Thursday, July 14, 2005
'Alternative views of sexuality,' Part II: Teddo rips into Rick Santorum, as well he should. But he veers off the specific issue of priests sexually abusing children and into a defense of the state's universities, community services and programs for 'at-risk and vulnerable children.' Huh? Is the issue really about the culture wars? ...
Hub Blog admits to one of many prejudices: I just assumed Santorum was a Christian evangelical of the protestant type. Turns out he's a devout Catholic. But that makes sense too. I.e. He's the same type of Ray Flynn-like umbrella holder who was in complete denial about the sex-abuse scandal as it unfolded. Santorum is obviously still in pathetic denial about its scope and nature.
'Watching America': The CSM looks at 'Watching America,' a new web site that translates foreign articles for Americans to get a better understanding about what the world is saying about us. Not bad. ...
But I happened to gravitate over to the French section (being a closet Francophile) and found a Le Figaro article that seemed to be translated accurately. But certainly not the headlines. You don't have to speak French to understand the difference between the English version ("'Bush Fell Into' bin Laden's Trap") and the French version ("La guerre, oui! Mais laquelle?"). The English subhead reads: "Due to a failure to understand the goals and thinking of Islamic extremists, al-Qaeda's strategy to exploit the inherent vulnerabilities of Western democracies have largely worked." There's no subheadline in the French edition. The English headlines, in fact, misrepresent the entire point of the Le Figaro piece, which is about Europe's awakening to the totalitarian threat of al-Qaeda in the aftermath of the London bombings, though the piece does have a buried criticism of Bush falling into an Iraq trap. An excerpt:
"Like the red and brown totalitarians of yesteryear, this group (of Islamic extremists), formed in 1954 in reaction to Nasser’s secular revolution, is motivated by a dream of universal domination. Its propaganda relies on a deep resentment, and its fight, which strives for the triumph of a new civilization, will not end with the settling of the Middle Eastern crisis. Its targets are both Western democracies and Arab dictatorships accused of having betrayed Islam. In its most visible form, al-Qaeda relies on very religious believers. But in its methods, it reproduces with little originality the strategic and totalitarian doctrines inspired by the West; it owes less to Mohammed than to Clausewitz, Marx, Lenin, Hitler and even Mao."
Hub Blog admits to one of many prejudices: I just assumed Santorum was a Christian evangelical of the protestant type. Turns out he's a devout Catholic. But that makes sense too. I.e. He's the same type of Ray Flynn-like umbrella holder who was in complete denial about the sex-abuse scandal as it unfolded. Santorum is obviously still in pathetic denial about its scope and nature.
'Watching America': The CSM looks at 'Watching America,' a new web site that translates foreign articles for Americans to get a better understanding about what the world is saying about us. Not bad. ...
But I happened to gravitate over to the French section (being a closet Francophile) and found a Le Figaro article that seemed to be translated accurately. But certainly not the headlines. You don't have to speak French to understand the difference between the English version ("'Bush Fell Into' bin Laden's Trap") and the French version ("La guerre, oui! Mais laquelle?"). The English subhead reads: "Due to a failure to understand the goals and thinking of Islamic extremists, al-Qaeda's strategy to exploit the inherent vulnerabilities of Western democracies have largely worked." There's no subheadline in the French edition. The English headlines, in fact, misrepresent the entire point of the Le Figaro piece, which is about Europe's awakening to the totalitarian threat of al-Qaeda in the aftermath of the London bombings, though the piece does have a buried criticism of Bush falling into an Iraq trap. An excerpt:
"Like the red and brown totalitarians of yesteryear, this group (of Islamic extremists), formed in 1954 in reaction to Nasser’s secular revolution, is motivated by a dream of universal domination. Its propaganda relies on a deep resentment, and its fight, which strives for the triumph of a new civilization, will not end with the settling of the Middle Eastern crisis. Its targets are both Western democracies and Arab dictatorships accused of having betrayed Islam. In its most visible form, al-Qaeda relies on very religious believers. But in its methods, it reproduces with little originality the strategic and totalitarian doctrines inspired by the West; it owes less to Mohammed than to Clausewitz, Marx, Lenin, Hitler and even Mao."
