[AgThorn]

Ah, good old Rushdie ...
I was thinking about buying his book just this morning.

Wonder if I can get it on Amazon.com and if the Ayatollah still has a price on his head?

Hope his sales go up ...

[GOPJ]

The democrats are mad because they haven't had a new idea in 40 years. But the Muslims are madder, they haven't had a new idea in over a hundred years. Rage has a way of building when you accept you're a failure, or you redouble your blind faith.

Poor Muslims, they're worse off than democrats.

[EggsAckley]

Thanks for posting this. It provides a great deal of insight into the "Islam-mania" that
is flooding the world at the moment. It also gives me some hope that some of the Muslim
faith MAY be ready to reform the archaic radical elements of Islam and join the real world.

[ex-Texan]

Islamic leaders and clerics risk death by saying even a single word of moderate praise for Rushdie ....

The Taliban [so-called "Students of God" ... B.S. !!] are so vile that they must all be wiped off the planet.

Justice = KAAAABOOOOOM!

Sorry, but that is just the way I see it.

[etcetera]

"Many commentators have spoken of the need for a Reformation in the Muslim world."

Finally a glimpse of hope from the Muslims themselves.

[Big Bunyip]

If you're going to buy one of his books, "Midnight's Children" is by far and away the best.

The odd thing is, a few years on BBC2, he did a monologue in which he hailed the unease that the muslim/third world influx into Britain was inspiring among Anglo-Saxons. It was the chickens of colonialism coming home to roost, and the Brits had no right to complain about mosques and strange cultures invading their High Street shopping centers.

All very righteous and politically correct. Now his tune has changed.

I guess having a price put on your head by a bunch of camel-scented clerics from the dark ages can help a man to concentrate on the important things in life -- things like just staying alive.

[Helms]

it would be absurd to deny that this self-exculpatory, paranoiac Islam is an ideology with widespread appeal.

[AgThorn]

Bears repeating ... here's the cliff notes version!
Suppose we say that the ills of our societies are not primarily America's fault,
that we are to blame for our own failings?
How would we understand them then?
Might we not, by accepting our own responsibility for our problems, begin to learn to solve them for ourselves?

An Iraqi writer quotes an earlier Iraqi satirist:
"The disease that is in us, is from us."

A British Muslim writes, "Islam has become its own enemy."

A Lebanese friend, returning from Beirut, tells me that in the aftermath of the attacks on Sept. 11, public criticism of Islamism has become much more outspoken.

Many commentators have spoken of the
need for a Reformation in the Muslim world.

 

[Map Kernow]

Saying ad nauseam that "This isn't about Islam" simply means we haven't got a genuine dialogue going with the Muslim world. Most of them would absolutely insist that this terrorism conflict is all about Islam. It's just easier and less unsettling for us in the liberal, self-absorbed West to foist our own preconceptions and prejudices on Muslim opinion, even while claiming to act in the name of "tolerance," rather than listening to what Muslims really have to say on the subject.

[gone_to_heck_back_soon]

Here's hoping the Taliban go the way of all Inquisitions. GONE.

I just hope another "ism" isn't the result in the West.

[Praxeologue]

I find it difficult to derive any hope from the moderate opinions of a Muslim who would be shot on sight by a huge proportion, perhaps half, of the Muslim world.

What, pray tell, could be characterized as a "mainstream" Muslim position? I fear that the answer would not be pleasant.

I agree and sympathize with Rushdie, but believe that he speaks, as of today, for a small minority.

In times of horrific terrorist danger, we must act on today's reality, not idealistic hopes.

[Shermy]

Rushdie called Islam, "that least huggable of faiths."

---S.Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet, Henry Holt: New York, 1999. p.74

[Oschisms]

Rushdie's close to unreadable- and I don't mean that as a compliment, a la James Joyce- but he's dead right in this mercifully short article.

[AlGone2001]

It seems to me that Muslims are attempting to get around the "coversion" idea, and go straight to a militant Islamic in your face kind of religion. Some who called themselves Christians in the past tried this approach, and it's a failure.

[rebdov]

Oh,oh I smell a new fatwa coming. Any fatwas yet against OBL ordaining his murder?

[semaj]

Good post. I agree with the author's premise that religion needs to be a personal and individual matter and not something enforced and compelled by the state or any other organized entity.

[RnMomof7]

I am amazed the liberal rag printed it.

[the_alfalfanator]

Bump

[Cacique]

This thread will get pulled. You're supposed to link to NY Times articles rather than post them verbatim. Don't you know these bozos have a suit against freerepublic ? Next time read the disclaimer at the front page.

Though I find the Rushdie article intriguing it's a pity it appears in the Times.

[NoControllingLegalAuthority]

I heard President Bush say "Islam is a peaceful religion." Where is the proof of this?

[ChadGore]

Islam needs a Ghandi