Vladimir Putin and Ariel Sharon should have made more of their recent meeting. It was Sharon’s chance to get Putin on his side. Unlike George Bush the internationalist, Putin and Sharon are fierce nationalists who care first and foremost about their respective countries. Both, paradoxically, are under pressure from the U.S. for their treatment of terrorists —the two leaders are expected to make concessions to murderers who kill their civilians, while Bush and the international community make no such allowances for al-Qaida. The Murder Inc. of the Middle East (Hamas) and that of Russia (Chechen terrorists) have pan-Islamic aspirations and ties to al-Qaida. That the Left sympathizes with violent societies like Chechnya and the Palestinian Authority (their July-17 election is predicted to be a shoo-in for Hamas) is to be expected. From the Right one expects better, although it’s certainly a pleasant surprise to read an article in a libertarian publication which, for a change, rejects the root-causes rubbish: “[A] high-violence society does not get that way because of any particular cause or condition,” writes James L. Payne in The Prospects for Democracy in High-Violence Societies. “It is better understood as a society mired in the past, a society that has failed to make the transition away from primitive, counterproductive modes of interaction.”
In any case, a better understanding between Russia and Israel might take the pressure off Sharon to keep making concessions to “Hamastan,” and, perhaps, inject a new dynamic into the current imbalance of power in the world.
Monthly Archives: May 2005
On Sober Spirits And Spies
What’s there to debate? Lawrence Franklin, a “Pentagon analyst [who] was charged Wednesday with illegally passing classified information about potential attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq to two members of a pro-Israel lobbying group” deserves opprobrium, and worse. What I’d like to offer is some perspective. While it shouldn’t be condoned, all governments spy on each other, friendly governments included. “Russians and Americans still spy on each” (Robert Hanssen anyone?); “peeping” is a time-honored tradition (hey, Canada?). Franklin, moreover, has done his Israeli mates no favors, unless he is unaware that some in America now share with Eurabia, Arabia, and “the executive committee of the Third World dictatorships,” otherwise known as the UN, the “perception” of Israel as the greatest threat to American security and world peace. I know; these are not the most sober spirits. While this gang bangs on about the Israeli Influence, Muslim “Charities” across the U.S. funnel money to terrorists; many of the community’s religious pillars preach war on the West from their pulpits, while pretending to promote peace; and crafty —oh so powerful —Muslim lobbying groups privately defend al-Qaida’s capo di tutti capi, while posing as moderates, and whispering sweet nothings in naïve American ears. As a softy from Washington’s Council on American-Islamic Relations put it, “Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran . . . should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth.” (CAIR claims to represent moderates.) Next time you shake in your socks on an American airplane, as Middle-Eastern men strut up and down the isles unhindered, duck into toilets with cell phones and cameras, flout flight rules and intimidate terrified travelers with menacing gestures, remember to thank Muslim lobby groups for ensuring rational profiling remains illegal. (If only El-Al flew locally). There’s another small snag in the theory of Israeli subversives: Israelis didn’t attack the U.S. in 1993, 1998, 2000 and 2001; Muslim terrorists did. Journalists who neglect all the above, yet work indefatigably to depict Israel as the source of all evil, are looking through the wrong end of the telescope. Worse; they’ve abnegated journalistic responsibilities.
Judaism, The Mother Faith
With reference to Unlearned Rabbi Rages at Ratzinger, here’s a thought: Judaism is the Mother Faith —it gave birth to Christianity (Jesus was Jewish). The proper metaphor for the relationship between Judaism and Christianity is that of parent and progeny. Self-anointed Jewish leadership, however, has managed to cast Jews as a mere faction among a multicultural mob, a position Jews (being liberals) love.
After reading Paul Sperry’s Infiltration, I am more convinced than ever that if Christians and Jews fail to form a united front, our children’s children will be destined for infidel’s dhimitude under the most unforgiving of faiths: Islam.
Introducing Barely A Blog
No, I’ve not changed my generally unfavorable assessment of blogging, which I expressed in The Importance of Boundaries. And yes, although certain blogs are thoroughly good, I still hold that, “The upshot of populism in punditry… is that bad commentary is promiscuously outed,” and that, “Few and far between are the commentators and conversationalists who have honed their craft.”
Alas, I know when I’ve been defeated. The word “blog” must appear somewhere on the toolbar if a website’s popularity is to be enhanced, hence “Barely A Blog.”
Barely A Blog began as bookmarks on a page at IlanaMercer.com.
I’d like to thank Sean Mercer and Crystal of VDARE.COM for helping transform BAB into a legitimate blog.
Archived Comments going back to 2002 can still be found here on IlanaMercer.com. We’ll also do our utmost to bring over the letters written to BAB in its early instantiation. BAB posts are cross posted on Free-Market News Network, for which I am blogger-at-large.