Bill Clinton and James Patterson almost certainly didn’t write this book; it was likely written by hired hands. But they are still responsible for its contents, which reflects Leftist wishful thinking. In the minds of the political and media elites, jihad terrorists are indeed not Muslim. I remember years ago, during the George W. Bush administration, a State Department official in conversation with me caught and corrected himself after referring to jihadis as Muslim, saying abashedly, “I shouldn’t say they are Muslim…”
Well, what are they? Seventh Day Adventists? Something like that, anyway. In the Clinton/Patterson novel, the fictional President explains that “he held a telephone conversation with ‘the most dangerous and prolific cyberterrorist in the world,’ Suliman Cindoruk, who leads an organization known as Sons of Jihad. (‘He’s Turkish-born, but he’s not Muslim,’ Duncan says.”
Clinton and Patterson likely really believe that jihadis aren’t Muslim, but this is ridiculous. Jihad is an Islamic concept. There is no concept of jihad outside of Islam. Read my new book The History of Jihad From Muhammad to ISIS, and you may notice that in fourteen centuries of jihad warfare around the globe, the jihadis all have one thing in common: each and every one of them is Muslim. But this Suliman Cindoruk is Turkish and jihadist, yet somehow not Muslim. Leftist fantasy embodied.
“Bill Clinton and James Patterson’s Concussive Collaboration,” by Anthony Lane, New Yorker, June 18, 2018 (thanks to Mark):
…Bill Clinton, who can write, has hooked up with James Patterson, who can’t, but whose works have sold more than three hundred and seventy-five million copies, most of them to happy and contented customers for whom good writing would only get in the way. This unlikely pact has resulted in “The President Is Missing” (Knopf and Little, Brown), which we must, not without reservations, describe as a thriller. Get a load of this: “The stun grenades detonate, producing a concussive blast of 180 decibels.” A hundred and eighty, mark you, and not a decibel less! If that isn’t thrilling, I can’t imagine what is….
Jon Duncan is the President of the United States, “fifty years old and rusty.” The events in the novel are designed to put the shine back on. Duncan is, by his own account, “a war hero with rugged good looks and a sharp sense of humor,” not to mention a beguiling modesty. He served in Operation Desert Storm, in Iraq, where he was wounded. He is also a former governor of North Carolina. His wife died not long ago, and now it’s just him and his daughter…
Remember who is the putative principal author of this book.
Cue the stress. Duncan is facing possible impeachment, partly because his opponents are careerist weasels but mainly because, according to leaked reports, he held a telephone conversation with “the most dangerous and prolific cyberterrorist in the world,” Suliman Cindoruk, who leads an organization known as Sons of Jihad. (“He’s Turkish-born, but he’s not Muslim,” Duncan says. That faint sound you can hear is our two authors treading very, very carefully.)…