NEOGNOSTIKOS

Thursday, 8 December 2005

The Contrary Position
Now Playing: "Vamos" by the Pixies
I force myself to listen to Chris Matthews and Jon Stewart and Keith Olbermann and other such celebrity propagandists because I have to keep my contempt for Leftists and liberal Democrats sharp. It's like sickening myself to achieve immunity.

Respectability in Big Media is all about taking the contrary position without any sincere regard for the logic or morality in what that might be. It is everything to resist and ridicule this President and his Administration because that is what [serious journalists and analysts] do. They don't fool with such frivolities as considering whether their positions are the same as those of the murderers in Iraq. That's because the first thing comes first: savage Bush the Younger.

You know why it's so hard to explain why we need to be in Iraq to these people? Because they haven't lived the future of that decision. They don't know what they will, which is that we were preparing the way for the necessary and welcome secularization of Islamic society. And they wouldn't want to live in the alternate future they might imagine would proceed from their ignorant pacifism and calls for immediate withdrawal if they could only see what it would entail: completely uncontrollable borders with Syria, Iran, and Saudi Arabia; huge and permanent spikes in the price of oil; rampant terroristic activity in all four of those countries and others; and a loss of American military prestige in a vital part of the world.

Oh...maybe they would want to.

Posted by Toby Petzold at 7:24 PM CST | Post Comment | View Comments (3) | Permalink
Updated: Thursday, 8 December 2005 7:24 PM CST

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Friday, 9 December 2005 - 5:45 AM CST

Name: Rider

Preparing the way? That's a reasonable position. But ask almost anyone from the Middle East, including Israelis, and they will tell you that a democratically-elected Shiite Islamic theocracy is not likely to remain democratic after it comes to power and so highly unlikely to secularize. The only historical model, I think, is Iran which firmly rejected secularization in its last elections, now thirty (?) years after the Khomeini Revolution.

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Friday, 9 December 2005 - 7:54 AM CST

Name: Rider

As to saying what "the murderers in Iraq" are saying, note that it's not just the Sunnis who want the U.S. out:

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200512/iraq-withdrawal

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Friday, 9 December 2005 - 9:22 PM CST

Name: TP

So, because a democratically-elected Shiite government is not "likely" to stay democratic, then there is nothing to be gained from the venture? Get serious.

As for your assessment of Iran, I must say I am shocked at how little faith you have in the true sentiments of the democratically-minded and Western-oriented youth of Iran, who constitute a disproportionately large part of the whole population. We are making possible in Iraq what we hope young Iranians will achieve for themselves without our military intervention, which is something like a secular and democratic revolution.

When we empower the girls in that region, we are going to have huge economic interests to pursue. Those people want what we have. Let's give it to them and spread the Good Word.

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