Watchers Council Results – Self-Serving Distraction Probably An Insufficient Response To Mumbai Massacre

As The Watcher commented when he posted the vote count, this week’s list is all over the place. That’s not totally unexpected: the left often proceeds by saying whatever will suit them. That’s straightforwardly in tension with their self-declared elitism, which is what has non-Council runner-up ZenPundit mocking Obama boosters. The idiotic Brooks article that provides the grist for that mill is asinine on its face and has previously been taken out to the woodshed by Council member Glittering Eye. So a solid pick. Equally solid was Council runner-up Bookworm Room’s systematic dismantling of Ayers apologism. Reality based community indeed.

The non-Council winner was William Jacobson’s American Thinker column calling out activists who are attacking the Mormon Church. He thinks the surreal venom of the anti-Mormon campaign is a result of “pent-up anger.” I’m not entirely sure that’s true: I could it being inchoate anger with nowhere else to go. Coalitional politics and multiculturalism prevent liberal activists from impugning African American voters. As for other religions: Evangelical churches around here are often heavily African-American so same problem. Jews overwhelmingly rejected Prop 8 so that would make no sense. Now Muslims did seem inclined to support the ban. But come on – these activists aren’t about to shout threats at anyone who might actually respond. So Mormon bashing it is.

A much more severe case of venomous resentment that’s been allowed to metastasize: the Mumbai massacre that the top Council pick JoshuaPundit extensively explored:

This represents a new and more deadly phase in this war, and there’s no question it will be repeated…perhaps even with Iran or Pakistan adding to the mix by providing nuclear or biological weapons. There’s no reason to suppose that what happened in Mumbai couldn’t happen in Paris, Indianapolis, New York, Toronto or Barcelona. That is the basic nature of the war we face… To a great many Muslims, that holy war began fourteen hundred years ago, and they fully understand that this is just the latest round of the war between Islam and the West. Most western elites haven’t even acknowledged that war yet. Mumbai’s message is that we begin taking them seriously and defend ourselves accordingly.

Or we could cocoon ourselves in anodyne faux sophistication, hanging on any false hope able to claim the barest hint of nuance. I guess that’s an alternative too.

References and previously after the jump…

References:
* So Many Weasels [Watcher of Weasels]
* Smug Liberal Sophistication Undisturbed By Decades Of Disastrously Wrong Domestic And International Predictions [MR]
* The Elite as a Tribe [ZenPundit]
* The "brightest" if not the best [Powerline]
* That One Sentence [The Glittering Eye]
* Ayers’ life was a just a joyous, misunderstood frolic [Bookworm Room]
* It’s Time to Speak Out Against The ‘Mormon Boycott’ [American Thinker]
* Prop 8 was traif to L.A. Jews [Politico]
* Fremont Muslims vote for Prop 8 [510Report]
* The Message of Mumbai [JoshuaPundit]