One question: Who is More Rational? Or -- The real reason OBL tape is bad

[Cats Against Frist]

1. Child A -- He spends several years stealing Child B's blocks and giving him Indian rubs. One day, Child B attacks him back, and he says -- "I don't know, maybe he hates me for my teddy bear," shrugs, and then kicks Child Cs ass, while Child B goes on to taunt him from a daycare across town. Child A, sits alone, sucking off a Jameson bottle in the corner, complaining that everybody hates him.

or

2. Child B -- Sick of being trampled on by Child A, Child B manages to totally get one in on Child A -- totally knock his two front baby teeth out. He waits until Child B throws a temper tantrum and kicks Child C's ass. Meanwhile, the rest of the Children see that Child A is a real fucking asshole, and yeah -- he's picked on them too, and they're pissed. Child B also manages to turn all the parents against Child A, who -- though they always thought he was kind of a smart ass -- gave him the benefit of the doubt. So, they kind of turn a blind eye, the next time Child B decides to knock Child A on the knee caps or something.

Jesus -- this fucking analogy was not supposed to get so confusing.

My point is: These people -- television pundits -- who keep referring to OBL as an irrational madman, and a cold-blooded killer -- do they not KNOW the history of foreign policy in the Middle East?

I mean, I don't think it's right to kill 3,000 innocent people, but why should anyone be SURPRISED by this and call OBL a "madman?" He's told us himself, in no uncertain terms, that he attacks us because of our policies. Religion to him, is the same as religion is to the radical right in this country -- means of manipulating your followers, or at least increasing their zeal.

This is a guy that managed to mastermind a plot to hijack our planes with BOXCUTTERS and hit THE WORLD TRADE CENTER and the PENTAGON. Sounds pretty fucking rational to me. He identified his enemy, has a specific, and perhaps justified reason for hating them, and then he attacked them. Not good -- but rational. Definitely rational.

I'd even go further to say that perhaps he knew that Bush would make a total asshat out of himself and invade Iraq, thereby inflaming the Islamic world, boosting al Qaeda's ranks, and making the U.S. more hated -- by a big chunk of WESTERN civilization -- than they probably ever had been. This might even go beyond simple rationality. OBL might be -- dare I say it -- a fucking genius.

So, basically, the stage of the game in which we are now is that Child A has beaten up Child B for one or more centuries, inflicting no telling how many hundreds of thousands of deaths from numerous causes, and Child B has struck back, striking Child A and killing 3,000 people, and Child A has struck Child C, killing 100,000 people, and 1,200 of Child A's people, and wounding 7000 of Child A's people.

And Child B is taunting Child A, in his long flowing golden robes from what looks like a very safe and healthy far, far away.

I guess that I just don't understand. I have a degree in Nonwestern politics, but maybe I'm just not Darwinian enough to make it in this world. I look at what we've done to the Middle East, in the name of furthering our own interests, and I am ashamed. I sympathize with the people -- not necessarily OBL, but the people -- and I am ashamed of how we've acted.

But what I'm scared of -- more than sharks, more than terrorism, more than anything is that quote in the Suskind article, where the Bush aide harshed on Suskind for "living in the reality-based community."

I am not a Christian, but I do believe in the transformational message of Jesus Christ, and even though I hesitate to invoke absolutes, I do believe in humility and deferrence and egalitarianism and community -- and love (which is a rarely talked about thing in this War on Terror).

Whether or not you think that it's GOOD to treat the world like your own private pantry, in your best interest, and consider those souls who lie outside your borders (and even your own citizens) "collateral damage," -- is not the point.

The point is -- how can we stand in front of the world and tell them that we're free, and a shining city on the hill, and blah blah blah, when what we are is ruthless, shrewd, manipulative and blatantly unresponsive to human atrocity -- unless it touches us? Why do we act surprised that a faction from the Middle East has decided to kill our people?

Maybe we have to be militant and shrewd and ruthless. Maybe it's the nature of humanity -- and anything that we've attributed to ourselves that attempts to separate us from our animal natures is probably a construct. An illusion. But if we have to do it -- why can't we just admit it? Why can't we simply -- or those on the right that have no problem with it -- say: we will do what we will do, and if you get in our way, we will crush you?

Because that's what we do.

We disregard the Geneva Conventions, we won't join the International Criminal Court -- we pulled out of Kyoto, had a hard time signing the International Womens' Rights act -- and why?

Because we are not subject to that. Because it might negatively affect us. Because we've some how decided that anything that we do to act in the best economic or security interests of our nation -- from killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people, to gutting our own Constitution -- is ALWAYS JUSTIFIED, and any accountability would simply diminish our ability to act in accordance with our needs at every turn.

The people who believe this are the same people who harp on the left about their "if it feels good, do it" moral relativism.

But isn't acting in the interest of the state, independent of dominant morality systems -- secular or religious -- MORALLY RELATIVE????????????

While some people are concerned about the immediate fallout of the Bin Laden tape and "will it do this or will it do that," I'm worried about our entire basis of morality, and reality shifting into this rootless GOP place that hearkens for an idealized past that never was -- where John Kerry singlehandedly loses the Vietnam War -- and the Clinton's murder anyone who get in the way -- and the Constitution is a just a list of "suggestions," and the corporation is the human and the human is the cold, tar-blackened pit of existence -- from its hating heart, to its rabid desire for the acquisition of material wealth, to its need to kill for survival, and to claw, always claw its way above everyone else to establish its own identity.

Here's the Suskind quote again, for those who don't remember:

In the summer of 2002, after I had written an article in Esquire that the White House didn’t like about Bush’s former communications director, Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House’s displeasure, and then he told me something that at the time I didn’t fully comprehend—but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency.

The aide said that guys like me were “in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who “believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. “That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued. “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

And the world where OBL is always the madman. Even the nonpartisan media says so.

A mad man, indeed.

Anyone have any thoughts? Any dems or lefties that disagree? I wish someone would make an argument that actually sounds rational -- that would make me believe that OBL is the madman, and we're pink butterflies on a rabbits nose -- particulary someone on my side of the political gully.


***edit: had to change a child letter :)

[Cats Against Frist]

1. Look, it's a 60-second post in a 30-second world

I'm sorry for kicking. I've never done this. I am seriously crying out for help, here. :)

[Daocrat]

2. Indeed.

Bin Laden is not irrational, nor is he a madman. He is a sane, intelligent individual. He is also evil. As long as we go on pretending that Bin Laden is a nutcase, we can continue to evade the fact that Bin Laden attacked America for many of the same reasons Bush attacked Iraq.

Bin Laden is an evil man who is responsible for an abominable terrorist attack. However, he is not insane, nor is he irrational. He knows exactly what he was doing, just as Bushco knew what they were doing when they decided to invade Iraq.

Personally, I'm tired of American exceptionalism. When others do evil things, they are insane, irrational madmen, but when America does evil things, it's an entirely different story.

This whole nation needs to grow up, wake up, and get over itself. In my first DU post, I am hereby giving notice that if America re-selects Bush, I may be forced to denounce my own nation. It will hurt to do so, because America could have been something great, but if the people of this nation want to flush all of our nation's promise down the toilet for the sake of false security, xenophobia, and a self-serving tax cut, I won't stand by and countenance it silently.

If the American people are ignorant, arrogant, and greedy enough to throw America down the toilet by putting Bush back in office, God help this nation. One thing is for certain - I won't be denouncing the America I once knew, because that America began to die when the neo-cons took over. If the people of this bizarre "Neo-America" elect Bush, the America we once knew will be officially dead, and we will all find ourselves strangers in a strange land.

Orwell was only off by 20 years. Instead of calling it "1984," he should have called it "2004."

Even atheists like myself should be praying for a Kerry victory on Tuesday.

[Cats Against Frist]

3. He's a jerk -- but is he EVIL???

And as an atheist, do you even believe in "evil?" Isn't calling something inherently evil, as much of a muddying of the discourse as calling someone "crazy?"

I agree with pretty much the rest of your post, but I could only call someone evil if they were unprovoked. He isn't nice, certainly, but he has a calculated gripe. Again -- we've killed 100,000 Iraqis -- most of whom did nothing to us. If OBL is evil, we're evil, no?

[arewenotdemo]

4. Nicely stated first post

and I agree...evil and good are essentially relative terms.

The amazing thing, to me, is that he comes across as the rational one in all of this. His statement that American security depends primarily on American foreign policy cannot be countered.

The Cheerleader-in-Chief has really accomplished the impossible in making Osama a hero in the Muslim world, and the U.S. a pariah worldwide. He should be behind bars for life with UBL and Saddam, as far as I'm concerned.

[newyawker99]

5. Hi Daocrat!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast: