[Mb-civic] FW: The pattern began in 1979 ...

[Golsorkhi]

------ Forwarded Message
From: Samii Shahla <shahla at thesamiis.com>
Date: Sat, 8 Apr 2006 02:48:26 -0400
Subject: The pattern began in 1979 ...



Begin forwarded message:

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>  http://www.annaqed.com/english/under/all_for_one.html
> <http://www.annaqed.com/english/under/all_for_one.html>
> Annaqed 
> "The Critic"  
>  <http://www.annaqed.com/english/cartoons/table.html> All For One
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> www.annaqed.com <http://www.annaqed.com>

By Amit Ghate
April 4, 2006
In reacting to the Islamists¹ ongoing cartoon Jihad, most commentators have
focused on the issue of free speech. This is natural, and necessary, since
eradication of free speech is the most immediate risk; and certainly without
free speech there can be no defending other values. Nevertheless it is also
vital to take a step back and to view the events as part of a larger
pattern, a pattern which poses a grave threat to our core Western values and
system of government ­- and to their primary consequence and beneficiary:
the free individual.

To see why, and to appreciate what we stand to lose, we must begin by
understanding what is meant by ³Western². Let us be clear that ³Western²
refers to a set of ideas -- it is not a racial or ethnic epithet. Anyone can
embrace the ideas, just as anyone can reject them, regardless of his race,
country of birth, or upbringing. Thus we can speak of Japan and Hong Kong
having adopted ³Western² principles as accurately as we can speak of Canada
having done so.

In the broadest and most essentialized sense, the term ³Western² denotes a
set of fundamental ideas first discovered and adopted by the ancient Greeks.
It was they who, for the first time in history, challenged the age-old
notion that only the life of a society¹s rulers and/or priests was important
-- to instead assert that every man¹s life is of crucial value. It was they
who turned their focus from an obsession with death and the after-life -- to
instead seek success and joy in this life. It was they who dispensed with
all-encompassing superstition and from cowering before the supernatural ­-
to instead assert that the world was knowable, that no question was
off-limits, and that the questioning mind was among the most revered of
attributes. Finally, and as a consequence of all the others, it was they who
cast away the resignation of living as unhappy subjects in an unknowable
world -- to instead realize that with freedom to live, happiness on earth
was possible for every man.

These groundbreaking ideas led to an unheralded flourishing of man and an
outpouring of man¹s achievements, both spiritual and material. Few, if any,
periods in history can rival the developments and accomplishments made by
the ancient Greeks in arts, science, mathematics, humanities, medicine,
athletics and general living conditions. And it is for this reason that
³Western² ideas and values are rightfully described as life-affirming: for
they lead to man¹s freedom to pursue success and happiness in this life.

Historically, the transmission and implementation of Western ideas, the
so-called Western tradition, was rocky and uneven at best, and its biggest
opponent was always authority and dogmatic faith. In fact, during the Dark
Ages, Western tradition was nearly extinguished by Christianity, whose
irrational doctrines rejected the importance of the individual¹s happiness
on earth and of the existence of a knowable world; to instead preach abject
self-denial in this world and salvation in a mystical after-life. Not until
men reacquainted themselves with ancient Greek ideas did they find
themselves back on the ³Western² track; and only then did they turn away
from blind faith, question and reject the Church and its authority, and
eventually produce the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and modern Western
society.

Concomitant with the emergence and development of Western ideas came man¹s
political desire to form societies which would allow him to achieve the
promise of these ideas: individual joy and happiness on earth. Defining and
building such societies was an arduous task, one much more difficult than it
might seem in hindsight, but by fits and starts, Westerners rose to the
challenge.

Indeed the solution lay in the uniquely Western focus on the value and
importance of every individual¹s life. For with the gradual elucidation of a
theory of rights (i.e. an understanding that every man has natural and
inalienable rights) came a political system whose specific function was to
protect those rights. In this type of system, each individual delegates his
use of retaliatory force to the government, and the government wields that
force in the protection of each individual¹s rights and freedom. Protection
is understood to be protection from other men¹s violence, i.e. the
protection of each individual citizen from attacks from abroad and from
criminals and tyrants at home. This political development ultimately led to
the founding of the United States, the writing of its Constitution, and the
subsequent understanding that protection of individuals must be applied
universally, i.e. it must extend to all races and genders. In the past
hundred years or so, the purpose of government has been construed to range
well beyond the protection of rights (improperly in my opinion), but
nonetheless protection of individuals and their rights is still the basic
and unifying principle of Western government.

The unique relationship existing between each man and his government cannot
be overemphasized: in the West, and only in the West, government exists for
the sake of each individual, not vice versa. As Lincoln put it so famously:
ours is a ³government of the people, by the people, for the people².

Yet though government exists for the sake of each man, its proper
implementation involves having each individual delegate his use of
retaliatory force to the government, which then acts as his agent to protect
his rights. Thus in civilized nations, the government is the sole legitimate
wielder of force, and its central charge -- and solemn obligation -- is to
wield that force when (and only when) necessary to protect its citizens in
the exercise of their legal rights.

The benefits of this system are manifold. There is strength in numbers, and
by assigning the use of force to the government, we can effectively defend
ourselves from attacks by foreign nations, something which would be much
less practical for individuals to attempt on their own, or on an ad-hoc
basis.

Justice too is made possible when the use of force is put in objective
hands, for in doing so, standard procedures and processes (the legal system)
can be developed to ensure that violations of rights are punished by a
rational and proportional standard. This again would not be possible if
every individual tried to mete out justice on his own.

Finally, because each individual knows that his government has the means and
responsibility to defend him, he does not have to seek out other forms of
protection. Specifically, he does not need to join a gang or tribe whose
members will help him battle others. In civilized society there is no need
to ally oneself with members of one¹s race or ethnicity (as do the Tutsi¹s
and Hutus in Rwanda; or the Serbs, Croats and Albanians in the Balkans), or
of one¹s religious sect (as do Sunni¹s, Shiites, Jews and Christians
throughout most of the Middle East), or with criminals (as do those seeking
the ³protection² of a mafia Don) or with the politically-connected and
politically-favored (as does almost everyone in the Third World). In a word,
because the individual is sovereign and consistently protected by his
government, there is no gang warfare of the type so prevalent around the
rest of the world.

The result is modern Western society; a society whose overwhelming
advantages include: freedom for each individual to live, think, question and
speak as he sees fit; respect for the law and the rights of others;
individual safety and empowerment; and a benevolent atmosphere of
cooperation and peace among men.

But along with all the advantages of an individual-based society comes one
inherent risk. In delegating his use of force, and forsaking adherence to
any gang or tribe, each individual is disarmed and essentially helpless
should his government fail to act on his behalf.

It would therefore be of the highest treason for a government to abandon any
law-abiding citizen who comes under attack. In fact failing to protect an
individual would be beyond treason: it would essentially reverse and betray
2,500 years of Western development. It would be tantamount to taking the
individual, whose life and happiness is for the first time important,
stripping him of all his defenses, and then offering him up to any mindless
brute or savage to skin alive as he pleased.

And yet, in the past few decades, this is exactly what Western governments
have done repeatedly. If it is not stopped soon, Western, i.e. civil and
peaceful, society will break down -­ and we will return to the primitive
state of gang rule and utter contempt for the individual which currently
exists in the entire non-Westernized world.

To understand the pattern of failures, and to see how it must be broken, it
is important to survey the relevant historical events of the past 25 years
or so. For though the faltering of Western governments could be decried
since the end of World War II, and even more so with the events in Korea and
Vietnam, a watershed of sorts began with our response to the rise of
fundamentalist Islamic nations and their self-proclaimed hatred and
hostility towards the West and all things Western.

The pattern began in 1979 when the newly empowered supreme leader of Iran,
Ayatollah Khomeini, took power. Khomeini was an Islamic ideologue, who on
every main point opposed and declaimed the views of the ancient Greeks and
of the West. Man is not the measure of things; only Allah is. Man¹s
happiness on earth is unimportant; only the after-life matters. Man is not
to be successful at living; martyrdom is the surest way to happiness.
Knowledge is not achieved by studying a knowable reality; prostrate yourself
to Allah instead and you will learn all there is to know. And since there is
no knowledge other than that revealed by Allah; if anyone disagrees with us
-­ kill him.

The political organization he implemented, that of a theocratic Islamic
Republic, flowed logically from his ideas and values. In this type of
government, the supreme religious leader and his clerics hold absolute
power. Individuals are of no value and have no inalienable rights, with the
result that all Islamic states are also brutal dictatorships.

It is worth emphasizing that Khomeini¹s ideas and philosophy were those of a
revered and highly knowledgeable exponent of Islamic doctrine, one who
represented the basic views of his countrymen. In other words, he was no
³hijacker² of Islam, but a consistent practitioner of it -- and Iran¹s
actions from his time onward must therefore be interpreted as true
expressions of Islamic policy.

So what happened when he took power? In the first days of his rule, on Nov.
4, 1979, Khomeini¹s religious followers stormed the US embassy in Tehran and
captured 66 Americans. Most of the hostages were held for 444 days, during
which time many were beaten, psychologically tortured, and subjected to
extended periods of solitary confinement.

Now remember that these were American citizens, working directly for, or
with, the American government, captured in an embassy (which is technically
American soil and to which International Law has provided the highest form
of immunity going as far back as the Congress of Vienna in 1814). Breaking
such immunity has always been an act of war. So did our government declare
war to protect its citizens, who not only were acting lawfully, but who were
in fact put in harm¹s way at the request of their government? No. Instead
our government, under the pacifist Jimmy Carter, wrung its hands and
negotiated with a regime which had just broken the most basic law of
diplomacy. (Two half-hearted, under-manned and under-planned rescue attempts
were made, but the fiascos only underscored how unwilling the government was
to use its military force to remedy the problem).

This event signaled to all observers, that though the West still had
abundant physical means to defend its citizens, it had lost its will to do
so. In fact, not only would it not defend its citizens, it would even act
against them, as did the US State Department when, after the eventual
release of the hostages, it quashed their attempt to seek redress in
international courts, simply to avoid ³stirring up² trouble with foreign
nations!

The absence of any military response and the complete abdication of the
government¹s responsibility to its citizens was the first sign to the
Islamic world that it could act with impunity against any Western citizen --
and act it did. A series of attacks throughout the Middle East followed.

As a sampling, and not including incessant Islamic attacks on Israel and
Israelis, which are just too numerous to list, consider: 1982, various dates
­30 Westerners taken hostage in Lebanon by Iranian-sponsored terrorist group
Hezbollah, some killed, some died in captivity, some released (Terry
Anderson held for 2454 days). April 18,1983 -- US embassy in Beirut bombed,
63 dead. Oct 23, 1983 -- 241 Marines and 58 French Paratroopers killed in
their barracks in Beirut. Dec 12, 1983 -- Shiites attack US embassy in
Kuwait City, 5 killed, 80 injured. Sept 20, 1984 -- truck bomb outside US
embassy annex in Beirut kills 24. June 14, 1985 -- Hezbollah hijacks plane
en route from Athens to Rome, beats and kills American Navy Diver Robert
Stethem. October 7, 1985 -- Syrian and Libyan-backed Palestinian Liberation
Front hijacks ocean liner Achille Lauro, kills one wheelchair-bound
American. December 18th, 1985 -- Rome and Vienna, Libyan-backed terrorists
bomb airports, 20 killed. April 2, 1986 -- Palestinian group detonates bomb
on TWA flight 840 en route to Athens killing 4. April 5, 1986 ­- Libyan
terrorists bomb disco in West Berlin killing 3 and injuring 230.

In its only true retaliatory attack against state sponsors of terrorism, on
April 14, 1986, the US (under President Reagan) launches air strikes against
5 targets in Libya. Predictably, the poster child of Western appeasement,
France, condemns the US¹ defense of its rights. And though the retaliatory
strikes were immediately followed by two significant airline bombings, one
against French UTA flight 772 in which 170 people were killed, and one
against Pan Am flight 103 in which 270 people were killed (over Lockerbie
Scotland), the action was generally successful in decreasing Libyan
sponsorship of terrorism. In fact, since 1988 Libya has scarcely been heard
from, and in 2002 it actually admitted responsibility for the Lockerbie
bombing -- and offered $2.7 billion in reparations to the victims¹ families.

Seeing the bombing of Libya as an exception to the rule, and correctly
realizing that France¹s attitude truly represented that of the West and of
Western intellectuals, the Islamists decided to test whether they could
directly control the lives and minds of Westerners, overtly attacking that
most important aspect of Western life, the freedom to speak one¹s mind.

The attack adopted the age-old military strategy of ³divide and conquer²: in
this case it consisted in isolating defenseless individuals (who in an
effort to create a peaceful society had delegated their right and means of
self-defense to their governments), and threatening them should they dare to
disobey Islamic rule. And because Western governments and intellectuals were
by now so craven and depraved -- the strategy actually worked.

The test case, of course, was the Rushdie affair. This was, until recently,
the most famous example of Western governments failing to protect their
law-abiding citizens. In 1988, British citizen Salman Rushdie wrote a book
titled The Satanic Verses which contained what Islamists deemed an
irreverent depiction of the prophet Mohammed. By Western standards the
critical depiction was mild, but more importantly, the book was a simple
expression of the freedom of speech which exists, and is protected by
statute, in every Western nation.

The book was banned in many Muslim countries and book burnings were staged
in some countries including England itself. But the true attack on Western
citizens began on February 14, 1989, when the leader of Iran, Ayatollah
Khomeini, issued a fatwa calling for the murder of the author and worldwide
publishers of The Satanic Verses, with a $3 million dollar bounty tacked
onto Rushdie¹s head for good measure.

This state-issued death sentence against Western citizens should have been
seen for what it was, a declaration of war, and every Western country should
have demanded that Iran immediately retract and rescind the fatwa. Had they
refused, Western governments should then have marshaled forces to protect
their disarmed citizens by attacking and destroying the Iranian nation which
was overtly threatening them.

Instead what happened? Apart from some feigned outrage, Western governments
did nothing but engage in ³diplomacy² and then proclaim that we must
³tolerate² differences of opinion and respect the ³feelings² of those who
would murder us. And the result? Rushdie went into prolonged hiding, a
Japanese translator was stabbed and killed in Tokyo, an Italian translator
was beaten and stabbed in Milan, a Norwegian publisher was shot and severely
wounded, 37 people were incinerated in Turkey as executioners burned down
the hotel of a translator, and publishing houses and bookstores in the US
were firebombed to destruction. Those were just the direct results.
Indirectly, westerners learned that freedom of speech only applied if it
were directed against lawful, peaceful targets. There would be no protection
for discourse about Islam or any doctrine whose adherents backed it up with
violence. Moreover, it set the precedent of foreign nations placing bounties
on the heads of Western citizens with impunity, which would encourage
similar behavior by every ardent fundamentalist given that the tactic had
proven effective and without any risk to the issuer.

In some respects the Rushdie affair was worse than the embassy hostage
taking. For example, in the hostage crisis, though the hostage-takers were
sympathizers of the Khomeini regime, and though the regime publicly
acknowledged support for the hostage-takers, an argument, however
implausible, could have been made that the hostage-takers were not direct
agents of the Iranian government. In the Rushdie case, however, not even
that thin veneer of an argument existed, since it was the commander in chief
and supreme theocrat (which are one and the same in Islamic states) who
issued the fatwa himself. Thus there was absolutely no question that the
call to kill Western citizens came directly from the Iranian government, and
that it was therefore an act of war.

The cowardice of the West, and its non-reaction to overt acts of war,
encouraged further Islamic attacks, including in America itself. On Feb 6,
1993, 6 people were killed and 1040 injured when Islamists detonated 1,500
lbs of explosives in the basement of the World Trade Center in New York. On
Nov 13, 1995, a car bomb in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia killed 5 at US military
headquarters. On June 25, 1996, a truck bomb in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia killed
19 and injured 502 at an American military housing complex.

On Aug 7, 1998, simultaneous explosions at US embassies in Nairobi, Kenya
and Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania killed 224 and wounded 4,500. The attacks,
perpetrated by Bin Laden¹s Al Qaeda network, prompted President Clinton to
lob a few token cruise missiles at a factory in Sudan and at a couple of
physical Al Qaeda training facilities in Afghanistan. He followed this limp
response with an unnecessarily appeasing gesture, one which would become
standard White House protocol, assuring all who would listen that Islam was
not the target: ³I want the world to understand that our actions today were
not aimed against Islam, the faith of hundreds of millions of good,
peace-loving people all around the world (but) at the fanatics and killers
whoŠprofane the great religion in whose name they claim to act.²

Realizing that we could not even name the ideology motivating the
perpetrators, supporters, state sponsors, and funders of terrorist acts, let
alone challenge them intellectually or existentially ­ Islamists continued
their attacks.

On Oct 12, 2000, 17 sailors were killed when Al-Qaeda bombed the US Navy
destroyer the USS Cole in Aden, Yemen. On Sep 11, 2001, in an attack worse
than the one on Pearl Harbor, Al-Qaeda crashed two airliners into the twin
towers of the World Trade Center, one into the Pentagon and one into a field
in Pennsylvania, killing a total of 2,986 people and injuring another 6,350.

Though outrage reigned and most average citizens saw the attacks for what
they were -- an expression of Islamist global jihad ­ the intellectual
climate of appeasement, i.e. our fear of ³fostering² further dissension and
unrest, of riling the so-called ³Arab Street², prevented us from naming the
anti-Western ideology underlying the attacks. Our own President even went
out of his way to assure us that, contrary to all evidence, ³The face of
terror is not the true faith of Islam. That¹s not what Islam is all about.
Islam is peace² (³As long as you submit mindlessly to its every edict and
spokesman² he conveniently forgot to add.)

When the US made a military response, it did so by fighting a
³compassionate² war in Afghanistan, one which involved dropping food
interspersed with bombs, and which featured ³respecting Islamic
sensitivities² such as sparing holy sites and taking Islamic holidays into
consideration as part of its military planning.

This ³compassionate² fighting was extended to the war on (relatively)
secular Iraq, which was fought to eliminate weapons of mass destruction and
to bring freedom to the Iraqi¹s, not to destroy the militant Islamists who
threaten us. And though removing a madman hostile to the US is justifiable,
never did we declare ³This war is being fought to defend Americans from
attack. Threaten a hair on the head of a single law-abiding American -- and
this is the consequence.² Of course, if defending Americans were our true
goal, the war would have been waged against Iran not Iraq.

Once again our inability to name and confront our enemy, coupled with our
unwillingness to fight an all-out war, were taken as signs of weakness by
the Islamists, and encouraged insurgency and Islamic posturing as a result.

(As an aside, it should be noted that the one good thing to come out of
these wars is to see the superlative devotion, bravery and effectiveness of
our military forces, even when they are constrained to fighting with a
proverbial ³hand tied behind their backs². Not enough has been said about
their willingness and ability to defend their countries and values; and
should we ever truly find the will to defend ourselves, their skills and
courage will all but assure our victory.)

Given that the compassionate wars were taken as a sign of weakness, not of
strength, Islamists continued their attacks on Western soil. On the morning
of March 11, 2004, in the worst terrorist attack in Spanish history, Islamic
terrorists detonated bombs aboard four commuter trains during rush hour in
Madrid, killing 192 and injuring another 2,050. The bombing came two days
before a national election. The ruling party (Partido Popular), which was
committed to keeping Spanish troops in Iraq, was leading the polls, however,
after the bombing, the opposing party (Partido Socialista) won in an upset,
and quickly withdrew Spanish troops from Iraq (signaling to Islamists that
their barbaric acts could be used to influence Western governments).

The next test of Western governments¹ willingness to defend their citizens
came with the production of the 10 minute film ³Submission². The film, which
was written by Islamic dissident Ms. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, and directed by Dutch
social critic Theo Van Gogh, portrays the plight of women under Islam,
including being beaten and raped as proscribed by the Koran for women who
³misbehave². Islamic death threats against Van Gogh and Ali followed the
film¹s release, and on Nov 2, 2004, Van Gogh was murdered in broad daylight
on a Dutch street. The killer was an unrepentant Muslim, Mohammed Bouyeri,
who claimed to be ³carrying out Allah¹s will². The murder was a ³show
killing² aimed not just at silencing Van Gogh, but at silencing all critics
of Islam. After shooting Van Gogh eight times, Bouyeri proceeded to slit his
throat and then skewer him with two daggers to which he attached Jihadist
manifestos and death threats against Ms. Ali. And although the evidence
showed connections with the Egyptian terrorist group, Takfir wal-Hijra, no
attempts were made by the Dutch to root them out of Egypt (with or without
Egyptian help). Ms Ali, brave as she is, is no longer in hiding, but her
life is clearly at risk, and she must be accompanied by bodyguards 24 hours
a day.

The killing and lack of any retribution had its intended chilling effect on
the Dutch, many of whom now openly admit to being deathly afraid of publicly
criticizing Islam.

The general state of fear was reinforced when, on July 7, 2005, Islamic
suicide bombers killed 56 and injured 700 in a series of coordinated attacks
on London¹s subways and a double-decker bus. A similar attack on July 21
failed when four bombs malfunctioned (only the detonators went off).

The fear of Islamic attacks was now so prevalent in Europe that when Danish
writer Kare Bluitgen tried to find illustrators for his biography of the
prophet Muhammad, all potential candidates declined citing fear of violent
retribution by Islamists -- noting not only the murder of Van Gogh, but also
attacks on lecturers at the University of Copenhagen (who had been beaten
simply for reading the Koran to non-believers).

Editors at the Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, decided to investigate
just how widespread the impact of Islamic intimidation had become, and to do
so, they invited forty cartoonists to give their interpretation of how
Muhammad may have looked. Twelve responded with cartoons of varying degrees
of irreverence (though all mild by any standard, they are especially so when
contrasted to those in Islamic countries where Jews and others are routinely
caricatured in much more grotesque and inflammatory cartoons). But this,
again, is irrelevant, as the cartoons were legal expressions of free speech,
made by law-abiding citizens, and should have been subject to every possible
protection which a government can muster.

The first reaction to the cartoons was sad but predictable, with Islamic
leaders petitioning every possible government and quasi-government agency to
censure the cartoonists and castigate the offending newspaper. Danish Prime
Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen¹s initial stand was laudatory, as he
proclaimed that he ³cannot, and will not, decide what the newspapers are
allowed to print². Early on, he also refused to meet with Muslim ambassadors
saying that meeting with them would give the impression that ³this issue is
something to be discussed. It is not.²

But when stonewalled by a principled Danish nation, Islamists gathered and
fomented their believers to engage in a rash of violent protests, arson, and
killings around the globe. Protesters in England promised that ³Bin Laden is
coming back², that the ³Annihilation of Europe² was imminent, then warned
Europeans ³to heed the lesson of Theo Van Gogh² and ³your 9/11 is coming².
Western buildings and embassies were again attacked and destroyed, including
ones in Beirut, Damascus and Tehran. Islamic clerics, in both India and
Pakistan, issued death sentence fatwas against the cartoonists and backed
them up with bounties totaling $12 million. The Indian and Pakistani clerics
carried out their death threats in full public view, surrounded by chanting
and rabid supporters -- the Danish cartoonists are hiding in isolation,
possibly for the rest of their lives.

What has been the Western response? Some continental European newspapers,
understanding the issue and the stakes, reprinted the cartoons as a show of
solidarity and in the name of free speech. Many editors were fired and/or
are under death threats as a result. American press was less courageous,
realizing that their government would not act to protect them, so only a
handful of papers reprinted the cartoons. Others disingenuously claimed to
be respecting Muslims¹ ³feelings² by not doing so, yet the ³feelings² of
peaceful targets had never previously stopped them from publishing offensive
material. A Boston newsweekly, the Phoenix, perhaps most clearly stated the
real reasons for which they were not republishing the cartoons: ³Out of fear
of retaliation from the international brotherhood of radical and
bloodthirsty Islamists Š This is, frankly, our primary reason for not
publishing any of the images in question Š we are being terrorized, and as
deeply as we believe in the principles of free speech and a free press, we
could not in good conscience place the men and women who work at the Phoenix
Š in physical jeopardy Š this may be the darkest moment in our 40-year
publishing history.²

In reality though, it is not the role of the press, but of the government to
stand up to those who threaten violence. Yet Western governments have acted
deplorably, once again breaking their most solemn promise and contravening
their very raison-d¹etre. Said the US State Department: ³These cartoons are
indeed offensive to the belief of Muslims." "We all fully recognize and
respect freedom of the press and expression but it must be coupled with
press responsibility. Inciting religious or ethnic hatreds in this manner is
not acceptable.² (The Department later mitigated its position somewhat, but
in the face of death threats, killings, etc., it was clear that it had no
principled defense of free speech or of Western values and citizens.)

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw ³praised the UK media for refusing to
reprint the cartoons² saying that ³I believe the republication of these
cartoons has been unnecessary, it has been insensitive, it has been
disrespectful and it has been wrong.² He later added that ³freedom of speech
did not mean an open season on religious taboos.² EU commissioner Frattini
capitulated completely and suggested that the press adopt a ³voluntary code²
of self-censorship.

No Western government has taken a single action to eliminate the sources of
the bounties on the heads of Western citizens, to hunt down the issuers of
death threats against editors and publishers, nor even to pledge full and
unconditional protection to any citizen who wishes to exercise his statutory
rights in the face of violent Islamic opposition.

The historical pattern is clear and consistent. For twenty five plus years,
Islamists have isolated and targeted Western citizens around the world with
impunity, and have succeeded in fostering fear in most citizens. They have
effectively used a divide and conquer strategy, with little or no
opposition. The pattern must be broken immediately.

To see how, imagine a neo-Nazi state arising and declaring to Western
nations: ³We have no quarrel with you, we just want to exterminate the Jews
who reside within your borders.² The proper response would of course be: ³if
you want to harm our law-abiding citizens, you DO have a quarrel with us, in
fact you have a war, for no one may threaten our citizens without
threatening our nation as a whole.² Similar reasoning extends from a segment
of the population to a single individual citizen. If a nation threatens one
citizen, it threatens the nation, and we must do everything in our power,
including going to war if necessary, to eradicate the threat. Otherwise
there is no point for individuals to delegate their use of force to the
state, and every enemy will employ a ³divide and conquer² tactic to
eliminate us one citizen at a time.

As a reminder of this, let us resurrect Dumas¹ famous Musketeers¹ rallying
call: ³One for All and All for One² emphasizing the latter phrase. For only
by standing together to defend each individual can a peaceful society exist.
Thus we must stand together and protect the lonely author who dares question
a religion and who is sentenced to death because of it. We must stand
together to defend his publishers who are firebombed for printing the book.
We must stand together to defend the individual film-maker and political
dissident who criticize Islam and are sentenced to death because of it. We
must stand together to defend the benign cartoonist, who pens a simple
cartoon, and is then forced into hiding by death threats and bounties.

To stand together means to assert our rights with our government as our
agent. To those who threaten us with force, asserting our rights means
responding with force, in fact, with overwhelming force. We must say to Iran
(which on February 14 just reconfirmed the Rushdie fatwa) ³oust and turn
over the regime which sees fit to condemn a single citizen of ours to death,
or face all out war.² And if they refuse, give them the war they started,
but be sure to win it decisively, not protecting their mosques and
infrastructure, but instead doing everything necessary to ensure they have
no capacity to ever threaten us again. To Pakistan and India, which host
clerics bold enough to put bounties on the heads of our citizens, demand
that they turn over the men and their supporters, and if they refuse, go in
and take them by force.

For if we fail to reverse our pattern, men will continue to learn that their
rights are a sham, that the government¹s promise to protect the individual
is a hoax, and that only by refraining from thinking and speaking out might
they be momentarily safe. Men will then go on to realize that they must seek
out true protectors, in the form of some gang; ethnic, religious or
otherwise; who may afford them a measure of security, albeit at the cost of
complete obedience. Eventually the gangs will fight it out in an effort to
wrest absolute power and to subjugate the others.

So will end the great intellectual and political achievement of the West,
which began 2,500 years ago in Greece with its discovery and reverence for
the individual, and which culminated in the enunciation of the guiding
principles of the United States. The end will not come because an
over-powering enemy has arisen ­- no, to our everlasting shame, the end will
come because Western governments, in a display of incredible cowardice and
treason, have abandoned and delivered their disarmed individual citizens to
a mob of stone-age savages.

http://amitghate.blogspot.com/2006/03/all-for-one.html
<http://amitghate.blogspot.com/2006/03/all-for-one.html>
 




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