Posted on 12/09/2003 1:37:45 AM PST by kattracks
That should definitely do it. Canadian whiz kid David Frum could rework his "Unpatriotic Conservatives" hit piece to purge any and all critics of Grover. The Jacobins need to stick together.
Yep. Until then, let's hold judgement.
Bob, a classic Norquist story, from Peggy Noonan's book (and thanks to Mrs Byron, for typing all this up!)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
...now, the presentation of the youngest person there, Grover Norquist, thirtyish, Harvard-educated, a free-lance Conservative operative.
With ten minutes to brief his first president, Grover had called around to friends who had worked in the White House and asked, How do I keep his attention on a subject he may not find naturally interesting? The day of the meeting, he gave a presentation in which the president was forced to look at a picture, read a short letter or respond to a question. All this not so much so Grover would keep his attention, but so the president’s staff would notice he’d kept his attention. “I wanted them to know the president had heard my arguments and would remember them, so they’d have to take that into account when they discussed Mozambique with him.”
He captivated the president with a kind of show-and-tell on Mozambique – that the governing party is Marxist-Leninist; President Chissano is a Communist. You may have been given the impression by the State Department, which tends in its worldview to assume a black African is too dumb to be a Communist, to think that’s only for white Europeans – you may have been given the impression that the people of the Mozambique government are not serious. But they are.
But there is a strong opposition, he said, a guerrilla army with twenty-two thousand men under arms, the fastest-growing anti-Communist insurgency in the world. It is pro-democratic and pro-Western in its outlook.
“Sir, this is a picture I took of one section of a very large official government mural that is placed very prominently on the highway between the airport and Maputo, the capital. The mural is placed alongside the Plaza of Heroes, which every person who enters Mozambique must pass as he leaves the airport. As you can see, this part of the mural shows a white man with a Star of David very prominent on his military cap. He is strangling and manacling a young black man. The message is obvious: Zionism is the enemy.”
He handed the photo to the president.
“Mr. President, the government of Mozambique has picked up all the Soviet Union’s bad habits, from concentration camps to secret police to anti-Semitism. These are decisions and positions the Soviets tell them to take. By the way, I asked a high official of the government why anti-Semitic art is part of an official government poster. He said, ‘Oh, the artist did that.” Reagan was studying the eight-by-ten colour glossy.
“Mr. President, did anyone ever tell you of this mural?”
“No.”
“Well, Mr. President, you can’t miss it.”
The president asked if he could keep the photo. At that point, for the first time in the meeting, Weinberger, Carlucci and Howard Baker picked up their pencils and wrote on their White House pads.
“Mr. President, they have East Germans running the secret police, and you know and I know who East Germans are: They’re Nazis, without the charm.”
The president laughed. Howard Baker wrote on his pad, “Nazis without the charm.” He underlined it.
The president said, “Well, I fought the Communists years ago in the Screen Actors Guild, and I understand them.” He told a story of how he had to carry a gun for a year. He said there was a plan by some of the Communists in the union to throw acid in his face so he’d never be able to work in pictures again.
“Well, they were successful,” Weyrich said dryly. “You haven’t made a picture in years.”
Everyone laughed, and stood to leave. Norquist walked around the table to the president.
“Sir, when you meet with President Chissano in October, keep one thing in mind: Chissano used to be the head of security in Mozambique, and in that capacity he once had one of his lieutenants murder his own father in front of a thousand government troops to teach them what revolutionary discipline really means. Do you know how the man killed his father?”
Reagan shook his head. Norquist drew an imaginary dagger from his belt, pointed it toward the present’s abdomen and traced up and over.
The president winced and stepped back.
“So remember,” said Norquist, “when you meet with Chissano: plastic cutlery.”
The Constitution doesn't protect anything. The Constitution's purpose is to define the limitations of government, not define the limitations of the people or their religions.
Human sacrifice and suicide bombing can be banned because these things violate the inalienable rights of other individuals; but the religious motives behind human sacrifice and suicide bombing cannot be banned. You cannot stop someone from believing.
The problem isn't in their belief anyway. It's when there are actions.
You can at best say that a mullah's calls for jihad are incitement to riot, kind of the grandaddy of the old "yelling fire" in a crowded movie theater cases.
However, not all muslims issue calls for Holy War, and certainly, most never heed them. You have to go after the folks who issue those fatwas (calls for holy war) for that, not after the believers who might hear them. Neither believing nor hearing is a crime.
You are free to worship Quetzalcoatl if you like; but there are consequences when your beliefs spill over onto other people and you take action by cutting out someone's heart and presenting it to your god. That's defined as murder.
But in that case, YOU pay for it, because you did it, not other followers of Quetzalcoatl.
Horowitz has taken a definite risk by deciding to publish this story; some may argue that he has risked the entire reputation of his publication on this story.
For sure, Norquist has many enemies in Washington, both significant and insignificant...
BobJ's defense of Norquist is admirable; I just hope that BobJ knows Norquist personally enough to find it worth defending him.
See post #184.
Mister Grover Norquist was fighting the good fight, when you blokes were just a bulge in your daddy's polyester slacks.
2. Again, explain to me why I should trust ANY governmental involvement in cultural issues, much less to decide which norms are used. What I see in the plain wording of the Constitution does not favor any religion, nor does it grant any authority for the federal government to be involved in matters of culture.
All laws are based on social and CULTural norms, by nature. There is no neutrality in the end.
We are a Western Christian nation. We simply have no denomination.
I would also note that I trust the opinions of our Founders on Church-State Constitutional issues over those of the ACLU.
Then again, it's possible--just possible, mind you--that some of the "social liberals" who are defending Norquist and his moslem allies are anti-Israel "palaeocons."
PaleoConservatives are not "social liberals". They tend tobe civilizational or Christian conservatives. Most belong to the orthodox branches of their faiths. Most Pre-Vatican II Catholics I know are paleos.
According to Lind, "The modern conservative brain trust originated in a scheme hatched in the 1970s by William E. Simon, Irving Kristol, and others." The plan was to make conservative intellectuals, hitherto an independent-minded, quirky, and diverse community, a controlled monolith that would function as the reliable tool of the Republican Party. "By the early 1990s, thanks to the success of the Simon-Kristol initiative, almost all major conservative magazines, think tanks, and even individual scholars had become dependent on money from a small number of conservative foundations."
1. Is that Michael or William Lind?
2. Considering that many neocons including Kristol were DEMOCRATS in 1970, I find this to be a laughable conspiracy rant.
I warned members of ATR staff of the Islamist links in July 2001. I was told that the Muslim groups were no threat.
Instead of admitting a mistake Norquist rather grandstands and hide behind Political correctness, good Muslims, and the President. He despoils these.
As far as I can tell, Norquist is pretty much the same independently-minded conservative he always has been. Let me tell you what has changed.
Using the anonimity of the Internet, small-minded and jealous men, of little personal accomplishment, can throw stones at their betters. I have seen that sad and sorry personality defect on display from such as you since my first day at FR. Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, Alan Keyes, Pat Buchanan- don't try and emulate their decades of principled achievement, just sign up with a screen name, and let the slander flow. For a certain kind of personality, ripping into true heroes of conservatism somehow narrows the accomplishment gap.
Well, you're not going to get away with it unscathed, as long as I'm around.
For God's sake, get off the us-them modality and pay attention to the big picture.
Just as the Catholic Churches fear of bad press was a reason for the failure to deal with the abuse problems, so to your KNEE-JERK defense of Norquist blinds you to the problem. Look what happened to the Catholic Church in this country. "Catholic Priest" has become a synonymm for pedophile. It isn't fair.(It is also not just a Catholic problem. Jews blacks and other groups that are or percieve themselves as persecuted follow the same DESTRUCTIVE behavior.
The Betlway establishment is making the same mistake by not repudiating the Islamists.
I can warn you only so long before your fear or general damage to Republicans and conservatives becomes self-fulfilling.
Cut the cancer out early or late. The need is the same. Only the scope of the damage differs.
When will Bush wake up?
*** ### --- Devastating --- ### ***
Lose the puffery; you objectively overuse the word objectively.
He refuses to judge minorities by objective standards.
Please expand on this fascinating concept of judging minorities by objective standards.
He opposes the nation-state
Grover is not anarchist. To imply otherwise is paranoia and hysteria.
He is ignorant of the charges because he refuses to see them.
Circular logic, begging the question; next.
He cares more about bringing the Muslim vote than the threat to the country
Paleos should disdain the open-border WTO-supporting PC relativistic Norquist.
America will never abandon free minds and free markets.
Don't tell me that the blinding hatred of Neocons by paleocons are bliding them to objective threats.
You overuse the Disagreement Is Blindness metaphor. You misspell it on the third use because your hands are as tired of typing it as we are of reading it.
1. Is that Michael or William Lind?
The particular author has no bearing on the fact of the statement.
many neocons including Kristol were DEMOCRATS in 1970
Read harder: Lind (objectively) says 1970s. Not 1970 (your strawman).
Maybe you would have noticed that little detail if you weren't so...
blinded by your hatred of paleocons.
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