Suicide bombers inspired by military occupation

by: Jay Stevens

Tue Oct 12, 2010 at 09:19:51 AM MST

Robert Pape, a University of Chicago political science professor and former Air Force lecturer, will present findings on Capitol Hill Tuesday that argue that the majority of suicide terrorism around the world since 1980 has had a common cause: military occupation....

"We have lots of evidence now that when you put the foreign military presence in, it triggers suicide terrorism campaigns, ... and that when the foreign forces leave, it takes away almost 100% of the terrorist campaign," Pape said in an interview last week on his findings.

Yet many conservatives bend over backwards to show that inherent characteristics of race or religion or region make certain people more naturally prone to violence. Haven't they seen Red Dawn, fer chrissakes?

The problem is religious extremism

by: Jay Stevens

Tue Jun 02, 2009 at 11:30:21 AM MST

The suspect, Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, 24, had changed his name from Carlos Leon Bledsoe after converting to the Muslim faith....

It was not known what path Muhammad, a U.S. citizen who is a recent convert to Islam, had followed to radicalization.

My thoughts and condolences go out to the family and friends of the slain soldiers, William Long and Quinton Ezeagwula. Ezeagwula was 18.

Obviously, these killings were no less a terrorist act than the shooting of Tiller.

The lesson to take away here is that religious extremism is the problem, not any particular religion, whether it's Christianity or Islam. And just as commenters are quick to damn the mullahs that filled Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammed with the hatred that led him to take the lives of two men, so should we be decrying those that fuel the hatred and violence within the extremist wing of the anti-abortion movement.

Still, you read stuff like William Saletan's piece in Slate, "Is it wrong to murder an abortionist?" or Operation Rescue's Randall Terry's statement on Tiller's murder, and you realize just deeply embedded the double-standard on right-wing terror is for many conservatives. Can you imagine how a defense of Muhammad's murders would sound if written in the same logic? That the soldiers deserved to die because of..well...choose your rhetorical hyperbole. (For an antidote to the Saletan op-ed, check out Feministe's Jill reminding us that Tiller provided legal, legitimate health care, and the AmPro's Michelle Goldberg's piece on what late-term abortion is really like.)

This may be news for some, but we are a democratic society governed by law. Those that seek to dismantle our social structure and community standards with a gun deserve neither encouragement nor support. Period.

Terrorist strikes in Kansas

by: Jay Stevens

Sun May 31, 2009 at 20:55:53 PM MST

President Obama said this afternoon that he was "shocked and outraged" by the killing of abortion doctor George Tiller, who was shot while attending church in east Wichita.

Tiller's clinic was often a target of abortion protesters. His clinic was blocked by protesters during the 1991 "Summer of Mercy" and bombed in 1986. Tiller himself was shot earlier in 1993 by an anti-abortion activist.

The suspect in this case - Scott Roeder - is an anti-tax extremist who was convicted and sentenced for building bombs, and was a member of Operation Rescue. I'm guessing Tiller was killed for political reasons, which pretty much is the definition of "terror." In fact, as Jon Perr points out, "Tiller's suspected assassin Scott Roeder is a poster child for precisely the kind of the anti-government extremism detailed in the recent DHS report on right-wing terror threats..."

Hey Dan McGee, is this your idea of "civil war"?

NARAL has a fact sheet on violence against abortion providers (pdf), and there hasn't been a murder since 1998, when Dr. Barnett Slepian was killed in his home by James Kopp. Anti-abortion terror was at a pretty high level during the 1990s, during the Clinton administration. Let's hope another Democratic administration doesn't re-up the terror activity of anti-abortion extremists.

Matthew Yglesias wrote a smart thing about this kind of right-wing extremism:

Random murder of civilians in order to coerce political concessions doesn't have a great track-record. But direct action terrorist violence against abortion providers has, I think, proven to be a fairly successful tactic. Every time you murder a doctor, you create a disincentive for other medical professionals to provide these services. What's more, you create a need for additional security at facilities around the country. In addition, the anti-abortion protestors who frequently gather near clinics are made to seem much more intimidating by the fact that the occurrence of these sorts of acts of violence.

In general, I think people tend to overestimate the efficacy of violence as a political tactic. But in this particular case, I think people tend to understate it.

Absolutely true. If you've ever been in a clinic that does family planning services, you know what he means. Security, bulletproof doors, etc & co. I know that clinic workers face an unrelenting barrage of threats and intimidation on a near-daily basis. And that's not even considering how intimidating it is to go into one of these places, especially when there's a pack of protesters outside.

Very few anti-abortion activists are violent. But the violence in the movement makes even peaceful demonstrations threatening. Especially when you read stuff like this:

I can't escape the conclusion that killing Tiller was the right thing to do. I am uncomfortable with this conclusion because it's dangerous. But nevertheless, it was the ethical thing to do. Tiller would have continued to take numerous lives. Nothing was going to stop him. So someone did stop him. And now fewer lives will be taken.

Jose Padilla convicted

by: Jay Stevens

Thu Aug 16, 2007 at 13:13:30 PM MST

There, that wasn't so hard, was it?

Mona of Unqualified Offerings:

The normal procedures of American justice were finally allowed to work. There was never a reason to subject Citizen Padilla to anything less, all the prior excuses notwithstanding.

Of note, the more serious accusations against Padilla didn't make their way into the charges, including the claims of a plot to set off a "dirty bomb" in the US:

The charges brought in civilian court in Miami, however, were a pale shadow of those initial claims in part because Padilla was interrogated about the plot when he was held as an enemy combatant for 3 1/2 years in military custody with no lawyer present and was not read his Miranda rights.

Get it? Torture and improper detention make it harder for the government to bring charges against the accused in court. (Although the "dirty bomb" plot turned out to be false.)

In short, the Padilla case was an example of what not to do in fighting terrorism. Dahlia Lithwick:

Of all the terrifically bad ideas implemented by the Bush administration since 9/11, probably the worst have involved torture. The decision to sideline criminal prosecutions and instead focus on "alternative interrogation" methods was wrongheaded from the get-go. It was wrongheaded as a tactical matter, wrongheaded as a legal matter, wrongheaded as an ethical matter, and wrongheaded as a matter of undermining world opinion. In fact the only thing the Bush administration has actually gotten right about torture is this one tiny truth: If you want to destroy someone-if that is your sole objective-torture works.

Stu Bykofsky: we need another 9/11!

by: Jay Stevens

Fri Aug 10, 2007 at 17:45:00 PM MST

America's fabric is pulling apart like a cheap sweater.

What would sew us back together?

Another 9/11 attack.

The Golden Gate Bridge. Mount Rushmore. Chicago's Wrigley Field. The Philadelphia subway system. The U.S. is a target-rich environment for al Qaeda.

Is there any doubt they are planning to hit us again?

If it is to be, then let it be. It will take another attack on the homeland to quell the chattering of chipmunks and to restore America's righteous rage and singular purpose to prevail.

Ugh. I don't know if this guy is a conservative, but this sure sounds like the usual war-proponent's bluster about how we should all shut up and follow "our" President, because...well...because he's "ours," even is if he is incapable of leading.

Steve Benen:

Our political system is premised on the notion that people are going to disagree with one another. To borrow a phrase, "That's a feature; not a bug." Americans have substantive policy disagreements about national security and foreign policy. The past several years have, thanks to an intentional White House strategy, driven people apart, which leads us to the contemporary debates Bykofsky seems troubled by.

Benen also notes that Bykofsky doesn't really mention exactly what or who we'd rally around if another 9/11 came. Personally I wouldn't be willing to put my trust in this current administration in anything they did in response to a massive terrorist attack, outside of immediate aid or investigation. I'd just suspect it'd be more of the same: pushing their radical ideology in the name of preserving national security. (And this is from a guy who supported - and still supports - our mission in Afghanistan.)

Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

Update: Weird. Apparently some righties are agreeing with Bykofsky! Wishing a massive terror attack so they can go ahead with their policies? I mean, I know some of these *sshats wanted to win their rhetorical wars at any cost...but are their egos really worth the deaths of thousands?

In any case, don't hold your breath for a post 9/11 II to actually benefit Bush or his few remaining hangers-on. Quite the reverse. I suspect most of us would prefer having someone competent and not so radical in office at a time of crisis...

Coming around on impeachment

by: Jay Stevens

Fri Jul 13, 2007 at 21:33:54 PM MST

Anyhow, if you needed a better reason for impeachment, check out this story:

As senior intelligence and law enforcement officials met again today in the White House Situation Room to deal with the "summer terror threat," a top terror commander said an attack was coming that would dwarf the failed bombings in London and Glasgow.

Let's set aside for a moment the hollowness of the threat. Frankly the London and Glasgow plots were ill-conceived and miserably executed. It wouldn't take much to "dwarf" them. Letting off a firecracker in a movie theater, for example.

First, this smacks of more fear-mongering by the administration. Chertoff had a "gut feeling" we're going to be attacked, and now you see the media dutifully stoke up the panic with crap stories like this. (Yeah, a Taliban leader threatened big attacks in the US. And the head coach of the Raiders vowed to take his team to the playoffs.) The administration has a history of tweaking with terror alerts and fantasy plots to influence politics. That's worthy of both impeachment and a swift kick in the *ss.

Second, if this threat is real and imminent, and something actually happens -- it's not the shrapnel I'll be worrying about, it'll be the overreaction of the government. This a group of thugs that kidnaps, tortures, and spies on its own people in times of safety. Think what they'll do when the sh*t flies. Not to mention their track record against your standard-issue emergencies like, say, hurricanes.

I do not want these people in power in a time of emergency.