Two questions:

1) Do the Geneve Conventions protect terrorists? This is a question of fact.

2) Should the Geneva Conventions protect terrorists? This is a question of opinion.

I'll let Ace answer the latter first:

There are many reasons to object to extending Geneva Convention protections with full force to those, like Islamicists, who delight in cruelty and inhumanity. But one reason is psychological in nature, and nevertheless worth considering.

We cannot agree with the Islamists that we are subhuman and only they are entitled to honorable and humane treatement. We must insist, particularly with these racist thugs who consider those who do not share in their creed to be animals, that honor is based on reciprocal conduct and by compact.

We cannot agree that their status as fervent Islamists makes them our superiors and creates obligations towards them that they do not extend in return towards us.

For, if we do, are we not confirming their racist beliefs? Are we not telling them that we are, just as they believe, inferior to them by God's decree, and as such, fit only for slaughter or subjugation?

So, the answer to #2 is no, terrorist [my word] ought not be covered by the Geneva Conventions. But are they covered? This is a question of fact.

The Conventions apply to all prisoners of war. Should we consider Islamist insurgents prisoners of war? Let's see if they meet the conditions of a prisoner of war according to Article 4:2 of the Conventions:

(b) That of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance...

(d) That of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.

Posted by: Rusty at 07:02 PM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
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The Pulitzer is a joke. Always has been. It's the journalism equivalent of the Academy Award. No, worse. It's the journalism equivalent of the Daytime Emmys.

Like the Oscar or the Emmy, it is simply an in-house award. The Oscar & Emmy represent what Hollywood think, not what America thinks. Or did you actually believe most Americans are impressed with gay cowboys as art?

The Pulitzer represents what the media thinks about itself. It's a pat on the back to reporters who report what other reporters want to hear.

It is masturbation. No, it's a circle jerk. Nothing more, nothing less.

So, why is it that Dana Priest got a Pulitzer for doing nothing more than report what had been reported before? Previous reports had not seemed to hurt the Republican administration, her's did.

Can the Pulitzer committee be so crass as to use a political calculus for determining worthy recipients? You. Bet. Your. Ass.

This is the Pulitzer committee. These are who they give the Pulitzer to: Pulitzer Prize Given to Terrorists

Color me unsurprised.

Posted by: Rusty at 01:02 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Last December we debunked a terrorist produced video claiming to show that al Qaeda controlled the streets of Ramadi. Today, Bill Rogio debunks another 'major' offensive in Ramadi over the weekend.

It's interesting how a 'major' offensive can be carried out by the exact number of terrorists that can fit into a Toyota Corolla. It's also interesting to note the similarities between the video produced by a CNN 'stringer' (linked by Bill) and the video I have produced by a 'stringer' for the Islamic Media Center from which the image shown below was captured.

For your enjoyment, here is an image from our earlier debunking:

Thanks to Michelle for the link to my post and for bringing Bill's discovery to my attention. I didn't think I was going to have time to post anything else today-- and I really dont-- but I couldn't resist.

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Remember our good friend Bilal Hussein? He's an Iraq stringer who works for the AP and who's up-close and personal photos of terrorists in Iraq helped to gain that organization last year's Pulitzer. Well, he's back in the news. This time as part of an expose of how photos are staged, faked, & doctored by pro-terrorist stringers employed by the AP, AFP, Reuters, and Getty Images.

On one forum that I frequently visit, some of these doctored photos discussed in the article have been used to justify killing American soldiers in Iraq. In all cases they are used by Islamic extremists to justify their hatred of America and recruit new jihadis. Thus, the images used by the AP & other organizations--which are often staged and sometimes fake-- lead directly to the deaths of American troops and will eventually help justify the next act of terrorism against American civilians.

Via James Joyner here are some of the highlights of the National Journal article:

Thanks to digital technology, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are the most photographed in history. Photographers with digital cameras have provided, almost instantaneously, an enormous flood of accurate, dramatic, and even shocking images to people around the world. But the daily downloads of news photos include some that are staged, fake, or so lacking in context as to be meaningless, despite the Western media's best efforts to separate the factual from the fictional....

The photo editors for Time and The New York Times' Web site declined to comment. Other publications printed images of damage from the missile strike that seem entirely accurate. For example, Newsweek and The Washington Times published wide-angle photos of locals standing beside houses that had obviously been severely damaged. The New York Times print edition published the same wide-angle photo on January 18.....

The problem sharpens when no Western reporter is on the scene, but a photographer, usually an Iraqi stringer, is. Photo editors, or even local Western bureau chiefs, have trouble judging the veracity of the images that come from such an event. Last October, for example, The Washington Post printed a striking image of four caskets, purportedly containing dead women and children, and a line of mourning men on a flat desert plain outside the town of Ramadi, west of Baghdad. The photo, provided by the Associated Press, accompanied an article that began this way:

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I'll admit it, I'm a Dan Simmons fan. Both Hyperion & Return to Hyperion deal with the time paradox problem & I loved both books. Incidentally, one of the major heroes of the Hyperion series is a Muslim.

On that note, what if some one was to come back from the near future and warn you about the coming War with Islam, Eurabia, & a future global caliphate? And what if it was your society's own damn fault that they are enslaved in the future because they were so self-critical and unwilling to engage in the ruthlessness needed to win a war?

A brief conversation between Dan Simmons and a traveller from the future---read the whole thing:

I tried to relax. “What do you want to talk about?” I said.

“The Century War,” said the Time Traveler.

I blinked and tried to remember some history. “You mean the Hundred Year War? Fifteenth Century? Fourteenth? Sometime around there. Between . . . France and England? Henry V? Kenneth Branagh? Or was it . . .”

“I mean the Century War with Islam,” interrupted the Time Traveler. “Your future. Everyone’s.” He was no longer smiling. Without asking, or offering to pour me any, he stood, refilled his Scotch glass, and sat again. He said, “It was important to me to come back to this time early on in the struggle. Even if only to remind myself of how unspeakably blind you all were.”

“You mean the War on Terrorism,” I said.

“I mean the Long War with Islam,” he said. “The Century War. And it’s not over yet where I come from. Not close to being over.”

“You can’t have a war with Islam,” I said. “You can’t go to war against a religion. Radical Islam, maybe. Jihadism. Some extremists. But not a . . . the . . . religion itself. The vast majority of Muslims in the world are peaceloving people who wish us no harm. I mean . . . I mean . . . the very word ‘Islam’ means ‘Peace.’”

“So you kept telling yourselves,” said the Time Traveler. His voice was very low but there was a strange and almost frightening edge to it. “But the ‘peace’ in ‘Islam’ means ‘Submission.’ You’ll find that out soon enough”

Great, I was thinking. Of all the time travelers in all the gin joints in all the world, I get this racist, xenophobic, right-wing asshole.

“After Nine-eleven, we’re fighting terrorism,” I began, “not . . .”

He waved me into silence.....[snip]

Posted by: Rusty at 02:55 PM | Comments (20) | Add Comment
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So, the Democrats have a 'plan' to win the war on terror? Unfortunately, their plan seems to be exactly what the Mullahs of Iran, and their Salaafist rivals of the Sunni extremist camp, all predict. Withdrawal from Iraq is exactly what they want.

Amir Taheri in the WSJ:

For the past several weeks Mr. Abbasi has been addressing crowds of Guard and Baseej Mustadafin (Mobilization of the Dispossessed) officers in Tehran with a simple theme: The U.S. does not have the stomach for a long conflict and will soon revert to its traditional policy of "running away," leaving Afghanistan and Iraq, indeed the whole of the Middle East, to be reshaped by Iran and its regional allies.

To hear Mr. Abbasi tell it the entire recent history of the U.S. could be narrated with the help of the image of "the last helicopter." It was that image in Saigon that concluded the Vietnam War under Gerald Ford. Jimmy Carter had five helicopters fleeing from the Iranian desert, leaving behind the charred corpses of eight American soldiers. Under Ronald Reagan the helicopters carried the corpses of 241 Marines murdered in their sleep in a Hezbollah suicide attack. Under the first President Bush, the helicopter flew from Safwan, in southern Iraq, with Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf aboard, leaving behind Saddam Hussein's generals, who could not believe why they had been allowed live to fight their domestic foes, and America, another day. Bill Clinton's helicopter was a Black Hawk, downed in Mogadishu and delivering 16 American soldiers into the hands of a murderous crowd.

According to this theory, President George W. Bush is an "aberration," a leader out of sync with his nation's character and no more than a brief nightmare for those who oppose the creation of an "American Middle East." Messrs. Abbasi and Ahmadinejad have concluded that there will be no helicopter as long as George W. Bush is in the White House. But they believe that whoever succeeds him, Democrat or Republican, will revive the helicopter image to extricate the U.S. from a complex situation that few Americans appear to understand.

Mr. Ahmadinejad's defiant rhetoric is based on a strategy known in Middle Eastern capitals as "waiting Bush out." "We are sure the U.S. will return to saner policies," says Manuchehr Motakki, Iran's new Foreign Minister.

Hat tip to Allah. No, not really, hat tip Bill at INDC.

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Rob and American Future have more on the jihad started by Muhammed and which continues today.

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What would you do if every day you saw images of dead civilians, women, and children? Now, imagine that you are told these deaths were the result of Americans intentionally killing civilians. If this was your perception of reality, then you too would probably feel an obligation to fight America. At the very least, you would support those that took up arms.

Now imagine that it was mainstream media sources that were reporting Americans had massacred Iraqi civilians. The media, instead of challenging the version of the story as delivered by radical Islamists that routinely lie, equivocate and act as if the story told by U.S. soldiers is only one version of the truth. That the word of a U.S. soldier is just as suspect as that of Muqtada al Sadr.

Propagating the lie that U.S. soldiers massacre mosque worshippers constitutes a form of blood libel. By portraying American troops as blood thirsty murderers, jihadi propagandists create an atmosphere of obligatory vendettas. What moral person could stand by and let the Americans get away with this type of murder? By treating that lie as if it was a legitimate viewpont, the media help prolong the war on terror. Worse, they give jihadis recruiting power, which leads to the death of more U.S. soldiers and eventually civilians.

Take for instance this story from the Christian Science Monitor--a publication usually known for its excellent reporting--which treats the 'truth' as something unknowable:

Did US forces attack a mosque in a Shiite district of Baghdad Sunday night, killing 17 unarmed worshippers, an act that Iraq's Shiite interior minister called a "horrible violation" that has dominated Iraqi TV and sparked a political outcry?

Or, did Iraqi special forces, backed up by US advisers, take on a "terrorist cell" at an office complex, kill 16 "insurgents," and free an Iraqi hostage - only to have Iraqi provocateurs, as top US commanders allege, "set the scene up" to look like an atrocity?

The Asian Tribune is even worse, stating that a massacre occured as a matter of fact:

Iraq: US mosque massacre deepens occupationÂ’s crisis

The massacre of as many as 40 unarmed worshipers in a northeast Baghdad mosque Sunday has triggered a political crisis that threatens to accelerate IraqÂ’s descent into civil war while sharply intensifying the hatred of millions of Iraqis for the three-year-old US occupation of their country.

Deadly mosque raid in Iraq enrages Shiites

Shiite political leaders erupted in anger Monday over a U.S.-Iraqi raid that killed at least 16 people at a Baghdad mosque complex, suspending negotiations on the formation of a new government and spurring the provincial governor to cut ties with U.S. officials.

The British taxpayer supported BBC aids in the murdering of its own troops in Iraq by publishing pictures of the aftermath of the raid in which it declares as a matter of fact that it was against 'a Baghdad prayer complex'.

And here is a Washington Post article which also equivocates between the two sides. It identifies AP reporters who were oonvinced the complex raided was a mosque. Hmmm, I wonder if it was local pro-insurgent AP stringers often employed by that organization?

The question that arises is whether or not the media has some culpability in the death of U.S., British, Iraqi, and other Coalition soldiers when the stories they write inflame the fans of hatred and make winning the war impossible. When did the Chicago Tribune forget that it was in Chicago? When did the Washington Post forget that it was in Washington? Do these organizations have any loyalty whatsoever to their country and fellow citizens? Or are they so cosmopolitan that they believe the death of a U.S. soldier is no more sad than the death of a member of Muqtada al Sadr's terror brigades?

UPDATE: More commentary from Bluto here.

Posted by: Rusty at 03:26 PM | Comments (22) | Add Comment
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W. Thomas Smith in Townhall:

Perception is everything. And when applied to the war in Iraq, perception, public opinion, and a far-reaching press are all variables that could ultimately have a hand in any setback or defeat for U.S. and coalition forces in that country...

I do, however, have concerns about false and deliberatively inflammatory propaganda aimed at manipulating audiences. I am not suggesting that any press – good or bad – be quashed. What’s good or bad is open to interpretation anyway. But I think we should recognize the difference between news (including reported facts, analysis, and opinion) and propaganda.

We will only win the war on terror when the media bias becomes one in favor of American victory rather than one of defeatism.

Posted by: Rusty at 10:07 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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Active duty deaths during Clinton's first four years (1993 - 1996): 4302

Active duty deaths during Bush's first four years (2001 - 2004): 5187

Here's where that data is from via Rob at Say Anything.

That's 881 more deaths under Bush's watch in those four years (no data available after that). See especially the sharp decline in the number of homicides and suicides now compared to those glorious Clinton years. Can somebody remind me what the Clinton administration accomplished militarily in those years?

More discussion here.

Posted by: Rusty at 02:57 PM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
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Time to send some of that mad Sandcrawler traffic to the wonderful people whose brilliance allows me to schlep on the couch all day scarfing bon-bons and watching 24 repeat marathons on A&E (what Rusty calls "fishing"):

Kyer: A third anniversary tribute.

Tee Bee: V for Vendetta = G for Get Over Yourselves, It's Just A Frickin' Movie.

Muslihoon: The Hitchiker's Guide To Taqqiya.

The Dread Pundit Bluto: Not cross posted at The Jawa Report and Vince Aut Morire.

Merri: Abu Ghraib? What Abu Ghraib?

Me: I am suffering major blogger burnout. It must be all of those "Bush Planned 911" emails I get every f***ing day.

And, as an added bonus, a full length reprint of a post done by Muslihoon at my home blog under the fold. It's a Part 2, the link to Part One is in there somewhere. Since he didn't cross-post it at his blog, I think it's okay for me to cross-post it for him here. more...

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The Big Pharaoh has a collection of reactions from Muslim commenters regarding the upcoming trial of Abduhl Rahman in Afghanistan for apostasy. Remember, these are comments on an English language website--not al Jazeera. Here are a few zingers:

"I am a female medical student. Converting out of Islam is forbidden"

"In our law, a person who forsakes the religion should be killed and there is no freedom in this regard."

"To my secular Muslim brothers who are expressing their sympathy towards this man: these are the teachings of Islam, no negotiations in them."

Posted by: Rusty at 02:31 PM | Comments (23) | Add Comment
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I can't name a single televangelist I like. Not. A. Single. One. It's not so much the shallowness of their theology as it is their staged and canny performances. There seems to be something fundamentally wrong with turning the divine into a stage show. So, what to make of this CNN report about a popular Muslim televangelist from Egypt?

Notice the subtitle: Popular Egyptian televangelist tries to bridge Islam and West

He must be some kind of moderate, right? Well, yes, in fact, he is. But as we've discussed here dozens of times, being a moderate in the Islamic world is still a far cry from ideal [emphasis mine]:

Islamic televangelist Amr Khaled is young, smiling, teaches love and mercy and is so popular he's credited with inspiring thousands of women -- turned off by dour, traditional clerics -- to take on the veil. ....

He is a very simple, moderate, humble man, easygoing. He makes you feel like you are his sister," said Zeinab el-Sherif, 32, a wealthy, veiled Egyptian businesswoman who has been a fan since hearing Khaled at her club a decade ago.

"He is so tolerant and friendly, he makes you feel good about your religion and yourself," she said.

The entire article paints Amr Khaled as the seminal moderate Imam. Sure, he's moderate by Muslim standards--he doesn't want to kill those who blaspheme Muhammed, he just, you know, wants to pass laws making irreverancy illegal. And, ladies, when you're not busy soiling your panties over his charm and good looks, please remember to put on your veil. We wouldn't want an uncovered head to force an otherwise chaste Muslim brother to rape you. Because, if he did, we'd probably have to kill you.

This much credit I will give to Christian televangelists: at least they give lip service to a God deeply concerned with human freedom, liberty, and dignity. So, maybe all televangelists are snake-oil salesmen--but at least there is some value to what our guys are selling.

Thanks to Fred Fry for sending the link.

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If the NY Times can get away with misleading headlines, why can't I? Newly released documents confirm that the Saddam Hussein regime actively funded al Qaeda linked terror organizations. Abu Sayyaf is al Qaeda's Southeast Asia wing--all emphasis mineWeekly Standard:

SADDAM HUSSEIN'S REGIME PROVIDED FINANCIAL support to Abu Sayyaf, the al Qaeda-linked jihadist group founded by Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law in the Philippines in the late 1990s, according to documents captured in postwar Iraq. An eight-page fax dated June 6, 2001, and sent from the Iraqi ambassador in Manila to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Baghdad, provides an update on Abu Sayyaf kidnappings and indicates that the Iraqi regime was providing the group with money to purchase weapons. The Iraqi regime suspended its support--temporarily, it seems--after high-profile kidnappings, including of Americans, focused international attention on the terrorist group.

A SECOND internal Iraqi file obtained by The Weekly Standard concerns relations between Iraqi Intelligence and Saudi opposition groups. The document was apparently compiled at some point after January 1997, judging by the most recent date in the text, and discusses four Saudi opposition groups: the Committee for Defense of Legitimate Rights, the Reform and Advice Committee (Osama bin Laden), People of al Jazeera Union Organization, and the Saudi Hezbollah.

The New York Times first reported on the existence of this file on June 25, 2004. "American officials described the document as an internal report by the Iraqi intelligence service detailing efforts to seek cooperation with several Saudi opposition groups, including Mr. bin Laden's organization, before al Qaeda had become a full-fledged terrorist organization." According to the Times, a Pentagon task force "concluded that the document 'appeared authentic,' and that it 'corroborates and expands on previous reporting' about contacts between Iraqi intelligence and Mr. bin Laden in Sudan, according to the task force's analysis."

The most provocative aspect of the document is the discussion of efforts to seek cooperation between Iraqi Intelligence and the Saudi opposition group run by bin Laden, known to the Iraqis as the "Reform and Advice Committee." The translation of that section appears below.

We moved towards the committee by doing the following:

A. During the visit of the Sudanese Dr. Ibrahim al-Sanusi to Iraq and his meeting with Mr. Uday Saddam Hussein, on December 13, 1994, in the presence of the respectable, Mr. Director of the Intelligence Service, he [Dr. al-Sanusi] pointed out that the opposing Osama bin Laden, residing in Sudan, is reserved and afraid to be depicted by his enemies as an agent of Iraq. We prepared to meet him in Sudan (The Honorable Presidency was informed of the results of the meeting in our letter 782 on December 17, 1994).

B. An approval to meet with opposer Osama bin Laden by the Intelligence Services was given by the Honorable Presidency in its letter 138, dated January 11, 1995 (attachment 6). He [bin Laden] was met by the previous general director of M4 in Sudan and in the presence of the Sudanese, Ibrahim al-Sanusi, on February 19, 1995. We discussed with him his organization. He requested the broadcast of the speeches of Sheikh Sulayman al-Uda (who has influence within Saudi Arabia and outside due to being a well known religious and influential personality) and to designate a program for them through the broadcast directed inside Iraq, and to perform joint operations against the foreign forces in the land of Hijaz. (The Honorable Presidency was informed of the details of the meeting in our letter 370 on March 4, 1995, attachment 7.)

C. The approval was received from the Leader, Mr. President, may God keep him, to designate a program for them through the directed broadcast. We were left to develop the relationship and the cooperation between the two sides to see what other doors of cooperation and agreement open up. The Sudanese side was informed of the Honorable Presidency's agreement above, through the representative of the Respectable Director of Intelligence Services, our Ambassador in Khartoum.

D. Due to the recent situation of Sudan and being accused of supporting and embracing of terrorism, an agreement with the opposing Saudi Osama bin Laden was reached. The agreement required him to leave Sudan to another area. He left Khartoum in July 1996. The information we have indicates that he is currently in Afghanistan. The relationship with him is ongoing through the Sudanese side. Currently we are working to invigorate this relationship through a new channel in light of his present location.

Hat tip: Captain Ed and The Commissar.

Posted by: Rusty at 03:25 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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It's almost as if they wanted us to lose in Iraq.....

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The man shown in a now infamous photograph falling from the Twin Towers on 9/11 has been identified as Jonathan Briley, a claim made by the British tabloid, The Mirror. A documentary about 'The Falling Man' will be aired on the British TV channel 4 tomorrow. Briley was one of dozens who chose to end their own lives by jumping, rather than face the horror of being burned alive. The Mirror:

Five years after the horror of September 9, 2001, the falling man has finally been identified as Jonathan Briley, a 43-year-old who worked in a restaurant at the top of the north tower.

Over the years, his family has always assumed he perished in the building. Now, learning he had jumped is almost too much to bear.

His father, Alexander, a Baptist minister, has still not come to terms with the manner of his son's dying. "I can't talk about it," he says. "My life's work is telling people that they have to go on after tragedy, but I can't do it for myself."

Jonathan's elder sister, Gwendolyn, says: "When I first looked at the picture... and I saw it was a man - tall, slim - I said, 'If I didn't know any better, that could be Jonathan'....

THEY caught a man, seemingly calm, plunging to his inevitable death.

The picture was published around the world, causing widespread revulsion, as if merely looking at them was to intrude upon a moment of private agony. After September 12, the picture was rarely shown again, but Tom Junod couldn't get the image out of his head and spent years trying to discover the identity of the Falling Man.

It was executive chef Michael Lomonaco who finally solved the mystery.

"Jonathan fitted the body type, the skin colour, and it left the door open for a possibility that it was really Jonathan," Lomonaco says.

Jonathan's father is still too upset to speak about his son but his sister, Gwendolyn, is ready to talk.

"Jonathan was a person who just loved life and it was contagious so that when we were around him, you couldn't help smiling and laughing." Nobody will ever know for sure if Jonathan was the Falling Man, although the evidence makes it highly likely.

In one of the pictures, his white shirt is blown away by the wind to reveal an orange T-shirt - identical to the one he wore to work.

But as Gwendolyn says: "It's not about trying to find out who he is, but what his death says to all of us." And what it says is ... never again.

Thanks to Olivia for sending the link and for reminding readers that this drives home the point that the struggle against Islamofascism is not about race, but about a murderous and totalitarian ideology.

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin has a moving tribute here.

Posted by: Rusty at 04:55 PM | Comments (58) | Add Comment
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Today, two different opinion pieces target the same important issue, one that we need to not only hear much more about, but one that we must get deadly serious about making our number one priority - the battle over ideologies, to win the battle of hearts and minds with the clear objective of ending the threat of terrorism by the totalitarian ideologies of Islamic jihadism. (It is wrong and even deceitful to argue that jihadism has nothing to do with Islam, because the jihadists believe that they are acting as "true Islamic believers" and learn the Islamist mind-set in mosques and Islamic schools, including those of the Islamic diaspora in Europe).

We in the United States, the Western Europeans and other allies, as well as moderate Muslims, are engaged in a global battle of ideas, and our enemy is "barbaric if possible and deadly and suicidal if necessary." This battle is against those who want to "destroy the secular Western societies of Europe and the United States, moderate Muslim societies throughout the Middle East, as well as India, Indonesia and Israel, to mention just a few". There is no negotiating our way through this war, that's impossible, and defeat is unthinkable.

The challenge that we in the West face, along with our allies, is to utterly discredit the totalitarian ideologies of jihadism just as we discredited Nazism and communism before. And we need President Bush and all of our leaders" to lead us in the ideological fight just as Ronald Reagan did in the Cold War. "We need to hear from him – and the rest of our leaders – the kind of blunt comparisons we heard from Reagan - that radical Islam enslaves people."

In Jed Babbin's excellent opinion piece at Real Clear Politics, we are reminded of our failure to adequately engage the Islamists in the idealogical battle that is as much a necessity in the War on Terror as the military operations:

(...) We arenÂ’t fighting a war against terrorists to win the hearts and minds of the Middle East. We are fighting it to end the threat of terrorism. Victory canÂ’t be achieved with bullets and bombs alone. This is, at its core, an ideological war. Just as we defeated communism by defeating the communistsÂ’ ideology, we need to attack and destroy that of the radical Islamists.

(...) To do that, we first have to understand that radical Islam – the Islam of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Usama bin Laden and the rest – isn’t a religion. It is an ideology that cobbles totalitarianism together with a messianic vision of religious nationalism. Radical Islam (unlike the actual religion) tolerates no other religion, and demands that its adherents give up the basic human freedoms enshrined in our Bill of Rights. No freedom of speech, no free press, no fair trials by a jury of your peers, only enslavement. Like the Nazis, the radical Islamists play on the sense of persecution and cultural inferiority that many people in underdeveloped nations have because they are truly oppressed. And, like the Nazis, the Islamists have convinced their followers that the problems of their world are the fault of others. The Islamists blame every ill of their world on America, the West, the Jews and Israel. Like the Soviets, the Islamists believe that their enslavement of the world is inevitable (though, unlike the Soviets, they believe it is God’s will that they must succeed). Its adherents, like the Nazis and the Communists before them, believe their victory is both inevitable and irreversible. That is a powerful ideology which we have yet to engage with the necessary weapons.

(...) Our military – comprised of many of the best people our country has ever produced – is winning every fight it enters. But it can’t win the war alone. Our politicians have to do that by fighting the ideological war.

(...) President Bush needs to lead us in the ideological fight just as Ronald Reagan did in the Cold War. We need to hear from him – and the rest of our leaders – the kind of blunt comparisons we heard from Reagan. Radical Islam enslaves people.

Read all of "Fighting the Ideological War".

Ariel Cohen, Ph.D., a Senior Research Fellow in the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies at The Heritage Foundation, offers agreement with Babbin (above) that we are engaged in an ideological battle, and in referring to the latest violent convulsion in Iraq, he says that this homicidal rage has nothing to do with the United States. It has everything to do with the political ideology of militant Islam: more...

Posted by: Richard@hyscience at 02:21 PM | Comments (15) | Add Comment
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Jewish terrorists: throw firecrackers.

Muslim terrorists: bombs.

A lot of nuts in the world. Some are more deadly than others.

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I got this letter from a Muslim urging me to refrain from making fun of his religion (scroll down), so I felt it necessary to respond publicly.

As regular readers know, I'm totally cool with Muslims. It's Islam I don't like. As a non-Muslim, I can't know what true Islam is---just as a non-Catholic and non-Protestant I can't know what true Christianity is. That's an internal debate that you Muslims need to be having (and are having) with yourselves.

And even though I don't consider myself a traditional Christian, I do consider myself a follower of Jesus and I've read the Bible dozens of times. So, while I'm not an expert on true 'Christianity', I do have a fairly in depth knowledge of the Old and New Testaments. I do have an opinion, then, on what the Bible says and means.

I have also read the Quran. All of it. Several times. I've also read many of the hadiths (traditions). So, I'm not an expert about true Islam, but I do believe I have enough information to have an opinion on what the Quran says and means.

So, here are my opinions about them.

Old Testament: Pretty bloody horrifying. Luckily, Judaism does not treat the Old Testament as the literal word of God. Further, as the story of the Old Testament unfolds, Jehovah seems to get a lot nicer. Good on you LORD for growing up. (If you don't think that God can handle criticism, then I'd suggest you don't know too many Jews.)

New Testament: Pretty cool, except for all the pacifism stuff. Jesus seems to clearly be a pacifist in my reading. Which is fine, as long as Christians were in the minority. But once Christians became a majority--in other words, once they controlled the state--pacifism doesn't seem all that great to me. Luckily, theology was able to take care of dangerous pacifism. Further, no theologian I know of treats the New Testament as the literal word of God. Even fundamentalists only claim that it was inspired of God--that the words are those of Paul, not God's.

Quran: Pretty frightening. Not only does it have all of the bad stuff from the Old Testament, but Islam treats the words of the Koran as the literal word of God. These are God's words, not Muhammed's (or Gabriel's). The Quran is not a collection of stories, but, as Reza Aslan says, it is the "Divine monologue."

If these are God's words, then I'm a monkey's uncle. Either I am very wrong about God being a pretty cool dude, or the God described in the Quran is not God at all. In fact, Allah, if we take him at his word (as he himself reveals it in the Quran), is an asshole. He's worse than Hitler.

So, I won't apologize for making fun of the Quran. I do not believe it is the word of God. If I'm wrong, and Allah is God, then he certainly does not deserve to be worshipped or followed. Further, I do not believe that it has any redeeming value whatsoever. I do not believe any of it. None.

Hadiths: Don't teach us much, except that Muhammed is not someone I would like to hang out with. He was a pedophile. He marries a 6 year old, but we are to believe that it's okay, because he really doesn't have sex with Aisha until she's 9. Yeah, that makes everything better. He is a genocidal maniac. He wipes out entire tribes. He's a fascist. He thinks it's cool to kill any one who gives up the faith. So, no I don't believe he was a Prophet.

There is no God named Allah and Muhammed is not a Prophet.

Incidentally, I don't believe Sidhartha actually found enlightenment under the Bodi tree. But I have a great deal of respect for the Buddha. I don't believe that Baha'u'llah was a Prophet. But I do have a great deal of respect for the content of his writings and the Baha'i faith.

Muhammed, I have no respect for. It's not so much that I reject him as a Prophet--there are a lot of people who I don't accept as a Prophet, but whom I respect--as it is that he was a sick S.O.B. who also had a lot of destructive things to say.

If you want to follow Muhammed that's your right. But it is also my right to criticize him. If you want me to refrain from criticizing him, then I'd first suggest that you take away my right to bear arms. Because, you will find that I will give up both of those rights over my cold, dead body.

If you want me to end my criticism, then you'll have to first convince me that Muhammed and the Quran are worth respect. Since I've read a lot of the hadiths, and the entire Quran, I know better.

If it makes you feel better, if your Quran actually doesn't have all the bad stuff in it, and you don't take as authoritative the stuff about Muhammed screwing a child and engaging in genocide, then I'm totaly hip to your Islam. But, then, your Islam is not traditional Islam. In that case, I'm not criticizing Islam as you know it, or the Quran as you know it, or Muhammed as you know him, but I am criticizing some other Islam, some other Quran, and some other Muhammed.

If such is the case, what is the problem?

My response is below. UPDATE: Here is Bluto's response. Here is Howie's response. more...

Posted by: Rusty at 11:09 AM | Comments (25) | Add Comment
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Via NRO.

All I want to say about this now is what I said on my blog about the word "manifesto." It just sounds so....Marx. Kaczynski, even.

Anyway, read it for yourself. more...

Posted by: Vinnie at 06:55 PM | Comments (13) | Add Comment
Post contains 774 words, total size 5 kb.