Earlier on Pajamas Media (via RaymondIbrahim.com) I discussed how Ron Paul appears to be ignorant and naïve when it comes to the goals of the jihad: ignorant because his statements are not based on accurate knowledge and naïve because he thinks they are – more to the point, because he takes al-Qaeda's propaganda at face value:
Among other qualities, a good presidential candidate must be knowledgeable and able to think outside the box; equally important, he must not be naïve or gullible — certainly not swallow everything the enemy says hook, line, and sinker.Read the rest.During the recent Republican candidate debate, Congressman Ron Paul exhibited his ignorance and gullibility when the panel was asked "Do you plan to decrease Defense spending, to balance spending, or do you believe high spending is essential to security?"
After Paul explained how he was "tired of all the militarism that we are involved in," and his plan on cutting back, he said, "But we're under great threat, because we occupy so many countries…. The purpose of al Qaeda was to attack us, invite us over there, where they can target us…. but we're there occupying their land. And if we think that we can do that and not have retaliation, we're kidding ourselves."
This is, of course, an old and well known narrative.
By questioning Paul, however, Rick Santorum exposed the latter's problematic foreign policy approach:
On your [Paul's] Web site on 9/11, you had a blog post that basically blamed the United States for 9/11. On your Web site, yesterday, you said that it was our actions that brought about the actions of 9/11. Now, Congressman Paul, that is irresponsible. The president of the United States — someone who is running for the president of the United States in the Republican Party should not be parroting what Osama bin Laden said on 9/11. We should have — we are not being attacked and we were not attacked because of our actions. We were attacked, as Newt [Gingrich] talked about, because we have a civilization that is antithetical to the civilization of the jihadists [full transcript here].After rejecting Santorum's thesis, Paul made his fatal blunder:
Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda have been explicit — they have been explicit, and they wrote and said that we attacked America because you had bases on our holy land in Saudi Arabia, you do not give Palestinians fair treatment, and you have been bombing – [audience booing] I didn't say that. I'm trying to get you to understand what the motive was behind the bombing.This exchange clearly revealed Paul's lack of knowledge concerning the nature of the enemy. It's one thing for some Americans to believe that the source of all conflict is the United State's presence in some countries, it's quite another for a potential president to think, and speak, this way.
Ironically, Paul even contradicted himself: minutes earlier, when discussing the need to cut back on the military, he complained that we had a military presence in 130 countries — bringing to mind the question: if U.S. military presence is the source of problems, why haven't these countries lashed out?
But what's worse is Paul's naivety — that he would actually swallow and regurgitate verbatim the propaganda al-Qaeda has been dishing for years, to wit, "Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda have been explicit — they have been explicit, and they wrote and said"; and "I'm trying to get you to understand what the motive was behind the bombing."
Did it ever occur to the Congressman that al-Qaeda could be, um, lying?...
So what was the motive for the attempted Strasbourg Christmas bombing of 2000? Which Muslim countries were the dhimmi French still occupying in 2000?
Could it be that the Muslims will try to kill us whatever we do or don't do to antagonize them or appease them, simply because we are kuffars who celebrate Christmas (among many other offenses against Islam)? http://crombouke.blogspot.com/2011/03/islams-jihad-against-christmas.html
I wouldn't want him for President. He has been totally naive (How could he so naive about our military fighting against Islam?) If he is so naive about that, then what else could he naive about?
Ron Paul has some good points such as on the "create money out of thin air" scam of the Federal Reserve and the fake money it issues. But on Islam he is abysmally stupid and so are his followers. They want to live a free libertarian life of non-interference so have wished away the fact that Islam does not believe in non-interference and does not believe in live and let live or the Golden Rule.
Because their imaginary Allah is so fabulous, Muslims are quite offended by paganism and atheism which is what a lot of Ron Paul supporters are such as Barry Manilow. Yes, Manilow came yesterday as a Ron Paul supporter
THE SUPERPOWER OF LIBERTY
Ron Paul has nostalgia for an America that is lost forever; for the necessarily isolationist America of the 19th century-an America that was a stepping stone in our providential evolution into the SUPERPOWER OF LIBERTY.
As for our country's responsibility for 9/11, bin Ladin was an imperial restorationist whose jihadist ideology of restoring Islam into a great world power (the caliphate) is rooted in the Moslem Brotherhood-an organization that was born in the late 1920s when America was a hemispheric power with no troops in the Middle East or military global reach. In short, Islamic imperial restorationism was the overarching cause of 9/11, not US foreign policy.
Btw, the dissapointment I have with Paul's statement is not with Paul (He is an idiot) but with conservative voters out there who support him candidacy.
There is no longer any hiding place on this planet from Islam. Disbelief in Mohammed will soon be an international thought-crime, when the OIC gets its way.
You may not be interested in Jihad, but the Global jihad is interested in YOU!
Isolationism is not an option now that the enemy has wormed its way into every important institution in America: http://crombouke.blogspot.com/2010/01/muslim-subversion-sedition-and-social.html
"Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda have been explicit ...". Yes, they have, they have been very explicit in invoking Islam and sharia, and quoting the Quran and Mohammed. Funny how those aspects of the explicitness get completely overlooked.
Physician Ron Paul, wouldn’t treat a disease he had never seen before without really learning about it first, would he? Now, standing for the Republican nomination, what makes him think he understands the number of security threats the United States faces? Has he simply accepted what his own staff has told him, or is his problem deeper than that? Bertie Wooster has the correct diagnosis.
Ron Paul is an ignorant loser. Don't even think about him. He's irrelevant.
I wonder how Congressman Paul feels about the Muhammad cartoon backlash. Surely as a Libertarian he is pro-free speech, and the forced censorship perpetrated by muslims should be cause for concern.
He is woefully inept on the subject of national defense. Burying one's head in the sand is no platform to run on.
I always find these kind of articles interesting and frustrating.
In the first place...
Ron Paul is the only candidate who is for restoring America to the Constitution and the Libertarian Republic it was founded by and as.
This COMPLETELY wipes out Sharia law and any chance whatsoever that America would ever even begin to be twisted by political correctness and complete nonsense.
Secondly...
Ron Paul is the only candidate who will eliminate every single penny of aid and support to ALL Islamic supremacist governments and all Islamic majority countries (who hate America) by cutting ALL foreign aid and fake, non-Constitutional projections of American corporate power in the world.
So all domestic sharia law concerns on a Federal level are INSTANTLY eliminated and all American jihad funding internationally are ELIMINATED. PERIOD. No other candidate, Republican or Democrat, has policies that does that, or a voting RECORD that does that. Nobody. PERIOD.
So, by default, Ron Paul doesn't have to concern himself with Islam because it is anti-Constitutional and something that cannot be an issue. Period.
HOWEVER...
It does make some sense for Ron Paul to educate himself via Robert Spencer on the issues so that he has a more rounded world view beyond the American Constitution. So I get the criticism. Certainly Thomas Jefferson educated himself on Islam when he took on and destroyed the Barbary Coast jihad pirates. Ron Paul should consult the modern day expert on Islamic supremacists and jihad, who is Robert Spencer, and it would be the final piece in the equation which makes him the ultimate candidate in American politics in at least 60 years.
Abraham_Lincoln, while Ron Paul may be right about some of the issues you raise, he fails the "necessary and sufficient" test that needs to be applied to presidential candidates. Wheels are necessary for a car, but they are not sufficient - an engine, and other things, are needed, too. So, too, it is with Ron Paul.
Also, there is the matter of the ineffable qualities that mark a leader, the ability to inspire confidence and respect among more than just a few devoted followers, and to get people to follow. This ability seems to be independent from technical competence in this or that discipline; it can be found in fools and charlatans (cf. the present occupant of the WH).
We need someone in office who passes the necessary and sufficiency test. Ron Paul might be right about monetary policy issues, but he is woefully uneducated about the fundamental realities of Islam. And that fact alone disqualifies him in my book for being taken seriously as a presidential candidate, without needing even to touch on issues of his weak personality.
l cannot understand some of the rabid support this man gets.. its like the reverse of obama koolaid drinkers! the US made some mistakes but generally they have freed more muslims and other people than any other nation ever did now and in the past.
Help please. Hi, can anyone link me to an essay that explains the difference between Christian thought and Islamic thought in regards to reason? I know it has something to do with their differing concepts of God - the Christian concept is that God is held to natural laws, the Islamic concept is that he isn't - or somethign like that. I'd like to come to an understanding of it for a discussion I'm having with an Islamic apologist. If anyone can point me in the right direction it would be much appreciated.
l cannot understand some of the rabid support this man gets..
It's because on other issues he's pretty damn good.
Redwine,
I would recommend ANY of the articles written by our very own Hugh Fitzgerald, found here.
Wheels are necessary for a car,...
I laughed aloud when I read your post. Mr. Paul is missing a wheel or two. I doubt very much that any foreign leader would take him seriously. With neo-isolationist Ron Paul in office, Jihad would intensify, which I think is Mr. Ibrahim's point.
Ron Paul is an apologist for iranian thugs! he has no idea about the harm he is doing with his put down of the US military.
Fabulous article from one of the clearest thinkers on Islam and Jihad!
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Mr. Ibrahim quotes, I believe, himself, in his fine piece:
"For example, for all his talk that U.S. "occupation" is the heart of the problem, shortly after the 9/11 strikes, Osama bin Laden wrote in confidence to fellow Muslims:
'Our talks with the infidel West and our conflict with them ultimately revolve around one issue — one that demands our total support, with power and determination, with one voice — and it is: Does Islam, or does it not, force people by the power of the sword to submit to its authority corporeally if not spiritually? Yes. There are only three choices in Islam: [1] either willing submission [conversion]; [2] or payment of the jizya, through physical, though not spiritual, submission to the authority of Islam; [3] or the sword — for it is not right to let him [an infidel] live. The matter is summed up for every person alive: Either submit, or live under the suzerainty of Islam, or die."" (The Al Qaeda Reader, p. 42)
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This little tidbit above pretty much lays to rest the apologists' "imperialist invader" argument.
__________________________________
The piece you wrote is absolutely correct, Mr. Ibrahim. I cannot find a word out of place.
YOU, Sir, understand the enemy.
Thx.
Raymond Ibrahim is more-or-less correct about Ron Paul's understanding of Islam and the global jihad, but honestly what candidate had shown any understanding? For all their talk of jihadism and such, men like Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum express the same delusional and dangerous idea of the neoconservatives that democracy in the Muslim world will somehow save us from Islamic violence. Neither figure would dare suggest that Muslims should be halted from immigrating to the West. Romney is an idiot on Islam, suggesting that jihadism is a religion seperate from Islam, which he suggests is peaceful and tolerant in its standard form.
Thanks for that Boneshack. That doesn't really narrow it down for me though. I'm specifically after something that deals with the difference between the Christian and Islamic concept of God, and how those different views leads to their differing attitudes towards reason. I've tried all kinds of search queries, but it's like looking for a needle in a haystack. I know what I'm looking for is there, because I've read a Robert Spencer essay on the subject before.
You know, I've got to tell you plain and simple like, and I have conveyed this to you before with no effect and thus I am dubious you will ever learn, but being for "restoring America to the Constitution" (your exact words) doesn't mean didly shit if liberal judges, and even the occasional confused moderate or conservative judge, decree that Sharia can be considered when deciding American cases. And here's the essence of it all------Ron Paul's profound ignorance of Islam (do you deny this?) makes it more likely, should Ron Paul ever become President, that the judiciary of the American government will continue to facilitate the entrance of Islamic doctrine into American law.
Can you at least try to realize that Ron Paul's high theory of the Constitution is functioning in a vacuum, because any decent legal system (such as that of America's) is only as strong as the supporters of that system are informed of the way the world really works. Common sense, correct knowledge and street smarts of all those elements out there which can bring down a democratic polity are as necessary as high theory. Ron Paul has the high theory down well. He fails otherwise. Quite frankly, I think what I've just written will go completely over your head.
Oh yeah, one last thing, Ron Paul's antipathy (and even indifference to Israel by a free person is moronic) to the Jewish state is palpable. This also is a stupidity on his part. And you won't get this either I would bet.
Very apropos, Classicus!
"But you're an absolute idiot, Ginger. I KNOW...!"
Thanks for posting that! I haven't watched Jeeves and Wooster in ages. I will have to look for it on netflix.
Would you consider me terribly uncool if I confess I HATE Hugh Laurie in House? I dislike the show and I dislike his character even more. For me he will always be Bertie Wooster or the Prince Regent from Black Adder the Third.
Redwine,
Sorry if that was not enough. You can always read Craig Winn's Prophet of Doom.
No offense to Mr. Spencer, but I think Mr. Winn does a far better job of destroying islam with his book and commentary.
Would you consider me terribly uncool if I confess I HATE Hugh Laurie in House?
You, uncool? Never.
Bertie's Aunt Agatha would have been appalled at Laurie's disheveled appearance and boorish behavior in House, and I'm afraid that Jeeves, thinking very seriously of his own future, would have found a different situation straightaway, seeing that Mr. Wooster was no longer able to keep up the required standard.
Jeeves and Wooster was always witty, escapist fare; and the Wodhouse stories were even funnier than the show. Hugh Laurie ought to move on from House now. He can do better.
Ron Paul talks about non-intervention and staying out of everyones business when it comes to Islam and terrorism but whenever Israel is the subject his anti-semitism overpowers his libertarianism.
Did anyone else have trouble logging onto Jihad Watch this evening? Was the site down for a while?
Free Gilad Shalit!
Paul does have this tendency to live in a past long gone. I agree in principle with many of his ideas, but things do change and one must recognize that not all challenges have the same stock answer. I'm especially disappointed in his narrative towards the Islamic world, whereby he overlooks the aggressive and expansive drive of the religion. As you study Islamic history you get a sense that any sign of concession to their demands is viewed as weakness and an opportunity to ask for yet another inch (or foot as it were) of leeway. Some people simply will not listen to reason. To attempt to reason with a group like al-Qaeda is akin to reasoning with a rattlesnake you just stepped on!
Wellington, your last paragraph demonstrates what motivates your politics. And it isn't America, America's constitution, or America's best interests.
Just to make sure this is clear: Israel is a fine country -- which exists as a completely separate autonomous entity to the United States, on the other side of the world. Israel's interests are as opposite to the United States, as its reason for being and underlying premise are different. All they have in common is that Islamic supremacists hate them for different reasons. Israel because it exists, America because of sixty years of projecting its power in the name of corporate interests (installing and supporting dictators, ad nauseum for example). Israel is not part of the United States. It is a good ally, not a Middle East Hawaii.
I'm glad to have cleared this up for you, but "you won't get this either, I bet".
Foreign policy is the only issue(s) Ron Paul is naive about. With other issues (especially economic issues), his stances are far more sensible.
My question for Ron Paul:
If terrorism by Al Qaeda is a response to provocation by non-Muslims, why didn't Al Qaeda ever attack Serbia or the Bosnian Serbs during the 1990's, when Serbs were oppressing Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo?
Ron Paul doesn't appear to realize we are in a war of worldviews that the US can't get out of simply by ceasing to "occupy" certain parcels of middle eastern real estate. This glib pragmatism -- that says "don't get all hung up on that religious stuff, we all know it really comes down to doing business" -- is what our enemies are relying on to infiltrate our legislative and cultural structures, which they are doing with impunity at present.
Things have gotten a lot more complicated than they were in the early and mid 20th century. With the world getting smaller through global communications and air travel, a simplistic separatist approach to foreign policy isn't gonna cut it. It's not just the economy, stupid.
This guy is out as POTUS.
More from Osama bin Laden about why he attacked us on 9/11 is contained in his "Letter to America" dated 24 November 2002, and found here http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/nov/24/theobserver .
Ron Paul would appear to be parroting many of bin Laden's justifications for the attacks, not just on 9/11, but many others, as well. For this reason alone, and apart from whatever thoughts he might have about economics, Ron Paul cannot be entrusted with the defense of the United States, and by extension the Western world.
Redwine,
The Closing of the Muslim Mind by Robert R Reilly fully fleshes this issue out. It will give you all the amunition you need, even beyond what the average muslim would know.
Is it possible to both restrain and defend an ally? The ancient Athenians had a little trouble doing that. We had better not repeat their mistakes.
If America does not stand by her friends, she will have no friends; and worse, her friends may cause her grief.
Wellington is in no way un-American. He understands that America has obligations; Ron Paul does not. Mr. Paul thinks he can outrun a crocodile, by leaving Israel to herself.
Moreover, Wellington is that rare professor in academe who is not in the camp of Nietzsche's far less brilliant bastard children; the incompetent, semi-literate America haters who write revisionist drivel like Howard Zinn's A People's History of the Unites States, or Edward Said's, Orientalism.
Wellington is old school - the kind of school where facts, rather than ideology, get respect.
We must understand what Ron Paul really is first.
Ron's hero is Murray Rothbard, who while a good economist, was never "in love" with the U.S. You may want to ask David Horowitz about Rothbard, as he came from a very rabid communist upbringing. Other than his Austrian Economics, he ALWAYS preferred the USSR way of government to that of the U.S.
Why would Ron Paul favor any authoritarian type political system to the imperfect republic he lives in?
Now about Paul and his fiscal policy and those earmarks of his... I do in fact know a little about them. When he has an earmark with a title including "For Free Trade" expect the opposite. He rants about "corporatists" (his term, not mine)yet many of these "For Free Trade" earmarks are nothing more than payola to those very "corporatists" such as ExxonMobil, BP, Dow Chemical, etc... I've done a little investigating, but you have to know so local geographical references to understand this.
BTW, in 2002, I was charged with selling a brand new dredge to be used by Dow Chemical, Freeport, TX for maintaining the depth at its docks, but good ole Ronny Boy got an earmark to take care of their costs for them.
The word for 'reason' in Arabic is 'aqil'. You have 'aqil' if you believe everything the Qur'an says. You lack reason - aqil - if you don't.
So, when the Qur'an says that the earth is flat, and you don't accept that, you lack reason!
The Qur’an 20:53, talks of God who has, "...made the earth for you like a carpet spread out..." (see also 71:19). This could hardly be a clearer way of describing the earth as flat. The Qur’an repeatedly refers to how the earth is "wide" or "spread out" (Qur’an 13:3; 15:19; 18:7; 19:6; 21:30; 35:40; 41:10; 43:10; 50:7; 51:48; 55:10; 78:6; 79:30; 88:20), which is not the language used to describe a round sphere.
For a list of similar kinds of nonsense in Al Qur'an, check out the following.
http://www.bibleandscience.com/science/quran.htm
I hope you can see now why Al Qur'an and what lies between its covers is totally inappropriate for the 21st Century.
"l cannot understand some of the rabid support this man gets."
You may not be aware of or may not believe this, but many of Paul's most rabid and vocal supporters care about one thing and one thing only: the possibility that a libertarian president would push to legalize pot. They're potheads, many of them (though not all), who don't give a crap about any other facet of policy.
Between that fact and the generally pro-abortion mindset of libertarians, it's the main reason libertarianism hasn't gained as much traction among conservatives as they'd hope. Paul's foreign policy foolishness is a more recent development (or retardation, depending on how you look at it).
After Paul explained how he was "tired of all the militarism that we are involved in," and his plan on cutting back, he said, "But we're under great threat, because we occupy so many countries…. The purpose of al Qaeda was to attack us, invite us over there, where they can target us…. but we're there occupying their land. And if we think that we can do that and not have retaliation, we're kidding ourselves."
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We were not occupying any Muslim country pre-9/11. We had a small presence in Saudi Arabia because the Saudis had asked us to protect them from possible depredations by Iraq's Saddam Hussein after he invaded Kuwait. (Whether we should have acceded to that request is a separate issue).
I have heard apologists—with a straight face and a disturbing sense of ahistoricity—that we were attacked by Al Qaida because we were occupying Afghanistan and Iraq.
Never mind that these invasions were *responses* by the West to 9/11—*not* its cause. This gives a sense, though, both of how muddled many Westerners are when it comes to Jihad, and how eager so many are to blame the West for Jihad savagery.
Michelle wrote:
Did anyone else have trouble logging onto Jihad Watch this evening? Was the site down for a while?
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Yes, it was, Michelle. I wrote Marisol when I was unable to log on to Jihad Watch for a couple of hours earlier this evening, and she confirmed that the site had been down briefly.
Luckily, it seems to be "back in business" now.
Apart from assessing Ron Paul's presidential capabilities regarding his ignorance and naivety, there is probably a much more important factor to be considered.
Ron Paul doesn't look, or sound like a President. His stature is wrong, his speaking is wrong. He doesn't talk, he whines. The image Ron Paul projects is that of a wimp.
"Ron Paul doesn't look, or sound like a President. His stature is wrong, his speaking is wrong. He doesn't talk, he whines. The image Ron Paul projects is that of a wimp."
Exactly so, and what I was referring to in my somewhat mildly worded comment above about "... the ineffable qualities that mark a leader, the ability to inspire confidence and respect among more than just a few devoted followers..."
The purpose of al Qaeda was to attack us, invite us over there, where they can target us…. but we're there occupying their land.
This whole argument by Ron Paul sounds confused.
Where is "there", Afghanistan? But was al Qaeda not lead by a Saudi and an Egyptian who were 'occupying' Afghanistan for their own ends after the Russian occupation?
"Would you consider me terribly uncool if I confess I HATE Hugh Laurie in House? I dislike the show and I dislike his character even more. For me he will always be Bertie Wooster or the Prince Regent from Black Adder the Third."
Remarkable! Exactly how I feel about his acting! He is a brilliant actor and I also often enjoyed him as Bertie Wooster and in Fry and Laurie. And how he is playing HOUSE! negative to the bone, rude as hell, yes, I refuse to watch that show!
I think Ron Paul may not only be clueless about Islam, but also that he is one of those many Westerners who apply different standards to Democratic Western governments en companies on the one hand and other, less advanced, less powerful humans and organisations, like the Palestinians, or all Muslims.
Yes, blatant double standards I notice. And these, often leftist, people admit it too, they say that when some people are having more power, more civilization if you will, that then they should be judged the responsible party and much harder than their alleged victims.
That is why especially Americans and Israeli's are harassed much more by such double-standard people (like Ron Paul I suppose) for the same kind of behavior as so many other humans and groups display.
For instance in Syria nowadays; even one Muslim colleague told me that even some Muslims are now saying that Bashir Assad behaves WORSE THAN THE JEWS. But people with double standards, because of higher accountability for perceived more powerful people, keep on prioritizing Israel and America for criticizing, keeping THAT up by most of the time and energy and indignation by far! Without seeing their faults in a truly global context. It frustrates and enrages me a lot!
@ Abe
You mistakenly wrote: ...all they have in common (America and Israel) is that Islamic supremacists hate them for different reasons. Israel because it exists, America because of sixty years of projecting its power in the name of corporate interests...
You're right about Israel and wrong about America. The Islamic Ummah hates America because it's not an Islamic country. If the US had never been involved in any 'projection of power' and there was no alcohol, no crime and everyone went to bed at 10pm and lived blameless lives, Islam would still hate America.
Jihad and the imposition of Sharia worldwide is all that matters to Islam. Nothing else. All this 'projection of power' stuff is just an excuse used by apologists for Islam, which you are parroting, to carry out the Qur'anic mandate to conquer the world.
Wars of Jihad were being fought 850 years before America was discovered. Islam's agenda is nothing to do with what the US has done or does now. Islam would carry out its agenda regardless. They would find another excuse if the 'projection of power' one didn't exist.
You are very fuzzy in your thinking. You lack focus. You need to read JW's 101 page about Islam.
Redwine, for what it is worth; Daniel J. Boorstin explained the difference well in his book of 1998, the Seekers, which I enjoyed to read. traeh here is even able to recite explicitly the difference in perception of God you seek to argue. But this book I borrowed from the Library, so right now I cannot find that passage.
Good luck and much success in your dialoque-effort!
No surprize here. The U.S. has been sending money to people that don't neccessarily like us and are not our friends for decades.
The problem is our legislators don't know the first thing about the ideology of any of these people. So it doesn't help our positive effort at all. In fact it hurts it. Imagine sending money to Hiters SS during world war two with the idea that the SS would become our friends against Hitler.
The ideology of Islam is clear to everyone except our legislators, courts, and Department of Defense. All you have to do is pick up any news paper and read it for yourself. The radical Muslims have been telling us for 5 decades exactly what they intend to do. And yet we continue sending them billions of dollars to try to appease them. There is a word for that its called treason.
The leaders of this nation must stop appeasing the enemy of this nation. Anything less is one step forward and two steps backwards regarding homeland security.
Hello.... there are radical Muslims working in high places in this country. Of course they didn't announce that they are the enemy. They want to win are trust and move us away from the truth. Used car dealers have been hidding the truth for 100 years now. In Islams case its called taqiyya and they use it as a key to open thousands of doors throughout the world for their cause.
The truth is not found in Islam take that to heart. Islam has not kept so much as one agreemment or promise yet. "Beware of gift burying and kind talking strangers". The heart and soul of Islam is to conqure the world by "any means" neccessary because Allah has told them to.
Would someone please inform our legislators so they will be removed from ignorance. Because as things stand today most legislators are commiting treason by helping and appeasing the enemies of the United States. Ignorance shouldn't be an excuse at this late date.
redwine,
I think the issue of the different concept of god and reason between Christianity and reason was debated by the 13th century Byzantine emporer Paleologus, who was quoted by Pope Benedict XVI, to the great consternation of Muslims. A sample of Pope Benedict's speech is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVI_Islam_controversy
You can read the entire debate here:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/40389472/Manuel-Paleologus-Dialogue-with-a-Learned-Muslim-Scholar-Dialogue-7-15th-century
Let me interject a bit of my own opinion. The relation between theological views and reason is complex and subtle. You may not be able to find a quick debating point. There are Muslims who claim that they converted to Islam from Christianity because the monotheistic view of Islam made more sense to them than the trinitarian view of Christianity. I don't doubt you will be able to find some Muslim scholar well-versed in Christianity who states that true Islam encourages freedom and free inquiry.
You have to be more concerned with your own logical thinking than with answering someone else. It may be that you will have to do a bit of studying and thinking before you can reply adequately to the assertions of a sophisticated Muslim. Don't worry so much about losing a debate as about developing a logical and historically accurate picture for yourseld.
I have read a lot of JW over the years, but I don't understand the venom against Paul. It may be that Paul and Paulians are naive, but neither the article nor the comments have been able to prove the implicit premise of all their criticisms:
that the reality of blowback and the ideology of islamic supremacism are incompatible.
Paul's apparent softness on Islam may dissuade some people from considering him as an alternative to the neoconservative "kill them all till we run out of money and become a police state" approach.
However, I don't think Paulian naivety justifies neocon naivety. Terror may in fact be the result of both islamic ideology and blowback. Can you prove that all the wars abroad are actually making us safer, and not just distracting and draining our country; or is it our patriotic duty just to go along? Do all antijihadists believe that the Constitution, as written, is a suicide pact and must be junked in the name of the war against "terror"? I don't think so. In fact, I seem to recall that Spencer has expressed skepticism about the Bush and Obama wars.
Don't we risk hurting the antijihad cause by excluding and reviling Constitutionalists and people who aren't convinced by the "war on terror"?
"I don't understand the venom against Paul."
Peter,
Let me say that in listening to the Republican primary debate, I heard Ron Paul say that we have to be careful about fences on our border, because those fences can be used to keep citizens inside our borders, as well as non-citizens out. Paul was referring to US citizens with money, who might want to leave the US for friendlier tax environments.
That kind of wrapped it up for me with Paul. Someone who makes crazy statements is simply not Presidential material, and in fact would be extremely dangerous as President.
I agree that our adventures in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya are terribly expensive and counterproductive. I know that Paul would pull out of those countries, but that is not sufficient to protect us. Our main danger is in unchecked and unfiltered immigration, exactly where libertarians are weak.
When we admit a Muslim immigrant, we are stressing our law-enforcement agencies. Not every Muslim is a terrorist, but the proportion of terrorists from the Muslim community is much higher than other communities. Whenever 3 Muslims get together to plot local jihad, it takes years of observation and scores of police and prosecutors to prevent the acts and catch the perpetrators. Furthermore, law enforcement becomes stressed to the point where Muslim-on-Muslim crimes: female mutilation, wife-beating, forced marriages, honor killings, are not adequately investigated, or worse, are actively covered up by law-enforcement, as happened in Tampa.
Furthermore, we live in a democratic republic, very susceptible to special interest groups. The more Muslims we admit, the more people we have as citizens who are committed to changing our form of government and doing away with our freedoms. They are extremely dangerous to our way of life, even if they eschew violence, and intend to carry out their program through legislative influence and constitutional amendments.
There is a positive role for government in protecting the character of our society from outsiders, and in enforcing the rights of even the most helpless citizens. Too little government in this respect is at least as dangerous as too much government.
I don't like many of the Republican hopefuls, but Ron Paul stands out in his unique lack of qualifications to be President.
Ron Paul also stated during a previous debate that "government should have nothing to do with marriage...it's entirely a religious affair."
Sound good until we see our least favorite cult, Islam, allowing 4 wives and numerous concubines.
The founders would have probably agreed with Paul. They would never have envisioned that the nation borne of their blood would be populated by some of the laziest, most stupid non-thinkers alive today, whose only goal it seems is to promote the will of America's enemies inside her borders on the back of her citizens.
How you can conclude, Abraham_Lincoln, that what motivates me politically isn't America or its Constitution escapes me completely. Because I see Israel as an ally that should not be abandoned (in essence what Ron Paul wants), this hardly should translate into my not having America's interests first and foremost in mind. Israel is the canary in the coal mine and Paul is clueless of this, just as he is clueless of Islam's ultimate designs. For Paul to convey, as he has numerous times, that those in the Middle East are angry with us because we are involved in that region of the world betrays 1) a woeful misunderstanding of a religion that seeks to conquer all the world in a territorial sense and 2) is a slap in the face to much of American foreign policy which has had to get involved in the Middle East precisely because the Islamic world is so dysfunctional, so screwed up. I'm not arguing that every decision that has been made respecting American involvement in Middle Eastern affairs has been the right one, but Paul's kind of isolationism is simply unrealistic and even dangerous in the world in which we now live.
Also, you didn't answer my query to you about what Ron Paul knows of Islam. Do you deny that Paul is ignorant of this religion? Future Presidents of the United States simply can no longer have inaccurate views of the Islamic faith, as Bush did significantly and as Obama does egregiously. Ron Paul, unlike Santorum, Gingrich, Bachmann and certainly Allen West (though, of course, West is not running for President), has manifested blithe ignorance of Islam's tenets, more, in fact, than any other Republican candidate for President. Your turn.
Very touched, classicus, by what you wrote of me. Thank you, my friend.
I see no one wants to try to prove the assumed but still unproven premise of all this: that blowback and jihadism are incompatible as causes of terrorism against the US.
I deny that any other GOP candidate would or could do more than Paul to reduce the introduction of dangerous immigrants. He has pledged to reorient our defense to actual defense and security of the homeland, which is not happening now and will not happen under the other candidates, because they love to pour all our resources into wars overseas.
Perhaps you believe that since the US is the shining city on the hill it can never collapse or lose the freedoms the Constitution guarantees us. If so, you are the dangerously naive one.
Paul does have a foreign policy, it seems to me: national defense and national interest. Not the Wilsonian nation-building that we're very unsuccessfully trying now.
Paul is not anti-Israel; he is opposed to aid to Israel, and especially the larger aid to all the Arab countries, and all the strings that are attached to this aid. If you believe Israel cannot defend its own interests, I think history proves the contrary.
Hi folks,
I found this despicable video made by Ron Paul fans using cut and paste of Ron Paul with Osama Bin Laden 'proving' that Osama was right all along. There was to me no better proof that Ron Paul fans take the terrorists at face value. So I posted it on my channel. And the very same video that they put thumbs up for in the original posting, now they are thumbing down!! They even flagged it away and I had to repost it on my backup channel.
Here is the video for all to see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-j4rjhXHIEs
It is pretty obvious that Ron Paul fans trust the Islamist terrorists.
Hello peter,
"I see no one wants to try to prove the assumed but still unproven premise of all this: that blowback and jihadism are incompatible as causes of terrorism against the US."
It's odd that you make this charge while replying to me, since I never made the assertion in the first place. I made the assertion that increasing the number of Muslims in the US through immigration will increase the incidents of attempted terror. Britain has experienced more terror incidents, Denmark, Finland, India, Spain, Somalia, Nigeria, Sweden: are all these countries experiencing blowback?
You assume that Ron Paul would take steps to protect our borders from dangerous immigrants, since he is "pledged to reorient our defense to actual defense and security of the homeland".
First of all, if this is a platform of Paul's, let him say it explicitly. When you make the claim for him that he has not made, you're just blowing smoke. Give a quote from his platform showing he will cut off immigration to immigrants opposed to the constitutional freedoms we now enjoy, even if those immigrants will do so peacefully.
This is not an unreasonable request. It is an important assumption of many libertarians that immigration ought to be open, that economic self-interest will sort out the criminals. It is quite possible that Paul has a different idea, but he has to make that clear. Your unsubstantiated claim is not valid evidence.
I agree with you that the US ought not to carry out foreign wars or nation-building in the Middle East or anywhere else. Our aid to Israel involves more than giving money. We provide a diplomatic defense of Israel through our United Nations veto. Otherwise, the UN would slap an embargo on Israel, an action which brought down the former South African regime. What is Paul's position on the non-military defense of Israel by the US. And, don't give your unsubstantiated opinion. If you can't provide an actual statement by Paul, I won't accept your opinion as evidence.
Finally, you didn't address the fact that some of Paul's statements are just plain screwy, like his statement out of the blue that border fences might be used to keep people inside the US, as well as people outside.
Actually, I don't think the videos are as horrible as made out. I think Paul is certainly within his rights to believe the US ought not carry out military attacks unless directly threatened, or unless there is an overwhelming interest in helping an ally protect its borders against outside aggression.
I think Paul is naive to believe that bin Laden would not have carried out violent jihad if the US had not bombed Iraq. Bin Laden broke with Saudi Arabia over the question of whether Saudi Arabia could voluntarily ask for the presence of US military.
I would not hold the video against Paul if he made his position clear on actually defending the US against violent and non-violent subversion, and about the US commitment to Israel's security, apart from actual military defense and even apart from US financial aid to Israel.
Redwine, here is the answer to your question as to the fundamental difference between Islam and Christianity.
THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS OF THE BIBLE teach that reconciliation must take place between sinful man and eternal God who possesses absolute righteousness.
1. The Bible teaches that God offers redemption to anyone who believes that Christ died for the remission of sins.
2. This redemption allows God to impute His own absolute righteousness to man by an act of grace.
THE KORAN AND SUNNAH (Hadith and Sira) of Islam teach a works-based system in which Muslims must score points in obedience to Mohammad’s teachings if they are to please Allah.
a. Allah is portrayed as distant, impersonal, autocratic, totalitarian, and is never described in terms of “grace”. Muslims can never be sure that they will be accepted into heaven. There is no sense of eternal security, only the hope that Allah will be in a good mood when they get there.
b. The rewards in heaven reflect the permissive and totally inconsistent, unrighteous character of Mohammad’s Allah. One of the promised rewards mentioned for men in heaven is the provision of unbridled sexual lasciviousness, both heterosexual and homosexual. If Allah were God, one would expect moral consistency, but immorality and permissiveness is his norm. Allah’s whimsical nature is manifested both in Mohammad’s teachings about man’s behavior during life and in the afterlife. Islamic values and Biblical values are totally incompatible. What Islam calls “good,” the Bible calls “evil.” What Islam calls “evil,” the Bible calls “good.”
c. The character flaws of Allah are portrayed in the life of Mohammad. It is clear that “Allah” is merely the invention of Mohammad who recruited his army and built a civilization based on appealing to the basest character flaws of the human nature. He promised booty in the forms of money, slaves and he allowed the rape, murder and plunder of his victims, all the while praising his army as doing the will of Allah the righteous. Mohammad reversed (“abrogated”) many of Allah’s teachings throughout his life to suit his power and sexual lust pattern, claiming that Allah had given him instructions to do so, always in time to get him out of a situation that was a clear violation of a previously forbidden directive of Allah.
d. Mohammad injected his teachings and himself into the Bible and claimed himself to be the “final prophet.” This alone makes him a false prophet.
e. Mohammad was a Godfather who directed “hits” on those whom he didn’t like or who spoke against him or made light of him. He was hypersensitive to criticism, and very vindictive. He justified rape, torture, murder, enslavement, and plundering the wealth of nations as Allah’s will, and called it “good.”
f. Islam is basically an international plundering organization, a mafia crime syndicate with a religious front.
g. Mohammad injected his teachings and himself into the Bible and claimed himself to be the “final prophet.” Mohammad was a false prophet who deceived and continues to deceive many people. He died in 632AD after eating poisoned lamb, which seems a fitting end to a man who poisoned the fountains of virtue and reveled in his hatred of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
http://www.ronpaul2012.com/the-issues/immigration/
Unlike the GOP front-runner, Paul is against rewarding illegal activity, including illegal immigration through amnesty.
This idea that Paul's ideology prevents him from addressing crimes like sedition is ludicrous. There is nothing in the Constitution that prohibits enforcing laws against illegal immigration and subversion (except maybe birthright citizenship, which Paul is against). I've never met a libertarian who was pro-subversion. The laws are there but are not being enforced, probably because we're too busy defending the borders of Iraq to defend our own. Too busy creating Sharia "democracy" elsewhere to defend our republic at home.
Paul's quip about the fence has to do with the prospect of US collapse or descent into totalitarianism. If you want to believe that's impossible, go ahead. If you want to believe that even an important goal like fighting jihad, if pursued unconstitutionally and at any price, could become a pretext for loss of our freedoms, you're free to do so. But I think you've got your head in the sand.
Thanks.
I read your link.
Paul is going to be hell on immigrants from Mexico for sure. I still don't know his position on admitting Muslims who apply for immigration through regular channels, but who are ideologically committed to change the constitution to come closer to Sharia.
I do agree with his position on mandating state payment for medical care and welfare for illegal aliens and of course his position on fighting unnecessary wars. But, the devil's in the details. The original charge was that Paul did not understand the specific threat that Islam posed. However attractive he is otherwise, there has been no information to refute the original charge.
ppeter wrote:
I have read a lot of JW over the years, but I don't understand the venom against Paul.
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Peter, I do not believe Jihad Watch has any particular "venom" for Ron Paul. JW has been vetting *all* the Republican candidates vis-a-vis their stand on Jihad. Candidate Rick Perry has undergone some uncomfortable revelations here recently, as well.
I for one am glad that we are getting a close look at *all* these candidates. The Jihad threat is too central not to consider it—and consider it strongly—while in the voting booth November after next.
More:
It may be that Paul and Paulians are naive, but neither the article nor the comments have been able to prove the implicit premise of all their criticisms:
that the reality of blowback and the ideology of islamic supremacism are incompatible.
Paul's apparent softness on Islam may dissuade some people from considering him as an alternative to the neoconservative "kill them all till we run out of money and become a police state" approach.
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Uh...what? I have *many* disagreements with what you call the "neoconservative" approach. Along with many others here, I don't believe the war in Afghanistan has been conducted in a logical manner, and I'm not sure our presence in Iraq—as appalling as Saddam Hussein was—ever made sense.
That being said, can you really believe that our attempts to build constitutional democracies in these nations can actually be characterized as "kill them all till we run out of money"?
Recently American soldiers in Afghanistan received a directive that they not stop Jihadists openly planting IEDs at night because they might wake up and disturb nearby sleeping civilians.
A directive such as this might be a lot of things—including utterly suicidal—but is hardly indicative of a "kill them all" policy. We've spent more time in central Asia trying to "Win Hearts and Minds" building schools, roads, and hospitals than we have rooting out Jihadists—or randomly killing people, as you would have it.
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However, I don't think Paulian naivety justifies neocon naivety. Terror may in fact be the result of both islamic ideology and blowback. Can you prove that all the wars abroad are actually making us safer, and not just distracting and draining our country; or is it our patriotic duty just to go along?
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You say you have "read a lot of JW", but I have to wonder. Jihad Watch has been criticizing the Afghanistan and Iraq wars—and arguing that they do not make us safer—for years and years now. And Robert Spencer is a supremely rational person—he would never argue that one should just "go along" with *any* policy.
As for "blowback"—we were not, as I noted above, occupying any Muslim country on 9/11. And yet, somehow this was not enough to keep us safe.
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Do all antijihadists believe that the Constitution, as written, is a suicide pact and must be junked in the name of the war against "terror"? I don't think so. In fact, I seem to recall that Spencer has expressed skepticism about the Bush and Obama wars.
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This rather contradicts your idea that we were expected to just "go along with them". But if you believe that failing to stand against Jihad at all is likely to protect the Constitution, I believe we have another thing coming.
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Don't we risk hurting the antijihad cause by excluding and reviling Constitutionalists and people who aren't convinced by the "war on terror"?
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Again, if you have been reading JW as you say, you will know that there has been much criticism here of the "war on terror"—including the use of the term "War on Terror".
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I see no one wants to try to prove the assumed but still unproven premise of all this: that blowback and jihadism are incompatible as causes of terrorism against the US.
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Pious Muslims are waging violent Jihad all over the world—does Jihad against Christians and animists in Nigeria have anything to do with American foreign policy in Afghanistan? Is Somali piracy a protest against the US and NATO occupation of Iraq? Was the suggestion by a Kuwaiti candidate for Parliament that Russian women captured in Chechnya be sold as sex slaves based on upset over the US having given foreign aid to the Mubarak regime in Egypt? Have all the Jihad terror attacks—plotted or carried out—in England, in Bali, in Sweden, in Thailand, in Israel—all been due to a supposed laxity in observing strict constitutionality in the United States?
More:
Perhaps you believe that since the US is the shining city on the hill it can never collapse or lose the freedoms the Constitution guarantees us. If so, you are the dangerously naive one.
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Again, you say you have been reading Jihad Watch—but every article here about the Jihad threat aimed at the US—*and* at our allies in the free world—shows that we understand America is at risk.
Until you can explain why abandoning our democratic allies to the tender mercies of genocidal Jihadists is either moral or in our national interest, I will have to look beyond the candidacy of Ron Paul for solutions.