European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 23, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse Friday july 23, 1993 i commentary the stars and stripes Pago 15 William f. Buckley the sensation seekers have been amply satisfied in the last few weeks and every Day leaves the betting Man in the quandary of not knowing whether the number of people who tried to blow up Manhattan will match or exceed the number of prostitutes whom Joel Rifkin has confessed to killing. Of course there Are precedents for both crimes a massacres in the Pursuit of jihad Are historically commonplace and the penchant of bluebeard to eliminate the current woman to make Way for her successor is a familiar legend in most cultures. But suddenly we Are up against something we have no cultural training for. When the Kun flux klan emerged Aurin reconstruction we were so to sea ready to contend with it. By this i mean that what the Kkt sought to do was in the context within which it was done 1 illegal and 2 immoral. Whatever the la cities of the Law in the South during reconstruction there was never that condition of anarchy that authorized Lynching negro dissenters or flogging White suspects. Moreover there was the ultimate Appeal to the southerner namely the word of the Christian god the sanctions of the culture of the South were available to the critics of such behaviour. The Rev. Martin Luther King or. Appealed to the higher Law of americans when he invoked the teachings of Christ. But we Are dealing now with that creature the Muslim fundamentalist which we have All along thought comfortably to be a problem of other cultures. We knew recently that the algerians decided to forgo democracy for a spell when a democratic exercise brought in Muslim fundamentalists in a general election. We knew that the 1981 assassination of Anwar Sadat in Egypt was the act of Muslim fundamentalists who were protesting his civilized attitude toward Israel and again we reasoned that this was a regional problem. When the Ayatollah Khomeini locked up american diplomats in Iran the suggestion was made in this space that an Appeal to the Ayatollah using koranic language having to do with Justice might be the Best available weapon. And such an attempt was made but Khomeini Wasny to somebody to whom it was easy to lecture on the More benevolent strictures of the Koran. We Are after All face to face with something very different from the religion common to our own culture. Even in the most theocratic of times St. Thomas Aquinas rejected the idea that the state is obliged to tailor its Laws exactly to those of the divine by e.g., eliminating All vice by compelling conversion. But that is not so in islam where the Law As put Forth in scripture the Koran and tradition Sunna is to be reflected exactly not Only in the personal lives of believers but also in the Laws of the state As Well. The word a islam Quot Means the government of Muslim states is explicitly an institution of god. Moreover the governments Are to irradiate islam not merely by the example of the. Rulers but by the institution of jihad. Again that word literally Means a to struggle a or to Endeavor and can be use to describe self discipline. But it is most notoriously known As the Fountainhead of the holy War that enjoins islam to expand its reach Over the world. There was a period in Christian history when the same impulses were Felt but it has been centuries since christians excused spreading the word by shedding blood. Chapter 2, verse 193 of the Koran enjoins the faithful to a fight in the Way of god against those who fight against you but do not commit aggression. Fight against them until sedition is no More and allegiance is rendered to god alone but if they make Amend then make no aggression except against evil that seems to say that there is no need to blow up Manhattan after manhattanite All pay allegiance to islam. The current enthusiasm in academic circles for multiculturalism has got to face some difficult problems. The Koran 2 228for instance informs us that a the husband is one degree higher than the wife because he cams by his strength and expends on his so we Are going to have to take explicit notice of the incompatibility of our own culture and that of the fundamentalist Muhammadan and we need to organize our immigration Laws with some refer ence to this problem. The idea of welcoming the alien does no to Call for inviting him to blow up Ellis Island in route to citizenship. C Universal pros Syndicate a the last brother is More cartoon than substance a would no to it be Nice if it just dropped like a Stone a. My Friend offers this As a purely Wistful thought. The a a it we Are talking about is the last brother. We Are both too Well versed in the ways of the marketplace to expect that a Flap about fact fiction and fairness will result in a debacle at the Cash Register. Quite the contrary. 0 in the weeks since Joe Mcginniss Book on sen. Teddy Kennedy came into View or at East preview its made More of a splash than a thud. First came the disclaimer a some thoughts and dialogue were a created by the then came the disclaimer of the disclaimer. Then came the debate about biography and a free form Quot journalism about Docu and drama about taking License and just Plain making things up. Now the publishers Are hurrying books to the stores. The excerpts Are scheduled for vanity fair. The miniseries is being prepared for a to sweeps week the traditional time for tales of mayhem and mass Mur As someone who prefers not to judge a Book by its cover or for that matter by its first 100 pages a the ones that caused this debate a i waited until the entire 631-Page Tome dropped like a Stone onto my desk. And i found another reason to wish that the last brother might be the Bombshell that bombs. Yes i share the squeamishness about putting words into Peoples Mouths and presenting mind Reading As biography. In the most dramatic scenes in the Book Mcginniss tells us what Teddy Kennedy a must have Felt a he writes again and again it must have occurred to him a a the must have known. And this is my favorite a one suspects that Teddy sensed a Between sensing and suspecting its hard to know when you Are in Teddy Kennedy a head and when you Are in Joe Mcginniss. But its the publishers claims As Well As its disclaim ers that usually ring equally false to my ear. They have called the Book a searing yet strangely moving. Curiously moving both startling and surprisingly in fact it is strangely unmoving both predictable and not surprisingly unsympathetic. Mcginniss has made a composite of the very worst images of the Kennedy. Its All Ellen Goodman there. The Kennedy Are again the dysfunctional poster family. Jacks Story of it 109 is cast As a cover up for a screw up. Even Joe death on a Volunteer Mission Over Europe is a a pointless accidents to which he was driven by Competition with his brother. The Only one who emerges relatively unscathed by Mcginniss is Bobby. As for Teddy a the last and the least of them a the a overweight underachieving insecure portrait is As unrelenting As inane right Wing fund Raiser. At least the right Wing Nas the Grace to take the senator seriously As a political Power. The author has written As if he were inside Kennedy a head. But what passes for psychological insight is a repetitious description of Teddy As the fat neglected ninth child the family Mascot and screw up. What passes for empathy is the repeated claim that a. He was simply unable to meet the demands of being a Mcginniss even turns Ted Kennedy a passion for social Justice into a kind of family failure the result of a having lived his whole life at the Bottom of the Only society that really mattered to him psychologically a his own in the unfair est Cut he disparages Ted As a Parent a Teddy remained devoted in his own limited Way to his As for his legislative career he Waves aside two and a half decades after maty to Kopechne a death As a Long downward slide. Over these years i have been More than uneasy with Ted Kennedy a private life and written so. I done to believe there is a Wall separating the private psyche from Public performance. Indeed in the old Era of Camelot myth making a person s private life personal character and psychological make up were ignored. People wrote biographies of great men and their deeds. In the Post Camelot Era a the open season on Ken Nedys Era a we have become More interested in motive than actions. We Are More interested in private behaviour than Public in flaws than in strengths. For All the claims and the disclaimers the last brother is not a serious biography and its not a novel. Its More proof that there a More than one Way to draw a caricature. This one is pure cartoon. C the Boston glob
