By Christopher Hitchens
"Even in a week that concentrated all eyes on the magnificent courage and maturity of the people of Cairo, a report from Kabul began with what must surely be the most jaw-dropping opening paragraph of the year. Under the byline of the excellent Rod Nordland, the New York Times reported:"
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5 comments:
This illustrates the fight within the family (liberalism), nice one!!
Is there a defense of western liberalism, is it worthy of a defense, is it ineptly flawed, is it the best we've got, isn't it apparently?
Should we be inconsistent if it furthers the defeat of our provincial political foes (Right, Conservatism)?
Is the notion of a zeitgeist that departs from Left/Right ideologies and excuse for being flaky and frivolous?
Well-written article, and it speaks the truth... but for goodness' sake Hitch, get over this Julian Assange business.
You can always tell what the most sinister and weird evil is in any society by that which is left unnamed.
The one thing always missing in any Hitchens' article is the notion that our military is staffed by young proto-fascists with probative masculinity issues on display managed by sociopaths and right-wing evangelicals with arch-racist/sexist personality disorders. This is especially true inside JSOC (SEE: Stan Goff).
Furthermore, we have a non-adversarial press who fears the military so much that they would rather self immolate than show our military culture for what it is. Well, some of us have served inside it and can tell you much better than Hitchens and others who secretly/openly feel guilty for their lack of service and then go on to lionize and apologize for an institution that is largely fascist and racist/sexist by design and peopled by the types who excel inside such demonic cultures.
The US military is almost exclusively low-brow, reactionary, sexist and racist and so obsessed with proving its masculinity that incessant acts of high-order violence against the weakest and most vulnerable of people on the planet is de rigueur for it. So much so that is isn't even noticed by our self-conscious little intelligensia...
It's Hitchens' blind spot and while he's right on 98% of everything else, his apologetics for our military is something he is very very wrong on... (we all have them, mine is Castro and Cuba... but somebody needs to keep us all honest. My work is done here)
LT
READ: Sgt Stan Goff (RET): Full Spectrum Disorder and Hideous Dream for a crash course.
Wow. You're really pissed off they didn'tpromote you to Captain.
P1: What will replace it? It's realpolitik. Dear sir you may have bad or you may have very bad. And the margins don't necessarily stop there. Say how about either we can have mediocre or abject evil. This rarely goes in reverse, but there are exceptions. Don't make the 'perfect' an enemy of the good.
P2: No, the idealistic is always attainable!
P1: Not it isn't...
P2: Yes it is! It's worth at least mentioning.
P1: Now we're making progress. :)
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