Robodex 2003 (via Max Power)

John Lloyd, ex-editor of the New Statesman, takes the British Left to task for their implicit support of Hussein. (In of all places, the Guardian)

A large part of the British left - and the left elsewhere - has made a fundamental mistake. In opposing the invasion of Iraq, it has shown itself incapable of thinking through not only the nature of the world as it is today, but also its own claims to be the leading force in making the world better. The more vehement sections of the left have succumbed to the comfort of violently rhetorical attacks on the US and have led the world in creating an image of Tony Blair and the Labour government as US poodles, incapable of articulating a British national interest.

The crimes of Saddam Hussein's regime - its support for terrorism, its aggression toward its neighbours and its brutality against its own people - are dismissed either by referring to the left's own past protests against it, or to reminders that a slew of western, especially American, political and corporate leaders did business with, and supported, that regime.
...
Will the end of the war and the effort to rebuild decent government in Iraq change the view of the left? It would seem unlikely: the anti-US reflex is too ingrained, the dislike of Blair too great.

Yet the left's programme now should be to argue in favour of committing resources to those multilateral agencies that work, and to seek agreement from those forces everywhere in the world that are committed to democratic (or at least more responsive) government and to an observation of human and civil rights. The aim, as the US political scientist Michael Walzer has put it, should be a "strong international system, organised and designed to defeat aggression, to stop massacres and ethnic cleansing, to control weapons of mass destruction and to guarantee the physical security of all the world's peoples".

Andew Breitbart has a good column on the obsequious fawning over Cuban 'President' for life, Fidel Castro, by the Hollywood Left.

Perhaps they don't know any better, as they return with Cuban cigars and fawning praise: "It was an experience of a lifetime" (Kevin Costner); "he is a genius" (Jack Nicholson); a "source of inspiration to the world" (Naomi Campbell). But people who should know better make the pilgrimage too. Director Steven Spielberg, founder of the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation and winner of an Academy Award for illuminating the horrors of the Holocaust, described his meeting with Castro in November as "the eight most important hours of my life." Never forget, indeed.

This week, as reported in Newsweek International's Global Buzz column, a pack of New York media VIPs, each willing to pony up $6,500 for travel costs, are set to jet to Cuba with Yoko Ono to meet with the Bearded One, just as his crackdown hits overdrive. Slate's blogger Mickey Kaus shrewdly comments: "It's especially ironic that press and publishing executives are paying an enormous premium to meet with a man who is busy jailing journalists and writers for being journalists and writers."

Just remember...43% of the population will believe any statistic you make up and 54.61% will believe it if you add extra decimal places to imply added precision (even if your margin of error is +/- 20%)

Arnold Kling outlines some of the steps required to revitalize the Iraqi economy.

The main point of this essay is to stress that the rapid privatization of assets is not a panacea. In the former Soviet Union, where the work ethic failed to take hold, the benefits of privatization were dissipated by criminal behavior and corruption. We should learn from that example in the reconstruction of Iraq. In order to work, capitalism requires ethical foundations. Only when the ethics of work, public service, and learning have been cultivated can we expect a successful conversion to a modern capitalist economy dominated by the private sector.

23nd New York International Orchid



Just an update to the post from yesterday. I went to the show yesterday afternoon and it was magnificent. It was also, amazingly, very un-crowded. It was much worse last year. Again, I strongly recommend that you go and walk through if you leave near NYC. For those of you who don't here are some other places to see some photos:

Internet Orchid Photo Encyclopedia
The Orchid Photo Page
The Complete Orchid Picture List
Orchid Mall List of Orchid Photo Sites

Victor Davis Hanson does a short fisking of MoDo.

I confess that her writing has long bothered me, always in times of national duress reflecting an elite superficiality that is out of touch with most of us in the America she flies over. It is not just that for the last two years she has been wrong about Afghanistan, wrong about the efficacy of the war against terror, and wrong about Iraq — despite yesterday's surprising sudden admission that "We were always going to win the war with Iraq." The problem is more a grotesque chicness that quite amorally juxtaposes mention of tidbits like alpha males, Manhattan fashion — and her own psychodramas — with themes of real tragedies like the dying in the Middle East and war's horror.
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It might be neat between cappuccinos to write about leaders getting "giddy" about winning a terrible war, or thinking up cool nicknames like "Rummy," "Wolfie," and titles like "Dances with Wolfowitz," but meanwhile out in the desert stink thousands of young Americans, a world away from the cynical Letterman world of Maureen Dowd, risk their lives to ensure that there are no more craters in her environs — and as a dividend give 26 million a shot at the freedom that she so breezily enjoys. (via Occam's Toothbrush)

Ouch!

Dave Barry makes a powerful argument for simplifying the tax code and proposes a way to get it done.

The question is: What can we, as citizens, do to reform our tax system? As you know, under our three-branch system of government, the tax laws are created by: Satan. But he works through the Congress, so that's where we must focus our efforts.

Here's my proposal, which is based on the TV show Survivor: We put the entire Congress on an island. All the food on this island is locked inside a vault, which can be opened only by an ordinary American taxpayer named Bob. Every day, the congresspersons are given a section of the Tax Code, which they must rewrite so that Bob can understand it. If he can, he lets them eat that day; if he can't, he doesn't.

Or, he can give them food either way. It doesn't matter. The main thing is, we never let them off the island.

I'm all for it, where do I sign?

Christopher Hitchens says all the anti-war slogans have been vindicated:

So it turns out that all the slogans of the anti-war movement were right after all. And their demands were just. "No War on Iraq," they said—and there wasn't a war on Iraq. Indeed, there was barely a "war" at all. "No Blood for Oil," they cried, and the oil wealth of Iraq has been duly rescued from attempted sabotage with scarcely a drop spilled. Of the nine oil wells set ablaze by the few desperadoes who obeyed the order, only one is still burning and the rest have been capped and doused without casualties. "Stop the War" was the call. And the "war" is indeed stopping. That's not such a bad record. An earlier anti-war demand—"Give the Inspectors More Time"—was also very prescient and is also about to be fulfilled in exquisite detail. (via new blogger, and old mystery writer Roger L. Simon)

Read the rest...

Kurdish fighters have seized Kirkuk. Normally I don't post this kind of stuff, leaving it for the folks at Command Post, but in this case I wanted to point out an interesting historical footnote. In many writings and interviews, Saddam is said to have viewed himself as a modern day Saladin, the Muslim leader who united much of the Arab world and retook Jerusalem from the Crusaders and who is considered one of the greatest Muslim leaders in history. Unlike Saddam, however, Saladin was reputed to be a fair and magnanimous leader. Someone who united the Arabs rather than massacred them, who earned the respect of Richard the III who surrendered Jerusalem on the condition that Christians be given free passage to it.

This quote from Writer Rene Grousse, should indicate Saddam's complete lack of resemblance to Saladin.

"It is equally true that his generosity, his piety, devoid of fanaticism, that flower of liberality and courtesy which had been the model of our old chroniclers, won him no less popularity in Frankish Syria than in the lands of Islam"

Oh, and by the way, the reason for this post ... Saladin was a Kurd.

Michelle has a fine little rant about the claims of the loony left that the scenes of jubilation in Baghdad yesterday were all staged, part of a huge US propaganda plot. Keep this in mind when the fighting is over and the coalition forces turn their attention to finding Saddam's WMD stashes. The groundwork is already being laid that any such finds will be US plants. Remember to believe that Iraq has no WMD you have to believe that such weapons which were unaccounted for in 1998 when Iraq expelled inspectors were destroyed subsequently and that while out from under the inspectors eye in the intervening 5 years no new weapons were manufactured. And you would believe this because of... Saddam's great respect for international accords?

Lileks is in top form today with a column on Iraqi liberation.

I’m not stupid enough to think that we’ve just created a nation of 22 million wannabe Americans. But tonight parents can look down at their children in bed and believe they will have better lives. Not just hope for it, but believe it. Some of us call that the American Dream - hold the scare quotes, please - and we pray for the day when it’s no longer an American concept but a universal birthright.

Whatever you think we should do to get to that point, you have to admit that the sound of a cast-iron skull striking the pavement is a good way to start. And if you don’t it’s because you see some other false god on the podium, pointing at an empty heaven.

Men never seem taller than when they stand next to the prone remainders of a toppled tyrant. Someone someday will do a study of the statues the West pulled down. How they all showed a hard face to the dawn. How they all fell face first.

23nd New York International Orchid

For those of you who live in or near NYC, the annual Orchid Show at Rockefeller Center begins today. I have a modest collection of orchids which I raise (I will post some photos on the site soon as many are starting to bloom). They are truly wonderously beautiful things as you will see if you manage to get to the show. I will be going this afternoon.

PS. Also check out the orchid photos at Miguel Octavio's site, Devil's Excrement. He lives in Venezuela where he can keep them outside and has a huge collection of about 1500. I keep mine in a solarium in my house so I only have about 60.

Andrew Sullivan has a nice collection of war predictions.

VON HOFFMAN AWARD II: "In Baghdad the coalition forces confront a city apparently determined on resistance. They should remember Napoleon in Moscow, Hitler in Stalingrad, the Americans in Mogadishu and the Russians at Grozny. Hostile cities have ways of making life ghastly for aggressors. They are not like countryside. They seldom capitulate, least of all when their backs are to the wall. It took two years after the American withdrawal from Vietnam for Saigon to fall to the Vietcong. Kabul was ceded to the warlords only when the Taleban drove out of town. In the desert, armies fight armies. In cities, armies fight cities. The Iraqis were not stupid. They listened to Western strategists musing about how a desert battle would be a pushover. Things would get 'difficult' only if Saddam played the cad and drew the Americans into Baghdad. Why should he do otherwise?" - Simon Jenkins, the Times of London, in an article called - yes! - "Baghdad Will Be Near Impossible to Conquer," March 28.

Duh!

"We discovered that all what the (Iraqi) information minister was saying was all lies," said Ali Hassan, a government employee in Cairo, Egypt. "Now no one believes Al-Jazeera anymore." (via Right Thinking)

He may or may not be dead, but Saddam is still posting to his blog:

:: Wednesday, April 09, 2003 ::

Okay, I will admit to having suffered some... "minor" setbacks during the last several hours. But this is merely a temporary situation while I and my forces, who I am sure are still out there somewhere, regroup. For the time being I am staying here, where I am safe for the moment. Please forgive me I fail to share my actual location with you, my friends and fellow members of the Micheal Moore fan club. Incidentally, I found his website, but does anyone have an email address for Mikey? I want to see if he has a room I can rent for a couple of months. It would be purely temporary, you understand.
Then we'll drive the invading hordes from our borders. And you can be damn sure I'm charging 'em for those statues they destroyed. And I'm not talking about some kind of depreciation value nonsense here. They're paying full replacement cost.
Then we'll invade the US and free the American people so that I may enslave them.
And when we get there, I've got dibs on Britney Spears....
:: Saddam "No Nukes" Hussein 9:18 PM [+] ::

Jonathan at As It Should Be has a very interesting essay defending the virtue of selfishness and decrying the vice of sacrifice.

Brent at The Ville has scored an interview with David Horowitz, founder of Frontpage magazine.

Michael Lewis offers suggestions on how to properly annoy the French.

From Scrappleface:

Looting Suddenly Stops in Baghdad

(2003-04-09) -- The looting in Baghdad stopped suddenly today as Iraq's largest organized crime family disappeared from the city.

Thousands of Baghdad residents entered government buildings in an attempt to retrieve some small portion of what had been stolen from them for the past 24 years.

"I got a big vase from one of Uday's offices," said one local woman. "It can never replace the family members Saddam took from me, but all of this stuff belongs to the people and it was taken from us without our permission."

David McWilliams has an excellent editorial in the Irish Sunday Post defending Pax Americana.

In 1948 a civil war erupted between the Muslim and non-Muslim peoples of this region. Historically,the smaller non-Muslim group had lived in peace with their majority neighbours, but in 1948 they seized their chance. The newly founded UN, based on an earlier British promise, gave them a new state. As the civil war raged and pogroms ensued, ethnic cleansing on a monumental scale erupted.

The British did what they did best, and partitioned the country. The majority Muslim areas of the protectorate were divided in two - a large Muslim state and a small sliver of over-populated land created, wedged between the mountains and the sea. This small pathetic piece of land is now among the poorest places in the world, characterised by desperation and Islamic fundamentalism.

The bigger Muslim entity was cut off from its hinterland, with only tiny access to the ocean. Beside it, a new, democratic but non-Muslim state emerged, absorbing displaced refugees from far and wide. These two states have been involved in three major wars since 1948. The borders are today the most heavily policed in the world, with two huge standing armies eyeballing each other over disputed territory.

Where am I talking about? No, it's not Israel and Palestine. It is the far more worrying conflict between India and Pakistan.
Peace between these two huge states, and the attendant economic development in the region (particularly in India), is just one huge positive of the current United States grand plan - which is being sorely tested by the war in Iraq and the subsequent European reaction. It would be wise to recap how positive, in comparison to other historic hegemonies, the American leadership of the world has been.
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By providing security for Britain, France, Germany and Japan, by defending their interests in far-flung places like the Gulf, and by intricately involving them in a system of mutually enhancing alliances, Washington prevented any of the old powers from ploughing their own furrow. This global policy, which is known as "reassurance", has cost the Americans billions of dollars. It has also facilitated unprecedented levels of economic, political and social cooperation among the states of western Europe with the EU and east Asia with ASEAN. Make no mistake, without the US security blanket, the EU would never have evolved into the peaceful structure it is now, of which Ireland is a member and from which it benefits greatly.
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Underneath this American military umbrella, the economies of Europe and Asia have flourished at unprecedented rates. The system that the US has fostered has led to enormous improvements in the standard of living for most of us. Politically, Ireland has been able to express itself in Europe, feeling like an equal at the top table. Do you think this would have been possible in an EU dominated by the military aspirations of France, Britain, Germany, Italy or Spain? No way, Jose.

Our increase in living standards has been the result of cherry-picking from both the European and American way. By attracting foreign investment on the one hand, and taking advantage of the European pool of savings on the other, we have profited in ways unimaginable only a few years ago.We have moved from a society of emigrants to one of immigrants. Historically, this has always been a good sign. The technology transfer from the US to Ireland has also been unprecedented in the past few years. All this has been possible because of, not in spite of, American hegemony. (via RWN)

Read the whole thing...

Lee Harris defends something that you would not think needed defending, "heroic decency".

For the past couple of days, ever since I heard about him, I have been thinking about Mohammed.

This is the name that has been given to the man who guided American Special Forces to the hospital in which Jessica Lynch was being held by the Iraqis, and where, without Mohammed's intervention, it is quite probable that she would have died, alone and terrified.

We all owe Mohammed our profoundest gratitude. Not merely for saving the life of one of our soldiers and one of our daughters, but for demonstrating the immense difference that the heroic decency of one single man can make.


Heroic decency has an odd ring to our ears, and well it should have. Decency, in our world, is taken for granted; it marks the standard by which our conduct is judged to be adequate and acceptable, and certainly not the standard by which it is judged to be heroic and inspiring. If we fail to be decent, we are rightly condemned; but if we just manage to be decent, no one thinks to praise us. And why should they? We live in a society where acts of decency usually cost us little or nothing.

Mohammed and his family do not live in such a society. And that is what made his act heroic. Because in the Iraq governed by Saddam Hussein and his henchmen, the simple act of saving a fellow human being from pointless and unmerited suffering is regarded not as an act of humanity, but as an act of treason. And far from costing Mohammed nothing, such simple decency could have easily have cost him the lives of his own children. And that is what makes it heroic. How many of us would have done the same?

Read the rest...

John Hawkins has a collection of quotes about the 'Iraqi quagmire' at RWN. Here's a sample:

- "'Rumsfeld says we can't write the history yet. Perhaps, but I think we're close. The US-British plan was to blow up small bits of Baghdad and fool the Iraqis into believing they had the resolve to actually fight a war. They weren't fooled. Both sides dug in, to a stalemate. Eventually the American-led force withdrew, after thousands of casualties at the hands of terrorists from all over the Middle East, leaving Iraq to be ruled by a strengthened Ba'ath Party. In the aftermath, the world lost its last remaining superpower (which was mostly a public relations idea in the end)" -- Dave Winer on March 28, 2003.

US congressman Dennis Kucinich has proposed the creation of a "US Department of Peace" to be headed by a cabinet-level official.

The proposed legislation calls for a department that would advocate non-violence and peace education. It would support international disarmament treaties and help resolve potentially violent conflicts around the world, Kucinich said.

The Department of Peace would also promote non-violence as an organizing principle in our society, and would generally seek to "help to create the conditions for a more peaceful world," he said.

And this is different from the Department of State how? Just what we need another large federal bureaucracy to suck in tax dollars and issue memos critical of the US. Isn't that what the UN is for? I can't wait to hear the rest of Kucinich's presidential platform. Let's just hope he gets the nomination, can you say 'Dukakis'?

Perhaps he was visited by the ghost of Michael Kelly, but Richard Cohen actually has a sensible column today in the WaPo.

Just recently the government of Fidel Castro arrested about 80 dissidents and almost instantly brought them to trial -- if it can be called that. Foreign journalists and diplomats were excluded from the proceedings, in which 12 of the accused face life sentences. All of them are undoubtedly guilty of seeking greater freedom and on occasion meeting with visiting human rights activists. In Cuba, those are crimes.

Castro is probably relying on the fact that the United States is occupied elsewhere, and as usual, he needs scapegoats to blame for the dismal state of the Cuban economy. But he can rely also on the unswerving naivete and obtuseness of the American left, which consistently has managed to overlook what a goon he is. Instead, it concentrates on his willingness to meet with American intellectuals and chatter long into the night. He is, apparently, good company.
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So I would like to hear some moral outrage about Castro. I would like to see the vilification of Cuban Americans cease. They have as much right to lobby the government as do, say, Jewish Americans on behalf of Israel or Greek Americans on behalf of Greece. I'd like to see anyone interrupt one of Fidel's marathon soliloquies to ask about human rights violations.

Fidel Castro is a thug and a fool. Those are constants, unaffected by an inconsistent U.S. embargo -- why Cuba and not China? -- or by the fact that some of his American opponents are political troglodytes. To someone in a Cuban jail, it hardly matters that Castro reads books or that he gushes revolutionary rhetoric -- goop about "the people." The people are impoverished and oppressed. (via Eleven Day Empire)

James DiBenedetto is referring to Saddam as Schroedinger's Tyrant since he is simultaneously being reported dead and alive. Mmmm, physics joke.

Amish Tech Support defends Iraqi's letting off a little steam in a fine, full-flavoured rant:

These people have been taught to hate America and Jews for 12 years.
They have had all their country's wealth spent on Saddam's splendor, nothing on them unless they licked his boots.
They have been murdered, tortured, and rapes by the thousands by Saddam.
They are hostages to their own despot-ruler.
Bush 41 and Clinton wussed out when it came to freeing them from Saddam, instead just tossing a few weapons and ignoring the calls for help when Saddam's pathetic troops massacred them.
Babies have been kept in freezers so that they can be counted multiple times for the UN nitwits to count.
People are unburied out of cemeteries and put on display or tossed about as "carnage" of Coalition attacks.
They have been lied to for 12 years how the world views them as a people.

Suddenly free, without the despot's evil laws around their throat, without the world nattering about and arguing itself into stalemate about freeing them, they go a bit wild.

the rest...

Carnival of the Vanities is up at Solonor.

James Taranto has this excerpt from a September interview with Scott Ritter about the children's prison which was just liberated.

The prison in question is at the General Security Services headquarters, which was inspected by my team in Jan. 1998. It appeared to be a prison for children--toddlers up to pre-adolescents--whose only crime was to be the offspring of those who have spoken out politically against the regime of Saddam Hussein. It was a horrific scene. Actually I'm not going to describe what I saw there because what I saw was so horrible that it can be used by those who would want to promote war with Iraq, and right now I'm waging peace.

Now my question is, like the UN inspectors who refused to give asylum to the people who ran to their cars a few months ago, did it ever occur to any of these UN employees to issue a formal protest about a prison which housed toddlers to pre-adolescents? I guess as long as the UN got their cut from administering the Food-for-Oil program they were content.

Update: Read Lileks comments today on the children's prison.

Russell Wardlow (aka Mean Mr Mustard), suggests a new way to deal with Saddam (if he isn't already dead). I think it violates the Geneva Convention though.

GREETINGS AND GOOD DAY MISTER SADDAM HUSSEIN!

I REALIZE YOU ARE BUSIED MAN WITH COALITION FORCES AND THEIR BOMBINGS AND SOLDIERS KNOCKING AT THE STEP OF YOUR DOOR, BUT ALLOW ME TO INTRODUCE MYSELF: I AM GEORGE BUSH OF WASHINGTON D.C. IN THE AMERICAN UNITED STATES, AND I AM MAILING YOU WITH UTMOST CONFIDENTIAL AND TOP SECRET BUSINESS PROPOSITION OF GREATEST MAGNITUDE TO BE PROSECUTED WITH REQUIRING MAXIMUM CONFIDENCE.

WE ARE TOP OFFICIAL OF UNITED STATES FEDERAL GOVERNMENT WHO ARE INTERESTED IN REMOVAL OF FUNDS FROM HIGHEST CONGRESS BUDGET MONIES TO INTERNATIONAL AREA. IN ORDER TO COMMENCE THIS BUSINESS WE SOLICIT YOUR ASSISTANCE TO ENABLE US TRANSFER INTO YOUR ACCOUNT THE SAID TRAPPED FUNDS.

THE SOURCE OF THIS FUND IS AS FOLLOWS: DURING THE LAST REGIME OF UNITED STATES HERE IN AMERICA, GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS MAKED MANY CONTRACTS BEING OVER-INVOICED IN VARIOUS COMMITTEES. THE PRESENT CITIZEN GOVERNMENT SET UP A PANEL OF REVIEW AND WE ARE HAVING IDENTIFIED MANY INFLATED BUDGET MONIES WHICH ARE CURRENTLY NOW FLOATING IN UNITED STATESIAN CENTRAL BANK OF AMERICA FOR PAYMENT.

Read the Rest...

The WaPo has an interesting profile of Paul Wolfowitz, one of the primary architects of the administration's Iraq policy.

Fred is amazingly rant-free this week. In fact he is sounds downright Arnold Kling-like as he discusses copyright issues.

James Taranto reports in Best of the Web that the story about Martin Savidge that Max referenced a few days ago was a hoax.

Now this is as stupid as the idiotic 'Freedom Fries' nonsense. German linguists want Germans to use French words in place of their popular English equivalents in protest at the war with Iraq.

A campaign launched by the group Language in Politics proposed swapping English words such as "ticket" with "billet" or "briefing" with "communiqué".

Prof Armin Burkhardt of Magdeburg University, who heads the group, said: "This is a political demonstration through language against a war that we don't support," adding that he had no intention of encouraging German-French separatism. (via Command Post)

And why don't they just use German words?

Joke of the Day

A lady came up to me on the street, pointed at my suede jacket and said, "Don't you know a cow was murdered for that jacket?" I said "I didn't know there were any witnesses. Now I'll have to eliminate you too".

Matt Ridley defends new technologies against the neo-Luddites of the world in the Guardian.

If you debate the new genetics in Europe and America these days you get asked the same question in two different ways. The average European says, with dread: "How do we stop people doing x?" The average American says with excitement: "When will I be able to do x?" For x, read "test myself for future dementia risk," "change my unborn children's genes," or even "fill my blood vessels with nano-robots to enable me to live to 150".

To the jaded European palate, the American attitude seems silly and irresponsible. Caution should be the watchword for all new technology. I beg to differ. I think the American optimism is necessary and responsible. It is the European pessimists who are in danger of causing real harm. Caution has risks, too.
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I am not arguing that all new technologies are risk free. Reproductive cloning, for example, carries a 30% risk of producing a bodily deformity, 15 times the normal rate. To use this technology on human beings is wrong precisely because it is unsafe.
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For the past century the world has got steadily better for most people. You do not believe that? I am not surprised. You are fed such a strong diet of news about how bad things are that it must be hard to believe they were once worse. But choose any statistic you like and it will show that the lot of even the poorest is better today than it was in 1903. Longevity is increasing faster in the poor south than in the rich north. Infant mortality is lower in Asia than ever before. Decade by decade per-capita food production is rising.

Here at home, we are healthier, wealthier and wiser than ever before. Pollution has declined; prosperity increased; options opened.

All this has been achieved primarily by that most hated of tricks, the technical fix. By invention, not legislation.

My point? Simply this: if you asked intellectuals at almost any time since Malthus to talk about the future, they would have been pessimistic and they would have been wrong. The future (actual) has consistently proved better than the future (forecast).

(via The Agitator)

There is a very interesting interview with philosopher Andre Glucksmann.

Europe is trapped by complacency and an all too human desire for oblivious contentment, says a leading French philosopher. This helps ensure the success of the nihilistic terror and extremist ideology exemplified by al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein. Nobody wants war – but genocide is worse than war.
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Socrates asked: what do a beautiful woman, a beautiful vase and a beautiful bed have in common? His answer: the idea of beauty. My question is: what do extremist ideologies like the communism or Nazism of yesteryear and the Islamism of today have in common? After all, they support ostensibly very different ideals – the superior race, mankind united in socialism, the community of Muslim believers (the Umma). Tomorrow, it could be altogether different ideals: some theological, some scientific, others racist. But the common characteristic is nihilism.

The root element is the attitude that anything goes, particularly when with regard to ordinary people: I can do whatever I want, without scruples. Goehring put it like this: my consciousness is Adolf Hitler. Bolsheviks said: man is made of iron. And the Islamists whom I visited in Algeria said that you have the right to kill little Muslim children, in order to save them.