In an article published recently on the Arab liberal websites Aafaq, Middle East Transparent, and Modern Discussion, Egyptian liberal Hisham Al-Tukhi adapted Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech for the Egyptian context, urging full civil rights and equality for Egyptian minorities.
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"...I have a dream that one day ... every kind of oppression will cease, all Egyptians will be equal, and 'the religion will be for Allah, and the homeland for all' "
Unfortunately, if the religion will be for Allah, the rest of that dream is pretty much null and void.
"The police station in Slotervaart (where a muslim earned himself a 72 yr old virgin recently) was besieged by muslims, damaged and tree police cars vandalized. No arrests were made. The riot police were present, but didnt act."
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My best guess is that Nicolas Sarkozy wants to reopen the debate on religion and "laïcité", not to help the Catholics of France, but only to smooth the way for the further Islamization. If such a debate really materializes it will be interesting to see if the Catholics can turn it somehow to their advantage.
Thomas B. Edsall, Huffasnuffaluffagus Post Jim Geraghty of National Review describes Edsall as "a solid, veteran reporter," so this seems to be worth taking seriously despite the source.
A panicked and cash-short Clinton campaign is seriously considering giving up on the Nevada caucuses and on the South Carolina primary in order to regroup and to save resources for the massive 19-state mega-primary on February 5.
At the same time, some top independent expenditure groups supporting Clinton have been exploring the creation of an anti-Obama "527 committee" that would take unlimited contributions from a few of Clinton's super-rich backers and from a handful of unions to finance television ads and direct mail designed to tarnish the Illinois Senator's image.
Comments Geraghty: "Wow. You think Hillary's likeability numbers are low now? How about when her allies declare all-out war to tarnish the guy being called the second coming of Martin Luther King?"
(Remember, kids, nobody smears like the Clinton smear machine. This could be ugly.)
It also sounds like a strategy aimed at producing deadlock at the convention, so that Hillary can win by playing inside baseball--or at least insure that if she's not the nominee, Obama won't be, either.
Posted by: Mike ||
01/08/2008 15:51 ||
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Of course if any of this is 'true' enough and with the usual ability of the net to distribute the info before the election, it would pretty much insure the absence of a major support group in November if Hillary does get the ticket. That'll take the foundation out of the Congressional and state elections for the Donks. The lust of power has never stopped people from destroying everything in that last addictive pursuit.
For the past year, I, like millions of others, have been bewildered by TVs talking heads, always assuring us that Hillary before a single vote was cast, before a singe attack ad was made, before a single blunder or mini-crisis occurredwas to be coronated as the Democratic nominee and would inevitably go on to beat any Republican rival. (Many instead thought Never underestimate the ability of Bill Clinton to do damage to those around him).
Now after the first week of the primary season, these same geniuses are deifying Obama (formerly trashed as running a surprisingly dismal and uninspiring campaign) to the skies and writing Clintons post mortem even as her national polls are still even or ahead of Obama. . . .
Hillary is not comatose, but instead at a crossroads. If she distances herself from Bill, goes silent about her First Lady years, stops the play-safe, dont-blow-it-fourth-quarter strategy, and instead takes risks, talks about what shes going to do in simple, blunt terms, gives more interviews, answers impromptu questions at her campaign stops, jettisons the canned laugh for real give and take, she could recover in two weeks.
Left unsaid is that America will soon thanks to input from the shadows from various hitmen from the Clinton 1992/1996 team be hearing a lot more details about the relatively unknown life and views of one Barrack Obama and those around him.
Right now voters know almost everything about Hillary and are troubled by that knowledge; they know almost nothing about Obama, and are happy for that ignorance but that too can change, since she has nothing left to disclose or lose, he everything.
Posted by: Mike ||
01/08/2008 07:47 ||
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And Hillary is the most moderate runner in that unfaithful and ignorant party. Obama is a fast learner but I wonder if he will listen to his dark overlords. Which evil shall my country chose? Which path to darkness and dispair shall they elect?
Maybe it is time for some misery. They are never faithful without it. Afterall, Americans have never, ever had it so good. 95% employment. 52 months of growth or something like that, reduction in federal debt, higher wages, and watched the debates on HDTV. Supermarket shelves are full and no rationing during a war, bumper crop of wheat, peaceful subjects albiet ignorant as hell, and the highest group of freeholders on the earth.
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Hillary is not comatose, but instead at a crossroads. If she distances herself from Bill, goes silent about her First Lady years, stops the play-safe, don�t-blow-it-fourth-quarter strategy, and instead takes risks, talks about what she�s going to do in simple, blunt terms, gives more interviews, answers impromptu questions at her campaign stops, jettisons the canned laugh for real give and take, she could recover in two weeks.
Even Madonna can't change that fast for the public. All she can be is herself, but when that is nothing more than a neo-marxist spouting a dialectic unanchored by the daily reality the rest of us, outside the blue core Eurocolonies, live with, it ain't going to sell.
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I have to admit that Obama was a good choice to be chosen as Hillary's opposition. As we find out more about Obama, Hillary will look more like the rational statesman. And during this time, all of the party-on-party trash talk, (the most damaging kind) will be on Obama, not Hillary. Right now she's getting a complete and total pass on everything but her inability to beat Obama. Should she manage to pull off the nomination, she will have shown herself able to overcome this negative.
I suppose that was the Clinton plan all along and it never occurred to Hillary that Obama's star would rise high enough to cast a shadow over her own.
One thing that may become an issue for Hillary will be that Edwards will continue to come in second to Obama (or even first) and Hillary will not end up with enough delegates to make it happen. (Yes I know about the superdelegate wild card).
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The scenario I'm hoping for is Obama wins the race for primary delegates, but Hillary wins the nomination due to her hold on the Superdelegates. This would cement her as the choice of the insiders of the Dem party.
Al
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
01/08/2008 13:45 Comments ||
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I like that scenario Frozen Ali - I'd like to script in a part for Al Gore making a 1880s style floor run for the delegates and has his minions destroy convention center's AC in act of courageous political theatre.
Posted by: Thomas Woof ||
01/08/2008 15:07 Comments ||
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Hillary at the crossroads? If we are lucky maybe an 18-wheeler will come along.
Its New Hampshire day; flinty residents of one of Americas narrowest states will chose the next leader of the free world today, if you believe the hype. Im undecided. This being the age of Feeling, here's my emotional reaction to the candidates:
Fred Thompson has that Emperor Palpatine thing going on . . . And I like that. Makes you want to say yung SKYYY-wokkah, does it?
Hillary well, I feel sorry for her, in a way, because her time in the sun seems to have coincided with the exact moment the electorate decided it was tired of being ruled by Boomers. If someone grew up accustomed the sound of mom burping the lid on some Tupperware, people dont want to have anything to do with them.
Huckabee: he makes me recoil, instinctively. Some of this has to do with his positions, but its mostly the particular flavor of his religiosity and the thickness of its application to his campaign. People who think hes some Elmer Gantry-type wholl run around tossing flag-wrapped Bibles into the crowd overstate the case, but still: he just strikes me as one of those fellows wholl treat you with respect and friendship and good cheer, and you know he thinks youre going to hell. No, thats not fair, but there it is. I dont think hes a phony - Bill Clinton was a phony, but he was such a genuine heartfelt phony it didnt matter. Huckabee just rubs me the wrong way. Nothing more profound or irrational than that.
Mitt Romney? Super-brainy smart, a proven administrator, impeccably decent. In some parallel universe where good is bad and bad is good and James Bond serves Satan, Mitt Romney is Blofeld. Hes an admirable man in many ways. But my favorite finely-crafted piece of Stickley furniture is an admirable piece of wood in many ways, too. I cannot warm to Romney.
I like John McCain. He seems like the sort of guy you could have a beer with, right up to the moment where he smashes the bottle on the table and jams it in your face over something you said six years ago.
I like Rudy Guiliani, partly because his second-term sex scandal would involve someone closer to Teri Hatchers age than Jamie Lynn Spears. But mostly because he is smart, agrees with me on enough things, and does not appear to have a heart ruled by sentiment. I do not want a National Dad or even a Cool Brother (double-meaning unintended) for the President; I want someone with JFKs optimism, Roosevelts steel, Trumans irascibility, and so forth.
But its all for naught if the Obamaboom continues, because he has the zeitgeist at his back and a sail the size of an IMAX screen. People will vote for him because they want to be part of something larger, and thats a rare and potent thing these days. Whether thats a wise thing to do in perilous times depends on whether people think were living in perilous times, I suppose. Well see.
In the end, I think of the person I'd like to see behind the big desk the night the President addresses the nation after the nutwads pull off something big. It's certainly not Ron Paul. He'd probably bitch us out for starting it all by enraging the Barbary Pirates.
Posted by: Mike ||
01/08/2008 06:15 ||
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Posted by: Thomas Woof ||
01/08/2008 15:08 Comments ||
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Spiny GI, Mr. Lileks is a long time op-ed writer for the Minneapolis newspaper. He has been blogging for years, mostly charming little bits about his daughter growing into childhood and suchlike silliness. Think of him as a much smarter and more perceptive Dave Barry, if that helps.
Sorry, I had to bang my forehead on the keyboard for a bit just to make sure I was connected to "reality".
Some five year old kid had security at Seattle running around with their hands over their heads because his name was the same as some criminal on a watch list or some crap like that. The only thing they didn't do was body cavity search the kid and his mom. Must not have been part of the procedure. They even re-searched his mom after she gave him a hug during the process! Where do they go to find the kind of people that can't think for themselves? Who writes these rules in such an authoritarian fashion? Don't they trust anyone to judge simple reality? That guy probably got put on the watch list when the kids was two years old, or maybe even before he was born! We can do better than this. But in watching the news it seems we never learn. The simplest change to some DOHS software to a fix a problem (such as comparing the criminals approximate age to this kid's) seems to require a note from God.
I see this kind of thinking supplanting reason and logic more and more. It's all throughout the legal system or people like OJ wouldn't get out of a murder rap, and people who aren't guilty could actually use modern DNA analysis to prove their innocence and get out. HMOs are another good example.
I'd sure like to know how much time and energy is wasted in our economy to support this kind of brain-dead Nazi procedural crap instead of growing the economy. Sometimes it isn't worth the effort even if you are wrong occasionally.
Not only that, the mother has to file paperwork to get an exception for her kid so it doesn't happen again! WTF?! Why can't they do it right then and there with obvious cases like this? Oh well. The Soviets used bread lines to keep the masses in check, I guess the Western version is unnecessary paperwork.
OK, I'm feeling better now. Until next time . . . .
It was fated, or "written," as the Arabs would say, that George W. Bush, reared in Midland, Texas, so far away from the complications of the foreign world, would be the leader to take America so deep into Arab and Islamic affairs.
This is not a victory lap that President Bush is embarking upon this week, a journey set to take him to Egypt, Israel, the Palestinian territories, the Saudi Kingdom, Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. Mr. Bush by now knows the heartbreak and guile of that region. After seven years and two big wars in that "Greater Middle East," after a campaign against the terror and the malignancies of the Arab world, there will be no American swagger or stridency.
But Mr. Bush is traveling into the landscape and setting of his own legacy. He is arguably the most consequential leader in the long history of America's encounter with those lands.
Baghdad isn't on Mr. Bush's itinerary, but it hangs over, and propels, his passage. A year ago, this kind of journey would have been unthinkable. The American project in Iraq was reeling, and there was talk of America casting the Iraqis adrift. It was then that Mr. Bush doubled down--and, by all appearances, his brave wager has been vindicated.
His war has given birth to a new Iraq. The shape of this new Iraq is easy to discern, and it can be said with reasonable confidence that the new order of things in Baghdad is irreversible. There is Shiite primacy, Kurdish autonomy in the north, and a cushion for the Sunni Arabs--in fact a role for that community slightly bigger than its demographic weight. It wasn't "regional diplomacy" that gave life to this new Iraq. The neighboring Arabs had fought it all the way.
But there is a deep streak of Arab pragmatism, a grudging respect for historical verdicts, and for the right of conquest. How else did the ruling class in Arabia, in the Gulf and in Jordan beget their kingdoms?
In their animus toward the new order in Iraq, the purveyors of Arab truth--rulers and pundits alike--said that they opposed this new Iraq because it had been delivered by American power, and is now in the American orbit. But from Egypt to Kuwait and Bahrain, a Pax Americana anchors the order of the region. In Iraq, the Pax Americana, hitherto based in Sunni Arab lands, has acquired a new footing in a Shiite-led country, and this is the true source of Arab agitation.
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A loss for the wahabbi, salifist crude organizing of things to say the least. 60% of that nation was Shiite ruled by a brutal Sunni regime. That kind of rule will not be tolerated again. Do you have a problem with this?
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Still waiting for evidence that Shiite liberation is on the way to Iran. May have already happened and we don't know yet. May be about to happen. May be a while yet.
Anyway - I expect there will be a visible, tangible moment where it's clear that something in Iraq led to something in Iran.
Sort of like analyzing stress building along a fault line. You pretty much know it's there, and BOOM, it's there.
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Glung McG: I hope, and suspect, you will be proven correct.
In many ways, I have always viewed Bush's willingness to take action and not sit on the sidelines in the ME as really just a way to accelerate the natural progression of things. Not that we didn't have good reason to go in before 9/11, but that fateful day just made the necessity for it starkly obvious. The status quo of diplomacy and negotiation was proven ineffectual by 9/11. As a matter of national security and to protect innocent Americans not only against a repeat 9/11 but a far worse and now entirely plausible WMD attack on the US, things had to change. And how.
In order for things to change, some sort of action needs to take place. Real action. Action such as going into a hornet's nest like Iraq. Shortly after we toppled Saddam, anyone with half a brain could have told you that it would get far worse before it even started to get any better. Whether or not we had the fortitude, courage of our convictions, and resolve to see it through was the real question.
Fortunately for both the Arab AND American people (and which of the two is more fortunate is still up for debate but I'll say the Arabs for now), Bush has that fortitude, courage, and resolve. In spades.
Say what you want about the man and his other policies, many of which deserve their fair share of criticism. However if the dramatic turnaround in Iraq continues, and all indications are that it will, I firmly believe more than ever now that history will judge him favorably. Not as the most articulate, not as the most likable, not as the most endearing President to lead this country. Yet when it mattered most, he stuck to his guns when he knew he was right-- just like a good Texan should-- despite the shouting voices to the contrary. For this, history will remember this President much like they do Reagan: The man who got it right when everyone said he was wrong.
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Bush flushed the punchbowl in the middle east. I'll always love him for that, despite his other faults...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
01/08/2008 15:26 Comments ||
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Not that we didn't have good reason to go in before 9/11, but that fateful day just made the necessity for it starkly obvious.
I'd go so far as to say 9/11 made it possible to go in, where it wasn't before, because nobody would accept a pre-emptive strike, let alone a pre-emptive invasion. Wonderful rant, eltoreverde! And yours is nicely succinct, Glung McGurque2454. The history books are going to make for interesting reading, two generations later. I'm looking forward to expanding my library then.
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AlGore is working on his second nobel peace prize for an incoherent truth. Hey, wait a minute, you can't get a nobel peace prize twice for the same thing.
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.
In an article published recently on the Arab liberal websites Aafaq, Middle East Transparent, and Modern Discussion, Egyptian liberal Hisham Al-Tukhi adapted Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech for the Egyptian context, urging full civil rights and equality for Egyptian minorities. 
