For allowing themselves to be used by the White House to promote a piece of legislation, Mark Steyn says the least the family of Daniel Pearl deserved was a bit of honesty from President Obama. What they got instead was the same "delusional pap" we've come to expect from an administration trying to remove any reference to Islamic-inspired terrorism from the government lexicon.
Tom Blumer writing at Newsbusters, has the quotes and links, but here's the offending Obama line:
"And obviously the loss of Daniel Pearl was one of those moments that captured the world’s imagination because it reminded us of how valuable a free press is, and it reminded us that there are those who would go to any length in order to silence journalists around the world.
The Pearl family had been notified by the White House just four days before the bill's signing that they could be props at the ceremony for the legislation bearing Daniel's name. The bill is a "free press" matter, and while Pearl was clearly an advocate of that ideal, it seems to me cynical for the administration to make use of public sympathy for Pearl in the service of their latest legislative photo op, and then gloss over the real reasons why this particular journalist was "silenced".
The twisted version of events that served Obama's momentary purpose is that Pearl was beheaded on video for the entire world to see because he was a journalist....presumably silenced for seeking truth by forces opposed to its disclosure. The words of KSM, Pearl's confessed beheader, provide enough clarity for me to get the picture..."I decapitated with my blessed right hand the head of the American Jew Daniel Pearl, in the city of Karachi." Truth-telling doesn't seem to have been a stumbling block for KSM here.
Interesting how the journalist thing doesn't come up. The murderers are at best just selective enemies of a free press...using the Internet to virally spread their murder video to a global audience, while denying free expression wherever they can.
As usual, Steyn is reacting more eloquently (and entertainingly) than the rest of us...
Now Obama's off the prompter, when his silver-tongued rhetoric invariably turns to sludge. But he's talking about a dead man here, a guy murdered in public for all the world to see. Furthermore, the deceased's family is standing all around him. And, even for a busy president, it's the work of moments to come up with a sentence that would be respectful, moving and true. Indeed, for Obama, it's the work of seconds, because he has a taxpayer-funded staff sitting around all day with nothing to do but provide him with that sentence.Instead, he delivered the one above, which in its clumsiness and insipidness is most revealing. First of all, note the passivity: "The loss of Daniel Pearl." He wasn't "lost." He was kidnapped and beheaded. He was murdered on a snuff video. He was specifically targeted, seized as a trophy, a high-value scalp. And the circumstances of his "loss" merit some vigor in the prose. Yet Obama can muster none.
[...]
But what did the "loss" of Daniel Pearl mean? Well, says the president, it was "one of those moments that captured the world's imagination." Really? Evidently it never captured Obama's imagination because, if it had, he could never have uttered anything so fatuous. He seems literally unable to imagine Pearl's fate, and so, cruising on autopilot, he reaches for the all-purpose bromides of therapeutic sedation: "one of those moments" – you know, like Princess Di's wedding, Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction, whatever – "that captured the world's imagination."
Read it all, naturally.
Via Jen Rubin, an interview with Judea Pearl at Haaretz.com
The Obama people cannot dodge forever the public spectacle of re-living 9/11 and its radical religious inspiration. Pearl's murderer, the 9/11 terrorist leader, awaits trial, and sooner or later they have to decide how and where to hold it. The vibe you get is that they don't want to dredge up all that nasty 9/11 carnage by trying its strategic mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. How is that going to impact the Obami outreach to the Muslim world? Or their radio silence on the connection of Islam to what they are now calling "violent extremism".
And if trying the terrorist mastermind for the crimes of 9/11 presents a troubling and badly-timed image problem for the administration, think how little they want to deal with Mullah Omar, the now-captured clerical ideologue who, along with Osama bin Laden, sent KSM on his murderous mission. So far, they refuse to acknowledge that he is even in custody, let alone say how they plan to bring him to justice.
I stumbled on an older piece by Judea Peal at danielpearl.org, and had to share. It doesn't seem dated half a decade out. From the top...
In his speech of April 15, 2004, President George Bush linked the murder of my son, Daniel Pearl, to a global "ideology of murder." "The terrorist who takes hostages, or plants a roadside bomb near Baghdad" said Bush "is serving the same ideology of murder that kills innocent people on trains in Madrid, and murders children on buses in Jerusalem, and blows up a nightclub in Bali, and cuts the throat of a young reporter for being a Jew.A week later, while engaging in a Jewish-Muslim dialogue in Williamsburg, Virginia, the first question reporters asked me was: "What is your reaction to the President's mention of your son?" My answer was:
"I agree with the President's observation that Daniel's tragedy is pivotal for understanding the current tide of madness." However, I consider Danny's legacy as a communicator and bridge builder to be equally pivotal in inspiring and revitalizing East/West dialogues, an effort to which I am devoting my energies.The wave of violence now rocking the planet is of a fundamentally different character than anything this planet has known in the past few centuries. For the first time in recent history a friendly messenger is killed by calculated design, in front of millions of spectators, for the sheer purpose of transmitting a message to those it deems its enemies.
True, planet earth has known cruelty before, and on a much greater scale. Yet even the Nazis labored to hide their gruesome deeds, thus unveiling some inkling of shame, doubt or fear. Daniel's murderers, in shocking contrast, boasted openly in their cruelty, totally secured in faith and righteousness, triumphantly expecting spectators to rally in sympathy. More shocking yet, many of their spectators did rally in sympathy (according to reports from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia) and, as the recent murders of Nicholas Berg and Fabrizio Quattrocchi indicate, message-transmission killing has become an increasingly acceptable practice in certain parts of the world.
Such brazen assault on the sanctity of human life marks a profound transgression in the evolution of human civilization, and we must ask ourselves what the origin of this transgression is, and whether it can be isolated, understood and controlled.
Pearl's moral clarity is refreshing, and his message of hope for eventual peaceful reconciliation makes this worth reading in full.
Posted by dan at May 22, 2010 1:06 PM