He may be a total fruitcake, but Bobby Fischer has the right to play chess in Yugoslavia, China, Iraq, Chile, Russia, or even Arkansas. Iceland has granted him citizenship to allow him to leave Japan, which is holding him on a U.S. extradition request for having played chess in Yugoslavia when sanctions were being enforced on that now defunct country.
Fischer is an antisemitic anti-american goof ball but why are we so eager to incarcerate a harmless individual at taxpayer expense?
I can see no purpose in pursuing criminal charges against him other than assertion of the Supremacy of the State over the freedom of the individual (or in this case freedom of the nutcase).
Equal Protection for Goofballs under the Law!!!
And since when did people—goofballs though they may be—become cogs in the American foreign policy apparatus?
Nej, nej, Dr. Palmer! Bobby Fisher… hann er vitlaus!
when you have a sec, listen to these interviews. We are talking ‘disturbing case’ here:
listen to BF on 9/11, on Israel and on the USA in general.
http://home.att.ne.jp/moon/fischer/
NV
I agree that Bobby Fischer seems to be barking mad (“hann er vitlaus,” in Icelandic), but that doesn’t mean he has no rights. If a crazy anti-Semite wants to play chess, his crackpot views should have no bearing on the issue. The persecution of Fischer by the U.S. government for having played chess in Yugoslavia is, in my humble opinion, both unjust and absurd. I’m impressed that Iceland has chosen to give him asylum. That doesn’t absolve him from the charge of being an anti-Semitic, anti-American kook, but it does vindicate his rights, and that’s a good thing.
The man is “vitlaus”, indeed, but I agree with Tom.