Thinking Fool

The problem isn't with them, it's with us. Why do we pay attention to these idiots? Have you read or looked at some of the viscious cartoons and speeches muslims have made about Jews recently? They make the Pope's speech sound like a Muslim recruitment poster.

The quote was taken ENTIRELY OUT OF CONTEXT. The Pope was quoting someone else form a long time ago, not endorsing the position in any way. In fact, the quote was the prologue to a speech that had as its focus interfaith dialogue.

Ironic.

Even if the quote wasn't taken out of context and the Pope does think Islam is an evil religion, who cares? Well, we know who, but why do they care? It'd be like a fourth grader who was popular with about a third of the class saying something bad about someone who already hated his guts. Shrug it off and move on.

P.S. - Overeducated, not paying attention to the idiots leaves us in a blissful ignorance for awhile, but then car bombs explode outside our embassies and planes start flying into our buildings. I think we should pay attention.

We would get the same result if we were to compliment Muslims.
The only solution would be to get rid of them because having them around is obviously too much trouble for the normal people of the world.
It is a small price to pay for a decrease in terrorism.

Awesome post - I'm still cracking up.

Why am not surprised at the Pope. I think the best way for us to get along with our Muslims friends over the sea is to insult their religion, imply they are inherently violent and evil, and otheriwse be ignorant. Don't you?

Finished Law School - I don't think we should get rid of all Muslims. Some definitely. All. Hardly.

First Year - We've complimented their religion - insisted it's peaceful - and that hasn't gotten us anywhere. If it is so peaceful, should derogatory comments about it be greeted with bombs and fire? Me thinks not.

You might be correct. Getting rid of all of them may be going too far.
But you kids just need to remember that a vote for a liberal democrat is a vote for terrorism.

@Fool - I'm not saying ignore terrorism, I'm saying don't give these holocaust-denying crazies the airtime they so desperately crave. They want us to pay attention, the best way to neutralize them is to flat out ignore them or better yet, just tell them to piss off, we will write what we want.

@Finished - Why do you hate America?

Over-educated: It's the same reason Ann Coulter gets so much press. She's loud and obnoxious. The media is sensationalist, and we're not going to be able to stop that.

Meg: Ann Coulter gets so much press because she is hot snatch. If she looked like Madeline Albright she would be just another crazy woman wandering the streets with a shopping cart.

We used to take the let's ignore them and they will go away path. It is not like radical islam is new, they have been killing because they think the lord wants them to since there was a Jewish tribe just outside Mecca 1500 years ago or so.

Islam is not and never was a religion of peace. It is a religion of intolerance towards those who do not follow its tenants; they even have honor killings of their own people. It is the religion started by the lowest part of society a millenia and a half ago.

Still, the gay leftist liberal in me wants to think that if these people had an economy to speak of and jobs to provide for their families then they would know the value of like, the market and the horrors they were creating. Instead, they wake up in anger and feel no qualms about killing an infidel, at least it gives them something to do.

If they just thought like I do the world would be a better place. I have considered for a while starting my own religion, I think I could get it right.

"I have considered for a while starting my own religion, I think I could get it right."

That's what everyone else thought too. ~And thus spake Mohammed: "This is the last time God is going to tell you fuckers what to do!"~

Islam is not a religion of peace. It's confused as such because the root of the word comes from the same root that "peace" comes from in Arabic, but it also is the same root that makes up "submission" - as in "jiujitsu submission hold." Mohammed would have been a jiujitsu master if black belts were around in the Gulf back then.

My own opinion is that some people in these countries (the ones loudly protesting) are woefully uninformed about what is going on because of a culture of conspiracy brought on by their own governments and (dare I say it) the US influence too. Add into the mix a ridiculously high unemployment rate and of course there will be no shortage of able-bodied men willing to burn pictures of the pope or the American flag on city streets throughout the Muslim world.

If we fight the economic war for hearts and minds, I think we might have a chance at winning them over.

(Using "Muslims" as a catch-all is also not helpful. "Extremists" is preferable, as we have extremists of all creeds and faiths looking to make big political statements with violence to themselves or others. Plus you can't really roll all the world's 1.5 billion Muslims into the same stereotype, no matter how hard you try.)

over_educated - "hot snatch"...heh.

I do not hate America and that is why I support Bush and a Republican government.
Liberal Democrats would never respond to terrorism in a manner that shows that they want to and know how to protect Americans. Democrats would run around asking what the terrorists want instead of realizing that the terrorists want nothing other than your death because you do not subscribe to their barbaric ways and methods of religion.
Hippy liberals are more concerned about global warming and other "inconvenient truths" that lack objective scientific support despite the more immediate and obvious threat that exists from Muslim terrorists who want to kill Americans just because you are an American.
Looking at the Democratic party as a whole you see little more than efforts at countering Republicans rather than solutions to anything.
It is all a big joke really but the lesser evil of the two is definitely a Republican led government.

For the record, not all of us Democrats are like the New England style democrats. There's Midwestern democrats too. We're not much like the new england style.

@Finished - For heavens sake man put down the red Kool-aid.

First: Don't speak about "bad science" if you have NO training in the sciences. How would you like a physicist walking up to you saying that the brief you just filed is "bad lawyering"? There has never been an administration in the history of the republic as hostile to scientific inquiry as the current one. That is why scientists are pissed. Have you actually bothered to examine the current evidence on global warming or are you just repeating verbatim the drivvle spewed by right wing talk show hosts?

I suggest you start at the non-partisan Pew Center: http://www.pewclimate.org/global-warming-basics/

As a scientist this is a HUGE pet-peeve of mine. If you don't have ANY scientific training, don't talk like you know more than folks who have devoted their lives to a discipline. (And its not only the republicans, Alec Baldwin and his PETA crowd need to drink a big glass of shut-the-f%^$ up. Hey Alec I don't tell you how to act (poorly) so don't tell me how the $%!# to do science).

Second: "Know thy enemy as you know thyself and you will always stand victorious" - Sun Tzu. If you had to catalog all the blatantly idiotic moves made by this administration in the prosecution of its war on terror (allowing Osama to escape in Toro-boro) and Iraq (too many to mention, but I will highlight: disbanding the regular military, having no reconstruction plan, Abu Gharaib) the root of these mistakes come from the fact that no one bothered to sit down for a second and, you know: THINK. Understanding the nature of the enemy, their motivations and their methods puts us in a far better position than randomly blowing sh!t up. We are not fighting a state here, we are fighting a movement, and taking control of countries does not defeat a movement, you must cut off the support in the form of money and personel flowing to the organization. The vast majority of our actions in "the war on terror" and "the war on Iraq" have just amounted to being one big recruiting poster for jihadists. how do we deal with this? I imagine a combined military, police and diplomatic approach would be the most successful, solely using the military approach ain't working and burying our head in the sand with platitudes like "stay the course" stand in the way of our vistory. Even the republicans are waking up to that fact.

Third: You are right the current Democratic party is full of ba!!ess wonders who bend like a cheerleader at a frat party. But we need to put the breaks on this sh!t and soon, and I would rather have a contemplative government in power than the current "damn the torpedoes" approach.

The right in this country wants to spew off 3 second soundbites and empty platitutdes, which is a shame, because a decade ago they were movement based on principle. Now all that remains is the empty husk of an ideology whose remains are used to prop up a more and more authoritarian state. The vanguard of this movement seem to be populated with loud-mouth simpletons more content to parrot RNC talking points than engage in actual fact-based debate.

You want to impress me chico? Explain to me why you feel the vast (we are talking over 97%) majority of the global climatology community has acknowledged global warming is a real and serious problem? Oh, let me guess... left-wing conspiracy!

Explain to me how "staying the course in Iraq" furthers the:

A. Strategic objectives of the United States.
B. Prevents terrorism.

Over out.