Department of Book Reports

Afghanistan-A Book Review of The Places In Between

Afghanistan has always seemed a remote and mysterious place to me. I knew a little, a very little, of its history, a history that has been wrapped up with many other places and cultures, including the Greeks (Alexander stopped in while on his way to India), the Persians, the Mughuls, the British, the Russians and now ourselves. I knew that in the initial Sherlock Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet, Holmes was able to deduce that Watson had recently served there during the Second Afghan War. I grew up in a predominantly Jewish suburb in Los Angeles (ok, it was Encino, have your chuckle and get over it). So while in the sixth grade when an Afghani family moved there and the fraternal twins, Khan and Shari became my classmates, they seemed exotic and I was curious... I'd ask them questions about their homeland and about Islam, but they were secular Muslims, and really didn't know much about their religion and I doubt that they attended mosque. They seemed to be more interested in being adolescents, which seemed to be the right thing to be interested in. I knew it was a region that always resisted its conquerors, that the Russian attempts at subjugating the area ultimately played a large role in the fall of the Soviet Union. And I knew it was the country the U.S. invaded, driving out the Taliban, in our "search" for Bin Laden, the country where Pat Tillman, the man the Bush administration wanted to turn into a poster boy for its agenda, but inconveniently was thwarted in doing so.

Fortunately, the many holes in my ignorance of Afghanistan, the Mid-East, and its cultures and peoples have been very ably filled by Rory Stewart in The Places In Between (Harvest Books $14.00) paperback. (The slide show at the site is fascinating).
Stewart is an inveterate walker. Previous to his Afghan adventure, he had spent sixteen months walking across Iran, Pakistan, India and Nepal.
With the fall of the Taliban, he thought he could complete his Asian sojourn by walking from Herat, on the Afghan western border near Iran, to Kabul, close to the Afghan border with Pakistan. In January of 2002, after cajoling Afghan officials, dealing with its security forces, and being told that such a walking tour was too dangerous, that he would be killed along the way if he left, Stewart did depart, becoming the new government's "first tourist". And it was dangerous. The Taliban though routed from Kabul, still controlled many areas, towns and roads. Winter was arriving and the mountainous roads could get very cold... On his way Stewart encountered tribal chieftains, Taliban, Sunnis, Sh'ia. All had stories about the Russians, the Taliban and, now, the Americans. (Although Scots, himself, he was often mistaken for being from America.)
He was also adopted by a mastiff that Stewart named Babur, the first Mughal emperor of the early 16th century. Babur himself is an interesting minor character. This man had written his memoir and had followed the same route that Stewart himself planned to travel. Stewart wisely gives us excerpts from Babur's travelogue along the same path and the observations are still insightful.
Stewart's own writing is graceful and clear. Though he is not sure why he is undertaking this journey, he probably express his mission best when he tells the newly installed leader in Herat, "...I am hoping to show my people what a wonderful place Afghanistan is." With an emphasis on the wonder, he succeeds.

The General here. I've asked SeattleDan and SeattleTammy to do book reports on Saturdays so that you can witness for yourself just how cunningly seditious mystery and non-fiction writerslamunistofascists can be.

I've also urged them to remind readers that they can buy these books by ordering them from SeattleDan and SeattleTammy at Jackson Street Books in the hope that they'll become rich enough to afford to become Republicans.

Of course, if you'd rather support a giant mega-corporation rather than a small independent book store owned by a couple of francohippies, you can order it through this Amazon link. I love Amazon, mostly because they give me a kickback when you purchase through that link, but also because I look forward to the day when they and Wal-Mart control all the book sales in our great nation. We'll all be on the same page then, by God.

D'Souza in the sky with diamonds

Mr. D'Souza replies yet again:

From: dineshjdsouza@aol.com
To: jcchristian@charter.net
Sent: Friday, January 19, 2007 1:54 PM
Subject: Re: Disappointed fan

But I don't have leopard print carpet in my den. Are you on drugs or something?

DD

My response,

Dear DD,

I hope it's ok to call you DD rather than Mr. D'Souza. I was touched by your concern about my possible drug use and am beginning to view you as a friend.

Your concern is unfounded. I do not use illegal drugs. In fact, the only drug I use regularly is a prescription medication called Oxycontin. I take it to relieve the pain I suffer from a pilonidal cyst (a big boil in the area of the, uh, "tailbone." It's a stress related disorder I acquired when I learned that Congress was considering reinstituting the draft. I understand that Rush Limbaugh suffers from the same affliction for similar reasons.

Other than the 25-30 prescription (well, it's somebody's prescription, anyway) Oxycontin tablets I melt down and shoot every day and the Viagra I use when I vacation alone in places like the Dominican Republic, my life is completely drug free.

Well, enough about me and Mr. Limbaugh. I accept your denial of the allegations that your home office is lined with "wall-to-wall leopard-print carpet." I should have realized that inasmuch as it was printed in the San Diego Reader, a MSM rag, the charge is likely to be just as phony as AP's source in Iraq's Ministry of Interior, Capt. Jamil Hussein. My guess is that the liberal media planted that story in the hope that our Islamunistofascist cultural allies would be fooled into thinking that you're a sexual libertine and, therefore, attack you.

Please accept my apologies for being fooled, myself. I'd like to make it up to you by inviting you over to the compound for a weekend. We'll drink beer, eat Frito pie, and punch each other in the shoulders like men do with their man friends. Then we'll dress up in gladiator outfits and watch Ben Hur and Spartacus, and maybe even Gladiator if I can get that goo off the DVD. After that, if you're up for it, I'd like to honor you in the only way a warrior may truly honor another warrior--that is to wrestle naked in the ancient manner of our Spartan philosophical forefathers until one of us establishes dominance over the other by driving his mighty shaft of supreme manliness into the other's cavern of shame.

Or we could just have pizza down at the mall.

Heterosexually yours,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

Previous exchanges with Mr. D'Souza

My original email to him.

His reply and my response.

Mr. D'Souza responds to my email

Dinesh replies to my email:

From: dineshjdsouza@aol.com
To: jcchristian@charter.net
Sent: Friday, January 19, 2007 4:56 AM
Subject: Re: Disappointed fan

Some crackpot is sending me emails and using your email address. Just thought you'd like to know.

best, Dinesh D'Souza

My response:

Dear Mr. D'Souza,

Thank you for alerting me to this. I suspect Nancy Pelosi is behind it. I'm fairly certain she's also the one who has been sending me disgusting, yet strangely arousing, photos in emails with subject lines like "Col. Oliver North Takes One in the Foxhole" and "Bill O'Reilly in The Falafels of October." She's trying to silence me by making me a target of our islamunistofascist cultural allies. Please forward the forged emails you received so I can compare them to the ones she sent me.

Was I was wrong about you? I assumed that you were responsible for choosing the leopard print carpet in your den. Now, I'm wondering if the carpet was laid without your knowledge, perhaps by one of America's enemies like Keith Olbermann, in an effort to discredit you. If that's the case, please accept my apologies.

Heterosexually yours,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

Update: Dinesh and I are now pen pals. I'll post his latest response sometime tonight.

Dinesh D'Souza caused 9/11

Dinesh D'Souza
Head Scribe, The House Of Scaife

Dear Mr. D'Souza,

I've been a big fan of your work since the eighties, back when you seized the English language for conservatism and made it safe to hurl racial slurs on campus once again. Needless to say, I couldn't wait to read your latest book, The Enemy At Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11. It was encouraging to see someone finally blame sexually permissive liberals for the acts of terror we experienced on that terrible day.

Sadly, my respect for you was shattered today when I learned that you are a hypocrite. You betrayed yourself when you allowed a reporter to see your carpet. Its leopard print design is the same as that favored by the most morally suspect Hollywood celebrities, stars like Liz Taylor, Rip Taylor, and Twiggy. Obviously, your carpet preference serves as proof that you suffer from some twisted need to engage in all manner of unspeakable acts of perversion--acts so vile, a very disgusted Jesus commanded Saddam bin Laden to take out the Twin Towers and the Pentagon.

Someday, you'll pay for your perversity. I just hope God isn't politically correct, because I want to hurl slurs down to you as you toil in Hell.

Heterosexually yours,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

Del. Hargrove discovers another use for his whacking stick

Frank Hargrove
Virginia House of Delegates

Dear Delegate Hargrove,

I salute you, sir. It takes a lot of courage to stand up on Martin Luther King Day and tell the brown people of your state that they just need to get over that whole slavery thing. That's especially true in these times when the white Christian male suffers from so much persecution.

That act alone is enough to earn you a spot in your local heritage appreciation society's Great Hall of Kleagles. But you didn't stop there; you went on to indict the Jews for murdering Jesus.

It was a shrewd move on your part. By doing so, you angered one of the Jewish delegates, causing him to accidentally betray their greatest weakness, a weakness you then immediately announced to the world: Jews have thin skin.

Now that you know their weakness, you can use it against them. All you need to do is take your brown people whacker--the stick you use to beat uppity brown people when they try to drink from your water fountains or complain about the deer heads you stuff in their mail boxes--and turn it into a Jew poker, just like the ones your ancestors used in the old country.

Heterosexually yours,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

A helmet tip to commenter ThomasAllen.

Giftcard balance?

Do you receive one of those visa gift cards for Christmas and don't want to hassle with the $4.27 balance left on it. Consider contributing to one of the Presidential candidates at the General's Act Blue site (I haven't contributed yet, because I'm waiting for my aluminum redemption check, but when I get it, I'll pony up too).

Blue Hampshire tells you how to check your balance.

Of course, I'm hoping that Our Leader uses his secret Article II powers to seize a third term, but if he'd rather go into retirement so he can watch cartoons full time, I'll settle for some other Republican.

That said, a Republican victory would be worth little if we did't defeat the most dangerous of our enemies, John Edwards and Al Gore. That's why I've placed them on my Act Blue Page. Our triumph will be all the sweeter if we defeat well funded opponents.

John Edwards is at the forefront in questioning Our Leader's New Economic Order. If he wins, our betters, people like Paris Hilton and Donald Trump, will no longer receive the governmental advantages so generously provided by Our Leader.

Al Gore is no better. His treason lies in his commitment to the words found on an ancient piece of paper called the Bill of Rights. He believes that such things as torture, the denial of habeas corpus,warrantlesss wiretaps, and even Our Glorious War to Resubjugate Brown People are criminal acts.

If you don't like these candidates,

Of course, you're always welcome to go the paypal donation to Jesus' General route (see sidebar) so I can get my Cheetoes on while I wait for that check.

The wussification of America

I think most of you know that I monitor Radio France to gather evidence of their sedition to use on The Great Day of the Rope. Well today, Sam Seder read the following story about Our Republican Lord and Savior and then spent the rest of his show mocking good, manly Christians like myself.

The strobe lights pulse and the air vibrates to a killer rock beat. Giant screens show mayhem and gross-out pranks: a car wreck, a sucker punch, a flabby (and naked) rear end, sealed with duct tape.

Brad Stine runs onstage in ripped blue jeans, his shirt untucked, his long hair shaggy. He's a stand-up comic by trade, but he's here today as an evangelist, on a mission to build up a new Christian man -- one profanity at a time. "It's the wuss-ification of America that's getting us!" screeches Stine, 46.

A moment later he adds a fervent: "Thank you, Lord, for our testosterone!"

It's an apt anthem for a contrarian movement gaining momentum on the fringes of Christianity. In daybreak fraternity meetings and weekend paintball wars, in wilderness retreats and X-rated chats about lust, thousands of Christian men are reaching for more forceful, more rugged expressions of their faith.

Stine's daylong revival meeting, which he calls "GodMen," is cruder than most. But it's built around the same theory as the other experimental forums: Traditional church worship is emasculating.

Hold hands with strangers? Sing love songs to Jesus? No wonder pews across America hold far more women than men, Stine says. Factor in the pressure to be a "Christian nice guy" -- no cussing, no confrontation, in tune with the wife's emotions -- and it's amazing men keep the faith at all.

"We know men are uncomfortable in church," says the Rev. Kraig Wall, 52, who pastors a small church in Franklin, Tenn. -- and is at GodMen to research ways to reach the husbands of his congregation. His conclusion: "The syrup and the sticky stuff is holding us down." John Eldredge, a seminal writer for the movement, goes further in "Wild At Heart," his bestselling book. "Christianity, as it currently exists, has done some terrible things to men," he writes. Men "believe that God put them on earth to be a good boy."

Says Christian radio host Paul Coughlin, author of "No More Christian Nice Guy": "The idea of Jesus as meek and mild is as fictitious as anything in Dan Brown's 'Da Vinci Code.'"

At one point a patriot called in and took Seder to task for defending pink-tied girlymenislamunistofascists. Seder responded by asking if the man ever felt like he was becoming a little feminized, and, well, you have to hear the call for yourself. Here it is with a few photos and video clips added for your enjoyment:



Elsewhere: The argument over whether AM or FM draws the most Neanderthals continues.

Good wishes for Jane

Jane Hamsher is truely one of the nicest, most decent persons I've met through blogging. I wish I were a believer so I could pray for her tonight. Hopefully, my respect and friendship for her will serve in prayer's stead.

Immorality in our Northern Forests

Bryan Fischer
Idaho Values Alliance

Dear Pastor Fischer,

When I first read about Gov. Otter's plan to slaughter 85% of Idaho's endangered wolf population, I worried that he might not have the political muscle needed to pull it off. Sure, he has the backing of such powerful groups as the Idaho Woolgrowers and the Idaho Cattle Association, but what about our lord, Jesus Christ; where does He stand on the issue?

Thankfully, I didn't have to wait long before you stepped forward with the Lord's answer:

The Judeo-Christian tradition teaches us that man has a God-given authority to manage animal populations for the benefit of the human family, and Christian compassion directs us to use that authority to provide maximum protection from predatory animals to Idaho families who make their living through farming and ranching.

I'll have to admit that you had me a little worried there with all that franco-Jesus talk about compassion, but you later cleared it up with some good old angry God preaching from Leviticus:

The book of Leviticus contains part of the civil code for the ancient nation of Israel. In a section toward the end, God, speaking through Moses, identifies the results of obedience in the nation's life and compares them to the consequences of disobedience.

He says, "If you follow my decrees and are careful to obey my commands...I will remove savage beasts from the land...But if you will not listen to me...and reject my decrees and abhor my laws...I will send wild animals against you, and they will rob you of your children, (and) destroy your cattle ..." (Leviticus 26:3, 6, 14, 22)

In other words, one sign that a nation is operating under an open heaven and with the blessing of God is that its people will have little to fear from predatory animals. On the other hand, one sign that God is withdrawing his favor from a land due to its rejection of him is that the nation must once again confront the threat to life and livestock posed by predatory creatures from the wild.

I'm afraid, however, that you're letting the wolves off the hook here, at least as far as responsibility goes. Have you considered the possibility that the people's wickedness is something they've learned from the wolves? Think about it. Alpha male wolves take multiple wives. They're just as bad as the Mormons. What kind of example is that for our children? The sight of these alpha males engaging in adultery all over the woods has to affect them. If we don't wipe the wolves from Idaho's forests, we will be cursed with a generation of fornicators.

I hope you will consider adopting this message as part of your communication strategy on wolves. I think it would mesh nicely with all of your other messaging efforts.

Heterosexually yours,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

A helmet tip to commenter kt.

The Ballad of the Yellow Berets

By commenter Democommie:

The Ballad of the Yellow Beret
(to the tune of "The Ballad of the Green Berets")

We are tough, young Republicans
We fight with words (but never guns)
We show support by drinking beer.
But since we’re rich we’ll stay right here.

(chorus)
Chicken wings suit me just fine
They go so well with my yellow spine
I’ll ply my trade while you’re overseas
When you return, your job will speak Chinese

I’m like my grandpop and my dad,
Those terrorist bastards make me mad;
But I’m a Stanford B-school grad;
So I’ll not be going to Baghdad

(Chorus)
Chicken wings suit me just fine
They go so well with my yellow spine
The poor man’s born to join the fray
I was born rich, I’ll get an MBA

I just can’t share the poor man’s fate
Cause at the Frat House hot babes wait
Just like Dubya I get “C’s”,
And like Dick, I got “Priorities”

(Chorus)
Chicken wings suit me just fine
They go so well with my yellow spine
We strut like cocks in our “Old School” halls
We’re really hens, we’re lacking balls

Crossposted to Operation Yellow Elephant

MLK's other message...

is still just as valid today:

...I am as deeply concerned about our troops there as anything else. For it occurs to me that what we are submitting them to in Vietnam is not simply the brutalizing process that goes on in any war where armies face each other and seek to destroy. We are adding cynicism to the process of death, for they must know after a short period there that none of the things we claim to be fighting for are really involved. Before long they must know that their government has sent them into a struggle among Vietnamese, and the more sophisticated surely realize that we are on the side of the wealthy and the secure while we create hell for the poor.

Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor of America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home and death and corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as an American to the leaders of my own nation. The great initiative in this war is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours.

This is the message of the great Buddhist leaders of Vietnam. Recently one of them wrote these words:

"Each day the war goes on the hatred increases in the heart of the Vietnamese and in the hearts of those of humanitarian instinct. The Americans are forcing even their friends into becoming their enemies. It is curious that the Americans, who calculate so carefully on the possibilities of military victory, do not realize that in the process they are incurring deep psychological and political defeat. The image of America will never again be the image of revolution, freedom and democracy, but the image of violence and militarism."

[...]

The world now demands a maturity of America that we may not be able to achieve. It demands that we admit that we have been wrong from the beginning of our adventure in Vietnam, that we have been detrimental to the life of the Vietnamese people. The situation is one in which we must be ready to turn sharply from our present ways.

In order to atone for our sins and errors in Vietnam, we should take the initiative in bringing a halt to this tragic war.

State Security Apparatus seizes potential terrorist weapons

State Security Apparatus shoots dangerous infiltrator armed with potential terrorist weapons.


State security apparatchik inspects some of the seized weapons.

Back by popular demand

The Fighting First Family

War Blogs & War Powers: Playing Fast and Loose with the Lives & Liberties of Others

_{Image © Austin Cline
Original Poster: National Archives
Click for full-sized Image}

In the past, most right-wing bloggers seem to have been pretty firm in their rejection of the idea that more troops in Iraq would have made things better in the past and would help ensure success going forward. Now that The Decider has proclaimed the need for more troops, these same bloggers are becoming more supportive of the plan, if not downright enthusiastic. Yet given the extent to which our military has already been stretched in Bush's overseas adventures, where are the extra soldiers and support personnel to come from?

Frederick Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute has written, "The president must issue a personal call for young Americans to volunteer to fight in the decisive conflict of this generation" (emphasis added). Notice the language: for the ideological architects of this war, America is not involved in any mere "police action." This is instead an existential struggle for the future of Western Civilization – either America is victorious and Western values survive, or America fails and Western values succumb to the brown hordes.

Yet despite the dire consequences of losing this battle, one thing is conspicuously absent: any call for the war supporters to pledge life, fortune, and honor in the conflict.

The Chicken Hawk Argument has been around for a while, and war supporters have argued that just as one doesn't need to become a firefighter in order to support fighting fires, one also doesn't need to become a soldier in order to support a war. There is some validity to this response, though this validity has always been somewhat undermined by the fact that this conflict has consistently been portrayed as so vital to the future of America. There is no indication that fires themselves are becoming a danger to the survival of Western values. Now, added to this is the open admission that more troops are needed for the successful prosecution of this war. With that, the war supporters' answer to the Chicken Hawk Argument falls apart completely.

As Glen Greenwald put it: "A "coward" is someone who (a) fails to fight (b) in a war they consider to be necessary and just (c) notwithstanding their country's need for more fighters and (d) in the absence of a unique and compelling excuse for doing so."

Because war bloggers and war supporters still don't get it, he was forced to rephrase it again as an analogy: "if a person: (a) were arguing vociferously that the threat of unmanaged fires posed a danger to the Republic's existence and to civilization as we knew it, and containing them therefore outweighed all other issues, and (b) experts accepted as such by that person urgently warned that the fires have become impossible to contain -- and that the fate of our country is therefore seriously threatened -- due to a severe shortage of willing fire fighters, then, self-evidently, it would be natural and entirely legitimate to demand of that person a response as to why he himself is not acting to confront the fire threat, given that he himself characterizes that threat as civilization-endangering and more important than all others."

Since few if any of the most vociferous war bloggers and war supporters — our own "reciters of oracles and soothsayers, and all other omen-mongers" — are either volunteering themselves or calling up colleagues, friends, and family to volunteer, then we must conclude along with Greenwald that either they are too afraid to do what they are asking strangers to do, or they are disingenuous about the seriousness of the threat we are facing. At least, those are the two most logical options in a reality-based universe — but is that really the universe in which these war bloggers live? I'm not so sure — I wonder if perhaps there is not a third option.

Allow me to approach this from the other direction. War supporters like Kagan are not volunteering themselves or calling upon friends, family, and colleagues to volunteer (both Fred Kagan and his younger brother are of enlistment age). They are, however, willing to call upon complete strangers to volunteer — the above quote from Kagan is quite broad and impersonal. There is a strong parallel here with how often the far right will call for limitations to liberty which don't seem to affect them. Newt Gingrich, for example, would have Muslims arrested for praying in public on a plane, but coincidentally he's not a Muslim. Dinesh D'Souza calls for an end to the "abuse" of freedoms, but I haven't seem him volunteer to surrender any of his own civil liberties in order to support the war against terrorism.

There is a pattern here, and it's not one limited to just our current era or this particular conflict. Whites once called upon blacks to pursue a more "moderate" course of action and not push for too much equality too quickly. In effect, they called upon blacks to give up some of their claims to equality, but they didn't volunteer to give up anything themselves. Men used to insist that women should be satisfied with the power and authority they had in their homes and families rather than agitating for political power or a right to vote, yet the same men never offered to "settle" for anything less than what they wanted.

The common thread running through all of this is privilege: some people believe that because of some quality they possess, they should benefit from special privileges denied to others. Men should be privileged over women, whites should be privileged over blacks, Christians should be privileged over non-Christians, and of course well-to-do conservatives (usually, and not coincidentally, white male Christians) should be privileged over everyone else. This, then, might be that third option I mentioned above: these people are not quite cowards and they do believe in the seriousness of the threat, but they also believe that as part of a privileged class they shouldn't be expected to do any of the "heavy lifting" required for meeting such a threat. That's what the lower classes are for.

Some might even go so far as to suggest that their "ideological contributions," in the form of blog posts, short missives at The Corner, or policy papers for organizations like the AEI, are even more important than the contributions of soldiers patrolling the streets of the latest nation to come under American occupation. It is a "war of ideas," right? Democracy is an idea and an ideal, which makes the war blogs the most important weapon in the fight to spread democracy. It takes a lot of time and effort to find something written by someone else, quote a portion, and say "I agree." These bloggers risk missing the latest episode 24!

Just how far have we come that we might be tempted to look back fondly on noblesse oblige, or on the sense of duty of British aristocrats which caused them to join the military in order to defend Britain? Their sense of privilege and entitlement may have been extreme, but it didn't come without a corresponding sense of duty to the community and nation — a sense of duty which didn't necessarily keep them safe all the time.