliation aren't what pushes Brits such as Richard Reid (the shoe bomber) or the one who committed the July 7 Terrorist’s attacks to act but rather that Britain owed them something and that since it wasn't giving it to them, they were going to destroy it. I wonder if the answer is that simple. Are terrorists simply bad and self-centered people?

Food for thought

“In Washington today, where each bad idea to rattle through the nation’s billionaire class seems to have a dedicated think tank to push it along, we are living out Abramoff’s dictum: that an idea is not worth hearing unless a large amount of somebody’s money is behind it.” Thomas Frank, “Defunders of Liberty.”

The photo du jour

In Memoriam: A year ago, Hurricane Katrina killed blissful illusions by blowing away the walls, which made it impossible for most Americans to realize that there are two Americas, one where the American dream is still possible, and one where it is not a dream deferred, but an improbable one. Hurricane Katrina destroyed the blinders, but did it change America?

Ségolène and Hillary

James Forsyth had a great post yesterday on Ségolène Royal and the Machiavellian schemes within the socialist party designed to do everything to stop her. What is interesting about the Royal case is that it is, at the same time, very different and very similar to the Clinton (Hillary) case. Ségolène is very popular, the French believe that she is the face of change and that she is trustworthy. More importantly, polls show that she can win the French Presidential next year. Hillary is much more of a polarizing figure and Americans are most inclined to believe that everything that she does is motivated by politics rather than by conviction. Amazingly, the two women have the same problem and it is how to convince their party that they will be good candidates and that they are about substance and not style. The French Socialists have waited for so long for somebody who could challenge Nicolas Sarkozy and stop him from becoming president. However, now that the French people have picked one of them for that role, they are having second thoughts because she is a beautiful woman and because as we all know, charm and feminine qualities are always presumed to be that a woman is weak and a lightweight. Hillary Clinton hasn't even declare her candidacy that already Democrats and the sanctimonious pundits are challenging her authenticity and her sincerity by arguing with incredible bad faith that she is more cunning and more superficial than any of the presidential candidates that they have chosen in the past.

All of these facts lead me to the following conclusions. The left political class is a lot more misogynistic than the right. The fact that the leftist political ideology is in general more about compassion and other good feelings and about government doesn’t help leftist women rise to the top. It put the emphasis on their gender or rather the prejudices that an electorate have about it such the belief that a woman can't be tough and can't send protect the country against its enemies and wage necessary wars. It is in my opinion for that reason that Hillary Clinton will never say that she was wrong to vote for the authorization that made it possible to go to war because once she does that, she becomes a wimp and a weepy woman who will never be able to fight terrorism and to protect America against its numerous enemies. Ségolène Royal is facing the same problem for she can't totally agree with her party's policies without becoming another soft leftist woman who believe that all we need is love and without losing the hearts and the vote of the French who want to believe in her. In short, Ségolène and Hillary face obstacles, which are magnified not only by their gender. They come from the left of the political spectrum, which is facing an identity crisis since terrorism became a major political issue and since it became clear that people have as much a need for justice as they do for order. The big question is whether they will overcome those obstacles. I don't know, but if I was force to bet my life on somebody it would be on Ségolène Royal because her task is less formidable that Hillary and because the French electorate is a lot more ready for a radical change than the American electorate. After 14 years of Mitterrand and almost twelve of Chirac, the French are desperate for something new and they may well chose Ségolène as long as terrorism doesn't become the first issue on their minds.

Just another sadistic creep

The John Mark Karr story is just creepy and unfortunate because I feel that the world (including me) gave that man what he wanted, his long twenty seconds of fame. What is sad and disturbing is how easy, it has become for one to get some stolen time in the spotlight. I have the feeling that they are never going to solve the JonBenet Ramsey case and that whoever did it got away with it.

What happens when “they” hit “us” again?

Niall Ferguson attempts to answer a fascinating answer in his column in the LATimes to the question “what if the terrorists had hit London?” He argues that the reaction of the world would have been a lot less sympathetic that it was after 9/11 and that many would have argued that Britain deserves it and that the attacks would have torn apart the Brits. I think that all terrorist's attacks, which follow 9/11, are going to be different not only for America, but also for the country, which is hit. 9/11 was unexpected and a great shock not only to an unprepared America, but also to an unprepared world, which had been fooled into believing that it had reached the end of history and future struggles weren't going to be existential struggles. The world has matured since 9/11 and expects more from its leaders that is it expects them not to protect them absolutely, but to fight the struggle against terrorism smartly and competently without being more dedicated to an ideology than to principles and to the protection of human lives. The problem is that since 9/11 false dichotomies and inappropriate Manichaeism have blurred the lines between rationality and irrationality and between morality, immorality, and amorality. What terrorism, in the twenty first century, shows is that in a globalized world, there are no “us” versus “them,” “here” and “there” but simply a complex togetherness threatened by the merchants of false truths and of dangerous absoluteness.

The best of Yesterday

Frank Rich had another great article yesterday in the Times in which he talked about Katrina and how it changed the American political scene. He writes:

What’s amazing on Katrina’s first anniversary is how little Mr. Bush seems aware of this change in the political weather. He’s still in a bubble. At last week’s White House press conference, he sounded as petulant as Tom Cruise on the “Today” show when Matt Lauer challenged him about his boorish criticism of Brooke Shields. Asked what Iraq had to do with the attack on the World Trade Center, Mr. Bush testily responded, “Nothing,” adding that “nobody has ever suggested in this administration that Saddam Hussein ordered the attacks.” Like the emasculated movie star, the president is still so infatuated with his own myth that he believes the public will buy such nonsense.

Katrina brought America back to reality if only for a short time and made it realize that it can't be beautiful when its leaders are not only asleep at the wheel, but also blissfully unaware of its problems and of the way to solve them.

Belated and meaningless Regrets

Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, admitted yesterday that he regretted kidnapping the two Israelis soldiers and starting a war, which only destructive both the Israelis and Lebanese people. For Nasrallah’s regrets to become meaningful, he must learn from his “mistake” and change the nihilist’s view of Hezbollah, which makes its militants believe that having the destruction of Lebanon is worth a draw or a not only fruitless, but bitter victory against Israel. The problem is that politics isn’t always about facts and reality, but about passion and idealism even when they are destructive.

Food for thought

“Part of Mr. Bush’s legacy may well be that he robbed America of its optimism — a force that Franklin Delano Roosevelt and other presidents, like Ronald Reagan, used to rally the country when it was deeply challenged. The next generation of leaders will have to resell discouraged Americans on the very idea of optimism, and convince them again that their goal should not be to live with their ailments, but to cure them.” Adam Cohen.

“Much of the behaviour that makes Muslims different is a question of conscience. Islam is an all-purpose religion. The Qur'an answers every question. That is why alienated Muslim youths increasingly argue that the political parties - by which they feel rejected - are superfluous.[…] Most young Muslims agree that to enjoy the full benefits of British society they have to accept most of its conventions and adopt its mores. Since they were born in this country, they have little difficulty in behaving as British by birth and upbringing. […] But that generation wants to make its own decisions about how to mix and match the two parts of their lives. The more they are told to drop Islam in favour of Britain, the more alienated they will feel. Islam is essential to their identity and self-respect. They want to be integrated but they are not prepared to be absorbed. And assimilation - which is absorption by a fancy name - is what most of the critics of multiculturalism really want.” Roy Hattersley, “Choice is for Minorities too”

Illegal immigrants and crime

The New York Times has an article about illegal immigrants and crime and about the fact that they are more often than not the victims of crime rather than the perpetrators of it. Because illegal immigrants are ostracized by society, they are being preyed upon. Criminals know that they are less likely to fight back and to get some assistance. As Capt. Mary Olsen of the West Palm Beach Police Department says in that article, “They’re being preyed upon because they’re easy victims. They don’t fight back. They’re very modest people, and they’re afraid of the police.” I’m sure that many people will argue that the fact they are here illegally means that they deserve all of the bad things that happened to them, but I can’t help but wonder if the United States is starting to view anybody that is different as a threat to America and to its way of life. The fact that Pat Buchanan is able to express such a point of view legitimately shows that many people believe that it is impossible for some people to become American.

Food for thought

“But at Haditha Dam, the marines have the Purrfect Angelz, as the dancers are known. Their tours, which organizers say are paid for by the military, have occasionally stirred some controversy. During the group’s 2005 visit to Baghdad, a female Air Force officer complained that the dancers’ wardrobes and routines encouraged insensitive attitudes toward women in the military. On the group’s third tour of Iraq, there were no complaints from the boisterous crowd of male marines at the dam or the solitary soldier in the audience from Azerbaijan, who mistook the Oklahoma-born Tanea for a Russian. A small group of Iraqi Army officers who are being trained by the marines were so enthusiastic they all but rushed the stage and filled their digital cameras with this sampling of American culture.[…] the dancers, in revealing outfits, energetically performed dance routines that were more rousing than most Super Bowl halftime acts — wardrobe malfunctions notwithstanding — but far less provocative than Las Vegas shows. At one point, one of the Angelz sang Lee Greenwood’s song “God Bless the USA,” a veritable anthem for many of the troops.”Michael R. Gordon, “Dancers Land in Iraq. Marines Offer No Resistance.”

More on Islamic fascism

Katha Pollitt has an article in the Nation, which gives us a different perspective on the reasons why the use of the expression “Islamic fascism” or “Islamofascism.” Her argument is more political than mine, but it is worth reading. She argues that Islamic fascism is not an intellectual term, but an emotional one. I agree because the use of that expression is based not on reason or on the facts, but on a desire to connect what scared us in the past with what is scaring us now. Those who use that term are refusing stubbornly and angrily to accept that there is a lot that we don’t know about our world, its present and its future, and that what threatens use doesn’t have to be the same to be dangerous. The fact that Islamism is not Nazism or Fascism doesn't mean that it is as dangerous of an ideology, just that it is different and that difference shouldn't be denied or camouflaged with the use of expressions such as Islamic fascism or islamofascism for two simple reasons. One, it is important to get a different mindset in order to understand the world as it  is and to fight Islamism without alienating the billions of Muslims in the world. It is important not to give those Muslim the impression is their religion, which is the problem and not the people who interpret him and those who stand silent when it used for destructive means. Second, we are not in the middle of a third world and we are never going to win the fight against Islamism militarily. I believe that Islamism is just one of the forms of the forces, which threaten the modern world, which is the part of the world, which believes in humanity and its ability to make the world better with science and culture. What scares me is that because Islamism has had some successes terrorizing the world, that other forces of intolerance will start to use violence and terrorism to express their anger against modernity and to restore an order based on tradition, nature, religion, or force whose time has passed.

Giving up or Growing up?

Michael Totten tells us that Israel has finally realized that it can't disarm Hezbollah with force. Is this realization going to lead it to implement a new strategy, which may be political unpopular in the short-term, but more effective in the long term or rather to continue the same old strategy in the hope that its ineffectiveness leads to a more spectacular failure? John Robb from Global Guerillas gives us some idea of what future wars will look like and by reading his post, it is easy to understand why winning a war against organizations like Hezbollah will get more complicated and why new and more innovative strategies are necessary.

The best of yesterday

The best article, I read yesterday was the column by Thomas Frank in the New York Times titled "Thus Spake Zinsmeister." I think that  Frank has a remarkable ability to put, which at first glance appear odd or just incomprehensible, into perspective. The article is about Karl Zinsmeister, the president's Chief domestic adviser and  his ideology. What is scary is how much one's biases can darkened one 's worldview and make one unable or unwilling to see the whole picture. The most important thing that Frank says about Zinsmeister, "What his career really shows us, though, is the looming exhaustion of the conservative intellectual system; its hopeless addiction to dusty, crumbling clichés; and a blindness to the reality of conservative power so persistent and so bizarre that it amounts to self-deception or, in Zinsmeister’s case, delusion. " I don't enough about Zinsmeister to know whether Frank's indictment is fair, but if it is, it would be one more proof that demonisation works in American politics.

Food For thought

“The nation’s standing in the world, let alone the rankings, has probably never been lower, an unpopular president, and a controversial foreign policy fuelling long-standing anti-American sentiment all around the globe.

In the past, Americans could always count on their sporting stars to lift the gloom. But today, even that consolation is gone.

Some attribute America’s athletic decline to the nation’s health problems — and the expanding waistline of national obesity. Others think it may be all to do with the fact that US sports fans are increasingly focused on domestic sport nobody else plays. But it may just be that the rest of the world has finally caught up with the superpower. […] It is worth remembering that many of the stars of other nations have risen with the financial and educational and human assistance of America itself — through universities, gyms and the simple wealth of American resources. Globalisation cuts both ways; it may have undermined American athletes’ pre-eminence but it has enabled other nations’ talent to find a home – and a lucrative career — in America.” Gerard Baker in The London Times.

Mourning Pluto

Well, at least one planet was demoted this week since Pluto is no longer a planet, but something else. What changed since it was agreed that Pluto was a planet? Does it matter anyway? The only thing that Plutogate shows that astronomy is a science, which includes some subjectivity especially when it comes to interpreting evidence. Oh well, I guess I'm going to have to learn to forget what I learn when I was in school. The good news for me is that it isn't going to be difficult. Nevertheless, I feel sad that Pluto is no longer a planet because size shouldn’t be everything. I wonder how much we know about the solar system and how much what we know is true or misinterpreted?

Arguing for Plan B

The approval by the FDA of Plan B is controversial. Many argue that underage girls will be able to access to it (the age limit is 18 but girls who are less than 18 will be required to get medical approval), that in fact, this is a way to enable women to have an unlimited amount of abortions and that it will encourage promiscuity among girls. I don’t think those are valid arguments. First is there are many products which are forbidden to minors and which nevertheless are still available to adults. The fact that minors can get access to them is not a strong enough argument to forbid otherwise we would have a society without alcohol, cigarettes, R rated movies, and every other product, which are unsuitable for people of a certain age. Second, is that abortion is legal in the United States and that Plan B isn’t use to abort a fetusi, but to prevent a pregnacy to occur. Third, Plan B will encourage promiscuity among girls and women as much as condoms have encouraged promiscuity among males. Women are wanton creatures who resist sexual urges just because they are afraid to become pregnant. Women like all human beings live their private lives by finding a balance between their desires and their values. We don’t forbid the sale of beer because of the fear that people will become alcoholics. Thus, people should be consistent and impose the same unreasonable standards they impose on Plan B on other products and medications, which are equally if not more dangerous as Plan B. The FDA made the right decision because Plan B is a tool, which enables women to have more control of their fates. The decision to become a mother ought to be in the hands of the woman and not in the hands of people who will not share with her the responsibility to raise it.

Refusing to be terrorized

Bruce Schneier has written a post with which I agree totally. He talks about the numerous incidents that have happened since the London Foiled Attacks when fear led people to overreact and to make flying anything, but a normal experience. He writes, “The point of terrorism is to cause terror, sometimes to further a political goal and sometimes out of sheer hatred. The people terrorists kill are not the targets; they are collateral damage. And blowing up planes, trains, markets or buses is not the goal; those are just tactics. The real targets of terrorism are the rest of us: the billions of us who are not killed but are terrorized because of the killing. The real point of terrorism is not the act itself, but our reaction to the act. And we're doing exactly what the terrorists want.” Schneier is right. Fighting terrorism means to refuse to make terrorists achieve their aims by making us change who we are and how we live. It doesn’t mean that we ignore the menace, which is all too real, but rather that we do everything that we can so that it doesn’t reduce our quality of life. I refused to be jumpy when I get on a bus, a train or a plan. More importantly, I refuse to see in every Muslim or Arab, a probable terrorist and I accept that they have the right to live a normal life, one where they don’t have to overcome the presumption of guilt.

The photo du Jour

At last, George Allen did what he should have done since he insulted S.R. Sidarth by using a racist slur, he called him up and apologized. Siddartha via Sepia Mutiny has a great post on the Macaca affair.

Food for thought

“A year after Katrina, New Orleans remains submerged in bureaucracy, paralysed by failed politics, and alarmingly vulnerable. Much of the money needed to repair essential infrastructure has not yet materialised, and some $2 billion has vanished in fraud or waste. The city is operating on about one quarter of its pre-Katrina revenue because so many businesses remain closed and only half the city’s residents have returned. […]Katrina exposed rank inefficiency, some traditional corruption and an apparent lack of concern summed up in President Bush’s words to his emergency management director Michael Brown — “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job” — just before he was sacked. Above all, it exposed the disproportionate suffering of the poor and black residents of New Orleans, vividly reflected in Spike Lee’s angry new documentary, When the Levees Broke. Many blame the US Corps of Engineers for failing to design and maintain adequate defences. Those with longer memories blame the French for building a city on a swamp, much of it below sea level. The excuses and recriminations will continue to ebb and flow. Guilt and innocence are never clearly defined in the vaporous atmosphere of New Orleans. What is inexcusable, amid the shifting responsibilities and accusations, is the failure to address with sufficient urgency how the city should be protected in the future.” Ben Macintyre in the London Times.

The best of yesterday

Agnès Poirier had the funniest and most interesting article on David Cameroon (the Tory Leader in Britain) and Ségolène Royal (the French socialist who may become the First woman and first socialist president since Mitterrand. This was the best part of her article:

They look good, dress smart and talk sharp. To their compatriots, they feel new, fresh, and charismatic. Only a year ago, nobody would have bet a penny on their presence, front of stage. Since their blitzkrieg ascent on to the political scene, they have been bullied and denigrated by the media for, among other things, being chameleons. The public, disliking personal attacks, have loved them more for it. [...]The only visible difference between them: to get to parliament, one travels by bike; the other in high heels. They are David and Ségolène, Cameron and Royal, yesterday's unknowns, today's political stars, and, perhaps, tomorrow's rulers of Britain and France. David is 39 going on 30, Ségolène is 53 going on 38. They both have the look. And the manners. […] They have found their niche. They slipped on to the political scene's front-of stage through a keyhole: the soft issues. Add a zest of work values and a pinch of respect, and here is their "winning hearts" programme: education, family, the environment and anything to do with local and domestic questions.[…] So far, each has been a deft tightrope walker. But for how long? While Cameron seems to have positioned himself at a healthy distance from the Iron Lady, last Sunday Royal referred, once too many times it seems, to Mitterrand's heritage. One more time and she may lose her footing with the electorate on the right, which she has courted so astutely. They both have one obsession: Tony Blair. Cameron to defeat him, Royal to emulate him. […] Today, it seems, it doesn't matter what background one comes from, conservative or socialist. Words are of little importance in the new world of politics that Blair has created for Europe.

Chirac did the right thing, will the French haters admit it?

The New York Times titled one of its editorials a few days ago “Waiting for Jacques” and today, Jacques Chirac not only came but he did the right thing. He increased the French presence in UNIFIL from a ridiculous 400 to 2000. So I am waiting for those who bashed France by talking of surrender and of cowardice to recognize the fact that Chirac has done something that needs to be praised and that France's decision to become a significant part of UNIFIL no matter how it came about was moral and responsible. So to all the French bashers, do you have the guts to admit that France is a great country or  does your courage limits itself to mock the importance that France place on finesse and complexity? I am waiting for Kevin Drum and Captain Ed to have some good things to say about France now.

The best of yesterday

The best article I read yesterday was the one of Daniel Davies in Comment is Free in which he argues that the French are right to stay out of the farce that is the current cease-fire in Lebanon. He writes:

Chirac negotiated that ceasefire. If it turns out he was lying when he promised a load of troops, well, then maybe Israel, the US, the UK, Hizbullah and the Lebanese government ought to ask him to lie to them a little more often, because it seems to me that he has fibbed them out of a disastrous conflict that neither side was winning and neither side had a clue how to end. (...) As he did in Iraq, Chirac has played a blinder diplomatically. I don't think anyone ought to have ever believed that he was going to unilaterally cough up the men and money for this forlorn hope of a peacekeeping force. All that France provided was a convenient pretext for Hizbullah and Israel to walk away, in a reasonably dignified fashion, from a fight that neither of them wanted to be in. Having got that, the international community ought to just say, "Thank you, monsieur," and walk away, not start complaining. Asking for the peacekeeping force is just childish, like asking for a kiss from the Easter Bunny when you've already got the chocolate.

Davies may be right, but the problem for France is that the next, and there will be a next time, this diplomatic strategy may not work because it will be less credible and therefore less able to convince the parties to stop the hostilities.

In the footsteps of Bin Laden: the past, the present, the future of terrorism

I watched “In the footsteps of Bin Laden” last night on CNN and I must say that it was gripping and frightening because it made me realize how difficult it is to foresee and to stop people who are determined to kill millions of people. The saddest and the most frustrating thing is that all of the signs were there that we were going to enter an age where terrorism is once again a legitimate tool for many to achieve political and religious goals, but that too many people refused to use their imagination to anticipate and to prepare for the worst. Maybe, it was inevitable that the world would be in the place where it is today threatened by people who want to destroy a big part of it in attempt to purify from what they consider to be the sins of modernity. Maybe it was impossible three years ago to imagine that 9/11 would happen. Frontiers and oceans are no longer able to protect the West from the ills of the rest of the world and from the hatred and the violence of those who believe that mass-murder can be not only justifiable, but also honorable. The future scares me for I wonder if we are fighting terrorism effectively or whether we are prolonging the struggle by making the same mistakes that we did before by forgetting to use our imagination and by recognizing that the most serious threat to our world are no longer just weapons of mass destruction, but ideas of mass destructions. The real question is how we stop the millions of youth around the world who are looking for a reason to live or to death from becoming the next Bin Laden, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, or Mohammed Atta. I don’t know the answer to this question and unfortunately, I don’t think that the leaders of the modern world have one either.

Food for thought

“DEFEAT IS NEVER pleasant, but often it is better to lose than to win. Defeat in the Second World War was the best thing that ever happened to Germany and Japan in their thousand years of recorded history. For America, losing in Vietnam was also a blessing in disguise. While defeat seemed to shatter the illusion of an “American century” of global dominance, it was followed by 30 years of almost uninterrupted prosperity, a political renaissance for conservative values and America’s total victory over communism in the Cold War. […] What then should America and its allies do in the face of Iran’s nuclear defiance? The answer is clear: concede defeat. Iranhas won this tussle and there is no point in pretending otherwise. Instead of trying to stop Iran’s nuclear programme, the international community must bring Iran back into the civilised world. The only way to do that is to stop issuing empty threats and to start offering Iran real incentives for co-operative behaviour — non-aggression guarantees from America and Israel, removal of the residual US economic sanctions dating back to the 1980s and the prospect of steadily improving treatment in investment and trade.”Anatole Kaletsky, in an article in the London Times.

Now that Iran has said Nah, what will the US and the world do?

Yesterday, I was so busy waiting for Doomsday, that I didn't blog about Iran and its nuanced negative response to the package of incentives provided by the five permanent members of the UN security council (The US, France, Britain, China, and Russia), which called for it to suspend its nuclear program in exchange for some incentives. Instead, Iran called for serious talks in an obvious attempt to gain more time and to divide the international community. There was no doubt that Iran was going to give a negative answer to this proposal because after all, it has the upper hand right now as this report from Britain's Chatham House shows. Iran has, therefore, no real incentives to give up the pursuit of a nuclear program, which does two essential things for them. First, it forces the world to give Iran a lot of attention and to treat it as a serious country. Second, it enables its theocratic government to survive by making it difficult for the Bush administration and others to pursue a policy design to insure that there is regime change in Iran. The biggest question is what does the US do now. Richard Holbrooke has advocated direct talks with Iran because he said that it was foolish to let others communicate our message to Iranians when it is clear that it won't have the same impact and that its meaning and significance will be diluted by the interpretation and the bias of the third party. However, I think that it is going to be difficult for the Bush administration to change its Iran policy because it would be an admission that the old policy was not only wrong, but also foolish, simplistic, and dangerous. The response of the State department to the Iranian response shows that nothing is going to change for a while. Thus, the same old and pointless dance between Iran and the US will continue until the US finally recognizes that either it has to take on Iran by going to war, which is virtually impossible given the fact that Iraq and Afghanistan are still unstable or it has to deal with Iran. The New York Times in its editorial on August 21, 2005 made a point, which I believe is relevant to this situation even though it made it about France and its reluctance about contributing a significant amount of troop to UNIFIL, “A second-tier power can sidestep difficult choices. The superpowers cannot.” The US is a superpower and it has to make the difficult choice to deal with Iran before it becomes impossible to do so and before it becomes a real and just an eventual threat to the world.

Food for thought (II)

“Israel is often thought of, in the West, as an unhinged fanatically right-wing country, like the U.S. on speed. Israel is far more ‘European,’ though, than it is ‘American.’ If Israel were not constantly under fire and constantly embroiled in conflict with eliminationist enemies, Israel would resemble a Jewish France or even Sweden of the Levant. The country was founded by democratic Labor Party socialists, and only rather recently has become more capitalist and complex.” Michael Totten

Spike on Katrina part deux

I watched the second part of Spike Lee documentary on Hurricane Katrina and I wondered why if New Orleans is worth rebuilding or rather saving, as the documentary shows, why more hasn't been done. I think there are two possible answers to this question. The first is that those who can help haven't concluded that New Orleans is worth saving or that it is possible to save it without great sacrifices, which they aren't willing to make. The second is that New Orleans is just no longer a priority now that the intensity of emotions created by the destruction of Katrina has greatly diminished.

The best of yesterday

I missed this article in yesterday's Times "The Fame Motive" which attempts to explain why so many people nowadays are more motivated by fame than by anything else. It's a fascinating article because it gives great insights about our time and about how image-conscious society has become. Useless Tree has some good commentary on it.

Food for thought

“President Bush's recent formulation of the enemy in the war on terrorism as "Islamic Fascism," or, as it's more often known, "Islamofascism," is extremely offensive here. […]You never hear the terms "Christian fascism," or "European fascism," goes the rejoinder, despite fascism's historical hijacking of Christian (actually atavistic paganism, more often) or ancient European iconography. Last week in the Weekly Standard, the apparent inventor of the phrase, Stephen Schwartz, dismissed those who'd be offended by "Islamofascism" as "primitive Muslims." That should tell you all you need to know about those who use the term. […] The people it infuriates aren't primitive. They're the moderate, pro-American, well-integrated Muslims who form one of the greatest bulwarks against Al Qaeda that the U.S. possesses, and they see the term as draining their Americanness away.” Spencer Ackerman.

Immigration Moratorium?

I shouldn't be outraged by Pat Buchanan's call for an Immigration Moratorium to protect White America as Eminem would say, but I am. Buchanan has a new book "State of Emergency" in which he does the same thing as in all of his other books that it argues that White and Christian America is in danger because it is been invaded by people who are colored and who are not Christian. Is that racist, stupid, ignorant or all of the abobe? For more read Stevens Taylor's post on the subject on poliblog. (Hat tip: Think Progress)

Because I could not stop for Death...

Apparently, Michael Totten was right, today is just another Tuesday and not doomsday. Israel still exists and the world doesn’t have to brace itself for Armageddon. Well, we still have a few more  hours to go before the day is over, but I have the feeling that because Israelis and the rest of us have so much to live for, Death took a vacation, and Armageddon is for another day. I am not ready to die until the Sox pay back the Yankees by sweeping them at Yankee stadium. More seriously, why are people so prone to believe in the end of the world? Do they really think that there is another life after this one? Well they are wrong, this world is all that we got so we better fix it and make the most of the time that we have.

Darfur and Hopelessness

Marc Goldberg has a great post on Darfur and on what it is going to take for it to have a chance to avoid further violence and chaos. He writes, “Darfur is on the verge of total collapse. Unless this new movement for Darfur turns into real momentum for progress in the region, death and misery will remain the norm in Darfur or the foreseeable future.” Is any leader can make a difference listening? (Hat tip: War and Piece)

Spike and Katrina

Last night, I watched the first part of the Spike Lee's documentary"When the Levees Broke" on Katrina and the ways it devastated New Orleans and Mississippi. I think that it is fascinating because it shows how easy it is to cause a catastrophe by refusing or not being able to face reality and by choosing to be stuck on stuck. I am waiting for the second part to make a definite judgment on her, but CityMama from Blogher has a good post about it so do IzzyMo on her blog and Lisa Manzi.

Food for thought

“By the time he was drafted, in November 1944, the war was manifestly lost. In their efforts to shore up crumbling morale, the Nazi leaders cast all restraint aside in their use of the death penalty. Ordinary Germans were almost as much at risk as the ethnic minorities the Nazi war effort had initially targeted.
Retrospectively pardoning World War I deserters, then, is as empty a gesture as retrospectively condemning World War II conscripts. Harry Farr and Günter Grass were simply two tiny cogs in the monstrous mincing machines of total war. That is why the real question children should ask of veterans is not "What did you do in the war, Daddy?" but "What did the war do to you?" ” Niall Ferguson

The photo du jour

Who is she? She's Ségolène Royal, the French Socialist who could be the next president of France if her party gets out of her way and gets over its old, old, old and macho principles.

Fear, paranoia, and dangerous stereotypes

La Shaw Barber has a disturbing story on her blog which talks about the fact that for some people having "Muslim" passengers on a plane is as disturbing if not more disturbing that having snakes on a plane. I find this story unnerving for two reasons. The first reason is that people are making the fooling and dangerous assumption that Muslim means Arab and that Arab means terrorist or Islamic fascists as President Bush would say. The second reason is that the people who are refusing to fly on a plane with Muslim passengers are in fact trying to implement what the government so far has refused to do (because it is illegal and in my unconstitutional) that is ethnic profiling when in fact, it isn't an effective way to ensure that airplanes are attacked by terrorists.

The weirdest news of the day: Osama had (supposedly) a crush on Whitney Houston

I am not sure what to make of this story and I am having trouble believing that it is true, but apparently Bin Laden had a crush on Whitney Houston and she once performed for him in the eighties for a million dollars in 1985. I am not going to make a judgment on Whitney Houston because Bin Laden of 1985 wasn't the Bin Laden of 2006. If the story is true, it means that Bin Laden doesn't hate all things American is evil for apparently since he likes American music and American women. He isn't the purist that he claims to be and that some people think that he is.

An election isn’t the same thing as democracy

The latest violence in the Congo even after it had its first elections in more than 40 years shows that an election isn’t the same thing as democracy. The partisans of the two "winners" of the elections, Joseph Kabila and Jean-Pierre Bemba, are now confronting each other by using violence and my guess is that both sides are afraid to love. Kabila, the current president, thought that he would win easily and he never imagined that he would to face somebody else in a runoff. Bemba probably never expected to do this well and now that he has, he isn't ready to lose to Kabila. Thus both sides fear the uncertainty that comes with elections in a country as large and as unstable as Congo. Violence and intimidation are the effective political tools. Congo has no democratic institutions, which means that candidates cannot campaign the way people do in a democratic society, they cannot suing each other, file complaints with the proper authorities, go on Television to make allegations and to score political point against their opponent. All they can do is use violence as a means to intimidate the other side and to let it know that they will not be outsmarted and that they are willing to win by any means necessary.

Food for thought

“At first they came, just one or two, then, like cockroaches, laying their eggs and spreading.”Matt Manganele, a resident of Hazleton talking about Latino immigrants. Hazleton has passed the Illegal Immigrant Relief Act, which suspends the licenses of businesses hiring illegal immigrants.

Civil liberties in the age of terrorism

Do modern societies need to curtail civil liberties to adapt to the post 9/11 world? Christopher Caldwell argues that it is impossible and dangerous for people to have the same liberties that they did before we started to live in the age of terrorism in an article in the Sunday Times. I don't agree with him, but he makes an interesting argument nonetheless. Gary Becker makes the same point in the Becker-Posner blog by arguing the balance has shifted away from civil liberties to security. Sandy Levinson takes a different, which I share entirely. What separates Modern and democratic societies from ones which aren't are civil liberties. To argue that security means less civil liberties is to argue the most important value of modern societies is self-preservation. However, it is precisely civil liberties, which enable modern societies to overcome terrorism and to subsist.

Food for thought

“I am about to let you in on a few secrets, but I'm far from sure that this is the smartest thing I can do. In fact, it may be one of the dumbest. Because I can tell another story when the war is still in the background and so wrap up another week, then wait for things to return to normal and go back to dealing with marginal matters like racism, discrimination, xenophobia and the difficulty of coping as an Arab in the Jewish state. [...]  it's like this: I was against the war, but after it started I wanted the army to lose, or at least not to feel victorious. My hands tremble as I write, but in this war I was against Israel - make no mistake - my country. This has nothing to do with the other side, it has nothing to do with what I think about the side that fought in this round against the IDF. It's true that I would prefer that the IDF, that the State of Israel lose without the consequence being that soldiers die. I would like to see it lose in arm-wrestling. Rows of tables in which soldiers from both sides sit and arm-wrestle. I would prefer a loss by penalty kicks.” Sayed Kashua.

“Uri, my love. All your short life, we have all learned from you, from the strength and determination to go your own way.[...]You were the leftie of your battalion and you were respected for it, because you stood your ground, without giving up even one of your military assignments ... won't say anything now about the war you were killed in. We, our family, have already lost in this war. The state of Israel will have its own reckoning ...

Uri was such an Israeli child; even his name was very Israeli and Hebrew. He was the essence of Israeli-ness as I would want it to be. An Israeli-ness that has almost been forgotten, that is something of a curiosity. And he was a person so full of values. That word has been so eroded and has become ridiculed in recent years. In our crazy, cruel and cynical world, it's not 'cool' to have values, or to be a humanist, or to be truly sensitive to the suffering of the other, even if that other is your enemy on the battlefield.

However, I learned from Uri that it is both possible and necessary to be all that. We have to guard ourselves, by defending ourselves both physically and morally. We have to guard ourselves from might and simplistic thinking, from the corruption that is in cynicism, from the pollution of the heart and the ill-treatment of humans, which are the biggest curse of those living in a disastrous region like ours. ” David Grossman writing about the Death of his son Uri in the Israeli-Lebanon Conflict in The Observer.