 On Point Vincent Carroll, editor of the editorial pages, writes his On Point column most weekdays. He is also an author and freelance writer. Reach Vincent Carroll at carrollv@RockyMountainNews.com. |
Carroll: Edwards' strange trek
In his current political trajectory, John Edwards will soon be declaring that George Bush knew about 9/11 in advance. It took the Democratic presidential candidate only four years, after all, to evolve from a senator who voted for the war in Iraq to someone who dismisses the entire war on terror, as the president conceives it, as a “political slogan, that’s all it is.”
Edwards is now just a few steps removed from the inner sanctum of Conspiracy Central, that humid bunker where Bush is suspected of welcoming 9/11 or even somehow aiding the plotters in pulling it off. If the former North Carolina senator really believes the war on terror is a cynical slogan and nothing more, as he insisted in Sunday’s debate in Manchester, N.H., he might as well finish his remarkable ideological trek.
According to Edwards, “What this global war on terror bumper sticker — political slogan, that’s all it is, it’s all it’s ever been — was intended to do was for George Bush to use it to justify everything he does.”
These words were spoken one day after the revelation that four men had plotted to blow up John F. Kennedy International Airport on behalf of “the war for Islam,” and just weeks after the arrests of six men planning to massacre soldiers at Fort Dix. Maybe Edwards should start reading the newspapers during haircuts.
It was up to Hillary Clinton, playing the role of an adult, to point out that she had “seen firsthand the terrible damage that can be inflicted on our country by a small band of terrorists who are intent upon foisting their way of life and using suicide bombers and suicidal people to carry out their agenda.” Clinton was even willing to concede that the war on terror, although conducted by a man she deems shockingly incompetent, had in fact made us “safer than we were.”
The origins of a myth
It was 40 years ago today that Israeli warplanes inflicted an annihilating blow on the Egyptian air force, igniting the Six-Day War and laying the groundwork for a now-enduring myth: that the main source of Mideast tension is the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Golan Heights and Gaza Strip.
To believe this, however, you must overlook the fact that the 1967 war was the third that Israel had fought with its neighbors — before the Occupied Territories were under Israeli control. You must ignore the escalating forays by Palestinian fedayeen into Israeli territory in years before the war, the unrelenting hostility of Arab leaders such as Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, his closing of the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping, the massing of Egypt’s troops in the Sinai, and the shelling of Israeli villages by Syria.
If Israel didn’t have a case for pre-emptive attack, it’s hard to imagine what one would look like.
Four days before the fighting began, the chairman of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, Ahmed Shukairy, described the fate of Israelis should conflict erupt: “Those who survive will remain in Palestine. I estimate that none of them will survive.”
Israel has made its share of blunders since that war, but the primary source of conflict today remains what it was when a flotilla of warplanes swooped under Egyptian radar on a fateful morning exactly four decades ago: the refusal of too many Arabs to accept a Jewish state in their midst.
Vincent Carroll is editor of the editorial pages. Reach him at carrollv@RockyMountain
News.com.
Well that's a strange leap in logic. Edwards says that Bush is using the so-called "War on Terror" for political purposes (hard to argue with that unless you are total right wingnut) and Vince now believes he is a conspiracy theorist? Hard to believe this nut has a job.
Posted by Obvious on June 5, 2007 07:56 AMObvious, it is tough to bring logic to the 28%'ers...Vince may indeed be a lost cause.
Posted by jay on June 5, 2007 11:46 AMMr. Breck Girl is perhaps the most pandering and overtly political one of a pretty sorry Democratic field. Mike Gravel and Kucinich are the only principled ones but they only appeal to the left wing nutjobs - to use a "diversely tolerant" "progressive" term.
Posted by CC on June 5, 2007 12:58 PMJohn Edwards was asked to clarify a statement he made in a recent speech where he called the war on terror, “a bumper sticker, not a plan.” Edwards said that he rejects the notion that there is currently a war on terror saying, “that’s exactly what it is, it’s a bumper sticker” and a, “political slogan, that’s all it is. That’s all it’s ever been, was intended to do was for George Bush to use it to justify everything he does.”
Posted by SlouchingtowardBoulder on June 5, 2007 01:08 PMJohn Edwards was asked to clarify a statement he made in a recent speech where he called the war on terror, “a bumper sticker, not a plan.” Edwards said that he rejects the notion that there is currently a war on terror saying, “that’s exactly what it is, it’s a bumper sticker” and a, “political slogan, that’s all it is. That’s all it’s ever been, was intended to do was for George Bush to use it to justify everything he does.”
Posted by SlouchingtowardBoulder on June 5, 2007 01:08 PMWhat a vacuous and dangerous man is John Edwards. I would imagine that he thinks the recent Ft. Dix and JFK plots were hatched by the Bush administration for propaganda. In fact, this is EXACTLY what the DailyKOS Krazy Kids are saying.
I don't think Vince is in any position to take a pot shot at someones hair. I've seen grapefruits with more hair than Vince. If my dog looked like him, I would shave his butt and teach him to walk backwards.
Posted by just sayin' on June 5, 2007 01:34 PMBOOK REVIEW: Here's an interesting article, speaking of conspiracies.
Pros: Fast-paced spy-thriller to an unbelievable ending.
Cons: Everyone thought this couldn't happen, then it did.
Mr. Spirko discusses all the issues confronting the Middle East through the minds of both the Palestinians and Israelis. His understanding of the collective mindsets (those who are continually at war with each other) brings a new dimension of reality to the Palestinian question, which has now become the ever-persistent Israeli obstacle. How to achieve peace in the Middle East? If the Palestinian problem can be solved where both sides achieve peace, then world terrorism will go away. Mr. Spirko is more right than anybody knows. ...
SAN FRANCISCO – THE PALESTINE CONSPIRACY, a genre spy-thriller by Robert Spirko, was fourth on the best-seller list at Atlasbooks, Inc., a national book distributor. Ingram Books is the worldwide distributor.
Spirko, a financial and geo-political analyst who has given his advice to the National Security Council, turned his attention to the Middle East in 1987, after discovering several common elements related to the Middle East question. He wrote down his analysis, and when he was finished, he not only had a solution to the quagmire, he had a story to tell. THE PALESTINE CONSPIRACY foreshadowed the Persian Gulf War by three years, and the resultant Iraq War followed by the Sept. 11 attack.
Spirko states, "The chief threat in the region I see right now is the threat to Saudi Arabia by Iran and Al Qaeda. If Al Qaeda were to overthrow the present royal family in Saudi Arabia, cutting off the oil supply to western nations including Japan and China, it would bring down entire world economies. France and Germany would be begging us to go to war to retake those oil wells. It would be World War III."
“If such a scenario were to occur,” he reiterates, “France and the European economies would collapse in a matter of weeks.”
“Another looming concern is Iran which wants to develop nuclear weapons to couple with their Shahab 4, 5 & 6 missiles on the drawing boards which have a range to hit London, Israel, all of Europe, southern Russia and the United States. Also, the Iranian government has said it initially had 300 centrifuges to enrich uranium to weapons grade material. They have increased that to 3,000. They will soon increase that again to 10,000 centrifuges,” Spirko says. “They have the additional capacity to add another 20,000 centrifuges in mass production techniques that will enable them to produce at least seven nuclear bombs in about a year. Where did they get these centrifuges?”
Spirko answers that question by stating an Arab proverb, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
“Simply put,” Spirko explains, “they probably got them from Saddam Hussein before the Iraq War started and were probably smuggled out of Iraq and into Iran just like he did his air force of 600 Soviet fighter planes. In other words, he gave them to his former enemy rather than let them be destroyed on the ground.”
“Why would he have done any differently with the 30,000 centrifuges he supposedly had on a decentralized basis inside Iraq before the war?” Spirko asks. “Isn’t it strange that Iran could come up with a nuclear weapons program in about six months to a year when it took the United States six years under the Manhattan Project with 5,000 of the world’s most brilliant scientists like Robert Oppenheimer, Niels Bohr, Seaborg, Einstein, Fermi, and others working on it?”
Another point Spirko makes on the Mideast is that, “It is time for the Israelis and Palestinians to return to the Camp David Peace Talks or some other place, resume where they left off and "freeze in place" the already-agreed-upon negotiating points,” Spirko says.
"And, it's all related to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict which I said back in 1987 was the crux of my book. It always has been, and always will be until it's settled,” Spirko says. “That linkage is exactly what Osama Bin Laden stated in a taped message aired the weekend before the election in November of 2004. Whether you believe him or not is beside the point. That's what's he told us, and we'd better take that into account."
The novel is a mass market paperback produced by Olive Grove Publishers, and can be purchased at area bookstores through Ingram Book Group, New Leaf Distribution, and Baker and Taylor, priced at $14.99, ISBN 0-9752508-0-9. THE PALESTINE CONSPIRACY can also be ordered on the web at www.atlasbooks.com, or email orders from: order@bookmasters.com, or from Barnes & Nobles, Border's, Dalton's, efollett.com & Follett bookstores at colleges and universities, WaldenBooks, Amazon.com, Walmart.com, Target.com and other popular retail bookstores. Or, readers and store managers can call 1-800-BOOKLOG, or 800-247-6553 direct, to order.
Posted by OLIVE GROVE BOOKS on June 5, 2007 03:16 PM
Nice article. I think the general public will begin to see Mr. Edwards' "evolution" in thinking for what it is -- and for the peril it would place us in if he became president.
Posted by Cooper Wriston on June 6, 2007 08:53 AM