Terrorism

The Perfect Enemy

by

Suppose you wanted to create a perfect enemy. An enemy so vile that its evil would be recognized by almost everyone. An enemy that would inspire people to come together in order to ensure its defeat.

To be more specific: suppose you were a screenwriter with the assignment of creating a suitable villain-organization for a major motion picture. The marketing plan for this movie suggests that it will be marketed primarily to a certain demographic and that, hence, your villain-organization should be particularly appalling to members of that demographic. The demographic in question consists of people who are affluent, highly educated (college with at least some postgraduate education), not particularly religious, and who consider themselves politically liberal or “progressive.” The plot of the movie demands that the audience must see the necessity for Americans–of many beliefs, occupations, and social backgrounds–to come together in order to defeat the enemy.

Oh, and one other thing. The year in which you are given this assignment is 1999.

Read more

A few thoughts on the Geert Wilders affair

by

After all, I am becoming involved in this discussion and a posting might be preferable to responses on the discussion forum. This is cross-posted from the BrugesGroupBlog, which I run in parallel to my work on EUReferendum. As I explain elsewhere on it, the intention had been to make this blog a part of a structured research programme but that is not going to happen. So, it continues as a more or less personal political blog until I set up another one as part of a network Richard North and I envisage.
On EUReferendum my colleague, Richard North (often referred to by me as the boss) and I have expended a very large number of words on the Geert Wilders affair. It would, therefore, be seemly to call a halt to the flood and so I shall (albeit temporarily) as soon as I have discussed a couple of related issues.

My colleague has already written about the Conservative Party’s ridiculous reaction but there have been some developments there as chronicled by ToryBoyBlog, a.k.a. Conservative Home.

At first the Conservatives, laughably known as Her Majesty’s Opposition, kept quiet on the matter of a Dutch parliamentarian being stopped from taking up an invitation by two members of the House of Lords to explain his political views because another member of the House of Lords, who is waiting to be sentenced for dangerous driving that resulted in a death, was threatening violence. The threats were unlikely to have turned into reality but that is a separate issue. They were made.

Read more

Imagine

by

What would happen if the police chief of a major city in the United States was kidnapped, tortured, and executed by criminals?

I’m asking because something like that occurred in Mexico over the weekend.

The operations against the Mexican drug cartels is entering the third year. They are calling it The Cartel War.

Anyone planning on a vacation in Cancun this year? I hear accommodations are cheap and spring break is only a few months away.

(Hat tip to Murdoc.)

MasterCard & International Relations

by

Under the heading of “we’re all in this together” and “there are heroes among us”:

Tonight I phoned MasterCard; they hear from me quite a lot since I’m pretty incompetent. (I lost my purse for about a week; Target wouldn’t tell me they had it even though I kept phoning; when I dropped by they said, sure, and immediately gave it to me.). So tonight I’m pointing out that I can’t figure out a couple of bills I probably got suckered into by filling out something on the net.

The woman was quite helpful and consistently apologetic though I’m pretty sure it was my fault and told her so. As we were about to hang up, I asked her where she was. She said Mumbai. I gasped and offered my condolences. She told me about a friend trapped in an office during the seige. She said they had learned from the incident – learned to be more vigilant, to be more careful. And that people had reached out to others in warm ways. Still, the destruction of the beautiful landmark was disturbing. And, she hoped all of us (I doubt she mean America hadn’t) would take a consistent stand against the terrorists. We spoke of the stories of heroism. She said I made her feel better – certainly, she made me feel better. The virtue of a world economy is that it brings together people like us, over the telephone very early in her morning and in my evening. We share much; of course, we can share much because we speak English. Her Indian accent and my Mid-western one give no trouble. And it is yet another argument that no matter how tragic the loss of languages may be (and I agree, the more we “save” the better), the sooner and more broadly we have a strong, common language the more moments like this will happen.