Love and hugs won't change terrorists who hate us

St. Paul Pioneer Press ^ | Friday, September 21, 2001 | JOE SOUCHERAY

[Revolting cat!]

B-b-b-b-b-but hug therapy works, doesn' it? I saw a doctor of sykohlogy on PBS once, the one with a gray beard, who was hugging people all over and it worked! PBS, telebision, gubmint sponsored program, why, it must be true. Let's all hug!

[bleudevil]

Great column. I hope the guy who wrote the Winnie-the-Pooh letter to the Minneapolis paper read this column. Sounds like he helped inspire it.

[LADY J]

I am submitting this to all of you!!

I got an email from someone I don't know:

Carmen Lynn

swinglyn@mindspring.com

Subject: Justice not Terror I want the murderers responsible for the massacre in New York and at the Pentagon to be found, but I want Americans to be proud of what we're going to do now in the years to come. I hope you'll join me in signing an online statement of support for "Justice, not Terror" at: http://www.moveon.org/justice/ http://www.moveon.org/justice/

I feel highly insulted -like this is implying that WE are terrorists or might conduct ourselves like terrorists!!!!

Am I being too sensitive? Just wondering what the FReepers think about this!!

Thanks for listening!!

[Anonymous2]

who is we?

[LADY J]

I forgot to add what she ended her email with:

Thank you. Your participation could really make a difference -- it's vital that we all speak up now, before it's too late.

[Revolting cat!]

What riles me is the mere fact that these letters to the editor are printed at all! With 90% of Americans supporting the President and supporting military action, the media once again pretend to show us "all sides of the issue" when at this point there is practically speaking only one side! The result is what is known as Rand Effect if I'm not mistaken, which works to undermine the unanimity, because the less informed become convinced that there are indeed multiple sides and that perhaps they ought to rethink their positions. This is an old communist trick which was used so effectively by the Krintonites.

[oyez]

who is we?

The civilized world. Why?

[uscit]

You're a disgrace to your American-icon moniker. Change it to something more descriptive like "terrorist_apologist." As for your comment that the earliest they could have hated us is 1776, are you so dense you can't see the author is referring to the ancient enmity of Muslims for Westerners/Europeans?

[pocat]

We've stopped Israel many times from achieving victory in several battles.
Shame on us. Had we not restrained our ally many times in the past, they would have recovered most, if not all, of the land promised to them by God in the Old Testament. And we probably wouldn't have the problem we have now.

Question: How do you tell the "moderate" moslem from the covert radical jihadist?
Answer: You can't, you just have to wait for the bomb to explode.

TM - I work with a guy from Bosnia. He's Catholic (Eastern Orthodox?) and he's been here with his wife for about 2 years. His family is still in the Balkans. He's generally quiet, but just this morning, he expressed the same sentiments you did in your half-joke/riddle. This guy was going ballistic over the Muslim siutation. He briefly explained that before war broke out in his homeland, everyone lived side-by-side in peace. When TSHTF, every Muslim became a "cut-throat". This guy was almost in tears by the time he was finished speaking, and the last thing he said (in his heavy Slavic accent) was "Americans are too nice - too naive. You do not know the minds of the Muslims, and I don't think you would."

[Anonymous2]

ok. btw, the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ, loves you!

[driftless]

Re: Soucheray....you got that right! He and D. J. Tice barely manage to counterbalance all the leftist nuts whose clueless and anti-American columns the Press prints daily. Like Glenda Holste, Locke, and others.

[Darheel]

More to the point, the answer is Jews and Christians. It's so simplistic an argument that the John Deere guy is either a terrorist or a complete numbskull, you make the call.

[oyez]

the John Deere guy is an insult to tractors every where.

[Irene Adler]

I will say only a couple of things, but I could say much more. My daughter is married to a young man who was raised a Muslim. He is now a U.S. citizen, but most of his family live in an ME country (won't say which one). They kicked him out of the family for marrying my daughter, refused to attend the wedding or meet her. We received anonymous phone calls from some of his sisters prior to the wedding which contained many lies.

My daughter finally agreed to convert to Islam (rather to my dismay) so that the family would agree to meet her and would reconcile with their son. The in-laws expect my daughter to wear their form of dress when they come to this country to visit. The father became a U.S. citizen only because he got a HUGE raise in pay on his job in the ME country due to being a U.S. citizen (don't know why, just know it's true). The family lives mostly in the ME country and have no intention to be Americans (with the clear exception of our son-in-law.)

We have not insisted that our son-in-law become a Christian; we welcomed him into our family just the way he is. No one here insists that his family wear western-style clothing when they are here; they insist my daughter dress like them (in her own country, yet) and practice their religion. I couldn't be happier with my son-in-law; he is really a sweetheart. His family must consist of good people if they raised him. They are definitely NOT terrorists, and I don't blame them at all, in any way, for what has happened in NY or DC. BUT, tolerant, they are NOT. They are not Shiites, either; they are Sunni.

Tolerance as a one-way street doesn't seem to work terribly well. An awful lot of Americans are ignorant and naive about certain aspects of Islam.

[FITZ]

You can accuse Bin Laden of many things, but being unclear is not one of them.

Then it's clear he wants to be some kind of dictator of the entire Middle East. He wants no other leaders ---he uses the accusation they are controlled by the West. He wants no Israeli expansion, obviously only the Islamics are allowed to expand---even into the US. He is nothing but an evil man very much like Hitler who was also determined to kill all the Jews and rule as much of the world as he could.

[FITZ]

People in Berkeley shouldn't read this. Their heads might explode.

I think we should immediately set up a peace corps in the Middle East countries like Afghanistan, Iraq, Saudi, Egypt and a few others and send all the peaceniks to teach political correctness and love to their Muslim friends. Let them put their money ---or rather their lives ---where their mouths are.

[Travis McGee]

What made the Serbs so tough? Holding the front line against islam for centuries.

[patent]

>>>>You can't, you just have to wait for the bomb to explode.

Preferably ours.

[wardaddy]

Reminds me of an e-mail I got yesterday from a relative in your fair state (Bay Area) who informed me that she was a pacifist but patriotic and signed off with "Peace and Love"

I responded that I wasn't sure what pacifist meant but that I had seen that Harrison Ford movie about the Amish and it was encouraging that she was patriotic. As for the peace, I informed her that was all well and good after we have utterly crushed our enemies both abroad and from within

I haven't heard back from her. God bless the lambs I suppose. (till they break weak and start to peel off) Just stay the hell outta the way!!!!

[harpseal]

People in Berkeley shouldn't read this. Their heads might explode

Actually I think people in Berkley should read this and any exploding heads will be so much the better.

Stay well - Stay safe - stay armed - Yorktown