geoffff
I thought this was a reasonably balanced response to the call by British Christians on the US to stop using drones because they are evil.
But look at the responses. Anybody would think I just kicked over their chicken sheds and killed all their chooks.
Sheesh. I was just taking the opportunity to get the subject off Israel.
cross posted Israel Thrives
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- 10.05.12 at 4:55 pm
- No intelligent rational democratic society opts for war if it can be avoided. This is especially so if they are liberal societies where women have unfettered participation in the decision making processes.These societies make mistakes. Sometimes these are grave. But that is something else.This is why it is unthinkable for secular democratic countries to go to war. There has never been a case in history of a war between secular democracies. The closest is the American Civil War but given that there was no female franchise and on one side 2/3 of the population owned the other 1/3 it too does not qualify.It should go without saying that the deployment of military force by Western countries is a matter of some passing consideration. It is not tossed around with the snags on the BBQ . It is a leftist delusion that it is..This is not to say terrible mistakes are never made. But again that is saying something different. Besides the worst mistakes of the last century were Chamberlain’s.Once in a war there can be only one humane objective . End it. As quickly and cleanly as possible.Or at least keep the enemy suppressed at the least cost to the folk without the guns on the ground .And the lives of the brave men and women of the country’s defence forces on the ground and in the airPacifists will be appalled at any military method but there can be no ethical objection to a developing technology that is already a degree of magnitude advanced in terms of its impact on extremist insurgents with the least possible impact on people not in the fight.It’s expensive. It uses ground intelligence as well as what’s in the air. But AQ and the other insurgent death cults hate it especially their leaderships. They have no difficulty sending others to the paradise they condition them from childhood but they are not suicidal themselves..The best way of attacking terrorist attacks on civilians is to make the practice as suicidal as possible. It is especially effective with jihadist martyrs. They fear that last flash from the sky more than any.
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10.05.12 at 5:58 pm3
10.05.12 at 6:38 pm- No intelligent rational democratic society opts for war if it can be avoided.(1) Ergo, the US is not an “intelligent rational democratic society”. Or the statement is false. Tertium non datur.(2) And it’s not only pacifists that will be appalled at this remark from the Dark Side, so too will any just-war thinker.(3) But too much said already. I don’t want to legitimise such toxic comment. So I’m done here. Richard, please, if Geoffff wants to fling shit, let him do it in his own house.
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10.05.12 at 7:00 pm- Yours too Richard.I am so sick of the debates on whether Iraq or Afghanistan or whatever were moral mistakes. The US is not an evil country that opts for war where it sees peace. . This anti-Americanism, as if American wars are unique and happened in a vacuum where all other parties were innocent, is frankly disgusting .It is bigotry and it is no less less ugly because this anti-American shit is being flung by a former American. I’m not in the slightest bit surprised to see that it is utterly intolerant of opinions it does not like. .
- 10.05.12 at 7:26 pm
- 10.05.12 at 9:28 pm
- Whatever Richard.Thank you for the space for a profoundly different point of view by the way. Not everyone does that.
- 10.05.12 at 10:47 pm
- 10.06.12 at 12:43 am
- Your comment is awaiting moderation.No because I never implied that and I most certainly have not lied..What I implied is that the very notion that by now in the present and now antizionism is just another form of antisemitism so shocked and offended you, was in fact so silly that you deleted my comment and refused to hear anything more from me on that active thread.You enforce that to this day. I have the pastes to prove it. Which part of the word “ban” do you take exception?.The thing is Richard I think that antizionism is at the very core of the new antisemitism that is sweeping across the globe like a tsunami and I intend to keep on saying so because as a secular human rights activist I believe it is right to speak this truth to power. .To do so is to defend human rights. Everyone’s human rights including the poor bloody “Palestinians” nurtured in perpetual grievance and pointed at a foreign enemy by their real foreign oppressors who rule by deploying Nazi era racial hatred against the Jews.Also the human rights of the Syrians. Look at the horrors ahead for those people. How does destroying the human rights of Israelis help them?The human rights of the remaining Christians in Muslim lands. The ancient Christian communities from Iraq through Syria Lebanon Gaza, PA controlled Judea and Samaria and even Egypt are dwindling and starting to pass into history like the Jews before them. What about their rights?.The human rights of the women.I believe that the mantra of the left that antizionism is not antisemitism is wrong. Antizionism means something much much more than criticism of Israeli policies.I think that antizionism is offensive. Ignorance can not explain it. It never does. It involves holding impossibly contradictory views about Israel and Jews that are straight from the shelves of history.. It is at the very core of the new antisemitism and that should scare you.
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Any non-Jew who declares themselves an "anti-Zionist" in this day and age is unquestionably an antisemite. They have applied a definitive label to themselves, the only meaning of which is to seek to deny the Jewish people the right to national self-determination.
ReplyDeleteIs this really still up for debate?
And thanks for being a friend of our country, Geoffff. Are we perfect? Certainly not. But then again, who is?
I walked past the Noam Chomsky mural on Fairmount Ave here in Philadelphia a couple evenings ago, and I couldn't help but think how many other countries would have, at the very least, 'disappeared' him long, long ago.
In the United States, he (and his ridiculous views, but that's another story for another time) ends up painted on walls.
I'm sure the regimes in Syria or Iran or etc etc would do the same for their own local versions though, right?
I don't think it should be up for debate but you can see what a brain snap it for these people. Antizionism is antisemitism? They behave like the robot in Lost In Space after conflicting orders. They do not compute. But they are sure good at waving their arms.
ReplyDeleteI'm not quite sure why you make that distinction among antizionists Jay. This is something about I would not bother too much with with nuance.
I have no problem with the idea of antisemitic Jews. Keep in mind "Jew" is both narrow and wide in meaning and there are many who can claim it or deny the title as it suits.
Antisemitic Jews are out there and they may occur among Jews as frequently as in the general population. there are antisemites who are Jews only because they are antisemites.
When it comes to the individual there is no need to identify someone as antisemite. We are not required to delve into the darker regions of someone's mind. It is enough that they support an antisemitic cause. This is especially the case perhaps with Jews.
Who knows what warped and sad psychology is at play.
Your point about Chomsky is exactly spot on and I'm forever amazed at those just can't get it. In some countries you are free to say what you like more or less and in other countries you get your head cut off and in the US you are freest of all.
Maybe there should be a Chomsky coefficient. Perhaps a grading applied to counties 1 to 9.
A country that treats Chomsky as a wealthy and celebrated public figure whose works are prescribed on every campus in the land gets a 9.
There's only one of them.
A country that drags Chomsky to a public place after a show trial and then stones him to death get a 1.
Those countries that use a more humane method of execution get a 2. Those that don't do it in public and promise they didn't use torture get a 2 1/2.
You then work your way up through mysterious accidents, professional blackballing, constant surveillance etc until you get to about a 7 where he would be released from home arrest and no longer has to wear the bracelet.
Agreed. I made the distinction to allow for the possibility that certain religious beliefs may oppose Zionism for reasons having nothing to do with bigotry; although that certainly does not preclude the possibility of those same individuals also being antisemitic in other ways, though.
DeleteIf that makes any sense.
Oh, and the Chomsky Coefficient is great!
Delete