So. Why is no one complaining about burning Bibles, killing Christians, and demolishing churches in the Arab World? Why hasn't psuedo Prez B Hussein Obama called the King of Saudi Arabia to ask him to stop the persecution of Christians and to build a synagogue in Mecca? All this causes Christian terrorism - not.

Awesome post, thank you.

As to the above by Mark:

a. Barack Obama is not "pseudo prez" he is The President of the United States of America.

b. Our concern is the Constitution and values of The United States of America, not stooping to the values of countries which are still only gradually reforming and entering the modern world.

c. We are not all that far ahead of them. Or, perhaps you have forgotten the vicious antisemitism of Henry Ford, the fact that women couldn't vote until 1920 and also, let us not forget, this nation officially and legally held slaves until after the Civil War (in real terms not that long ago.)

Let's focus on our own values, shall we, and try to avoid making bigoted comments about our President, for example calling him "pseudo prez" and implying, by calling him B. Hussein Obama, that he is a) Muslim and b) there is something wrong with Muslims in the first place.

Sophia, You say, "Our concern is the Constitution and values of The United States of America, not stooping to the values of countries which are still only gradually reforming and entering the modern world.".

I'm not defending Mark above, but just what US Constitutional values are you defending? It seems to me that freedom of conscience and freedom of speech are pretty important American values. I saw nothing in Mark's comment that violated those values - in fact his comment was a direct exercise of those values. He was simply expressing his opinion.

There is nothing in the Constitution that says you can't express an opinion that others disagree with. There is nothing in the Constitution that says you can't express an opinion about religion, even Islam.

Are you suggesting, like Obama suggested, that Jones should not burn a Quran because some Muslims might want to kill Americans if he does? That's a cowardly thing for a president to say. Obama dropped several levels lower on my meter for that one. It seems to me that like him, you are pretty smug to tell Americans that they can't express their freedom of conscience and speech if they believe or say something you don't like. That includes believing and saying that the president is a pseudo president or that Islam is an ugly religion suffused with racism, bigotry and notions of ethnic superiority and fascistic domination of non-Muslims. If you actually studied the Quran and listened to Islam's most prominent spokesmen with an unbiased mind you'd see that that was absolutely true - even though there are many Muslims who do not accept those teachings.

Mark is exercising his freedom of speech - as is Pastor Jones - whether you like what they are saying or not. If you are really concerned about the Constitution you would be defending their rights under our Constitution to believe and say what they wish - whether you agreed with them or not. You would not be calling him a bigot and implying he has un-American values. I think you are the one who is showing a lack of American values here. Either that or you don't have the foggiest idea what freedom of conscience and freedom of speech mean.

WHY JONES IS BURNING A KORAN

(Note, Sept 9, 12:30 a.m.: Unfortunately I did not make a copy Jones's articles for VFR, and all through Wednesday evening it has been impossible to load his church's website to read them. I assume that this is because the site is overwhelmed with readers, not because the site has been blocked. I've also been unable to find a copy of the article at any other site.)
From the website of Terry Jones's Dove World Outreach Center, an article dated September 2 on "Ten Reasons to Burn a Koran." And here is a follow-up: "Five More Reasons to Burn the Koran."

At the very least, one must say that Jones's planned act is not mindless. He is performing a certain act, and he has laid out his reasons for performing it. His reasons are that Islam is anti-Christ, anti the West, anti liberty, and anti human decency. His view is that Islam is a danger to everything we cherish and everything we are. By burning a Koran, he is expressing his complete rejection of Islam, and causing other people to think about why he is rejecting Islam. Since I myself believe and have frequently stated that Islam does not belong in the West, how can I condemn a man who is expressing the same idea through a strong symbolic act? An act that is not illegal and is not harming anyone. An act that will force people to think--is Islam the enemy of ourselves and of everything we cherish, or not? Does Islam belong among us, or not?

People are saying that the Koran burning will cause Muslims to kill innocent people. Perhaps it will. But the Danish cartoons caused Muslims to kill innocent people. Islam demands aggressive war against non-Muslims, including the killing of innocents, because from the Muslim point of view there is no such thing as an innocent non-Muslim. The clearest and most frequently repeated message of the Koran, appearing on almost every page, is that all non-Muslims are guilty of the monstrous crime of rejecting Allah and his prophet, and thereby deserve death and eternal torture. Why should we respect such a book? Why should we respect such a religion? Sooner or later, people in the West (and people in the non-Muslim world generally) must come to recognize the nature and teachings of Islam. They can have that recogition sooner, and prevent much violence, or they can have that recognition much later, only after Muslims have gained substantial power over our societies and get in a position to harm anyone who opposes them. My view is: the sooner the truth comes out, the better; the sooner things come to a head, the safer we will be.

Sophia @ 7:16PM 9/10/10:

"b. Our concern is the Constitution and values of The United States of America, not stooping to the values of countries which are still only gradually reforming and entering the modern world.

c. We are not all that far ahead of them. Or, perhaps you have forgotten the vicious antisemitism of Henry Ford, the fact that women couldn't vote until 1920 and also, let us not forget, this nation officially and legally held slaves until after the Civil War (in real terms not that long ago.)"

Breathtakingly mindless drivel.

Exactly whose concern is "not stooping to the values of countries which are still only gradually reforming and entering the modern world"? Yours, Sophia? It isn't mine, since we are about us far removed from the values of the country Mark mentioned, that is Saudi Arabia, as imaginable. Do you think otherwise, or seriously fear that we are somehow moving in the direction of Saudi Arabia? As far as the Constitution, have you seen some governmental action in NYC to stop the Cordoba House project, in FL to prevent the exercise of Reverend Jones' First Amendment right to burn Korans, or elsewhere that are cause for your concern?

Your "c" is worse than drivel, since it in effect asks us to be "understanding" of those countries and cultures in which such loathsomeness as rank antisemitism, severe oppression of women, and even slavery are to be found. If an end was put to slavery in the US, 150 years ago, how much longer do you think we should give other countries to come around to our level of enlightenment. Is women didn't enjoy suffrage here until 90 years ago, how much longer do you think Saudi Arabia and other places in which women are so terribly oppressed should be given to grant women suffrage, and in the meantime do you think they should let women dispense with the abaya and uncover their faces, drive, participate in the workforce, leave the country without a male's permission, etc.? How much longer for the antisemitism and other forms of religious bigotry? Of course, the problem is that this "primitiveness" is so fundamental to their society. (And I don't mean to limit this to Saudi, overlooking such other foci of "unenlightenment" like Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc.)

Sophia, I suppose your place here is to be the "liberal" foil. You are doing a terrible job of it, though, with stuff like this.

dcdoc, given the utterly hateful rhetoric of a great many people on the Right, I do think we're in danger of heading straight downhill.

Our society flourishes in a climate of mutual respect, but also respect for facts. The comments about Obama are frequently both false and slanderous; beyond that they reflect real ignorance about Muslims and other non-white, non-Christian people.

In other words they're bigoted as well as stupid.

Of course I think a lot of people on the Left are idiots too.

For example, here's a comment I just posted on Harry's in response to "flanker" who says extremism etc can all be blamed on Western imperialism. I disagree as follows:

Flanker – wait a second. Past a certain point how much can one blame the West for a lack of intellectual and other curiosity in other parts of the world, especially those dominated by a medieval religious and social code?

In cases where wars have raged I think it’s clear that creativity and progress will be severely hampered. On the other hand Israel is at war all the time and its creativity has flourished – so????

And – being in a war zone isn’t true of all the Islamic countries, in fact some of the least progressive are the richest and most secure. For example what about KSA?

And Egypt is not in a war zone – when it was in a war zone Egypt and the UAR themselves were creating the wars (against Israel.)

But I think one could argue that Egyptian culture isn’t at a high point relative to its long history or even to periods of the 20th century.

How much of this can be blamed on the West?

http://hurryupharry.org/2010/09/11/get-over-the-quran-burning/

Ray, the Constitution isn't just rules. It reflects a set of ideals, of which mindless stupidity and deliberate hatefulness isn't one.

YES the preacher has A RIGHT to burn books. We protect that right as we protect the rights of individuals to freedom of expression.

American ideals, however, are in direct opposition to book burning which is a sign of Nazism, not Americanism.

Am I right?

Obama is not a coward for stating the obvious. We have troops in harm's way in the middle of the Islamic world.

So duh?

Is General Petraus a coward too?

Why be needlessly and stupidly and hurtfully provocative?

Sophia, you engaged with nothing I said.

If you seriously believe we are moving in the direction of Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, and some of those other Islamic exemplars, then you should: first adduce evidence to show that there is actually real movement in this country, that is that things are notably different than they have been in the not too distant past here; and, then you should compare (and contrast) us with those countries you fear we are drawing closer to, so we might see that there is something to your "b" and it isn't simply prattle.

As for your "c," which I find so troubling, you really do owe us an explanation of what appears to be an apologia for the loathsomeness of those countries you imagine are on the way to enlightenment, lagging us by just a few years in getting there. (Do you have any evidence of progress being made in those countries? Are they better places than they were a decade ago? Two decades ago?)

No Sophia, There is absolutely nothing in the Constitution that says that ideas that you (or someone else) consider to be stupid or hateful can not or should not be expressed.

There's a reason for that. The people who wrote the Constitution realized that only where people are free to say whatever nonsense they wish - and where others are free to criticize it - will the best ideas flourish and the worst be cast aside.

That's what I meant when I suggested you didn't understand what the First Amendment is about. Whenever someone like Jones burns a Quran others - like you perhaps - are free to point out the virtues of Islam and show him to be wrong. Calling him (or those that defend his right to say what he wants) "bigoted" or "stupid" actually confirms his thesis - that Islam (and it's supporters on the left in the West like you) are the real enemies of American freedoms and values here.

Book burning is not a sign of Nazism, except for your facile attempt to make it it so. It's an effective means for a private citizen to state that the contents of the book (that they own) are disgusting to him or her. It's as American as apple pie and motherhood as affirmed by the USSC re: things like flag burning and neo-Nazi's right to march in Skokie.

Now, if the government who holds the power of force over citizens, not a private citizen who holds no such power, decided to ban or burn certain books, that would be fascistic and similar to Nazism. It's a crucial distinction that I'm afraid is lost on Obama and his anti-American-values followers.

As a clarificaion for Sophia, Calling him (or those that defend his right to say what he wants) "bigoted" or "stupid" confirms his thesis when you use those as excuses to silence him. That's what Islam attempts to do by killing cartoonists who draw pictures of Mohamed. You are effectively doing the same thing - although not committing a crime.

And yes, Obama and Patreus are both cowards in my opinion. Their first duty is to protect the Constitutional rights and lives of American citizens. They are cowards for attempting to avoid defending Americans' first amendment rights by claiming that our soldiers would be endangered if Jones expresses his beliefs.

It is the soldiers' duty (Patreus' duty) to defend the rights and lives of Americans by putting themselves in danger if necessary.

I notice when some people started complaining about the ground zero mosque, Obama's first words were a rigorous defense of the imam's right to build his mosque there - standing up for the imam's first amendment rights.

Now, when a non-Muslim American wants to use his first amendment rights to say what he believes to be true - Obama and Petreus seem to have forgotten all about the first amendment. Now, it's all about calls to silence Jones - preventing him from using his first amendment rights for speech they say will "upset some people". Well, the mosque obviously "upset some people". If you don't see the double standard you're blind.

Petreus has sworn to follow the orders of his CiC and so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that Obama told him to make that statement - even though it was cowardly for him to not refuse and resign IMO.

Obama though just makes me sick. I suspect that because of statements like this he'll be a one term failure. Whether or not that happens, the many good ideals of liberalism - that I support will suffer a defeat in the minds of Americans that will take years to recover from.

I believe that General Petraus was just following orders of Barack Hussein Obama.

As far as burning objects dear to people, it should be fine to burn the flags of:

- the islamfascist republic of iran
- hamass
- hezbullah
- paleswine
- saudi arabia

Fair is fair.

Eddie gets it. There is no right "not to be offended" in places where people live in freedom, supposedly here. Being occasionally offended by other people's beliefs is part of the price one pays to live where your right to believe and say what you believe is protected. It is disgraceful that our "slippery politician pseudo-prez" seems to have no concept of such things.

If something offends you doc, try explaining why it's wrong and persuading me and others that you are right. I have no problem admitting that I could be wrong. But in case you didn't notice you totally failed on that count. Didn't even attempt it. The fact that you are offended doesn't mean squat to me.

"If something offends you doc, try explaining why it's wrong and persuading me and others that you are right. I have no problem admitting that I could be wrong. But in case you didn't notice you totally failed on that count. Didn't even attempt it. The fact that you are offended doesn't mean squat to me."

The reasons why you are offensive are self-evident and numerous. Among them are the fact that General Petraeus has spent his life in the service of this country, putting himself in harms way repeatedly, while I wonder what, if anything, you who call him a "coward" have ever done anything remotely comparable. Care to say? (BTW, I have served in uniform during one of this country's wars, and I don't for a moment imagine that I have done 1/10000 of what Petraeus has done for our country and countrymen.) His assessment of the threats our troops face means something, while yours means nothing, and he is fulfilling his responsibilities to his troops and the rest of us, while you are simply shooting off your ignorant mouth.

If this "conversation" were taking place in a bar, we might allow that it was alcohol talking for you, but we aren't in a bar. So, we must conclude that these are your "considered" thoughts, especially since you have chosen to rejoined as you have, and those thoughts do not commend you.

Now, people can take exception to the wisdom of how Petraeus and other leaders of ours have handled this, as Dorothy Rabinowitz did in the WSJ yesterday ("Liberal Piety and the Meaning of 9/11"), but that is a different matter from calling him a coward and suggesting soldiers should die because of this loathsome leader of a 50-person congregation in Florida. He and Reverend Phelps should both be over in Afghanistan, along with you, fighting for those principles rather than making their extraordinarily negative "contributions" here at home, protected by our military.

I'm confident that if I gave this more time, I could make this case better. But I don't have the time or interest in doing so, since I do think the "offensiveness" is obvious enough, and thus without much need for explanation, and I doubt you will ever get it.

As far as "getting it" - it appears you still don't. Being offended is not the same thing as being right. Nor does the act of me offending you make me wrong. Offending or being offended have nothing to do with right or wrong. There could be rational reasons why I could be wrong but again you have not tried to offer any. For you it seems that being offended is the central issue in disputes - a modern liberal concept that makes it difficult for me to admit that I'm a liberal these days.

But, you've taken some time and written several hundred words now explaining why I offend you, why I shouldn't be making negative comments about your "hero" Petraeus. There have been many US generals who were more politicians than soldiers. I don't know if Petraeus is one of those - and I said I don't know why he said what he did - so I give him some benefit of the doubt.

I do know that as a citizen who's taxes pay his wages and who's Constitution he has sworn to defend - I find a statement advising an American citizen not to exercise his first amendment right to state his beliefs because people who are out there trying to kill Americans may try harder now because of that exercise of speech - to be a strange state of affairs. On the surface I'd say it reeks of the disgusting politics of a president eager to appease and apologize to our sworn enemies on the anniversary of the day that those enemies ruthlessly slaughtered almost 3000 innocent Americans.

Your comments about bars and military service are not relevant to the discussion except in your desire to discredit me rather than address my points which I remind, you have avoided again. I won't even address those for that reason. You say you're confident though that you could address them. I suggest your confidence may be due more to the emotional offense you have taken at my words than to your ability to mount a rational argument against them. But feel free to prove me wrong.

Uh huh.

Several hundreds words of blah blah and you guys are STILL not engaging with the core problem, which is, people are stereotyping a whole group of American citizens, in this case Muslims, and openly slandering them.

As far as the US falling backwards, THUS FAR our Constitution has held up but I think in some quarters our ideals are faltering.

The insults to Barack Obama are unfair. If you think he's a bad president say so but condemning him on the basis of his middle name, asserting that he isn't a real president and slandering Muslims in the process is a very low form of discourse.

Why is this so hard to see?

As for Eddie.

HOW can you guys defend this s***?

It's bigoted, it's offensive and it lowers the tone of this blog to that of a public toilet.

YES Eddie has a Constitutional right to be a jerk.

So? He HAS to be a foul mouthed bigot?

Why?

The core problem is people are stereotyping a whole group of American citizens, in this case Muslims.

No Sophia, words (not advocating violence) uttered by people in a free society are not anybody's core problem, except yours it seems. By "yours" I mean you and dcdoc (and Obama) and other liberals who think that if "bigoted" Americans like me would just not say bad things about the people in cultures whose first choice is to kill anyone who slights them, they will see we are their friends and decide to be nice to us and stop trying to kill us.

I know you won't understand this but some cultures simply foment hatred and violence. There's no need to get into the cultural anthropology of the ME but Arab/Muslim culture has (understandably) shaped a society and a religion that basically functions as legal and moral sanction (Sharia) for whatever violence its members wish to impose on others - a wish they seem have had in ample supply throughout history. If you want to find core problems and causes - that's probably the best you'll find for virtually any ME dispute or conflict. It covers everything from raising their children to their treatment of women and homosexuals and the weak in society to their preferred methods for choosing their government.

So please stop insisting that others share your delusions about Arabs/Muslims being "just like us". If they were, we'd be facing their diplomats and not their suicide bombs packed with ball bearings or their airliners flying into our skyscrapers.

We in the West prefer to deal with others diplomatically if we possibly can or haven't you noticed? If you want some credibility in these discussions you could start by holding Arab/Muslims to the same standards of decency and humanity that everyone else in the civilized world has come to accept.

Let's be clear, Ray, the question here is not whether Petraeus should or should not have said what he said about the much ballyhooed Koran burning. I noted that in yesterday's Dorothy Rabinowitz took exception to it, and Charles Lane did the same in the Washington Post. So reasonable people can disagree as to whether or not he should have said what he did. What is not reasonable or defensible, but is stupid and offensive, is for someone to accuse Petraeus of cowardice, with no basis in fact.

Stars on the epaulets do not guaranty that the wearer is an entirely admirable human being. Patton was a really ugly antisemite, and a rear admiral refused to allow the Naval Academy lacrosse team to play against Harvard unless the Harvard coach agreed not to bring along the African American on their team. But one doesn't get a star, let alone two, three or four of them, without proving themselves a leader, and there are plenty of opportunities along the way to weed out cowards.

I don't know the details of Petraeus's military service. I do know, though, that a round from an M16 tore through his chest in a training accident and it was a matter of millimeters, minutes, and Bill Frist's surgical skills that saved his life. Petraeus, the person Ray from Seattle, calls a coward for telling us that the men and women under his command would be put at greater risk if this stunt in Florida went ahead, kept going in the service of his country, including the unappreciative among us.

The people who reach those exalted heights in the military are extremely talented and dedicated people, whose compensation is a fraction of what they could expect to earn in private pursuits for undertaking far less. But anyone who files a tax return can call themselves a taxpayer no matter how little they may pay in taxes and say something profoundly assinine like, "I do know that as a citizen who's taxes pay his wages..."

Doc, I already pointed out that although I did say he was a coward I immediately caveated my comment and said that I gave him the benefit of the doubt. This comment makes the third time. I realize this has upset you.

In my last comment to you I said, "I find a statement advising an American citizen not to exercise his first amendment right to state his beliefs because people who are out there trying to kill Americans may try harder now because of that exercise of speech - to be a strange state of affairs." I will now add that I could have been wrong about his bravery and that me calling him a coward based on this incident was not warranted. You can consider this to be my amended full opinion on Petreaus and his statement.

I'm still open to reading your reply to any of the significant points I've made. I'll reiterate my main point here:

Many thousands of Americans have died to establish and defend the rights of freedom of expression embodied in our first amendment. I find it disgusting or worse that the president of the US and his general are now telling American citizens to voluntarily give up that sacred right to express their opinion - apparently because some violent hateful people have threatened to kill other innocent Americans if they don't. Don't you have any problem with an American president cowering to threats of violence and blackmail against US citizens who only wish to non-violently express their opinion? Why is he not standing up for Americans and our rights and defending us against those threats - instead of apologizing to and appeasing those making the threats?

"I'm still open to reading your reply to any of the significant points I've made."

Go find those pieces in yesterdays WSJ and WaPo by Dorothy Rabinowitz and Charles Lane, and see if you are in general agreement with them. I think there is balancing required by our leaders and I would be far more disturbed if they urged that Yale University Press not publish that book about images of Mohamed with those images than that they urged this horse's behind in Florida not to proceed with his gratuitous provocation. (Oops, they didn't have to urge YUP not to publish, YUP spared them the trouble by censoring themselves.) I, like Rabinowitz, think leaders like Mayor Bloomberg are going too far in casting all those who oppose the "Ground Zero Mosque" project as bigots.

'Nuff said.

[I will add that well-meaning Sophia sounds like a kindergarten teacher admonishing her class to treat one another nicely. I would call her contributions pablum, but pablum has some nutritive value, and see no nutritive value to her contributions which speak vacuously of the Constitution. And her "we are not all that far ahead of them" is worse than mere drivel.]

I'd rather hear your opinion in your own words. But I'll read those articles and get back. I am curious about why you call the FL pastor a "horse's behind" and his words a "gratuitous provocation".

It seems to me from the few YouTube clips I saw that he honestly believes that Islam is a guide to violence, not to living in harmony with one's neighbors. Whether he has judged it correctly or not I'd say it is not obviously clear that he's wrong. In fact, for someone reading the Quran who had never heard of it before - I can see why a reasonable person could come that conclusion.

So, it doesn't seem justified to call his plan to burn a Quran "gratuitous". I'd say it was a dramatic way to bring attention to something he honestly believes is a danger to his congregation (and probably to the world). Isn't that just the kind of unpopular views we should be most anxious to protect in a democracy that honors individual freedom of conscience?

It may be provocative as you say - but throughout history true believers in the political / religious dogma of the day have always found skeptics to be provocative - enough so to kill many millions of them. Since many Muslims take offense at even the existence of non-believers as directed in the Quran - and since he seems sincere enough in his belief that the Quran is a dangerous document - my tendency is to see his statement as a reasonable expression of his beliefs. Aside from that there have been a number of books in the last several months that make a pretty good case for his thesis. "The Strong Horse" by Lee Smith is a pretty good one if you haven't read it. But it's not necessary that anyone agree with him for his speech to fall under first amendment protections.

I also have an antipathy to mob rule - whether it's the press and the president vilifying and humiliating some poor southern preacher on national TV and pulling political strings to get his website disconnected - or a mob of Muslims whipping some teenage girl in public who was seen in the presence of unrelated males. So, I'm curious. Why have you joined the mob? It seems to me he has done nothing to justify such treatment.

Rabinowitz' piece seems to be not available. Do you have a link?

Lane's I read. I agree with half of what he said. Obama's behavior was disgraceful for all the reasons Lane articulated. The part I disagree with is his characterization of Jones. My last comment stands. I still fail to see what Jones did that was so wrong or that requires such public vilification. I notice that Lane did not justify his opinion of Jones. He just described it as defacto " . . mean, stupid, intolerant, and spookily evocative of Hitlerian book bonfires."

When mobs burn books that they confiscate from their enemies or when governments burn books that they confiscate from their citizens, that is Hitlerian. When private citizens burn books they own that they disagree with - that is free speech. Ask the USSC. IMO Lane's vilification of Jones is facile and unsupported. I think Lane was showing a little "fear of the mob" there.

Link to Dorothy Rabinowitz's 9/11/10 piece in Wall Street Journal:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703545604575407160266158170.html

Correction: The Rabinowitz piece did not appear on 9/11, it was apropos 9/11. It actually appeared one week earlier.

Thanks for the link. Yes, I'd say I generally agree with Rabinowotz' essay. When the GZM issue arose in the media my first opinion was that the imam has a constitutional right to build it there and that we should let the legal system run its course as I expected there would be one or more lawsuits if there were reasonable grounds for one under NY laws.

But as I watched Bloomberg, Cuomo and others, eventually including the pres, register their views that anyone who questioned the imam's motives, financing or wisdom was a bigot and a racist, and as I read more about the "imam" and his views about the West, I became more and more pissed off about what was happening.

I developed serious doubts about Obama as the primaries proceeded. I became dismayed with the lack of substance in his words, his friendship with Wright and other troubling signs. I foresaw a coming administration of political expediency rather than principle. I was especially doubtful about his support for Israel despite his iron-clad assurances. Unfortunately, it seems I was more right than wrong.

The left has morphed since Viet Nam. I participated in anti-war rallies in the sixties. I did that based on principles that I anguished over at the time (and since). Now, the left seems to stand for nothing more than hatred of America and the West and the glorification of some of the ugliest societies and belief systems human nature has ever produced. And we have a president who apologizes for those societies and prostrates himself in our name to appease them and grant them deep respect.

Although I did not serve in Viet Nam I had many friends who did. I had a draft deferment because I was working in the aerospace industry with a high level security clearance on military related projects. But, I could have quit and enlisted. Every one of my friends who went, came back and told me not to even think about it. Unlike some in my generation I have always had great respect for those who wear the uniform.

Ray from Seattle, see what you think about Bret Stephens's piece in the WSJ last month, "Our 'Moderate' Muslim Problem." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704868604575433214247852860.html

dcdoc, I would but they require a subscription. What do you think about it?

RfS, I think you would probably nod your head in agreement with Stevens, who urges caution where Rauf is concerned for a number of reasons, including that not so long that terrorist recruiter al-Awalaki, who we now are looking for so we can kill him before he encourages more Major Hasans, Underpants bombers, Times Square car bombers, and the like to kill Americans, was once held out as a model "moderate" imam.

As for access to that month-old WSJ piece, it must be that after awhile they require you to pay to see things. I do have a subscription, so can see the older stuff, but I think I could also get to see it online from home through our county library system. I don't make much use of that capability, but it is great for reading publications I couldn't otherwise easily access or would have to pay to read. You should check with your local library system to see if they offer cardholders a service like that.

WSJ seems to have gone completely behind the pay wall. I used to be able to get around it by going through a Google News search, but I haven't had any luck with that lately. That's why I haven't been linking much over there lately.

OK, here's a cut-and-paste of that August 17, 2010 WSJ piece, which I think worth reading:

Items of interest in the news media's coverage of "moderate Muslims":

• The New York Times, Oct. 19, 2001: "Imam Anwar Al-Awlaki, spiritual leader at the Dar al-Hijra mosque in Virginia, one of the nation's largest. . . . is held up as a new generation of Muslim leader capable of merging East and West."

• NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, Dec. 9, 2004: "It's the TV industry's newest experiment, 'Bridges TV,' billing itself the 'American-Muslim lifestyle network,' featuring movies, documentaries, cartoons. . . . It's the brainchild of Aasiya Hassan, an architect, and her husband, Muzzamil Hassan, a banker, who are disturbed that negative images of Muslims seem to dominate TV, especially since 9/11."

• Boston Globe editorial, Aug. 4, 2010: "The simple fact is there's nothing threatening about the proposed Islamic center, which is being spearheaded by Feisal Abdul Rauf, one of the most respected moderate Muslim leaders in the country."

See where this is going?

Most readers probably know of Awlaki as the U.S.-born imam who presided over the mosque attended by two of the 9/11 hijackers. Awlaki also served as theological mentor to Fort Hood killer Nidal Malik Hassan, would-be Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, and Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad. President Obama has authorized the military to assassinate Awlaki, now thought to be living in Yemen.

Al Qaeda Imam Anwar al-Awlaki, former poster child of moderate Islam.
As for Bridges TV, the saccharine story told by Brian Williams and reporter Ron Allen (complete with scenes of the family's domestic bliss in their modest home in Buffalo, N.Y.), came to an abrupt end in February 2009, when Mr. Hassan beheaded his wife after she had filed for divorce, evicted him from their home, and won an order of protection. Last week, Mr. Hassan's attorney defended her client on the grounds that he was, of all things, a "battered spouse."

Now we have the controversy over the Ground Zero mosque, opponents of which are being widely branded as bigots. As, no doubt, some of them are: There are bigots in any crowd.

Then again, is it bigoted to oppose bigots? Consider an interesting historical antecedent. In 1993, a controversy similar to the current one unfolded when residents of a Washington, D.C., suburb sought to use zoning laws to shut down the local mosque, ostensibly on grounds that it was a traffic nuisance. "Worshipers of many faiths said closing the popular mosque . . . would amount to discrimination against one of the area's fastest growing religions," the Washington Times reported at the time.

The mosque in question? None other than the Dar al-Hijra, later to be known as the "9/11 mosque." So were the petitioners who sought to shut it down bigots? Or is it that they got a whiff of its extremism, and didn't like the smell? "We are appalled at the ill will and friction," the paper quoted one Sylvia Johnson, "who said mosque-goers have yelled at her and blocked her driveway."

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GOP Pounces on Obama's Mosque Remarks Manhattan Mosque Fires Up Long Island Race Obama Defends Plan for Mosque Near Ground Zero Here, of course, the argument will be made that, unlike Awlaki, Mr. Rauf really is a moderate. And that might well be so—by the standards of his native Kuwait. But a man who claims to condemn all forms of terrorism yet refuses to call Hamas a terrorist group is not a moderate by American standards, which happen to be the relevant ones when you're trying to build a mosque two blocks from Ground Zero. Mr. Rauf still has a perfect legal right to go ahead with his scheme. But his supporters need to choose between defending him on grounds of his alleged moderation (in which case his views are relevant), or on the principle of religious liberty (in which case they're not). They can't have it both ways.

Which brings me to the fundamental problem with too many self-described moderate Muslims. A few years ago, my friend Irshad Manji made the point to me that "moderate Muslims denounce terror that's committed in the name of Islam but they deny that religion has anything to do with it." By contrast, she noted, "reform-minded Muslims denounce terror that's committed in the name of Islam and acknowledge that our religion is used to inspire it."

That's a distinction worth pondering. It's also a considerable comfort to know that there are Muslims in the U.S. like Irshad who are working, tirelessly but mainly out of view, toward the cause of reform. They could use more support and recognition. As for the professional charlatans and secret radicals who claim to be moderate, it would be well if their cheerleaders in the media could inspect their credentials a little more carefully before lavishing them with praise. Because, when it comes to heralding the arrival of the long-awaited moderates, there's nothing more embarrassing than a case of premature congratulation.