UPDATED, 02/17/06
UPDATED, 02/19/06
A few of the things I came have come across today that bear on yesterday’s post about “Riots, Culture, and the Final Showdown” (ADDITIONS BELOW):
Michael Barone says, “Tom Bevan of www.realclearpolitics.com weighs in on Al Gore’s speech about visas, as does Kathleen Parker in the Orlando Sentinel. I haven’t yet seen any defense of Gore’s comments.” And Michelle Malkin piles on.
Right Angle (the blog of Human Events) notes that “Islam Demands ‘Defamation Law’ of UN.”
WorldNetDaily reports:
The University of Washington’s student senate rejected a memorial for alumnus Gregory “Pappy” Boyington of “Black Sheep Squadron” fame amid concerns a military hero who shot down enemy planes was not the right kind of person to represent the school.
Student senator Jill Edwards, according to minutes of the student government’s meeting last week, said she “didn’t believe a member of the Marine Corps was an example of the sort of person UW wanted to produce.”
Then, there’s Russia, which we should not count among our allies. Alexandros Petersen offers particulars at TCS Daily.
P.S., Thanks to Maverick Philosopher for plugging “Riots, Culture. . .”
ADDITIONS, 02/17/06:
John Mandez at The American Thinker says that because
American forces cannot be defeated in the field, [bin Laden’s] last desperate hope is appealing to leftist anti-American guilt at home, and thereby sapping our will. . . . He fully understands that as Iraq draws ever closer to a functioning democracy his medieval theocratic ideology will be summarily rejected and Iraq will serve as a model of what can be accomplished. A beacon of hope in a sea of desperation.
Michelle Malkin is on the case of the U.S. ports that would be handed over to a company that operates out of Dubai.
The RCP Blog has more about Al Gore’s recent anti-American speech in Saudi Arabia.
Best of all, there’s a series of essays (“The Forever Jihad“) by Donald Sensing (One Hand Clapping), which I just discovered. Some excerpts:
[Bin Laden’s] goals are evident from his own declarations and are –
1. Expel America’s armed forces from Saudi Arabia, emplace Islamist regimes and sociopolitical order there and expel all non-Muslims of any sort,
2. Emplace Islamism in the other countries of the Persian Gulf,
3. Then reclaim Islamic rule of all lands that were ever under Islamic control and emplace Islamism there,
4. Convert the rest of the world to Islamism. . . .
Islamism has been defined by scholars such as Gilles Kepel as “political Islam” and it existed long before Osama bin Laden came along. (See my PDF essay on the history of Arab terrorism.) What we call Islamism began some decades ago as a Muslim reform movement and was not originally violent. Islamists generally call for the unification of a Muslim country’s law and social order under the umbrella of sharia, strict Islamic law. The apparati of the state, the mosque and civil society would be a single, organic unity. . . .
So far I have reviewed al Qaeda’s objectives and strategy, explained the distinction between Islamism and jihadism and discussed the theology of Islamic suicide bombings. A short review:
** Islamists call for the unification of a Muslim country’s law and social order under the umbrella of sharia, strict Islamic law. The apparati of the state, the mosque and civil society would be a single, organic unity.
** Jihadism is a war-based, expansive, aggressive form of Islamism for which the use of violence is the central tactic.
** After jihadism swallowed Islamism beginning in the 1970s, they are starting to diverge again, at least a little. But their differences concern not what they want to accomplish, only how.
Islamists are determined that all of human existence be brought under the sway of Islam (as they define Islam, of course). While we rightly continue to worry about and guard against deadly attacks against us by al Qaeda, the long-term menace of Islamism is not jihadism. Jihadists, because they are overtly military in nature, can be effectively (though not always easily) defeated with our own military. Jihadists attack with hammer blows. Remove the hammer and its wielders and construct strong enough shields and the blows and their effects will be reduced.
But Islamism is like a fog that enfolds itself within and around, over and through a society. Western countries have a long tradition of religious freedom, but this freedom is predicated on the presumption that religious freedom will not threaten the political nature and autonomy of the state. . . .
The entry of large Muslim populations into this system, whether entry by immigration or conversion, is a deep challenge to Westernism’s survival. It simply remains to be seen whether Islam itself can be politically pluralist in countries where it holds sway. Islamism, of course, does not even pretend to pluralism. . . .
Simply put, the dictates of the Quran cannot be reconciled with the social mores and liberties of Western society. . . .
From Mohammed’s day until now, Islam has always assumed that it would rule the societies in which it existed. . . .
ADDITIONS 02/19/06:
The Strata-Sphere offers a thoughtful, dissenting view about the case of the U.S. ports:
We are starting to look at ‘them’ and find ways to wall them off from ‘us’, and the rationales are too often generalizations about ‘them’ as opposed to finding instances of real problems with real individuals – irregardless of the ancestral, cultural or religious roots.
The one bugging me right now is the outcries about a UAE company acquiring control of a British company that runs some of our ports. Has anyone heard that this is a British company, using American employees, which is selling a controlling interest to a UAE company?
I hadn’t. By the outcry I thought UAE Muslims were taking complete control of the ports (which, by the way, are also run by the US Coast Guard) and would be smuggling nuclear bombs through them any day now. That is the fear being alluded to that is driving us to create the ‘them’ and ‘us’. The UAE is one of the most western Middle East countries and they have a lot of commercial ties to the West because they have been investing their oil monies to modernize the region. . . .
Looking down the road to what we want to see in the future I see a democratic Middle East with successful growing economies living peacefully (but competing commercially) with the western nations. I see future Japans and Germanys leading the Arab nations out of their current despotism. And nations like the UAE and Kuwait and Qatar are pathfinders for this knew, peaceful future.
And because of fear we are about to do Al Qaeda’s bidding and nip this opportunity in the bud. Because an ‘Arab’ country of ‘Muslims’ is continuing to work its way into the Western economic picture – we are up in arms. . . .
We WANT a modern, peaceful Middle East as an economic partner. We cannot live in fear of every Arab or Muslim or we will fulfill Al Qaeda’s dream and WE will be the ones that divide the world into ‘haves’ and ‘have nots’. We do not target groups and punish them for sharing blood or religion with our enemies. We identify individuals and prosecute them (or kill them) if they are working with our enemies.
Well said.
On the other side of the ledger, there’s always more to say about appeasers, and The American Thinker says it. And Wizbang has this to say about the hypocrisy of America’s media.
In the news:
Muslims Assault U.S. Embassy in Indonesia
At Least 15 Die in Nigeria Cartoon Protest
Nigeria Militants Threaten to Hit Tankers
And so it goes.
Politics and Prosperity 