Posts from ‘March, 2006’

The U.S. affiliate of a worldwide Muslim organization begs to differ with its Afghan brothers about death being the prescribed penalty for those who leave the faith.

According to AAIIL(USA), which is part of the Lahore Ahmadiyya Movement, only people who leave Islam and end up fighting against members of their former faith deserve the death penalty.

Quote: “I stand before you tonight as somebody who knows from personal experience that this administration will take national security information and use it for political purposes . . . “

Posturing is one thing but the reality is something else. That’s especially true in the House of Representatives, where the worst of the worst among U.S. elected officials still happily march in lockstep to President Bush’s tune. Or maybe it’s Vice President Dick Cheney’s tune. Or Karl Rove could be the drum major. Who knows?

What has Furious and others, well, furious, is that Kaloogian’s photo caption ragged on the press for deliberately playing up any and all violence they could find in Iraq. As if finding gruesome violence there was a challenge.

The U.S. seems in transition to being at odds with powerful Shiite factions in the Iraq occupation morass. A deadly Sunday raid on a mosque complex in northeast Baghdad is generating heightened rancor recriminations on both sides. . . .

Quote: “Grabbing reality by the throat and forcing it into a form you find more pleasing than reality itself is not only a great election strategy, it works for a lot of people on a lot of levels in life — denial is a good game while it lasts. . . .”

Now we have super sanctimonious radio talker and shameless self-promoter Hugh Hewiit trying to impress with how he’s broadcasting from a deadly dangerous zone — the Empire State Building in midtown Manhattan. . .

So, White House chief of staff Andrew Card is hanging up his spurs and moving on. President Bush appointed his budget guru to replace Card.
So what?
Bush hailed Card’s successor, Josh Bolten, as a creative policy thinker. Given the ongoing horror story Bush’s budgets have been, we took Bush’s endorsement as another “heck of [...]

This episode reinforces the impression Islam is a throwback to 14th-century ignorance and barbarism — absolutist, intolerant and heavily inclined toward violence. That impression was already running strong throughout the non-Muslim world because of sometimes deadly riots staged a few weeks ago over a few offensive cartoons.

“Because of you (American soldiers), the people of Iraq no longer fear being executed and left in mass graves. Because of you, the world is more just and will be more peaceful. . . .”