al Qaeda and the Two Party System

Andrew Sullivan points us to a quote that summarizes my thoughts about the politics in America as it relates to terrorism and Al Qaeda. The British Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw says:

"What people have got to remember is that Sept. 11 happened in 2001 and not in 2003. It was planned under the presidency of Bill Clinton."

Sullivan's take:

"The point, of course, is not to blame Clinton for 9/11, but to show that al Qaeda terrorism is not some kind of response to the Bush administration. It predated it, and will probably outlast it."

Simply put, the Islamic militants don't give a rats @$$ about who is in the White House. Democrat or Republican, the militant Islamic fundamentalist sees both parties (and independants for good measure) cut from the same cloth of satanism. Really, all one has to do is witness the bombings in Turkey, a Muslim country and Saudi Arabia, a Muslim country run by a theocracy, to know that even fellow Muslims are not safe.

Historical perspective on Bush’s visit to the UK

At Power Line blog, they have some news stories from when Regan visited the UK 20 years ago. Then, as now, there were large demonstrations against the US President. Hat tip to Hugh Hewitt. This is a good read to help keep things in perspective, a vocal minority can seem like a majority because the majority is too busy working or living to attend demonstrations. The Guardian newspaper (left wing UK paper) published a poll just before Bush’s visit which gives a very different view from the demonstrations going on in the street. Don’t have a link, sorry.

Italian group backs Iraq fighters

Even in the face of 19 Italian military policemen dead in Iraq, the militant left in Italy is funding the Iraqi Patriotic Opposition which has ties to Baathists and also supports military resistance to the coalition in Iraq:

"We support the armed struggle in Iraq. our money is to help them, it doesn't matter to us if they use it buy weapons, Kalashnikovs, or medicines for people."

When asked to confirm if the money raised could be used to buy weapons [antiimperialistas spokesman, Moreno Pasquinelli] admitted: "Yes they could, and why not?"

If they are so concerned for Iraqi freedom, why are they attempting to restore the party that terrorized the Iraqi people to begin with? Why support the group that gasses hundreds of thousands of their own men, women and children? Why give aid to the people that imprisioned children as a means of leverage on their parents?

I can only conclude that such a group is treating the Iraqi people as a pawn to cause hurt and harm to the coalition's aims in order to advance their own militant agenda.

(hat tip to Andrew Sullivan)

Homework

Busy these last two days at work (go figure). But I'd thought I'd point out a pretty entertaining bleat over at Lileks--Michael Moore, Ted Rall, Howard Dean/George Soros, the frogs and Voltaire get the treatment last Friday.

Show Michael Moore a man in jeans holding a rake and a man in a suit with a briefcase, and he will not only automatically side with the guy who has the rake, he will assume that the briefcase contains plans to move the rake factory to Mexico, as well as documents that prove the company knew that its rakes gave people painful splinters at a rate 150% above EU standards.

...

(yeau yeau hommeboix, j’avais le mic! E U Hammeur c’est ici, dans la maison!)

News stories to read

Two interesting articles this morning (hat tip to Lucianne.com) that should be read and printed out and read again later.

The first one is from David Warren at The Ottawa Citizen, it’s a tribute to Fritz Kraemer who recently died at the age of 95. He was a refugee from Germany, fought the reds (Communist) and the browns (Nazi) in the street of Germany before 1933. Once he came to the US, he spent his life fighting for freedom and would not make excuses or compromises with those who were the enemy. Kraemer denounced detente because it compromised the truth of freedom. He saw the war on terrorism in the same light, either you fight for freedom and truth, or you are helping the enemy. Recommend this story.

The second news story is from David Frum at the Telegraph. It’s a look at the demonstration in London due to President Bush’s visit and how the demonstrators are vilifying the two leaders who are working to insure the demonstrators can hold their rallies and not fear the police will send in the tanks to disperse the crowd. Another good article.

American Work Ethic

Joshua Claybourn points us to a commentary on how America is "is still the hardest working country in the industrialized world". This got me to thinking about work and life. The ensuing commentary focused on the difficulty of work and the terrible state of America that requires two income families. Some energy was spent around vacations and retirement.

But I have sort of a problem with that: why is there such a focus on not working? i.e., vacations, retirement, living for the weekend and being independently wealthy? It's not that I don't enjoy the weekends or a good vacation--the Lord does command rest one day out of seven--but there is such a large part of the middle that we tend to miss. I think that when we look at work as a necessary evil rather than a potential good, we miss out. In fact, it's wrong. Work is not evil, but the conditions that we work under that are evil--Adam's job was to work the cursed earth, not cursed to work the earth.

Work, for most of us, is the here and now. I happen to enjoy work, I also happen to enjoy my family even more. But I cannot focus on one to the exclusion of the other--that would be disasterous.

What happened to finding the good in the labor? To know that work is part of a larger whole and finding means of self-expression through work? To see how your work can serve others? To say that you cannot do any of these things devalues and demeans a significant, necessary and important part of life.

There's a Troll in the Blog!

Journeying through the swamp infested blog, our adventurer is "Scaling the Cliffs of Insanity, Battling Rodents of Unusual Size, Facing torture in the Pit of Despair". . .I suppose we shouldn't be surprised.

Mark Byron is a blogger who stepped into it with a very controversial post--he was doing a thought experiment for a supposed "Christian Liberation Front". Then he got hammered by the libs. Byron does some introspection over the weekend over the post and returns, refocused.

Well, the blog entry has Byron being pretty open and honest about things, but some troll gets in there and just bangs on him to "return to the closet where Jesus can explain to you what he meant". I presume that Mr. Troll does know what Jesus meant and, therefore implies that Byron does not Understand.

This is what bugs me about the dark side of electronic discourse: the free interchange of ideas turns into an ugly flame war led by trolls on both sides. I'd like to think that although the people who make up the Carpetbloggers do take and espouse a particular stand on issues, that we are capable of responding and commenting in a thoughtful manner (ed: most of the time). This is also another reason why I am very guarded about posting more personal entries; there are some who delight in taking advantage of such expression. Such people remind me of a couple of guys I knew in high school who weren't known as terribly nice blokes.

Thankfully, the best thing to do is that I can just stop looking at the monitor, look up at the blue sky, take a breath and take stock of life. Ultimately, no blow hard in some online comments section can invade your offline life: family, faith, friends, work. There is only so much you can concern yourself with, concern yourself only with today:

25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. (courtesy of gospelcom.net)

I presume that just as the birds of the air and the lilies of the field didn't worry about the day to day issues of being cared for, so they also probably didn't worry about their blogs. In the end, the opinions of people who leave the electronic equivalent of graffiti (really, blogging is a sort of a glorified poster wall) don't matter that much at all, in comparison to living the non-electronic life. Gee, go figure.

That is, unless the opinionated people are stalking you ;).

UPDATE: Another comment appears in Byron's blog. Keith says, "You better pray you SOB. My kids read that trash.>". Is this indicative of the quality and level of American rhetoric today?