LIEBENSRAUM
AP, Today
Iran's president launched a new phase in the Arak heavy-water reactor project on Saturday, saying Tehran would not give up its right to nuclear technology despite Western fears it aims to make atomic bombs.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was speaking just days before an August 31 deadline set by the U.N. Security Council for Iran to halt uranium enrichment -- the West's biggest worry in Iran's atomic program -- or face possible sanctions.
"No one can deprive a nation of its rights based on its capabilities," he said.
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"We need breathing room." - Hitler - 1938
It is said (by, among others, the reductive Christopher Hitchens, who appears to be substituting agitation for analysis the more we learn how one bad turn has begotten another in Iraq. He even gave Bill Maher the finger on Maher's show last night as he told Maher that Maher was "stupid" for calling Bush stupid. Of course, Hitchens can, with impunity, call Reagan a "cruel and stupid lizard," simply because Hitchens did not agree with Reagan's policies, such as they were. But because Hitchens agrees with Bush on one thing - Islamic fascism is bad (should Hitchens' internal logic lead him to decry this term as a Hitler comparison - which is, to him, a "weak" argument?), Bush should be shielded from being called stupid, (and moveon.org calling him stupid and comparing him to Hitler is the moral and legal equivalent of the government equating dissent with Bush to treason), and those who call him stupid are stupid (and the logic behind THIS declamation is?) Of course, Mr. Maher's point was not that Bush was stupid so much as that inarticulate gibberish could never be enunciated by an organized, thoughtful mind (and furthermore, that if one is intelligent, one has a thoughtful mind that has the power to convince). Since, therefore, Mr. Bush cannot articulate his reasons for why the Iraq was is so important (other than because it makes Hitchens more money than he earned when he wrote for The Nation), and according to Hitchens, there is a percentage of individuals who are "sitting on the fence" on this matter waiting to be persuaded by a President who can make the case for this war, what are we to conclude? That Bush does not have a thoughtful mind, and lacks the power to convince, perhaps, and that, dare I say it, he is unintelligent? Even if Hitchens is correct in stating that Bush "recognizes" Islamonutjobism as a dangerous threat (and there is no evidence that Bush does in fact recognize this, as opposed to say, Bush just being told that it is so and blindly repeating it), that alone doesn't make him intelligent, as Hitchens implies. ("The ability to speak does not make one intelligent," someone said to a super-annoying movie character). What Bush does with his recognition is the measure of the intelligence - and here his stupidity - which surely should be a matter of concern to us as much as Dick Morris' "triangulation" (which actually scaremongered no one) - shines through.
Hitchens is an interesting parallel to Bush. Bush believes he's smarter than everyone else because he is ill-learned and vacuous. Hitchens believes he's smarter than everyone else (and his self-labeling, like Bush's, naturally leads him to quickly label others and their motives) because he's well-read and pompous. Both men are living examples of the truism that intelligence (or lack thereof) is truly on some level immeasurable, just as stupudity is.
Iran's president launched a new phase in the Arak heavy-water reactor project on Saturday, saying Tehran would not give up its right to nuclear technology despite Western fears it aims to make atomic bombs.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was speaking just days before an August 31 deadline set by the U.N. Security Council for Iran to halt uranium enrichment -- the West's biggest worry in Iran's atomic program -- or face possible sanctions.
"No one can deprive a nation of its rights based on its capabilities," he said.
*******************************************************************************
"We need breathing room." - Hitler - 1938
It is said (by, among others, the reductive Christopher Hitchens, who appears to be substituting agitation for analysis the more we learn how one bad turn has begotten another in Iraq. He even gave Bill Maher the finger on Maher's show last night as he told Maher that Maher was "stupid" for calling Bush stupid. Of course, Hitchens can, with impunity, call Reagan a "cruel and stupid lizard," simply because Hitchens did not agree with Reagan's policies, such as they were. But because Hitchens agrees with Bush on one thing - Islamic fascism is bad (should Hitchens' internal logic lead him to decry this term as a Hitler comparison - which is, to him, a "weak" argument?), Bush should be shielded from being called stupid, (and moveon.org calling him stupid and comparing him to Hitler is the moral and legal equivalent of the government equating dissent with Bush to treason), and those who call him stupid are stupid (and the logic behind THIS declamation is?) Of course, Mr. Maher's point was not that Bush was stupid so much as that inarticulate gibberish could never be enunciated by an organized, thoughtful mind (and furthermore, that if one is intelligent, one has a thoughtful mind that has the power to convince). Since, therefore, Mr. Bush cannot articulate his reasons for why the Iraq was is so important (other than because it makes Hitchens more money than he earned when he wrote for The Nation), and according to Hitchens, there is a percentage of individuals who are "sitting on the fence" on this matter waiting to be persuaded by a President who can make the case for this war, what are we to conclude? That Bush does not have a thoughtful mind, and lacks the power to convince, perhaps, and that, dare I say it, he is unintelligent? Even if Hitchens is correct in stating that Bush "recognizes" Islamonutjobism as a dangerous threat (and there is no evidence that Bush does in fact recognize this, as opposed to say, Bush just being told that it is so and blindly repeating it), that alone doesn't make him intelligent, as Hitchens implies. ("The ability to speak does not make one intelligent," someone said to a super-annoying movie character). What Bush does with his recognition is the measure of the intelligence - and here his stupidity - which surely should be a matter of concern to us as much as Dick Morris' "triangulation" (which actually scaremongered no one) - shines through.
Hitchens is an interesting parallel to Bush. Bush believes he's smarter than everyone else because he is ill-learned and vacuous. Hitchens believes he's smarter than everyone else (and his self-labeling, like Bush's, naturally leads him to quickly label others and their motives) because he's well-read and pompous. Both men are living examples of the truism that intelligence (or lack thereof) is truly on some level immeasurable, just as stupudity is.
posted by EnterCenter at 8:23 AM
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