She's Right
I was thinking about this Ann Coulter quote this morning:
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We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war.
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Everybody and his crazy Aunt disassociated himself from Ann Coulter's remarks at the time, in spite of the fact that the Bush Administration embraced the first third of her remark almost immediately, and, as luck would have it, was able to follow through on the second third of her remark in due course and with relative ease.
So what about the final third of "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity"?
Because if you read any rightwing pundit these days, you will notice that their great fear is the spread of Islam. As you know, Dear Reader, rightwing pundits support the War on Terror and the Mission in Afghanistan and do not for a second believe the Americans should pull out of Iraq until the job is done, any more than Canadians should pull out of Afghanistan in 2009.
But really, if Islam is the enemy, does it not follow, then, that the job will not be done until we have "converted them to Christianity"? Because I really don't see the point, if Islam is the enemy, of pulling out of anywhere until we can rest assured that we have followed through after "invading their countries and killing their leaders" with "converting them to Christianity".
And I can't imagine any rightwing pundits would disagree with me. Afterall, they will insist, column after column, Islam is a spreading menace. Its mission is to take over - not just THE world - but OUR world - the Western Judeo-Christian one.
Sure, it's easy to dismiss Ann Coulter as a nut, but is she any more of a nut than, say anybody who supports the War on Terror and the Mission in Afghanistan? Of course she isn't. In fact, she said very clearly right off the bat what every rightwinger has taken a few years to say, over and over and over:
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We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war.
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And she's right, from every angle of a rightwing pundit's point of view. And since her government is every bit as rightwing as she is (and ours is now in lockstep), we have invaded their countries, we have killed their leaders, and now - given that the people who support the War on Terror believe Islam to be the enemy - it follows, logically, from a rightwing nut point of view, that we must now convert them to Christianity.
Only then will the War on Terror make any sense to them (its supporters) and to us (sane people).
The same "principle" really must apply, as well, to the Mission in Afghanistan, in my opinion. If every time we leave a region, it falls back into Taliban hands, well - we maybe we need to convert Afghanis to Christianity before we leave the region so that they have a counter position to defend against the Taliban when it moves back in to take over again. I really don't see any alternative. It was Islam that was the reason given for why women could have no rights in Afghanistan, and freeing those women from tyranny is the reason constantly given for why we are there, and the Taliban follows Islam - as do most other Afghanis - so why is everybody pretending that Islam won't just be used all over again to oppress women?
Men + Islam = Oppression for Women. Right? Isn't that what I keep reading? Over and over and over?
I mean, if our rightwing pundits are right (and they're in every newspaper, and on every news station - so there must be SOME legitimacy to their opinions) - how can we leave Afghanistan without first converting Afghanis to Christianity?
The War on Terror? Of course it's a waste if only parts one and two of Ms. Coulter's assertion are followed through on and part three is left unaccomplished. Read any pundit on the right - any one - and you'll agree that they are very definitely saying that in order for the War on Terror to be in any way a success, Islam will have to be eradicated in Iraq and Christianity imposed in its place.
If Islam is truly the enemy, and that's what these rightwing pundits are saying - all of them - then Islamic countries need to be converted to Christianity or the War on Terror is and has been - pointless - and we in the West will always be at risk of Terrorist attacks and Sharia Law and all manner of Imperialistic Islamic Menacism.
Ann Coulter told it like it has to be done - from the right's point of view: "We should invade their countries" - done; "kill their leaders" - done; and "convert them to Christianity" - not done - yet.
It's only logical, afterall.
