August 12, 2005

MSM: Missing in Action in the Struggle for Women’s Rights in Iraq

 From World Magazine:

...The rise in terrorist attacks over the past month and its link to the constitutional debate in Iraq should not be underestimated. No one has a greater stake in the wording of Article 1 than al-Qaeda and its affiliates.

Intense pressure from the Islamic left and right is falling on Baghdad's parliamentary committee on the constitution. And it's this simple: whether Article 1 will declare the Quran "the" source of inspiration behind Iraqi laws or "a" source. For the sake of those wee words, U.S. and Iraqi forces are shedding their blood, and brave Iraqis are taking to the streets to have their voices heard, too.

Women representing 17 civil society groups took the streets of Najaf on Aug. 3.

"We want to make clear that we're against any attempt to revive the notorious 137 personal affairs laws," organizer Intisar Al-Mayali declared. "We want a civil law to govern issues like marriage and inheritance . . . and even the existing civil law that we support needs to be modified and improved in a way that matches the needs and rights of Iraqi women and we insist that Islam must not be the only source of legislation."

What is striking about the protest was its location, Najaf, a Shiite stronghold where local elected leaders and clerics demand Islamic law be the law of the land.

That is why al-Qaeda's No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri came out of hiding in Afghanistan in an Aug. 4 videotape long enough to issue more death threats to U.S. troops in Iraq and more strikes against the United States. He may wag his finger at the West. But it's the women he's afraid of.

Hat tip for the link to Tsar Lazar, who comments: 

...for the more vocal feminists, civil-rights warriors, and other stereotypes of the Left, to actually give aid and comfort to Iraqi women would be to admit that the President’s policy on Iraq has been successful and may actually improve the life of the average Iraqi. 

Thus, we see the Left caught once again on the horns of a dilemma of its own making.  To respond whole-heartedly to the request (which is, morally, the right thing to do---no tongue-in-cheek intended) is to admit the Iraq invasion has accomplished much good---something which would make Teddy Kennedy choke on his martini olive.  On the other hand, failure to respond to the request would raise charges of hypocrisy since it would mean ignoring the plight of a decidedly underpriviliged group that has made an eloquent appeal for help.

So far the Liberals are avoiding this subject with the help of MSM, which refuses to report on it. This is a perfect example of the insidious effect of MSM being so unbelievably in the tank for the Dems. Because they are restricted to their anti-Iraq war, anti-GWB message, MSM refuses to cover something that it ordinarily cares deeply about: women's rights.  MSM suppresses this news so that the U.S. public doesn't hear about it. The result: Libs can pretend there is no such thing going on.

In this way MSM is aiding the great harm which will be done to women's rights in Iraq, should the Iraq constitution specify the Koran as "the" source for Iraqi law.

Evan Sayet on Efforts to “Balkanize America”

From Evan Sayet: 

What exactly do the Democrats think is going to happen when they Balkanize America and invent categories for people so that no one is an American any longer but rather an "African-American" or an "Hispanic-American" or a woman or a homosexual whose allegiance shouldn't be to America but rather to the "cultural heritage" or the unique behavior that "defines" them?

What do the Democrats think is going to happen when English is not the language of everyone but everyone is to speak their own language ( even made up slang like "ebonics" ) so that communities become isolated and antagonistic and incapable of communicating with one another to solve differences and problems?

This is a key issue. America has produced a lot of ways of doing things that have been very successful. We must work hard to make sure we don't stop doing the stuff that works.

Al Qaeda Produces a Documentary

AL QAEDA PRODUCED A 2-HOUR DOCUMENTARY AND IS GOING TO AIR IT ON AL JAZEERA:

STEVE EMERSON, TERRORISM ANALYST: Bill, they're telling us what they believe. They hate us for who we are. They hate us for our promotion of human rights, for women's rights, for democracy.

It's not a linear equation here. They're not saying they oppose us merely because of the Iraq War. They hate us because of the fact that we are considered part of this conspiracy to subjugate Islam.

And in this, you know, two-hour special that they've produced, they actually cite the Crusades as happening yesterday. They want to slit the throats of Americans, Christians, Jews and anybody who is not Muslim.

O'REILLY: No. There - I should explain that this sound bite you just heard is part of a two-hour documentary that basically says the West started the war, that the USA started this by invading and all of this stuff.

But you know, we've heard this now, Steve, for decades from these fanatics. Is there a change in their tone? And why would they bother putting out a two-hour documentary? Who's going to watch that?

EMERSON: Well, they certainly are going to get a lot of people watching it in al Rabiya and now in al Jazeera, throughout the Middle East.

What's great is all the intel we're going to get from the stuff these bonehead terrorists put in the show:

O'REILLY: Now can this have any value to U.S. intelligence, watching something like this, taking a look at it? Can they get any worthy information from this?

EMERSON: I think they can get a lot of information from it. First of all, even though their faces are masked, there are voices that certainly could be acoustically matched to potential other voices in terms of voice pattern identification.

Number two, they can see exactly perhaps with a backdrop where some of the scenes were shot.

Three, they could see perhaps in terms of trying to contain the operational compromise where documents were taken and what those documents are, since they actually showed them on the air, as well as some of the computers they seized.

I think there's a tremendous amount, Bill, of intelligence value that can be gleaned if carefully scrutinized.

The terrorists are not not well-educated in deductive reasoning. If they were they'd probably find something better to do with their lives.