Re: A message from Dr. John Lewis

In a separate article on JW it has been noted that in the UK some clergy have advocated a "state within a state". This was the method advocated by Hitler in Germany, including the development of a military (the SA Stormtroopers) and the wearing of distinctive clothing that would separate the Nazis from the non-Nazis in Germany. Hitler and the Nazis exported (and financially supported) this method in the US and elsewhere. It is very important to be aware of this danger in the "host" countries. The JW article re the "state within a state" approach to subduing the existing state warns us that Muslim clergy have read Nazi history and know how Hitler came to power in Germany, and how Nazis came to power in Austria and elsewhere.

Hitler advocated deception in this process (Sports clubs, etc.) and the distinctive garb (pins, shirts, etc.) was a means to have Nazis identify each other and use what Hitler called "spiritual terror" against anyone who dared to speak out against the Nazis. Thus the majority of Germans were at a great disadvantage in dealing with the Nazi minority. They dressed differently, formed paramilitary units, even had shadow state officials (Gauliters) that increasingly intimidated the actual state. This process appears to be well advanced in Europe, though it is yet mild in America.

Hitler was amazed at how he was allowed to set up a "state within a state" in Germany. It was done by deception, physical force and "spiritual terror" against the majority in Germany. In the final analysis, as Hitler pointed out, the Nazis would have to be stopped by military force. That's what finally happened when the USA woke up and became "the arsenal of Democracy".

I am not so sure that the use of tactical nuclear weapons in Iran should be ruled out in the destruction of Iran's nuclear threat and think such an action will send a powerful message to the adherents of this ideology. Only the most ruthless use of force at the base of this new Nazi ideology will bring the adherents of the belief-system to reason. Appeasement will bring disaster. Meanwhile, every effort must be made to end the "state within a state" methods that mirror the method employed by Hitler in Germany and elsewhere and now employed by Islam in host countries.

Posted by: Frank at January 8, 2007 8:53 AM

When I read the "state within a state" (Hitler used this exact phrase) JW article the alarm bells went off with me. The Muslim clergy have studied and are using the exact methods Hitler advocated for a minority to subdue a majority within a society. It was very effective in Germany. Now I understand they are using "spiritual terror" by uniformity of garb (among other things). This was an important aspect of intimidating the majority in Germany (as per Hitler). The minority, as per Hitler, must be distinct in every way (including dress) and constantly hostile to the predominant political-social-culture.

Many of these Muslim clergy have read and are using the methods Hitler outlined for subduing the majority in Germany. I have no doubt of it. (Of course, once Hitler took power the leaders of the "state within a state" were killed in the 1934 purge. They were a potential competition to Hitler who desired absolute power once the Nazis subdued the actual state.)

Posted by: Frank at January 8, 2007 9:16 AM

A chill went down my spine when i read the JW article that mentioned the clerics urging a "state within a state". That exact phrase was constantly used by Hitler and the Nazi leadership. It was very important to the Nazis.

Posted by: Frank at January 8, 2007 9:25 AM

s_sgt7-

A lot of folks are getting it, and they are the Churchills of our time. These clerics have studied Hitler's ideas re the "state within the state". I have no doubt of it.

The clerics are very much like Hitler and Co, including the Jew-hatred (concealed hypocrite-CAIR-style), the deception, and the "state within the state". My hunch is that eventually they will meet the same fate the various Nazi "Bunds" did in the 1940's and the same fate will be meted out to Iran that was meted out to Nazi Germany in 1945. An alternative to the Koran will be found and they will come to reason when their pain becomes unbearable. Then they will face reality, and not a moment sooner. "(The carpet bombing of Berlin, etc. was an outreach project. Outreach works.)

Posted by: Frank at January 8, 2007 11:28 AM

This is a mix of brilliant insight and less brilliant insight. To begin with, a flaw in the analogy to Imperial Japan is that once the Emperor was forced to publicly surrender, and in his Imperial persona abjure all but symbolic divinity, all but the most insane Japanese could accept the new order of things.

Furthermore, Shinto is inextricably tied to the soil of Japan, which made it possible to define a non-aggressive Shinto and a non-expansionist Japan. Even when Japan was expanding its Empire, it did so on the grounds of need and of the perceived right of a superior culture to rule. The Japanese didn't claim to already own Siberia and China, for example, but to deserve them. The same was true for the Germans with respect to the USSR.

The Nazi doctirines the Master Race and the Muslim doctrine of the Ummah also differ in important ways; while Arabs are often racist, and Islam has a distinctly Arab flavor Islam is nonetheless not racist in a modern sense. (Malcom X describes this movingly in the part of his memoirs describing his haj, where he saw Muslims of many races in unity.)

In Sharia it isn't that Muslims to own Spain, or Tel Aviv, but that in their own minds they already do, and the current state of affairs is an intolerable injustice.

Likewise, it is not that any particular race deserves to rule another in Islam, but rather that the Umma, living under Sharia is the only situation in which (as I understand it) true ownership of property, or any other law for that matter, can be said to exist as far as any normative school of Islamic jurisprudence is concerned. (That is why I am very worried that it may not be possible to be a both a good citizen of a non-Muslim country and a Muslim fully consistent in his beliefs.)

Professor Lewis also errs more deeply in thinking that the goal of the Jihadis is a Muslim State. The goal of the Jihadis is not a State but an un-State: a world caliphate. Any Islamic State, Iran included is not seen as an end, but a means to an end. Ahmedinejad wants and expects Iran per se to wither away when the 12th imam returns.

While Muslims can and do live decently under non-Muslim governments, committed Islamists cannot be trusted to do so any more than any government has found it possible to trust committed Nazis to do so. It is a central but unsolved problem of our times to distinguish between decent Muslim citizens and enablers of the violent Jihad. So far it has proved impossible, particularly since many law-abiding and nonviolent Muslims respect and even envy the zeal and "purity" of the Jihadis. They therefore lend them aid and comfort.

Also, there is another source of Islamist danger besides Iran, perhaps even a worse one. And while Iran is to some extent a pariah, and its economy is a mess, that other source has deep pockets, and deep connections in our own government and others: I am speaking, of course, of Saudi Arabia.

Worse, we cannot halt the flow of Saudi money into Islamist channels in the United States without doing great violence to our legal and financial systems. Wouldn't it threaten our entire system of protecting private property and maximizing its enjoyment -including freedom of religious expression- for our government to use its coercive power to say that the proponents of religion X can spend money which they legally own to promote their religion but the proponents of religion Y may not?

Yes, we must slap the Iranians down hard. But what then? What is needed is not a Reformation in Islam, but a new Islam, and that cannot be externally imposed. And don't forget that one of the results of the Reformation in Europe was the 30 Years War which -literally- more than decimated many countries without modern WMDs being in the picture at all.

Professor Lewis' point about the Nazi state-within-a-state are very well taken and very troubling. We were able to shut off the Bund's money in WWII, but we weren't multiculti in those days, and the Bund wasn't a religion. I am very much afraid that Islam will not destroy Western Civilization, but that Western Civilization will destroy itself fighting Islam.

In that vein, Judaism, too, has its apocalyptic tradition; one teaching of which states that "Ishmael will defeat Edom," i.e., that Islam will defeat Rome, before the final defeat of Islam in the Messianic Redemption. What this really means, and how it will play out in reality, of course, nobody knows.

Posted by: ontheleftcoast at January 8, 2007 12:08 PM

To clarify my post above: Rome isn't just the Rome of Caesar, but Christianity and by extension Western Civilization.

Posted by: ontheleftcoast at January 8, 2007 12:11 PM

"To begin to enshrine the inviolability of individual rights as the central principle of government, clerics of all kinds must be stripped of political power. There can be no freedom of thought and speech if those with claims to mystically derived ideas can enforce them coercively."

The end of religious political power is near.

Posted by: voirdire at January 8, 2007 12:43 PM

The most critical corollary to this I think is that we must require western democratic leaders --especially those in the USA-- to READ THE BLOODY Kuran!

Unless one reads at least part of the material contained in this book, there is just no way to comprehend what it is that Muslims are up to.

If Bush had read the Kuran, there is no way America would have invaded Iraq in the manner it did. And the USA could have saved itself a lot of grief. And things will continue on this way in the western world's dealings with Islam until our leaders read the stupid Kuran and get REAL!

Posted by: pythagoras at January 8, 2007 1:23 PM

From the article:

"Islam itself is stateless, meaning that it respects no borders. It was designed precisely to rise above ethnic / tribal / clan groups, to unite all those who submit to Allah."

"Islam is a way of life, not a religion as distinguished from state."
---

In effect, Islam is a cult.

A gigantic cult, but a cult none-the-less.

Capice?

Posted by: Foehammer at January 8, 2007 1:28 PM

"In that vein, Judaism, too, has its apocalyptic tradition; one teaching of which states that "Ishmael will defeat Edom," i.e., that Islam will defeat Rome, before the final defeat of Islam in the Messianic Redemption. What this really means, and how it will play out in reality, of course, nobody knows." [And the poster adds: "To clarify my post above: Rome isn't just the Rome of Caesar, but Christianity and by extension Western Civilization."]
-- from a posting above

The stony-hearted unbeliever, motivated by the understandable desire to preserve above all else mental freedom, and to avoid the hideous collectivism, suppression of freen and skeptical inquiry, and limits on art, that are what Islam necessariy offers in its Total Regulation of LIfe and Complete Explanation of the Universe, will be unlikely to respond to apocalyptic predictions or End-Times stuff, from whatever quarter.

The same poster makes another comment:

"we cannot halt the flow of Saudi money into Islamist channels in the United States without doing great violence to our legal and financial systems. Wouldn't it threaten our entire system of protecting private property and maximizing its enjoyment -including freedom of religious expression- for our government to use its coercive power to say that the proponents of religion X can spend money which they legally own to promote their religion but the proponents of religion Y may not?"

Of course we can. How does our "legal and financial system" suffer if we seize Saudi assets, as was done to the assets of aliens during World War II, without destroying our "legal and financial system," or in putting a complete halt to the inflow of Saudi money to undermine our country, its legal and political institutions?

As for the notion that this is all about "religion" and therefore that one cannot interfere with the spending money "to promote" a religion, this begs several questions and ignores several answers already given by the Supreme Court.

One, what is a "religion"? And when is something called a "religion" far more than what, in our unthinkingness, we have assumed a "religion" to be? What makes one thing a "cult" and another a "religion" and another a "political ideology"? The fact that once one is a Muslim any attempt to leave Islam is an offense regarded as punishable by death (even if that sentence is not always imposed), shows that it has the elements of a closed cult. The fact that Islam has rules for everything, and that it does not allow for the play of human freedom, or a learning about morality, but merely demands assent to the rules, the rules that may or may not accord with our notions of morality (do you find the division of the world between Believer and Infidel, and the uncompromising hostility which the former must exhibit toward the latter, including the conquest of Dar al-Harb and its slow incorporation into Dar al-Islam, reasonable? Morally justified?) makes one hesitate to call this only a "religion" for there is no distinction between church and state, and indeed Islam covers the entire life of its Adherents. There is not to be anything outside of, unregulated by, Islam.

The notion that one cannot deal with Saudi or other Arab money is nonsense. And besides, mere financial systems are not the essence of the United States, and if to preserve that essence they must be changed, so what?

The poster writes that "I am very much afraid that Islam will not destroy Western Civilization, but that Western Civilization will destroy itself fighting Islam."

I hope that poster did not mean to echo those who claim we can or should do nothing to protect ourselves -- really quite modest measures so far, compared to those taken in any other war -- becuase otherwise "we will become like them" [i.e., Muslims] or some other platitude that pleases the morally preening but does not fit the case.

Posted by: Hugh at January 8, 2007 1:52 PM

ontheleftcoast--

Likewise, it is not that any particular race deserves to rule another in Islam,...

Would you care to explain how arab muslims killing black african muslims in Dafur is not one group of muslims, arabs, who see themselves superior to, and more entitled to the land and resources then another group of muslims to black african "raisin" muslims?

islam is the stalking horse of arab imperialism. Always has been. Always will be.

Until islamism is confronted and burned to the ground like naziism this planet will never know a true and lasting peace.

Imposing a separation between church and state in the muslim world would be a good first step.

"Wouldn't it threaten our entire system of protecting private property and maximizing its enjoyment -including freedom of religious expression- for our government to use its coercive power to say that the proponents of religion X can spend money which they legally own to promote their religion but the proponents of religion Y may not?"

The point is that people may be muslim all day every day, but STATES may not build madrassas in TEXAS to recruit jehadists to undermine America from within.

STATES may not TAX the citizens of their countries to pay religious police who beat and whip teenage girls back into a burning building because they don't have rags on their heads.

STATES may not tell one group of citizens that they may build a mosque, but tell another group of citizens that they may not chapel or synagogue.

The STATE may neither promote nor suppress.

The STATE exists only to provide the security in which the citizen may pursue happiness under the least burden of regulation possible.

The concept promotes personal religious expression.

Posted by: Joseph of Carpentry at January 8, 2007 2:07 PM

ontheleftcoast wrote: '...a flaw in the analogy to Imperial Japan..."

So we have to remain paralyzed to inaction until the perfect analogy comes along?

onethe leftcoast wrote: "The Nazi doctirines the Master Race and the Muslim doctrine of the Ummah also differ in important ways; while Arabs are often racist, and Islam has a distinctly Arab flavor Islam is nonetheless not racist in a modern sense."

What does "important ways" mean? You have discussed no important ways, certainly not from a war doctrine standpoint.

What does racism "in a modern sense" mean? How is racism different today from any other time?

I think all this is quibbling to justify inaction.

Islam teaches that it is destined to rule the earth (basically, as a "master race"), that Allah will get behind the pious jihad fighters to assure them a global victory.

The bottom line is that the ideology called Islam must be visibly defeated and discredited every time it rears its ugly head. Every time Muslims mount an assault of any kind (as an umma, as a nation, as a CAIR, as an individual hate-monger), or threaten same, they should lose something tangible: land, resources, people, privileges. Let them scream "injustice" and "humiliation" until their lungs burst. These are the just wages they earn from their intolerant, uncompromising, and vicious ideology. We must make sure the Muslims come to understand--and we must broadcast this message from the parapets--that Islam is the cause of, not the salvation from, their worldly suffering.

Posted by: Stendec at January 8, 2007 2:33 PM

ontheleftcoast,

"while Arabs are often racist, and Islam has a distinctly Arab flavor Islam is nonetheless not racist in a modern sense."

In putting a fine point to the question whether Islam promotes racism by unduly delimiting the definition of racism, ontheleftcoastloses sight of the forest for the trees: Islam promotes a super-racism, more comprehensive and sweeping than any other type of racism: a racism that divides the human race into two camps, one pure (the Believer, the Muslim), the other unclean and to be hated (the Infidel).

"Likewise, it is not that any particular race deserves to rule another in Islam, but rather that the Umma, living under Sharia is the only situation in which..."

Again, the poster loses sight of the forest for the trees: yes, it is not any "particular race": it is the master race of Believers who will, in the vision of the global Caliphate, dominate (after killing enough to be able to dominate) the subhuman race of Infidels.

"Professor Lewis also errs more deeply in thinking that the goal of the Jihadis is a Muslim State. The goal of the Jihadis is not a State but an un-State: a world caliphate. Any Islamic State, Iran included is not seen as an end, but a means to an end."

Lewis is not erring because his strategy is simply and rationally limiting itself to the concrete situation of de facto Muslim nation-states (whether or not they pass muster as "authentically Islamic" with the Islamic purists) providing, as entitative vehicles, the necessary military tools of infrastructure and materiel. Supra-national or trans-national terrorists can only go so far working in a stateless vacuum; they need and solicit the cooperation of nation-states, and by targeting those nation-states, we can wreak appreciable damage -- a degree of damage that Lewis never claims is perfect or will absolutely solve the problem.

Posted by: remote_control at January 8, 2007 2:49 PM

remote_control,

You can't change your race, but you CAN change your religion and join Islam. In that very narrow sense you can say that Islam is not racist. It just says you must accept all of its tenets in order to be treated the same as everyone else in the ummah.
Our genetics make us black, white, brown, etc. It's something over which we have no control. We do have the power to accept Islam, if that is what we prefer.
Islam is more totalitarian than racist.

Posted by: PMK at January 8, 2007 3:53 PM

The notion of creating a "state within a state" I also find most compelling. And that some countries may be more prone to this than others. I think Canada may be particularly vulnerable.

Also, I don't like the notion of quoting a claim from scripture -- Ishmael defeats Edom -- and in any way being influenced by such a notion. It's so What? or should be relegated to the trash bin.

We cannot base our lives on such speculations nor shape what we do on such idiocy. (in fact, I find it's like a superstition, or someone reads a Horoscope and then acts accordingly to such b.s.) it is also at heart defeatist. And that's really, really, not HELPFUL right now. We can, I believe, easily be defeated by such defeatism! So enough!!

Posted by: J.S. at January 8, 2007 4:15 PM

I am dubious about the prospect of detoxifying Islam by compelling Muslims to separate its political imperatives from its personal ones. Islam is founded on a single document that Muslims must accept as the revealed, eternally unchanging Word of God -- and that document explicitly exhorts Muslims to go forth conquering in Allah's name. They're also permitted all manner of deceits at those times when and in those places where their forces don't suffice. How, then, are we to assure ourselves that any particular Muslim isn't practicing taqiyya and kitman when he assures us that he has no desire to live under shari'a law, tear up the Constitution, or erect an American Caliphate?

Posted by: Francis W. Porretto at January 8, 2007 5:01 PM

Lewis seems to wish to align the threat of Islamism with the Islamist use of force. But is the use of force (ie, violence to attain ends) the only threat the west faces with respect to Islam?

I don't think so.

So what is the end goal? just having the Islamists renounce violence (no more terrorist attacks) -- would that be sufficient for the west to then relax and announce, "Victory"?

What if the threat goes beyond merely using force to achieve their ends? What if they wish to achieve their ends through lawful means?

Lewis alludes to this by discussing the adoption of Sharia law in western countries. Lewis also seems desirous of separating Islam from "Islamic Totalitarianism." But what if the adherents of Islam don't wish to separate Islam from Totalitarianism? What happens then?

Posted by: J.S. at January 8, 2007 5:21 PM

PMK,

"You can't change your race, but you CAN change your religion and join Islam. In that very narrow sense you can say that Islam is not racist."

While I agree that people cannot change their biological race, while they can change their ideological religion, this is not the central point of racism. While a person cannot change his race (nor, for that matter, the race of anybody else), a person can change the way he thinks about another person's race. It is the ideology of race that is at the root of racism, not so much the biology of race. Therefore, the founders and members of a racist ideology can create any "race" they want to -- either taking advantage of biological data, or distorting biological data, or not even taking biological data into account at all. Some of the ancient Gnostics, in fact, developed a very similar type of racism as the Islamic ideology has, denoting those few humans who have a divine "spark" in them to be one genos (race; of course, a Greek term like this used in the 1st century A.D. would hardly have the biological connotations it does in modern times), while all those other humans who for some mysterious reason are not blessed to have this divine "spark" in them to be another genos, doomed to lose salvation from this evil Cosmos.

Again, racism is an ideology that divides up Mankind, either into two camps, or into several camps; the biological data that could be exploited to provide a defense for this racism should be kept distinct (though one should not on the other hand err on the other side by setting up a counter-ideology that refuses to recognize -- and even tries to prohibit the recognition and analysis of -- real differentiations within Mankind).

Posted by: remote_control at January 8, 2007 6:19 PM

Remote_control,
It's still hard to explain how Islam itself can be considered racist. The word "racism" is frequently misused. Bigotry is very real, but "racism" suggests something that isn't there.

Is the ummah divided by race? Are American Muslims considered inferior to Malaysian Muslims? Granted, everything came out of Arabia and the first conquerors were Arabs, but even they didn't exclude anyone from Islam on the basis of ethnicity. All were welcome as long as they were prepared to submit to Allah. The Jews were invited to join. They only became the enemy after they refused.

I refer to Muslim Unity, who said on his blog that anyone who converted to Islam was considered "pure", regardless of skin color.
This seems to be the philosophy of Islam through its history. Outsiders weren't welcome, unless they converted to Islam. It's more totalitarian than racist. It's Allah uber alles.

There are more ways to divide mankind than race or ethnicity.

Posted by: PMK at January 8, 2007 6:57 PM

PMK, but then the black Muslims are being killed in the Sudan because they are black. Non Arab Muslims are indeed treated as inferior in the Islamic world. Arabs are the chosen race, etc etc.

Posted by: Brett_McS at January 8, 2007 7:09 PM

There is yet another distinction which I believe needs to be drawn with respect to defining "racism."

Personally, if a religion wishes to define certain behaviours as "saintly" or establish that conforming to certain restrictions constitutes "saintly" behaviour, I don't really care.

Then I read a text, written by a Muslim which stated the following: "An important consequence of Islam's ...purification laws is the setting apart of Muslims as a special community. The abstention from pork, for Muslims.., is a powerful boundary marker. This marking is not so evident in an all-Muslim society, such as Saudi Arabia or Iran. But in Malaysia, where Malay Muslims number about 55 percent and Chinese (who are mostly non-Muslim) 34 percent, the dietary prohibitions of both pork and alcohol have visible social and political consequences. Many Chinese enjoy both pork and alcoholic beverages. Simply to be brushed up against by a (non-Muslim) Chinese person, for example in the market, may cause a pious Malay Muslim to recoil in disgust. The pork-handling, whiskey-drinking outsider has brought pollution up close. It matters not whether a particular Chinese drinks alcohol or eats pork; he or she represents a class of human being for whom those substances are lawful."[emphasis in the original, js]

This comes close to a Hindu notion of a caste --- but, of course, in Islam, it's not based on a person's birth, but on a behaviour (not even an "individual" behaviour) -- but a type of behaviour which in the modern West is NOT considered "immoral." Should a group of people become "immoral" simply because their culture permits alcohol consumption?? This is the sort of bizarre, pre-modern world that Islam inhabits.

Posted by: J.S. at January 8, 2007 7:24 PM

ontheleftcoast said: "Professor Lewis also errs more deeply in thinking that the goal of the Jihadis is a Muslim State. The goal of the Jihadis is not a State but an un-State: a world caliphate. Any Islamic State, Iran included is not seen as an end, but a means to an end. Ahmedinejad wants and expects Iran per se to wither away when the 12th imam returns."

A Government is an entity which holds a monopoly on the use of physical force. The Caliphate would have a monopoly on the use of force over the whole Islamic World.

Since both of these statements are true it follows that an Islamic Caliphate IS a Government.

"The Nazi doctirines the Master Race and the Muslim doctrine of the Ummah also differ in important ways; while Arabs are often racist, and Islam has a distinctly Arab flavor Islam is nonetheless not racist in a modern sense. (Malcom X describes this movingly in the part of his memoirs describing his haj, where he saw Muslims of many races in unity.)"

You are looking at the inessential of racism, when that is only one particular brand of irrationality. Excluding (and killing) people who do not believe in your particular brand of mysticism is just as irrational, if not more so. So one should not look at this as a comparison of two types of racism but rather two types of irrationality with regards to the judgment of others.

Posted by: Demosthenes354 at January 8, 2007 8:40 PM

I'm not proposing inaction. I'm saying that we should understand our own strengths and weaknesses as well as our enemy's. I'm saying that not every concern about the loss of civil liberties is unfounded, and that we need to be vigilant about unnecessary expansion of our own government and police powers.

As a biochemist and chiropractor I know enough to have a clue about biological warfare and public health countermeasures. Both are frightening. And waddyaknow, some medical bureaucrats use homeland security to further other agendas, which they had before the crisis, with which I disagreed profoundly, and the dispute over which, in the open marketplace of ideas, they were losing. I am shocked, shocked. I don't propose inaction in the face of CBW, but I don't think that rubberstamping every proposal made to "protect" me is wise, either.

The same FBI that is protecting us perpetrated Waco and Ruby Ridge. Agencies like to do things that make their work easier, and/or increase their budgets and power, and those things are not always wise. Quis custodiet?

One of the strengths of the USA is that we neither establish a state religion nor forcibly destroy religions. We have made non-adaptation pretty uncomfortable, as many 19th century Mormons found, but we still have the LDS among us. And while we proscribe some behavior, we have tolerated cults -whatever that really means- that limit their behavior. But toleration of religion, and the state not doing much to judge what is or isn't a religion is also a weakness that the Jihadis are exploiting.

J.S., you are using "race" -as in "race of believers" in the way it was used in the 19th century. Unfortunately, since Hitler (may his name be blotted out) that isn't a viable option. He corrupted the language to the point that your usage is confusing. Islam is universalist, and so not racist as we in the USA today mean racism. Arabs and Muslims have always fought Arabs and Muslims (Iran/Iraq war, anyone?) and Islam in large part minimized this by directing the aggression outward.

Oh, gee. That sounds like the Saudis today. The same Saudis who fund missions to the unbelievers in the USA, and who have bought into most of its mosques. Please let me know how to end the missionary activities of one religion or sect without affecting, say, the Baptists, or the Scientologists.

Hugh, please let me know how to stop an important official of a "valued ally" of the USA from giving money to a religious organization recognized by the IRS. The world economy is a lot more intertwined today than it was during WWII.

Demosthenes, I don't disagree with you, about racism, but with JS who is using an unfortunately outdated sense of the word. It's sort of like using "gay" to mean happy nowadays. But I stick with what I said about states. Islam is a premodern, essentially tribal worldview. It doesn't think about states in the same way we do.

Try this set of categories:

Idologies that believe human nature can be changed by external coercion and that therefore a government MUST try to change human nature -- a lot of pre-modern Christianity, Communism, National Socialism, most Leftists, Islam...

Ideologies that try to minimize the role of governemtn and leave changing human nature up to individual choice, and try to structure society so that people pursuing their own interests act as checks and balances on each other, as in Federalist 51.

The question then becomes: if we can't move Islam from the first group to the second, do we try to contain it, or....

Posted by: ontheleftcoast at January 8, 2007 9:04 PM

The term "race" (and its associated entailment of "racism") is (as we're all only too aware) highly charged and problematic. In a sociology course I took it traced "racism" (from the nineteenth century) from a borrowing (a Frenchmen was stationed in an Islamic country -- Gobineau. he brought back to Europe a theory of a hierarchy of "races." He wrote a text about the "inequality of human races." This notion was later picked up by others, particularly Germans. It attached itself to Der Volk (these quaint beliefs about "blood" and "soil.") This form of "racism" was soon attached with heredity (that is, one's native "origins" in terms of inheritance -- "race" -- could not be altered, etc.) (One of the reasons why Freud at the turn of the century developed his particular form of psychotherapy -- with its emphasis on early childhood experiences as opposed to "genes" or a genetic explanation for behaviors.)

With most sociology texts when "racism" is discussed there will be another, associated ideology -- and that is "nationalism" (it's aligned with "racism") -- although it can be a voluntary association (one can choose to become a citizen of nation X.) Thus, the text I have discusses (in the section on "racism"-- but not circa the nineteenth century), "...separatist movements within India, Bosnia, Belgium, Canada, and Nigeria also fit this pattern, and so does Black nationalism in the United States." Ok?

Interestingly, perhaps the factor which links Islam with both the older nineteenth century form of "racism" with "newer" extremist forms of "nationalism" is the belief in supremacy. That is, "my group is better than your group." And such notions (as we can see from places such as Bosnia and elsewhere) can also lead to genocide. (I was also going to note, but don't have the time to go into all the murderers of ethnic Chinese in Malay, committed by Muslims).

I do feel that the form of bigotry (the supremacism) expressed by islam is very dangerous. We should at least recognize it as a form of prejudice which threatens many, many others (that is, non-Muslims).

Posted by: J.S. at January 8, 2007 9:35 PM

Just wished to also quickly add -- about "unnecessary expansion of our own government and police powers" -- I'm not living in the United States (I follow what's going on). I don't know if there has been an "unnecessary expansion" of police powers, etc. I do know that here in Canada, there is very little by way of, say, scrutiny of in-coming immigrants (in fact, there are some I've read that say the situation has deteriorated -- it's even easier now to enter Canada than it was prior to 9/11 -- all that's necessary is to destroy any documents prior to entering Canada -- that way the authorities don't know where you're from and can't deport you).

I've seen some degree of tightened security (around court houses), but, that's about it. And, the one legal means by which Canada has traditionally removed undesirables who entered Canada -- if you had a criminal background, say -- was through what's called a Security Certificate. Now (it's a long story and I won't go into it) the Security Certificate (the only way to deport undesirables) may be revoked. It's coming under heavy, heavy fire -- so, the security situation here in Canada has done the opposite of "getting tighter." (There are also Muslims -- NOT the CAIR types -- who also are afraid that our security is growing too lax -- there's a Muslim woman who's written a book about how Canada's mosques have been filled with extremist preachers -- she doesn't like what she sees, but she's powerless to stop it. ditto for other Muslims, one got death threats, etc., and he too would speak out about the radicalization going on...BUt, the government DOES NOT LISTEN. And who will eventually pay the price for this??)

Posted by: J.S. at January 8, 2007 9:55 PM

Many postings above have pondered how to deal with Islam-in-America. Some have suggested that giving it an official designation as a "cult" rather than as a "religion" would be helpful. Others, following that line, haver pointed to the examples of Waco and Scientology. Yes, indeed!
Yes, indeed! At Waco, Billy the Kid and his sidekick, Gal Reno, sent in helicopter gunships and flame-throwing tanks against the Branch Davidian cult and killed some 90 of its members. The government's excuse? Why, the Davidians were practicing child abuse! Merciful heavens, if that's all the excuse it needs, then it could shut down every mosque in the country. Islam is the mother-lode of child abuse. As for Scientology, it was the IRS that did a number on them, for financial irregularities in connection with their tax-exempt status. Here again, the misdeeds of this cult were small potatoes compared to the financial shenanigans of Islam-as-money-supplier-to-terrorists. What mosque could withstand a really thorough investigation of its books?
So the laws are already there to deal with them. It only requires the political willingness to do so. I realize that's a big requirement in today's political climate.
As a side note, nowhere in the media was there any real condemnation of the gov't for its actions at Waco. In general, the media approved whole-heartedly. At most, there were a few "tut-tuts" about the level of force applied, but no one in the media questioned the gov't's right to seize the compound. At the time, I wondered, and wonder still, what the media's reaction would have been if Waco had been a black Nation of Islam compound instead of a white, quasi-Christian one.

Posted by: ebonystone at January 9, 2007 12:49 AM

It would serve the U.S. to have a high court ruling on a religion being in conflict with laws of the country. Bring a ruling on the religion, say that had human sacrifice killing by removing the heart, try to outlaw this, based on it being against laws of the country.

A suscess would give a opening to removing religions that are in direct conflict with the country's laws.

And I don't think we should find jobs for Iraqi youth to settle them down eather.

Posted by: Islofob IS-1 at January 9, 2007 3:08 AM

An editorial was published today in the National Post (Jan. 9, 2007), entitled "A good Iraq policy -- three years late" by David Brooks. In the article Brooks writes: "In an ever-radicalizing climate, the Sadrs are supplanting the Sistanis, and genocidal Sunni leaders are replacing the merely racist ones."

Strictly speaking, I suppose, one could perhaps argue against the use of the term "racist" as it applies to the Sunni vs Shiite clash. It would certainly fail to meet a 19 to 20th century understanding of the term "race" (that is, using a person's biology to identify one's "race", then further describing certain behaviours as the consequence of said, inherited factors).

But the term "racist" has mutated and now encompasses far more (one also hears the term applied to anyone who advocates nationalism while simultaneously expressing what pundits claim is "xenophobia.") Thus the term "racist" has been politicized (and when used by groups such as CAIR, the term loses virtually all meaning, except for it's derogatory connotations...too frequently it's just a mindless epithet hurled at opponents.)

I suppose linguistically the term can be decomposed to find "shared meaning elements" between its old usage and its new usage...

Posted by: J.S. at January 9, 2007 12:46 PM