[secretagent]

Which is all Islam is to the terror masters. He speaks of their self-righteousness, accurately enough. But they haven't an actually righteous bone in their bodies. And until that is seen as the crucial issue in the Muslim world, the war is still with us.

I think of Mohammed - a killer himself. Righteousness in Islam seems congruent with killing all infidels in the world, if necessary, and I've heard it said that the older Mohammed got more viscious than the younger, "liberal", Mohammed. The last words don't sound good for us.

All religions seem like fairy tales to me, so I can only stand outside and speculate about deeply held Islamic beliefs.

The suicide bombers sure seem sincere, and some of their leaders have suffered torture and execution for their faith. I don't know of a more severe proof of conviction than sumitting to torture and execution for one's belief. Deep conviction and determination conserning what looks to me like a bad fairy tale.

But the Koran does contradict itself, apparently, and has the tolerant quotes for sincere liberal Muslims.

All of it whackdoodle to me, and sincere Muslims can die fighting each other over the "true" version. At least I hope some liberal Muslims will emerge, ones willing to die for their more enlightened Islam, since apprently it will take that to win.

But seeing Islam as demented, I hold out hope for enough of them snapping out of it all together, with agnostic children standing on the shoulders of their liberal parents. The Indonesians seem halfway there, as the author describes them.

[JasonC]

"I don't know of a more severe proof of conviction than sumitting to torture and execution" Men do not submit to torture and execution to prove their beliefs, but to defy torturers and executioners. The test of conviction is whether one lives that way oneself. These people have no belief in a just judge who searches hearts. It is all about worldly power to them. The worldly power of a movement or a group, not of themselves as isolated individuals, no doubt. That is still entirely worldly and has nothing "holy" about it.

And I know what you are saying, and is it what the article writer is also saying, and it is what has been tried for a century in the Islamic world, and it is never going to work. They are not going to drop Islam and forget about it and become secular and develop warm fuzzy feelings about westerners because we are so much more fun that religion and morality.

If you make it a contest in which they either give up their faith entirely or fight you to the death, they will fight you to the death until the end of the world. And they will think it righteousness, and you and I and the entire west corruptors whose sole motive is to detach them from their religion.

They are perfectly willing to learn from your example to only care about this worldly effects and this worldly power. That to them counsels only fighting. You can't cure cynicism with a double dose of it plus a bare belly button. The only thing that will convince them not to act immorally is -morality-.