Posted on 12/11/2003 4:39:44 PM PST by Sabertooth
Hugh Hewitt has posted links to several reviews of Tuesday's debate between Frank Gaffney and Grover Norquist, about Gaffney's recent Frontpage.com expose of Norquist's Islamist ties which has gotten so much attention at Free Republic the past few days.
I checked them out, and thought they were worth a read here...
December 09, 2003
Gaffney versus Norquist
On his show tonight Hugh Hewitt led with a full hour devoted to a joint interview of Frank Gaffney and Grover Norquist regarding Gaffney's Frontpage article (discussed below earlier today): "A troubling influence."
The thesis of Gaffney's article is that Norquist has worked on behalf of, and together with, an American fifth column of Islamists and Islamist organizations. According to Gaffney, Norquist has successfully sought to turn his political connections to the advantage of these Islamist individuals and organizations.
I first heard Gaffney present a skeletal version of this argument in person at the Conservative Political Action Conference this past January. Norquist appeared and responded later that day. As I recall, the gist of Norquist's response was that Gaffney's criticism of him was bigoted and that Gaffney's criticism unfairly impugned his patriotism. Norquist tearfully invoked his family background in avowing his allegiance to the United States.
I was struck at the time by the vacuity of Norquist's response. It is clear that Norquist is devoting substantial professional efforts to the advancement of interests that have brought him into close contact with a number of unsavory characters and placed him in circles where he has become acquainted with key Islamist players.
In his interview this afternoon, Hugh focused the inquiry on critical factual disputes that go to the heart of the issues raised by Gaffney's column. Norquist flatly denied certain of Gaffney's charges while avoiding others. Again, I was most struck by the rhetorical devices used by Norquist to respond to Gaffney.
When asked by Hugh about the American Islamic Council and the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Norquist not only denied any connection but professed a kind of agnosticism about their means and ends that is utterly incredible -- i.e., not believable. In his concluding remarks, Norquist raised irrelevant issues about the financial status of Gaffney's organization.
Factual disputes are not usually susceptible of resolution in the kind of joint interview Hugh conducted with Gaffney and Norquist. Nevertheless, Norquist's response to Gaffney's charges on-air tonight is powerfully suggestive of the conclusion that Norquist's response is lacking in candor. Hugh will replay the interview during the third hour of his show tomorrow night. Listen if you can and let us know what you think.
Powerline Blog link
December 09, 2003
HUGH HEWITT, BLESS HIM, is interviewing Frank Gaffney about the Grover Norquist / Wahhabi connection article mentioned below. It'll start in about 15 minutes, and you can stream it live from his site.
UPDATE: Listening to it now. Norquist and Gaffney are both on. Norquist says he's only supporting Arab democracy and that Gaffney is engaging in guilt-by-association. Gaffney says that's B.S., and says that Norquist's closeness to terror-linked Islamists is undeniable and emblematic of a much larger problem of Washington political types being too close to Arab money. I hope that other journalists will look into this problem further.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Phil Bowermaster emails that he listened to the show and thinks it's much ado about nothing. I'd like for it to be, but. . . .
Instapundit link
Tuesday, December 09, 2003
Grover Norquist and Frank Gaffney, Grudge Match?
Hugh Hewitt moderated a debate this evening that was a lot more illuminating than that of the Democrats. Hewitt hosted Frank Gaffney and Grover Norquist, the latter of which was one of the subjects of the former's article in FrontPage.com's new article, A Troubling Influence. The article delineates in great detail the extent of the influence that radical Islamists have had on conservative circles, including but not exclusive to Grover Norquist. I haven't read the article in detail -- I plan to do so over the next day or so -- but I had read stories about the article and I was familiar with the general themes. The accusations are deeply disturbing. As Power Line capsulizes it:
The thesis of Gaffney's article is that Norquist has worked on behalf of, and together with, an American fifth column of Islamists and Islamist organizations. According to Gaffney, Norquist has successfully sought to turn his political connections to the advantage of these Islamist individuals and organizations.
In an odd way, not having read the article, I felt like I had a better perspective on the debate itself. Instead of calibrating arguments in my own head based on my knowledge of the material, I was forced to listen in the moment and try to make a judgement based on detail and presentation. Both men communicate well and obviously have public-speaking experience, and so neither had a technical advantage over the other. Hugh tried to keep both men focused on facts, reeled them in when they started to wander into personal ad hominem attacks, and forced them to answer critical questions that seemed to be avoided.
In my mind, Frank Gaffney clearly spoke with more conviction and more factual presentation than Norquist. Norquist started off the debate by challenging Gaffney to come up with "just one" specific charge, and Gaffney continually responded during the one-hour segment with specifics. Norquist, however, never acknowledged Gaffney's presentations. He would start off after each charge by saying something to the effect of "I appreciate the opportunity to refute this" or "Journalists have looked into this and found nothing." I find that type of approach a bit annoying after the third or fourth time; it's a mannerism that allows the speaker to gather his thoughts while he tries to continue holding the mike. Norquist, who had to have read the article (he said he had), should have been prepared for Gaffney's charges and had responses ready.
By the end of the segment, Gaffney had made several specific charges regarding Norquist's association with people such as Sami al-Arian and other known Islamists with ties to terrorist groups or charity front groups, and Norquist was left decrying Gaffney's attacks on his "patriotic" associates and insisting that people read his web site, as if an organization's web site substitutes for an independent investigation. At one point, he accused Gaffney of writing the article to raise funds for Gaffney's organization, implying it was bankrupt.
It seemed to me that of the two, Gaffney kept his arguments to factual statements, ones that could be refuted or affirmed by indepedent investigation, while Norquist's arguments deteriorated almost exclusively into passive-aggressive personal attacks, such as, "I ask everyone I know why Frank says these things about me, and no one can understand it," or "All Frank had to do was call the White House and ask," or "I was just 100 feet away from Frank, and all he needed to do was ask me." Gaffney focused on facts and in so doing revealed questions about Norquist's motivations; Norquist focused on motivations and made himself seem much more suspicious. If Grover Norquist intended to dispel suspicions about his motives and his character, he failed miserably.
Captain's Quarters
12/9/2003: Gaffney and Norquist Face Off
Hugh Hewitt had both Frank Gaffney and Grover Norquist on his radio show today to discuss Gaffney’s article on Norquist’s ties to radical Islamic groups and individuals—and sparks flew. In my opinion, Grover Norquist came off very poorly, with a series of almost hysterical personal attacks against Frank Gaffney, and very little real substantial rebuttal of Gaffney’s charges. You can listen to Hugh Hewitt’s show with Windows Media Player at KRLA’s web site for the rest of the day. Recommended.
Little Green Footballs link
Hello President Dean, AG Schumer, SecState Gore, SecDef Wrangel.
This better not happen. I'm going to be where a feller can get hurt at election time/swearing in, and I don't want to have guys like that calling the shots.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
Bingo! That's what keeps me suspicious about Gaffney's charges. This is all happening right under the nose of the Secret Service, the FBI, and the entire National Security establishment. Grover Norquist is in and out of the White House all the time. He's not some guy they have to go looking for. To hear Gaffney tell it, Norquist should be in Guantanamo, but no one who actually has a job worrying about this is acting like that's true. Toss in the fact that these two guys hate each other's guts, and you have to at least consider the possibility that this is a spear-throwing contest and nothing more.
Here's Frank Gaffney telling us that he's smarter than the Bush White House about who ought to be going in there. Frank Gaffney is well connected. He can get ahold of people to make his concerns known. Yet here he is throwing these spears on the radio and in magazines. It cannot be true that his concerns have not been heard in the right places. They've been heard; they are being ignored. The people who actually run the National Security show in the United States have heard Frank Gaffney up one side and down the other. But they are not reacting the way he thinks they should, and he's pissed about that, and so he's running around acting like he has to save the country all by himself.
I'm not so quick to believe that the Bush White House is stupid, or incompetent, or oblivious to the dangers of Wahhabi Islam, or naive about why people curry favor with the White House.
Frank Gaffney has a bunch of scary names to throw around, but what he doesn't have is a reason why no one who actually has the job of worrying about this is paying any attention to him. It's not like Arab terrorism is a low priority for the Bush White House. There is something here that doesn't meet the eye. Bush Administration naivete about Arab terrorism is not it.
Bingo! That's what keeps me suspicious about Gaffney's charges. This is all happening right under the nose of the Secret Service, the FBI, and the entire National Security establishment.
Frank Gaffney has a bunch of scary names to throw around, but what he doesn't have is a reason why no one who actually has the job of worrying about this is paying any attention to him.
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If Frank Gaffney knows something related to subversion in the United States, he knows whom to call about it, and it isn't David Horowitz. This is public mud-slinging directed at a specific individual, which is a different phenomenon.
You sound as though you're ready to refute some of the scores of facts Gaffney cites. I'm all ears.
Mr. Gaffney has done much better than calling the authorities, he has published a well-researched article with which the public can hold the authorities, Mr. Norquist and his apologists all to account in this case.
Why isn't Norquist filing a defamation lawsuit, or threatening to do so, or even, at a minimum, publicly refuting the worst of the allegations and facts? Huge questions that continue unanswered, by Norquist or his "mud-slinging" apologists.
Are you one of the FRN folks associated with his shop? Do you have a dog in the hunt, Nick Danger?
I continue to see lots of attacks on Mr. Gaffney's politics and character, but none at all on his statement of the FACTS.
This is becoming a thoroughly pointless discussion. You seem to think that by repeating how scary this guy is, you are advancing some argument. I don't think you are. Let us stipulate that certain people are creeps. Gaffney's argument is that having them around is dangerous, and mine is that once we know they are dangerous, they aren't dangerous anymore. They become zoo animals that we get to watch. We get to watch what they do. We get to watch what they advocate. We get to monitor their cell phones.
Now comes Frank Gaffney, pointing frantically, saying, "Look, everybody! A scary guy!" And so the villagers grab their tigers and their torches and their pitchforks and chase the scary guy away, and beat up Grover Norquist for good measure.
And the people whose job it is to catch the scary guys we don't know about yet go, "Aww, sh*t. Thanks a lot, Frank."
| Now comes Frank Gaffney, pointing frantically, saying, "Look, everybody! A scary guy!" And so the villagers grab their tigers and their torches and their pitchforks and chase the scary guy away, and beat up Grover Norquist for good measure. And the people whose job it is to catch the scary guys we don't know about yet go, "Aww, sh*t. Thanks a lot, Frank."
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No, it's more subtle than that. It's what the statisticians would call a "known bad." You watch the known bads to build a model of what unknown bads look like. In order to do that, you have to let your known ones run around and be bad a little bit.
Your Ashcroft incident is a perfect example of that. So he goes in there and he tries to influence them. You act as though removing him from the picture would improve things. No. You're better off with the devil you know. After he leaves you can say, "OK, so that's how the bad guys would want us to behave." The guy you need to worry about more is the guy you didn't know was bad. Don't assume he isn't around, because he is.
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