Apr 21, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Though not as principled as I'd wish, I can only applaud HBO's exercise of its right to free speech in refusing to support Oliver Stone's Castro documentary:
HBO has ordered the removal of "Comandante" from the [Tribeca film] festival, where it was supposed to make its New York premiere. The cable network pulled the plug after it cancelled its plan to air the movie on May 5. The fear was that the documentary was too soft on the Cuban dictator, especially in light of Mr. Castro's recent crackdown on dissidents...."In light of all that has happened in Cuba, unless Oliver can go back and interview Fidel about the recent events, the film is obviously incomplete," said Paul Marotta, a spokesman for HBO...The film reportedly doesn't delve into a referendum effort in Cuba that has collected thousands of signatures in support of democratic reforms. Mr. Castro recently jailed about 20 people associated with the project.
Mr. Stone... has called Mr. Castro "magnetic and charismatic." At the Sundance Film Festival, the 56-year-old director was quoted as saying, "I thought [Mr. Castro] was warm and bright. He's a very driven man, a very moral man." [New York Sun, 4/18/03]
Only if you judge a person by the corrupt moral standard of self-sacrifice--and look at what you justify by doing so.Apr 21, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
Apr 20, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Russia, France and other key Security Council members set the stage today for a new battle over Iraq, signaling that the United States must give the United Nations a broader role in reconstruction efforts before sanctions can be lifted...."This decision cannot be automatic," [Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov] said. "For the Security Council to take this decision we need to be certain whether Iraq has weapons of mass destruction or not." Russia and other council members maintain that it must be U.N. inspectors, not the U.S. military, who verify whether the country has been disarmed....The EU echoed that demand in a statement issued from the summit: "The U.N. must play a central role, including the process leading toward self-government for the Iraqi people, utilizing its unique capacity and experience in post-conflict nation-building." [Washington Post, 4/17/03]
You mean its unique capacity and experience in destroying and impoverishing everything it touches? As exemplified, for example, by its threat to maintain sanctions on a defeated regime--to keep the Iraqis poor unless the UN can seize power over them?Apr 19, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Dana Rohrabacher, a maverick California Republican, criticized U.S. policy of favoring strong central government in a new Afghan constitution being drawn up, calling it the product of "too many Ivy League thinkers..."There is no doubt that if you are going to have any sort of social harmony in a country like Afghanistan, people have got to be able to elect their local leaders. You can't expect everybody to take their orders from Kabul when you have such ethnic diversity. "Giving people local autonomy is a way of making them happy and content with being part of a central system." [Reuters, 4/18/03]
In other words, we will have peace if we pander to ethnic separatism. Good luck. There is no peace without limited government and individual rights; if the population doesn't accept these ideas, then it's anarchy or tyranny no matter what.Apr 18, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
U.S. forces came upon a recently abandoned terrorist training camp on the outskirts of Baghdad where recruits were apparently taught how to make bombs and what to do if they got captured, the Marines said Wednesday. The extensive camp consisted of about 20 permanent buildings on 25 acres south of the city and was operated by the Iraqi government and the Palestine Liberation Front, said Marine spokesman Cpl. John Hoellwarth. [Associated Press, 4/17/03]
"So what?" say the antiwar protesters. "This was to support the Palestinians. Everybody knew they did that. But what does that have to do with terrorism in America?" Leave aside for a moment this utterly anti-conceptual method of approaching issues, and consider a second story:
Secret dossiers detailing [Ugandan guerilla group Allied Democratic Forces'] discussions with the Iraqi Intelligence Service were found in the spies' Baghdad headquarters, among the detritus of shredding.....In a letter to the head of the Iraqi spy agency, a senior ADF operative outlined his group's efforts to set up an "international mujahideen team". Its mission, he said, "will be to smuggle arms on a global scale to holy warriors fighting against US, British and Israeli influences in Africa, the Middle East, Asia and the Far East"....Nassir offered to "vet, recruit and send youth to train for the jihad" at a centre in Baghdad, which he described as a "headquarters for international holy warrior network". It was not clear whether the centre was established....In December 2001 the movement was placed on the US list of terrorist organisations. Throughout its campaign the ADF has been provided with weapons and funding by the Islamist government in Sudan, one of more than half a dozen states Washington accuses of sponsoring terrorism. The key figure behind the ADF is widely acknowledged to be a fundamentalist Islamic cleric, Sheikh Jamil Makulu. According to the Ugandan government and western intelligence sources, Sheikh Makulu became friendly with Osama bin Laden in the early to mid-Nineties, when the al-Qa'eda chief was living in Khartoum. [Daily Telegraph, 4/16/03]
Of course, by the anti-conceptual method, this isn't enough either, since so far there's no evidence that the ADF was responsible for 9/11. And don't worry, if evidence is found connecting Saddam Hussein to 9/11, the anti-conceptual mentality will just say that it doesn't count since we didn't know about it before the war started. And if it turns out our intelligence officials did know about it before the war started, then the fact that they didn't reveal their sources will disqualify their having known about it. And if they did reveal their sources to closed Congressional committees, well, then, it still doesn't count because it wasn't public.
All these objections are beside the point: Iraq was known to have supported terrorist action against the US and was developing weapons of mass destruction that would have made a strike devastating. But the objections do serve a purpose: The refusal to integrate information is a tool of evasion. All the facts in the world cannot force a person to acknowledge reality.Apr 18, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
"It (arrest of Abu Abbas) indicates that America is sinking its sharp teeth into Iraq and into Palestine," [Hamas founder] Sheikh Ahmed Yassin said. "It is a crusader's war against both. But it will be defeated. Our people are stronger than Israel and America," the wheelchair-bound Yassin said as 2,000 Palestinians marched to mark Palestinian Prisoner Day....
"Let them arrest the whole Palestinian people. Resistance will never stop. We will continue Jihad (holy struggle) and resistance," Yassin said. "Whether we go to prison or whether they kill leaders, resistance will never stop before the liberation," he added. [Reuters, 4/17/03]
Get that? Abbas murders one of our citizens but we have no right to arrest him or we're declaring war on the whole Palestinian people. What more open admission could there be that these people claim the right to murder us? Hamas is clearly just a bunch of thugs, its ideology is nothing but a rationalization for aggression and antisemitism, and we should just go ahead and wipe them off the face of the earth, or at least let Israel do it.
