Text 18031, 103 rader
Skriven 2006-03-01 21:08:46 av Alan Hess
Ärende: no war on terror?
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Jewish World Review March 1, 2006 / 1 Adar, 5766

This means war

By Michael Graham

     
     

http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | "We live in fictional times, with a
fictional president elected by a fictional election, leading us into a
fictional war justified by fictional evidence." - pseudo-documentary filmmaker
Michael Moore


Michael Moore was right about one thing: The war on terror is pure fiction.


America is not at war, at least, not with terrorism. We have soldiers in harm's
way in Iraq, but they must be part of some peacekeeping mission or
nation-building charity work, or bizzaro-world reality show, because the
country they serve is certainly not warring against Islamo-fascism or the
terrorist violence it inspires.


I know we're not at war with terrorism because I just read a New York Times
story about a member of the Taliban who is also currently a student at Yale
University. In the weeks before 9/11, Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi was the
Taliban's representative in the US, a high-profile member of the notoriously
Osama-friendly Afghan government.


Today, Hashemi calls himself "the luckiest person in the world. I could have
ended up in Guantanamo Bay. Instead I ended up at Yale." All because the Bush
administration issued a student visa (!) a to a member of a radical Islamist
government with whom we are (theoretically) at war.


War on terror? If so, we wouldn't have a Secretary of Transportation who
insists on an airport security system that treats Swedish grandmas and Sudanese
men as identical security risks. If this were a war, we wouldn't have sent
millions of dollars to Palestinians operating the Al Aqsa Martyr's Brigades, or
be considering still more aid, this time to the Palestinian governed by Hamas.


During wartime, presidents don't send out State Department stooges to criticize
cartoons that insult the enemy. Governments on a war footing don't urge the
media to abandon the principles for which its soldiers are fighting. You know,
like free speech and freedom of the press?


And if we were really, truly in a war against Islamist terrorism and the people
who support it, any government official who even suggested giving operational
control of our ports to the United Arab Emirates would be standing in front of
a bullet-spattered wall with a cigarette and a blindfold.


This is war?


No, war involves sacrificing, like say, when a nation with a 30-year history of
funding terrorists is required to "sacrifice" the opportunity to oversee port
operations in the United States. Or like when the country whose banking system
funneled most of the money used on 9/11 "sacrifices" its bid to operate the
ports that served the World Trade Center. Or when the country whose leaders met
repeatedly with Osama bin Laden; and that still refuses to recognize the state
of Israel but did recognize the Taliban; and whose leaders still fund
anti-Semitic propaganda?.


I could go on and on.


Supporters of the UAE ports deal point out that this tiny Arab nation has a
mixed record on terrorism, and that right now they are cooperating with us more
than any other nation in the region. That would be a fine argument to make
during peacetime.


But during a time of war, there is no tolerance for "mixed records" or "close
calls" or "Emirates Formerly Known As Terror Sponsors." This is doubly true in
the UAE case, where the US Coast Guard warned that "intelligence gaps" kept it
from determining potential terrorism risks, particularly on issues involving
"the background of [UAE] employees, and foreign influence on their operations."


Despite all this, the Bush administration still put the UAE port deal on the
fast track and did not give it the full, mandatory 45-day review as required by
law.


Imagine FDR during World War II saying he would use his veto power to make sure
American ports were run by Vichy France. Imagine a president arguing during the
Cold War in favor of Soviet-occupied Poland overseeing our ports, since "it
doesn't really matter who operates the ports, anyway. The Coast Guard handles
all the security."

<snip>

Rest of column at jewishworldreview.com

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