The Sandmonkey, who’s from Egypt, describes the airport in Bahrain (in the United Arab Emirates):

Man, Bahrain’s airport is psychotic: Foreigners everywhere, their Liqueur collection at the duty free shop surpasses that of Egypt’s by leaps and bounds, and every freakin 10 feet is a brand new luxury car that you have a great chance to win if you join the lottery effort by paying 150 dollars or something. And let’s not even talk about their movie section: I won’t go over the brand new Hollywood releases, but goddamn it, they had all the religious movies that were banned in Egypt: They had the 10 commandments, Richard Harris’s Moses, 2 movies named Jesus of Nazareth, the Message, and even a couple of movies discussing the DA Vinci code. The whole religious controversy that plagues Egypt? Not a big deal to those people. I am guessing religious strife usually takes the form of Sunnis vs. Shia over there. Still though, WTF? Bahrain has all those movies and WE- the Hollywood of the middle east and shit- ban them? Something really went screwy here.

“Do you have any narcotics in the house?” – DEA Agent
“Of course, I’m Tommy Chong.” – Tommy Chong

a documentary about how Tommy Chong went to jail for selling bongs online

coming soon to the Film Forum, in NYC (along with a documentary about Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man—woohoo!)

I’ve added Oliver Kamm’s name to my growing (casual and personal, not exhaustive or scholarly) list of people who get it—and not a Bushie among them—along with links to some of their representative work on the subject of, hmm—what to call it?—the fight against the newest totalitarianism:

Tony Blair (and most recently here)

the authors of the Euston Manifesto

Christopher Hitchens (who called it early on the “progressives’” betrayal of “liberal values,” which I recently wrote about here):

I suppose therefore that I should be uplifted by all this, since an ad hominem attack is almost by definition an admission that my enemies would rather not engage with my arguments. I can’t quite make that claim, however. They do engage with my arguments. They generally do so in the status-quo, safety-first mode that now distinguishes so much of the Left, insisting not that such and such a line on Iraq, say, is wrong on principle, but that it is too risky or too hazardous. [emphasis mine]

Michael Walzer
Paul Berman (here and here)
Flemming Rose (a new essay posted on the DLC site)
Andre Glucksmann
Alain Finkielkraut
Adam Michnik
Vaclav Havel
Azar Nafisi
Peter Beinart (reportedly—I haven’t yet read his book)
the Progressive Policy Institute
Ayaan Hirsi Ali

It’s a gloomy Saturday.

I’ve been reading Oliver Kamm’s Anti-Totalitarianism (available only from Amazon UK), which I recommend to anyone who has an interest in understanding the nuances of real progressive (i.e., liberal internationalist) thought.

In this slim volume, Kamm provides background and nuance to the politics of the day, offers some perspective on our current geopolitical situation, and makes an eloquent case for the left-liberal humanitarian-interventionist worldview. There’s too much in this rich book to do it justice by summarizing it. But here are some key points I noted:

Regarding the failure of liberal commentators to show a vocal (or at least rhetorical interest) in defending the “constitutional societies” of the West:

The historical idiosyncrasy of the debates since 9/11 is not that some parts of the Left excuse or identify with totalitarianism, but that an alliance has emerged etween different and previously hostile forms of totalitarianism. (p. 17)

On Blair (who is in some ways the hero of Kamm’s story, and one of the engines, rather than the caboose, of the “coalition of the willing”):

But on foreign policy, Blair represents something distinctive. This is insufficiently understood by his critics. Orthodoxy within and outside the Labour Party holds that Iraq was an unnecessary war founded on Blair’s perplexing lack of judgement….My view is different. Blair’s position has been more consistent than his critics suppose. In many respects it has been admirable….Rather than acquiescing in Serb aggression, Blair confronted it. (pp. 18-19)

On Iraq:

Knowing that the character of the international order had changed since the Cold War and not just since 9/11, Blair chose to ally himself with a nominally conservative US administration in a war that needed to be fought, with the policy of containment of Saddam Hussein had failed, and the toleration of autocratic states in the regions was both an affront to our values and an emerging—though not an imminent—threat to our security. The threat consisted in the confluence of failed states, the likely proliferation of nuclear technologies, and terrorist groups driven by religious fanaticism more than specific grievances. (p. 20)

Kamm talks a great deal about divisions on the left over how to deal with totalitarianism. Here, he makes a critical point, which also extends to the culture war in the United States (and Western Europe…though not in Eastern Europe):

Least surprising in any survey of opinion on the causes of terrorism is the resistance of the ostensibly Marxist Left to re-examining its presumptions about the sources of oppression in the modern world.
(p. 71)

On the failure of the liberal left to grapple with the stakes in this worldwide conflict (which explains the popularity of “radical chic, vintage 2006“):

The standard radical critique of American assertiveness ends up embodying the ethnocentrism it professes to transcend. Intent on ascribing its own disaffection to militant Islam, it fails to grasp the latter’s ideological character. (p. 73)

On “why they hate” us (emphais mine):

It is the best features of Western liberal societies and not the worst [features] that inflame our enemies. (p. 74)

This final point is really the most important one, because it clarifies who these enemies are, and why we must resist and fight and defeat them. As Milos Forman, whose profoundly humanist spirit never fails to move me (thus his top-right-sidebar billing), The demagogues (and worse) will always be there. We must never allow them to prevail over us.

I recommend Kamm’s book and his blog, where, I note, he’s currently mounting a vigorous defense of the book.

The Furl experiment failed.
It screwed up my sidebar and header, it didn’t update automatically, and I’m tired of wasting time trying to figure it all out. I’ll probably migrate the items I want to publish without commentary to del.icio.us. It’ll take a while, like every other technical blogging improvement/action I attempt to undertake.