I am rather ignorant about this matter. Stephen Schwartz, however, says the following:

“When I tried to explain to the Uzbeks that neither President George W. Bush nor Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who had supported Karimov in the past, wanted to hear this, they became hostile. My visit coincided with the decision of the U.S. State Department to declare HuT an "extremist," but not a terrorist, organization. Why were "we" doing this, I was asked aggressively and angrily? Why were "we" protecting terrorists?”

http://weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/005/623dlyqv.asp?pg=1

I am simply going have to do some studying. Most Americans regrettably know little about this part of the world. Let’s see what can be done. After all, we are very well aware that the UN isn’t going to do anything! It always falls into our laps.

I am rather ignorant about this matter. Stephen Schwartz, however, says the following:

“When I tried to explain to the Uzbeks that neither President George W. Bush nor Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who had supported Karimov in the past, wanted to hear this, they became hostile. My visit coincided with the decision of the U.S. State Department to declare HuT an "extremist," but not a terrorist, organization. Why were "we" doing this, I was asked aggressively and angrily? Why were "we" protecting terrorists?”

http://weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/005/623dlyqv.asp?pg=1

I am simply going have to do some studying. Most Americans regrettably know little about this part of the world. Let’s see what can be done. After all, we are very well aware that the UN isn’t going to do anything! It always falls into our laps.

Stephen Schwartz has written some strange things about Uzbekistan. Seems he might be coming around now, though.

So, since Bush has said that he has changed the policy of supporting oppressive dictators in exchange for stability, and has repeatedly stated that he stands for freedom and against tyranny, if he does nothing to oppose Karimov (or, more likely, if he says Karimov is a naughty man but continues to support him in exchange for basing rights), will any of Bush's cheering squad accuse Bush of hypocrisy? Of empty rhetoric? Anyone?

Liberals don't count. Duh.

And if an [insert descriptor here] Revolution happens in Uzbekistan in the near future, will you then credit Bush, Commenter? Or will Bush just have gotten lucky once more?

Agreed we need to back off hard on Uzbekistan. I'd like to know more about what leverage we have with them. Are we still using airbases there? If so, why? Are we sending money? If so, why?

A quick google didn't prove satisfactory. I hope someone here can provide links that answer some of thse questions

Let's say Bush dumps the Uzbek leader -- so that they become a failed state. Like Chechnya, only on the Afghan border, so they ally with Afghan drug funded warlords.
And become the training ground for a new, Uzbek Taliban.
And they start exporting Islamic suicide bombers to Afghanistan, to murder Red Cross folk, Peace Corps folk, any and all foreigners; occasionally beheading them, occasionally car-bombing US forces.

How many would have to be murdered before those who say "dump Karimov" would say, um, too many were murdered? Karimov was bad, but not THIS bad.

The US needs to get its bases out of Uzbekistan as long as the Uzbek gov't is this bad. It should clearly state that such gov't oppression is "not acceptable". But how fast, before what action? Maybe months and years, not days. Maybe only weeks.

Why can Leftists complain of Bush and Uzbekistan while remaining silent on the UN and Sudan (and the Human Rights commission)? Leftist hypocrisy, and MSM Leftist bias. Why no pictures of Darfur this week, weren't some thousands dying there?

U for Ukraine, stan for Kyrgyzstan; Even if the Uzbeks want to follow the Orange Revolution, their dictatorship seems ready to follow China's Tiananmen example.

How many US soldiers are Leftists (like Commenter?) willing to have killed to support an uncertain democratic revolution? Body-counting in Iraq indicates Zero, which means following the Clinton plan: take no action now, apologize later if needed. Oh, I forgot; the Leftist sneering squad is ready to sneer at every action AND inaction, unless the results are Unreal Perfection. As long as the sneers are against the US and Bush.

Good post, Michael. I'd like to see you do a post on extraordinary rendition, as well (apologies if you already have and i missed it).

What is so ironic about the "neoconservative" position on current foreign debates is that the neocons used to be the great champions of moral relativism and foreign policy realism. Jeanne Kirkpatrick wrote the definitive neocon statement on the subject, "On Dictatorships and Double Standards", in Commentary Magazine, November 1979. Basically, she was appalled by the Carter Administration's decision to put pressure on the Shah, Ferdinand Marcos, Allende, Somoza, other dictators who were 'our' dictators...

Michael Kinsley is the only person I've seen, either on the left or the right, who has noted this and pointed out the descrepancy between their former and present views.

I predict you'll see similar viewpoints exerting themselves in the near future, particularly in situations when the only alternatives to a despotic, barbaric, unpopular anti-Islamist ruler
is rule by despotic, barbaric, popular Islamists.

I hear you Michael except before you get too inidignant read this "The Tale of 2 Muslims"

http://dailyscorecard.blogspot.com/2005/05/tale-of-2-muslims.html

Mark,

I'd say he did the right thing, and played a role in bringing down Karimov. The credit, however, would go to the people of Uzbekistan.

Tom,

U is for Ukraine and I is for I don't have a clue what you're talking about when you ramble on like that. Your first two paragraphs make it seem like you're excusing tyranny by suggesting that the alternative could be worse - do we'd better support Karimov. And then you say we should get out. And then you start playing the alphabet game. Right.

Woops! "do we'd better" should be "so we'd better".

Their time will come.

Freedom and democracy are the right of every human being.

For now, I would counsel patience, pragmatism and condemnation. Uzbek is too useful to the process of democratization to discard as an ally, but it should be made clear gunning down civilians is NOT acceptable.

Good post, Michael.

I've heard that there are over 1,000 US troops in Uzbikistan right now. As The Commenter has indicated, there are US airbases there.

In formulating theories about the nature of the rebels in Uzbekistan, I think it's worthwhile to remember that it's a psychopathic dictator who is labelling them fundamentalist terrorists, and that may be a lie. He has used the whole "terrorists" ploy before when cracking down on opposition, as have a few other dictators in the area. It's a reasonable ploy, as they get to both eliminate pesky threats to their regime while looking like valuable contributors to the war on terror at the same time.

I'd also like to condemn Vladimir Putin, breast cancer and bad weather!

However, he added that the protestors had chosen the site of the US embassy because they had less reason to fear retribution from the Uzbek authorities, in full view of their US allies.

"We would be beaten if we had this protest near a government building -- we had it here because the Uzbek authorities don't want to spoil their reputation," he told AFP

Given that we aren't going to overthrow them by force anytime soon, condemnation, urging democratic reform, and just being around is probably the best we can do for the Uzbek people for now.

For now...

Tom: Oh, I forgot; the Leftist sneering squad is ready to sneer at every action AND inaction, unless the results are Unreal Perfection. As long as the sneers are against the US and Bush.

Smells like strawman, Tom. The Bush administration is to be commended for cutting support to the regime because of human rights violations, and I've read about financial support to pro-democracy movements in the nation. The problem, however, is that this guy is still an ally, and that's bad PR for an administration pushing for democratization of the region. Of course, IMO, support for Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are worse PR.

Tom,

The odds that Uzbekistan will go fundamentalist are about as high as Beirut going fundamentalist. Both are very secular places. I'm not worried about that scenario.

Wooden Bridge: Yes, let's condemn Karimov! I'd also like to condemn Vladimir Putin, breast cancer and bad weather!

Idiot.

Commenter:

I'd say [Bush] did the right thing, and played a role in bringing down Karimov. The credit, however, would go to the people of Uzbekistan.

That's all I ask. If Iraq becomes a successful state, it will be because the people of Iraq make it so. The same applies to all states. But pretending any of the progress made to date was inevitable strikes me as disingenuous at best.

The Loyal (?) Opposition seems to operate within the parameters that all bad outcomes can be blamed exclusively on US actions, while any good outcomes are at best peripherally linked to US policy. It seems to me that the truth is that the United States can shake things up good and hard, but that good outcomes can only be promoted, not enforced. And as Newsweek has shown, bad outcomes can be produced even when a respected private entity foolishly reports something bogus.

Could CENTCOM have prevented that? Not under the parameters of the First Amendment. And yet, the State Department and the Pentagon and the Whitehouse et. al. have to deal with the outcome. And ain't nobody bring the dead people back.

Assuming we all want good outcomes (less violence, more personal freedom, less starvation, better health care, chickens in every pot, etc.) it might be a good idea to stop alternating between US-as-Darth-Vader and US-as-Glenda-the-Good-Witch and start paying attention to a complex reality out there, where the US can be a force for the Global Good, but has a lot of crap it has to wade through as responsibly as it can. In other words (and I hope Andrew Sullivan reads this) try constructive criticism for a change, and be damned careful what you say until you're sure of your facts.

Or we can throw in the towel and rely on the United Nations to do for everyone else what they've done for the Sudan.

Liberal dreck.

Wooden Bridge,

You mean neocon dreck.

Mark: And as Newsweek has shown, bad outcomes can be produced even when a respected private entity foolishly reports something bogus.

Errm, but it ain't bogus, Mark. There have been dozens of reports of Koran desecration for months now.

And yet, the State Department and the Pentagon and the Whitehouse et. al. have to deal with the outcome. And ain't nobody bring the dead people back.

The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff says a report from Afghanistan suggests that rioting in Jalalabad on May 11 was not necessarily connected to press reports that the Quran might have been desecrated in the presence of Muslim prisoners held in U.S. custody at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Air Force General Richard Myers told reporters at the Pentagon May 12 that he has been told that the Jalalabad, Afghanistan, rioting was related more to the ongoing political reconciliation process in Afghanistan than anything else.

No comment.

Good Post!

Yeah, I think we better dump this dude! He served his purpose, but if he's going to gun down the people like this, then he needs to go.

Nope, still a liberal. Even "neocons" aren't this naive.

Wooden Bridge,

See here:

Over the past few years, Uzbek president Islam Karimov has been warned by the U.S. to either get with the democratic process, or risk getting overthrown. Even though the United States withdrew most foreign aid last year over this issue, Karimov believes that he can tough it out. But the United States has been funding pro-democracy political organizations in Uzbekistan.

I guess the Bush Administration are just a bunch of stupid naive liberals then? Okay. Have it your way.

DPU trots out the old "fake but accurate" argument.

Those "dozens of reports" of desecrations that I've read about seem to come from inmates, who were coached in media manipulation tactics as part of their training. Sourcing counts.

And as fine examples of Pavlovian conditioning, our press corps is more than happy to drool when shown red meat, regardless of who's waving it or how it smells. So yeah, knowing the source does make a difference. And NEWSWEEK is choosing to protect the source who burned them. Gots to protect the innocent.

As to the accuracy of what I wrote:

According to initial reports, the situation in Jalalabad began on May 10 with peaceful student protests reacting to a report in Newsweek magazine that U.S. military interrogators questioning Muslim detainees at the Guantanamo detention center "had placed Quran s on toilets, and in at least one case flushed a holy book." By the following day the protests in the city had turned violent with reports of several individuals killed, dozens wounded, and widespread looting of government, diplomatic and nongovernmental assets.

However, Myers said an after-action report provided by U.S. Army Lieutenant General Karl Eikenberry, commander of the Combined Forces in Afghanistan, indicated that the political violence was not, in fact, connected to the magazine report.

So the protests apparently started peacefully over the "desecration" but the actual "political" violence may not have been related.

Why the State Department decided to throw NEWSWEEK a bone, I have no clue. If the original protest never happen, the subsequent (presumed) political hijackinig never gets to happen. It seems to me that the best spin you can put on this is that Newsweek piled the wood on the pyre but somebody else lit the match. Great. Go ahead and defend that.

DPU: Errm, but it ain't bogus, Mark. There have been dozens of reports of Koran desecration for months now.

All of them right out of the Al Qaeda playbook. You'd think, with so much alleged testimony out there for the taking, Newsweek could've gotten a bit more support for their story. Then again, maybe that's where those folks fired from CBS wound up ...

As far as the unrest having nothing to do with the alleged incident, State may like to think so, but these guys disagree, and they're a bit closer to the horse's mouth.

Forgive me if I'm misreading you, Mark, but you seem to have said that any information about alleged abuses is a lie if it comes from those who were allegedly abused. This, despite the fact that the allegations were deemed worthy of investigation by the army itself.

You also seem to be more outraged by the fact that an independent media reported on an alleged abuse than about the abuse itself. As part the role of a free press plays in a democratic society is to monitor and make public things like this, I'm not sure what you're suggesting should be done. Self censorship?

All of them right out of the Al Qaeda playbook.

Except that these guys were, y'know, released by the US because they aren't Al Qaeda.

I was teaching at the University of World Economy and Diplomacy (and the Finance Institute) in Tashkent six years ago. None of this is new but for the fact that protestors are now being killed in the streets. Historically, they just disappeared into the Nukuz Gulag. Clinton (and Albright, who visited) didn't care then. At least the Bush administration doesn't condone Karimov's behavior.

In some respects, Michael is right: In the cities especially, Uzbekistan has a very cosmopolitan culture. Not particularly democratic as we understand it; but the women wear short skirts and make-up as they would anywhere in the cities of the West. It's when you get out into the rural areas that the argument breaks down. The Wahabbists have been moving among the rural poor for more than a decade. I've been to villages along the Tajik border (especially Yanjiabad) that were effectively overrun by Wahabbis and subsequently bombed by government jets and then retaken by Uzbek troops.

We're talking about an enforced secularism here. Brutally enforced. I knew a handful of Christian missionaries, but they all operated under the CAFE program and were extremely discrete.

My Moslem friends were mostly observant, but they drank vodka with the worst of us. That may be the problem. You shouldn't discount the possibility of a Khemer Rouge-type situation developing here. If democratization doesn't take hold, it may be a very rough beast indeed that slouches to Tashkent.

I guess the Bush Administration are just a bunch of stupid naive liberals then? Okay. Have it your way.

Unfortunately that seems rather unlikely, seeing how Bush already turned the Iraq war into a propaganda disaster.

Forgive me if I'm misreading you, DPU, but are you claiming that the Pentagon shouldn't investigate allegations of abuse? Get real, dude. You're engaging in the "have you stopped beating your wife" debate tactics.

DPU, this goes right back to the old US-always-bad, anti-US-always-good paradigm that has the Left sliding into oblivion. I'm not saying that it's impossible that abuse occurred; I'm saying that it is possible that those claiming abuse are lying. After all, they have every reason to do so.

And the servicemen at Guantanamo have very good reason not to abuse the inmates, as the backlash from this "reporting" shows.

As for me, I know some devout muslims, and if I wanted to get under their skin, and I were evil, I think I'd use surgical instruments or syringes, not a toilet and a $5 book. Maybe I've read too many spy thrillers, but simple steel seems to give you more bang for the buck.

Waiting to get the story right isn't self-censorship; it's good journalistic practice. (As an aside, if a White House source tipped off NEWSWEEK that W. took his morning walks across the Washington Monument reflecting pool, you can damn well be sure the editorial staff would want to see the video. As well they should.)

The whole story has a certain Kabuki feel to it that would be funny, except people happen to have wound up dead as an end result. That's what I feel outrage about.

...publicly hang Karimov and his sycophants...

This is the typical bleeding-heart approach to foreign policy. Hang them with the entrails of the jihadists, you pathetic wimp.

"This is the typical bleeding-heart approach to foreign policy. Hang them with the entrails of the jihadists, you pathetic wimp!!"--DPU

Excellent !!

DPU has been taken over by the dark side.All hail Karl Rove.

Forgive me if I'm misreading you, DPU, but are you claiming that the Pentagon shouldn't investigate allegations of abuse?

No. But if a former detainee accused his former captors of something ludicrous (like being anally probed by aliens or something), they wouldn't investigate, would they? Investigations indicate that they are credible allegations. You were stating that they weren't credible, I offered that in response.

DPU, this goes right back to the old US-always-bad, anti-US-always-good paradigm that has the Left sliding into oblivion.

Please read my kudos to the Bush administration above. And compare to the liberal-media-always-bad paradigm that you're espousing.

LOL Judging from this Instapundit post, maybe I was wrong about whether we could overthrow the Uzbek gov't sometime soon:

Over the past few years, Uzbek president Islam Karimov has been warned by the U.S. to either get with the democratic process, or risk getting overthrown. Even though the United States withdrew most foreign aid last year over this issue, Karimov believes that he can tough it out. But the United States has been funding pro-democracy political organizations in Uzbekistan.

The last part is good news, too.

Except that these guys were, y'know, released by the US because they aren't Al Qaeda.

No, some went right back to fighting us.

Link from Instapundit

http://www.strategypage.com//fyeo/qndguide/default.asp?target=casia.htm

Well, I disagree with the characterization that we're "buddying up" with Karimov. The government to government relationship is lukewarm at best. But, we certainly could rethink our policy. The biggest problem I've seen is that State and Defense send different messages. That needs to be fixed immediately. Defense can't be in a position to compromise the work that State is doing (which, I have to mention, I don't think Defense is doing intentionally).

A coordinated message and using the airbase as a weapon against Karimov by playing on his fears of two much closer great powers who would love to twist his arm would be a most welcome development.

I'm not saying the Liberal Media is bad so much as I'm calling it feckless and stupid. Certain institutions found a paradigm in the early '70s and have stuck with it, never mind that the world is a radically different place, and maybe the paradigm wasn't such a great thing even then.

Human psychology seems to dictate that bad news will always sell better than good news; Big Media is driven by the need to put eyes on content (which is really the host for parasitic advertising); therefore, a great model for steady product consumption is to identify and mine reliable sources of bad news.

Few things in the world today are more dependable than the continuity of the US government.

Which leads to a model where treating Uncle Sam as Darth Vader makes good business sense.

Is any of this written down in the Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy playbook? No. Does it need to be? No. It worked for the Washington Post, The New York Times, and CBS for years, through lots of Administrations. To be a stable system, all it takes is buying into a couple of assumptions and falling into a couple of habits, and voila! persistent groupthink.

The trouble for Big Media is the distribution channels have opened up, and groupthink is no longer healthy business practice.

The recent riots in Afghanistan and the problems in Uzbekistanshow how unhealthy this groupthink has become. In Afghanistan, gotcha-unca-sam journalism put protesters in the street, never mind the immediate factors got them shot. In Uzbekistan, stuff is happening that could materially affect what happens to our troops in the mideast (again, never mind the moral aspect for a moment) and a casual consumer of mainstream news is pretty much clueless about it. (But we do know what's going on with Michael Jackson, don't we?)

No, not evil. But not good, and not getting better fast enough, IMHO.

If the Administration decides we cannot afford to let Karimov fall at this juncture, than we are going to start hearing a lot of spin from the media that the Uzbek opposition is dominated by muslim fundamentalists/jihadists and that we cannot afford to let another jihadist state take root in the heartland of Central Asia. And unfortunately, for Uzbeks especially, this has some truth to it. But it is essentially a self-fulfilling prophecy. The longer Karimov stays in power the more jihadism is going to seem like an attractive alternative to young people. The tragedy is that in 1991 you could have counted the number of Islamic fundamentalists in Uzbekistan on your fingers. Still, while Uzbekistan is still basically secular, historically it is very different from other Central Asian States like Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. The population of the latter two were traditionally nomads who paid lip service to Islam but maintained pre-islamic traditions and were not particularly devout. The major cities of Uzbekistan - Samarkand, Bukhara, Khiva- were all at one time or another major centers of Islamic learning just like Baghdad or Damascus. Not unlike Iran, a basically secular population could be persuaded to support an Islamic government if they really believed the Islamists were going to wipe away the corrupt and venal politicians currently running the country. What this means is that Karimov has to go now, while secular leaders still enjoy some real role in the opposition. If he stays in power another 5 years the secular elements will be increasingly marginalized, and Karimov himself will create a situation where the US will not be able to trust the alternative.

Me: Except that these guys were, y'know, released by the US because they aren't Al Qaeda.

TallDave: No, some went right back to fighting us.

Really? You mean the US military are releasing actual terrorists after already having them in captivity for several years? That's a pretty strong charge. Do you have anything to back that up? A link, possibly?

Released Detainees Rejoining The Fight

At least 10 detainees released from the Guantanamo Bay prison after U.S. officials concluded they posed little threat have been recaptured or killed fighting U.S. or coalition forces in Pakistan and Afghanistan, according to Pentagon officials.

One of the repatriated prisoners is still at large after taking leadership of a militant faction in Pakistan and aligning himself with al Qaeda, Pakistani officials said. In telephone calls to Pakistani reporters, he has bragged that he tricked his U.S. interrogators into believing he was someone else.

Google is your friend.

Thanks, Mark. That's pretty staggering.

Now, were these the ones making the Koran defilement charges?

Michael,

I completely agree with you. I don't have all the information to assess how useful Uzbekistan currently is as an ally, and I don't care. If we can be cavalier about the resources of the French, we can sure as hell send this medieval Karimov asshole packing.

DPU- Nice goalpost move.

I love it. Members of the United States Armed Forces and Intelligence Community torture Muslims prisoners - some terrorists, many innocent people or petty criminals rounded up at the same time. Some just get beaten, some are tortured to death.

The media reports on this.

Some Muslims get very angry at this and, as a result, are more willing to tacitly support our enemies or even join them. In fact, some, apparently, become angry enough at reports of Koran desecration (which, interestingly enough, have been reported before, have been apologized for before by US soldiers, and haven't really been denied by the Pentagon so far) that they participate in riots, in Afghanistan at least.

So, let's break it down:

US personnel torture Muslims to death.
Media reports it.
Muslims get angry.
And bloggers get really, really mad at:

The Media!

Not the torturers, and not people attacking US troops.

What happened to not shooting the messenger?

Commenter: What happened to not shooting the messenger?

Interesting email to Andrew Sullivan that breaks it all down, Commenter.

Though I might not agree with everything Andrew Sullivan writes, he has been a godsend when it comes to the torture issue, calling it what it is, refuting arguments that it wasn't really torture or murder(the convictions for and investigations of homicide say otherwise), pointing out that a lot of people seem to care more about scoring points against the dread MSM than taking the administration to task for what it's doing, and for reminding everyone what the real point of this is: every time the US government does something like this, it alienates Muslims who otherwise wouldn't be our enemies at a time when we're trying to win people to our side.

Everyone wants to blame Newsweek. Why not, you know, blame the people who have been, you know, torturing people to death?

Commenter: "Everyone wants to blame Newsweek. Why not, you know, blame the people who have been, you know, torturing people to death?"

Whatever you do just don't, you know, blame the little brown people.

A bit of sanity

Muslims torture and slaughter thousands of Americans
Media reports it.
Americans get angry.
And pacifists get really, really mad at:
The Americans!

Why do we hate us?

In his second inaugural address Bush said
"All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: the United States will not ignore your oppression, or excuse your oppressors. When you stand for your liberty, we will stand with you."
You can be sure the Iranians are watching what happens next.

Tashlan - It's when you get out into the rural areas that the argument breaks down. The Wahabbists have been moving among the rural poor for more than a decade. I've been to villages along the Tajik border (especially Yanjiabad) that were effectively overrun by Wahabbis and subsequently bombed by government jets and then retaken by Uzbek troops.

That was a very interesting comment. Were the Wahhabists local or were they outsiders?

Many news reports have mentioned that a group called Hizb ut-Tahrir is influential in Uzbekistan. An Indian security expert said that Hizb ut-Tahrir may also be influencing the protests in Afganistan.

Do you know if reports of HuT's influence are exaggerated?

Caroline,

Some Muslims get very angry at this and, as a result, are more willing to tacitly support our enemies or even join them. In fact, some, apparently, become angry enough at reports of Koran desecration (which, interestingly enough, have been reported before, have been apologized for before by US soldiers, and haven't really been denied by the Pentagon so far) that they participate in riots, in Afghanistan at least.

I also hold it against the Bush administration for making our job harder.

You know what? If what you really care about is fighting terrorism, then at some point you have to stop saying "oh, you sneering liberals only care about criticising Bush and not our enemies".

Our enemies are our enemies, and that's criticism enough for me right now. I'd like to defeat them, and if I believe that my democratically-elected representatives, whose behavior I can change much more easily than that of people all over the world, are following policies that will make it harder for us to win, then sure, I'm going to be as critical as possible.

But anyway: at some point you have to stop talking about how bad our enemies are and just figure out a God damn way of beating them.

If there were a serial killer roaming the countryside, and the sherrif was spending his time napping, I'd be out yelling "Hey, sheriff! Wake up and catch that serial killer!" A lot of other people, apparently, would accuse me of hating the sheriff more than the serial killer, because I hadn't said anything bad about the serial killer. "The serial killer is terrible! He's so bad! He's evil and mean!" all those people say. They say "Stop yelling at the sheriff. It's not his fault that the serial killer is a homicidal maniac. He didn't make him that way. Why aren't you out there yelling at the serial killer?"

Well, it's all true, the serial killer is a very bad man, but he could be a force of nature for all I care. Except as a means of catching him, I don't care about his motivations, I don't care about his excuses, I don't care about what made him that way. All I care about is stopping him from killing. We can talk about all the other details later.

In a similar vein, yes, our terrorist enemies are very bad men. Why aren't I, and others, more critical of them more often? What does it matter how critical we are of them? The only criticism of them that I care about is stopping them from killing. How's that for a criticism? Hey, terrorist! Here's a bomb on your head! Also, I disagree with your interpretation of Western civilization!

So, yeah, I'm going to be vocally critical of Sheriff Bush. Every time I say "Bush screwed up by handing al Qaeda a propaganda tool", I hear all about how it's not Bush's fault, how it's the person who joins al Qaeda, because they're the evil one, why aren't we being critical of them?

You're right in that it is terrible, the decisions these people make, and that they shouldn't, as a result of Abu Ghraib, want to join with the murderers of children. You're right, that this is terrible and evil and unjust, but it happens. Pretend, for a moment, that we're not fighting rational people, but rather that we're fighting a force of nature. If we do X, then Y happens. If Americans torture Muslims at Abu Ghraib, then more Muslims join al Qaeda. Don't worry about the motivations behind this decision, the rationality or morality of it. Just know that it happens, that it's bad, and that if your real concern is to stop them from hurting people, the first priority isn't "blog comment #957,948,939,104 about How Terrible Our Islamofascist Enemies Are and How Much They Hate Us for Our Freedoms", but rather yelling at Sheriff Bush until he gets up and stops these mistakes from happening in the first place.

Caroline:

"Whatever you do just don't, you know, blame the little brown people.

A bit of sanity (link)"

Hmm. I THINK the article was kinda sorta agreeing with at least part of what Commenter was saying, in a red-meat kind of way.

Commenter, as ususal you said it better, if less succinctly.

Vino,

If I am anything, I am not succinct.

Commenter - I don't disagree with you that the primary goal is to defeat the terrorists. My comment wasn't meant to defend the Bush adminstration at all. Neither was it meant to defend Newsweek. I just happen to believe that 4 billion people can stand up to 1 billion people and say STOP IT! GROW THE FUCK UP! TOO BAD ABOUT YOUR FUCKIN KORAN! WE'RE NOT IDIOTS! WE KNOW ALL ABOUT YOU BLOWING UP THE BUDDHIST STATUES, DESECRATING JEWISH GRAVES, DESTROYING CHRISTIAN CHURCHES! WE'VE ALSO WATCHED YOU PUT YOUR OWN "HOLIEST SITES" IN THE LINE OF FIRE BY USING THEM AS AMMO DUMPS. WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE KIDDING HERE?

In other words, the proper response from the western world to this was DEAD SILENCE! i.e. "Yeah - we're looking into it. We'll let you know what we find out". End of story. Riot and kill yourselves like children throwing a temper tantrum in a grocery store if you wish and we'll watch it with a box of popcorn until you wear yourselves out in your idiotic frenzy. Zero tolerance for insanity, got it?

The difference between the way you and me see this thing is that you actually still retain the delusion that Muslims respond to tolerance and understanding of their demands and I DO NOT! It results in more demands! While you dream on in your little western fantasy world, they're playing you like an effing violin.

E.G. - your point about the torture enraging Muslims. Who are you kidding? Muslims couldn't care less about torture! Where were the outcries from the Muslim world about Saddam? Abu Ghraib caused a much much bigger outcry. I think the response should be - sorry - we've got a job to do here. Shit happens.

At the same time, while these folks go crazy in the streets - they're doing a great advertisement for Islam. They're showing the west what islam is all about. They should feel ashamed. But you won't let them do that will you? You won't let them own their shame. No - instead you want to run to the 2-year old and make it better for them so they never have to grow up. No thanks. Like I said, we just have a fundamental disagreement about how to deal with this thing.

Caroline,

As you mentioned, there are roughly one billion human beings who subscribe to Islam. That's a lot of people. That's a lot of people about whom to make a sweeping statement like "Muslims couldn't care less about torture!" Do you imagine that, of that 1/6 of humanity, none care about torture?

I imagine that some do. In fact, all evidence indicates that our enemies are a very tiny fraction of that billion people, who are supported by a slightly larger number and tolerated by a fairly significant segment of Muslims.

If you feel that there's no point in trying to sway the opinions of those who do not yet support our enemies or who do support them but could be swayed away, then I suggest you write your Congressman or -woman and request that he or she try to stop funding to our strategic communications efforts, through I hope you don't because I'd be out of a job.

You're right that Saddam killed more people, and that there is a greater outcry against Abu Ghraib (I love the new standard: hey, we're not as bad as one of the worst dictators of the 20th century!). Where you go wrong is that Saddam is not currently trying to convince Muslims around the world not to fly planes into him. We are. Is it unfair that there are people who are angrier over us than Saddam? Yes, it is extremely unfair. Does fairness factor into this? No, it does not factor into this at all. If we can stop one wannabe-suicide hijacker by apologizing for Abu Ghraib a little more vociferously than we have, would it be worth it? I certainly think so.

I guess the problem is that you still want to punish them for their bad thoughts, you want them to know that they've been naughty, you want them to feel ashamed. I want them to not kill me. I would love for them to feel ashamed, but it's not a must, you know? Not dying, that's a must.

"Every time I say "Bush screwed up by handing al Qaeda a propaganda tool","

Commenter,

But you conveniently give yourself (broadly speaking ) a pass. Every time you say Bush screwed up you are handing al Qaeda a propaganda tool. You are free to say what you wish. But do you acknowledge that beating the dead horse of an INEVITABLE screw up (surely you aren't suggesting that it's possible to run a perfect occupation of Iraq) hands Al Queda two propoaganda tools - further repeats the the original screw up to those that might not have heard it and perpetuates the belief that the President is weak and encourages the anti-democratic forcs in Iraq to have increased hope.

Free speech has costs that many seem to blithely ignore.

"I love the new standard: hey, we're not as bad as one of the worst dictators of the 20th century!"

Commenter,

Obviously you are not an Iraqi. I'm guessing that might mean something if you were.

Sweetie,

I believe that there might have been a misunderstanding. When I wrote that, I meant to be critical of the habit of some to excuse all bad behavior of the US by pointing out that our enemies are worse. We torture people to death? Well, they saw the heads off of innocent people!

True, and terrible, but it in no way excuses the United States of America - we're the good guys, the city upon the hill, remember? - from acting badly. We're supposed to be better. We're supposed to be the example the rest of the world looks to. We're supposed to be leaders of the free world. We're not supposed to torture people to death. That's all.

Sorry, I missed your first post.

Well, I suppose there is a risk in saying that Bush screwed up. But, seriously, which is a worse image - Americans smiling over the corpses of Iraqis who murdered them and a president who glosses over the issue, or me saying "hey, Bush, do something about this!"?

I tend to think that, you know, the torture is the bigger propaganda tool.

Mary,

It was widely believed to be outsiders, but who could tell? The reasoning was that Karimov had effectively decapitated the indigenous radical moslem leadership after they set off car bombs around the capital shortly before I arrived. Tashkent was an armed camp during their Independence Day Celebrations, and a moslem uprising seemed highly unlikely despite the moribund state of the Uzbek economy.

Still, there were plenty of disaffected locals with tribal and ethnic affiliations that extended beyond and across the national borders of Tajikstan, Khazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, etc.

Major border crossings were heavily guarded, but not so well in the mountainous region bordering Tajikstan and Kyrgyzstan (the area around the Ferghana Valley, where Andijan is located). Pretty lawless area in any case, and there were stories of fellow NGO workers in running battles with taxi cab drivers irked about not getting their business.

Tajikstan was in a civil war, and the Wahabbis were busy blowing up railroad bridges there. When they ran out of jet fuel at Mannas Airport after a student conference in Bishkek, we had to take a bus from there all the way around through Khazakstan. You just didn't go to Ferghana if you didn't have to.

All that said, I really have no idea if the reports of Hizb ut-Tahrir are exaggerated, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were. The Wahabbis were viewed as occasionally violent and extremely inept... but unfortunately not as inept as the corrupt military authorities of the region.

I once had a MVD guy try to shake me down in a park, and then he tried to sell me some of his bullets as souvenirs. The Uzbek government does NOT inspire confidence.

Commenter:

"Where you go wrong is that Saddam is not currently trying to convince Muslims around the world not to fly planes into him. We are."

Ummmm, yeah. Sure we are.

And Caroline has a point; the whole "desecration of the Koran" thing puts the propoganda priorities in perspective. (I love the guys who claim they were tormented by being wrapped in the Israeli flag. Two points: (a) it seems like we're validating some pretty sick cultural neuroses by considering that "torture" and (b) I guess every G.I. Torturer gets issued an Israeli flag in secret, just because, you know?) Sure, everybody can understand putting underperforming soccer players through the wood chipper, but desecrate the second-most-printed book in the world?

Too far.

Again, this would all be funny if people weren't putting on explosive undies because of it. Responsibility in a free society can't be limited to whoever sits in the Oval Office. It has to extend to anyone who thinks they actually have influence on events. (I guess that includes bloggers -- and Commenters -- too.) People like bin Laden see the Western Press as a weakness in our society, something to be exploited. I wish like hell our press would start acting like bin Laden was wrong.

"I meant to be critical of the habit of some to excuse all bad behavior of the US by pointing out that our enemies are worse.....We're supposed to be better. We're supposed to be the example the rest of the world looks to."

So who is excusing Abu Ghraib (as an example)? I don't recall a rush of conservatives picketing Graner's court martial or anybody for that matter, left or right, doing so. On the contrary I think most Americans were happy that these individuals did not get a pass.

Also, I think the phrase is American Exceptionalism, not American Perfectionism. If we can only sell America when we're perfect....well, we're not going to be selling America. Ever. For the less developed world, and in particular the Middle East, isn't an imperfect American recipe better than a Stalinist or Islamist government (while acknowledging that the people could choose an Islamist gov't hostile to the West)? Or do we need to be perfect before we have the moral authority to help the less developed world beyond feeding them?

Mark,

Yes, the Israeli flag thing is pretty dumb. Yes, people were tortured to death - there are photographs and court records to prove that too.

But pretend that something incredibly weird and petty and seemingly-irrelevant - say, every time Bush winked with his right eye, some Muslim became so enraged that he decided to become a suicide bomber. Would this be crazy? Would this be so unbelieveably weird? Absolutely!

Would I still want Bush to stop winking with his right eye? You bet!

If we can do something minor, petty, something that seems utterly unimportant, yet something that stops one person from becoming our enemy, then yes, I want it to happen.

And what didn't you get? Aren't we currently trying to convince Muslims to not be our enemies? How many fucking times does the president have to say "hearts and minds", how many dollars do we have to spend on our propaganda campaigns, before you people acknowledge that yes, we are actively trying to engage Muslims and convince them not to be our enemies?

Anyway, let me push some strategic communications everyone's way, as a useful primer on Central Asia.

Commenter: "If we can stop one wannabe-suicide hijacker by apologizing for Abu Ghraib a little more vociferously than we have, would it be worth it? I certainly think so."

Again, Commenter - we disagree. I don't think those apologies stop even one, except perhaps temporarily. I think we create more folks who feel justified that they have been wronged. Our apology is the admission of that fact. The apology merely creates a delay.

As far as I am concerned, the only real question is - have Muslims been wronged? We're talking here about 1400 years of Muslim history, coming into the present day, here and now. That means you and me. Many of us erroneously thought history had ended or something. No - how really amazing - it's the same old story - and we're smack in the middle of it!

Don't you get the way Muslims play the victim card? Why do you think that is? I'll tell you why. The Koran sanctions jihad only when Islam is under attack! How hard is it to understand that the "victim card" that the Muslim world plays time and time again, from the time of Muhammed himself, IS the pretect for jihad, IS the moral justification - exactly as we've seen this past week vis a vis the Newsweek story. Someone somewhere may or may not have flushed a Koran down the toilet (or spit on one somewhere in the world). But Commenter, that means that Muslims have been attacked. Their jihad is now justified! (I'm sure you saw the report of the 300 or so Afghan clerics calling for jihad in the face of this Koranic desecration?) How long will 4 billion people keep playing this game with the 2 year olds Commenter? That's what I want to know. Cause the thing is - they've already gone over the top. We already know that any American city can be nuked any day now. UBL's grievances remember? The difference between you and me is that I know there are 4 billion of us and 1 billion of them. And I don't think that 4 billion human beings should have to lie to themselves, eachother, and the 1 billion 2 year olds about the reality of Islam. I think massive genocide is likely either way. It just really really sucks that people are going to die for an obvious lie. If people are going to die, isn't it better that they die condemning this pathology? That's how I feel anyway. And I think if more people felt like I do, our chances might actually be better in the long run. Like I said - we disagree about fundamental strategy.

"I suppose there is a risk in saying that Bush screwed up"

'Suppose' seems to imply you haven't given it much thought. But I appreciate that you at least acknowledged it and didn't lecture me on the 1st ammendment. Much abliged!

"Americans smiling over the corpses of Iraqis who murdered them and a president who glosses over the issue"

I'm not sure what you are refering to, but I agree that the President's words and deeds have far more impact than yours or Newsweek's (obvious, of course). "Glosses over" is pretty subjective but I'm not sure what Bush has glossed over given that the Abu Ghraib perps have gone or are going to trial.

Thanks, Commenter, for the exchange. I like your posts - don't agree with much but they are well reasoned.

Thank you, Sweetie. I was referring to the picture halfway through this post. I was also referring to the fact that government officials, according to internal memoes, knew about Abu Ghraib (and other incidents in Afghanistan and Cuba) long before the public did, that they did nothing about it, that internal administration memoes set the stage for what happened by justifying torture and abrogation of Geneva, and that the administration seemed to care more about yelling at the media for publishing the pictures and punishing "a few bad apples" rather than tackling the problem of torture that continued even after the Abu Ghraib pictures were first released.

Caroline, I think the problem (among many) is that you assume that I care about radical Muslim grievances. I really don't. I know that plenty of Muslims live really shitty lives not of their making, but that never excuses what their radical bretheren do.

No, let's imagine another situation. Let's imagine the girl in a short skirt walking down the dark alley who gets raped. Was she asking for it? Of course not. Is it her fault? No, it is the fault of the rapist who chose rape over not-rape. If I say to a second short-skirt-wearing-girl, "don't go down that alley, or you'll get raped like the first girl" I am not excusing rape and I am not blaming the victim. In a wonderful, perfect world I could yell down the alley "hey, rapist! Rape is wrong and you're a bad person and you shouldn't rape!"

I might shame the person into not committing rape, but I still would recommend that the girl not go down the alley. If my priority is preventing the girl from getting raped, then I will try to stop her from going down the alley. Is it her fault? Of course not. Should she be the one who has to change her behavior? Of course not. Should the rapist be condemned and punished? Of course. But waiting for condemnation to change the behavior of the rapist is not the best way of preventing the girl from being raped.

Justice is important. Not dying is more important.

Certainly, out of a billion Muslims, there are enough who are on or close enough to the fence that some can be swayed away from our enemies and towards our side. Every single individual is a victory, especially if we have to expend very little effort to accomplish that victory (i.e., if we convince more Muslim reformers that we are on their side and not the side of dictators by having Bush not hold hands with Abdullah during photoshoots).

Certainly, radical Islam should be condemned vociferously by the global community, just as rape should be condemned by our local community. Unfortunately, condemnation is not enough, and it sounds a lot like you'd like to give up other avenues of pursuasion in exchange for a stern scolding.

Well, technically, in a wonderful perfect world there would be no dark alleys (except fun ones!) and no rapists, but you get the idea. There would, however, be many more short skirts.

Sweetie, I just noticed your other post (again). For some time, there have been any number of conservative voices claiming that either torture is not bad, or that it's ok, or that it's super good! or that what happened wasn't torture, or that it was ok because they were terrorists, or that even if it were torture it's not as big a PR disaster as it might be, and anyway it's that damn media's fault!!!!

Recall Limbaugh's comments about murder by torture being no worse than a fraternity hazing?

Commenter:

But pretend that something incredibly weird and petty and seemingly-irrelevant - say, every time Bush winked with his right eye, some Muslim became so enraged that he decided to become a suicide bomber. Would this be crazy? Would this be so unbelieveably weird? Absolutely!

Would I still want Bush to stop winking with his right eye? You bet!

Let's pretend instead that unsubstantiated rumors of disrespect for the Koran could make Immams of the excitable variety call for Jihad. Would I want more responsible behavior from the Fourth Estate? You bet!

I'll say it again; in a free society, responsibility cannot start and end at the government's doorstep. Do I think torture has happened? Yeah, probably. Do I want it stopped? Yeah, definitely, and for exactly the same reasons you give.

That England bitch needs to be locked up for a long time; I feel for her kid, but she did damage to the nation, and she brought disgrace to us all. Ditto for the pros and amateurs who may be doing what she did or worse. But I'll be damned if I'm going to limit my criticism to the White House and to the men and women who actually have to deal (and die) with the enemy, face to face.

The bottom line for me is that irresponsible reporting can kill people, and sloppy journalists need to be accorded the same respect as the Englands; none at all.

I guess, Mark, that the difference is that I would like to punish the actor, not the messenger. If by reporting on government abuse the media can end government abuse, I feel that more good will be done than if the government is free to continue to abuse (and the world still finds out about said abuse eventually anyway) and the media shuts up about it entirely.

In other words, I feel the cost of reporting is outweighed by the cost of continued government torture.

The problem with your formulation is that the media obviously IS an actor. That's why al Q. actually trained people in media manipulation.

I don't want the media to stop reporting abuses, I want the media to GET THE FACTS STRAIGHT. It's the whole "boy who cried wolf" problem. We can at least turn bastard politicians out of office. A fourth estate that isn't doing its job is a harder problem to fix, or so it seems to me.

Mark Poling: “Responsibility in a free society can't be limited to whoever sits in the Oval Office. It has to extend to anyone who thinks they actually have influence on events. (I guess that includes bloggers -- and Commenters -- too.)”

Hell yeah! That’s the beauty of the blogs! I am not a spokesman for the US government. They have a diplomatic role to play while I have a world citizen’s role to play and dammit – that’s the role I’m playing. I understand why our government can’t say what I’m saying – but that’s precisely why I choose my role in civil society while they choose theirs.

Commenter: “We're supposed to be the example the rest of the world looks to."

Where is Tom Grey with his mantra about “unreal perfection” when you need him?

Commenter: “the administration seemed to care more about yelling at the media for publishing the pictures and punishing "a few bad apples" rather than tackling the problem of torture that continued even after the Abu Ghraib pictures were first released.”

Commenter – I may be mistaken here but it seems to me that it was average citizen bloggers who yelled at the media over the Abu Ghraib photo orgy and not the Bush administration itself.

Commenter: “I know that plenty of Muslims live really shitty lives not of their making, but that never excuses what their radical bretheren do.”

No – you’re right – most of their shitty lives are in fact due to their radical brethren. All the more reason to fight Islam as far as I’m concerned. Westerners should stand up for the rights of Islamic apostates, Islamic blasphemers, Islamic women who do not wish to live under Shariah law, Muslim homosexuals and so on. Come to think of it – western liberals should oppose Islam period. Anyone who has a FREEchoice to live that way – fine. My opposition shall be limited to defending people who do not. That means supporting people who want to leave it and fighting like hell against anyone who even remotely imagines that Islam would be a good thing for the remaining 4 billion other members of the human race.

Commenter: “I might shame the person into not committing rape, but I still would recommend that the girl not go down the alley. If my priority is preventing the girl from getting raped, then I will try to stop her from going down the alley. Is it her fault? Of course not. Should she be the one who has to change her behavior? Of course not. Should the rapist be condemned and punished? Of course. But waiting for condemnation to change the behavior of the rapist is not the best way of preventing the girl from being raped.”

Commenter – you’re hopeless. You don’t seem to realize that you’re already condemning that girl to a burqua in the new world we’re confronting. I’m a girl. Maybe I see it more clearly than you do. Screw you.

Aw, Caroline, and you were so nice to me before.

I'm not even sure how to tackle the contention that suggesting to a girl that she not walk down a dark alley known to contain rapists condemns her in any way to life under a burqa. ?

Seriously, if I told you "if you walk through this door, you will be shot in the head by a crazy person", would you then proceed to lecture me about how awful that crazy person was, and then walk through the door as a demonstration of how you're standing up to crazy murderers?

Caroline,

You continue to type "Muslims" when who you're talking about is extreme violent fundamentalists. You seem to forget (or be unaware of) the fact that most Muslims are just people who are trying to get through their day and have zero interest in murdering infidel babies.

You know I just lived among the Muslims of West Beirut for a month. Have I told you that they were far kinder and sweeter to me than my fellow Americans are? And they are w-a-y nicer than Europeans. Europeans could learn some manners and social skills from the Arabs.

An apology for Abu Ghraib is NOT going to deter a guy who wants to kill infidel babies. But it will help reasonable people in the Middle East (and there are millions of such people) think more highly of us. We need those people to help us track down those who kill infidel babies.

I really don't care what the Koran says about jihad. I mean, I do care to an extent, but I'm not going to judge a billion people because of something a guy named Mohammed wrote 1300 years ago. I will judge a terrorist for being a terrorist, and I'll judge a terrorist cheerleader for being a terrorist cheerleader. But I am not going to judge a person because he or she was, by sheer accident, born in Istanbul (or wherever else) and was raised in the prevailing faith of that place.

I was raised a Christian. If anyone wants to hang the crimes of General Franco and Slobodan Milosovic around my neck they can kiss my ass.

Some pundit, I think Richard Cohen or EJ Dionne, included the following anecdote in a column recently: In WWI, we treated German POW's well. As a result, in WWII, German soldiers were often quick to surrender, saving American lives.

America is at her best when she lives up to her ideals. We should argue the "how" but never abandon our principles of truth, justice and freedom.

Commenter: "But waiting for condemnation to change the behavior of the rapist is not the best way of preventing the girl from being raped.”

Excuse me? No condemnation of the rapist? And you are suggesting what, might I ask? Understanding? Group therapy? Psychoanalysis of the poor rapist's early childhood trauma? Sure, Commenter, by all means avoid condemnation. Condemnation just might, you know, piss the guy off and cause him to rape more women - or something.

MJT: "And they are w-a-y nicer than Europeans. Europeans could learn some manners and social skills from the Arabs"

Michael - boot me when you feel the time is right. I'll go without a fight. But what you're describing is a cultural trait - politeness. No one doubts the warmth and hospitality of the Muslim world. It is without a doubt a wonderful cultural trait. The west could use more of it no doubt. The west could also use more overt and loud grieving at funerals. We're extremely uptight in many ways. But you're still talking about a fairly superficial cultural trait in the end, aren't you?

I am not talking about treating one billion people as my enemies. I'm sure you appreciate that tomorrow there could be 1 billion less Muslims in the world and not one less human being on the planet. Why do people insist on imagining that belief=human being? It doesn't. Sorry for the rant tonight. I should back off. My apologies, especially to the host.

One last point - to Commenter. Have you followed Fjordman's posts re the rape epidemic of native Swedish women at the hands of Muslim immigrants? The same thing is going on in France and Australia. In Sweden, the official response has been to the effect that 'we're living in a multicultural society now' - the message being that Swedish women need to understand the fact that their western clothes are provocative in this new multicultural milieu. Well - that pretty much says it all, doesn't it? It's not too hard to figure out where things are heading for native European women in this new multicultural milieu, is it now? But then a little multiculural 'understanding' is not a bad thing is it - unless you happen to be a woman.

Caroline: But you're still talking about a fairly superficial cultural trait in the end, aren't you?

Well, yes. But people who treat me that way aren't itching to kill me and my family. I would get a different reception in some parts of Algeria (for example), and that means something.

I could also remind you that pornography is sold on the streets of Beirut and that not even Hezbollah thinks women must wear the veil or a headscarf. That means something, too.

It also means something that most Iranians want to hang the fascist mullahs from cranes.

Most Muslims aren't the Taliban. Most Muslims did not riot over the Koran-in-the-toilet story. We're talking about the fringe of the fringe here. That's all I'm saying. It's easy to forget that on this side of the ocean, but it's easy to remember that when you're living (temporarily or otherwise) among liberal and moderate Muslims.

Caroline,

I can't help but feel that there has been a miscommunication. At no point did I say "don't condemn evil". I said "don't expect condemning evil to stop evil".

For the sake of morality and justice, no, these people should not be rewarded or coddled in anyway. I would love it if, instead of coddling, people wouldn't join al Qaeda because they realized that al Qaeda is evil.

But what if it takes coddling? What if coddling saves a life?

You want to look at the potential terrorist as a little child who needs to be scolded into good behavior. If the kid misbehaves, I shouldn't bribe him with a cookie to stop misbehaving, right? Of course not.

But what if the kid has access to semtex? You better believe that I'll give him the damn cookie. Is it good? Is it fulfilling? Is it fair? Is it just? No, no, no, no. But if giving him the cookie means my family and me are still alive the next morning, then yes, I'll give him the cookie now and then yell at him when I get the semtex away while he's distracted watching Sesame Street.

C is for Cookie!

Michael and Commenter -

I have surely violated Mom's primary rule: If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. (But then honestly, whoever listened to Mom?)

What's that? The 3:00 bell? School's out! I'll do my homework and see you when class (evidently Terrorism 101) meets again..

(P.S. Commenter - sorry for being mean. I AM glad you're feeling better.:-))

But what if the kid has access to semtex? You better believe that I'll give him the damn cookie.

..umm..Commenter, do you have kids?

Because if a kid knows that he can boss you around by making larger and ever more convincing threats, you're going to have one very out-of-control kid.

Not to say that your idea is unique. This was, for years, the standard approach to terrorism; which explains how a bunch of bratty, brain dead Islamic thugs wound up in charge of large oil-producing nations. It explains Arafat and the British "success" with the IRA. It explains why extremist Mullahs think they can get their way by yelling really loud and stomping their feet. Why on earth do we keep indulging these brats?

Kofi Annan probably knows about the relationship between parenting and foreign policy.

doubleplus,

You: Except that these guys were, y'know, released by the US because they aren't Al Qaeda.

Me:No, some went right back to fighting us.

You:Really? You mean the US military are releasing actual terrorists after already having them in captivity for several years? That's a pretty strong charge. Do you have anything to back that up? A link, possibly?

Yes, really, and no it isn't, considering all the complaints and legal wrangling about them being held in the first place. If we can't prove they're going to commit terrorist acts, and they take an oath not to, it's difficult to hold them forever without charging them with some crime other than "suspicion of being a member of Al Qaeda" which isn't illegal.

Yes, I have a link.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52670-2004Oct21.html

At least 10 detainees released from the Guantanamo Bay prison after U.S. officials concluded they posed little threat have been recaptured or killed fighting U.S. or coalition forces in Pakistan and Afghanistan, according to Pentagon officials.

Next time you might try to follow the news or at least learn to use Google rather than accusing me of making things up and forcing me to waste my time remedying your ignorance of well-publicized knowledge. You'll save me work and yourself embarassment.

Most Muslims aren't the Taliban. Most Muslims did not riot over the Koran-in-the-toilet story. We're talking about the fringe of the fringe here.

Amen, Michael. While they do have a somewhat more violent fringe than other major religions, the vast majority of Muslims don't share the zealots' mission of spreading Islam by the sword and suicide bomber. They're just people trying to live their lives like you or me, and they want the same things we do. I think Iraqis in particular view the jihadists as religious nuts.

Great post there, Michael.

Excellent stuff. Thanks.

Good morning Caroline -- you KNOW I'm in Slovakia, don't you? {Plus there's the Carnival of the Liberated to read!}

Why an apology over Abu Ghraib?
"But it will help reasonable people in the Middle East (and there are millions of such people) think more highly of us."

Over a YEAR ago Rumsfeld apologized. Why isn't that enough? (Michael? Really, why isn't it?)
The US military had ALREADY fired Gen. Karpinski (the PC correct, [redundant!] female general, literally with no balls to stand up to the mil. intel colonel); she's recently been demoted.
Why isn't that enough?

Because ... (mantra roll, please) UNREAL PERFECTION. Commenter is lying to himself. The only way Bush, or any military leader, can avoid ALL soldier abuse is the Clinton Rwanda strategy--avoid action first, apologize for genocide later.

The reason Leftists talk, incessently, of Abu is to show America has no moral superiority over the terrorists--and therefore Bush was wrong to fight in Iraq, or he's doing too much (interrogation/ tortue), or he's not doing enough (regime change of allies), or he's the Chimp-Hitler devil. In other words, Bush fighting evil is not better.

Wrong.

Fighting evil means innocents WILL be killed. (No wonder the Pope opposed the war; and the WW II Pope wasn't so hot for war then, either. Knowing Dresden or something like it was coming.)

What is enough? Bush resigning. And prolly not even then (if Haliburton ran the war).

What is the US supposed to do that it hasn't done? (Release terrorist suspects because there's not enough proof? As innocent as OJ.)

Michael earlier: "The odds that Uzbekistan will go fundamentalist are about as high as Beirut going fundamentalist. Both are very secular places. I'm not worried about that scenario."

Sorry Michael, I'm not reassured. The 2000 election law will prolly be used in Lebanon, the messy slightly anti-Christian democracy coming has not been proven stable, and I'm certain Hezbollah has the power to cause huge economic destruction. I don't think they're willing to do it, so I agree the odds are low -- about the same as 1929 democratic Germany going insane? Likely less, but still worrying (and more worry & care means even less likelihood of civil war).

Uzbekistan is much, much worse. Drug funded warlards might well thrive on an anti-gov't program of increasing anarchy, in some alliance of convenience with Wahhabists. I really, really don't know.

But reassurance by some folk that nothing "too bad" is likely to happen is really hollow. Like Kerry's 71 testimony about the US leaving Vietnam would likely cause only a few thousand murders.

Finally, back to Commenter's early "if he does nothing to oppose Karimov ... will any of Bush's cheering squad accuse Bush of hypocrisy? Of empty rhetoric?", even after it's pointed out that the US is, ALREADY, doing something, it's not enough.
Who is the hypocrite? Commenter is.

"Would I still want Bush to stop winking with his right eye? You bet!"
Liar. Or not. "Would I still criticize and implicitly call for Bush/ Reps to lose elections as long as they don't 'do enough'? You bet!"

I think current US policy in Uzbekistan is pretty much on the right path now, even if the Leftist media prefers beating Bush with the Abu stick. (Not enough until US is perfect). But a problem with the Democracy Domino theory occurs when it is true -- too many non-democracies start significant change at the same time, so the US media can't focus on just one. I think Condie took over just in time.

Have you all seen JibJab's Second Term? My kids love it!

Mary,

I'd like to point out that this if off-point from what we were originally discussing, but I'll deal with it anyway.

I'm not suggesting that we reward terrorists, and so far as I know very, very few marginalized voices ever did so. No government has a policy of rewarding terrorists. So far as I know, most governments have "no negotiations" policies, and history has demonstrated that most governments deal with terrorists by shooting them or arresting them.

So, if someone were to kidnap a contractor in Iraq and demand that the US disband, we'd say "no negotiations!" It would be insane, and it would be rewarding a terrorist's bad behavior, which would only encourage more. But if a terrorist made a credible threat of, say, detonating nuclear bombs in a hundred US cities unless we paid him a trillion dollars, I can bet you that we'd pay him a trillion dollars. At a certian point, questions of rewarding bad behavior are superceded by questions of not getting blown up.

Anyway, that wasn't the point. The point was that Caroline seems to be rejecting any counterterrorism policy that doesn't scold people for thinking of joining our enemies. In other words, I feel that if we make certain public relations moves, we can discourage some people from hating us. Caroline seems to believe that because people shouldn't be joining terrorist organizations in the first place, that PR moves like that are simply coddling them and are therefore bad.

Well, it's true, people shouldn't join these groups and they shouldn't hate us. But saying "they should know better" isn't going to stop them from doing so. Now, if I knew that Bush going on TV and saying "I love fruit rollups" would make 100 people decide not to help terrorists, I would ask that Bush go on TV and say "I love fruit rollups". Should those 100 people know better than to join the terrorists? Of course.

But for the sake of counterrorism, let's not think of them as spoiled children who should be punished for their bad behavior. Let's think of them as a very dangerous force of nature. A hurricane. An angry bear. Let's say an angry bear eats my dog, and then comes after me. I might think "I will throw a steak to distract the bear so I can run away". Is it right to "reward" the bear with a steak after he ate my dog? Is it just, moral, and so forth? Who cares? Run away!

And that's my point: when it comes to immediate survival, shut up about whether it's fair or right or moral or just. Stop expecting people to know better or do what we think they should do. If I sat there thinking about how unfair it is for the bear to get my dog AND my steak, and how the bear should know better, the dog will eat me. Similarly, if a press conference deters 10 potential bomb makers, I can sit around thinking about how those 10 potential bomb makers should just grow up and know better and how it's not my responsibility to make them good people, it's theirs. And that's all correct. But it will not stop them from being potential bomb makers. If giving them candy stopped them from wanting to be bomb makers, I'd probably give them candy. Is it fair? No. Is it rewarding bad behavior? In a way, yes, because it means that they are not being made to own up to their own potential for being monsters.

Caroline seems to care more about the principle of making sure bad people know they're bad, and making people grow up, and own up to their mistakes, and so forth. I'm all for that stuff too - once I've made sure that none of them are going to blow me up.

That dark alley with the potential rapist in it? Optimally, we'd be able to convince him that rape is wrong. Slightly less optimally is getting the police to go down the alley and arrest him. But what if the situation is: a person about to walk down the alley RIGHT NOW, I'd say, hey, don't walk down that alley or you'll get raped. Is an innocent person being asked to change their behavior because of the sins of another person? Sure! Is this rational? Sure! I don't want to get raped! I care about the principle of it, sure, but I care a lot more about the immediacy of not getting hurt. Caroline sounds a lot like she'd walk down that alley out of principle and end up getting hurt. When your life is in immediate danger, principles like "rapists should know better" become a lot less important than "I don't want to get raped".

Or, let me put it another way.

Condemning radical Islam is part of a long-term strategy for discrediting it.

Convincing on-the-fence Muslims that we're not their enemies through a campaign of strategic communications (and making sure Bush doesn't undermind that campaign by holding hands with Abdullah or that American commanders don't by saying that this is an anti-Muslim crusade) is part of a medium-term strategy for decreasing the number of our enemies.

Blowing up terrorists is the immediate, short-term strategy.

Clearer?

But if a terrorist made a credible threat of, say, detonating nuclear bombs in a hundred US cities unless we paid him a trillion dollars, I can bet you that we'd pay him a trillion dollars. At a certian point, questions of rewarding bad behavior are superceded by questions of not getting blown up.

Money is just a short-term goal. The goal of most political terrorism is negotiation. When we negotiate with them, they win. In the case of Arafat and the IRA, when we give them political power, they win.

According to their mugger's logic, they can't get our respect without a gun, so they use a gun.

If terrorists were able to make a credible threat about nuclear annihilation, then the situation would be like the cold war. Mutually assured destruction. Islamic terrorists are not stateless, they have lots of bombable territory to lose. We've already dealt with this kind of problem.

But for the sake of counterrorism, let's not think of them as spoiled children who should be punished for their bad behavior. Let's think of them as a very dangerous force of nature. A hurricane. An angry bear. Let's say an angry bear eats my dog, and then comes after me. I might think "I will throw a steak to distract the bear so I can run away".

They're not a huge and unstoppable force of nature, they're punks. Look at photos of Prince Abdullah. He's a creaky old man. So's bin Laden. Saddam's army was the strongest in the Arab world. While terrorists & Ba'thists follow the philosophy of the Nazis, they don't have Hitler's military strength or strategic skills. If our government decided to fight terrorism instead of playing indulgent realpolitik games, terrorists would be toast. The only power they have is the power we've been giving them.

While I don't agree with Caroline's ideas about Islam, I do agree with the idea that evil thrives when good men do nothing. Or when good men inflate a threat to Herculean proportions.

Commenter,

Good arguments as usual, but for your sanity, give it a rest. Especially avoid mud wrestling with Tom Grey, who, for a guy who scoffs at "unreal perfectionism", seems to demand a lot of that commodity from his opponents.

Don't spend so much time here that you jeopardize that Master's you're working on. That is more important to America than any of the shit going on here.

A word of advice: avoid analogies that use rape. Women tend to see it as either too emotionally charged or a trivialization of the subject - and I know that wasn't your intent.

Ugh, Mary, I didn't say they were an unstoppable force of nature, unless you think that a bear is unstoppable (and only robo-bears are really unstoppable). The point is to try to divorce the imperative for moralizing from the immediate reaction to a threat: respond to the threat, then deal with the moral imperatives.

Muslims should not be reacting to the Koran story with violence. It is wrong to hurt random, unrelated people for something like that. These people bear the moral responsibility for this. Caroline is right, they should grow up.

But utterly, utterly regardless of the fact that they should grow up and should not act this way is the fact that they do act this way, and that we have an incentive to get them to not act that way, and if we can do that through strategic communications we should.

PS - The point of the nuclear bomb scenario is, as I said, a tangent meant to demonstrate that there are situations in which rational people will give in to the demands of terrorists, despite the fact that this will only encourage terrorists to do the same in the future. If a mugger points a gun at me, I will give him my wallet. I will not think "in the interest of denying this mugger an incentive to continue mugging, I will refuse to give him my wallet" because I would then be shot and killed. Likewise, if a terrorist plants nuclear bombs in a hundred cities and says "withdraw all troops from the Middle East and stop aid to Israel", the government would probably, rationally, do exactly what the terrorist demands. Is this optimal? Nothing is optimal when millions of people could die from a nuclear holocaust. The rule of "don't reward terrorists" is applicable only when the consequences of doing so are low - when a few hostages are going to die, for example. If the survival of America as a state and millions of people are at risk, then the immediate consequences are too dire to try to factor in the future consequences of rewarding one terrorist.

And where the hell do you get the idea that we can deter terrorists like that? Isn't the whole point of the War on Terror that we can no longer deter people who are willing to committ suicide and who want to kill large numbers of people? That these people are not acting under the same rubric of loving life more than hating us the way the Soviets did? Or did I miss that memo?

Just a quick comment. I have stuff to do.

Mary, the Israelis, who know a thing or two about dealing with terrorists, will negotiate if that's what is called for. They know that negotiation, in and of itself, means nothing, and can be a useful part of an overall strategy.

Vino, Commenter - ..and that's why the ideals and courage of Roosevelt and Kennedy's Democratic party are dead.

I'll bet you guys always lose at poker..

I get it, the ideals of the Democratic Party are dead because we're not willing to get shot to death by a mugger to prove a point about how mugging is bad. Or because, if I were in charge, I would give into a terrorist if it meant that 100 million people would die if I didn't. Yeah. I'm terrible! I value the immediate survival of a hundred million people over the principle of not rewarding terrorists! Clearly, the Democrats have no principles!

Mary: "I'll bet you guys always lose at poker.."

I avoid gambling. I have a tendency towards obsession-compulsion; that's probably why I keep posting here.

Oh, and Mary: "and that's why the ideals and courage of Roosevelt and Kennedy's Democratic party are dead."

Didn't you get the talking-points memo from the White House? Roosevelt sold out at Yalta! Sheesh!

Isn't the whole point of the War on Terror that we can no longer deter people who are willing to committ suicide and who want to kill large numbers of people? That these people are not acting under the same rubric of loving life more than hating us the way the Soviets did?

We're not fighting a War on Terror. If we were, Saudi Arabia and the Sudan wouldn't be our allies.

With a very powerful military, tons of nukes, an educated population and a successful space program, I'd say that Soviets were a little scarier than a bunch of blithering zealots who bomb little kids and hide like roaches.

If they're not afraid to die, why do they hide?

If their state supporters aren't afraid of us, why don't they just openly declare war?

We treat these weak supporters of terror with more respect than we gave to Russia or Hitler's Germany, and there's no reason to do that.

Mary,

The term "War on Terrorism" is short-hand for a lot of things that have nothing to do with terrorism. It's just a useful, innacurate shorthand, like "liberal" or "conservative".

The point of the hypothetical was: what if America faces a massive, massive attack? What if we're talking about a nuclear bomb in New York or Washington? What if we're talking about ten bombs, or more? Is there a point at which you say: "ok, I give in" - just to survive long enough to fight another day? In the same way, if a criminal says "give me your wallet or you'll watch your children die in front of you", do you give them the wallet or do you watch your children die?

So how do you deter a massive attack? What if Osama bin Laden says "I have planted ten nuclear bombs: in New York, DC, LA, Chicago...."

What do you bomb? Who do you shoot? How do you deter that sort of thing?

And how do you respond? Do you say "no negotiations" and watch millions of people die, or do you give in, reward the terrorist, but survive intact to continue fighting?

There is certainly a division among people like al Qaeda between those who are willing to die and those who are not. Do they hide because they are afraid, or because they are not willing to "waste" their lives, but rather want to die killing others in a suicide attack? Are some willing to die while others are unwilling because they are scared, or because they deem themselves too important to their cause?

Does that matter? Well, operationally, no. We know that there are people willing to carry out suicide attacks, and the greatest deterrance is to kill them before they can die carrying out their mission. Beyond that, how do you deter them? How should we have deterred Mohammad Atta? Terrorists continue to stage massive attacks - in Russia, Indonesia, Spain, Turkey, and so forth, with no state support (or if it is, it's hidden enough that we cannot effectively deter it because we can't even see it - or else, wouldn't we be trying to deter it?). They don't need state support. They're not afraid to die.

What happens if a particular cell gets hold of a nuclear bomb, and declares that only withdrawing all US forces from the Middle East will save Miami. We say "we'll attack your state sponsers!" And they say "what do we care about state sponsers, we've already planted the bomb!" And we say "we'll deter you! We'll shoot you!" And they say "we were planning on dying this way anyway!" And we say "we'll deter you! We'll nuke your headquarters!" And they say "Our headquarters is Boston!" Seriously, how do you deter these ten guys with a suitcase nuke?

Maybe Michael should consider setting up open threads so people can go there to comment on the topic-du-jour - Abu Ghraib, liberal media, Newsweek, whatever. How many of the above posts have anything to do with Uzbekistan? 7? It's hard to generate much of a conversation when people veer so wildly off topic. And some of those off-topic comments raise interesting issues, just seems like they should be somewhere else.

Commenter - if terrorists have no state support, if they're stateless and independent why are we trying to use less Saudi and Iranian oil? Why shouldn't Bush hold Abdullah's hand?

Terrorists value their income, they value their oil, they value their homeland, Islam, Mecca, mosques and all of their various holy places. They hope to establish a Caliphate in the Middle East. It would be hard to do if the Middle East was no longer there.

Terrorists say they're stateless and that they're not afraid to die. The Soviets said they'd bury us. If we're afraid of their threats, we lose.

You seriously overestimate them.

Vanya - there are some terrorists in Uzbekistan, but not enough to justify going this far off topic. OT blog commenting is a habit, like crack. I go OT on most of my own posts - very bad.

"if they're stateless and independent why are we trying to use less Saudi and Iranian oil?"

Because the more closely involved we are in the region, the more people hate us.

"Why shouldn't Bush hold Abdullah's hand?"

So that people who don't hate us there might actually trust us.

"It would be hard to do if the Middle East was no longer there"

So you're saying that genocide is the solution?

"If we're afraid of their threats, we lose."

So there's no danger from terrorists? The point of the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq are...?

"So you're saying that genocide is the solution?"

Commenter basically made the claim that MAD couldn't work to deter people willing to die for their religion. Mary is making the point that there are presumably things which they do value more than their own lives and those are things that relate to Islam - Mecca, mosques, Korans and so on. If you make it very clear that everything that Islam holds dear will be destroyed should they put numerous nukes in American cities, then you have MAD and deterrance rather than capitulation to terrorist threats and demands. Two can play this game.

Thanks, Caroline!

Echidna, how will buying less oil and destroying their economies make them like us better? Do you think they hate us because we give them too much money?

Whatever works for you..

Shoot the bear. Put a light in the alley so the girl can get a good sight picture. Share the steak with the dog (I like dogs). Next problem?

Semper Fi

"Put a light in the alley so the girl can get a good sight picture."

I was gonna say carry a gun in the alley and bring along backup. But "Take back the alley!" would be my rallying cry!

Commenter - I came across this today at Laurence Auster's site. It addresses the point I was trying to make last night.

(Warning: serious political incorrectness):

How Muslims use rage to manipulate white guilt

A quote from someone named Gedaliah Braun, author of 'Racism, Guilt, And Self-Deceit" (never heard of this person before):

"One must look at the logic of "anger". If I am angry at you it is presumed, based on the very nature (logic) of anger, that you must have somehow wronged me, which automatically means that I have a grievance against you, which in turn means that you "owe" me. In short, as I emphasize in my book, once whites grant the legitimacy of black's "anger"--or, in the case in point, Muslims' "anger"--i.e., that it is based on some legitimate grievance, the (psychological) battle is over: blacks (and Muslims) have the upper hand--which of course leads to groveling apologies, and which in turn only leads to more "anger" since, among other things, it emphasizes to blacks and Muslims, how incredibly weak and frightened whites are. And, how stupid they are for continually blaming themselves for things which (I know) blacks know are not whites' fault and which I suspect Muslims and Arabs know just was well--deep though it may be buried below multiple layers of self-deceit.

In this battle of wills or psychological warfare, blacks and Muslims feel, correctly, that they have whites on the run; and when you have the 'enemy' on the run, that makes you run after them all the harder and faster. It is, in many ways, quite similar to an army that has the enemy in a rout. It also involves the bully-mentality: once the bully senses fear and weakness, that simply makes him go for the jugular."

I suppose your view, OTOH, is well expressed in this article, posted at LGF today:

Linda Heard

Well - there you have it - certainly a debate worth having, even if this thread isn't the place for it. (With apologies to Vanya for the hijacking, (and also to Commenter for my rudeness last night).

VinoV: "I have a tendency towards obsession-compulsion; that's probably why I keep posting here."

Welcome to the club!

(PS - VinoV - I get a little heated about the rape thing only because it seems to be one of the few crimes where the 'blame the victim' mentality still applies but I by no means consider it the worst thing that could happen to a person. It's things like cutting off heads, gouging out eyes, cutting off tongues, cutting off genitals and stuffing them in people's mouths, that drive me ballistic and make it hard to see or think straight.)

When people think that I am trying to blame the victim, or that I'm acting out of "white guilt", or the myriad of other interpretations I've heard, I realize that I have utterly, totally failed to convey what I have tried to convey.

Fortunately for me, the Bush administration agrees with me (!) over a multi-approach strategy that includes trying to win over moderate and fence-sitting Muslims to our side through strategic communications. Unfortunately, Bush and Co. continue to do things that make this more difficult, but no one's perfect.

Anyway, like Vino suggested, for my sanity's sake I'm going to give up, because no matter how many times I explicitly point out that suggesting "don't do something that you know will get you hurt" does not, in any way, blame the victim, apparently people still don't get it. Cheers!

Commenter - I do appreciate your efforts here, don't get me wrong. But while I understand, "don't do something that you know will get you hurt", it's very hard for me to understand how that - as a philosophy - doesn't ultimately embolden the bullies in the schoolyard. That's not to say that I endorse confronting the bullies in the schoolyard merely for the sake of a fight because I don't. I am as peace-loving as the next western liberal by nature. But we are confronting something rather unprecented in American history and obviously we're all trying to figure out how to deal with it. I guess I would sum up my own philosophy as "call a spade a spade - even when the bully is a spade - and then let the chips fall where they may."

Please don't give up trying to make your point. I think this debate is most fruitful because it's getting quite to the heart of the matter, which is apparently "confrontation vs appeasement". I have little doubt, however, that we both share the same long-term goals, namely, understanding which approach saves the most lives in the long run? Which is the correct psychological model for understanding what we face and how to solve it? But I would also add - what price do the living pay for choosing life over death? These are the eternal questions about human conflict, warfare, and well, - the meaningof life, non?

We in the west are obviously not used to addressing these issues in the context of religious warfare! Religion introduces a whole new twist! Something we pretty much have only read about in the history books! To say that these are interesting times we live in would surely be the understatement of the year, would it not?

Commenter - FWIW - I do hear what you're saying and I will continue to ponder it. Well - little choice BUT to ponder it, as your POV is obviously the prevailing one in the west. I mainly keep pushing the other (what some might call the extreme) side because I think that's the kind of balance that is ultimately needed to help us make the right decisions about what to do.

But, Caroline, that's the point. It's not about appeasement! It's not appeasement! It was never appeasement! It will never be appeasement!

Let's say there are two groups of people out there, two groups of Muslims. A gross oversimplification, but a useful one for now. Two groups. One is our enemy, they hate us, they want to blow us up, and so forth. I believe we should destroy them, or deter them, or contain them, or do whatever it takes to prevent them from doing further harm.

There is another group. They have the potential to be our friends, but they also have the potential to be our enemies. I say, let's do our best to win them over as our friends. We can say "well, they should know better than to join our enemies" all we want, but this will not magically make it so. If we could do a study that showed that pictures of Bush holding hands with Abdullah encouraged 100 people in this group to join the group of our enemies, I think that we should make sure those pictures don't get taken.

Is this appeasement? No, because I'm not handing over anything to our enemies. I'm not even talking about our enemies! I'm talking about people that we'd like to have on our side. You're right, they should not join our enemies, because our enemies are bad. But, that's like saying a rapist shouldn't committ rape because rape is bad. Of course rape is bad! Of course no one should rape! But there's still rape, because there are still bad people who are going to committ rape regardless. Saying "rape is wrong and you should not committ rape" will not magically stop rape from happening.

Right now those people who have the potential to be our friends are on the fence. Right now they have a voice whispering in their ear, the devil on their shoulder, whispering to them about how terrible we are and how we should be destroyed. I think that we should be the angel on the other shoulder, whispering good things to them. I also don't think that the angel, while whispering good things, should be busy torturing that person's friends, because then he or she might not trust the angel. You know what I mean?

Not appeasement. Telling someone not to walk down a dark alley is not appeasement. The rapist should be arrested, lights should be installed, the alley made safe, and all people should know that rape is bad and not do it. Ok, does any of this change the situation of the alley? Not at all. If you tell your children "don't take candy from strangers", is this appeasing criminals? Is this blaming the potential victim? Or is it common sense? Seriously, if you can do X that costs you little and benefits you a lot, why not do it? If X is "no more pictures with Abdullah", and X means that 100 fewer Muslims become our enemies, why not do it?

Now, should people turn to terrorism over those pictures? [I don't think any do - I just think those pictures make people trust us less, and less willing to help us, and more willing to listen to our enemies] No, people should not turn to terrorism over those pictures. But what if some do? We can sit and scold and moralize all we want, but that doesn't change the reality. Now, if your priority is preventing terrorism, then here's a channel. This is not appeasement. This is called "strategic communications" and the point is to prevent people from even wanting to be terrorists in the first place. If, in that region, all it takes is a tiny excuse, let's at least minimize that excuse. Instead of saying "well, people are going to hate us anyway, so let's not do anything", why not do everything in our power to minimize what excuses we can?

But, honestly, the whole thing about the dark alley was probably not the best example, because that opens up to all sorts of people the chance to yell "you're blaming the victim!". Seriously, the point of that example was simply to point out that the best option for dealing with a threat is not to say "well, that bad guy should grow up and start acting good!" Do something, anything, to deal with the threat, but don't say "since the bad guy should act a certain way, I'm not going to change or do anything until he starts acting that way".

Anyway, I don't know about you guys, but if someone told me that if the US didn't withdraw from the Middle East then 100,000,000 Americans would die, I'd say "withdraw from the Middle East". Is that appeasement? Hell yeah. Do norms for dealing with terrorist threats start to break down under such extreme conditions? Hell yeah. The point is: you cannot deal with a threat like radical Islamic terrorism by simply saying "no negotiating with terrorists, no nothing, because they should know better than to be so naughty!"

Yes, they should know better than to be naughty. But while you're busy waiting for them to grow up, I'd like to do a number of things, including a) killing them and b) convincing as many of their neighbors not to join them.

PS - the bear, the hurricane, all of those examples are an attempt at getting people to stop thinking in terms of "well, since reasonable people don't become terrorists over pictures, we should not care that the pictures are there". Do not think in terms of "they shouldn't do that because rational people don't do that". Think in terms of "for whatever reason, this is the way they act, and we should respond accordingly". If your goal is "stop terrorist acts from occuring" then, in the short run, we do not have the luxury of sitting back and saying "well, since they shouldn't be acting naughty, I don't have to do anything because it's not my responsibility". No, it's not your moral responsibility, but if you don't want to get blown up, then I suggest that you do something about that. So, I suggested: think of them as a bear, as a hurricane, as robots, because then you'll stop thinking about them in terms of "they shouldn't do that so I don't bear responsibility for doing anything" and you'll start thinking in terms of "if I wave the red flag the bull charges, so I shouldn't wave the red flag".

Especially when the red flag is "torture". What happened to our standards?

Commenter - I am guilty of long posts myself but that was a whopper! I will definitely have to ponder that some before responding in the morning - over coffee (especially since it's 11:30 pm here - for you too I guess)...

Commenter,

I think you should get a blog. I will read it if you do. When you first showed up here I threatened to kick you out if you didn't stop trolling. I'm glad you stopped trolling and stuck around.

Commenter: "Anyway, I don't know about you guys, but if someone told me that if the US didn't withdraw from the Middle East then 100,000,000 Americans would die, I'd say "withdraw from the Middle East". Is that appeasement? Hell yeah."

Commenter - the number is a bit high but isn't that precisely what we've already been told?