Redstate

Your contention that "that Muslim peoples harbor towards apostates is unlike anything seen in the West since about the 17th century" is patently absurd.  Have you already forgotten the plight of the Jews in the twentieth century, not only at the hands of the Nazis, but also in Eastern Europe both prior to and subsequent to the rise of communism?  Or if that is too far in the distant past, how about the last experience in Ireland throughout the twentieth century or in the Balkans since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Secondly, your premise that human rights advocates are silent in the face of such crimes against humanity is equally absurd. To contend that human rights groups ignore or downplay violations against perpatrated against Christians is completely unspported and unsupportable.  

You don't think that the "international human rights groups" have a very selective outrage in these matters? I dare say multiple-murderer Tookie Williams got a lot more international support than this Christian convert will ever get.

leftists and islamics depend on the ratchet effect: Once something goes lefty, it is never supposed to change. Once someone is moslem, they are not supposed to change. Yet another of the many interesting overlaps bettween slamofasicsm and lefties.

Jews were never "apostates"; the pograms and holocausts were motivated by anti-semitism and bigotry, which are evils distinct from hatred of "apostates".  The Troubles in Ireland were also not related to apostacy: those were a direct clash between competing religio-politico blocks.  Apostacy per se was not the objection; political and religious domination by "those other guys" was the issue.

An apostate is one who coverts OUT of a given faith -- it does not apply to those who never WERE members of that faith.  And in this respect, Paul is correct: while Radical Islam condemns all infidels, even so-called "moderate" Islam despises apostates.  So much so that in "moderate" Afghanistan, and "moderate" Turkey: Christians are tolerated SO LONG AS they do not proselytize, and converts OUT OF Islam are punishable by death.

E.g. if you're a Christian, you can stay one and keep breathing as long as you don't try to carry out the Great Commission.  However, if you're Muslim, you will remain Muslim unto death -- we (the state) will guarantee THAT.

Oh, and about the concern of Amnesty International et. al. with regards to Christians?  I call bullcrap; they are not overly concerned with the fate of Christians.  Even when AI talks about the Sudanese massacres and human slavery -- which is rare; they prefer to whine about Guantanamo -- they cringe and hide the religious aspect, prefering to couch the conflict in racial or geographic terms: but in fact, it's Islamic nutjobs murdering and enslaving Christians and Animists -- not "southern Sudanese" and "northern Sudanese" as AI would have you believe.

that there is significant discussion of this incident on DailyKos right now.

It is amazing to me, however, that rather than draw the obvious conclusion--that "democracy" means a heck of a lot more than just casting ballots, and that the Bush administration's venture in Afghanistan has not been all it's cracked up to be--that you choose to decry the left's supposed lack of attention to this subject.

It's getting attention, from right and left.  And attention is anything but good for the GOP.

standard and do they come under greater scrutiny and get more public attention?  No doubt this is true.  But we are supposed to be setting the standard.  But on the whole their outrage is not selective.  The press in Western countries tends to cover cases here more extensively and the right in this country tends to get very bent out of shape when this country is criticized by human rights organizations.  

Will Jessica Simpson or Britney Spears get more press over the next two months (which is when the verdict is supposed to come down) than this poor man?  There is no doubt.  

Will Fox News spend more time on this story or a break in the Natalee Holloway case, if one occurs?  I would bet on the latter.

Get your mommy to read this piece to you again, then try commenting. Obtuseness can be charming; from you, it's merely irritating.

Lib, calm down. It's not the higher standards that we are being held to by the supposed "human rights organizations". It's the standard of the relativist freaks whose only moral good is standing against the productive, the strong, the free, the capitalist. Their standard is that anything US does is evil when we are not licking the boots of the almighty UN.

Anything that US does with moral certitude is automatically wrong, while the people they defend are the terrorists, the death row criminals, the socialist freeloaders.

It's people from those pathetic organizations that you find at the anti-war marches that are full of stalinist hacks, hamas supporters, unemployed pedophiles, and cindy sheehans.

That to bring popular sovereignty, a. k. a., democracy, to the Islamic world may empower our enemies -- who constitute a guiding majority of Muslims -- by giving them not merely the tools of political power that popular government implies, but also the legitimacy that it entails.

Thankfully, we can disregard the examples of Indonesia and Turkey* on the ground that they don't support your thesis.  (Also, pay no attention to the hopeful noises made in Lebanon; and also ignore India, with its 135 million-plus Moslems.)

Thankfully, we can disregard the examples of Indonesia and Turkey

Except for the odd slaughter of ethnic Chinese and the occasional bloody crackdown by the institutional army to prevent precisely this, respectively, true.

(Also, pay no attention to the hopeful noises made in Lebanon; and also ignore India, with its 135 million-plus Moslems.)

You really don't want to go the Lebanon route. And I didn't know that India's population had declined to 250 million. My God! When did that happen?

That Turkey's secular democracy has endured only alongside a systematic suppression of Islam does not make it a particularly strong case against my view. Indonesia maybe, but not Turkey. I am hopeful about Lebanon too, but even if that sad country does come around, the price paid over the past 25 years has been unspeakable.

Which is what the technical about apostacy is.  The overall point of the main post contrasted the tolerance of Christianity and the West with the intolerance of Islam.  It implied that it had been hundreds of years since westerners had perpertrated the kinds of crimes on non-Christians that Muslims are now perpertrating on Christians.  

You want to defend the post by saying that the point was that it has been four hundred years since Christians had killed anyone for apostacy (although I am sure you will find that most Mormons will disagree even with that contention).  That ignores the point of the entire post.

Whether or not AI chooses to emphasize the religious aspect of human rights abuses does not negate the fact that they work tirelessly to prevent human rights abuses regardless of the politics or religion of the perpertrators or victims.

... Was to note the emergence of a Islamist governing party, and the steady divestment of the Army from the affairs of state.

The overall point of the main post contrasted the tolerance of Christianity and the West with the intolerance of Islam.

Which post did you read?

Except for the odd slaughter of ethnic Chinese

Chinese is a religion?  

and the occasional bloody crackdown by the institutional army to prevent precisely this, respectively, true.

See my note to Paul, below.  

his point about religious intolerance still stands.  The fact that we pride ourselves on our postmodern tolerance for all religions is only because we went through centuries of religious warfare, part of the cure for which was democracy.  That's my problem with the "sky is falling" crowd in regards to Islam and democracy.  We forget our past so easily.

For instance, localized democracy in the early United States gave puritan communities a lot of legitimacy to punish and expel their members for apostasy, as well as adultery and any number of other crimes for which we think punishment would be unthinkable today.  People seem to believe the Enlightenment was with the West all along, and that sectarian violence and intolerance was an aberration to "universal Western values."  In fact, religious toleration only caught on about 300 years ago.

After that, it's a chicken-and-egg argument: which came first, religious toleration or democracy?  There's a strong argument that democracy will produce religious toleration, and it seems hard to believe we could foster toleration in mostly religiously homogenous societies like those in the Middle East without also instituting democracy.  In the short run, we will see things like this happen, but at the same time we've also seen startling progress in Turkey, Iraq, and Afghanistan.  If it's not going fast enough for your liking, well, society doesn't move at the speed of human desire.

Then what exactly were you trying to say other than muslims can't be trusted with democracy because they aren't civilized enough to handle it while we (westerners who haven't slaughtered apostates since the seventeenth century) know how to handle democracy?

I say it is yet another piece of evidence added to the increasing pressure of many events that forces us to consider what once was unthinkable: That to bring popular sovereignty, a. k. a., democracy, to the Islamic world may empower our enemies -- who constitute a guiding majority of Muslims -- by giving them not merely the tools of political power that popular government implies, but also the legitimacy that it entails.

The only things that Amnesty International is tireless about are: trying to portray US in the worst light possible, trying to invent human rights abuses where they don't exist, minimize condeming truly evil countries of Iran, North Korea, Cuba, etc.

Amnesty International is one of the true enemies of the War on Terror. They would defend any anti-american terrorist 100% because it fits with their real and not subtly hidden agenda to overthrow global capitalism. Same as the agenda of the global environmentalist movement.

Sorry, no sale.  Ataturk-style secularism maintained relative supremacy ONLY because the military was explicitly designated as the guardian of secularism: it stood ever-ready to overthrow the democratically-elected government if the mob elected an islamic party.  Yet even so, during the entire Ataturk-secularist period of Turkey's history, it still wasn't...er, open...to other religions.  Proselytizing (by anyone other than Muslims) was illegal, and apostacy (converting out of Islam) was a serious crime.

That's not exactly a Jeffersonian republic.

However, about three years ago Turkey's military abandoned their traditional role, and allowed the Islamist AKP party to stand for election -- predictably, AKP won.  And ever since then Erdogan, the new AKP prime minister, has been busily stuffing the bureaucracy with Islamists, solidifying Islamist control of the military, among other fun things.

Also, it was just after Erdogan's election that he forced the US 4th I.D. to sit, floating at anchor, off the Turkish coast rather than transit thru the US base en route to the Iraqi northern front in the Iraq War.  (Now, part of this may also be explained by Turkey kow-towing to the EU in hopes of early admission, but still...)  So, there WAS no northern front, and the envelopment manouver didn't happen -- so the bad guys weren't trapped (and killed).  Instead, they melted away (for a while), and formed the base of the initial insurgency.  Gee, thanks, Turkey.

So, as Turkey moved toward a more pure-democratic model (e.g. the military refused to overrule the mob; abandoning its role as secularism's champion) we got:

  (1) an Islamist governing party

  (2) more Islamists secreted in positions of power in the Turkish government

  (3) obstructionism to US policy rather than cooperation or at least engagement

  (4) abrogation of military cooperation treaties

Sounds like Turkey is a point in FAVOR of Paul's position, not an objection to it.  Further:

Indonesia: Abu Sayyaf (or is it Jemayah Islamiyah? I can't keep my murdering Islamicist sociopathic nutjobs straight) chopping off the heads of schoolchildren in Indonesia.

India: continuous and unrelenting terrorist attacts in Kashmir (and now stretching throughout the subcontinent).

Look here: Bloody Borders and pay close attention to India, Indonesia and Pakistan.  Granted, Turkey doesn't have (much) of a internal terrorism issue -- but its political system is moving AWAY, not TOWARD, a western-style secular representative republic with religious and press freedom that respects minority rights.

von: the first rule of holes is, when you're in one, stop digging.

I certainly haven't forgotten the West before the Enlightenment. In fact I regard the Enlightenment as a mixed blessing indeed.

And the role of Islam in periodic Han-cleansing is not precisely a small one.

So: About the others?

Well yeah. Democracy in America means that we can kill murderers for killing and kill the unborn for being inconvenient. You will find that there are plenty of people who will say one is right the other wrong, both right or both wrong.  If a democacy decides that (fill in the blank) is worthy of state decreed death, that's the way it works. You can't equate democracy with moral correctness. If the majority votes to add their country to the next basket to hell, so be it.

There is a huge difference between Liberty and Democracy. This is a prime example. Democracy in itself is devoid of moral quotient. It can be used for good and for evil.

Democracy is not a prerequisite to a truly liberated society (a society that fully protects human rights to be who they want to be) but the two often coexist to some degree.

Despite all the promotion from the Bush administration (and I support Iraq war for other reasons) we should be in the business of spreading liberty and not just democracy. If the democracy is used to impose the laws worthy of Hitler's regime... well judge that democracy for yourselves.

I am yet to see the combination of Democracy and Islamism that would produce real protections of individual liberties. Unfortunately unless there is a true separation of Islam and their laws, their religion seems to call for less than Western standards of freedom.

to do with democracy. Iraq was far, far more "tolerant" of religious diversity under Hussein than it currently is with an elected parliament and U.S. troop presence. Yugoslavia had Muslims and Christians living next to each other as friends until the artificial Eastern bloc structure broke down into burgeoning democracy. Now, of course, it's also true that Hussein had a bad habit of killing large numbers of people who weren't from his particular clan, but that's a different story! Thriving democracies can operate extraordinarily well while doing all sorts of strange things. It's part of the reason why we paleoconservatives find ourselves shaking our heads in disbelief at some of the actions and policies of neoconservatism. Neoconservatism comes with a host of mid-50's/early 60's Ivy-league hawkish ideals, which isn't remarkably surprising considering that many of the current generation of neoconservatives started life as 1960's big-government liberals before they got driven out of the party in the 1968 convention.

And, for coming back a third time when banned twice, farewell.

He plays chess so well!

then why do you single out Islam for special scorn?  Premodern Christianity was little better in terms of tolerating apostasy, and the modernizing force that turned us into the liberal nation we are today was in part made up of democracy.  That force also took a century or three to achieve its work.  So far, it's had about 80 years in Turkey and less than a decade in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we're already calling every instance of trouble a sign Islam won't modernize.  Given Western history, I just can't accept that hypothesis.  The only difference between the West before and the Middle East now is that 300 years ago there was no media or internet circulating stories like these, so most didn't make it into the history books, and for that reason we don't seem to think incidents like Abdul Rahman were commonplace in early America and for most of Europe's history.  

I feel bad for Mr. Rahman, I really do.  But I'm not hitting the panic button because democracy failed to produce modern Western standards of religious tolerance overnight.

a really bad idea too.  But the reformation is what made Christianity tolerant.  And if Islam is to truly moderate and modernize it needs its own Luther, Calvin, Knox and maybe even Henry VIII to sever the religion from the state and control of every aspect of secular life.

their territory had more to do with fear of an independent Kurdistan than any religious concerns.

Given that Thirty Years' War thing, the burning of Catholics in post-Catholic England, and the sundry slaughters of Catholics by Protestants for decades and centuries after.

Paul, by the way, is a Protestant. I am the ultramontane who thinks the Reformation, and the response to it, were horrible events.

I'm curious, what history did you study?

Were not the Muslims involved in just as much and just as bloody wars over religion?

Yet in the same time, Christians have moved on and decidedly stepped AWAY from those endless, mutually destructive wars while Islam has, apparently, embraced them.

I felt the same as most Americans about Islam:  It is a naturally peaceful religion being coerced to the purposes of evil men.

Until recently, anyway.  Having read Orson Scott Card's essays on the subject, and comparing them to history, both ancient and modern, I am being forced to reevaluate.

Card calls Islam a door that opens only one way.  Once you choose to be Muslim, you can't choose anything else.

with current Christian tolerance.  Its success was born out of that tolerance.  The people said "War no More!" and started eliminating reasons to go to war.  Religion was at the top of the list.  Because what gain can be had for society from those wars?

I think I'll need to check those essays by Mr. Card out. He is a very smart man.

Had no effect on the tolerance of Christians.  Note, I said "Christians" and not "Christianity."  The Church is still as unbending in its doctrine as ever.  But Christians won't deal with that kind of inflexibility and forced the Church to recognize that no matter what Doctrine may say, people won't do certain things anymore.

People, Christians, got tired of the blood.  "Dying for God" was not good enough, anymore.  Even those who had thought it was changed their tune when it was Their wives and sons and parents at the stake.

Now, tell me why the Muslims haven't made the same change when they've gone through the same.  When they've had their own schims and Reformation, etc, etc, etc.

summarizes them quite well, I found.  Makes them entertaining, too.

..."What was once unthinkable now wants for thought -- for sustained, rigorous, unafraid public thought; in short the business of self-government in a republic. "

If I tried to find some fault in this sentence in would more or less concentrate on the use of the word "unthinkable". A little dramatic, but good use for effect.

The rest of it however, seems fair and has a tone of hopefulness to it.

Whether or not a democracy of some sort can be established, or whether it will end up being a socialist country, or some other governing form comes to fruition has yet to be seen. However, even with total success in establishing what we percieve will be a more friendly government toward the U.S. and it's allies because it's a form of democradcy or other is not guaranteed.

Islam can function even in it's extremist form under a democracy too.

Also, it is unfortunate that many stories that deserve attention, in fact in most cases, get no attention at all. But we do what we all can to make sure not all get by and that eventually something is done about things that seem to repeat themselves, North Africa is becoming such a place with such a story. Any suggestions on how to bring about more attention and support for these stories mentioned here is this blog and other stories not and pressure that ends in action is of course welcomed.

The AKP gets a bad rap on this site for reasons I don't quite understand.  Yes, they're "Islamist" but also in some ways far more liberal than their "secularist" predecessors.  this piece by Robert Pollock, hardly an AKP or Turkey apologist, offers some perspective:

I want to give Mr. Erdogan an opportunity to explain his undeniable domestic achievements. What has he tried to accomplish? He tells me about tackling the "three Ys": The letter "y" begins the Turkish words for corruption, poverty and prohibitions. Let's start with the latter. It's worth recalling that Mr. Erdogan was initially unable to claim his election victory after falling afoul of Turkish laws banning overly religious political expression. That needed to change, and Mr. Erdogan can justly brag that "no person has entered jail for expressing their thoughts during my term. Turkey is a country of freedoms."

On poverty, too, there is little doubt Mr. Erdogan is making much progress. I comment on how much richer Turkey seems since I first started visiting in the late '90s. Mr. Erdogan boasts that growth over the past three years has averaged 8% annually, and that per capita income has risen to about $5,000 (it's much, much higher, of course, in cities like Ankara and Istanbul). A major factor here has been that Turkey has finally beaten inflation, which was down to 7.7% at the end of last year from more than 30% before. This has fueled an unprecedented expansion in consumer credit and some Turks believe it's a "bubble." But I think they're more likely witnessing the real and permanent benefits of a stable currency.

Another factor is that Mr. Erdogan has helped make Turkey much more friendly to entrepreneurship. He tells me that the corporate tax rate has dropped to 20% from 33%, and that the top personal tax rate has fallen to 35% from 45% and "it will go down" further. And when I ask about his hopes for a legacy, it is interesting that he answers first in economic terms: "At the end of the next [government] term--2012--a Turkey which achieved $10,000 per capita income." He sounds like a fervent supply-sider!

Sound like religious fanatics?  Not to me.  And yes, Turkey does occasionally pee in our pool when they do things like recognize the new Hamas government in Palestine or deny overflight rights,  but how is that any different from the treatment we get from many of our other NATO allies, especially Germany and France?  All in all this "Islamist" party has governed in ways often more satisfactory than the previous overtly secular government.  

I wrote a diary on this back in December, and I continue to think Turkey is an example of what an Islamic democracy can accomplish in a relatively short period of time.  I also have no doubt that Turkey will continue to modernize, no matter what party is at the helm.

Ender himself is behind the times in his own series.

there is no such thing as post-Catholic England.  The Anglican Church still claims to be a Catholic church, they are just not Roman Catholic and do not recognize the authority of the Pope.  If the Pope will just acknowledge Henry VIII's annulment from Katharine of Aragon and they will happily return to the fold ; ).  

to see what they would do if the Pope were to grant it at this late of a date.

Of course they were.  That has little bearing on my point.  The West modernized and democratized and stopped (mostly) the religious violence.  The Middle East, for lots of reasons, failed to do so.  Now they are entering that process, and we in the West, because we have already come out on the other side, forget how hard it was for us to do it.  Afghanistan and Iraq have accomplished much more in a short amount of time than I would have thought possible.  That's why I don't get this doomsaying.

As for the "religion of peace" vs. "religion of war" debate, I submit that religions are neither peaceful nor warlike.  Most religious texts have calls to both war and peace in them, and people choose to read them as they will.  Centuries ago, most Christians paid more attention to the warlike parts of the Bible than they did to the calls for brotherhood.  Today, many Muslims seem to pay more attention to the warlike parts of the Koran than to the peaceful parts.  That's obviously partly because of political reasons, and for the masses, partly because their authorities give so much weight to the warlike interpretations.  Democracy can help change that.  I refuse to throw in the towel because Afghanistan and Iraq are moving too slowly for the more impatient among us.

Is whether he can defeat Diablo, let alone go after Baal now.

hundred years younger than Christianity.

But they definitely need some people who will speak out against those who would prefer blood over peace.

India, and almost his whole family was murdered by Muslims, because they tried to obey the great commission (he escaped along with a few siblings).  This happened in the late 90's.  It didn't get any MSM or really any news coverage, it is just part of his story and testimony now.

anymore.  It's the Bean series.

Aaron, since you have managed to miss it, Yet Again, is that Democracy came AFTER the fact.  Successful democracies came only where and when the People stepped back and said, "No, the Church (whichever one) cannot call us to kill our neighbours because they practice a different religion."

So, Islamic countries are experimenting with Democracy.  Yay for them.  It means nothing insofar as tolerance is conceerned.

But still Ender started it :) I actually liked Ender's Shadow almost as much as the Game. Bean is an awesome character.

that they are not a "Protestant" Church in the true sense of the word.  It is rather like calling the Orthodox Church a Protestant Church.  

Islam has seen just as much, if not More bloodshed in the name of God as Christianity.

Perhaps the problem is that they didn't suffer centuries of persecution and execution for the grievous crime of being Muslim before gaining power and legitimacy.

Instead, Islam swept across the Middle East and Africa and parts of Europe in a conquering wave as soon as it was born...

But I think it's all over now.  I do believe the Ender universe has come to an end with Shadow of the Giant...

and involves all the religions, sometimes Muslims are the perpertrators, sometimes they are the victims.  It is unfortunate, but no one religion is to blame.  Remember that the genocide in the Balkans ten years ago was primarily Christians (Orthodox and Catholics) killing Muslims.

Here's my take on on Turkey.  (I live in the U.S., but my parents are in Istanbul)  My parents think the reason for AKP's success is in large part due to how incredibly incompetent all the other parties in Turkish politics are.  And I mean, utterly incompetent.  Even though he's retired now, my father is  completely secular, and strongly dislikes the AKP since they're Islamic.  And even though he'd never vote for AKP out of principle, even he admits that they've gone a pretty good job as far as Turkey's economy (the inflation rate in the 90s was atrocious), improving major transportation (building highways, bridges, etc), cleaning up Istanbul, and finally starting entrance talks with E.U.  

So he feels that the votes for AKP aren't so much because they're Islamic, but because compared to the sorry state of the other parties, AKP is actually somewhat competent and can get things done.  On the other hand, they've made plenty of boneheaded moves lately (which the major Turkish newspapers, as they're all secular, have excoriated them for).  But until a strong political party who can get things done challenges AKP, it's likely they'll continue to remain in power.  

Regaring the U.S. and Iraq, I think there was very strong political pressure from France and Germany on Turkey to not help the U.S.  Claire Berlinski in her "Menace in Europe" book says it's pretty certain they blackmailed Turkey by threathening to not let them into the E.U.  And fear of an independent Kurdistan may've also played a role, but I don't think religion was a big factor.  But I continue to remain optimistic that with a large percentage of the Turkish population still wanting to enter the E.U., that despite setbacks, the country will continue to become more Westernized.

bloody, and numbers wise they have been far bloodier (partly because they haven't given up their bloody ways, and methods of killing have gotten easier).

I do think your idea that perhaps a history absent extreme persecution makes them more bloody-not sure, but it is an interesting hypothesis.  But I also wonder if the fact that Christians are encouraged to persevere through, and actually take pride in persecution may be part of the difference-I don't think Islam comes with any such admonition (although I am willing to be corrected on this).  But Christianity didn't really grow from outright warfare-even during the reformation-the warring wasn't done with the intent to enlarge the church sect, but to fight the other side over the doctrinal differences.  Islam spread through direct warfare, and conversion was by the sword.

And Croatia, and...

proselytizing doesn't count as "expressing [one's] thoughts", because telling people the Good News will land you in jail in Turkey today just as fast as it would before the AKP was elected.  And "Turkish prisons" had a reputation long before Abu Graib.

Only now, you might just get shot in your church courtyard, before the government gets the chance.

I don't understand your emphasis on economics.  Putin's Russia has a flat tax, and it did improve their economy.  But that doesn't mean Putin is a Jeffersonian democrat.  He's just an economically pragmatic KGB throwback (so much for W's "I saw his soul" intuition).  So what if Turkey lowered their marginal tax rates and adopts a rising-tide-lifts-all-boats approach to economy.  That has nothing to do with whether they are slipping into Islamist religious oppression at home, or making like-cause with terrorist enemies of the US (the latter doesn't seem to be happening, YET, unless you count their support of Hamas-in-Palestine).

Witness the huge reception "Valley of the Wolves" got in Turkey.  They are not our friends, but they used to be -- and the sea change occurred when the AKP and Erdogan, Islamists all, were elected.  2+2=?

always so much over the religious difference as it is the ethnic difference-the religion just sort of turns into the excuse.

The death penalty is banned in Turkey. So while converts out of Islam aren't treated with great enthusiasm, it's not legally a crime and it's definitely not punishable by death.  But maybe I misread and you just meant that statement for Afghanistan.

but.., there's always a "but" isn't there? That particular conflict had been going on for centuries. Also, I seem to notice a particular thing that many seem to not pay attention to when it comes to why the 2 type of people with different religious beliefs seem to be killing each other through the centuries non-stop.

Here is a very key difference in most cases when we are talking current times. Through the centuries, Christianity has indeed undergone a series of tolereance changes that makes it's application much less violent and much kinder than it sometimes was in the past. Islam , for the most part has yet to undergo such a social change.

The key difference is that there are nearly no stories of Christians killing Muslim's or any other religious person with a differing religion for the sake of God or the religion. Islam and how it's applied around the world in so many instances, seems to have a hole where killing in the name of Mohammed or Islam is ok, and is applied often.

This key difference in the understanding of the different religions by it's followers is seldom notice or pointed out.

Christian's for the very, very large part do not kill in the name of God, almost never. It's not so uncommon in Islam.

This really doesn't lend itself to a religious war very much ( alittle), but rather a governing philosophy vs. a fundementalist application of a religion. State structure and the philosophies that follow many of them (such as human rights, woman's right etc...) are additional issues that could and do clash between the authority of State and the authority of religious philosophy within a governing structure.

Since most in the West believe that the State should have ultimate authority over the national issues we more readily accept a governing state. On the other hand, most Muslim's believe religion should play a major or the primary role of authority within a governing structure. I remember that even Islam's most extreme fundementalist and thier ideals can easily, activity and effectively function within even a pure Democracy, it's those side issue that make the difference.

Convincing the Muslim world that the State and  a more subdued philosophy should be applied to Islam and should have ultimate authority over religious philosophy may prove to be especially tricky if they are going to be friendly to us.

Again, even a Democratic Iraq could turn out to be very unfriendly to us, (ie. France) LOL.

that depends on which Anglicans you ask.  Speaking as one, the subject of what constitutes an Anglican, and what, if anything, an Anglican is, is sufficiently vexed that we mostly prefer not to discuss it.  Some high church Anglicans make a claim to being Catholic, but it is not a claim taken seriously by our broad or low church wings, and even less so by the Church of Rome.  The Oxford movement aside (and Newman and Manning swam the Tiber, eventually), the history and sentiment of the Anglican and Episcopal churches is simply Protestant in any objective sense.  /End threadjack

No doubt you find the Reformation  

a really bad idea too.  But the reformation is what made Christianity tolerant.  And if Islam is to truly moderate and modernize it needs its own Luther, Calvin, Knox and maybe even Henry VIII to sever the religion from the state and control of every aspect of secular life.

As to this, your earlier post, it has no basis in anything other than vulgar Whiggish prejudice.  The Reformation had no perceptible effect on religious tolerance, and even less on the separation of religion from state (granting, only reluctantly, for the sake of argument, that such a thing is either possible or desirable).  Protestants could be and were every bit as bloody-minded as Catholics, with the English being worse than most, tendentious Anglophile history notwithstanding.  Besides that, the result of the Reformation was in most places a closer union of the nascent states of Europe with their now suitably tamed (and looted) Erastian Protestant churches.  What any of this has to do with Islam, where there is no "church" per sé, and which has already undergone its own share of schism (Twelver Shiites, Sevener Shiites, Sufis, Sunnis in all their various flavors and traditions), is beyond me.

Re:L So much so that in "moderate" Afghanistan, and "moderate" Turkey: Christians are tolerated SO LONG AS they do not proselytize, and converts OUT OF Islam are punishable by death.

When was the last time someone was sentenced to death in Turkey for apostacy? I think you are tarring with an overly broad brush here.

Yes, my statement was directly intended for Afghanistan -- but indirectly for Turkey.  What's the difference if the State executes you, or wink-and-nods at some nutjob to do it instead, and only halfheartedly attempts to "solve" the murder -- as in the recent case of the Catholic priest?

From there, it's only a short step to active government collaboration with the perps, without all those messy incidences and publicity of a trial.  And with a trial, all they could do is put you in their (turkish) prison.  Where you probably wouldn't last very long, either -- but then they'd be directly and publicly culpable.

There's lots of ways to suppress infidel religions, and Turkey -- despite Erdogan's protestations -- is no slacker in that department.

By the end of the 17th century people had become so disgusted with the orgy of blood and destruction that had savaged Europe for nearly two centuries that calls for religious tolerance were gaining force. During the 18th that tolerance gradually took effect-- though pockets of intolerance remained certainly, and it took Napoleon to finally put the Spanish Inquisition out of business. Democracy is a 19th century innovation, even in the US.

Perhaps Islam's problem is that it never experienced wars of religion the way Europe did and so never leraned the futility of settling theological debate with swords.

but Catholics were hanged (and drawn and quartered and gruesomely tortured) by Protestant authorities in England. Burnings were rare in England and much hated by the people.

is not a very good example of an intolerant democracy. Milosevic and his henchmen were not exactly Jeffersonian clones! And indeed, it's wrong to label the violence there "religious" as it was fomented by a bunch of ex-Communist thugs seeking to use old ethnic tensions to hold onto power.

for Islam is just beginning, that the road ahead is super long, uncertain, and we don't know how long it will take to get there. Or, even if we will arrive at some distant, happy shore. But President Bush said in his 2006 State of the Union:

Democracies replace resentment with hope, respect the rights of their citizens and their neighbors, and join the fight against terror. Every step toward freedom in the world makes our country safer -- so we will act boldly in freedom's cause.

But, as you correctly pointed out, these are attributes of mature democracies, and the ones in the Middle East are quite unlikely to resemble them at any time in the near future. In the meantime, the net result of our democracy campaign, as Mr. Cella has pointed out numerous times, is going to be to actually stregthen anti-Western, Islamists whose policies are highly unlikely exhibit the characteristics on the President's laundry list.

These governments may eventually give way to more liberal regimes. However, that is by no means guaranteed. In other words, the American public is being asked to embark on a crusade to spread democracy whose payback is highly uncertain.

Since this is an evolutionary process, at best, that can't be rushed - my question is why are we trying to do exactly that? If the tunnel is long and the journey is hard, then let these countries take their own sweet time about it. The only rationale behind our current pro-democracy policy is that we will get some benefit in the reasonably close future.

If the President were completely honest about the risk/reward profile of the 'spread democracy' policy, then I think support for it would drop to under 10%. No one wants to spend extravagantly for a pig in polk.

On the subject of this poor Christian in Afghanistan, he is just indicative of how little influence we actually have in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Repeatedly before the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, I warned fellow Christians (especially Catholics) that the U.S. military would not and could not protect the Christians in that country. That is because to do so would be to put the U.S. forces on a collision course with the Muslim majorities of both nations. To protect Christians means to tick off the Muslims, since the practice of Islam is that Christians do not have equal rights. Our experience standing by watching Serbs get ethnically cleansed from Kosovo is proof enough that occupying forces will not protect the native Christians from Muslims.

occurred when the Soviet Union fell. Turkey (along with the rest of NATO) no longer had food reason to adhere closely to the US, and so struck out independently in a quest to become a regional power. If the commissars were still ruling in just across the Black Sea I have no doubt Erdogan and his folks would be bowing and scraping to Washington as of old.

Could the prosecutors involved with the case of the dead priest do a better job?  Sure.  But I strongly doubt the government itself would be involved with the death, or would have ever (or will ever) approved it.  Why would they?  It brings Turkey terrible publicity. And with wanting to join the European Union, (where every nation is Christian) that's the last thing they want.  

I agree that the government laws should be better regarding tolerance of other religions. But Turkey has changed a great number of laws in the past decade to conform to EU standards (like banning the death penalty, etc), and the prisons are much improved.  So I have hope that as Turkey progresses toward joining the E.U. in the next decade, their laws regarding minority religions will change and improve.

...that so few in West will likely ever know much of the plight of 41-year-old Abdul Rahman...in no way diminishes his ordeal.

I think you are being premature here.  This story has just now started making the news and this is the third blog I've seen pick it up as a front page post.

It will take a day or two for the story to fully spread through the news.

Lots of bloviating here.  Can someone give me the skinny on whose moral absolutes we're debating here.    I mean, in order to make a consistent argument on this, what system of morals are we talking about.  If we're using the God of the Bible as our guideline for establishing the thought pattern here...then it would be helpful to know...because you guys are all over the place.  If you want to debate the Christians vs. the Roman Catholics..that's cool.  I can add to it.  If you're debating the difference between Western and Eastern democracy...that's cool as well...just so we're all on the same page.  Nothing is new under the sun.

were getting it from all sides-that's why so many of them ended up in the US-PA, NH and some others, because religious freedom (although not entirely tolerance in some locations, but the roots of tolerance were certainly being planted) had taken root.  But Europe in the 17th century and into the early 18th was not a safe place to be for the various anabaptist sects.

So, as Turkey moved toward a more pure-democratic model (e.g. the military refused to overrule the mob; abandoning its role as secularism's champion) we got:

  (1) an Islamist governing party

  (2) more Islamists secreted in positions of power in the Turkish government

  (3) obstructionism to US policy rather than cooperation or at least engagement

  (4) abrogation of military cooperation treaties

(1) hasn't stopped Turkey from upping its bid to modernize its laws and economy in order to join the EU; rather, it accelerated it.

(2) With no apparent functional decline.

(3) Is true of Spain, France, Russia, Germany, etc.

(4) Is not true, but, if it were, it would also be true of Spain, France, Russia, Germany, etc.

historically you aren't quite right.  The inquistion and crusades both involved killing in God's name.  The various religious wars during the reformation could also be considered to have occured in God's name.

Although in general Christianity doesn't have a history of forced conversions by the sword-ie while Christians have taken on an endevor like the Crusades in God's name, the intention was not to make the inhabitants of the region convert to Christianity, but to free the region from the clutches of the infidel.  

Islam does have a history of conversions by the sword.

don't do quite so well, since government is by majority rule.

I think the founders were on to something, with the creation of a representative republic, because this style of government makes it more difficult for the majority to impose its will (ie more difficult, not impossible).

But you are right that a democracy-of any type, doesn't neccessarily mean it is going to be a moral society, but overall countries that are actual democracies are less likely to go to war with other countries and are definitely less likely to kill its own citizens without some form of due proccess.  Granted the case of the Christian convert could be considered legitimate due proccess of law, even though the charge, trial and outcome are appalling to most of us.

And the role of Islam in periodic Han-cleansing is not precisely a small one.

Economics of ethnicity, though have nothing to do with it.

The other's have been addressed.  ("You don't really want to go there" is not a response on Lebanon; as I remarked to Paul, the emergence of an moderate Islamist party in Turkey is a good sign.)

Paul makes three assertions:

Those assumptions are, seriatim, that Islam and radical Islam, or extremist Islam, or totalitarian Islam, or whatever semantic construction suits your fancy, are meaningfully different; that democracy and totalitarian Islam are compatible in the sense of being capable together of producing a sane and decent political order; that introducing and working to establish democracy in Islamic lands will disarm our enemies and weaken their hand, fortify our friends, and thereby advance our security interests.

I've yet to see evidence to support any of them, and a great deal of counter-evidence against.

For you, this really boils down to the question of whether or not moderate Islam is capable of democracy?  And also that you haven't seen any evidence that moderate Islam is capable of doing so?  

What counter-evidence against it have you seen?  Who were the actors producing that counter-evidence?  

I seem to remember a particular incident in a German town (don't ask me for the particulars) in which the warring Catholic and Lutheran factions discovered that the Anabaptists were in the area and put aside their differences long enough to join forced to crush the third group. Evidently adult baptism was a much more controversial issue than it is today ;)

Re: Islam does have a history of conversions by the sword.

I disagree. Conversion by the sword is as rare in Islam as in Christianity. It happened in both, but was never widespread. In Islam most conversions were produced by subtle pressure: the institutions of dhimmitude made conversions attractive. And of course similar discrminatory were also used in Christendom to effect conversions. Consider the strictures under which the Jews laborted even in tolerant eras.

as a fair comparison, after all, for once I totally agree with what's coming out of Paul's brain;  it's democracy in particular of which he fears can offer the ultimate legitimacy to some very bad and evil ideas.  

Because it was a fascist state, I would exclude Nazi Germany, maybe some of the others.  For instance, I believe that all the real moves against the Jews took place after the Nazis had taken Johann Q. Public out of the voting process.  However, let's not forget that the Nazisocialists were voted in.  Kinda like the way proponents of sharia law may well be voted in within any Islamic democracy.  

It's a legitmate concern, but consider the alternative.  However Saddam would fall, by treachery, or by bolt of lightning, or by old age, the power vacuum would have led to 100% guaranteed turmoil/land grab/civil war on a grand scale in the Middle East.  I don't see a way around that.  We were smart to put it all down in our terms.  All Hail Dick Cheney.

Back in reality, the main difference is that we have 150,000 on the ground in Iraq, and that a voting democracy is in place, not yet solid, but in place.  That's my definition of a fighting chance, and the Iraqis must realize that and take the reigns at some point.  The alternative would have been no chance at all for freedom.

"That to bring popular sovereignty, a. k. a., democracy, to the Islamic world may empower our enemies -- who constitute a guiding majority of Muslims -- by giving them not merely the tools of political power that popular government implies, but also the legitimacy that it entails."

Duh.  Hello?

Economics of ethnicity, though have nothing to do with it.

I have to confess I have no idea what this means.

The other's have been addressed.  ("You don't really want to go there" is not a response on Lebanon; as I remarked to Paul, the emergence of an moderate Islamist party in Turkey is a good sign.)

First, you left out India, which you magically transformed into a peaceful, Muslim-majority state. Second, I suppose we could imagine that the last couple of years in Lebanon v-a-v Muslims and Christians (not even to speak of Jews) is emblematic of the last several decades, although it curiously leaves open why there has been such an enormous diaspora of Lebanese Christians these last several years, and also leaves open the curious question, Hey, where did these bodies come from? It would also require one, I suppose, to pretend that Syria has always had a master-client relationship with that place. Third, given that the only reason, historically, that Turkey has been such a friendly place to the West is the very Army who suppression you appear to be cheering, by an allegedly moderate Muslim party, I'm at a loss for why this answers any concern any reasonable observer might have.

I've yet to see evidence to support any of them, and a great deal of counter-evidence against.

I suppose if you're willing to overlook the entire history of Islam, with the possible exception of Indonesia -- and only possible -- then I suppose that statement makes sense.

I think the historical vision that lies behind your arguments is profoundly wrong. That vision, as far as I can tell, is the old "history as the story of progress" formulation, which just doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

I don't see how the break-up of all the bewildering localism of the mediaeval age by the new Machiavellian political science of the moderns, and the ushering in, on the heals of that political science, of the modern absolutist state, was really a piece of progress. The absolutist state, at least in the West, was emphatically a modern innovation. The power of the average mediaeval king was a pittance compared to what was given to the early modern king by the practicioners of this new science of politics.

There were innumerable wars in the Middle Ages, and innumerable cruelties, dispossessions, usurpations, etc.; but do we really imagine that modernity, with its tolerance and its democracy, extirpated these things? No, what happened is that modernity merely lent them the awesome power and detachment of mechanical science. Instead of impulsive massacres and pillages, we get the concentration camp. Instead of the Inquisition, which at least still recognized individual guilt, we get the totalitarian purge, which posits collective guilt for entire peoples or classes.

How do you really think that later historians, distant from our own prejudices, will write about the twentieth century: the age when all the intellectual world was alive with talk of freedom and tolerance, and all the world was aflame with savagery and tyranny on a scale totally unprecedented in all of history?

And the entire "history-as-progress" school is predicated on a quiet, casual contempt for Byzantium, which issues in a kind of studied ignorance. The fact that Greek and Latin learning was maintained and even advanced under the auspices of the Byzantine Empire (which still understood itself, with good reason, to be the Roman Empire) until the 15th century, makes total hash of the story of the Renaissance. And it is very convenient, for those who want to look the other way when it comes to Islam's depredations, that this historical prejudice has left us largely bereft of all the tremendous drama, and ultimately the almost unbearable tragedy, of Constantinople's long struggle against Islam.

As of now, we have no better options.  I suppose we could have decided not to do anything - continuing to use multi-million dollar cruise missiles to destroy $50 tents and kill camels until we were one day forced to use nuclear weapons to respond to an attack involving weapons of mass destruction.

What other option is there?  Just saying, "the hell with them" is unacceptable - because that will not improve our national security one iota.  Some of these countries can be turned from the abyss - and tolerance is quite possible in that region (look at the unjustly-maligned United Arab Emirates as a case in point).  But do we have the will to stick through it despite setbacks and the imperfections of other countries, or are we just going to throw up our hands, and do nothing until we're forced into an "us or them" situation?

What other option is there?

This strikes me as an amazing question. There are many other options beside attempting to begin the transformation of the political culture an entire region of the world -- a transformation which we insist on trying in ignorance of that region's most salient feature: namely, the fact that it is shaped by a religion that has stood as our adversary, when it has not stood as our outright enemy, for 1400 years.

One obvious option is to recognize a plain fact: that the only reason we are threatened by Islamic terror is because totalitarian Muslims are here and live among us. Having recognized this, our next step is to consider how we can diminish this threat by diminishing the numbers of totalitarian Muslims. An immediate moratorium on Muslim immigration might be in order, or at least the requirement that every potential Muslim immigrant be required to renounce, on pain of deportation, the doctrine of jihad to gain entry. We might consider criminal prohibition of the doctrine of violent jihad itself, thus exposing all the Internet jihadists in the U.S. to prosecution. We might name the espousal of jihad as itself an act of sedition, subjecting it to instant pressure, and giving every potential jihadist some second thoughts about posting that sermon denouncing the infidel on his blog.

Of course, all these things would require the repudiation of some Liberal pricinples that have been foisted on us without our consent; which repudiation, I contend, is the very first action we must take: an act of intellectual purgation or discipline by which we might think hard about this business with the clarity necessary for so difficult a question.

>>an Islamist governing party

> hasn't stopped Turkey from upping its bid to modernize its laws and economy in order to join the EU; rather, it accelerated it.

Uh-huh.  And that's why it's still a crime -- regardless of Erdogan's protestations to the contrary -- to proselytize for any religion other than Islam.  And it's still a crime to convert FROM Islam.  Will that change?  You must be more optismistic than I about the future plans of...

>>more Islamists secreted in positions of power in the Turkish government

>With no apparent functional decline.

Oh come on.  The nazis made the trains run on time, too.  I never said that fascists weren't efficient: why should Islamofacists be any different?  Efficiency is not liberty.

>>obstructionism to US policy rather than cooperation or at least engagement

>Is true of Spain, France, Russia, Germany, etc.

Right. So the Zapatista govt is reflexively anti-american.  This is an excuse for the reflexive anti-americanism of the AKP?  Turkey used to be one of our more reliable allies in NATO -- even after the fall of the USSR.  That changed with the election of the AKP. This is a good thing?

>>abrogation of military cooperation treaties

>Is not true, but, if it were, it would also be true of Spain, France, Russia, Germany, etc.

NATO invoked Article V after 9/11.  Yet even then, they did so disingenuously: to demand that the American response be gate-keepered by the full NATO.  That is, "an attack on one of us [America] is an acknowledged attack on us all [enlightened Europeans], so we all have to agree on the response: which is to restrain America".  That's a far cry from its meaning during the Cold War: "an attack on one of use [Europe] is an attack on us all [America], so America WILL respond with her nuclear arsenal."  The latter is a mutual defense treaty.  The former is...Great Game Politics?

That's the point at which "Spain, France, [okay, NOT Russia], Germany" abrogated their military cooperation treaties -- in spirit, at least.  We were able to shame France into sending a squadron or so of fighters to Afghanistan, not that it helped: in at least one instance, they refused to follow lawful orders for air support, leaving some of our guys trapped until RELIABLE air support could be called in.

I guess I just don't understand: you keep referring to other "allies" who are actually geopolitical opponents in this uni-polar world, and pretend that their existence and behavior means that similar AKP/Turkish opposition to the US is...what?  Good for the US?  Not really an example of creeping Islamism in Turkey?

But this is all wide of the mark: Islamists are opposed to the Great Satan.  The AKP are Islamists.  They won election in Turkey.  And now Turkey opposes the Great Satan at every opportunity and gobble up films like "Valley of the Wolves", whereas they did not do so before the AKP election. Q.E.D: today's Turkey is NOT a positive example of Islam + democracy.  Rather, it supports Paul's reluctant thesis that maybe, just maybe, pure democracies in historically Islamic countries will empower our enemies rather than our friends.

What other option is there?  Just saying, "the hell with them" is unacceptable - because that will not improve our national security one iota.  Some of these countries can be turned from the abyss - and tolerance is quite possible in that region (look at the unjustly-maligned United Arab Emirates as a case in point).  But do we have the will to stick through it despite setbacks and the imperfections of other countries, or are we just going to throw up our hands, and do nothing until we're forced into an "us or them" situation?

 Perhaps we have different notions of national security.  Frankly, from my vantage point, saying to hell with them sounds like a wonderful idea.  Whether the middle east is governed by despots is really no concern of ours, so long as we keep their people, and their problems, out of our countries, and keep the oil flowing freely.  We can certainly sally across the limes when ever we perceive the barbarians doing something particularly nasty, such as working on a nuclear weapon, but the idea that we are somehow responsible for managing the long and bloody process of state formation in every country in the world is sheer hubris.  And pride goeth before destruction.  

As I said, one can look to the UAE, Bahrain, Turkey, Jordan, Morocco, Kuwait, and Indonesia to see relatively tolerant and moderate societies when compared to the Taliban regime or Saudi Arabia.  These are also Islamic societies that are no threat at all to their neighbors or to us.  Would you have us at war with them?

To judge all Moslems by the actions of al-Qaeda and Hezbollah would be akin to judging all white people by the actions of the Ku Klux Klan or the Aryan Brotherhood.  Or African-Americans by the actions of the Black Panthers and the Crips.

That's like saying "government intelligence" or "dry water".  Islamist is a synonym for Islamofascist.

Maybe it was just a typo, and you meant "Moderate IslamIC" as opposed to "IslamIST".  In that case, the jury's still out on whether even THAT phrase is itself an oxymoron -- but after the cartoon riots I think the jury's finishing up lunch and preparing for a final vote...

And, even so, I dispute that the AKP is moderate anything.  They're simply better than Hamas at hiding their long-term aims from the ignorant.

I'm not judging all Muslims. I am saying that a very significant faction of them is our sworn enemy, not because we are Americans, but because we are infidels. There is a permanent menace in Islam because it will always contain this element of radical hostility to the unbeliever, which issues in the conviction that anything is justified against him. Whether this faction speaks for all Muslims is an open question; but that this faction exists and is making war against us, is undeniable.

Any national security strategy that will not strike at this faction, by name and with the instrument of law, is an unserious strategy. Once we have shown the will to buck all the suicidal nostrums of Liberalism, and name the enemy, we will have struck a solid blow against him. Stronger, indeed, than the early and very tenuous steps toward democracy in the Islamic world.

Would you have us at war with them?

This war is not of our making; neither was the war that the Arabs waged against the Byzantine provinces in Egypt, Syria and North Africa; neither was the war against Western Europe that Charles Martel heroically checked in the eighth century; neither was the war that the Turks waged, under various leaders, first in eastern Anatolia, gradually into the fertile interior of Asia Minor after Manzikert, and then to the very gates of Constantinople and the final tragedy of that great city. This faction of Islam has been at war with the infidel for 1400 years, whether the infidel liked it or not.

This history of conquest you are describing is not because of religion. The religion was adopted by feudal warlords because it expedited their needs.

What you are describing is Imperialism. It isn't the religion that fuels this but the ambition of the aristocrats who covet greater power.

There is a reason these imperialists adopt Islam, because they know what the Romans learned about controlling people. That religion is more effective than armed troops. Rebels can fight the man with a sword, because him they can see; but rebels cannot fight a vengeful god whose punishment and rewards are meted out in the hereafter.  

What must be eliminated is the forms of government that permit aristocratic and royal leadership. As long as there are kings by what ever name, life and liberty are but privileges granted by royalty, and their minions. Privileges that may be rescinded at the will of the king.  

Under these circumstances, there will always be people willing to lay down their life for their king and his confidants, in the hope that they might secure greater privileges for their family.

Islam, like Christianity of the middle ages, simply facilitates that by authenticating the kings claim to divine right, and by promising a hereafter of great reward to those who submit

We have seen in the past that small groups of extremists can, by the use of force, imtimidate those critics they do not kill.  The Ku Klux Klan during the 19th century in the US, the Nazis in Germany from the late 1920s to 1933, the Japanese warlords in that same timeframe, the Bolsheviks in Russia from 1917 to 1923, going all the way back to the 8th Century and the Hashshashin.

This is the "false consciousness" reading of history. That virtually every war that the caliphs and the sultans launched, they launched in the name of Islam; that when Mehmet II beseiged Constantinople for the final time, he recalled publicly the prophesy that one day a successor to the Prophet would conquer the Imperial City; that the elite units of the Ottoman armies were the dread Janissaries, Christian boys taken captive and raised as fanatical Muslims; that whole schools of Islamic jurisprudence grew up around the question of jihad, how it was to be waged, how its victims were to be treated, its vindicators rewarded, etc. -- all this is meaningless, mere epiphenomena on the surface of the true movement of history, which is the cynical machinations of rulers.

With due respect, I don't buy it. Individuals move history, yes, but  to remove the motive of piety, of obedience to a religious tradition, from the historical discussion by the kind of materialist legerdemain so perfected by the Marxists, is to render history dry, inert, lifeless. It is part of the reason why history in our country has become a lost art, and why those real creative historians are so often amateurs.

To read Byzantine history while precluding the possibility that, say, Emperor Constantine XI was a religious man who regarded it as his absolute religious duty to defend the Imperial City, leaves you in ignorance about the man. To read Islamic history and preclude the possibility that the conquering sultans, the jihad-preaching imams, were most of them quite sincere in their beliefs, renders much of that history unintelligible.

By the way, Divine Right of Kings was a modern innovation. It could only develop once all the wild localism of the mediaeval order was broken up and replaced by the territorially extensive absolutist state.

That suggesting the most basic instruments of legal sanction against groups that make war against us -- instruments we have used in the past on Loyalists, Jacobins, Copperheads, polygamists, anarchists, Nazis, and Communists -- impels you to raise the alarm about the KKK and the Nazis, shows (1) just how little confidence you have in the capacity of your countrymen for self-government, and (2) your basic unseriousness about the war we are in.

Actually, the AKP didn't oppose allowing the U.S. to use Turkish soil to invade Iraq.  The vote in the Parliment was extremely close - they got a majority of the representatives present, but not an outright majority due to absent members.  There was also strong pressure from the E.U. to vote against the U.S.  A short while later, Turkey actually proposed sending up to 6,000 troops in to Iraq to help the U.S.  It was the Iraqi council that nixed that idea, saying they didn't want them.

And again, it's not a crime to convert out of Islam in Turkey.  It's not a crime to proselytize.  Now, the family and neighbors of a person converting may get suspicious, and some municipal governments may try to discourage missionary activities.  But under the law, neither conversion nor proselytizing is a crime.  What needs to happen is for societal attitudes (more so in rural areas) to catch up with these laws.    

Turkey also has strict restricions against Islam actually.  Wearing Muslim religious dress (like head scarves) in government facilities, universities, schools, and workplaces is banned.  Children are banned from attending Islamic schools until high school level.

But I believe that with Turkey heading toward E.U. membership, that attitudes and laws will become more open and relaxed towad religious minorities, and not the opposite.  Perhaps I'm more optimistic than you, because with the rest of my family living there, I want it to continue becoming more Westernized, more open, and to ultimately join the E.U.  I hope you can see where I'm coming from.  I don't want it to regress and become another Iran, and I think a large majority of Turks feel the same way.

For you, this really boils down to the question of whether or not moderate Islam is capable of democracy?  And also that you haven't seen any evidence that moderate Islam is capable of doing so?  

No, that's Paul's argument. Paul argues that "moderate" Islam is mere semantics (at least at this stage in time) and that, accordingly, Islam is not compatible with democracy.  I disagree with Paul's first premise, and also his second.

enjoyed broad, if not majority, support.  By definition, they were not extremists, if "extreme" is a statistical concept, and not an evaluation of one's distance from the liberal consensus.  If Al Qaeda are "only" as popular as the Nazis circa 1933, or the KKK circa 1925, that means that they only enjoy the support of perhaps 40% of the world's Muslims.  Why, that's "only" 450 million people.  I feel better already.

You mean the United States is held to a different standard. If you are an international human rights organization, you should have one standard that you apply to the entire world, rather than trying to equalize criticism of the US with Syria or Sudan. Human rights shouldn't be graded on a curve.

I'm up to my eyeballs in dep prep, so this'll be short:

I have to confess I have no idea what this means.

Replace the "of" with "or," and it makes more sense.

First, you left out India, which you magically transformed into a peaceful, Muslim-majority state.

No, India is a peaceful, multi-ethnic state in which Muslims are a significant minority and participate in the largest democracy on teh planet.

Second, I suppose we could imagine that the last couple of years in Lebanon v-a-v Muslims and Christians (not even to speak of Jews) is emblematic of the last several decades, although it curiously leaves open why there has been such an enormous diaspora of Lebanese Christians these last several years, and also leaves open the curious question, Hey, where did these bodies come from?

I'm quite familiar with the causes and effects of the Lebanese Christian diaspora.  I am also well aware of the history of sectarian strife in Lebanon -- indeed, I attended a wedding once in which a (Maronite) Lebanese priest spent the majority of his time insulting an (Orthodox) Lebanese priest (Maronite-Orthodox counts as an interfaith marriage, so far as the two priests were concerned).  What I stated was that there were hopeful signs in Lebanon.  And there are.

Third, given that the only reason, historically, that Turkey has been such a friendly place to the West is the very Army who suppression you appear to be cheering, by an allegedly moderate Muslim party, I'm at a loss for why this answers any concern any reasonable observer might have.

The ruling party in Turkey is not a "moderate Muslim party."  It's an Islamist party.  But it has behaved as a moderate Muslim party because the people won't accept a more severe brand of Islam.

I suppose if you're willing to overlook the entire history of Islam, with the possible exception of Indonesia -- and only possible -- then I suppose that statement makes sense.

Paul's formulation, however, is absolutist.  It brooks no exceptions.  (And I don't agree with your formulation, either.)

I just don't stand ready to condemn an entire religon for the actions of extremists, as you have done.  Particularly when your assertion can be easily disproven through a simple look at the State Department's reports on religious freedom for the various countries I have cited earlier.  It would not have been that hard to find.  Yet, you have chosen not to look.  Is that because it would force you to re-examine your basic premise that the world's 1.2 billion Moslems are all guilty simply by virtue of being Moslem?

If largely-Moslem countries are showing tolerance - and even acceptance - of Christians and even Jews, it's an awfully inconvenient fact that gets in the way for your description of this war as a clash of civilizations?  And so, you decide you're going to shoot the messenger instead, often simply labeling them as a "Liberal", or accusing them of either relying on "Marxist history" or "race-baiting" - complaining everytime someone dares question your assertions.

That's the real question.  Do people support them because they believe in what they stand for?  Or do they simply acquiesce to their statements that they speak for everyone - and just stay out of the way to avoid the dagger and the bullet?

when you insist on misreading me.

I just don't stand ready to condemn an entire religon for the actions of extremists, as you have done.

No, I have not.

I'm glad some Muslim countries are showing some tolerance for the unbelievers. Most Muslim countries have always shown some tolerance for unbelievers: that is the whole point of the dhimma contract. The dhimmi is tolerated, so long as he submits to the Islamic conqueror.

But all this has little to do with the faction of the Islamic religion that is making war on us, and will not stop until we declare our submission to the Islamic conqueror.

to hold a conversation with someone who persists in firing off all sorts of mischaracterizations of those who express disagreement with him.

The way I see it, you have not even bothered to figure out who is showing signs of progress (as fitful and inconsistent as it may be) and which actively support the faction seeking out conquest.  For the latter, I see Iran, Syria, and (to an extent) Saudi Arabia as being guilty parties in that regard.  A problem, yes, but so severe as to require extreme measures like those you have proposed.

For those that show signs of progress, it ought to be encouraged with engagement via trade, and support in all areas - not repaid with the blatant fear-mongering and prejudice (I use that term after lots of consideration) towards the UAE that was all-too-present during the DPW controversy.  The more such fear-mongering occurs (and this is to be distinguished from plainly discussing the enemy we are fighting - the Islamic extremists), the harder - and costlier - the task ahead will be.

Harold, I'm not talking about countries. I'm talking about a faction which spans all Muslim countries, and operates under the banner of none. It operates, rather, under the banner of its religion, which may or may not be "true" Islam, but which it certainly a religion. This faction does not move in the world of nation-states and territorial integrity that we Westerners are so used to. So progress in some Muslim nations is good, and to be welcomed, but it is hardly an antidote to a faction that recognizes no territory as boundries.

In fact there may be no antidote to this faction, which is why we must, to the extent we can, keep it from our shores.

The "extreme measures" you so worry about (after demanding that I lay out "other options" besides democracy-promotion) were used by this country, without plunging us into the darkest tyranny, on seditious factions which never even came close to accomplishing the kind of damage that totalitarian Islam has.

to form a government.  That would not have happened if they represented a mere two or three percent of the population.

Are you kidding?  Instituting traditional immigration restrictions and curbs on seditious speech is extreme, but invading countries to make them free is moderate or pragmatic?  What?

of the Middle Ages.  In a feudal system that held sway in Europe until the plague (which for all this talk about religion, war, Islam and Christianity is really the event that started the ball rolling and led to the collapse of feudalism and eventually the Renaissance, the Reformation, Enlightenment, Revolutions, and Democracy in Europe) there was no rule of law and since the King ruled by divine right and the serfs were tied to the land, only a tiny fraction of the population had any meaningful rights or freedom.

Even in 1776 the idea that "All men are created equal", even if Jefferson only meant white males by that phrase, was still a radical concept.

To think that we have not advanced morally in all these years is just indefensible.  At least there are very few people left in the world who think that people rule countries because God chose them to do so.

of the Middle Ages.  In a feudal system that held sway in Europe until the plague (which for all this talk about religion, war, Islam and Christianity is really the event that started the ball rolling and led to the collapse of feudalism and eventually the Renaissance, the Reformation, Enlightenment, Revolutions, and Democracy in Europe) there was no rule of law and since the King ruled by divine right and the serfs were tied to the land, only a tiny fraction of the population had any meaningful rights or freedom.

With all due respect, you simply get far too many things wrong to take seriously.  I'm no medievalist, but allow me to make several corrections.  Firstly "feudalism" is a very controversial term; I'd be interested to hear your definition, that is unless it's the colloquial definition where  feudalism = "any system that I don't like," which is about as descriptive and useful as my mother-in-law's use of the term "fascist."    Secondly, it is usually agreed that, to the extent that such a thing existed, what spelled its end was the growth of the money economy in the 12th and 13th centuries, that is, well before the Black Death.  Thirdly, serfdom was by no means a universal condition.  It is correct to say that there was no constitutional presumption of equality before the law, but the relative status of commoners varied tremendously by time and place, and there were numerous gradations of .  The worst examples of serfdom occur more in 17th and 18th century Russia and Eastern Europe than in the high Middle Ages of Western Europe.  Serf <> poor.  Fourthly, it strains credulity to ascribe the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and mass democracy to a disaster that preceded them by centuries.  As to rule of law, I must ask what you mean.  Western Europe in the middle ages lacked neither laws, lawyers, or litigants in profusion.  Indeed, well into the 16th century, you find Philip II of Spain being required to travel across his vast European dominions to pledge to honor the local privileges and customs of his subject territories.  Yes, a king was believed to rule at God's pleasure, and under divine judgement, and yes, the political order was considered consecrated, but the absolutism with which you carelessly conflate this basic Christian insight was a development, not of the Middle Ages, but of the 16th and 17th centuries, and one that is still with us.  A modern mass democracy is both in theory and in practice far more absolute in its authority than any medieval European ruler, who had to deal with the rights and privileges of nobles, towns, churches, and regions, and was assumed to be subject at least to God.  It is amusing that moderns are so proud of the fictional contractarian theory of the formation of their states, while dismissing a time and place where rulers actually had formally to contract with their subjects, as one of barbarism and absolutism.  

that prove that they do recruit forcably and do indeed kill in the name of God would be exhausting to compile, but probably already done by some group somewhere, I think it has in fact been studied. However, we can forego such an endeavor and look only at the last 30 years. The last 3 decades could easily be considered recent history. So, we'll restrict this discussion to the last 30 years for ease of understanding.

I would be willing to place a few dollars that in the last 30 years, the reported incidences of people killing for the sake of religious purposes worldwide would not only be lead by Islam, but would drawf all other religions combined, yes a few large amounts on that.

Although I cannot provide you with the last 30 years of information on a global scale, I think even a person who hardly hears the news anywhere in the world (Except Islamic countries, but include all other people and religions) would have one religion in the world in mind if asked this question..,

..."Which religion or people of any religion kill for the sake of God that you can think of right off the bat, on a regular bases for the last 30 years"?

I believe your question would be answered nearly the same every single time from nearly every single person, regardless of who, what and where they are.

Sudan and Chad could account for about 1/2 a million people dead in the name of Islam. And, that's just the last 5 years or so in one tiny area.

Where else can such a toll be found with numbers like these? Or, any numbers at all, much less 1/2 a million about any other religion?

A few thousand in NY. A few hundred in Spain. A few hundred in Malaysia, and on and on and on. Where can such accounts be exposed about Christians, or any other religions, period?

I would like to think that I was wrong about these numbers. Somehow believe that none of this ever happened. Somehow convince myself that my daughter and son and wife and family and friends will all be ok as long as I realize that none of this ever happened or happens.

Jihad, a holy war declaired by millions of Muslim's worldwide against the U.S. in the name of God. What is it that I missed?

You fail to note how great the risk really is.  The physical risk of beign conquered is extremely low, and if push came to shove, we have a lot of nukes and they don't.  We can wipe them off the face of the planet if need be - albeit it would result in lots of blood on this country's hands.  It is best to prevent things from getting to that level.  How to do so?  We have a variety of approaches, of which yours ins the broadest and most ham-handed - as well as unnecessary and unwise at this juncture.

There ware methods we can use that do not require the step of viewing every Moslem as guilty until proven innocent.  The best way to find those who are of this faction is the proper coordination of intelligence, law-enforcement, and military assets to locate and take down the folks actually intending us harm, not those who simply wish to live their lives in peace and are willing to let us do the same.

The same largely applies to governments.  We know who supports such things - Syria, Sudan, Iran, the Palestinian Authority, and (arguably) Saudi Arabia.  Sooner or later, regime change in one form or another is going to be needed in each of those places.

But for those largely-Moslam countries which are not sponsoring terrorism by Islamic extremists (and in some cases are fighting them), like the UAE, Bahrain, Indonesia, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Morocco, Turkey, Malaysia, Iraq, and Jordan (I may have left some off), the proper course is to assist those governments in combating the faction there - and to increase the ties and cooperation with them.  Does that expose us to some risk?  Yes, we do take risks.  But those governments who are tolerant have drawn the wrath of the extremists (don't take my word for it, see what al-Qaeda says about the UAE), and have taken risks to aid us.  Aren't they owed anything for that?

I submit that the greater risk lies in abandoning and/or dismissing those governments and people who are willing to work against the extremists.  That is certain to give the faction that seeks conquest and domination a much stronger hand - and we will see them murder and intimidate their way into power.  Then, we might end up with no choice but to resort to the nukes.  Cooperation and the use of intelligence to ferret out the extremists, while riskier, has a very good chance of encouraging further improvement in those countries which are trying to get to the 21st century (or remain there) in the face of the extremists.  At the worst, it will limit the number we will have to kill if push comes to shove.

In any case, I suspect that if we give a lot of people in the Moslem world a chance, they will turn from the extremists.  We've already seen this to a large degree in Iraq, and that certainly bodes well for the experiments in democracy.  It won't work all the time, but I suspect its chances are better than you give it credit for.

at least the requirement that every potential Muslim immigrant be required to renounce, on pain of deportation, the doctrine of jihad to gain entry.

 Probably not the most useful idea, since it relies on a promissory statement the truth of which cannot be tested at the time it is made. That being said, it might not hurt to try something similar - did you know that if you are a foreigner and you admit to previous drug use, even in the distant past and only of a small quantity or dosage (e.g. "I was young and tried it once"), that is enough to get you a rejected visa application, and probably a for-life ban from ever entering the United States?

 Given that foreigners regularly and truthfully admit to past drug use when asked by Customs, we might infer that some (small) percentage of "undesirable" Muslims would also admit to engaging in jihad against the United States or some similar rejection-worthy activity. Maybe they are already being asked such questions...

We might consider criminal prohibition of the doctrine of violent jihad itself, thus exposing all the Internet jihadists in the U.S. to prosecution. We might name the espousal of jihad as itself an act of sedition, subjecting it to instant pressure, and giving every potential jihadist some second thoughts about posting that sermon denouncing the infidel on his blog.

 I would think that existing law and jurisprudence sufficiently covers cases where speech which incites violence or which instructs an audience in the commission of criminal activity is not protected by the First Amendement - without a need to specifically single out a particular ethnic or religious group. This is a good text describing some of the cases in which an incitement toward violence have been examined. While the standard seems high, it definitely isn't so high that the kind of speech you seem to be thinking of would be protected. We can't move the bar too low - unless you're going to implicate the Coulters of the world, too.

Of course, all these things would require the repudiation of some Liberal pricinples that have been foisted on us without our consent;

 Which liberal principles are you thinking of? Singling out a group for special prosecution is just the mirror image of singling out special victim-groups for the purposes of meting out greater punishment for the perpetrators. I suspect you would generally find hate crime legislation that penalizes violence against homosexuals greater than the same level of violence perpetrated against heterosexuals to be of liberal descent and unjust law. What is it about penalizing Muslims for inciting violence to a greater degree than we would penalize a non-Muslim, or penalizing them under looser standards, that requires the repudiation of liberal principles? If anything, the idea strikes me as based on a traditionally liberal viewpoint - that punishment should increase based merely on some vaguely perceived 'heinous/hateful thought' on the perpetrator's part rather than the facts of the illegal activity itself.

there are no instances of Muslims killing in the name of God, only that concersion by the sowrd was rare. Those are two very different propositions. Christianity has a grim history too of killing in God's name (most of it though is happily in the distant past now) but very little history of coverting by the sword.

I have a Christian friend in Turkey.  Trust me, he is not safe from either "societal attitudes" OR the government, if he were to openly share his faith with any Turkish muslim.  He is not safe if he were to privately do so, since he could be ratted out, or blackmailed over it.  He could be arrested, jailed for that crime or for any convenient pretext -- or simply beaten to a bloody pulp by "independent hooligans" who will never be found, tried, or punished.  Or, like the Catholic priest, he could be killed by said "hooligans" and it would no more concern the government than if a rabid dog were put down.

lena, you're not in the real world.  Don't believe the propaganda of a country and government angling to tell gullible European ears what they want to hear, in order to win EU admission.  I'm sorry to burst the bubble your family has created for you, in their concern not to have you worry about them.

I wish you were right about the current status of Turkey. I wish you were right about its direction and future.  But you're not, more's the pity.

Remember all those dulcet tones and soothing phrases we heard about the Afghani constitution?  They were lies.  Same with Turkey -- and I'm increasingly afraid, same with the Iraqi constitution.  We are empowering our enemies by imposing pure democratic rule without ironclad protection of religious, not just ethnic, minorities.  The Islamists are using that naivete to entrench sharia and its attendent totalitarianism.  Yay, us!  Woot!

I have lived in Turkey for several years, so I feel that I have a pretty good familiarity with their laws. (And my family is plenty happy in Turkey, no worries there.)  Again, I never said that a Christian missionary proselytizing in the street would be welcomed with open arms.  (Although neither would a Muslim one - proselytizing in general is frowned upon)

However, I know what the laws are.  And under Turkish law, neither conversion out of Islam nor proselytizing is a crime. There's well over a 1,000 Christian missionaries in Turkey today. Depending on what area of the country they live in, they may not always be safe from hooligans, which is very unfortunate.  And local law enforcement may try to make things more difficult for them.  But perpetrators of attacks will in general be prosecuted.   Additionally, things have been this way long before AKP took over - but I think things will begin to improve in the decace as changes in societal attitudes follow the actual laws.

Turkey has changed a great number of laws in the past five years, and will continue to change many more in the next decade to prepare for EU entry.    And if they want to convince reluctant EU nations to vote for their entry (which is by no means a guarantee), the government will have to carry out the laws on the books, and crack down on any harrassment.  And any more reports of dead priests is defnitely not going to help.  

You may be right about Afghanistan and Iraq, but on Turkey, we'll have to agree to disagree, and see what happens in the next decade as possible EU entry approaches closer.

Replace the "of" with "or," and it makes more sense.

Given that: Did I say that? I don't think I said that. Where did I say that?

No, India is a peaceful, multi-ethnic state in which Muslims are a significant minority and participate in the largest democracy on teh planet.

...and frequently engage in massive sectarian violence. And the context, if you'll recall, was majority-Muslim countries.

What I stated was that there were hopeful signs in Lebanon.  And there are.

There's a term for the triumph of hope over experience.

The ruling party in Turkey is not a "moderate Muslim party."  It's an Islamist party.  But it has behaved as a moderate Muslim party because the people won't accept a more severe brand of Islam.

...yet. Get back to me when the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the latest Gary Busey release aren't flying off the shelves.

(And I don't agree with your formulation, either.)

You're gonna be hard-pressed to show a single point in time, other than some sort of elegaic, hagiographic paean to Andalusia, in which my formulation, as you will, is wrong.

Let's be clear on a point here: I believe that Islam is not incompatible with a modern society that has many, and perhaps most, of the features we've come to link to Western Civilization. (There are some features I'd spare them.) I believe this in spite of Islam's history and present, neither of which gives any rational reason for hope on this score. I hold this utterly uncharacteristic view, frankly, because the alternative is, in the words of Tulio from The Road to El Dorado, "painful, agonizing failure." And the pain and agony won't be ours. (His other great line: "No, I worry the exact right amount; you can never worry too much.")

During the Anglican Reformation:

When Protestants held power, Catholics were beheaded for treason.

When Catholics held power, Protestants were burned for heresy.

Henry VIII did both at the same time.

Ironically, "Bloody" Mary I's religious body count was far lower than either her father's or her siblings'. However, the spectacular burnings of many of the Protestant leaders made hers seem worse tham the others.

we might infer that some (small) percentage of "undesirable" Muslims would also admit to engaging in jihad against the United States or some similar rejection-worthy activity.

More than that, those jihadists who concealed their sympathies, and then turned around and started preaching jihad, could be deported forthwith, or arrested, detained, interrogated, and then deported.

I would think that existing law and jurisprudence sufficiently covers cases where speech which incites violence or which instructs an audience in the commission of criminal activity is not protected by the First Amendement . . .

It is insufficient, in my mind, because it does not single out the specific enemy we face right now. What I am proposing requires little change in the mechanics of sedition law; it requires only to naming of that form of sedition which is, today, the greatest threat.

Singling out a group for special prosecution is just the mirror image of singling out special victim-groups for the purposes of meting out greater punishment for the perpetrators.

Nonsense. The group in question is the one that declared (in a training manual): "The confrontation that Islam calls for with these godless and apostate regimes, does not know Socratic debates, Platonic ideals, nor Aristotelian diplomacy. But it knows the dialogue of bullets, the ideals of assassination, bombing, and destruction, and the diplomacy of the cannon and machine-gun." You're hate-crimes comparison is a non sequitur. Singling out this faction is simply a matter of saying that totalitarian Islam is a particularly pressing threat (a threat that not so very long ago produced a mass grave in Manhattan) which demands particular attention.

 If your concern are Muslims who self-identify as members of terrorist organizations or whom we discover to be operating as a member of or accessory to a terrorist organization, then do we not already have sufficient recourse in preventing them from entering the United States or deporting them upon recognition/realization that they are as such?

 See for example the "Immigration and Nationality Act" and it's various amendments.

 Inadmissibility of terrorists

 Deportation of terrorists

 If existing policy is insufficient then what more needs to be done? I assumed you were angling toward applying different legal standards to a class of people, particularly with regards to the First Amendment, based merely on their race/religion/opinion and in the absence of criminal activity. If it's only terrorists you're worried about - keeping them out and deporting them - then it appears legislation has adequately addressed that concern.

Singling out this faction is simply a matter of saying that totalitarian Islam is a particularly pressing threat (a threat that not so very long ago produced a mass grave in Manhattan) which demands particular attention.

 This is the same basic rational, of course, used by advocates of hate-crime legislation. But are you advocating broadening the legislation regarding sedition or asking for a looser interpretation of what sort of speech is not protected by the First Amendment and applying that universally to all - or are you indeed calling for a different standard of free speech to be applied specifically to Muslims living inside America than we would apply to any other group?

I do tire of the constant maligning of the Middle Ages for sins that quite frequently are not even its own.  To the extent that such criticisms are not misplaced, they typically boil down to nothing more than a condemnation of the people of the period for being, well, poor, compared to late moderns.  While I have no desire to return to 14th century standards of dentistry or hygiene, there are reasons enough that such criticisms are misleading.  The period was actually one of considerable technological development.  In any event, thank you gentlemen for your kind words.  What kind of a reactionary would I be if I didn't stand up for the 13th century?

There's a term for the triumph of hope over experience.

I believe it's called "marriage."  :)

I am interested in following y'alls dialogue. To speed it along I am drawing your attention to his reference to "sedition law." Some reference to said Act and his view on how its use should be ramped up can be read here.

taught me all I ever needed to know about medieval medicine and hygiene.  

I assumed you were angling toward applying different legal standards to a class of people, particularly with regards to the First Amendment, based merely on their race/religion/opinion and in the absence of criminal activity.

I am angling toward classifying the advocacy of jihad as itself criminal activity, because the classical understanding of jihad, more recently articulated by Qutb, holds that sedition and revolution is enjoined upon "all able-bodied men" by Islam. In short, to espouse jihad is to advocate the overthrow of the American government.

Jim Geraghty's TKS blog on National Review may be a good source.  He's been living in Turkey for over a year and has discussed how hospitable the locals have been to him, and how safe the country is.  He's also mentioned receiving many emails from other conservatives who've had good experiences with Turkey.  And I know many Europeans, like Brits and Germans, are buying up vacation homes on the Mediterranean coast.  

But again, I can only vouch for Istanbul, Ankara, and the touristic towns on the Aegean and Mediterranean coasts.  While there are always exceptions, I think the problems arise much more in rural and far eastern areas of the country, where unfortunately the people tend to be more backwards.

If you go right now to amnesty.org you'll see that the first story under on their front page under latest news is "Afghanistan: case of Abdul Rahman underlines urgent need for judicial reform." To say that Amnesty takes interest only in domestic cases is patently ridiculous.