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Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald offers this calm and even-tempered assessment of Frank Lindh and his notorious son:
That family man, and father of John Walker Lindh, thinks that his hideous son, and the criminal negligence of that hideous son's hideous parents, are to be forgiven. Why? Because his son was for all the world like a Bryn Mawr girl on her Junior Year Abroad, just "learning about new cultures and acquiring new language skills."I don't think that his rotten son was ever "a decent and honorable young man embarked on a spiritual quest." I think he was one more empty simpleton, raised by empty and simple-minded parents no doubt trying to "find" themselves -- here, there, god knows where they looked or are still looking -- at the same time that their son was looking for himself on his no-doubt-to-him fascinating Spiritual Search. But unfortunately instead of Hari Krishna or Father Divine or Bob Jones or some other spiritual ponzi scheme, little Lindh found Islam -- and his upbringing became a moral tale, in which those parents do not fare well not because they divorced (for all you family values folk), but because they were both very very stupid, which is an incurable disease, and very very negligent in their doctor-spockism run amok, and more than amok -- chose the very worst thing he could have chosen.
They thought it was just fine, just peachy, when he took up Islam? It never occurred to either one of them to find out what Islam was all about? In all those years, since John Walker Lindh discovered Islam by going to a movie about Malcolm X (by the way, in Algeria Malcolm X discovered a lot about the Muslim Arabs that proved quite disturbing to him -- but that isn't in the movie), and went from there, they never discovered anything? No one thought to find out about Islam? Don't parents stay up late when a kid comes home an hour or two after he or she has promised to? Not in the blasé Lindh household, where this little brat was allowed to travel to Yemen, and then to Pakistan, and to train -- what the hell does that mean, if not train militarily -- in camps in Pakistan, and then end up in Afghanistan?He did nothing, this kid? Then why did he plead guilty? Because the Gestapo-government of the United States was so unfair to him? He was working with, training with, aiding and abetting, an organization -- the Taliban -- that routinely stomped women to death in front of whole stadiums of cowed or cheering crowds, that smashed in the heads of people for doing such things as flying kites, that decapitated anyone (and still does) who dared to teach little girls to read and write. Don't dare to tell us about the innocence of your rotten son, who by the looks of this speech is the rotten son of a rotten father.
And then? And then the world changed. Islam didn't change. The Taliban didn't change. No, they were just as innocent and wonderful as ever. What changed was the United States: "What happened unfortunately for John is that the United States made an abrupt change after the 9/11 attacks," Frank Lindh said. "We switched sides."
Yes, "we switched sides." You see, just before 9/11 the United States had been on the side of the Taliban murdering those women in those stadiums, killing those Afghani folk singers showing up at weddings, those kite-flyers, those teachers who deserved death for instructing little girls in their ABC's, and those horrible women who dared to go out without a burqa. That's it -- we changed sides, overnight.
And what's more, we didn't have the decency to let the Lindh family know, much less to send a DSL package, full of new instructions, to the Afghani address of John Walker Lindh.
Tell me your reaction if Lord Haw-Haw, or Tokyo Rose (actually, she was not one but a composite of several people) had tried to plead, in extenuation, that the former was already in Germany before the war began, and the latter in Japan, when we were still at peace, and it wasn't they who changed -- it was Great Britain, and the United States, that had changed overnight.
I don't think John Walker Lindh should ever be let out. As for his nauseating father, he is already under his own house arrest --- arrested moral development.
Meanwhile, let's listen to the father of Mike Spann, and his view on clemency for John Walker Lindh. Perhaps he will agree with me that John Walker Lindh, once he has finally served his sentence, should -- like Mike Hawash, like all other American citizens found to be working with, giving aid and comfort to, objectively promoting or furthering the aims of, the Jihad anywhere and everywhere -- be stripped of his citizenship, and expelled to a Muslim country. Mr. Spann, unlike the man whose vaporings are all over the news today, deserves to be heard.
Posted by Robert at January 20, 2006 3:06 PM
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Why would the Commonwealth Club allow Frank Lindh to give a speech?
I was enjoying the Lindh family's silence.
I hope he returns to the rock he crawled out from under forthwith.
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at January 20, 2006 3:38 PM
audio of Lindh speech
http://www.commonwealthclub.org/audio/06-01lindh-complete.ram
great comment Fitz
Posted by: ploome at January 20, 2006 3:56 PM
No surprize here. There was an editorial in The Montreal Gazette the other day exclaiming that (one of our Canadian terrorists from the infamous Kadhar family) who is presently in Gitmo was brainwashed as a 14 year old during his childhood and never stood a chance to be a child therefore, should not be put in front of a military court. In fact our good victimized Canadian is playing his cards right and has demanded a Canadian lawyer. I quess he does not understand American english and can only function in Candadian english eh! There are plenty of 14 year old boys all over the world that know the difference between right and wrong. This boy now a man legally is a victim according to some bent psyco babble, it's all about saving the children! This boy/man is a terrorist pure and simple and deserves no more that what he is entitled to, a very long time in jail.
Montreal, Canada
Posted by: Gheri at January 20, 2006 3:58 PM
http://thetruereligion.org/modules/xfsection/article.php?articleid=176
ROME (Reuters) -- Italy's ambassador to Saudi Arabia has converted to Islam, the second time in seven years that an envoy of Rome to the land of Mecca has adopted its religion.
Torquato Cardilli, a career diplomat from overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Italy, revealed his decision to Saudi newspapers Saturday, his 59th birthday. Italian diplomatic sources confirmed the announcement Monday.
His official conversion was made on the eve of the Islamic holy fasting month of Ramadan, which began on Nov. 16 in Saudi Arabia. Cardilli himself could not be reached for comment but an employee at his embassy in Riyadh confirmed the reports.
The Saudi embassy in Rome said it planned a statement later. An embassy spokeswoman said there was no record of any Saudi ambassador to Italy ever converting to Catholicism.
Italy's Foreign Ministry had no comment.
The conversion of Cardilli -- who is married with two children -- follows the move to Islam made by Mario Scialoja, Italian ambassador to the Arab kingdom in 1994-95, who has since left the foreign service and is head of Italy's Muslim League.
Scialoja's decision came as a shock, made while he was Rome's permanent representative to the United Nations in New York and long before he was posted to Riyadh.
Cardilli's change of faith follows years of study of Islam. A graduate in oriental culture and languages from the University of Naples, Cardilli has spent much of his 33-year diplomatic career in the Muslim world.
Following postings in Sudan, Syria, Iraq and Libya, he took over the embassy in Riyadh in October last year. Cardilli has also served as ambassador to Albania and Tanzania.
His personal move comes at a sensitive time, with Italy a member of the U.S.-led coalition fighting the hard-line Islamic Taliban movement in Afghanistan and barely two months after Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi offended the Muslim world by saying Western Christian civilization was superior to Islam.
Corriere della Sera newspaper said Cardilli had been recalled to Rome "for consultations."
Some 3,000 to 5,000 Italians have converted to Islam from Catholicism in recent years, according to figures from the Union of Islamic Organizations and Communities.
A spokesman for the Italy-based group said it welcomed Cardilli's entry into the Muslim community, saying of his conversion: "The ways of the Lord are infinite."
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/meast/11/26/religion.islam.italy.reut
2. Italian Envoy Reverts to Islam by Javed Hassan, Arab News, November 26 2001 CE
RIYADH, 26 November — The Italian ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Torquato Cardeilli, has reverted to Islam, the Italian Embassy here announced yesterday.
Cardeilli, who speaks Arabic, is the first ambassador to revert to Islam in Saudi Arabia, home to Islam’s holiest sites in Makkah and Madinah, according to a dawa center in Batha which handles Muslim reversions.
Nouh ibn Nasser, director of the Batha center, said the Italian converted on Nov. 15, the day before the start of the holy month of Ramadan.
"He came to the office and read the two testimonies (necessary to declare faith) and then prayed with us," Nasser said.
Cardeilli, 59, was not available for comment as he left Riyadh to Rome on Saturday.
But in a press statement, the ambassador expressed his happiness over his reversion to Islam. He said he was fully convinced about the truthfulness of Islam through his regular reading of God’s final revelation, the Holy Qur’an.
Posted by: ploome at January 20, 2006 4:05 PM
Any one up for a little contrast? And I hope Jihad Watch does not mind a little impromptu plug. The movie is not a critical success, but it is a spiritual success. It is based on the true story of martyred missionaries led by Jim Elliot.
"The tribe is a squabbling bunch whose members seem to have no problem fatally impaling one other with spears. This has won them a savage reputation and has also brought them to the brink of extinction."
http://www.boston.com/movies/display?display=movie&id=8555
at January 20, 2006 4:27 PM
Fitzgerald fails to mention in his long windy harangue about the “rotten son,” that Lindh’s Islamic quest started in a high school classroom in California; where islam was introduced to the students in a spirit of healthy “multiculturalism” -- and subsidized by tax payers. Or is this fact to be overlooked because it might prove to be politically embarrassing?
Posted by: witness at January 20, 2006 5:09 PM
Hi Ploome:
I'm not sure what the relevance of your posting is. Are you suggesting that Cardeilli was acting out in a manner similar to young Lindh in his conversion (err, ooopsie, that's reversion) to the true religion and is the victim of inattentive parents? While I'm gratified for the detail you've provided but no better off for the context.
I tend to agree with Hugh's remarks, to the extent that Lindh's parents may have the stupidity that comes of moral bankruptcy. But Cardeilli is a grown man and his decision has been made as a grown man. My concerns are ones of Cardeilli's loyalty to Western principles. But I'm not prepared to berate his parents, aged as they are if indeed they're still alive.
So please, humor me. What's your point?
Posted by: Chatillon at January 20, 2006 5:17 PM
Might I suggest that John Walker Lindh and his father and the entire herd of free thinkers who find Islam such a wonderful alternative to the West be sent to a real Islamic paradise, like Somalia. Once there, they can rent trendy condos, lecture at local universities, write, sip coffee at Starbucks, and feel good about the wonderful country that they are permanently consigned to, no matter how bad the coffee gets. This is OT, but what's with the freelance reporter, Jill (?) who is currently under a death sentence by members of the religion of peace in Iraq. I have seen a photo of her in a black burqa, sweeping a courtyard. Her mother made an appeal, with a hijab draped around her shoulder, to the peace-lovin' people who are holding her daughter. I sincerely hope that Jill gets out alive, but I can't help wonder if she and her mother belong to the same country club as the Walker family.
Posted by: maryrose at January 20, 2006 5:18 PM
"But unfortunately instead of Hari Krishna or Father Divine or Bob Jones or some other spiritual ponzi scheme, little Lindh found Islam"
I don't want to defend the Hare Krishnas in particular, but I wish to forestall the common Western extrapolation that all Asian religions are a bit flaky. I assure you that the kind of Hindu or Buddhist sages you never hear of in the press are very sober, mature, and generally apolitical. They certainly represent the opposite of a fanatical ideology, and they didn't blow their minds on drugs either. Neither do they get involved in sex scadals and so forth with their students.
Posted by: Benjamin at January 20, 2006 5:30 PM
"I wish to forestall the common Western extrapolation that all Asian religions are a bit flaky.."
-- from a posting above
Mention of Hare Krishna -- aren't these the people in saffron robes, Father Divine (who stood in for all the scamps and elmer gantries), and Bob Jones (isn't that the name of the Kool-Aid man who had loyal followers, or have I given the wrong first name and confused him with the niblick-and-mashie man who gave his name to a university with Protestant connections -- if the latter, I apologize). I simply listed whatever I could. I might have listed the Millerites (say, did the world come to an end in 1844 or didn't it? -- I just can't remember), or followers of David Koresh, or any number of others. Father Divine was just a rogue, and I didn't mind him, except that he took advantage of people who had very little money (he did promote himself from being the mere "Messenger of God" to being God himself -- see "Who Is This King of Glory" by St. Clair McKelway, who used to write in the pre-Remnick, pre-Brown, pre-Gottlieb, even pre-Shawn, New Yorker).
I wasn't calling into question Asian religions. I was mocking the Spiritual Searchers. It's something I like to do.
Posted by: Hugh at January 20, 2006 5:39 PM
Yes Hugh,
The world did indeed end in 1844. When Henry Clay was tragically relegated forever to being Right rather than President by the Dark Horse (speaking of Krishna) candidacy of James K. Polk, the curtain fell, and all since then has been shrouded in darkness.
Cordially
Robert
at January 20, 2006 6:02 PM
". . . and Bob Jones (isn't that the name of the Kool-Aid man who had loyal followers, or have I given the wrong first name and confused him with the niblick-and-mashie man who gave his name to a university with Protestant connections -- if the latter, I apologize)."
Hugh, I believe you were thinking of Jim Jones, of the People's Temple and Kool-Aid fame.
Posted by: Rick at January 20, 2006 6:03 PM
Italy's ambassador to Saudi Arabia has converted to Islam, the second time in seven years that an envoy of Rome to the land of Mecca has adopted its religion.
If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.
Posted by: Alarmed Pig Farmer at January 20, 2006 6:06 PM
From Laurence Austers site
I heard from a correspondent about an American woman who spends a lot of time in Italy each year. She told him that the ordinary Italians she talks to seem resigned to the Islamization of Italy, which they regard as irreversible, and that their attitude is, "Let's enjoy ourselves while we can."
http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/
Do read it all, as it has a lot more on Europe as a whole.
at January 20, 2006 6:25 PM
And some dark night, when everything
Is silent in the town
I'll shoot those tyrants one and all,
I'll gun the flogger down.
Oh, I'll give the land a little shock,
Remember what I say,
And they'll yet regret they've sent Jim Jones
In chains to Botany Bay.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
at January 20, 2006 6:28 PM
"Posted at 3:06 PM."
You fellas are hitting the Johnny Walker a little early today, aren't you?
Oh well, it's Friday.
at January 20, 2006 6:34 PM
Weaver argues that when thought is no longer grounded in solid metaphysical absolutes, mankind lurches from sentimentality on the one hand to brutality on the other, which seems to be the case with little Johnny boy and the entire Lindh family. Modern people seem to feel that their most terrible acts of brutality and cruelty can be wiped away by simply applying a little sentiment coupled with a few weepy tears. Presto! all is forgiven and everyone is back together again whole and new.
"Without this grand source of ordering, our intensities turn to senseless affectation and drain us, or to hatreds and consume us. On the one hand is sentimentality, with its emotion lavished upon the trivial and absurd; on the other is brutality, which can make no distinctions in the application of its violence...The refusal to see distinction between babe and adult, between the sexes, between combatant and non-combatant - distinctions which lay at the core of chivalry - the determination to weld all into a formless unit of mass and weight - this is the destruction of society through brutality." - Richard Weaver
Posted by: Rebecca JW at January 20, 2006 7:19 PM
Hugh, I agree with you 99 % of the time. This is the 1 % or less I don't. Lindh is acting any father would act in a similar situation. What should we expect? For him to say, "Let him hang." It reminds me of Hinckley(The Reagan shooter). Except in this case, the parents were supposedly good people who raised a rat. Kids can turn out great . . . and sometimes not. This kid was raised in a weird situation. He listened to rap music and got into Malcolm ect, went to the Mosque(where were his dad indeed at this point), went to Yeman and the rest is history. Would his journey to Yeman have been aborted by his Father after 911? Who knows. His dad is a dufas . . . no arguing here, but feels a normal father's response(perhaps way too late) in wanting a second chance for his son. I, myself, almost barfed when his Dad initially likened his son to Mandela when his son was sentenced to jail. What an idiot. Maybe if he had normal parents who would have taken him to the shrink instead of Yeman...his life course might have been altered. Everyday, I hear or see of cases where parents take an active interest in their child, get them off drugs, dry them out, and things turn out different. Do I feel sorry for the CIA guy who got killed. Of course I do, and if this kid had anything directly to do with it, then I'd be in favor of the gas chamber. But I can't help feeling a tinge of compassion for Lindh's father...for dereliction of duty. Usually when your kid winds up on drugs or some other criminal enterprise, it's not front page news. Another thing that has always bothered me about this case is how this dufas of a kid goes to Yeman, then Bin Laden's camps, then meets Bin Laden(twice). If it was so easy for him to meet Bin Laden, couldn't something like this have been planed by our CIA like with a sleeper agent?
Posted by: biorabbi at January 20, 2006 7:23 PM
Also if he lucked upon the Hare Krishna, he'd only be a nuisance at the airport . . . not the American Taliban. Had he been seduced by Bob Jones, he might be a missionary in the Phillipines and not a national disgrace. I think the sentence of 20 years was justified. The death penalty also IF he had direct involvement in the CIA agents death, but 20 years is about right. I can't put myself in Lindh's fathers shoes, but I probably also would beg for forgiveness or clemency or whatever. Any parent would. To this day, Lindh's father probably has no qualm's with Islam and thinks its just another idiology. That also is the tragedy here.
Posted by: biorabbi at January 20, 2006 7:27 PM
Hugh, I do agree, however, with the stripping of his US citizinship after he serves his sentence. The kid is beyond redemption at this point and I've read he's studying the Koran in jail anyway. If my son ever wants to convert to Islam, I'd disuade him. If that approach fails, I'd disown him and give him a first class ticket to Karachi with a change of name. Just today a patient of mine told me of their deepening depression caused by a son on drugs who's in jail. Did he deserve it. Probably yes, but it's destroying his father who's wracked with guilt. I guess this is the nature of my objection to your post. Sometimes even with the best of parents a kid can go off the reservation, and this can destroy a family.
Posted by: biorabbi at January 20, 2006 7:32 PM
As a last illustration of my point . . . while I'm outraged that Hinkley got off with a psychiatric sentence for trying to kill Reagan, everytime he's released on weekend furlow to visit his aging parents, I do feel very sorry for what they must endure.
Posted by: biorabbi at January 20, 2006 7:33 PM
The Internet must not handed over to other nations as totalitarian states desire. The greatest weapon against Islam is not bombs, but free speech. Of course, this is not to say that weapons have no place in fighting radicals or wars against them. I believe in the marketplace of ideas. If any particular religion is a bad one, as is the case with Islam, then word will get out about how bad it is. However, in order for free speech to work, speech must be free. Lies can longer be told about Islam, or ay other religion, in order to conceal its true warlike nature. This also means the media have a responsibility to expose the tenets of faiths to ignorant masses. Right now, it is clearly not doing so. Blogs have become a means of people to say things they feel they cannot say in public.
Islam has made some gains in our societies because we have allowed it remain unattacked in the West; we have not taken it seriously. Islam will soon, inshallah, have to confront its greatest enemy: the exposure of the terrible teachings within it's own books.
at January 20, 2006 8:04 PM
Re: Italian ambassador to Saudi Arabia
"An embassy spokeswoman said there was no record of any Saudi ambassador to Italy ever converting to Catholicism."
Small wonder, may it have anything to do with wanting to live?
Interesting question though - to speculate on any U.S. ambassadors who may have done the same thing in secret given that so many have gone on to become shills for S.A. afterwards.
Posted by: johnb at January 20, 2006 8:36 PM
This kid was not passive and sweet!! I know some people who were in Yemen at the same time that John Lindh went there, and they said that he was incredibly obnoxious, basically a holier-than-thou type. He actually had the gall to berate native Yemenis, and told them that they weren't sufficiently religious, and that they were too easily accepting the influence of Western culture. The Yemeni government ended up EXPELLING him from the country!!
He was such a pretentious twit that when he was finally captured with his jihadi fighter pals, he was speaking English with an affected pseudo-Arabic accent, claiming that he had been speaking only Arabic for so long that he forgot how to speak English!! Please....I've known Westerners who lived in the Middle East for decades, and none of them lost their accents when they spoke English. (And, of course, Lindh had only been overseas for less than a few years, at that time). No, the jerk is just basically a fanatic wannabe.
I predicted that this would happen, after Lindh and his family (very gratefully!!) accepted the plea bargain which allowed Lindy to weasel out of facing the serious legal charges he deserved (like, oh say...TREASON!?) They've waited a few years, hoping that our collective memories of his atrocious behavior would fade, and then they'd begin the campaign to find a legal loophole to get this guy out of the prison he deserves to STAY IN for the next couple of decades.
at January 20, 2006 9:23 PM
The Lindhs are stupid and ignorant at the least, and it just gets worse from there....
So, even if there is no law against stupidity, there is hell to pay. Unfortunately, a CIA agent paid with his life for the Lindh's ignorance.. or was it betrayal?
Posted by: Alert at January 20, 2006 10:23 PM
Interesting quote Rebecca. It'll go out to a couple of my siblings prone to arguments employing moral equivalence. Thanks.
Posted by: Cornelius at January 20, 2006 10:23 PM
I don't agree with Lindh's father's argument, but at least he is showing some loyalty and concern for his son, ironically too late. Funny, but the people who exploit his lifestyle and upbringing and blame that for Lindh's betrayal never do the same for Timothy McVeigh. I don't see anyone here condemning conservative, uneducated, rural, working class white America types for producing a monster who would murder his fellow Americans so indiscriminately.
Posted by: Dumbo at January 21, 2006 12:00 AM
TempeB said:
"I know some people who were in Yemen at the same time that John Lindh went there, and they said..."
It would be nice if you could flesh this out a bit. How did you happen to know people in Yemen who knew John Lindh personally? If they didn't know him personally, how did they come by this info? Who are your sources? Even if you can't give names, how 'bout some more general identifying characteristics?
Posted by: eduardo odraude at January 21, 2006 12:49 AM
"Might I suggest that John Walker Lindh and his father and the entire herd of free thinkers who find Islam such a wonderful alternative to the West be sent to a real Islamic paradise, like Somalia."
How about sending rightwing Judeo-Christians to a Christian paradise like Ethiopia, the abode of "Lion of Judah." May be we can send a pro-American democrat like Karzai to an American paradise like East Saint Louis, Southside Chicago or Newark New Jersey.
Posted by: Batilshikan at January 21, 2006 12:51 AM
"Fitzgerald fails to mention in his long windy harangue about the “rotten son,” that Lindh’s Islamic quest started in a high school classroom in California; where islam was introduced to the students in a spirit ofhealthy “multiculturalism” -- and subsidized by tax payers. Or is this fact to be overlooked because it might prove to be politically embarrassing?"
-- from a posting above
1. "Long windy harangue"? Your chosen noun does not need, and is better off without, its redundant adjectives -- unless, of course, you were attempting to offer an example of one of J. L. Austin's performatives.
2. The article itself contains the father's revelation that his son first discovered Islam not in high school, but at the age of 12, when he first saw on that fateful Silver Screen a movie about Malcolm X, and fell instantly in love -- with Islam. It was a veritable coup de foudre, and if you are feeling bold, you can replace the dental in the last word of the phrase with a more expressive one, one that fits the situation to a t.
3. A brigade of posters here have made known their desire that every comment here raise that issue of "multiculturalism," and agree to view "multiculturalism," whatever meaning they endow that word with (and some are shaky with meanings) as the source of America's, and by extension the world's, every woe, and further, resent the fact that some running this website will not just hop to it, and get with their program, and accommmodate their demands.
4. "Or is this fact to be overlooked because it might prove to be politically embarrassing?"
You must be kidding.
Posted by: Hugh at January 21, 2006 1:02 AM
TempeB's comment about the Yemenis he knows who met Johnny sounds like baloney. But I'm sure there is truth to his general claim cause it's always the converts who are the most fanatic. They want to prove how loyal they are to the new faith.
Posted by: Dumbo at January 21, 2006 1:06 AM
"How about sending rightwing Judeo-Christians to a Christian paradise like Ethiopia, the abode of "Lion of Judah."
-- from a posting above
No, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, France, Iceland, Spain, Denmark, Holland, Germany, Belgium, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, and fifty other countries will do quite nicely, thank you. And should some of those "Judeo-Christians" choose to emphasize the first part of that Keatsian compound adjective, then a Jewish state, Israel, is available, and it hasn't done too badly, against incredible odds, either.
For that matter Ethiopia will be in much better shape once it begins to use the headwaters of the Nile for irrigation projects -- which the Western world should support and help pay for. Egypt will try to stop it. Too bad for Egypt.
Posted by: Hugh at January 21, 2006 1:07 AM
Am I the only parent here who is astonished by the arguments of those who believe that Lindh senior is behaving in an appropriately paternal way in defending his son? I have four sons, all of whom I adore. My children are not being raised to address their prayers to "To whom it may concern", and I most fervently hope that they become good and strong men.
Having said that, how can a parent, no matter how loving, accept the unacceptable, all in the name of good parenting? Would it have been proper for Ted Bundy's mum to loudly defend him as being just a bit different? I really don't see the validity in the arguments supporting the supposed loyalty of Mr. Lindh, but instead see him continuing to set a very poor example to his hopelessly and criminally misguide son.
libbysmom
Posted by: libbysmom at January 21, 2006 1:08 AM
I'd join you in being an appalled parent if I were a parent. But cats don't count. ;)
For now, I have the perspective of one who, the farther I get into my twenties, keeps gratefully realizing how right my parents were in what seemed at the time like a strict upbringing.
I occasionally realize that I'm sort of turning into my parents as I get older... I'm sure John Walker Lindh may feel the same way about the fruits of his upbringing at some point, but clearly, I got the better deal.
Posted by: Shinoliite at January 21, 2006 1:29 AM
"Sometimes even with the best of parents a kid can go off the reservation..."
-- from a posting above
I don't blame parents for children not turning out as they should. I'm a rotten child, with some rotten siblings to boot, and our parents, who raised us in an entirely eufunctional family, did nothing to deserve the way we turned out, and when I see them next week I will tell them so yet again.
This case is different. There is a connection between Lindh pere and Lindh fils, and the comments of the former about the latter are absurd. Just a few years after helping to win a remarkably lenient sentence for his son, by the latter's momentary expression of regret, the father now refuses to recognize, at all, that the behavior of Lindh fils was in the slightest reprehensible. We are now told of that spiritual quest, how it began in early youth, how he proceeded to follow his bliss to Yemen and then Pakistan, how he simply wanted to help people (which is why his father suggested that he could choose to do that -- just helping people he just work is now telling us all kinds of things about him, his motivation, his spiritual quest, his innocence, the fact that it was not he -- he who remained true-blue to the Taliban -- who changed, but rather that turncoat, America itself.
Imagine the defense lawyer for someone who spied for the Soviets in the late 1940s, arguing at trial that since the Soviet Union had been an ally during World War II, why should the court charge his client because after that war "everything changed" and the Soviet Union "overnight became" America's enemy? Yes, why blame Klaus Fuchs for remaining loyal to the Soviet Union, when the real blame should be put on the United States for changing its atittude toward that wonderful ally -- just like John Walker Lindh remaining true to the Taliban.
It is Lindh the father of Lindh the son who can be blamed not so much for how that son turned out, but for his own comments yesterday, his refusal to admit that either his son's behavior, or his own -- in letting him go off to Yemen, to Pakistan, and not to have tried to find out what happened to him after that, for not beign vigilant, for not exercising due diligence, for being selfishly and stupidly indifferent or still worse, approving of their son's activities as if he were demonstrating some wonderful rather than appalling qualities --and for defending him in such an atrocious way.
Posted by: Hugh at January 21, 2006 1:32 AM
you can replace the dental in the last word of the phrase with a more expressive one...
Filth!
So you take the voice away and it becomes more expressive?
Paul Greenberg on Lindh and Mike Spann.
It is because of Mike Spann, and many others like him, that some of us can sit in clean, well-lighted offices, comfortable and secure, and argue the civil rights of the John Walker Lindhs of the world.Posted by: Interested
at January 21, 2006 8:27 AM
I will not be more specific about from whom exactly I got that information. Suffice it to say that I lived in Yemen for several years, and still have a few contacts who know people who currently live and travel there.
at January 21, 2006 9:37 AM
Hugh, this is great. But do you really think that stupidity is incurable? Certainly some are born with a "quick wit to grasp the middle term" (a turn of phrase I learned from Avicenna, of all people), but stupidity is more a life-style choice than a matter of genetics isn't it? We revile the 90 pound weakling because we know he can turn to Charles Atlas, but we have only pity for a man who has no legs. Lindh père is culpably stupid, as is his wretched son.
Posted by: AnneCrockett at January 21, 2006 10:50 AM
"If you don't know where you are going, all roads will take you there". Pogo?
Posted by: GFB at January 21, 2006 12:12 PM
Rebecca,
RE: Richard Weaver
If I were you, I would be reluctant to quote a man with such disdain for modernity. He does your cause great damage and raises the spectre of racism. Racism is the greatest weapon for the putrid Moslems in the US, and you implicitly hand it to them.
In The Conservative Mind, Weaver opposed "a world smudged by industrialization, standardization by the masses, consolidated by the government." It paints a picture of a world strikingly like the one Islam desires, a world where Slaves obey their masters, women obey their husbands and there are strict rules.
His writings reflect a disdain for all modernity, and by extension, modern values such as the emancipation of human beings from the oppression of indentured servitude. (I can see how modern medicine, science, dentistry and driving a car has made life unbearable to those 19th century thinking types like Weaver.) In Weaver's world, life would have been better had it remained as he knew it in his South; you know, the "good old days of the South". Was life so wonderful in a time when most Christians did not dare challenge Biblical “truths”, like Slavery, which is of course AMPLY supported in the Bible? We do not live in those times. The Bible was wrong about many things. The South was terribly wrong about slavery. Racism and slavery are utterly despicable. Weaver was dead wrong.
With respect to Lindh Senior (and baby Lindh), he is an idiot. There is no need to bemoan the "liberal" thinkers of the 19th century, or even the 21st century. Lindh is not just a liberal, as am I in many ways, he is an ignorant fool. But then again, so was Weaver.
Cheers,
Kafir
at January 21, 2006 12:32 PM
A couple of considerations everyone seems to miss on the Jonnie-Islam business.
The foundational core of Islam appears to be deep fear and hatred of women, and of heterosexuality. All the ritual and smoke-and-mirrors organize around that central component. Lindh the Younger may simply have been attracted to the lifestyle of men-without-women, a somewhat homoerotic lifestyle (never called that in Islamic Saharasia, but that's what it is) and with a definite sadistic streak where women are beaten up, thrown under the burqa, stoned or shot in the head for showing any speck of independence, etc. Did young Lindh ever have a girlfriend in the USA, before "converting to Islam"?
Nobody who joined the Talibans could miss the forbiddance of music, dancing, unveiled women, etc., nor the chronic butchery associated with their rule. Jonnie liked all of that, was attracted to that, supported that, because among the Taliban, he could be the "big man" and go around with an AK, etc. Does anyone know, if he admitted to killing local Afghanis? I can hardly imagine the Talibans would admit him into their group without him "demonstrating loyalty" in some dramatic manner, such as by murdering some hapless innocent who crossed the Talibans. Murderous bullys all, and woman-haters to the extreme.
at January 21, 2006 1:18 PM
A brigade of posters here have made known their desire that every comment here raise that issue of "multiculturalism," and confirms it, whatever meaning they endow that word with (and some are shaky with meanings) as the source of America's,and the world's, every woe, and resent the fact that some running this website will not just hop to it, and accommmodate their demands.
Setting aside your breathy hyperbole, do you have an explanation for the en masse denial-of-reality that is plunging the Western world into Dhimmitude?
That's the big story here. How can whole continental cultures tacitly opt for suicide; how can such awful double standardism prevail? Has self-delusion ever taken place on a scale that it is now?
What is causing the surreal disconnect between the reality of what's reported by this site and the unreality of what's publicly acknowledged? There must be some ideological force causing such spectacular dysfunctionality.
I await your explanation, if any.
MORE MOSLEMS MORE ISLAM MORE KORANS MORE HADITHS MORE SIRATS MORE
Multiculturalism is defined here as the mistaken belief that all cultures are of equal value, are compatible, and that it is a good thing to replace a native Western culture with an admixture of imported cultures (i.e., diversity and exoticness are inherently superior to homogeneity and nativeness).
Even though our multiculturalist friends have never offered a shred of evidence to prove these assertions, they control the permanent governments and public discourses of every Western nation.
Posted by: Alarmed Pig Farmer at January 21, 2006 3:15 PM
Sorry Kafir N - I'm going through a heavy duty Weaver phase. There's no stopping me quoting him. People call me a racist for working at this site, so I count myself in good company.
cheers, Rebecca
Posted by: Rebecca JW at January 21, 2006 4:29 PM
Alarmed Pig Farmer, I agree that our entire cultural zeitgeist borders seriously on the insane right now. We are clearly in the presence of a psychological phenomenon on a massive scale. We are called hate-mongers, but we are just the people holding the flashlight illuminating the real hate-mongers.
We are defining a major conflict that many people want to pretend does not exist, so as not to disrupt their comfortable lives, lives being held together by a thread anyway. But by forcing the truth to the surface, we in effect, though not in intent, challenge every individual to make a personal moral decision. It is not we who are forcing that decision, but the necessity of the times. Fear of this decision is what causes such unreasonable passionate hatred to be directed toward us, often by our own family and friends. I think hatred is just "the other side" of fear. The measure of one reveals the measure of the other.
Many people want to continue to fight on the old ground, turning over old issues, where the moral decision was made by history long ago, where it is not demanded of them to decide in the now. "These are the times that try men's souls." The times are trying us, each one of us, and demanding a moral answer. Wars are always ultimately fought on moral ground.
Posted by: Rebecca JW at January 21, 2006 5:13 PM
Batilshikan you are back. I am glad to see you again. I had some comments on one of your previous postings I have linked it below. I believe it is the last comment on the page. If you wish too respond to that I will return to that archive periodically.
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/009806.php
Oh and by the way,
How about sending rightwing Judeo-Christians to a Christian paradise like Ethiopia, the abode of "Lion of Judah."
There are no "Christian" nations as you mention here, because Christianity is not imposed on anyone anywhere in our present day and age. How come a christian cannot visit Mecca but a Muslim can visit the Vatican or Bethlehem?
Salam Alikum
at January 21, 2006 5:14 PM
"How can whole continental cultures tacitly opt for suicide; how can such awful double standardism prevail? Has self-delusion ever taken place on a scale that it is now?..."
-- from a posting above
1. "How can whole continental cultures tacitly opt for suicide..."
See Europe, August 1914. See Europe, 1914-1918.
2. "how can such awful double standardism prevail?"
Exploitation of pre-existing mental diseases incudling Anti-Americanism and antisemitism. Encouraging misplaced guilt over neverending "post-colonialism" and supposed sins of the advanced world, and skillful manipulation of such fashions by those bent either on promoting themselves (especially in universities) without their possessing any ,mental merit, but who have constructed a rationale for themeselves, and a jobs program as "authentic" representatives of some supposedly victimized group.
3. "Has self-delusion ever taken place on a scale that it is now?..."
See the reaction throughout Western Europe and North America to the rise of Nazism, 1933-1939.
See the reaction in Western Europe to the Red Army in Central and Eastern Europe, 1945-circa 1949.
In summary:
Rhyming Reasons With Feminine Endings,
or the Truth of the Esdrujula:
Timidity (fear of offending the Gods of the Copybook Headings)
Stupidity (the most powerful force on earth, aggravated by egalitarianism that erases the distinction between those who have bothereed to study something, and comprehended it, and thosee who have repeatedly demonstrated that they have not.
Cupidity (see those oil companies and businessmen seeking to recycle petrodollars, those arms salesmen in the Gulf, those Western ex-diplomats, intelligence agents, jouranlists, academics of the esposito vain, trolling for Arab dollars)
Rigidity (see the inability, as in Iraq, to be flexible, to recognize one's initial mistakes, to change course, to admit that understanding was lacking) Iraq misallocation of resources)
at January 21, 2006 8:50 PM
I saw the seige, capture and revolt of masir al Sharif, Afghanistan on Discovery Times, and with it John Walker Lindh and Mike Spann (30 minutes before Mike died), Johnny bin Walker was asked by Spann,"Why did you come to Afghanistan" Answer it was the purest of Islamic nations.
"Do you approve 9-11" Spann asked.
"I do" answered Johnny bin Walker
The interrogation was so incriminating that bin Walker accepted a plea bargain, for he would have gotten worse if he went on trial.
As regards making excuses for Dad because of paternal love. Bullcrap, I'm fed up with that bleeding heart crap..Ted Bundy's step mother loved and stood by him till the bitter end,and still does.
I have three children, all grown now, most older than the average JW'er and if any of them were to be involved in something like that, or a murder or a serious crime where they hurt another.. I would write them out of my life...it's called tough love.
This namby pamby crap of my child right or wrong is what is weakening and destroying the nation.
Still left with the question of why are converts to Islam mostly Catholic, and why are the most radical converts Catholic as well, Lindh, Ismail Royer, Jose Padilla.. the list mounts.
Must be something similar in the two religions for the crossover to take effect.
Posted by: Nariz at January 21, 2006 10:44 PM
Re multiculturalism. Don't underestimate its destructive potential. Massive third world immigration beyond any numbers that can be assimilated into our own culture is a dire future threat to stability and national unity. And although most of America's immigration is Hispanic and particularly Mexican, "Anglos" are now a minority in California and soon to be a minority in Texas and even Nevada. I've labored in the demographic fields for a number of years now and I know what I'm talking about.
Furthermore, this unassimilable immigration is fueling the fires of Mexican irredentism. If the US fragments 25 years down the line, who, pray tell will stand up to the Islamic juggernaut, the French? And does anyone remember the old saying "the enemy of my enemy is my friend"? I invite any followers of Jihad Watch to check out some of the "Aztlan" websites - these guys are the spearhead of the invasion.
Posted by: RBLA at January 21, 2006 11:50 PM
"How can whole continental cultures tacitly opt for suicide..." See Europe, August 1914. See Europe, 1914-1918.
The historical comparison implicit in this is so bad that I'll put it down to self-deprecative humor.
"how can such awful double standardism prevail?" Exploitation of pre-existing mental diseases incudling Anti-Americanism and antisemitism. Encouraging misplaced guilt over neverending "post-colonialism" and supposed sins of the advanced world...
This explains the fodder used (of which we're all aware), but not the mechanics of making possible the double-standardism that devastates us one inch at a time every day.
"Has self-delusion ever taken place on a scale that it is now?..." See the reaction throughout Western Europe and North America to the rise of Nazism, 1933-1939. See the reaction in Western Europe to the Red Army in Central and Eastern Europe, 1945-circa 1949.
In fairness, to make this historical comparison work I'll have to check the history books for a) pre-war allied governments importing tens of millions of Nazis and putting them on welfare, b) massive allied funding of Nazi Germany during the run-up to the war, c) that string of pro-Nazi propaganda films (Clooney) and TV shows produced by Hollywood, d) all those Nazi Centers set up in Western universities, and e) the various Nazi Experience curricula operated in our public elementary schools and high schools.
Stupidity (the most powerful force on earth, aggravated by egalitarianism that erases the distinction between those who have bothereed to study something, and comprehended it, and thosee who have repeatedly demonstrated that they have not.
This sounds like two things:
1) An insult. Under the circumstances, I'll happily take it.
2) A call for intellectual elitism. Say, didn't these moron pinheads get us into this mess in the first place?
MORE MOSLEMS MORE KORANS MORE HADITHS MORE SIRATS MORE ISLAM
So then, no explanation is offered to deal with this "cognitive disconnect" phenomenon that, unchanged, surely will catapault Moslems to primacy in the not-so-distant future.
Shouldn't this historically unprecedented disconnect be the project? I'd like to see one book on modern opinion programming and Islam for every study published of Islamic history.
I'd also like to see some TV presence, for that is where the potential for change lays. Enough intellectual groundwork already. It's time to educate.
Posted by: Alarmed Pig Farmer at January 22, 2006 12:30 PM
There are two things about ''american taliban'' jhonny walker and his father that are being overlooked here:
1. Before jhonny went on his ''spirtual quest'' daddy walker dumped on the family by leaving his mother and moving in with his gay lover (even if the lover had been female, shattering the family like that was wrong and plainly destructive).
2. As jhonny went on his ''spirtual quest'' guess how he was supported finacially? That's right, with daddy writing the checks the whole way.
I know if I had gone on a ''spirtul quest'' after I had turned 18 MY living parent would have told me ''fine with me'' but would NOT have sent money whenever I asked (in fact, would likely NOT have sent money at all). I would have had to work (or beg) to fund all my misadventures around the world.
A perfect example of a loser parent who wrecks the family then tries ''to make up for it'' with a checkbook.
Frank Lindh has earned all the scorn being heaped upon him. And his son should rot in prison...
at January 22, 2006 5:01 PM
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