24 thoughts on “News/Politics 9-12-15

  1. Metaphorically dust could stand for humility. Presidents rarely have that, you need an ego to aspire to the highest confidence. Carter had/has humility. Trump? Clinton? Not so much.

    The left is finally back. Jeremy Corbyn is the new Labour leader. No more middle of road mushy New Labour. Meanwhile Sanders keeps catching up to Clinton. And in Canada the NDP is still ahead in the polls.

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  2. Maybe I need to rethink my non-belief in Karma…

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3231117/At-62-people-dead-crane-collapses-Grand-Mosque-Mecca.html

    “Saudi official has confirmed that the annual hajj to Mecca will go ahead, despite the horrific crane disaster that killed 107 people and wounded 238 in the city yesterday.

    The tragedy occurred when a crane crashed through the ceiling of the Grand Mosque of Mecca, the largest mosque in the world, amid high winds and thunderstorms on Friday afternoon. ”

    “The crane belongs to a German crane company operated by the Bin Laden family’s consortium, who are heading the expansion of the Holy Mosque.

    Saudi BinLaden Group was founded by Osama’s Bin Laden’s billionaire father Mohammed and the sprawling construction conglomerate runs a large amount of major building contracts in the Sunni kingdom.

    A massive £14billion project is currently underway to increase the area of the mosque by 4.3million sq ft – so that it can accommodate up to 2.2 million people at once.
    Pictures taken before the disaster show the crane being struck by a bolt of lightning and authorities are in little doubt extreme weather was to blame.”
    ————————

    And on 9-11 no less…..

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  3. Most of us will never forget 9-11. But there are some who already have…

    http://www.ijreview.com/2015/09/418464-americans-swore-they-would-never-forget-9-11-but-college-students-asked-why-it-happened-have-no-idea/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=Social&utm_content=floating-sidebar&utm_campaign=Sharing

    “When college students at George Mason University are asked by the Young America’s Foundation what caused 9-11, several give baffling or just plain wrong answers about the largest terrorist attack in U.S. history. This is an inexcusable failure of the U.S.’ education system and the major news media.”

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  4. And it’s not the fault of the students too young to remember it. It’s the fault of our revisionist education system.

    http://nypost.com/2015/09/06/revisionist-history-of-911-being-taught-to-our-college-students/

    “Not all of us will be mourning 9/11 victims and their families this Friday on the 14th anniversary of the attacks. Hundreds of college kids across the country will instead be taught to sympathize with the terrorists.

    That’s because their America-hating leftist professors are systematically indoctrinating them into believing it’s all our fault, that the US deserved punishment for “imperialism” — and the kids are too young to remember or understand what really happened that horrific day.

    Case in point is a freshman-level English class taught at several major universities across the country called “The Literature of 9/11” — which focuses almost entirely on writings from the perspective of the Islamic terrorists, rather than the nearly 3,000 Americans who were slaughtered by them.”

    “Even highly ranked University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has adopted the curriculum. The 9/11 seminar is taught by UNC associate English professor Neel Ahuja, who specializes in “post-colonial studies.”

    In Ahuja’s twisted worldview, al Qaeda terrorists are the real victims. “Abu Zubaydah’s torture may be interpreted as simply one more example of the necropower of US imperialism, the power to coerce and kill targeted populations,” Ahuja recently wrote in an academic paper criticizing the war on terror.

    He says America’s depiction of the 9/11 terrorists as “monsters” is merely an attempt to “animalize” them as insects and justify “squashing” them in “a fantasy of justice.”

    This colonialist “construct” of an “animalized enemy,” he added, “dovetails with the work of mourning the nation after 9/11 (which in the logic of security must be made perpetual, melancholic).” To him, it’s all cynically designed to justify more “imperial violence” against “Muslim, Arab and South Asian men.”

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  5. And one more….

    http://nypost.com/2015/09/11/america-is-being-bullied-into-sympathizing-with-911-attackers/

    “We gather together on this solemn anniversary in a spirit of mourning and peace.
    But this is also a time of unspeakable shame. As we remember the nearly 3,000 souls who were butchered on American soil 14 years ago by Islamic terrorists bearing not a speck of decency or humanity, we must also remember what we have lost. And it is great.

    In the days and weeks following Sept. 11, 2001, we were a nation united in agony. We bore a common resolve to defeat the forces of evil that hit us, and hit us hard. “Never again!’’ we cried in unison. I remember walking down a New York City street, debris still swirling in the air from the destroyed World Trade Center, and seeing women and even men hugging heroic cops, firefighters and other first responders.

    Now, one is just as likely to see a man or woman in uniform spit upon or cursed at by the very people whose lives they protect every day.

    We have transformed into a fractured society, paralyzed by leftist propaganda and lock-step political correctness. Many Americans, from those studying on university campuses to a baseball analyst for ESPN, are being bullied into submission or brainwashed into believing that our enemies are nothing more than misunderstood souls, justified in mass slaughter because of this nation’s imperialist policies.

    And this disgraceful display makes me sick.”

    Ditto.

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  6. The question is somewhat ambiguous — “why did it happen?” This is/will be a matter of historical debate. Similarly if you asked someone why did WWI happen in 1928, I would expect a similar wide range of responses — i.e. interventionist policies, economics, religion, nationalism, alliances, etc. The kids gave 15 second answers to what is a complex question currently debated by historians and political scientist.

    Although I’m happy no one said it was an inside job.

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  7. Im an old school humanist — freshman should be forced to read the classics to modern in chronological order, in order to understand the progression of thought, the common themes, the change of style, etc. Once one has a historical understanding of the background of any subject, than only should one delve into more modern controverisal topics — i.e. 3rd and 4th seminars.

    The iraq invasion was the polarizing event. the US should have remained focused on Aghanistan and typical police work in eliminating terrorist groups

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  8. I agree with you, HRW, that asking people with a limited knowledge base to have a cogent answer is silly.

    Years ago, I sat on a controversial books committee for a school district. The committee, made up of folks across the community spectrum, was tasked with reading and evaluating any new books or curriculum brought into the district. It was fascinating and I took my role seriously.

    Of the 30 members, I apparently was the only person who read everything all the way through–which made for some interesting discussions.

    One high school history teacher wanted to teach a world history class from the point of view of the disenfranchised (losers). A fascinating idea. I jumped in and read every book in his curriculum.

    But you know what? Even I, a well read, college graduate who had traveled the world and read the newspapers, couldn’t make sense of the class well enough to evaluate it’s effectiveness. I didn’t know enough about the simple history of the Philippines, South Africa, India and somewhere else that escapes me now.

    Reading the memoirs and books by the disenfranchised did me know good because I didn’t know the basic history with which to put them into context. The teacher, himself, withdrew the course. We never voted. But I gained some insight into the world.

    Translate that into kids today. What’s their takeaway from 14 years ago?

    Firemen are heroes (my word, they were that day,), ex ray machines at airports, fighting and brokenness. They’ve learned a lot more about Islam and perhaps seen that history is messy and never crystal clear.

    It’s a difficult world. Without context, it’s impossible to have any insight. 😦

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  9. Hwesseli, like your first paragraph. And younger kids need to study the classics, mainly because they were written with good grammar, So much of modern youth literature is written in first person, current vernacular. I learned more grammar from Charles Dickens than I did from any of my teachers. I realize that the grammar in this post is probably not perfect but it would be much worse if I had grown up reading “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” or “Captain Underpants”.

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  10. I agree that the invasion of Iraq was a mistake. But for a different reason.
    Sadam was a dictator. Not a good man, but he kept the Islamist inline. We got rid of Sadam and Khadafy and we got chaos.
    Democracy doesn’t work with Islam.

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  11. Captain Underpants? Wow.

    Chas, maybe that was the lesson we had to learn — that democracy (for now) can’t be transplanted in some places around the world. Painful but I think now we know and accept at least that much.

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  12. AJ – Are you saying that 62 Muslims being killed in an accident in a mosque on 9/11 is “karma” (not that either of us believe in karma)? Or did I misunderstand your point?

    If a bunch of terrorists were killed, I might agree. But not for a group of ordinary Muslims. (I’m guessing that’s who they were.)

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  13. About the Mosque accident. I would never want to be like the liberal commenters on Huffington Post who like to go on and gloat whenever a natural disaster hits a red state. They never think that the reddest state is only about about 60 percent republican and that a large percent are too young or choose not to vote or that red states often have large minority populations and that the victim they are rejoicing over could very well be one of their own.

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  14. Karen,

    Karma is nonsense,

    But there is a certain irony to a towering crane, owned by Bin Ladens, falling and killing several people, after being hit by lightning, on 9-11.

    I wan’t speaking at all about the victims, or implying that they deserved it. Just simply pointing out that this is the sort of thing that people will say is Karma, nothing more. But thanks for assuming the worst. 🙂

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  15. Wondering about all the security that will be needed for Tuesday’s Trump appearance on the Iowa … Dogs, metal detectors? This is going to be complicated

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