When intelligence, courage, and honesty trump political stances
Christopher Hitchens
% mauser
Excerpt:
Why can't folks on the left be more like Christopher Hitchens. While he may be a marxist, he is intelligent about it. Too many on the left are such utter idiots (like the 99th percenters) who rather than THINKING about what is good and bad, right and wrong, merely take up an automatic opposition to anything, well, American. They have nothing more in their heads than the starting idea that America and anything Western is bad, and that therefore anything that goes against it is good. A perfect example is the question Hitchens is responding to in this clip - on that boils down to "9/11 was justified in response to how horrible we are."
The result is the kind of intellectual bitch-slap Hitchens is deservedly known for.
Hitchins will have no truck for those who want to bend over backward to try to placate and appease the ranting Islamists and jihadis. I'm impressed. That he's on the Left isn't as important as the consideration of whether he is a) intelligent, b) honest, and c) brave. He's all three, and in this matter those qualities are all-important. Jihadis and Islamists are bullies -- bullies armed with everything from acid (to throw in the faces of unveiled women) to high-power explosives, the means to deliver them, and the enthusiastic will to do so, and bin Laden's manifesto was his way of throwing a tantrum: "No matter what you do, I hate you hate you hate you!!!" We have to be adults who see through the tantrums and the attempts to bully and act on what we perceive by making the tantrumists and bullies understand that WE WILL NOT GIVE IN, WE WILL NOT CAVE, WE ARE NOT EMBARRASSED TO DEFEND THOSE WHO NEED DEFENDING AND PROTECT OUR RIGHTS. Hitchinson is saying just that, but so much more elegantly. Bravo! :-)
And see Christopher Hitchens Dead: Legendary Writer Dies At 62. We have lost one of the best. Why the hell do the worst get such an advantage?
% mauser
Excerpt:
Why can't folks on the left be more like Christopher Hitchens. While he may be a marxist, he is intelligent about it. Too many on the left are such utter idiots (like the 99th percenters) who rather than THINKING about what is good and bad, right and wrong, merely take up an automatic opposition to anything, well, American. They have nothing more in their heads than the starting idea that America and anything Western is bad, and that therefore anything that goes against it is good. A perfect example is the question Hitchens is responding to in this clip - on that boils down to "9/11 was justified in response to how horrible we are."
The result is the kind of intellectual bitch-slap Hitchens is deservedly known for.
Hitchins will have no truck for those who want to bend over backward to try to placate and appease the ranting Islamists and jihadis. I'm impressed. That he's on the Left isn't as important as the consideration of whether he is a) intelligent, b) honest, and c) brave. He's all three, and in this matter those qualities are all-important. Jihadis and Islamists are bullies -- bullies armed with everything from acid (to throw in the faces of unveiled women) to high-power explosives, the means to deliver them, and the enthusiastic will to do so, and bin Laden's manifesto was his way of throwing a tantrum: "No matter what you do, I hate you hate you hate you!!!" We have to be adults who see through the tantrums and the attempts to bully and act on what we perceive by making the tantrumists and bullies understand that WE WILL NOT GIVE IN, WE WILL NOT CAVE, WE ARE NOT EMBARRASSED TO DEFEND THOSE WHO NEED DEFENDING AND PROTECT OUR RIGHTS. Hitchinson is saying just that, but so much more elegantly. Bravo! :-)
And see Christopher Hitchens Dead: Legendary Writer Dies At 62. We have lost one of the best. Why the hell do the worst get such an advantage?