Posted on 12/16/2008 10:11:35 AM PST by ConservativeColumns
Ever since the shoe-launching incident in Baghdad, the media has been dying to brings us all up to its level of education and culture by teaching us that in the Arab world, "throwing shoes at someone is a sign of contempt" (AP), "throwing shoes at somebody is a supreme insult" (Reuters), and "hitting someone with a shoe is considered the supreme insult" (NYT, one-upping Reuters). BBC even has a whole article on this.
Being an Arab who grew up in the Arab world, I was quite fascinated by progressive journalism graduates' attempts to show me how my culture played such a big role in the shoe attack (granted, as a conservative, I'm predisposed to be suspicious of anyone with a journalism degree, but I digress). "Really," I thought? Thinking I was the only one who missed out on this part of Arab culture, I asked some fellow Arabs - and they were just as interested to learn about their culture from the Associated Press...
(Excerpt) Read more at paulibrahim.com ...
Anything to make GWB look bad is to be played on every media outlet in America. Probably will continue even when he is out of office. I still amazed that the member of the Islamic Shoe Throwing Olympic Team did not take a couple rounds from the Secret Service.
My guess is “Paul” is a Christian Arab, and, as such, probably has a very different “take” on the significance of this incidence.
Oh, I think beating someone with shoes has a bit more cultural significance in the middle east, and in India, and possibly in Asia than it does here. But his point is well taken that that doesn’t mean we LIKE being hit with shoes, or having them launched at us.
My cousin always takes a ‘thong’ to his kids when necessary. He only has to pick one up and they start to behave.
Heard a “reporter” on CNN yesterday say that this could possibly be George Bush’s legacy. What a moron.
Excellent, excellent editorial!!!
Thank you for finding it.
It is my belief that the Left needs Bush so badly that war crime trial are inevitable for the Bush Administration. Senate, House and Department of Justice "investigations" are already "in the works".
“I still amazed that the member of the Islamic Shoe Throwing Olympic Team did not take a couple rounds from the Secret Service.”
Maybe this is the newer and kinder SS. On the other hand, they might have been simply stultified into immobility at such an inconceivable (to western eyes) act.
As for the Media making a fool of GWB - he does a good enough job all by himself, whether he is kicking his own party by surrendering to the UAW on the auto bailouts or conspiring to bring more Mexicans into America to bring down wages of American farm workers.
GWB is one of the main reasons the Republicans lost the midterms in 2006 and the general election in 2008. He is a counterfit conservative and liberal Republican.
Meanwhile, in Newark, there's a black guy selling drugs and shooting his competition. Other guys from his gang say "Yeah! Go for it!"
What would the media say if I made a blanket assessment of all black people based on the actions of the miscreant in Newark and his fellow travelers?
It would be the hight of stupidity on their part to do this.
A trial would simply illustrate the stupidity of their own position on thigs like interrogations, etc, while turning Bush’s image from that of a very unpopular President to a martyr.
But then they are Democrats and hence not very analytical - even dumber at times than Republicans and that says a lot.
I guess he will be going on the lecture tour series with Mrs. Rodham’s domestic partner to shore up his legal defense fund.
We already know what passes for news and reason in the ‘Arab world’, so we know the whole thing sure means more to them than to the people reporting on it. Only, the people reporting on it don’t have the sense to see it for the BS it is...NOT NEWS! I think the MSM would not know ‘news’ if it bit them in the a%$
I’ve been thinking about this and it makes sense. If you don’t have anything to throw at someone the only thing handy are your shoes. The media ran with this angle and we fell for it.
the fact that they are making a hero of a guy for throwing a shoe.. seems hilarious to me.. its kinda ridiculous.. and kinda pathetic..
is that the best they can do for a hero?
The Legend of the Shoe Thrower..
The Shoe Chronicles..
Odds are, you're right.From his bio at North Star Writers Group:
Paul Ibrahim was born near Beirut, Lebanon. He became a U.S. citizen in the summer of 2005, but had long before expressed his love of American values through extensive writing, work, and activism.
Once detached from political activity, he was inadvertently launched into the conservative intellectual movement as a student at Cornell University, and has since refined his libertarian tendencies at the Law & Economics haven of the George Mason University School of Law.
That's probably Howard Fineman on MSNBC with Herr Olberman where the shoe video was replayed 25 TIMES(!!) and 8 straight times while Fineman was hammering Dubya.
I am taking bets as to when Muhammad Shoebootie gets a Nobel Peace Prize and an offer of an Obama cabinet position.
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