http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/12/26/1463815/-Why-do-they-hate-us?detail=email
Last week, Republican front-runner Donald Trump made a most amazing statement when asked about terrorists.
"Without looking at the various polling data, it is obvious to anybody the hatred is beyond comprehension. Where this hatred comes from and why we will have to determine."
It's not beyond comprehension. President Bush explained it to us back in 2001. "They hate our freedoms." Of course he may as well have said "they hate us because we're pretty and popular." It would have meant the same thing.
In one of his campaign commercials, Senator Rubio flatly asserts that violent extremists target us because we let women drive and girls attend school.
It appears that what motivates Islamic terrorists is their weird, incomprehensible culture and religion. Their deity, Allah, is some strange six-armed Gawd with a ram's head, and not the very same Gawd that Moses and King Solomon worshipped. At least that is what many Americans seem to believe.
It's simply not possible that Islamic terrorists could be motivated by political and economic reasons. It's simply not possible that our ridiculous assumption about the Muslim terrorists are self-serving.
Trump, Rubio, and Bush are talking to the very same low-information crowd that likes their answers in easy-to-swallow chunks that can fit into 30-second TV commercials, preferably in front of an American flag. They are often driven by imagery and are actively hostile to facts. Unfortunately these people decide elections.
The Hatred is Beyond Comprehension
It's not like Trump, Republicans, and Americans in general don't know that we've been bombing Iraq for 24 years, and Afghanistan for 14 years. It's not like they are unaware that we've invaded and killed many thousands of brown-skinned people.
It's that the lives of foreign people don't matter as much as ours do.
In 1967, Thomas Merton summed up American attitudes in these words.
“The Asian whose future we are about to decide is either a bad guy or a good guy. If he is a bad guy, he obviously has to be killed. If he is a good guy, he is on our side and he ought to be ready to die for freedom. We will provide an opportunity for him to do so: we will kill him to prevent him falling under the tyranny of a demonic enemy.”
Not much has changed in America since the days of the Vietnam War. We still destroy villages and children in order to save them.
For instance, consider how the White House explained why we had to assassinate 16-year-old Abdulrahman Awlaki who was guilty of nothing.
GIBBS: I would suggest that you should have a far more responsible father if they are truly concerned about the well being of their children. I don't think becoming an al Qaeda jihadist terrorist is the best way to go about doing your business.
Most Americans can't even imagine another nation not approving, or at least understanding, America destroying it's infrastructure and killing its children.
Most Iraqis don't want us to bomb them, but when have you ever heard an American media outlet or politician admit that? And if they did, why do Americans never consider their wishes? This is similar to our drone strikes in Pakistan, where only 5% of Pakistanis approve us bombing their country and an overwhelming majority oppose it, but we continue to do it anyway.
It may seem inconceivable to Americans, but lots of people in the world resent it when you kill their neighbors, friends, and families.
As for our political leaders, they are pushing to escalate the violence because no one in those Muslim countries is truly innocent.
Donald Trump has called on killing families of terrorist suspects. As if deliberately targeting innocent women and children is something we should consider.
Ted Cruz has called on “carpet bombing” Syrian cities controlled by IS and see if “sand can glow in the dark.”
When moderator Hugh Hewitt asked Ben Carson, “So you are OK with the deaths of thousands of innocent children and civilian?” he responded, “You got it. You got it.” I find this statement amazing, not just because it is evil, but because no one seems to find it unusual.
i never subscribed to the Bush elephant dung about they hate us for our freedoms they read the papers they read blogs like this my friends are on all continents but Antarctica they know what republicans do many have their own right wing establishments that mirror ours like Israel not to mention they are also victims of our aggression's. we hear talk about if we had not butted in to regime change the middle east would not be in disarray now nor would the terrorist exist creating murder and mayhem.
and then there's Trump and the republican bigots. if you hate and act on it only Jesus will love you.
