From the WSJ Opinion Archives
Our
Friends the Saudis
Are there any limits to the gall of our purported allies in Riyadh--15 of whose
countrymen were among the 19 perpetrators of the Sept. 11 atrocities? Today's
New York Times (links require registration) reports that "Saudi Arabia
is balking at American requests to freeze the bank accounts of those the United
States says are linked to terrorism." An anonymous official of the Saudi
government--one of the world's most repressive regimes--lectures America on
due process: "This is the problem between us and the Americans," he tells the
Times. "When they ask us to do something, we say, 'Give us the evidence.' That's
when they accuse us of helping the terrorists."
Another Times article reports that Saudi Arabian Airlines is refusing to comply with a new American law requiring it to supply passenger manifests for international flights to the U.S. Explains a spokesman for the Saudi Embassy in Washington: "At this time, hundreds of Saudi citizens are being detained and questioned with regard to the hijackings. A lot of them are innocent people. That number would probably quadruple if we shared advance information on air passengers with the United States." U.S. officials say passengers arriving on noncompliant airlines "will be put through extremely rigorous, lengthy searches," the Times reports.
Agence France-Presse, meanwhile, reports that "Riyadh is more likely to show clemency toward any 'Afghan Arabs' "--i.e., terrorists and pro-Taliban fighters--"who return home than other Arab governments."
National Review's Rich Lowry has had enough. "Saudi Arabia is hardly even a country," he writes. "It consists of essentially a few thousand princes sitting above a natural resource that they have had little or nothing to do with discovering or developing, and engaging in one business: price fixing." Echoing a Wall Street Journal editorial from last month, Lowry urges an American takeover of Saudi oil fields if the Riyadh's perfidious princes don't adjust their attitude:
Sound outlandish? It certainly does now. But wars tend to get broader rather than more narrow, and to scramble the international order in ways that seemed impossible before they started. . . .
If the Saudis are made to feel the same fear, they will make the same choice. If they don't make the right choice, well, life suddenly won't be so comfortable anymore for all those Saudi princes.
'He'll
Find Out'
President Bush seems to be laying the groundwork for eventually expanding the
war to Iraq. "Afghanistan is still just the beginning," he said at a press
conference yesterday. "If you develop weapons of mass destruction that
you want to terrorize the world, you'll be held accountable. . . .
As for Mr. Saddam Hussein, he needs to let inspectors back in his country, to
show us that he is not developing weapons of mass destruction." If he refuses?
"He'll find out."
A month ago Saddam's deputy prime minister, Tariq Aziz, told London's Daily Telegraph that Iraq would not allow inspectors in. "We do not trust them because the main objective of the United States is not to get the inspectors in but to topple the government," Aziz said. Let's hope he's right.
Suspected
Terrorist Loses Lawyer
The Washington Post reports on the resignation of Agus Budiman's lawyer. Budiman,
an Alexandria, Va., man, is suspected of having been associated with Sept. 11
mastermind Mohamad Atta:
Budiman was in court for what his attorney thought was a routine fraud case unrelated to the terrorist attacks. As Budiman's ties to Atta and other hijackers became the focus of the testimony, his attorney told the judge that he could not "in good conscience" represent anyone who might be connected to terrorism.
Attorney Greg English told U.S. Magistrate Judge Theresa C. Buchanan that he is a former Army officer, that his wife works for the Department of the Army and that they have friends who were killed when one of the hijacked airliners crashed into the Pentagon. Buchanan immediately postponed the hearing until Thursday, after Budiman can get a new attorney.
Is Alan Dershowitz available?
Regrets
Only
Detroit-area law-enforcement officials are trying avoid being "intrusive"
in complying with Justice Department requests that they interview men from terrorist-supporting
countries who've recently come to America on temporary visas, reports the New
York Times (link requires registration). Rather than show up at the men's doors,
the Michigan lawmen are "inviting" them to schedule appointments to
be interviewed. Aren't the bad guys the ones who are least likely to take up
such an invitation?
When
in Rome
Talk about going native. Torquato Cardilli, the Italian ambassador to Riyadh,
has converted to Islam, Reuters reports. Cardilli, the second Italian envoy
to make the switch, has been recalled to Rome for "consultations."
Stupidity Watch
James
Carroll, a columnist for the Boston Globe, weighs in with an unbearably
idiotic column titled "This War Is Not Just." Most of it is a rehash
of dopey arguments we've seen elsewhere, but one point we hadn't seen anywhere
else:
Early in the war, the highest US officials, including the president and vice president, encouraged the idea that the anthrax attacks were originating with the bin Laden network. The understandable paranoia that consequently gripped the public imagination--an enemy that could shut down Congress!--was a crucial aspect of what led both press and politicians to accept the idea that a massive war against an evil enemy would be both necessary and moral.
Now, the operating assumption is that the anthrax cases, unrelated to bin Laden, are domestic crimes, not acts of war. But for a crucial moment, they effectively played the role in this war that the Gulf of Tonkin "assault" played in the Vietnam War, as sources of a war hysteria that "united" the nation around a mistake.
Putting aside the still-open question of whether the anthrax attacks were domestic in origin, Carroll apparently missed the events that preceded the anthrax attacks, namely the terrorist massacre of thousands of Americans on Sept. 11. The country was united behind this war long before the first anthrax letter arrived.
James Sledd, a professor emeritus of English at the University of Texas, looks at George W. Bush and sees another Hitler. (Must be the mustache.) In a letter to the editor of the Daily Texan, Sledd writes: "To folks old enough to have lived and traveled in Europe in the late 1930's, George W. Bush's performance in Atlanta on Nov. 8 brought back sharp memories--memories of Hitlerian self-praise at a Nazi Parteitag or of Italian mobs shouting 'Duce! Duce! Duce!' "
And for gay journalist Michelangelo Signorile, the pope is another Osama bin Laden. (Must be the robe.) In New York Press Signorile writes: "Flash! This just in: All the while that Afghanistan's ruling Taliban has been protecting Osama bin Laden, Italy has been harboring another omnipotent religious zealot, one who equally condemns us Western sinners and incites violence with his incendiary rhetoric. Yes, right there on the European mainland! Meet John Paul II, Christian fundamentalist extraordinaire and a man who inspires thugs across the globe who commit hate crimes against homosexuals, a form of terrorism if ever there was one."
Andrew
Sullivan Goes Monkeyfishing
Warning: What we're about to quote is pretty sick stuff. It comes from a Web
site called usQueers.com, which features a page entitled "Het Supremacists
Who Have Earned a Horrible Death Soon." Here's one example, to give a flavor
for the thing:
Ronald Reagan, ex-President, deserves to experience a horrible death soon, and is getting what he deserves. We're listing him as wounded because the way he is dying is horrible (Alzheimer's) and irreversible, even if he isn't aware of it anymore, and not soon enough we will happily add him to our Good Riddance! section.
Andrew Sullivan, for one, is indignant. In an item titled "More Hate From the Gay Left," he writes:
The far gay left is one of the most virulent hate-groups in the country. Tolerated by much of the gay media and beyond, their hate-filled and near-violent tactics are often ignored or tolerated by other gay men and women and liberal straights who should know better. Here's a small taste of what some gay hate-groups are now up to. It's a list of leading individuals the authors of the website "usqueers.com" want to see dead. The headline: "Wanted: To Experience A Horrible Death By Any Means Soon. Well-Known Het-Supremacists Deserve It As Their Reward." Notice the phrase 'By Any Means." Are these people condoning murder? There then follows this statement:
"If a person on this list dies (preferably a horrible death), a line will be drawn through their name (and they will probably be added to our Good Riddance! list.) If a person on this list is merely wounded or debilitated in some way, we will change the color of their name to brown. NOTE: We're just getting started on this list, but the type of information we will be listing here as it comes in includes anything such as Home Address, Home Phone, Office Address, Office Phone, Studio Address, Church Address, Girlfriend's Address, Boyfriend's Address, Favorite Hangouts (restaurants, etc.), Family Members, details about automobiles, just about anything which could be useful in spotting these dangerous het supremacists when they are wandering around loose. Organization information is also helpful, but mainly when it can be linked to specific het supremacists."
They add a disingenuous disclaimer disavowing violence--but these are the very people who seize on even the slightest homophobic remark to argue that it leads to gay-bashing. Notice also their complete contempt for anyone's privacy or personal dignity--a good indicator of a totalitarian mindset. Don't get me wrong. I'm all for their free speech. And I'm no fan of many of the individuals they oppose. But this kind of extremist, personal rhetoric is simply disgusting. It's equivalent to the hate-filled pro-lifers who discredit their cause by advocating the murder of abortionists. I don't know where these people get their hatred from, but it is as real and as dangerous as any of the right-wing hate groups who also deserve censure.
CNSNews.com reports that "prominent First Amendment lawyer" John B. Thompson has written a letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft calling on him to shut down usQueers.com: "This is clearly left-wing domestic terrorism which [the] Justice [Department] and the FBI must move on immediately with a shut down of the site and an arrest of B. Allen [actually Allan] Ross, who operates the site from San Diego."
We hate to spoil the party, and the usQueers stuff is awfully vile, but this death list is obviously a joke--a parody of the Nuermberg Files, Neal Horsley's wacko antiabortion site. The usQueers list is identical in concept to the Nuremberg Files, and similar in telling details, including the solicitation of personal information and the annoying cursor that drags words across your screen (a feature Horsley seems to have removed from his site). The usQueers page even acknowledges the Nuremberg Files as its "inspiration." In any case, how can anyone take seriously a site that features such things as a commentary entitled "Mathtering the Mythtery" and a newsletter called "Those Wacky Heterosexuals"?
As for Thompson's effort to shut down the site and have Ross hauled in to prison, it's unlikely to go anywhere. A unanimous Supreme Court made clear in Hustler v. Falwell (1988) that puerile satire is fully covered by the First Amendment, and even if Ross weren't kidding, his site would be protected under the Ninth Circuit ruling Planned Parenthood v. American Coalition of Life Activists (2001), which held that the deadly serious Nuremberg Files is shielded by the First Amendment.
May we suggest an alternative legal strategy? Thompson could sue Ross on Neal Horsley's behalf, alleging copyright infringement.
The
Refreshment That Gives Pause
A statement from the Hemlock Society, "the country's largest and oldest
death with dignity association," promotes a "press conference to announce
the launch of a national campaign to overturn Ashcroft's ruling prohibiting
assisted-death." The press release notes that "refreshments will be
provided."
Uh, thanks, but we'll bring our own.
(Elizabeth Crowley helps compile Best of the Web Today. Thanks to C.E. Dobkin, Christian Peck, Damian Bennett, Raghu Desikan, S.E. Brenner, Gerald Robbins, Mario Fante, Paul Kashman, John Campbell, Fred Cote, Kyle Flanagan, Kevin Gowen, Dawn Eden, Bill Kelly and Rob Latham. If you have a tip, write us at opinionjournal@wsj.com, and please include the URL.)
Also on OpinionJournal:
- Review & Outlook: Cloning and the meaning of life (link requires registration).
- Tom Bray: Some feminists grouse as Bush champions women's rights.
- Pete du Pont: Bush needs a bold vision.
