The Muslim preachers of moderation and peace are not just laughed at, they are denounced as heretics by Islamist imams and their very lives are put in jeopardy. If the West intervenes on their behalf, we get clubbed with the "imperialist" stick by domestic and international objectors. Even if we were to leave the Islamic world utterly to their own devices, and threaten them with dire consequences should they ever decide to spread the <i>ummah</i> to our shores by force, the Islamist strain would see it as their duty to do so.

There is no winning anything against such a mindset.

Actually, I was also meaning that <i>we</i> laugh at them. With respect, we use words like "mindset" and "clubbed" while not seeking a confederacy of moderate nations such as Dubai, Turkey and others to pro-actively teach us about how to differentiate between non-violent conservative Islam and violent conservative Islam and work to promote the former at home and abroad. If we think that we are going to make conservtive Islam go away we may as well be trying to make conservative North American protestantism go away.

Not uncoincidentally or unrelated, the Flea has written a masterpiece.

okay, i'm not in the 33%, and while i abhore the carriage and timing of the iraq conflict, i kinda buy into that bringing democracy to the middle east argument and everything will be okay. unfortunately, like everything else in human history, including how my house gets cleaned, things have to be very bad before they go to better. we're paying for treating the middle east like one big gas pump. all the nuts who want to kll us are the price we pay for driving away from the pump, for not caring as long there's gas to buy and we can afford it. saudi arabia you're my pal because you've made it possible for me to own a humvee. now, there's a great basis for a lasting friendship. and that's, unfortunately, the kind of friends we - all of us humveee owners - deserve. and so the nuts who hate the saudi royal family - which is just good thinking if you live in a mud hut - hate us. fair enough. but being asked to blow yourself up by those guys? eventually, if there's money to go around (which is what democracy is - face it) you get a middle class that goes - "uhhh, we were with you, but that blowing myself up thing sounds kind of nuts. we're not for that part" it's happening in iran. if you can go to a disco in terahn , there's your proof. disco will rescue us all and something will eventually come of it. it will eventually happen in iraq too - maybe - which is kind of why i said let's go get saddam, no skin off my nose, in the first place. but what a muck up. jesus wept, what a muck up. how long is this interlude gonna be? holy cow. and in the meantime, do i know what to do? well, we could kill every one of them. or......well strike that, i dunno actually know what to do. or actually i do; if everybody in north america commits to driving a geo metro, so humvees will be off the road and therefore not a threat to us metro owners, i'll commit as well. i'll get a trailor for all the stuff i drag around with me (or maybe a sidecar - hmmmmmm). and then, once we all have little cars, we'll go back to sending dizzy gillespie, louis armstrong and thier ilk (mostly their ilk) on continuous world tours again. it'll work. it'll only take 50 years or so the first time. hey, deep down, even catholics think the pope looks funny in that hat.

I'm not sure I'm comforted by the fate of the world resting on disco.

I fully expect we will eradicate "conservative Islam" where "conservative" equals globalist aspirations of forced conversion and murderous thuggery. I might be wrong but conservative North American protestantism has yet to embrace that sort of doctrine in small but significant numbers -- even at the margins.

Not sure how the United Arab Emirates rates in the grand reformist scheme of things. I was under the impression that they were considerably less liberal than say Qatar, which has strong Wahhabi roots but permits alcohol consumption, women with drivers' licenses, and optional use of the abaya. At any rate yes we should be cultivating more moderate friends in the region. Turkey might be one although that nation has gone a bit too far the other way and has exceedingly strict statute restrictions on religion in general.

If you consider (as you should) the Bush administration as an extension of conservative North American protestantism - perhaps it's hoped for ascension - then you can see how that idea that few are involved might not hold up if you are disposed to see the word in that way.

If fact, there is likely a conservative to conservative dialogue available here.

I can not follow your equation of George W. Bush with murderous thuggery no matter what mental gymnastics may be required. If he is ramming anything down the throat of the <i>ummah</i> by force of arms, it is apostasy, not conversion. And it would be entirely unnecessary if they had simply restricted their misery-mongering to their own fellow citizens.

Time to take responsibility and note that is is you that equates a class of conservatism with thuggery. I was just noting the logical implication. As long as you fail to differentiate between non-violent conservative Islam and violent conservative Islam you are bound to miss the point.

I am going to disagree with everybody in a moment (and by my immediate purposes everybody means Alan and Chris) but first I need to signal sympathy with Portland:

<i>... unfortunately, like everything else in human history, including how my house gets cleaned, things have to be very bad before they go to better.</i>

This is so exactly my apparent, if not explicit, philosophy at Flea Towers that this comment is, like, just <i>spooky</i>. And things have got very bad indeed. Oh, they warned me? But would I listen? Now I have to rearrange the furniture.

But back to being disagreeable.

Chris: I am going to take issue with the notion that things would be fine if the Islamists kept their business at home, and;
Alan: I am going to disagree with your hope for dealing with a non-violent conservative Islam.

And the poignant, nay <i>piquant</i>, thing about my disagreement is that I am disagreeing with both of you <i>for the same reason</i>. That reason being the people overlooked in almost all reportage and commentary on this subject, i.e. everybody enduring the centuries long dominion of <i>sharia</i> and the whole panoply of associated medievalist evil. Most obviously this includes women forced to suffer genital mutilation, unequal access to what little education is on offer, unequal access to medical services, few civil rights - let alone liberties - independent of their male relatives, etc. and so forth.

We will never be free of this menace until the women of Islam is free. I have more thoughts on this subject for a future Flea-post but they are still digesting. But the road-map looks something like i) women's literacy, ii) women's access to health care and especially birth-control and iii) equality before the law in matters of property and civil disputes and these three in something like that order.

Finally, thanks, Alan, for the kind words about the H.G. Wells piece.

Hmm, a number of grammatical problems there. I should have a Post-It with PIMF written on it tacked to the side of my monitor.

I think that is good stuff to a point but I would like the same analysis to apply to the socially conservative aspects of our community, then, too. And not just CPC conservative. There is a big difference between genital mutilation and wearing a headscarf even literacy but if non-mandated but conservative community pressured wearing the headscarf or literacy needs rooting out then so do our choice in our society to limit freedoms as well. We are lumping this sort of conservative community norm in with violent fascism. We also have a host of norms that limit ability to maximize opportunity, many of which are building and based on neo-con ideas leading to everything from non-universal publicly funded health care or opportunity to secondary school based on finacial as much or more than intellectual capacity. In addition to the obvious impostions on people deemed to have the group characteristic, it also has the effect on others even though there is not a neat class of human experience into which these things can be places. They equally impose upon human experience, teach to know or force people to stay in their place. But remarking about these is now tossed away as "liberal" by clingers on to the new rural overlord way. So I am fine with changing non-violent and not regulatory conservatism elsewhere but it has to be recognized for having the same effect here, too.

i said what flea said. eventually, hopefully, chicks will rise up and dance the hustle, shaking thier booties for democracy (or at least a say in how things go down). and then we shall all be free. the rest of you used too many big words.

Alan I routinely and habitually distinguish between violent Islam (Islamism) and nonviolent Islam (Islam). It is you who are assuming that I use the terms interchangably. I do no such thing. Note the use of "Islamist" instead of mere "Muslim" in my first comment; the distinction is there.

Flea: I do not think things would be fine if would-be mullahcrats kept their fighting to their own sandbox, but folks like the Talibs and Saddam would certainly still be in power. Deciding to affect real estate on our turf was a bit of an error in judgment; I seriously doubt the West would have mustered the will to invade Afghanistan over the much less compelling casus belli of mere human suffering. Darfur, Rwanda, Somalia, Cambodia and many other places are ample evidence of that.

Wow, Al, stealing a few philosophical bases today are we? Lumping modern conservatism(being in existance since about 1950 or so) with old school conservatism and calling it all fascism. Simply amazed at the gymnastics.
You sure you aren't substituting the equality of outcomes for equality of oppurtunity here? That's what it looks like to me. And using that to declare that all who disagree with your progressivism/democratic socialism(of which Orwell himself was a proponent so don't think I'm trying to brand you a commie pinko, okay?) are fascists who need to be rooted out? And you may want to read up on what neo-con is(hint, it ain't just a pejorative. Francis Fukuyama---proponent of much of what you are---is a neo-con. A better term for neo-cons is Big Gov't Anti-Communists. But, hey, if it lets you go off on a jag, who am I to complain? Abuse the language and define everything down to the point of 'every one to the right of me is a heartless twit'. It's fun to watch.;))

How far down into socialism do we need to go before we live in a 'just society'? How much of 'luck' and the random must we root out to achieve this? Raise all kidlets in creches? All monies above, say, $60kUS in income become property of the state? No choice but to use public transit? Where is the endpoint so we can say we live in a 'just society,' and be done with progress?
When we're all the same and equal(society is trully just in N. America), can we go after the self-selecting illiberal, murderous, Luddite thugs THEN but not NOW?
(admit I'm fuzzy about secondary school. Down here that means hs and that's based mostly on geography. Canada sounds like it's more like Germany in that you get 'tracked' and funneled into schools that prepare you either for college or a technical trade. So, maybe your way ain't working. Maybe our way ain't working. What do you really mean by that?)

Hey, cm, do you comment over at crooked timber with that handle too?

I love when these discussions turn into sometihng like Shakespearian identify comedies. There ought to be a word for that. So here is my go...

When I wrote "[W]e are lumping this sort of conservative community norm in with violent fascism" I clearly meant (as one always should say <i>clearly</i> at this point in the thread that conservative Islam is being confused with violent fascist usurpation of Islam.

The rest of your comment makes my case. You cannot even entertain the fact that conservatism in North America creates as much lack of opportunity and inequality benefit. This is because it is a matter of faith (a neo-con trait if wver there was one) that the world should be better that way so it by definition is better that way and <i>reducio ad absurdum</i> proves it and anyone who does not agree is therefore dumb. That is the grade A defense structure for discussions like this that is played like a trup card but hasn't got the slightest finalty except to those who play it. Soon we will be told that "liberals don't get it."

Now let the discussion can devolve further. There ought to be a number to assign to this argument structure. In mortgages now you no longer attach one or another of the standard terms and conditions. You just assign the number. This is argument 7.

And, yes, Chris. I have been accentuating your statement <i>where "conservative" equals globalist aspirations of forced conversion and murderous thuggery</i> to make the point that it does not equal that - which is bizzare if you think about me defending the meaning of conservative to a conservative.<p>Yet, if you consider the acts of certain evangelizations in the third world and their track record of partnering with rightist military dictorships with their para-military wings (aka the stick to the carrot) you may again give yourself a moment to see a glimmer of the point.

ry, no, that's not me.

Alan, I agree, it does not equal that. I thought the statement was explicit enough. Where the conservatism is conjoined with expansion by violence it will not be tolerated. You are the one making the leap, my friend.

While I suspect the right answer is "n'uh" I will defer. I did want to make that distinction exceedingly clear, though, to ilustrate my point that there are many types of violence and oppression that a type of conservatism well short of militant terroism is connected with. Conservatives should root out such thought and the thinkers and put it on show trial.

Is this an opportune time to mention those Christian conservatives who shoot abortion providers? Granted, they aren't doing it to win converts, but still...

That is a good illustration of idealist, faith-based and violent conservatism which is entirely analogous to Al Queda and not analogous to non-violent faith-based conservatism.

I have to quibble here again, Al and cm. It is not quite analogous to Al-Qaeda as the nutjobs who murder abortion providers are targeting specific doctors performing a specific task; whereas I doubt Al-Qaeda's attack was motivated by the occupational specialties of 2,773 individuals who worked in the Manhattan block bounded by Vesey St., Church St., Liberty St. and West St.

Please note I am not saying that violent Christianist nutjobs are any more virtuous than violent Islamist nutjobs, but their scope is a little less broad.

Disagree entirely (though it is entirely gratifying and a tribute to civility that we have agreed on our framework for dscussion.)

The real goal of the murderous evangelists who kills doctors is exactly the same as the Taliban in fact. They are there to create a general chill keeping women from freedom. Fewer doctors will do the job, fewer women will consider themselves free to seek out the service. Deterrence from freedom through criminal violence in the general community. Canadian soldiers are fighting people who would bring in the exact same limit on women in Afghanistan.

No Al, it was anything but clear, and it was caused by you tying conservatism to Islamo-fascism with this: 'They equally impose upon human experience, teach to know or force people to stay in their place. But remarking about these is now tossed away as "liberal" by clingers on to the new rural overlord way." YOu weren't trying to equate the two as evil in any, way, shape or form what so ever? Please. I may be a dunce, but that was obvious as anything, Al.

"You cannot even entertain the fact that conservatism in North America creates as much lack of opportunity and inequality benefit." Actually, Al. I did and can. Go to the University of California, Davis website and look up the Davis Student and Agrarian Effort co-ops. I lived in Ag for a summer and Student for a year. Where I had to participate in 'alternative econony' projects and collective work all the time---and saw first hand how quickly people shied away from it because something better(better oppurtunity and more equality) was available. Not to mention the cult of personality that invariably formed creating an oligarchy. By which those favored got 'good shit' and those of us outside got the shaft.
I can entertain all kinds of things, Al. So you're 'conservatives simply cannot understand' comment fails, utterly and weepingly.

I guess it's good that I don't buy those rotten grade A methods then, eh Al? Do a little more hands on learning like Dewey always said was good for you.

Nice straw man by the way. Where ever did you find the nice little bow tie to put on him? Soooo Tucker Carlson(or were you aiming for Pat Buchanon? I might help you tar and feather Pat Buchanon by the way.). Must have been heck for you to destroy it after dressing it up so prettily?

From experience, toiling in the dirt, not hiding in little clatches of rich-white-young-republicans, I've seen that both create immense levels of inequality. One actually has given us the standard of living we all enjoy and for a goodly number to transcend parents socio-economic class while the other clearly denies it to those who have the same access to natural resources we have had here in N. America(the former USSR, much of Europe, today's China) while having the same level of inequality or worse. I walk with Churchill on this: it's the worst, simply the worst, save all the others.
I'm willing to tweak it all, Al, really I am(though my dander gets up when you go on to say I'm party to evil rather unprovokedly with such broad brush statements.). I'm willing to tweak the system. I'm willing to compromise(on some things--since the general structure is right, the particulars may be wrong, but in general it is correct. Or need we look at places that have continued to try to maintain the old ways and see the failure to respect the individual and give her the right to rise above?).

I really don't get this Al. You're living 'the dream'. YOu don't sound like you were born with a silver spoon and yet have moved on to become a successful enough barister to own your own home. Why the hatred for the system that gave you the oppurtunity to do that? Why the hatred for a system that allows me to engage in collectivism thru charity and Catholicism while transcending the Irish-family-who-never-owned-anything class that I was born in? (Family living in Donegal still don't own spit and the Irish Republic is far more collectivist and communalist than the US.) I simply don't get the anger, Al. Especially since otherwise I enjoy hanging with you.

I would be much more interested if you didn't look at a converasion as an insult opportunity. Chris and I have discussed elsewhere my interest in actually coming to a new understanding through debate. But just presenting possible refutation analogies to every point is not very satisfying. It is not personal to me (so your last bit is weird and a bit offensive) and it is not personal to you. No anger. Go back when you can set yours aside. Try again.

<i>for a goodly number to transcend parents socio-economic class</i>

See, this is the part that's always gotten me: Isn't there only so far up one can go? I mean, if your parents are your stereotypical middle-class suburban house with pool*, how do you transcend that?

*Ok, on preview that sounds like your parents are actually a house but I'm too tired to go back and try to rephrase it. I'm so tired, in fact, I typed the secret code into the email address field.

Yes, but please save it for another day. We are not talking about economics but gradations of and varieties of conservative. Ry has taking an odd tack but no one else need go into the shoals with him.

Right. Sorry about that.

PLEASE CAN YOU GIVE ME DETAILS ABOUT THE FORMER PM OF PAKISTAN BHUTTO SORRY
IF MY SPELLING WAS WRONG AND ABOUT HER FIRST NAME BECAUSE I AM REALLY CONFUSED ABOUT HER ISSUE.PLEASE CAN YOU HELP ME OUT.
I AM A STUDENT IN GHANA AND I LIKE WATCHING BBC NEWS.

I WANT TO GET THE LATEST NEWS ON THE FORMER PM BHUTTO OF PAKISTAN.I AM A STUDENT OF GHANA AND I LIKE WATCHING BBC NEWS.

Why me, Teddy?

And do you support Hearts of Oak?