On the other hand, it kind of was racist oppression, because Israel did murder a bunch of people and probably would not have done so with such bloody-minded enthusiasm had the people in question not been of a different race. So there's that, too.

>>>until you can explain to me how the mass murder and slaughter of nearly 1,400 Gazans by the Israeli military under the ridiculous claim that isolated unguided missiles forced them to do it, is anything other than racist oppression

You can call them "isolated unguided missiles" if that pleases you, but the operative word, I think, is "missiles." I also think that if you send missiles in someone's direction, you sort of forfeit your right to complain if larger, more accurate missiles make the return flight in your direction.

"Spittin' in the wind only comes right back at you" --Lou Reed.

By WILLIAM FOREMAN, Associated Press Writer William Foreman, Associated Press Writer – 57 mins ago (see sig)

URUMQI, China – Police have arrested 1,434 suspects in connection with the worst ethnic violence in decades in China's western Xinjiang region, which killed at least 156 people, state media reported Tuesday.

The arrests come amid a security clampdown on the region, with hundreds of paramilitary police with shields, rifles and clubs taking control of the streets of the capital, Urumqi, where the riots took place on Sunday.

The violence does not bode well for China's efforts to mollify long-simmering ethnic tensions between the minority Uighur people and the ethnic Han Chinese in Xinjiang — a sprawling region three times the size of Texas that shares borders with Pakistan, Afghanistan and other Central Asian countries.

Mobile phone service and the social networking site Twitter have been blocked, and Internet links also were cut or slowed down.

A nonviolent protest by 200 people was broken up in a second city, Kashgar, and the official Xinhua News Agency said police had evidence that demonstrators were trying to organize more unrest in Kashgar, Yili and Aksu.

It said police had raided several groups plotting unrest in Dawan township in Urumqi, as well as at a former race course that is home to a transient population.

[...]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090707/ap_on_re_as/as_china_protest

It's me. Just kidding. It's really Jerry Garcia.

And now in honor of the blessed memory of Derbig (where are you?), let's go back to What if the Uighurs were Jews?

Well, first, because of the unholy alliance between the well known terrorist group Yiddishe Kopf and the ancient cabal, Elders of the Manhattan Project, (whose protocols are written in funny symbols I can't understand), they would be armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons. But don't tell anybody. No NPT 'cause safe sex is for sissies. Let the mohel do his thing with the rockets and leave it at that. And lastly and most importantly, they then would be able to eat the local pork fried rice because as everybody knows except the muslims (h/t Leonard Cohen) if you cut the pork up in small enough pieces it loses its oink and becomes kashrut by proxy.

A few of the other Iraq operation names:

• Operation Shillelagh (March 2004)
• Operation Aloha (March 2004)
• Operation Spring Clean-up (May 2004)
• Operation Giuliani (June 2004)
• Operation Slim Shady (June 2004)
• Operation Cajun Mousetrap III (August 2004)
• Operation Ala Allah (February 13, 2006)
• Operation Minotaur (February 26, 2006)
• Operation Dirty Harry (February 2006)
• Operation Raging Bull (March 2006)

Complete list at:

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/iraq_ongoing_mil_ops.htm

So please spare us the stupid arguments, which by the way, has its counterpart in the East with regard to the Western war machine--'look how violent they are, look how many they kill, look how indulgent and greedy they are, how long will you turn a blind eye to what they do?' and so on.

I agree completely. The goal of this kind of bs has always been "don't look at my backyard, look at my neighbor's. He's a total asshole!"

There are 5 million Muslims living in the US. Should we gather them up in camps like we did the Japanese, or maybe like the Nazis did the Jews, because they are prone to violence, irrational, and dangerous?

There are over a billion Muslims in the world and not all of them live in the Middle East. Writing about them in monolithic terms is nothing short of bigotry. Whatever trends you see amongst Muslim populations are better explained by the way the news is reported in the US specifically (try watching Al-Jazeera sometimes), socio-economic conditions on the macro and micro scale leading to endemic corruption, internal strife, and yes, Western oppression, etc.

So please spare us the stupid arguments, which by the way, has its counterpart in the East with regard to the Western war machine--'look how violent they are, look how many they kill, look how indulgent and greedy they are, how long will you turn a blind eye to what they do?' and so on.

@Ondellete -- I stand corrected.

Glenn is the first on the columnist list who is not published in newspapers - in other words, not establishment-supported (unless Salon is The Establishment).

Operation Swift Sword

You are entirely correct to be rather suspicious of the name of that operation in Afghanistan...good catch!

♬♩ ♬Evreybody sing!! ♬ ♬♩ ♬♩

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;

He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:

His truth is marching on.

(Chorus)

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

His truth is marching on.

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps,

They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;

I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:

His day is marching on.

(Chorus)

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

His day is marching on.

I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel:

"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal;

Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,

Since God is marching on."

(Chorus)

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Since God is marching on.

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;

He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat:

Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!

Our God is marching on.

(Chorus)

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,

With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me:

As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,

While God is marching on.

(Chorus)

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

While God is marching on.

He is coming like the glory of the morning on the wave,

He is Wisdom to the mighty, He is Succour to the brave,

So the world shall be His footstool, and the soul of Time His slave,

Our God is marching on.

(Chorus)

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Our God is marching on.

I'm sure those moslems being attacked are wondering which god the song is talking about.