It’s sad that this approach doesn’t win elections.

The US is at war with whoever it wants to be at war with at the moment, and if it’s not trying to manufacture an Iranian front, then the unintended similarities of maneuvers before the opening of an Iraqi front are truly remarkable. The leader of the folks whose actions justify all this sits comfortably; so do the two nations who produce his patronage and followers. Everyone else who can be conveniently tagged as Other, islamofascist, and the like is pretty well screwed. Furthermore, this is a war being fought with active commitment to breaking legal and moral norms. Everything’s on the board – no treaty, no ethical guideline can ever stand in the way of what someone in the chain of command think useful or just plain fun at the moment.

Along with this, we know that the US administration treats the press as purely a tool of propaganda: planting stories and columnists, getting a gay pimp to ask easy questions at press conferences, all kinds of backroom wheeling and dealing.

Now here comes an effort specifically to provoke hostile reactions. Are we really that sure that there’s no US money or leverage here? There’s apparently some deliberate rabble-rousing based on lies and misdirection in the Muslim world, too? Are we so sure that the ghost of COINTELPRO is that calmly laid to rest?

I’m not sure I’m paranoid enough to answer either of those questions with a fully committed denial…but I think that there’s more than enough reason to ask them, and not to accept as given any clearing unless there’s a whole lot of evidence behind it.

Here’s a question – a genuine one, since I don’t know the answer and didn’t have much luck trying to research it – for those more up on the law than I am. What laws and other obligations govern the treatment of propaganda mills in wartime? There must be some spectrum from “openly manufactured at the home office” to “created independently in hopes of supporting the struggle without any direct patronage at all”, but I don’t know what the categories are or how they work. I do know that the US obviously regards sympathetic independent media in the Middle East as fair game, and it seems like it would be no great stretch or surprise for a lot of Muslims to regard such an effort as equally obviously part of the war effort aimed at them.

“One thing seems to be the treatment of those who practise terror as though they were part of some natural environment we have to take as given – not themselves free and responsible agents, but like a vicious dog or a hive of bees. If we do anything that provokes them, that must make us morally responsible, for they can be expected to react as they do. If this isn’t a form of covert racism, then it’s a kind of diminishing culturalism and is equally insulting to the people transformed by it into amoral beings incapable of choice or judgement.”

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP)—Tens of thousands of angry Muslims marched through Palestinian cities, burning the Danish flag and calling for vengeance Friday against European countries where caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad were published. In Washington, the State Department criticized the drawings, calling them “offensive to the beliefs of Muslims.”

While recognizing the importance of freedom of the press and expression, State Department press officer Janelle Hironimus said these rights must be coupled with press responsibility.

This makes it official. It was the right and proper thing to do to print those cartoons.

First – I think ‘no’ should be replaced by ‘very few’.
Second, do the writer and others who share this view know how many prosecutions there are per year under the incitement-to-racial-hatred laws?

If not, they could try the following exercise: ask yourself (before checking the answer) how low the number would have to be for you to take the same view (vanity, stunt, sop, misuse of parliamentary time etc.) of that legislation.

For those genuinely interested, I see there is a short essay on this subject (the symbolic element of legislation) in the current (Feb) edition of Prospect (not free online).

Sometimes the heated discussions that occur in threads at this blog are about real issues, and I disagree with the way Chris B cut off a discussion about the I/P conflict a few weeks ago simply because it was, um, being forcefully conducted, but this thread is begging for a pair of scissors.

All the peoples of the Abrahamic religions should simply get on with exterminating each other as quickly and completely as possible so the rest of us can then live in peace and quiet. These constant arguments about who has most offended whom are giving me a headache.

Have a nice day,
Antti