The Dish

The outreach has begun:

U.S. News has learned that Thompson recently hired Bill Wichterman, who served as conservative outreach director for former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, and Joseph Cella, president of a conservative Catholic group called Fidelis, to lead the effort. The aides are arranging more meetings between Thompson and conservative Christian leaders and have launched a rapid-response operation to fend off attacks on Thompson’s conservative credentials.

The success of the effort is by no means ensured; in March, Focus on the Family’s James Dobson told U.S. News that he doubted Thompson was really a Christian. But Dobson and Thompson have since talked, with Dobson rumored to be reassessing Thompson. And prominent social conservative Paul Weyrich, who met recently with Thompson and evangelical activists, said the former senator "was in agreement with us on almost everything."

South Dakota, 9.05 pm.

For a newly updated, global gallery of Dish readers’ window views, click here.

The new lie being foisted by an increasingly desperate Bush administration is that our main enemy in Iraq is al Qaeda. They must know this isn’t true. In so far as it is true, the source of the problem lies in Saudi Arabia, a country the Bush administration seems unable to confront. The truth is much more complicated. Today’s WaPo piece on the Mahdi Army reveals more of it:

The brazen attacks on U.S. soldiers also appear to challenge the idea that the Mahdi Army has been lying low to avoid confrontations with Americans. Street fighting between the Mahdi Army and U.S. forces has also broken out in other parts of the capital recently, including clashes in the al-Amin neighborhood Thursday in which Apache attack helicopters were called in to quell the gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades targeting U.S. troops. The next day, U.S. soldiers killed six Iraqi policemen during a raid in which they captured a police lieutenant believed to be working with Iranian-backed Shiite militias.

American soldiers who oversee West Rashid — a district of about 700,000 people that includes the al-Amil, Bayaa and al-Jihad neighborhoods — described an organized, well-financed Shiite enemy that rules ruthlessly and distributes the spoils of war to the area’s impoverished residents.

Meanwhile, the one success story in Anbar means that along with sudden calm, we have also made more serious enemies, and our allies are deeply untrustworthy. So we have the following situation, as detailed in the NYT this morning:

Abu Azzam says the 2,300 men in his movement include members of fierce Sunni groups like the 1920s Revolutionary Brigade and the Mujahedeen Army that have fought the American occupation. Now his men patrol alongside the Americans, who want to turn them into a security force that can bring peace to this stretch between Baghdad and Falluja.

A few miles away, in the town of Abu Ghraib, Brig. Gen. Nassir al-Hiti and his brigade of Iraqi Army soldiers also have the support of the American military. But they have a different ambition, some American commanders here say: doing everything they can to undermine Abu Azzam’s men, even using a stolen membership list to single them out for wrongful detention.

The truth is: we are fighting, when we are fighting, for factions in a continuing civil war. Every act we take in defense of one faction will make an enemy of another. There is no neutral entity. The Iraqi government is a tool of the Shiite militias. So we are sending young Americans to die for Sunni tribalism, or Shiite triumphalism, or Bush’s face. It is a mug’s game. Either the president is too stupid to understand this, or he is lying and spinning at the expense of soldiers’ lives to escape the consequences of his own misjudgments. 

"Well, let’s play chess." Blazing Saddles.

A reader writes:

If you can’t see the difference in the Mangum murder and Islamist terror, then perhaps it’s time to question why anyone (me included) would read your blog. I therefore assume it is a rhetorical question. Differences: a)  Mangum thought he was Elijah. As far as I know, no Muslim committing murder in the name of Allah thought he was Mohammad or any other Islamic figure (including Elijah). Magnum’s actions appear to be the result of a mental problem. He is presumably insane. It is therefore not fair to attribute his actions to Christianity. b)  Mangum didn’t blow himself up. c)  Mangum was not taught his belief at church.  He appears to have been acting alone. d)  Mangum’s actions were not met with dancing in the street in his hometown. e)  Mangum’s family was not paid $20,000 in honor of his death by the leader of a sovereign nation or taken care of in honor of his "holy act" by his local congregation. f)  Mangum did not get his weapon of choice from Iran. g)  Mangum didn’t claim he was promised 70 virgins in Paradise for his murder h)  Mangum’s actions or not based on any scripture (nor did he claim them to be) so far as the killing was concerned.

i)  Most importantly: all but a microscopic portion of Christianity loudly condemn his act as that of murder, even those denominations (like mine) that teach homosexuality is a sin. I only say a microscopic portion of Christianity because I assume there is some denomination like the one you linked to some time ago that might actually claim the act was one of God. I don’t know of a single one myself. Go to Palestine, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. to see the contrasting reaction from the Muslim world when a homicide bomber takes out a non-believer.

Let me respond to each in turn. a) The quote in question reads to me as if he believed he was like Elijah, not literally Elijah: ""I believe I’m Elijah, called by God to be a prophet." This kind of association with holy figures in the past is a rote feature of many religions, including Islam. Is he nuts? I don’t know. Is Bin Laden nuts? You tell me. b) No, he didn’t blow himself up. He can lay no rancid claim to martyrdom, but his victim, it is fair to say, found the distinction irrelevant. c) Of course, he was taught his hatred of gay people at church. Where else? 

He invokes his Christianity explicitly as the core motive for his murder. d) and e) No, there was no dancing in the streets, no reward for despatching an infidel. But I did not claim that he represents some broader movement as dangerous as Islamism. I merely wrote that the act was indistinguishable from Islamist barbarism. f) No, Mangum was not armed by Iran. Neither were the 9/11 murderers. g) No, Mangum wasn’t expecting vigins, but he was expecting divine favor. h) Leviticus explicitly calls for the execution of homosexuals. Those who teach and believe in the literal inerrancy of the Bible cannot deny that gay men are explicitly called to be put to death by Scripture. Why would an extreme Christianist not take that seriously? i) same response as to d) and e).

The danger for all of us is believing that just because we are who we are, we cannot be vulnerable to the same temptations and the same evil as those of another faith or culture. We can be. Christianism is nowhere near as dangerous a force in the world as Islamism – nowhere near. But Christianity, history teaches us, is not immune to the totalist logic, political extremism, murderous violence and fundamentalist certainty that fuels the Islamist enemy. Vigilance is the key. There is no inherent virtue in either being a Christian or an American. We are all human and subject to the same pathologies. When we see them emerge here, we should not balk at pointing them out, and highlighting the dangers of complacency.

Dean Barnett explains:

The surge’s purpose is to pacify Baghdad and its surrounding areas so the Maliki government can become strong enough to bring a bit of civilization to Iraq.

And yet, Dean doesn’t want a Shiite theocracy. Who does he think pulls the strings in the Maliki government? The Brookings Institution? Then this:

What America needs, and what the Iraqis need, is a government that has its heart in the right place but won’t mind ignoring certain "niceties" when necessary. Think of a leader like Andrew Jackson. Or, more likely, someone like Augusto Pinochet, whose ruthlessness has obscured for history the free market reforms he imposed that saved Chile and the democracy he bequeathed to his previously misbegotten country.

So Dean is saying that if Bush is clearer about his hope for an Iraqi Pinochet, more people will come on board? And that backing our torturing thug will help us win the wider war for Muslim hearts and minds? Well, it may be the only coherent option Bush has left. Except there is no Iraqi version of Pinochet. And no Iraqi version of Chile either.

"We are in danger of having, George, a Weimar moment in our politics. German politics was embittered disastrously by the belief that they were on the cusp of victory in 1918 and were stabbed in the back by the civilian leadership that didn’t understand Germany’s military prowess. There is a constituency in this town that believes we’re winning in Iraq, that we have at last figured it out, that the indices of success are there. And if we pull out and have the kind of disastrous consequences, telegenic disastrous consequences or could have, we’re going to have people saying, "We had it won and threw it away,"" – George Will on Stephanopoulos yesterday.

Imagine you realize you have created the worst foreign policy debacle for the US since Vietnam. Imagine you have single-handedly wrecked America’s reputation for humane treatment of military detainees. Imagine further that your own pushing of the legal envelope even forced the president to commute your chief aide’s prison sentence for perjury. Imagine that your strategy in Iraq, now unspinnably failed, is grinding the US military into the dust, and uniting the entire country toward realism in the Middle East. What are you going to do? There’s only one thing that truly changes the game in your favor – a vast and reckless expansion of the war to another country. Obviously, the Congress will not assent. Obviously, the international community will not assent. Obviously, the State Department will not assent. Obviously, the American people will not assent without a very intensive, careful and persuasive case being made. But how on earth do Bush and Cheney have credibility on the question of intelligence that would be the core of the argument?

But you’re Dick Cheney. And as long as you control the president, you can still do what you want:

The Washington source said Mr Bush and Mr Cheney did not trust any potential successors in the White House, Republican or Democratic, to deal with Iran decisively. They are also reluctant for Israel to carry out any strikes because the US would get the blame in the region anyway.

"The red line is not in Iran. The red line is in Israel. If Israel is adamant it will attack, the US will have to take decisive action," Mr Cronin said. "The choices are: tell Israel no, let Israel do the job, or do the job yourself."

It seems to me that the question of who trusts any potential successors to Bush and Cheney should be left to the American people. But we know the contempt Bush and Cheney have for them. It also seems to me that a decision to go to war with another sovereign country while the US military is largely tied down policing a civil war in Iraq is the Congress’s. But we also know the contempt Bush and Cheney have for them. With rational people, we could be assured of some caution, preparation and transparency. These are not very rational people.

Apologies. Bronchial issues. Had to sleep in. Normal blogging resuming imminently.

If an Islamist had murdered a Jew for religious reasons and then refused to offer any remorse, you could count on the conservative media to highlight it. And rightly so. Whenever violence, especially murderous violence, is unleashed in the name of religion, it’s worth taking note. Well, let’s take note, shall we? From the Houston Chronicle:

A Cypress man charged in the death of a Southwest Airlines flight attendant said Saturday that he was doing God’s work when he went to a Montrose-area bar last month, hunting for a gay man to kill. "I believe I’m Elijah, called by God to be a prophet," said 26-year-old Terry Mark Mangum, charged with murder June 11. " … I believe with all my heart that I was doing the right thing." Interviewed in the Brazoria County Jail Saturday morning, Mangum said he feels no remorse for killing 46-year-old Kenneth Cummings Jr., whom relatives described as a "loving" son who never forgot a holiday and a devoted uncle who had set up college funds for his niece and nephew. He worked at Southwest for 24 years.

Mangum, who described himself as "definitely not a homosexual," said God called on him to "carry out a code of retribution" by killing a gay man because "sexual perversion" is the "worst sin." Mangum believed Cummings to be gay. "I planned on sending him to hell," he said…

 

Mangum — who claimed he has studied the Bible for "thousands and thousands and thousands of hours" — said God first commanded him to kill during a "visitation," or dream, while he was in prison in 2001. He said his victim must be a man because men "carry the harvest of the sinner."

After six months’ planning, Mangum said, he went to E.J.’s, a Montrose-area club, where he met Cummings. After they drank a couple of beers, he said, the two went to Cummings’ home in Pearland.

Mangum said he stabbed Cummings with a "6-inch blade."

"It’s not that I’m a bad dude," he said, expressing concern that people might view him as "strange." Pausing briefly, he said, "I love God."

And this is different from Islamist barbarism how, exactly?