{"id":818,"date":"2001-11-11T21:06:30","date_gmt":"2001-11-12T02:06:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=818"},"modified":"2014-06-13T17:14:44","modified_gmt":"2014-06-13T23:14:44","slug":"aha_it_was_the-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2001\/11\/11\/aha_it_was_the-2.html","title":{"rendered":"Aha! It was the Russkies behind it!"},"content":{"rendered":"

There’s an Internet story going about<\/a> that bin Laden was “inspired” by Russian-born Isaac Asimov’s seminal sf novel, Foundation<\/i>. Supposedly that word is an alternate translation for al Qa’eda.<\/i> The story tries to draw vague parallels about a crumbling empire, a distant “foundation” whose leader communicates by video tape, and stuff like that.<\/p>\n

Frankly, it seems like a bizarro stretch to me, especially since there is very little if anything philosophically similar between Asimov’s Foundation and bin Laden’s al Qaeda. The Foundation wins its battles against the decadent Foundation through superior science and free enterprise, neither of which seem high on the terrorists’ list of things to pursue. Further, the Foundation largely functions defensively, and is governed more or less democratically. There are no suicide attacks on the Empire. No random bombings. No terror utilized whatsoever, that I can recall.<\/p>\n

Now, if Charlie Manson can think that the Beatles are writing songs just for him, I suppose bin Laden might draw on a similarly odd channeling (or bad memory) to be “inspired” by Asimov (a peaceful and intellectual man). But it sounds … kind of screwy. Using the same vague logic, I imagine I could claim that he was inspired by Heinlein’s Starship Troopers<\/i>, Haldeman’s The Forever War<\/i>, or Cole & Bunch’s Sten<\/i> series. Or, for that matter, Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings<\/i> trilogy. <\/p>\n

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Especially when it comes in a cigar box from a cigar store.<\/p>\n

(Via InstaPundit<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There’s an Internet story going about that bin Laden was “inspired” by Russian-born Isaac Asimov’s seminal sf novel, Foundation. Supposedly that word is an alternate translation for al Qa’eda. The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[36,10,382],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media-books","category-geopolitical-brouhaha","category-lord-of-the-rings"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":47940,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/11\/11\/asimovs-foundation-trilogy-to-become-an-hbo-series-hmmmm.html","url_meta":{"origin":818,"position":0},"title":"Asimov's "Foundation" trilogy to become an HBO series? Hmmmm","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 11-Nov-14 9:23pm","format":false,"excerpt":"An interesting idea, though as a series of stories and novellas early on, it's hard to see how this will work as a continuous TV series. Which is fine -- a series of segments where the actors (and century) changes between would be okay with me.I'm also hoping this will\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":136091,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/04\/11\/asimovs-foundation-to-be-made-into-a-tv-series.html","url_meta":{"origin":818,"position":1},"title":"Asimov’s “Foundation” to be made into a TV series","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 11-Apr-18 5:18pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The Good News: Isaac Asimov's seminal SF epic will be made into a TV series (quite literally the only format that makes any sense other than, well, a series of books). The Bad News: It will be on Yet Another Streaming Service. Ugh. The Problematic News: Has there ever been\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Heinlein-De-Camp-Asimov-1944.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6954,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/11\/23\/fly_the_cinemat.html","url_meta":{"origin":818,"position":2},"title":"Fly the cinematic skies","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 23-Nov-04 3:07pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Some quick media reviews (which have been banging around in my Palm and online for a few days) of my British Airways movie entertainment: The Bourne Supremacy More conspiratorial spy...","rel":"","context":"In "Media & Culture"","block_context":{"text":"Media & Culture","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":131362,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/08\/26\/is-it-true-the-clinton-foundation-spends-80-of-its-money-on-overhead.html","url_meta":{"origin":818,"position":3},"title":"Is it true the Clinton Foundation spends 80% of its money on "overhead"?","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 26-Aug-16 11:54pm","format":false,"excerpt":"As part of the grasping-at-straws efforts of the GOP to discredit Hillary Clinton more than Donald Trump keeps discrediting himself, the philanthropic Clinton Foundation has come under fire.Part of that is on largely baseless accusations of \"pay for play\" deals between donors to the Clinton Foundation and those donor getting\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":29521,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/08\/14\/brains-and-the-foundation-of-ideology.html","url_meta":{"origin":818,"position":4},"title":"Brains and the foundation of ideology","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 14-Aug-12 8:50am","format":false,"excerpt":"An interesting look at associations with brain structure and different ideological positions. Which, if true (and if causality is established), doesn't really solve anything, except, perhaps, in how we approach ideological debates (appealing to \"fairness\" vs appealing to \"disgust\"). Embedded Link Red States, Blue States, Gray Matter - Ever wonder\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":51705,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/07\/09\/an-historical-foundation-of-sand.html","url_meta":{"origin":818,"position":5},"title":"An historical foundation of sand","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 9-Jul-15 6:02am","format":false,"excerpt":"It seems trivial, but it's not. When you tell bad history, even to what you think are good ends, you are, in essence, lying. Most people don't think that's a good thing to do, but Glenn Beck apparently didn't get that memo, as he spins a legend about the first\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42843,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions\/42843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}