Letters to the Editor
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Nunnsense
Glen states that "as a matter of course," Christians do not burn buildings and kill people who say things they don't like. As a matter of "course," they have done precisely that pretty much until they stopped being the law of the land.
No, I didn't state this. I quoted Jamie Kirchick stating this.
And your examples from the post don't disprove what he says - his comment is about what Catholics do NOW as a matter of course; your examples are about what Christians did in the past.
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A fatwa in every pot
Do you fear that they'll be a fatwa issued against you for saying this? Are you walking around with bodyguards today? Is that why you post under a psuedonym?
The strategy of terrorism isn't to kill every possible target; it's to kill enough people to change the behavior of everybody else. Most comedians or critics of Islam will not get the Theo van Gogh treatment, but the threat is there. It's the same principle as that used against abortionists in the United States; the likelihood of a abortion provider being murdered by anti-abortion terrorists is vanishingly small, but the threat is enough to keep them looking over their shoulders and to keep their heads down, which is the point.
Cultivating an attitude of defiance, in this situation, seems to me the honorable and good thing to do.
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blinking and code...
I can't really believe I am coming to the defense of Double-A but her comment regarding the use of the blackened goggles on Padilla might have had some basis in truth.
She is old enough to remember (as am I) that one of our POW's held by North Vietnam was paraded out in front of the cameras once to basically tell everyone how well they were being treated but at the same time he did in fact use his eyelids to blink out the word torture in Morse code. As I recall, his captors later gave him another severe beating after they found out about what he did.
So that may have been in her mind when she made that statement.
As far as Double-A being the stupidest woman alive - while she might be on that shortlist I think Malkin and Coulter have to be higher on the list than her.
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Elephant man asks a simple question.
Other than "Muslim extremism" (which I think is actually a more pejorative term than "Islamofacsism") is there any greater, more real, more unpredictable and more active threat to world stability right now?
Yes there are. Several in fact:
-Some tens of thousands of nuclear weapons, not all of them in the most secure condition, around the world.
-An increasingly erratic and violent global weather system.
-A messianic nihlist occupying the Oval Office.
-A sour and arguably paranoid autocrat in the Kremlin.
Muslim extremists/fundamentalists are just one of several threats to the planet right now, and like the rest, it has no easy solutions to it.
Welcome to the real world. Hope you enjoy your visit.
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Nothing to fear from offending Islamofascists
Only in the lalaland of left-wing bloggers. Tell that to the family of Theo van Gogh.
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The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
nunnsense,
If you read "The Closing of the Western Mind", by Charles Freeman, the codification of Christianity into Catholicism, was part of the attempt to salvage the crumbling empire. Gibbon is the one who felt that Christianity caused the fall, but that would be true only in the sense that it became one of the competing power blocs that warred over the remains.
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Arguing about which side "does it more" is far from an adolescent exercise
Those warmongering/fearmongering bastards aside, it is not an "adolescent exercise" to argue about which side "does it more" when we're talking about violence.
It is not adolescent to point out that Israelis kill a lot more Palestinians than vice-versa. It is likewise a simple fact that Muslim extremists kill and maim more people than Christian extremists. Christian extremists didn't haven't stabbed any Dutch film makers to death recently. They haven't beheaded any prostitutes in the last decade or so that I'm aware of.
To extrapolate from the acts of a relative few Muslims in order to claim that we're in a huge war of civilizations is the height of irresponsibility. To argue that there is no important quantitative difference between Muslim and Christian extremism is just stupid.
On the other hand, it is valid to ask whether a group's stated and real reasons for violence are the same. Muslims kill more people in the name of their god and morals than Christians do...but we are now engaged in a project of killing Muslims by the bucketful; does the fact that we claim other than religious motivations make any practical difference?
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Elephantman
I think the term "jihadist" is more descriptive and accurate, preferably preceded by "radical" or "violent". Then again, "terrorist" works just as well, when the individual in question utilizes such tactics. Does it really matter whether they are Salafist or Irish Republican or Tamil Tiger or Michigan Militia? They're violent criminals all the same.
I would take issue with the characterization of jihadi violence as the "most serious threat" to "world peace, stability and economic growth". That's just aimless hyperbole. Statistically speaking, a violent death at the hands of a radical jihadi criminal is just not very likely, even when one limits the calculus to homicides. Especially if one is an American. If the FBI's statistics are any indication, you should be more worried about a violent death at the hands of your family and friends.
Even if one were to take an extremely broad definition of "peace, stability, and economic growth", it's not intuitively clear that radical jihadis are the primary antagonists--or even an important one. Do you have any statistics to support this--say comparisons of violent deaths committed by various actors and their subsequent economic impact in the last ten years--or are you just blowing smoke?
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Mongering for War
Neo-cons have always had deep seated unsatiable fantasies about being a "great generation" like the one that lived through WWII and saved the American way of life. When the Berlin Wall collapsed they were a-drift, but 9/11 gave them the chance to go even bigger and better, they can save all of Western Civilzation! Which is why they can't stop inventing fanatasies about this new enemy.
It's one two three four
It's our Civilization we're fight for
I don't give damn how or why we got Saddam
Five six seven eight
Being a Greater Generation Ain't it great
Open them pearly gates Either us or the A-rabs gotta die
(with apologizes to Country Joe and the Fish)