UPDATED (8/24/018): Taki: Not Very Bright

Anti-Semitism,Islam,Israel,Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,Neoconservatism,South-Africa,Terrorism,The West

            
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In “From Russia With (Less Than) Love,” I asked—and answered—the question as to why Russia and Israel don’t cooperate more. For one, both nations live adjacent to terrorist entities—the Russians to Chechnya; the Israelis to the Palestinian Authority. Putin must put up with Shamil Basaev (a Chechen terrorist and advocate of an Islamist state in the Northern Caucasus); Israelis have to contend with the new Dalai Lamas of Gaza (Hamas).

And both Israelis and Russians “are hectored by elements in the Bush and Blair administrations and the Europeans about granting statehood to their terrorism-endorsing neighbors. Against insuperable odds, both are expected to trust terrorists and their fan base to stop butchering babies and embrace Jeffersonian democracy and a Bill of Rights.”

Note the consistency of my position: Assailed by savages, Russia and Israel have my sympathies and support on this front.

A year later, Taki, a moldy scribe, with life tenure in various publications, makes a similar point in The American Conservative (TAC). He is smarting over the administration’s double standard: “American policy makers” are “bear baiting” Russia about its mistreatment of Chechen jihadists, whom the administration (as I pointed out) lionizes. Chechens are freedom fighters, but the Palestinians are terrorists? What’s up with that, he wants to know.

This is rich because Taki’s writing is laced with exactly the same illogic:

In fawning, radical-left fashion, he and TAC finesse everything about the savage and dysfunctional Palestinian society, yet evince a loathing of all things Israel. Or, if a little honesty pierces the fog, and they acknowledge the facts on the ground, it is invariably to blame Israel, Ã la the left’s theory of culpability. Apparently, if not for Israel, a veritable economic oasis and a culture of life would flourish where a black hole now threatens to collapse upon itself.

Yes, this is rich because it exposes Taki’s inability to detect the same category of contradiction he rightly accuses the administration of in his and The American Conservative’s oeuvre.

That’s good for a laugh.

UPDATED (8/24/018): Praised by a cult.