Mark Steyn and a Tale of Two Asinine Videos

As usual, Steyn says it much better than I could.

Jon Stewart Vs. the Benghazi Debacle

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

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Quote of the Day: On Benghazi

I'd already posted this, but you might also want to look at this smackdown by Kirsten Powers.  The quote of the day is related, and here it is:

... why is the Administration admitting that this is terrorism treated as some sort of endgame? Congratulations, you admitted the obvious. Now, what the hell are you going to do about it?

That's My Story and I'm Sticking To It ... Until I Can't Anymore

The WaPo has a detailed timeline of the Obama Administration's statements of the Libya embassy attack.  Read the whole thing.  Here is the remark that kicks off the timeline:

In any kind of confused overseas event, initial reports are often wrong. But the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya, in which four Americans were killed, including the ambassador, is a case study of how an administration can carefully keep the focus as long as possible on one storyline — and then turn on a dime when it is no longer tenable.

UPDATE: There's this too.  And this.  OK, I can't help myself.

 

Satire Alert: "Imagine There's No YouTube"

I hate "Imagine," but the delightful Remy is so good that just this once I don't mind, and as usual he makes a point with humor.  Lyrics here.

 

Quote of the Day: Culture Wars in the Middle East

From an op-ed with a Pakistani background:

Salman Rushdie’s book — Satanic Verses — sparked global outrage in the late 1908s and since then, we have increasing polarisation between those who view freedom of expression as an absolute value, and extremists within Muslims who think violence is the only way to ‘save’ Islam from such attacks. Millions of Muslims are trapped between the two ends of this hate-spectrum. Despite the offence caused by such provocation, they will not resort to violence or support wanton destruction of life and property. But are these voices represented and articulated through credible leadership? The answer is no because the hold of clerics and merchants of political Islam is gaining more and more traction across the globe.

Mark Steyn on the Mob and the First Amendment

Worth a look, as Steyn always is.

Quote of the Day: Jonah Goldberg on the First Amendment

Goldberg declares that some things are non-negotiable, though you wouldn't know it to look at our so-called governing "elite" these days:

There’s nothing wrong with exercising sound judgment, even caution, when it comes to offending another’s most cherished beliefs. But the First Amendment isn’t the problem here, the dysfunctions and inadequacies of the Arab and Muslim world are. 

James Burnham famously said that when there is no alternative there is no problem. If free speech in America causes a comparative handful of zealots to want to murder Americans, the correct response is to protect Americans from those zealots (something the Obama administration abjectly failed to do in Libya) and relentlessly seek the punishment of anyone who succeeds. Because, as far as America is concerned, there is no alternative to the First Amendment.

Krauthammer on the Collapse of Obama's Foreign Policy

It ain't pretty, people.  In the end, the worst of it may be this:

"It’s as axiomatic in statecraft as in physics: Nature abhors a vacuum. Islamists rush in to fill the space and declare their ascendancy. America’s friends are bereft, confused, paralyzed."

Well, DUH!  What did you think was going to happen?  It's not only the disarray of American influence under a leadership that is seemingly made of as much mendacity as naivete and incompetence and wishful defiance of reality.  (Some of the policy decisions and whatnot seem as if they sprang straight from a particularly silly chapter of high school Model UN.)  It's not only the willful sidelining of Israel in the face of Iran's nuclear ambition.  It's the seemingly blithe abandonment of the most vulnerable of all, the liberals and reformers in those wretched countries that are burning up the news outlets right now. We've proven ourselves craven to our enemies, treacherous to our natural friends, and squishy to the core.  It's all as dishonorable as it is immoral and self-destructive, and it is going to cost even more lives than it has already.  

Political Cartoon: On Selective Outrage

We Humbly Apologize For Your Bad Behavior

We're running apology ads in Pakistan now?  The stupid "Innocence of Muslims" video inspired a mob freak-out, and I'm pretty sure this Obama-Hillary Clinton video is going to make everything OK ... not!  Get ready for more hate, this time spiked with contempt.  The haters will go on hating, because at the end of the day, their problem isn't with a video.  The video's just a catalyst for a far bigger problem.  

You know, I'm reminded of John Wayne as Captain Nathan Brittles in She Wore a Yellow Ribbon:  "Never apologize.  It's a sign of weakness."

Quote of the Day: The Libya Narrative

It was a spontaneous reaction to a crappy video!  It was a planned terrorist attack!  It was both!  Neither!  Something ... SQUIRREL!  

What's the deal with the White House's wonky take on the Libya embassy debacle?  PERFECT ASSESSMENT:

“I think this is a case of an administration saying what they wished to be true before waiting for all the facts to come in.”

Meanwhile, here's other news about the increasing scale of people getting it wrong on all fronts.  What we were just saying about living in utter defiance of reality?  Well, reality will eventually bite you in the (insert body part of choice).

Free Speech and the Terrorists' Veto

Michael Totten comments.

Rant: I Hate Everything About "The Innocence Of Muslims" Except Its Right To Exist

Take a look at this passionate rant from one of the movie sites that I sometimes visit.  Language warning.  Oh, then contrast with this opposing take by the Los Angeles Times, the ending of which has the most clueless paragraph I've read in a while.

Sign of the Apocalypse: Tom Friedman and I Actually Agree on Something

As for Friedman, even a stopped clock is right twice a day, so this must be one of those times?  He tells the violent embassy-storming mobs to take a long hard look in the mirror.

Beijing: Protesters Mob US Ambassador's Car

Has everybody in the world been eating crazy flakes for breakfast lately?  Or perhaps these fine upstanding folks didn't want to get left out of embassy-storming and ambassador-assaulting, the hottest international fad in foreign policy commentary and cultural dialogue right now!  Don't miss out!

The car of the U.S. ambassador to China was surrounded Tuesday by a small group of demonstrators who damaged the vehicle and briefly prevented it from entering the U.S. Embassy compound in Beijing. 

A YouTube video of the incident showed the protesters chanting slogans such as "down with the U.S. imperialists" and, in an apparent reference to the Chinese government's purchase of U.S. government debt, "return the money!" 

...The U.S. Embassy is located near the Japanese Embassy, which in recent days has been targeted by thousands of Chinese protesters voicing complaints over Tokyo's move to purchase islands in the East China Sea that are also claimed by China.  

In an apparent reference to that dispute and the United States' security treaty with Japan, some of the demonstrators Tuesday chanted: "The U.S. government is the mastermind." 

Well, as for that final quote, I see fevered nutball conspiracy theorists are cavorting out in Beijing too.  It's not a proper ambassadorial assault unless you bring the nutball conspiracy theories about how everything ever that annoyed you is the result of the actions of an evil mustache-twirling mastermind.  You are also free to say mean things about our mommies and burn flags, but you do that last bit at your own risk.

Quote of the Day: Lileks on Culture

James Lileks, always worth your time, has a firecracker of an essay.  Read the whole thing, of course.  Here is a blurb:

Forgive me if I note that one culture has a debate about allowing gays to marry, and another that seems to have concluded a debate about whether they should live. 

Yeah, and somehow we're the bad guys if you listen to too many pundits and opinion makers.

Living in Utter Defiance of Reality

I was going to write a full-blown post about this administration's foreign policy and public relations follies, but  the thought occurs to me that everything I want to say can be summed up in the blog post title.  

When Hillary Clinton insists that Benghazi residents took the late ambassador to the hospital as if performing a good deed instead of dragging his corpse in the street while snapping photos, when Susan Rice insists that the riots were spontaneous when the Libyan president says otherwise, when Jay Carney insists that the riots weren't about America but only one asinine video when even a cursory look at history would prove him wrong, when the president would rather go to Vegas and hang out with Beyonce and Jay-Z than go to security briefings and meet with Netanyahu, when the First Amendment seems to evaporate at a convenient moment, when the prospect of a nuclear Iran doesn't make you do anything other than pay lip service, and when Mitt Romney seems to be a bigger problem than the fact that abroad you have alienated your allies and inflamed your enemies while at home you have presided over 40+ months of 8% unemployment and $16 trillion national debt and unsustainable entitlements ... Well, you just might be living in utter defiance of reality.  It's not just denial.  It's the active, willful defiance of it.

(And, no, it's not raaaaaaaaaaaaacist to say so.)

Old Glory and Karma?

Or you call this poetic justice?

Reminder: The Long History of Muslim Anti-Western Protests

Surprise!  They didn't begin with George W. Bush, and they certainly won't end with Barack Obama.  On another day, maybe we'll talk about Napoleon's 1798 campaign in Egypt, a campaign that might count as the beginning of the modern period in the Middle East, along with Western impact thereon.

UPDATE: Thanks for the link, Dignified Rant!