Posted on 03/25/2006 12:34:52 PM PST by the anti-liberal
The fragile Afghan state is protected by American, British, Canadian, Australian, Italian and other troops, hundreds of whom have died. You cannot ask Americans or Britons to expend blood and treasure to build a society in which a man can be executed for his choice of religion. You cannot tell a Canadian soldier serving in Kandahar that he, as a Christian, must sacrifice his life to create a Muslim state in which his faith is a capital offense.
As always, we come back to the words of Osama bin Laden: "When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the strong horse." That's really the only issue: The Islamists know our side have tanks and planes, but they have will and faith, and they reckon in a long struggle that's the better bet. Most prominent Western leaders sound way too eager to climb into the weak-horse suit and audition to play the rear end. Consider, for example, the words of the Prince of Wales, speaking a few days ago at al-Azhar University in Cairo, which makes the average Ivy League nuthouse look like a beacon of sanity. Anyway, this is what His Royal Highness had to say to 800 Islamic "scholars":
"The recent ghastly strife and anger over the Danish cartoons shows the danger that comes of our failure to listen and to respect what is precious and sacred to others. In my view, the true mark of a civilized society is the respect it pays to minorities and to strangers."
That's correct. But the reality is that our society pays enormous respect to minorities - President Bush holds a monthlong Ramadan-a-ding-dong at the White House every year. The immediate reaction to the slaughter of 9/11 by Western leaders everywhere was to visit a mosque to demonstrate their great respect for Islam. One party to this dispute is respectful to a fault: after all, to describe the violence perpetrated by Muslims over the Danish cartoons as the "recent ghastly strife" barely passes muster as effete Brit toff understatement.
Unfortunately, what's "precious and sacred" to Islam is its institutional contempt for others. In his book "Islam And The West," Bernard Lewis writes, "The primary duty of the Muslim as set forth not once but many times in the Quran is 'to command good and forbid evil.' It is not enough to do good and refrain from evil as a personal choice. It is incumbent upon Muslims also to command and forbid." Or as the Canadian columnist David Warren put it: "We take it for granted that it is wrong to kill someone for his religious beliefs. Whereas Islam holds it is wrong not to kill him." In that sense, those imams are right, and Karzai's attempts to finesse the issue are, sharia-wise, wrong.
I can understand why the president and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would rather deal with this through back channels, private assurances from their Afghan counterparts, etc. But the public rhetoric is critical, too. At some point we have to face down a culture in which not only the mob in the street but the highest judges and academics talk like crazies. Abdul Rahman embodies the question at the heart of this struggle: If Islam is a religion one can only convert to, not from, then in the long run it is a threat to every free person on the planet.
I concur. I love reading and hearing Steyn. You can read him on steynonline.com, and he is on Hugh Hewitt's radio program every Thursday. He has such a great wit on top of his great writing.
Sadly, his column will not be in the Telegraph anymore.
THAT guy would win the aforementioned audition in street clothes!
You do realize that THAT guy is Kerry?
Yup. And I realize he's a horse's ass!
I do a lot of things, within the law, recognizing that Muslims have rights. Whatever legal precedent is set denying them their rights can later be used to deny me mine.
The Old Testament contains a number of passages calling for violence against homosexuals and adulterers. Do all Jews subscribe to those passages?
All Muslims are not as fanatical as you seem to believe.
Stop issuing visas.
What do you do with the ones that are already here?
Cancel their visas and annul any naturalizations.
What rights would you allow to US citizens who practice Islam?
The same as all other US citizens.
Neither will last another twenty years.
You left out the best part:
". At some point we have to face down a culture in which not only the mob in the street but the highest judges and academics talk like crazies. Abdul Rahman embodies the question at the heart of this struggle: If Islam is a religion one can only convert to, not from, then in the long run it is a threat to every free person on the planet.
What can we do? Should governments with troops in Afghanistan pass joint emergency legislation conferring their citizenship on this poor man and declaring him, as much as Karzai, under their protection?
In a more culturally confident age, the British in India were faced with the practice of "suttee" - the tradition of burning widows on the funeral pyres of their husbands. Gen. Sir Charles Napier was impeccably multicultural:
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: When men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks, and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
India today is better off without suttee. If we shrink from the logic of that, then in Afghanistan and many places far closer to home the implications are, as the Prince of Wales would say, "ghastly."
I like that.
Unfortunately, cultural relativism has produced a generation of spineless idiotarians who, because they do not stand for something solid, they stand for nothing - the notion of American customs has become eroded to the point that there are none. We have nothing to stand on.
Thank you very much Liberal Socialists.
Some other basis for denial or cancellation must be used.
Steyn has hit it out of the park again. Crystal clear in his thinking and reasoning.
Secondly, it has repeatedly been the case that the exigencies of war permit all sorts of executive action which would normally be considered impermissible.
As President Lincoln so famously put it, "the Constitution is not a suicide pact".
Long Live the Queen, indeed!
If not, we are limited, if we are, we should be doing more than we are...
"Can" and "will" are two different things. It is time to recall that the Constitution is not a suicide pact.
The redefinition of Islam from its current ill-considered status as a bogus pseudo-religion, to a political ideology, is inevitable and will happen at some point in the future. The fact is that Islam is a conspiracy to overthrow the government of the United States(among others), and is therefore by definition illegal. All moslems are de facto members of this conspiracy unless concrete acts can be shown to the contrary.
It must be so, to preserve western civilization. Failing that, the time will come that the Second Amendment will be the defining fact of life of the American citizen, not a footnote for the pundits to mess with.
Are you saying that Muslims whose visas have been canceled can not sue?
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