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Sunday, September 10, 2006

Couple of Links to Good Reading

Two amazing posts by Xoff and folkbum (who does ramble and rant, but he can be forgiven considering the topic) about the deceit of Patrick McIlheran. Shame on the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for continuing to provide space for this bald-faced liar.

Meanwhile, kudos to Rick Esenberg for a well written piece about 9-11 and five years later. One thing: Rick does go on about radical Islam and its rage somewhat. This is somewhat simplistic. I believe and history supports: Western civilization must take a huge portion of the blame for Islamic rage. Our deceit was instrumental in arousing Arab anger to a fever pitch.

And let us please not call all of the peoples of the Middle East radical Islamics. Just as Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and the rest of their ilk do not represent true Christianity in America, nor does al-Qaeda and the other radical groups represent true Islam.

4 Swings of the bat:

Dad29 said...

Lemeesee, heah.

Mohammad himself starts a war against Christians and Jews, takes the Holy Land, North Africa, and half of Spain--not to mention Turkey, and parts of the Balkans, threatening Vienna.

Murder, rape, pillage, and forcibly convert...

And "the West" must take a "huge share of the blame?"

I'm sure you can fill in the blanks, here...right?

Other Side said...

I'm aware of that history, too, dad. It's not unlike the periodic urges that western civilization has burped up over the centuries, i.e. the Hapsburg effort to achieve hegemony, Napoleon's and Htiler's marches across Europe, etc, etc.

However, I refer to the late 1800s and up to and past WWII. European colonization with no regard to the wishes of the indigenous peoples, lies regarding proposed autonomy, practiced condescension ... all of these and more have contributed to a distrust and, yes, even hatred of things western.

None of which excuse the indiscriminate killing of innocents, but we have been good teachers in that regard.

Oh, prior to Jews being resettled in the Holy Land, Islam was historically tolerant of other faiths within their midst, especially those of the Book. It wasn't until after WWI and the West's favoring of Jewish settlements at the expense of Arab interests did that sort of tolerance fade away.

Dad29 said...

So you think the British Empire is the bad-guy since, roughly, 1850 or so.

And the Zionists.

OK. I can live with that.

By the way, consider the Cult of Materialism as another significant contributor...

Other Side said...

I would agree with you. You liked this line from me some time back (expanded a bit):

We are living in a chameleon culture, moving at the speed of fad.

I confess, there are probably values that you and I can actually agree on.