Monday, April 07, 2008

Le jackass

Look. What the Chinese have done to Tibet over the past half century or so is truly abominable. And certainly keeping world attention focused in a squirm-inducing fashion on the ChiComs is a good thing. Unfortunately, however, the sorts of people engaging in many of the public protests seem little removed from the rock hurling/window bashing delinquents seen outside WTO meetings. I suppose they must want Tibet to be free not to engage in international trade agreements. Anyway...Get a load of this AP photo from Paris today (via FoxNews):

Now as you may have heard, protesters in London over the weekend, and today in Paris, have been stalking the Olympic torch as it is relayed from Greece to Beijing. In a few instances, a "Free Tibet!" partisan has snatched the torch from an official carrier's hand and extinguished the thing. Until today a Bic or Zippo has been handy to get the procession on its way again. (In response to the intensity of the protests, French officials have shut down the relay in Paris. Analysts believe this may stem from rumors of German-speaking arrestees or perhaps an unintended consequence of recent state-enforced smoking bans.)

But getting back to the photo, notice the position of the torch bearer. She's the one in the center holding the torch. She's also sitting. In a wheelchair. Here's to hoping the gendarmes gave the attacker (exiting frame, right) an extra kick in the ribs. And here's to also hoping this jackass lives with unending humiliation over being bested by 100 pound disabled woman.

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm going to be going to the protests of the torch passing in downtown SF today. I met someone from Team Tibet 08 that had come from Massachusetts to protest the Olympics, and their motivations were great and respectable. One of the unfortunate things about massive protests for anything is that they don't attract simply believers and always have the potential to bring in people that want something to do that day. I'm sure one or two kids that just wanted to skip school showed up in the Million Man March, and some of those blokes we saw knocking over the Berlin Wall may have really just wanted to hit something with a huge sledgehammer.

To be blunt, though, John, China is out there killing Tibetans right now, continuing aggression against its neighbors, jailing dissidents and funding genocide. They're the true villains in this scenario.

9:56 PM  
Blogger John Egel said...

Mike...Please do three things for me: Carefully read the post again, find a sense of humor and lighten up, man. In doing so you will see that I was aiming at a specific kind of goon protester personified by "le jackass" who attacked a crippled girl. You know, the kind of asshole who ruins the important message of the protests. That's all there was to it.

Oh, and a fourth thing: Don't lecture me on the evils of Communism. That's twice you've done so in the last couple of weeks, and it's annoying.

Lastly, I wish you hadn't posted that comment on my Townhall blog. I was going to habdle that in my own way.

5:09 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Okay, sorry if I'm being a little annoying. Sometimes my mouth can run out of control.

6:29 PM  

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