Sunday, January 28, 2007
More Andy Sullivan Douchebaggery
Here's Andy defending his characterization of the Sunni guys with the mortars in their car as "civilians."
Andy, go take your meds, man.
I'll make it easy for you: The people with the mortar in their car cannot be usefully described as "civilians," in the sense you mean it to mean - i.e., noncombatants.
You screwed up (because you're not a very smart man anymore), and you got called on it. The first rule of getting out of a hole is to stop digging.
The people with the mortar in their car are not civilians, they are combatants. What's more, since they do not wear a uniform and do not carry arms openly, they are not even entitled to the de minimis protections of the Geneva Conventions. While there are laws prohibiting foreign troops, such as ours, from committing summary executions (and the United States has, foolishly in my view, extended Geneva combatant status to moojies fighting in Iraq) Iraq's own security forces are perfectly within Iraq's rights to have shot them on the spot.
Those moojies ought to be grateful that those bruises aren't bulletholes.
Our allies in the Iraqi Army and police forces, as you can see in the next video down, cannot expect the same courtesy.
Andy, what can I say?
I'm chagrined.
have no idea what Mickey Kaus believes about the Iraq war (never have, actually). It is not a subject he is much concerned with. He is much more interested in weightier topics such as yours truly. His latest swipe is about this post, where I show a British Channel 4 video showing Shiite soldiers beating Sunnis on a joint patrol with U.S. forces. I describe the victims as "civilians," which gives Mickey an opening to ignore the point I was making and accuse me of inaccuracy. Hey, it gets him up in the afternoon. I referred to them as civilians because they are residents of the neighborhood, not in uniform, and unarmed, as compared with the soliders in Iraqi army uniform. Mickey protests because the video clearly shows the beaten men had mortars in their car. So they're not civilians, right? That depends on who is or is not a civilian in a messy civil war like the one we're now policing. The insurgents are civilians in as much as they are not in the Iraqi army, not in uniform, and often residents of a neighborhood. But they are not civilians in as much as they are engaged in a violent insurgency - actively or passively.
Andy, go take your meds, man.
I'll make it easy for you: The people with the mortar in their car cannot be usefully described as "civilians," in the sense you mean it to mean - i.e., noncombatants.
You screwed up (because you're not a very smart man anymore), and you got called on it. The first rule of getting out of a hole is to stop digging.
The people with the mortar in their car are not civilians, they are combatants. What's more, since they do not wear a uniform and do not carry arms openly, they are not even entitled to the de minimis protections of the Geneva Conventions. While there are laws prohibiting foreign troops, such as ours, from committing summary executions (and the United States has, foolishly in my view, extended Geneva combatant status to moojies fighting in Iraq) Iraq's own security forces are perfectly within Iraq's rights to have shot them on the spot.
Those moojies ought to be grateful that those bruises aren't bulletholes.
Our allies in the Iraqi Army and police forces, as you can see in the next video down, cannot expect the same courtesy.
Andy, what can I say?
I'm chagrined.
Comments:
Have you ever heard of Shia supporters of al Sadr carrying supplies to one of his groups being treated in the same way?
Al Qaeda ain't Shia, David. They don't like Sadr either.
Just like the Sunnis pushing Hamas and the Shia pushing Fatah and HB.
Jason: Sully hasn't walked back any of these characterizations or assertions, ever, as far as I know. His memory is as flexible as it is needed to support the current desires of the Party of Andrew.
And that's gobsmacking.
Just like the Sunnis pushing Hamas and the Shia pushing Fatah and HB.
Jason: Sully hasn't walked back any of these characterizations or assertions, ever, as far as I know. His memory is as flexible as it is needed to support the current desires of the Party of Andrew.
And that's gobsmacking.
You opposed Andy, so you must hate gays and favor torture. I'm gobsmacked.
Let's Fisk just one sentence:
"I referred to them as civilians because they are residents of the neighborhood, not in uniform, and unarmed,"
"Residents of the neighborhood" - by this rule, if our host Ali Bubba Gump, were to be involved in humanitarian relief missions in his home town as part of a NatGuard mission, he'd be classed as "not a member of the Nat Guard" because he "is [a] resident[] of the neighborhood." Funny, it used to take DA action to get you in or out of the Army - now it seems your local zoning board can do it!
"They were not in uniform" - oh, as opposed to "members of the insurgency"? Praytell, dear Andrew, what uniform does the insurgency wear, so that we might publicize this to our troops in an educational comic book, and remind them to be on the lookout?
They were "unarmed." Okay, maybe I missed something. But when exactly did mortars slip out of the class of crew-served weapons, and into the class of "sure, we carry that in 7-11... we keep it behind Juggs magazine though, so the kids can't get at it, not unless they can reach the top rack anyhow."
Holy crap. That's a lot of idiocy packed into one sentence.
Let's Fisk just one sentence:
"I referred to them as civilians because they are residents of the neighborhood, not in uniform, and unarmed,"
"Residents of the neighborhood" - by this rule, if our host Ali Bubba Gump, were to be involved in humanitarian relief missions in his home town as part of a NatGuard mission, he'd be classed as "not a member of the Nat Guard" because he "is [a] resident[] of the neighborhood." Funny, it used to take DA action to get you in or out of the Army - now it seems your local zoning board can do it!
"They were not in uniform" - oh, as opposed to "members of the insurgency"? Praytell, dear Andrew, what uniform does the insurgency wear, so that we might publicize this to our troops in an educational comic book, and remind them to be on the lookout?
They were "unarmed." Okay, maybe I missed something. But when exactly did mortars slip out of the class of crew-served weapons, and into the class of "sure, we carry that in 7-11... we keep it behind Juggs magazine though, so the kids can't get at it, not unless they can reach the top rack anyhow."
Holy crap. That's a lot of idiocy packed into one sentence.
I know Al Qaeda isn't Shia. I'm wondering if the largely Shia police force is treating Shias carrying mortar shells and Sunnis carrying mortar shells the same - and if this procedure is forwarding Bush's plans for a prosperous and peaceful Iraq or not.
Like Sullivan, I made an error. I should have said soldiers. Gives me a bit of sympathy for him. On one hand, if everyone out of uniform is a civilian, that includes the whole insurgency, which as far as I know doesn't have one officially, though some of them have police and army uniforms. On the other hand, if it turned out that only Sunnis carrying mortars and not Shias carrying mortars were beaten, deciding if this really helps us towards a stable Iraq really is more important that Sullivan's misuse of the word civilian.
David, now you’re getting with the program, albeit in a backwards way.
How can Andy and the Center for Constitutional Rights (a commie front group, but who’s counting…) characterize all Gitmo and Iraq detainees as subject to Common Article III of the Geneva Conventions? Easy. Because they are all soldiers fighting the U.S.
Except when it suits their purpose to characterize the fighters as civilians, as when the mean rotten U.S. catches them with a carload of mortar rounds.
Got that? Captured AQ, Sadrists, et all, are soldiers, except when it suits our political purposes, in which case they are not. Clear?
Oh, one other thing. You shouldn’t identify yourself with Sullivan. You made a mistake and admitted it. He made (a possibly intentional) error, and keeps defending it.
Andy is so tendentious, it's really almost not worth arguing with anything he says.
How can Andy and the Center for Constitutional Rights (a commie front group, but who’s counting…) characterize all Gitmo and Iraq detainees as subject to Common Article III of the Geneva Conventions? Easy. Because they are all soldiers fighting the U.S.
Except when it suits their purpose to characterize the fighters as civilians, as when the mean rotten U.S. catches them with a carload of mortar rounds.
Got that? Captured AQ, Sadrists, et all, are soldiers, except when it suits our political purposes, in which case they are not. Clear?
Oh, one other thing. You shouldn’t identify yourself with Sullivan. You made a mistake and admitted it. He made (a possibly intentional) error, and keeps defending it.
Andy is so tendentious, it's really almost not worth arguing with anything he says.
Well, I'm down to a few hundred readers a day these days...I don't have the heat to provoke a response from the Sullivator, unless someone like Reynolds or Malkin links me.
So it's not like I'm arguing with Sully. It's more a case of trying to counter the meme before it becomes conventional wisdom - which is generally the idea here.
So it's not like I'm arguing with Sully. It's more a case of trying to counter the meme before it becomes conventional wisdom - which is generally the idea here.
I think you need to post some more nude photos of Britney Spears with Madonna in Brad Pitt's place with the New Ford Mustang to give the public interest some viagra - like effect, a p.r. penis enlargement if you will. That would yield a superbowl of visitors, aliens to your realm of warblogging who could say their peace about anti-war or inflation or wingnuts or kool aid drinkers or Bush or Hillary Clinton before moving on to A-Rod or Paris Hilton or the Pam Anderson sex tape. After that you could study birds, like Tits, or Eagles or Falcons or maybe four legged creatures like bears or colts. (Just trying to help out with the search engines there...)
Part of the problem is in pointing out the recidivist stupidity of Andy or the NY Times, you are telling us something we've learned at great length over the last 3-4 years. Dammit, but they are reliable, to the point where it's almost not possible to be outraged, their misfeasance is expect and quite frankly boring. After the 100th time your dog craps in the house, you are more excited on the rare day that he doesn't. So you need a new angle - if I were Treacher I'd suggest killing a street person every time Andy accuses Bush of war crimes or makes up some disingenuous "gobsmackingly vile" claim about torture lovers or somesuch. Then you could turn the tables on Andy and point out that every time he acts like a hysterical moron, he is responsible for somebody's death, and you're gobsmacked about that. I'm not Treacher so I couldn't get away with suggesting something like that - but you have to admit it would raise circulation at least briefly, and at least among the highly desirable police demographic.
That, or you could get deployed again. That certainly made your posts interesting.
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Part of the problem is in pointing out the recidivist stupidity of Andy or the NY Times, you are telling us something we've learned at great length over the last 3-4 years. Dammit, but they are reliable, to the point where it's almost not possible to be outraged, their misfeasance is expect and quite frankly boring. After the 100th time your dog craps in the house, you are more excited on the rare day that he doesn't. So you need a new angle - if I were Treacher I'd suggest killing a street person every time Andy accuses Bush of war crimes or makes up some disingenuous "gobsmackingly vile" claim about torture lovers or somesuch. Then you could turn the tables on Andy and point out that every time he acts like a hysterical moron, he is responsible for somebody's death, and you're gobsmacked about that. I'm not Treacher so I couldn't get away with suggesting something like that - but you have to admit it would raise circulation at least briefly, and at least among the highly desirable police demographic.
That, or you could get deployed again. That certainly made your posts interesting.
