Posted on 11/13/2009 1:55:16 PM PST by markomalley
Shortly after 9/11, there was a lot of talk about how no one would ever hijack an American airliner ever again – not because of new security arrangements but because an alert citizenry was on the case: We were hip to their jive. The point appeared to be proved three months later on a U.S.-bound Air France flight. The "Shoebomber" attempted to light his footwear, and the flight attendants and passengers pounced. As the more boorish commentators could not resist pointing out, even the French guys walloped him.
But the years go by, and the mood shifts. You didn't have to be "alert" to spot Maj. Nidal Hasan. He'd spent most of the past half-decade walking around with a big neon sign on his head saying "JIHADIST. STAND WELL BACK." But we (that's to say, almost all of us; and certainly almost anyone who matters in national security and the broader political culture) are now reflexively conditioned to ignore the flashing neon sign. Like those apocryphal Victorian ladies discreetly draping the lasciviously curved legs of their pianos, if a glimpse of hard unpleasant reality peeps through we simply veil it in another layer of fluffy illusions.
(Excerpt) Read more at ocregister.com ...
Steyn is one of my favorites as well along with Walter Williams.
I know this is high praise, but Steyn’s writing style and eloquence remind me very much of Chesterton.
Wow. Steyn cuts right through all the crap.
” my personal favorite stand-in host for Rush.”
Good choice on the part of you and Rush!
“I know this is high praise, but Steyn’s writing style and eloquence remind me very much of Chesterton.”
His words chosen and placed expertly in context form a brilliant picture.
When the muslims hit Madrid, we said that it was “their” 911. But it wasn’t; they didn’t fight back, they elected a marxist appeaser into office in reaction.
Now we’ve done the same thing, and the slaughter at Fort Hood seems destined to be explained away, fuzzed away, he was crazy, he was agrieved by American intolerance, blah blah zzzzz until we all lose interest and return to our slumbers.
We’ve elected our marxist appeaser into office and he is about to give the author of our 911 a chance to put the United States itself on trial; we are headed for a three year Court TV circus where KSM gets reborn as OJ and the guys that caught him get to explain why they used bad language and made him listen to Barbara Streisand music in violation of the Geneva convention and relevant copyright laws.
In earlier posts I said it was a mistake to try him in New York, but I realize now that I was wrong. Its a mistake if you care about the United States, and what such a trial would do to it. Its not a mistake if you want to do damage.
And now Spain is in a full blown depression.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/6228390/Spain-tips-into-depression.html
Hows that hope and change thing working out?
This cartoon illustrates Mark’s point perfectly!
I know. I saw it earlier today, thought it was great then and that it would fit here perfectly,l and linked it up.
Vous dites, Mark, but I just don't meet these people at my church, in the homeschool association, or at the Food Lion. And I live somewhere with paved roads, really.
nobody says it better
At any time, one can find plenty of moderate Muslims who sound very friendly and pro-American. However, I believe the problem is this: violence is the default mechanism for an unhappy male Muslim, and rather than having the brakes on such action by his faith, the Koran gives APPROVAL to violence.
So a Muslim male who is seemingly well-situated in his career and personal life suffers a set-back, and he defaults to running over his daughter with a car, or beheading his wife, or shooting 14 people at Ft. Hood.
I don't know if I am explaining this coherently, but it has become obvious to me that Muslims are safe ONLY if they are happy (which means getting their way). Extreme stress will cause them to go violent and their violence will always be backed up by their understanding of jihadism and the passages in the Koran which we are all familiar with.
They cannot be counted on in stress situations, and without a reform of their faith (which is almost impossible) this will be a recurring behavior pattern which surfaces with some degree of regularity.
It is also why the jihadists are able to recruit from the ranks of the middle class and educated. Young men are volatile and as soon as they become angry enough, al Quaeda is there to tell them that their anger is religiously motivated, and another jihadist is born. I also think this is the explanation for the Palestinian situation; that group has been angry that they didn't get their way for the last 60 years, and so, again, they default to violence with religious back-up.
I also think that this is the explanation of the success of the Black Muslims, particularly in prison. Their anger is channeled into a religious framework, and giving them a group identity that is currently more socially acceptable than being a gang-banger. But the really angry ones go into a jihad mentality, as has been shown by numerous terrorism-related arrests over the last 8 years.
So, that is Miss Marple's analysis, for what it's worth.
As a believer in a religion that many "advanced" people consider unsuited for the modern world, I hesitate to form that sort of opinion about someone else's beliefs. However, it's simply a fact that Knights of Columbus aren't regularly blowing people up or shooting them, even in a down economy, and suburban altar-society ladies aren't telling their children to go murder people for their religion.
Between these two religious systems, then, there is a qualitative difference in the outcomes both sought and achieved by adherents.
I hesitated to post this, but I have been thinking about this for some time. I am not a psychologist or sociologist, so my opinion is only one formed by a layman.
What I would like to see is a well-documented study entitled "A Comparison of Violence Levels in Arab Adolescent Male Muslims and Christians," with statistics and extensive interviews. I am almost positive that my gut feeling would be borne out, and if we had some actual numbers with which to confront the Muslim world, perhaps some sort of intervention could be done.
The reason I posted this is because it's not enough for us to point out our personal observations. To effect change we must confront the issue with serious study, none of which I have seen. Until something like this is done, my policy is to mistrust all of them because of the high degree of unpredictability concerning their behavior.
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