He Has Friends in Tehran, Gaza, Beirut, Baghdad, Jerusalem and Cairo
Tags: Kooks.
Click here to get Caucus of Corruption: The Truth About The New Democratic Majority by Matt Margolis and Mark Noonan.
And, naturally, he writes for The Nation:
I will not pay my income tax if we go to war with Iran. I realize this is a desperate and perhaps futile gesture. But an attack on Iran–which appears increasingly likely before the coming presidential election–will unleash a regional conflict of catastrophic proportions. This war, and especially Iranian retaliatory strikes on American targets, will be used to silence domestic dissent and abolish what is left of our civil liberties. It will solidify the slow-motion coup d’état that has been under way since the 9/11 attacks. It could mean the death of the Republic…
…I will put the taxes I owe in an escrow account. I will go to court to challenge the legality of the war. Maybe a courageous judge will rule that the Constitution has been usurped and the government is guilty of what the postwar Nuremberg tribunal defined as a criminal war of aggression. Maybe not. I do not know. But I do know this: I have friends in Tehran, Gaza, Beirut, Baghdad, Jerusalem and Cairo. They will endure far greater suffering and deprivation. I want to be able, once the slaughter is over, to at least earn the right to ask for their forgiveness.
Those friends of the writer, Christ Hedges, are not likely to be IDF soldiers in Jerusalem, democracy advocates in Beirut, Cairo and Tehran, or Iraqi policemen in Baghdad. Other than that, we’ll leave it as an open question as to just who the writer’s friends are.
Be that as it may, this absurd shreik of fear is just all too typical on the left these days…absurd because to think that our Republic is in danger from President Bush is just stupid. There are more than a dozen people contending to replace President Bush representing a wide variety of political opinion. President Bush’s party, just a year ago, lost control of both houses of Congress. People like Hedges freely write dissenting articles which say everything you can imagine against President Bush…if this is a “slow-motion coup d’état”, then it is so slow that it’ll be a few hundred years before President Bush makes it to dictator. This sort of opinion would be laughable except for one thing – its not a small number of people who believe this. The number of kooks who think such things are true probably numbers in the range of tens of millions of people…people who will view anything other than a complete route of the GOP in 2008 as proof positive that America is no longer a democratic republic…and if you really think you’re living under a dictatorship making cruel war against your innocent friends in Tehran, etc, just what won’t you do to help them fight against this horrible government of Fascist Amerika?
This sort of thing really needs to stop – get a grip, lefties. You’re not living in a dictatorship. Not an iota of your civil rights have been taken away. President Bush isn’t evil – he isn’t stupid; he’s none of the things you think him. Believe he’s wrong all you want, but get over the paranoid, conspriacy-theory thinking.
Mark Noonan is co-author (with Matt Margolis) of Caucus of Corruption: The Truth About The New Democratic Majority. He also blogs at Nevada News and Views. Follow Mark on Twitter.
14 Responses to “He Has Friends in Tehran, Gaza, Beirut, Baghdad, Jerusalem and Cairo”
Caucus of Corruption
It’s really not so much that the lefties believe what they say, in as much as it is that they LOVE TO PLAY THE VICTIM!
Liberals love to play the violins, feel downtrodden, abused and to throw pity parties. It’s who they are and the main reason why they never have solutions, only complaints.
I loved the line in the Nation article where it said:
“Once the slaughter is over, I hope they forgive me”
Can you say drama!
Our President’s foreign policy is simple. It is to protect our allies. Whether it is Israel, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Canada, France.
Since WW1 and WW2, America has been there for its allies, even at great costs to the American people. Chavez and Iran may vow to crush American Imperlism. But I think most people see America as having the highest quality of Freedom on this planet. Many countries want to do business with the U.S and be on our side when it comes to military conflict. Conspiracy Theories are everywhere you look, anyone can have a theory.
I have a conspiracy theory about Opec running the oil prices up too high. To drive down the value of our dollar. and another theory of banks and credit card companies running interest rates up so high that people will lose their homes.
People like Hedges freely write dissenting articles which say everything you can imagine against President Bush
This fact, in and of itself, disproves the ridiculous accusation that President Bush has taken away the right to dissent. On the other hand, the right to dissent against your own leaders does not exist in some of the places where Hedge’s friends live.
markrusalem
i agree….bush isn’t evil
but i disagree….he’s not that smart or deep
however…lord cheney…..that’s another story
What I find totally laughable is that every single one of the Democrats’ candidates are running against President Bush…and he can’t be on the ballot!
lenny,
Then you’re half way to a cure for BDS…
Poor lenny, looking so hard for a villain and not being able to come up with anyone more sinister than the former union electrician from Casper, Wyoming.
I wonder what the lennies of the world are going to do if we get a real-life, gen-you-wine power-mad control freak in the White House—I’m thinking, of course, of our former Co-President, the little lady who sicced the IRS on those who dared to question her husband’s FIDELITY. That is a very important point, worth a little screaming. His FIDELITY. They dared to comment on the most obvious and notable characteristic of Slick Willy (and you do realize, don’t you, that in England a “willy” is, well, the part of Bill that got the most use…) and for that, for acknowledging the well-known fact that he could not keep his zipper up, she turned the IRS loose on them.
And of course, this is the same champion of civil rights who complied (illegal) FBI records on those who did not meet her standards of total and absolute loyality to the First Couple.
How much you wanna bet that actual, proven, documented, abuses such as this will be given a free pass by the lennies of the world as they persist in trying to find/invent something to hang on Bush and Cheney and that rascal, Rove.
The Clintons had that much power over the FBI? Gosh, what’s wrong with THAT picture?
If what you say is true, Almiranta, wouldn’t you say that the best way to prevent crap like that from happening in the future is to ensure a stronger, more clear wall between the DoJ and the rest of the executive branch? That seems to be a recurring theme.
Sorry… I forgot to mention the Department of the Treasury, too.
As I understand it:
1. Liberals are concerned about loss of privacy because of intercepted messages and phone calls.
But 90% of the Internet traffic comes through the US. Where else would be a good place to capture it?
2. Liberals are concerned about the Executive Branch being able to declare someone, even a US citizen an “enemy combatant” and holding them without trial.
Actually, I don’t like this either. They should be charged with treason. Or, they should be treated as a POW like during the Civil War.
3. Liberals are concerned about torture and rendition (sending someone to a country that will torture).
First, there is a big disagreement about what is torture. But giving them the benefit of the doubt, I say take no prisoners. That solves the whole Guantanamo and possible torture thing.
4. Conservative see a press that is 90% registered Democrat. That donates heavily to Democrats. And that shows bias towards Democrats in stories without admitting it. How do liberals reply to this question about a fair press? – Please, don’t cite Fox. First off, its not as conservative as you say. But even if it was, its one network compared to how many?
5. Conservatives see a movement to stifle political speech. First in the current campaign finance laws (while I’ll never vote for McCain). And second in the move to control “talk” radio. Talk IS still speech, right? So trying to control talk is trying to control speech. Am I wrong?
6. Conservatives see a movement to disarm the populace. Whats up with that? Areas with more legal guns have less crime – proven fact. Areas with less or no legal guns have higher crime – proven fact. DC is a good example. ONLY Police and criminals have guns in DC. ONLY. No one is allowed to own a handgun and long guns must be disassembled or locked up. So, since the crime premise is false – why do you want our guns?
7. Both sides have concerns about voting rights. Democrats see “disenfranchisement” everywhere. Republicans see voter fraud. The recent plan to give illegal immigrants drivers licenses in New York could have led to fraud. And the numerous violent attacks on Republicans (gunfire, fire bombings, disabling “get-out-the-vote” vehicles, ransacking offices, and shouting down of Republicans makes us wonder just who is disenfranchising who?
8. Taxes – feel free to pay more. Nothing is stopping you. Is that a civil right? Taxes?
Kahn,
To answer for our lefty friends, the MSM is conservative in their view…Fox is just ultra-conservative. For our leftwing friends, only 100% subscription to the kookiest of kook fringe conspiracy theories can prove you are not one of “them”.
Mark: Kahn, To answer for our lefty friends, the MSM is conservative in their view…Fox is just ultra-conservative. For our leftwing friends, only 100% subscription to the kookiest of kook fringe conspiracy theories can prove you are not one of “them”.
Oh I dunno. Just Kahn’s statement: “First, there is a big disagreement about what is torture. But giving them the benefit of the doubt, I say take no prisoners. That solves the whole Guantanamo and possible torture thing” would probably do it. In fact, that would probably do it for most conservatives as well. At least I would hope.
Pardon me for saying so Kahn, but that’s not only a despicable thing to say, it’s also stupid. After all, whatever else that could be said, it goes without saying that you can’t get much information from a dead man. One would hope that the controversy about “torture”, or “aggressive interrogation”, or whatever you want to call it, would hinge around whether it’s a productive way of obtaining useful information — not whether it’s preferable to other means of eliminating people you would prefer weren’t around.
Or perhaps we should ask Alice. Sometimes it gets so very surreal around here.
Rico, the “take no prisoners” view is the view friends of mine had on Guadalcanal, at Tarawa, and Iwo Jima. What good does it do to take a fanatic prisoner and then not let anyone question him? Why bother.
From what I understand we get most of our intelligence from people who hate our common enemy along with telephone records and computer info. I understand we found a pretty good map in Iraq lately that really helped.
But I understand that this could be taken as an incendiary statement and I’m sorry I gave you an easy out on the other questions. You don’t have answers to anything else, do you?
Sure I do. I just don’t have a lot of time. But here are my responses in a nutshell…
1. The issue isn’t the monitoring, it’s the oversight. “Trust me” just doesn’t cut it — for any president, whoever they are. Sunshine is the best disinfectant.
2. I really haven’t been following the enemy combatant issue. But it seems to me that if they are US citizens, then they are entitled to the rights of habeas corpus like any other alleged criminal. And if they’re found guilty, throw the book at them.
4 and 5. I’m not in favor of media consolidation. I think it’s essential to get multiple points of view from multiple, independent sources. Other than that, I’m not in favor of stifling the media, either. But liberal bias in the media has been a controversy among conservatives for 25 years or more. Well, if it’s so bad, why hasn’t it been a focus of attention? It’s way past time to put up or shut up as far as I’m concerned.
6. On gun control I’m inclined to respect and listen to the opinion of police agencies around the country. Generally speaking, and as I understand it, they are generally in favor of concealed carry laws. And the available evidence does suggest they help to reduce crime. So I’m fine with it. On the other hand, they also generally support assault weapons bans, and bans on certain types of ammo. That also seems reasonable to me.
7. I think there is a potential danger both with respect to voter fraud and disenfranchisement. Anyone who is eligible to vote should be able to do so, and it shouldn’t cost them anything. Indiana appears to have a pretty workable “proof of enfranchisement” law in place, one that considers all possibilities. It’ll be interesting to see how it performs. I also think there should be a tamper-proof, redundant way to verify votes, should that become necessary in a close election. As for incidences of violence against targets of the political opposition, they should be aggressively pursued, as should any act allegedly intending to intimidate or otherwise mitigate a person’s ability to vote.
8. I’m really just beginning to entertain the various possibilities for tax reform. I guess you could say that I approach the problem from the perspective of assuming that some sort of graduated scale for personal income taxes isn’t the worst thing in the world. I’m not very keen on taxing businesses as opposed to individuals on a federal level. But I think personal capital gains (including dividends) should be taxed the same as ordinary income. All that being said, IMO there is only one thing worse than tax and spend, and that’s borrow and spend. That baloney has to stop.