Benedict Goldstone Admits he was "Wrong"

According to Mona Charen at the National Review online, Richard Goldstone, has changed his little mind about Israel and war crimes. AND he has the temerity to suggest that he was not in possession of all the facts at the time when he lended his name and his jewishness to this ugly smear on Israel.

Perhaps what he was really not in possession of was all of his faculties, in fact he was out of his mind, drunk on the adulation of the Israel hating, UN loving leftists who would love to see six million more dead jews (when they're not doubting the Holocaust or claiming that jews are using rabid anti-semitism and threats of mass murder to manipulate public opinion). Yes, Goldstone you became a hero to jew killing wannabes everywhere and Charen is quite correct in saying you cannot undo the slander or the libel or whatever it was...both, probably.

This begs someone to ask the obvious question, which is "why would a prominent jew lend his name to some pack of distortions that would endanger millions of jews". I suggest that there are two reasons why someone would do this. The first, of course, is the adulation and the adoration of the press which is notoriously leftist and ant-Israel. Do not discount this as flattery and celebrity are powerful drugs. Secondly and most importantly is the self-deception that if somehow the people you have influence over can be "wrong" the situation can be corrected and peace will reign forever, amen.

What do I mean by this? Let's take 9/11 as an obvious example. While Al Qaeda received a bit of negative press, all the usual suspects began blaming America (and George W Bush) as soon as the smoke cleared and they were able to find their partisan hats. If one is rational and can accept an ugly situation for what it is,it's obvious that Al Qaeda and its supporter nations were completely responsible for this atrocity, this terrorism. But looking at things rationally is scary. It means that there are people out there who would like to destroy Western Civilization and the United States in particular. Well there are, but this is worrisome, frightening and challenges the trendy assumption that all cultures are innocent and good and equal. It would also require that somehow you need to "change" or defeat the aggressor culture, a culture that does not want to change and that you really cannot change.

Well, as pop culture is quick to point out, we can only change ourselves! Enter the "why do they hate us", let's blame George Bush crowd. George Bush had his faults, God knows, but he did not cause 9/11 and his presidency did not inspire terrorists to try to bring down planes and buildings and murder as many as they could. After all, they tried to bring the towers down in 93.

So the magical thinking began, that if we only rid the nation of George Bush and his policies and "reset" our interactions with foreign leaders, peace and love would break out everwhere and we could "teach the world to sing in perfect harmony". If we could get rid of Bush, the muslim street would love the United States and all would be well.

Of course this is nonsense. Radical islam is not a reaction to Bush and it cannot be cured by a few flowery speeches read off a teleprompter. Radical Islam has been around for a very long time, so "changing ourselves" by showing how much we hate W did not and could not remedy anything. If we are honest we will see that radical islam is, in fact stronger because of our delusions. The Muslim Brotherhood is very likely to control Egypt and establish sharia law.

So what can we do next to prove to this aggressive, but innocent, good, and co-equal, culture, that we mean it no harm? Show that we will allow Israel to be villainized for trying to survive. The press works overtime to downplay the goals of Hamas and Hezbollah and to show their "humanitarian faces". They minimize the "death to the jews" jazz to the point of not reporting on it at all or giving it scant attention and slanting the story to justify the killing of civilians, even children, if they happen to be jewish.

"Well the jews won't kill us for lying and the radical islamists might kill us for telling the truth....and we wanna live, dammmit!" So the media lies and distorts at every opportunity. And yes, some of that lying falls into the "I want to be a loved celebrity" rationale as well. There will be no prizes for reporting about islamic terrorist goals. Bugly, no?

Lately, I am aslo considering the possibility that reporters are being co-opted by the people they report on. This business about how we must curtail free speech as long as it is "critical of islam" free speech. Sure, it must be offensive to jihadis and to the muslim faithful that korans are burned or "defiled", well it's insulting to me that they burn the US flag and I bet there were plenty of bibles in those churches they desecrated. Nobody calls for their speech to be less free as a result. Civility is a two-way street? Apparently not. But to admit this means that you have to once again accept the reality that there are people out there who hate us and mean us harm. And that is scary, so again we start with the let's change ourselves instead crap. Maybe we should even make hate speech against islam a crime? But only against Islam. We can feel "free" to call for the destruction of Israel or to put crucifixes in urine or to burn US flags (why do they always have an endless supply of US flags and US president dolls?).

By "acknowledging" that we must not offend islam we are slouching toward sharia! And all to avoid a confrontation with reality.

Goldstone is trying to undo his delusional report. But it is too late for him.He has done critical and massive damage. Let's start facing reality about cultural relativism, hmm? A "culture" that mutilates its women and hangs gays is not "equally valid". Sorry. And if we publish a report that whitewashes this culture, it will not make it change its ways.

Yes, this is rambling...but so what.