“This “war against terrorism” is in fact an open declaration of war against the peoples of the developing world; initially the peoples of the Middle East and Africa, and ultimately the peoples of South and Central America and the Caribbean, all Asia, the South Pacific and the islands of the Seas – – some four-fifths of humanity. It is a desperate attempt to meet and overcome this developing world’s growing challenge to the continuation of four centuries of European and American hegemonic domination, exploitation, suppression, insult and injury by its executors in America and Europe. In pursuit of this objective the events of September 11 are being used to justify the imposition of a wide range of military and socio-political measures gravely endangering democracy as we know it; measures that have as their objective the emergence of an authoritarian, military/corporate state in the U.S.A. This gives rise to serious question as to who really planned and executed the September 11 events.” – David Graham du Bois, BlackElectorate.com.
COHEN’S CHUTZPAH: “We were lax, lazy and self-indulgent. We’ve underfunded our military, police firefighters, nurses, doctors … people who drive our ambulances,” – William Cohen, former Clinton Defense Secretary, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “Underfunded our military?” What you mean “we”, Mr. Pentagon?
BUDDHISTS FOR WAR: Check out a highly informative piece on how many serious Buddhists in America are responding to the morality of fighting against terrorism. It’s in the invaluable website, beliefnet.com. My favorite quote: “When necessary, kill, but only out of wisdom and compassion.” That’s from the abbott of Zen Mountain monastery. Then there’s this passage: “Scholar Andrew Olendzki, Ph.D., of the Barre Center for Buddhist studies cites numerous stories to illustrate the point. In one past life, the Buddha is said to have killed a man who was about to murder 500 others. In another, the Buddha said that if, in order to save a choking boy, he had to cause injury he would do so. ‘My sense is the Buddha accepted that a certain amount of violence is built into the world situations,’ Olendzki says.”
WHOSE QUESTIONS?: “A precise death toll could not be determined, but the apparently large number of Taliban deaths, compared with the reported killing of about 40 Northern Alliance fighters, raised questions here about whether the violence was less an uprising than a massacre orchestrated by alliance troops.” – Keith Richburg, Washington Post, November 27. You’d think 40 dead prison guards would be a hefty enough number to give credence to the notion that this wasn’t a slaughter, but a nasty, if one-sided, battle. So why this interpretation? Richburg should at least tell us who’s casting suspicions on the Alliance so we can judge for ourselves.
MONKEY-FISHING?: James Taranto of OpinionJournal.com thinks I’ve been snookered by a site, usQueers.com, that’s supposed to be a parody. And USQueers.com does have its fair share of campy excess. But James is wrong. The site I’m worried about is serious, extensive, and the owner of it is real. He’s one Allan Ross, who told CNSNews.com that he was indeed unironic: “In a phone interview, Ross said he stands behind the content of his web site. But he added: ‘It’s certainly open to legal change if somebody points out that you’re crossing the line here and legally you’re saying, go out and do this, because we don’t want anybody to go out and do this. The whole idea here was to say that they deserve to die for what they’ve done. I’m not standing behind calling for the death or murder or anything like that of anybody on this list at all. Or anybody listed on our web site. We do not call to murder anybody or hurt them or even touch them,’ Ross said.” So why then, one wonders, is the early and horrible death of named individuals called for on the site “by any means”? Then see what you make of this. Earlier this year, the following incident occurred at First Southern Baptist Church in San Diego. One Allan Ross had to be subdued by San Diego police for attacking a Baptist minister, David Powell. According to the Baptist News, “Powell said Ross initially asked to speak with the pastor … Powell agreed to contact [Pastor] Lewis from the church office in the adjacent main building. As they were walking toward the office, Powell recounted that Ross revealed a jagged bottom of a glass bottle. ‘I will hurt you if I have to,’ Powell quoted Ross as saying. Powell said Ross also threatened to cut the artery in his neck and take his own life.” According to the Baptist Press, Ross then took Powell hostage until he called the media, wanting to broadcast an anti-Baptist message. Ross was eventually overpowered by police. This article from the Catholic World News identifies this criminal with the same Allan Ross of the usQueers.com site. And on the site itself is this statement: “B. Allan Ross, was arrested for three felony violations he allegedly committed at the First Southern Baptist Church of San Diego, including the two most likely to be pursued in court – kidnapping and holding the church’s janitor hostage.”
LAVENDAR FASCISM: So am I over-reacting? Sure, Ross represents a minuscule portion of gay culture. Sure, his site is fringe and obscure. And sure, Ross may well be a bit unhinged. But none of this makes his specific threats against named individuals any less real. In fact, it makes them more real. I guess it’s having been subjected to death-threats from far left gay activists myself that makes me realize these people are for real. (Last summer, a legit gay website, Datalounge.com, having fomented a vicious witch-hunt against me last spring, broadcast a specific threat to have my own “skull cracked open” in Provincetown. It took a week to get the owners to take the threat off the site, and they refused to apologize. They still won’t disown the death-threat.) The truth is these extremists are not parodists. And they’re not monkey-fishers. They’re dangerous cranks, who get a pass from the liberal gay establishment, so long as they keep terrorizing straights or non-p.c. gays. Again, I support their right to free speech. I don’t believe their site should be censored or shut down. But they are the gay equivalent of the anti-abortion murderers and the Klan. It’s time we said so – don’t you think, Mr Taranto? Or do we have to wait for the unthinkable to happen before we speak up?
The Dish 