The Real and Present War

[Tiarnan O'Corrain]

> 
> Anybody who hates modernity hates America. 

Self-regarding tripe.

> Anybody who hates 
> freedom hates 
> America. 

Urine tests by corporations on employees? Or the 'freedom'
of the largest proportional prison population in the world?

> Anybody who hates privacy hates America. 

Kenneth Starr?

> Anybody who 
> hates human 
> rights hates America. 

Pinochet? The Shah of Iran? Saddam Hussein? All peace-lovin'
freedom-lovin' types, and US clients to boot.

> Anybody who hates ballots and bookshops 
> and newspapers 
> and televisions and computers and theaters and bars and the 
> sight of a woman 
> smiling at a man hates America. 

Simply bizzare. I'll just snigger at the 'bookshops' bit, recall
the presidential election/coup d'etat when considering the
ballots, and compare US newspapers with foreign equivalents.

> He wishes also to punish Israel (and Jews generally) 
> for being so 
> remorselessly American, that is, so secular, so liberal, so 
> enthralled by 
> enlightenment, so unimpeded by the burdens of the past. 

What utter nonsense! Israel, a repressive and overtly racist
state, in love with the enlightenment? I suppose the Likud
party are philosophes.

> Israel poses the 
> same threat to bin Laden's picture of the world, the same 
> challenge to his 
> horror of liberty and equality, as the United States does, 
> and Israel is 
> flourishing right there in the orbit of Islam.

Israel is flourishing with the help of massive US aid. It could
not survive without it. To the hamfisted caricature of
Bin Laden's picture of the world, one can only say that he probably
imagines he is securing liberty and equality for his people.

> For this reason, the terrorist 
> war against the 
> United States and the terrorist war against Israel is the 
> same war. 

First off, it's not a reason. Second, the idea of a terrorist
war is a contradiction in terms. They don't have cities, armies
or states.

What happened to the World Trade Centre was a dreadful tragedy
and a horrendous crime. It was cold, cruel, and deeply symbolic.
It's symbolism may be misunderstood by the Americans, because
it was not aimed at them. If Bin Laden orchestrated the act
(and no proof has yet been stated), it seems like an attempt
to provoke the US into an unwinnable war, on the worst terrain
in the world, against a veteran guerilla army. The US may have
overwhelming military force and technology, but as it found out
in Vietnam, some terrains make it impossible to bring that force
to bear.  

T