MY MEETING WITH DAN RATHER

Aish.com ^ | April 21, 2002 | Elliot Mathias

[leadpenny]

Makes it a lot easier for me to see how Rather thinks x42 is an honest man.
Neither one has anything resembling a moral center.

[Tom Jefferson]

BTTT

[Political Junkie Too]

"Who am I to say what is right or wrong? Who am I to say that the Palestinians are wrong in their beliefs?"

If not you, then who? If not now, then when?

-PJ

[Stultis]

Not Dan Rather, too?! The expert on world events who is watched by 30 million nightly viewers can't identify the Temple Mount?

EVEN for psycho-sweaterman Dan "courage" Rather (that description may reveal how long it has been since I've watched him) this is un-freaking-believable.

[mo]

even worse-such moral relativism is basically an excuse to avoid having to do the right thing when its inconvenient or uncomfortable.

[MarkL]

Since Arabs view the world differently, who's to say that we're right and they're wrong?

You know, if you think about it, this sort of thinking (i.e. liberal) equates arabs with animals: They're saying, "it's their nature, like a predatory animal, and they can't change it. It's just a part of nature."

In a situation like this, maybe they need to have it explained in another way... Let's say that there's a bear on the loose in your neighborhood, and it's begun killing people. Would you say, "who's to say if the bear is right or wrong in killing people?" Well, maybe a lot of liberals would, but once a few of them have come out of the south end of a north bound bear, I'd bet that their friends might start thinking about getting rid of that bear.

Mark

[MeekOneGOP]

"Wait a minute," I asked her. "When a Palestinian straps on a belt of dynamite lined with nails and walks into a pizza shop, blowing up innocent people, that wouldn't be objectively wrong?"

"Of course I would think that is wrong," she answered me. "But the Palestinians believe this is a legitimate form of warfare. And they would say the Israelis are doing the same to them by killing innocent civilians when they retaliate militarily. Who am I to say what is right or wrong? Who am I to say that the Palestinians are wrong in their beliefs?"

"But don't you think there's a difference between a person blowing himself up in a restaurant, and a military that responds by searching for and killing terrorists. Granted that innocent civilians are killed in both circumstances -- but in one situation the innocents are targeted, and in the other situation they are regrettably caught in the line of fire?"

"Well, that's a very Western way of looking at things. You see I'm Christian and American. I see things the way you do as an Israeli -- we have the same moral framework. But the Arabs view things differently, and who's to say that we're right and they're wrong?"

At this point we both realized we weren't going to get any further in the conversation, and we politely thanked each other and parted ways.

Gee, I could say that the Palestinian suicide HOMICIDE bombers aren't people but are more like wild animals,
but that would be a high insult to animals everywhere...........

Chairman Arafat
Mark Steyn Link Excerpt:

Just as revealing was the reaction from the European media. In the American press, you read things like: "An observer to the bomb-blast scene described a dead young girl, perhaps 10 or 12, lying on the ground with her eyes open, looking as if she was surprised." For Europe, on the other hand, the main significance of this development was that it was "unhelpful" to the "peace process". Before I'm accused of being more upset about dead Jewish than dead Muslim kids, let me say that I take people at their own estimation: in the Palestinian Authority schools, they teach their children about the glories of martyrdom; indeed, the careers guidance counsellor appears to have little information on alternative employment prospects; at social events, the moppets are dressed up as junior jihadi, with toy detonators and play bombs. It's not that I place less value on Palestinian lives, but that Chairman Arafat and his chums in Hamas do. So does Saddam Hussein, whose government (the subject of an admiring article in this week's Spectator) gives $25,000 to the family of each Palestinian suicide bomber. So does the Arab League, which at last year's summit passed a resolution hailing the "spirit of sacrifice" of the Palestinian "martyrs" and thus licensed Wednesday's massacre. As for the "peace process", those Europeans who, just a few months ago, were urging the Americans to cease operations for Ramadan evidently feel no compunction to demand from Chairman Arafat and his dark subsidiaries any similar "bombing pause" for Passover.

In the days after September 11, we were told that Muslims had great respect for their fellow "people of the book" - ie, Jews and Christians. This ought to be so: after all, the dramatis personae of the Koran include Abraham, Moses, David, John the Baptist, Jesus and the Virgin Mary. It's one thing to believe that the Israelis are occupiers and oppressors and that the Zionist state should not exist. But no Muslim with any understanding of his shared heritage could in good conscience blow up a Passover Seder. It marks a new low in the Palestinians' descent into nihilism - though, as usual, the silence of the imams is deafening. As for the nonchalance of the Europeans, that too should not surprise us: in my experience, the Continent's Christians, practising and nominal, find the ceremonies of Jewish life faintly creepy, notwithstanding that these were also the rituals by which their own Saviour lived.

But this year, when the Christians' solar calendar and the Jews' lunar calendar have coincided and Easter and Passover fall together, it's a safe bet that George W Bush will make the connection. The first time I ever heard him speak, he spoke openly about his faith and about Christ in a way that would be unimaginable for a British politician. He will know all the details - "the baby tried to crawl away, but it died, too".......................

[MeekOneGOP]

Before I'm accused of being more upset about dead Jewish than dead Muslim kids, let me say that I take people at their own estimation: in the Palestinian Authority schools, they teach their children about the glories of martyrdom; indeed, the careers guidance counsellor appears to have little information on alternative employment prospects; at social events, the moppets are dressed up as junior jihadi, with toy detonators and play bombs.

[MeekOneGOP]

[MeekOneGOP]

[Political Junkie Too]

Yeah, but then he goes out with the pooper-scooper and tries to clean it all up instead of letting everyone suffer the consequences of the filth and stench.

-PJ

[TopQuark]

Tom, what a great post! Very telling.

Thanks for the ping.

[moneyrunner]

In another context, I referred to this sort of thing as "intellectual pollution." Kind of stomach turning.

[moneyrunner]

Has anyone e-maild this to Dapper Dan?

[Lancey Howard]

Great post.

I agree with the author's conclusions and would add that another reason for the news media's anti-Israel bias is as simple as "the enemy of my enemy is my friend". Liberals have a built-in loathing for capitalism and for America's basic conservatism and pioneering spirit. Also, good old fashioned liberal hand-wringing 'guilt' is certainly part of the equation. In any event, if America seems to be siding with Israel and against the Palestinians, then liberals will take exactly the opposite side. America just can't be right, and the liberals in the newsrooms will do what they can to show that.

[PhilDragoo]

Perfect.

And Al Gore touring Monticello, the home of (who else) Thomas Jefferson, gaped at busts of Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, asking, "And who are these people?"

Dan Rather had a privileged private viewing of the Zapruder film in the late 'sixties (before Geraldo Rivera showed it on his program in the 'seventies), and demanded immediate on-air time to tell the American people it showed a forward head snap, proving JFK had been shot from the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository by the lone gunman hisself.

A chilling glimpse that the elite of the hatebaiting left is dumb as dirt and proud of it.

We should not be surprised, as their revisionism makes the West the aggressor in the Cold War, makes white European males the focus of evil in the modern world, et cetera, et cetera.

[Pharmboy]

Nice one...

[Tom Jefferson]

You should also read the following post: A LETTER FROM ISRAEL

[Joe Bonforte]

"The liberals are not so much opposed to Israel as they are opposed to the Jewish religion and capitalism. Islam does not pose the same threat because the religion and the state are one."

An insightful point that I don't think I've seen anywhere else.