43 Comments

1. Bob_R:

I’m concerned that Henninger and Roger seem to be focused on legalistic or moral aspects of terror. We should focus instead on the fact that we are at war with enemies who intend to kill us. It doesnít matter one bit what techniques they use. If OBL had ridden up on a white horse, thrown down a gauntlet, read a declaration of war, and then killed 3,000 US soldiers, Iíd want him just as dead as I do now. Terror is common because it is the most effective technique available to some groups of combatants. We will end terror only when its use assures a quick, humiliating defeat.

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:00 am 2. Buddy Larsen:

Well said, Bob_R. And those two over at Gates of Vienna are on fire lately!

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:06 am 3. Ron Wrght:

Excellent read!

On a related issue, here’s something you can do right now in the GWOT. A strategic window of opportunity is now opening in Iran. We must seize this moment to deliver a crushing if not fatal blow to the enemy.

The Iranian people must hear that President Bush and the American people support their move for FREEDOM!

The Blogos now has the power to spread this word that the MSM is not. Please pass this word and post on your sites.

GWB Declares Iranian Election a Fraud

[At least that's the meaning]

*****

Statement by the President Bush on Iranian Elections

In recent months, the cause of freedom has made enormous gains in the broader Middle East. Millions of people in Afghanistan and Iraq defied terrorists to cast their ballots in free elections. Palestinians voted for a new president who rejects violence and is working for democratic reform, and the people of Lebanon reclaimed their sovereignty and are now voting for new leadership. Across the Middle East, hopeful change is taking place. People are claiming their liberty. And as a tide of freedom sweeps this region, it will also come eventually to Iran.

[...]

Read more

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:08 am 4. The Truth:

In my bleaker moments I think this has created a situation even more troubling than those day in 1938 and 39 when many also looked the other way and that we may indeed be at the Gates of Vienna again.

My God man, how do you find the will to leave your house in the morning? You and your ilk would have Americans bolting their doors, clutching at their breast in paranoia, cowered in fear at the shadowy menace of some swarthy other.

This has been a nation of the courageous, of men who in their bleaker moments resisted the lure of an easy security purchased with liberty to actually make decisions that, though difficult and perhaps unpopular, made America a beacon for humanity in the world.

Four years after Pearl Harbor, America was on the verge of defeating tyranny in Europe. Four years after 9/11, the America of men like you are still afraid.

As Lance Mannion so eloquently put it, “Well, that’s why the Right hates the Left these days. We aren’t as afraid as they are. They hate us for our freedom from fear.”

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:13 am 5. Buddy Larsen:

Truth, you have multiple personalities–and they all, well, suck.

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:20 am 6. JK Ribera:

I’m not sure I should speak for him, Monsieur le soi-disant Verit´, but I suspect what Mr. Simon is personally afraid of is moral idiots like you, not the terrorists.

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:24 am 7. mrp:

Truth, you have multiple personalities–and they all, well, suck.

LOL!

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:24 am 8. Rick Ballard:

Buddy,

The gutless anonymous seditionist has, in fact, one personality. If one can define personality in terms of cowardice. Pravda boasts of fearlessness yet cannot quite bring himself to actually use his own name.

This is a very common trait of the seditionist left. The cowardice of their convictions is always an identifying characteristic.

I wouldn’t give him too many pixels – he might cause himself harm by excessive self flagellation.

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:27 am 9. Buddy Larsen:

Yes, let’s show the world how healthy we are!We’re not afraid to surrender! We like suicide!

Jun 17, 2005 - 9:03 am 10. David Thomson:

ìFour years after Pearl Harbor, America was on the verge of defeating tyranny in Europe. Four years after 9/11, the America of men like you are still afraid.î

You conveniently forget that the United States was united during WWII. Today we are forced to deal with the disruptive behavior of the Democratic Party. Franklin Delano Roosevelt never had to deal with the likes of Senator Richard Durbin, Barbara Boxer, and John Kerry.

Jun 17, 2005 - 9:27 am 11. PJ:

I think denial of danger is only human. Our denial is a response to fear and grief that was never fully resolved after 9/11.

We can’t even see this enemy because they are dispersed and weak. So they hide in alleyways, set off a couple bombs, and use the modern equalizer of the media to frighten the world. They couch their rhetoric in our own and use it against us because they are not up to a real fight.

Hitler declared war on France one September. Parisians frittered away their time in political bickering and ennui, built their Maginot Line and called it a day. They were shocked when Hitler ran over and crushed their castle in the sky the following May. Had they cared to look or send even one spy, they would have seen their future.

The one significant difference between them and us is that this country is huge and not homogeneous. We still have robust, freedom loving people in America. I hope there are enough.

Jun 17, 2005 - 9:39 am 12. Robert Crawford:

Well, that’s why the Right hates the Left these days. We aren’t as afraid as they are.

What a contemptable lie. A day doesn’t go by without hearing another Lefty whining about how terrified they are of the “Christers”, or how horribly oppressed they are when they’re called on the idiocy of their pronouncements — some of them get terrified if they know there’s a silent Republican in the same concert hall.

Oh, and let’s not forget the line they have on confronting terrorists. Killing terrorists just makes more terrorists, as if they were Awful Green Things From Outer Space and every weapon we have creates 3d of frags whenever we use it.

The left’s line in the lead-up to the Afghanistan War was “it’ll be another Vietnam”, followed by “quagmire!” They certainly acted terrified then.

And let’s not forget the lead-up to the Iraq War, during which the left alternately told us there was no threat from Saddam and that we’d be bringing home tens of thousands of dead because of his WMD, there’d be millions of civilians killed, etc.

Fear is the only council I’ve ever heard from the left, not just recently, but in my 34 years. Reagan’s military build-up wouldn’t make us safer, he was going to start The War by calling the Soviets the Evil Empire, blah, blah, blah.

Jun 17, 2005 - 9:44 am 13. PeterUK:

“Four years after Pearl Harbor, America was on the verge of defeating tyranny in Europe. Four years after 9/11, the America of men like you are still afraid.”

They were afraid then, only a fool is not afraid.They knew what the war would cost in lives,social upheaval,families broken,countries devastated,treasure and blood expended,the maimed the destitute and the homeless,the sheer inhumanity it would take to defeat the enemy.

Yes they were afraid,but they girded their loins,picked up thier swords and their shields and did what had to be done.

You see Truthie,bravery is not an absence of fear,it is the conquering of fear,when you have learned that you will be an adult my child.

Jun 17, 2005 - 10:18 am 14. Dymphna:

I copied

This cannot be ascribed entirely to the “if it bleeds it leads” philosophy. Other, more nefarious forces, conscious and unconscious, are at work…

in order to paste and comment on it, only to find Mr. Truth had cut a near-by senctence and reached a quite different conclusion about Mr. Simon’s sentiments. A mean-spirited conclusion.

The “other, nefarious forces” have been around a long time. Though now tricked out in the impeccable garb of modern intelligentsia this kind of hatred (for self and other) goes way back to the 19th century utopian ideology. Talk about the Laws of Unintended Consequences. Played out to their final meaning, these ideas are poisoning the well of the commonweal. Mr. Simon is right to be concerned.

What complicated things was Einstein. Theology and philosophy (including political philosophy) follow physics. In fact, they haven’t gotten over the fact that physics dethroned them and grabbed the crown for itself. Thus the intelligentsia, in envious imitation, have tried to make a patch of Himself’s Theory of Relativism, and then tried to sew this pathetic patch onto the human condition. It never will stay glued, though they have striven manfully to make it do so, even going so far as to stand there, both hands holding the damn thing on to make sure it doesn’t fall off.

Mr. Simon is right to be concerned that history is cycling back to 1939. It is doing so because the gatekeepers of the public dialogue are such ignorant, uneducated ninnies. Come on, look at Daniel Rather. This is a savant? Not even and idiot savant. And yet TPIC (The People In Charge) paid him handsome sums to open his mouth and let sounds come out. Oh, the shame of it.

Does anyone know Al Stewart’s work? It’s amazing that a song writer has to teach us history. Google his CD “Between the Wars” and read the lyrics to the song “Laughing Into 1939.” Think of it played in D minor…

Like Mr. Simon, I’m concerned. However, the gates still hold. Despite the enemy inside the city, the gates still hold.

Jun 17, 2005 - 10:45 am 15. Buddy Larsen:

Not only that, but the people who get in the shit and save their nations are in great fear of what will happen to their people if they don’t.

Jun 17, 2005 - 10:46 am 16. Terrye:

Truth:

I know just what Roger means. Sometimes I feel like there is a deliberate attempt on the part of the left to make me take them seriously and vote the way they want me to vote or they will come up with whatever they have to get some more soldiers killed and make a bad situation. Cultural extortion if you will.

How else do you explain the obsessive disire to paint everything in its darkest tones even when we all know that the longer the enemy thinks he can win, the longer he will fight.

As for four years after Pearl Harbor, Europe and Japan were devastated and communism was on the rise.

There would be decades of cold war ahead of the people who survived WW2 and tens of millions would perish or be imprisoned in real concentration camps [as opposed to pretend death camps the left is so fond of bitching about]. That might not seem like a big deal to you but to the Koreans and Chinese and Asians and East Europeans that would soon die it did not bode well.

And the left is afraid, of us and themselves.

When 9/11 happened the Democrats divided into two parts: the part that said Clinton had told Bush that Osama was our greatest national security threat and the Michael Moore Democrats that thought Ashcroft was a lot scarier than any Muslim terrorist. It has been the great misfortune of the country that the Dems did not fight this out among themsxelves rather than dragging the rest of us into their Hellish Bushitler blood for oil nightmare. This has meant that Bush either created a bogus war or did not fight hard enough. whichever.

I am sick of it. The left is not only afraid, they are hysterical.

Jun 17, 2005 - 12:58 pm 17. PeterUK:

Terrye,

It is plain and simple emotional blackmail of the most infantile kind.

When I was aboy there was a series of books by Richmal Crompton about the scapegrace adventures of a schoolboy William Brown.One of the characters,contunually plagued by William was one Violet Eliazabeth Bott whose main device for getting her own way was,

“I’ll thcweam and I’ll thcweam until i make mythelf thick.

That is the left in a nutshell

Interestingly the regimes they so admire would simply put them up against a wall and shoot them as defeatists.

Jun 17, 2005 - 1:32 pm 18. Terrye:

Peter:

Thank you for that. I thought I was getting paranoid.

I mean it is just so hard to believe that people who keep telling up how kind and warm and wonderful they are would go out of there way to create trouble for other people and themselves just to get what they want.

Durbin=Nellie Olson.

The brat.

Jun 17, 2005 - 2:03 pm 19. Buddy Larsen:

“We’ll make sure you lose the war unless you elect us, in which case MAYBE we’ll let you win the war!”

Jun 17, 2005 - 2:19 pm 20. PeterUK:

Terrye,

Iam sure the resident psychiatric team will correct me if I’m wrong but,

“people who keep telling up how kind and warm and wonderful they are.”

never are.

Just as those who keep telling one how honest they are,are invarably planning to steal ones spoons.

Someone rang me a while back for some information,he started the conversation with,”People will tell I’m a great listener” the only word I got in was “Hello”

I find what people are, is evident from their actions.

Jun 17, 2005 - 2:24 pm 21. ShrinkWrapped:

The fundamental psychological mechanism at work in paranoia is “projection”.

Since those on the left know themselves to be more caring and loving of their fellow man than those of us who reside closer to reality, they are unable to tolerate their own hatred and must deny it. It is then projected onto others (ie, “I don’t hate you, but you are hateful to me.”) This, in turn, then justifies their rage as a reaction to our (fantasied) attacks on them. It is as if the left (which sadly, now includes the core of the Democratic party and the MSM) has been so enraged by their rejection by the country (which has been going on now for 20 years), that they first deny it (the election was stolen), justify their innate goodness by projecting the hate onto the “Republicans”, invent fantasies of horrors perpetrated by our governemnt and military (Abu Graib, Gitmo) and then can offer aid and comfort to our enemies with a clear conscience. (Senator Durban)

As I have warned in the past, this kind of paranoia is a prescription for violence: If the Bush administration is the equivalent of Pol Pot, the Nazis, and the Soviets, all right thinking Americans must oppose the evil, even with violence. In fact, violence against such a state would be a moral necessity.

It is worrisome.

Jun 17, 2005 - 2:48 pm 22. PeterUK:

Thank You Shrink Wrapped,

IIRC it was Theodore Dalrymple who wrote that in his dealings with prisoners convicted of violence,the excuse was always the “victim had made them do it”.

Worrying indeed.

Jun 17, 2005 - 3:17 pm 23. Rick Ballard:

One of the benefits of lefties having been thoroughly indoctrinated in moral relativity is that they may feel no “moral” compulsion to action whatsoever. The elevation of “advocacy” (think Hillary! and AI) to its exalted position with the left diminishes the personal responsibility to act, rather than talk, to the point where our current resident idiot, Pravda, probably thinks that he has actually accomplished something by excreting in the comments section.

In ‘02, within the US, 40 murders, 685 forcible rapes and 870 assaults with injury occurred every day. I am unaware of any violence against persons having been committed by Pravda’s ilk to date. Certainly, cowardice accounts for most of the lack of violence. Fear of incarceration wrt property damage and fear of bodily harm wrt attacks on persons undoubtedly overwhelm the Pravdian urge to destroy. Perhaps Pravdians have a level of intelligence that surpasses that of the common murderer, rapist or street thug, although little evidence of such intelligence is ever provided.

I understand (I think) the pyschological concept of projection but I have severe doubts that the current left is capable of violence. Keyboard attacks? Certainly. Attacks that involve personal risk? I don’t think so. Have we had a single lefty troll with the backbone to even use their own name?

I also question the amount of potential violence that is disbursed through the comment boards accross the internet. I believe it to be substantial. I am also curious as to the amount of actual stimulation to violence during the Vietnam era. Never forget that rabblerousers like Alinsky, Hoffman and Kunstler used relatively sophisticated techniques to move mobs from noisy protest to actual violence.

Jun 17, 2005 - 3:27 pm 24. PeterUK:

Rick,

Ah,but that is why they nurture the seventh century warriors.Just think,the revolution and a clean pair of hands.

Jun 17, 2005 - 3:43 pm 25. PJ:

Well said, ShrinkW. I have been reading about Lincoln and the press, the hatred for him by European press and ours, as well as the Democrats, which was stunning in its virulence. It also was just as venal as today’s confederacy of the bribed. I feel their hysteria fed the sense of rightenousness that led Booth to shoot him.

Neo-neocon talks about a book on Booth that seems to support your theory and mine. I havent read it yet, but her description implies that if he were alive today, he might be a Hollywood actor/leftist who went off the deep end.

I dont think the left as a whole will rise up, but individuals certainly might.

http://neo-neocon.blogspot.com/2005_06_01_neo-neocon_archive.html

Jun 17, 2005 - 4:25 pm 26. Kyda Sylvester:

I’m not frightened of the darkness outside. It’s the darkness inside houses I don’t like.

You know it’s going to be a lively thread whenever The Truth makes an appearance.

John Wayne said the characters he played weren’t heroes because they were fearless, but rather because they were able to act in spite of their fears.

Do I have a healthy fear of the havoc Islamofascist terrorism can wreak? Sure, you bet I do. Fear is an appropriate response to 9-11. But it hardly holds sway over my life. My ilk emphatically does not cower in fear behind bolted doors, its breast clutched in paranoia. We channel our fears into actions designed to eliminate the sources of those fears.

But however frightened I may, or may not, be of the darkness outside, the darkness inside the house is far more worrisome. I fear those elements inside our house who would abandon the battle before the war is won. I fear a political party which places its own ambitions and lust for power above the defense and security of our nation. I fear those who, in the service of their ambitions, would malign, debase and endanger the guardians of our liberty and therefore liberty itself. I fear a political party that caters to, rather than admonishes, the dementia and other assorted pathologies of its whacked out base. I fear the pack of drooling miscreants who, incapable of learning even the most unambiguous lessons of history, remains locked inside a faux reality where the United States of America bears the primary responsibility for all that is evil in this world.

So, yes, I and those of my ilk may feel depressed and discouraged at times. We may even feel despair. But we do not cower. We are not the heroes in this struggle, not by a long shot, but neither are we the cowards and we will prevail.

To treat your facts with imagination is one thing, to imagine your facts is another.

Hugh Hewitt has the transcript of an interview given this morning by one of the cowards. He just keeps digging the hole deeper and deeper and just wait till you see on whom he casts the blame for the blowback (bet you can guess).

Jun 17, 2005 - 4:28 pm 27. PeterUK:

From Austin Bay via Instapundit

“I find that this return visit to Iraq spurs thoughts of Americañ of American will to pursue victory. I donít mean the will of US forces in the field. Wander around with a bunch of Marines for a half hour, spend fifteen minutes with Guardsmen from Idaho, and you will have no doubts about American military capabilities or the troopsí will to win. But our weakness is back home, on the couch, in front of the tv, on the cable squawk shows, on the editorial page of the New York Times, in the political gotcha games of Washington, DC. It seems America wants to get on with its wonderful Electra-Glide life, that September 10 sense of freedom and security, without finishing the job.

The military is fighting, the Iraqi people are fighting, but where is the US political class?

Jun 17, 2005 - 4:38 pm 28. PeterUK:

Kyda

The Truth is frightened of its owm name.

Jun 17, 2005 - 4:39 pm 29. Jamie Irons:

Peter

Iam sure the resident psychiatric team will correct me if I’m wrong but,

“people who keep telling up how kind and warm and wonderful they are.”

never are.

You remind me of a wry saying of my Jewish father-in-law, a businessman…

He used to say, “How do you know when not to trust a Jewish businessman?”

Answer?

“When he says, Trust me…”

Jamie Irons

Jun 17, 2005 - 5:44 pm 30. Buddy Larsen:

Jamie, on the plaza in Cairo, a Jewish beggar had set up a big Star of David sign, in front of a Mosque. Next to him a few feet away was another old beggar with a big “Praise Allah” sign.

Going in and out of the Mosque the natives were staring at the old Jew and then emptying their pockets into the other beggar’s bowl–which was overflowing with cash.

An American happened by, noted the scene, and when no one was nearby, stepped over to the old Jew and said “Excuse me sir, but, I’ve gotta tell you, you’re never going to make it in this location, I’m an American and we know marketing.”

The other beggar looked over from counting the cash and laughed, “Hey, Herb, look who’s telling the Goldstein brothers about marketing!”

Jun 17, 2005 - 6:18 pm 31. Kevin P:

Roger:

The left is not scared? The patriot act is ending privacy rights as we know it. hillary told us that the Bush administration is the most abusive administration in the history of the country. The republicans, by winning elections, is conducting the greatest power grab in the history of this country. haliburton, Haliburton, Haliburton, Ther sky is falling.

And of course the two most scary things of all. WHITE CHRISTIANS. Go to the left wing blogs and you will learn how the christian right is bringing the inquisition back, the next crusade is soon to be upon us, and of course women will soon be tied in chains and become breeding machines for those nasty WC’s.

Then of course there are the Jews. According to Rat McGovern, the left’s star witness in the mock trial of GWB, the jews knew about 9-11, started a inside trading scheme, and are now controlling the White House and they all follow the orders of Sharon.

The left is plenty scared all right. They are just more paranoid about the American public and Israel then they are about the Islamo fascists who have attacked us and promise to do it again. Clever choice by those lefties. eh?

Jun 17, 2005 - 6:49 pm 32. PeterUK:

If the left were not scared they would not be trying to get laws enacted banning everything.

Jun 17, 2005 - 7:12 pm 33. Jamie Irons:

Buddy

That’s a good one!

Its logical structure is similar to that of the celebrated “Yom Kippur parrot” joke, which I’ll tell you sometime. But now off to dinner with Nina and one of our boys (the computer engineer)…

Jamie Irons

Jun 17, 2005 - 7:35 pm 34. PeterUK:

Oh,Well Larsen has already lowered the tone ,

A very smartly dressed Jewish lady was coming out of a fashionhouse,a man in a dirty raincoat opened the raincoat and flashed at her,she simply said “Call that a lining?”

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:04 pm 35. Buddy Larsen:

LOL–good one! But, *ahem* it was Irons who tumbled the thread–and then went to dinner, the rascal!

Jun 17, 2005 - 8:26 pm 36. David Thomson:

ìIn fact, violence against such a state would be a moral necessity.

It is worrisome.î

I suspect that we will see an increased amount of Weatherman style terrorism in the near future. A small handful of these folks are stark raving mad. And yes, if they take their rhetoric to its logical conclusion—violent acts are inevitable. Existentially, they have no other option.

Jun 17, 2005 - 9:30 pm 37. Syl:

There won’t be much, if any, weatherman-type violence. At least not in the near future, and if so, not for long. The Patriot Act, you know. No wonder the Left hates that Act.

————-

ShrinkWrapped:

“Since those on the left know themselves to be more caring and loving of their fellow man than those of us who reside closer to reality, they are unable to tolerate their own hatred and must deny it.”

They did it to themselves with multiculturalism and moral relativism. In order to fight the Islamofascists they must give up their cherished isms. There’s a disconnect, a contradiction, and they simply cannot handle it.

Anyway, they really are scaredy-cats. I see them hiding in the closet as Daddy tries to rid the rafters of the wasp nest. Don’t do it! You’ll just make them mad!!

Really a bunch of wussies who have the self-knowledge of slugs.

Jun 18, 2005 - 4:33 am 38. PeterUK:

The left may not know their assault rifles from their elbows,but they are quite capable of being facilitators for those who do.The connections between the Socialist Workers Party and the Muslim Brotherhood are alarming to say the least.

The large number of, ostensibly freedom loving organisations which are hobbling every move to curtail the activities of international terrorism,are all doing their bit for the cause.

Jun 18, 2005 - 6:53 am 39. Buddy Larsen:

Yeh…the American lefty radicals of today are chicken shit, but they do offer money and political cover to the legitimization of terrorism itself.

Jun 18, 2005 - 7:23 am 40. Scott Crawford:

Syl said:

There won’t be much, if any, weatherman-type violence. At least not in the near future, and if so, not for long. The Patriot Act, you know. No wonder the Left hates that Act.

If that’s true, it doesn’t seem to have affected ALF and ELF much. Both of them are classified by DOJ as terrorist organizations.

Jun 18, 2005 - 8:58 am 41. geoffb:

One thing I’ve always noticed about the Dem’s and “projection” is they always accuse others of exactly what they are doing or are planning to do. By looking at what they accuse Republicans of you can see what they are doing or wish to do when they are able. This is how they always telegraph their punches.

Jun 18, 2005 - 9:06 am 42. Buddy Larsen:

That’s exactly true. The current flap, Israel as nothing but a USA base, means that’s exactly how they see Israel–not as the Holy land, not as the home of an heroic people fighting for their very existence, but just as an abstract right-wing war-monger oil-ploy that they detest. Just an exploitable issue, mere ink-on-paper. Oh, their words lead to Jerusalem bus-bombs? Well, close the place down and move, then. Feh.

Jun 18, 2005 - 9:18 am 43. Brian H:

A British Labour MP provided the motto for modern Dems: “The People have spoken. The bastards!”

Jun 19, 2005 - 5:35 pm

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