Posted on 05/09/2002 6:19:16 AM PDT by xvb
BTW - there could be a sixth option....give Israel Florida, produce our own oil using the reserves in the ANWR and then let the Arabs kill each other over their petty differences! .... Hey, I can dream, can't I?
We don't know how long it would take, and if anything the experience with individual people and with other countries (including Islamic countries like Turkey) indicates that it always takes much less time than people believe. The way you cure suicidal behavior is by forcibly preventing it, which immediately breaks the self-reinforcing pattern. Once the pattern is broken, therapy can begin to try to prevent a relapse, although you have to be ready to intervene again at any moment. I see no reason to believe that it would take a hundred years; what it would take is will and dedication.
"...the condition precedent to that is total military defeat, as happened in Japan and Germany. Not a pretty picture."
Total defeat is precisely what I'm advocating as a first step—well, second step; first step is mustering the will to bring that defeat about. It certainly wouldn't be pretty, but it would be far prettier than any of the alternatives.
At any rate, I'm not saying it's guaranteed to work, just that it is incumbent upon us, as the most moral civilization in history, to try. We stand at a unique moment: We have the military might to bring about lasting reform in the Middle East, and we have both a moral and an economic imperative to do so. We can instead take any one of several short-term, utilitarian ways out, but in so doing we betray the principles this nation was founded on.
It can't be much fun being a fairy, elf, or Santa Claus either. None of them are real. The myth of a "Palestinian people" is part of their propaganda and a big part of the problem with these Arabs.
While I don't disagree with you, a solution has to be found. Personally, I believe that terrorists, and those who support them logistically, economically, or emotionally, need to be exterminated. And while there are many who agree with me regarding Bin Laden and those who support him, these same individuals do not have the same view of the so-called "Palestinian" terrorists.
Tried that........the water bill doubled!(but I did get the quantity discount)
"I spent some of my formative years in Hong Kong, a barren piece of rock with zero natural resources, under foreign occupation, chock-full of refugees from the Mao tyranny. The people there weren't lounging in UNRWA camps or making suicide runs at the governor's mansion. They were trading, building, speculating, manufacturing, working — with the result that Hong Kong is now a glittering modern city filled with well-dressed, well-educated, well-fed people, proud of what they have accomplished together, and with a higher standard of living than Britain herself. If, following the Oslo accords — or for that matter, in the 20 years of Jordanian occupation — the Palestinians had taken that route, had set aside their fantasies of revenge and massacre, and concentrated on building up something worth having, I might have respect for them. As it is, I don't."
Thanks for the excellent article.
"Any"? Sure there is: Turkey. I'll grant you, Turkey's no Switzerland, but it does okay by world standards, and certainly has more than "any" peace and freedom. It does so because a single strong leader, Kemal Ataturk, forcibly imposed secular democracy on the country—in effect, while most people have to be liberated from their government, Turkey's government was liberated from its people. Islamic nations don't have the cultural foundations to become democracies on their own the way the United States did, but then again neither did Asian nations like Korea, Taiwan and Japan.
One thing that this war has shown me, is that the British are still British, for as long as they're allowed to be. Soon, they'll be outnumbered in their own country. For now, though, Rule Britannia.
They don't allow female politicians to wear hijab in official capacity, and there's been squawking about that. Kinda draws attn to the fact that women ARE politicians in Turkey, doesn't it? If hijab were allowed, how long would women be allowed in office?
It all keeps coming back to the fact that Islam does NOT teach peace. It teaches the assimilation/annihiliation of "non-believers" and, sadly, too many Islamics still believe this is the road to their salvation (hence, the suicide bombers, etc.).
Not long, that's for sure. That's why constitutions, and militaries dedicated to preserving those constitutions, are so important. In the early years of the United States, the threat to our democracy was external conquest. In the Middle East, the threat will come from within—"one man, one vote, one time."
Sharia law, as currently practiced, is as illegitimate and corrupt as even the worst Communist systems, and should be condemned just as strenously. Unfortunately, our otherwise-admirable tradtion of religious tolerance forces us to pretend that all manifestations of religions are equally good. That's just foolish, though: If Central America were still ruled by the human-sacrificing Aztec Empire, we would not be under any obligation to respect their religion. Just because sharia kills Muslims slower and less methodically, it is no less evil. Just as 51% of the population should not be permitted to impose Communism on the other 49%, neither should majority rule be able to drag a country back into the seventh century.
Maybe we should begin to refer to them as the "alleged Palestinians". ;o)
I'm usually the last person that would ever say this, but Derbyshire is an outright racist and so are you if you agree with this drivel. He is wrong on so many levels it would take a post equal in length to his article to point them out. FR and the conservative movement keeps sinking lower over this issue. Thank goodness GWB doesn't listen to these fools.
You're entitled to your opinion, of course, but you're not going to make many friends calling people you don't know, such as myself, racists. If you think you can argue effectively against Derbyshire's position, why not do that, instead? Surely it's important enough for the investment of your time?
I reached Derbyshire's conclusions myself on September 12, 2001, when the videotapes of the celebrations on the West Bank reached me. I think it inevitable that this quarrelsome, hatred-soaked people, outcasts unwelcome even among other Arabs and other Muslims, will be dispersed, probably by force -- and as the old saying goes, it's no kindness to hang a man slowly.
The Israelis will have more of a hand in the decision than we will. Their resolve has ratcheted up quite a way in recent weeks, and they're strong enough to go it alone, if they feel they must. Washington might cut off their foreign aid, true. However, we can't prevent them from doing whatever they decide to do without going to war against Israel, on the Palestinians' behalf -- an event about as likely as a bake sale at the South Pole.
It would be nice if the Palestinians grasped the reality of their condition and sobered up in time to avoid the erasure of their group identity. But this, too, is rather unlikely for a people whose children are taught to hate Jews and encouraged to pledge themselves to the destruction of Israel from the time they first learn to talk.
Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
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That is a good point you bring up. However, before we were able to impose democracy on those countries we first had to firebomb the city of Dresden, and you know what became of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Do we really want to do that to the land along the West Bank and risk bringing WWIII into full swing?
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