Posted on 02/23/2008 5:18:41 AM PST by Kaslin
The Washington Post's E.J. Dionne Jr. thinks there's "something peculiar" about conservatives who turn "Islamic extremism into a mighty ideological force with the power to overrun the world."
In a way, he's right. There is indeed something peculiar about portraying "extremism," Islamic or otherwise, as an ideological movement of sufficient mass and might to capture the world. After all, "extremism" is something "extreme" practiced by, well, "extremists." You know -- a few far-out kooks on the margins. Why worry? There's always that disclaimer that we, as a post-9/11 society, invoke when we talk about "Islamic extremism" (or, plain "extremism," as President Bush now prefers): Namely, that such extremism has nothing doctrinally or traditionally to do with Islam as practiced by the rest of the world's billion-plus Muslims. So much more reassuring to see things this way, at least as long as no one notes that Sharia (Islamic law) is advanced by "extremism" and Islam alike.
Of course, if Western society understands "extremism" merely as a marginal phenomenon, little wonder Dionne thinks it's odd that so many conservatives take it seriously -- specifically, he writes, "Osama bin Laden's lunatic claims that he will build a new caliphate." Isn't Bin Laden just an extremist fruitcake on Islam's fringe, who, naturally, makes "lunatic claims"? It should take not a war to subdue him, but a warden.
Personally, I doubt so many conservatives really take the prospect of a Sharia-governed world seriously -- even a Sharia-governed Europe, or, for starters, a Sharia-governed Britain. And that goes whether such prospects are promulgated by a notorious Al Qaeda jihadist or the Archbishop of Canterbury. After all, the threat to Western-style liberty posed not only by violent "extremism" but by creeping Sharia -- with its dire implications for monogamy, women's rights, laws of evidence, freedom of belief and expression -- has never even made it into the rationale behind President Bush's so-called "War on Terror." It certainly hasn't been a topic on the campaign trail or most opinion pages. What seems to divide political thought these days is that conservatives still worry about "extremism" and liberals don't. Conservatives want to fight extremism in Iraq and Afghanistan, and liberals don't. Islam -- even as a, yes, democratically spread conduit of liberty-shrinking Islamic law -- is out of the political debate altogether.
Not surprisingly, then, Dionne thinks conservative concerns over mere "extremism" are a political liability that Democratic presidential candidates -- in their appeal to Americans bent on a leader "righting a jittery economy" and "rolling back extreme inequality" (did I miss the socialist takeover?) -- should exploit. Examining John McCain's stated belief that "radical Islamic extremists," or plain "extremists," pose the "transcendent challenge of the 21st century," Dionne argues that Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama should be knocking this contention, which seems to strike the liberal columnist as fantastic. He writes: "Does (McCain) mean that in the year 2100, Americans will look back and say everything else that happened in the century paled in comparison with the war on terrorism?"
Well, who knows? If, for example, Europe has become an Islamic continent by century's end, as predicted by the oft-cited Bernard Lewis, they just might. They might also wonder why in tarnation their post-9/11 forbears (us) failed to note the obvious connection between "extremists" like Bin Laden and the millions of ordinary Muslims who Islamized the European continent, which is a roughly shared devotion to Islamic law.
What's notable here is that Dionne, and, presumably some significant swath of liberal thought, don't see the war on terrorism as the stand-out priority even now. That's why he wants Democratic candidates attacking McCain on it. "If McCain's `transcendent challenge' claim falls apart on close examination," he writes, "the best rationale he has for his election would disappear."
In a way, he's right again. There is a transcendent challenge facing Americans, but we can't rise to it if our leaders can't explain it. President Bush certainly hasn't. To date, what should be a momentous civilizational debate -- liberty versus Sharia -- has fizzled into politically correct hemming and hawing over "extremism." This poses a transcendent challenge to McCain. Can he make it clear that such "extremism" is only a part of the problem? Does he even believe that? We urgently need to understand that Western-style liberty -- freedom of religion, freedom of conscience, freedom of expression, women's rights, equality before the law -- requires vigilance and protection in an era of advancing Sharia. And there's nothing "peculiar" or "odd" about that.
Anti-truth, anti-freedom, anti-individual, anti-life collectives and individuals are likely to join forces.
Yes, it is too bad that,
instead of advancing toward defining what the actual threat IS - ISLAM,
we’re retreating from “Islamic extremism” to “extremism”.
It’s not even “extremist” Muslims that are the problem, it’s ISLAM ITSELF.
You won’t find any Muslim that will denounce violent jihad to convert/subjugate the world, because that’s the core of Islam and to denounce it is apostasy and death.
This piece hits the nail right on the head...one of the costs of freedom and liberty is eternal vigilance...well stated...
Few people acknowledge the existence of a supernatural evil force that keeps Marxists, Islamists, feminists and envronmentalists on the same team when they should logically oppose each other
Mark for later read
I've been saying this for years. But sadly the author misses the connection to multiculturalism I'm afraid.
Examine the history of the Crusades.
They were almost successful in seizing Europe once before.
Reader’s Digest scenario:
- Hillary or Obama win and pull out of Iraq.
- AQ & Iran fill the vacuum in Iraq and begin absorbing Iraqi oil revenues.
- Iran uses their nuclear weapons to blackmail the West into further retreat in the Middle East.
- Europe quickly agrees to concessions.
- The U.S. pulls back support for Israel.
- You choose (A) or (B);
(A) Under threat of attack, Israel NUKES Iran....
(B) Russia & China back Iran and overwhelm Israel, while the U.S. stands back chiding Israel for not having “negotiated”....
We ignore at our peril the insidious creeping of Islam into all the corners of the earth.
We are appeasing and apologizing ourselves to our own demise. Our cultures mean nothing to the Islamofascists other than a source of wealth to be plundered and infidels to be converted, enslaved or killed. There is no negotiating with Islam. The muslims work from their own playbook, the quran, as given them by their delusional prophet some 1400 years ago. Nothing has changed for Islam, still living in the seventh century. Their stated goal is the global caliphate, the extension of Islam as the sole belief system in the world. Their methods are jihad, terrorism and gaming the very systems they seek to destroy; counting on our sense of fairness and compassion to allow their cancer to gain a foothold in formerly free societies.
The PC multi-culti crowd continues its incessant stroll into oblivion, choosing to ignore the fact that the majority of their inclusive lifestyles will be among the first targeted for destruction by a ruling Islamic theocracy, should that come to pass.
It’s time to become a little less tolerant, and a whole lot safer.
One of the best things you can do for the upcoming election is buy a copy of one of Spencer’s books, Say the Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam and the Crusades, and pass it on to an independent friend or a young one that is on the fence or leaning Obama . . . without talking about Presidential politics at all when you do it. They’ll be much more receptive to McCain’s message not to cut and run if they read it.
BUMP!
The author is exactly right. Political Correctness has already closed the debate. Unless this is somehow overcome, we are finished and "liberty" will eventually become universal "submission" to Allah.
Our Founding Fathers would be appalled at the state to which their legacy has degenerated. Every passing year our country resembles more the ancient Biblical Kingdom of Israel than the newly minted 13 United States of America!
One of the big problem conservatives have is that they usually talk in terms of “stopping” some advancing problem, instead of “turning back” that problem.
In this case, “no more Sharia” is little help to those who have recently been placed under its sway, and suffer accordingly. Instead, pressure needs to be brought to bear first, to liberate those who do not want to be ruled by Sharia, and second, to consign Sharia as so inferior to the secular law of the land in all ways, that it has no value.
Typically, the chain of reason should follow the principles of western law:
1) Inferior laws might add to superior secular laws in conformity with those laws, but they cannot contradict, supersede or subtract from them. And,
2) Contracts must fully obey all secular contract law, and any additions must both conform to, *and be in the format of*, secular contract law.
This second provision is just as important, as it requires language and format conformity. This means that a contract court will not need for the contract to be “interpreted” to understand any subtleties or complexities unique to the religion or mutual understanding. That it will be clear and interpretable by the contract experts and attorneys of a secular court.
That means no “poetic license”, no religious references, no Islamic precedent, no fatwas. If it says it in black and white, with proper punctuation, the *letter* of the contract is all that matters. The *spirit* is meaningless.
Under such restrictions, Sharia law is superfluous.
It replaces some archaic statement like, “By the first Moon, the parrot shall be invested in the happy camel”, with something like, “In 28 days from the official date of this contract, party of the first part will deliver by bank check payment for the four (4) specified Potrzebies, after quality inspection and acceptance, to the party of the second part, to the amount of $15,327.88(USD).”
Joseph Story
Commentaries on the Constitution
The means that are being employed to advance the acceptance of and deference to Islam - demands for special public accomodations, the "flying Imams" circus in a public airport terminal, refusing to do the job they were hired to do, etc - are the dividing line at which the original intent of the Constitution to protect religious freedom stops. They cross that line of thier own accord and as long as they continue to do so, I for one feel no obligation to hold their religious beliefs beyond the reach of civil law.
btt
If we had not kowtowed to the mighty oil weapon instead of removing it, the moral bankruptcy of Sharia law would have become apparent long since.
As it is we have steadily conceded the use of a legal system that has not progressed since the 600’s and its expansion when but for the one-crop economy of oil it would have long since been forced to modify into the modern world. And Senator McCain, the “maverick” now seems to be swallowing the conventional wisdom instead of leading us into doing something about it.
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