Call me out and name yourself after a great book, I’m more likely than not to respond.
That said, I’d rather not.
I don’t agree with this post, but instead of saying horrible things about its author, I responded by pointing out the problem with the structure of his argument. That seems to me the better mode of engagement.
However, if you talk about its author in this thread the way you did in the other one, I’ll slam down the ban-hammer faster than you can say “motherfu—
The Edge of the American West 
76 comments
June 22, 2009 at 3:47 am
dave
Can anyone say ‘recursive reflexivity’?
Someone, and not necessarily SEK, is so far up they’re seeing sunshine through their teeth.
Just sayin’, is all…
June 22, 2009 at 5:42 am
sdh
It is amazing that people who couldn’t give a damn about Iraqis think that Iranians are the greatest people on the face of the Earth.
/snark
The intellectual disconnects that pass for today’s conservative thinking are staggering. In foreign policy, there are a whole bunch of people who have not thought through the consequences and constrictions that the previous eight years of US foreign policy have wrought.
June 22, 2009 at 6:13 am
A_Tale_Of_Two_Cities
At least now we know how to address Scott when we feel he’s giving our arguments insufficient attention.
June 22, 2009 at 10:56 am
The Iliad
See you and raise you.
June 22, 2009 at 11:04 am
The Case of George Dedlow
Surely you can do better than that?
June 22, 2009 at 11:51 am
Naked Came the Stranger
What are youse guys talkin about?
June 22, 2009 at 11:52 am
Naked Came the Stranger
What are youse guyses talkin about?
June 22, 2009 at 11:54 am
The Bible
Pikers.
June 22, 2009 at 11:56 am
The Necronomicon
Your pitiful notions of “greatness” will be as naught when Great Cthulhu arises from his dreams in R’lyeh.
June 22, 2009 at 1:45 pm
Liberal Fascism
My mom says I’m an argument that has never before been made with such great care.
June 22, 2009 at 1:45 pm
Atlanta Nights
None of you have anything on me.
June 22, 2009 at 2:05 pm
SouthernWreck
I know you folks are younger, but giving ‘rico air time is such a waste. Leave them in their warped obscurity.
And it was a Huddie Ledbetter lyric – “Sometimes, I takes a great notion, jump into de river and drown….” before Kesey used it as a title; the original was the Stamper clan motto – “never give a inch”.
Good Oregon story.
June 22, 2009 at 3:45 pm
kevin
It is amazing that people who couldn’t give a damn about Iraqis think that Iranians are the greatest people on the face of the Earth.
More than that — it’s amazing that people who only a month ago were advocating massive bombing of Iran now see themselves as the very strongest allies of the average Iranian.
How John McCain has the balls to follow up his “bomb bomb bomb Iran” schtick with his pearl-clutching worries that we’re not saying the right things to Iran is beyond me. It’s so nice to have an actual adult as president for a change.
June 22, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Patterico
More than that — it’s amazing that people who only a month ago were advocating massive bombing of Iran now see themselves as the very strongest allies of the average Iranian.
In September 2006 — almost three years ago — I said:
“[T]he Iranian people have been big supporters of America[] for quite some time. It’s just their government that hasn’t been.”
So your comment doesn’t apply to me.
I like SEK a lot, but I think his argument here sucks — not because there is no valid argument that Obama needs to tread lightly; there is — but because Obama is the president. So drawing analogies to people who aren’t the president just don’t work.
I’m not gonna be worried if SEK runs a blog and runs around commenting on people’s sites, but if the President did that I’d be concerned. You just can’t analogize the president to everybody people.
June 22, 2009 at 7:43 pm
politicalfootball
“[T]he Iranian people have been big supporters of America[] for quite some time. It’s just their government that hasn’t been.”
I can’t claim to speak for the Iranian people any more than Patterico can, but this seems pretty far out there in neocon fantasy land. In fact, the Iranian people – the very ones who oppose their own government today – show every evidence of being pretty pissed off at the United States, too – and especially at those Americans who express an interest in bombing their country.
Obama’s choice to maintain a respectful distance from Iran is being treated by Patterico as though it’s an insult – yet nobody actually in Iran seems to regard it that way. The insult comes from patronizing “sympathizers” like Patterico, who fail to acknowledge that the people of Iran have actual policy preferences born of their own experiences and history.
June 22, 2009 at 7:47 pm
Patterico
“I can’t claim to speak for the Iranian people any more than Patterico can . . .”
Sounds like you can:
“. . . nobody actually in Iran seems to regard it that way . . .”
You might want to do a little more reading. Your first statement was more accurate than your second.
It’s no fantasy that many Iranians are pro-American. Guess who marched in SUPPORT of America just after 9/11 when the rest of the Muslim world was erupting in glee?
June 22, 2009 at 7:54 pm
Patterico
“[S]ixty thousand spectators observed a minute of silence during a soccer match in Iran’s Azadi stadium, and hundreds of young Iranians held a candlelit vigil in Tehran for the victims of September 11 attacks.” Link.
Meanwhile, in most of the rest of the Muslim world, the reaction was quite different.
June 22, 2009 at 7:54 pm
politicalfootball
It’s no fantasy that many Iranians are pro-American. Guess who marched in SUPPORT of America just after 9/11 when the rest of the Muslim world was erupting in glee?
If this is what it takes to define people as “pro-American” – that is, not wanting to see thousands of Americans senselessly murdered by known enemies of Iran – then I think you’re right that they are pro-American.
But look at how you have to move the goalposts – you’re no longer even willing to commit to “the Iranian people” or even “a majority of the Iranian people” not wanting to see Americans randomly killed. You’ve now reduced pro-American sentiment to meaning that, in the wake of an appalling tragedy perpetrated by an enemy of Iran, “many” Iranians are willing to express sympathy for the U.S.
It is also ludicrous to say “the rest of the Muslim world was erupting in glee.” I mean, again, I can’t speak for the Muslim world, but I can speak against hallucinatory misreadings of actual history.
June 22, 2009 at 8:02 pm
tpb
It might be helpful to define the kind of anti-Americanism one means. Some, like the British, find American culture repellent, while others, like the Germans, rather like it. My guess would be that some Iranians might like some aspects of American culture and find other aspects of it repellent and some other Iranians might like some aspects of American political life attractive and other aspects of it, calls for bomb bomb bomb bomb bombing Iran — for example, less so. It might also help to consider SEK’s larger point, which I — in any event — took to be that it is always easy to make someone, even be he or she the president, living his and or her normal life look like a moral monster when that normal life is played off some horrific event.
June 22, 2009 at 8:12 pm
politicalfootball
Patterico is claiming here to be more Muslim than the Ayatollah (to coin a phrase). That’s how he is able to take offense at this grave insult by the president of the United States that actual Iranians don’t seem to have noticed. In the guise of deep respect for Iranians, Patterico patronizes, and shows utter contempt for their actual views.
Happily, Obama has more respect for the people of Iran than Patterico does, and is willing not only to listen to their concerns, but to act on them.
June 22, 2009 at 8:15 pm
Patterico
“It is also ludicrous to say “the rest of the Muslim world was erupting in glee.” I mean, again, I can’t speak for the Muslim world, but I can speak against hallucinatory misreadings of actual history.”
From my link that it appears you didn’t read:
You find me the descriptions of thousands of Palestinians observing a respectful moment of silence like they did in Iran. You find me the reports of hundreds of people holding candlelight vigils in support of us in Syria.
June 22, 2009 at 8:16 pm
Patterico
” . . . that actual Iranians don’t seem to have noticed . . .”
This you know as the expert on Iranian sentiments that you already told us you are not.
Link-filled comment stuck in moderation.
June 22, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Patterico
“Obama has more respect for the people of Iran than Patterico does . . .”
True — if by “the people of Iran” you mean “the murderous leaders of Iran.”
June 22, 2009 at 8:37 pm
ari
Link-filled comment stuck in moderation.
This is the new, “The lurkers are with me.”
June 22, 2009 at 9:56 pm
Josh
See what you’ve done now, SEK? This is worse than the Ron Paul supporters.
June 23, 2009 at 12:57 am
dave
“Some, like the British, find American culture repellent, while others, like the Germans, rather like it.”
Which British? The ones who flock by their tens of thousands to Florida each summer, or the ones who sit by their millions soaking up Hollywood movies and the best of US TV output? Maybe the ones who listen to the umpteen varieties of US urban music, or read crime thrillers set in New York, LA and Virginia?
Or maybe you mean the ones who wear pinstripe trousers to work and eat cucumber sandwiches for high tea? Because if you did mean those ones, then I’m afraid you imagined them.
As for the Germans, I think you’ll find it’s David Hasselhoff they like. And nobody knows why…
June 23, 2009 at 3:53 am
politicalfootball
I know, I know, I ought not feed the troll, but I can’t resist.
Patterico, we’ve established that “the Muslim world” in your universe equals some random writers and Palestinians. I get that.
But to repeat: what evidence is there in your “link-filled comment” or anywhere else that actual Iranians are pissed off about Obama getting ice cream?
June 23, 2009 at 5:55 am
dana
There isn’t any. And the point of SEK’s comparison was that two things juxtaposed can look meaningful when they are not. The President getting ice cream is really not an issue, or evidence that he’s a secret mullah supporter or whatever.
In Iran, there is very limited access to Internet and foreign media at the moment, and people are dying. I’m guessing the American president’s choice of dessert probably isn’t high on the priority list.
More to the point, people who do know what they are talking about (Sullivan’s had plenty of links) think that the administration’s moderate response has been wise. The fastest way to kill a reform movement in Iran is to make it look like it’s funded by Americans.
June 23, 2009 at 6:43 am
Patterico
ari says:
Actually, no. It’s the old: “I posted a comment with many links, but it is stuck in moderation (probably because of the number of links, which often causes comments to go into moderation.”
June 23, 2009 at 6:51 am
Patterico
“I know, I know, I ought not feed the troll, but I can’t resist.”
“Troll” = “person who disagrees with politicalfootball.”
“Patterico, we’ve established that “the Muslim world” in your universe equals some random writers and Palestinians. I get that.”
Actually, my comment established more than that. You keep saying things that suggest you haven’t read it. If you have read it, please do not mischaracterize it. If you haven’t read it, please do so now. Click the links, too, and read and look at them. (They might not all work as it’s from an old post of mine.)
All you have to do to prove me wrong is establish an equally prominent set of stories and articles from the West Bank, Lebanon, Jerusalem, Syria, and Egypt showing throngs of people solemnly marching in support of the U.S. Like they did in Iran.
June 23, 2009 at 7:48 am
politicalfootball
Actually, my comment established more than that.
Yes, it established that, in your mind, the “Muslim world” doesn’t exist in any meaningful way outside the Middle East. It established that, even in the Middle East, the “Muslim world” doesn’t include the majorities that, in polls, expressed opposition to bin Laden and his tactics after 9-11. I said that I get it, and I do.
Once more time:
But to repeat: what evidence is there in your “link-filled comment” or anywhere else that actual Iranians are pissed off about Obama getting ice cream?
As I said, I get that you learn what the “Muslim world” thinks based on whatever cherry-picked examples you choose to pay attention to.
But what about those circumstances where you can’t even come up with a single example? Is there anyone affiliated with Mousavi who has expressed unhappiness with Obama’s support for democracy in Iran?
June 23, 2009 at 8:38 am
Charlieford
It’s a simple syllogism:
Obama promised change.
Iran’s still Iran.
Patterico’s right.
June 23, 2009 at 9:46 am
dana
That’s not a syllogism.
June 23, 2009 at 10:33 am
Charlieford
It’s a special kind of syllogism you ain’t never seen before.
June 23, 2009 at 10:37 am
TF Smith
One of these things is not like the other, according to Mssr. Patt:
“The Christian world” – summed up by the actions of demonstrators in Belfast and a selection of columnists and/or individuals quoted in or from the Irish Republic, Wales, Scotland, and England…
“The Muslim world” – summed up by the actions of demonstrators in the Palestinian territories and a selection of columnists and/or individuals quoted in or from Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and England.
“The Jewish world” – summed up by the actions of demonstrators in Manhattan and a selection of columnists and/or individuals quoted in or from Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, and Westchester County.
Not exactly compelling samples…
Extra credit questions, class:
1. What is the most populous majority Muslim nation in the world today?
2. Name four countries in South Asia (i.e., the Indian subcontinent) with significant Muslim populations?
3. Name two majority Muslim nations with Atlantic coastlines?
4. Name two majority Muslim nations that belong to ASEAN?
June 23, 2009 at 11:02 am
Charlieford
1. Indonesia?
June 23, 2009 at 11:15 am
TF Smith
1. Correct. Extra credit for Mr./Ms. Ford, who understands that Islam is no more limited to Southwest Asia and Northeastern Africa than Christianity is to the British Isles and Judaism the five boroughs and the Hudson Valley…
I realize it is difficult for certain people (apparently including Patt) to understand that Islam is, as one of the three great monotheistic faiths, as much as a world religion as Christianity and Judaism, buit come on…
Maybe Patt should take a World History class; he/she/it/them could probably get the equivalent of H 100 at the local junior college…maybe even AP World History in high school?
My 11-year-old has a better understanding of world religions, in terms of culture, history, and geography…
June 23, 2009 at 11:29 am
Naked Came the Stranger
Is it my imagination, or did some goal posts get moved? I thought the issue was Obama fiddling with ice cream while Iran burned.
What the hell does the reaction to 9/11 in other middle eastern counties have to do with that? Maybe the post got hung up in moderation for its blatant lack of relevance.
And, I have to say, it takes a really special brand of mean-spirited wrong-headedness to criticize a dad when he takes his daughters out for ice cream, of a Saturday evening, and most especially when it’s father’s day eve.
When there’s nothing real to criticize, they just make shit up. How damned sad is that?
June 23, 2009 at 11:39 am
Charlieford
2. Don’t all the nations in that region have “significant” Muslim populations? Pakistan and Bangladesh have Muslim majorities, and there’s a large % in India (from memory: about 120 million or so?). Also: Malaysia, Sri Lanka?
3. Morocco and Nigeria?
June 23, 2009 at 11:45 am
Charlieford
Naked, if Obama wasn’t wasting so much time nepotisticly procuring desserts for his favored relatives, maybe he could have effected some real change by now–eg, maybe Iran wouldn’t be Iran anymore. Maybe it’d be West Virginia. But noooooooo . . . being ashamed of America as he is, he doesn’t want to see Iran become West Virginia.
June 23, 2009 at 12:16 pm
politicalfootball
In defense of my new friend Patterico, he does offer a nifty illustration of the paternalism behind neocon dogma. Neocons express their affinity for the Iraqi people by favoring the the U.S. occupation – even though the majority of Iraqis are opposed. This is possible because, after all, Iraqis don’t really know what’s good for them. (Or maybe they secretly favor the occupation, but are disinclined to say so.)
Likewise, Obama’s ice cream transgression is important not because it offends freedom-loving Iranians, but because it offends people like Patterico who know what’s best for freedom-loving Iranians – or who know what Iranians are really thinking.
This works the other way, too. If the vast majority of the Muslim world abhors bin Laden, well, those Muslims don’t really know what they think – they need to ask Patterico what their opinion is, so they can find out how truly contemptible they are.
June 23, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Charlieford
Flunky: “It bombed in Pittsburgh.”
Sullivan: “Oh, what do they know in Pittsburgh?”
Flunky: “They know what they like.”
Sullivan: “That’s no argument. If they knew what they liked, they wouldn’t live in Pittsburgh.”
June 23, 2009 at 12:25 pm
TF Smith
2. Yep – Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India, which is the one that usually blows the minds of Cold Warrior/Clash of Civilizations types; “you mean, India is a secular democracy (granted, even with the BNP) with freedom of religion as a cornerstone? Whut?” India’s Moslem population is roughly 150 million, which is more than 10 percent of the total population; by itself, roughly comparable to the population of Pakistan, and larger than that of Bangladesh.
3. I was going for Morocco and Mauretania; I think Nigeria’s Moslem population is about 30-40 percent of the total.
I think the critics expected Obama to parachute into Tehran and say “Mr. Khameni, tear down this wall” or something equally 24-esque…it’s like they never heard of the idea that when your opponent is digging himself into a hole, just stand back…
June 23, 2009 at 12:39 pm
Charlieford
On India: I forget who it was, but it was on Charlie Rose, and the fellow was refuting the idea that terrorism and Islam are inherently related. He pointed to the fact that while 11 (?) of the 9/11 hi-jackers were from Saudi Arabia, has about about 25 million Muslims, none were from India, with a Muslim population five or more times as large. If merely being Muslim predisposed one to engage in terrorist operations against the US, statistics would lead us to expect more operations out of India than Saudi Arabia.
June 23, 2009 at 12:42 pm
Charlieford
On Obama and Reagan: has anyone else noticed a funny inconsistency in right-wing attacks on the former, viz., they constantly carp that “all he does is talk smooth,” but at the same time go all limp and glassy-eyed over Reagan’s “great communicator” stuff? I mean, all Reagan did was say “tear down this wall.” He didn’t exactly pull it apart with his own bare hands.
June 23, 2009 at 1:25 pm
jacob
Other majority Muslim countries with an Atlantic coast are The Gambia (according to the CIA World Factbook, 90% Muslim); Guinea (85%); Guinea-Bissau (50%); Senegal (94%); Sierra Leone (60%). I confess that when I first started looking them up, I was hoping to find that one or more of the Caribbean countries with high South Asian populations would have a high Muslim population too, but no dice, though about a fifth of Suriname is Muslim.
June 23, 2009 at 2:12 pm
TF Smith
India has some severe problems between ethic and religious groups (with, to be fair, plenty of blamce to go around between Hindus and Moslems), but they also have a fairly strong history of religious background not being a bar to elite status: three presidents have been Moslems and the current PM a Sikh, and members of fairly tiny minorities (Indians of Christian, Jewish, and Parsi backgrounds, for example) have risen extremely high…
In defense of your new friend Patt, it seems he would have been prime meat for “sendin’ the best ya’ breed” in 1898…or at least telling others they should go.
June 23, 2009 at 2:44 pm
Charlieford
Yes, I think that was the other point being made: the issue is one of opportunity, mobility, democracy. India’s got those, and it’s Muslim population benefits. Thank goodness George Bush had the wisdom to invade Iraq and get those democratic dominoes popping up all over the Middle East, huh?
June 23, 2009 at 3:24 pm
TF Smith
Yep, George is right up there with the fool of hope…
June 23, 2009 at 6:12 pm
Patterico
Indonesian Vice President Hamzah Haz shortly after 9/11: “”hopefully, this tragedy will cleanse the sins of the United States.”
Still waiting to hear how all these other Muslim countries had big public demonstrations in support of America.
“Is there anyone affiliated with Mousavi who has expressed unhappiness with Obama’s support for democracy in Iran?”
His spokesman?
If you’re interested in cheap debating points, I suggest you focus on those last two sentences, snicker about Bush, and ignore the fact that Mousavi’s spokesman is criticizing Obama. If you want to be intellectually honest, you’ll note that the answer to your question is yes. More:
Meanwhile, Obama is planning to have some representatives of this murderous regime over for the Fourth of July. Not exactly what Mousavi’s spokesman wants.
Mark my words: he will shake those bloody hands with a Shite-eating grin.
June 23, 2009 at 6:21 pm
Patterico
“What the hell does the reaction to 9/11 in other middle eastern counties have to do with that? Maybe the post got hung up in moderation for its blatant lack of relevance.”
You’ll have to ask the moderators. However, my point was: I argued the people of Iran were surprisingly pro-American, and cited as evidence their public support for America after 9/11 — something I thought rather surprising for a Muslim country. Then I was told: duh, everyone supported us after 9/11 — that doesn’t show that Iran is pro-American. To which I said: more pro-American than Syria or Lebanon or Egypt or Jordan or the West Bank . . . and I have had the TRUMP CARD played: aha! there are other Muslim countries!1!!!1!! To which I say: again, can you cite ONE that had such a large public outpouring of goodwill as Iran (as contrasted with Indonesia, who had a VP who gloated about how 9/11 would cleanse our sins).
It’s a rather silly merry-go-round and I’m happy to get off and return to the original point: yes, there are people affiliated with Mousavi who are disappointed with Obama’s lack of support (of which the ice cream run is only a potent symbol, given the timing and his weak-kneed words).
June 23, 2009 at 6:41 pm
politicalfootball
The mind boggles, Patterico. Mousavi’s guy takes something Obama allegedly said amiss, while explicitly comparing Obama to Mousavi and Bush to Ahmadinejad, and this is your damning evidence? What do democracy-loving Iranians have against Bush?
And what about Khamenei’s complaint that Obama is backing the militants? Is he lying about that? If so, why is he lying?
Now you have the vice president of Indonesia erupting in glee at 9-11 in his role as spokesman for the Muslim world. Well, I’ll see your Indonesian vice president and raise you Yasser Arafat himself, who staged a blood donation as a public show of solidarity with the victims of 9-11. You can cherry pick anything you like, but to say as you have that the Muslim world is united in its glee at 9-11 is ludicrous, no matter how many vice presidents said mean things about the U.S.
Somewhere, some Muslim is saying that all Americans are racist idiots who paint Muslims as inherently terroristic. And if he is like you and gets ahold of this comment thread, he’ll have all the evidence he needs.
June 23, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Patterico
Me:
“If you’re interested in cheap debating points, I suggest you focus on those last two sentences, snicker about Bush, and ignore the fact that Mousavi’s spokesman is criticizing Obama.”
politicalfootball:
[complies]
June 23, 2009 at 7:02 pm
Patterico
“I’ll see your Indonesian vice president and raise you Yasser Arafat himself, who staged a blood donation as a public show of solidarity with the victims of 9-11.”
I’ll see your fake blood donation and point out that it was fake:
June 23, 2009 at 7:25 pm
politicalfootball
If Arafat was afraid of needles, as your link proposes, that doesn’t change at all that Arafat wasn’t content to merely express solidarity with 9-11 victims, he wanted to show it. But suppose he merely expressed his solidarity without the photo op? What then?
June 23, 2009 at 7:31 pm
Patterico
“If Arafat was afraid of needles, as your link proposes, that doesn’t change at all that Arafat wasn’t content to merely express solidarity with 9-11 victims, he wanted to show it.”
He wanted to FAKE it. The same as he always did: one face to the Western world, one anti-Semitic, nasty face to the Muslim world.
“[T]he event had been staged for the media to counteract the embarrassing television images of Palestinians celebrating in the streets after the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks.”
Think you missed that part the first time. So you probably missed this part too:
“And yet, Arafat’s condolences to the American people were broadcast far and wide, with no mention that on that same day the Palestinian Authority’s newspaper praised suicide bombers as ‘the noble successors of their noble predecessors . . . the salt of the earth, the engines of history . . . the most honorable people among us.'”
Anyway, I don’t have all night to bat down your examples. I’ll just note that your first and best turned out to be a fraud. kthxbai
June 23, 2009 at 7:32 pm
politicalfootball
And I do admire how you’re able to censor anything that doesn’t match your weird view of the world. Mousavi’s guy expresses admiration for anti-democracy Obama and contempt for pro-democracy Bush? Pointing this out is a “cheap debating trick” that requires no response.
Here’s another cheap debating trick: actually asking people for their opinions rather than assigning opinions to them.
June 23, 2009 at 9:38 pm
Charlieford
Ari, eric, . . . I think it’s time to separate these two.
June 23, 2009 at 9:58 pm
ari
I thought about saying something earlier, but if Patterico wants to keep walking into pf’s haymakers, who am I to stop him? It’s all about liberty, Charlie.
June 24, 2009 at 12:18 am
Patterico
“I thought about saying something earlier, but if Patterico wants to keep walking into pf’s haymakers, who am I to stop him?”
Is “haymaker” a word for “comment mistakenly arguing that a phony gesture is serious”? Because most people would be embarrassed by making an argument like: “Look how genuine Arafat was!” and then being shown that his gesture was a complete fraud.
Most intellectually honest people, anyway.
Here, apparently, “my side wins no matter the facts” trumps “my argument is based on reality.” Your guy craps on himself and you give him a round of applause.
June 24, 2009 at 12:19 am
Patterico
SEK, I make a direct appeal to you.
Are you proud of that Arafat argument? “Here’s my argument. What? It’s based on bullshit? Well, no matter. Hur, hur. I still win because the commenters here share my views. No matter if the points I make turn out to be crap.”
June 24, 2009 at 12:23 am
Patterico
See, here’s your problem: credibility.
If you had said: “Whoops, Patterico. You got me. My Arafat argument was bullshit. However, let me still argue [x] [y] [z] . . .” that would be fine. That would show credibility.
But the attitude “who cares if my point is proven to be bullshit, everyone here will still call it a haymaker”? Really, that should embarrass you. It really should.
(I said “should.”)
June 24, 2009 at 12:27 am
Patterico
“There’s a politicalfootball born every minute.” — P.T. Barnum.
June 24, 2009 at 12:36 am
Patterico
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Lagos, Nigeria
June 24, 2009 at 5:44 am
dana
Hey, Patterico! Knock it off.
June 24, 2009 at 6:18 am
politicalfootball
Ari, eric, . . . I think it’s time to separate these two.
I do get carried away, and things that are interesting to me are tedious and unpleasant to more sensible people. If the consensus is that I’m being annoying, I’ll certainly stop.
But this stuff really is interesting to me – I really want to know how people like Mr. Patterico arrive at the place that they do. And unlike SEK, I’m not actually prepared to wade into their web sites wholesale. (I truly think Scott performs a service in this regard.)
Mr. P is prepared to patiently explain the contents of his skull for my benefit, with a relative minimum of random nonsense (until his last comment). I’m grateful for this.
In another thread here, I propose that it’s important to engage people like Limbaugh because, well, they are important people in this country. The views of people like Mr. P are increasingly marginalized, but are still quite important – take a look at how the press quizzes Obama about Iran, if you don’t believe me.
(All of this elides the question of whether EOTAW is the right forum for this conversation. I leave that up to The Management.)
June 24, 2009 at 7:12 am
ari
pf, if you’re willing to put the time into knocking heads with someone like Patterico, the pixels are on us. That said, the Arafat example is the key moment for me: you clearly demonstrate that one of the ostensible villains of Patterico’s monolithic Muslim world was willing to offer at least a show of support for the US in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. But he interprets that same moment as a slap in America’s face. The differences, they are irreconcilable.
June 24, 2009 at 7:22 am
ajay
I think the reasoning goes: “Arafat was willing to make a show of support for the US, but I know that this was fake, because I know he really hates the US, and the fact that his show of support was fake proves this, because if he didn’t hate the US his support would have been genuine.”
June 24, 2009 at 7:43 am
politicalfootball
So okay, Patterico, we won’t talk about whether Obama’s ice cream was offensive to Iranians, and we won’t discuss Iranian dissidents’ feelings about Bush vs. Obama. We won’t talk about Khamenei’s efforts to tie the protesters to the U.S., and we will absolutely not have anything to say about polling data.
You’ve had the guts to play away from your home court, so if you’re uncomfortable discussing those other things, I’m prepared to move on to Mr. Arafat, whom you do feel more comfortable talking about.
My claim was that Arafat “staged a blood donation” – a phrase chosen intentionally because it was the staging I was interested in, not the blood. (I’ll guess that you, too, are uninterested in the actual blood, and that your opinion of Arafat’s gesture was unchanged after you read the Weekly Standard piece.)
Yasser Arafat was not a nice man. He had a lot of problems with the United States, and he wasn’t squeamish about violence. But even Arafat, as extreme as he was, wanted to distance himself and his movement from bin Laden. Not only was the “Muslim world” not “erupting in glee,” but even Arafat felt compelled to make a very public show of solidarity with the U.S.
To homogenize the Muslim world and ascribe to it a more extreme position than Arafat’s is noxious and dangerous. The policy blunders of the Bush years were directly attributable to this sort of thinking. What do you do if you’re attacked by terrorists? Attack a government that is holding its terrorists in check. This is okay because they are all Muslims anyway, and there’s no particular need to sort them out because the Muslim world (minus Iran, in your reading) was gleeful about 9-11.
June 24, 2009 at 9:40 am
TF Smith
Not that PF needs any help, but as a minor historical note, “not only was the `Muslim world’ not `erupting in glee,’ ” over 9/11, but quite a few Muslim nations (Turkey, the UAE, Jordan, Egypt, Albania, Azerbaijian, and Bosnia) actually have chosen over the past several years to put “skin in the game” so to speak, with either their own troops on the ground in Afghanistan and/or Iraq or by providing training to Iraqi or Afghan troops in their own countries (Jordan, most notably, with regards to the Iraqi military).
India (not a majority Muslim country, but one with a significant Muslim population, with all that entails in terms of domestic politics) has a national mission in Afghanistan, with a mixed military-civilian civil engineering team.
During the 1991 war, of course, the Egyptians and Syrians had more troops on the ground in Iraq than the British and French combined…
And all part of “the Muslim world,” amazingly enough…
June 24, 2009 at 3:05 pm
SEK
Are you proud of that Arafat argument?
Pride isn’t an issue. The example of Arafat demonstrates that he thought it was politically efficacious to stage a blood-drive and publicize the fact that he had. The question becomes, then, who he staged it for, and I don’t know enough about internal Palestinian politics to answer that definitively.
June 24, 2009 at 11:30 pm
TF Smith
Does the good counselor get the whole concept of why generalizations are – oh, how to put it gently – imprecise?
I mean, surely somebody at UT taught him about that during Rhetoric for Opening and Closing Arguments 101.
June 25, 2009 at 7:19 am
politicalfootball
The question becomes, then, who he staged it for,
This is, in fact, what the question becomes, once you’ve established a sensible basis for a conversation about Arafat’s relationship with al Qaeda-type terrorism, but we haven’t done that here.
To get there, we’d have to establish prior facts such as:
-Non-Iranian Muslims aren’t monolithic, and aren’t predominantly hostile to Americans, especially not to the point of supporting the 9-11 attacks.
-Terrorists aren’t monolithic, and don’t all have the same goals and methods.
And I could go on in this vein. These things seem too stupid to talk about, but if you’re going to talk to Patterico, this is what you’ve got to talk about – and this is why I brought up Arafat. I needed to make the (seemingly) obvious point that his motives and methods are different from those of bin Laden. Again: “Terrorists aren’t monolithic, and don’t all have the same goals and methods.”
Does that seem too obvious to say? Tell it to Patterico, who can’t distinguish the desires of the Muslim world from those of al Qaeda – much less distinguish the motives and methods of a guy like Arafat from a guy like bin Laden.
Hell, we are in a war on terrorism here, and while it’s easy for sensible people to forget how stupid that formulation is if taken literally, sensible people have to remember how literally that formulation has been taken at the highest levels of government. Patterico, here, is parroting guys like Doug Feith, who wrote a memo to Donald Rumsfeld on Sept. 20, 2001 that is summarized in the 9-11 Commission report this way:
Patterico and I are probably in rough agreement about Arafat’s intended audience, and are likewise in rough agreement about Arafat’s personal sincerity. But if we start there without having established some obvious distinctions, it’s an invitation for Patterico to speculate on Arafat’s motives based on Patterico’s ludicrous premises.
So again: I didn’t bring up Arafat to show that he was personally sympathetic to Americans after 9-11; I brought up Arafat to show that he thought it was important to make a big public show of sympathy to Americans after 9-11.
Bin Laden didn’t do that. (Yes, I know, duh. But that’s the level on which this conversation is taking place.)
June 25, 2009 at 7:33 am
politicalfootball
I thank ari for indulging my pixel prolixity, and I acknowledge that TF Smith said pretty much the same thing, with many fewer words, in his comment immediately preceding.
June 25, 2009 at 10:40 am
Charlieford
“Terrorists aren’t monolithic, and don’t all have the same goals and methods.”
The essential point of David Kilcullen’s THE ACCIDENTAL GUERRILLA, which I’d recommend. If you need an endorsement, they absolutely hate him over at JihadWatch (which makes NRO’s Corner look like a bastion of sanity).
June 25, 2009 at 8:46 pm
TF Smith
PF – Thank you for the gracious comment. Patt has apparently taken his ball and gone home, I expect…