Letters to the Editor
GlennGreenwald
Published Letters: 2221 Editor's Choice: 18
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SomeNYGuy:
[Read the article: The Islamic enemy within]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]You're right, and I don't think Glenn went far enough with his reference to the Virginia Tech shooter. The wingnuts didn't merely lose interest because he wasn't a Muslim; they shut up like clams when it was revealed that Cho Seung Hui was a Christian from a church-going family! That's gotta be bad for the Elmer Gantry business, right?
You're right. The reason it doesn't occur to me to point that out is because the idea that Cho's religious beliefs -- as opposed to his obvious pychosis -- were to blame for his shooting spree is absurd.
But it is notable - and I therefore should have noted - that had he been Muslim, it would have been automatically assumed that that's where the blame lay. But the minute it was revealed that (his family at least) is Christian, everyone shifted to the psychological causes and no further meaning was sought.
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SomeNYGuy:
[Read the article: The Islamic enemy within]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Agreed. I certainly didn't mean to imply that Cho "cracked" because he was a Christian, merely that the Christianists virtually flushed the entire incident down the memory hole once they learned that this reviled, rampaging "monster" was in fact one of their own.
Agree with all of that. They were willing to think that his religion was to blame for the attacks only when they thought (based on nothing) that he was Muslim. When they learned he wasn't, they were no longer interested in his religion because then, of course, it became irrelevant.
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Golden Boy:
[Read the article: The Islamic enemy within]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]All very interesting, to be sure, but where do you actually address the finding of the poll?
I addressed the findings with arguments you ignored.
1 - 60% of Muslims in America believe that the 9/11 attacks were not carried out by Arabs (60%!!)
Most groups hold beliefs in large numbers that other people not in the group consider wild and irrational. Large numbers of American blacks believed O.J. Simpson was not guilty while large numbers of American whites believed that was irrational. Large numbers of those on the Left believe that the Bush administration either planned 9/11 or that the official version is false.
Large numbers of Christians deny evolution and believe in creationism. Large numbers believe that the U.S. should engage in extreme acts to support Israel becasue that is the only way the messiah will return.
Why is the denial by large numbers of Muslims of the ethnicity of the 9/11 attackers such a unique concern? What is going to happen as a result?
2 - 15% of Muslims in America under the age of 30 believe that suicide attacks are justified
As I said, they believe "suicide attacks" can be justified in some hypothetical instance. Do you believe such attacks are NEVER justified? You can never conceive of any situation where they would be?
And the polling expert cited in the AP article suggested most who answered YES, and it's a small minority, were referencing attacks on Israel as part of the fight against the occupation. Again, you can disagree with that obviously, but what is going to happen as a result of that belief?
3 - 7% of Muslims in America under the age of 30 have a favorable view of Al Qaeda, and another 19% refused to answer. That means that over a quarter of young Muslims in America refuse to condemn bin Laden. Nothing to worry about?
That is a small percentage. Yes, it's terrible that people sympathize with bin Laden. I think it's terrible that people sympathize with all sorts of things, including torture. But again, what is the point?
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Golden Boy:
[Read the article: The Islamic enemy within]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Why can't you condemn Islam in(at least) the same terms that you condemn Christianity, and for the same reasons?
That's the whole point of the post.
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Golden Boy:
[Read the article: The Islamic enemy within]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I was beginning to wonder why this letter thread was so quiet. By GG standards this is very lightly commented upon, considering that I have directly challenged GG's article.
Actually, and for what it's worth, I didn't post this until the afternoon. There are now 100 letters. That is at least an average pace, if not above-average. Your analysis of the letter section is as sound as your analysis of the main point of the post.
And really, it's quite hilarious that you invoked this defective reasoning all in service of trying to claim that people were so "sobered" by your piercing insights that they were stopped in their tracks and frozen from commenting further.
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Paul
[Read the article: Improvement in Iraq: Trust Joe Klein and his secret sources]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I actually think that post is worth reading, too, but I have to say I am somewhat baffled by the criticisms of my post it purports to voice, such as this:
First, in his angst, Greenwald is himself succumbing to the myth that al-Qaeda in Iraq is a dominant force. While al-Qaeda in Iraq, more properly the Islamic State of Iraq an independe, has been responsible for enormous bloodshed, it represents a rather insignificant political force and just a small portion of the various insurgencies.
I'd love to know where in anything I wrote I "succumbed to the myth that " al-Qaeda in Iraq is a dominant force." My post had nothing to do with that issue. And I don't think Al Qaeda is the dominant force. I know they're not, and I've written before about the manipulative attempt to depict them as such.
What happens a lot is that if someone reads an article and thinks that the most important objection to make is X, but someone else comes and talks about a different issue -- Issue Y -- they will claim you've gotten everything wrong and are misguided, when what they really mean is that you didn't talk about their issue.
My post wasn't about the situation between the various sects Iraq, really. It was about Joe Klein's "reporting" and the public debate we are having in the U.S.
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Weird sentence
[Read the article: Attacks on civilians, torture and lawless detentions]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]At this blog, early birds catch not-fully-edited versions of the posts. That "weird sentence" was the by-product of an editing error which caused parts of two different sentences to be patched together. It is now fixed.