And let’s not let Prime Minister Sharon off the hook here either. I really cannot understaned where he’s coming from on this.

The only theory I can contrive, which essentially echoes your last paragraph, is that Sharon realizes all too well where this will go — that the ‘Palestinians’ will not give up on terror and that Hamas and others may even increase their deadly work, giving Sharon the right to say, “See, here’s what happens when we try…”

But this makes little sense. I would think that Barak’s 2000 offer, and all that followed should be sufficient, as if bringing in one of Arafat’s long-time henchmen would make any difference.

So what’s up here? Why is Sharon using term like “occupation?” And why is he going along with this crazy scheme against the positions of his own party?

I don’t know what’s happening with Sharon. For him suddenly to start using—four times in a single paragraph—the language of his enemies certainly indicates that more is afoot here than his just playing a negotiating game in order to stay in step with the U.S. It suggests some loosening of the strings of his mind, much as occurred with that “tough old soldier” Yitzak Rabin when he embarked on the Oslo process. In an almost perfect symbolic expression of the folly into which he had fallen and into which he had led Israel, Rabin on the night he was assassinated had just left a peace rally in Jerusalem where he had been singing John Lennonesque peace songs; a song sheet was in his jacket when he was shot.

Of course the Israel haters are rubbing their hands in gleeful anticipation when they see Sharon speak of “occupation.”

The only plausible excuse I can think of for Sharon is that he talks before he thinks, and he’s heard and seen that word “occupation” so many times that it sounds normal to him. He was a better general than he is a politician. As to his accepting the road map, probably he’s relying too heavily on American assurances. Although I’m a fierce patriot, I don’t think that’s wise, in view of both history and the occasional divergences between the two nations’ concerns.

I think Bush is easier to explain. He’s subject to two illusions, in my opinion. The first is that most Palestinian Arabs want a state of their own and that if they can get it they’re prepared to live in peace with Israel. Wrong. They do want a state of their own, but it extends from the Jordan to the Mediterranean. They also interpret every “peace” plan emanating from Washington as a reward for their massacres of Jews. Surely some of Bush’s advisers have pointed out these facts to him, but I’ve also been told by people who’ve observed firsthand that once Bush makes up his mind on some issue it’s unchangeable. That isn’t always a good trait.

The second illusion is that the Arab psychology is the same as ours. It isn’t. We compromise and settle an issue at a point between the two starting points. They see compromise as weakness. They see all Israeli compromises to date as invitations to press for more. Each step of “progress” in the atrociously misnamed “peace process” has been followed at once by more massacres, in the hope (so far justified) that more good-will gestures will be forthcoming.

There are two phrases that are thoughtlessly bandied about and that deserve to be exposed as misleading. One is “confidence-building move.” Ostensibly the Israelis should try to show their good will toward the Arabs. Anyone who uses that phrase doesn’t realize that what makes the Arabs hate the Jews isn’t a deficit of confidence. The second is that “Israel must take risks for peace.” No it mustn’t. If Israel loses just one war, it goes out of existence, whereas if its enemies lose one war they live to fight again. That asymmetry in risks dictates that Israel take NO risk for peace. What risks it has taken have led to more war and more massacres. I fear that Bush doesn’t understand these elementary facts, even though I’m sure that Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and a few other of his top advisers do.

Curious, Shawn’s anti-catholic bigotry is ok, but criticism of Zionism earns a deletion. Someone just flew his colors and they weren’t American colors.

Let’s see if this post also earns deletion.

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030609&s=khalidi

I deleted Jacob’s earlier postings of articles because at least one of them looked like an atrocity story dating from the time of Israel’s founding in the late 1940s, and thus was both offensive in itself and completely unrelated to the subject of the current thread which is the “road map.” People such as Jacob attack “Zionism,” when what they really mean is that they they want the state of Israel to cease to exist. Such people have nothing to contribute to a discussion of the Israel-Paletinian “peace process,” since that process assumes the legitimacy of the Jewish state, while the anti-Zionists, by their very name, deny that legitimacy. All they have is a standing diatribe against Israel that they are ready to launch anywhere, anytime. This is not a place for that.

I would have written to Jacob earlier to explain the deletion, but he conceals his e-mail address.

And on the subject of Shawn: In the midst of an ongoing discussion, Shawn, a valued participant here, made some harsh statements about the Catholic Church that several other contributors, including me, strongly objected to. He was not, like Jacob, simply coming out of the blue linking articles unrelated to the subject at hand in order to express some bias.

Biased? Hardly, unless you mean biased toward decency and favor of my own country, not Israel.

Nor was it completely unrelated since the topic is Sharon’s use of the word occupation, with the primary effect of the occupation being settlements and suppression.

Israel as a nation may have a right to exist, but it doesn’t have the right to err at the expense of the lives, liberty, happiness, and blood of men women and children.

http://www.mondediplo.com/focus/mideast/question-3-2-2

I don’t think Frieda and others have much to worry about since the Likudites have little desire for peace or decency.

“Curious, Shawn’s anti-catholic bigotry is ok”

Ok let me get this one out of the way.

I do not consider myself an anti-Catholic bigot. I am a traditionalist Protestant, and this naturally means I have a different view of some issues than a Catholic will, especially regarding the states relationship to the Vatican. Having a Protestatnt informed view does not make me a bigot.

I am however a sinner before God, and at times I have said things which are ill-informed, ignorant, and based on a faulty understanding of the issue. My comments regarding the relationship between Catholicism and the Nazis fall into this category.

Partly because of that exchange I have been researching the issue on my own, as well as talking to Catholic friends of mine, one of whom is an amatuer scholar of WW2, and based on what I have learned I see clearly that my former opinion was totally wrong, and based on ignorance.

I therefore retract those comments and unreservedly and offer my apolgies to all the Catholics who post at VFR, especially if my comments caused pain and offence.

If I have learnt anything from this, it is that it is foolish to offer opinions on subjects that one is not familiar with. Pride, or in this case ignorance, goeth before a fall.

Ignorance however does not make me a bigot. I do naturally oppose those who wish to turn my country into a purely Catholic nation, as some here have argued for, http://www.counterrevolution.net/cgi-bin/mb/messages/17.shtml,
but that also does not make me a bigot.
I have a great deal of respect for Catholic spirituality, I was for many years a great fan and supporter of Patrick Buchanans, and I have happily marched side by side with Catholics at anti-abortion protests. I will work with anyone, Catholic or Jewish, who is a patriot and commited to the preservation of the Republic.

Why would anyone link to an article in an anti-Christian left wing rag like the Nation?

“Israel as a nation may have a right to exist, but it doesn’t have the right to err at the expense of the lives, liberty, happiness, and blood of men women and children.”

Israel does have the right to self-defence. The Israeli’s offered the “Palestinians” an extremely generous peace deal. Arafat rejected it in favour of terrorism. On that basis alone, Israel is morally justified in defending itself against the PLO, HAMAS, Hizballah, and Islamic Jihad. With the exception of elements within the PLO, none of the above terrorist groups recognise the right of Israel to exist at all. Surrounded by such enemies, and faced with such morally repugnant and cowardly tactics such as suicide bombings, Israel’s purely defensive military actions are understandable.

Somewhere I heard the pithy remark which to me sums this issue up: anti-Semitism is hatred of Jews, while anti-zionism is hatred of Jews who defend themselves.

Shawn dont apologize. I tired of being called an anti-Catholic bigot just for disagreeing with Catholic politics and doctrine elsewhere. I left the RCC a year ago. It is interesting to me that those who shout “Anti-Catholic” bigot are using the same technique of the left, calling anyone who questions certain beliefs a bigot!

I remember years ago reading in Bible Prophecy books how America would one day betray Israel. I consider that happening now. For those who are amillenialists, I know you do not see things the same way but many things are coming together.

Victoria, I think Shawn was apologizing for a position he took several weeks ago that Catholicism was responsible in some way for the rise of the Nazi regime in Germany - a smear against Catholicism that has been advanced by Daniel Goldhagen and taken up by leftists - not for disagreeing with Catholic doctrine. I was among those here who chastised him for repeating that vicious smear - and I’m not a Catholic. The Catholics who post on this blog are what a former pastor referred to as “God-fearing Catholics” (in contrast to the Ted Kennedy kind).

“Israel does have the right to self-defence.”
Did I say otherwise? Nor did I, as your post implies, attempt to defend the indefensible Palestinian attacks on men, women and children.

To paraphrase Lawrence Auster,
People, like Shawn, who twist the argument and substitute in terrorism when ever settlements are mentioned, prove by this substitution that settlements are indefensible, but support their barbarism none the less. Such people have nothing to contribute to a discussion of the Israel-Paletinian “peace process,” since that process assumes the palestinians right life, liberty, and happiness, while the Likudites, by their very arguments, deny those rights. All they have is a standing diatribe against Palestinians that they are ready to launch anywhere, anytime. This should not be a place for that.

“Why would anyone link to an article in an anti-Christian left wing rag like the Nation?”
Truth is where you find it.

“Somewhere I heard the pithy remark which to me sums this issue up: anti-Semitism is hatred of Jews, while anti-zionism is hatred of Jews who defend themselves.”
A better remark is anti-Semitism used to mean hatred of Jews, but now means those who are hated for putting America before Israel. Anti-Zionism means those who are hated for putting Palestinians on the same level of humanity as Israeli citizens.

Jacob denies that he denies Israel’s right of self-defense. But Jacob attacks Zionism. Zionism is the movement that created and has maintained the Jewish state. So an anti-Zionist is a person who denies the legitimacy of Israel’s existence; therefore he denies Israel’s right of self-defense as well. Therefore he has no place in any discussion of the peace process. He is an enemy of Israel, period.

As to whether people on our side are engaging in a similar hypocrisy, speaking for myself I’ve been completely against the peace process from the start, so I can’t be accused of hypocritically involving myself in discussions about how to advance a process the underlying assumptions of which I don’t support. By contrast, the Israeli government under both Labor and Likud does support the peace process; in fact, the Israeli government INITIATED the peace process and carried it out UNILATERALY while the Palestinians continued to agitate for the destruction of Israel.

Jacob writes:

“A better remark is anti-Semitism used to mean hatred of Jews, but now means those who are hated for putting America before Israel.”

So, for Jacob, under this new dispensation, there no one who hates Jews. Anti-Semitism, in the sense of hatred of Jews, no longer exists! The charge of anti-Semitism is simply a fraudulent way of marginalizing true American patriots, such as Jacob himself. How convenient for all the anti-Semites out there.

This reminds of an e-mail exchange I had with Joseph Sobran. After a long back and forth, with his statements about Israel and Jews becoming increasingly bent, I finally had it and told him he was an anti-Semite. He wrote back calling me a “traitor.” In Sobran’s mind, as in Jacob’s, a person who is called an anti-Semite is simply an American patriot. Therefore if someone attacks such a true patriot by calling him an anti-Semite, then the accuser must be a traitor—to America.

“Shawn dont apologize. I tired of being called an anti-Catholic bigot just for disagreeing with Catholic politics and doctrine elsewhere. I left the RCC a year ago. It is interesting to me that those who shout “Anti-Catholic” bigot are using the same technique of the left, calling anyone who questions certain beliefs a bigot!”

Thankyou for your support, but in this case I was wrong. If someone chooses to call me anti-Catholic for merely disagreeing with the RCC or Catholic political positions then be assured that I will defend myself to the hilt and stand up for what I believe.

However, while I still refute the charge of being anti-Catholic, my former opinions were based on ignorance and a shallow understanding of the issues, and under the circumstances a retraction and apology were warranted.

Like Lawrence I reject the so-called “peace proccess” totally. ALL of the land west of the Jordan river belongs to the Jewish people. It is their ancestral homeland and has been for well over two thousand years.

I reject completely the notion of a “palestinian” people or nation. The entire idea is nothing more than a con job to justify Arab and Muslim warmongering against Israel. The so called “Christians” who side with the “palestinians” are deluded fools. What do they think groups like Islamic Jihad and HAMAS are going to do in any “palestinian” state? Treat them as equals of the Muslims?

Israel should take the West Bank and Gaza permanently, and send the Arab invaders back where they came from.

“Jacob denies that he denies Israel’s right of self-defense.”
Well of course I deny it. Real self defense of Israel has nothing to do with subjugation of Palestinians anymore than self defense of America would require the return of chattel slavery. Although some of the posts on this blog make me wonder if some would not welcome its return.

As I said before, Israel has a right to exist, but it doen’t have the right to subjugate a portion of it populace. The settlements are used as a method of subjugation, and should cease to be used for such a purpose. This criticism does not deny Israel’s right to exist, and frankly, I don’t see Israel ever having peace as long as it maintains its subjugation of the palestinian portion of its populace.

And hypocritical? Oh please! Exactly how is defending the rights of all men hypocritical?

Ahh, yes, we should have seen it all the time. Jacob is really a liberal idealist, seeking, like Wilson, the equal national rights of all peoples.

There’s just one little problem. Not all self-described nations have the wherewithal to be nations. That’s why even Wilson ended up only giving nationhood to some nations, and not to others. Practicalities intrude upon a right that is universal only in the abstract. A nation may be too small or poor or disfunctional to be viable; or it may be too intertwined with some other nation to have a viable national existence of its own; or its national existence would immediately threaten the existence of some other, already existing nation.

Guess what? The Palestinians fail on all three counts.

On top of which, by their own super-savage behavior, they have given up any rights to nationhood, or even to live on that land at all. Nobody should be expected to live next to such people.

At least, that’s my view.

It’s not the view of the U.S. government and the Israeli government, who are still trying to have a “peace process” with Palestinian state.

Meanwhile, I imagine that if the various Indian tribes in America started a terror campaign demanding that their historic lands be given back to them, even Jacob with his belief in the equal rights of everyone would not support the Indian claims, since that would dismantle the United State. Yet at the same time, he furiously insists on such a suicidal course for Israel.

“As I said before, Israel has a right to exist, but it doen’t have the right to subjugate a portion of it populace.”

The problem with this argument is that Israel is not subjugating anyone in the first place. Arabs are quite welcome to live in Israel and they do. Arabs have been elected to the Knesset. So no subjugation exists. The military actions carried out in the West Bank and Gaza are legitimate defensive actions against terrorism.

The settlements cannot be said to be a form of subjugation either, as this rests on the false claim of a “Palestinian” people with claims upon that land. As this claim is an Arab fraud, then Israelis forming communites and towns on Israeli land is right and moral.

“On top of which, by their own super-savage behavior, they have given up any rights to nationhood, or even to live on that land at all. Nobody should be expected to live next to such people.”

This argument cuts both ways since the Israeli government and segments of the Palestinian populace have been equally brutal.

“Israel is not subjugating anyone”

It’s very sad that a fellow American raised in this country founded on liberty and the pursuit of happiness could make such a comment. Such comments make me worry for our own future. I only hope those who make such comments are unaware of what is really taking place in Israel.

http://www.antiwar.com/hacohen/h-col.html

http://www.antiwar.com/hacohen/h090401.html

http://www.antiwar.com/hacohen/h052402.html

http://www.antiwar.com/hacohen/h123002.html

“Meanwhile, I imagine that if the various Indian tribes in America started a terror campaign demanding that their historic lands be given back to them, even Jacob with his belief in the equal rights of everyone would not support the Indian claims, since that would dismantle the United State.”

I would condemn the terrorism, but if American Indians wished to take the lands they currently occupy and form independent sovereign states, so be it. Since the United States is composed of a union of sovereign states, it would be in keeping with the principle of the founding. It would also be in keeping with the principle of self determination.

Many of the problems of muticulturalism in the U.S. are directly related to consolidation of dispirate peoples and cultures.

In the name of equality and liberty, Jacob wants ALL nations that contain different ethnic groups within their borders to be dismantled, including our own. So it turns out that Jacob is not, as I thought, an Israel hater, but rather a consistent liberal—consistent to the point of the supporting a principle that must lead to the destruction of virtually all existing societies.

“It’s very sad that a fellow American raised in this country founded on liberty and the pursuit of happiness could make such a comment. Such comments make me worry for our own future. I only hope those who make such comments are unaware of what is really taking place in Israel.”

America was founded upon a number of principles, not only the two you assert.

The fundamental problem with your take on the conflict is your continued assertion that there is such a thing as a “Palestinian” people, who are a distinct nation having the right to self-determination. Unless you can prove this assertion, your entire argument is built on a falsehood.

Prior to 1947, the land of Israel was sparsely populated by a number of disparate ethnic and religious groups. These groups did not make up a nation. They never had made one. There was never at any time in history a distinct sovereign Palestinian nation. After the expulsion of the Jewish people by Rome (the only people who have formed a distinct and sovereign nation in that land), Israel had been occupied by a succession of foreign powers, right up to the British mandate. After the refounding of Israel, the surrounding Arab nations decided to flood the West Bank and Gaza with Arab peoples who had no ancestral claim upon the land. They then began a propaganda campaign internationally, claiming that the Jews had wrongfully invaded a heretofore-unknown people and nation, called “Palestine”. This lie was perpetrated with the sole purpose of justifying Islamic Jihad against the Jewish people.

So your claim about Palestinian rights is wrong, because there is no such thing as a distinct Palestinian nation or people. Only REAL nations can have rights, including the right to self-determination. The Israeli’s are fighting a war of national liberation against Arab invaders.

On a final note, I take the posting of links from Jew-hating sodomite Justin Raimondos site as little more than pro-terrorist propaganda.

“Jacob wants ALL nations that contain different ethnic groups within their borders to be dismantled, including our own.”

The United States is not a nation, but a union, a federation of States with a federal government. So I don’t think our country should be dismantled, but neither do I think it should be consolidated.

“So it turns out that Jacob is not, as I thought, an Israel hater”

Not in the least, and thank you for seeing it.

“but rather a consistent liberal”

A classical liberal is more accurate.

“consistent to the point of the supporting a principle that must lead to the destruction of virtually all existing societies.”

Not societies, since societies have a natural limit of size and don’t have real existence beyond that size. I do though support a principle antithetical to unnaturally large consolidated nations.

The Rise of the Nation-State by Donald Livingston sets out the principle rather well.

http://www.mises.org/audio.asp scroll down to History of Liberty.

In the case of the Iraeli Palestinian conflict, the conflicting peoples are too irrational and violent with too much spilt blood between them, making it next to impossible to form a natural whole.

Thanks for explaining Shawn.

I agree with your later post.

“America was founded upon a number of principles, not only the two you assert.”

Read your Declaration of Independence, there are three founding principles from which all else devolves. I left out life which I think is an obvious principle to all except pro-abortionists.

“The fundamental problem with your take on the conflict is your continued assertion that there is such a thing as a “Palestinian” people, who are a distinct nation having the right to self-determination. Unless you can prove this assertion, your entire argument is built on a falsehood.”

The Israeli goverment doesn’t seem to have your problem of separating out and distinguishing the Palestinian people. Nor do the settlers have much problem knowing who they can shoot at with impunity. The Palestinians are not currently a distinct nation, but then neither was Virginia prior to the DOI.

Just as Virginians became a distinct people with the right of self determination, so are the palestinians a distinct people, and by being a distinct people have the right of self determination.

“So your claim about Palestinian rights is wrong, because there is no such thing as a distinct Palestinian nation or people. Only REAL nations can have rights, including the right to self-determination. The Israeli’s are fighting a war of national liberation against Arab invaders.”

By your argument, Virginia, or the U.S. for the Lincoln faithful, could never have claimed the right of self determination.

“On a final note, I take the posting of links from Jew-hating sodomite Justin Raimondos site as little more than pro-terrorist propaganda.”

That’s a very inflammatory comment to make without providing any proof.

The mere fact that Justin Raimondo has linked to an article makes that article “pro-terrorist propaganda” is a very broad brush to paint with.

When I wrote that Jacob supported a principle “that must lead to the destruction of virtually all existing societies,” he replied:

“Not societies, since societies have a natural limit of size and don’t have real existence beyond that size. I do though support a principle antithetical to unnaturally large consolidated nations.”

According to Jacob, America is not really a society—because it surpasses Jacob’s definition of one. Therefore, if some enemy wants to kill Americans and destroy America, that person is really not trying to destroy our society, since America is not a society. He’s just trying to de-consolidate an inappropriately large state.

I’m glad that’s cleared up. Jacob is a type we’ve encountered before at VFR, the paleo-libertarian Nazi. For the paleo-libertarian Nazi, the “oppressive untermenschen” that has no right to exist is any society or nation which is larger than what the paleo-libertarian Nazi sees as the correct size, or which is allegedly interfering with the national claims of some other people, regardless of how specious such claims are. If the citizens of such a nation, the oppressive untermenschen, are attacked by terrorists, the oppressed ubermenschen, well, they had it coming to them.

Here is a reply I gave some months ago to another poster with views similar to Jacob’s:

http://www.counterrevolution.net/vfr/archives/001130.html#3669

“The United States is not a nation, but a union, a federation of States with a federal government. So I don’t think our country should be dismantled, but neither do I think it should be consolidated.”

America may well be a federation in terms of the poltical structure, but it is a nation in every other sense. The pledge of allegiance is said to the flag of the Union, not to the various state flags. Americans identify themselves as Americans. The time when they identified themselves as Virginians or Texans first has long gone. America has developed into a nation with a strong national identity and culture.

“A classical liberal is more accurate.”

Classical, Marxist, whatever, a liberal is a liberal. You can tack any word you like onto the front of that as justification, but we are still talking about liberalism.

“The Israeli goverment doesn’t seem to have your problem of separating out and distinguishing the Palestinian people.”

The Israeli government has been forced into a de-facto recognition of the “Palestinian” fiction by the U.N, and, sadly, our own government.

“The Palestinians are not currently a distinct nation, but then neither was Virginia prior to the DOI.

Just as Virginians became a distinct people with the right of self determination, so are the palestinians a distinct people, and by being a distinct people have the right of self determination.”

Except they are not a distinct people at all, they are Arabs. The notion of being “Palestinian” is a ruse that they and the surrounding Arab nations are using to justify war against Israel. They have not developed into any kind of distinct nation or people. You continue to base your argument on a falshood.

“By your argument, Virginia, or the U.S. for the Lincoln faithful, could never have claimed the right of self determination.”

Not at all. The colonists had by 1776 become essentially self-governing, within distinct areas making up the various states. Also the colonists had legitimate grievances upon which to base their claim to self-determination.

The Arabs currently claiming to be “Palestinians” are nothing more than a Trojan horse created by the Arab nations to weaken the Israeli nation and continue their Islamic Jihad to wipe out the Jewish people.

To compare the Arab invaders of Israel to the American colonists is absurd and innacurate.

“That’s a very inflammatory comment to make without providing any proof.

The mere fact that Justin Raimondo has linked to an article makes that article “pro-terrorist propaganda” is a very broad brush to paint with.”

I have read Raimondo’s site for several years now, and I assert that he is little more than an apologist for Islamic terrorism and a disseminator of anti-American propaganda. The man is certainly no patriot and no conservative.

What are you talking about? You can’t fight against leftist multiculturalism if you start out defeating yourself by buying into the leftist consolidation of the United States.

America is not a single culture and you can’t have a single society made up of cultures incapable of assimilation, the melting pot is a myth, you know that.

Federalism lets divergent societies come together and operate as a whole and compete in the world militarily and economically.

“I have read Raimondo’s site for several years now, and I assert that he is little more than an apologist for Islamic terrorism and a disseminator of anti-American propaganda. The man is certainly no patriot and no conservative.”

WEAK. Still more very inflammatory comment without providing any proof.

I see you’re now limiting your self to Raimondo and no longer saying all he links to are also “little more than pro-terrorist propaganda”.

“This argument cuts both ways since the Israeli government and segments of the Palestinian populace have been equally brutal.” – Jacob, June 1st, 2:25 AM

There is really no equality here. The Israelis have used targeted assasinations and military operations directed at specific terrorists while the Palestinians have indulged in the deliberate random murder of civilians. Yes, some Israeli troops have probably lost control and gone trigger happy on occaision, and there have been Palestinian civilians unintentionally killed during targeted strikes. There is still no equality here. There would be no equality even if the Israelis were to fire-bomb densely populated Palestinian areas like Gaza in response to terror attacks since the Palestinians are the ones who decided to sink to this level of evil in the first place.

Jacob wrote:
“A classical liberal is more accurate.”

Jacob makes the mistake — common on the right — of attempting to draw a categorical distinction between classical liberalism and modern liberalism. In fact they are very much the same thing. Both attempt to reduce politics as much as possible to abstract “founding principles” of individual freedom and equal rights. Both abolish the transcendent from politics except as realized voluntarily through the exercise of individual freedom and equal rights. Both reject the role of the transcendent (and its mediators, particularity and tradition) in politics as a tyrannical relic of the past before history’s end. Both posit a new free and equal superman for whom the exercise of equal freedoms is the natural and only moral political state. Both posit the existence of an oppressor-untermensch that is holding back the emergence of the free and equal superman.

In the end, both the classical liberal and the modern liberal are self-deluded utopian fools.

“This argument cuts both ways since the Israeli government and segments of the Palestinian populace have been equally brutal.” – Jacob, June 1st, 2:25 AM

But of course, Jacob here is echoing Patrick Buchanan’s nihilistic statement from a year ago, that the Israeli government is the “mirror image of Hamas and Hezbolah.”

By the way, comments like this are usually described as an expression of moral equivalency; but moral equivalency, by denying the existence of objective moral distinctions, is a form of nihilism.

So Carl thinks it’s ok for the Israeli government to fire-bomb densely populated areas of its own people as a response to the crimes of a few who happen to be in that densely populated area.

This shotgun method of fighting crime by incineration would of course kill or maim large numbers of completely innocent men, women and children. But as the Stalin admiring Duranty said when Stalin’s attrocities came to light, “you can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs”.

I can also see that Carl is not a great fan of habeas corpus, or of punishing only criminals.

I wonder if Carl would also approve of the same tactic being practiced in our own country. Perhaps we could start by firebombing Watts. Sure lots of innocent men, women and child would be incinerated, but crime in L.A. would certainly decrease. Besides, you can’t make an omelet without incinerating a few children.

Lawrence Auster, Shawn, Carl, and Matt, thank you for the conversation.

Keep the faith and America first.

Jacob wrote:
“So Carl thinks it’s ok for the Israeli government to fire-bomb densely populated areas of its own people as a response to the crimes of a few who happen to be in that densely populated area.”

Carl can speak for himself of course, but he did not say what Jacob imputes here. What Carl said was that even if the Israeli government went that far, not that it would be a good or justified action, but that it still would not entail moral equivalence to the “palestinian” (really Arab) actions. Presumably this is because (so the argument goes) the Israeli government is legitimately consitituted and is defending its women and children from a class of brutal attack initiated by the Arabs, whereas there is no legitimately constituted authority behind the terror bombings and the Arabs themselves initiated the tactic of indiscriminately murdering civilians. Without commenting on the strength of Carl’s argument in itself I can say with certainty that Jacob has not understood and addressed it.

“What are you talking about? You can’t fight against leftist multiculturalism if you start out defeating yourself by buying into the leftist consolidation of the United States.

America is not a single culture and you can’t have a single society made up of cultures incapable of assimilation, the melting pot is a myth, you know that.

Federalism lets divergent societies come together and operate as a whole and compete in the world militarily and economically.”

There is no leftist consolidation of the U.S. What the left wants is multiculturalism, the division of the U.S into disparate ethnic and language groups with no sense of shared national unity. No, America is not a single culture, but it does have a degree of cultural untiy, despite the insane attempts of multiculturalists, and this unity is essential to preserve our country. America is (or should be), as the creed says, a soveriegn Nation of many soveriegn States.

On a final note, I’m a firm believer in America First, but allowing an Islamic victory over Israel through inaction on our part, would not serve America’s interests, or the Wests.

Jacob, I don’t think it would be morally permissible for the Israelis to fire-bomb the Palestinian camps. Matt’s post was correct, I was simply trying to point out that there is no moral equivalency between what the Palestinians have done and what the Israelis have done in response. The deliberate targeting of innocents was a tactic initiated by Palestinians. By induging in it and supporting it (as they do in great number evidently), Palestinians have forfeited any moral claims. The Israelis have shown remarkable restraint in light of what they’ve been subjected to.