Then I glanced down on the table where I spied a copy of the day's Pittsburgh Post-Gazette -- two socialist papers in one, the defunct Pittsburgh Post having merged with the should-be-defunct Pittsburgh Gazette. The picture on page one caught my interest immediately. Under the headline, "Uprising Hits New Areas," was a picture of Moslem savages sporting head gear emblazoned with passages of that document of peace, the Koran, and brandishing Kalashnikov rifles (Who says the Russians haven't contributed to civilization?). The caption identified them as members of Shiite al-Sadr's "Mahdi" army. And that's what really grabbed me, the word 'Mahdi'. This al-Sadr thinks of himself as the "Mahdi!"

      Of course, this was, and is, totally lost on the press and may be lost on all of our great government officials dealing with the war and homeland security. It's a good bet it's lost on most of you, too. But because you are readers of the Rice Report® you're about to be educated. And because it's lost on all official-dumb it's why we will probably fail to deal successfully with the al-Sadr uprising.

      Islamic literature -- but not the Koran -- contains references to the "Mahdi." Simply put, the Mahdi is an end-times prophet who will arise to unite all of Islam under his banner, then conquer the world for Islam, instituting a rule of "justice and peace." Oh, did I mention the catch? If you decide that you'd rather opt out of his rule of justice and peace, he'll kill you. There, now you know. Sweet, isn't it? That's the religion of "peace," looking forward to their own Islamo-Hitler.

      I've got another flash for ya -- they've already tried it. It was 19th century Sudan, and his name was Muhammed Ahmad. Initially a fisherman and boat builder on the Nile, he studied the Koran and became convinced that he was the promised Mahdi. In the mid 1880s, he united the Sudanese tribes into an army and set out first to conquer the Sudan and then Egypt, the latter of which he believed had fallen into apostasy.

      At the time, the British were in nominal control of Egypt due to their possession of the French-built Suez canal. The canal was a life-line of the Empire to the chief jewel in its crown--India. Hence, it's easy to understand why the British had an interest in Egyptian affairs, to safeguard their most direct route to India. (It's a shame we were not that far-sighted about the Panama canal.) The Mahdi's plans for Egypt posed a direct threat to British lines of communication. Of course, he was also a direct threat to world peace and all of Western, non-Moslem culture. Whether or not that was widely realized in 19th century Europe, I don't know. At least one man realized it, and his name was Charles Gordon. You might know him better as Charleton Heston who played the part in the great 60s epic, Kahrtoum.

      With very little help from the British Foreign Office, Gordon was dispatched to Egypt to take control of the Egyptian army, rebuild it, and to try to hold Egypt and the Sudan against the rising tide of Mahdism. He did yeoman work and held out for months against the Islamo-Hitler while besieged in the city of Kahrtoum. Kahrtoum was finally overrun in January of 1885, just one day before a British relief expedition arrived. Gordon was butchered along with the Egyptian garrison as the Mahdi began his reign of justice and peace.

      Fortunately for Egypt and the world, Ahmad died before the year was out. But that was not the end of Mahdism. Ahmad had a second in command who went by the title of the "Khalifa." The Khalifa saw it as his Allah-ordained duty to continue the aims of Mahdism, which, by the way, included the continuation of the Sudanese slave trade. In the ensuing ten years the Khalifa consolidated his control over the Sudan even to the point of subjugating Abyssinia as a tributary. (That's present-day Ethiopia for those of you who are historically challenged.) In the meantime, he awaited his opportunity to resume an invasion of Egypt and the conquest of the world for Islam.

      Happily, for Egypt, Britain, and the world, Horatio Herbert Kitchener was appointed Sirdar of the Egyptian army, and Kitchener had no soccer-mom illusions about the true nature of Mahdism and the threat it posed to civilization. The defeat of an Italian army in Eritrea by an Abyssinian force was the catalyst for Kitchener's campaign to regain the Sudan. Several causes had come together to trigger measures to end the barbaric rule of the Khalifa, not the least of which was the desire to recoup European prestige after the Italian defeat. Nevertheless, Kitchener recognized the danger posed by the 19th century Islamo-facist, something soccer-mommy America seems unwilling to do today if there's even the hint of an ulterior motive like "oil" on the horizon. Soccer-mommy liberalism strives for a purtanism without God, failing to realize that in a fallen world an action can be the right thing to do even if the motives behind it are mixed. And, of course, nothing on this earth is pure.

      Kitchener's desert campaign against the Khalifa -- conducted with vigorous support this time from an outraged Britain whose public looked to avenge Gordon -- ended in September of 1898 with the battle of Omdurman, a sweeping desert engagement of epic proportions along the Nile. Omdurman, the Khalifa's capital, was taken. But the Khalifa escaped and was still plotting his return to power when he was tracked down and killed along with all his lieutenants in November of 1899. That, finally, was the end of that phase of Mahdism. The British had no illusions about what had to be done, unlike soccer-mommy America. Queen Vicky, the original soccer-grannie of the 19th century, was horrified to learn that Kitchener had defiled the tomb of the Mahdi by throwing his bones into the Nile and making a drinking cup out of the skull. Kitchener had a very good reality check.

      When Kitchener entered Omdurman he found the head of Charles Gordon mounted on a pike, along with others, all vanquished enemies of the Mahdi's reign of justice and peace.

      As Michael Barthorp says in his little classic, War on the Nile,

The Islamic faith contains a latent fanaticism which, when aroused by some holy man with special gifts of striking a chord in the minds of his listeners, can impel its believers into concerted action of a most violent and self-sacrificing nature, no matter how impoverished, mentally and physically, they may have been previously;...In August of 1881, ... Mohammed Ahmed proclaimed himself the awaited "Mahdi," the guide who would lead the way to true salvation. His task was to expunge the hated "Turk" from the Sudan, and then from Egypt, and subsequently to establish Islam throughout the world, destroying any -- Christian, Moslem, or pagan -- who opposed him. (page 78)

There's only one recourse for dealing with such an individual, and that's extermination. That's exactly what Kitchener's forces did.

      In the current case, I'd like to think that history would repeat itself. It usually does -- except, of course, when I'd like it to. And, unfortunately, soccer-mom America reads very little history.