Damn them.

Damn them to hell.

And before anyone asks, I specifically limit my curse to the people who did this.

Comments

[Edward]

I saw this earlier and didn't have the heart to comment on it. You've summed up my feelings perfectly though, Moe.

[sidereal]

What do you say? There's nothing to say.

I can only hope it hardens the Muslim world against these people until they have no hope of refuge. I hope that they turn around one day and find that their hatred and murder have driven all of their allies and recruits away until they have nothing and are nothing. I desperately wish we'd stop turning them into sympathetic characters.

[Anarch]

Part of it's the fact that I'm out of the country; part of it's that it's 4:30am and I can't get to sleep; part of it's that I've been getting "Breaking News Updates" every day for the past week detailing the blood-soaked outrages in Iraq; but I can't muster anything more than a sickening sense of detached finality, like lurching towards the end of a particularly gruesome Greek tragedy.

And that's the worst feeling of all.

[Katherine]

I'm glad someone wrote this letter, even if it was ignored.

"I declare that I pledged to protect this man," said Saad al-Mu'men, a pseudonym for the colleague, who wrote a letter that appeared on radical Islamist Web sites.

The letter -- and an interview with him -- was posted later on the Al Arabiya news channel's Web site.

In his letter, al-Mu'men told the kidnappers that if Johnson is harmed, "I will never forgive you. I will curse you in all my prayers."

He cited the prophet Mohammed in his letter: "If they were granted [Muslim]protection, then killing or taking their money or harming them is forbidden."

[double-plus-ungood]

I wish that the photos and videos of these things could be voluntarily shunned. Drudge apparently has posted them, which is pretty much doing the murderer's work for them.

I am going to do my best to avoid looking at these, partly out of respect for the man's family, but also because every new publication of this kind of distgusting snuff material encourages the next lot of murderers.

[sidereal]

"and their leader was then killed in a shootout with security forces as he tried to dispose of the body, Saudi officials said. "

[Navy Davy]

++Good,

I am going to do my best to avoid looking at these, partly out of respect for the man's family, but also because every new publication of this kind of distgusting snuff material encourages the next lot of murderers.

I completely agree. Thanks for the encouragement. It's so tempting to look at the savagery up close. But, I already know the murderers of Johnson are savages. So, watching their dirty deeds doesn't add any new knowledge, it just makes me feel worse.

My heart goes out to the Johnson family.

[slartibartfast]

Since it's no secret where I work, I just want to say that although I didn't know him, I knew of him, and had passed by him in the hall. And that I second Moe's sentiment. And that, further, the perpetrators ought to be sped on their way to eternal punishment.

[lex icon]

May they meet Allah before they age another day.

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

"The death hours later of Abdulaziz al-Moqrin, the reputed leader of al-Qaida in the kingdom, was a coup for the Saudi government, which has been under intense pressure to halt a wave of attacks against Westerners."

Also pretty lucky since it is fairly obvious that he had ties in the government and now he can't reveal them.

[Blue]

If only we could say this instead...

I can only hope it hardens the WESTERN world against these people until they have no hope of refuge. I hope that they turn around one day and find that their hatred and murder have driven all of their allies and recruits away until they have nothing and are nothing.

[Q]

It seems to me that if Americans and the rest of the world could see the pictures of another execution by Islamic terrorists it would help us to understand the nature of the enemy better.

After all, doesn't seeing the pictures from Abu Ghraib help us understand what really went on there?