Muslims bash Il Papa for bashing Muslims

[Yonivore]

If Hillary were getting serviced by her courier in her Senate office, would it be considered quite as big an outrage?

[boutons_]

"Clinton degraded the ins ution of the Presidency."

... was the post I was responding to with:

What's the problem with getting a piece of ass in the WH? You people have a childish, Puritanical view of morals of powerful people, esp those in DC.

But there's no problem with wasting 3000 US military lives in Iraq? There's no dishonor on the imperial, kingly office of the President when the commander-in-chief commands so poorly he takes heavy loss of life for absolutely no advantage to the USA?

dubya is a -stain on the office.

[Extra Stout]

Obviously humor isn't your thing.

It depends on how much sleep I've been getting.

[Extra Stout]

What's the problem with getting a piece of ass in the WH? You people have a childish, Puritanical view of morals of powerful people, esp those in DC.

But there's no problem with wasting 3000 US military lives in Iraq? There's no dishonor on the imperial, kingly office of the President when the commander-in-chief commands so poorly he takes heavy loss of life for absolutely no advantage to the USA?

dubya is a -stain on the office.

Yet another classic example of the boutons auto-retort, which completely misses the point a poster is making, and reinforces the hypothesis that boutons is not an actual person, but rather a web bot.

[Mr. Peabody]

Is that really what the article says? Because what I read rings true with a thought I have been trying to find a way to express.

There seems to be this delusion that we have significant control over how we are regarded by the Muslim world. On the right, this delusion has manifested itself as a policy where if we go take over other countries and install democracy, and show them how nifty and keen it is, they will love us and Islamic terrorism will go away.

(The futility of this notion is self-evident in the results of recent U.S. policy.)

On the left, this has manifested itself as a belief that we must have committed some terrible atrocities for people to be so mad at us that they want to kill us, so if only we stop those atrocities, Islamic terrorism will go away. Alternatively, it must be that these people are so mad because of poverty and hopelessness in their societies, so if we go in and root out poverty and hopelessness, Islamic terrorism will go away.

All of these assume falsely that the Islamist threat exists because of reasons we can control, and that if we just do the right thing, it will go away.

It is far more comfortable to imagine that we would have control over the situation if we only would choose to exercise it, rather than confronting the notion that we don't have all that much control at all.

That would explain why so many on the left have the tendency so often to overblow the malice of the West, while projecting upon the rest of the world a collective sense of justice and magnanimity that has never existed in the real world. We can do something about our own behavior, but we are more or less powerless to control that of other societies. It's comfortable in a chaotic and scary world to assume it's all our fault, because then it would be within our grasp to fix it. If it's not within our grasp... then the world becomes a much more sobering and frightening place.

I disagree (sorry for the delay in my response). I don't think liberals feel that we, as a nation, have control of the situation insofar as if we address poverty and hopelessness, then the terrorists will go away. I think the overriding concern of many liberals is that our foreign policy encourages others to take up arms against us. So, while we cannot solve some theoretical underlying problem and keep the terrorists from acting irrationally, we can add fuel to the fire and inspire hate in those that may have not otherwise felt that way.

[clambake]

I took many notes. They say "your (WH) words are empty and weightless and should be spoken to the wind". After many minutes of clarifications, what is meant is that we (US) have lost, no sqaundered our power of influence. They laughed aloud regarding the august deadline for Iran to end nuclear programs. Just more empty words. "You can't add more water to a bucket full of water".

Real good people. Very passionate. Sometimes moments of extreme tension, but never disrespectful.

[johnsmith]

Yet another classic example of the boutons auto-retort, which completely misses the point a poster is making, and reinforces the hypothesis that boutons is not an actual person, but rather a web bot.

It's funny and true.

[Extra Stout]

I disagree (sorry for the delay in my response). I don't think liberals feel that we, as a nation, have control of the situation insofar as if we address poverty and hopelessness, then the terrorists will go away. I think the overriding concern of many liberals is that our foreign policy encourages others to take up arms against us. So, while we cannot solve some theoretical underlying problem and keep the terrorists from acting irrationally, we can add fuel to the fire and inspire hate in those that may have not otherwise felt that way.

My rebuttal would be that among those parts of our foreign policy that our values might actually allow us to change, really only the Iraq war is driving people to attack the U.S. who otherwise would not.

Recent events show that Western nations which have opposed the Iraq war have fallen under at least as great a threat of terrorist attack as the U.S. does. So it's hard to claim that pulling out of Iraq is going to put a significant dent in terrorism.

The Iraq war was stupid.
Calling in public for outright regime change in several countries is stupid.
We can modify those policies.

We don't have a time machine to go back to 1953 and undo the coup in Iran.

Our values are not going to allow Muslims to exterminate the Israelis.

Our values are not going to allow Muslims to slay the Indians in Kashmir.

We are not going to start a war with Russia to protect the Chechens.

Our values are not going to allow us to keep women fully covered and out of public to avoid offending Muslim sensibilities.

We are not going to abandon our own prosperity in order to eliminate the contrast with their own cultural dysfunction that drives them to murderous envy.

We aren't going to sit back so that Islamists can carry out violent revolutions in places like Saudi Arabia.

We do not control OPEC.

Our penchant for working with their own despots is not separating them from what otherwise would be moderate, prosperous countries (would Pakistan be better off if Musharraf were overthrown?).

We aren't going to pack up and avoid all contact and all business dealings with Muslim countries.

We can't help it if their own populations like our culture more than they like repressive Islam.

We are not all going to convert to Islam.

We are not going to allow Muslim communities in our own country to practice Sharia law, and neither are our allies.

We are not going to suppress free speech in our societies to stave off worldwide riots whenever somebody says something bad about the prophet Mohammed or Islam.

Those are some of the big reasons the Muslim street takes up arms against Western society. If you can identify some other specific policies of ours that Muslims have cited as reasons they are driven to take up arms, I will be glad to read them.

[Yonivore]

I disagree (sorry for the delay in my response). I don't think liberals feel that we, as a nation, have control of the situation insofar as if we address poverty and hopelessness, then the terrorists will go away. I think the overriding concern of many liberals is that our foreign policy encourages others to take up arms against us. So, while we cannot solve some theoretical underlying problem and keep the terrorists from acting irrationally, we can add fuel to the fire and inspire hate in those that may have not otherwise felt that way.

And my response would be that these foreign policy actions the liberals feel are encouraging others to take up arms have actually been welcomed by those most directly affected.

In example, al Qaeda has claimed they attacked us in the 90's because we had soldiers in Saudi Arabia. Well, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia wanted us there. Why should we capitulate to al Qaeda on a matter that doesn't directly involve them?

It's like this in many of the other "gripes" they claim to have.

Any foreign policy is going to piss someone off. The only recourse, if you're a liberal, is to come home, throw up fences, and become an isolationist country.

The bottom line is this, the Islamofascists don't represent any country with which we can negotiate or have diplomatic relations and, therefore, it will always be impossible to satisfy their demands because, as evidenced above and in most other cases, their demands generally conflict with the aims and goals of the legitimate countries in the regions over which they wish to driver our foreign policy.

To capitulate to the Islamofascists on the basis that we're engaged in foreign policy actions that piss them off is to discount the allies and partners in those regions who support our foreign policy initiatives.

[clambake]

What about Hezbollah? Are we not on the road to negotiations with Iran? It's our incompetence and foolhardy endeavours that has left us toothless in the eyes of the world. Everyone is waiting for our next foolish move. You know it's coming.

[temujin]

My rebuttal would be that among those parts of our foreign policy that our values might actually allow us to change, really only the Iraq war is driving people to attack the U.S. who otherwise would not.

Recent events show that Western nations which have opposed the Iraq war have fallen under at least as great a threat of terrorist attack as the U.S. does. So it's hard to claim that pulling out of Iraq is going to put a significant dent in terrorism.

The Iraq war was stupid.
Calling in public for outright regime change in several countries is stupid.
We can modify those policies.

We don't have a time machine to go back to 1953 and undo the coup in Iran.

Our values are not going to allow Muslims to exterminate the Israelis.

Our values are not going to allow Muslims to slay the Indians in Kashmir.

We are not going to start a war with Russia to protect the Chechens.

Our values are not going to allow us to keep women fully covered and out of public to avoid offending Muslim sensibilities.

We are not going to abandon our own prosperity in order to eliminate the contrast with their own cultural dysfunction that drives them to murderous envy.

We aren't going to sit back so that Islamists can carry out violent revolutions in places like Saudi Arabia.

We do not control OPEC.

Our penchant for working with their own despots is not separating them from what otherwise would be moderate, prosperous countries (would Pakistan be better off if Musharraf were overthrown?).

We aren't going to pack up and avoid all contact and all business dealings with Muslim countries.

We can't help it if their own populations like our culture more than they like repressive Islam.

We are not all going to convert to Islam.

We are not going to allow Muslim communities in our own country to practice Sharia law, and neither are our allies.

We are not going to suppress free speech in our societies to stave off worldwide riots whenever somebody says something bad about the prophet Mohammed or Islam.

Those are some of the big reasons the Muslim street takes up arms against Western society. If you can identify some other specific policies of ours that Muslims have cited as reasons they are driven to take up arms, I will be glad to read them.

We all love pasta. And risotto, we like risotto too. We are not going to change that with whatever food muslims eat (and I don't have the foggiest idea about it).

We also like cappuccino and croissant. Not after lunch, in the morning. Strictly in the morning. Never at night anyway. We are not changing that with say, tea. Nor are we changing the time of sipping the cappuccino. Now of couse there could be a debate about a cold milk or hot milk, or a long one in the cup rather than a shorter one in the glass. Anyway, we ain't gonna discuss that with say Mubarak.

[RandomGuy]

Heh, you know you have done something roundly stupid when you get op-ed peices in a normally restrained rag like the Financial Times

SECOND TAKE - Financial Times
Financial Times

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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THE furore ignited by the remarks about Islam embedded in Pope Benedict XVI’s lecture last Tuesday at the University of Regensburg is surely a surprise only to the terminally naive — among whom the former Cardinal Josef Ratzinger is surely not to be counted. In the context of a long reflection on the relationship between reason and belief, a characteristic preoccupation of this pope’s academic and theological career, Benedict made reference to derogatory remarks about Islam by Manuel II Paleologus, a Christian emperor of the late Byzantine era.

Specifically, he quotes the emperor, in supposed dialogue with an unidentified Persian scholar, thus: “Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached”.


The Pope’s subsequent apology for his choice of such an incendiary text is remarkable: a rare admission of a mistake by the holder of an office that lays some claim to infallibility. But it is also a little disingenuous. Pope Benedict is not so unacquainted with power and the public arena that he does not know the difference between contributing to philosophical enquiry and the possible impact of the words of the leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics. His lecture “in its totality”, he claims, was an invitation to a frank and sincere inter-faith dialogue. Really?



This outstandingly learned pope would also know that there was little to choose between the Christian and Muslim practice of holy war in the Middle Ages from which he retrieved his provocative dialogue. It was papally endorsed Crusaders who massacred the Muslim, Jewish and Orthodox inhabitants of Jerusalem in 1099, or sacked Constantinople in 1204, among the worst affronts ever to civilisation. His call for a frank debate is welcome, but to incense gratuitously the Muslim world is hardly the way to achieve it. Financial Times

[DarkReign]

I wonder if they count Nation of Islam in there because that is not Islam.

I just said Arab population, I cant go off on wild assumptions about their faith.

I went to school with many Arab people, but all were Christian. Albanian and Chaldean mostly.

In the Dearborn area you have the classic middle east clash. Lots of Jews, lots and lots of Arabs. I dont frequent down there very often (it isnt exactly on your way to Detroit unless you take side roads), but of the few times I have, it isnt like any other place I have ever been.

Hasidic Jews (sp?) "own" a portion of the area basically. I was surprised by the community there. All the signs were in Hebrew then in little letters, English. Full wardrobe and books in hand, school must have just been let out and all the youngsters were walking home (or what not). If you havent seen it, its kind of......foreign.

Then, of course, right down the way is the Arab culture. Lots of em. Definately Muslim (local problem when the Mosque in the area starts the prayer over a loud speaker that non-Muslim people dont exactly enjoy).

These are just observations, not judgements.

My opinion, why the do the Arabs and Jews follow each other around everywhere? Logic would tell you "Hey, I being a <insert religion here> dont want to live here. The <insert different religion here> that my people have been fighting for centuries seem to have already mvoed in."

But who am I?

[101A]

“Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached”.

I would like to know the answer to the question posed by Paleoleous. I am not a scholar of Islam, and am curious. I think it is pretty apparent that THIS is what the Pope thinks, and he is trying to get it "out there" for discussion. The fact that parts of the Muslim community have a knee-jerk violent, or threat of violence, reaction, makes his point.

If he sees the situation as hopeless as it apparently is, based on this post by Extra Stout:

My rebuttal would be that among those parts of our foreign policy that our values might actually allow us to change, really only the Iraq war is driving people to attack the U.S. who otherwise would not.

Recent events show that Western nations which have opposed the Iraq war have fallen under at least as great a threat of terrorist attack as the U.S. does. So it's hard to claim that pulling out of Iraq is going to put a significant dent in terrorism.

The Iraq war was stupid.
Calling in public for outright regime change in several countries is stupid.
We can modify those policies.

We don't have a time machine to go back to 1953 and undo the coup in Iran.

Our values are not going to allow Muslims to exterminate the Israelis.

Our values are not going to allow Muslims to slay the Indians in Kashmir.

We are not going to start a war with Russia to protect the Chechens.

Our values are not going to allow us to keep women fully covered and out of public to avoid offending Muslim sensibilities.

We are not going to abandon our own prosperity in order to eliminate the contrast with their own cultural dysfunction that drives them to murderous envy.

We aren't going to sit back so that Islamists can carry out violent revolutions in places like Saudi Arabia.

We do not control OPEC.

Our penchant for working with their own despots is not separating them from what otherwise would be moderate, prosperous countries (would Pakistan be better off if Musharraf were overthrown?).

We aren't going to pack up and avoid all contact and all business dealings with Muslim countries.

We can't help it if their own populations like our culture more than they like repressive Islam.

We are not all going to convert to Islam.

We are not going to allow Muslim communities in our own country to practice Sharia law, and neither are our allies.

We are not going to suppress free speech in our societies to stave off worldwide riots whenever somebody says something bad about the prophet Mohammed or Islam.

Those are some of the big reasons the Muslim street takes up arms against Western society. If you can identify some other specific policies of ours that Muslims have cited as reasons they are driven to take up arms, I will be glad to read them.

I think the Pope has intentionally fired a shot clean accross the bow in this burgeoning holy war. He had to of known what would come of it.

[Yonivore]

I would like to know the answer to the question posed by Paleoleous. I am not a scholar of Islam, and am curious. I think it is pretty apparent that THIS is what the Pope thinks, and he is trying to get it "out there" for discussion. The fact that parts of the Muslim community have a knee-jerk violent, or threat of violence, reaction, makes his point.

What'e even more ironic is that when Paleoleous said this, it was too a learned and powerful Muslim who, by the way, did not immediately call for the death of Paleoleous but, instead, allowed that such discourse was good.

Wow! How times have changed.

Oh, and the answer to Paleoleous's question? Nothing. Abso-freakin'-lutely nothing.

[Ozzman]

Yet another classic example of the boutons auto-retort, which completely misses the point a poster is making, and reinforces the hypothesis that boutons is not an actual person, but rather a web bot.

HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[PixelPusher]

What'e even more ironic is that when Paleoleous said this, it was too a learned and powerful Muslim who, by the way, did not immediately call for the death of Paleoleous but, instead, allowed that such discourse was good.

Wow! How times have changed.

Oh, and the answer to Paleoleous's question? Nothing. Abso-freakin'-lutely nothing.

Paleoleous's quote struck me as "sour grapes", since the Ottoman Empire basically surrounded Constantinople, and hadn't relied on the sword as exclusively as he implied; many Christian towns and villages welcomed the Ottomans openly as they demanded far less taxes and tolerated the open practice of Christianity and Judaism as a policy.

So what did Islam bring that was new? Well besides a more just and scientifically advanced civilization than the old Byzantines...

...they brought tax relief.

[Extra Stout]

the ottomans were republicans I presume?

the ottomans were really liberal practicing muslims. there were far less islamic extremists in those days. there were far less muslims, period.

that empereror was between a rock and sharp sword so he had to say something.

It's not so much that the Ottomans were "liberal" (no such concept even existed in the 15th century) as that the European Christian rulers of the time were so much more oppressive and bloodthirsty. Oftentimes following Muslim conquest Christian sects were treated better than they were by the Christian kings.

Keep in mind that the Ottomans were not Arabs.

[spurster]

My rebuttal would be that among those parts of our foreign policy that our values might actually allow us to change, really only the Iraq war is driving people to attack the U.S. who otherwise would not.

..........................

Maybe we can start by not making all Muslim countries our enemies. That's a no-win position.

We need to respect Islam, but at the same time demand that they respect Christianity and other religions.

We need to help defend Israel, but not support their settlements.

If we want Westernish democracies, we need to keep consistent with our values, work to support human rights, and beat the out of anyone who attacks us. I think most people, whether Muslim or not, can be persuaded eventually by that. We need a bipartisan long-term policy (e.g., containment and MAD for Soviet Communism) that we can work together on.

Regarding Iraq, I would give up on the Sunnis and Shiites and place my bets on Kurdistan (via a slow withdrawal and increasing aid to the Kurds). This would allow us to put more forces in Afghanistan, which we are letting out of control.

[temujin]

It's not so much that the Ottomans were "liberal" (no such concept even existed in the 15th century) as that the European Christian rulers of the time were so much more oppressive and bloodthirsty. Oftentimes following Muslim conquest Christian sects were treated better than they were by the Christian kings.

Keep in mind that the Ottomans were not Arabs.

Ask Greeks.
And Serbs.
And Romanians.

And, finally, ask Armenians.

[Extra Stout]

Ask Greeks.
And Serbs.
And Romanians.

And, finally, ask Armenians.

OK, scratch "oftentimes" and replace with "on occasion."

[temujin]

OK, scratch "oftentimes" and replace with "on occasion."

yes.
When they had to cut a deal.

[Nbadan]

Here is the biggest Irony of all this, you'll will get a kick

The Pope offended radical Islamists by reading a passage from a historical text, so the M$M and the wing-nuts religously (forgive the pun) defend the Pope because, well, he certainly didn't mean for his comments to reflect on the nature of Islam today, right?

Ok, but when the President of Iran said he wanted to 'wipe Israel off the map' he was also talking metaphysically about a historical passage in a ancient Islamic text, hummm, but that not what the wing-nuts and their pundits would have you believe.

Two religions, two differing standards? You decide.