Films show terrorists as people
By Scott Bowles, USA TODAY Wed Dec 21, 6:45 AM ET

Clooney, who produced Syriana, says the trend stems largely from growing American displeasure with the Iraq war.

“I’ve been called a traitor for questioning the war,” he says. “But more people are beginning to look critically at what our government is doing, who we’re fighting. And that’s the most patriotic thing you can do.”

You’re not a traitor if you question the war, or look critically at your government. You cross the line of treason when your words or actions damage your country and countrymen. When your worldview is based on the premise that America has been wrong about most things, most of the time, and you see it as a perpetrator of evil rather than a proponent of good, and that this is the root cause of everything that is wrong in the world – then pardon me for pointing it out but you are a traitor. Not being a traitor doesn’t automatically make you a patriot. The next time you or your Hollywood jetsetting friends are traveling the world and you’re standing in front of a crowd of American-hating foreigners try telling them you love your country and explain why rather than joining in their bashing. That would be patriotic.

Syriana, for example, “simply doesn’t want to paint things in black and white, because the world isn’t that way,” Clooney says. “The world is complicated, and good movies try to show that.”

How about a good movie that explores the complicated roots of terror? Not more “religion of peace” apologia. Show them as people. What do they believe? What are their goals? A documentary or two about Islam would be nice. How it started, how it spread; a view backward that doesn’t stop at the Crusades, or colonialism. What are the core beliefs of the various Islamic sects? Why are there so many terror groups? It’s all so complicated, we need Hollywood to help us understand.

Don’t hold your breath.

Via LGF.

My country, always wrong

Pages could be filled with the caustic, contradictory, and almost schizophrenic accusations of the prophets of anti-Americanism. Don’t be fooled for a second that such criticisms are fueled by a genuine desire to build a better America. It’s pure bile that does not deserve to be taken seriously. So when you hear me calling anti-Americanism by its name, don’t assume I mean that every leftie is a traitor. I don’t take issue with reasoned dissent, I just have a problem with those on the Left who follow the motto, “my country, always wrong.” It just happens that this type of leftist represents about ninety-five percent of the Left.

Nice blog.

Treason of the Intellectuals, Volume 3

But a new magnet for intellectuals is emerging: radical Islam. It’s not that intellectuals are likely to embrace radical Islam themselves anytime soon – for one thing, the requirement of believing in God would deter many of them. But what they can do is obstruct efforts to combat radical Islam and terrorism, undermine support for Israel, stress the "legitimate grievances" of radical Islamists, and lend moral support to the "legitimacy" of radical Islamic movements.

This is a phenomenon at first glance so baffling it cries out for analysis. Both fascism and Marxism censored, harassed, and imprisoned intellectuals, but they also gave lip service to intellectualism. Russia and Germany both had great universities. Both fascism and Marxism appealed to their respective nations’ cultural heritage in support of their ideologies. Our mental picture of fascism is now mostly colored by images of Nazi book burnings and bad art, but before World War II fascism was quite successful at passing itself off as a blend of socialism and nationalism.

When we try to discover what fascism, Marxism, and radical Islam have in common, the field shrinks to a single common theme: hatred of democracy. Despite all the calls for "Power to the People" from radical intellectuals, the reality is that no societies have ever empowered so many people to such a degree as Western democracies.

The problem is that people in democratic societies usually end up using that empowerment to make choices that intellectuals hate. How can we reconcile the fact that the masses, whom intellectuals profess to support, keep making wrong choices? I’ve got it – they’ve been duped somehow. Those aren’t their real values; they’ve been brainwashed into a "false consciousness" by society. If they were completely free to choose, they’d make the "right" choices. But of course we have to eliminate all the distractions that interfere with the process: no moral or religious indoctrination, no advertising or superficial amusements, no status symbols, no politically incorrect humor. "False consciousness" is a perfect way of professing support for the masses while simultaneously depriving them of any power to choose; a device for being an elitist while pretending not to be.

Via no dhimmitude.