Afghan courts have produced yet another example of its de-evolution into a medieval Sharia system. The country’s Supreme Court has upheld the 20-year-sentence of Parwez Kambakhsh for blasphemy. He was convicted of asking questions in a university class about women’s rights under Islam and downloading an article on equal rights for woman. We are about to send thousands of more troops into the country to preserve it from . . . radical Islamic influences.
Kambakhsh was a journalism student at Balkh University in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. He was originally sentenced to death and then given the “merciful” sentence of 20 years.
For the full story, click here.
This is an amazing story. Even under George W. Bush, the journalists could ask anything that they wanted without sanctions. Wait a minute, in his press conferences, if you asked a question he didn’t like you were never allowed to ask a question again. The press wasn’t allowed to take pictures of the caskets carrying our fallen heroes from Iraq or Afghanistan and when the press requested information on the participants of the energy planning, Cheney’s office told them to go scratch and wasn’t Judith Miller put in jail for awhile for refusing to give the name of her source? Maybe Afghanistan is emulating the US too closely.
20 years in an Afghan prison is merciful compared to death? That’s an unusual definition of mercy.
“We are about to send thousands of more troops into the country to preserve it from . . . radical Islamic influences.”
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How many American service personnel and how many more billions of dollars are we going to sacrifice before we understand that the Islamic World can never become a western-style democracy no matter how much money and how many human lives they bleed from ‘US’?
FFLEO, your point is exactly right. The entire concept of “exporting democracy” to the Middle East was an absurd western conceit from the start. These elements of conservative Islamic culture are systemic and institutionalized. I am quite certain that the Bush administration was advised by bona fide experts that its ideas on democratization wouldn’t work (leaving aside the arrogance and presumptuousness of the proposal itself). That is why I remain convinced that our actual motives have never been honestly explained to the American public. Bush’s radicalism was no different from that of Pol Pot, Ho Chi Minh, Chairman Mao or Robert Mugabe, an insane belief that an entire society can be transformed from the ground up by violence. I’m having a hard time even saying this, but the evidence is overwhelming.
Mike A.,
Yep. That’s always been my issue with “exporting democracy”. It’s simply not in the culture some places like it is here and in Europe. How can you change that in any way other than by getting the people to rise up and create themselves? Not at gun point, that’s for sure. That’s a battle that can only be won in the minds of the people. Otherwise it’s just an enforced virtue and I’ll defer to mespo on the value of enforced virtues.
Mike A. and FFLEO,
There’s a documentary you may have already seen, but if not, it is excellent. It shows in detail, the many decisions made in Iraq, about Iraq, despite all warnings to the contrary. It is called: “No End in Sight” and it is amazing.
“No End In Sight provides an exclusive and candid telling of Iraq’s descent into chaos and warfare as a consequence of the debilitating decisions made by US …”
http://www.noendinsightmovie.com/
It won an award at Sundance if that matters.
No End in Sight, is a brilliant, level headed piece. Bless every person who had a hand in making it come together. I have more to say but it’s counterproductive bile like in nature. Please make the time to watch
No End in Sight.
Thanks for the reference, Jill. I confess that I hadn’t even heard of the film. I’ll be sure to check it out.
Jill,
I watched the trailer and then went to Amazon.com and read some of the 93 reviews (5 stars = 76; 4 stars = 11…). $16.00 DVD and I am in the market for more documentaries.
I am going to have to force myself to listen to and watch GW Bush again. I know the odds of him ever being incarcerated in the USA for his war crimes–and recompense for the lives and the country he has ruined–are low, but he might slip up some day and take a trip ‘overseas’…
The farther we get away from 9/11 the more I believe what my wife says about our motives for going into Iraq namely that W wanted to impress daddy and or pay Sadam back for trying to kill big B.
And I agree with what Aristotle said over 2,000 years ago – you cant take a bunch of nomadic shepards and make them into Greece. I guess we are now realizing that truth.
The question I would like to ask is what should we have done in response to the 9/11 attacks? We could not have allowed that to go unanswered could we? Should we have just gone to Afghanistan and erradicated the Taliban and Bin Laden and then left?
I actually thought Bush had a strategy for going into Iraq and Afghanistan and that was to catch Iran in a 2 front war to get rid of terrorism once and for all. Looks like I was wrong.
If I am ever served up another compassionate conservative I am voting for the other guy.