Tim Blair

I highly encourage Malcolm to puke on a Marine's boots. I'm interested in just how far he'd go before hitting the ground like a sack of beans...

i'd love to see him vomit on a marine...hee-hee...let me get my brother-in-law, a major in the usmc. i'm sure he'd love to have a chat with him

Well at least I know that all the leftist fuck-twits aren't ALL here in urban America ...

Oh to be a liberal and have to agonize over how to respond in an adult way to an imperial tool. I recommend that Malcolm just spit on the Marine. In fact, I really wish he would. Than the Marine could break his fingers and spare the rest of us this garbage.

I bet Malcolm got beat up a lot as a child . . . by girls. I know I would have smacked him around the playground during recess. I'm reliving those games of dodge ball where the annoying kids got a well aimed ball to the head. Wish I could see a photo of Maaaalcolllm to complete my fantasy.

thank you, polly. i was trying to think of the perfect metaphor for how to deal with a sludgemerchant like this: schoolyard dodgeball to the head...and another...and another...had enuff doofus? no? ok, heres another...and another. what? no mas? not until you say semper fi. the creature says Semper Fi or it gets the hose again! i've got a bud who's chief of security aboard a us navy frigate and i'd love to intro him to this ass clown. or maybe we can tie him to a goal post and let jake ryan and his mates take a few "penalty kicks" how bout it people????

Ah, liberals. Never let historical facts get in the way of a good rant.

This guy need someone to send him a crate containing a heavy set of history books, starting with the entire 15 volume Oxford history series... then drop the lot on his head.

I do wish the aliens from Planet Fisk would stop beaming these lifelike creatures to our planet.

I do wish the aliens from Planet Fisk would stop beaming these lifelike writer-creatures to our planet.

Somebody invite Malcolm to Mr. Ryan's booze up. I sure the boys will help him see the error of his ways.

Tim:

Even with your humorous commentary, reading Malcolm's column makes me ill. It is sad to think that there could be such people as Malcolm in the world, who would turn a blind eye to mass murder and death camps, only to tell us repeatedly that they are morally superior to those who care about life, freedom, and human dignity.

Who would pay such a man as Malcolm to write for their newspaper and who would want such a man for a friend? How could anyone stand to be in the same room with him? It is gut-wrenching that Malcolm would condescend to those who took out one of the half dozen most repressive regimes of the last 100 years.

When did the left stop caring about promoting freedom and stopping mass murder?

Jim asks,

"When did the left stop caring about promoting freedom and stopping mass murder?"

Umm, when did they ever care about promoting freedom and stopping mass murder?

When they looked the other way during the Stalin trials? Whitewashed Stalin's signing of Hitler's "Non-Agression Pact"? Tried to cover up the Killing Fields in Cambodia? Waxed ecstatic about Mao's Cultural Revolution? Defended suicide bombers? Tried to cover up the slaughter of the Sudanese non-Muslims?

I hope one of Saddam's "Freedom Fighters" (as that scumbag would definately call them) blows himself up near Mr. Knox. Fucking pig.

"When you look at the lists of Americans who have died in Iraq, they're dominated by under-25s and sub-corporals. I don't see many victims of their commander-in-chief's age, nor many who went to Yale."

Alternative: we should send in the Miami Beach shuffleboard club? We should put the generals on desert recon and the admirals on carrier deck ops? Does this prick have any idea as to how wartime operations are actually run?

Of course his real insinuation is that the American military's ranks are composed of a perpetual undercaste of naively loyal kids who don't realize just how evil the Big Boss really is.

I went to high school with kids who enlisted in the military or signed up for the National Guard upon graduation. They weren't drafted; they volunteered. There were easier jobs that paid more. There were jobs closer to home. There were colleges that would have happily accepted them. But they volunteered anyway, because they felt it was important, because it's what they wanted to do. But that was only a few guys (and at least one girl) from Western Pennsylvania; I'm sure the other 99.999% are exactly as Ms. Knox describes them.

What an asshole.

Malcom needs a "half-forgotten history lesson" shoved squarely in his ass.

Does he honestly think that the Iraqi soldiers who fought against us were doing so out of a courageous patriotic urge to defend their homes against the evil American invaders?

What planet is he living on? Surely not the same one the rest of us occupy.

(By the way, the US hasn't drafted anyone since 1973. I know this because they stopped drafting people four months before my year of eligibility for the draft began.)

Another sneer/whinge-fest from Malcolm. Blech! Hopefully most Australians today retain the same spirit as the ones who greeted my dad when he visited there on leave from Vietnam. He still talks of the beer, blondes, beaches, harbor ferry, and shrimp the size of his head that greeted him when he set foot in Sydney.

My preference would be to catch Malcolm by the scruff of the neck, shave his head, jam him into a set of fatigues, hand him a loaded M16 and drop his ass on the line.

Attitudes change fast at the front. :)

If fate ever hands me the opportunity to beat Malcolm Knox to within an inch of his life, I'm taking it.

'I don't buy the whole "Hate the War Love the Soldier" thing.'

And I don't buy the whole "Oppose the war, yet still oppose Saddam" thing.

Actually, American soldiers are not "good at killing themselves in combat;" they are good at killing other people in combat. Our combat casualties were very low thanks to all that body armor, excellent equipment and air support. It may not be sporting to fight a poorly equipped enemy, but war is not sport.

I'm not really that surprised. The article is the sort of smug,leftist,'I know better than you' crap that I would expect of a feature journalist at the SMH.

As an Aussie in Hong Kong, we often get a number of American naval vessels passing through. I too am surprised at how young the soldiers are. Rather than to sneer and to have a good smirk about it like Knox, it made me realise exactly how selfless these kids really are.

Whether you agree with the politics of the decision or not, these kids are doing what many will not, at the risk of their own personal safety.Compare this to journalists like Knox with the decent salaries, access to soy- mocha-chino's and the ability to save the world by pontificating behind a desk.

As Australians, we remember the young from our own country who lost their lives in wars for the achievement of a greater ideal. As a nation we mourn the sacrifice of our youth.

To not have the same compassion for the Americans is churlish and immature.

I agree with most of the previous posters, but think that to analyze the arguments in this article is to miss the point of it. Knox isn't trying to persuade; this is nothing more than a bitter harangue pitched to the like-minded. If there's a coherent argument or even an actual fact buried in the essay, it's coincidental and of no importance.

It's useful reading, though, as a reminder of the headsful of worms Malcolm Knox and his SMH followers have.

"When you look at the lists of Americans who have died in Iraq, they're dominated by under-25s and sub-corporals."

Gee thats a tough statistic to work out.

there are 7 or 8 L/Cpls or Ptes for every Cpl and above.

Given the serious numerical dominance of the Sub Cpl ranks, it's hardly surprising that they took the hightest number of casualties.

I've got nothing much to say that hasn't already been said above, except perhaps "why the hell does anynoe pay this utter fuck-wit to write?" I cannot express my revulsion for this load of crap adequately.

As a lifelong member of the non Marxist, non Tooth Fairy Brigade section of the left, it saddens me that so many people spend so much time on the intellectually blinkered "Malcolms" of the world, yet don't try to do something about the education systems which are producing our "Malcolms" in ever increasing numbers.
When I tried to oppose what I saw as [correctly as it turned out] destructive of the intellectually and socially important aspects of education, the right weren't interested in doing anything about it. And they still seem to want to spend more time on the consequences than on the causes.

Quoted in the post:

"The other way of looking at imperial wars - rich white nations protecting and extending their economic interests to keep the poor 80 per cent of humanity under the heel - also softened me towards the marines. If neo-imperialism is a crime, aren't we all complicit? If those trained killers aren't defending my liberty in Iraq - an absurd notion - they are, ultimately, defending my lifestyle, where I can duck out and grab clothes and toys manufactured by slaves and food subsidised by a wealthy state ripping off impoverished trading "partners".

Sorry, but I get really steamed at people who partake of the "rich white nations" system (ok, maybe I'm speaking out of ignorance and he's moved to Mugabe-land?), and yet wish to deny others the fruit of that system. No, it's not a perfect system -- what the fuck is? -- but why do so many people want to deprive others of its spoils? And even if they think we've gotten a great deal of it wrong, I don't see how one can -- knowledgeably -- argue that its tenets are incorrect.

If they hate it so much, I'd have a helluva lot more respect for their expressed opinions if they'd...well, move to Mugabe-land.

In fact, I imagine there are any number of oppressed people who would trade with them in a minute for the ability to "duck out and grab clothes and toys" -- not to mention food, shelter, health care, voting rights, civil rights, etc.

Sign those idiots up immediately for the "My life for Your's" exchange program. Take the "Human Shields" movement to the next level, says I!

And he might want to ask himself WHY -- why the fuck, sir --- those impoverished trading partners are so damned impoverished, and why they are so eager to trade with us, and WHY, WHY in gawd's name, working for 13 cents an hour is a friggin' STEP UP, a MEANS for IMPROVEMENT from their present circumstances?

And those trained killers? No, they're not defending his liberty in Iraq. They're defending his liberty in where-ever-the-hell-his-ilk-live. And if he thinks the Islamo-fascists aren't aiming for his liberties, which he so easily dismisses, I almost wish his liberties could be brought to a screeching halt, so he could, perhaps, begin to understand the truth. Only that would endanger my liberties, and I'd rather suffer fools such as he.

Malcolm Knox's whole attitude to 'history' is a little suspect anyway. A few years ago he wrote a long piece in Spectrum, blasting Australian authors for writing so much historical fiction instead of properly engaging with the contemporary (to which Peter Carey replied v.nicely). Knox's novel (Summerland) was published soon after - a bizarre contemporary re-write of Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier. The work was far more connected to the lost world of Fitzgerald & Ford (post WWI US & the continent) and seemed to have very little relevance to contemporary Australia ....

Norman - Here in the US President Bush just signed a new law demanding accountability from schools. Student performance will be measured in some systematic way, determined at the state level, which will force teachers to focus on educational results. This sort of thing has been opposed by the Democrats who are largely in thrall to the teacher's unions, who don't want their members to be held accountable. Probably many Democrats supported the new law, as well, but in general education reform has been a big issue of the right in the US, while the left has preferred whacky touch-feely educational experiments.

Who is this Malcolm Knox? Did John Pilger father a bastard with Dicky Neville's sister? He's got the vanity genes, the lying genes and the stupid genes.
"The other way of looking at imperial wars - rich white nations protecting and extending their economic interests to keep the poor 80 per cent of humanity under the heel - also softened me towards the marines.''

Someone better tell China and India about that 20 per cent of humanity from rich white nations that's steppin all over them.

The saddest thing about this is that Malcolm Knox could regurgitate this garbage to a room full of Sydney Morning Herald staffers and not one of them would disagree with the drongo.

Andrea Harris could have written this about Malcom Knox - he believes "every time someone in a highrise penthouse turns a switch, a light goes out in some African hovel."

Hee hee.

If I can steal a cliche from the anti-war crowd, this man makes me 'ashamed to be an Australian'. And please God, let me be there when he decides to vomit on a US marine.

Flynn, maybe I met your dad - I was working in the city area at that time and we met dozens of soldiers on R&R, they were never shy about hitting on us young girls - I often wonder what happened to them all in the end. At least your father survived, God bless him. Say hi to him - from Sydney.

A rewrite of Ford’s The Good Soldier? By a man who sees the diehards among Stalinophile Saddam’s soldiers as heroes? This goes beyond intellectual blinkers. Way beyond.

Where do these evil-minded people like Malcolm Knox come from to become journalists & novelists? I guess the hatemongers join the Left because that’s an allowed place, a sanctuary, podium, & pedestal, for them in today’s free world. Yet, how instinctively they form alliances with fascists (nationalist socialists). In the unfree world, they often join the fascists. For every Dracula, thousands of these Renfrews. Thousands of more Renfrews in search of a Dracula. Intelligent, literate Renfrews. This is a phenomenon that needs to be accounted for.

I just wish Malcolm had have chundered on a Marines fatigues- it would save us from having to read any more of his pointless pompous prose, what with him being dead or in traction and all.

Malcolm Knox proved his stupidity beyond all doubt after this gem: .

"former cricket correspondent", hmm. Let me guess why. Trust The Age/SMH to thrust idiots like this into the public forum again.

Hey, what happened to the link? http://sport.guardian.co.uk/cricket/story/0,10069,878108,00.html

""When you look at the lists of Americans who have died in Iraq, they're dominated by under-25s and sub-corporals."

Gee thats a tough statistic to work out.

there are 7 or 8 L/Cpls or Ptes for every Cpl and above.

Given the serious numerical dominance of the Sub Cpl ranks, it's hardly surprising that they took the hightest number of casualties."

Well, it surprised me to "find out" that sub-corporals dominated the list of US killed in the Iraq War. Maybe Malcolm Knox is not familiar with the US ranks. Corporals (in both Army and Marines) are E-4 so sub-corporal would be E-1 to E-3. A quick count of those killed up to June shows 57 sub-corporals out of 193. Hardly dominating. If you add the corporals (E-4) to this number you'd get 107 which, while a majority (55%) would not be what I'd call dominating.

Non-coms in the E-4 to E-5 range actually make up the largest group and non-coms as a whole made up the majority of those killed.

As far as under-25, yes they do make up the majority (55%) but not what I would consider a dominant group.

Tim read this passage carefully again:

Now courage is an absolute value, so next year why not go major league and get inspiration from soldiers who are defending their very homes, with hopelessly outdated equipment, on starvation rations, lacking body armour, vulnerable from air attack like fish in a barrel, and haven't been paid in months. That's real courage.

I think he was talking about the Canadian Army!

No one commented on it, so I thought I would. Not a sensitive type (I read your blog and many other excellent ones like it)but am up on my American Racist Code. Malcolms use of "yassuh" instead of "yes sir" sets in the readers mind the image of a subservient slave/"Jim Crowed" black man. Someone to be despised. I'm getting tired of the strain of racism, which, as the lefy ideologies become more and more unwrapped, comes to the fore. Am I being sensitive. No.
Goes more to the meme developing about NGO's and their need for refugees--- the need for a justification of their existence. The left is like that. They need the oppressed to champion. But we "oppressed" are saying more and more "here's ten bucks. Go buy a step ladder and climb the @#$%# of my back."
Interesting qoute on Stephen Rittenbergs site from Frederick Douglas:

“[I]n regard to the colored people, there is always more that is benevolent, I perceive, than just, manifested toward us. What I ask for the negro is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, but simply justice. The American people have always been anxious to know what they shall do with us….I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! [Y]our doing with us has already played the mischief with us. Do nothing with us! If the apples will not remain on the tree of their own strength, if they are worm-eaten at the core, if they are early ripe and disposed to fall, let them fall!...And if the negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is, give him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone!...Your interference is doing him positive injury.”

So, to conclude, last night, in two thousand and three, was engaged with one of my lefty friends. He let it slip. "You, as an oppressed person....." Tore into him.

As a Soldier in the Imperial War Machine, "Malcolm, you expressed your opinion. I respect that. It's your right, as a free man. And, Efff. you!"

Gimpy: I did find his use of "yassuh" strange, but assumed he was trying to badly mimic a US Southern accent. If it's racial in intent, it would kind of jar with the "white evil fascists keeping the global non-white man down" thesis he tries to ply by the end of the article.

Dee: I will indeed tell my dad of your hello from Sydney. ;-) He'll sure get a kick out of it.

Polly asked for a photo ...

gimpy, I was also put off by the "yassuh" since it did remind me of what I think of as slave dialect...I thought maybe Malcolm as an Aussie wasn't really sure how Americans talk and saw Gone With The Wind one to many times.

Or maybe he was purposely going for the image of someone saluting their master.

Halliburton: "Git me some oil boy"!,

Bush: "Yassuh Masta Halliburton"!.

As a former US soldier I can say without reservation that a crisp "Yes Sir" is expected..not a sloppy "yassuh".

Malcolm,
The proper response in the U.S. Marines and U.S. Navy when given an order to carry out is "Aye Aye, sir". Not some insinuation of racism. I think you'll find the age of those in harm's way in Irag was a little higher than you would like to fit into your story. The military has many frontline communities that require years of training before assignment to an operational command (e.g. special warfare, aviation). But that wouldn't conform to your hate and predetermined notions regarding people who actually place service to their country and its ideals above themselves.

Wow.

Knox's article is admittedly mostly utter piffle. Mostly bland and inoffensive too, but you've succeeded in making a mmountain out of a molehill. Your reaction only gives the work stature.

The vehemence of howls of outrage from you lot is just amazing. Is your whole philosophy about reacting to such minor "wounds" with such major artillery? (Rhetorical question, guys and gals - I know the answer).

How DARE you be so incredibly insecure? What the hell excuse do you have for being so pathetically piss-weak? Does all this angry chest beating make you feel better? Or at least less bad?

Vomit on a marine? Er...pass. But you lot definitely make me sick.

My reason? Knox appears to be one of the utter fools for whom politics rules his entire life. He's bumping into real live US Marines and all he can think about is to regurgitate some slew of party-line gibberish.

He is different only in degree from the kind of person who would be comfortable in the administrative divisions of either the Cheka or the SS. People unable to do better than formulaic political denunciations make me sick, Nemesis. We see far too much of it already.

As to insecurity - hey, I'm not the one using DARE in all caps while fantasizing that I'm Moses presenting my demands to Pharoah.

Moses, hey? Wish I'd thought of that one. Careful, pharoah, lest I smite thee with a plague of Adamses and Kingstons. Oh yes, I will.

You sir, are silly. "Different only in degree" indeed. You could be right about Knox, but it's unlikely. More likely that you are just an overly dramatic twit. Cheka and the SS indeed. What sort of blinkered sophistry is that? You yourself are of course different only in degree to Hitler, Pol Pot, Pinochet and Idi Amin. Your alter ego probably stood guard at Auschwitz, blindfold on, earplugs in.

Or is that a bit harsh? Live by the sword...

Just a thought, using your logic: George W Bush is different only in degree to Osama Bin Laden (Bush has of course killed far more people, but does this necessarily make him a bigger bastard?)

Utter twaddle.

"People unable to do better than formulaic political denunciations make me sick, Nemesis".

Oops. I think I smell a formulaic political denunciation! Surely not!

By the way, as far as I can tell, there was nothing political in my denunciation. Formulaic it may be, a denunciation it certainly is.

But I think it's probably apolitical.

Bye for now.

PS - What is exactly is your PROBLEM with capital letters?