What The President Should Have Said in Cairo
posted at 12:06 am on June 7, 2009 by Doctor Zero
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Author’s note: I know perfectly well there’s no way Barack Obama would have said any of the things that follow. This is how I think the speech in Cairo should have gone. I liked Obama’s first sentence, so I kept that.
I am honored to be in the timeless city of Cairo, and grateful for your hospitality. I will honor you in return by addressing you directly. I came here to speak to you, not to European leaders or American media commentators. I hope you will forgive my frankness, but we have much to talk about, and some of what I came here to say will not be easy for you to hear.
I will not waste your time by carefully selecting quotes from the Koran, in a misguided attempt to tell you what your religion means. I am here to tell you what membership in the community of civilized nations means. Your faith is your own affair, but it ends where the rest of our lives begin. It is fashionable among the Western elites to say that we have much to learn about the Muslim world, but the truth is precisely the reverse. One of the bedrock principles of Western democracy is that we don’t need to understand, or even like, a particular religion in order to respect its faithful and their rights. There are some things the West is long overdue in teaching its Muslim neighbors, however. Let us begin with dismissing the notion of a “Muslim world.” There is no such thing. There is one world, made increasingly intimate by the easy movement of people, resources, and ideas. We are all in the process of learning how to live with our fellow men, and while the West is far from perfect, we are much further ahead in our studies than the nations of the Middle East. Our security, and yours, will be greatly enhanced if we can lend you some of the wisdom we have accumulated.
We did not come by this wisdom easily. We learned by taking incredible risks… and making terrible mistakes… magnified by the power of Western military tradition and technology. The people of the Middle East have never known anything to compare with the industrialized slaughter of the two World Wars, in which millions of lives were lost to decisively settle the question of what makes a government just and legitimate. You have never watched five thousand of your sons die on a single day, to secure a beachhead against the forces of genocidal fascism – a battle we commemorate on the sixth of June every year. Your fighting men have not faced anything like the battle for Okinawa, where American Marines faced an eighty percent chance of death – and did not waver. You have not sacrificed half a million soldiers to destroy the evil of slavery, as America did during its Civil War. You have not spent blood and treasure around the world to save other nations from the savage darkness of communism. You have no leaders to equal the Founding Fathers who pledged their lives, and sacred honor, to win America’s independence from imperial domination.
You have not burned and bled for freedom, as we have. We would spare you that pain, if we could. We are willing to burn and bleed for you – and we have been doing so, for eight long years. Instead of indulging in foolish paranoid fantasies about crusaders and oppression from America, open your eyes and look to the mountains of Afghanistan, where over a thousand Coalition troops have died to overthrow the Taliban, after their despicable complicity in the murders of September 11, 2001. We did not have to send those troops into harm’s way, to avenge the slaughter at the World Trade Center. We could have eliminated all life in that region, in a matter of hours. If we followed the standards of our enemies, we would have. We sent our best and bravest into battle because of who we wished to spare, not who we wanted to kill.
Open your eyes and look to Iraq, where we allowed thousands of Iraqi troops to lay down their arms and go home, instead of killing them where they stood. We paid an awful price for this act of mercy, as many of those men went on to join the brutal terrorists who dreamed of keeping the Iraqi people enslaved. Some in America and Europe find it politically expedient to draw moral equivalency between American soldiers and the terrorists they fight. I ask you to show me the al-Qaeda “equivalent” of Private First Class Ross McGinnis, who climbed down into an armored vehicle and smothered a grenade to protect his crew, when he could easily have leaped from his gunnery hatch to safety. Show me an “insurgent” who can match the valor of Sergeant First Class Paul Ray Smith, who flung himself into an impossible battle against odds of a hundred to one… to save the lives of a hundred wounded men. These two soldiers are among those who have won the Congressional Medal of Honor for their sacrifices in Operation Iraqi Freedom. No one on the other side is worthy of such an honor. I say this to you because keeping silent – whether from misguided modesty, self-loathing, or the desire to avoid offending your vanity – is an insult to your honor, and an injury to your future.
We have made a fetish of “tolerance” in America, and it has curdled into poison. I am here to tell you what the civilized world is no longer prepared to tolerate. We will not stand silently by while women are enslaved, brutalized, or murdered. We will no longer hypnotize ourselves with self-criticism over gay rights, while you bury gay men and women under piles of jagged stone. We will not swallow our tongues for fear of offending Islam, when Islam oppresses all other religious beliefs within its borders. We know you can do better. We also know that nothing will improve unless we demand you do better… and we do demand it. The world has turned, and the old days of totalitarianism and pillage are done. There is no more place in it for barbarians. Believe what you will, follow your customs, honor the holy writings of your Prophet, and strive to understand God’s will through prayer, music, and scholarship. You will find nothing but honest respect and admiration from the West. But when you stand among civilized people, you will be civilized people. When you are shown respect, you will answer with respect. As the West reveres and protects the life of your innocents, so you will revere ours.
I speak to you as the democratically-elected leader of a great republic, which has earned the right to walk tall and proud through the halls of history. It is a right earned on battlefields… but also at humanitarian relief camps, pharmaceutical laboratories, civil-rights marches, and field hospitals. It is a right earned by rebuilding shattered enemies after terrible wars, by tearing down the statues of tyrants and building schools for the children of their liberated victims. Ours is a hard-won glory that can be seen in six men raising a flag on Mount Suribachi, or one man planting that flag in the dust of the moon… or millions of men and women stepping into voting booths. Look at the free people of Iraq, with their fingers proudly covered in purple ink after they vote, and know that America is eternally eager to share her glory. Indeed, we believe we can only render it proper honors by sharing it with all of our brothers and sisters around the world. But also remember this: the Middle East stands at a crossroads, and the heavy responsibility of reconciling faith, tradition, and the demands of the modern world rests with you. You must choose between old hatreds and new possibilities. You must choose between murder and prosperity. I have come here today to tell you clearly, and without reservation, that you cannot have both. May the next leader chosen by the American people stand in my place someday, to congratulate you on a wise choice.
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This “speech” is riddled with pomposity and disingenuousness. Why bother giving this speech when a double middle finger would have summed up what you wrote?
To think, foreign policy was run with your mindset for so long.
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 3:19 AM
If Obama had given this speech, I would have had a thrill going up my leg.
trubble on June 7, 2009 at 6:27 AM
Yes, that’s true. It helped create the most powerful and prosperous nation the world has ever seen, and nurtured and saved liberty and prosperity all around the world. On the other hand, countries with other “mindsets” have slipped so far back from their former greatness they’re on the verge of disappearing – which might be preferable to the alternatives that await some of them.
Your mindset is a disability.
CK MacLeod on June 7, 2009 at 11:31 AM
http://in.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idINIndia-40143320090607
And this is the result of what he actually said!
Guess the King did not get the line from Obama that went, “no nation should impose”.
America now entering 5th level of hell!
freeus on June 7, 2009 at 4:03 PM
Excellent speech, Doctor Zero. Truly.
If we could just get you in control of the TOTUS, we might make it through this nightmare.
P.S. I would have turned Afghanistan to glass, but given that we took a different tack, your incorporation and use of it to further your point is marvelous.
P.P.S. A mention of Salman Rushdie and The Satanic Verses is probably in order, since that was really the start of the islamic world moving out of its boundaries and coming directly to the civilized world (our most cherished principle of free speech) and which the West totally collapsed in response to.
progressoverpeace on June 7, 2009 at 4:44 PM
Just curious..would you like to live in any of those countries? If so, what do you think the advantages to your personal dreams and freedoms would consist of compared to the life you experience where you presently live…and if not, why not?
Itchee Dryback on June 7, 2009 at 5:02 PM
“disingenuousness”?? Ckoeber, it is anything but that.
Also, it’s not pompous to claim that we in the US know what individual freedom is and that we are committed to supporting it. Also, it’s not pompous to claim that we also know a bully when we see one and we wont tolerate it.
Standing up to a bullies is not the same as being one.
Quetzal on June 7, 2009 at 5:05 PM
Great column, Dr. Zero.
One small point of order:
Medals of Honor are not won, they are awarded. Those who are awarded them are recipients, not winners.
fossten on June 7, 2009 at 5:05 PM
Cheney/Zero 2012
katy on June 7, 2009 at 5:13 PM
Great read, Dr. Zero.
elduende on June 7, 2009 at 5:15 PM
Dr. Zero,
If that had been Obama’s speech, it would have been about America and the world, not about HIM.
He could never do that.
Star20 on June 7, 2009 at 5:20 PM
That is indeed the speech that Obama should have given. However, he would have had to understand those principles first, something he obviously hasn’t a clue about.
Obama has absolutely no interest in anyone or anything not named Obama.
AW1 Tim on June 7, 2009 at 5:24 PM
What about the line telling them (and the rest of the world) to put an end to their demonization of the Jews and Israel? As well as announcing a Palestinian state – to be composed of a 20 mile strip of land on the EAST BANK of the Jordan River.
Great speech but, meh, just mental masturbation.
J.J. Sefton on June 7, 2009 at 5:32 PM
The Weekly Standard quotes you, but botched the link.
Karl on June 7, 2009 at 5:51 PM
I’m giving you a double middle finger right now.
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 6:04 PM
Awesome.
The Apologist on June 7, 2009 at 6:27 PM
That has nothing to do with the current subject matter.
You don’t go to another country and try to change their minds by telling them how to live or how much better you are.
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 6:50 PM
Awww, how creative.
Can’t even come up with your own lines so you use mine…
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 6:53 PM
You don’t merit any more of an effort.
progressoverpeace on June 7, 2009 at 6:57 PM
This is Ebola, not THS, couldn’t login for some reason, so used hers. Anyhow:
Either you’re just ranting or you’re highly misinformed about history concerning this. Let’s see, these world wars you’re talking about? Maybe you forgot about the Ottoman Empire…yeah, bunch of Arabs, in that crazy Middle East that has never known anything like a world war. Except the Ottoman Empire was a central power in the first world war! The Empire suffered 771,844 recorded deaths, 400,000 wounded and 2,150,000 civilian deaths. Matter of fact, that’s around 10% of all military losses in WWI. So, yeah, they wouldn’t know anything about world war mistakes or millions in losses at all. Oh, lets not forget, they lost the Empire. Yup, those pesky arabs wouldn’t know snot. /sarcasm
As for my own personal take, yeah, they’ve got alot to learn. Of course we’re doing our own take on ignoring history and taking a couple of rapid steps backwards. ::grumble::
tree hugging sister on June 7, 2009 at 7:07 PM
Excellent post Doc, as always……….
…….. with your permission, I am going to pass this along to a few hundred friends.
And “ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 3:19 AM”…….
……. they have flights that leave the United States of America every hour, just so you know.
Seven Percent Solution on June 7, 2009 at 7:13 PM
Just to straighten out this little point, Turks are not arabs. In fact, the arabs pretty much despise the Turks.
progressoverpeace on June 7, 2009 at 7:25 PM
0bama should have told the simple truth. He was in the area to make the Hajj like he’s required to do…
GeneSmith on June 7, 2009 at 7:46 PM
AMEN Dr Zero, and you can count on me when you need a defense fund!
DougDavis on June 7, 2009 at 7:49 PM
Excellent, Doctor Zero.
Caroline Somebody who posted on JihadWatch said similar, more or less. I saved hers and will save yours too.
Nothing will change until the west grasps that Muslims themselves only respect strength and despise weakness. Of course that goes against our Christian upbringing and that’s why we continue to think that we can win hearts and minds among Muslims with compassion.
The opposite is the case. Their hearts and minds are with the victorious – that’s what Allah tells them. Their ethics in terms of which they order their hearts and minds – are nothing like what westerners, raised in the Christian faith, understand by the term “hearts and minds”.
Islam does not teach the same sort of compassion for the other that virtually every other religion including today’s “secular humanism” teaches. Muslims murder and torture each other without compunction and their own ummah, “brotherhood” has no condemnation to offer. That’s because they don’t value INDIVIDUAL human life the way we Christian westerners do. It’s not a concept in Islam – which means it’s not a concept in Muslims “hearts and minds”. Their hearts and minds instead understand what Allah teaches them in the Koran – namely, the Collective Will to Power.
When will our leaders understand this? And moreover understand that it is necessary in the end to be “cruel to be kind”, to treat Muslims in the way they themselves understand moral principles? Which ultimately means that they must be beaten back and vanquished and humiliated by a greater strength?
That is clearly what they understand. Every move to win their hearts and minds that strengthens them, merely emboldens them to advance their own peculiar ethics of the world, which couldn’t give a damn about “hearts and minds”, as we understand the term. They will accept the shehada from anyone they can swindle and connive to recite it while at the same time are willing to kill anyone who leaves Islam. Whatever it takes to build the army of Islamic soldiers is what their ethics is about.
But how is it being kind to people to pander to their immaturity and self-deception and base impulses towards power?
Certainly no mature human being would suggest that one should pander to the primitive intellectual, emotional and moral sensibilities of a two-year old? A 2-year old understands the will to power through aggression only. But by the same token a 2-year old also thoroughly understands limitations that he simply has no power to transgress. That’s ultimately what a 2-year old understands.
And that’s basically what we’re dealing with here – 2-year olds – from an intellectual perspective, from a moral perspective, and mostly from a behavioral perspective -except it happens to be 2 year olds armed with AK-47’s (weapons they could never have invented for themselves, being 2-year olds, but the fact is that now they’ve got their hands on them!).
There is no way of avoiding the reality that the adults in this world are going to have to act like adults and step up and slap – in a big big way – Muslims who have made of their own societies the equivalent of “Lord of the Flies” and who now threaten to overrun every more advanced society with their mayhem.
“It’s cruel to be kind” is going to have to be the anthem of the future relations between the West and Islam. We’re going to have to come to terms with that fact. Either that – or it’s simply going to be cruel for all of us, with no kindness in sight, and possibly no one left to come and rescue us off an Island from hell that in our passivity and cowardice we allowed to be taken over by moral and intellectual pygmies with very, very big guns.
MB4 on June 7, 2009 at 7:57 PM
You are aware, are you not, that Obama seems in little, if any, more hurry than Bush or McCain to draw down in Iraq and is, in fact, “doubling down” with troops in Afghanistan?
MB4 on June 7, 2009 at 8:07 PM
Alas, speeches like this won’t be given until we need to once again awake and discover we are strong….
Mew
acat on June 7, 2009 at 8:11 PM
The Arabs pretty much despise everybody else. They despise the Persians although probably not as much as the Persians despise them. They even rather despise their fellow Arabs, the Palestinians, when they are not using them to bleat against Israel and the U.S. anyway. Sunnis despise Shiites, Shiites despise Sunnis. Don’t ya feel the love.
MB4 on June 7, 2009 at 8:14 PM
Heh. Yeah, I was thinking of writing exactly that, myself, but I thought it took away from the impact with the Turks.
The Persians do some of the best anti-Arab writing around!
It’s a mad, mad, mad, mad world out there … without any of the laughs.
progressoverpeace on June 7, 2009 at 8:24 PM
I don’t see any point in getting banned just to tell you in my own words what I think of you.
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 8:40 PM
They take advantage of our good-naturedness. Not being good-natured, I can plainly see this.
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 8:47 PM
Ebola again:
To doubly straighten out the point, the Ottoman Empire wasn’t strictly Turks. Matter of fact in 1914 it covered from Istanbul through Turkey and down through Palestine and into Saudi Arabia (da Arabs, run!). Just for a little reference in the matter.
tree hugging sister on June 7, 2009 at 9:10 PM
Great post! You did not use the pronoun “I” enough for BO. My only hope is that after this debacle, the libs will be in the political desert for a long, long time. Yes, we will survive the terrible mistake of this election and we will be stronger.
d1carter on June 7, 2009 at 9:18 PM
The Muslim world actually knows plenty about genocides, from ones they committed themselves to the Holocaust where the Mufti of Jerusalem served in a consulting role and pled for the construction of an extermination camp in Palestine to their religion which calls for the destruction of all peoples that do not submit to their cult.
True, the Muslim world has never sacrificed for another people, never liberated another, but they sure as hell have a propensity and a thirst for inflicting suffering on a vast scale.
Maquis on June 7, 2009 at 9:26 PM
This is “God” you write about. See HA headline thread on what the French saw.
“God” will reign forever.
Schadenfreude on June 7, 2009 at 9:33 PM
Did you ever think that maybe the reason the Arabs hate the Turks is precisely because all of the important decisions about Arabia were being made by Turks in Istanbul during the period of the Ottoman Empire?
Besides, isn’t it pretty much a given that an “empire” will include multiple ethnicities? Who calls their own country, made up of the indigenous, or at least naturalized, people, an “empire”?
At this point, I’m just going to refer you to the first rule of getting out of a hole.
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 9:35 PM
That proves just how much Doctor Zero knows about the Middle East.
Everything in his mind sums up to them being ‘ragheads’.
And people wonder why they hate us.
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 9:38 PM
OK, so then why bother. Reminds me of the protests on April 15th in DC.
Protest the government (but forgot the permits
)
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 9:40 PM
YOU are the one protesting the current approach. If YOU want the least amount of government possible, Somalia hasn’t had a functioning government since 1991.
Care to see how the free markets work over there?
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 9:42 PM
Except he didn’t even visit Jerusalem where a Muslim would go to make the Hajj…
Keep it up, guys. You’re doing great!
More hate, more racist jokes, more everything! I want to see Newt, Cheney (both of them), Beck, Hannity, and Rush twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week talking about how socialism, Muslims, and racist judges are taking over the world.
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 9:50 PM
To sum up your comment:
“Let’s nuke ‘em all!”
You are willing to start a war with practically an entire region but the “buck stops here” when someone tries to start a conversation.
But keep it up! You’re doing great.
More calls for war, more socialist/communist rants, more racist jokes, more everything!
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 9:56 PM
I’m guessing Somalia doesn’t rank ahead of Hong Kong on this list, so I’ll take Hong Kong, thanks.
http://www.heritage.org/Index/Ranking.aspx
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 9:58 PM
Wasn’t really a bother, but thanks.
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 10:00 PM
Very good indeed. It looks like you took time and effort in polishing it.
I’d like to make a some comments about your proposed speech in the spirit of offering what might be helpful should you want to republish it elsewhere, or even stand at the podium and present it.
In the first paragraph you might like to make it clear that the speech is to the Cairo audience specifically, not to Muslims everywhere. When it is seen on the web it naturally seems more generally directed than a speech delivered face-to-face.
It looks like you tried hard to be forthright without being condescending, but at times the tone still seems a little arrogant and could be interpreted as contemptuousness (especially if delivered by the likes of Mr Obama). If the intent is to encourage introspection, and to persuade, then a few adjustments might be useful.
Some of your examples of American experiences stress the motivation for the action but some of them seem only to compare the experiences of American soldiers with the experiences of Middle Eastern soldiers. Also a challenge such as “Show me an ‘insurgent’ who” seems unnecessarily and counterproductively provocative because they encourage the audience to find examples to refute you, to try to prove that you are ignorant. Also, unless they are particularly well versed in history, they might interpret your examples of American deeds as a mere side-effect of ‘American imperialism’ and greed. Tactically, then, these might be weak challenges because they invite subjective sponses and hence it will be easy for people to satisfy themselves that you are wrong and that they or their team are superior. If they are provoked to rebuttal and refutation then perhaps they will fail to consider the significance of your examples and to ponder the challenge deeply. Perhaps there are phrases that could lead them to ask those types of questions of themselves.
Quibbles notwithstanding, my principle reaction to this speech is that you have offered us a finely crafted piece of work, eloquently expressing important points and certainly far better than the speech that provoked you to action. Reading it brought pleasure and satisfaction. Thank you.
YiZhangZhe on June 7, 2009 at 10:05 PM
In my previous post, for those wondering about the noun they’ve never seen before:
“… they invite subjective sponses …”
should be
“… they invite subjective responses …”
YiZhangZhe on June 7, 2009 at 10:12 PM
Between MB4’s “Nuke ‘em all” and Obama’s “Let me grab my ankles for you”, I know which I choose.
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 10:14 PM
To sum up your comment:
“I’ll just make things up because that’s the best I can do!”
MB4 on June 7, 2009 at 10:21 PM
And you ckoeber, probably don’t even have the first clue as to why people don’t take you seriously.
MB4 on June 7, 2009 at 10:24 PM
I find it quite interesting that you name a place that has very little military engagement with other nations yet you would like the President of the United States to be more forceful in terms of foreign policy.
In fact, if we truly followed the model of Hong Kong, then we would have nothing much outside of the National Guard service we have now.
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 10:25 PM
The only people who don’t take me seriously are the same people NO ONE is taking seriously right now.
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 10:26 PM
You are so dense it is astounding. Maybe it has something to do with Islamic teachings.
2:10 Disbelievers are diseased.
2:99 Disbelievers are evil people.
2:104 For disbelievers is a painful doom.
2:171 Disbelievers are deaf, dumb, and blind.
3:28 Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference of believers.
3:73 Don’t believe anyone who is not a Muslim.
3:48 Don’t be friends with non-Muslims. They all hate you and want to ruin you.
4:89 Have no unbelieving friends. Kill the unbelievers wherever you find them.
4:63 Oppose those who refuse to follow Muhammad.
4:101The disbelievers are an open enemy to you.
4:144 Do not choose disbelievers as friends.
5:51 Don’t take Jews or Christians for friends. If you do, then Allah will consider you to be one of them.
5:51 Jews and Christians are losers.
5:60 Allah turned unbelievers into apes and swine.
5:59 Jews and Christians are evil people.
9:5 Slay the disbelievers wherever you find them.
MB4 on June 7, 2009 at 10:29 PM
You seem to live in a world of your own.
MB4 on June 7, 2009 at 10:34 PM
You’re the one who sarcastically cited “Somalia” as some sort of free-market paradise because they haven’t had a functioning government for nearly two decades. My response wasn’t with regard to foreign policy, it was with regard to economic policy.
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 10:38 PM
Interesting definition of “NO ONE” you got there.
From today:
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows that 35% of the nation’s voters now Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Thirty-two percent (32%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of +3.
From +30 to +3 in less than five months. Apparently, SOMEONE is taking the contra-Obama arguments seriously.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/obama_approval_index_history
venividivici on June 7, 2009 at 10:44 PM
LOL, you must be kidding?
“Women should be silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but should be submissive, as the law also says.” (1 Corinthians 14:34)
“Judge for yourselves: Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? Does not even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair it is a disgrace to him, but that if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her as a covering.” (1 Corinthians 11:13-15)
“If any man takes a wife, and goes in on her, and detests her, and charges her with shameful conduct, and brings a bad name on her, and says, ‘I took this woman, and when I came to her I found she was not a virgin…” (Deuteronomy 22:13,14)
“But if … evidences of virginity are not found for the young woman, then they shall bring out the young woman to the door of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones…” (Deuteronomy 22:20,21)
“If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed, rather than having two hands, to go to hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched.” (Mark 9:43)
“One of illegitimate birth shall not enter the congregation of the Lord.” (Deuteronomy 23:2)
“Slaves, obey your human masters with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ.” (Ephesians 6:5)
“Slaves, obey your human masters in everything; don’t work only while being watched, in order to please men, but work wholeheartedly, fearing the Lord.” (Colassians 3:22)
“Slaves are to be submissive to their masters in everything, and to be well-pleasing, not talking back .” (Titus 2:9)
“Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the cruel. ” (1 Peter 2:18)
Care to go on?
ckoeber on June 7, 2009 at 10:55 PM
As a commenter at Hot Air, you are entitled to offer your opinion about anything you read. You are not entitled to pretend you can read anyone’s mind, or attribute racial epithets they did not use. The only one tossing the word “raghead” around in here is you. Why don’t you take a deep breath and try to write a post that doesn’t make you sound like a gibbering idiot? You can even make it a nice long one, filled with ideas and analysis. Try writing it offline and showing it to a few friends, and ask them if it makes you sound like an ignorant jerk, before you post it.
Thanks for the thoughtful response, Yi! I think it’s interesting that an American leader talking about things America has actually done would sound “arrogant,” especially in comparison with the usual phony humility and condescension that peppers speeches to foreign audiences.
Besides the general unfairness and inaccuracy of requiring the United States to sound like it’s testifying before a grand jury every time it addresses other nations, it seems to me that no good is being done for the oppressed people around the world, when freedom’s greatest champion is perpetually denigrating itself, or allowing itself to be sold short. There are many Arabs outside Iraq who dream of one day showing the world purple fingers as they emerge from voting booths, after doing more than just choosing between a couple of psychotic mullah-approved cult leaders in a sham election. Where else do they turn for hope and inspiration? Who can pick up the Liberty Bell, if we set it down? Fashionable multi-culturalist sneering at America dangerously obscures the simple truth that the dangerous, bloodthirsty parts of the world desperately need to become more like us. It is a truth that cannot help anyone if it’s hidden.
When an American president has the attention of Arab Muslim audiences, he does them no favors by mumbling. Better to speak proudly of the things America has done, then flatter the vanity of Muslims by congratulating them for things they didn’t actually do. A mindless devotion to raising self-esteem is as bad for the education of nations, as it is for the education of individual children.
Thank you for pointing that out earlier. Turkey is very different, both currently and historically, from the audience Obama was addressing in his speech.
Doctor Zero on June 7, 2009 at 11:31 PM
Haven’t you caught a plane for Saudi Arabia yet? Go on with what? Your lame attempt at “moral equivalence” rather than your defending Islam, which apparently you can’t do? If so you will need some passages worse than that to match Islam. I don’t know much about the bible but I would guess most of what you listed is from the Old Testament, not the New Testament. Islam has no New Testament. You might also try doing a little comparative analysis of recent history – you might learn something if your mind is not completely shut. I have got a test for you. Some say that some people can only learn by doing and you seem to be one of them. Try openly practicing Islam in the U.S. and see what happens to you. Probably nothing. Then try openly practicing Christianity in a Muslim country and see what happens to you. Which would you rather try? I know which I would choose but then maybe you have a death wish.
Although I am an atheist it has not made me blind.
MB4 on June 8, 2009 at 12:04 AM
Excellent strategy. Say something and then when other people call you on it, step back and tell others that you forgot to look at the periods and commas.
Look, you did not directly call anyone names and I never said that you did.
My assertion, however, remains. Your “speech” sounds more like a lecture from someone who feels like he is better than someone else and therefor can make all kinds of claims and requests.
You write:
Noticed the bold section. Who are YOU to say this or even claim this? Have you completely studies the history of the entire Middle East?
With this passage you essentially claim that the history of America is somehow better than another region of the world; a region that had a history lasting far longer than even before the United States has ever existed.
So, yes, you did not say they were ‘ragheads’. But you might as well have.
ckoeber on June 8, 2009 at 12:23 AM
ckoeber by all means go play backgammon in Damascus.
daesleeper on June 8, 2009 at 12:24 AM
I reckon you already are.
daesleeper on June 8, 2009 at 12:25 AM
When you can set up a site about Christianity that is even a tenth as atrocity-laden as this one about Islam, you’ll have the beginnings of a point.
http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/
venividivici on June 8, 2009 at 12:27 AM
What I found truly interesting was that The Precedent’s remark about the hijab was, intentionally or not, a broadside against Turkish secularism more than anything remotely applicable to the West or the rest of the islamic world. If Ataturk were alive I think he would have flayed the idiot messiah on the spot, as Ataturk understood islam all too well. While Ataturk was a great lover of islam, he understood that islam could never be trusted to stay out of state power and that islam controlling the state would never allow modernity to catch hold.
It’s interesting that liberals always point to Turkey as the archetype of democracy in islamic societies, but most of them seem to have no inkling as to what the actual structure of Turkey is. Few even knew that military supremacy was part of the Turkish constitution, only recently removed because of EU demands for supreme control of civilian governmental authorities … and look at how Turkey has been sliding back into the islamic abyss.
I have no doubt that The Precedent’s hijab remark was heard more clearly in Istanbul than in Paris. I also have no doubt that no one in the White House even gave this a second of thought.
progressoverpeace on June 8, 2009 at 12:28 AM
Where did he say anything about periods and commas? You keep saying that others said things that they did not say. Are you delusional?
Don’t you even read what you write? You said Everything in his mind sums up to them being ‘ragheads’.
I suppose it all depend on what the meaning of is, is? I doubt that even Bill Clinton would see any significant difference.
It is not only better, but far better and anyone with a modicum of sense could see that. The fact that they have a longer history, given what they have done with all that extra time, just makes them more lacking.
There you go again.
- Ronald Reagan
It would be interesting to impress your memory engrams on a computer, ckoeber. The resulting torrential flood of illogic would be most entertaining.
- Spock
You are a complete waste of time.
Cheshire Cat on June 8, 2009 at 1:03 AM
Not really. Except for a few fringe groups, no one in current Jewish or Christian theology or practice takes these scriptures to be binding on personal or political behaviour. In the case of the quotes from the Quran MB4 presented, the few Islamic fringe groups who disagree with their implementation under a strict Sharia system are afraid to speak out, and the courageous Muslims who do speak out against them require round the clock security.
In the case of suggesting Somalia as a haven for those who dislike government, this is a ridiculous caricaturing of conservative thought for your own small-minded benefit. No conservative wants government to go away. But we believe that the appropriate spheres of government action, in foreign policy and economic stability, end long before the kind of socialistic interference in everyone’s daily life and experience that President Obama’s policies will lead us to.
brambo_42 on June 8, 2009 at 2:22 AM
I’m still looking for the passage in The New Testament that you quoted which says “Kill all of the unbelievers”. I’m not seeing it, though.
If you’re really trying to equate “Kill all of the unbelievers” to “Women shall not wear hats in church” then I think that you’ve gone off on a moral equivalency tangent of unparalleled proportions.
Theophile on June 8, 2009 at 4:34 AM
Whoops, that should be “Women should wear hats in church”.
Theophile on June 8, 2009 at 4:34 AM
The funny thing about that little error is that either way, the “moral equivalence” point you made is still correct!
Leftists simply cannot make a point these days without the crutch of moral equivalence.
venividivici on June 8, 2009 at 7:13 AM
Ebola one last time:
1) How is that even relevant to the argument? Remember, it was “The people of the Middle East have never known anything to compare with the industrialized slaughter of the two World Wars, in which millions of lives were lost to decisively settle the question of what makes a government just and legitimate.” Last I checked, Turkey is a portion of the Middle East, and at the time being discussed, ran the vast majority of it outside their current borders.
2) Wow, so you’re admitting that it wasn’t simply ethnic Turks involved in the Empire. Ergo Arabs might well have some rather vivid memory concerning the point. Thanks! I appreciate the support!
3) Yeah, remind me to get you a ladder.
tree hugging sister on June 9, 2009 at 5:29 AM