According to an article in today's Washington Post, the root causes of the recent British Muslim plot to blow up American airplanes crossing the Atlantic are clearly understandable. But they're NOT the root causes that George W. Bush, George F. Allen, and other leading Republicans would have you believe. Instead:
The answer is that Britain has become an incubator for violent Islamic extremism, fueled by disenchantment at home and growing rage about events abroad, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.[...]
In one of Europe's largest Muslim communities, young men face a lack of jobs, poor educational achievement and discrimination in a highly class-oriented culture. Prime Minister Tony Blair is the most outspoken ally of President Bush, and their policies in Iraq and Afghanistan are seen by many Muslims as aimed at Islam.
In other words, by fighting them "over there" (in Iraq), we're actually INCREASING the frequency with which we have to fight them "over here," whether that is London or New York. Let's be blunt about this: the U.S./British invasion and occupation of Iraq, far from creating a "new Middle East" and helping to win the "war on terror," has completely backfired and produced the exact opposite - a MORE violent Middle East, MORE recruits for Al Qaeda, and - not surprisingly - HIGHER levels of terrorism. Heckuva job, BushAllenCheney! Heckuva job!!
Oh, and just in case people like Bush and Allen are too dense to understand all this, here's Asghar Bukhari of the Muslim Public Affairs Committee, "which advocates Muslim involvement in the democratic process and opposes violence."
"It's not hard to comprehend the mind of a Muslim." He said young British Muslims look around the world and "everywhere they are getting bombed," so they increasingly respond by saying, "Don't just sit down and take it -- let's fight them."[...]
"The root is foreign policy," said Bukhari, who has emerged in the past year as a leading voice of the young Muslim community. "Only a half-wit wouldn't understand that this is about" British and American policies in the Middle East.
Only a half-wit wouldn't understand that, eh? Hey, Mr. Bukhari, did you ever try explaining your analysis to George "Bring It On" Bush, George "Bored" Allen, or Dick "Dick" Cheney? Speaking of half-wits...
P.S. How about some of THESE "root causes" of terror, identified by the International Peace Academy and the Norwegian Mission to the United Nations?
* "lack of democracy, civil liberties, and the rule of law";
* rapid modernization and a "dissolution of traditional norms and social patterns";
* hegemony and inequality of power, where one power -- the United States in the current international system -- possesses overwhelming power compared to other actors, and where "the latter see no other realistic ways to forward their cause by normal political or military means";
* "powerful external actors upholding illegitimate governments";
* "historical antecedents of political violence, civil wars, revolutions, dictatorships or occupation"; and
* "failure +óGé¼-ª by the state to integrate dissident groups or emerging social classes," which leads educated young people with few job prospects to seek alternative forms of expressing their frustration, such as violence and terror.
Ah, forget all that. Too complicated. Anyway, BushCheneyAllen know all the answer. "They" (the terrorists) hate our freedoms. Oh, and they're "Islamic fascists," whatever THAT means. End of story; bombs away. I'll tell you, it must be nice to live in black-and-white right-wing world!
Lowell Feld is Netroots Coordinator for the Jim Webb for US Senate Campaign. The ideas expressed here belong to Lowell Feld alone, and do not necessarily represent those of Jim Webb, his advisors, staff, or supporters.
>British Muslims look around the world and "everywhere they are getting bombed,"
Gimme a break! It's Muslim terrorists doing the bombing!!
Still, I strongly suggest that you and Candidate Webb pick this up as a prominent campaign theme: Muslim terrorists are doing what they're doing because of American policies. We should stop being mean to them... try to understand why they feel the way they do. Stop fighting them, and hope they'll be nice to us.
Great plan... I'm sure that will resonate with Virginia voters.
Nobody here is saying to "stop fighting them." Uh, maybe you haven't been paying attention, but I've been attacking George Allen and George Bush from the RIGHT, in the sense that I believe we should have kept our eye on the ball and completely annhilated Al Qaeda, not gotten off onto a sideshow in Iraq. And, if Iraq really WAS a threat to the United States and the key to the War on Terror, I believe we should have gone in with overwhelming force and sufficient resources necessary to maintain security and help build Democracy over there. But we didn't, because Bush and Rumsfeld are incompetent, arrogant, neocon ideologues. And George Allen? He's their unthinking, kneejerk lackey. Jim Webb? He thinks for hiimself, has a brilliant strategic mind, and knows that Iraq was a strategic blunder of the first order. How about you?
The British suspects were barely in handcuffs before House Majority Leader John Boehner was complaining about "Defeatocrats." Funny, but I don't recall it was Democrats who stood in the way of full implementation of the recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission.This isn't about whether you can pack hand cream in your carry-on bag. This is about how President Bush has squandered manpower and materiel in the war in Iraq, a conflict that has emboldened radical Islamists and made their cause more acceptable and recruiting much easier.
In his first public response to the arrest of suspects in Britain, Bush said that uncovering the plot was "a stark reminder that this nation is still at war with Islamic fascists."
What Bush did not say was that the continuing war in Iraq has been a diversion from U.S. leadership in the global war on terrorism.
Jim Webb, the former Reagan administration official who is running as a Democrat against Sen. George Allen, R-Va., pointed out that the war in Iraq had little to do with the war on terrorism."The occupation of Iraq keeps our military locked down in a civil war in the Middle East, and consumes resources that can better be used in the larger fight against global terrorism," Webb said in a statement.
Allen has attempted to equate Webb's opposition to the war in Iraq with being weak on the battle against terrorism. The reverse is actually the case, and if voters buy bull such as Allen's, then they, too, get what they deserve.
not all the bombing is Muslim on Muslim. Of course you know that, which makes your comment that much more offensive.
LONDON - The number of Islamic extremist security suspects in Britain has increased by 50 percent since the deadly suicide bombings in London last year, The Observer newspaper said on Sunday.A senior intelligence source at the country’s domestic spy agency MI5 was quoted as saying that they were targeting 800 such suspects before the bombings on July 7 last year, but that figure now stood at 1,200.
In September 2001, the number of people deemed a “risk to national security†was 250, the newspaper said.
Huh? So Islamic extremists up 50% since last year, up 600% since 2001? This notion of "Fightin' them over there, so we don't have to fight them over here", is not adding up.
So what the hell was the point of invading Iraq? Mr. Pubus, any actual thoughts from anonymous ditto-head land?
It's not a question of fighting terrorists once they become terrorists, it's a question of fighting strategically (and intelligently) so we only have to fight the existing terrorists. By creating an environment where new terrorists are easily recruited we have created a long term losing situation and a never ending war.
So it's not about scraping the war on terrorism, it's about being much smarter about how we conduct that war.
Vrit enima fulgore suo qui praegrauat artes
infra se positas; extinctis amabiture idem.
Praesenti tibi maturos largimur honores
iurandasque tuom per numenae ponimus ares,
You do actually know Latin, don't you? Or are you faking it, like you do with your analyses? (Just so you can't Google a translation I've changed a few spellings in minor ways. But it's such a famous passage that should not deter you one bit.)
Now on to substance. My dear friend has been in both Afghanistan and Iraq in the past few years. He has been representing the U.S. in one danger zone after the other. He has lived in every Middle Eastern country at one time or another. His verdict -- "it will take three generations to erase the damage we've done over there." He thinks W is a complete idiot.
Let's take another view. My mom has voted Republican consistently -- I believe exclusively -- for 40 years. Her verdict on W? "He's evil and a war criminal."
The conversion, even if temporary, of a life long Republican speaks volumes about just how bad this batch of Republicans are.
That’s about a thousand per capita, or for Virginia, close to $8 billion. Money that Tom Davis, Frank Wolf, and George Allen have cost us -- urinated away, as it were -- by voting reflexively for Bush’s wars and programs. For $8 billion we could have a Metro system with people to give you neck massages after a tough day, etc.
If George Bush has a coherent foreign policy, I’m a first baseman. Or, as William Buckley put it (on CBS):
Asked what President Bush's foreign policy legacy will be to his successor, Buckley says "There will be no legacy for Mr. Bush. I don't believe his successor would re-enunciate the words he used in his second inaugural address because they were too ambitious. So therefore I think his legacy is indecipherable."