The violence that claimed the life of Chris Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, and three of his American staff members yesterday appears to have been sparked by an obscure, anti-Islam film produced by Sam Bacile, an Israeli-American real-estate developer who says his goal was to draw attention to the hypocrisies of Islam.
So, what do we know about Bacile? In short, not much.
A man claiming to be Bacile spoke to a number of international news outlets by phone after going into hiding in the wake of the attacks.
Run your mouth, let other people do the dying. Not much different from what Thiessen, Senor, Kristol, and company everyday, so I guess we shouldn’t be surprised.
The Moar You Know
Brave Sam Bacile ran away.
Mike Goetz
This entire event boggles the mind. You can bet news teams will be following the money on who financed that movie, who this Bacile guy is, who he knows.
It reminds me of “Libra” by Don DeLillo. Same feel.
Brian R.
All he did was produce “The Protocols of the Elders of Islam” and prompt the deaths of American diplomats abroad.
Gosh. Why is everyone so mad at him?
pharniel
One of the dead was a Goonswarm member and personal friend of the Mitaanati Vile Rat: RIP
I..almost have pity for this guy. If Anon/Goons judge him as the cause his life will be…interesting.
Ben Cisco
That’s who they are, that’s how they roll.
Dying is for “you people” (for values of “you people” = us).
Everyone beating the drums for this crap should either suit up or STFU. And that goes for the Mittlets too.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Mike Goetz:
More importantly who dubbed it into Arabic and sent it out to enrage people.
SmallAxe
I smell rodent copulation of the highest order. The timing with Adelson, Bibi’s trix and the 911 background of dismissed memo’s coming the day before. Bring on the friggin meteor.
The Moar You Know
I might point out in the interest of accuracy that Sam Bacile and his ilk are not trying to “draw attention to the hypocrisies of Islam.”
They are trying to start a multi-front, multi-party nuclear war, with the goal being the genocide of all people who subscribe to the Muslim faith.
I might also point out, uncivil as it may be, that once that’s done, the next folks on the hit list are Christians.
All of them.
jl
Another profile in courage is the Mitt campaign issuing multiple attacks on the Obama administration in the middle of a foreign crisis, attacks that are based on a blatant and demonstrable falsehood.
What is the falsehood? That Obama administration statements issued BEFORE that attack that attempted to calm things down, were the Obama administration responses issued AFTER the attacks.
And Mitt is doubling down on these vile lies.
And profiles in competence: CNN repeatedly running with Mitt’s false story, that do not correct the record.
TPM has the sorry story today. Too many links, so you have to go to TPM.
This is where blogs like BJ can be very useful: put the truth out front and center. Hammer the vile Romney campaign for their dishonesty or carelessness and lack of judgment, and get CNN to correct the record, and correct it repeatedly. Hope the front posters pay a lot of attention to this demonstration of Romney unfitness for office, and abject failure of our failed corporate media experiment over nest few days.
quannlace
I’m sure he’s already painting himself as ‘the real victim here.’
Thomas F
Free speech is free speech is free speech — no reservations. John, post a few more articles about the barbaric savages who stormed the embassies before you change the subject to the schmo who made a meaningless documentary several thousand miles away. The people who did this in Bengazi were and are sub-literate parasites who should have been dispersed with a cluster bomb.
General Stuck
Birds of a chicken feather, and all that sort of thing.
salacious crumb
I hope this is a lesson for Obama not to interfere in that part of the world trying to vanquish dictators. Of course the Obots will flame me and defend Obama’s removal of Gaddhafi, but I guess so far everything is turning out beautifully in Libya, eh?
Dan
I love you Cole, but I can’t really agree with you on this one.
I don’t care if the dude made a movie of himself shitting on the koran lighting it on fire and then putting the fire out with his piss.
It doesn’t matter. The fact that some assholes had a violent reaction to this dude’s stupidity is never his fault, its the fault of those who choose to be violent. If some radical Christian decided to take Bill Maher out because he took a (entire deserved) rhetorical dump on fundamentalism in Religulous would you say well Bill Maher shouldn’t have made the movie? Of course not.
Just cause the movie was shit, innacurate, and intentionally misleading doesn’t mean he is responsible for the consequences. These assholes that think the only way to respond to a moron criticizing them is to act like a violent sociopath are the problem.
Bokonon
So – whose money paid for the production of Sam Bacile’s movie?
Seriously. This didn’t come out of nowhere. And the timing of this is not a coincidence either. This movie was intended as an incitement, and is producing the intended events (which is – empowering Islamic radicals to do violent, vile things).
Same issue with the “2016: Obama’s America” movie that just got released this past weekend.
A lot of money. A LOT of money.
R-Jud
@jl:
Worse: They weren’t even issued by the Administration, but by the US embassy staff in Cairo, who were trying not to be killed.
Dennis G.
And this bit about the movie is sure to calm tensions in the Middle East:
No way that that will inspire any attacks on Israel.
MattF
Good to see that there is, in fact, a level of cowardice, dishonesty and stupidity that’s over the line.
curiousleo
There are two groups which transcend religious divisions–those who seek & desire conflict & violence and those who do not. The person who made the film and the person who posted the film are on the same side as the people who rioted. They may claim to be on separate sides but they are not.
And in case anyone here hasn’t seen the photograph yet, here is what Mitt Romney looked like as he left the podium after his statement to the press:
Look at his face, enlarge the pic if you can’t see the expression on his face.
I can’t properly express my anger. Posting here so the picture will be broadcast far and wide.
shortstop
@jl: This is being covered in multiple threads here. Take a look.
pete
Slogan updated from the Bush era: People Die, Mitt Lies
The Dangerman
I watched FOX when I got up this morning to see how this was all playing out from their perspective; at least in the first 15 or 20 minutes, a lengthy interview with Lindsey Graham and a review of the “rift” with Netanyahu…
…but not one word about Romney’s remarks. Not one. If Fox won’t touch it, it’s a disaster.
Ding dong
This is a serious question. Does Israel have a friend in the world besides the US?
Ben Franklin
“Religion is the opiate of the People”
flukebucket
@The Moar You Know:
So are you saying that this is Jews trying to get Muslims destroyed and then get Christians destroyed?
Do the Jews believe in some kind of Rapture too?
I just don’t understand any of this shit.
Napoleon
Interesting, I just read a couple of stories where people have had a hard time running down details of Sam Bacile’s existance (for example Isreal has denied he is a citizen) and so I ran my own search on a database and he does not seem to exist.
Brian R.
@R-Jud:
That’s the insane part.
Romney is essentially criticizing the besieged staff of the American embassy in Egypt for not understanding the plight of the besieged staff of the American embassy in Libya.
What a fucking asshole.
jl
@R-Jud: thanks. Then two falsehoods. And unbelievably crappy CNN reporting.
Need to make a huge fuss about this.
If truth get out to voters, I hope this will sink the dangerous joke of Romney for President.
McCain sunk himself with grandstanding during Ossetia/Georgia crisis and incoherent melt down during financial crisis. But McCain performed those meltdowns live and everyone could see the facts for themselves.
The truth needs some help getting its boots on right quick this time.
Haydnseek
Hey John, no fair bringing up this Bacile guy when I’m not done being incandescent with rage at Reince Priebus and Mittens.
Ben Franklin
The bottom line is that we know very little about Sam Bacile, the man who produced the film. But The Wall Street Journal caught up with Bacile before he went into hiding.
According to the Journal, Bacile raised “$5 million from 100 Jewish donors” and he produced the film using 60 actors and 45 crew members.
Bacile told the Journal that he made the film to expose “Islam as a hateful religion.”
“Islam is a cancer,” he told the paper. “The movie is a political movie. It’s not a religious movie.”
In another interview, Bacile told the Associated Press that he was a real estate developer and an Israeli Jew, but Israeli authorities told the wire service they have no records of him being a citizen.
Our library did not turn up any footprint for Bacile. They turned no property, phone, licenses nor court records. And Bacile had not made news until today.
Bacile repeated what he told the Journal to the AP.
“The U.S. lost a lot of money and a lot of people in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but we’re fighting with ideas,” he said. The AP story also points out that Bacile may have been warned this film would be controversial and perhaps even incite violence.
“You’re going to be the next Theo van Gogh,” Steve Klein, a consultant on the film told the AP he told Bacile. Van Goh, the AP explains, was the Dutch filmmaker who was killed after making a movie perceived as insulting to Islam.
npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/09/12/161003427/what-we-know-about-sam-bacile-the-man-behind-the-muham…
jl
@shortstop: Thanks. I saw just one short one. Didn’t meant to say blog was not covering it. But more aspects of the sorry spectacle still unfolding.
So, I revise and amend my bottom line: BJ, keep up the good work!
Zifnab
@The Moar You Know:
Dude did this for quick cash from suckers. He saw “Obama 2016” and decided to jump on the money train.
I’m not saying he might not be a True Believer, too. But more likely than not, he’s just another tick on the back of the conservative movement. Crazy shit like this doesn’t shift public opinion. It just puts on a puppet show for the die-hards to enjoy.
We’ve got a sucker culture in the US that is fueling this kind of nonsense.
The Red Pen
@Thomas F:
You forgot to add that they hate us for our freedom.
Omnes Omnibus
@Thomas F: Hey, I am damn close to being a free speech absolutist, but that doesn’t mean I think people cannot be criticized for the content of their speech or for the way in which they react following their speech.
amk
@Ding dong: No. SATSQ. Apartheid SA used to be.
karen marie
@Thomas F: Yes, because Americans would never ever ever do anything like that.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@salacious crumb: Fuck you asshole, with a sharp stick. That clear enough dickless?
Brian R.
@curiousleo:
Wow, that is amazing. What an evil fuck.
ChrisNYC
Yeah John Cole! Free speech! By which I mean, keep yer damn mouth shut. Calling this guy a coward is NOT allowed. First Amendment11
jrg
They hate us for our freedoms. No, seriously. Clearly, the solution is to chastise people for exercising those freedoms.
We need to change our behavior. That should keep people in the middle east from incessantly blowing shit up.
Linda Featheringill
@curiousleo: #19
Yes.
Brian R.
@Ding dong:
No, and if Bibi keeps this shit up, they won’t have us anymore either.
RP
@The Moar You Know: If this is a serious comment it’s disgusting and merits a lifetime ban from this site.
shortstop
@Thomas F: This cluster-bombing business seems to be at odds with the honor-life-at-all-costs Catholicism you’re always claiming. Oh, but maybe you’re one of those crusading Catholics and were born in the wrong time?
scav
There’s free speech. There’s yelling fire in a crowded theater. There’s incitement to riot. There’s callous indifference to the lives of others, especially with a profit motive. Yelling “Free Speech!” isn’t a get out of consequences and instant justification and access to the moral high-ground card.
Robin G.
This guy has the right to say what he wants, no matter how heinous. And everyone else has the right to make him a pariah.
That being said, the whole thing really does have a funny odor to it. Almost like rat semen.
sherparick
@Dan: Au contraire, and you faile to understand they symbiotic relationship that unites rightwing thugs everywhere.
Sam Bacile and Terry Jones, from prior experience, knew that mirror image types throughout the Muslim world would react, afterall, Jones in particulary and trod this road before, getting other Americans killed in the process while he enjoys 1st Amendment freedom, a freedom he would take away from Liberal, or atheistist, or Gay fellow U.S. citizens if he and his fellow Christiantists would gain power. He does this safely from 3,000 miles away, knowing that he is putting fellow U.S. citizens, soldiers, diplomats, and just ordinary visitors/NGO workers in serious bodily risk. They may have a legal right to do what they have done here, but they should not be able escape moral criticism for their bigotry and their intentional provocation.
At the Washington Monthly, I found this to be a very accurate take, not only between the Islamists and the Christianists, but also between the U.S. and Israili Likudnites and the Iranian Mullahs.
…I’ve been watching CNN today, and paid special attention to an interview with Egyptian-American journalist Mona Eltahawy (who was jailed and sexually assaulted by Mubarak regime authorities during last year’s Cairo uprising), who was expressing sharp criticism of Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi for his failure to say anything condemning the attacks on the U.S. Embassy or the closely related attacks in Libya.
Discussing the relationship between the creators and promoters of anti-Islamic propaganda films in the U.S. and those “protesting” them in the Middle East, Eltahawy noted that an alliance of “the right-wing fringe” in both countries was creating these disturbing and destabilizing events. There’s not much question about the mutual support society that’s long operated between Muslim-haters and radical Islamists who share a vast stake in escalated hostilities….”
washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2012_09/confederacy_of_dunces039835.php
Shinobi
Just saw a tweet from CNN reporting that the attacks were pre planned and used the protests as cover. I’m skeptical.
jl
The First Amendment kind of allows private citizens to criticize what other people say. Heck, it even allows Obama to criticize what other people say, he just cannot stop them from saying it.
To think otherwise is to be extremely ignorant and deluded. To pretend to think otherwise makes for a troll.
poco
According to CNN:
So, no, the murderous attacks were NOT because of the film.
news.blogs.cnn.com/2012/09/12/u-s-ambassador-to-libya-3-others-killed-in-rocket-atta
shortstop
It would appear that some of us are on a race to compete with the many wingnuts who think freedom of speech protects their desire not to be criticized, derided, mocked or embarrassed for anything they say.
amk
@Robin G.: yeah, the free speech pron. Guess peeps outside of murka don’t give a fuck about that.
amk
@Robin G.: yeah, the free speech pron. Guess peeps outside of murka don’t give a fuck about that.
Trinity
Laura Rozen has some theories about “Sam Bacile“.
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
Early on, I thought “see what McCain does.” Can’t link to twitter from here, but McCain’s sided with HRC on this one. And where McCain goes, Lindsey Graham and Joe Lieberman are sure to follow.
Mitt’s on his own.
Still two months to go, but this might be remembered as the day Romney lost the election.
Comrade Dread
Of course the jackoff has the right to make his damn movie.
And we have the right to say that if you’re going to pretend to be brave and make a movie that you know will incite violence and cause the deaths of innocent Americans, that you be brave enough to stand on the front lines and not run into hiding like a chickens***
Brian R.
Sam Bacile. Imbecile.
R-Jud
@Ding dong: The UK.
chopper
@Ben Cisco:
typical neocon. “let’s go to war. i’ll hold your coat”
gwangung
@Shinobi:
Maybe yes, maybe no.
Not out of the realm that this was something Al Quaeda cooked up on the 9/11 anniversary.
Linda Featheringill
The first amendment, BTW, prevents the government from telling people to shut. It is not meant to keep John Cole from telling people to STFU,
Villago Delenda Est
@Ben Cisco:
Mittens, like the deserting coward and the Dark Lord, had their chance to suit up and show how fucking ballsy they were back in the late 60’s.
Interestingly, they had “other priorities” at the time.
jrg
@shortstop:
Not really. Some around here are throwing around the “shouting fire in a crowded theater” line, which was used in an opinion to express the permissible limitations on free speech.
Zifnab
@scav:
Yeah, I usually see it played as a last-resort against legitimate criticism. Apparently “Free Speech” actually means “Shut up when I’m talking”.
Spatula
Come on Cole, it seems to me you really ought to be supporting the cause of free speech, not justifying the barbarism and delicate fee fees of Islamist murderers.
The strange thread of BJ authoritarianism lives on…
chopper
@jl:
watching mitt attack the POTUS is like watching some kid swinging at his big brother while being held away by the face at arm’s length. it’s almost cartoonish.
SatanicPanic
Since I am regularly on the internet expressing unpopular opinions anonymously, I’m going to refrain from criticising this idiot for going into hiding.
Elizabelle
@Napoleon:
“Sam Bacile” sounds perilously close to “imbecile.”
Omnes Omnibus
@amk: As always I will ask you, if you want to limit speech, where does the line get drawn and who gets to draw it?
Litlebritdifrnt
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God:
I see alot of that chatter. He stepped in it royally, and the picture of the smug grin as he stepped off the podium after talking about dead Americans just stinks to high heaven.
Shinobi
How do you explain freedom of speech to people? How do you convince people who have grown up with the idea that “might makes right” that they have to allow other people the right to speak no matter how much they disagree with it?
(I’m not saying that Islam preaches this, but that they have grown up in dictatorial regimes where the peace is kept through force and the silencing of dissent.)
That seems like a huge barrier to overcome. As an American it is hard enough to hear people say terrible stupid things and not get filled with blinding rage. And I believe in freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and freedom of religion. I think it is the more important thing that we have in the modern world.
How do you make an entire group of people see that responding to anything they don’t like with violence is counter productive and wrong? Especially when they’ve been raised to believe the opposite. It just seems hopeless. We can’t even convince a third of our population that the president was born here.
Is there anything but fear that will keep some groups from reprising speech with violence?
Culture of Truth
shortstop
@jrg: “Some of us” really does mean “some of us.” Otherwise, I’d have said “all of us” or “most of us.”
scav
@Zifnab: Exactly, usually with the undertone of Shut up and agree with me type of bipartisanship as a side-dish.
burnspbesq
@Haydnseek:
Learn to multi-task. And save some of that rage for the lunatics who did the killing.
chopper
@flukebucket:
jews don’t have a ‘rapture’, no. but orthodox jews tend to believe in moshiach, who will someday unite the jewish people, return them to israel and rebuild the temple. guess what has to happen to the arabs to make that happen?
Raven
Folks, there is no other kind of planning other than pre-planning.
lol
@poco:
So not because of the film, just enabled by the film.
Shinobi
@gwangung: Agreed, but I am also concerned that it is a being circulated in order to justify reciprocal violence.
LanceThruster
Saw Donny Deutsch on MSNBC this morning on Joe Scarborough’s program beating the Iran nukes war drum in a hyper-agitated fashion. It was great to see Joe Klein calmly rebut his nonsense using facts and a rational approach. Deutsch, however, was not letting go of that bone.
curiousleo
@Brian R.:
Indeed. He let his guard down too early. He is freaking smirking.
The more people that send out this pic, the greater the chance that some additional media types put it on their site for all to see. If an enthusiastic yell gets Dean dropped…
link to tweet of pic for your forwarding pleasure
twitter.com/CharlesDharapak/statuses/245893711257563136
i.imgur.com/o3ooQ.jpg
Spatula
@Robin G.:
Oh, never mind that. Americans don’t mind the scent of rat semen. There was a huge, stinking puddle of it in lower Manhattan eleven years ago. You can smell it to this day but everyone pretends otherwise. Impolite to notice.
Villago Delenda Est
@Thomas F:
You’re projecting, asshole.
amk
@Omnes Omnibus: Well, as I have always told you, look at eewrope. You do realize that the rest of the world – pahdon me, the rest of the ‘civilized world’ – has gotten along fine without your 1st and 2nd amendment crap?
Last time I address your free speech porn problem.
Culture of Truth
I actually agree that a man shouldn’t have to go in hiding for making a movie; by the same token, the embassy is not to blame for not having tighter security.
Raven
@Spatula: Up from your nap shit head?
rlrr
@chopper:
The rebuilding of the temple is a precondition for the Christian rapture…
chopper
@Brian R.:
…knowing full well that if he was in the embassy at that time he would have been tweeting
Litlebritdifrnt
Sully has weighed in and his title says it all.
karen marie
@RP: You’re kidding, right?
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@Ben Franklin:
I can find no record of a “Sam Bacile” existing before 5 days ago (and that was in an article relating to this movie).
Real Estate developers, by the nature of their business, tend to be quite self-promoting (they sort of have to be). And the really big ones will get their name in local newspapers as they close deals (or have the occasional court case).
The string “Sam Bacile real estate -movie -israel” should easily find him. But for this guy? Nothing.
Just sayin’.
g
@curiousleo: Wow. He’s certainly a happily smiling fellow for someone who’s so properly outraged and saddened about the death of Americans.
bemused
@curiousleo:
My antipathy to Romney increases every time he opens his mouth but now seeing that photo, he is really giving me the creeps.
Comrade Dread
@Spatula: I think if I went up to an angry drunk guy and insulted his girlfriend and he started swinging and beat the crap out of a few innocent bystanders that you’d be in the right to call the drunk guy and myself assholes.
rlrr
@g:
As long as none of the Americans are him…
f space that
@Litlebritdifrnt: That left a mark.
Napoleon
@Elizabelle:
It does, but I actually know someone who is Jewish with a last name spelled pretty close to his name and similarly sounding similar to that word.
Chris
@Ding dong:
No.
Didn’t start out that way. They had quite a few when they got started, especially people similarly concerned about Arab nationalism (Turkey, Iran and Ethiopia in the region, and most of Western Europe, especially France).
Over time they managed to alienate all of them by turning into an increasingly violent and aggressive security state that people found it harder and harder to make excuses for. For the last couple decades, though, they’ve pretty much made the calculation that America will never cut off their allowance no matter what, and that they therefore have full license to completely fucking nuts and not care what anyone else thinks.
jl
@curiousleo: Thanks. Need to add some text that points out that vile performance that Mitt thought was so clever, and so proud of, and was done in the midst of a foreign crisis, is based on at least two miserable lies.
Miserable lie one: statement issued by US Embassy in Cairo was issued by Obama (thanks to R Judd for pointing this out above)
Miserable lie two: the statement was a response to attacks, rather than what it was, namely, an attempt to calm things down issued before the attacks.
Really truly vile behavior by Romney. Glad we have some graphic evidence that Mitt is very proud of lying to the public in the middle of a foreign crisis.
jibeaux
Maybe I’m weird, but it doesn’t seem that difficult to me to simultaneously understand that the United States has a Constitution that includes a First Amendment right to speech, which is rightly prized and valued by the American people; but that in many other countries, not all of which are in the Middle East, other values are more familiar and widespread, such that very extreme examples of exercising your right to free speech could lead to consequences for innocent people elsewhere. It’s also sadly ironic that people like Chris Stevens accomplish so much more than these extremists towards other people understanding our values more and us appreciating theirs, but they’re the ones caught in the crossfire of those demanding acceptance of their views.
Spatula
@Omnes Omnibus:
Applications for permission to express opinions may be submitted directly to AMK here on BJ. It would be more efficient to submit them directly, but AMK is hiding behind an anonymous Internet Nym.
The Bobs
CNN BREAKING – THE ATTACKERS IN LIBYA PLANNED THE ASSAULT IN ADVANCE, USED THE PROTESTS AS COVER, U.S. SOURCES TELL CNN
Sorry for the all caps, that was how I received it.
Napoleon
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God:
I am in real estate and this is exactly right. This smells to high heaven.
CarolDuhart2
@Ben Franklin: It could be that the name is a pseudoym (stage name) for someone else. I’d keep looking-there’s someone who knows his real name.
This stuff is where the apocalyptic Christians and the land of Judea/Samaria stuff meet. The Christians are tired of waiting for the Antichrist and the Rapture: the Judea/Samaria types are tired of waiting to run off all of the Palestinians so they can recreate the Israel of Solomon’s time. So its in their mutual interest to stir up stiff.
And time is running out on both propositions. The reason is demographic in both groups. America is increasingly inhabited by people who have little emotional interest in Israel, having fled their own troubles elsewhere. Israel is starting to have a demographic crisis due to several factors: emigration, lack of interest in diaspora Jews as far as immigration, a growing Orthodox population that doesn’t serve in the Army. So the push is on to nail down something before the numbers are against them.
wrb
@Bokonon:
He supposedly had 100 backers who raised $5m
Sure would like to see who is on the list.
Prominent neo-cons?
People associated with the Romney campaign?
Likud?
Mossad?
Adelson?
Who paid to have it it dubbed in Arabic and distributed just before 9-11 and the election?
amk
@Spatula: Hyperbole much ? I point out facts and you indulge in typical murka is the greatest bs rhetoric.
Chris
@gwangung:
Am I the only one who thinks they might just be separate? The thing in Cairo struck me as a regular protest/riot, the same sort of thing that happens in France on a fairly regular basis. The thing in Benghazi struck me as a terrorist attack.
jibeaux
Sam Becile is only a marginally more convincing pseudonym than M. Becile.
Todd
For anyone who is inclined to inveigh smugly about the superiority of Christianity on religious disputes, I’ll start the discussion with three place names: Belfast, Serbia, Croatia.
Litlebritdifrnt
This is going to be awesome.
smirkingmitt.tumblr.com/
Chris
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God:
Someone Terry Jones made up so that any revenge killers would go after him instead?
The Moar You Know
@RP: It’s quite serious. Ban me.
Oh wait, you can’t, you’re just some dipshit.
I stand by my statement.
curiousleo
@bemused: @jl: I’m HULK SMASH about it
Our foreign service folks deserve so very much better. Let’s make sure Romney’s disgusting behavior & expression is seen far and wide. Maybe our blog-overlords would help spread the news?
i.imgur.com/o3ooQ.jpg
twitter.com/CharlesDharapak/status/245893711257563136
Chris
@The Bobs:
That sounds right.
Culture of Truth
So Sam Bacile may not be a real person? Sounds about right.
Nina
In gaming news, the first American to die in these attacks, Sean Smith, was a big name in Goonswarm on EVE Online, head of their diplomatic corps.
2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/09/news-of-officers-death-breaks-over-gaming-community.php?ref=fpnew…
JR in WV
@ChrisNYC:
You are an un-American piece of trash. You are ignorant of the meaning of the First Amendment, and not fit to comment about it.
While the First Amendment even protects your right to make absurd and ignorant statements, it in no way protects you from having your ignorance commented upon, which is my First Amendment right.
You need help with critical thinking, history, the American way of life, politics, civics, and the meaning of patriotism. Get a life, go to school.
And STFU about things you know nothing about. Dickhead!
curiousleo
hmm, don’t know what in my last comment (#113) tripped the moderation alarm. oh well. Was it the all caps in my hulk smash anger expression?
Yutsano
@amk: Try again. The First Amendment was written at a time when there were no free speech laws in Europe and were conceived precisely because of that issue. In fact, virtually all of Europe now has laws that defend speech much greater than what existed in the past. The First Amendment is not an American weakness, in fact Europe copied us on that exact point.
RP
@The Moar You Know: So you’re claiming that a group of Jews want to annihilate billions of Muslims and Christians with nuclear weapons? Have I got that right?
Citizen_X
@Comrade Dread: And to that point, the law does recognize such a thing as “fighting words,” such that you don’t have an unlimited free-speech right to say anything provocative to anybody, and then charge the other guy with assault when he takes a swing at you. (You’d probably both get charged, successfully, with public disturbance or something.)
Not that that applies internationally.
CarolDuhart2
@jibeaux: But at the same time we need to realize something: while the rest of the world is used to American insanity and has shrugged it off, these people have lived under censorship combined with propaganda. Some of it was anti-American, either because the previous regime was considered a puppet, or because America was an adversary of the regime. More than a few generations lived under this cloud. So the relationship is a mixed bag of respect and horror. Outright disrespect for the Prophet confirms the suspicion of some that America is a false friend and not to be trusted. Their reference, too is a world where media is centrally controlled and where nothing would get out without some approval. They don’t know that in the West, a lot of crazy stuff can be printed or filmed by independent crazies who have nothing to do with any government at all.
What do I think we should do? First of all, strong civic condemnation not only by individual citizens, but a few Christian and Jewish and Hindu and other clergy, publicly and openly. Let people know that Americans as a whole do not agree with the toxic sentiments of that movie. Education will help too: once more Libyans and Egyptians can read stuff on their own, they will be less susceptible to demogogues of any and all stuff.
Elizabelle
NPR: What we know about Sam Bacile…
NPR quoting The Hollywood Reporter:
Chris
@RP:
I… really don’t see what’s controversial about that statement. Certainly there are groups of Christians who want to annihilate billions of Jews and Muslims, and groups of Muslims who want to annihilate billions of Jews and Christians. It would be news if the Jews didn’t have their own coterie of similarly assorted psychos. Every religion does.
But there I go being antisemetic again.
Ben Franklin
@CarolDuhart2:
I don’t want the outrage sequestered to the spark without acknowledging the flaming sub-humans who suffocated, then dragged the body through the streets. We are dealing with a culture which shoots first, then asks questions later. I know there are good Muslims who decry this shit. But any culture which seeks to retain ignorance, whether it’s Tea Baggers, the Early Catholic Church, or Muslims, should reap their own rewards.
amk
@Yutsano: And yet, they thought it prudent to draw the line (omnes fav rhetoric) at the hate speech.
And how about murka adapting to 21st century reality instead sticking to the 16th century reality?
rita forsyth
@Thomas F: your ilk never runs out of bombs generation after generation deaths after deaths, do you have a functioning brain?
rita forsyth
@Thomas F: your ilk never runs out of bombs generation after generation deaths after deaths, do you have a functioning brain?
rita forsyth
@Thomas F: your ilk never runs out of bombs generation after generation deaths after deaths, do you have a functioning brain?
The Moar You Know
@RP: Not quite. I’m claiming that a group of American Jews, egged on by some extremely irresponsible Israeli politicians and a shitload of American evangelical Christian dupes – useful idiots if you will – wish to do so, starting with Muslims first.
The facts allow a logical person to reach no other conclusion.
You are more than welcome to ban me.
KS in MA
@salacious crumb: You might want to read Juan (not John) Cole at Informed Comment on that subject, if you’d like to become informed.
CarolDuhart2
@Ben Franklin: Yes, I agree with you that those acts should be condemned wholeheartely. Nobody should be murdered for their opinions, not matter how vile. But thinking that it’s culture is falling into the “inferior culture” “savage browns” kind of bigotry that sells these people short. For one thing, other Libyans defended the embassy, and the Government has condemned the acts.
amk
@salacious crumb: yeah right, why give a fuck about majority of Libyans who got fucked by qadaffi?
LanceThruster
@jibeaux:
He sa mbacile.
Yutsano
@amk: All that has done is drive it underground where it can fester. You honestly think that’s better. Or did the rise of the extreme right in Europe these past few years escape your attention? When our extremists speak out, we know who they are and we can confront them. Never occurred to you that just MIGHT be an advantage now huh?
chopper
@Chris:
as i said, the more hardcore orthodox jews out there want a messiah to push aside the muslims and rebuild the temple, retaking all of eretz yisrael for the jews. which would of course involve a wicked holy war with essentially all of islam, the winning of which would necessarily involve the deaths of a fuck of a lot of muslims.
it’s much like the christianists and their obsession with the rapture. it’s like they don’t really think too hard about the actual death and destruction of human kind that would come along with it, because all those ‘other people’ don’t really matter as long as their fave religious prophecy is fulfilled.
ChrisNYC
@JR in WV: Ha! I was snarking. I actually thought that the part about leaning on freedom of speech to prevent speech made that clear but you seem to have missed it. Your right to speak and insult wrongly, as you have done here, I would go to my death to defend.
And just so you know, the First Amendment isn’t implicated here. John Cole isn’t a state actor and nobody from the govt or outside is trying to silence the idiot Bacile. The First Amendment protects us from government suppression of speech, specifically — let me look in the copy of the Constitution I got the day I graduated from law school, ah, here it is — “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” Maybe take a class on that.
Amir Khalid
@Thomas F:
@Dan:
The film might well have been a deliberate provocation. This is not a possibility to be dismissed, with Terry Jones among its producers.
Now that doesn’t diminish the embassy attackers’ culpability one bit. They still have the blood of a US ambassador and his colleagues on their hands. But the trailer for Sam Bacile’s film set off the violence. However innocent your intentions, you are responsible for the consequences of your actions. And if, as seems likely, Bacile’s intentions were not so innocent — that is, he made the film to express his own rank bigotry — then he has that blood on his hands too, no less than the ambassador’ killers.
pseudonymous in nc
@Trinity: And Rozen is pretty fucking sharp on that kind of stuff.
Ben Franklin
@CarolDuhart2:
savage browns
Wait a minute. I said nothing about race. Islam is a religion which gloats about it’s preoccupation with the past. There are persons of many color in that religion. I am talking about a philosophy. Tea-Baggers are overwhelmingly white, but their dependence on inaccurate thinking, biased by their racial profile, is ignorance they celebrate. I hate ignorance. But I hate the refusal to learn more.
Someguy
@General Stuck:
Yeah, I was outside in D.C. when the plane hit the Pentagon. It wasn’t clear where it had hit and I didn’t know about the other ones. I figured a plane had dropped from the sky onto the Bush whitehouse – there’s precedent for planes dropping out of the sky and hitting the WH and local bridges – and that maybe there was in fact a god in the universe. Alas, it wasn’t so.
As for that ambassador who got killed – well, it was nice that he helped liberate the Libyans and all, but the word is he stuck around and was mucking in Libyan politics. I think this is what Chomsky called “blowback.” It isn’t surprising. We need to let these folks be and quit meddling in their politics.
Joel
I’m going to cite Goldberg twice in a day. I think this is unprecedented.
Yes, I agree.
Link.
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@wrb:
Wouldn’t a ‘Director’ have to be registered with the Director’s Guild and/or some other union to be able to do business?
Chris
@chopper:
If you’re a certain kind of religious, this life and all these people aren’t even entirely real, or certainly worthwhile intrinsically. This existence is just a way to win enough points to get to the next level, which is where things matter. If some eggs have to be broken to make the omlet, well, so be it.
Omnes Omnibus
@amk: How do you define hate speech then? If I say that Republicans are vermin, is that hate speech? Should I be banned from saying it? It does verge on eliminationist rhetoric, doesn’t it?
I think there are some things that people should not say, but there are very few, if any,things that I think people should be prevented from sayIng. This does not mean that speech should be consequence free. If you harm someone through your speech (e. g., defamation), you should be held accountable. This allows both the free exchange of ideas and accountability.
Ben Franklin
@Omnes Omnibus:
Obviously you don’t have a problem excluding the yelling of ‘Fire!” in a crowded theater, when none exists, from free speech. Right?
amk
@Omnes Omnibus:
My navel has two hairs.
Yeah, I am that shallow/dumb/clueless.
Gunnite.
Susanne S.
FYI, ABL has re-tweeted a link to an article saying that Bacile is a pseudonym, and the real guy isn’t Israeli or Jewish (sigh of relief).
—> RT @AdamSerwer: boom RT @JeffreyGoldberg Muhammad film consultant: ‘Sam Bacile’ is not Israeli, and not a real name: theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/09/muhammad-film-consultant-sam-bacile-is-not-israeli-and… …
Omnes Omnibus
@Ben Franklin: Yes, I think that a person who, with knowledge that it is false, shouts “Fire!” in a crowded theater can and should be held responsible for any harm that results. And why is this different than Bacile’s work? Primarily, because the purpose of free speech is political in nature. It is to allow the exchange of ideas and to prevent the government from cracking down on ideas it does not like. Does it allow a lot of horrible and pernicious ideas to be spread? Yep.
Ben Franklin
@Omnes Omnibus:
I agree. The false-flag which could proscribe free speech needs outing. Well said.
anonymous
@KS in MA:
Since Juan Cole supported the invasion of Iraq for similar reasons, he’s not to be trusted in these matters.
KatinPhilly
@Susanne S.: @Susanne S.: I’m surprised ABL re-tweeted this. Anything Goldberg spouts is suspect – I remember all too well his infamous article, full of lies and grotesque exaggerations, being used to gin up support for the Iraq War.
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
More and more, this whole situation is looking less like a guy who decided to say assholish things and more like a coordinated operation that planned to kill the American ambassador in Libya and blame “rioters”:
Pentagon to review video of Libya attack
So does a guy working with or for al-Qaeda have an absolute free speech right when the “film” he produces is a trailer made up of footage stolen from other movies that is aimed at providing a cover story for a group of assassins?
Svensker
@Joel:
And would he militantly stand up for the filmed version of the Protocols?
Part of “free speech” is being able to say the other person is an offensive bigot.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Short answer: I would say the “film” itself is still a form of protected expression; at the same time, the act of making it was probably an overt act in furtherance of a criminal conspiracy.
Spatula
@Mnemosyne:
Hmmm…I thought BJ Bots didn’t cotton to ridiculous things like CONSPIRACIES.
Move on please, it has been made clear here that conspiracies simply do not happen at any time or place.
General Stuck
I am absolute about nothing, and that includes civil liberties and speech that does have exclusions, such as inciting violence. But it is a very narrow exclusion and I think, considered only when done with explicit terms and intent. This does not rise to that level, imo. So no, the government cannot and should not impede these films. But it is also my free speech to say what I think this film is and that it’s makers are building a monument to international depraved indifference sculpted in bigotry, like it or not, stamped with USA as perceived by the world. with resultant murder and mayhem that can be counted on in far flung places on the globe. And Mitt Romney criticizing diplomats literally under fire for their lives, is just about as fucked up as it comes from any politician, let alone from a POTUS candidate from a major pol party. I can’t even snark it and It makes me physically ill, absorbing this unadulterated bullshit.
Mnemosyne
@Spatula:
See, that’s where you make your mistake — you think that people mocking you for your ridiculous belief that the US deliberately crashed a Blackhawk helicopter in an urban center in Pakistan as part of a deep, elaborate conspiracy to pretend we killed Bin Laden means we think that criminal conspiracies don’t exist all all.
9/11 happened because of a conspiracy, but not the convoluted, unproven one you believe in. (Hint: the conspiracy was hatched by a guy with the initials O.B.L. Ring a bell?)