"Fearlessness may be a gift, but perhaps more precious is the courage acquired through endeavor; courage that comes from cultivating the habit of refusing to let fear dictate one's actions." -- Aung San Suu Kyi
Today I was determined to write about something positive. I am not sure if this will qualify. However, I am writing about inspiration and people who had a tremendous sense of conviction. The quotation above is from one person of great conviction, who is actually in the news right now.
The words of Aung San Suu Kyi are very important because I think it reminds us that we may not be able to eradicate or eliminate our fear, but that we must move forward into courage with it.And as we can see in Myanmar today, the actions of the monks in protest and the words of Aung San Suu Kyi are essential.
For the record, I spent some time speaking with my blogpal DCup this morning. I am feeling more than a little uncomfortable with a comment flap that I inadvertently got into over the past couple of days. I wasn't flaming, but I was flamed a bit. Not wanting to breathe any further life into this situation I am choosing to not link to it.
What I did do was to admit to some activities that our government might not like. As a result, earlier I felt ill at ease and then actually afraid. How stupid is that? Not so stupid in these times.
Not wanting to yield to fear and paranoia, I wanted positive.
Then I came up with this... write about Sophie Scholl .
Things didn't work out so well for Sophie so I am not sure how positive this is, but she is such a symbol of dissent, justice and the non-violent quest for peace.
In case you don't know, Sophie was a member of the The White Rose Society , which a non-violent resistance group working against the Nazis.
Sophie, her brother and a friend were arrested in Munich for distributing anti-Nazi pamphets. Her trial was a travesty and she was executed by the Reich.Then what is so damn positive about this?
Sophie spoke up. Sophie acted. Sophie took risks. When confronted with the reality of what her actions brought forth, she responded with quiet strength and dignity. She relied on her principles, her values and also her faith. She never backed down. Her core was strong. She did what she must.
And that people- that is positive.
We live in dark and dangerous times. We must not shrink back. That is what Sophie did. That is what Aung San Suu Kyi and the monks of Myanmar are doing. And so many others have done, are doing and will do.
Living in these times demands that we expand and not contract. That we move forward with all of our convictions, come what may.
It is unlikely anything will result of my comment issue. It is a reminder to me that I should always be true to who I am. Every time I have chosen otherwise - that is exactly when the bad things happen.
If you want to know more about Sophie, you can also check out the great film that was made of her story.As for me - I will keep blogging, I will keep my mind and heart open, especially when they want to close. I will - as I have said before I will choose dissent and I will choose peace.
It is the only way.
And that my friends is the most positive thing for me. I hope for you too.
Peace all.
30 comments:
great post, love it.
it's about the courage to walk to the beat of a different drummer, to go with what you know is right and not cave in to the naysayers and people who live their lives in fear and quiet desperation.
it is the courage to be authentic even if that means you feel like such an outsider sometimes that you want to scream.
Fran,
Almost everyone gets into a little "flap" out here in the Ether.
I wouldn't worry too much. Be who you are, and don't apologize.
I got into a "flame war" and at first I felt bad (Not to mention I thought it might hurt my blog b/c this person is "popular"), but then I decided, "No, that dude is a pompous douche bag, and someone needed to say it. Why not me?"
Just because we all "agree" on certain issues does not mean we have to get along.
That's what separates us from the Wingnuts. The Wingnuts are hive minded. Not good. (Actually dangerous).
Being a nice person, does not mean you're perfect or that you have to lay down.
We love you Fran. (I'm not sure who "we" is, but we do).
Fran-
What a great post. I remember reading about Sophie Scholl and when I did, I wondered if I could be as brave as she was if we were ever in the same situation. Now, I fee that we are dealing with the fight of our lives for the continuation of our Constitution. I feel bad that I haven't been out marching like many others have. But I'll keep blogging and making phone calls at election time, and walking the streets putting those annoying pamphlets on the door handles for my candidate.
In the meantime, Fran, you are an inspiration to many of us. Keep putting up these great posts, I look forward to them everyday.
Blog on sister!
I keep meaning to see the movie about her, one day I will. I do admire her and she is one of my heroes for speaking out.
I loved that movie; I'd never heard of Sophie Scholl before then. What an amazingly courageous woman. I think what really affected me was the way they kept giving her the option to lie so she could get out of trouble. It would've been so easy for her to just sell out to save her own neck, but she refused. She knew the costs, the risks, the probable outcome; yet she took action and spoke out against the war and the nazis.
I often wonder if I would have the courage to do that; to speak the truth even though I knew I would die for it. I can only hope I would, and hope that it will never come to that.
Don't let fear keep you from blogging. You serve an essential purpose. Often times I've found that people aren't nearly as mean-spirited in comment threads as they might appear to be at first glance. We all want to be recognized and validated and sometimes that complicated matters.
Daring to be positive in these troubled times is a challenge, but a worthy one. Keep at it.
Fran-
Take it from a guy who talks too fucking much. Don't ever, ever, ever, shut the fuck up, especially if you feel strongly that what you're saying needs to be said.
I think these days, people live in too much fear of being outed as a subversive or (that dirtiest of all words) a liberal for not spouting the company, government or popular line.
If that doesn't convince you to keep speaking up and out, then let me express it in words you know well....
Stand up and testify...sister!!!!!!!
Fran, I needed this about Sophie today. I am feeling very discouraged about the Episcopal Church and don't know that I can do anything. Sophie gives me a little hope.
What great comments and I really appreciate them.
The owner of the blog in question actually put a comment in that uplifted me too.
Thanks for the support. We must keep our voices tuned to peace, clarity and honesty to our own values.
Wise or not, emboldened by the blog owner's support, I did put a comment over there linking back to this post.
When we start to single out any one group as evil, we have started down the road of despair and destruction and I for one just will not go there.
Come what may, I know I have acted from within my heart.
I seem to be taking all this too seriously!!!
But so it is for me today.
Thanks and peace to all.
Fran... Try not to take the "dust-up" too seriously. My little troll is what I refer to as a "cooler". He (she?) pops in from time to time, insults as many of my readers as possible, usually by calling their intelligence/sanity/motives into question, and then disappears again for a month or two. He (she?) basically tries their level best to shut things down (the function of a 'cooler').
On the other hand, I'm enormously encouraged that you managed to turn the situation into a positive post on an important topic.
My hat's off...
Kvatch- thanks. I know I am being overly sensitive today!
Thanks for the good words in all places.
You are a stand up guy. I mean frog!
And you say you're the cranky one in your profile... I think not!
Wow -- thanks Fran. I've been thinking so much about this and realize that living in the very red state that I do I really am afraid of reprisals -- I think I told you someone said I should have put my Kerry/Edwards sticker on the passenger side of my vehicle so when the bullet came thru it wouldn't hit me. This state had one of the first shootings and beatings of Muslims right after 9/11. There has even been a new hotline set up to report suspected illegals -- gee, don't piss anyone off, they'll call and report you! I can't believe I've bought into the fear factor.
I have such a big mouth, I can't believe I'm scared to speak my beliefs!
My thanks to you and all your blog friends who inspire strength, courage and knowledge!
Fran
The really, truly great thing about blogging is that you can and should say what you want, when you want. It's called an opinion because that is all it is: one person's perspective. Everyone has the right to one. Here online, AND in Burma. Luckily, we are able to express ours. Hopefully, the spotlight will remain on the goings on in Myanmar.
great post. Thanks.
fran, I must not have been around for 24 hours, I don't know about the flap or the flame, but this is an inspirational post about Sophie. Thank you so much for this -- I really need to keep being reminded to have courage -- not about who is following me, but courage to do hard things that I might fail at. thank you again.
Thanks and wishes of peace and good outspoken blogging to all.
I really feel so grateful to know all of you!
franiam, it appears you and your fellow posters live in some surreal country -- not mine -- where people are thrown in jail for comments on blogs.
What's the worst that's happened? Hmmmm. The other day someone who wrote an editorial in a college newspaper -- was it U of Colorado or Colorado State -- saying little more than "Fornicate Bush".
Where's the cops? Oh. Only the students at the school were disturbed. I think the writer of the piece was an editor of the paper. His fellow students have requested his resignation. Wow. That's harsh.
Of course here in NYC, we had the pleasure of listening to the madness of Iran's president speaking from Columbia U. He said he supports the execution of gays and the destruction of Israel.
What a swell fellow. Meanwhile, people in the US have actually engaged in terrorist activities. Some of those people have lived near me in Brooklyn. Very near me in Brooklyn.
Moreover, my former office was in the World Trade Center.
Furthermore, due to the valid assumption -- based on statements made by several good friends of Osama bin Laden -- that the US should expect an internal terrorist strike, I am pleased to see police surveillance cameras at a number of sites around my neighborhood.
The cameras are positioned around subway stations and a commercial strip of stores surrounding one of the two subway stations near me.
The cops are not recording images of breakfast, lunch and dinner or other activities underway inside nearby homes. Just movements in public places that have experienced crime such as muggings and purse snatchings.
You seem to equate police interest with oppression. Police activities are oppressive in places like Cuba and North Korea and Myanmar, but life in those countries is life under the thumb of real oppressors.
Let me know when you find someone who's been arrested, prosecuted, convicted and sentenced for a terrorist crime he or she did not commit.
Fran, thank you for this. As usual, you do your part to bring awareness to important issues (like nonviolent dissent). I will check out that movie.
Have you read Ettie Hillesum's book, An Interruped Life? It is beautiful--very, very beautiful.
one of the reasons i blog is to learn and to share and to have what may seem to be a lost art in our society... discourse. the exchange of ideas and opinions. while most of the blogs i visit and the bloggers that visit me are of a similar mindset, we are far from cookie cutter versions of each other.
it seems a pity to me that someone with such strong opinions as yours does not have their own blog. beyond that, you don't even seem to have, likely by choice, a google id so that we might know a bit about you. is there a reason for all the subterfuge?
you left a comment on my blog saying that you worked in the WTC. I am very sorry to hear that you experienced that. i myself was in nyc that day, although in midtown. i can not imagine what you might have seen.
also, you have a lot of opinions about israel, the middle east and muslims. i am wondering if you have ever been there? as i mentioned before i have been there two times. while i am not jewish, my father was. i have many jewish relatives here and there. i have no question about the right for israel to exist.
by the same token, i have learned in my own life that all or nothing propositions tend to leave one with nothing. as a result, i can not support either the unilateral unquestioning support of israel. nor can i support the unilateral dislike/distrust of all muslims.
the reason the nazi party and any other despotic evil regime ever succeeded was because they used fear to get people to buy into one common enemy.
as a result, jews were thought of a evil, less than and worth destroying. your own attitudes towards muslims seems shockingly similar to that and i wonder how you feel about it.
cold, rational thought and not any of my other urgings tells me that it is impossible for an entire people to be "bad".
if you have some proof of otherwise, do let me know.
i am sorry that you seem to be so angry and that you want to lash out. i am wondering what brings you to our blogs when you know that we do not share your opinions and ideas.
i have no need or desire to change your mind one bit. please respect that this is still a free country and we all get to have our own thoughts and opinions.
in case you are wondering, i will close by saying that i grew up in a very violent and abusive household. remember that jewish father i told you about?
my life could have gone in any number of directions. i could hate all men. i could hate all jews. i could just hate everyone for the evil i suffered at his hands, physically and mentally.
years of anguish finally brought me to a place where i found that the only real peace and healing was to let go of my anger and revenge. don't let this short paragraph fool you into thinking that was a short or easy journey. in fact the journey is not over and the imprint of it is burned upon my soul for all time.
it has been long and hard and i am deeply grateful that that is the fork in the road that i chose.
i normally do not discuss this as it does not make me an "expert" of any sort, it is just who i am. don't pity me and don't stare at me. i simply will try to respect all who treat me with even a modicum of respect, which is all i ask.
the reason i bring it up here is to say that your ways of fighting evil and oppression are very different than my own. and peace to you for that.
all i know is that the path i am on today is rich, varied and even when painful(as it often is) it is always one of possibility and not of hate.
that is why i have and hold the attitudes that i do. hate and violence must stop at some point and for me that point is in my heart.
for the record i am cross-posting this comment at Blognonymous where you also left a comment.
peace to all
Thanks for the post.
Wonderful.
Ri
franiam, you wrote:
"...you don't even seem to have, likely by choice, a google id so that we might know a bit about you. is there a reason for all the subterfuge?"
Subterfuge? I see. You think I'm hiding something. Interesting.
You wrote:
"also, you have a lot of opinions about israel, the middle east and muslims."
Yes I do.
You asked:
"i am wondering if you have ever been there?"
Why? Would it matter?
You wrote:
"by the same token, i have learned in my own life that all or nothing propositions tend to leave one with nothing."
You prefer the half-baked? The wishy-washy? Appeasement?
YOu wrote:
"...as a result, i can not support either the unilateral unquestioning support of israel. nor can i support the unilateral dislike/distrust of all muslims."
I didn't think it was possible to miss the entire picture with such ease. But you did it.
There are roughly 1.3 BILLION muslims in the world. Virtually NONE of them would stand up in support of Israel's right to exist. If muslims were asked to vote on the continued existence of Israel, they would vote against it. There is no voice in the islamic world that supports Israel. Not a peep. Nothing.
No islamic government supports Israel, though Egypt and Jordan have acknowledged its existence. Most islamic governments provide financial support to terrorists seeking to destroy Israel. The moron so-called palestinians elected a terrorist entity into the government.
The islamic world has shown over and over its hate for Israel and Jews. Virtually all 1.3 billion muslims would prefer a world without Israel. Yet you fail to recognize and measure what this means.
One point three billion muslims want a world without Israel and five million Israeli Jews along with 10 million Jews elsewhere in the world want to see the country live on. Of course there are even a few Jews who disapprove of Israel.
Nevertheless, it's the world's 1.3 billion muslims against the world's 15 million Jews. When we focus on the territory itself, we see a country of 5 million Jews and 1.5 million muslims surrounded by muslim countries with far larger populations that have launched terrorist campaigns and wars against Israel since 1948.
You don't get the picture. The muslims have declared that only one outcome will satisfy them. Them = muslim governments and muslim citizens.
You wrote:
"the reason the nazi party and any other despotic evil regime ever succeeded was because they used fear to get people to buy into one common enemy."
You've got to be kidding? Nazi propaganda was built on the belief that aryans were superior. Meanwhile, the Jews were portrayed as physcially weak but clever people who depended on deceit to gain advantages. No one feared Jews. On the contrary, the propaganda developed hatred for Jews. But not fear of them.
You wrote:
"...as a result, jews were thought of a evil, less than and worth destroying."
The preceding is accurate.
You wrote:
"...your own attitudes towards muslims seems shockingly similar to that and i wonder how you feel about it."
I challenge you to find one sentence, one word or one instance in which I expressed a desire to destroy all muslims.
You seem rather naive on this topic. You ought to wake up to the fact that entire populations can accept totally false beliefs. It happens every day. On the most obvious level, anyone who accepts and believes the contents of the Bible -- both testaments -- or the koran has demonstrated beyond any doubt that he/she will embrace total fantasies and lacks the capacity for reason.
You wrote:
"...cold, rational thought and not any of my other urgings tells me that it is impossible for an entire people to be "bad"."
Guess again. And wake up. Germans believed that Jews were objectionable people whose existence was bad for the world. German citizens did not oppose the extermination of Jews. Obviously ALMOST ALL Germans felt nothing for Jews.
What's troubling is your inability to grasp the obvious. The German government was conducting genocide and the genocide was no secret. In other words, almost all Germans accepted the murder of millions of Jews. Were those Germans bad? What makes today's muslims different? Today's muslims want what Germans wanted in the years of the Third Reich.
Do we presume today's Germans would resume the genocide begun by hitler, if given the chance? Of course not. But the Germans of the Third Reich were more than willing to let it happen.
Would muslims -- who joined forces with the nazis in WWII, by the way -- would they pick up where the nazis left off? Obviously the answer is yes.
Fortunately, muslims are incompetent at everything except making a mess of their own societies.
Try this on for size. The religion of islam does not believe in pluralism. And to make the point, muslims establish islamic governments that form laws against the practice of other religions in their lands.
What more could muslims do to express their antipathy, hate, dislike, animus and rebuke for those who do not subject themselves to the same koranic idiocy?
You asked:
"...if you have some proof of otherwise, do let me know."
Proof of muslims' hate for all things non-muslim is as abundant as sunshine. I suppose there are some tolerant muslims in this world. But they do not raise a banner to declare themselves.
Yet in the US, there are many people who side with the palestinians in their efforts to destroy Israel. The supporters of the palestinians include Christians and Jews.
And there are many people who support Israel. However, I have never met a muslim who sides with Israel on the issue of the palestinians, or any other issue.
You wrote:
"in case you are wondering, i will close by saying that i grew up in a very violent and abusive household. remember that jewish father i told you about?"
Is this why you fear the existence of dominant powers in the world?
You wrote:
"my life could have gone in any number of directions. i could hate all men."
Well, that's the feminist position.
or:
"i could hate all jews."
That's the scapegoat anti-Semitic postions.
or:
"i could just hate everyone for the evil i suffered at his hands, physically and mentally."
The misanthropic view. But not one of them addresses your reality.
You seem to suggest you deserve approval for letting all mankind, then all men and finally, all Jews, off the hook for the misfortunes you suffered at the hands of one person, who appears to have been of questionable mental stability.
You wrote:
"years of anguish finally brought me to a place where i found that the only real peace and healing was to let go of my anger and revenge."
It's a good thing you reached this better plane of existence. But it has nothing to do with the fact that the US and the West face serious problems stemming from the ambitions of the muslim world.
You wrote:
"don't let this short paragraph fool you into thinking that was a short or easy journey."
Why would I be fooled? Some parents have succeeded in subjecting their kids to a lifetime of misery, even long after those parents have departed. I know too many people who blame every misfortune in their lives on their parents.
You wrote:
"in fact the journey is not over and the imprint of it is burned upon my soul for all time."
Everyone is a product of Nature and Nurture. What else is there? One has no choice but to play the hand one has been dealt.
You wrote:
"it has been long and hard and i am deeply grateful that that is the fork in the road that i chose."
Well, that's good. Though it seems as though you expect someone to challenge your claim.
You wrote:
"the reason i bring it up here is to say that your ways of fighting evil and oppression are very different than my own."
Have evil or oppression ever succumbed to peaceful opposition? No. Of course, in a democracy we have the capacity to do away with bad aspects of life at the ballot box. However, we did have to kick England's ass to get the democratic ball rolling. And the North did have to kick the South's ass to end slavery when the ballot box wasn't powerful enough. But we managed. And the Republic survived. We stitched it back together and changed permanently for the better.
You wrote:
"all i know is that the path i am on today is rich, varied and even when painful(as it often is) it is always one of possibility and not of hate."
Good for you. But what about those billion people who see things differently -- I mean muslims, among others? Do you pretend they don't exist?
You wrote:
"hate and violence must stop at some point and for me that point is in my heart."
When imams, who are paid by their islamic governments, stop preaching hate for all non-muslims, that might mark the start of better times. But as long as muslim societies maintain their anti-West propaganda machines, your hate-free world will not arrive.
In case you haven't noticed, no Christian or Jew has cut the head off a muslim in the US, or anywhere else. Despite the brutal slaughter of 9/11, there has been no anti-muslim vigilantism in the US.
On the other hand, 1,000 Americans were murdered by muslims BEFORE 9/11.
Therefore, if you want to conduct conflict resolution seminars, you'd better start booking venues in the middle east, where all the freedom-hating muslim dogmatists circulate their madness.
Wow. Such a long-winded discourse with not one attributable fact included in the diatribe.
Each and every point you bring up is disputable. Beheading? Are you talking about Nick Berg? Can you exlain why Berg was wearing a US issue prison uniform? Can you explain why, as he is beheaded on the cameras, that there is no blood? Nobody knows for sure what happened to Berg, but what you did not see on that camera was the the beheading of that young man. Are you talking about Daniel Pearl? Why were there no sanctions against Pakistan? Why is Pakistan an ally?
Why do both Marianne Pearl and Michael Berg side with the views of Fran and not you?
Michael Berg: "I feel doubly bad, though, because Zarqawi is also a political figure, and his death will re-ignite yet another wave of revenge, and revenge is something that I do not follow, that I do want ask for, that I do not wish for against anybody. And it can't end the cycle. As long as people use violence to combat violence, we will always have violence"
Marianne Pearl: Building bridges through dialogue also was one of Daniel Pearl's natural instincts and one of the couple's shared passions, his wife said. In a CNN interview on Jan. 31, she made the first of several appeals to the kidnappers to release her husband, calling him a ''gentle'' person who wanted to help break down political and religious barriers in Pakistan.
''We are two people who met and fell in love because we have the same ideal, you know,'' she said in that interview. ``All of my life, all of his life and our life together is just a big effort to try to create dialogue between civilizations.''
The current laws in our country do not allow us to know how many citizens have been arrested, deported, tortured or killed because in most cases it is illegal to let anyone know.
Is it just beheading that you are opposed to? What about the tales of "rape rooms" that no one in your neocon speakers' committee brings up anymore? Mostly because we are the operators of those rape rooms. And there are children there.
There is incontrovertable proof that Jose Padilla was tortured. We don't know the numbers of innocents killed at Abu Ghraib, but those numbers include children.
3 million (at least) Iraqis have been displaced and are refugees. Our treatment of the Iraqis has eclipsed that of the people of Darfur by the Sudanese government. And for what? The Lancet number of dead, just so you know, is a number that says how much higher the death rate is under the current occupation than it was under the sanctions during the regime of Saddam Hussein.
We have no idea how many Iraqis have died trying to leave the country.
Here in our own country a woman was killed by overzealous security guards at Phoenix Skyway Airport. How did that action prevent a terrorist attack?
You even expose your own lie of concern about the prevention of terrorist attacks in your statement
based on statements made by several good friends of Osama bin Laden -- that the US should expect an internal terrorist strike, I am pleased to see police surveillance cameras at a number of sites around my neighborhood. But then go on to admit that the cameras are in places to prevent domestic crime.
And the wiretapping is being done ala Nixon to spy on those this administration believes to be its enemies. Like Quakers.
Fran asked you whether you have ever traveled to any predominantly muslim countries because if you had that might give you some legitimacy in your claims. However, you haven't and you don't have a clue what you are talking about. Your entire opus is a regurgitation of the talking points of fear the right likes to employ. There is but the smallest fraction of militarized muslims, but we are doing our best to create more, through our own ethnic cleansing of shiites in Iraq. (Shiites - the ones who were going to greet us with flowers and chocolates. Hmmm)
Ahmadinejad wants to 'wipe Israel off the planet'? Hates all Jews? Sorry, that's not true. There are jews living in Iran. There is exactly ONE in Afghanistan - supposedly liberated by us. The 'wipe Israel' comment, just so you know, was a quote originally uttered by the Ayatollah Khomeini - the guy your friends North and Reagan traded arms for hostages with- in the early 1980's. Further, what was said was that the zionist regime would collapse. Ahmadinejad went on to say that evil regimes collapse - like the Soviet Union, though no one would have believed that possible a few years earlier.
You are simply a small-minded poorly informed person who actually believes his own fear is his strength. You were wrong five years ago. You are wrong today. You and people who think like you are directly responsible for the end of the US' term as the sole global superpower.
You've given us away to the Chinese through your small-minded petty limited beliefs. And that is alot more serious than the terrorist threat.
Saw this this morning, thought you might be interested, no-slappz:
Two U.S. Special Forces soldiers took part in the execution of an Afghani who was suspected of leading an insurgent group.
Though the Afghani, identified as Nawab Buntangyar, responded to questions and offered no resistance when encountered on Oct. 13, 2006, he was shot dead by Master Sgt. Troy Anderson on orders from his superior officer, Capt. Dave Staffel.
According to evidence at the Fort Bragg proceedings, an earlier Army investigation had cleared the two soldiers because they had been operating under “rules of engagement” that empowered them to kill individuals who have been designated “enemy combatants,” even if the targets were unarmed and presented no visible threat.
Yet, whatever the higher-ups approve as “rules of engagement,” the practice of murdering unarmed suspects remains a violation of the laws of war and – theoretically at least – would open up the offending country’s chain of command to war-crimes charges.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/100107.html
jess wundrun, you wrote:
"Fran asked you whether you have ever traveled to any predominantly muslim countries because if you had that might give you some legitimacy in your claims. However, you haven't and you don't have a clue what you are talking about."
Like most nitwits, you created something out of nothing. She asked if I had ever traveled to that part of the world and I gave no answer.
In your foolish and confident way of reaching the wrong conclusion, you assumed the absence of an answer was equivalent to "no."
Too bad for you. I've been there.
As for your claim that my pronouncements are disputable. Well, I suppose we might quibble over the number of non-muslims who were decapitated by muslims.
But there is no doubt the Nick Berg, Daniel Pearl and a number of others had their heads cut off by the practitioners of that "religion of peace."
You, however, are concerned with the quality of islamic political/murder theater. Nick Berg may well have been dead when the video was made. But there's no doubt his head was cut off.
Daniel Pearl too. His head was cut off and held aloft by his decapitator.
As for the statements from Iran, the fact that threats against Israel were made by Ayatollah Khomeini and repeated by Ahmadenijad only reinforces the obvious fact that muslims seek the destruction of Israel and the deaths of all Jews.
It's remarkable that you deny the statements that muslims themselves don't deny.
You wrote:
"The current laws in our country do not allow us to know how many citizens have been arrested, deported, tortured or killed because in most cases it is illegal to let anyone know."
Utter nonsense. There isn't a newspaper or media venue in the US that would miss the chance to report every number you suggest is knowledge of an illegal nature.
You're a fool and a dupe if you believe what you've written. People who have been deported, tortured or arrested have no reason to keep their mouths shut. Reporters are looking for them and would report on them whether they were willing to speak to the press or not. The dead, of course, can't speak. But friends and relatives can.
Meanwhile, thousands of muslims who had been living in a large muslim community in Brooklyn, near me, left the country after 9/11. Why? Because they were illegal aliens suddenly of interest to the FBI and the INS. The population of the muslim community had been around 75,000 or 80,000 before 9/11. After the exodus, it declined to probably 55,000 or 60,000.
The FBI has nailed a number of muslims for sending money to middle-east terrorist groups.
The presence of the large muslim population is the primary reason for the surveillance cameras around the two subway stations near my house. The fact that some common street crime occurs around these stations contributed to the reason for the recent placement of the cameras. But mainly the cameras were mounted around the subway stations because they are major sites of departure and arrival for large numbers of muslims from the nearby community.
Your Homeland Security funds at work.
As for China and the economic forces at work -- you have no idea what you're quacking about.
Once again, an entire diatribe with out a single reference, or ability to back up your statements with facts. Why am I not surprised?
You use the beheadings of Berg and Pearl to your own ends and completely miss the points being made. (1)Michael Berg and Marianne Pearl are as diametrically opposed to your opinion as they could possibly be. Fran agrees with them. (2) No one knows who killed Berg. Pearl was killed in a country that is supposed to be an ally, and is still harboring bin Ladin. Why?
Like most of your conservative brethren, you seem to think that name-calling suffices for debate and can actually substitute for facts.
Many middle-eastern and asian foreigners of all religions were deported in the aftermath of 9/11. This does not mean they were guilty of anything. Some were the spouses of American citizens. Some were on track for citizenship. Immigration lawyers did not know how to counsel these people. Others without access to adequate representation were simply deported. From this you assume guilt. You can't prove any of it.
You make this statement: "...that muslims seek the destruction of Israel and the deaths of all Jews." and attribute your proof of that to statements by Ahmadenijad and Khomeini. (Khomeini - Oliver North's friend, remember?)
There are 20,000 jews in Iran. They have parliamentary representation. Ahmedinajad's statement was akin to wanting 'regime change' in Israel. Where, oh where, have he heard the term 'regime change' used?
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/09/24/ahmadinejad/
This is the funniest (odd) statement I think I have ever read:
"People who have been deported, tortured or arrested have no reason to keep their mouths shut." Really? Because they would no longer be afraid of torture? Are you insane? So if you haven't heard of them they don't exist. If they are in the media then what?
How about the case of Maher Arar,.." a Canadian citizen [who was] born in Syria in 1970, came to Canada in 1987. After earning bachelor's and master's degrees in computer engineering, Arar worked in Ottawa as a telecommunications engineer.
On a stopover in New York as he was returning to Canada from a vacation in Tunisia in September 2002, U.S. officials detained Arar, claiming he has links to al-Qaeda, and deported him to Syria, even though he was carrying a Canadian passport.
When Arar returned to Canada more than a year later, he said he had been tortured during his incarceration and accused American officials of sending him to Syria knowing that they practise torture."
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/arar/
Jose Padilla wasn't allowed to consult a lawyer for or even let his family know where he was. That he was tortured is not disputed. He was an American citizen who was declared by the president to be an "enemy combatant". In that one simple decision, every 'inalienable' right he had was removed without the benefit of jurisprudence. Your naivete is astounding.
These are not isolated incidents. But they are the most famous. Only a handful of those held at Guantanamo have been charged. It is estimated that upon capture, 90% were innocent.
If the government decides that you have information on your neighbor or business client or library patron you have to produce it. If you tell your neighbor et. al. you can be held as a material witness under gag order. This is done without warrant under National Security Letters.
http://www.library.yale.edu/~llicense/ListArchives/0212/msg00070.html
Nice rebuttal on China, by the way. Were you simply afraid to open that can of worms, or have you by now realized that all you have parading itself as "information" is irrational hate fueled by right wing talkies?
Seriously, one fact or attribution might buttress your case. Please go back through your comments and you will find that all you've got is an irrational hatred of muslims.
I understand that I will never get you to expand your limited cognitive abilities. That you will always rest your case on the side of hate and not information. I hardly care what you think, and I am heartened that you are in the distinct minority in this country. I just replied because your bullshit should not go unchallenged.
I am done.
jess wundrun, you wrote:
"You use the beheadings of Berg and Pearl to your own ends and completely miss the points being made."
Well I certainly agree that a point was made by the worldwide release of the beheading videos produced by the people who appear to be your favorite murderers.
You babbled:
"(1)Michael Berg and Marianne Pearl are as diametrically opposed to your opinion as they could possibly be. Fran agrees with them."
So what? The world is full of people with self-defeating opinions, views and principles. Michael Berg and Marianne Pearl have my sympathies for their losses. But their views on the bigger picture are foolish to idiotic.
You went off the deep end with:
"(2) No one knows who killed Berg."
Yeah. And no one knows who killed OJ's ex-wife and Ron Goldman. The exact identity of Berg's murderers isn't important. He was beheaded for an international audience. Maybe you are fantasizing that some remorseful non-muslim will one day break down and admit he was paid by the CIA to decapitate an already dead Berg to stir anti-muslim sentiments in the West. Is that it?
You jabbered:
"Pearl was killed in a country that is supposed to be an ally, and is still harboring bin Ladin. Why?"
Gee whiz. With logic as ridiculous as yours, I suppose you do believe OJ when he says he didn't kill his ex-wife and Ron Goldman.
How do you explain murders in other countries that are our allies? Like suicide bombings of Jews in Israel by palestinians? Based on your comments, you are implying there is no anti-West or anti-American sentiments among muslims because, well, because Pakistan is our ally.
The Soviet Union was our allly in WWII. How did Stalin ever manage to kill 30 million of his citizens if his nation was allied with ours?
In your own lunatic fashion, you made my point when you copied my statement and responded:
""People who have been deported, tortured or arrested have no reason to keep their mouths shut." Really? Because they would no longer be afraid of torture? Are you insane?...
And:
"How about the case of Maher Arar...On a stopover in New York as he was returning to Canada...U.S. officials detained Arar,...and deported him to Syria,...When Arar returned to Canada more than a year later, he said he had been tortured..."
Like I said, and you have agreed, people talk to the press. Or did you receive this information about Arar through your tin-foil hat?
Moreover, you have no idea what's true or false in this situation.
The you gabbled about:
"Jose Padilla..."
Ah, the omnipresent Jose. And you followed that with your groundless claim that:
"These are not isolated incidents. But they are the most famous."
Actually, they are isolated and you have no data to support any other conclusion. You depend on the usual nonsense of your crowd, which is Proof by Assertion. You think if you repeat Arar's name and Jose's name enough times, the repititions will add up to something.
In your paranoia, you quivered:
"If the government decides that you have information on your neighbor or business client or library patron you have to produce it. If you tell your neighbor et. al. you can be held as a material witness under gag order. This is done without warrant under National Security Letters."
Funny thing about these letters. The Post Office must be up to its usual operating efficiency. Because no one seems to have received them. On the other hand, if you have evidence that some people have received them, then we can conclude that people were not honoring the silly gag rule.
You fall for the simplest logical traps. You are claiming that because there is no evidence that such letters have been received, that is proof that they have, in fact, been received. You have been sucked into the game of disproving a negative.
However, you can be sure investigations have been undertaken into the activities of muslim mosques and their fundraising activities. One near me was busted for sending $20 million to middle-east terrorist organizations. I suppose the imam got a letter. But it's more likely he got a personal visit.
Regarding China, you wrote:
"Nice rebuttal on China, by the way. Were you simply afraid to open that can of worms, or have you by now realized that all you have parading itself as "information" is irrational hate fueled by right wing talkies?"
I fully support our relations with China and the fact that China, whether it wants to or not, is becoming a capitalist state, which will eventually evolve into a democratic capitalist state.
There seems to be something about China that you fear. Too bad. Despite its many flaws, it is moving in a better direction than other centrally-planned economies -- and that's what matters most.
I don't know if you are one of the screwballs who believes the US should steer clear of China, but whether you are or not does not matter. The US will continue to engage China and attempt to nudge it along the road to freedom and prosperity.
The muslim world should pull its head out of the koran and learn something about prosperity from China and other nations capable of providing instruction. Virtually any path is better than the path most muslim nations are on.
You should take notice of the fact that the muslim world produces NOTHING of world-class quality. Its only significant export is oil. And the entire oil industry is managed by non-muslims.
No-slappz:
Nice completely unhinged diatribe. Still not one fact to back up your assertions. Not one.
Can we expect one anytime soon?
You believe allowing China and Saudi Arabia to hold our debt to pay for our misadventure in the middle east is making us stronger? That statement alone shows incredible ignorance of the situation in the Caspian sea where the real geo-political turmoil is shaping up the fact that deficits do matter, and the erosion of the US dollar. Not to mention the shift away from US dollars toward other currencies vis petrodollars. . Not that I'd have expected less from you, junior.
Thanks for playing.
Oh, and as for "logical traps" your rhetoric seems to imply that what we don't hear about in the media can't possibly happen. Therefore it doesn't. Odd. That's a cognitive dissonance that most 6 year olds are able to recover from.
We know that rendition flights happen. I gave you more proof above of US soldiers executing innocents.
Now you deny National Security Letters? You can read the Patriot Act parts I and II if you need to be further informed of material witnesses injunction against speaking.
Here's another quote:
I was one of four library colleagues who challenged an NSL [National Security Letter] in the courts around the time of its reauthorization. We were under a gag order because of the nondisclosure provision of the NSL section of the Patriot Act. This happened even though a judge with high-level security clearance had declared that there was no risk in identifying us as recipients of an NSL. We were therefore not allowed to testify to Congress about our experience with the letters - which seek information, without court review, on people like library users. It is more than irksome to now discover that the attorney general was giving Congress false information - at the same time that we recipients of NSLs were not allowed to express our concerns
http://www.librarian.net/?cat=12
You still have nothing but name calling. You could save yourself some time and just post your last sentence. It is all you got, and you've proven Fran right from the start.
jess wundrun, you wrote:
"Still not one fact to back up your assertions."
I see. I gather "factness" is defined by you.
Like I said, the muslim world manufactures NOTHING on a world-class scale. World-class reflects quality. Like I said, the only export product is oil, and even that is produced and exported mainly by the labors of non-muslims.
As for comments on other topics, your claims have zero credibility despite your assertions.
As for the purchase and sale of US debt, well, it's a free market out there. In case, you didn't know, that means anyone who chooses to buy US Treasury Securities is welcome to do so.
I gather you fear a sudden dump of those securities. Well, that won't happen -- for a lot of reasons. Among them is the fact that an unloading would do more harm to the countries unloading than the US. It is a two-way street. But the street runs more in our favor than the other way around.
You wrote:
"We know that rendition flights happen. I gave you more proof above of US soldiers executing innocents."
So what? By the way, you gave nothing that constitutes "proof" of anything more than it appears an incident worthy of investigation occurred. If we learn that two people were unlawfully murdered, a couple of members of the US military may suffer the consequences.
If only there were similar levels of rectitude extant in other countries of this world.
You chortled on:
"Now you deny National Security Letters? You can read the Patriot Act parts I and II if you need to be further informed of material witnesses injunction against speaking."
I know they exist. And it's equally obvious no one feels terribly threatened by any of these federal threats, as your following quote shows:
"I was one of four library colleagues who challenged an NSL [National Security Letter] in the courts around the time of its reauthorization. We were under a gag order...
Yeah. I'm gagging. Once again, if this information didn't come to you from the press whose members were quoting these unfortunated "gagged" people, where did it come from?
The New York Times is ravenous for stories of people who've been placed under the government's thumb by gag orders or other acts of suppression.
But, the good old NY Times, which is happy as it can be to print information about the methods some of our investigators use to track money flowing overseas to terrorist organizations has had noticably little luck turning up stories of renditions and illegal deportations.
That's not to say no mistakes have been made. But it's clear the government is not at war with its citizens. However, it appears you will believe anything.
Here's a pleasant fact for you. About 1,000 Americans were murdered by muslims from 1968 to September 10, 2001.
The death toll due to muslim terrorism worldwide over the same period is many multiples of the US toll.
An entire post of feelings.
Not. One. Fact. Presented.
Nice try.
That shit flies at LGF - I suggest you go back there and leave the factual debates for grown-ups.
slappz, why don't you head over to e pleeb neesta where they seem to enjoy your company? seriously, why do you even want to truck with us?
you don't agree with us and we don't agree with you. which would be fine if you wanted to have some kind of intellectual or rational conversation instead of your hateful diatribes, but no- rational not so much.
you have blogs both left and right wing deserving resepct on your own un-written for 2 years blog. maybe you should take that up again.
i mean i can't stop you from coming here but i can tell you this is the last you will ever hear from me.
you are tiresome, angry and boring. please go be with your own kind. the rest of us have better things to do. you can insult me all you want on my real estate, but honestly please leave my guests alone.
that is all.
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