03/24/2012
Establishment NeoConservative operative Mark Steyn has the right enemies, sometimes asks the right questions and occasionally approximates the right answers. But he has always displayed a curious defeatism about Eurabia — the demographic swamping of Europe by Muslim immigrants.
Nevertheless the Toulouse murders and the mendacious attempt to blame the right has provoked him write what many VDARE.com readers would accept as a decent piece and, more impressive, getting it up at National Review: Lather, Rinse, and Repeat March 21, 2012
The killer of French schoolchildren and soldiers turns out to be a man called Mohammed Merah. The story can now proceed according to time-honored tradition:Stage One: The strange compulsion to assure us that the killer is a “right wing conservative extremist,”
…So on to Stage Two: Okay, he may be called Mohammed but he’s a “lone wolf.”
…On to Stage Three: Okay, even if there are enough lone wolves around to form their own Radio City Rockette line, it’s still nothing to do with Islam.
…And then, of course, Stage Four: The backlash that never happens
Steyn concludes
…is it so hard to acknowledge that rapid, transformative, mass Muslim immigration might not be the most obvious aid to social tranquility? … Is it so difficult to wonder if… the price of putting an Islamic crescent in the diversity quilt might be too high?
This might sound o.k. — but it failed to pass the fire assay test over at View From The Right. In his characteristically blunt way the ferocious proprietor, Larry Auster posted
Steyn courageously declares that (no, Steyn tentatively inquires whether) Muslim immigration is endangering Europe
Let us recall that Steyn in all his voluminous writings on the Islam problem during the previous decade…not only never addressed the issue of Muslim immigration as a factor in the Islamization of Europe, he never once used the words "immigration" or "immigrants." Not once.
… In more recent years he has on rare occasions brought up the the problem of Islamic and other Third-World immigration — only to counsel surrender to it. See also his 2009 Macleans article, where … Steyn perforce mentioned it — only to admit that he was a coward on the subject, and … to aver once again that there is nothing to be done about it.
…Steyn, having massively excluded the thought of the increasing Muslim presence in the West that has been produced by immigration and of doing anything about it from the minds of his many thousands of "conservative" followers, both the intellectual elite and the rank and file, who all amazingly treat this lightweight as their authority on the subject (!), once again broaches the issue of Muslim immigration, but only in a blog entry at the Corner
…in my view, for his long career of cowardice and staggering dishonesty on this vital subject, and for the incalculable harm he has caused through his huge influence on conservatives, he cannot be condemned enough.
In an amendment posted later Auster upgraded his assessment of this particular essay and withdrew his final point
Steyn … does go beyond rhetorical questions whether Islam is harmful and makes a strong declarative statement that it is harmful, when he says … "What’s left of Jewish life in Europe is being extinguished remorselessly, one vandalized cemetery, one subway attack at a time." But note that it was only the danger to Jews that he felt comfortable addressing in the declarative mood, not the danger to Europe as a whole.
But he concludes
At the same time, what has Steyn ever said to encourage Europe and the West to reverse this suicidal error? NOTHING.
That is correct. I think Auster’s retraction is too generous, his overall analysis is sound and the headline is right. The slight improvement is not enough to offset years of damage.
This post reminds me of a sweet memory: NR Austerized: What a pleasure
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