Patterico's Pontifications

1/27/2006

Michael Hiltzik Says That Whether or Not Hamas is a Terrorist Organization Is a “Minor Issue of Syntax and Diction”

Filed under: Dog Trainer,Terrorism — Patterico @ 9:27 pm



L.A. Times blogger Michael Hiltzik has complaints about my post from this morning, in which I noted the odd reluctance of L.A. Times editors to call Hamas what it is: a terrorist organization. The Times editorial I criticized contained this infuriating passage:

Although the United States, Israel and the European Union brand Hamas a terrorist organization, Palestinians admire it for the schools and hospitals it runs. And the organization that once routinely dispatched suicide bombers into Israel has mostly refrained from such attacks for about the last year.

(My emphasis.)

As I noted this morning, this amounts to a simple refusal to call Hamas what it is: a group of terrorists. It is also a semi-apology for the group’s behavior, which has maintained its murderous character throughout 2005, notwithstanding the editors’ phony and half-assed suggestions to the contrary.

According to Hiltzik, my complaint amounts to nothing more than “picking at minor issues of syntax and diction.” This criticism is so ridiculous, it refutes itself.

It’s difficult to know just how to respond to someone who doesn’t see the importance of labeling terrorist organizations as terrorist organizations. But I’ll give it a shot.

Certain portions of the left — including, it now appears, the editors of the L.A. Times — seem so opposed to this president’s efforts to combat terrorism that they are unwilling even to call a terrorist a terrorist. It is this unfortunate tendency that I am criticizing, and it is a significant issue. If we can’t get clarity on this point, we can’t get it on anything.

It is the height of absurd relativism to suggest, as L.A. Times editors did this morning (and have in the past), that whether Hamas is a terrorist organization simply depends upon your point of view. Hamas is an organization that, not so long ago, bragged on its web site of its murderous operations, with boasts like these:

“He was able to kill 2 and injure 21″

“Three militants stabbed two Israelis. . .The Hamas members wrote some slogans and considered this operation as a gift for Yitzhak Rabin on the occasion of winning the Israeli elections.”

“The group disarmed the sergeant and took all his papers. He was then exterminated and disposed of.”

Nor has the organization’s thirst for blood disappeared. As I pointed out in my post, Hamas took credit for the brutal kidnapping and murder of Sasson Nuriel last year, and according to this source, sent 29 potential suicide bombers into Israel last year.

It is, quite simply, a murderous, terrorist organization. That’s not all it is, of course. It is also a selfless creator of hospitals and schools — just like that other selfless creator of hospitals and schools, Al Qaeda. But its creation of hospitals and schools doesn’t change the fact that it is a terrorist organization.

A news organization that can’t admit this — such your newspaper, Michael — has a real credibility problem. To call this “picking at minor issues of syntax and diction” is to trivialize a very serious complaint about the paper’s willingness to speak simple truths.

Moreover, Michael, this is a problem that appears to be characteristic of the staff at your paper. Take, for example, the refusal of your paper’s Barbara Demick to call Kim Jong Il “evil” — despite his deliberate responsibility for a famine that killed up to 2 million of his people.

It is irrelevant to me whether this stems from a misplaced desire for “objectivity,” some off-kilter form of moral relativism, or a mixture of the two. Who cares? If your paper and its staff can’t tell the truth, it is worthless as a source of information.

Kim Jong Il is evil. Hamas is a terrorist organization. If you can’t bring yourselves to acknowledge and articulate such obvious facts, how can you expect anyone rational to trust you?

I’ll put the question to you directly, Michael Hiltzik: is Hamas a terrorist organization? If so, shouldn’t your editors simply say so?

The question answers itself.

Hiltzik also complains that I selectively quoted from the editorial:

Applying his customary method of leaving out any and all information that contradicts his theme, the conservative blogger Patrick Frey unloads on the L.A. Times today for an editorial whose language he brands as “enraging.”

What did I leave out? While I noted that the editors were strangely unwilling to call Hamas a terrorist organization, I didn’t tell you that they did manage to bring themselves to say some bad things about Hamas:

Let’s fill in the blanks, shall we? Here’s some of the language the editorial employs to describe Hamas, phrases Frey conveniently forgot to mention: “Dedicated to the destruction of Israel…[with] leaders who have refused…to disarm and renounce violence…preachers of hate.”

Wow. They really let Hamas have it!

Let me paraphrase commenters Dana and perfectsense in response. Let’s say, hypothetically, that I were to write the following:

Although Adolf Hitler has been branded by the Allies as a racist who has ordered massive genocide, he built autobahns, liked dogs, and was a vegetarian. And his Luftwaffe, which once bombed London, largely refrained from such attacks after 1942. However, Hitler certainly was a preacher of hate and refused to renounce violence.

If I were to write such tripe, the news would be in the first two sentences, which suggest that: Hitler may not have been a mass murderer; may not have been such a bad guy; and didn’t do such a bad thing in ordering the bombing of London. Do you really think that someone who criticized me for these two sentences would be misrepresenting my position if they failed to quote the third sentence, which weakly criticizes Hitler for some of his lesser sins??

Apparently, Michael Hiltzik would complain if you quoted the first two sentences, but omitted the third. What nonsense.

Ironically, Hiltzik does exactly what he accuses me of: ripping a sentence from its context and “conveniently” failing to include critical surrounding sentences. (The difference is that I didn’t really do that, as I have already explained.) To see what I mean, see what I really wrote (read the whole paragraph) about everything being “okey-dokey” if Hamas has “mostly” refrained from terror attacks. Then look at how Hiltzik characterized my post. Note especially that Hiltzik omits my documentation of Hamas’s continuing terrorist activities in 2005, including a murder unrelated to suicide attacks. Once you’ve read my entire post, tell me whether you think he’s being fair. (Hint: he’s not.)

Weak, Michael. Very weak. This is the best you can do???

Postscript in the extended entry:

P.S. Hiltzik, you may remember, is the fellow who proved his lack of seriousness earlier this year, when he compared me and other critics of his paper to Stalinists. (How dare I complain about that — it’s just a “minor issue of syntax and diction”! The word “Stalinist” is just a word!) In my post responding to that accusation, I issued a challenge to Hiltzik to address two points made in my recent Dog Trainer Year in Review 2005 post. Hiltzik ducked my challenge. Yes, my readers and I noticed that — and we haven’t forgotten. I’ll remind you of the challenge:

On the “imminent threat” post: did the editors say that Bush claimed Iraq was an imminent threat in a State of the Union address? Did he? Was it an error by the editors? If so, do you agree with the editors that it was “not correctable”?

On the death penalty post: do you agree with me that it overstates the cost of capital punishment to count the entire cost of capital appeals as a cost of the death penalty? I have written the reporter and his editors about this and have not gotten a single individual at the paper to acknowledge this simple and indisputable fact. How about you?

I responded to your criticisms, Michael, and you have ducked my challenge in response. If you ever bother to answer my questions, let me know.

37 Responses to “Michael Hiltzik Says That Whether or Not Hamas is a Terrorist Organization Is a “Minor Issue of Syntax and Diction””

  1. Pfft.

    Mr. Hiltzik’s blog traffic must be down again, so it is time to leech off a real blogger with a phoney rant.

    I suppose that when Saddam was paying suicide bomber’s families $25k he was doing ‘good works’ too, so calling him a brutal dictator was really a matter of opinion – and remember, he was elected by 100% of the voters. Oh sure, he fed people into plastic shredders and paid for suicide bombers but he also built hospitals!

    ——————————

    Honestly, what I wonder about is how people like Hiltzik and the Times editors – and the left in general – reconcile the extreme contradictions within their positions. Do they simply not think about it? How hard is it to look at an organization like Hamas and apply the normal standards of civilization?

    Dwilkers (a1687a)

  2. The answer to it all is that they DON’T THINK–critically that is. The reluctance to be “judgmental”–except for Chimpy Bush McHitler and his perceived failures–infects the liberal mind. Sometimes people who do bad things are in fact just plain evil–but perish the thought that someone would actually say that–at least for Michael Hiltzik and his ilk.

    Mike Myers (3a4363)

  3. Patterico Channels Big Lizards!

    In this passionate and snarly post, Patterico rightly takes the L.A. Slimes to task for being unwilling to bring itself to call Hamas a terrorist organization (though they seem to have no trouble calling the Bush administration one). Of course,…

    Big Lizards (fe7c9d)

  4. So the Republican’s rhetoric about democracy being a panacea was wrong. Just because a country is democratic, that is not a guarantee that they will be more agreeable to the interests of the United States. Thus, we shouldn’t be hearing that meme from thinking people anymore.

    It seems to me that the more familiar a violent group is to us, the more we hesitate to label them terrorists. Are the factions in Ireland who were killing each other, terrorists? Were they ever labeled as such in the news? Since the violence has subsided in recent years, should these Irish groups still branded with the word “terrorist?”

    As for the LA Times article, it could be that since Hamas is a legitimate political entity in power now – it is counter-productive to insult them in that way – more of a diplomatic approach is appropriate. If the article mentions their atrocities, that’s good enough. The hope is that, now that they have power, their tactics will be less violent. (I’m not predicting that will happen, but that is the hope.)

    Not only that, haven’t these people been killing each other for a thousand years? And of course we had to go jump into the middle of that fun with both feet. To label one faction terrorist and not the other seems ridiculous to me. Israel kills civilians too – why aren’t their political regimes labeled terrorist organizations?

    Psyberian (1cf529)

  5. “Certain portions of the left — including, it now appears, the editors of the L.A. Times — seem so opposed to this president’s efforts to combat terrorism that they are unwilling even to call a terrorist a terrorist.” – Patterico

    Assuming facts not in evidence. Where is the case the word “brand” signifies coded repudiation of terror policies of GWB?

    It’s J-School reflex not to assign loaded terms like “terrorist” or “murderer” without vague attribution. It was an arguably inelegant instance of that. Comparing Hamas to Hitler is even more inelegant and – I would suggest – borderline desperate.

    steve (9bc5b0)

  6. Here we go again:

    Bloodthirsty savages elect a bloodthirsty terrorist organization halfway around the world and our “enlightened” Liberal friends quickly point out how they don’t want to hear any more silly talk about the virtues of self-government. Wow.

    News Flash from Moonbat News Service: Democracy (not to be confused with Elections) doesn’t guarantee agreement with US interests. Global warming can be prevented, repent, and bow down to John Kerry while there’s still time, also he’s returning from the Swiss Alps today and will be featured speaker at the Save the Polyester rally this afternoon, weather permitting.

    Psy wrote, “…Hamas is a legitimate political entity in power now…” and so he doesn’t want us saying mean things about them, according to him we should be “diplomatic.” Well, now, how nice, and this from the very folks who were so quick to acknowledge GWB’s legitimate victory over Al-Gore, and who have behaved so “diplomatically” ever since. Can you spell hypocrisy?

    Psy says “…haven’t these people been killing each other for a thousand years?” Why yes, they have. So why then should anyone expect that a single election is going to result in them renouncing terrorism and all coming together to hold hands and sing Kumbaya?

    Black Jack (9f37aa)

  7. “Comparing Hamas to Hitler is even more inelegant and – I would suggest – borderline desperate.”

    Right you are. Poor Adolph just can’t seem to get a fair shake these days. Why, even his former supporters have turned their backs on him.

    Black Jack (9f37aa)

  8. Steve, please speak English, using complete sentences that have coherent thoughts logically connected to one another. I know almost nothing about J-school, but would guess that somewhere along the way clarity and coherence would receive at least a nod of approval. Give it a try.

    But even before working on your ability to express yourself, maybe you should learn to interpret the speech of others. Necessarily guessing as to your intent, I consider your apparent implication that Patterico compares Hamas to Hitler to be wonderfully ironic. It reveals that you also don’t understand the coherent speech of another, and so your comment demonstrates that word connections are problematic for you both coming and going.

    There is indeed “desperation” here; you need desparately to learn how to read with comprehension and write so that others have an outside chance at comprehending.

    Levans (93a705)

  9. Anyone who thinks that the point of my analogy was to “compare” Hamas to Hitler is, I do suggest, borderline illiterate.

    Patterico (929da9)

  10. Comparing Hamas to Hitler is even more inelegant and – I would suggest – borderline desperate.

    Hitler: Kill all the Jews.
    Hamas: Kill all the Jews in Israel.

    Some difference there.

    So the Republican’s rhetoric about democracy being a panacea was wrong. Just because a country is democratic, that is not a guarantee that they will be more agreeable to the interests of the United States. Thus, we shouldn’t be hearing that meme from thinking people anymore.

    I see. So a series of successful democratic events in Lebanon and Iraq produce governments more agreeable to the interests of the United States. A series of successful democratic events in the Palestinian Territories produces a government not agreeable to the interests of the United States.

    There are almost 30 million people in Iraq and Lebanon. Depending on who you believe, there’s around 1 – 4 million in the Palestinian territories.

    So tell me again how the “Republican’s rhetoric” was wrong? Lebanon and Iraq hold far more significance in the long run than the Palestinians.

    Your reasoning is brilliant. Really!

    Not only that, haven’t these people been killing each other for a thousand years? And of course we had to go jump into the middle of that fun with both feet. To label one faction terrorist and not the other seems ridiculous to me. Israel kills civilians too – why aren’t their political regimes labeled terrorist organizations?

    More brilliant reasoning. Israel doesn’t deliberately target civilians. Hamas does. Israel treats Palestinians injured in Israeli anti-terrorist attacks. Palestinians massacre and mutilate Israelis they capture, or hold them hostage and demand that Israel let mass murderers out of its jails.

    Yeah, really brilliant reasoning you got there.

    Chaos (27ce18)

  11. I posted the same at Hiltzik’s blog – although his primitive site does not allow code:

    The bottom line here is that Frey objects to the LAT not specifically calling Hamas terrorists. In general, if you were to ask 1000 Americans, how many do you think would say that Hamas is a terrorist organization? If they are not, why did the US talk about not doing business with the Hamas led government until they renounce terrorism and their stated goal to wipe Israel off the map? Why did Abbas say that he was taking a chance on bringing them into the fold – the chance being that they would renounce terrorism? All of these people can’t be wrong.

    Is using the word “branded” a minor syntax error? I think not. Journalists, like lawyers, use wording in very specific ways. Nowadays, they choose words very carefully to slant articles towards to their own political viewpoint. The editorial stated:

    Although the United States, Israel and the European Union brand Hamas a terrorist organization, Palestinians…

    Ahhh…here is the crux. It is not only the US, Israel, and the EU. Abbas himself said that Hamas was a terrorist group. Iran has supported Hamas over the years as a terrorist group, as has Syria. The overall implication is that they are terrorists.

    Back to the editorial. I believe that the piece does strike a good note of hope that Hamas has changed their ways. Politically, Hamas is now an entity that has to be dealt with in a different way, and the editiorial correctly points this out. So in many ways the editorial was fairly well-balanced and informative (my opinion of course – and I usually don’t side with the LAT).

    What we have to remember is that “the organization that once routinely dispatched suicide bombers into Israel has mostly refrained from such attacks for about the last year.” That has to be weighed against decades of terroristic violence. Decades vs. months. My gut feel is that the change terminology, to not recognize what the Hamas have been for so long, is a bit premature. And that is what Patterico objected to – the calculated wording that made it sound like only the decadent US and their allies think that Hamas is terroristic.

    BTW – off topic – Splash Kennedy is now posting at Kos Kooky Kidz.

    Specter (466680)

  12. Well Psyberian at least you acknowledge what Bush has said is the US strategy. I haven’t seen many on the left that seem to even know this.

    I hardly think Hamas’ election victory indicates democratic reform is a failure though, and somehow I doubt you do either. Since Fatah has looted the country dry my guess is Jack the Ripper would win opposed to them. If you were a Palestinian would you vote for the party that has led them to the place they are right now? The moderating influence of the people’s consent in governance is IMO a good bet. I think moderation is an especially good bet if women are involved in the political process.

    My guess is we’ll see Hamas begin to moderate their policies almost immediately. Why would they do that? Because they will want to stay in power and people don’t willingly vote to be at war unnecessarily for decades on end. It isn’t that the government will moderate the wishes of the people, but that the people will moderate the government.

    Will democratic reform work to reduce or end the terrorist problem in the ME? Maybe, maybe not – its certainly going to be interesting to see. But doing nothing didn’t seem to be working.

    How about this, I’ll put my money on democratic reform and you put your money on theocratic despotism, we’ll see who collects in 10 years.

    Dwilkers (a1687a)

  13. …..tell me again how the “Republican’s rhetoric” was wrong. – Chaos

    You should just read my comment again Chaos. But to Republican rhetoric, democracies are always more friendly to America. Well Hamas just shot that out of the water. At least it isn’t true as an absolute. What, are you getting all relativistic on me now? Only democrats are allowed to do that. 😀

    Also Chaos, you have a point about Israel I suppose. But of course if you listen to the Palestinian’s side of the story, I’m sure they would claim that Israelis have targeted innocent civilians. With 1000 years of war, who knows?

    Psyberian (1cf529)

  14. I find the Left’s cheering of the failings of democracies quite fascinating.

    Once upon a time, they condemned US Presidents for not respecting electorates who voted in anti-American folks like Allende.

    Now, apparently, well, it’s not really clear is it? Is the US supposed to topple Hamas? Respect the Palestinian choice of Hamas? Was Hamas, in fact, the real choice (along the lines of Saddam’s 100% support back in 2002)?

    As for the meretricious claim that Israel and Palestinians both make claims, who is to say what is true, one wonders how Psyberian would tell the truth between the rapist and the raped, or the murder victim and the murderer. Somehow, one wonders whether the reality on the ground might make a difference, such as how many casualties would be generated if the Israelis were to deliberately seek to do so?

    Lurking Observer (ec7ac6)

  15. Anyone who thinks democracies are always more friendly to America has apparently forgotten about France.

    Black Jack (9f37aa)

  16. With 1000 years of war, who knows?

    Am I mistaken or did Israel become a country in 1948?

    Harry Arthur (b318a5)

  17. “Anyone who thinks that the point of my analogy was to “compare” Hamas to Hitler is, I do suggest, borderline illiterate.” – Patterico

    Others grasped it as such.

    There are few categorical imperatives in hard news copy that can stand alone without qualifiers.

    al-Qaeda are “terrorists.”

    Hamas are called “terrorists.”

    The case may be overwhelming. But the Hamas enigma is whether its political and social practicalities will dominate in a new construct. Yasser Arafat was a terrorist. Precisely when in copy did he become a “former terrorist?” In Oslo? These are calls editors get to make arbitrarily, but not casually.

    The instinct is to assume society has not resolved anything much.

    Should 96% of Americans believe in heaven — you don’t allow, “God called Mrs. Lopez home” in news copy. She simply “died.” And so do popes.

    You’re an AP supervisor. Along comes an otherwise fine piece referencing hip-hop as “demeaning to women.” You (reluctantly??) add qualifiers like “many call” or “which critics like Bill Cosby insistently label..” and send it back.

    It’s a function of blogs to offer a gnat as a six-course meal and impugn motives.

    But, again, where is the case the word “brand” signifies coded repudiation of terror policies of GWB?

    steve (6d9d5f)

  18. steve,

    This was an editorial. If the editors thought Hamas was a terrorist group, nothing discussed in your comment prevented them from saying so.

    The fact that Hamas and Hitler share a startling characteristic — a desire to kill Jews in large numbers — does not mean that the point of my example was to compare the two. You’re smart enough to know that, but you pretended that my point was to compare the two, to make a cheap rhetorical point.

    Patterico (929da9)

  19. Clearly I’m not smart enough to grasp such a Durbinian distinction.

    But again — where is the case the word “brand” signifies coded repudiation of terror policies of GWB?

    steve (6d9d5f)

  20. From The Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement (HAMAS)-Palestine:

    Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it. (Preamble)

    The Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, has said: “The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree, (evidently a certain kind of tree) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews. (Article 7)

    Initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement. Abusing any part of Palestine is abuse directed against part of religion. Nationalism of the Islamic Resistance Movement is part of its religion. Its members have been fed on that. For the sake of hoisting the banner of Allah over their homeland they fight. “Allah will be prominent, but most people do not know.”

    Now and then the call goes out for the convening of an international conference to look for ways of solving the (Palestinian) question. Some accept, others reject the idea, for this or other reason, with one stipulation or more for consent to convening the conference and participating in it. Knowing the parties constituting the conference, their past and present attitudes towards Moslem problems, the Islamic Resistance Movement does not consider these conferences capable of realising the demands, restoring the rights or doing justice to the oppressed. These conferences are only ways of setting the infidels in the land of the Moslems as arbitraters. When did the infidels do justice to the believers? “But the Jews will not be pleased with thee, neither the Christians, until thou follow their religion; say, The direction of Allah is the true direction. And verily if thou follow their desires, after the knowledge which hath been given thee, thou shalt find no patron or protector against Allah.” (The Cow – verse 120).

    There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors. The Palestinian people know better than to consent to having their future, rights and fate toyed with. (Article 13)

    These people have been willing to fight and die for their beliefs; why would we engage in Jimmy Carteresque wishful thinking and not take their words seriously?

    Dana (9f37aa)

  21. Clearly I’m not smart enough to grasp such a Durbinian distinction.

    You said it, steve — I didn’t.

    But it’s not a “Durbinian” distinction. It’s actually pretty simple:

    1) Hamas, like Hitler, hates Jews and wants to kill them.

    2) Hamas has not killed Jews on as large a scale as Hitler (though it might like to).

    3) My point related to whether it would be an unfair smear to quote language minimizing the atrocities of racist mass murderers, while failing to quote language that accused said mass murderers of being very, very bad boys.

    For someone to fail to understand this shows them to be 1) just plain stupid; 2) so blinded by partisanship that they can’t see simple facts; or 3) deliberately missing the point to level a cheap shot.

    You, steve, aren’t #1. You *could* be #2, I suppose, but I see you as doing #3: leveling a cheap shot. Trouble is, nobody’s buying it, because everybody can see right through your trickery.

    As for the editors’ “coded” repudiation of GWB’s terror policies, they have long since proven that said repudiation is hardly “coded.”

    Patterico (929da9)

  22. That clears it up. It was an abstraction on an equivalence – not at all like Dick Durbin’s explanation.

    Fortunately, you saw through my trickery.

    [I did, and so did everyone else who understands that unlike Durbin, my point was not to define an equivalence. Keep up the hackery, though . . . your credibility sinks further with every snide and off-point comment you make. — Patterico]

    steve (539a32)

  23. Am I mistaken or did Israel become a country in 1948?

    Harry, how long have Jews lived in that region? Whether it was Israel or some other country, Jews have been in that region for thousands of years haven’t they? The name of the country is completely irrelevant to my point.

    Psyberian (1cf529)

  24. As for the meretricious claim that Israel and Palestinians both make claims, who is to say what is true, one wonders how Psyberian would tell the truth between the rapist and the raped…

    Lurking, I hesitate to be certain about this situation because the Palestinians and Israelis have such a long history, their conflict is completely politicized, and it is such a far away place that yes, I reserve judgment. But for the record, I do favor Israel over their enemies; but also think that we bend over backwards too far for Israel at times too. Actually by the way, Patterico has understandably asked that we not have a Palestine/Israel debate, so I’d better stop there.

    Psyberian (1cf529)

  25. Patterico,

    Thanks for helping me with the fun over at hiltzik’s site. lol

    Specter (466680)

  26. You should just read my comment again Chaos. But to Republican rhetoric, democracies are always more friendly to America. Well Hamas just shot that out of the water. At least it isn’t true as an absolute. What, are you getting all relativistic on me now? Only democrats are allowed to do that. 😀

    orly?

    I wasn’t aware that Republican rhetoric was that democracies are always more friendly to America. As much as I can recall from the very boring speeches given, it was that democracy is 1) a process and 2) the effect of that process on a country is political moderation, which considering the current state of politics in the Middle East, can certainly only be in America’s interests.

    A society totally indoctrinated by racist nationalist propaganda about “Occupied Palestine” over the past forty years elects racist nationalist candidates to Parliament – Republican rhetoric repudiated! If the schoolbooks in the United States all said blacks were mud people, if the radio and the TV all said blacks were mud people, if the newspapers all said blacks were mud people, if every major cultural entity said that blacks were mud people, and this went on for decades, it just might be that the non-black populace would vote for candidates who also thought blacks were mud people. That is not a judgment on democracy, it’s a judgment on the society and the people living in it.

    Whatever you think “Republican rhetoric” is, it bears little to no resemblance to the actual “rhetoric” of the Republican Party.

    Chaos (27ce18)

  27. Chaos, if you’re a Republican, you’re not a very good one. For example:

    By helping Iraqis build a democracy, America will win over those who doubted they had a place in the new Iraq, and we will undermine the terrorists and Saddamists, gain an ally in the War on Terror, inspire reformers across the Middle East, and make the American people more secure.

    http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/12/20051212-1.html

    Now all of a sudden, Democracy doesn’t seem to be as promising as it once was.

    Psyberian (1cf529)

  28. Have Arabs and Jews really been killing each other in Palestine for “thousands of years”, as psyberian’s unsupported assertion attests? The first wave of Arab conquest didn’t sweep through Palestine until the early 8th Century, AD. Centuries after Palestine’s Jewish population had been dispersed by the Romans when they put down the Jewish Rebellion.

    Jews did not return to Palestine in any numbers until Herzl’s Zionist pioneers arrived in the late 19th Century. Arab-Jewish sectarian strife flared in isolated localized incidents after that, but not in any significant or systematic fashion until the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem called for pogroms during the late 1930s and WWII.

    Unless, of course, psyberian can cite otherwise. Happy googling!

    In the meantime, as for “democracy not as promising”, well, heck, in our own democracy, the benighted Massachussetts electorate have been sending drunken, whoremongering, crapulent Kennedys to Congress for thousands of…oops, decades, and yet the Republic still stands.

    In the meantime, it’s still Afghanistan/Iraq/Lebanon 3, Paleostinians 1.

    Besides, there is an upside to having Hamas running the Palestinian government — the IDF won’t have to worry as much about “collateral damage” when mounting reprisals for another terrorist outrage. Pretty much any government building will do.

    –furious

    furious_a (048884)

  29. As the Left itself has long recognized, being a democracy hardly equates with only electing pro-American governments. Where the Right now agrees w/ the Left (when the Left isn’t running away from the idea full tilt) is that in the Middle East, democracies, even when they are anti-American, are ultimately more in American interests than non-democracies. This is because the Cold War is over, and the belief in stability above all in that post-Cold War environment is seen as neither a workable long-term strategy, nor actually providing stability.

    One wonders, however, is the Left simply perpetrating a tu quoque policy of “Haha, you’re supporting democracies when you pooh-poohed us in the past”? Or did they fully expect anti-American governments to come to power, even in the past, and would have welcomed it then?

    Lurking Observer (855e4e)

  30. That was easy furious_a. It looks like empires and war in the Middle East all started about 500 B.C. and I believe that Jews lived there from the beginning and were, in one form or another, involved. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Middle_East

    I’m not disparaging Jewish people or any others in that region – they just have a long history. America sure has had its share of wars in its short history too already – including a nasty Civil War. We’re off to a good start!

    Psyberian (1cf529)

  31. Lurking Observer – I certainly don’t want to speak for all leftists, but I have expected that democracies would elect anti-American governments, and I have no problem with that.

    The people of state [X] have the right to select the government they want; and if that government doesn’t like us, then presumably the people who elected it got what they wanted.

    Correspondingly, i’m not at all upset with the results of the election in Palestine. The elections appear to have been reasonably free and fair; the incumbents were tossed out and a peaceful exchange of power is happening. This is how it is supposed to work.

    I don’t like the new government of the Palestinian Authority; and I think we should be very cautious about negotiating with them. But I’m happy that they held a free and fair election – in the long run that matters more than who the government of the moment happens to be.

    aphrael (6b0647)

  32. What a terribly pitiful argument Psy 🙂

    I don’t see anywhere in that quote a guarantee of democratization always being immediately beneficial to the US or having more pros than cons in every situation.

    Nice job completely ignoring the whole “democracy is a process” concept, I suppose because its easier to misrepresent and lie than come up with a real argument 🙂

    The President was also specifically talking about the benefits of Iraqi democracy. The only mention of the situation outside Iraq in that quote is about “reformers” elsewhere in the region.

    A SINGLE Arab election whose outcome IT IS CONTENDED, not proven, is harmful to American interests somehow disproves Bush? You guys must be getting desperate if that’s the best you’re coming up with these days…

    So try again, and try to make it better, k? “Hamas won the first real Palestinian parliamentary elections so the idea of bringing democracy is wrong!” is just so pitiful. If you come back in three or four decades and Hamas is still winning elections (and Hamas is the same as it is today), then you might have a point Psy, otherwise yoy’re not really qualified to talking about who is a “good” anything 🙂

    Chaos (27ce18)

  33. Chaos, I’m afraid you’re just incorrigible. Also, the disingenuous smileys don’t help your case.

    Psyberian (1cf529)

  34. I think that it is the desire to present more than one side of an issue and to do so from the point of view of more than one side. Sure, many consider Hamas to be terrorists. Many do not. Many consider their tactics to be justified by the condition of occupation which existed up until the pullout from Gaza and, frankly, by the existence of Israel, established as a state in a land that Muslims consider among the most sacred due to the Dome of the Rock there, in a land that had been considered by many Muslims as ‘theirs’ for centuries. They view Israel as the uninvited guest that took over the house and began treating the ‘owners’ as though THEY were the uninvited guests, tolerated…barely.

    Simply calling Hamas terrorists and evil does nothing to lead to understanding of why people would do the things for which we consider them, justly, to be terrorists and evil. We often seem to be more concerned that the msm call terrorists terrorists than with understanding why Hamas utilizes terrorist tactics with the approval of a wide percentage of Palestinians. The msm are, rightly I think, concerned with trying to convey more than just that aspect of Hamas which they did convey by reporting on Hamas’s acts of terrorism in the news section of the paper over the years.

    To sum up, the msm report the terrorist acts, attribute the acts to Hamas when they have been identified as the responsible party but refuse to call Hamas terrorists and evil. So what? Who or what is evil is a moral judgement for the reader to make, not one for the reporter to make. Times readers who do not already consider Hamas’ tactics to be evil are not going to change their minds on that subject just because the Times calls Hamas “evil terrorists”. Neither will their readers who consider blowing up civilians in Israel to be evil be disinclined to think Hamas evil the next time they read a report of a suicide /murder bomber being sent into Israel by Hamas. All that they are likely to do is think that the Times have taken to moralizing, akin to turning news reports into sermons for the day.

    Objective reporting is impossible. I suppose that a Martian dwelling among us earthlings, with no attachments to any side in any issue and who was able to observe and report on everything that might be relevant to understanding any given event might be able to present an unbiased report of an event but nobody, no earthling anyway, can report events objectively. The best one can do is avoid using biased language in reporting events. Evil and terrorist, although accurate from our point of view, are hardly unbiased terms.

    Okay, time to admit that the msm is hardly famous for avoiding unbiased terms in reporting, particularly in issues that tend to cut along partisan political party lines. I suppose one could argue that avoiding highly charged terms such as terrorist and evil with respect to Hamas when they freely sprinkle their reports of political issues with terms that are also emotionally charged and/or biased is hypocritical but, think about it: isn’t the better solution to rid all reports of emotionally charged, biased language rather than adding even more? I think so.

    Craig R. Harnon (cd1dbc)

  35. Craig,

    My post criticized an editorial, not a news story.

    It is an insight into how editors think there that they are unwilling to call Hamas terrorists in an editorial.

    Patterico (929da9)

  36. Point taken. I wonder, though, is it only in the editorials that you criticize the exclusion of such emotionally charged terms as evil and terrorist, or do you think that they should be used in the news reports also? As for the editorials, do you know whether the use of the terms are forbidden or simply avoided by the editorialists? When the Times runs opinion pieces by more conservative writers, do they ever refer to Hamas and others as terrorists and or evil or is it just the more liberal writers? As I recall, the Times have hired some conservatives to run opinion pieces. It may just be that moralizing has fallen out of favor in the trade.

    Craig R. Harnon (cd1dbc)

  37. Shoddy reasoning, poor writing skills, obfuscation and distortions, is that steve above actually Steve Lovelady? It just has to be.

    Veeshir (5f9b87)


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