More on London Posted by Michael Signer

A few more thoughts on London, in no particular order:

-  The world and American solidarity with Great Britain is outstanding and heartening.  See these comments at Europhobia for more. 

-  This is going to be difficult and delicate to say, but amid the absolutely valid task of communicating to the world and America both the human tragedy and unfolding events in London, I hope the American media don't overhype the terrifying aspect of this.  Watching the Today show this morning scared me almost as much as the fact of the event itself.  Terrorism works through the exponential effect of the media's replaying of horrible images (not to mention repeating in hushed tones the common fear of Al Qaeda's supposed gathered might).  If the stories simply and only focus on fear and pain, there is a point where they replicate fear and pain, rather than record it.  There is no clear rule to follow here.  The media knows when it goes too far, and I hope they by and large take care not to make this event (50 people have died -- horrible, terrible, heart-wrenching -- but it's not 3,000) what the terrorists want it to be -- a paralytic event for the Western economy as well as the Western mind.

-  I'm not totally convinced that the first, or primary, thought on progressives' minds ought to be "Bush did this," or "Here's how we can finally show him he's wrong."  I hate as much as anyone the cheapness, partisanship, and thoughtlessness of the Iraq war and much of the GWOT in general, and do think the President and his staff are to blame.  But there are larger fish to fry.  Ever since 2002, when the President took the terribly exploitative step of scheduling the vote authorizing force in Iraq three weeks before the mid-term elections, the left has been mired in its own resentment -- which has morphed into ressentiment (which, if you remember your Nietzsche, means self-fulfilling anger that ultimately retards the bearer into backward thinking).  It's all a very understandable reaction to a shocking level of partisanship by the President in the GWOT.  But in my view we should not respond primarily as a party or a side.  We should make this less about the President's errors than about what we as a nation (not as a party or a political side) need to do. 

Comments

[Stormy]

I agree with most of what you say, but unfortunately Bush's pronouncements do a disservice to a clear discussion of issues.

I wish there were a way of having a discussion without his being in the room, so to speak.

I do have one suggestion: leave ressentiment and replicating fear to scholars and psychiatrists. I weary of people on the left examining every twitch of their psyche. Clear, muscular, rational discussion is in order.

[Robert M]

One thing I noticed over the ensuing time frame(it is now 10P EST), the pictures and talking about the London bombings dropped of the face of the 24/7 media outlets. they even went back to Aruba situation as a lead.
People are way to comfortable with what has happened.

[Jay.Mac]

You believe that George Bush is responsible for British Muslim terrorists planting bombs in London to kill their countrymen? The only people responsible for this are the terorrists involved. It was their decision to plan and carry out this attack and they bear full responsibility.

The war on terror or Iraq did not "make" anyone do anything- if British citizens are upset about the removal of a secular tyrant and the liberation of the majority Muslim Iraqi people (and at the end of the day, that's what it was, regardless of the arguments about WMD or anything else) they live in a free and democratic society and they can make their case at the ballot box. Instead of protesting against the actions of the government peacefully they choose to carry out the indiscriminate murder of innocent people. That's not George Bush's fault. It's not the fault of Iraq or the fault of Afghanistan or Israel or any other of the long list of grievances that the jihadis seem to have- it's the fault of the individuals themselves. They chose this path. No one forced them onto it.

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