Lieberman to strip citizenship of guilty people, mostly

By Dan Brooks in Public Discourse 1 Comment

Senator Joe Lieberman (I–CT) taking a bold stand against imagined guilty terrorists

Yesterday, we got all up in our heads about what the search for meaning in terrorist acts might possibly mean, and despite that sure-fire discursive strategy, things got a little abstract. Fortunately, we’ve got Joe Lieberman to bring us back to hard, unforgiving, maybe-taking-you-away-in-the-night-with-a-velvet-bag-over-your-head reality. In the wake of the arrest of Faisal Shahzad, the senator from Connecticut proposed legislation that would revoke the citizenship of Americans tied to terrorist organizations. Incensed at the news that Shahzad, a naturalized US citizen, had been read his Miranda rights after his arrest, Lieberman was joined in his outrage by Rep. Peter King (R–NY) and John McCain, who apparently has some kind of personal hypocrisy bucket list. The Paul Theroux Man of Straw Award has to be given to senator Chris Bond on this one, though, for saying that “We’ve got to be far less interested in protecting the privacy rights of these terrorists than in collecting information that may lead us to details of broader schemes to carry out attacks in the United States.” When an extrajudicial authority strips you of your American citizenship so that you can be imprisoned indefinitely without trial or sent to Egypt for interrogation, it’s not your privacy that’s violated.

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Terrorism and the absurdity problem

By Dan Brooks in Public Discourse 2 Comments

Today in Slate, Timothy Noah asks, “Was the Times Square bomb the follow-on to 9/11 we’ve all been bracing for?” He’s not being funny, at least not on purpose. To Noah, Faisal Shahzad’s Nissan Pathfinder full of camping gas and fireworks, foiled by a t-shirt vendor when it smoked but did not explode, was the inevitable second strike. The enemy is extraordinarily subtle. From a list of sketchy connections that includes Shahzad’s claim to have received bomb training in Waziristan* and the arrest of one of his associates at a mosque in Pakistan connected to Jaish-e-Mohammed—”the same al-Qaida affiliate that five young Muslim Americans from Alexandria, Va., contacted in Pakistan this past December”—Noah deduces a global network, presumably biding its time until it could accumulate enough fireworks. “It would appear that a second shoe has dropped,” he writes. Here’s a tip for young journalists hoping to remind America of the omnipresent threat of terrorism: don’t say “shoe.”

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Friday links! Futility of reason edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 4 Comments

This picture of a sausage comes courtesy of a blog entry on Russian food. Note the "Made in USA" featured prominently on the label.

It’s Friday, and that means it’s time once again for us to rouse ourselves from our intellectual slumber—from the chattering distractions of what the Buddhists call the Ten Thousand Things—and stand outside ourselves to consider the products of the week that is about to have been. You just want to get through Friday as quickly as possible so that you can rush home and watch the Winter Olympics on DVR until the Winter Olympics on NBC comes on, don’t you? Perhaps somewhere, in the shrivel portion of your hypothalamus that used to feel, you dimly recognize the unsettling irony that this celebration of athletic endeavor and bold living should inspire millions of people to stay home and watch TV. Fortunately, you’re an American, and we’ve just won a gold medal in not giving a crap about irony—or any type of connection between concepts, for that matter. The United States has been a country for a long time now, and after two hundred some years we don’t really need to think about operating it anymore. We go with our gut, and if some pointy-headed nerd wants to complain about the details—”those two statements directly contradict each other,” or “you have not actually read the Constitution,” or “your child needs medicine to live”—we can tell in a glance whether he’s a Real American or not. To paraphrase my junior high school wrestling coach, there’s not much difference between a reason and an excuse; it follows therefore that the only people who need to resort to reason are those who need excuses. This is America, and we don’t make excuses here, as the news of the last week will indicate. Won’t you join me in the complete abdication of sense?

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Point/Counterpoint: We must submit to the TSA vs. the TSA doesn’t do jack

By Dan Brooks in Uncategorized 2 Comments

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, now known everywhere as the Underwear Bomber

Unless you are Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s elderly grandmother, chances are you have already heard about Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s attempt to detonate explosives on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 as it approached Detroit on Christmas day. First of all, in order to save time and space, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab will henceforth be referred to as the Underwear Bomber. Second of all, in order to save American lives, a man with a GED will henceforth put his finger in your anus every time you fly on a plane. Does that sound like a demeaning invasion of your privacy? Well, do you want to live? Okay, then, let me just get a fresh latex sheath and…we’re in. Enjoy your flight!

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