Top-notch article from Janet Daley that confirms my general beliefs about this war.
I am an unabashed liberal, but there is a grave danger in being too friendly with your enemy. If we liberals are committed to freedom (remember where the word comes from and what it really means) then we cannot forget Daley's excellent points.
Remember that the original World Trade Center bombing and the planning of both the Bojinka plot and 9/11 occured before we even really knew who G.W. was. Add to this the fact that 9/11 occurred relatively early into his tenure--when he was still just pissing off liberals, environmentalists, and Democrats--and it becomes obvious that we cannot reduce this war to retaliation against a corrupt and immoral Administration. This is a war of ideas where far more is at stake than well-meaning liberals are willing to admit.
Daley writes:
"...many of those same sceptical sophisticates who wished to distinguish so carefully between the various Islamic discontents would also claim that the answer to all our problems was to solve the Palestinian problem (and thus withdraw our support for Israel), which is certainly of little relevance to the anger of Kashmiri separatists with whom most British Muslim suspects identify.
Al-Qa'eda began talking about the Palestinian question after 9/11, only when it found itself having to give a plausible public account of its motives. Until then, it was frank about its actual goal, which is to re-establish the Caliphate over the historic Islamic empire. So maybe those who wish to conciliate this movement, who believe that it can be negotiated with in some rational way, would like to tell us where they would begin making concessions. Would they like to explain to the citizens of Turkey that they may have to sacrifice their secular democracy and be ruled again by the theocracy from which they had broken free? Or perhaps they could persuade the residents of Spain that, since Islam would like to rule the Alhambra once again, they must, in the interests of meeting al-Qa'eda halfway, consider sacrificing this region. Next, perhaps, would be the recognition of sharia law in Muslim-dominated regions of Britain and France.
I am an unabashed liberal, but there is a grave danger in being too friendly with your enemy. If we liberals are committed to freedom (remember where the word comes from and what it really means) then we cannot forget Daley's excellent points.
Remember that the original World Trade Center bombing and the planning of both the Bojinka plot and 9/11 occured before we even really knew who G.W. was. Add to this the fact that 9/11 occurred relatively early into his tenure--when he was still just pissing off liberals, environmentalists, and Democrats--and it becomes obvious that we cannot reduce this war to retaliation against a corrupt and immoral Administration. This is a war of ideas where far more is at stake than well-meaning liberals are willing to admit.
Daley writes:
"...many of those same sceptical sophisticates who wished to distinguish so carefully between the various Islamic discontents would also claim that the answer to all our problems was to solve the Palestinian problem (and thus withdraw our support for Israel), which is certainly of little relevance to the anger of Kashmiri separatists with whom most British Muslim suspects identify.
Al-Qa'eda began talking about the Palestinian question after 9/11, only when it found itself having to give a plausible public account of its motives. Until then, it was frank about its actual goal, which is to re-establish the Caliphate over the historic Islamic empire. So maybe those who wish to conciliate this movement, who believe that it can be negotiated with in some rational way, would like to tell us where they would begin making concessions. Would they like to explain to the citizens of Turkey that they may have to sacrifice their secular democracy and be ruled again by the theocracy from which they had broken free? Or perhaps they could persuade the residents of Spain that, since Islam would like to rule the Alhambra once again, they must, in the interests of meeting al-Qa'eda halfway, consider sacrificing this region. Next, perhaps, would be the recognition of sharia law in Muslim-dominated regions of Britain and France.
No wonder the liberals are in disarray. What we are up against is quite outside the limits of our rational political discourse. This enemy does not even bother to offer explanations for its actions that fall within the acceptable bounds of Western debate: it is overtly racist, explicitly imperialistic and unapologetically inhumane...
This is a critical moment. What we must call the "free world" will either decide that it must unite unequivocally against a force so dark that it is almost incomprehensible to democratic peoples, or else succumb to a daydream of denial that is nothing more than appeasement."
posted by James at 11:30 AM
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