I'd say the audience loves excitement, the news is just a business after all.
If you're correcting my quip that the "news" loves excitement by saying that the audience not the "news" is what loves excitement, I'd say that the "news" is nothing without an audience, and the business function of the "news" is to get and enlarge an audience much as do the "whores" and "porn peddlers" like Limbaugh and Stewart, and that the "news" is sold to the audience in packages of exitement, and so the "news" loves the excitement as a commodity as much as the audience, and how could it be otherwise since "news" and audience are parts of the same trick.
It looks like the Muslim response to the issue was comparable to the actual Muslims responding. Western Muslims were quite rational on the issue, while poor, uneducated Muslims in war torn areas were more likely to react with violence. I think 10 have died in Afghanistan today just trying to hold an election.
As I said "I agree with those who think the Muslim response . . . would have been more idiotic, lawless, and to be pleaded against than the tiny group of book burners."
Islamic violence is regularly condemned by Muslim leadership around the world, although I'm not sure many are listening. With the current climate of Islamophobia, speaking out can get you whacked from either side.
I agree that speaking out against Islamic violence can get you whacked by Islamic extremists, but are you saying that it can also get you whacked by those who oppose the violence? Has this happened?
If perhaps the most noteworthy Imam in the US and trusted adviser to our Presidents can't get a fair shake, why would they?
How is he not getting a "fair shake"? Did he speak out against the Islamic violence and get whacked?
By the way, if Islam has been high-jacked by "extremists," doesn't that mean that the "extremists" are in charge? If the "moderates" want to own Islam, don't they have to get rid of the high-jackers? How can the "moderates" claim to represent "true" Islam if the high-jackers own the religion? Does "regularly" condemning the violence get rid of the high-jackers? When planes were high-jacked, were the pirates removed by condemning them? What are the radical Islamists condemned to? Death? Imprisonment? Fines?
This is a good question, but not one that I think can be easily answered in a few paragraphs.
I would say that in the US there is a common bond (The American Dream) which isn't exclusive to any one group.
Are you saying that Americans are unified in our opinions of who we are because of the so-called "American Dream? We all have the same dream?
Are there Muslims in the US who would take the Koran over the Constitution? Sure, but I'll bet I can find a lot more who would do the same with the Bible.
Certainly a disuniter.
As for unification of Islamic positions, you'd have to break this out into issues to perhaps understand it. Palestine is certainly an issue with general Islamic consensus, but you'll also get a similar level of support from many Western nations and even liberals in the US.
Perhaps the biggest issue in Islam today is the role of the woman. I'm not sure even this is very unified throughout Islam, and is very heavily influenced by local conditions, especially in the Third World.
All well and good, but this has nothing to do with what I spoke of--Islamic opinion of who Americans are.
I'd agree the level of division is quite alarming. A very real threat to the American Dream is when people question if it really applies to everyone.
So the so-called "American Dream" is not a uniter but a divider.
I didn't see many looking to gain from support of the Mosque issue, and considering the public sentiment it would be hard to see the benefits.
But to gain support by trying to make "conservatives" look foolish for opposing the mosque--a la Jon Stewart.
I did see many on the Right quick to pretend there was parity between the two events though, sort of a "well if one's wrong the others wrong" logic that doesn't make a lot of sense, at least to me. It did seem to make some feel better about opposing the Mosque though.
The pretence is in your eyes not in the minds of those "on the right." It seems that you're quick to "politicize." And there was not a pretence to "parity" in so-called sensitivity. The reaction to building the mosque is "can you build it elsewhere?" The predicted response to the burning of Korans is large scale mayhem.
Give the kid a few more years.
Is the kid instructed, trained by Imam Rauf, or by his govt., or society, to abstain from mayhem in a few more years, or is that behavior solely dependent on what Americans do?
To some degree this is certainly true, although with the Mosque issue it seems to be a situation of political exploitation.
No political exploitation yet.
This project was announced last December, reported in the NYTimes and didn't cause a ruckus. The Laura Ingraham interview with the Imam's wife (in the John Stewart video) wasn't so noteworthy because it was an attack on Fox News as you seemed to suggest, it was that in December even a bomb throwing pundit remarked that "I can't find many people who really have a problem with it" and "I like what you're trying to do."
No political exploitation yet.
When the project was approved what followed was an all out onslaught of anti-Islam propaganda characterizing the center as a temple to the 9/11 hijackers. Then the story rapidly became a big national issue.
No political exploitation yet.
What changed? Well, the facts around the purpose of the planned center didn't seem to change. It was the controversy being pushed from the fringe that was different, and this was the first glimpse of the issue that most Americans got. Hence my remarks that this story isn't really about the Mosque, but rather the controversy surrounding it.
No political exploitation yet.
I wouldn't call this a simple difference of opinion when the opinion seems to have been manufactured. That's political...
No political exploitation yet. I don't recall Republicans blaming the Dems for the Mosque. The change in opinion was created by a few (as is usually the case) who saw a historical connection between this mosque (the Cordoba Project) and its patronimically antecedent mosque built in Cordoba Spain to commemorate that conquest. It didn't seem to get political until Obama made his statement as to the constitutional right to build it. Most of the Public wasn't aware of the mosque plans until some "fringe" pointed out what they saw as symbolism of conquest on "hallowed" ground. If the opinion was "manufactured", is that equal to "being made aware"? Manufacturing is good, no? Don't we bitch about losing our manufacturing base?
But no political implications were made (except for implying that "right wingers' were bigots, etc., for opposing the mosque.)
For our critics it's as simple as those outside the US believing we don't follow the same rules we expect of others over the years. Be it protecting Israel at the UN for decades, claiming we respect life but killing tens and tens of thousands of civilians when it's in our interest, ignoring human rights when countries have things we need, saying we don't torture and treat prisoners with respect...then abu Graib, renditions etc...
That these things may be technically legal or suit our interests at the time isn't really the point. What should be considered is the impact they may have whether we like it or not...instead we get "you're perfect, just keep shopping".
So, by this as a response to my asking, re the Koran burners, "what laws have been broken? What lives have been taken?" your answer is a twisting, arguable, non-responsive and irrelevant way of admitting that no laws have been broken, no lives have been taken.
I don't think Republicans fear the press as much as they do their own party.
You mean they fear the Tea Party? So do the Dems.
As they say...Democrats fall in love, Republicans fall in line
-spence