Black XXVII: "Dubyuh's Got Faith!!"

If there are white ni##ersn in Byrds world, one can pretty well guess that there were black ones as well.

That was Senator Byrd's point exactly.

I didn't accuse Byrd of personally lynching any blacks. But Bob Byrd was a recruiter for the KKK, and a member of an organization that supported lynching, cross burning, and terrorizing blacks. You can live in denial of that if you want, but I have NO doubt in my mind that he knew damn good and well what the agenda of the Ku Klux Klan was, as any good recruiter would know the AGENDA of the organization they are recruting for.

I don't doubt that he knew all about the Ku Klux Klan. But you've still shown me no evidence that he supported the lynching of any black man, or that he did anything else illegal at the time. This is nothing more than mudslinging.

Sam, did I call YOU a bigot, or make any other personal slurs or attacks on your character??? NO. I haven't made this personal in any way, to you, but it's clear that that is where you want to go, with your debate.

But neither did I. I said your post was bigoted, but I have no idea who you are as a person, and thus have no basis to make any claims on your prejudices, or lack thereof.

People often believe things that they want to believe, without considering the undertones of those beliefs. In fact, that's how the Third Reich got started.

So, it's now: "bigoted" to criticize Islam, huh?

It's bigoted to take fanatical sects of any religion or organization and apply them to the much larger, moderate tent of the organization. It would be much like someone assuming my Christian beliefs were similar to David Koresh's Christian beliefs.

I've never gotten myself familiar with the names of radical Islam -- too many hyphens and vowels in weird places. =) But I have been to Muslim mosques and spoken with Muslim followers and leaders, and I can assure you that mainstream Muslim thought condemns the 9/11 attacks, condemns Osama Bin Laden, Wahhabi teachings, and everything they stand for, and rejects the movement back toward dhimmitude and the return of the shari'a.

Your screed against radical Islam and using it to condemn the whole religion is not unlike the tapes released by bin Laden that claim the U.S. is on another Christian crusade and intends to destroy or convert all Muslims.

Learn a little bit about this "religion", it's practitioners abuses of women, their hatred of Jews, Christians, intolerance of anything liberal, before YOU call ME a bigot, my FRiend.

Don't project ignorance on me when you know as little about who I am as I do you, especially when you've demonstrated no knowledge of the subject matter except a few cherry-picked quotes and name drops.

"I don't doubt that he knew all about the Ku Klux Klan. But you've still shown me no evidence that he supported the lynching of any black man, or that he did anything else illegal at the time. This is nothing more than mudslinging."

Oh sure, and Bob Byrd thought blacks were what? Lets ask him again, what he thought of blacks: He also opposed the Civil Rights Act, (as did Al Gore SR.)

Bob Byrd quote:
"I will never go to war with a Negro by my side.
Rather I should die 1000 times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds." -
-Bob Byrd- 1945; in a letter to a fellow Senator in his opposition to integration of the Armed Forces.

You defend Bob Byrd and his rascist past, and my opposing a mysogynistic religion that hates the Jews, democracy,and all things non-Islamic is bigoted.
OK...I got it.

Amir Taheri: "Islam Is Incompatible With Democracy"

May 19, 2004

Amir Taheri's remarks during the debate on " Islam Is Incompatible With Democracy"

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I am glad that this debate takes place in English.

Because, were it to be conducted in any of the languages of our part of the world, we would not have possessed the vocabulary needed.

To understand a civilization it is important to understand its vocabulary.

If it was not on their tongues it is likely that it was not on their minds either.

There was no word in any of the Muslim languages for democracy until the 1890s. Even then the Greek word democracy entered Muslim languages with little change: democrasi in Persian, dimokraytiyah in Arabic, demokratio in Turkish.

Democracy as the proverbial schoolboy would know is based on one fundamental principle: equality.

The Greek word for equal isos is used in more than 200 compound nouns; including isoteos (equality) and Isologia (equal or free speech) and isonomia (equal treatment).

But again we find no equivalent in any of the Muslim languages. The words we have such as barabari in Persian and sawiyah in Arabic mean juxtaposition or levelling.

Nor do we have a word for politics.

The word siassah, now used as a synonym for politics, initially meant whipping stray camels into line.( Sa'es al-kheil is a person who brings back lost camels to the caravan. )The closest translation may be: regimentation.

Nor is there mention of such words as government and the state in the Koran.

It is no accident that early Muslims translated numerous ancient Greek texts but never those related to political matters. The great Avicenna himself translated Aristotle's Poetics. But there was no translation of Aristotle's Politics in Persian until 1963.

Let us return to the issue of equality.

The idea is unacceptable to Islam.

For the non-believer cannot be the equal of the believer.

Even among the believers only those who subscribe to the three so-called Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam ( Ahl el-Kitab) are regarded as fully human.

Here is the hierarchy of human worth in Islam:

At the summit are free male Muslims

Next come Muslim male slaves

Then come free Muslim women

Next come Muslim slave women.

Then come free Jewish and /or Christian men

Then come slave Jewish and/or Christian men

Then come slave Jewish and/or Christian women.

Each category has rights that must be respected.

The People of the Book have always been protected and relatively well-treated by Muslim rulers, but often in the context of a form of apartheid known as dhimmitude.

The status of the rest of humanity, those whose faiths are not recognised by Islam or who have no faith at all, has never been spelled out although wherever Muslim rulers faced such communities they often treated them with a certain measure of tolerance and respect ( As in the case of Hindus under the Muslim dynasties of India.)

Non-Muslims can, and have often been, treated with decency, but never as equals.

(There is a hierarchy even for animals and plants. Seven animals and seven plants will assuredly go to heaven while seven others of each will end up in Hell.)

Democracy means the rule of the demos, the common people, or what is now known as popular or national sovereignty.

In Islam, however, power belongs only to God: al-hukm l'illah. The man who exercises that power on earth is known as Khalifat al-Allah, the regent of God.

But even then the Khalifah or Caliph cannot act as legislator. The law has already been spelled out and fixed for ever by God.

The only task that remains is its discovery, interpretation and application.

That, of course, allows for a substantial space in which different styles of rule could develop.

But the bottom line is that no Islamic government can be democratic in the sense of allowing the common people equal shares in legislation.

Islam divides human activities into five categories from the permitted to the sinful, leaving little room for human interpretation, let alone ethical innovations.

What we must understand is that Islam has its own vision of the world and man's place in it.

To say that Islam is incompatible with democracy should not be seen as a disparagement of Islam.

On the contrary, many Muslims would see it as a compliment because they sincerely believe that their idea of rule by God is superior to that of rule by men which is democracy.

In Muslim literature and philosophy being forsaken by God is the worst that can happen to man.

The great Persian poet Rumi pleads thus:

Oh, God, do not leave our affairs to us

For, if You do, woe be to us.

Rumi mocks those who claim that men can rule themselves.

He says:

You are not reign even over your beard,

That grows without your permission.

How can you pretend, therefore,

To rule about right and wrong?

The expression "abandoned by God" sends shivers down Muslim spines. For it spells the doom not only of individuals but of entire civilisations.

The Koran tells the stories of tribes, nations and civilizations that perished when God left them to their devices.

The great Persian poet Attar says :

I have learned of Divine Rule in Yathirb ( i.e. Medinah, the city of the Prophet)

What need do I have of the wisdom of the Greeks?

Hafez, another great Persian poet, blamed man's "hobut" or fall on the use of his own judgment against that of God:

I was an angel and my abode was the eternal paradise

Adam ( i.e.) man brought me to this place of desolation

Islamic tradition holds that God has always intervened in the affairs of men, notably by dispatching 124000 prophets or emissaries to inform the mortals of His wishes and warnings.

Many Islamist thinkers regard democracy with horror.

The late Ayatollah Khomeini called democracy " a form of prostitution" because he who gets the most votes wins the power that belongs only to God.

Sayyed Qutub, the Egyptian who has emerged as the ideological mentor of Safalists, spent a year in the United States in the 1950s.

He found "a nation that has forgotten God and been forsaken by Him; an arrogant nation that wants to rule itself."

Last year Yussuf al-Ayyeri, one of the leading theoreticians of today's Islamist movement, published a book ( available on the Internet) in which he warned that the real danger to Islam did not come from American tanks and helicopter gunships in Iraq but from the idea of democracy and rule by the people.

Maudoodi, another of the Islamist theoreticians now fashionable, dreamed of a political system in which human beings would act as automatons in accordance with rules set by God.

He said that God has arranged man's biological functions in such a way that their operation is beyond human control. For our non-biological functions, notably our politics, God has set rules that we have to discover and apply once and for all so that our societies can be on auto-pilot so to speak.

The late Saudi theologian, Sheikh Muhammad bin Ibrahim al-Jubair, a man I respected though seldom agreed with, sincerely believed that the root cause of all of our contemporary ills was the spread of democracy.

" Only one ambition is worthy of Islam," he liked to say, " the ambition to save the world from the curse of democracy: to teach men that they cannot rule themselves on the basis of manmade laws. Mankind has strayed from the path of God, we must return to that path or face certain annihilation."

Thus those who claim that Islam is compatible with democracy should know that they are not flattering Muslims.

In fact, most Muslims would feel insulted by such assertions.

How could a manmade form of government, invented by the heathen Greeks, be compared with Islam which is God's final word to man, the only true faith, they would ask.

In the past 14 centuries Muslims have, on occasions, succeeded in creating successful societies without democracy.

And there is no guarantee that democracy never produces disastrous results. (After all Hitler was democratically elected.)

The fact that almost all Muslim states today can be rated as failures or, at least, underachievers, is not because they are Islamic but because they are ruled by corrupt and despotic elites that, even when they proclaim an Islamist ideology, are, in fact, secular dictators.

Let us recall the founding myth of democracy as related by Protagoras in Plato.

Protagoras's claim that the rule of the people, democracy, is the best, is ridiculed by Socrates who points out that men always call on experts to deal with specific tasks but when it comes to the more important matters concerning the city, i.e. the community, they allow every Tom , Dick and Harry an equal say.

Protagoras says that when man was created he lived a solitary existence and was unable to protect himself and his kin against more powerful beasts.

Consequently men came together to secure their lives by founding cities. But the cities were torn by strife because inhabitants did wrong to one another.

Zeus, watching the proceedings, realised that the reason that things were going badly was that men did not have the art of managing the city ( politike techne).

Without that art man was heading for destruction.

So, Zeus called in his messenger, Hermes and asked him to deliver two gifts to mankind: aidos and dike.

Aidos is a sense of shame and a concern for the good opinion of others.

Dike here means respect for the right of others and implies a sense of justice that seeks civil peace through adjudication.

Before setting off Hermes asks a decisive question: Should I deliver this new art to a select few, as was the case in all other arts, or to all?

Zeus replies with no hesitation : To all. Let all have their share.

Protagoras concludes his reply to Socrates' criticism of democracy thus:" Hence it comes about, Socrates, that people in the cities, and especially in Athens, listen only to experts in matters of expertise but when they meet for consultation on the political art, i.e. of the general question of government, everybody participates."

Traditional Islamic political thought is closer to Socrates than to Protagoras.

The common folk, al-awwam, are regarded as "animals "( al-awwam kal anaam!)

The interpretation of the Divine Law is reserved only for the experts.

In Iran there is even a body called The Assembly of Experts.

Political power, like many other domains, including philosophy, is reserved for the " khawas" who, in some Sufi traditions, are even exempt from the ritual rules of the faith.

The " common folk", however, must do as they are told either by the text and tradition or by fatwas issued by the experts. Khomeini coined the word "mustazafeen" (the feeble ones) to describe the common folk.

In the Greek tradition once Zeus has taught men the art of politics he does not try to rule them.

To be sure he and other Gods do intervene in earthly matters but always episodically and mostly in pursuit of their illicit pleasures.

Polytheism is by its pluralistic nature is tolerant, open to new gods, and new views of old gods. Its mythology personifies natural forces that could be adapted, by allegory, to metaphysical concepts.

One could in the same city and at the same time mock Zeus as a promiscuous old rake, henpecked and cuckolded by Juno, or worship him as justice defied.

This is not possible in monotheism especially Islam, the only truly monotheistic of the three Abrahamic faiths.

In monotheism for the One to be stable in its One-ness it is imperative that the many be stabilised in their many-ness.

The God of monotheism does not discuss or negotiate matters with mortals.

He dictates, be it the 10 Commandments or the Koran which was already composed and completed before Allah sent his Hermes, Archangel Gabriel, to dictate it to Muhammad:

Read, the Koran starts with the command; In the name of Thy God The Most High!

Islam's incompatibility with democracy is not unique. It is shared by other religions. For faith is about certainty while democracy is about doubt. There is no changing of one's mind in faith, while democracy is about changing minds and sides.

If we were to use a more technical terminology faith creates a nexus and democracy a series.

Democracy is like people waiting for a bus.

They are of different backgrounds and have different interests. We don't care what their religion is or how they vote. All they have in common is their desire to get on that bus. And they get off at whatever stop they wish.

Faith, however is internalized. Turned into a nexus it controls man's every thought and move even in his deepest privacy.

Democracy, of course, is compatible with Islam because democracy is serial and polytheistic. People are free to believe whatever they like to believe and perform whatever religious rituals they wish, provided they do not infringe on other's freedoms in the public domain.

The other way round, however, it does not work.

Islam cannot allow people to do as they please , even in the privacy of their bedrooms, because God is always present, everywhere, all-hearing and all-seeing.

There is consultation in Islam: Wa shawerhum fil amr. ( And consult them in matters)

But the consultation thus recommended is about specifics only, never about the overall design of society.

In democracy there is a constitution that can be changed or at least amended.

The Koran, however, is the immutable word of God, beyond change or amendment.

This debate is not easy.

For Islam has become an issue of political controversy in the West.

On the one hand we have Islamophobia, a particular affliction of those who blame Islam for all the ills of our world.

The more thin skinned Muslims have ended up on regarding every criticism of Islam as Islamophobia.

On the other hand we have Islamoflattery that claims that everything good under the sun came from Islam. ( According to a recent PBS serial on Islam, even cinema was invented by a lens-maker in Baghdad, named Abu-Hufus!)

This is often practised by a new generation of the Turques de profession, Westerners who are prepared to apply the rules of critical analysis to everything under the sun except Islam.

They think they are doing Islam a favour.

The opposite is true.

Depriving Islam of critical scrutiny is bad for Islam and Muslims, and ultimately dangerous for the whole world.

The debate is about how to organize the global public space that is shared by the whole humanity. That space must be religion-neutral and free of ideology, which means organized on the basis of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

There are 57 nations in the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC).

Not one is yet a democracy .

The more Islamic the regime in place the less democratic it is.

Democracy is the rule of mortal common men.

Islam is the rule of immortal God.

Politics is the art of the possible and democracy a method of dealing with the problems of real life.

Islam, on the other hand, is about the unattainable ideal.

We should not allow the everything-is-equal-to-everything-else fashion of postmodernist multiculturalism and political correctness to prevent us from acknowledging differences and, yes, incompatibilities, in the name of a soggy consensus.

If we are all the same how can we have a dialogue of civilizations, unless we elevate cultural schizophrenia into an existential imperative.

Muslims should not be duped into believing that they can have their cake and eat it. Muslims can build democratic society provided they treat Islam as a matter of personal, private belief and not as a political ideology that seeks to monopolize the pubic space and regulate every aspect of individual and community life.

Ladies and gentlemen: Islam is incompatible with democracy.

I commend the motion.

Thank you

* The motion was carried by 403 votes for, 267 against and 28 undecided.

"Don't Worry, We Don't Kill Muslims"
FrontPageMagazine.com ^ | 6/08/04 | Daniel Pipes

After an Islamist rampage in the Saudi town of Khobar on May 29-30 that ended in the death of twenty-two persons, survivors of that atrocity have recounted how the terrorists went to great lengths to ensure that they would kill only non-Muslims. Their actions raise a delicate but urgent issue: how might non-Muslims best protect themselves if caught in such a situation?

Even as the massacre was underway, the terrorists took pains to distinguish Muslims from non-Muslims. Here are some of the survivors’ testimonies:

Hazem Al-Damen, Muslim, Jordanian: two terrorists knocked on his door and asked him and others hiding whether they were “Muslims or Christians.” On hearing “Muslims,” the assailants told them to stay in the room because their purpose was to rid the country of Americans and Europeans.

Abu Hashem, 45, Muslim, an Iraqi-American engineer (also called “Mike” in some accounts): The terrorists demanded his residency card, which documented his religion (Muslim) and nationality (American). That combination provoked an argument between two terrorists. “He’s an American, we should shoot him,” said one. “We don’t shoot Muslims,” replied the other. The two went back and forth until the latter decided it: “Don’t be afraid. We won’t kill Muslims, even if you are an American.” With this decision, the terrorists turned polite, even apologizing for breaking into Abu Hashem’s home, searching it, and leaving blood stains on his carpet.

Abdul Salam al-Hakawati, 38, Muslim, a Lebanese corporate financial officer: He and his family hid upstairs in their house after hearing gunfire. Downstairs, they heard the terrorists break in and rummage around before one apparently noticed framed Koranic verses on the wall and announced to the others, “This is a Muslim house.” When a heavily armed terrorist came upstairs, Al-Hakawati confirmed his identity by greeting the assailant with “Assalamu ‘Alaykum,” the Muslim greeting.

Nizar Hajazeen, Christian, a Jordanian software businessmen: He hid with another Jordanian in a room but they opened the door when two armed young men banged violently on it. The terrorists asked the identity of the Jordanians, Arab or Westerners. “We’re Arab,” came the response. Each was then asked, “A Christian or a Muslim?” Both claimed to be Muslims and showed a Koran as proof.

Taking care to kill only non-Muslims appears to be in response to widespread Saudi criticism of Islamist terrorism directed against Muslims; Saudis seem to agree that murder is a tool suitably directed only against non-Muslims, as two quotes suggest:

Abdelaziz Raikhan, a maintenance man for the Saudi security forces, responded to the suicide bombing of a police headquarters in Riyadh that killed 5 people and wounded 148 on April 21, accusing the perpetrators of being “mentally ill. … There’s not one American in this entire area. Not one! What kind of jihad is this?”

Mohsen al-Awaji, a Saudi lawyer, suggests that terrorists should be encouraged by the authorities to go to the many “occupied territories that require resistance,” such as in Afghanistan, Iraq, the Palestinian Authority, and Chechnya. “If someone decides to go, we wish him luck. He’s going to die anyway, so let him die there while achieving something, not die here and kill innocents with him.”

Nor is this the first time Islamists have specifically targeted infidels. In Malaysia in 2000, for example, jihadists purposefully killed two non-Muslim hostages and spared two others, both Muslims. In Pakistan in 2002, a police chief noted killers “took a good fifteen minutes in segregating the Christians and making sure that each one of their targets gets the most horrific death.” The murderers separated Christians from Muslims by requiring each hostage to recite a verse from the Koran. Those who could not were shot.

In all these cases, non-Muslims facing jihadists could have saved themselves by passing as Muslims.

There are several ways they could have done this. They might have greeted their potential murderers with Assalamu ‘alaykum (which, ironically, means “peace be with you”). They might have recited in Arabic the Shahada, the Islamic statement of faith. Or they might have recited in Arabic the first sura (chapter) of the Koran, the essential prayer of Islam called the Fatiha (“Opening”).

In the past, such knowledge would have saved lives. It could probably do so again in the future.

How about those Pistons? If they had held a six point lead with 48 seconds to go in Game 2, they'd be up 3-0 right now. Scary.

They're finding their offense at the right time, but I've seen this movie waaay too many times. The Lakers will come back from the dead and win in 6.

You defend Bob Byrd and his rascist past, and my opposing a mysogynistic religion that hates the Jews, democracy,and all things non-Islamic is bigoted. OK...I got it.

I've never defended it. Read my post at the beginning of this discussion.

The difference between you and Robert Byrd is: he recognized the hate and bigotry of what he said and did in the past, and admitted he was mistaken. You've failed to do either of those things.

And before I waste my time reading either of the diatribes you've posted above, do these have anything to do with mainstream Islam? Or is this more cherry-picking from the fringe?

A little Friday fun for everyone:

Suppose that you were elected President in November through a inexplicable, massive write-in campaign. Suppose, also, that you meet the age, citizenship, and all other requirements to serve as President. Suppose, also, that a like-minded Congress was elected as the overwhelming majority, and that they have publicly pledged to support any policy you decide to pursue.

What would be the ten most important things you would accomplish in your four years as POTUS?

I'll post my answer after everyone else today. But I'll warn everybody: you probably won't like my answer. =)

"The difference between you and Robert Byrd is: he recognized the hate and bigotry of what he said and did in the past, and admitted he was mistaken. You've failed to do either of those things."

Really? But I thought you said you didn't "know me to judge whether or not I was bigoted?

You can cast your aspersions all you want,Sam.
I don't hate anyone or individual Muslims.
But I DO despise a *religion* that is an outright lie, abuses women, and preaches death and hatred. Please try to understand the difference between loving the sinner, and hating the sin. you implied you were a Christian, than that concept shouldn't be foreign to you.

Peaceful Muslims are peaceful IN Spite OF what the Qu'ran says, NOT because of it.

This is a picture of my son, a Marine.
I resent someone like Bob Byrd who would use the "N" word,as he did a couple of years ago, especially given his racist past, in both his words and actions.

As I said, it's typical of someone with a weak view point, to keep up the personal slander. Keep inferring that I'm a bigot, because of my views on the Islamic religion.
That way, you can "pigeon-hole* me, so you don't have to consider anything I'm trying to convey to you. Because you are so much more "enlightened" than me, I guess.

I AM thankful that Islamists aren't all faithful followers of the radical sects, no, only about 3% of them, which makes that about 30 million fanatical radicals in the world, devout followers of the pirate pedophile Mohammad.
(You did know Muhammed took a little seven year old girl to be his wife* didn't you?...and you did know ol' *Prophet* Muhammad killed over seven hundred people, right?)... And he ordered many of them beheaded, as well.

Hmmm...that sounds familiar...21st century Islamists beheading folks...hmmmmm

""And before I waste my time reading either of the diatribes you've posted above, do these have anything to do with mainstream Islam? Or is this more cherry-picking from the fringe?"
Mainstream Islam?"

You clearly don't know much about Islam, if you've never read Ibn Warraq, who is an Arab, and wrote "Why I Am Not A Muslim", or Amir Taheri, who is an Iranian, and knows quite well what Islam is all about. He is a Muslim...so Taheri must be a bigot, for CRITISIZING Islam, HUH?

Oh yeah...Ibn Warraq had to change his name from his Muslim birthgiven name to avoid having a fatwah being issued on him, when he wrote his book: "Why I Am Not A Mulim"

And speaking of which, why don't any "mainstream" muslim organisations issue fatwah against terrorists?
They don't, or at least I've never read any of them doind so. No, they issue fatwas on anyone criticizing Islam.
Take Salmon Rushdie, for example, where is he my slanderous FRiend?

You appear by all that you say, to be a multi-culturalist.
A multi-cuturalist believes all religious cultures must be given equal treatment, no matter how unequal that religion treats those outside their religion, no matter how intolerant it is towards equality of treatment of people.

Oh, yeth...we muth rethpect all cultures, and their diverthity. No matter how screwed up they are. No matter how intolerant the are.

It *appears* that you just wanna feel good about yourself, and congratulate yourself for being sooo tolerant of others.

Just like my feminist sister, who supports all sorts of liberal causes, feminism, abortion, gay marriage, etc... and then talks about Muslims "women of cover", with such respect, the irony of which is fairly glaring to objective thinkers, of whom you *appear* not to be.

This must be a fairly new trend, as Maddona has been seen prancing around in a burka, at her concerts lately.
Wow.

Here is Madonna at her concert, last week; singing in a burka.
Multi-cultural diversity in action: a feminist in a burka. Who would have thought they would see the day.
The Left just keeps getting wackier and wackier.

Here's a "Mainstream" Islamist quote for you:
"Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant...The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth,"
-Omar Ahmad - Co-founder of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

Tribute to the Gipper:

Really? But I thought you said you didn't "know me to judge whether or not I was bigoted?

Let's try this again: it is what you've said that is bigoted. I have no idea whether you are a bigot or not. The only thing I can comment on are the posts you made, and they have been rife with bigotry.

Please try to understand the difference between loving the sinner, and hating the sin. You implied you were a Christian, than that concept shouldn't be foreign to you.

No, I said I was a Christian. And that's why I don't hate anyone either, including you. When I have demonstrated any hate for anyone?

Peaceful Muslims are peaceful IN Spite OF what the Qu'ran says, NOT because of it.

And this is where we disagree. The Muslim religion is no more or less peaceful than the Christian religion or any other mainstream religion in the world. Any of these religions have texts written for specific purposes that can be badly misrepresentative of the religious belief if taken in general.

Take what you've written about jihad. You've quoted very specific passages from the Qu'ran that seem to imply the Muslim religion is nothing more than an Al-Qaeda recruiting tool. But here's something that might interest you, directly from Bernard Haykel, a professor of Islamic law.

According to Islamic law there are at least six reasons why bin Laden's barbaric violence cannot fall under the rubric of jihad:
1) Individuals and organizations cannot declare a jihad, only states can.
2) One cannot kill innocent women and children when conducting a jihad.
3) One cannot kill Muslims in a jihad.
4) One cannot fight a jihad against a country in which Muslims can freely practice their religion and proselytize Islam.
5) Prominent Muslim jurists around the world have condemned these attacks, and their condemnation forms a juristic consensus (ijma) against bin Laden's actions. This consensus renders his actions un-Islamic.
6) The welfare and interest of the Muslim community (maslaha) is being harmed by bin Laden's actions and this equally makes them un-Islamic.

A “jihad” in this sense can only be declared by a religious leader. Originally only the Caliphate could declare it. At that time the caliph was the highest religious and political authority in the land.

Today because there are so many religious leaders, an individual cannot make this declaration. They will have to have something in Islam called ijma (consensus). No one person can make this declaration unless that person is truly the supreme religious leader, i.e. like the Pope. And in Islam there is no such person.

But you don't mention that in your posts. You don't mention the fact that Amir Taheri was the editor-in-chief of Iran's leading daily newspaper, and Iran has been an enemy of the United States for a long time. You don't think there might be a teensy bit of political influence in his interpretation of Islam, do you?

I have to wonder how many other things you don't mention in your screeds, how many facts you ignore in your arguments and religious citations. I have to wonder if you even recognize that this is the sort of manipulation leaders like Hitler used to start wars and declare fatwas.

Just to show you the dangers of posting religious texts without the proper context, here's Deuteronomy 13:6-18 (NIV):

"If your brother, the son of your mother, or your son, or your daughter, or the wife of your bosom, or your friend who is as your own soul, entices you secretly, saying, 'Let us go and serve other gods,' which neither you nor your fathers have known, some of the gods of the peoples that are round about you, whether near you or far off from you, from the one end of the earth to the other, you shall not yield to him or listen to him, nor shall your eye pity him, nor shall you spare him, nor shall you conceal him; but you shall kill him; your hand shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. You shall stone him to death with stones, because he sought to draw you away from the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. And all Israel shall hear, and fear, and never again do any such wickedness as this among you. "If you hear in one of your cities, which the LORD your God gives you to dwell there, that certain base fellows have gone out among you and have drawn away the inhabitants of the city, saying, 'Let us go and serve other gods,' which you have not known, then you shall inquire and make search and ask diligently; and behold, if it be true and certain that such an abominable thing has been done among you, you shall surely put the inhabitants of that city to the sword, destroying it utterly, all who are in it and its cattle, with the edge of the sword. You shall gather all its spoil into the midst of its open square, and burn the city and all its spoil with fire, as a whole burnt offering to the LORD your God; it shall be a heap for ever, it shall not be built again. None of the devoted things shall cleave to your hand; that the LORD may turn from the fierceness of his anger, and show you mercy, and have compassion on you, and multiply you, as he swore to your fathers, if you obey the voice of the LORD your God, keeping all his commandments which I command you this day, and doing what is right in the sight of the LORD your God.

Of course, the excerpt above is from the Penteteuch, and is directed towards the specific circumstances of the non-Gentiles at Mount Sinai, and should not be taken as God's final covenant with us. But the Muslim imams and leaders you quote earlier are every bit as blasphemous as anyone who takes the passage from Deuteronomy above and construes it to mean we should kill all non-Christians.

And quite frankly, I don't understand the point of the rest of your post. You show me a picture of your son, apparently to parade the fact that he's black, drop a few more Muslim names, cite a few more of the outrageous claims and practices of Islamic radicals, and then proceed to chide me for being a "multi-culturalist" (whatever that might mean in your eyes) and then projecting me with a homosexual lisp. (Are you trying to suggest that my post was homosexual? I don't think so.) And then there's some random outrage at whatever Madonna's wearing these days.

Whether or not you wish to forgive Robert Byrd for using the n-word is totally up to you. Frankly, I don't care what you decide. But you seem intent at all costs to steer the discussion away from what I asked earlier: when did Robert Byrd lie? When did he participate in or sponsor a lynching? When did he do anything illegal? When did he do anything other than precisely what he said he did? It's the sort of manipulation that's become the hallmark of your posts so far.

A grown feminist in a child's burka.

Think about the purpose of the burka. By definition, the burka is a garment worn by Muslim women, which is intended to cover the entire body and face, to promote modesty, humility and subservience. When I view this picture, modesty and humility certainly don't come to mind; those capable of recognizing truth can discern that was never Madonna's intent.

So exactly what were Madonna's intentions?

So exactly what were Madonna's intentions?

Maybe she tried to implant those cone things on her breasts, and it didn't work out. =)

Excellent ! Thank you. :^D

"Whether or not you wish to forgive Robert Byrd for using the n-word is totally up to you. Frankly, I don't care what you decide. But you seem intent at all costs to steer the discussion away from what I asked earlier: when did Robert Byrd lie? When did he participate in or sponsor a lynching? When did he do anything illegal? When did he do anything other than precisely what he said he did? "

I have said REPEATEDLY to you: I don't know that Byrd ever burned a cross or lynched any blacks; whom he called: "...race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds."
But then again...I don't know that he DIDN'T... Do you???

So; Robert Byrd needs to answer one simple question to us all:
- Were you, Robert K. Byrd, ever involved in a Cross-burning or a Lynching, while in the Ku Klux Klan, or did you have knowledge of aforementioned Klan activities?

If Byrd burned even ONE cross on even ONE lawn of even ONE fellow American, he has nothing left to offer. He is discredited, disgraced, and has no other option other than to tender his resignation from the Senate.

So, tell ya what Sam: Provide us all a link, show us where Robert Byrd has apologized PUBLICLY for being in the Klan, and where he has completely denounced the Klan, OK?

So there's my challenge to you.
Show us, with Robert Byrd's own words, his apology for being in the Klan, and his denouncing the KKK publicly. and I'm not interested in any of your excuses for him, or the D.N.C. spin, or his own PR boy's B.S.
And don't give me that BS that he was in the Klan to fight Communism. The Cold War hadn't even started in 1942. If you can show his denouncement of the Klan and his apology, I'll shut-up, and never say another word about Bobby KKK Big Byrd...EVER. Fair enough?

BTW; Robert Byrd stayed out of the military in 1945, because he was opposed to the integration of blacks into the military, and you're DAMN Right I'm proud of my son, who (by golly you noticed, Sam: he's half-black) served honorably in our military.

"Ronald Wilson Reagan: Interment Service (Live Thread)"

What a great day...what a great man!!

Long Live the Great Liberator!!

FReegards...MUD

"Dutch's Home!!"
(To be sung to Bruce Springsteen's "Thunder Road")

Effete Whore'd's damned...Reagan's hearse waits...
RATS' derision towards Nancy, the Right ignores...
As Sean Hannity raves!!
Liberator's fightin' fer "the lowly"...
Hey, I'm FReer 'cuz what Reagan showed me!!
Dutch's headin' home again...Right claims his grace...we're not alone!!
We gathered outside...Leftists, you know just what we're here for!!
RATS're scair't 'cuz they're thinkin'...our Nation ain't listenin' to FOOLS anymore!!
Show a little faith, there's passion on the Right!!
RATS're poltroonish...we'll win the Big Fight!!
Folks, FReedom's all Right to me!!

Left ain't Right...we'll recover...RATS' loss is our gain!!
Right's awestruck...cut Big Guv'ment...shed programs to the States!!
Wasteful Guv'ment is FReedom's Bane!!
Righteous saviors, conspire...help US FReep!!
Normal folks...not "heroes"...we fight fer Good!!
At each election, VOTE Fer FReedom, World!!
Liberty is always Good!!
It's our chance to fight RATS' Lust Fer Power!!
Dutch, what else can we do now?!!
We'll educate Dem Lib'rals...reject Left's spin...show that Right cares!!
'Cuz the Right's future's hopeful...this Nation rejects Left's feeble fears!!
We've got one more chance to seal the deal...
Let's make that City on a Hill!!
Right's on track...Heaven's callin' "Dutch" Reagan back!!
Oh oh...come join our stand!!
Fightin' fer what's Right...come hear our Righteous band!!
Oh oh...Dutch is home...folks, Dutch is Home!!Yeah, 'neath the Dome!!
Standing out here, gettin' scorched by the sun...
Still, we'll stand and wait...we love Reagan like his sons!!
Lord, Dutch is Home!! We're Right...we're Bold!!
Dutch is Home!!

Yes, Reagan was our star...he outsmarted Ol' Gorbachev!!
Got the Country on track...now Gip's ready to take that long walk...
To where folks, they live in Peace!!
The gates're open...say "Howdy" to Saint Pete!!
We know Nancy's lonely...her loving heart is broken!!
But tonite Ronnie's FRee...after Righteous words were spoken...
There are tears in our eyes...fer all the dreams he liberated!!
We'll honor Gip's memory 'til we're olde...by rededicatin' our lives to Reagan's aims!!

[We'll] revere his name each time when we FReep!!
Ron's Revolution's grown...fight DemRATS 'til we're FRee!!
'Cuz all Dem Leftist fools don't know Ron...
RATS fear the RightWing's soaring dawn...
'Cuz when we fight righteous wars, Left's gone!!
Fight RATS' spin...John Kerry can't win!!
DeeCeeTowne's full of LOSERS...but, fer the Gip, the RightWing Shall Win!!

Mudboy Slim

"Black XXVIII" is UP...MUD

Six Hunnerd...MUD