Archive for the 'Humour' Category

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We’ve always been winning in Anbar

Published on May 28, 2007 in Humour, Iraq and Middle East. 0 Comments

A wonderful example of the shamelessness and delusion of the wingnut fraternity (aka Instapundit) care of Instaputz.

Putz added to his ludicrous “you’d think lefty bloggers would be happy if things were going badly in Iraq” post.

I’m starting to think that they don’t follow the news all that closely. It’s true — as Michael Yon noted in an earlier email — that Anbar isn’t perfectly peaceful. But it’s also true that it’s changed quite drastically since it was being written off last year. That’s news — if you care about reality, rather than just rooting for America Bush to lose.

What, no “nanny-nanny-boo-boo”?

Here’s the problem: Putz has been insisting we’ve been winning in Anbar for three years. Read these posts and decide who it is doesn’t follow the news or care about reality.

October 06, 2006

Don’t let the media convince you that things are going badly in Iraq. The Anbar tribes are now fighting al Qaeda on their own initiative, and the Shi’ite-dominated government is slowly dismantling al Sadr’s Mahdi Army…Our strategy in Iraq is sound. It’s keeping our own casualties down, and it’s forcing the Iraqis to defend themselves.

Don’t despair. We’re winning.

October 05, 2006

ED MORRISSEY looks at events in Anbar province, and observes: “The tribal backlash shows why the Zarqawi strategy was always a loser.”

October 02, 2006

A GROWING INSURGENCY in Iran?
UPDATE: Plus, a look at Anbar tribes vs. Al Qaeda from Bill Roggio.

September 22, 2006

STRATEGYPAGE OFFERS A RATHER POSITIVE TAKE on what’s going on in Anbar province.

September 21, 2006

Good work has been and continues to be done in Anbar. The military has a problem with public affairs, plain and simple, and fails to realize that the impact on remaining silent on this report far outweighs the need to keep the information classified.

January 27, 2006

IRAQ THE MODEL: “Iraqi tribes in Anbar arrest 270 Arab and foreign al-Qaeda members!”

September 18, 2004

If the pattern of American casualties shows that most fighting is happening in Al-Anbar it is not because Administration officials are manufacturing the results to camouflage a “widening insurgency”. It is because there is no power vacuum among Kurds and Shi’ias as complete as that in the Sunni triangle. Civil war, if it eventuates, will not be result of military failure but from a lack of commitment to create a replacement Iraqi State. If we build it, it will come.

As Glenn Reynolds demonstrates time and time again, the right wing wasn’t kidding when they say they are creating their own reality.

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Norman Geras clutches at straw

Published on May 28, 2007 in Humour, Politics and UK. 0 Comments

For immediate release to Euston Manifesto signatories

Listen my fellow train spotters, I know my manifesto has turned us into a bit of a laughing stock. And that our support of Bush, Blair and The War Against Terror has made us look like knuckle dragging Islamophobic bigots or apologists for Israeli war crimes or god help us Melanie Phillips. But I think I have a solution. Look, they love us in Sierra Leone:

To say Tony Blair is popular in Sierra Leone scarcely does justice to the intensity of feeling towards him in this small tropical corner of west Africa.His decision seven years ago to send in British troops at the height of a brutal civil war is widely seen by Sierra Leoneans themselves as the critical moment in their country’s salvation. It turned the tide in the conflict and helped bring an end to an 11-year nightmare.The village of Mahera, for example, would almost certainly have been overrun in 2000 by rebels with a well-earned reputation for chopping off the limbs of children had British paratroopers not stood in their way.

Tony Blair and Tony-Blair Kamara

Read the rest and watch the slideshow. I think we could easily hide out there until the mess in Mess O’ Potamia is sorted. It shouldn’t take more than twenty or thirty years of lying low. What do you say? Shoould I call Easyjet and book us a few seats?

Regards

Norman Geras

PS Don’t tell Mel. She’s an utter loon.

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Large number of Americans favor violent attacks against civilians

Published on May 24, 2007 in Humour, Islamophobia and US. 0 Comments

Rightwing pundits in the US have recently seized on a new poll to fan the flames of anti-Muslim hysteria, Glenn Greenwald investigates:

The hysteria over the Pew poll about American Muslims continues unabated, with the focus now on the finding that while 80% of American Muslims oppose attacks on civilians in all cases, 13% said they could be justified in some circumstances. The “discussion” illustrates some standard failings of our political discourse.

Michelle Malkin went to National Review to proclaim that the poll “should be a wake-up call, not another excuse for the mainstream media to downplay the threat of homegrown jihad.” Mark Steyn said it demonstrates the existence in America of “a huge comfort zone for the jihad to operate in,” and Jonah Goldberg warned how “significant” this is. On CNN last night, Anderson Cooper was horrified — just horrified — that “so many” American Muslims would support such violence.

The reality, though, is that it is almost impossible to conduct a poll and not have a sizable portion of the respondents agree to almost everything. And in particular, with regard to the specific question of whether it is justifiable to launch violent attacks aimed deliberately at civilians, the percentage of American Muslims who believe in such attacks pales in comparison to the percentage of Americans generally who believe that such attacks are justifiable.

Twenty years ago, in an episode of the classic BBC comedy, Yes, Prime Minister, (The Ministerial Broadcast), that expert of official trickery, Sir Humphrey Appleby, gave us a priceless insight into these polls which illustrates Greenwald’s point. (click play on the control below to listen.)

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