So it’s only bad when Israel does it: Remember all the brouhaha over Israel’s refusing to go along with the UN’s one-sided Gaza war investigation? Well, there doesn’t seem to be an eye being batted over Hezbollah declaring that no matter what the UN investigation into Rafik Hariri’s assassination turns up, they won’t turn over the suspects. He has even threatened a coup over the results. So, how many editorials, op-eds, and statements you figure were made over how Israel should cooperate with the UN no matter what? Shyeah. What time is it? That’s right, Israeli Double Standard Time—but no worries. It only occurs on days that end with a “y.”
Yes, Glenn Beck was over the top. I can’t believe I have to say this, but Media Matters isn’t wrong on this part of their most recent complaint against Glenn Beck. (Broken clock, etc.)
On his November 10 radio show, Beck described how Soros, who was born in Hungary to Orthodox Jewish parents, “used to go around with this anti-Semite and deliver papers to the Jews and confiscate their property and then ship them off. And George Soros was part of it. He would help confiscate the stuff. It was frightening. Here’s a Jewish boy helping send the Jews to the death camps.”
Soros did not help send Jews to the camps, and Beck is wrong to say so. The ADL is right to call him out on this, and he should be ashamed of himself. There are plenty of other rotten things to say about Soros, but he did NOT help round up the Jews and send them off to the death camps.
Beck, is only half wrong. Soros actively partisipeted in idendifying jewish property in Budapest. You can say that he worked with the Nazis in Hungary. What worst in 60 minutes interview, he told the interviewer that he have no regrets and he is not sorry what he did. In out family, my mother is the only survivor from family of 10, Soros is Nazi collaboretor.
wow, nice call w.r.t. Glenn Beck. he is a “mixed bag” to say the least. it’s a sad, sad fact that some of those who take Soros to task for currency manipulation feel the need to drag in charges of “Nazi collaborator,” the sort of thing that’s straight out of John Fowles’ fine yarn “The Magus.” in short, it is so over the top that it diminishes whatever legitimate grievance one might have with Soros. in my view, the greatest service Beck has done is focus on the misdeeds of the Wilson administration / but even that has been complicated by the knee-jerk defense of Wilson by persons committed to the Democratic Party, i.e., “Beck doesn’t like Wilson, therefore he must’ve been, like, the greatest President *ever*.”
.. in other news, someone forwarded me a Sinatra PSA from 1945:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0NraoSYr38
from afar, Frank comes off looking like a Cool Hippie, i guess. but, being a product of its time, one could read the message as: “All men are created equal / ‘cept for the Jap finks !”
You do remember that the USA was at war with Japan in 1945, and that the government roused war spirit in ways that are now considered, by the squeamish, rather infra dig, if not racist. In WWII Hollywood was a major source of propaganda efforts supporting the war against both Germany and Japan. That has not been the case for decades now, since the people most influential there deplore our oppostion to their favorite totalitarians. I think that one of the reasons that support for military actions have become exiguous in wars since 1945 is that the government made no efforts to rouse such spirit to support the war among civilians at home. The trumpet gave forth an uncertain sound and the people were confused thereby.
We can only be thankful there is as much support for the war against the jihadists as there is, since the government has made little effort to rouse war spirit and Hollywood has been actively opposed to the fight, putting out many movies denigrating the US and its armed forces. Even things that seem obvious to many of us must be explained to others to gain and hold support. As a maths prof at a British university told his sutdents “If I ever see the word ‘obvious’ on one of your proofs it will be marked wrong.”
Sure, America was at war with Japan .. and Japanese-Americans found themselves in a very unfortunate place. And once the broad-brush is activated, you get little spin-off prejudices: East Asians, in general – Chinese, Koreans, etc. It’s like the Sikh who got beat up on the subway in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Sometimes war makes sense , and governments who mobilize for war would do well to Make Sense of the war for the citizens who end up paying for it. Unfocused resentments and hatred don’t cut it. A popular Tawk Radio tawking point goes like this: “if the allegedly ‘peaceful’ Muslim majority doesn’t crack down on their violent brethren, then – by gum – we’ll do it for them!” .. stuff like that works pretty good over the radio (a “hot” medium), but it ignores little details such as al-Qaeda’s jihad against large groups of Muslims as well. When the battle lines are drawn between groups who see in strict black and white terms, truth is the first casualty. The War on jihadist groups as it exists today is of the full-on assault “wrecking ball” variety. An undeniable side-effect is more radicalization (which is fine .. if you’re a Hegelian [i’m not]). There are other methods to destroy a rigid edifice / observe the grass growing up through the concrete, how it splits over time. It is an inevitable process, one that we in the West can choose to encourage (or *laugh at* as silly Eastern mumbo-jumbo while India and China continue to pull ahead in the world).
Tomas, I don’t know if you can call Soros a collaborator. He accompanied his guardian, who was confiscating property. I can’t find a direct source for the transcript, and until I can find a direct source, I remain unconvinced. Did his childhood affect him greatly? Yes. I think it contributed to his fear of being singled out as Jewish, and his anti-Israel bent. One of these days, I will finish writing my “Jews who hate Jews” post in my head and get it out there, but I think Soros is one of those Jews who hates that he was born Jewish, hates that he has any ties to the Jewish community, and actively works to prove that he doesn’t want to be Jewish. And the reason he got that way? He was a Jewish teenager in Hungary in the 1930s and 40s.
“, but I think Soros is one of those Jews who hates that he was born Jewish, hates that he has any ties to the Jewish community,”
Look forward to your post on this phenomenon! Thing of it is, a number of fascinating essays could be written on this, all focusing on different personalities. For me, three come immediately to mind: Werner Erhard (the “EST” guy who associated Judaism with “weakness”), Ayn Rand (her fiction is replete with iron-jawed “Nordic” heroes; very, um, “Triumph of the Will”) and international chess master/madman, the late Bobby Fischer (his anti-Semitic statements, especially after 9/11, were so over the top, most people blotted them from consciousness).
” The War on jihadist groups as it exists today is of the full-on assault “wrecking ball†variety. An undeniable side-effect is more radicalization (which is fine .. if you’re a Hegelian [i’m not]).”
Actually, Pablo, that is not true. The US government has moved Heaven and Earth to emphasize that the US is not at war with Islam or with Muslims in general. Remember all that “Islam is a religion of peace” hooey that Bush put out? The Jihadists give Sura and verse from the Qur’an justifying their atrocities. Thus the rise of the acronym “ROPMA.”
Nor has the US war led to radicalization. One of the unforeseen by-products of the Iraq Campaign was the growth of widesread loathing for Al Qaeda in Muslim lands. Why? They saw AQ killing Muslims by the thousands in marketplaces and mosques with their car bombs and suiciders. Few Muslims buy their “involuntary martyrs” nonsense.
What we have actually failed to do is pursue the ideological war. Long term the Jihadists’ vision of the future, a new, worldwide Caliphate where Muslims will strut about and lord it over the wretched dhimmis and seize all the wealth of the infidels, is an attractive prospect for many Muslims, flattering to their vanity. The alternative we offer though, liberty and prosperity in the modern world, is also attractive to many Muslims. The two choices are incompatible. To put that choice before the Muslims, especially the Arabs, was one of the purposes of the Iraq Campaign. By falling down in the ideological war we have missed an important point.