What to Look For in World Events
...a scorecard

Time For A Reality Check
By John David Powell (06/27/04)

The exchange of ceremonial and political keys from the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq
( www.cpa-iraq.org ) to the sitting ducks who make up that country's new government seems a good time to stop for a reality check and to ponder some points regarding Iraq et al. These points are terrorists, beheadings, collateral benefits, democracy, moral and religious values, and Islam versus Christianity. We must look at these subjects with open minds to prepare for the calamities of the not-so-distant future.

Terrorists

The folks who go around blowing up people and things, sniping at soldiers and marines, and kidnapping civilians and beheading them are not terrorists. Neither are they the more politically correct insurgents, rebels, guerillas, attackers, militants, or extremists. They are murderers and thugs.

Insurgents, rebels, attackers, and militants imply an organized and political resistance to an occupying evil force. Yes, the coalition is an occupying force, but it is a liberation force battling those who seek the return of tyranny the old or their own.

One can make a case for extremist, though, if the label also applies to those white murderers and thugs who dragged on a chain behind a pickup truck that east Texas black man a few years back. The Washington Post ( www.washingtonpost.com ) reported at the time that the prosecution portrayed one defendant as a young man "full of hate" who hoped the murder would excite interest in a white supremacist group he planned to organize.

Sounds a lot like those murdering Muslim thugs. Do not be deceived. The subjugation of the world to their distorted brands of Islam is the goal of these godless criminals. To describe the hoodlums in any term other than one that connotes cold-blooded killing is to do disservice to real freedom fighters.

Need more evidence? Look at the beheading videos. The murderers spoke in Arabic and wrote their banners in Arabic because their primary audience is the Arab-speaking population. Anti-U.S. demonstrators throughout the world, from Indonesia to Italy, always chant English slogans and hold up posters and banners written in English because they want their goofy messages received and understood by their fellow travelers in the English-speaking world.

Muslim head liberators commit their atrocities for the sake of recruitment. They do not give a fig what Americans, Texans, Europeans, or Koreans think. They want to reach impressionable and stupid teenage Arab boys who find great satisfaction in big guns, big noises, and the possibility of bedding a bevy of virgins in Paradise ( www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1246771,00.html ).

Collateral benefits

Another way we know these murdering goons are not freedom fighters is because true rebel patriots seek a better life for themselves and their country. If that were the case in Iraq et al, these guys would be out of the thuggery business, as demonstrated by the Coalition's success stories found on its web site. Here are some examples:

Since May 2003, U.S. contractors and coalition military personnel have rebuilt hospitals, schools, playgrounds, and bridges; paved roads; provided water, sewer, electrical, and telephone services; and instituted a ZIP code system.

You want numbers? How about this: More than 240 hospitals and 1,200 clinics refurbished and equipped; 80 percent of Basrah supplied with non-potable water; more than 8 million Iraqi children through the age of 12 vaccinated, raising the total of all vaccinated Iraqi children to around 85 percent; 700,000 pregnant Iraqi women vaccinated.

Iraqi universities will get tons of textbooks. Twenty universities will get $8 million for chemistry, biology, and physics laboratories. Primary and secondary schools will get nearly nine million textbooks. And, 1.5 million high school children will get shoulder bags, notebooks, pencils, pens, calculators, and rulers.

Democracy

Most of the world's population, particularly in Iraq et al., does not have a clue about democracy. They know only the rule of kings, caliphs, chieftains, or dictators. The idea of one person, one vote is foreign to them, quite literally.

Even though 4.5 million Iraqis in 90 percent of the municipalities have operating city or town councils, they do not appreciate our form of democracy and self-governance. One only has to look at their constitution that makes Islam the state religion to see what is coming.

Moral and religious values

Islam is a religion of peace, but millions of its adherents practice a form of Islam that western civilizations find repugnant. Two hallmarks of this form are the subjugation of women and wonton disregard for human rights.

Let's pick on our friends the Saudis for a moment. Amnesty International ( www.amanestyusa.org ) cites Saudi Arabia as having one of the highest rates of executions in the world in both absolute numbers and per capita. The Saudis include as capital offenses a wide range of so-called crimes, including apostasy, drug dealing, sodomy, and witchcraft. Execution is by public beheading or by firing squad after summary trials with no opportunity for the accused to put on a defense.

Prisons and detention centers in Saudi Arabia make Baghdad's Abu Ghraib look like a resort: cruel or degrading treatment or punishment; floggings; overcrowding; lack of hygiene; and dehumanizing conditions.

Islam versus Christianity

The Middle East Media Research Institute ( www.memri.org ) keeps track of state-controlled Arab television stations and their programming, particularly statements by leading officials and clerics. Understanding the Arab Muslim mind regarding Christianity and the West is imperative to understanding the regional and global crisis we face.

During a May 24 interview on Saudi channel TV1, Sheik Ahmad Abd Al-Latif, a professor at Um Al-Qura University, called Christians "oppressors" because of their "cruel aggression against Islamic countries." This is why, he said, all Muslims must curse the oppressive and plundering Christians and pray that Allah will annihilate them.

Muslim thugs have already murdered Christians in Iraq, with little notice by the Western media. Assyrian and Mandaean Christians have received letters threatening torture, bombings, and death if they do not convert to Islam, according to a report carried by the Assist News Service
( www.assistnews.net ). On March 22, someone beat to death an elderly woman and slit the throat of her husband in the Assyrian district of Baghdad. On June 7, masked men killed four Christians and wounded several others in the Dora district of Baghdad. That afternoon, drive-by shooters killed three Assyrian women as they returned home from working with the Coalition.

The Coalition Provisional Authority transfers power to a shaky Iraqi government even as murderers, thugs, and Muslim madmen prime their weapons and whet their swords. Maybe such dire warnings are the ranting of a lone voice in the wilderness. But, then again, what if they are not?