Category Error: Attacking Norway for Pearl Harbor

Bahukutumbi Raman, in a recent dispatch labeled “PAK ARMY & ISI: DANGEROUS MIX OF HUMILIATION & DESPERATION”, warns that Pakistan may be planning to redeem itself by orchestrating a successful strike against India, especially in the contentious Kashmir region.

No doubt, Pakistan’s citizens are seriously concerned about the ability of their government and armed forces to protect them. No doubt there has been talk on the streets of intelligence failure at best or illicit collusion with the Americans at worst.

Yet, all this follows a familiar pattern. Most military incursions into sovereign territory for any reason are done in stealth. The inevitable questions and accusations follow. Did Roosevelt know about Pearl Harbor in advance? Did Bush know about 9/11? And in her column in yesterday’s Jerusalem Post, Caroline Glick accuses Ehud Barak, Israel’s Defense Minister of failing to anticipate trouble along the country’s Syrian border on Nakba Day.

The truth is, no government can promise ironclad security to its citizens. A successful strategy, however, must involve the threat of consequences for anyone intending such a move. If Pakistan were to attack India in the wake of its so-called ‘humiliation’, such redemption would be short lived. For one thing, India had nothing to do with the bin Laden raid.

President Bush underwent a hell of tortures for his decision to attack Iraq in the wake of 9/11. His opponents constantly labeled it as “the wrong war”. In the end, rightly or wrongly, it proved to be his undoing.

My own sense of Pakistan’s leadership is that it is too mature to attack India as a direct consequence of the U.S. bin Laden raid. It has far better options: Turning its focus away from Washington to cooperating more with China is one. If India is attacked, it will not be because of anything that happened in Abbottabad.

I wish I had a similar degree of confidence in America’s foreign policy.

We Are Building a Religion

As we go back and forth and speculate about what might yet happen (in Egypt), we should go straight to the horse’s mouth. Let’s ask our president directly what it is that he wants to happen. And while we’re at it, let’s ask him straight out what he has in mind for the U.S. Let’s ask him to explain why he is doing what, and what he is hoping to accomplish by doing so. And let’s pretend to believe what he says.

By the way, there’s a great opinion column in the WSJ this morning (Feb. 1) by Bret Stephens entitled “Being Mubarak”. It takes an interesting slant, speculating that the old fox (Mubarak) may yet have some tricks up his sleeve.

It is what it is (and has been for some 30 odd years). There was a reason for why we supported Egypt and, I might add, Israel. With the election of Obama, those reasons have eroded. We turn our backs to both - and things happen. Read Caroline Glick’s column in the JPOST today. What we (in the West) define as ‘success’ is not defined as ‘success’ among Islamists (or communists). Our metrics are not valid there. Any attempt at such comparison may be regarded as ‘category error‘.

What if the revolution succeeds? What if the dominos fall, one by one; and an Islamic Caliphate emerges - one that is hostile to the West? And there is a genocide? Would it end with the destruction of Israel? Maybe so. Or would it gather steam and push into Europe? By the way, would Europe be capable of defending itself?

What if it were found that the American president actively participated in engineering the revolution in the Middle East by withdrawing key supports; manipulating food prices world-wide; deliberately crashing economies by way of monetary policy; supporting radical elements in the name of ‘social justice’? Would we be spared the indignity of shariah? Would he? Not likely. Traitors are universally despised, even under the minimal discipline of chaos.

The twelfth imam is likely to credit his own and pay scant attention to the welfare of foreign accomplices.

In any case, it’ll be the Atlantic that will shield us from the worst of it. Having allowed ourselves to come to this point, however, will haunt us into eternity. We will spend the rest of our lives apologizing, wearing sack cloth, wailing, and tearing our hair. No more arrogance; no more illusions of ‘American exceptionalism‘. We’ll have to rebuild slowly and painfully; our civilization will re-emerge, (this time) stripped of excess and bravado. We’ll have to harden ourselves to the hurled scorn of the betrayed, and forever suffer the weight of insurmountable guilt.

Only the Germans currently have a sense of it. They have been blessed with every attribute that would facilitate achieving unparalleled success; but, at the same time, they know they have forever forfeited their chance at enduring greatness.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Let's See How It Plays

Olbermann gone, but not forgotten. Perhaps it all boils down to ratings after all. Olbermann has always been near the bottom of the heap. He has talent, no doubt. His talent was overshadowed by his bias. Once bias has been freely and audaciously exhibited, there is no longer any need to watch. Everyone already knew what was coming.

Olbermann is much too smart to let this happen. I suspect he was encouraged all the way. He knew that his ratings suffered. (They all know.) In fact, he had much larger audiences than what was obvious when his clips were played on much more successful shows. These made him out to be a clown and he readily obliged. Why?

I suspect it’s some version of the ‘fairness doctrine’ again: Olbermann on the Left; Beck on the right. “We’ll get rid of Olbermann, if you get rid of Beck. In fact, let’s get rid of the whole bunch of them: We’ll get rid of MSNBC; you’ll get rid of FOX. Let’s start with Beck and Olbermann and see how it plays.”
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"Despite the fact that Democrat policies are hugely unpopular, two factors have enabled the party to continue to present itself as mainstream.

“The first factor has been the media. As has been their practice forever, it seems; the media have helped Democrats by demonizing the Republicans and rightist politicians. Working hand in glove with leftist politicians, the media have implemented the politics of personal destruction against right-wing leaders. By demonizing the likes of Bush, Cheney, Palin, Limbaugh et al, they have rendered the social cost of supporting Republicans and the Right too high for many Americans to bear.

“At the same time, the media have colluded with the Left to present leftist leaders as earthy, heroic, sophisticated and responsible statesmen. By keeping the content of their policies firmly out of the discussion and framing the debate instead around personal attacks and symbols, the media have successfully kept conservative leaders on the defensive and shielded leftist politicians from substantive attacks on their radical policies.“

The preceding has been taken from Caroline Glick’s latest article in the Jerusalem Post. It is not about America. It is about Israel. I’ve taken the liberty of changing a few words.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

We Must Believe

You’re not helping, John, bashing Republicans at every turn. When Barack Hussein Obama took office, I felt a shift under my feet. ”I don’t mean fear to anger. I mean a sudden shift, a tumultuous upheaval, an uncontrollable displacement, concepts whose surfaces had been insignificant heaving over, up-ended, raised as huge boulders smelling of the earth that still clings to them, a shift that came to me physically, as intestines violently stir and contract when some irritant throws a switch in the digestive tract. Earth, guts – I don’t know what metaphors to use (anymore), to describe…” my clutching for words to explain my sense of impending doom.

You obviously haven’t felt it yet. You’re as one deciding between cake and ice cream – Democrat or Republican – while the rooms of the mansion we cohabit burst into flames one by one.

Is the WSJ now also on the no-fly list – like FOX, MSNBC, Rush, Drudge, JPOST among so many others? The WSJ, whose offices you yourself frequently avail yourself of; the same WSJ that chronicles daily fresh, flagrant abuses by our essentially one-party government.

(Note, I threw MSNBC in with my mix of no-flies because it too has been singled out for censure after having been deliberately dragged down to unfathomable depths of ridiculousness for the sole purpose of giving the exercise an appearance of balance.)

Time will tell who is right. Yes, we are grasping at straws. Whereas Republicans don’t look promising, there is no alternative at the moment. Give them a chance. They will rise to the occasion. We must believe it, for the others (Democrats) are already way beyond redemption.
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Italics taken from Nadine Gordimer’s “Burger’s Daughter”.