The Great Mark Steyn On Canada, Bin Laden, and Today's Leftist, Unhinged Democrats
Next to the Smart Guys and Lileks, Mark Steyn is, by far, our favorite guest on Hugh Hewitt's show. And as we have devoted our Thursdays to Hugh Hewitt, it's only fitting that we post up Mr. Steyn's brilliant wisdom.
HH: We begin, as we do most Thursdays, with columnist to the world, Mark Steyn. You can read all of Mark's work at Steynonline.com. And Mark, will you be traveling like Joseph to Bethlehem, home to vote in the Canadian elections shortly?
MS: (laughing) I'm actually...as soon as I put this down, I am going to leap in my vehicle, and head for the border. Liberation is only four days away.
HH: Are you a Harper voter?
MS: I will be. And normally, voting conservative would be a fruitless task in the province of Quebec. But one of the interesting stories about this election is the complete collapse of...what looks like the collapse of the liberal vote in Quebec, which Quebec has always been in recent elections, divided between the separatist party, the Bloc Quebecois, and the federalist vote goes to the liberal party. But a lot of liberal voters are voting technically, and going with the conservatives this time. So it's...my vote may actually count for something.
HH: Well, tell me about Harper, your man. Is he going to be a significant improvement? Or is it simply going to continue more of what are they doing up there?
MS: No, I think...I've met Stephen Harper just once, and he's a very nice man. He's not what you would...he's a thoughtful moderate conservative, and that's to say that what I would hope for it is we will get a touch of the old John Howard in Australia, something like that. He's not...he wouldn't be regarded as on the right wing of the Republican Party, if he were down here, and that's fine. What matters is that Canada has become a one party state. It's become a very corrupt one party state, and it's necessary, just as an act of political hygiene, to change the governing party, because the stench of corruption from them is disgusting, and they need to go away and have a good long shower for five years.
HH: I will look forward to talking to you next week about what lies ahead under a Harper government. Good luck in casting your vote. Let me talk to you about Osama, who popped out of his hole via audio tape today. He'd like a truce, Mark Steyn. (laughing)
MS: Yeah, he sounds pretty desperate. And you know what is interesting to me? He basically has said don't believe this George W. Bush line that you need to come to Iraq and Afghanistan to kill us. That's just a waste of time. Get out of Iraq and Afghanistan, and you'll save yourselves...he's essentially making Democrat talking points. He's saying you'll save yourselves billions of dollars. He didn't actually say that you could spend on reconstructing New Orleans or anything, or building that bridge in Alaska, but he was basically...you know, it's clear that he does spend some time studying opinion polls, and the talking points on cable news in the United States. And things are going very badly for him. He had four of his top guys killed in that bombing raid in Pakistan the other day, and you can tell that in actual fact, he hasn't really got much going for him, other than to bounce back some of these more ludicrous American media talking points.
HH: But luckily, the American media is rallying to him today. Let me play you an excerpt of sad, old Jack Cafferty on CNN, reacting to the bin Laden tape about an hour ago, cut number two.
JC: The last time we got a tape from Osama bin Laden was right before the 2004 presidential election. Now here we are, four days away from hearings starting in Washington, into the wiretapping of America's telephones without bothering to get a court order or a warrant, and up pops another tape from Osama bin Laden. Coincidence? Who knows?
HH: Mark Steyn, that's completely nutter.
MS: (laughing) I think he's flown the coop. I've never liked Jack Cafferty, and I'll tell you why. Because he is typical of where the media goes wrong. They hire somebody to be the kind of iconoclastic contrarian fellow. And in fact, he's just a rather sort of cranky, curmudgeonly version of mainstream media convention wisdom. So there's absolutely no point in having him on. And let me tell him. If he's going to start talking about getting wiretaps and warrants, on September the 9th, 2001, Osama bin Laden placed a phone call to his mother, and he said in a couple of days, something big is going to happen, and you may not hear from me for a while. But I want you to keep watching the news, because this is going to be really something. You'll be proud of your boy. He placed that call to his mother on September the 9th, knowing that under the cumbersome intelligence bureaucracy of the United States, even though his calls were being monitored, nobody would get around to paying any attention to that phone call until after September 11th had happened. So that in fact the sclerotic, arthritic nature of U.S. intelligence is a big part of the problem in this war. And I don't believe that you should have to go and get a court order if you want to listen to the phone calls that a terrorist in Pakistan is placing to U.S. phone numbers. I'm sorry, I just don't think that's something...I think that's an arcane point that is deeply damaging to this country's national interests.
HH: You are correct, and you are correct, Constitutionally as well. Let's go to John Kerry earlier today on CNN, cut number five, his take on al Qaeda in Iraq.
JK: The fact is that al Qaeda is not the principal problem of Iraq. The principal problem of Iraq is a larger group of people who reject the current direction, because of the shape of the Constitution, because of a history of cultural confrontation, and because of their current fears that they are not going to be protected.
HH: Al Qaeda is not a problem in Iraq, Mark Steyn.
MS: You know, this is truly pathetic. What we're seeing...what essentially al Qaeda did in Iraq was to fasten onto a part of the Sunni population that was upset about being excluded from power. What we're seeing now in Iraq is that the Sunni population, whatever their disagreements with the new constitution are turning on the al Qaeda insurgents. And in fact, just at the moment, when all the pieces are coming into play for U.S. interests there, John Kerry is talking up a defeatist strategy again. You know, this is such...this political party is almost entirely irrelevant to the reality of development in the world. And they don't get it. What do they have to show after almost five years of this pathetic strategy? What do they have to show for it?
HH: Nothing, and whatever their nothing is is getting smaller. Hillary Clinton also drank whatever's in the water, I think brought back by General Zod, talking...listen carefully, America, as Hillary says we shouldn't do A, and then we need to do A. Here is Hillary.
HRC: I believe that we lost critical time in dealing with Iran, because the White House chose to downplay the threats, and to outsource the negotiations. I don't believe you face threats like Iran or North Korea by outsourcing it to others, and standing on the sidelines. We cannot, and should not, must not, permit Iran to build or acquire nuclear weapons. In order to prevent that from occurring, we must have more support, vigorously and publicly expressed, by China and Russia, and we must move as quickly as feasible for sanctions in the United Nations.
HH: Now Mark Steyn, she says we can't outsource the negotiations, but what we need is more support from China and Russia.
MS: Yeah, I think she's complaining that America outsourced the negotiations with Iran to France and Germany, instead of outsourcing them to China and Russia. You know, this is a pointless kind of oppositionism of the Democratic Party. If Bush had taken a unilateral line on Iraq. It he'd had Condi Rice going out there dealing directly with it, and saying we don't care what anybody else things, this is our position, this is what we're going to, they would have been the first to say oh, no. John Kerry would have been up there saying oh, no. You've got to get Jacques Chirac involved. It doesn't count unless the French and the Germans are on board. And the fact of the matter is, that Bush sat back here, and he let the multilateral thing go on, and the multilateral thing has failed, because essentially, these are mid-20th Century institutions that in Iran, the mullahs, think are a total joke.
HH: Now, she says we cannot, must not, let Iran have nuclear weapons. Do you think that extends, in Hillary's mind, to doing the one thing that will stop it, military action?
MS: Well, that's the point, isn't it? She'll be in favor of Iran not having nuclear weapons until the planes start flying in and start bombing and destroying them, and the projection of American force becomes the means by which you stop Iran from having nuclear weapons. You know, at some point, the Democrats...I believe...I mean, a two party system requires two functioning, healthy parties. And this party has failed to play its part in the necessary Constitutional balance of the Republic. They've got to make some contribution to the existential challenge of the times. This is just pointless, sour oppositionism of no value whatsoever.
HH: Last question, Mark Steyn. I began this conversation by asking you who you were going to vote for in the Canadian elections, and you said Harper. What follows is a replay of an interview I did in the last hour last night with CNN's Ed Henry, where he hangs up on me after I ask him a couple of times, did you vote for John Kerry. Why doesn't the mainstream media want to be transparent?
MS: Well, I think they're heavily invested in the idea. I mean, we all know that they're essentially progressive, urban, coastal liberals, even if they're working for a newspaper in the middle of nowhere. They tend to have been through journalism schools that churn them out that way. And I don't think there's anything wrong with that as long as they're up front about it. What's offensive about the American media is this pose they have of being kind of non-partisan arbiters of the great debate. And CNN's a classic example of that. That's actually one reason why it's a bore. If it was openly partisan, it might be as fun as Fox's half the time.
HH: Someone might actually watch it. Mark Steyn, safe travel to Canada. Good luck to the conservative Torries up there and Stephen Harper. We'll talk to you next week.
It is quite enlightening to listen to the wisdom of a man who gets it, and gets it in the same manner that I do on subjects like this. And just think, we KNOW we're a little nutty, but not this badly nutty. Further, these people refuse to acknowledge they're nuts. They think they're mainstream, and couldn't be further from it.
This is why the Left is losing, and why the old media is in it's death throes.
Publius II
Next to the Smart Guys and Lileks, Mark Steyn is, by far, our favorite guest on Hugh Hewitt's show. And as we have devoted our Thursdays to Hugh Hewitt, it's only fitting that we post up Mr. Steyn's brilliant wisdom.
HH: We begin, as we do most Thursdays, with columnist to the world, Mark Steyn. You can read all of Mark's work at Steynonline.com. And Mark, will you be traveling like Joseph to Bethlehem, home to vote in the Canadian elections shortly?
MS: (laughing) I'm actually...as soon as I put this down, I am going to leap in my vehicle, and head for the border. Liberation is only four days away.
HH: Are you a Harper voter?
MS: I will be. And normally, voting conservative would be a fruitless task in the province of Quebec. But one of the interesting stories about this election is the complete collapse of...what looks like the collapse of the liberal vote in Quebec, which Quebec has always been in recent elections, divided between the separatist party, the Bloc Quebecois, and the federalist vote goes to the liberal party. But a lot of liberal voters are voting technically, and going with the conservatives this time. So it's...my vote may actually count for something.
HH: Well, tell me about Harper, your man. Is he going to be a significant improvement? Or is it simply going to continue more of what are they doing up there?
MS: No, I think...I've met Stephen Harper just once, and he's a very nice man. He's not what you would...he's a thoughtful moderate conservative, and that's to say that what I would hope for it is we will get a touch of the old John Howard in Australia, something like that. He's not...he wouldn't be regarded as on the right wing of the Republican Party, if he were down here, and that's fine. What matters is that Canada has become a one party state. It's become a very corrupt one party state, and it's necessary, just as an act of political hygiene, to change the governing party, because the stench of corruption from them is disgusting, and they need to go away and have a good long shower for five years.
HH: I will look forward to talking to you next week about what lies ahead under a Harper government. Good luck in casting your vote. Let me talk to you about Osama, who popped out of his hole via audio tape today. He'd like a truce, Mark Steyn. (laughing)
MS: Yeah, he sounds pretty desperate. And you know what is interesting to me? He basically has said don't believe this George W. Bush line that you need to come to Iraq and Afghanistan to kill us. That's just a waste of time. Get out of Iraq and Afghanistan, and you'll save yourselves...he's essentially making Democrat talking points. He's saying you'll save yourselves billions of dollars. He didn't actually say that you could spend on reconstructing New Orleans or anything, or building that bridge in Alaska, but he was basically...you know, it's clear that he does spend some time studying opinion polls, and the talking points on cable news in the United States. And things are going very badly for him. He had four of his top guys killed in that bombing raid in Pakistan the other day, and you can tell that in actual fact, he hasn't really got much going for him, other than to bounce back some of these more ludicrous American media talking points.
HH: But luckily, the American media is rallying to him today. Let me play you an excerpt of sad, old Jack Cafferty on CNN, reacting to the bin Laden tape about an hour ago, cut number two.
JC: The last time we got a tape from Osama bin Laden was right before the 2004 presidential election. Now here we are, four days away from hearings starting in Washington, into the wiretapping of America's telephones without bothering to get a court order or a warrant, and up pops another tape from Osama bin Laden. Coincidence? Who knows?
HH: Mark Steyn, that's completely nutter.
MS: (laughing) I think he's flown the coop. I've never liked Jack Cafferty, and I'll tell you why. Because he is typical of where the media goes wrong. They hire somebody to be the kind of iconoclastic contrarian fellow. And in fact, he's just a rather sort of cranky, curmudgeonly version of mainstream media convention wisdom. So there's absolutely no point in having him on. And let me tell him. If he's going to start talking about getting wiretaps and warrants, on September the 9th, 2001, Osama bin Laden placed a phone call to his mother, and he said in a couple of days, something big is going to happen, and you may not hear from me for a while. But I want you to keep watching the news, because this is going to be really something. You'll be proud of your boy. He placed that call to his mother on September the 9th, knowing that under the cumbersome intelligence bureaucracy of the United States, even though his calls were being monitored, nobody would get around to paying any attention to that phone call until after September 11th had happened. So that in fact the sclerotic, arthritic nature of U.S. intelligence is a big part of the problem in this war. And I don't believe that you should have to go and get a court order if you want to listen to the phone calls that a terrorist in Pakistan is placing to U.S. phone numbers. I'm sorry, I just don't think that's something...I think that's an arcane point that is deeply damaging to this country's national interests.
HH: You are correct, and you are correct, Constitutionally as well. Let's go to John Kerry earlier today on CNN, cut number five, his take on al Qaeda in Iraq.
JK: The fact is that al Qaeda is not the principal problem of Iraq. The principal problem of Iraq is a larger group of people who reject the current direction, because of the shape of the Constitution, because of a history of cultural confrontation, and because of their current fears that they are not going to be protected.
HH: Al Qaeda is not a problem in Iraq, Mark Steyn.
MS: You know, this is truly pathetic. What we're seeing...what essentially al Qaeda did in Iraq was to fasten onto a part of the Sunni population that was upset about being excluded from power. What we're seeing now in Iraq is that the Sunni population, whatever their disagreements with the new constitution are turning on the al Qaeda insurgents. And in fact, just at the moment, when all the pieces are coming into play for U.S. interests there, John Kerry is talking up a defeatist strategy again. You know, this is such...this political party is almost entirely irrelevant to the reality of development in the world. And they don't get it. What do they have to show after almost five years of this pathetic strategy? What do they have to show for it?
HH: Nothing, and whatever their nothing is is getting smaller. Hillary Clinton also drank whatever's in the water, I think brought back by General Zod, talking...listen carefully, America, as Hillary says we shouldn't do A, and then we need to do A. Here is Hillary.
HRC: I believe that we lost critical time in dealing with Iran, because the White House chose to downplay the threats, and to outsource the negotiations. I don't believe you face threats like Iran or North Korea by outsourcing it to others, and standing on the sidelines. We cannot, and should not, must not, permit Iran to build or acquire nuclear weapons. In order to prevent that from occurring, we must have more support, vigorously and publicly expressed, by China and Russia, and we must move as quickly as feasible for sanctions in the United Nations.
HH: Now Mark Steyn, she says we can't outsource the negotiations, but what we need is more support from China and Russia.
MS: Yeah, I think she's complaining that America outsourced the negotiations with Iran to France and Germany, instead of outsourcing them to China and Russia. You know, this is a pointless kind of oppositionism of the Democratic Party. If Bush had taken a unilateral line on Iraq. It he'd had Condi Rice going out there dealing directly with it, and saying we don't care what anybody else things, this is our position, this is what we're going to, they would have been the first to say oh, no. John Kerry would have been up there saying oh, no. You've got to get Jacques Chirac involved. It doesn't count unless the French and the Germans are on board. And the fact of the matter is, that Bush sat back here, and he let the multilateral thing go on, and the multilateral thing has failed, because essentially, these are mid-20th Century institutions that in Iran, the mullahs, think are a total joke.
HH: Now, she says we cannot, must not, let Iran have nuclear weapons. Do you think that extends, in Hillary's mind, to doing the one thing that will stop it, military action?
MS: Well, that's the point, isn't it? She'll be in favor of Iran not having nuclear weapons until the planes start flying in and start bombing and destroying them, and the projection of American force becomes the means by which you stop Iran from having nuclear weapons. You know, at some point, the Democrats...I believe...I mean, a two party system requires two functioning, healthy parties. And this party has failed to play its part in the necessary Constitutional balance of the Republic. They've got to make some contribution to the existential challenge of the times. This is just pointless, sour oppositionism of no value whatsoever.
HH: Last question, Mark Steyn. I began this conversation by asking you who you were going to vote for in the Canadian elections, and you said Harper. What follows is a replay of an interview I did in the last hour last night with CNN's Ed Henry, where he hangs up on me after I ask him a couple of times, did you vote for John Kerry. Why doesn't the mainstream media want to be transparent?
MS: Well, I think they're heavily invested in the idea. I mean, we all know that they're essentially progressive, urban, coastal liberals, even if they're working for a newspaper in the middle of nowhere. They tend to have been through journalism schools that churn them out that way. And I don't think there's anything wrong with that as long as they're up front about it. What's offensive about the American media is this pose they have of being kind of non-partisan arbiters of the great debate. And CNN's a classic example of that. That's actually one reason why it's a bore. If it was openly partisan, it might be as fun as Fox's half the time.
HH: Someone might actually watch it. Mark Steyn, safe travel to Canada. Good luck to the conservative Torries up there and Stephen Harper. We'll talk to you next week.
It is quite enlightening to listen to the wisdom of a man who gets it, and gets it in the same manner that I do on subjects like this. And just think, we KNOW we're a little nutty, but not this badly nutty. Further, these people refuse to acknowledge they're nuts. They think they're mainstream, and couldn't be further from it.
This is why the Left is losing, and why the old media is in it's death throes.
Publius II
posted by Syd And Vaughn | 7:18 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home