Freedom Crushed
Thousands of protesters are dead and the bodies of hundreds of executed monks have been dumped in the jungle, a former intelligence officer for Burma’s ruling junta has revealed.
The most senior official to defect so far, Hla Win, said: “Many more people have been killed in recent days than you’ve heard about. The bodies can be counted in several thousand.”
[...]
A Swedish diplomat who visited Burma during the protests said last night that in her opinion the revolution has failed.
Liselotte Agerlid, who is now in Thailand, said that the Burmese people now face possibly decades of repression. “The Burma revolt is over,” she added.
“The military regime won and a new generation has been violently repressed and violently denied democracy. The people in the street were young people, monks and civilians who were not participating during the 1988 revolt.
“Now the military has cracked down the revolt, and the result may very well be that the regime will enjoy another 20 years of silence, ruling by fear.”
There is a myth that though we love freedom, others don’t; that our attachment to freedom is a product of our culture; that freedom, democracy, human rights, the rule of law are American values, or Western values; that Afghan women were content under the lash of the Taliban; that Saddam was somehow beloved by his people; that Milosevic was Serbia’s savior.
Members of Congress, ours are not Western values, they are the universal values of the human spirit. And anywhere…
Anywhere, anytime ordinary people are given the chance to choose, the choice is the same: freedom, not tyranny; democracy, not dictatorship; the rule of law, not the rule of the secret police.
How tragic.
Posted by Amy P. on October 01, 2007 at 1006 hrs
Tibet, again. And we did nothing then. . . .
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 01, 2007 at 1107 hrs
If only they’d had some oil under their land…
Posted by John Foust on October 01, 2007 at 1108 hrs
Oh, John your so witty. Any grown up will recognize that we have to consider things like whether their is oil (or the like), whether the current repressive régime is a perceived threat, whether they are actively committing atrocities or simply repressing people’s rights. We can’t go everywhere there is a problem on this planet. But that certainly does not mean we can’t go to places where there is a convergence of good reasons to go and I’ll say it: the economic and strategic importance of a country’s exports are a valid consideration.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 01, 2007 at 1532 hrs
So your SUV has a “Blood for Oil” bumpersticker, but in a positive way, huh? You should’ve been there a few weeks ago, everyone here at Boots ‘n Kittens was chuckling about a bumpersticker that showed the last letter of IRAQ rolling over into IRAN. Har, har! So how does the threat posed by Iran measure on your scale of atrocities-plus-economic-interest? Go or no go? Any other countries we should invade, uhm, I mean, help, to pad our nest and lead toward our style of government and economic subjugation? Gee, I hope no one ever uses the same justifications to try to invade us. That would be unfair, and we’d fight back.
Posted by John Foust on October 01, 2007 at 1654 hrs
I think Bush should give a similar speech immediately after handing the keys to new F-16s to Karimov, while clips from the installation of the Shah in Iran play on a screen in the background.
Man I love “principles”.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 01, 2007 at 2033 hrs
John - I don’t drive an SUV. I have no reason to. I am mini-van and small sedan kind of guy. The amount of oil we use for private vehicles is pretty inconsequential. Oil is strategically important because it fuels our economy. I think we should do more to reduce the amount of oil we import and the amount of oil we use. That would obviously lower the strategic importance of the middle east. As it stands today, however, it is irrational and irresponsible to pretend that oil is not vitally import to our interests as a nation. Hopefully some day that sentence will not be true.
Iran is a tough call. They are repressive (for example hanging gays just because they are gay, imprisoning Christians for being Christians, etc); I believe they are developing a nuclear bomb and that there is about a 50/50 chance that they would use it.
Ahmadinejad is a believer in the 12th (or hidden) imam prophecy which says that a world wide chaos will develop because of war between the House of Islam and the House of Infidels and that Allah will send Jesus to earth to announce that Islam is the true faith and that the 12th Imam, Mohammed ibn Hasan, the righteous descendant of Mohammed has returned. The 12th Imam will lead the world into Islam and thus peace. Ahmadinejad has given speeches were he has said that he believes he has been put on this earth as an agent of Allah to help bring about the great chaos; a few news papers have reported that he and his cabinet signed a contract with each other promising to prepare the world of the return of the 12th Imam.
Now, this may seem strange but, the clerics who actually run Iran are a bit more moderate than him and they have in the past called him in for a heart to heart that has resulted in a relative softening of his rhetoric. Another important factor is that even within Iran there is a fairly public dissident movement among the youth and a fairly large group of ex-pats in Europe and the US who want Iran to move in a Western direction.
End conclusion: I think that large scale military action can be avoided if the West can find a way to slow the development of Iran’s nuclear capabilities. So far diplomacy has failed; sanctions are unlikely to work because China and Russia will not agree to any with teeth. What I think that means is that surgical air strikes may be necessary to slow down the nuclear program. If that can be done successfully, Iran’s biggest card (a nuke) will be out of the picture and negotiates to some kind of a acceptable peace between Iran and the West may be fruitful.
You see John not everyone who disagrees with you sees the world in bumper sticker slogans. Sometimes different people read the same data and come to different conclusions. So why don’t you do us all a favor and stop making assumptions about who we are and how we think and approach this blog and the debates herein as an adult.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 02, 2007 at 0941 hrs
Joe, thank you for the considerate and lengthy reply - it was far better than my sarcasm. I tend to agree with the outline of your assessment of Ahmadinejad. Maybe he wants a nuke, maybe he wouldn’t use it, but I clearly understand why he feels safer with one, given the presence of the US forces in an adjacent country, and the saber-rattling “diplomacy” being carried out by Bush. On the other hand, Islamic millenialism isn’t that different than Christian millenialism. You can bet there are politicians here who believe Armageddon needs to happen before Jesus returns.
Posted by John Foust on October 02, 2007 at 0950 hrs
There certainly are politicians that believe Armageddon will happen but as of today I have not heard any of them stand up and say it is my job to bring it about. Ahmadinejad’s statements that he believes he is the guy who must bring about the chaos is what has me worried.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 02, 2007 at 1236 hrs
A politician that believes in a “final battle” between Islam and Christianity, or Christianity and San Francisco, or Christianity and Xenu, is still pretty messed up in my book. After swallowing the whole of Biblical literalism, you think it’s a big leap to get to Armageddon? Oh, but they don’t really believe in Armageddon, you say. Yeah? They believe in the rest.
Posted by John Foust on October 02, 2007 at 1626 hrs
Foust,
It’s different when we do it, you moral relativist.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 02, 2007 at 2159 hrs
No - I think you missed my point. The president of Iran has publicly stated that he thinks it is his job to plunge the world into chaos in order to bring about the end times and the return of the 12th Imam.
Christians believe that Christ will return at the end of days, there will be a battle between good and evil (some say literal, some say spiritual). But I know of no Christian world leader who is giving speeches where he says: God has sent me to be the agent that brings about Armageddon and the return of Christ to earth.
If you don’t see that distinction it is because you are closing your eyes. My fears with a nuclear Iran don’t have to do with Ahmadinejad’s end time’s theology they stem from his stated belief of what his role in it is.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 03, 2007 at 1019 hrs
In the opening of his speech at Columbia, Ahmadinejad said “In the name of God, the compassionate, the merciful… Oh, God, hasten the arrival of Imam al-Mahdi and grant him good health and victory and make us his followers and those to attest to his rightfulness.”
In a December 2006 speech in Kermanshah, Ahmadinejad wished the Christians a merry Christmas and said “I hereby announce that, with God’s help, the day is not far off when Jesus will return at the side of the Hidden Imam.”
Yes, he believes in that particular end-times story. And he’s made off-hand statements about how chaos is one of the clues to these end times. I remember Bill Buckley and The Illuminatus! Trilogy using the phrase “immanentize the Eschaton.”
The “end times” theme is popular in both Christianity and Islam. Christianity does have a branch, roughly called fundamentalists, who take the Bible quite literally. Why was the “Left Behind” author and others like him invited to the White House? Why did Hal Lindsey visit the Reagan White House?
In a speech on the 9/11 anniversary, Bush said:
I believe there is a reason that history has matched this nation with this time. America strives to be tolerant and just. We respect the faith of Islam, even as we fight those whose actions defile that faith. We fight, not to impose our will, but to defend ourselves and extend the blessings of freedom. We cannot know all that lies ahead. Yet, we do know that God had placed us together in this moment, to grieve together, to stand together, to serve each other and our country. And the duty we have been given—defending America and our freedom—is also a privilege we share.
Has Bush decided he is special, that he has God’s blessing to judge both Christians and Muslims? The Pope’s envoy begged him not to go to war in Iraq. Not close enough to God, I guess. When Bush says “The evil one is among us,” do you think it might be another code word to light up the Christians who will conclude he’s talking about the Antichrist?
Woodward claims Bush said “We will export death and violence to the four corners of the earth in defense of this great country and rid the world of evil.”
In this interview, Dick Armey says he believes in the Tribulation, and that Bush does, too. Armey says it’ll happen, but it would be bad to work to bring it about.
Former Nixon aide Charles Colson said “Some wonder if the president might be influenced by evangelical teachings that envision an end-of-the-world battle between Israel and its enemies. It would be dangerous for a president to take a particular theology like that and apply it to world events.”
Tom Delay said “Christianity offers a way to live in response to the realities that we find in this world - only Christianity.’ He also said he was on a mission from God to promote a “Biblical worldview.”
Read about dominionism and tell me you don’t see it as a thread running through much of Republican thought and policy, read about various forms of millenialism. Why did Cheney run off to a meeting last week of the secret “Council for National Policy”? Should I keep going?
Here’s a National Review summary of Islamic eschatology that starts with “Many Evangelical Christians in America are watching events unfold in the Middle East with great interest, seeing in the preparations for war the possible unfolding of the End-Times scenario predicted in the Bible.”
Posted by John Foust on October 03, 2007 at 1115 hrs
This is the same sort of BS that they fed us during the Cold War.
Then they wanted us to put our heads between our legs, now they want us to stick them up our….
It pumps up military spending and the military-industrial complex laughs all the way to the bank. No matter what country their in.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 03, 2007 at 1131 hrs
Okay lets try this again:
1. Amendighad believes the end times will be beset with violence and chaos.
2. Christians believe the end times will be beset with violence and chaos.
Obviously, there are differences but lets call this an agreement for the sake of our discussion.
3. Christians do not believe they can do anything that will speed up the coming of Christ. Indeed, the while many people watch for the signs the Bible is clear that we will never actually know when Christ is going to return:
“No one knows about the day or hour, not even the angles in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” (Matthew 24:36 – Christ speaking) see also (Mark 13:32-33; 1 Thess. 5:1-3; 2 Peter 3:10).
4. Amendighad believes he was put on earth to cause the chaos and violence that is required to bring forth the end times and the return of hidden Imam.
That is a huge difference. All your list of quotes demonstrated is that there are Christian politicians who believe in some type of end times. Nothing you put forth changes the fact that none of them think they can cause the end times to begin. Bush may believe he was selected to lead the forces of good in a battle with evil but he has never said he is bring about the end times.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 03, 2007 at 1723 hrs
Show me, Joe. Show me where Ahmadinejad believes he’s supposed to be the force of chaos to bring it about.
I found a quote, although I cannot vouch for the reputation of the source:
Suddenly, Ahmadinejad changed the course of the conversation with the following aside: “Do you know why we should wish to have chaos at any price?” he asked rhetorically. “Because, after the chaos, we can see the greatness of Allah.”
Another source discussing the Hojjatieh, right-wing necon.
Huge difference? It tells me Ahmadinejad is stupid enough to say it out loud. You’re arguing that he believes in leprechauns of a slightly darker shade of green than the Biblical literalists in the USA. At least our guys have been conditioned not to describe what they really believe when standing behind a podium with a microphone. It’s ridiculous enough that Bush thinks he’s got God on his side and will say it out loud.
Posted by John Foust on October 03, 2007 at 1815 hrs
There are actually a few fringe folks looking to bring on the end of the world. Ahmadinejad and his Mahdi Shi’a want to bring on the end of the world so the Mahdi comes out of hiding (he’s in a dry well, you know). The Temple Mount Faithful want to build the third temple so that the Messiah will come. Unfortunately, they want to build it by the Dome of the Rock, a sacred site for Muslims. And the Christian Zionists are willing to support it because they believe it will bring on Armageddon and the Messiah will come back.
And we all get to go along for the ride.
John, I watched an al Jazeera thing recently where Ahmadinejad said what Joe says he did. I would have to dig for it, and I don’t have time, but I’m pretty sure Joe is right about that one.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 03, 2007 at 1838 hrs
I found another interesting explanation here, especially the part after the picture of the kid on horseback. I get the feeling we are missing some subtlety here because we’re not immersed in Islamic culture and religion.
Posted by John Foust on October 03, 2007 at 1858 hrs
John - we can only “know” what anyone’s religious beliefs are to the extent they make them know to us. So if, as your last few posts suggest, your position is that some Christian politicians believe that they can cause Christ to return but are “smart enough” to keep it to themselves - how can anyone ever refute that. It is simply a hunch.
You yourself have found a quote that backs up what I said (thank you for being honest enough to post it); I have seen others and if I have time over my lunch hour I will try to find them.
As an aside – I want to be clear I am talking only about politicians – more specifically people with the ability to direct the use of nukes. That was the begging of all of this. It is the basis of my fear of Ahmedijad and part of my analysis of whether Iran was a threat.
If the Temple Mount Faithful think that rebuilding the Temple will bring the Messiah that’s fine with me – they don’t have an bombs. I actually think they believe that they are supposed to bring that restore the Temple and that a restored Temple must be completed before the Messiah will come but if you read their mission statement and the FAQ’s on their website I don’t get the impression that it is a direct cause/effect thing for them.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 04, 2007 at 1048 hrs
It’s clear there are plenty who will say they’re Biblical literalists, it’s clear there are plenty who will pander to that crowd, so I’m sure we’d agree it’s hard to trust words that float off the lips of politicians. There may be many who claim to be Christians but who aren’t in any sense of the word. Yes, I think there’s a passive component among some of them, too. They firmly believe they’re on the side of God no matter what they do, that Revelations will come true, and that by carrying out war-like policies in the Middle East, they’re doing their part. Millions will die, but Jesus will come, so it’s OK. Isn’t that what they’re both saying? Is it any less crazy to believe Armageddon is inevitable than there’s a 9-year-old trapped in a well for a millenium?
Posted by John Foust on October 04, 2007 at 1103 hrs
Total Entries: 19648
Total Comments: 129787
Most Recent Entry: 02/09/2012 11:52 am
Most Recent Comment on: 02/09/2012 07:17 pm
Total Members: 9751
Total Logged in members: 0
Total guests: 122
Total anonymous users: 2
Most Recent Visitor on: 02/09/2012 07:18 pm
The most visitors ever was 538 on 12/01/2007 02:11 pm
Protected and licensed under a Creative Commons License (some rights reserved).