From Ron Silver.

Since 2001 it has become apparent to me that many people are indeed afraid. It has also become apparent to me that the people who are most afraid are behaving hypocritically and cowardly. I do not make these assertions lightly. It’s a horrible thing to call a person or persons cowardly. A little less so with hypocrisy, a little bit of which attaches to all of us. Cowards, in that the fear of confronting the real enemy who wishes us harm is displaced by ranting against a liberal democracy where they know no harm will come to them. Is it so heroic to make a film or a speech that has the support of everyone in your community? What kind of courage does it take to go after the Bush administration if you’re a member of the Hollywood community, and most everyone agrees with your position and will reward you for it — or you’re part of the political class in Washington, D.C. or in New York or in parts of California? Forget the tenured and not so tenured academics, who while not being able to change the world in 1968 have devoted their lives to teaching future generations about the evils of the one, seemingly dispensable sovereign nation that evidently makes the world unlivable. Our country.

When a novelist has a death sentence on his head, when a filmmaker is shot in the street and then stabbed through the heart for making a film that the murderers found offensive, when newspaper editors and publishers, as well as network executives, refuse to show us the cartoons that created havoc and mass protests around the world, I think something more than good taste is involved. The reason we haven’t seen the cartoons in the New York Times (apparently this was news that wasn’t fit to print) or Newsweek, or on our TV screens, is fear. Of what? Pissing them off? From my perspective they are apparently quite pissed off already.

RTWT

Further, even though they fear another attack, they are more afraid of GWB and what he "might" do, than they are afraid of AQ and what they have sworn oaths to do. They are foolish thinking that way IMHO.

The reason we haven’t seen the cartoons in the New York Times (apparently this was news that wasn’t fit to print) or Newsweek, or on our TV screens, is fear. Of what? Pissing them off? From my perspective they are apparently quite pissed off already.

Perhaps the cartoons should be run in the American media. And then of course reported in Anbar province. I'm sure that would make Petraeus some new Sunni tribal friends . You know, as he himself ended a recent speech, Inshallah!

This is symptomatic of the schizoid feelings among the conservatives in the U.S. They now have no choice but to make friends with the Moslems in Iraq, while actually wanting to bash their heads in, or at least show them dirty pictures of the prophet.

They now have no choice but to make friends with the Moslems in Iraq, while actually wanting to bash their heads in, or at least show them dirty pictures of the prophet.

Please state chapter and verse why we want to bash heads of the Moslem's who are our friends. Unless there is a secret program that you have uncovered that no other outlet has uncovered, where we intend to club all Muslims like they were baby harp seals, your statement is shear horse pucky.

And according to the radicals ANY picture of Mohamed is a dirty picture.

These Moslems who are your friends - Ron Silver wants to show them dirty pictures of the prophet. So, do you think they might want to bash some heads, eh? And whose heads would those be? Can conservatives connect the dots?

Wow, post hit a nerve with TnT. Come on man, admit that you are scared. You, TnT, rather censor your own speech once someone threatens you?

Of course, several of the most inflammatory pictures weren't even cartoons.

Like the one that purported to show Mohammed as a pig. That was a poorly reproduced picture of a French hog-caller in a context---added by imams because the original cartoons weren't inflammatory enough.

So, perhaps finding out that the worst of the cartoons were added by imams in order to inflame might well show the Sunnis (and Shi'ites) exactly what kinds of people are being most "offended."

Just like living under al-Qaeda rule in places like Fallujah did quite a bit to cure the average Muslim of any desire to live under al-Qaeda rule.

I guess Toast_n_Tea doesn't accept the First Amendment as well. I guess "some animals are more equal than others" holds true to Toast_n_Tea.

I was trying to get the message across that unnecesarily aggravating any Moslems does not make sense while we are trying to build Iraq or more generally building bridges to moderate Moslems wherever. Obviously the logic-impaired here couldn't figure it out. So perhaps I should spell it out.

When the recent incident in Sudan occurred with the Teacher-Bear-Mohammed fracas, the Moslems in Britain were as outraged as anyone else, and expressed their outrage quite vociferously. Unfortunately this did not get the Press it deserved on conservative sites or in the MSM.

Ron Silver and other rabble rousers ignore the positive developments of this sort which are a sign that Moslems are beginning to express outrage at fellow Moslems who are nuts. Silver and his ilk want to make this a battle against all Moslems, all 1.3 Billion of them.

Shouldn't we make Petraueus' job easier? Or do you just want to be schizoid as I suggested earlier?

Bringing them into the Wonderful Secular West needs to happen one tribe at a time; that is unless you really don't believe in what Petraues is doing. Dirty pictures of the Prophet don't help. Petraues says Inshallah! for a reason.

On a purely literary note, I have read The Satanic Verses. It is truly a pretty shitty piece of writing. Rushdie's only work of value in my opinion was Midnight's Children. It was all downhill debauchery from there on.

Toast_n_Tea: Show me where Ron Silver wants to make this a war on all Muslims. Show me where Ron Silver's supposed desire to "bash their heads in, or at least show them dirty pictures of the prophet" represents "conservatives in the US". Show me why moderate Muslims can't see "dirty pictures of the prophet" on the one hand, and murdering radical AQ on the other hand, and keep things in perspective. A heckuva lot of humor ends up insulting somebody. Just how far do you want to take this "no blaspheming" issue?

Toast_n_Tea said:

Ron Silver and other rabble rousers ignore the positive developments of this sort which are a sign that Moslems are beginning to express outrage at fellow Moslems who are nuts. Silver and his ilk want to make this a battle against all Moslems, all 1.3 Billion of them.

Here, let me fix this for ya.

PZ Meyers and other rabble rousers ignore the positive developments of this sort which are a sign that Christians are beginning to express outrage at fellow Christians who are nuts. PZ Meyers and his ilk want to make this a battle against all Christians, all 2.8 Billion of them.