Islamic Imperialism

How come no one is talking about Muslim Imperialism? Rage against American Imperialism is all the rage. But Islamic Imperialism is the much bigger threat. Islam professes a policy of imperialism. That is the distinction between the Islamic Daar Islam and Daar al Harb. (The Islamic domain and the domain yet to be conqured by Islam.) Under the guise of Political Correctness Islamic Imperialism is dismissed as "their religion". This is just the effect of being in the grip of an ideology, and clearly not one of thinking.

Passover Break

I have been taking it pretty easy over the Pesach break. Spent some time with the family, and some time trying to work out what my summer will be like. I will write more as I learn more details.

Why the past two American military engagements have been unsatisfying so far: recapitulation of a biblical theme

Those of us who are in the least familiar with the history of art have come across at least one version of the Judith story as depicted by Michaelangelo, Botticelli, Carravagio, Jan Van Bijlert, or one of the many others who have depicted this scene from the apocrapha. It was a rather common theme in biblical art.

The story of Judith goes something like this: Judith's city was about to be attacked by Holofernies, the general of Nebuchadnezzer. Nebuchadnezzer (king of Assaryia (actually Babylon)) had just made a deal with all the neighboring provences that gave him the full right to repress and enslave all of them in exchange for not massacering them, and Bethulia, the Judean city was next. So Judith gets herself in to the enemy camp, gets herself seduced by Holofernies and cuts off his head as he sleeps. Afterward she takes the head and sneaks back to the Jeudean camp where the Jews are inspired by it, and Holofernies' arny is in dissarray without a general.

It seems to me that the story is really recapitulated in modern times (down to the Saadam comparing himself to Nebuchadnezzer in the past) except for one little detail - we do not have his head on a platter.

In both the Saddam Hussain and the bin Laden cases we have fought these massive battles without the satisfaction of seeing the leaders brought to justice, or without them being dead. We have had to settle for a fallen statue in Iraq, and there are no real defining moments in Afghanistan. When it came to the fall of the Berlin wall that was a symbol, but that was fine, because there was no one individual whose death would have signified the fall of communism. The wall itself was the symbol. In the case of Afghanistan, we wanted the man, same in Iraq.

We are in the end looking for something worthy of a michaellangelo painting. A statue with a flag over its head really didn't do it for me.

Sunday in Manhattan

Now that the weather is great out in New York, the East Village is really nice again. I got a "Mean people suck" sticker, from the mean-people-suck-sticker-man. There are tons of really dumb as nails political flyers all over the place, and there are PEOPLE. I went to St. Mark's bookstore and Strand bookstore, and to Union Square where there were tons of people just hangin' out, and a shirtless guy with a large cardboard sign that said "6 ft 7 inch Jew will rap for loot". I went down Broadway where there was a street fair, and I just caught the end of it.

Shwarma place

Last night I spent a whole bunch of hours in Esperanto with "A-" Then we found this good "Shewarma" place right next to the waverly theater. The owner said that it had been there for like 8 months. It is kosher too! They were out of shawarma when I got there, but I had the shnizle and "A-" had the steak sandwich. They were both good.

I totally see myself as a frequent visitor to that place.

Party

I am at this party somewhere in the east village. There are tons and tons of people here, and lots of music and drinks and stuff. It is lots of fun for a bit. You should all be here.

addendum-The party was later broken up by the police after numerous neighbor complaints.

Reading on the train

I was reading on the train today when this girl from Barnard starts talking to me about the book she is reading over my shoulder. We had a little chat about the book and it was all nice and friendly. I enjoyed it very much actually.

Chicago tried having this thing a couple of years ago where the mayor would encourage the whole city to read the same book so that people would just have something in common they can all talk about. It was like Oprah but for everyone. They tried to get books with broad appeal. I think we should do this here in New York. It is nice to have a chat with a complete stranger about something you are reading.

Gay Sodomy stickers

Those of you who spend time in Manhattan might have seen those crude black on white stickers that say "Fight Gay Sodomy" or something like that. They are white stickers about the size of an index card, and they are on busses and phone booths and stuff. If you haven't seen them, keep an eye out, the're all over.

Anyway, I saw the guy who puts them up. I always thought it was some creepy bible thumping geeky Christian fundamentalist who was abused as a child. I saw this guy sticking one fo his stickers to the back of a bus in broad daylight. It turns out that he is a creepy-looking, cigarette-smoking, Orthodox Jewish guy whith a white beard and who was probably abused as a child. Go figure.

Review of B. Netanyahu's Fighting Terrorism

Benjamin Netanyahu's Fighting Terrorism in not as packed with insight as I had hoped. The book was written in 1995 and reissued in 2001, after 9/11. The post-9/11 part of the book was confined to reproducing a speech he gave, which I recall seeing on TV. The book severely need updating, to the extent that I would say that it was irresponsible to have reissued it without adding stuff. The book reads like ancient history. In the beginning of the book there is talk about an impending "moment of truth" that the US has not yet faced vis-a-vis terrorism. That moment came, and everything is different. The book is old.

That having been said, in the book Netanyahu did predict Afghanistan, and he also called the Iran problem, which if he is right will only get worse. He also has a few good lines about the Soviet connection to terrorism during the cold war.

He has a decent chapter about terrorism and defense and civil rights. He makes the argument that states have the obligation to protect, and that citizens have the right to protection. The citizens also have certain civil liberties. Moreover the infringements of civil rights will likely only effect a few people, wheras the right to protection extends to many. Therefore, the duty to protect, and the right to protection of the many outweigh the civil liberties that will effect the few.

Also, the book annoyingly has no index.

Otherwise the book looks like it was meant to convince some people to take terrorism seriously. It looks like it did not succeed. Now we of course do not need his warning.

Good old fashioned jihad

What happened to the good old days when Muslims would wage Jihad with swords? Why, when it comes to weapons, and only when it comes to weaponry, must they be caught up with the 21st century?

Environmental myths explored

I noticed on slashdot of a day or two ago (I am very behind) this article about global warming. It turns out that in the middle ages it was much warmer than it is now.

One day liberals will realize that they simply do not know what is happening to the environment. When I was very young (and before that) all anyone was told about was the impending ice age. Now it is the impending global greenhouse.

The problem really is that scientists are simply unable to tell what is going on. We have various models for determining what the weather will be like in 30 years. Moreover, whenver the model is asked to input old data and predict today's weather, it fails. (I heard this somewhere.) Also, the apparatus for measuring all this is hopelessly unavailable. Strict conditions for measurement that are required to even establish today's temperatures are unavailable. The UN and Russian organizations who are charged with doing a lot of this monitoring are so underfunded that we cannot be sure we are getting anything right.

So we have all this data that is very contradictory and we attempt to come to all these conclusions. We are all clueless.

It is a worthwhile precaution to cut our use of pollutants as much as is possible, and look for alternative energy sources. But Bush was sort of right for ignoring the Kyoto Protocol. (As a political move he should have just signed the stupid thing, but not on environmental gorounds.) But let us be very cautious before giving doomsday scenarios to the world.

Guy on the Train

Today I was going to Brooklyn on the (Q) train and I was sitting next to this guy who was pretty obviously gay. He got off a few stops before me, like on Beverly road or something. But he was reading this book called _The Love Compatability Book: Twelve Personality Traits Taht Can Lead You to Your Soulmate_. He was quite obviously trying to hide the title, though I did manage to unobtrusively get a look at it. He was sitting in the seat next to the window. Every now and then he would face the window and let out a sniffle or two. I think he was really sad. I really felt bad for him.

I think I will crash in Brooklyn for the night. I am too tired to go to Manhattan right now.

From the in-case-you-need-another-reason-to-detest-the-French department

Here is an article making the rounds. Apparently a third of the french want Saadam to win the war, while the peace protesters attack Jews.

The Greeks

Today's NY Times reports that a poll from a month ago found that most Greeks are more favorably disposed to Saadam Hussain than George W. Bush.

I wish that there was something worth saying about this. I suppose that it just makes me realize why it has been over 2000 years since anyone cared what that culture produced.

Congolese massacre

As long as we are on the subject of the Belgians (see entry below) . . . it is worth knowing that the NY Times today reports that 966 villagers were slaughtered last week in the Congo. While it is not clear who did it you can be sure it will not go down anywhere in the annals of history. No one seems to care enough to do anything or say anything. You can bet that there will be no UN resolution, no big investigation, no blue-ribbon panel investigating this, and no minute-by-minute account a la Thomas Friedman, like we had with the massacres of Sabra and Shatilla.

("Why not?" you ask. The answer lies in the unfortunate historical fact that there are no Isrealis near the Congo. Had there been an earthquake inthe Congo last week and Israel would have sent a few troops or rescue workers to the country to help out, I am certain that the UN would be there trying to figure out how to tell the world that since Israel was in the region, she is responsible for this. But for the poor Congolese who have no one to blame but their own pitiful civil war, they will have to settle for a mass obituary of about 5 column inches in the New York Times.)

It is rather sick that massacres are only good as political cash. If there is nothing to be gained from exploiting their deaths, 966 people will die, and the world will barely notice. The biggist exploiter is of course the UN. They are charged with the responsibility of dealing with this. Failure to adequately deal with this will be yet another stain on their already filthy image.

Where are the Rachel Corries of the world? Where is the ISM defending the Congolese? Why are their lives worth less than the home of a weapons smuggling terrorist?