Segacs’s World I Know

Today, several pro-American and pro-war in Iraq rallies were held across Canada, the largest of which in Ottawa attracted over 5,000 people:

(Peter) Goldring said the fact that people were marching in favor of the United States on Saturday showed that a “silent majority” actually supported the war.

“We do have a new world reality following Sept. 11, and the new world reality says that we must go to root out terrorism,” he said.

More rallies are scheduled for next week, including a massive one in downtown Toronto on Friday. It’s about time that we Canadians spoke out in support of our friend and ally south of the border, who keeps doing our dirty work for us time and time again while we keep our noses clean and then criticize them.

Here’s a real shocker (insert sarcasm): The International Solidary Movement is harbouring terrorists:

Israeli troops raided the West Bank offices of the International Solidarity Movement on Thursday and seized a wanted member of the militant Islamic Jihad group, the army said.

The army said the man was being sheltered in the Jenin offices of the Palestinian-backed peace group whose members often act as human shields, placing themselves between Israeli soldiers and Palestinians.

Apart from Rachel Corrie, who the ISM calls its “first official martyr” (I wonder what she would do with 72 virgins?), other members of the ISM include some familiar names from Concordia, including many past and present members of the CSU.

The Concordia election results made headlines in the Gazette and president-elect Natalie Pomerleau was interviewed on CJAD yesterday afternoon.

Initial reports that CHUM radio had pulled 20 anti-war songs off the playlists of one of its radio stations are false, much to my relief. When I first read the story, I couldn’t believe it . . . and apparently, neither could the station:

The original report claimed the banned songs included Give Peace A Chance by John Lennon, Soldier Boy by The Shirelles (a love song), Revolution by The Beatles and One Tin Soldier by The Original Caste.

“No songs have been banned on 1050 CHUM — none,” Brad Jones, the station’s program director, said yesterday. The station yesterday even played at least two of the purported banned songs, including Give Peace A Chance.

Rob Farina, program director of 104.5 CHUM-FM, said his station also has not banned any war- or peace-themed songs.

Jones said pulse24.com’s story was the result of a breakdown in communication during an interview between a pulse24.com reporter and CHUM-FM music director Barry Stewart. The reporter asked Stewart which war-themed songs were being pulled. Stewart thought the reporter meant pulled off the shelf for broadcast, whereas the reporter meant pulled from the playlist.

I’m certainly glad that the rumours turned out to be false. But the fact that the media was so willing to believe and publish the story in the first place raises an interesting question: where does the line get crossed? Being sensitive to controversy is one thing, but I could never condone all-out censorship, and neither could most people.

But while this report was false, reports that MTV Europe is practicing censorship unfortunately seem to be true:

MTV has banned music videos with war-related titles, lyrics or images, including Paul Hardcastle’s 19 and Outkast’s Bombs over Baghdad, for the duration of the conflict in Iraq.

The leading music channel will not show pop promos that feature “war, soldiers, war planes, bombs, missiles, riots and social unrest, executions and other obviously sensitive material”, according to an internal memo seen by MediaGuardian.co.uk.

[ . . . ]

“MTV, like many other broadcasters, feels content should reflect audience sensitivities at this time of war,” an MTV spokeswoman said.

“Any changes to playlists are only a temporary measure,” she added.

I sincerely hope that this policy is reconsidered. After all, isn’t freedom of expression one of the things we’re fighting for?

There’s been a suicide bombing in Iraq:

Iraq hailed a suicide bomber who killed four American soldiers on Saturday and promised more such “blessed” attacks as the United States kept up withering air strikes on Baghdad.

[ . . . ]

“This is the blessed beginning on the road of sacrifice and martyrdom to inflict on them what they did not expect,” the television announcer said.

It appears at least someone has been heeding the call from Palestinian terror groups such as Hamas to export suicide bombings to other countries.

Holy indeed. All this means is that suicide bombing is gaining popularity outside Israel, due to its perceived effectiveness as a tactic. And that’s disturbing news for the rest of the world, because how to stop terrorism once it becomes widespread? Granted, there’s a difference between attacking military troups and attacking innocent civilians, but let us be very clear here: suicide bombings are used as tactics of terrorism, not military offense.

On the one hand, there are people like this guy who claim that the liberation of the Iraqi people is the main argument for the necessity of this war: (via LGF)

So if people want to talk about containing [Saddam Hussein] and don’t want to go in forcefully and remove him, how do they propose doing something about the horrors he is inflicting on his people who live in such fear of him?”

I did not cite “weapons of mass destruction.” Nor do I believe Saddam Hussein is a direct threat to this country, any more than the creators of the mass graves in the Balkans were, or the Taliban. And as has been evident for a long time, I am no admirer of George W. Bush.

The United Nations? Did the inspectors go into the prisons and the torture chambers? Would they have, if given more time? Did they interview the Mukhabarat, Saddam’s dreaded secret police?

An Iraqi in Detroit wanted to send a message to the anti-war protesters: “If you want to protest that it’s not OK to send your kids to fight, that’s OK. But please don’t claim to speak for the Iraqis.”

And on the other side, I was watching Bill Maher on HBO earlier, and guest Michael Graham said during discussion that (and forgive me for paraphrasing) for him it has nothing to do with the Iraqi people, it’s about protecting the interests of Americans and defending the US against the terrorism that Saddam supports. (To which Janeane Garofalo made some typical comment about our “world view” being wrong because how dare we tell Saddam that he has no right to torture his people anyway? But I digress.)

The point is, from a political standpoint every country does tend to act in self-interest. But I think the moral case for ousting Saddam Hussein is very strong, and it hasn’t been made clearly enough.

On the surface, I’d tend to agree with Graham more. There are many people in the world living in deplorable conditions. And while it’s altruistic to want to “liberate” them, I can understand a dose of skepticism about war based on those grounds. In general, countries go to war to defend themselves against a threat to their security.

Critics argue that the case has not been made that Saddam Hussein poses a threat to the security of the United States – or other UN members, for that matter.

That is just plain false. Every UN resolution that he ignored was a threat, because it weakened the power of the UN to take action against a rogue state. Every cheque provided to the family of a Palestinian suicide bomber was a threat, because it funded and encouraged terrorism which, left unchecked, can only spread. Every time Saddam Hussein juggled Western countries like little balls in the air, driving wedges between them, only served to up the threat.

Nobody in the world – not even France or Russia – actually believed Saddam when he claimed to have disarmed. They all know he has weapons of mass destruction, and they all know he’ll use them. The only people who are Saddam’s cheerleaders are the anti-war protester crowd, and even some of them are beginning to wise up.

Bush knows a war for altruistic purposes is easier to sell, so he dresses it up as being about the freedom of the Iraqi people. And I certainly won’t downplay their oppression. The horrors they have faced in the 33 years of Saddam’s regime are very real.

But if that in itself isn’t a prima facie case for war, self-defense can no longer be denied as an imminent one. So that’s why I say to the Americans, the British, and their allies: go kick butt! And to the Canadian government, shame on us for not being there with them.

Concordia students turned out in record numbers to give the moderate “Evolution” a resounding victory by more than double the number of votes over the radical leftist “Clean Slate” in this year’s CSU election. The tally was 2,260 votes for Evolution, compared to 1,097 for Clean Slate and less than 300 for each of the remaining slates.

More than half of council’s seats went to moderate candidates as well (although note that this year’s president, Sabine Freisinger, was elected to council, as well as a few of her buddies.)

All in all, this is a very clear message from Concordia students about what sort of union they want running their school next year. And it can only mean good things for the future and reputation of Concordia.

Update: It seems that the actual numbers will be slightly different, due to what the Link refers to as “misplaced tally sheets”. Updated numbers will be announced Monday, but the CEO says they will not affect the results.

Also, the first threats from the sore-loser leftists are starting to crawl out of the woodwork, for example, this comment on the Link’s site. They can’t be happy about losing the election, but I would have hoped they’d at least be more graceful about it.

Great e-mail forward (via Adina):

American flag: $25
Gasoline: $2
Cigarette lighter: $2.50
Catching yourself on fire because you are a terrorist asshole: PRICELESS

If this guy died he’d be on my list for a Darwin award.

A group calling itself “Friends of America” is holding a rally to show Canadian support for America in Toronto on April 4th. Visit the link for more details.