Justin Raimondo over at antiwar.com has another interesting article on the Dubai Ports controversy. Published March 10, Raimondo's original thesis had to do with the demagoguery of Arianna Huffington, Sen. Barbara Boxer, et al, regarding the sale of the ports management. However, what I found interesting was the potential economic backlash America might face, insha'allah, from this rejection of allowing the sale of P&O to an Arab company. For example, while I doubt that Dubai will not cease doing business with the American merchant fleet, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if Boeing loses out to Airbus as Raimondo speculates. Now, what follows is most - but not all - of Raimondo's article. So, if you want to read the entire article, click on the title link above.
...
The threat of economic retaliation from Dubai hasn't hit home yet, but when it does, their threat to do business with Airbus instead of Boeing is sure to provoke howls of outrage from the same crowd. We're kicking them out of the American port business – and also out of any defense-related industries, it seems – but, heck, why do they have to go and reciprocate in kind? That's positively anti-American, and yet more proof that those emirs are terrorist-loving Ay-rab (is there any other kind?).
America does a lot of business with Dubai – a fact that La Huffington considers evidence of "corruption." Apparently she'd much rather we just bombed them. After all, if the UAE is the hotbed of terrorism she and her allies in the War Party make it out to be, then why not invade, occupy the country, and root out the bad guys? Huffington will never address these issues, because it would expose her utter hypocrisy and spoil her fun...
...
The economic consequences of severing ties with Dubai – which is what legislation now being pushed in Congress would effectively accomplish – could be substantial. The Hill reports:
"Retaliation from the emirate could come against lucrative deals with aircraft maker Boeing and by curtailing the docking of hundreds of American ships, including U.S. Navy ships, each year at its port in the [UAE]."
There is also Dubai Aerospace Enterprise, backed by $15 billion, which plans to buy a whole fleet of aircraft from either Boeing or Airbus in the near future. Can anybody doubt which company they'll choose in the wake of the hate campaign directed against them in the United States?
The irony is that the Democrats and their enablers in the punditocracy, who pine for the good old days when American workers stood at the pinnacle of the world market, will be the first to whine about how "foreign" labor is "stealing" American jobs. Being economic ignoramuses, however, as well as horses' asses in general, this crowd would rather not let reality get in the way of a bout of self-righteous fear-mongering.
...
"We want to protect the American people," declares House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.):
"We've been doing it the last four and a half years. We fought a war in Iraq, fought a war in Afghanistan, stood up to the Homeland Security Department. We will continue to do that. We will maybe have our differences, but we think we're going to continue to oppose the Dubai deal."
Hastert is right to put the nixing of the Dubai deal in there with the various wars we're fighting (or in the process of starting) in the Middle East: it's all part of the Western campaign to denigrate and subjugate the Arab-Muslim world. The disgusting spectacle of the "antiwar" Democrats – like Sen. Barbara Boxer – jumping on this war-wagon recalls H. L. Mencken's definition of a demagogue:
"One who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots."
The idea that Dubai represents a "security threat" to the West in any way, shape, or form has the pro-Western elements of the Arab world shaking their heads in stunned disbelief. Targeting as "terrorist" the UAE – which lets Uncle Sam use it as a lily pad to transport troops to Iraq and throughout the Middle East, and which has cooperated in efforts to root out terrorist networks, including the nuclear black market ring centered around A. Q. Khan – is just not credible. There must, insist our beleaguered allies in the region, be some other reason for this curt repudiation of all things Arabic, this open display of contempt and hostility even to America's loyal friends in the Gulf emirates.
The sanctions against Dubai, if carried to their logical conclusion, would rule out any and all Middle Eastern companies from doing business in the U.S. After all, one of their terrorist-loving employees could possibly be an al-Qaeda "sleeper" whose clever plan to smuggle a suitcase nuke onto American shores could conceivably be pulled off under cover of a shield of corporate invisibility.
The exclusion of an Arab company from an important sector of the U.S. economy strikes a significant victory for the War Party. Even if the Bush administration succeeds in partially defusing the issue, the brouhaha is in itself a great victory for the advocates of "World War IV." It draws a line in the sand, as it were, between the U.S. and the Arabic-speaking and Muslim world, and legitimizes the idea of a "war of civilizations" – the meme that motivates our militaristic foreign policy.
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Showing posts with label Justin Raimando. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Justin Raimando. Show all posts
March 14, 2006
February 23, 2006
Hating Arabs
There's an interesting article by Justin Raimondo over at antiwar.com regarding the ports controversy. (Originally, I was going to only use parts of this article, but I ultimately felt that cutting the article up wouldn't do justice to the entire argument. Hope you don't mind, Justin. ;) )
In a repeat of the calculated insults to the Arab world coming fast and furious these days, Democratic politicians, including putative presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, are raising a ruckus over a deal in which Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation, a U.K. company that manages the ports of New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami, and Philadelphia, would be acquired by Dubai Ports World, a Dubai-based international company that manages port facilities from London to Okinawa. Republican lawmakers, including Sen. Bill Frist, have been quick to jump on the Arab-bashing bandwagon; Republican Richard Shelby of Alabama was the first to raise the "security" issue, ahead of even Hillary and the clueless Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who wants all "foreign-owned" companies barred from managing U.S. ports. (This presumably includes U.K.-based companies such as Peninsular, and others, which together dominate the international shipping and maritime industry.)
This outcry is phony from beginning to end, starting with the ostensible reasons for the alleged "security risk" involved in doing business with a company based in the Arab world. Phony reason number one: Two of the hijackers were born in Dubai. This is completely bonkers: Dubai is a city of over one million, a major financial and industrial center, and an increasingly popular international tourist attraction. Because two Islamist nutballs were born there hardly makes it a terrorist hive. Culturally, Dubai is the freest country in the Arab world. That doesn't matter to the Arab-haters who are driving this campaign, however: in fact, it probably just emboldens them.
The reality is that there are U.S. troops in Dubai, over 1,000 of them, and the United Arab Emirates (of which Dubai is a part) is one of our staunchest allies in the region. Indeed, Dubai is the one city in the Middle East that is the most like America in that it is a symbol – thesymbol – of the Arab world's entry into modernity. The architecture of Dubai is a vision of futurity, and there are few urban centers in the U.S. that are cleaner or safer.
Dubai a hotbed of radical Islamist agitation? One would hardly think so, yet demagogues in both parties are now touting the factoid that the U.A.E. was one of three countries to grant diplomatic recognition to Afghanistan's Taliban government. What they don't mention is that the other two were Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, the two pillars of U.S. military and economic interests in the region. Should we stop doing business with them, too?
Phony reason number two is that the 9/11 conspirators funneled money through Dubai-based banks. But Dubai is the major financial nexus of the Arab world, and, indeed, is right up there with any city in the West in that regard: funds traveling from sources in the Middle East are more than likely to have come through the U.A.E. in some shape, form, or manner. Targeting DP World on account of this is like embargoing Wal-Mart because the 9/11 hijackers bought their box-cutters there.
An odd coalition of pro-union Democrats, who represent the interests of the International Longshore Workers Union, which fears dealing with non-unionized Dubai, and deluded Christian fundamentalists, such as Cal Thomas, have banded together in an effort to demonstrate that ignorance – of both economics and the rest of the world – reigns supreme in U.S. ruling circles.
This smear campaign against an entire country – indeed, against an entire region of the world – has nothing to do with the facts. The State Department reports: "In 2004, the UAE continued to provide staunch assistance and cooperation against terrorism" and "the UAE Central Bank continued to enforce anti-money-laundering regulations aggressively." Furthermore, the U.S. and Dubai have signed something called a Container Security Initiative Statement of Principles, the purpose of which is to do what we don't do here in the U.S., but ought to: all U.S.-bound cargo transiting Dubai ports is carefully screened. We have also signed a defense pact with Abu Dhabi, and the emirate has been used as a base from which to pre-position U.S. troops bound for Iraq. Our planes refueled at Dubai's al-Dhafra air base on their way to patrol Iraq's no-fly zone during the run-up to the invasion. Dubai has borne the costs in fuel and facilities maintenance of these U.S. military operations, and receives not a dime in "foreign aid." In addition to hosting over 1,000 U.S. troops at various air and naval facilities, the U.A.E. is contributing to the maintenance of U.S. military bases in Germany.
I've heard it said – on such Democratic Party sites as DailyKos.com – that it isn't the Arabic character of DP World that provokes security concerns, but the fact that the company is owned, in whole or in part, by the government of Dubai. This shows complete ignorance of the reality on the ground in the U.A.E.: if Uncle Sam doesn't like you in Dubai, you are history, as was discovered by the heir apparent to the throne of one of the emirates, Ras al-Khaymah, who was taken out of the line of succession in June 2003 because he was thought to be behind pre-Iraq-war demonstrations. The Gulf states are islands of U.S. influence in an Arabic-Muslim sea of Middle Eastern hostility: to insult them in so flagrant a manner would be to effectively sink the pro-U.S. governments that have so far remained our only faithful allies in the region.
Fearful of Iran, the U.A.E. has cozied up to the U.S. like no other country in the Middle East, except, perhaps, Kuwait. What's more, they have developed into precisely the model free market, modernized, relatively tolerant country, culturally if not politically, that we in the West have been urging on the region. In rejecting a Dubai-based company as unworthy, and raising the specter of terrorist-related activities or allegiances on the part of an internationally respected company with many Americans in top positions, the U.S. is saying that is doesn't matter how much the Arabs may kowtow to the West, adopt our ways, and try to enter the world of international capitalist finance and embrace globalization – we still don't want them because the whole region is poisoned by hate and therefore untouchable.
That is the message the warmongering Hillary and her allies on the Christian Right and in the Republican Party want to send to the people of the Middle East. And they have the nerve to wonder, "Why do they hate us?"
The answer is all too obvious.
The worst demagoguery over this issue is coming out of Sen. Chuck Schumer's mouth. The Democrat from New York avers:
"Just as we would not outsource military operations or law enforcement duties, we should be very careful before we outsource such sensitive homeland security duties."
Yet it seems as if the security-conscious senator isn't against outsourcing when Israel is the beneficiary: Israeli companies, as well as direct input from the Israeli government, practically dominate the burgeoning homeland security industry. And the newly installed congressional phone system is franchised to an Israeli company, yet no one is making much of a stink about the security concerns raised by people like Philip Giraldi, who writes:
"One of the more intriguing aspects of the federal investigation into the activities of Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff is his Israeli connections. His large $2.2 million bail is reported to be due to fears that he would flee to Israel, as some of his business associates have already done, to avoid prosecution. Abramoff, an Orthodox Jew and ardent Zionist, set up a charity called Capital Athletic Foundation, which illegally provided $140,000 worth of weapons and security equipment to hard-line Israeli settlers.
"Abramoff also allegedly convinced Congressman Robert Ney, House Administrative Committee chairman, to award a contract worth $3 million to a startup Israeli telecommunications firm calledFoxcom Wireless. The contract was for the installation of antennas in House of Representatives buildings to improve cell-phone reception. Not surprisingly, such equipment can be designed to have what is known as a 'back door' to enable a third party, in this case Mossad, to listen in. That an Israeli firm should be given such a contract through a selection process that was described as 'deeply flawed and unfair' is inexplicable, particularly as there were American suppliers of the same equipment, and it suggests that the private conversations of some of our congressmen might not be so private after all."
When Schumer starts questioning this sweet deal, I'll listen to him when it comes to DP World.
I have a suspicion that the current ruckus reflects the economic interests of not only the unions, but also Eller & Company, the Miami-based business formerly a partner of Peninsular that is now suing for being forced into an quot;involuntary" partnership with those feelthy Ay-rabs. The suit raises the security canard, and one wonders what sort of economic interests the smear campaign is intended to mask. A press conference held Tuesday decrying the ports deal was held in Miami, and the Miami-based nature of the smear campaign tells me that something is afoot in the land of the hanging chad. In any controversy like this, the first rule is to follow the money, and this AP report hints at the stakes:
"The lawsuit represents the earliest skirmish over lucrative contracts among the six major U.S. ports where Peninsular and Oriental runs major commercial operations: New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami, and Philadelphia. The lawsuit was filed moments before the court closed Friday and disclosed late Saturday by people working on the case."
It wouldn't be the first time a corporate entity tried to take out the competition by raising a bogus threat to "national security." Led by a disparate coalition of mindless opportunists, anti-Arab racists, and warmongering politicians, an effort to scare the American public into making a few ruthless "entrepreneurs" obscenely rich by giving them a virtual monopoly on America's port facilities shows every sign of apparent success. The victors will be laughing all the way to the bank.
In a repeat of the calculated insults to the Arab world coming fast and furious these days, Democratic politicians, including putative presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, are raising a ruckus over a deal in which Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation, a U.K. company that manages the ports of New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami, and Philadelphia, would be acquired by Dubai Ports World, a Dubai-based international company that manages port facilities from London to Okinawa. Republican lawmakers, including Sen. Bill Frist, have been quick to jump on the Arab-bashing bandwagon; Republican Richard Shelby of Alabama was the first to raise the "security" issue, ahead of even Hillary and the clueless Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who wants all "foreign-owned" companies barred from managing U.S. ports. (This presumably includes U.K.-based companies such as Peninsular, and others, which together dominate the international shipping and maritime industry.)
This outcry is phony from beginning to end, starting with the ostensible reasons for the alleged "security risk" involved in doing business with a company based in the Arab world. Phony reason number one: Two of the hijackers were born in Dubai. This is completely bonkers: Dubai is a city of over one million, a major financial and industrial center, and an increasingly popular international tourist attraction. Because two Islamist nutballs were born there hardly makes it a terrorist hive. Culturally, Dubai is the freest country in the Arab world. That doesn't matter to the Arab-haters who are driving this campaign, however: in fact, it probably just emboldens them.
The reality is that there are U.S. troops in Dubai, over 1,000 of them, and the United Arab Emirates (of which Dubai is a part) is one of our staunchest allies in the region. Indeed, Dubai is the one city in the Middle East that is the most like America in that it is a symbol – thesymbol – of the Arab world's entry into modernity. The architecture of Dubai is a vision of futurity, and there are few urban centers in the U.S. that are cleaner or safer.
Dubai a hotbed of radical Islamist agitation? One would hardly think so, yet demagogues in both parties are now touting the factoid that the U.A.E. was one of three countries to grant diplomatic recognition to Afghanistan's Taliban government. What they don't mention is that the other two were Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, the two pillars of U.S. military and economic interests in the region. Should we stop doing business with them, too?
Phony reason number two is that the 9/11 conspirators funneled money through Dubai-based banks. But Dubai is the major financial nexus of the Arab world, and, indeed, is right up there with any city in the West in that regard: funds traveling from sources in the Middle East are more than likely to have come through the U.A.E. in some shape, form, or manner. Targeting DP World on account of this is like embargoing Wal-Mart because the 9/11 hijackers bought their box-cutters there.
An odd coalition of pro-union Democrats, who represent the interests of the International Longshore Workers Union, which fears dealing with non-unionized Dubai, and deluded Christian fundamentalists, such as Cal Thomas, have banded together in an effort to demonstrate that ignorance – of both economics and the rest of the world – reigns supreme in U.S. ruling circles.
This smear campaign against an entire country – indeed, against an entire region of the world – has nothing to do with the facts. The State Department reports: "In 2004, the UAE continued to provide staunch assistance and cooperation against terrorism" and "the UAE Central Bank continued to enforce anti-money-laundering regulations aggressively." Furthermore, the U.S. and Dubai have signed something called a Container Security Initiative Statement of Principles, the purpose of which is to do what we don't do here in the U.S., but ought to: all U.S.-bound cargo transiting Dubai ports is carefully screened. We have also signed a defense pact with Abu Dhabi, and the emirate has been used as a base from which to pre-position U.S. troops bound for Iraq. Our planes refueled at Dubai's al-Dhafra air base on their way to patrol Iraq's no-fly zone during the run-up to the invasion. Dubai has borne the costs in fuel and facilities maintenance of these U.S. military operations, and receives not a dime in "foreign aid." In addition to hosting over 1,000 U.S. troops at various air and naval facilities, the U.A.E. is contributing to the maintenance of U.S. military bases in Germany.
I've heard it said – on such Democratic Party sites as DailyKos.com – that it isn't the Arabic character of DP World that provokes security concerns, but the fact that the company is owned, in whole or in part, by the government of Dubai. This shows complete ignorance of the reality on the ground in the U.A.E.: if Uncle Sam doesn't like you in Dubai, you are history, as was discovered by the heir apparent to the throne of one of the emirates, Ras al-Khaymah, who was taken out of the line of succession in June 2003 because he was thought to be behind pre-Iraq-war demonstrations. The Gulf states are islands of U.S. influence in an Arabic-Muslim sea of Middle Eastern hostility: to insult them in so flagrant a manner would be to effectively sink the pro-U.S. governments that have so far remained our only faithful allies in the region.
Fearful of Iran, the U.A.E. has cozied up to the U.S. like no other country in the Middle East, except, perhaps, Kuwait. What's more, they have developed into precisely the model free market, modernized, relatively tolerant country, culturally if not politically, that we in the West have been urging on the region. In rejecting a Dubai-based company as unworthy, and raising the specter of terrorist-related activities or allegiances on the part of an internationally respected company with many Americans in top positions, the U.S. is saying that is doesn't matter how much the Arabs may kowtow to the West, adopt our ways, and try to enter the world of international capitalist finance and embrace globalization – we still don't want them because the whole region is poisoned by hate and therefore untouchable.
That is the message the warmongering Hillary and her allies on the Christian Right and in the Republican Party want to send to the people of the Middle East. And they have the nerve to wonder, "Why do they hate us?"
The answer is all too obvious.
The worst demagoguery over this issue is coming out of Sen. Chuck Schumer's mouth. The Democrat from New York avers:
"Just as we would not outsource military operations or law enforcement duties, we should be very careful before we outsource such sensitive homeland security duties."
Yet it seems as if the security-conscious senator isn't against outsourcing when Israel is the beneficiary: Israeli companies, as well as direct input from the Israeli government, practically dominate the burgeoning homeland security industry. And the newly installed congressional phone system is franchised to an Israeli company, yet no one is making much of a stink about the security concerns raised by people like Philip Giraldi, who writes:
"One of the more intriguing aspects of the federal investigation into the activities of Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff is his Israeli connections. His large $2.2 million bail is reported to be due to fears that he would flee to Israel, as some of his business associates have already done, to avoid prosecution. Abramoff, an Orthodox Jew and ardent Zionist, set up a charity called Capital Athletic Foundation, which illegally provided $140,000 worth of weapons and security equipment to hard-line Israeli settlers.
"Abramoff also allegedly convinced Congressman Robert Ney, House Administrative Committee chairman, to award a contract worth $3 million to a startup Israeli telecommunications firm calledFoxcom Wireless. The contract was for the installation of antennas in House of Representatives buildings to improve cell-phone reception. Not surprisingly, such equipment can be designed to have what is known as a 'back door' to enable a third party, in this case Mossad, to listen in. That an Israeli firm should be given such a contract through a selection process that was described as 'deeply flawed and unfair' is inexplicable, particularly as there were American suppliers of the same equipment, and it suggests that the private conversations of some of our congressmen might not be so private after all."
When Schumer starts questioning this sweet deal, I'll listen to him when it comes to DP World.
I have a suspicion that the current ruckus reflects the economic interests of not only the unions, but also Eller & Company, the Miami-based business formerly a partner of Peninsular that is now suing for being forced into an quot;involuntary" partnership with those feelthy Ay-rabs. The suit raises the security canard, and one wonders what sort of economic interests the smear campaign is intended to mask. A press conference held Tuesday decrying the ports deal was held in Miami, and the Miami-based nature of the smear campaign tells me that something is afoot in the land of the hanging chad. In any controversy like this, the first rule is to follow the money, and this AP report hints at the stakes:
"The lawsuit represents the earliest skirmish over lucrative contracts among the six major U.S. ports where Peninsular and Oriental runs major commercial operations: New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami, and Philadelphia. The lawsuit was filed moments before the court closed Friday and disclosed late Saturday by people working on the case."
It wouldn't be the first time a corporate entity tried to take out the competition by raising a bogus threat to "national security." Led by a disparate coalition of mindless opportunists, anti-Arab racists, and warmongering politicians, an effort to scare the American public into making a few ruthless "entrepreneurs" obscenely rich by giving them a virtual monopoly on America's port facilities shows every sign of apparent success. The victors will be laughing all the way to the bank.
December 25, 2005
Christmas in Malaysia
Justin Raimondo, of antiwar.com, has just written an excellent essay, entitled "Christmas in Malaysia." Raimondo writes about current events/politics, and every now and then he has written some line about Islam that has shown his ignorance. Otherwise, he is an excellent writer, and I've been reading his columns off-and-on for the past four years or so.
Raimondo was invited to speak recently at the Perdana Global Peace Forum in Kuala Lumpur (KL), and he initially showed his ignorance regarding Malaysia in particular and what life might be like in an Islamic country in general:
"To say that Malaysia is not what I imagined would be an understatement of epic proportions. Situated just south of Thailand, north of Indonesia, and quite close to the equator, the country describes itself as officially "Islamic," and this, at least in the minds of most Americans, means a stultifying uniformity, a monolithic apparatus of cultural and all too often political repression. It means women in burqas, gay people in hiding, and a society generally groaning under the weight of an enormous repression."
In other words, all the typical cliches that we've come to hate. But Raimondo has an open mind:
"I am now well into my second week of staying in Kuala Lumpur, at the fabulous Crowne Plaza Hotel, and it is clearer than ever that my prejudices were not only mistaken – they were and are the exact opposite of the truth. Malaysia is the virtual incarnation of religious and ethnic diversity, a veritable melting pot of racial and devotional groups that somehow manage to live in relative harmony far beyond anything I have seen even in that paradigmatic paragon of multiculturalism, California. Malays, Chinese, Indians, Arabs, and a generous smattering of Anglo expats swarm the streets of Kuala Lumpur, the biggest city in the country: yes, there is a Muslim majority, but non-Muslims are not subject to sharia law. Malay Muslims coexist with Chinese Catholics, and Buddhist priests roam the Bukhit Bintang plaza, begging, amidst crowds shopping for the latest fashions and punk rockers with pink hair stroll fearlessly down the street.
You never saw such diversity. And that's just during the daytime. At night…"
A little bit later, he writes:
"I have to say that I am… astonished by Malaysia. Here is an "Islamic" country where a gigantic Christmas tree sits in the lobby of the hotel I'm staying at, and the café waiters in the plaza a few blocks away are dressed like Santa's elves. Here is a city where the nightlife puts San Francisco's to shame. Where the city's oldest gay bar, the Blue Boy, makes Baghdad-by-the-Bay seem like a dive in Podunk, Idaho; where people party well into the morning light, and you can have a good time for a few ringgits (the Malay currency: around 30 cents). The food is fabulous: Malay (spicy, somewhat Thai-like), Arab (there's a great place right off Bukhit Bintang), Chinese (you haven't lived until you've sampled the pleasures of Kuala Lumpur's Chinatown), and too many more to go into here. The place is a gastrointestinal paradise!
"Modernity is juxtaposed next to traditionalism: on the one hand you have the soaring heights of the Petronas Twin Towers, the tallest buildings in the world, lit up like a vision of futurity against the night sky, and on the other hand you have women in traditional dress – colorful costumes of bright color and the requisite head covering – traversing its corridors. Two, three, many worlds coexisting: the past and the future converging into a new synthesis of creativity and entrepreneurial energy. The impression one gets is of a tremendous vitality, a restless yet directed life-force that seems to spring right out of the earth."
Raimondo even discovers that Malaysia's former Prime Minister, Dr. Mahathir Muhammad, isn't the person he thought he would be:
"I had some concerns about former Prime Minister Mahathir, but then I read this Paul Krugman column and my fears were somewhat allayed. Upon meeting Dr. Mahathir, whatever reservations remained were put completely to rest: the man seems to emanate benevolence and great gentleness, almost an aura of serenity, like some sort of Buddhist guru."
And so, I have some hope for Raimondo, that perhaps when he writes about Islam in the future, that he will remember his Malaysian experience and realize that his preconceived notions are not necessarily true...
Unfortunately, I don't have the same hope for most Americans, many of whom wallow in their ignorance regarding Islam and the Muslim world. But for those of you who can afford the trip, I would suggest that you come here to visit Malaysia and Singapore to see not only how Islam is lived by we Muslims, but to see how our two cultures can live harmoniously together despite the ethnic diversity (which, IMO, is much more diverse than most Western cultures).
On a personal note, I'd like to say that I can attest to most of what Raimondo wrote about Malaysia and Dr. Mahathir, that what he's written is true (except for the part on the gay bar - I have no idea about that ;) ). Malaysia's a great country, and I've enjoyed every one of my visits there (the most recent of which was just last weekend, when Milady and I drove up to the city of Melaka, along with some of her family). I've been to KL several times (one of which was for Milady's and my honeymoon), and it's a great city. You're missing out if you don't visit us here in Southeast Asia.
Side note: While you're at it, be sure to read Eric Garris' story about his return to the United States after going to the Perdana Global Peace Forum.
Raimondo was invited to speak recently at the Perdana Global Peace Forum in Kuala Lumpur (KL), and he initially showed his ignorance regarding Malaysia in particular and what life might be like in an Islamic country in general:
"To say that Malaysia is not what I imagined would be an understatement of epic proportions. Situated just south of Thailand, north of Indonesia, and quite close to the equator, the country describes itself as officially "Islamic," and this, at least in the minds of most Americans, means a stultifying uniformity, a monolithic apparatus of cultural and all too often political repression. It means women in burqas, gay people in hiding, and a society generally groaning under the weight of an enormous repression."
In other words, all the typical cliches that we've come to hate. But Raimondo has an open mind:
"I am now well into my second week of staying in Kuala Lumpur, at the fabulous Crowne Plaza Hotel, and it is clearer than ever that my prejudices were not only mistaken – they were and are the exact opposite of the truth. Malaysia is the virtual incarnation of religious and ethnic diversity, a veritable melting pot of racial and devotional groups that somehow manage to live in relative harmony far beyond anything I have seen even in that paradigmatic paragon of multiculturalism, California. Malays, Chinese, Indians, Arabs, and a generous smattering of Anglo expats swarm the streets of Kuala Lumpur, the biggest city in the country: yes, there is a Muslim majority, but non-Muslims are not subject to sharia law. Malay Muslims coexist with Chinese Catholics, and Buddhist priests roam the Bukhit Bintang plaza, begging, amidst crowds shopping for the latest fashions and punk rockers with pink hair stroll fearlessly down the street.
You never saw such diversity. And that's just during the daytime. At night…"
A little bit later, he writes:
"I have to say that I am… astonished by Malaysia. Here is an "Islamic" country where a gigantic Christmas tree sits in the lobby of the hotel I'm staying at, and the café waiters in the plaza a few blocks away are dressed like Santa's elves. Here is a city where the nightlife puts San Francisco's to shame. Where the city's oldest gay bar, the Blue Boy, makes Baghdad-by-the-Bay seem like a dive in Podunk, Idaho; where people party well into the morning light, and you can have a good time for a few ringgits (the Malay currency: around 30 cents). The food is fabulous: Malay (spicy, somewhat Thai-like), Arab (there's a great place right off Bukhit Bintang), Chinese (you haven't lived until you've sampled the pleasures of Kuala Lumpur's Chinatown), and too many more to go into here. The place is a gastrointestinal paradise!
"Modernity is juxtaposed next to traditionalism: on the one hand you have the soaring heights of the Petronas Twin Towers, the tallest buildings in the world, lit up like a vision of futurity against the night sky, and on the other hand you have women in traditional dress – colorful costumes of bright color and the requisite head covering – traversing its corridors. Two, three, many worlds coexisting: the past and the future converging into a new synthesis of creativity and entrepreneurial energy. The impression one gets is of a tremendous vitality, a restless yet directed life-force that seems to spring right out of the earth."
Raimondo even discovers that Malaysia's former Prime Minister, Dr. Mahathir Muhammad, isn't the person he thought he would be:
"I had some concerns about former Prime Minister Mahathir, but then I read this Paul Krugman column and my fears were somewhat allayed. Upon meeting Dr. Mahathir, whatever reservations remained were put completely to rest: the man seems to emanate benevolence and great gentleness, almost an aura of serenity, like some sort of Buddhist guru."
And so, I have some hope for Raimondo, that perhaps when he writes about Islam in the future, that he will remember his Malaysian experience and realize that his preconceived notions are not necessarily true...
Unfortunately, I don't have the same hope for most Americans, many of whom wallow in their ignorance regarding Islam and the Muslim world. But for those of you who can afford the trip, I would suggest that you come here to visit Malaysia and Singapore to see not only how Islam is lived by we Muslims, but to see how our two cultures can live harmoniously together despite the ethnic diversity (which, IMO, is much more diverse than most Western cultures).
On a personal note, I'd like to say that I can attest to most of what Raimondo wrote about Malaysia and Dr. Mahathir, that what he's written is true (except for the part on the gay bar - I have no idea about that ;) ). Malaysia's a great country, and I've enjoyed every one of my visits there (the most recent of which was just last weekend, when Milady and I drove up to the city of Melaka, along with some of her family). I've been to KL several times (one of which was for Milady's and my honeymoon), and it's a great city. You're missing out if you don't visit us here in Southeast Asia.
Side note: While you're at it, be sure to read Eric Garris' story about his return to the United States after going to the Perdana Global Peace Forum.
November 10, 2005
The Puppet Master?
Two comments in Dan Froomkin's November 8th column in the Washington Post ("Bush's Tortured Logic") that caught my eye. The first was taken from Thomas M. DeFrank's article in the New York Daily News, "Dubya-Cheney Ties Frayed by Scandal":
"Multiple sources close to Bush told the Daily News that while the vice president remains his boss' valued political partner and counselor, his clout has lessened -- primarily as a result of issues arising from the Iraq war.
"'The relationship is not what it was,' a presidential counselor said. 'There has been some distance for some time.'"
No surprise there. I read about this almost two weeks ago in Justin Raimando column, "Earth to Bush: Ditch Cheney" (31 October 2005). But what was interesting was the second comment that Froomkin quoted, from James Carroll's article, Deconstructing Cheney," in the Boston Globe:
"When the World Trade Center towers were hit in New York, it was Cheney who told a shaken President Bush to flee. The true nature of their relationship (Cheney, not Bush, having shaped the national security team; Cheney, not Bush, having appointed himself as vice president) showed itself for a moment.
"The 9/11 Commission found that, from the White House situation room, Cheney warned the president that a 'specific threat' had targeted Air Force One, prompting Bush to spend the day hiding in the bunker at Offut Air Force Base in Nebraska. There was no specific threat. In Bush's absence, Cheney, implying an authorizing telephone call from the president, took command of the nation's response to the crisis. There was no authorizing telephone call. The 9/11 Commission declined to make an issue of Cheney's usurpation of powers, but the record shows it."
Which makes me wonder...is the President's recent slump in the polls due to this distancing between Bush and Cheney?
"Multiple sources close to Bush told the Daily News that while the vice president remains his boss' valued political partner and counselor, his clout has lessened -- primarily as a result of issues arising from the Iraq war.
"'The relationship is not what it was,' a presidential counselor said. 'There has been some distance for some time.'"
No surprise there. I read about this almost two weeks ago in Justin Raimando column, "Earth to Bush: Ditch Cheney" (31 October 2005). But what was interesting was the second comment that Froomkin quoted, from James Carroll's article, Deconstructing Cheney," in the Boston Globe:
"When the World Trade Center towers were hit in New York, it was Cheney who told a shaken President Bush to flee. The true nature of their relationship (Cheney, not Bush, having shaped the national security team; Cheney, not Bush, having appointed himself as vice president) showed itself for a moment.
"The 9/11 Commission found that, from the White House situation room, Cheney warned the president that a 'specific threat' had targeted Air Force One, prompting Bush to spend the day hiding in the bunker at Offut Air Force Base in Nebraska. There was no specific threat. In Bush's absence, Cheney, implying an authorizing telephone call from the president, took command of the nation's response to the crisis. There was no authorizing telephone call. The 9/11 Commission declined to make an issue of Cheney's usurpation of powers, but the record shows it."
Which makes me wonder...is the President's recent slump in the polls due to this distancing between Bush and Cheney?
October 13, 2005
Good reading
Here are a few links to blog entries and articles that I have found interesting recently...and maybe you will too. The first two are blog entries, the latter three are recent articles by Justin Raimando over at antiwar.com. Enjoy!
Thoughts on a visit to the Mosque
I have
AIPAC and Espionage: Guilty as Hell
Bush's Satanic Verses
Democracy: The God That Failed
Thoughts on a visit to the Mosque
I have
AIPAC and Espionage: Guilty as Hell
Bush's Satanic Verses
Democracy: The God That Failed
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