Blogging for Freedom

I've been watching the protests in Iran with fascination and horror. I've seen the videos on YouTube and followed the resistance on Twitter and Facebook. For the first time in a long time I have a small hope for something better for the people of Iran and consequently that entire region.

It's impossible to learn so much about something and not have anything to say about it. I even went so far as to set my Twitter time zone and location to Tehran (but I will not change my profile picture to green because to me that color is another symbol of the oppression and tyranny of the Islamic regime).

What follows are my own tweets and Facebook updates in more-or-less chronological order. I figure this blog is about the closest thing I have to a journal, so I might as well record these thoughts.

Via Twitter:

Marveling at these beautiful skies.

Iran does not belong to the Mullahs. It is time for the people to take back the country!

Moussavi is also the Ayatollah's man, and his ascendance would be a weak moral victory for the people of Iran (but still a victory).

The world is finally witnessing the brutality of the Islamic regime. The cost of this enlightenment: enduring oppression and suffering.

The official US response to the Iranian revolt? Flaccid at best. (Good thing America doesn't belong to its government either.)

Freedom through truth! Censors and tyrants cannot defeat the intelligence and cunning resolve of the revolt. Truth will triumph!

The Mullahs in Iran are enemies of equality and cultural plurality, and Obama is too gutless to say it.

Via Facebook (actually posted prior to the tweets):

So the Ayatollah's got the final say in just about everything. Meanwhile, our own chief executive offers a flaccid at best condemnation of the Iranian government's response to the protesters, while rationalizing that the US president should not meddle in Iranian affairs. Too bad the feeling isn't mutual, as El Supremo and his lap dog, thug-in-chief Ahmedinutjob, have no reservations about "meddling" in anyone's affairs (particularly their own citizens and neighbors and especially Iraq and Afghanistan).

The consolation is that maintaining the status quo in the face of such overt domestic displeasure and resistance may call enough attention to the dire situation in Iran that the global community will finally take notice. (Really, Moussavi is the Ayatollah's man, too, despite his oft-touted "reformer" label - a win-win for El Supremo when it comes right down to it. Moussavi's ascendance would be a weak moral victory for the people of Iran.)

Unfortunately, this belated global enlightenment will be purchased with the continued suffering and oppression of the Iranian people.

Via Twitter:

Free Iran. No alternatives.

Holy War in the USA

I began writing this post several weeks ago and never finished it. I think it's worth posting, so without further revision, here it is.

***From early June:

As a professional soldier, there are a few issues that I follow to enhance my own personal understanding and further my professional learning. One of these is Islamic jihad.

Jihad, many will contend, is an internal struggle to discipline one's self in accordance with Islamic theology. This is certainly a noble endeavor and a concept that is not exclusive to Islam.

Many seem unwilling to acknowledge that jihad is also in very fact the violent "holy war" that people across the world have, over the course of centuries, grown to fear.

As an American soldier I am particularly interested in seeing how jihad affects the United States.

Several months ago, five Muslim men were convicted in a plot to kill US soldiers at Fort Dix, New York.

Just two weeks ago, two Muslim men, recent converts to the so-called Religion of Peace, were arrested after their plot to blow up a synagogue in New York City was foiled.

Thankfully, in both of these incidents, solid detective work and law enforcement prevented the realization of clearly violent aspirations.

Unfortunately, those mechanisms could not prevent today's tragedy.

PVT William Long was shot and killed at a US Army and Navy recruiting center in Little Rock, Arkansas. PVT Quinton Ezeagwula was also shot and is in stable condition.

Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad recently returned from Yemen having studied with a jihadist imam, Yahya Hajoori (or one of his students). Muhammad told authorities that he targeted the soldiers "because of what they had done to Muslims in the past” and explained that his goal was to “kill as many people in the Army as he could." [source] Indeed, his taken Arabic name includes the militant "mujahid" - a derivative of "holy warrior" and "jihad" (his given name was Carlos Bledsoe).

***Update from June 22nd:

The attack on the recruiting center was tragic, but the real tragedy is our collective failure to recognize this threat. Pres. Obama took the stage in Cairo recently to address the Muslim world. He apologized for the sins of the west, mostly ignored the obvious faults of Islam, and pledged to "fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear."

There are many problems with this vow, but I am mostly concerned that the President's perception is that these "negative stereotypes" are being perpetuated by those that are critical of Islam rather than those that use the religion to further violent or oppressive agendas. Obama merely described the attack in Little Rock as "senseless." His omission of the stated religious motives implies that he does not regard jihadist violence as a negative stereotype of the religion at all. Apparently, in the President's idealistic world of cultural plurality and relativism, there is room to accomodate this sort of religious intolerance and violence. The twisted result of this delusion is that violent jihad advances across the US and the world while those wishing to identify the threat are criticized as intolerant "stereotypers."