After the screening of American Zeitgeist, the sponsor, the New York Society for Ethical Culture, treated us to a debate between Christopher Hitchens and a pundit I'd never heard of before, Eric Margolis.

The Ethical Culture folks describe Margolis as:

Eric S. Margolis, best-selling author of War at the Top of the World: The Struggle for Afghanistan, Kashmir and Tibet, 2000; award-winning foreign correspondent and television commentator on foreign affairs who has covered 14 separate wars.

During the debate Hitchens was as professorial and precise as he was during his debate with the infamous catsuit king, George Galloway. Margolis was a more low-key opponent; his delivery lacked Galloway's Hitlerian overtones, but his support of Islamic extremism was about equivalent. His love for certain mujahideen was about equal to his hatred of the Russians. He was definitely a Brzezinski acolyte, combining moonbattery with a rabid hatred of Reds.

I don't always agree with Hitchens' views on Iraq, but I do admire his debating style; precise, slightly arrogant and cruel; something the British do so well.

After the debate the sponsors offered a party downstairs with free beer, but the gathering was about as lively as a Junior League garden party. What did we expect from the Ethical Culture society?

Outside Judith and "Alcibiades" got a chance to talk to the smoking Hitch about Iran (he hopes for a no-war solution and an eventual takeover by the secular liberals in Iran : Judith and Alcibiades aren't thrilled about the current appeasement). Offstage, Hitch was cruelty-free, setting aside a free beer to debate his views.

Afterwards, Judith and I had a very late dinner at a place called the Colosseum bar and restuarant. When we left, sometime past 1 am, the place was starting to fill up. That's New York.

Today I looked up more info on "Foreign Correspondent" Eric Margolis. It turns out that he's not just a supporter of the mujhaideen, he's an enthusiastic jihadi.

Not that this earns him any respect, even in Pakistan. After reading this precise evisceration of Margolis's mujhaideen dreams, I have to guess that arrogant cruelty towards the delusional and the pretentious is a Pakistani skill as well.

Eric S. Margolis' War at the top of the World: The Clash for Mastery of Asia. Generations of young men in the West have been fascinated by the experiences of T.E. Lawrence during the first decades of the 20th century. His adventures in the Middle East and his remarkable effort in uniting the Arabs, has inspired a host of books and David Lean's memorable movie: The Lawrence of Arabia. Margolis quite clearly pictures himself as a latter-day Lawrence. He was inspired by the jihad in Afghanistan against the Soviets during the 1980s and joined the Mujhaideen during a couple of military campaigns.

The first part of the book deals with the war in Afghanistan, and is probably the only one even worth reading. In this, Margolis describes his meeting with the Afghan leader Burhanuddin Rabbani and his decision to join the jihad, as he quickly relocates himself from Toronto to Peshawar and beyond, where his friends include the Pakistan intelligence chief, Lt. General Javed Nasser. His antics apparently provoked the Afghan government enough for President Najibullah to put a price on his head. Consider Margolis' colourful descriptions of the Mujhaideen: "These were the soldiers of Allah, the bravest men on earth... They feared no man and certainly not death. Each man believed that Allah stood at his right shoulder; Allah who was all-merciful, in spite of the cruel world that He had inexplicably created; Allah would carry him to his final rest as a parent would wrap a sleepy child in his arms and take him off to bed." The rest of the book deals with Kashmir, and Margolis' diatribe against Indian oppression, the tense military standoff between India and Pakistan, particularly at Siachen and the probability of a clash between India and China for Mastery over Asia. Much of what is written is superficial journalese, with few new revelations, and littered with errors of fact and judgement.

For all of Margolis' pretences, he is no T.E. Lawrence. He neither has the intellectual strength (recall Lawrence's magnum opus: The Seven Pillars of Wisdom), nor indeed the political vision. The result is a trashy book that will unfortunately bought by many who are seduced by the title. However, the discerning reader will soon recognise that Margolis does not really have it in him to produce a book that is capable of dealing with the immense complexity of the subject.

Margolis is so contemptible, FrontPage is willing to defend the commies in an effort to tear him down.

The man's a menace. Hitch was being kind.