Posted on 03/13/2005 3:19:42 AM PST by elhombrelibre
He gave us the Ford Falcon.
In hindsight, the '90s were the apogee of terrorist mainstreaming, with Yasser and Gerry given greater access to the White House than your average prime minister of a friendly middle-rank power. And in return for what? Nothing other than the corrosive impact on weak-willed Westerners desperate to believe that all terrorists can somehow be accommodated if you just roll out the red carpet for them. Witness Robert McNamara, the Kennedy/Johnson defense secretary who popped up last week with a particularly fatuous observation even by his own standards: As Associated Press reported, ''McNamara added that the threat of terrorists using a nuclear device could be reduced if the United States in particular tried to understand terrorists' anger and motivations.''
A Steyn ping.
He was a Whiz Kid from Ford, elevated by JFK. Kennedy should've known better, but he'd spent his whole life in government service.
I'm thrilled to death he did this. I've always thought the two wings, political and terrorist, was an improbable definition. It's like believing there are two wings to Hizbollah or Hamas.
When Steyn mentions the average PM of a friendly middle power, he's talking about Canada. I believe Steyn is Canadian by birth too, and he's unsurprisingly reviled by many up here. I must say that our last couple of Prime Ministers have earned zero hospitality in Washington, though.
bump for later. Good on Bush for not having the murderer Gerry Adams in the White House.
Adams will meet congressmen and senators but he can expect harsh words from some. Senator Edward Kennedy, a leading supporter of Irish nationalism, said: “There is no place for a paramilitary organisation and criminal activity in a democratic political party, and I will tell Gerry Adams that.”
Congressman Peter King, Adams’s biggest ally on Capitol Hill and a personal friend, added: “The time has come for the IRA to disband . . . I think Adams is focusing too much on preventing a split and can’t see the forest for the trees.”
US turns its back on Sinn Fein
FWIW...
I couldn't agree more. Saw some of that "They're patriots" crap on a Sinn Fein thread last night, disgusting.
Thank you for this ping. Better pass out the barf bags regarding McNamaras idiotic and inferiority-complex ridden comments.
He may not meet him publicly, but I would bet they meet.
Time will tell, but I don't trust anything about King.
Him and Ireland's Eoghan Harris!
Good link prairie. Here's a bit from the article:
"The hat may be discreetly passed round to cover expenses at this week’s events, but there will be no entry charge. Some backers may also feel the £26.5m raid on the Northern Bank in Belfast just before Christmas, for which the IRA has been blamed, makes the need for funds less urgent."
LOL, ya think?
Too true. Several years ago I was having brunch with friends at a popular Irish restaurant in Alexandria, Virginia (which, for those of you not from the area, is just a stone's throw across the Potomac from Washington DC). A movable screen had been used to partition our near-empty section of the dining room from other areas used for meetings, which meant that we could clearly hear, but not see, people nearby having a meeting. It was apparent that the meeting was of a group of Irish-American IRA supporters. We gasped in horror as we heard them quarreling, and one of them raised his voice to shout, "Last time ye didn't use enough C4, ye fool, and all ye did was blow the locomotive off the tracks--no one got killed at all!"
It has also long been said that the popular Capitol Hill bar The Dubliner is owned by the IRA as well. Many is the night we have all seen Teddy Kennedy there, swilling away.
I have no doubt that the organizers of these "charitable" fund raisers for NORAD or for the prisoners relief fund or whatever know full well the money goes for bombs and such. There complicity is of a different magnitude.
I'm quite (pleasantly) surprised by the responses on this thread. I have watched American opinions to the IRA, both left and right, over the years and the thing that struck me is that there are many why are otherwise conservative suddenly go on like Noam "Why Do They Hate You?" Chomsky when Northern Ireland comes up.
It's quite pleasing to see none of such posts on this thread. The power of Steyn's words, or because they have now woken up?
Thanks, that's the drift I caught as well. I grew up in Hong Kong and under the British colonial government it was natural we saw a lot about Northern Ireland. I had never been sympathetic to the IRA years before 9/11 from news coverage - in fact, I treat them in the same cloth as the PLO or ETA or Hamas.
We also have many Irish descents in New Zealand - former Prime Minister Jim Bolger was one example. And there has never been any sympathy for the IRA from these Irish descent New Zealanders. It was different for Americans with Irish ancestors or who don't but weren't well informed.
Also, it seems there is a cultural divide among the Irish in the US. I'd say the dumbest ones about the IRA are those geographically closest, if you know what I mean.
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