http://washingtontimes.com/article/20080425/EDITORIAL/15078464/1013/EDITORIAL
WASHINGTON TIMES (USA)
OPINION
FORUM: Silence is golden
April 25, 2008
By Julia Gorin - Penn State's student newspaper The Daily Collegian reported
on Ann Coulter's hour-long speech there this month: For possibly the first
time in her career the conservative commentator, had nothing to say about a
political issue. "I have no opinion," she told a student who asked her about
Kosovo and Ukraine. That may be the first time those words have passed my
lips.
During her hour-long speech to a crowd of more than a thousand in HUB Alumni
Hall last week, though, Ms. Coulter spoke candidly about her opinions on a
variety of controversial subjects ranging from the war in Iraq to global
warming to terrorism. The usual, in other words. The easy stuff. And on the
easy, day-to-day stuff, every conservative loudmouth in America has a strong
and ready opinion. But on the fact that in the Kosovo giveaway of 2008 weve
just repeated the Munich surrender of 1938 nothing.
While Americans can't be expected to have strong opinions on whether the
Ukraine gets an invitation to NATO or not, the Kosovo question is a
different story. So let me see if I have this non-opinion on Kosovo
straight: The U.S. is aggressively creating another Muslim state in Europe,
openly calling for a heightened Islamic presence on the continent, and Ms.
Coulter has no opinion.
In the case of Kosovo, it's a Muslim state whose leaders and inhabitants
have killed or cleansed most of the Christians (and Muslims who didn't mind
being part of a larger Christian nation) from its borders. But Ms. Coulter
has no opinion.
In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, investigators flew to Albania after
discovering a cell there that was connected to the hijackers and she has no
opinion.
In the weeks before 9/11, six Albanian-American fundamentalists arrived in
the Kosovo village of Skenderaj, telling locals that the U.S. would soon be
attacked, and Ms. Coulter has nothing to say about it. (Not coincidentally,
Skenderaj was a stronghold during the 1998-99 war of Americas past and
present ally, the KLA.) Less than a year ago, 4 out of 6 jihadists arrested
for planning to massacre American soldiers at Ft. Dix were Albanian; the
weapons provider among them (Agron Abdullahu) having been sheltered at Ft.
Dix during the 1999 resettlement process. And still Ms. Coulter has no
opinion on whether this kind of behavior deserves American-enforced
independence for Abdullahus horde. That we fought alongside this former
Kosovo sniper in Bill Clinton's war of aggression is for some reason
insignificant to this and all other pundits.
We're well post-9/11, and President Bush has been replicating and completing
a strong-arm war of might-makes-right started by Mr. Clinton whom Ms.
Coulter distrusts and despises and it elicits a shrug from this opinionist.
After we helped the ultranationalist Albanians with the Kosovo leg of their
jihad, they moved on like clockwork to de-stabilize Macedonia and southern
Serbia using the same terrorist provocations they employed in Kosovo, in
Macedonia winning U.S. support but Ann has no opinion.
Osama Bin Laden set his sights on, and traveled throughout, the Balkans in
the 90s, meeting with Albanian leaders (as he did with Bosnian ones), and
assigning al Qaeda capos to different areas there including Ayman
al-Zawahiris brother Mohammed. Today, America solidifies this radical base
for bin Laden, while presiding over the construction of 400 new Saudi and
UAE-financed mosques amid systematic church destruction. But this isnt
significant enough for Ms. Coulter to have an opinion on.
The U.S. is redefining the concept of the nation-state along ethnic
boundaries, with implications for every region of the globe including
Southern California and every other state of the Union that has majority
ethnic enclaves, but don't look to Ms. Coulter to have an opinion on that.
The U.S. is dismantling principles of the international order that have
guided and protected statecraft for sixty years, which is CURRENTLY being
used as a precedent from India to Sri Lanka to Catalonia in Spain to the
Galilee in Israel to Quebec to Vermont, but this isn't opinion-worthy,
apparently.
The American-backed prime minister of Kosovo oversaw the butchering of
civilians for their organs during this war for independence and against
genocide among countless other creatively brutal exploits by the
U.S.-anointed KLA but Ms. Coulter doesn't have an opinion on that either.
Of course, I have no opinion on that sums up the negligence of the whole of
American punditry, and explains why we have arrived at this staggering but
ignored precipice in history. If even the intelligentsia both right and left
has no opinion on a matter of such grave consequence to the free world, on
issues as vital as the sovereignty of countries with minority populations
and the challenges to a basic principle of international law, what hope is
there for the rest of the country? Busy trying to out-clever one another on
the election-oriented petty issue du jour, the commentators haven't noticed
that the bottom has just fallen out from under Western civilization before
their very eyes, as the international order is dismantled under their noses.
Once again, as in 2001 when we decided to back Albanian rebels against the
Westward-facing, multi-ethnic nation of Macedonia which took in 400,000
Albanian refugees from Kosovo we see that it's possible for America to be at
war without its public or the public's hard-nosed messengers noticing.
Indeed, if our war on behalf of Muslims is against the expendable Slavs,
it's more than possible. It's applauded.
Never do our thinkers stop to ask: Why all the sweating by world powers
foremost by the U.S. over such a small, seemingly insignificant Balkan
province? Why the absolutist approach (e.g. Condi Rice: Kosovo must be
independent; Nicholas Burns: Independence is the only solution)? After all,
everyone seemed to get the joke last June when President Bush found his only
friend on the planet in Albania. The answer is that the United States of
America is being blackmailed in Kosovo. The U.S., bitten by the Balkan bug,
today serves as a mafia enforcer for the criminal gang that is Greater
Albania. Such is the position we have allowed ourselves to be placed in.
Whether you like her or not, Ms. Coulter is considered an informed American.
Her no opinion on Kosovo speaks volumes about how much the rest of our
populace knows or cares about this underappreciated catalyst for the demise
of Western values and civilization. I'm reminded of the time I pitched a
book project to a conservative imprint at a major publishing house, about
the fallout and implications of Americas taking all the wrong sides in the
Yugoslav wars. The editor replied, Try a European publisher. Americans
aren't interested in other countries.
Julia Gorin, a contributing editor to JewishWorldReview.com and is an
advisory board member of the American Council for Kosovo.
letters@washingtontimes.com
WASHINGTON TIMES (USA)
OPINION
FORUM: Silence is golden
April 25, 2008
By Julia Gorin - Penn State's student newspaper The Daily Collegian reported
on Ann Coulter's hour-long speech there this month: For possibly the first
time in her career the conservative commentator, had nothing to say about a
political issue. "I have no opinion," she told a student who asked her about
Kosovo and Ukraine. That may be the first time those words have passed my
lips.
During her hour-long speech to a crowd of more than a thousand in HUB Alumni
Hall last week, though, Ms. Coulter spoke candidly about her opinions on a
variety of controversial subjects ranging from the war in Iraq to global
warming to terrorism. The usual, in other words. The easy stuff. And on the
easy, day-to-day stuff, every conservative loudmouth in America has a strong
and ready opinion. But on the fact that in the Kosovo giveaway of 2008 weve
just repeated the Munich surrender of 1938 nothing.
While Americans can't be expected to have strong opinions on whether the
Ukraine gets an invitation to NATO or not, the Kosovo question is a
different story. So let me see if I have this non-opinion on Kosovo
straight: The U.S. is aggressively creating another Muslim state in Europe,
openly calling for a heightened Islamic presence on the continent, and Ms.
Coulter has no opinion.
In the case of Kosovo, it's a Muslim state whose leaders and inhabitants
have killed or cleansed most of the Christians (and Muslims who didn't mind
being part of a larger Christian nation) from its borders. But Ms. Coulter
has no opinion.
In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, investigators flew to Albania after
discovering a cell there that was connected to the hijackers and she has no
opinion.
In the weeks before 9/11, six Albanian-American fundamentalists arrived in
the Kosovo village of Skenderaj, telling locals that the U.S. would soon be
attacked, and Ms. Coulter has nothing to say about it. (Not coincidentally,
Skenderaj was a stronghold during the 1998-99 war of Americas past and
present ally, the KLA.) Less than a year ago, 4 out of 6 jihadists arrested
for planning to massacre American soldiers at Ft. Dix were Albanian; the
weapons provider among them (Agron Abdullahu) having been sheltered at Ft.
Dix during the 1999 resettlement process. And still Ms. Coulter has no
opinion on whether this kind of behavior deserves American-enforced
independence for Abdullahus horde. That we fought alongside this former
Kosovo sniper in Bill Clinton's war of aggression is for some reason
insignificant to this and all other pundits.
We're well post-9/11, and President Bush has been replicating and completing
a strong-arm war of might-makes-right started by Mr. Clinton whom Ms.
Coulter distrusts and despises and it elicits a shrug from this opinionist.
After we helped the ultranationalist Albanians with the Kosovo leg of their
jihad, they moved on like clockwork to de-stabilize Macedonia and southern
Serbia using the same terrorist provocations they employed in Kosovo, in
Macedonia winning U.S. support but Ann has no opinion.
Osama Bin Laden set his sights on, and traveled throughout, the Balkans in
the 90s, meeting with Albanian leaders (as he did with Bosnian ones), and
assigning al Qaeda capos to different areas there including Ayman
al-Zawahiris brother Mohammed. Today, America solidifies this radical base
for bin Laden, while presiding over the construction of 400 new Saudi and
UAE-financed mosques amid systematic church destruction. But this isnt
significant enough for Ms. Coulter to have an opinion on.
The U.S. is redefining the concept of the nation-state along ethnic
boundaries, with implications for every region of the globe including
Southern California and every other state of the Union that has majority
ethnic enclaves, but don't look to Ms. Coulter to have an opinion on that.
The U.S. is dismantling principles of the international order that have
guided and protected statecraft for sixty years, which is CURRENTLY being
used as a precedent from India to Sri Lanka to Catalonia in Spain to the
Galilee in Israel to Quebec to Vermont, but this isn't opinion-worthy,
apparently.
The American-backed prime minister of Kosovo oversaw the butchering of
civilians for their organs during this war for independence and against
genocide among countless other creatively brutal exploits by the
U.S.-anointed KLA but Ms. Coulter doesn't have an opinion on that either.
Of course, I have no opinion on that sums up the negligence of the whole of
American punditry, and explains why we have arrived at this staggering but
ignored precipice in history. If even the intelligentsia both right and left
has no opinion on a matter of such grave consequence to the free world, on
issues as vital as the sovereignty of countries with minority populations
and the challenges to a basic principle of international law, what hope is
there for the rest of the country? Busy trying to out-clever one another on
the election-oriented petty issue du jour, the commentators haven't noticed
that the bottom has just fallen out from under Western civilization before
their very eyes, as the international order is dismantled under their noses.
Once again, as in 2001 when we decided to back Albanian rebels against the
Westward-facing, multi-ethnic nation of Macedonia which took in 400,000
Albanian refugees from Kosovo we see that it's possible for America to be at
war without its public or the public's hard-nosed messengers noticing.
Indeed, if our war on behalf of Muslims is against the expendable Slavs,
it's more than possible. It's applauded.
Never do our thinkers stop to ask: Why all the sweating by world powers
foremost by the U.S. over such a small, seemingly insignificant Balkan
province? Why the absolutist approach (e.g. Condi Rice: Kosovo must be
independent; Nicholas Burns: Independence is the only solution)? After all,
everyone seemed to get the joke last June when President Bush found his only
friend on the planet in Albania. The answer is that the United States of
America is being blackmailed in Kosovo. The U.S., bitten by the Balkan bug,
today serves as a mafia enforcer for the criminal gang that is Greater
Albania. Such is the position we have allowed ourselves to be placed in.
Whether you like her or not, Ms. Coulter is considered an informed American.
Her no opinion on Kosovo speaks volumes about how much the rest of our
populace knows or cares about this underappreciated catalyst for the demise
of Western values and civilization. I'm reminded of the time I pitched a
book project to a conservative imprint at a major publishing house, about
the fallout and implications of Americas taking all the wrong sides in the
Yugoslav wars. The editor replied, Try a European publisher. Americans
aren't interested in other countries.
Julia Gorin, a contributing editor to JewishWorldReview.com and is an
advisory board member of the American Council for Kosovo.
letters@washingtontimes.com
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