Hours after the broadcast of an interview in which Gen Musharraf claimed that the US and its allies would fail in their “war on terror” without the support of Pakistan and the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), the senior police officer in charge of the investigation into the bombings dropped a diplomatic bombshell.
Mumbai police commissioner AN Roy said the ISI began planning the July attack in March and later provided training to the Islamic militant group, Lashkar-e-Taiba, that carried it out.
What’s more distressing is that this public accusation seems to be based on rather dubious evidence.
Mr Roy said many of the suspects had been trained to resist interrogation and that investigators had managed to elicit the information only by drugging them with a “truth serum”.
To be honest, despite the constant tensions between India and Pakistan, I would be extremely surprised to find out that Pakistan’s government was behind the Mumbai bombings. I doubt that they would risk a full blown war that could eventually involve a nuclear exchange. That is not to say, though, that no members of the Pakistani government were involved.
At the present time, though, I’m doubtful that the truth will be known. In the meantime, let’s hope that tensions between the two countries don’t spiral out of control as a result of this accusation.
JEDDAH, 30 September 2006 — For years comedy has been used to satirize the state or society in the Arab world. It is said to be the only way to criticize the systems in the region without having to spend a night or two in lockups. More than two decades have passed since Syrian icon Dareed Laham starred in his hit motion picture “The Border”. In the film, Laham criticized Arab-style bureaucracy in a production that has become a landmark for the modern history of political satire in the Middle East.
Today, Arabs can get a little relief from the sometimes-frustrating realities of politics and society by watching “Tash Ma Tash,” which first appeared on Saudi TV during Ramadan 14 years ago.
“Tash Ma Tash” is somewhat of a phenomenon in the Middle East. It’s one of the most widely viewed TV programs during the month of Ramadan, popular for its ascerbic attacks on the status quo. What’s somewhat surprising (at least to those who have little knowledge of Saudi Arabs) is that it is a Saudi production, in Arabic, and so clearly for domestic consumption.
One episode this year satirized the recruitment of terrorists, having the would-be terrorists compete in an “American Idol” type show. You can imagine how well that went down in some quarters. This Arab News article talks about some other episodes as well as about audience reaction. It’s pretty hotly debated.
Do read the whole piece, particularly if you think of Saudi Arabia as monolithic in its beliefs. Or if you think Muslims–even conservative, Wahhabi, Saudi Muslims–are incapable of saying “No!” to terrorism.
Even better, than saying “No!”, the show mock those who seek to use religion to promote terrorism. Mockery is one of the sharpest pens there is, particularly in an honor-based society. The fact that this program is seen by millions of Muslims, throughout the Arab world and Europe, should put paid to some of the Islamophobia. But I’m not holding my breath, unfortunately.
TNOYF has the return of the BeeGees. V the K always has the best pictures at Caption This!
To join in, start a Caption Contest at your blog, edit it to add a link to this post, and then send a TrackBack. If your blog doesn’t automatically generate one, use the Send TrackBack feature below. For more information, see this post.
House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) told The Washington Post last night that he had learned this spring of inappropriate “contact” between Foley and a 16-year-old page. Boehner said he then told House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). Boehner later contacted The Post and said he could not remember whether he talked to Hastert.
It was not immediately clear what actions Hastert took. His spokesman had said earlier that the speaker did not know of the sexually charged online exchanges between Foley and the boy.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) took the House floor last night to demand an investigation into the Foley matter. But Boehner headed her off, calling on the House to refer the matter to the ethics committee, which the House promptly voted unanimously to do.
[...]
Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-La.), who sponsored the page from his district, said he had learned of some of the online exchanges from a reporter some months ago and passed on the information to Rep. Thomas Reynolds (R-N.Y.), chairman of the House Republican campaign organization, the Associated Press reported. Alexander said he did not pursue the matter further because “his parents said they didn’t want me to do anything.” [emphasis mine]
John Aravosis alleges that the leadership knew even earlier and asks:
Tell me why Denny Hastert shouldn’t be forced to immediately resign. They left your kids with this man AFTER they knew what he was doing. They let him stay in the GOP leadership. They let him remain the chair of the child sex offender caucus. Jesus Christ.
Fair questions all. Due process might explain keeping things close to the vest and exercising every caution in making sure Foley was in fact guilty of this conduct before letting word get out. I’m at a loss to explain why he was allowed to remain in charge of making laws to protect our children. Absent some incredibly good explanation, Hastert and Boehner need to go.
The deputy leader of al-Qaida called President Bush a failure and a liar in the war on terror in a video statement released Friday, and he compared Pope Benedict XVI to the 11th century pontiff who launched the First Crusade.
“Can’t you be honest at least once in your life, and admit that you are a deceitful liar who intentionally deceived your nation when you drove them to war in Iraq,” Ayman al-Zawahri said in a portion of the video released by the Washington-based SITE Institute.
Al-Zawahri also criticized Bush for continuing to imprison al-Qaida leaders in prisons, including al-Qaida No. 3 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged Sept. 11 mastermind who was captured in Pakistan in March 2003. “Bush, you deceitful charlatan, 3 1/2 years have passed since your capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, so how have you found us during this time? Losing and surrendering?” he said, according to the SITE Institute.
“What you have perpetrated against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the other Muslim captives in your prisons and the prisons of your slaves in Egypt, Jordan, Pakistan and elsewhere is not hidden from anyone, and we are a people who do not sleep under oppression and who do not abandon our revenge until our chests have been healed of those who have aggressed against us,” the Virginia-based IntelCenter quoted the message as saying. “And we, by the grace of Allah, are seeking to exact revenge on behalf of Islam and Muslims from you and your soldiers and allies.”
Al-Zawahri, the deputy to Osama bin Laden, accused the United States and its agents of torturing Muslim prisoners seized across the Middle East. “Your agents in the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan have captured thousands of the youth and soldiers of Islam whom you made to taste at your hands and the hands of your agents various types of punishment and torture,” al-Zawahri said, according to the IntelCenter. “But we, by Allah’s grace, are taking revenge on their behalf daily from your troops and the troops of your allies and agents in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, the Arabian Peninsula and all Muslim countries from Indonesia to Morocco, and moreover, on your own soil every day.”
Aside from the part about the pope, this speech could have been given by Howard Dean, Harry Reid, or Teddy Kennedy. It’s also eerily remniscient of the video released by Osama bin Laden days before the 2004 election.
UPDATE: The post was a tongue-in-cheek reaction written hastily before I departed for an evening engagement. Obviously, there are snippets of this speech–the death to America stuff–that the Democrats wouldn’t say.
Anyone who reads this site on a regular basis knows that I’m not in the “Democrats hate America” camp. Still, it is striking how much of Zawahri’s remarks are standard talking points from the opposition party: The business about Bush being a “failure” and a “liar,” the emphasis on Abu Ghraib, Iraq as a rallying cry for Muslim outrage, and so forth.
A gay couple from Rhode Island has the right to marry in Massachusetts because laws in their home state do not expressly prohibit same-sex marriage, a judge ruled Friday.
Wendy Becker and Mary Norton of Providence argued that a 1913 law that forbids out-of-state residents from marrying in Massachusetts if their marriage would not be permitted in their home state did not apply to them because Rhode Island does not specifically ban gay marriage.
Superior Court Judge Thomas Connolly agreed. “No evidence was introduced before this court of a constitutional amendment, statute, or controlling appellate decision from Rhode Island that explicitly deems void or otherwise expressly forbids same-sex marriage,” he ruled.
Although the ruling allows same-sex couples from Rhode Island to get married in Massachusetts, the Massachusetts court has no power to ensure that Rhode Island recognizes such marriages. No other states are affected.
The ruling is rather bizarre. Presumably, if same-sex marriage were legally permissible in Rhode Island, Becker and Norton could save themselves a trip to Massachusetts, not to mention court costs, and just get married in Rhode Island.
Saying he was “deeply sorry,” Congressman Mark Foley (R-FL) resigned from Congress today, hours after ABC News questioned him about sexually explicit internet messages with current and former congressional pages under the age of 18.
A spokesman for Foley, the chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, said the congressman submitted his resignation in a letter late this afternoon to Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert.
[A]ccording to several former congressional pages, the congressman used the Internet to engage in sexually explicit exchanges.
They say he used the screen name Maf54 on these messages provided to ABC News.
Maf54: You in your boxers, too?
Teen: Nope, just got home. I had a college interview that went late.
Maf54: Well, strip down and get relaxed.
Another message:
Maf54: What ya wearing?
Teen: tshirt and shorts
Maf54: Love to slip them off of you.
And this one:
Maf54: Do I make you a little horny?
Teen: A little.
Maf54: Cool.
The language gets much more graphic, too graphic to be broadcast, and at one point the congressman appears to be describing Internet sex.
Federal authorities say such messages could result in Foley’s prosecution, under some of the same laws he helped to enact.
“Adds up to soliciting underage children for sex,” said Brad Garrett, a former FBI agent and now an ABC News consultant. “And what it amounts to is serious both state and federal violations that could potentially get you a number of years.”
To join in, choose a post from your blog to highlight, edit it to add a link to this post, and then send a TrackBack. If your blog doesn’t automatically generate one, use the Send TrackBack feature below. For more information, see this post.
Mike Boyer observes, “I can only imagine that there is a cold chill in the air over at the WaPo newsroom this afternoon. After being scooped once again on a story about one of its own scribes, the Post is scrambling to catch up with the New York Times, which this morning outed the most important revelations of Bob Woodward’s new book, State of Denial.”
It’s an interesting quandry that newspapers find themselves in when their correspondents sign book contracts. The publishers quite naturally expect to control the timing of information release, which prevents the reporter-authors from handing their papers an automatic scoop. The result, frequently, is that someone under no obligation to the publisher beats them to the punch.
UNC lawprof Eric Muller posts about Michelle Malkin, a lot, on his blog, Is That Legal?
Yesterday’s installment is a rather inexplicable rant saying that her recent syndicated column criticizing Charlotte Church’s transition from Christian rock teen queen to 20-year-old skank is hypocritical because–brace yourself!–Malkin wore a bikini and went to parties in 1992 and he has photos to prove it.
Aside from being absurdly illogical, Muller’s argument is rather weakened by the fact that the photos of Malkin are rather obvious forgeries.
Malkin is urging Muller’s firing from UNC and AllahPundit suggests a libel suit and/or retaliation in like fashion.
While I’ve defended the likes of Ward Churchill, William Woodward, Juan Cole, Joseph Woolcock, and many other professors and their rights to express views I find objectionable without incurring professional penalties, Muller’s obsessiveness and dishonesty are worrisome. Thinking nutty things is within the bounds of academic freedom; cyber-stalking is not.
UPDATE: Muller posted an update a few minutes ago atop his post:
UPDATE, 3:00 p.m.: It appears that I was mistaken when I linked to the picture on flickr below, which I believed to be a picture of Michelle Malkin. I regret my error, and I apologize to Michelle Malkin for it. She has asked that I leave the post up — indeed, she has reprinted it — and so I will do as she wishes.
A decent gesture but the post itself, on the heels of some other bizarre ones about Malkin’s personal life, is still not what one would expect from someone in Muller’s position.
Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore warned hundreds of U.N. diplomats and staff on Thursday evening about the perils of climate change, claiming: Cigarette smoking is a “significant contributor to global warming!”
Gore, who was introduced by Secretary-General Kofi Annan, said the world faces a “full-scale climate emergency that threatens the future of civilization on earth.”
This is typical of the hyperbole of Gore and other global warming exremists. While it’s true that cigarette smoke contains carbon dioxide, it’s in very small amounts, and a drop in the bucket compared to the daily breathing of six billion humans.
What particularly bothers me about Gore and his fellow hysterics is that there is a lot of sound science indicating that human industrial pollution has contributed to atmospheric climate change. Even Bjorn Lomborg conceded this in his book The Skeptical Environmentalist. There’s still a lot left to be determined, but most of the real data is unquestioned by climatologists.
But when environmentalists get their hands on that data, it gets exaggerated and skewed to the point of absurdity. When the environmental hysterics postulate usupported and unsupportable suppositions about global warming that would require extreme and unworkable solutions, it makes the problem all that much easier to ignore.
Does a bear leave its waste in the woods? Of course. So do geese, deer, muskrats, raccoons and other wild animals. And now, such states as Virginia and Maryland have determined that this plays a significant role in water pollution.
Scientists have run high-tech tests on harmful bacteria in local rivers and streams and found that many of the germs — and in the Potomac and Anacostia rivers, a majority of them– come from wildlife dung. The strange proposition that nature is apparently polluting itself has created a serious conundrum for government officials charged with cleaning up the rivers.
I’m not an environmental scientist but this is something I have long considered obvious. We needed a major study to figure out that wild animals poop outside? And it’s page 1 news?
It gets better!
Part of the problem lies with the unnaturally high populations of deer, geese and raccoons living in modern suburbs and depositing their waste there. But officials say it would be nearly impossible, and wildly unpopular, to kill or relocate enough animals to make a dent in even that segment of the pollution.
So, we shouldn’t try to round up all the wild animals to prevent them from pooping outside? Really? Perhaps fodder for another NSF grant: Would the animals continue producing waste if relocated?
That leaves scientists and environmentalists struggling with a more fundamental question: How clean should we expect nature to be? In certain cases, they say, the water standards themselves might be flawed, if they appear to forbid something as natural as wild animals leaving their dung in the woods. “You need to go back and say, ‘Maybe the standards aren’t exactly right’ if wildlife are causing the problem,” said Thomas Henry, an Environmental Protection Agency official who works on water pollution in the mid-Atlantic.
Well, no. Either water is safe for whatever purpose humans would put it to or it isn’t. The public policy question is what to do if it isn’t safe. Presumably, if the cause of the contaminants is human, we would redirect the activity. If it’s naturally occuring, we either stop using the water for the purposes for which it is unsafe or figure out a way to filter the water.
To some scientists, this makes perfect sense. They point out that a few wild animals have managed to thrive in the environments that humans create: Deer feast on suburban flowers; raccoons raid backyard pet-food bowls. Nonmigratory Canada geese, descended in part from geese brought to this area as live hunting decoys, have fallen so much in love with golf courses and groomed city parks that their East Coast population now stands at 1.1 million.
It could be the ultimate irony of people’s impact on nature that the entire system has changed so radically that wild animals now degrade their own environment. More animals means more bacteria-laden waste. Some of that is swept by storm water into rivers and streams.
News flash: Animals were degrading their own environment all along, just as humans have done. Life requires the consumption of resources and production of waste products. Animals adapt by changing habitats or evolving; otherwise, they die. Only humans create technological solutions to fix their environment.
Austin Bay calls for an aggressive international intervention to stop the genocide in Darfur.
In February 2004, reflecting on Rwanda’s genocide, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan said: “There can be no more binding obligation for the international community than the prevention of genocide. … The events in Rwanda … were especially shameful. The international community clearly had the capacity to prevent those events, but failed to summon the will. … We must ensure that we never again fail to summon the will.” Lack of political will and lack of credible military power contributed to the Rwandan disaster.
[...]
Ending the Darfur genocide means terminating Khartoum’s savage policy. That means peacekeeping forces combating the militias would be waging war against allies of the “host” Sudanese government.
[...]
Credible combat power — well-armed, well-led, well-supported soldiers with full authority to use decisive, deadly force — can be deployed in Darfur. That credible combat power must be backed by credible leaders, however. That means leaders with the spine to intervene despite Khartoum’s intransigence and leaders with the grit to continue this difficult mission when (it is inevitable) the fighting gets dirty, good soldiers die and tragic mistakes occur.
Despite Annan’s fine words, outside of London and Washington such leadership is not in evidence. Until it appears, “the international community” deserves to be shamed.
Bay is certainly right that the Darfur genocide will continue unabated if we wait for consensus in the United Nations to muster. The UN does many things well but bold military action is not among them.
The question, then, is whether it is in the interests of the United States and the United Kingdom to intervene. Sadly, the answer is No.
What vital interest does either country have at stake? None that I can think of.
Purely humanitarian interventions can only be justified when the costs, in blood and treasure, are relatively low. That would not be the case here. Indeed, not only would it re-ignite charges of Western Imperialism (not unreasonably, incidentally) but it would even further inflame Muslim resentment against us, given that our fight would be with the Muslim Janjaweed militias.
Bruce McQuain asks, “Where was Afghanistan in the NIE?”
Afghanistan was just as much an invasion of a Muslim country as was Iraq. And in the case of Afghanistan, it was a Muslim country being run precisely as the jihadists think the world should be run.
What could be a more perfect “cause celebre” than that?
It’s an interesting question that never really occured to me before.
Today, Democrats tout their support of that “good” war as proof they aren’t soft on terrorism. Fair enough, I suppose. But guess what? That war made us less safe too – if the measure of such things is “creating more terrorists.” A Gallup poll taken in nine Muslim nations in February 2002 found that more than three-fourths of respondents considered the liberation of Afghanistan unjustifiable. A mere 9 percent supported U.S. actions. That goes for famously moderate Turkey, where opposition to the U.S. ran three to one, and in Pakistan, where a mere one in 20 respondents took the American side.
In other words, before Iraq became the cause celebre of jihadists, Afghanistan was. Does that mean we shouldn’t have toppled the Taliban?
Going back further, it’s conventional wisdom that we helped “create” Osama bin Laden, or his Taliban and mujahedin comrades, when we supported the Afghan resistance to the Soviet Union. So we shouldn’t have done that either?
Obviously, not.
It is simultaneously true that our actions help motivate the terrorists and that our inactions motivate the terrorists. In the famous words of Cap Weinberger vis-a-vis arms control with the Soviets, “We build, they build. We stop, they build.”
Had we not gone into Iraq, would there still be a major Islamist terrorist threat? Of course.
A small group of students has started a petition to remove a University of New Hampshire professor who believes that Bush administration officials planned the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks or knew about them and allowed them to happen.
“Basically, we watch professors to just ensure they’re doing their job … they’re not biased in the classroom and are not teaching what they are not supposed to teach,” said Bill Hunt, chairman of the newly formed and unrecognized organization Students for Academic Integrity. The group has set its sights on psychology professor William Woodward for “pushing his personal agenda on … students.”
[...]
Hunt said the Students for Academic Integrity are considering bringing audio and videotape recorders to class to prove their case. “I’ve heard from several students that (Woodward is) indoctrinating them,” he said. “He claims that he wants everyone to have an opinion. The fact is, he doesn’t.”
Woodward, a tenured professor, belongs to Scholars for 9/11 Truth, whose members question the official story about the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and contend that the U.S. government either had knowledge of the attacks or had a role in them.
Gov. John Lynch called Woodward’s beliefs “completely crazy and offensive” and asked the trustees to investigate. Andy Lietz, chairman of the university system trustees, said a “careful review” of Woodward found his teaching consistent with accepted standards, “even though he has expressed some ideas that many find objectionable.” Some of Woodward’s students have defended him. Woodward has said he does not push his views on his students but has mentioned it in his classroom in the spirit of full disclosure.
Bruce Mallory, provost and executive vice president for Academic Affairs, said he has investigated the controversy surrounding Woodward and has not heard of the Students for Academic Integrity petition. He added that the university still stands by its position that Woodward acted within the bounds of academic freedom. The UNH administration’s reaction is one of the reasons Hunt and his friends started the petition. “I think it reflects very poorly on the university that they have no problem with this,” Hunt said. “I really don’t think we can rely on the university to monitor these professors, so it’s up to the students.”
I’m not sure how Woodward’s views on 9/11 would fit into his psychology lectures, but it’s not my field. If he’s using his classroom to indoctrinate his students, that’s a problem. If he’s doing his job and just happens to have some rather strange off-duty activities, it’s not.
The idea that politicians, let alone students, should have any say as to which professors are hired and fired is nuttier than anything Woodward espouses. The professoriate has always operated as essentially a guild, with experts monitoring the conduct of other experts. That system has worked for centuries.
If we’re to keep our universities the best in the world, professors need to be free to explore their intellectual interests free from political considerations. The faculty and provost should ensure that professors are not abusing their positions, to be sure, but substantial latitude should be given otherwise.
UPDATE: Dave Shuler comments, “I don’t think they should fire him. I think they should ridicule him. Publicly. Relentlessly.” Agreed. That is much more in the spirit of higher education than censorship.
My presumption is that Woodward, a professor at a quite decent school, is a reasonably bright fellow whose obsession with his 9/11 conspiracy theory has him in command of the basic facts. To challenge him in debate, therefore, will require students and others to bone up on the facts themselves so as not to be defeated through ignorance. A few nutty professors are, in this sense, a positive addition to a campus.
