Debate: Islam -- Threat or Not? Part 3

Great response, Robert.

The "...let me give you a little lesson in Asbab al-Nuzul..." (at about 5:45 elapsed) is a nice touch. If Peterson thinks looking at the purported context of Quranic verses is going to lead to a more moderate interpretation of Islam, he is mistaken.

Notice how Dr. Peterson's comment are clearly prepared and read.

Robert Spencer, on the other hand, is comfortable enough with the topic to speak to the audience.

Thanks for posting this debate. I listened to number 3 and now I am beginning to listen to number 1. Dr. Peterson stumbled in his opening remarks in my opinion. He began by stating, there is no single or authentic Islam just as there is no single or authentic Judaism. He is very wrong about Judaism.

Orthodox (Torah based) Judaism is authentic or authoritative Judaism. None of the other so-called "streams" are authentic Judaism. Sorry, that's simply the way it is. Orthodox Jews do not accept converts from these liberal streams of Judaism (whether they be Reform, Conservative or Reconstructionist) as authentic.

I am certain the same holds true in Islam. There is authentic, Qur'an-based Islam and there is inauthentic Islam that likes to think it is authentic Islam.

Peterson said, "there are and always have been competing Islams, each claiming to be the authentic one just as there is no single, monolithic Judaism, but rather as the great scholar Jacob Neusner observes, Judaisms."

The great scholar Jacob Neusner is, alas, not an ordained Orthodox Rabbi. Neusner was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America; Conservative. On matters of homosexuality, ordination of female rabbis, abortion, etc., like Reform, Conservative deviates from normative (Orthodox) Judaism.

Of course Jacob Neusner claims there are Judaisms (plural).

Wild Jew, many Jews reject Orthodox Judaism for good reason. For one thing, there is no real Orthodox Judaism. Do Orthodox Jews Stone adulterers, sacrifice animals, and own slaves? No. So even Orthodox Judaism is Reform Judaism, just less reformed. Many would argue that Orthodox Judaism isn't even a legitimate religion because it has different rules and different standards for men and women, therefore it violates the Golden Rule all over the place. That may have worked 4000 or even 1500 years ago, but today that precludes 'religion' status. Most Orthodox Jews ignore the ridiculous misogyny in Orthodox Judaism anyway, but even then they're still reforming Judaism. Your statement is akin to 'Wahhabis are the only Muslims.'

Robert was awesome. Sincere, succint, and convincing. Notice how Peterson cited not a single Muslim source nor any source who is regarded as authoritative by Muslims, but Spencer cited only authoritative, Muslim sources.

Robert,

Well said sir!

Dr. Peterson had clearly prepared, and you clearly had to respond off the cuff, with no prep time to respond to his specific concerns.

That is impressive!

Excellent arguments and rebuttals!

Do you have your notes of your opening remarks that you would have used, should you not have chosen to focus on responding?

Looking forward to the rest! Please stop teasing us and making us wait for each segment!

The topic was not properly addressed by Peterson, who instead chose to criticize Spencer for revealing the truth about Islam.

While Spencer's arguments were substantiated by historical Islamic doctrine, Peterson attempted to repraoch Spencer on a moral level for pointing this out, to which Spencer had to defend himself from.

That being said, Spencer's examples of the evolving mandates of the Qur'an, based on Muhammad's status of the time, was quite compelling, though I doubt if the ramifications of abrogation were realized by the audience.

In summation, Spencer won an easy victoiry in this debate, quite simply because Peterson never refuted the initial concept of Islam being a threat, but rather focusing on elements that could work against that threat that need to be supported, in Peterson's pre-written opinion.

Dr. Peterson is so out of his league it's embarrassing.
I have to say I was exceptionally impressed with Robert's speech. He could have continued for the rest of the day and I would have still listened happily, whereas I was bored with Peterson's diatribe after thirty seconds.
Spencer wasn't just speaking to the audience but he was educating them and I guarantee that many people sat there wondering about their own beliefs on Islam(thanks to the propaganda of the Left Wing media) and how wrong they are. Well done Robert Spencer.

Your statement is akin to 'Wahhabis are the only Muslims.'

Robert was awesome. Sincere, succinct, and convincing.

Posted by: jdamn

Jdamn, I think you are unfair to Orthodox Jews. That the Jews do not stone adulterers, sacrifice animals and own slaves is to our credit, not to our discredit, though clearly the Torah speaks to capital crimes like murder. We do believe in capital punishment under certain circumstances.

Nonetheless, unlike Islam, Judaism has a heart. That's the way God intended it. God is merciful and gracious. Why shouldn't Jews be merciful and gracious? You seem to demand that Jews behave like merciless savages in order to be good Jews. My goodness, where did you learn this?

Orthodox Judaism to my knowledge, keeps the Sabbath. Can you say this about liberal Judaism? No. I'm not saying the Orthodox are perfect. They are not. I have some long-standing objections to some of our Orthodox rabbi's positions; particularly with respect to the integrity of the land of Israel. But that having been said, Orthodox Judaism is authentic Judaism because the Orthodox keep God's commandments.

As to your statement about Wahhabi Islam, you are not speaking from knowledge because Wahhabi Islam is authentic Islam. Wahhabi Islam is indeed the Islam that the prophet taught. Wahhabi Islam occupies Islam's two holiest sites. What does that tell you other than Wahhabi Islam is Islam?

I am continually impressed with your knowledge and perspicacity Mr Spencer. We need your expert abilities now, more than ever; if anyone has the stamina to do what it takes to convince people of the danger they face, it is you. Please stay safe.

'Stealth Jihad' is stunning, a must read for all who follow today's events.

Wild Jew, I agree with many of your points. You said: "Nonetheless, unlike Islam, Judaism has a heart. That's the way God intended it. God is merciful and gracious. Why shouldn't Jews be merciful and gracious? You seem to demand that Jews behave like merciless savages in order to be good Jews. My goodness, where did you learn this?"

Well, duh. That's why I proudly identify myself as Jewish. It's a fantastic faith. I just disagree with your statement that Orthodox Judaism is the only real Judaism. It's not. And that line of thinking is logically false because it hinges on the idea that reforming Judaism abrogates its doctrines, while Orthodox Judaism has abrogated several of Judaism's doctrines and practices, thank God, or yes, they would be savages. Judaism predated most religions and every modern civilization on Earth. Of course it had to evolve, but you seem to claim that it did while at the same time claiming that for Judaism to evolve necessitates its no longer being Judaism. Either Judaism can reform or the only real Jews stone adulterers, get engaged to 3 year olds, and sacrifice animals. You can't have it both ways.

Thank God Judaism has evolved. That's one of the best things about Jews: the fact that the world changes and we survive and adapt ever since time immemorial. Israel is the only nation to have had state religion for 60 years, or even 5 years for that matter, and to have not fallen decades or even millenia behind the ball in terms of economic growth, education, healthcare, human rights, and every other credit to a society, and that's the case because Judaism can adapt. I also don't foresee a civil war in Israel a` la Spain, a` la Ireland, a` la that which Italy has been on the verge of since 1865.

And here's where I take issue with the Sabbath: the idea behind it was to rest for a day just as God rested for a day after creating the world in 6 days. The Sabbath as it is practiced hardly constitutes rest. You can walk places on the Sabbath but you can't drive because according to that backward line of thinking, starting a car is akin to building a fire, which constitutes work. But starting a car is easier than putting your shoes on, and driving is easier than walking. The Sabbath, therefore, requires putting forth more actual work than not following the Sabbath.

As for Wahhabism being the only Islam, that's not true. Yeah, it's the real real Islam, but so is Salafism and so is Deobandism. I'm with you in believing that a human being cannot actually subscribe to Islamic dogma, follow the 5 Pillars, and divide the world up the way Islam requires and still be a remotely decent, or even sane human being. I'm not saying that Irshad Manji's misunderstood Islam, which has nothing to do with Islam - NOTHING - and everything to do with Humanism and tradition is the real Islam. It's not. But Shi'ism as practiced by Iranian mullahs is real Islam. The Taliban is real Islam. Just because they don't call themselves Wahhabis doesn't mean it isn't the real thing.

I especially love it when Peterson cites professors at universities in the US as examples of Islamic thinking. That reminds me of the people who couldn't understand Nixon's election in NYC: "But I don't know anyone who voted for Nixon." Similarly, Islam in Utah is not Islam in Waziristan, Riyadh, Qom, or Dearborn for that matter. But thanks for your self-delusional bunker Professor Peterson. It looks comfy. After years of kicking against the pricks I'm sure lots of us would rather hide with you than try to honestly assess the sahwa Islamia and its consequences for all of us.

By the way, if jihad in the cause of Allah does not mean fighting (as in warfare), someone needs to tell the MSA at USC:

http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/fundamentals/hadithsunnah/bukhari/052.sbt.html

jdamn, you wrote: "Thank God Judaism has evolved..."

How has Judaism evolved? The law (or Torah) is meant to serve as a warning. Torah, like Shariah law, "can" be carried out to its fullest, most severe extent.

In other words, an adulterer "can" be stoned to death for adultery. A rebellious child "can" be taken before the elders and if found guilty "can" be stoned to death. How many adulterers or rebellious children were stoned for these crimes in the history of the Jews? Few if any. Why? Because as I wrote, unlike Islam, Judaism has a heart.

Catholic historian Paul Johnson ("A History of the Jews" ) wrote: "In theory, a defiant son could be taken before the elders, convicted and stonned to death; he could be scourged even for the first offence. The Talmud said no such case had ever occurred, but the SHADOW OF THE LAW LAY OVER THE SON (EMPHASIS mine)."

You seem to hold the view that our ancients were an utterly cruel and savage people that were in sore need of reformation. What history have you read? You charged earlier (perhaps slandered) observant Jewish males with "misogyny." Where and how do you see this? Because the sexes are separated during worship?

Where do you find this in our history? Was the Patriarch Abraham a misogynist? Was his son Isaac a misogynist? I do not see this at all in Jewish history or in Jewish tradition, what you are charging.

I did not say Wahhabi Islam is the "only" Islam. What I wrote was, I believe Wahhabi Islam is authentic Islam. It is not a perversion of Islam, just as the 9/11 "terrorists" were not traitors to their own faith as Mr. Bush insisted. The terrorists DO NOT practice a fringe form of Islamic extremism that has been rejected by Muslim scholars and the vast majority of Muslim clerics -- a fringe movement that perverts the peaceful teachings of Islam, as President Bush opined in his Sept. 20, 2001 speech before a joint session of Congress.

As to the Sabbath, it seems clear it was meant to be largely a family day at or near or surrounding the home. The Sabbath is a day to spend in or near the home. This was clearly the intent from the beginning. It may, in large part, be the reason Orthodox Jews live within Jewish communities whereby they can spend the Sabbath near and around the home; where they can worship near the home.

No other self-professed "authentic" stream of Judaism can make this claim that I know of. Can it? If you are Reform or Conservative, fine. Chances are however, you do not observe the Sabbath at or near or in your home as the Orthodox do. Orthodox Jews keep the Sabbath. This is why Orthodox is authentic Judaism amongst other reasons, in my view.

I make no claim to being an Orthodox Jew, by the way. I do however know authentic Judaism. Conservative and Reform are not authentic Judaism. Their conversions should not be accepted as authentic. In this Orthodox are correct. Professor Peterson was wrong to cite Jacob Neusner as an authority on what constitutes authentic Judaism. Peterson's analogy failed. Just as there are not "Judaisms," (plural) as Neusner insists, neither are there "Islams" (plural).

There is authentic Islam and Wahhabi Islam is certainly authentic Islam.

In the thread following the first installment of this debate, a poster named "Thadeus" at 11:47 provides a link –
http://www.mormonapologetics.org/index.php?showtopic=39616

to a site at which Daniel Peterson offers his own comments, but never comes to grips with the substance of Spencer’s argument, nor with the criticism by Spencer, and others (at this website and now, no doubt, elsewhere) of what Peterson presented.

Daniel Peterson’s argument can be reduced to two main broad themes:

1) The importance of anecdotal evidence, based on “nice Muslims I have known,” instead of what the texts and Qur’anic commentors and the great Western scholars of Islam during the century of their flourishing (roughly, from 1870 to 1970, when the Age of Inhibition set in) .” Daniel Peterson is certainly not alone in this. Many will know – at work, or at a university, or elsewhere, someone who seems to be such a nice person, and a Muslim – though some will find the amiability a bit forced, a bit overdone – and this amiability will continue, just so long as a anything to do with Islam (and that means a great many things in the world today) are not brought up, and certainly all kinds of topics – little Aisha, the treatment of women, the humiliation and degradation and physical insecurity of non-Muslims under Muslim rule, the Jizyah, the reasons why Hindus in India, under Muslim rule, converted to Islam and became the ancestors of Muslims in India, and Pakistan and Bangladesh, or how it was that Coptic Egypt became a place where Copts are now a minority and oppressed, or how Christians and Jews, once to be found all over the Middle East and North Africa (was not Monica, the mother of St. Augustine, herself a Berber? Were not Tertullian and Augustine of Hippo not from the thriving Christian communities of North Africa, now unrelievably and irredeemably Muslim?), or why science did not develop under Islam, or why there are no Muslim sculptures, no Muslim paintings of note, or of course anything to do with Israel, or Kashmir, or with the Vatican’s skepticism about the Interfaith Healing Racket – no, once these topics are broached, an entirely different, much more implacable, hostile, aggressive face is show, as the mask of sweet-reasonableness and amiability comes off.

In any case, anecdotal evidence is always a poor guide.

Think of the titan of American industry, the one who graduated from Harvard in the Class of ’09 (that’s 1909) and who, in 1934 assures everyone among his fellow business titans not to worry, that “we can do business with that Hitler fellow, my old classmate Putzi Hanfstaengl tells me” and besides “I went on a bicycling trip to Germany in 1927 and it was wonderful – the people were so friendly everywhere I went” and “the beer! And the bratwurst! And the drinking bruderschaft -- wunderbar! I know my Germans, and there’ll be no problem with them, let me tell you.” will know this or that nice Muslim, the one who as long as the conversation is kept safely away from any topic having to do with Islam, may be perfectly, and even deliberately, amiable. people – out of laziness, ignorance, and sentimentality – and such people include government leaders meeting those ramrod-straight Pakistani generals or, as they once did, that fine, sincere, “pluckly little king” Hussein of Jordan, or other “moderate Arabs” (that epithet must always be used with care) ignoring what is inculcated, ignoring what is in the texts of Islam, and instead substituting , who behind the mask of fair-mindedness that he wears just a little too ostentatiously, deliberately -- and absurdly -- defines the debate as being over what he calls Spencer's insistence that Islam "is irredeemably violent."

Peterson’s presentation is remarkable, for it is so obviously lacking in specific references either to the texts (Qur’an, Hadith, and Sira) of Islam or to the major Muslim jurisconsults and Qur’anic commentators and historians, and also lacking in a seeming grasp of the history of Islamic conquest of vast areas, and the subsequent subjugation of all kinds of non-Muslims, all of them having to endure – at best, when they were not immediately killed or subject to forcible conversion – the status of dhimmis, that is a status that meant deliberate humiliation (as in the manner in which the Jizyah had to be paid), degradation, and physical insecurity (relieved, at times, by the magnanimity of a particular ruler – e.g., Akbar – who though Muslim would not take what Islam demanded of him quite fully to heart). No, Peterson is impelled, it seems, mostly by fear, and by want of imagination.

The fear is made explicit by Peterson: he explains in his own presentation that there are simply so many Muslims that we must not allow ourselves to look at Islam steadily and whole, but must convince ourselves that there is no real and permanent problem, that the texts and tenets of Islam do not inculcate the notion that all of humanity is divided between Muslims and non-Muslims, Believers and Infidels, and that Muslims must understand that they are in a state of permanent war (though not always of open warfare, especially when that would be self-defeating or damaging to long-term Muslim interests) with all Infidels, and that it is a central duty for Muslims to participate, in whatever way they can, directly or indirectly (depending on the circumstances), in the “struggle” or Jihad to remove all obstacles to the spread, and then the rightful dominance, of Islam. And that does not mean, does not require, violence, and indeed the most effective instruments of the Jihad in the Western world today are not those of violence, but deployment of the Money Weapon, campaigns of Da’wa, and demographic conquest.

One-quarter of the world’s population, Peterson blandly lets drop, are Muslims – and this exaggeration is quite telling. The real figure is about 15%, that is fewer than one out of six people on the planet. Even then, that 15% figure can be arrived at only if we accept the idea that everyone who is not openly and obviously non-Muslim in the lands of Dar al-Islam can be called a “Muslim.” So, once the Christians, or Hindus, or others of all kinds (Mandeans, or Yazidis, or a handful of Jews, or Buddhists, or Confucians)have had their numbers decucted, it is simply assumed that everyone else must be “a Muslim.” But is this true? We have no real way of knowing how many secret doubters and dissidents, that is nominal Muslims who do not really naccept Islam, but are not free to reveal this even to their relatives, for fear of the consequences which range from social ostracism to death – may exist in those lands. How many of those Turks called “secular” are really Muslims at all? Yet Turkey is described repeatedly as “95% Muslim.” Is it? I don’t know. Do you?

It is not the truth of Islam’s texts and tenets, and the attitudes that naturally flow from those texts and tenets, with which Peterson is concerned. He is, you see, an eminently practical fellow. And as a practical fellow, he simply sees the enormity of the problem, so because the problem is so enormous, he can conceive of only one way of dealing with it: to deny it altogether, and to attack those who, unlike him, think it better for Infidels to understand the nature, and full scope, of the problem.

But there is one other thing about Professor Daniel Peterson of Brigham Young University that must be understood. It is not so much his ignorance of Islam, and his timidity in dealing with it, and his hopelessly naïve reliance on the anecdotal evidence of this or that “nice” Muslim—colleague or taxi-driver, it hardly matters – but rather his failure of imagination, his failure of intelligence. He thinks the world is so full of Muslims – his exaggeration of their numbers may reflect his mental panic – that there is just nothing to be done.

He cannot identify, cannot recognize, cannot even begin to suggest ways to exploit, the pre-existing weaknesses fissures, sectarian and ethnic and financial, within the Camp of Islam.Daniel Peterson cannot, apparently, understand that the environmental crisis will, of itself, require the adoption of policies that will also have the effect, necessarily, of diminishing the use of, and reliance on, oil, which means that the environmental movement, nolens-volens, will be enrolled in the anti-Jihad movement, which surely must take as one of its chief goals a decrease in the size of the Money Weapon that has proven, over the past few decades, to be so successful in buying influence and staving off any critical inspection of the ideology of Islam, and especially of its adherents in Saudi Arabia, those daggers-and-dishdasha despots, with their sneers of cold command.

He dare not understand that the war of self-defense simply requires that we Infidels, or enough of us, have a clear grasp of the doctrines of Islam, the texts and tenets and attitudes, and how, in practice, over 1350 years, from Spain to the East Indies, the doctrine was carried out in practice. But it is good to have Daniel Peterson on the record, filmed and now immortalized for all to see, so that they can keep going back, and observe the two basic elements that explain his position: fear, and a want of imagination. His ck seems to be that of the amiable, ordinary fellow, who meets other, ordinary fellows some of whom “happen to be Muslim,” and If Only We Could All Agree To Get Along – and why can’t we? What’s keeping us? – everything can turn out okay. He’s Rodney King, but with a doctorate, and no doubt with tenure too.

It really won’t do. Not any more. Not about thi matter. Not now in the history of the unending conflict between Islam and – not only the West – but rather, the conflict between Islam and All The Rest.

Robert Spencer, what an eye opening "debate"! Peterson, disrespectful of your knowledge in every other sentence, obviously lacks even a basic understanding of the facts. Then you come along and have to ad-lib in a magnificent rebuttal of facts and figures that were astounding. (Also, your fairness to Peterson, after his rude approach did not go unnoticed,) Your knowledge is monumental and comes across as fair, honest and newsworthy. If only you could go before Congress with that brilliant knowledge. Keep up the great work. We are all behind you.

PS: I am NOT saying one cannot be a good Jew, whether you are Conservative, Reform or unafilliated. This is not what I am saying.

What we are speaking about is "authentic" Judaism and "authentic" Islam.

This came up when Professor Peterson postulated -- in the name of Jacob Neusner -- just as there are Judaisms, so there are Islams (plural).

Yes, Wild Jew, I think that to this day Orthodox Judaism is intolerably misogynistic, to the extent that it is immoral and does not constitute a legitimate religion if practiced to the letter. Women are filthy creatures, according to Orthodox practice. That is why they have to be covered in 110 degrees and why they are not to be touched for half the month. That is absolutely savage and ridiculously immoral. I agree that Judaism has a heart and doesn't take that to Islamic extremes by declaring women to be genetically inferior, inherently immoral creatures who should live as mutilated, undead corpses to be enslaves, raped, and traded like cattle. But the underlying mesage is that women are dirty by nature and that is sexist, immoral, and savage. And yes, I do think that by today's standards, or even simple objective morality, Abraham was a misogynist. I realize that he was doing as God and Sarai willed, but he had a concubine. 'Nuff said. Are you defending polygamy? Are you telling me that it's moral? I doubt it.

As for coversion, most converts are more devout in their practice and more knowledgable about Judaism than most born Jews like myself. My mother is a convert and she knows more about Judaism than anyone else in my family, at least since my grandfather died. It's not easy to convert to Judaism. It's like Islam, whereby you don't have to know anything or have any idea what you're getting into, and the less you know the better. You get tested on it. I agree with you about the Sabbath, but you should admit that your interpretation is a "reformed," i.e., not a very strict, one. I actually do keep the Sabbath (with all my electronics and creature comforts), but I didn't for many years when I waited tables and breaking it was necessary for my financial survival.

I agree with you about Jacob Neusner and the Wahhabis, though.

"It's not like Islam," was what I meant. I clicked "post" really fast because my printer crashed and I was sure my computer was going to also.

"Notice how Dr. Peterson's comments are clearly prepared and read.

Robert Spencer, on the other hand, is comfortable enough with the topic to speak to the audience."

Now, I'd say that's called charisma.

Robert Spencer clearly derives his charisma from studying the subject all the way through.

Therefore, he knows how to grab an audience with his deeply-felt dedication to the subject.

He actually believes in what he stands for, whereas Dr. Peterson is a 'clinical' academic, a soulless bureaucrat. He almost seems embarrassed to be out there and can't look the audience in the eye, like he has something to hide.

Maybe, like a total lack of conviction ?

This debate resembles a court case, whereby Dr. Peterson presents his case based on "hearsay", while Robert Spencer is obviously presenting the facts as they are.

I have to agree : abrogation is a key aspect of understanding Islam. It needs a lot more emphasis in upcoming debates, otherwise no audience will ever truly appreciate what the West will have to face up to.

jdam, speaking only for myself, I think your need to break the Sabbath in order to survive might have some merit, not knowing your situation. There are circumstances that require breaking the Sabbath. Other than the Orthodox, I do not know any Jews that adhere to liberal Judaism who keep the Sabbath. For a few years, I attended Reform synagogue. These were fine people. They did not however keep the Sabbath. The rabbi did not, to my knowledge, believe Torah was given by God. It seems to me, many if not most, Reform Jews do not believe Torah is divine.

Beyond that, it seems to me, your argument is not with Orthodox Jews but with the Almighty, whom I personally believe gave the Torah. Just as Peterson has spent time with Muslims, I have spent time in Yeshiva with Orthodox Jews. I did not see this, what you are advancing about Jewish men and their wives. I saw beautiful marriages. I saw men who loved and respected their wives, just as Avraham (the patriarch) respected his wife, Sarah. I saw men that treated their children lovingly. I saw beautiful families; beautiful marriages. Little doubt there are exceptions as with any people.

Just as males are considered "unclean" after a seminal emission, so females are "unclean" during their menstrual period. Torah commands men and women to not have relations during this period of time. This is God's law. Women are not filthy creatures. I've not seen, read or heard this anywhere except here on this site from you. Where do you find this idea that women are considered "filthy" within traditional Judaism?

I'm reposting a relevant article ("Why They Hate Us"), and then a response to a poster's comment about that article:

"The question itself -- "Why do they hate the West" --is the wrong question, and inevitably encourages the wrong answers.

The correct question is: "Why do they hate the rest?" Anytime anyone, anywhere, talks about "why they hate America" or "why they hate the West" they have already, unwittingly, conceded much of the case.

But like the Ptolemaic (geocentric) theory, that could not account for the data or have predictive value as did the Copernican (heliocentric), those who keep focusing only on "the West" will not be able to arrive at the correct conclusion.
Again and again it must be pointed out that the greatest victims of Islam have been Hindus, with some 60-70 million killed, and tens of thousands of temples destroyed. The Greco-Buddhist civilization of Afghanistan was largely destroyed by Muslim invaders. The Hindus and Buddhists who once inhabited the East Indies have been steadily reduced, under constant Muslim pressure, as a percentage of the population. The attacks all over Asia, and all over Africa, of Muslims against Christians (not only the Sudan, but the Jihad, with Egyptian pilots strafing Ibo villages, that was the war to suppress Biafra) and animists, need to be constantly recalled.
Not the "War Against the West."
But "War Against the Rest" -- all the Rest.
If Israel was, in the last half-century, the Infidel victim that received the most media attention, this was only because the tiny Infidel state of Israel is located right in the Middle East. Similarly, the Christians of Lebanon, though they did not possess a state of their own, have been targets, especially the Maronites of Lebanon.

If America has been the main target, it is not because of American foreign policy but because America is the most powerful, and most unyielding, and must unsusceptible (chiefly, but not entirely, because it has far more believers in muscular Christianity, not the etiolated pro-"palestinian" kind, and far fewer followers of the Western cult of "tolerance" that the Dutch, to their own great surprise and sorrow, have suddenly and still confusedly realized leaves much to be desired, and is no substitute for knowledge of the enemy).

What Do Women Want? is a title with which we are familiar.

What Do Muslims Want?

That is a title that needs a book to be written under it. Okay, I hereby copyright it, pour tous pays sauf l'U.R.S.S., which rumor has it no longer exists, so I needn't worry.

Phrase the question wrongly, and hark what silliness follows.

Phrase it correctly -- and you are in, like Flynn.
One of those taking part in the discussion here answered: "They hate us because they think we're corrupt and evil. We have pornography. We have drug use. We have homosexuality."
Is that it? Do the Sudanese blacks, all those Nuer and Dinka tribesmen, spend their time sniffing cocaine or watching Linda Lovelace? Did those 60-70 million Hindus who were killed, or Buddhists, or those devout Christians, singing their hymns, routinely blown up in Pakistan and Indonesia, or those Christian nurses punished in Saudi Arabia for singing Christmas hymns, or those naughty Copts in Egypt, who dare to remain Copts, and ditto with those Maronites in Lebanon -- are these people "hated" and persecuted and murdered by Muslims because they were "corrupt and evil...have pornography...drug use...homosexuality"?

What a failure to comprehend. No, let me put it to you bluntly: the Dinka and Nuer, the Hindus and the Buddhist monks in Thailand, the Christians opening their hymnals in Karachi or Lagos, the Hindu villagers in Kashmir and Pakistan and Bangladesh, are not now, and never were, "corrupt and evil...[with] pornography...drug use...homosexuality."
It is not cocaine and rainbow parties which caused Muslims to persecute and murder non-Muslims everywhere they conquered, and today, even within the countries called "Muslim," to keep the non-Muslims in their place.
It is the fact that they were, they are, Infidels. That's it. Whether we are in our Sunday-go-to-meeting best, or looking like Paris Hilton, looking at Rembrandt, or solemnly examining at the Tate Modern the unmade bed, underpants, tampax, and all the unseemly rest, that recently won a prize as "art."

Infidels. The prim and the libertine, le cru et le cuit, the wise man and the fool. It doesn't matter. Infidels -- that's our original sin. And unless we submit, as dhimmis or as "reverts," we will have hell to pay. Don't think that putting your soul in an upright position will save you, will prevent those Muslims from trying to highjack the civilizational plane you are on -- it won't work.

No, Mr. and Mrs. and Miss Infidel, and all the ships at sea, wherever you are, you can do no right by Islam. Don't even try.

[Posted by Hugh at July 11, 2005]

A poster comments:

"This is an interesting, if bleak, point of view. Is there any hope for humanity in this line of thought?"
[Posted by: Mike at July 11, 2005]

I then reply:

"This is an interesting, if bleak, point of view. Is there any hope for humanity in this line of thought?"
--- from a posting above

A curious comment. Should we avoid reality, because that reality appears to some to be "bleak" or should we, rather, pretend that that reality is otherwise, to cheer ourselves up?
"Hope for humanity" is not a phrase that means much. There is hope for those of us who wish not to be islamized, not to have Europe islamized, not to see the more vulnerable and marginal members of all non-Muslim societies fatally attracted to the Da'wa-pushers all around, funded by Saudi Arabia and other well-wishers.
What would it mean to say, in 1941, is there "hope for humanity"? What would it mean to ask if, in 1956, the world-wide threat of the Soviet Union, after it crushed the Hungarian revolt, without a finger being raised in the West, and Imre Nagy and Pal Meter, and many others, were executed? Did the picture look "bleak" in 1941? Yes it did. Did it look "bleak" in 1956? Yes it did. And guess what -- the right side won.

In the first case, it won through sheer military force -- total destruction of the enemy. In the second case, it won because, by holding on, by checking here and there every attempt to push forward, by helping to create the conditions which, after nearly a half-centuryuof the Cold War, caused enough people within the Soviet Union to recognize that it had failed, failed on its own (economic) terms, and that there was no point in pretending otherwise.

And that is exactly how any attempt to deal with Islam today should operate. Recognize what its texts teach. Recognize that those texts, those tenets, affect far more Muslims than just those who engage actively in terrorism, and far more than those who are profound believers, but because it is such a pervasive mental system, and becuase, especially for Arabs, there is so much -- filial piety, embarrassment, the self-esteem of those who cling ot half-truths or myths about the "greatness of Islamic civilization" more than a millennium ago (a preposterous attitude, even if that "civilization" really were as they describe, and even if it really were the result of "Islam" rather than despite Islam), because if they don't have that "Islam" -- if Islam turns out to be a bane rather than a boon for most of its history, then this causes all kinds of psychic disarray, apparently.

Just work to create those conditions among Muslims, whether in the Middle East, or Asia, or Africa, or in Europe or America, that will cause enough of them to question the faith, to begin dimly to recognize that the political, economic, social and intellectual failures, now blamed on "the West" or "Zionism" or something else (it really doesn't matter what) are in fact deliberately attributable to Islam itself.
That does not mean bombs raining down everywhere. It means education of Infidels, a refusal to be accommodating, a refusal to extend aid (we should, in fact, be moving heaven and earth to diminish any discretionary income Muslim states and peoples may possess, because the first use of that income will, quite naturally, be to further the Jihad through support of Muslim propaganda, Muslim weaopns projects, Muslim attempts to bribe large numbers of non-Muslims to act as apologists as so many have been doing for the past three decades), and an attempt not to create, but merely to exploit, the most obvious fissures within Islam.

To wit:

1) Resentment of Arabs by non-Arab Muslims, for the linguistic, cultural, and political suppression (Berbers, Kurds, and so on)

2) Resentment of Shi'a for the persecution and murder suffered at the hands of Sunnis (Shi'a in Saudi Arabia, in Iraq, in Bahrain, in Kuwait, in Yemen, and Lebanon)

3) Resentment of the poor Arabs -- Egyptians, Jordanians, and so on - for the oil-rich ones, a resentment that has been kept in check becasue the foolish West has taken it upon itself to provide for the economic betterment of those poorer Arabs, rather than force them to go hat i hand to the rich Arabs, and whatever results, whether requests are met or rebuffed, will inevitably lead to intra-Arab resentments.
And these three points of entry are not being exploited, today, at all.

Far from it. We are doing exactly the opposite. We pay what can reasonably be described as a "Jizyah" because it is received, by the Muslims (Egyptians, "Palestinians," Pakistanis, and so on) as theirs by right. They deserve it. We should not dare to suggest cutting what they so richly deserve -- look at how fearful the American government is of offending one of the most viciously anti-American countries, and regimes, in the world -- that of Egypt. We need to pay them, you see, in order to be "protected people." It is the same mental set. And we need to pay Pakistan, otherwise -- well, otherwise they might re-collaborate with Al Qaeda and the Taliban, and who knows where A. Q. Khan will send his bombs and know-how next. We are afraid to offend Musharraf, and do not dare to read him the riot act about A. Q. Khan (whom Americans have still not been allowed to interrogate) and the surreptitious support for the Taliban, the surreptitious undermining of Afghanistan, and all the rest of what that seemingly rectitudinous, but Janus-faced Musharraf, and ISI company, are still gettting away with -- and will, unless there is some understanding of the complete impossibility of winning Muslim friendship -- but Muslim coooperation based on threats and withholding of aid and closing of markets is another thing.

And, for the 500th time here at Jihadwatch, Iraq offers the perfect place to exploit the non-Arab Muslim resentment of Arabs, by supporting the Kurds to the hilt in their desire for indepdnence. The Turks don't like that? Too bad. Turkey kept that fourth division from invading Iraq. Turkey's bases and listening-posts, once useful in the Cold War, are no longer needed Turkey will not enter the E.U. Turkey has nowhere else to go -- and if it doesn't play its cards right, we need not guarantee that we will prevent a free Kurdistan from extending into Anataolia. But if they do play their cards right, well... And one more thing to tell Turkey -- chose us, or choose the Islamist Parties. But you can't have both. Make up your minds. Go back to full-bore Kemalism, and continue the job of constraining Islam, and creating conditions where people can leave Islam, can become other than Muslims, or don't.

In the Kabyle region of Algeria, as among Berbers in France, some will look over at a free Kurdistan, and putting away their dog-eared copies of Kateb Yacine, will begin to ponder. Hmmm -- now at last we are not punished for speaking Tamazight. Now we can observe Berber ways, Berber culture. And did you know, that Col. Bremond, back in 1950, wrote a book with the title "Les Arabes et les Berberes" with a subtitle: "La Berberie est un pays europeen." Perhaps we should look into that. And you know, I have heard that more and more Iranians are depicting Islam as an "Arab import" that helped damage Persian civliization. Maybe the Kurds, maybe the disaffected Iranians, have a point. Berberia -- why perhaps even that mercruial man Mr. Khaddafy, intermittently expressing his fury at the Arab League and the Arabs, might help fund something new -- Berberie. Oh, all sorts of things are possible, but not if one does not begin to talk about them, to suggest them.

And finally, and most importantly, Iraq presents the Shia-Sunni split. The Americans have done nothing to encourage it. They have done everything they can to patch it up. That makes no geopolitical sense. Get out your Halford Mackinder, boys, and begin to act like grownups. We need only leave, or greatly diminish our foces.
Give up the preposterous dream of that $595 million embassy. Stop dreaming of permanent bases anywhere in the Muslim world, but especially in a Shi'a-dominated Iraq, whose Defense Minister just signed an agreement with the Iranians, and whose President Jaafari, the one who a week or two ago publicly requested, on top of everything else we have done for Iraq, a "Marshall Plan" funded by the United States, to be called, he oleaginously suggested, "the Bush Plan." Spare us, please -- even the fact that such a request was made shows what kinds of assumptions and presumptions we have allowed to get into the heads of these people, who really must take us for fools, to be taken in turn for all we've got.

Oh, and just today Jaafari critized the American military for its tactics. Here's the AP story:
"Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari criticized US And multinational forces for shooting at Iraqi civilians who act suspiciously near patrols or military areas, saying such cases should be handled in a 'civilized' way, such as shooting at tires instead of passengers."

"Lieutenant Colonel Stephen Boylan, a spokesamn for the US Command, said American forces investigate all fatal shotings. He blamed the problem on the growing use of suicide car bombs as an insurgent weapon.

"Terrorists, through use of suicide [vehicles], have caused htis predicament," Boylan said. "they have affected the normal level of trust that people have for one another and have made it difficult to distinguish between normal traaffic and a grave potential threat."

Whose side are you on -- the American soldiers, trying not to be killed, or the Marshall-Plan-suggesting (always with the hand out, are the Iraqis, and for that matter the "Palestinians" and the Egyptians, and the Jordanians -- you know, we don't have as much as the Gulf Arabs, so why don't you Infidels try to make up the difference, huh?) Jaafari, who if my watch is right, will soon be winging his Sciri-party way to Tehran, to meet with his fellow profoundly devout rulers of the Islamic Republic of Iran, including Mr. Ahmadinejad?

Is this any way to conduct a war? To undo the very things you should be doing, to work against the very best way to demoralize and divide the enemy, and to preserve our own resources (a few hundred billion could go a long way to pay for nuclear, solar, and wind projects, and all kinds of conservation project -- and the effect on cutting back OPEC revenues would be far more important to the anti-Jihad war effort than bringing "democracy" to Shi'a-run Iraq).

Other than those one or two who like to ululate about "Surrender" and "Defeatism" and suchlike, I would be interested if someone finds something about what I suggest above to be flawed. If you argue that we must not "leave Iraq" as a sign of defeat, you are right; leaving Iraq msut take place only if accompanied by other measures that show it is part of a "conscientiously-applied program" (I take the phrase from the American Dental Association's endorsement of Crest) of anti-Jihad measures. Including ending aid to Muslim states, beginning with Egypt and the shock troopos of Jihad, those "Palestinians" born as a people round about 1968, and still going strong, and above all, with a change in rhetoric.

And leaving Iraq, accompanied by those measures, and with much more discussion between American and European governments, not in the old spirit of Eurabian appeasement, but in quite a different spirit -- how are we going to stop, and reverse, the islamization of Europe -- now we are talking.
"Bleak"? Not bleak at all, if you keep your wits about you. Merely -- complicated.

[Posted by: Hugh at July 11, 2005 1:52 PM]

Having taught policy debate at the high school level, I am finding this debate most interesting.

In my comment below, the affirmative = Peterson; the negative = Spencer. I know that seems backwards, but that's because the resolution is stated as a question. The affirmative team presents first. For the purposes of my comment, I'm thinking of the resolution as follows:

Islam is not a threat.

The affirmative agrees with the resolution as stated.

-----------------------------

Clearly, Peterson decided to define the terms differently from the resolution as it was originally stated. A policy-debate judge might find Peterson's 1AC to be "illegal," but the debate proceeds anyway because judges don't render decisions until the debate has ended.

Oftentimes, such a tactic as Peterson used is sufficient to throw the negative team off balance because the negative may not have amassed the evidence to handle the definitions as stated by the affirmative (an advantage of being the affirmative, i.e., going first). In the portions of this debate I'm watching in segments, I see that Peterson's ploy is not working. The negative doesn't have to plow through a file box of evidence and sources; rather, the negative has the information and the sources in his head.

Looking forward to the other segments!

Wild Jew, I derive my idea that women are filthy, according to Orthodox prctices, from the fact that they are not to be touched - not hugged, not kissed, not have their hands held - for two weeks of the month during all of their reproductive years. That just saddens me. I do think the Torah is divine, just as I believe that the human body is divine. They are both to be enjoyed and celebrated - that's why we were blessed with them - not feared and avoided. I've also known many Orthodox Jews who have had wonderful marriages and fantastic families, which never ceases to astound me, since most of those marriages were arranged. I just can't get down with that prctice or the idea behind it. Furthermore, I don't think that women would have increased sex drives and that sex would be better during menstruation if we were to avoided during it. That's another gift from God as far as I'm concerned. Orgasms wouldn't cure cramps if women were to be avoided during our periods. It's amazing anyone gets pregnant following that practice, since ovulation occurs the week after a period.

Robert

You use the variation in Christian belief as an illustration of how there exists a variation in Mohammedan belief as well. Towards the end of the segment, you talk about taquiyya (3:28).

However, the variation in Christian doctrine is different from the variation in Mohammedan doctrine in some very unique ways. For one, in the West today, those who are Christian in Name only are either categorized as Agnostics or Atheists: since they aren't under any compulsion to call themselves Christians, they don't. I don't know that it's that different in non-Western Christian countries, such as Brazil or Philippines, but here already is a difference. There may be Muslim Atheists or Agnostics, but they aren't allowed to call themselves that. In Islamic countries, they'd be persecuted, while in non-Islamic countries, they risk being targeted for honor killings. There is therefore a wider variation in belief in Islam than there is in Christianity, and I suspect in other religions as well, due to this lack of transparency that Mohammedans display, for whatever reason.

But what makes this variation in Islamic belief is taquiyya - something that you touch upon at the end, but don't link when you are talking about the variation in belief. When a Christian or a Jew or a Hindu or a Buddhist tell you that they are non-practicing members, and that those labels just happen to be their denomination by birth, one can believe them. For one, there aren't global campaigns to make any of these the sole religion of the world, as a result of which, a Christian/Jew/Buddhist/Hindu has no reason to lie about how devout s/he is or isn't.

But with a Mohammedan, one can't tell. When a Mohammedan tells an Infidel that s/he is a liberal or secular Muslim, s/he could be telling the truth, or s/he could be practicing taquiyya. As a result, while there is a variation in belief in Islam just as there is in the others, that variation is immeasurable, due to this simple fact. If we could tell with confidence that 60% of Mohammedans are devout and 40% are not, or that 90% are devout and 10% are not, or vice versa, that's something we could actually use. However, if we cannot determine how much is which, due to the above reason, that's worthless information. It's like being on a complete caffeine free diet, then going next to a table with 10 coffees, and only knowing that some are decaf, and others aren't, but having no way of knowing actually how many, or which ones are what. If you were on a strict caffeine free diet, and in this situation, would you do anything other than avoid that coffee altogether?

Therefore, the fact that this variation exists is actually worthless as a result of being so indeterminable. So when you described to Dr Peterson the difference between Islam being what it is and Mohammedans being anything from Atheistic to fanatical, you really didn't do your case any favors. After all, to know that the Mohammedans aren't our enemy, we'd have to know how many of them (out of 1+ billion) aren't our enemy, and among their leaders, which ones. If we can't, there's nothing we can do with that fact, no matter how factual it is.

@angryamerican
Spencer before Congress...hummm.
Sounds like an idea to me. A great idea.

Robert Spencer has clearly devoted the better part of a lifetime to study, analysis, and preparation of his argument, and this clearly shows. Dr. Peterson's argument is not new, and he works backwards in time and place to ground his conclusion--his premises are thus faulty, because he tries to revise or ignore the foundational truths of orthodox Islam. Mr. Spencer, having dealt with similar arguments before, demolishes Peterson's

His conclusion--that Islam cannot be a threat, because the idea that Islam as the engine of open-ended cosmic religious war is simply UNTHINKABLE, its implications too frightful, its consequences so costly, the choices it enjoins on us too painful, effectively hands victory over to Islamic terror by means of the Stockholm syndrome--willing submission triggered by the psychic trauma of victimization.

The question, "Islam, threat or not?" is pivotal to our day, and the course of human history turns on it. To answer it in the affirmative is to face another question, "What is price of freedom, and the cost of mere survival?"

Lan astaslem!

Isn't it so typical that every time a debate on islam comes up I only hear the Islamic proponent bash all the other faiths and then assert that islam is Less murderous than them.

Hardly a selling feature to endorse islam or Muhammad, it's like a Hotel in Mexico that boasts that "Fewer tourists get killed in our Hotels than any of the Competitions Hotels".

BTW
There are over 5 Billion non-Muslims on earth that are getting fed-up with a Minority of murderous thugs within islam , but the real irony over Muslims crying "Islamophobia" to excuse away the well-founded fears of terrorism from some Muslims is the deafening Silence by those same Muslims that won't condemn the actual Terrorists claiming to be Muslims.
We only hear the rantings about condemning all forms of Terrorism or Killing "Innocent Civilians" which they then refuse to give the Quranic definition which is all the non-Muslims
deemed as enemies of Allah and Muahmmaed.

Has anyone actually seen an Imam or Cleric with a Quran who then showed the media the Verse and then read it in the Alleged True-Context ?
Because I haven't , and the MSM never challenges Imams to cite the verse from a tangible Quran for all to see......that's of course if the claims by these Imams are really true and they don't fear going public.

Will there be a transcript?

When Mr. Spencer's ire is up he is BLAZING. Once Petersen went off topic (Islam: Threat or Not?) and instead attacked his fellow speaker, Robert tossed his notes and proceeded unscripted. His depth, breadth and passion were on display. Bravo! I was applauding at 4:20 and 5:12, particularly. This constituted a defense of our free civilization. (I don’t consider Islam to be free or civil.)

Dr Peterson created straw man arguments which Robert refuted. This buffoon was a character assassin.
If i were in the audience, i'd want half my money refunded. Only one of the men held up his end of the bargain in a civil manner.
Bravo Robert!

Spencer gave a pretty hard blow to Peterson's argument by pointing to something odd that Peterson had said. Peterson, no doubt inadvertently, had let slip that he, Peterson, bases his stance on avoiding what would be too "disheartening" or difficult to consider vis-a-vis Islam. How strange that a professor who presumably should be trying to think in accord with facts, would state his case in the form of a head-in-the-sand strategy. Really, Peterson thus unintentionally took himself out of the debate and left Spencer without an opponent.

Peterson's strategy is like knowing that you have cancer but refusing to get it treated because that would mean admitting that you have cancer. He would prefer to just let it metastasize rather than admit that it's there, as if it will become easier to deny as it devours the whole system, as if denying it somehow rendered it unreal.

Robert, I wonder if you were being overly generous in translating the verse from Al-Kafirun as "You have your religion and I have mine." If that were the case, the Arabic would be, "likum dinukum wa li dini". The text, which is "likum dinukum wa li al-din", really means, "You have your (false) religion (which Allah hates), but I have the true religion (of Islam). Even in the modern media, al-din is always translated "Islam". I'm not sure Muhammad intended that verse to be tolerant.

Hugh wrote, "We have no real way of knowing how many secret doubters and dissidents, that is nominal Muslims who do not really accept Islam, but are not free to reveal this even to their relatives, for fear of the consequences which range from social ostracism to death – may exist in those lands."

I invite you to meet one of those "dissidents", Edward the Saudi, and his courageous presentation on al-jazeera TV at link:

http://staringattheview.blogspot.com/2008/11/christians-in-iraq-and-edward-saudi.html

I was going to reserve this comment for the Blogging the Qur'an Surah 109, but it's probably worth mentioning here in the context of what staringattheview states above.

There is also the fact that Surah 109 was referencing Mohammed's initial refusal to worship the false gods of the Quraysh, rather than a tolerance for their religion. In other words, he was telling them that there's no way he'd worship Allat and those other 2, while conversely, they didn't need to worship Allah. That was more of exclusivity than tolerance. And it's that one part of that exclusivity equation (that the mushrikun don't need to worship Allah) that gets qualified by 2:190 and Surah 9, where the conditions under which they are at liberty not to worship Allah get spelt out.

So the claim that Surah 109 is a tolerant verse is misleading, but not just for the reasons of abrogation that Robert mentions in his speech.

staringattheview,

The transliteration given by openburhan and quranbrowser is (for 109:6)
"Lakum deenukum waliya deeni"

whereas you gave

"likum dinukum wa li al-din"

Openburhan also gives numerous translations, most of which say in English "my religion," and none of which say "the religion." Where are you getting the "al"? Incidentally, I do think the overall context of the Quran does support your interpretation of 109:6; I'm just not sure the text there, on its own, literally says that.

I don't necessarily think Robert was being "generous" but rather was citing Ishaq's commentary as relevant to the point about context, in terms of how Muhammad's policy for dealing with disbelievers evolved over time.

IP,

re 109, I'll reserve comment for now, but if you look at the commentaries at altafsir (see al-Jalalayn, Ibn Abbas, and al Wahidi's Asbab al-Nuzul), multilingualquran (Shia), and of Ibn Kathir, and Maududi, you will see that their comments do not support tolerance. Indeed, they describe the sura 109 as intolerant or, if temporarily tolerant, then abrogated or at least viewed in light of the later commands regarding physical warfare.

I just love watching Robert Spencer debating.
He is the James Bond ,the Superman of the debates about Islam.
He is the iron hand in a velvet glove and always knock out his opponent with a smile.

Excellent debate, Robert. As far as reform within Islam goes, I keep pointing out the obvious and that's their Perfect Man, Muhammad, and the huge stumblingblock that he presents towards moving foreward with reform. Muhammad is like the White Elephant in the room, so how can he be reformed? He can't.

Having said that, I am very much in favor of reform within Islam, but Muhammad presents a real problem for Muslims, which is why I don't hold out much hope for meaningful reform ever happening within Islam.

Yes, Muslims could choose to abandon certain Qur'anic verses, etc, but they can't give Muhammad a major makeover because that would be lying; and keeping him hidden away is not an option either.

The bottom line is Muhammad, and what to do with the evil life he led and the evil legacy he left behind. What to do with him, indeed.

A general note: I think some of the attacks on Dr. Peterson on these debate threads have been overly harsh. He is hardly the prototypical MESA Nostra pseudo-academic propagandist a la Carl Ernst or John Esposito or Omid Safi. He is not an apologist for Islamic jihad or Islamic supremacism, has not hesitated (even in these remarks in this debate) to acknowledge that there are elements of Islam that jihadists use to justify violence and supremacism and make recruits among peaceful Muslims, and he is not a Leftist or a slave of political correctness.

I much enjoyed debating him and while we clearly have some serious disagreements, I respect him and his work and thank him for being one of the few academics willing even to engage views that differ from their own. If it ever becomes possible to do so I'd be very glad to continue our public discussion of these all-important issues.

Robert Spencer

Kinana,

I always enjoy your comments. And you are right - I stand corrected - I misread the Arabic text. Al-Kafirun says "din", "not al-din".

People, in 2006 Obama went to campaign with his cousin Odenga in Kenya to turn kenya into a "safe-haven" for terriorist to turn Kenya into a SHARIA LAW state. Had they won the elections it would have meant it would be impossible to try prosecute "any" terriorist anytime/anywhere for their illegal crimes. The terriorst would have to be shipped off to Kenya where they would have been "safe havened". Since they lost the elections there was a pre-planned ensuing blood bath. How many don't know that in USA 2 days before election the press too issued a statement of a pre-planned blood bath had obama not been elected??

Couple days ago, the news announced that Pakistan is now a SHARIA LAW state.

The DEMS prior to 911 told USA law enforcement to go home when Yeman ambssador made a row claiming USA was infringing on his 'turf" when USA law enforcement went to arrest bin laden. Well, the DEM at the time didn't know their irresponsible actions made it possible for the groundwork and planning for 911 to go thru.

In 1999 NY times CLINTON admitted that it was DEMS and ACORN faulty lending practices that would and did lead to the financial meltdown.

In 2000 ?rememba? seattle WASH it was CLINTON and the DEMS whom attempted to claim that we should accept "globalist' government. This would strip the USA of all of its Sovereignty and it's rights and relagate every US citizen to being servants in their own Nation to someone else. Instead of being governed by WE THE PEOPLE. Well, a few protestors secured our Nations freedom by excersizing their constitutional rights and told the "globalist" to forget it.

What the globalism would do would be to make it possible for 'any" terriorist anytime/anywhere to apprehend "any" US civilian and US military and thru trumped up charges slam the US citizen into the UN international court and thrown in jail to rot without due process, without protection from double jeopardy and without fair trial and no one but no one would be able to do anything about it. The terriorist would not be able to be tried or prosecuted for these criminal actions.

As we see, how many people don't know that the UN also thinks our constitution is FLAWED-- because:

1. It actually "works" and provides us with the ability to protect ourselves and govern oursleves and to fairly, justly and legally protect others.

2. Because our constitution grants us freedom to govern ourselves and our finances instead of being relegated to the status of "servants" to a group of people whom don't care for our people, our flag our freedom or our seal.

The REPUBLICANS seeing the danger that globalism holds for our Nation; the REPUBLICANS have said it more than once this nations SOVEREIGNTY belongs to WE THE PEOPLE and it's not open for debate. However, how many Americans are still sitting around wondering what happened in Seattle yet?

However, how many people "still" don't know that globalism still looms as a threat to our Nation as a result of our refusal to tie our exit to political progress.

Now we just found out the bailout whom the DEMOCRATS so heartedly support will allow company's to engage in irresponsible business activities knowing that when the company funds dry up WE THE PEOPLE would be forced to pick up the tab. this will derail the economy and bankrupt this Nation and we would wind up like cuba.

How many Americans don't know that the ACLU thinks Americans are so 'stupid" that Norman Thomas one of the founders of the ACLU said this Quote American's will never "knowingly accept Socialism, however, under "liberalism" American's would accept every fragment of Socialism; and one day wake up in a Socialist nation and "wonder' how this all happened. Unquote.

What we need to wonder is how the DEMS AND ACLU can think they can continue to count on Americans being as "stupid" as the DEMS AND ACLU think Americans are?

Go see for yourselves what we saw at the site--coalition to fight against the ACLU. Go see for yourselves what we saw at the Freedom Alliance sight whom so bravely work to protect WE THE PEOPLE.

Just found out that if these sites don't get funding guess what? there isn't going to be anyone to protect WE THE PEOPLE anymore.

We don't subscribe to violience we believe every American should seek LEGAL and LEGISLATIVE avenues to protect our freedoms and that INCLUDES the right of every American to legally and freely own guns for their own enjoyment and defense.

Doesn't it sound more than a "little" strange to you that here we have a man like obama whom built his career on lifetime of amicable associations with guerillas and terriorists and thinks that's okay----but it's not okay for American's to be FREE and to have the FREEDOM to LEGALLY bear arms?

We as Americans need to seek every LEGAL and LEGISLATIVE avenue to protect our freedoms. feel free to copy paste re-print refute rebuttal or just plain comment

Has Society gotten so warped that it needs to debate whether or not people whom subscribe to murder, and hatred of all things decent, legal and free (to all races), flag, seal, allegience, and pertaining to freedom; are things no one should have to sit around pondering the fact it's NOT okay thing to do and NOT an okay way to be?

Some great or writer or president or author once said quote TOLERANCE only becomes EVIL when given and applied to CRIMINALS.unquote.

Feel free to cut, paste, print, re-print refute, rebuttal, or just plain comment and if you know whom was the originator of that statement please feel free to let us know that too!