The Enemy At Home (Dinesh D’Souza argues that the cultural Left is responsible for 9/11)

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Dinesh D’Souza, the Rishwain Research Scholar at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He is the author of several bestselling books, including Illiberal Education, The Virtue of Prosperity, and What's So Great About America. He is the author of the new book The Enemy At Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11.

FP: I’d like to announce to our readers right up front that Mr. D’Souza and I disagree with each other on various aspects of his argument in his new book. And the two of us have had an exchange here at Frontpage about our disagreements. However, out of courtesy to Mr. D’Souza, in this first part of our interview we will allow him to express his thesis without any rebuttal from my end. In this way, Mr. D'Souza can crystallize his main points without us getting into a point-counterpoint exchange which may prevent his main thesis from being clearly synthesized. Then, in tomorrow’s issue, we will publish the debate between us.

D’Souza: While I was researching my previous book What’s So Great About America I realized that there was a big debate about Islamic radicalism going on in this country, but it bore little or no resemblance to what Muslims were saying in their own countries. A good example of this is Sayyid Qutb, the Egyptian writer who has been called “the brains behind Bin Laden.” Here in this country we hear that the Islamic radicals are against science and capitalism and democracy. “They hate us for our freedom.” Qutb was for science and capitalism. He supported democracy. Yes, he wanted an Islamic state under sharia. His point was that sharia should reflect the religious and moral sentiments of the Muslim people. His anti-Americanism was based on what he saw as the paganism and immorality of American culture. He didn’t hate us for our freedom, he hated us for how we have used our freedom.

FP: One of the points you stress is that the war on terror is not a “war of competing fundamentalisms” between Islamic fundamentalism and Christian fundamentalism. Tell us why you find it important to make this point.

D’Souza: If this was a war of competing fundamentalisms, then clearly the solution is secularism. And this is what many people, mostly on the left but some on the right, are recommending today. “Bring on the Islamic Reformation.” These people think that an Islamic Reformation would go down the same path as the Protestant Reformation, toward secularism. But Islam is in the middle of a Reformation. The only problem is that during such a time there is a return to origins, to the way the faith started. Islam began with a unification of church and state, an infusion of Islam into all aspects of the society. And this is what many Muslims want, not just “fundamentalists” but also traditional Muslims.

So when religious Muslims look at America, what they object to is not Christian fundamentalism but what they see as an official stance of atheism. Bin Laden calls America the fountainhead of global paganism, and many Muslims agree. We don’t think of separation of church and state as atheism, but Islam is a religion of law rather than creed. Islam in this respect is like ancient Judaism. So for Muslims, the idea of expelling God out of the public sphere of society is atheism. In fighting America the radical Muslims believe they are protecting not just Islam but monotheism against the greatest embodiment and promoters of atheism in the world, which is us.

FP: You argue that liberal popular culture has created a blowback of resistance from traditional cultures, especially Islamic culture. Kindly explain.

D’Souza: Here in America we know that there is a distinction between the values of American popular culture and the values by which Americans live. But for a Muslim on the streets of Cairo or Islamabad, American popular culture reflects what America is all about. Our popular culture is our country’s face to the world. There is an attractive aspect to this culture, its vitality and individuality. But there is also a lot in this culture that is excessive and trivial and indecent and shameful. I’m not just talking about rap music and Jerry Springer, but also about so-called high culture. Eve Ensler is very proud that her “Vagina Monologues” has played worldwide, including in many Muslim countries. She is especially proud of sequences in which people stand up and discuss their vaginas. Now you have to remember that outside of Europe andAmerica, most of the cultures of the world are quite traditional. They are socially quite conservative. Islamic culture is especially conservative in valuing female modesty and childhood innocence. So things that we may consider edgy or “pushing the envelope” here in America are, in the Muslim world, considered shocking evidence of American moral degeneracy. The radical Muslims say it’s one thing for Americans to have these perversions in their own society, but now they are forcing it upon the rest of the world. So the call to jihad is issued defensively: to protect Islamic society from values that will undermine the religion and destroy the family and corrupt the children.

FP: If Islam rejects separation of church and state, how can Muslim countries become democratic?

D’Souza: Separation of church and state is an American invention. Even the Europeans don’t have it. In England you have the Anglican church which is an official establishment. Even European countries which are more secular than the United States often give money to religious schools and so on. So religious establishment is consistent with religious toleration. And religious toleration is an idea that has long been upheld in Islam. When Catholic Spain gave the Jews three choices—leave the country, convert to Christianity, or be killed—Jews and other religious minorities were living peacefully and practicing their religion in Muslim empires, from the Mughal empire in India to the Abbasid empire and later the Ottoman empire based in Turkey. True, the Islamic empires discriminated against other religions, but they put up with them and gave them considerable control over their own communities. The radical Muslims are trying to get rid of this tradition of religious toleration, but the traditional Muslims still abide by it. Here is something within the Muslim tradition that can provide a foundation for Muslim democracy.

FP: You cite Abu Ghraib as an example of the depravity of “liberal family values.” Why exactly do you say this?

D’Souza: For Muslims, torture was not the big story at Abu Ghraib. Historian Bernard Lewis has said that compared to prisons anywhere in the Muslim world, Abu Ghraib was like Disneyland. Many of the infamous pictures depicting captives blindfolded, or with wires all around them—that was simulated torture, not real torture. What really scandalized the Muslim world was the pictures of sexual depravity. Now even some conservatives minimized this at the time, I guess in the hope that it would make the scandal go away. “It was just a fraternity prank,” and so on. But for traditional societies where honor is the highest social value, there is nothing amusing about taking a religious man and putting a woman’s underwear on his head. There is no humor in stripping him naked and forcing him to masturbate while you take photos. For many Muslims Abu Ghraib was an illustration of what perverts Americans have become, and how lightly we tread on other people’s sacred beliefs. We think that a little sexual tomfoolery is nothing compared to cutting of a man’s head and broadcasting the assassination on the Internet. But for many Muslims, it’s bad to kill a man but it’s worse to strip away his honor. This is why some traditional Muslims are reluctant to condemn their radical counterparts. They don’t want to be seen as taking the side of Western depravity, a depravity that my book shows to be the product of contemporary liberalism.

FP: You challenge the idea that radical Muslims are against modern science, democracy and capitalism. How come?

D’Souza: Because they’re not. Read the works of the leading thinkers of Islamic radicalism, like Qutb and Sharia’ti and Mawdudi. They are all champions of modern science. They like capitalism. Now democracy is a trickier issue. Here the radical Muslims are divided. Some, like Qutb, support democracy while others say we cannot allow the will of the people to substitute for the will of God. But in the last decade and a half most of the leading organizations of radical Islam have become enthusiastic proponents of democracy. Why? Not because they have been reading The Federalist Papers. The reason they support democracy is that they have discovered that this is an excellent way to come to power. Look at the success of the Islamic Salvation Front in Algeria in the 1990s. Or the success of Hamas. Or of the Muslim Brotherhood in the Egyptian parliamentary election.

D’Souza: First the liberals advising Jimmy Carter helped radical Islam to capture its first major state. Since the 1920s the radical Muslims were on the margins of society. But in 1979 they came to power in Iran. How did this happen? Well, our friend Carter was elected in 1976 on a human rights platform. The liberals went to Carter and said, “You can’t support the Shah of Iran because he is a dictator. He has a secret police. He violates human rights.” And so Carter began to pull the Persian rug out from under America’s ally. As resistance to the Shah mounted, Carter urged the Shah not to resist it but to abdicate, which he did. And the result was Khomeini. In trying to get rid of the bad guy, liberal foreign policy brought us the worse guy. Khomeini invented the idea that America is the Great Satan. He called for martyrdom in the cause of fighting America. Without Khomeini, we would never have had Bin Laden. Khomeini paved the way for 9/11. I’m not even going to get into Clinton’s role in emboldening Bin Laden to strike when he did. I’ll leave that for people to read in my book.

FP: You say the left wants us to lose in Iraq. But why? Aren’t the Islamic radicals a threat to women’s rights and gay rights?

D’Souza: It’s quite clear that the left wants us to lose the war on terror. Some people like Michael Moore and Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn are outspoken in saying this. But even people who don’t say it clearly wish it. If you think the left wants us to win, then its actions become baffling and mysterious. You have to labor hard to figure out why they speak and act like they do. On the other hand if you assume the left wants us to lose, then all its rhetoric and actions make complete sense. But why? Because the left is a bit scared of Bin Laden but it is very scared of Bush. The left doesn’t like Bin Laden but it absolutely hates Bush. And while Bin Laden and his allies are the “far enemy,” Bush and the conservatives are the “near enemy.” As the left sees it, Bin Laden threatens sharia in Baghdad, but Bush threatens sharia in Boston. Imagine one or two more conservative court appointments and the whole liberal agenda of the past half-century is jeopardized. So the left is quite willing to ally with the lesser evil, the Islamic radicals, in order to defeat the greater evil, Bush and the right.

FP: We have a difficult time with the word “treason” now. Is treason the problem?

D’Souza: No, because the left loves America. Yes, I know David Horowitz is going to do a double-take on that, but it’s true. I’ll say it again: Michael Moore loves America. The only thing is that he loves a different American that we do. What he loves is liberal America, the America of labor revolts and bra-burning and the Stonewall riots and Roe v. Wade. What he hates is traditional or conservative America. Jeanine Garofalo said that she hates it when people wave the American flag but she gets teary-eyed when they burn the American flag. That’s because she identifies the flag with traditional American values. So she’s not anti-American: her patriotism is based on an allegiance to liberal American values.

D’Souza: I am not sure how we are doing in Iraq. It’s hard to say because the media accounts are so untrustworthy. It’s important we win because we don’t want radical Islam getting its hands on a second major state. They already have Iran, and that’s a big enough problem. If Iraq falls, you can be sure that Egypt and Saudi Arabia will be targeted next. This is not Vietnam, which was peripheral to our vital interests. Our whole way of life, not to mention our security, depends at least for the foreseeable future, on a stable Middle East. So the stakes in Iraq are very high, and the Democratic Leadership that is trying to force a precipitous withdrawal is playing with fire.

FP: You say America can fight a better war on terror by making allies with traditional Muslims. What do you mean?

D’Souza: Our current strategy is based on trying to find secular liberals in the Muslim world, people who believe in women’s rights and separation of church and state. News flash: there are hardly any such people. Yes, there is Salman Rushdie and a lesbian radio host in Canada who have gotten a lot of attention. I like some of the things these Muslim liberals are saying. But they have no constituency in the Muslim world. That world is divided between the Islamic radicals and traditional Muslims. The left is allied with the Islamic radicals, so common sense says the right should build ties with traditional Muslims. Besides, there is no way to win the war on terror without driving a wedge between radicals and traditionalists. The traditional Muslims are the recruiting pool for radical Islam. Even if we kill 100 radicals, it’s no use if 500 traditional Muslims join the next day. So we have to find a way of drying up radical Islam’s recruitment. Whenever we attack Islam or say that Muhammad was the founder of terrorism, we are pursuing a self-defeating strategy because we are driving traditional Muslims into the hands of the radicals. My book, however, has specific suggestions for how America can work with traditional Muslims to defeat not only Islamic radicalism but also the global influence of the cultural left.

"I agree with D'Souza on most things but have to part company here. I spent a short tour in Saudi Arabia in the nineties. Pirate video stores were crammed with the latest in American movies. The malls all had at least one Fredrick's of Hollywood. Saudis in particular may cover their women but they covet western society."

I'm reading the book now and I think you misunderstand. The traditional muslims will tell you that Western "decadence" is very appealing to muslims. That doesn't mean it is good or constructive or (in wisdom) desirable. It's because it is so appealing that they are so angry.

When they say the "Great Satan," D'Souza points out that in Islam, even more than Christianity, "Satan" is not so much "the Destroyer: as he is "the Tempter."

Actually Black I spent my years in uniform and ate my sand.

My brother-in-law, several close friends, and my former unit are over there now.

I don't blame America first since I believe these Islamofascist feel it is their religious duty to destroy us but that does not mean that a rational person cannot understand how liberal "Hollywood" culture could give a negative impression to other nations.

It is not improbable that more people in the middle east recognize Madonna than Dick Cheney. Like it or not Hollywood represents America in the minds of many overseas. Being a father of two youngsters I can see how that would give one pause if they were not used to it.

Thanks for the rational discussion. I am sorry my point did not meet your expectations so feel free to ignore my posts from now on. Have a nice evening.

At a certain point you must respect those who have served in the Armed forces.

But when you start blaming Madonna for Islamist maniacs rammimg planes into the World Trade Center...or planning dirty bombs in NYC and Chicago....you have lost your way.

Madonna is not disemboweling American GI's or burning Blackwater volunteers to a crisp.
This war has been on and off since 600 BC before Jesus or mohammad.
America has done more to save lives lives ...invent medications ..then any country ever.... not to mention our economic engine has helped lift the entire world out of misery. From the Declaration of Independence to inventing flight... blue jeans and rock and roll too standing down the commies and the nazis the world owes us a debt of gratitude.We are exceptionally.

WE ARE NOT TO BLAME FOR 9/11!

I agree we are not to blame for 9/11. My blood still boils everytime I think about that day.

I simply pointed out that it is easy to see how socially conservative people (i.e. good old Southern Baptist like me or Mansi the Muslim like he referenced in his interview) find a lot of the filth being spewed out of Hollywood, cable talk shows (why does O'Reilly interview this trash?), and our universally popular music.... offensive.

Think about walking through a mall and seeing a young kid with his pants down around his knees, a smirk on his face, and a ballcap on sideways. I admit being a little dubious about the character of that kid before I even meet him. It's even worse after you hear him slaughter the english language. That kid is the unfortunate cultural image of America to many foreigners.

It's a fair point like it or not. FWIW - I don't think that kid represents the majority of America but if all I saw and heard was propaganda from my preacher, slanted news about America, and all I actually saw of America was bootleg DVD's and CD's at the flea market I might think this country was a messed up place.

To defeat your enemy you must first understand them. I won't try to understand the Islamofascist but I can at least sympathize with a Saudi father whose kid wants to listen to Eminem.

P.S. - I have a good buddy with Blackwater as well. That's good money if you don't get killed.

"question"

You are correct. Obviously many people like D'Souza have either/or mindsets. They cannot understand that people, like Islamo-fasctists, can have multiple reasons for hating us and wanting to destroy us. Sure they hate the leftist drive towards hedonism and immorality. But they also hate democracy. They associate all Americans with sharing the same values. And in fact average Dems and Republicans are far closer in shared social values than either group would like to admit. Certainly far closer that religious fanatics like Bin-laden and the rest. The I-F's hate ALL!!! of our western values and mores...the good and the bad. They hate us ...period.

It is no coincidence Islamic pagans hate Israel, Jews, Christians and Western Civilization. The entire basis of Western Civilization is Mosaic Law, something both the Neo-Pagan Left and the pagan Islamic thugs cannot abide and wish to destroy.

The very idea that human beings have individual rights not subject to the whims of an earthly monarch, but subject to the laws of Yahweh, is directly from Moses.

Historically, this is proven over and over again with the successive conflicts between the forces of paganism and the Judaic culture. (This includes the idolatry of cultural Marxist paganism.)

Probably the best discussion on the subject that I've read. I only recently found D'Souza's writing, I'm going to read more of it. I disagree slightly with what he percieves the lef thates. They don't hate the right, they hate themselves. Hence gun control, they percieve themselves going postal if they had access to a semi automatic rifle. Hence their attempts at racial preferences, they are prejudiced. Go to a union meeting and mention rap music, you will hear the word 'nigger' more times than if you were at a Klan meeting.

Regarding democracy, D'Souza said something that I had not considered. Of course radical Islam favors democracy, democracy is the pure will of the people. We do not live in a democracy, we live in a constitutional republic. Democracy killed Socrates, among its other sins. If you can control the popular mindset through propaganda, fear, or a combination of both, your cause is a sure winner in a democracy. Even under the rule of law, the popular mindset prevails unless the law is willing to enforce its provisions without favoritism. Look at the segregated south, the treatment of Irish immigrants in the north, and the treatment of Vietnam draft dodgers by Carter for examples right here. Or look at 'hate crime' prosecutions in New York for examples of popular will perverting the rule of law.

When your democratic constituents riot becuase a newspaper a thousand miles away publishes cartoons, and they wear masks and bring their rifles, you have the mindset and the fear to do whatever you want. What fascist would turn away from that?

I think there is a basic disconnect here, and it is the fault of the interviewer.

I will preface this with this statement: When we hear the words "quoted out of context" around here, it is usually liberals trying to make an excuse and weasel out of what they said, which is usually exactly what they mean.

In this case, this short interview with Dinesh D'Souza is very much taken out of context. In the interview, Dinesh D'Souza speaks with the bank of knowledge that comes from having written his book, the interviewer has read it, as have many of us who agree with the points Mr. D'Souza makes.

The point is, if you have read his book "What's So Great About America", you understand perfectly the context in which this discussion takes place. Without having read it, it is akin to listening to a joke between a bunch of friends who all "get the joke" because of a shared experience, and you, as an outsider, are puzzled that those in on the joke can double over laughing.

Anyone else on this discussion who HAS read his book...do you agree with me? BlackIrish, if you read his book, you would understand he is NOT by any stretch of the imagination a "Hate America Firster".

He wrote his book "What's So Great About America" by deliberately choosing to view the USA through the eyes of one type of "foreigner" (an immigrant teenager from India) to help us see America through the eyes of another type of foreigner.

The book is most definitely NOT a "Why do they hate us" book, it is more oriented towards explaining our enemy so that we have a better understanding of why we need to fight them.

Basically, in the book, he talks at length about these issues, and you realize that the title of the book is only the hanging question, and the entire book is the answer about what actually IS so great about America.

I feel 100% confident that anyone who has read the book will agree with me. There is a major context issue.

The Shah was not liked by many because of the corruption, Western ways, and Savak, the secret police. I don't think sex and sexuality played that big a role except among the poor and illiterate.

I can second that. I know people who lived there during the time of the Shah, and he was hated for his dictatorial powers and secret police, not for anything to do with Western cultural influence. And the witnesses I'm talking about were secular, engineer types who never set foot in a mosque.

I lived in Tehran [1977-79] including through the arrival of Khomeini in February 1979. I left on March 31, 1979. The Iranian Revolution had less to do with religion and more to do with corruption and oppression. The mullahs hijacked the Revolution and Iran is now far worse off than under the Shah.

Your statement.

It is no coincidence Islamic pagans hate Israel,Jews Christians and Western Civilization. The entire basis of Western Civilization is Mosaic Law.

On the belief that the destruction or subjugation of Western Civilization by Islam, is inherent within Islam,may be the biggest "struggle for the mind". Once it is established that this is the case, then the West can prepare itself. Our survival will count on sheer determination and swift reprisals striking fear into them- the MOVERS behind the young fools, the "martyrs" of death. It seems THEY love the advantages of industrialization as much as any Westerner.

Now we are down to that excellent scholar D'Souza. He has a lot to offer us. Just the same as Mark Steyn (America Alone) and Robert Spencer (The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam).

Now it could well be, that his reason is a very important point. Not that it is the basic reason, but it certainly does fuel some inner demon. That demon is the absolute inner lust of these misguided young men. Then they are told it is the work of the devil. Not ye olde testosterone.

Our Achilles heel is in constantly trying to "understand them". NOW I will start to become irrational. Best I end my screed. With 9 degrees Fahrenheit,and brilliant sunshine up in Great Lakes country, at least something is jolly well back to normal. (Laughs)

Not so. Iran had been sending students to the US for a long time under the Shah.

The numbers increased rapidly as the Shah's regime became increasingly repressive. From Migration Information Source (online):

In the 1977-1978 academic year, about 100,000 Iranians were studying abroad, of whom 36,220 were enrolled in US institutes of higher learning; the rest were mainly in the United Kingdom, West Germany, France, Austria, and Italy. In the 1978-1979 academic year, the number of Iranian students enrolled in the United States totaled 45,340, peaking at 51,310 in 1979-1980. According to the Institute of International Education, more Iranian students studied in the United States at this time than students from any other country.

Most of the students I taught during that volatile period expressed both fear and hatred of the Shah's regime. They also expressed horror at what they perceived as America's depravity. Did these young men--for almost all of them were men--visit strip bars and the like? A lot of them did. Seeing the worst of American culture made them hate us at least as much as they hated the Shah.

The numbers increased rapidly as the Shah's regime became increasingly repressive. From Migration Information Source (online):

I don't buy your premise. I worked at the US Embassy form 1977-79. There was no correlation I am aware of between the number of Iranian students in the US and the amount of repression by the Shah who assumed power in 1941. In fact, at the advice of Carter and Vance, the Shah became less oppressive during the period you cite of increased enrollment. The Shah was counseled by us to restrain the use of Savak against the opposition during the last years of his regime. The Iranian government permitted the students to leave and study in the US. They demonstrated against the Shah in the US with paper bags over their heads.

Nonsense. The educated elite of Iran were embracing American and Western culture. In Tehran alone, there were more than 70,000 Americans working and living there. There were Kentucky Fried Chicken franchises, bars, etc. You could buy Playboy on the newsstands. Many government officials, professors, etc. were educated in the US. To blame the downfall of the Shah on the "depravity" of America is simply wrong.

The opposition to the Shah came from a number of different factions. Without going into the rationale and reasons for all of the groups that opposed him, the ecomonic and social reforms of the White Revolution in the 1960s engendered the hatred of land owners and the mullahs. Extending the right to vote to women, land reform, privatization, etc. affected their power. Iran was the first Muslim country to recognize Israel. The Baazaries were unhappy about the payoffs they had to make to corrupt government officials. I could go on and on. The point is that America's depravity had little to nothing to do with the downfall of the Shah.

The point is that America's depravity had little to nothing to do with the downfall of the Shah.

I never argued that it did. I was trying to explain why I think D'Souza's book is on target. By way of illustration, I pointed out that my Iranian students very quickly developed a hatred FOR THE UNITED STATES because they came to see us as depraved.

As for the reasons for the student influx at the time of the Shah's fall, I can only point out that the numbers support my point: Iranian students--many of them totally unfamiliar with America and even with the English language--came to this country in droves in the years immediately before the Shah's fall. Were they afraid of the Shah? Well, that may be why they put bags on their heads at demonstrations against his regime!

He wrote his book "What's So Great About America" by deliberately choosing to view the USA through the eyes of one type of "foreigner" (an immigrant teenager from India) to help us see America through the eyes of another type of foreigner.

It's worth noting that the land of D'Souza's birth, India, is also regarded with contempt and hatred by Islamists, despite the fact that it does not, for the most part, share in the Western "hedonism" that concerns D'Souza - kissing on the lips is still a very big deal in Indian movies.

The reason for this? The idolatry practiced by Hindus and Buddhists in India. More generally, they hate and attack India because India is not Muslim. That's why the Islamists hate and attack Bali. That's why they attack the Phillipines. That's why they attack Thailand. And that's why they hate and attack the US as well.

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