The covers were obnoxious and not funny or clever satire but thats irrelevant. Free speech is important and I hope this wont scare folks into silence

Radley Balko says: "The editors at USA Today have lost their fucking minds"

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2015/01/07/islam-allah-muslims-shariah-anjem-choudary-editorials-debates/21417461/

I retweeted Radley on that.

I hope that this doesn't put Lucy in any danger!

As always, she is cute as a button.

If Lucy needs a "hide-out" send her to me in Texas.

Watching their hand-wringing tweets about "hate speech" reinforces my point that the American Left is in no way, shape, or form American. They are a fifth column operating inside our borders, and they are fully in league with the Islamists.

I was going to say, Lucy is dead, and you can't get more protected than that. Amy did say, "my late doggie Lucy."

Regarding Nick Cohen's thoughts, if it's that important to him to criticize Islam, he can go right ahead and do it. Despite what's happened, I don't feel especially obligated to criticize Islam or any other religion.

I think USA Today should be commended. Allow miscreants like Anjem Choudary to get into the spotlight. Allow them to explain their belief system.

Expose the real face of Islam, and the claims that "Islam is the religion of peace" start ringing hollow to all but the most clueless.

Despite what's happened, I don't feel especially obligated to criticize Islam or any other religion.

That's fine. Just because you're not interested in Islam does not mean that Islam and its practitioners are not interested in you.

Oh, and here's Hitchens thoughts...

"That's fine. Just because you're not interested in Islam does not mean that Islam and its practitioners are not interested in you."

Specifically, Patrick, they are interested in seeing you stoned to death for your sexual orientation.

And, again, I feel the need to make the point...

There is some text in the Bible that calls for killing homosexuals (and other sinners too - it's a pretty broad brush, and I'm guilty of more than one of those sins. It is, IMHO, pretty nearly impossible to not sin.)

But Christ already died for my sins. There is no imperative, since His death, that calls Christians to stone sinners. The opposite - He calls us to love our neighbors. And not just the sin-free ones.

What Matt said above. Islam takes a different approach.

Kewl! If Jesus already paid for my sins I'd better get cracking on giving him his money's worth.

Bless your heart!

Christianity is long used to having satire thrown at it, but does not assault those who do. It is a religion that even though it's tenets on sexuality are deeply conservative, does not condone killing anyone who strays. It preaches forgiveness for sins - all of them - not stoning. My other point though is that anyone who took it upon themselves to kill others in the name of Christianity and misconstrued its precepts would be severely rebuked. Christians would not tolerate someone doing something in the name of Christ that was so un-Christ-like. However, there is no loud boisterous rebuke from Muslims about what has been done here, because as Amy has pointed out, it sort of makes you a good Muslim, even though they don't want to say it out loud.

A religion is not a race.

True. But I've long suspected that the reason leftists give Islam a pass on beliefs and actions that oppose their stated values far more than Christianity does, is that so many of Islam's practitioners in the US are black.

To copy what I just posted elsewhere:

It annoys me that somewhere along the line (perhaps starting with "homophobic") someone decided that "-phobic" means to hate or to be critical of something. Phobic means to fear. An Islamophobe is one who fears Islam. As far as I am concerned, the people who are "Islamophobic" are those who are afraid to say or do anything that might offend someone of the Islamic faith for fear of the repercussions, which includes many of the people who incorrectly use the Islamophonic label against critics. Publishing a cartoon of Muhammad is not Islamophobic; being afraid to publish one is.

As for what I am, I'm someone who opposes any ideology (religious or not) whose followers try to forcibly impose it on others either directly ("you violated my beliefs, so I will harm you") or indirectly ("I'm going to get a law passed to make it illegal for you to violate my beliefs").

Watching their hand-wringing tweets about "hate speech" reinforces my point that the American Left is in no way, shape, or form American. They are a fifth column operating inside our borders, and they are fully in league with the Islamists.

Do you really think that, or are you being hyperbolic to make a point?

I wouldn't compare liberals to jihadists by any means. But it is interesting how overthrow of the western system is their common value, though the systems they want to replace it with are much different.

What joins the two, IMHO, is their belief that one can earn utopia by its works here. Jihadists believe Shari'a Law and utopia in the next life, the left beleives a socialist utopia can be obtained in this one.

Christians believe in utopia in this world through faiths, not works. While some misconstrue that as a license to get away with all, think about the alternative ... most of the living hells on earth, from the Holocaust to Communism to the Middle East and beyond, were created by people trying to earn utopia (be it in this world or the next).

Do you really think that, or are you being hyperbolic to make a point?

I think that's more true than not.

Compare and contrast the left and the media (but I repeat myself) rhetoric regarding the Tea Party, and the violent practitioners of Islam.

To hear the left tell it, the Tea Party and conservative Christians are about to go on a crusade against...well everyone. Pretty much every time there's been a mass shooting or other anti-government violence the media has tried desperately to make a link to the Tea Party.

From Gabby Giffords [1] to the Boston Marathon Bombing [2], from a postal worker found hung in Kentucky[3] to a guy flying his small plane into an IRS building in Austin this was done. Even the wack job Colorado theater shooter was "linked" to the Tea Party by the media.

[1] a mostly apolitical nutjob
[2] more muslims
[3] guy committed suicide but wanted to make it look like a murder so the next of kin would get the life insurance
[4] another wack job who quoted Marx at length

But three muslim shooters who declared that they've avenged the prophet? not real muslims, not representative of Islam.

Maybe it is due to cowardice - they don't want to become targets. But I think it is more to do with the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Also, while we were not paying attention, Boko Haram has been a tad busy. How is #BringBackOurGirls working out?

Quoting:

Nigeria's militant Islamists have carried out a second attack on the key north-eastern town of Baga, an official has told the BBC.

Boko Haram fighters burnt down almost the entire town on Wednesday, after over-running a military base on Saturday, Musa Alhaji Bukar said.

Bodies lay strewn on Baga's streets, amid fears that some 2,000 people had been killed in the raids, he added.

That USA Today link is rather obnoxious IMHO. "It's time the sanctity of the prophet is protected."
One man's prophet is another man's village idiot.

And nothing like using ANY point to bring up more of this anti-liberal BS. The right is so much better, yes?

Something surprised me.

According to the media, France's Muslim population is 5 million.

(I assume that includes the children?)

But France's population is about 65 million.

So how can a certain well-known author, philosopher, and neuroscientist claim that France could be a Muslim majority nation by 2031 or earlier? (This is based on Muslims' high birth rate and immigration rate.) Can someone help me with the math, please?

BTW, here's an article about, in part, just such a scenario:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2015-01-06/novel-depicting-islamist-president-for-france-stirs-controversy.html

Was Attack Linked to Novel About France Under Islamist President?
By Helene Fouquet Jan 7, 2015 9:12 AM ET

First paragraph:

The deadly attack at a French satirical magazine today coincided with the release of a controversial book depicting a France led by an Islamic party and a Muslim president who bans women from the workplace...

Just to point out, the article in USA Today is an "opposing view." Apparently, for the sake of balance, they allowed someone with a contrasting opinion to speak their mind. There's no reason to think that the editors at USA Today have lost their minds merely for giving both sides of an issue.

As for those who think I should be concerned because the big, bad Muslims want to stone me for being gay, thanks for the concern, but I've navigated thus far through my life without being buried in the ground up to my shoulders and being pelted with rocks. I'm quite confident that I will continue to do so.

To me the below explains BOTH the American Left (esp. Obama) and Islam. Until members of both groups begin to DIE in efforts to regain their religion and/or to protect innocents they are considered a threat to my overall well-being.

"Muhammad ibn Jarir at-Tabari (d. 923), author of a standard and authoritative Qur'an commentary, explains verse 3:28 as follows:

If you [Muslims] are under their [non-Muslims'] authority, fearing for yourselves, behave loyally to them with your tongue while harboring inner animosity for them … [know that] God has forbidden believers from being friendly or on intimate terms with the infidels rather than other believers—except when infidels are above them [in authority]. Should that be the case, let them act friendly towards them while preserving their religion.[8]"

http://www.meforum.org/2538/taqiyya-islam-rules-of-war

"I wouldn't compare liberals to jihadists by any means. "

I've written here before about the difference between liberals and leftists. Liberals and conservatives are both dedicated to the concept of Western civilization, and we have in common the fundemental values of freedom, self-determination, rule of law, and being free from the chains of ethnicity and tribe. We may disagree on exactly what form this should take, but that's all negotiable.

Leftists share none of this. They are opposed, in very basic ways, to Western civilization and wish to overthrow it. They see people outside of their elitist cohort as drones, interchangable and disposable parts for the machine they want to construct that will manufacture nothing and accomplish nothing. The see themselves as being the natural rulers of humankind, so they have no use for rule of law. And to them, ethnicity and tribe are handy tools for distracting the masses and preventing opposition from gaining a popular foothold. (That's not to say that they don't carry centuries-old ethnic grudges; they do, but they figure they'll take care of that in due time.) Leftists are not liberal; they are quite illiberal, although they are willing to pay lip service to liberal principles to get a foot in the door. As we've seen, once they think they are safely ensconced in power, all traces of liberalism disappear. Like Islamism, leftism is a fundementally dishonest philosophy that usually conceals its true motivations in day-to-day interactions with the rest of the world.

Leftists and Islamists are, at this time, engaged in an alliance of convenience against a common enemy: the West. They each figure that once they have defeated that enemy, they'll deal with the other.

Okay, I've said some harsh things. It's true, I was getting upset about this ... unfortunate incident ... and then I remembered what the President said - and I'd like everyone else to calm down and repeat it out loud:

"Islam is peace."

I will say, Charlie Hebdo was racist... their depictions of Muslims were Arab and not, say, Indonesian. I don't think denying that helps matters.

My point is, even so, they have the right to express that without being murdered. Even if they were offensive, which they were.

Gooseegg, historically Christianity has killed people who strayed.

It is of course possible for Islam to be practiced sanely. It is done so by millions of people. Sadly, there is a huge contingent that doesn't practice it sanely, and unlike with Christianity, that bloc is not in check. There are no countries run by convert-or-die Christians. Extreme Christians are social outcasts even in Christian-majority countries. The reality is that today (not during the Middle Ages, not in some hypothetical future post-enlightment Islam) TODAY Islam contain a radical element with enough power to do seriou damage.

We can talk about socially-driven reasons for Muslim extremism, we can point the finger at ourselves and talk about Western Imperialism as a factor, but regardless of factors, the extremism is there and needs to be acknowledged, we can't ignore it. Too many people say, "Oh well it was our fault so oh well". While I agree that we should be constantly assessing our foreign policy, we still need to guard against this threat.

So instead of discussing what happened, I guess it's easier for some people to use things like this to group their own personal axis of evil: Leftists, Muslims, the Media, and Obama. Because anyone with brains knows that they're all the same.

In a more constructive offering, the editorial page editor at USA Today ran this explanation for yesterday's "opposing view" column that many found, well, wrong.

"Too many people say, 'Oh well it was our fault so oh well'.

Nicole, I'm glad you said this. The enemies of Western civilization are eager to use moral equivalency as a weapon, and far too many people fall for it. It's taking advantage of the desire of Westerners to morally perfect themselves. But things have to be kept in perspective... insulting someone, no matter how vile the words or depictions, is not the same thing as murdering them.

Our enemies view the values of civilization not as the glue that holds society together, but merely as a weakness to be exploited. In a very fundemantal way, they are denying the humanity of everyone but themselves. I fail to see why such people deserve to be accorded the rights associated with those values.

Meanwhile in Africa, Muslims slaughter 2,000 villagers.

Islam is peace.

Islam is peace.

vs.

http://www.quora.com/What-do-Hindu-Indians-think-about-the-Muslim-Rule-in-India