Bill Kristol has an editorial on conservatives and Egypt. He takes a well-deserved shot at Glenn Beck’s latest wild theorizing:
…hysteria is not a sign of health. When Glenn Beck rants about the caliphate taking over the Middle East from Morocco to the Philippines, and lists (invents?) the connections between caliphate-promoters and the American left, he brings to mind no one so much as Robert Welch and the John Birch Society. He’s marginalizing himself, just as his predecessors did back in the early 1960s.
That is, of course, IF Glenn Beck is wrong about Bill Ayres et al and Code Pink getting in bed with Hamas.
Hey Bill, do your job! Investigate this!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGlenn Beck is NOT indulging in wild theorizing. I would refer you to the following article by Lorenzo Vidino (deputy director at the Investigative Project; a DC-based counterterrorism research institute). His work is backed up by Daniel Pipes and many other Middle East experts. As my old teachers used to say - "Read, learn and inwardly digest" ... www.meforum.org/687/the-muslim-brotherhoods-conquest-of-europe
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe Neo-Cons such as Kristol, Barnes, Krauthammer, Boot and others deserve marginalization more than Beck. The Neo-Cons have been responsible for disastrous policies in the Middle East and elsewhere, and some of them such as Krauthammer have shown contempt for those such as Geert Wilders who deserve our support.
Beck might get a little carried away sometimes, but not as far in my opinion as the Neo-Cons. Conservatives should be more wary of the likes of Krauthammer and Kristol.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNot to defend Beck, because he does climb too far out on the limb of making connections oftentimes, but there is plenty to be alarmed with in an abrupt ejection of Mubarak.
This has far more potential to be like what happened after Arafat died than it is about the U.S. failing to back the Iranian people when they were trying to kick Ahmadinejad out of office. It is very unlikely the new government will be as cooperative with the U.S. or non-aggressive toward Israel.
We all love freedom, liberty and democracy and want it for the Egyptian people, but if we don't want to hit the replay button that put Hamas in control of Gaza, then we better figure this out a little more deeply than just supporting the people on the streets.
There are far more Egyptians hiding in their homes from the chaos that are not represented by the people on the streets. What is happening here is that we are assuming the protesters represent the desire of all the people. From feedback in Christian circles, Egyptian Christians fear what will happen to them if Mubarak is forced immediately from office, and they fear the ensuing power struggle.
Being overly idealistic about the situation is also not healthy.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI am not a big Beck fan (I do not watch his TV show and I only occasionally hear him on the radio), but I am also not so naive to think if things got out of hand in Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood could potentially take over. They make up 20 to 25% of the population there and (while knocked back) are organized. The Muslim Brotherhood is absolutely for restoring an Islamic Calphante. Is the Egyptian Army going to allow that? I hope not. Is it possible? Yeah, it is possible.
And I lived in Egypt for years. Most of the people there are uneducated, poor, and willing to consider voting for Islam. Being over sanquine about the situation there is not healthy either.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOh dear.
Rich Lowry just discovered the Islamic Caliphate agenda ... and promptly dismisses it, displaying the fact the Lowry receives his marching orders from Kristol. Sigh.
Lowry, here you go:
External Link
What is the first thing you lose upon submitting to the Beltway? Apparently it's your mind.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBill Kristol should take some of his own advice to Mr. Beck. I am quite tired of Mr. Kristol advocating U.S. intervention in foreign lands, and I am also quite tired of hearing Mr. Kristol publicly criticize fellow conservatives while he is working on a liberal television show. I suspect that he knows that the best way for a conservative to be a regular on a liberal establishment television show is to publicly criticize other conservatives on that show, and he uses this knowledge to promote himself at the expense of others.
I know nothing of Mr. Beck. However, I remember watching Bill Kristol as a panelist on This Week with David Brinkley in the 1990's and noting how much he delighted in pulling the tail of George Will on air and how he often sided with the liberal panelists on that show. I have never quite trusted him since. I definitely find him too preachy. He is a general without an army who continues to live as a conservative media figure at the pleasure of the liberal establishment.
Perhaps, a little humility for Mr. Kristol is in order.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf you think an Islamic Caliphate under Sharia law is okay, the Muslim Brotherhood is perfectly fine. The members of the Muslim Brotherhood are dedicated, radical, and definitely should not be underestimated.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI would refer Bill Kristol, Rich Lowry and all other skeptics to the following article; written 6 years ago but VERY pertinent today. It is a long but absolutely essential read ... External Link
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBill does not elevate himself or his points by attacking Glenn. Just makes him smaller in statue and patronizing to boot. No one appointed Kristol arbiter of Beck's theories or anyone else's. The "great unwashed" can judge for themselves whether Beck is off into the neverland of conspiracies or is onto something.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'm not buying Kristol's "come on, conservatives, get with the flower power" argument in that editorial. Conservatives should first think carefully about Egypt, and not rush to pick up the pom-poms for anyone. It is not siding with the oppressive elements of Mubarek's regime to be wary of mass street demonstrations when it isn't clear who is behind them and what will happen if the demands for "change" are instantly met.
About the shot at Beck, that is a very touchy subject. I've noted elsewhere that there is something wrong with Beck. That does not change the fact that he did good work, with the help of excellent research, on the who's who of the Obama administration and its ideology. His viewers were very engaged with, and thankful for, that. In recent days, however, he has gotten deliriously far ahead of himself.
Beck's form has become so sloppy that he has lost control of his content. His attempt to show a connection between Islamist organizations and their goals and the American and international Left is hardly off the wall, as Kristol's "John Bircher" reference suggests. But it is true that Beck's arm-waving wildness does not amount to a coherent argument. He is hurting what argument there is to make, but Kristol, in turn, seems more in a rush to step on Beck than he does to get at the truth.
Is Kristol unaware that the Left often serves as an apologist for Islamist terror? Or that it is actively advancing against Israel? It seems unlikely that he would not know that. But perhaps it is easier to just denounce Beck along with the essence of an argument he is making badly. If anything the argument needs to be reclaimed from Beck, straightened out, and then dropped on the doorstep where it belongs.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseKristol is just another CLUELESS media type talking about "democracy" in Egypt.
Guess what democracy gets you in an Islamic country. Yasser Arafat and Ahmadinejad.
Do you really think a country full of Muslims are going to not vote for the most Islamic candidate?
What Kristol does not understand is that the people in the Islamic countries WANT A militant Islamic state, because Islam itself is militant and anything else would be unacceptable to them.
These people in the Media are clueless that Islam is just not a religion but an entire social-political-system and its ENTIRE GOAL as given to it by its warlord murderous founder is to take over the entire world by death, conversion or slavery.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI believe that the involvement of code pink, Bill Ayers, Bernadine Dohrn, International Answer, and other Leftist organizations in the flotilla confrontations with Israel has been well documented by other sources than Beck's research and those orgs were in Egypt and Gaza. It is a very short leap to collaboration with the Muslim Brotherhood. Plus I believe Beck has audio.
However I agree that Beck is a semi-deranged megalomaniac. Last week he was sounding eerily like "I have a gift" Obama when he claimed a special talent for seeing the big picture and sniffing out cataclysms like Egypt and pronounced himself a fool for not seeing it in advance.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI've carelessly said some kind things about Beck in the past. "Careless" because I'd only seen Beck three or four times on TV. (I'd heard little snatches of him on the radio but thought that that was just fluff and his real effort went into his TV show.)
I praised Beck for laying out the big picture on a couple of matters, something he seems to specialize in.
I was excited when he did his program on Soros and paid close attention...the only time I really anticipated one of his broadcasts and focused on it.
IRONY: On the one hand, I think that Beck was absolutely right in his general take on Soros and the web of subversive (from a traditional American perspective) organizations that he has subsidized. ON THE OTHER HAND, Beck was ludicrous in his showy, insubstantial presentation of the case. He kept telling us to have paper and pencil at hand to take notes, but the only note I took was, "This is nothing but hot air." And such a waste: There is plenty of good evidence to build a serious case against Soros as an evil puppet-master. But the Beck show is a farce...he makes Sarah Palin sound like a wonk.
So I haven't listened to Beck on the Egypt situation (or anything else since the Soros fiasco). But I have no trouble whatsoever accepting that Kristol has his number.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSounds like Kristol and Lowry didn't get the memo. I don't know exactly what Beck is claiming about "connections" between Islamic jihadists and American liberals. But it's no secret that the liberals carry water for the jihadists. Many writers for National Review point that fact out all the time. Do Kristol and Lowry doubt that the ultimate goal of the jihadists is to set up a caliphate from "Morocco to the Philippines" as a minimum? Most conservatives don't. Ask Mark Steyn if the jihadists plan to include Europe eventually. So on the issue of Islamic jihad and its American liberal toadies, who is really on the margin of conservative thought, Beck or Kristol? I say Kristol is more than Beck.
Lewis Forro
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseVirginia Beach, VA
Come on, Lowry. Watch the Glenn Beck programs before you pile on with the criticism. There are plenty of knowledgeable people seeing the confluence of Leftist/communist alliance with Islamism.
The "social justice" embraced by both and their philosophy of redistribution is just one area where the two converge.
If the people in these oppressed countries are finding it more and more difficult to feed themselves, "freedom" and "democracy" are not going to put food on their tables. Desperate people will follow whoever offers them sustenance, whether class rabble rousers like the communists/socialists or the "charities" offered by the Muslim Brotherhood and their ilk. And both of these groups will scapegoat capitalism and autonomy. Socialism/communism and Islam rely on the subjugation of the individual to the collective.
Ironically Mubarak's son, Gamal, was opening economic opportunities for the Egyptians. He has been tarred with a broad brush against the Mubarak regime because he has no ties to the Egyptian military.
Beck presents the books and authorities on the subjects on his show and then invites his viewers/listeners to research and read for themselves.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMore nonsense from the discredited big-government establishment. Now, they are trying to police the PC left-wing view of Middle East events. Pathetic.
Kristol would be much smarter tif he would simply shut up. The thesis that Muslim Brotherhood is working to create a global caliphate is not Beck's invention but the explicit program of that organization. He should attack David Horowitz, Mark Levin, Rush Limbaugh, Patrick Gaffney, Mark Ledeen and numerous others.
It would be much more interesting to hear what he thinks about Obamma's selling the Brit's nuclear secrets to the Russians.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAsa rule when Rich Lowry gently chides you not to worry about some thing, that only right-wing knuckle-draggers would get excited about it, be afraid, be very afraid.
So Rich, why not share the good news? I knew you are full of it, good news that is, so let us now what is really going on? Get off your whoopie-cushion and tell us the Truth. The connections between the radical left and the islamites are actually well documented. I would love to hear how David Horowitz, Jamie Glazov, Mark Steyn (Oops, did I say a bad word?) among others are all so very wrong. I'd love to recycle my copy of America Alone and stop worrying about all this. Heck, maybe Obama is not a socialist, either. Good news everywhere!
So what is the new emerging world where everybody (Jefferson and Mohammad together!) will be joining hands in progress? Give us some details, man. Make an argument. Provide some, you know, context. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, so go for it. You aren't going to go into the default NR mode of smugness + moral preening now are you?
Thomas Sowell has stated once the Islamites get the bomb, it's "all over." Sounds really alarmist and birchy to me. Maybe you drop him to set an example. Only a couple of people at NR read him anyway.
Here, let me help. I at least can tell you one thing about the new order: it will be very civil. For there is nothing more peaceful and civil than a beheaded (or vaporized) infidel. You add the rest.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhy must one, who claims the mantle of conservatism, nip at the ankle of another who does the same?
Perhaps Mr. Kristol didn't notice that William Ayers, Bernadette Dohrn and that dimwit from CodePink were in Egypt last year doing their best to stir the pot? Perhaps Mr. Kristol is just not as informed as he seems to think he is.
Or perhaps Mr. Kristol, in his Beltway office, has failed to see the surveys done by Zogby [himself an Egyptian] and the Pew Research Center that says that Egyptians believe that Islam provides a positive influence on their government and that 49% of Egyptians support Hamas, a Muslim Brotherhood spin off.
But I don't pay much attention to Bill Kristol since he supported the Shamnesty Bill.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe only thing that I've heard from Beck's take on Egypt was on the Chris Matthews show. That clip certainly implied that Beck is off to the deep end.
However, Kristol's advice, while sounding much more reasonable, is also more dangerous. Nobody is going to take Beck seriously, much less literally. But Kristol is taken seriously and has personally helped shape a totally misguided national policy resulting in an electoral disaster for the GOP.
Kristol's analogizing of the American revolution and the events is Egypt is preposterous and, frankly, insulting. I thought conservatives believed in "American exceptionalism" - now, all of sudden, every riot and mob features the likes of George Washington.
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