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Denying Responsibility for the Wars One Cheers On
The NYT columnist who has supported 4 wars on Muslims in 6 years decries the Islamic disregard for human life.
David Brooks' column today perfectly illustrates what lies at the core of our political discourse: namely, self-loving tribalistic blindness laced with a pathological refusal to accept responsibility for one's actions. Brooks claims there is a unique evil that one finds in the "fringes of the Muslim world":
Most people select stories that lead toward cooperation and goodness. But over the past few decades a malevolent narrative has emerged.
That narrative has emerged on the fringes of the Muslim world. It is a narrative that sees human history as a war between Islam on the one side and Christianity and Judaism on the other. This narrative causes its adherents to shrink their circle of concern. They don't see others as fully human. They come to believe others can be blamelessly murdered and that, in fact, it is admirable to do so.
This narrative is embraced by a small minority. But it has caused incredible amounts of suffering within the Muslim world, in Israel, in the U.S. and elsewhere. With their suicide bombings and terrorist acts, adherents to this narrative have made themselves central to global politics. They are the ones who go into crowded rooms, shout "Allahu akbar," or "God is great," and then start murdering.
But Brooks himself was a vehement, vicious advocate for the attack on Iraq, which caused this:
The 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq has resulted in the deaths of many Iraqi civilians . . . Many international organizations, governments and non-governmental organizations have counted excess civilian casualties using such methods; however all have reported different numbers. Reports range from 128,000 to 1,033,000.
That's at least 128,000 innocent human beings -- at least -- whose lives were eradicated by the war Brooks repeatedly cheered on. It also resulted in this: "More than 4 million Iraqis have now been displaced by violence in the country." But Brooks accuses Islamic fanatics -- but not himself -- of "causing incredible amounts of suffering."
Brooks also justified the Israeli attack on Gaza, including its worst excesses -- a war that wiped out the lives of 1,400 Palestinians (including 252 children under the age of 16) and that entailed "the shooting of [Gazan] civilians with white flags, the firing of white phosphorus shells and charges that Israeli soldiers used Palestinian men as human shields," all of which, according to a U.N. investigation, were "the result of deliberate guidance issued to soldiers." He also cheered on the Israeli bombing campaign of Lebanon and derided those calling for a cease-fire, even as the war wiped out more than 1,000 Lebanese people, at least 300 of whom were women and children, during which "Israeli warplanes also targeted many moving vehicles that turned out to be carrying only civilians trying to flee the conflict." And Brooks is now demanding escalation of the war in yet another Muslim country, this one in Afghanistan -- making it the fourth separate war on Muslims he's cheered on in the last six years alone.
So here's a person who is constantly advocating and justifying the killing, bombing, and slaughtering of Muslims, including well over 100,000 innocent civilians. And yet today he writes a column saying: Look over there at those radical Muslims; can you believe how degraded and inhumane they are? In fact, he says, "they" -- those Muslims over there -- "don't see others as fully human. They come to believe others can be blamelessly murdered and that, in fact, it is admirable to do so." That's from the same person who cheerleads for the endless deaths of Muslims and destruction of the Muslim world while thinking that it makes him strong, resolute, Churchillian, righteous and noble -- exactly that which he accuses "fringe Muslims" of doing. And even as he blames the U.S. for "absolving" radical Muslims for the "evil" of their choices, Brooks will never make the connection between what he does and its results because he believes he is free from accountability and that his righteousness justifies the killings he desires -- again, exactly that which he says today is the hallmark of Islamic monsters ("They come to believe others can be blamelessly murdered and that, in fact, it is admirable to do so").
The tribalistic narcissism and depraved refusal to accept responsibility for the consequences of one's actions on vivid display here is hardly unique to Brooks. The very same people who express such moral outrage and self-righteous horror over events like the Fort Hood shootings themselves have immense amounts of innocent human blood on their hands, but they simply avert their eyes from what they have caused or believe that they are too inherently Good to be responsible, let alone culpable, for what they unleash.
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79 Comments so far
Show AllThis is perhaps off-topic.
A thought just came to me:
Could Ft. Hood be explained by a new condition?
PRE-traumatic stress disorder.
Perhaps traumtic stress disorder transference.
Yes, people that work with troubled people
absorb some of the trouble.
Another case of a pundit being totally out of touch with reality.
Superpower and its pundits create their own reality.
I can't even read most of them any more. In years past many people read and thought about what pundits had to say, and there were many useful discussions based on their columns. These days only a few columnists are worth reading.
Thank you Glenn, for stating the obvious about David Brooks' rantings. The hypocrisy of christians is astounding.
David Brooks is Jewish.
david is a sad little man. the pom pom waver at the neo con
department of the new york slimes. send his kids to death
and suddenly he wouldn't be on the band wagon anymore !
the times is a shadow of its former self and is a flag
waver for all that's evil in washington today. its all
about the money like anything else in the world today!
Denying responsibility for the wars one criticizes.
Glenn Greenwald is a Zionist and supporter of the two-state solution in Israel/Palestine, that is, the continuation of the apartheid state of Israel that has existed for 60 years.
As Fritz Hollings said 'The US invaded Iraq to secure Israel, and everybody knows it'. Thus, Greenwald supports the existence of Israel as an apartheid state, and this is what guarantees endless wars in the region.
Then he indulges in endless criticism of the war that he and the other Zionists are responsible for. This is a new order of hypocrisy.
Please supply evidence of Mr. Greenwald being a Zionist and supporter of a two-state solution.
I spent some time on this question, first by googling Glenn Greenwald and two state and Glenn Greenwald one state ..... I could not find anything definite one way or the other.
That in itself is sufficient. He writes about Israel/Palestine all the time, and never criticizes apartheid Israel, and never condemns the two-state solution, and never advocates the one state solution. So, by not challenging the overwhelmingly dominant view, he is implicitly accepting and supporting it.
But there's more. He writes for salon.com and there is a comments section after each article. I've tried to call him out there and he hasn't responded, but his regular followers have made it emphatically clear that they all support 'Israel's right to defend itself', that is, to defend the current apartheid division of Palestine.
Take this article for example, does Greenwald say ONE WORD about the root causes of the problems in the ME, that is, the existence of a racist European Jewish state in the middle of a sea of Arabs? Not a single word. Search all his articles, he loves to criticize other Zionists for their excesses, but he never criticizes Zionism itself.
Oh come on now, give it up.
Joe
This is from one of Greenwald's followers on salon.com ....
Glenn Greenwald is a Zionist
He has said so himself, do a little more research. I would post permalinks to the letters, but I can't because they don't show up in letters anymore...
Actually that is exactly what Greenwald is condemning in Brooks...Zionism is tribalism.
BRAVO!!!!!
Not Allen,
I'm not sure it's a good idea to presume to intuit Mr. Greenwald's opinion, based on not being able to find his opinion using a google search. After all, I couldn't find anything on space aliens when I googled "Not Allen", but that doesn't mean that it's reasonable to conclude that you're a space alien.
I have no idea what Mr. Greenwald favors as a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, other than I am certain he would advocate that it be fair to both Palestinians and Israelis. A "two-state solution" is indeed the prevailing political wisdom of the day, in both the West and the Arab world. I wouldn't be surprised if Greenwald does indeed favor the idea of a separate Palestinian state. However, it isn't the label we use that makes a "solution" fair and reasonable, but rather the content and implementation of such an arrangement. The same can be said of a one-state "solution", or any other solution. Much depends on the details and implementation of the actual agreement.
I'd avoid cliched code-words such as "Zionist". Loose use of that label really doesn't tell us very much about what a person's actual behavior and beliefs may be, but may well imply antisemitism if carelessly applied. After all, is one a "colonist" if one lives in America? Maybe, maybe not. It kind of depends on one's philosophy, history, intentions, attitude towards the rights of native peoples, etc. After all, there are Jews living in Hebron whose families have lived there for several hundred years, or perhaps longer. Are they "Zionists"? Is George Bush Jr. a "Zionist"? How about his father? Is Obama? For that matter, do you consider the entire denomination of Southern Baptists to be "Zionists"? That's a looooooot of Zionists, pardner.
We need to avoid being trapped by labels, and get to the heart of what is needed for fairness and justice.
Excellent post.
[I'd avoid cliched code-words such as "Zionist".]
The whole point is that Zionists are the only ones given any forum whatever in the US, the main media, the political arena, and even blogs like CD give non-Zionists absolutely ZERO space. That's not a cliche, that's is an incredibly stark reality.
There is not a single, NOT ONE, media or political figure who is not a Zionist. There is not one, NOT ONE, regular columnist featured on CD, or Salon, or Huffington, or Truthdig, or any of the other 'progresssive' blogs that does not support the continued apartheid division of Palestine into two factions. Michael Lerner, Jimmy Carter, Noam Chomsky, Glenn Greenwald, these phony 'humanists' and 'progressives' don't advertise their support for apartheid Israel, they don't call themselves Zionists, instead they spend plenty of time criticizing the non-humanist Zionists. Both types of Zionists play their part in delineating and restricting the range of discussion in the US. That's why I call Zionists like Chomsky and Greenwald the vanguard of the Zionist state. They're the real advance operatives, completely co-opting the left and diverting any effective progressive action against apartheid Israel.
Anyone who thinks Israel is the cause of "all our problems in the ME" is willfully ignorant. The US is trying to dominate the world by controlling all the fossil fuels under Moslem lands. The US and UK established Israel to help in that cause. True, the Zionists have moved beyond their subservient role and now seem to strongly influence, sometimes dominate U.S. foreign policy. But they're just different offices in the same company, U.S. imperialism for short.
Also, I don't think GG supports a two-state solution. I think he considers those issues outside his realm of knowledge. He certainly attacks Israeli actions and their U.S. supporters on a regular basis.
When GG has written about Israel he devotes most of his criticism towards other media for their narrow and one-sided reporting and then contrasts that against the few sources who provide a fuller picture.
GG reports facts and produces voluminous links to his sources.
He does not use his blog to spew invective.
I too spend time in his comments section.
He'll aggressively spar with those who challenge his conclusions.
Simply because he presents criticism of biased reporting is not proof that he's this or that, as long as his criticism is grounded in facts.
In a civilized nation no one would bother to publish Brook's demonic drivel.
My guess:the Fort Hoodlum Massacre is direct blowback from the anti Goldstone Report resolution in the USA house of gangsters.
May Mr. Brooks live 1,000 future lifetimes as a poor brown Muslim in a little known country brutalized and pillaged by a superpower.
Since Glenn Greenwald brought up the killings of Fort Hood, it would not be off-topic to question why those killings occurred. I think VDB's point is well taken. Reports have stated that the shooter was told that he was ordered to deploy to Iraq or Afghanistan. Hasan is a psychiatrist who counseled soldiers who had been through combat in those countries. It is quite conceivable, I believe, that he may have wanted those soldiers to ask themselves if they thought, either directly or indirectly, that what they had gone through was worth it and that whether they thought that they were fighting for a noble cause. Since he may have been attempting to get these soldiers to become introspective regarding their time in a war zone, this then may have caused him to wonder if the damage that he was seeing in those soldiers would also affect him in the same way after he had been placed in that same position especially if he thought that it all would have been for an unjust reason.
From an amateur point of view, one has to think that there are very few times that a person would commit an act for absolutely no justifiable reason whatsoever. It would seem logical that Hasan reacted in such a violent way because he could not effectively deal with the fact that he could very likely end up experiencing the very same things that his patients were going through and that, as it appeared to him, there was nothing at all that he could do that would prevent him from being shipped out to the Middle East.
It appears to me that this is another instance of how the wars have claimed more of its victims with conservatives like Brooks, as Greenwald points out, not caring at all about the fate of its victims. But then we have had the ironic sight of an [alleged] antiwar president saluting and "honoring" the dead as they return from Afghanistan and Iraq. A true antiwar president would be withdrawing soldiers from those countries as quickly as possible in order to prevent more tragedies like Fort Hood from occurring again and in order to make sure that no more body bags would be returning from overseas. Then the super patriots like Brooks, Obama, Beck, Limbaugh, et al become shocked when these victims of war manifest themselves to the people in this country as when a massacre happens at a place like Fort Hood, Texas. What happened at that military base was a time bomb waiting to explode. And it did, with most tragic results.
Maj. Nidal Hasan is a home grown, cowardly, murderous, terrorist and not any different from Timothy McVeigh.
A cowardly terrorist is insulated as is a drone operator or member of congress
Terrorism is the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, especially for political purposes.
So what makes Maj. Hasan a "terrorist"? His last name? We have incidents like this in the U.S. all the time--someone snaps and starts shooting people pretty much at random. But it's only when the shooter has an Arab last name that we label him as a "terrorist." What Hasan did was horrible, and indicates that he has some serious mental health problems. But he's not a "terrorist."
President Obama's foreign policy, however, fits the definition of terrorism very well.
So what makes Timothy McVeigh a terrorist? His last name? .... But it's only when the shooter has an Irish last name that we label him as a "terrorist" and a member of the IRA.
Give me a break.
Was Timothy McVeigh a terrorist? Or just another mentally deranged person?
The court-appointed psychiatrist who examined McVeigh said that McVeigh was probably suffering from PTSD from his service in the Gulf War. He said that McVeigh blew up the Federal Building in Oklahoma City because he wanted to avenge the Branch Davidians (80 people, including 20 children) who were attacked and killed by the federal government in Waco, Texas.
The psychiatrist said that McVeigh wanted to be known as a young man who struck a blow for freedom. He also said that to understand is not to condone.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from
_our_own_correspondent/1325650.stm
Wasn't Timothy McVeigh also a product of the U.S. military?
as was Oswald.
as was My Lai.
as was/is GITMO.
as ye sow, so shall ye reap.
When men are trained to kill there can be no surprise when they turn into killers.
The labelling of the Ft. Hood shooter as a terrist© merely postpones the inevitable realization Americans must come to:
Their country is still the world's #1 perpetrator of terror.
"ALL men are created equal" my arse.
Delete repeat posting
No, Fort Hood was not terrorism. Terrorism is violence directed against innocent civilians. These soldiers were preparing to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan to kill and be killed. Hasan just moved the battlefield. The U.S. government thinks they should be able to bomb and occupy while their home bases are untouched. Hasan disproved this.
Now will our gov't react by ramping up the violence even further, or by reconsidering its causes? I'm betting on the former, aren't you?
if one did not have ample other reasons,brooks is an additional one to stop subscribing to the nytimes.
funny you'd say that...he was, along with friedman and a couple of others, instrumnetal in weaning me off of my addiction to the nyt...I, too, had a period where I thought informed political engagement was of value, and thought the nyt a good source of info...not until I saw the criminal nature of the world's power structure did I realize how I was being played...this man, brooks, is a waste of thought...
It is not surprising that friendly dogs trained to be vicious guards will frequently turn on each other violently. Anyone murmuring "How could this happen?" has little awareness of the negative socialization that military training foists on it's gullible victims or the fawning respect of all things military that is culturally attached, virus-like, onto Americans and their pundits.
Violence is sickening. The military is institutionalized violence. Somehow we need to sweat it out of our system. We could start by not being so shocked that a military shrink might turn on his own people in a psychotic fit of deadly rage. We should expect it.
Senseless, deadly rampage is militarism's Job # 1.
An USns go inna "OUR" over-crowded WORLD, chanting "Gawd Bles' Merca" and start blitzkrieg and collateral Obombanations!
The problem with your argument is that it can recursively go back forever. Tribalism has not suddenly come into existence in the last fifty years. I understand your pique with DB, his head has been in the sand for years now but...
I recently saw newsreel footage of the Six-day War, taken in the early days in Cairo as the state media reported that Arab forces were overrunning Israel. Thousands were dancing in the streets, overjoyed that, at last, they were going to kill all the Jews.
It's not just the 'fringes', it never was.
Perhaps they were celebrating what they thought was the destruction of a threat to the region and the population of Palestine, as the Zionists had already revealed through Irgun and Stern Gang.
Perhaps the destruction of any nation with isreals tactics and agendas would be celebrated as well it should be, regardless of the religions involved( I would propose only a peaceful dissolution).
Historically the Jews have been treated alot more peacefully by the Muslims than by Christians.
As inter-connected, inter-dependent beings when we cause harm to one another the damage done to our own psyche can be deep and permanent.
Brooks himself is a victim and but lacks the depth or insight to recognize it.
To sit at one's keyboard and type words that'll be read by millions advocating senseless unimaginable violence of which you'll be safely protected solely for your own profit or power is the act of a madman.
Hasan exploded into violent murderous rage for reasons we don't know but being up close with those who shared nightmares of death and destruction probably played a role.
David Brooks has no similar excuse.
The news hour on PBS seems to think David Brooks has much value as a commentator. His counterpart gazes at Brooks with fawning eyes and a general look of subservience.
And that tells you everything you need to know about the PBS Snooze Hour.
· Yr Obd't Servant
Brooks has shown us all how a closed minded hypocrite thinks. Notice how there is NO examination of one's own actions when compared to those of your antagonist. It's all THEIR fault, while you sit there pure as the driven snow. He is the perfect example of right wing thinking.
He complains about other's lack of compassion for others while exhibiting none of his own. He whines about other's wars while calling for an even larger one against 1/6 of the world's population. He ignores the violence done in this very country by those of OUR most populated religion while complaining about other's activities.
He is just as bad if not worse than those he complains about.
Yes, Brooks needs to hang at Nuremberg, alongside Bush, Obama and about 1000 politicians and hangers-on who have waged wars of aggression against helpless peoples.
Where can I get a ticket to that event?
The clear objectivity of Glenn Greenwald is commendable.
yes.
David Brooks has been for as long as I can remember, nothing but another media whore, who is the master of casuistry. He is just nothing more than a cheerleader for the MIC that uses quiddity and obfuscation to cover his mendacious, rhetoric.
Brooks claims there is a unique evil that one finds in the "fringes of the Muslim world":
And Shiblikov claims there is a unique evil that one finds in the "fringes of the Judeo/Christian world".
glad you cleared that up - I'd misread: "FRIDGES of the Muslim world."
hahahahahahaha...that was both funny and furry...!
long after my family has given up on a specific item in our fridge, whether or not I will eat it is what determines whether it stays in there, or not...my gut is the last potential stop on the way to the garbage or disposal...
Two indicators about Obama from BEFORE the election of 2008.
1. Early on, in the campaign, he vowed to increase the Pentagon budget and not hesitate to attack within Pakistan.
2. He chose Joe Biden to be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Joe Biden was one of the heads of the committee in the Senate overseeing the intelligence used to support the unilateral, deceit-based war on Iraq when he refused to allow testimony by anyone who contradicted Bush and company lies. He then voted in favor of unilateral aggression. Senator Joe Biden also pushed to protect credit card companies against their victims by restricting the ability of people to declare bankruptcy.