... is that though adversaries can "fact-check your ass" you can still write whatever kind of crazy made-up stuff you like. Similarly, if you mainly publish articles in a magazine you happen to own, you can write things like "Assad has been sending Sunni warriors from all over the Muslim world across Syria's border with Iraq, where they massacre Shia on arrival" and nobody can ask you to produce, you know, evidence for that assertion.
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The Good Thing About Blogging...
05 Dec 2006 03:09 pm
Comments (10)
which is interesting, seeing that
a) assad and the ruling clique in syria are alawites, who are notionally twelver shia like the shia of iraq*
b) syria has had a long standing alliance with iran since the 1970s
* the alawites aren't really twelver shia, this declaration was to insulate them from charges of being heretics during the 1970s because they were allied with the shia of lebanon (a cleric of whose offered this opinion). but the alawites are more different from the sunni than the twelver shia
It's good to know that there's somebody out there who's not afraid to take on Syria.
Of course, what gets left out is that there is another country out there that also interferes in Iraq, arms militias (but calls them police) and is involved in killing civilians. That country is the United States, but oddly, the U.S. seems that it can lecture Iran and Syria about their interference. I would call it hypocrisy, but somehow that doesn't express it correctly.
Yeah, just ask the Ikhwan of Hamah how friendly the Assads are to "Sunni warriors." Or, as Chet alludes to above, how much love radical Salafists have for 'Alawites (to paraphrase Borat, "God, man, horse, dog, Shi'ite, woman, rat -- then 'Alawite.")
I swear, ever since he discovered the intartubes Peretz has sounded like Arutz Sheva with 83% more craziness.
I'd love to see Assad sue Peretz for libel. How much says that Peretz would describe it as a "holocaust by litigation"?
I'm almost hoping this goes down just for the amusement value.
I knew Marty Peretz was a neocon but I had no idea he was this unhinged until he started writing a blog. The man is borderline insane.
The Spine is quickly becoming my guilty pleasure on the Internet. I read it for the same reason people stop at accident sights to look. Peretz seems to have no self awareness. I guess this is what happens when you become very rich. You can afford to pay people to treat you like a sage.
I didn't even have to mouseover to know it was Peretz!
What's funny - and you'll have to take my word for it I guess - is that I KNEW with metaphysical certainty that the offending quote was written by Marty Peretz before I clicked on it. You can just tell with these things. It's a parlor game I play with myself (er, so to speak).
The spittle-flecked "Sunni warriors" is a dead giveaway, no?
Comments closed December 19, 2006.
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Heads in the Sand
I'd love to see Assad sue Peretz for libel. How much says that Peretz would describe it as a "holocaust by litigation"?
Posted by SP | December 5, 2006 3:35 PM