Angela Davis, Thou Art Avenged

Tim Cavanaugh | October 20, 2005

A defense lawyer in the Saddam trial (not Saddam's own) has been kidnapped.

Comments

|10.20.05 @ 7:22PM|#

Who ever would have thought?

Time to pull out and let those backwards fuckheads marinate in their own ignorance and violence.

The best we can possibly hope for is to keep them out of our country. Terrorists will always be a dime a dozen over there, regardless of our pathetic attempts to modernize that shithole.

|10.20.05 @ 7:56PM|#

Spoken like a true reactionary asshole. You remind of all those mealy-mouthed Bush-Is-God-John Wayne-Fox News types who talked big imperialistic shit before we deployed to Al Anbar, and once the mortars and RPGs started finding our positions, needed an hourly change of underwear.

It must be nice to take a whole part of the planet Earth, and reduce thousands of years of history, a multitude of cultures, ethnic groups, and languages to an "evil Arab people" abstraction that makes it easier for your pea brain to easily dismiss the lies, death, destruction, and chaos our little "War Against WMDS ... ooops, Democracy" has wrought.

Terrorists are a dime a dozen over here, too, shithead. Timothy McVeigh, John Allen Muhammad, Malvo, Terry Nichols, Lee Harvey Oswald, the KKK, Aryan Nation, the Nation of Islam .... well, you get the drift.

"Don't You Love Our Western Ways?" --- The Clash, "Overpowered by Funk"

|10.20.05 @ 8:01PM|#

Sorry all. Please don't construe that last rant as a Michael Moore-type defense of Saddam. After seeing what he did to his people, I think slow, disemboweling would be too good for Hussein.

However, travel broadens one's scope ... and one's disgust of domestic, neocon assholes.

|10.20.05 @ 8:56PM|#

"However, travel broadens one's scope ... and one's disgust of domestic, neocon assholes."

What the hell are you implying? I'm hardly your standard issue ignorant and arrogant American. I've been more places than most people I know, and can objectively say that this has significantly decreased my level of ethnocentrism, but that doesn't mean that I think every culture is equally wonderful.

Excuse me for not caring about a group of people who routinely kill eachother over the differences in their barely distiguishable traditions. I'm hardly saying that they all need to die. Of course I'd prefer that they coexisted peacefully, but, given even a cursory glance at their history, I'd say that's pretty much a lost cause.

All I'm saying is that we shouldn't be there. Our presence won't civilize the barbarians that obviously are a significant proportion of the population. Excuse me, you "shithead," if that makes me a "true reactionary asshole."

As for your ugly desire to liken our culture to theirs: "B...b...but we have terrorists too!", note that the number of home-grown terrorists is comparatively miniscule, not to mention a virtual non-problem compared to them. We're what's called a "modern" society where terrorism is strongly rejected by the vast majority of the population, unlike Iraq (the real one, not the one in your dreams).

|10.20.05 @ 9:19PM|#

"note that the number of home-grown terrorists is comparatively miniscule"

Well, I feel so much better then!

TallDave|10.20.05 @ 9:30PM|#

This is like Johnny Cochrane getting kidnapped by OJ's kids.

|10.20.05 @ 9:36PM|#

Ghost,

Why don't you be thankful that virtually no one is lynched anymore in the US and hope that people stop being killed in Iraq for absurd reasons?

|10.20.05 @ 9:44PM|#

What the hell was that Angela Davis reference good for?

|10.20.05 @ 9:54PM|#

Good thing that our country has never been plagued by violent ideological extremists who hate modernity and want to reshape civilization.

Like, say, anarchists.

Like, say, Leon Czolgosz.

|10.20.05 @ 9:56PM|#

What about us?

|10.20.05 @ 9:59PM|#

andy sounded a bit more like a Buchanan style paleocon in his first post, not sure where you pulled neocon from BAI. Either you haven't quite understood the difference or it was an attempted slight of hand.

|10.20.05 @ 10:07PM|#

What about us?

|10.20.05 @ 11:25PM|#

We're what's called a "modern" society where terrorism is strongly rejected by the vast majority of the population, unlike Iraq (the real one, not the one in your dreams) (emphasis added)

Can you cite a survey or some kind of scientific data that suggests that the proportion of Iraqis opposed to terrorism is not greater than 50 percent? Maybe you can, but I was not aware of any data which substantiates that assertion.

And even if the assertion is correct, it does not follow that Iraq can not be made a free, stable country; with the rule of law, legal protection for individual rights, and all the rest; within the next few years and before US troops leave. Not everyone who is indifferent or in favor of terrorism will actually commit terrorist acts, and those who do will not all be united with eachother. A constitutionally limited government which is compelled to protect freedom and individuall rights does not need enthusiastic support from the population at large, just compliance. The majority might want the government to persecute certain people in some cases, but one of the main purposes of a constitution is to protect the individual from such majoritarian tyranny.

|10.21.05 @ 12:05AM|#

This is like Johnny Cochrane getting kidnapped by OJ's kids.

Given the small percentage of insurgents who are acutally Baathists, not spectacularly apt.

Just a question; was Saddam so evil that even his supporters were happy to see him go, or was he, like nearly every other tinpot dictator the world over, actually capable of engendering actual, honest-to-god loyalty among a segment of the population? You can't have it both ways.

|10.21.05 @ 1:05AM|#

Can we get a do-over on this thread?

|10.21.05 @ 9:18AM|#

Please explain the Angela Davis reference.

|10.21.05 @ 9:22AM|#

Still making jokes now that he's dead?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/21/AR2005102100294_pf.html

|10.21.05 @ 9:55AM|#

Sorry iw, no refunds on the discussion thread. We get we pay for, unless you're a loyal Reason subscriber like Mona-Janeita.

Though like Peter K., I need to get smartened up on the Angela Davis reference.

|10.21.05 @ 10:42AM|#

My moral relativism and unsubstantiated hysteria sensors are going off.

|10.21.05 @ 11:49AM|#

I have no idea about the Angela Davis reference, but damn, she had a great 'fro, didn't she?

As far as ethnocentrism goes, my world travels have actually confirmed for me how much I prefer American culture. Doesn't mean I want to go out and start killing others for not being like us, but I think you can take Andy's basic point to heart without going all nutso about it.

Tim Cavanaugh|10.21.05 @ 1:18PM|#

Am I the only one left who associates Angela Davis with kidnapped jurists? Maybe the headline should have read "Dr. Angela Davis, Thou Art Avenged" or "Angela Davis, Ph.D, Thou Art Avenged."

|10.21.05 @ 1:45PM|#

No, but Charles Manson offing a public defender to get a mistrial may have been a more likely choice. Davis, poor dear, only bought a shotgun used in a attempted escape from a courthouse.

Peter K.|10.21.05 @ 4:04PM|#

Dude, you stole my message board handle.