The Logic Off Topic list

On Fri, 12 Oct 2001, Dennis Gunn wrote:

> At 5:03 PM +0100 10/11/01, Mark at Enduser wrote:
> >
> >Dennis!
> >
> >The story glosses over the facts in hand.
> 
> Really?  I thought it was a rather accurate metaphor.
> 
> >You cannot deny the subtle
> >interplay between nations over centuries.
> 
> There was nothing subtle about the attack.  Or the Taliban harboring 
> bin Laden and his camps.  Or their constantly changing and totally 
> conflicting stories about their relationship with him.

Nobody doubts the lack-of-subtlety in the 9-11 attack.  I think what Mark
meant by 'subtle interplay' was the complex history of interrelations
we've had with the middle east (and that they've had with each other) over
the centuries.  Not to mention the varied perspectives on those
interrelations.

To discount all the other possible political motives for the actions
against the Taliban, how they might be a small part of a much larger
American agenda in the middle east (not explained to the press for
political reasons), or how the grossly oversimplified popular version of
the story (the one which your metaphor fits perfectly) may just be
political spin, does a disservice to the complexity of the situation.

> Again I think it was an accurate metaphor.  What fact has been disregarded?
> 
> How so?   What did I miss.  Yoonchi says what I see as reasonable 
> point of view is stupid.  And so I beg to differ and use a 
> metaphorical story to illustrate my point.  What is the fact I have 
> ignored.

Well, for one, the fact that this is not even about Afghanistan
(represented by the guesthouse in your analogy).  Afghanistan just happens
to be the stage on which the bloody part of this long conflict begins to
unfold.  If it were another country that was taken over by a 
fundamentalist Islamic regime after it was destabilized by Russian
invasion and civil war, we'd be bombing it instead.

I don't necessarily disagree with what we're doing in Afghanistan right
now, but I have a serious problem with what amounts to blind agreement
with national policy, especially against an enemy this determined,
ruthless, and intelligent... and arguing the official point of view so
vehemently in an international forum is a very telltale symptom of that
blind agreement... as well as absence of objective thought.

If I really wanted to be witty right now, I'd use your apartment-building/
dog-penis analogy to (patronizingly) clarify the situation from the point
of view of the Taliban.  But I don't :)

Never underestimate the power of spin...

-(American) Denizen