Jay Tea...you are truly, a Word Wizard.

Concise. Can't wait for the rest. ww

These "malignant growths" can not survive without a source of nourishment.

The other day you mentioned what you thought to be the beginning of Islamic terrorism as the 1979 hostage event in Iran without mentioning that this was the blowback of the 1953 coup orchestrated by the CIA of the democratically elected government of Mohammed Mossadegh when he made moves to nationalize the oil industry.

To portray the USA as this humble gentle giant that bad things just happen to without acknowledging how some of our actions have propagated Muslim fundamentalism is dishonest.

Muslim fundamentalists need no excuse. How far back do you want to go? Islam has been militant from its inception, but you America haters always seem to find a way to blame her. Take a break from your flag-burning and Che t-shirt laundering to investigate the foundation of Islam.

Jeff,

Unfortunately, the 'dr lavas' have become America's own malignancy. But its our own fault for not going to the doctor sooner when we first started noticing the symptoms 40+ years ago.

-syb

Yeah, if we'd just continued tribute to the Barbary Pirates in 1815, instead of fighting them, all this wouldn't have happened...

Jeff, I couldn't have said it any better. The self loathing lefties are a pitiful lot. They take no pride in anything. They are motivated by hate only. ww

I believe a better disease analogy for Islam is anthrax. Most people with health immune systems exposed to small amounts of bacillus anthracis won't suffer any adverse effects. After all, it's just a bacterium and the neutrophils easily kill them. However, when enough bacillus anthracis congregate together they secrete a number of toxins, one of which, oedema factor, inactivates neutrophils. Like anthrax, a few Muslims dispersed in a non-Muslim nation have minimal impact on that nation. Where they come together in significant numbers, however, they start making toxic demands as we have seen with the EU and even within some US cities. The toxin of Islam is the threat and use of violence, which eventually shuts-up all but the most ardent and organized critics. Without that toxin Islam could not compete in the marketplace of ideas.

Liberals like to think Islam is just going through a violent stage like Christianity did, but they're wrong, dead wrong. As I pointed out yesterday, the Reformation of Christianity was brought about by the publishing and translation of the Bible into the languages of the common people. That knowledge pulled down the human hierarchy who gained power and wealth from Christianity, but could only hold on to it by suppressing the truth. Once the Bible was in the hands of the people Christianity begin to conform to it's true nature. That nature flows from the works and teachings of Jesus the Christ.

No such reformation is possible with Islam as it already express it's true nature, which flows from the works and teachings of Muhammad.

The way to defeat anthrax is to kill the bacterium directly or inactivate it's toxins and let the body kill the bacterium. The way to neutralize Islam is to inactivate it's toxins, which protect it from criticism and better ideas. Without the threat of violence what is Islam?

If I were king of he world I would first require every liberal to pull their head out of their ass, open their eyes and recognize each religion (belief system) on it's own merit, including secularism, humanism, atheism, environmentalism, materialism and even capitalism. They all have histories and attributes and need to be judged by such. Lumping some together as "religion" and treating them as the same thing is ignorant at best.

I would protect free speech understanding that some kinds of speech (fraudulent, malicious) are not protected. However, hate speech would be protected because anyone who doesn't like something another person says wants to label it hate speech. There's no objective standard.

I would protect religious freedom, but only if said religions recognize and support primary human rights such as free speech, freedom of belief system, own property, etc. Those refusing to abide by that edict would be quarantined to some nation(s) where they could live in peace, but not spread. There would be safe houses in every city where any individual wanting to make another choice could come to escape out of such nations. There would be open internet access to the rest of the world without censorship other than that imposed on kids by their parents.

I would protect separation of religion and state, but with some minor changes. Public education would not be considered part of the state, nor would government money given to private organizations carry with it the stink of government. The toxin that protects evolution would be inactivated in this way. Let it compete in the open marketplace of ideas.

Sorry it's so long, but if the question is long maybe it's ok that my answer is long.

When my kids are fighting, I care less about who started it than I do in 1) stopping it and 2) trying to prevent their fighting again.

Cancer may be inevitable for some due to genetic makeup. Sometimes it is just a relative risk due to genetic make up. And sometimes it is an inevitable response to an environmental stimulus one has not ability to overcome.

Now Dr. Lava would undoubtedly assume the latter is what happened to Islam and and West.

I would lean strongly to the first operator. I believe the militant and intolerant nature of its birth, a power struggle aimed at obliterating or assimilating all opponents without mercy, is malignant in nature from the start. That portions of the beast have "matured" does not erase the malignant teratoma of religion that Islam represents on our planet. Proper treatment might lead to having the only residual portions of tumor be mature and benign. The the decision whether to leave these behind or excise them would be based on whether they were causing significant physiologic or mental distress based on their size, location, and the rest of civilization's reaction to them.

Treatment of malignant teratoma is surgery followed by chemotherapy. Radiation is rarely used curatively, but may have a palliative role if the tumor is resistant to chemo. I believe the metaphor, if not obvious enough, is that surgery = war, chemo = attempts to convert malignant to benign using cultural, economic and military means, and radiation = nuclear option.

Anthrax occurs in nature. It can infect the skin, the gut, or if inhaled cause a fatal systemic infection. Vaccination can prevent or blunt the effect of all three infections. Unless the anthrax is engineered to be resistant to infection, antibiotics can be used to prevent infection at exposure, and cure IF STARTED EARLY ENOUGH.

Well, I suppose this could lend itself to a metaphor here too, but I like the Malignant Teratoma better.

Dr. Lava "does not mention" that British-American intervention in Iran in 1953 was in response to Soviet Communist aggression in the region. Of course, to a lib, opposition to communism is the cardinal sin.

Where else after all did Stalin more nakedly violate wartime agreements than he did in Iran--a loyal member of the wartime United Nations alliance? Whether motivated by traditional tsarist ambitions, communist imperialism, security fears, paranoia, or some combination of all of these, Stalin had clearly targeted Iran as a prize for the Soviet war effort. Russian diplomats thwarted almost every British and American attempt to reach an accommodation over Iran. From 1944 through 1947 the Soviets did periodically seek to intimidate the Iranian government into making political or economic concessions. Any historical explanation of the recurring international tensions over Iran in the postwar era must assign the Soviet Union much of the responsibility. 1

1 Mark Hamilton Lytle, The Origins of the Iranian-American Alliance, 1941-1953 (New York: Holmes & Meier, 1987) xiv

I like the part about the giant wall. Then the lunatics would be restricted to killing each other and their fellow Muslims. Game over.

Good post Jay and good comments all - except #3 from the typical blame America firster of course.

"In the comments on that piece, mild pain in the ass "hyperbolist" threw out a question.
....
It was a dishonestly-worded question, with the same kind of built-in presumptions that are in the "when did you stop beating your wife,""..

Well, hyper is one of those tofu-pounding Canadians who bring their citizens before the witch-hunt kangaroo courts for daring to express free speech against radical Islam..so don't expect too much from him.

I believe that a majority of Miuslims are not only not a threat, but a boon to the world.

You can call me a bigot, it matters not, but I totally disagree with you. Your analogy is based on a false premise: That somehow Muslims are peaceful people with a bad segment that must be dealt with, maybe a precription and some therapy to treat the tumor. But, try this exercise: Let's imagine for a moment that the patient is a white supremacist. Are we prepared to say the same thing, that's the group has a few bad guys, but the group is basically a bunch of good guys? Absolutely not! Why? Because it is their basic belief system that is flawed and has made the entire group sick. The fact is that Islam itself is the tumor.

I'm with mac lorry on this:

No such reformation is possible with Islam as it already express it's true nature, which flows from the works and teachings of Muhammad.

Until they are willing to purge their Koran and whatever the hell they call the proclamations from the clerics that are the same as the word of Allah, then it remains the belief system that is cancerous.

To take my analogy further to prognosis, here's my prescription: The patient must be quarantined. We better start drilling for our own oil yesterday. Not a penny more to OPEC than has to be spent. We take our dependency to foreign oil down to zilch and vote out every politician on either side of the aisle that has ever stood against drilling.

We make it abundantly clear that our freedoms are immune to their threats. They must understand that our freedom of speech will not be subjugated by their reverence for their beloved prophet.

That's for starters. But, you get the idea. I'm late for work. But, chew on this sampling from the Koran for a bit:

"Seize ye him, and bind ye him, And burn ye him in the Blazing Fire. Further, make him march in a chain, whereof the length is seventy cubits! This was he that would not believe in Allah Most High. And would not encourage the feeding of the indigent! So no friend hath he here this Day. Nor hath he any food except the corruption from the washing of wounds, Which none do eat but those in sin." (Koran 69:30-37)
"Strike off the heads of the disbelievers"; and after making a "wide slaughter among them, carefully tie up the remaining captives" (Koran 47:4).
Instill terror into the hearts of the unbelievers"; "smite above their necks and smite all their finger-tips off them" (Koran 8:12; cp. 8:60).
"O Prophet! strive hard against the unbelievers and the hypocrites, and be stern against them. Their abode is Hell - an evil refuge indeed" (Koran 9:73).
"slay or crucify or cut the hands and feet of the unbelievers, that they be expelled from the land with disgrace..." (Koran 5:34).
Women who disobey their husband will go to hell. (Koran 66:10).
"Thou mayest decline for the present whom thou wilt of them, and thou mayest take to thy bed her whom thou wilt, and whomsoever thou shalt long for of those thou shalt have before neglected; and this shall not be a crime in thee. Thus will it be easier to give them the desire of their eyes... and to satisfy them with what thou shalt accord to each of them." (Koran 33:51)

"....The self loathing lefties are a pitiful lot. They take no pride in anything. They are motivated by hate only."

Only complaint I have for lefties is that they do nothing. But motivated by hate? Umm no..it comments like that truely show a shortcut to thinking. Do I need to remind you of all the hate groups that reside on the right side of the fence? Didn't think so.

Personal accountability folks....BOTH side..libs and conservatives have their fair share of issues.

Inasmuch as it's been proven you cannot reason or negotiate with islamic radicals, i have no problem eliminating the threat they produce.

I refuse to blame my country for the world's ills, and most especially for this latest threat. To not understand that we are at war, like it or no, is reprehensible. It concerns me not at all if this position is derided, the continued survival of the country I served and love trumps any consideration of a 7th century perversion of religion.

The other day you mentioned what you thought to be the beginning of Islamic terrorism as the 1979 hostage event in Iran without mentioning that this was the blowback of the 1953 coup orchestrated by the CIA of the democratically elected government of Mohammed Mossadegh when he made moves to nationalize the oil industry.

Right, and all this happened in a sealed vacuum. The Cold War and the USSR aggressively expanding its sphere of influence into the Mideast had absolutely nothing to do with this. Otherwise, I'm sure you would have mentioned it.

"...I refuse to blame my country for the world's ills, and most especially for this latest threat."

See..its non-thinking verbal diareha like that, that gets us into trouble in the first place.

It't not about blaming America. Its about making us accountable for our actions. Personal accountability if you will. It's that fundamental thinking that makes America such a great country. If we didnt have it..we would have been wiped of the face the earth long ago.

Consider this.. Conservatives are our backbones..and liberals are our concious. Its worked this long hasn't it?

To portray the USA as this humble gentle giant that bad things just happen to without acknowledging how some of our actions have propagated Muslim fundamentalism is dishonest.

It's equally dishonest NOT to acknowledge Nazi Germany's influence that deeply infected the Arab/Islamic culture with its vile antisemitism and totalitarians-state political system before and during WWII, all of which are clearly present in a great number of M.E. states today and occurred years before 1953.

And where exactly is Jay Tea or any one else portraying the US as a "gentle giant". This is a red herring wrapped in a strawman inside a load of bulldung.

I just came back to review the patient's chart and, as I suspected, the doctor has a dilemma. It is my opinion that the patient has been misdiagnosed. This is not cancer, this is a highly infectious disease. To make matter's worse the patient is extremely combative and, in particular, he is violent regarding treatment.

What are you going to do, Doctor? You're risking the patient, your staff, yourself, and the outside world if you don't do the right thing...stat!

It might be time to review Aristotle, specifically his treatment of "errors of category". Good luck.

In my opinion, you have to look at the core problem of their religeion. Islam was started with Ismael the bastard son of Abraham. If Abraham would have trusted and had faith in God to keep His promise of giving Abraham a son, this could have been avoided. So, at it's core, because of Abrahams lack of belief, we are even having this problem.

When Abraham's wife, Sarah, gave birth to birth to their son, they were told by GOD to banish Ismael from the land.

Of couse the promise of GOD through Abraham brought us judaism and later Jesus Christ. So, this is a family hatred. Islam cannot accept Jews and by default Christians because of the "promise". They believe that Islam has first dibbs on the promise of GOD.

This is a very, very brief summary, but the points are noted. ww

You know, this might seem silly, but I'd decided long ago the Islam was ultimately not a good religion because it deprived the world of a source of joy and beauty in the form of Cat Stevens.

You may know the story, but if you don't he was a popular singer who contracted TB (I think). While he was recuperating someone gave him a copy of the Koran. He read it and decided to convert. I actually heard him speak about this in person in the late 80's. He basically said that that he could not be a Muslim and a pop singer because pop singers are idolized and the Koran forbids a mere human to be an idol. (Sorry if I'm a little sketchy on the details, but it was many years ago.)

At the time, I thought his comments odd considering that I did not hear a single Muslim denounce Ahmadinejad's contemporaries marching in Tehran after the overthrow of the Shah with large posters of Ayatollah Khomeini. I guess there's an exception for idolizing political leaders?

I tend to see good and bad in pretty much all organized religions, I don't however see very much good at all in Islam, but a lot of bad.

Strike a nerve there, Rawhide? I will DEFY you to show me a nation on earth MORE accountable for it's actions. The statement I made still stands and your disagreement is duly noted.

I further would point out that liberals today have co-opted the definition of a classic liberal--they are secular progressive, masquerading as liberals. If you claim to be a liberal in the sense of Jefferson, Washington, Hamilton, etc, then we may discuss further, otherwise, have a nice life.

I have to say I've been swayed to Clay's opinion.

After first accepting that Islam was not a problem, but just a few hundred thousand extremists causing problems, I am now of the firm opinion that it is Islam that IS the cancer... Sure, you can have benign members, but it is cancer all the same.

I certainly don't harbor ill-will towards those who practice this, or ANY cult//religion in a peaceful manner, but when the basic tenets are anathema to peaceful coexistence as a malignant tumor is to the body as a whole, it should be excised.

When you say "excised", SOTG, what exactly do you mean? In reference to the >1 billion people to which you refer, that is.

Metaphors and thought experiments are fun, but they ought ultimately to be grounded in reality; and genocide on that scale is not a realistic proposition.

Is it?

Where would single malt and an Oldsmobile fit into Islam?

Just wondering......

Is it?

Oh, come now. Of course not.

Not speaking for the Godfather's Son, but in excising I mean that we cut off the food supply. It's not debatable that the money that we're sending OPEC is being used against us. So, let's get busy on the OCS and ANWR and reduce our dependence while we're encouraging laissez-faire policies to find alternative solutions. We also must cut off their ideological food supply by doubling up on protecting the Constitution to make sure that Islam remains subject to the marketplace of ideas. Let me see, who stands to lose the most in a fair exchange between the concepts of freedom and the dictates of Islam?

Our freedoms are both our most appealing attributes and our greatest strength for the prevention of tyranny. Our freedoms either attract the best and the brightest or repel those whose intention is to enslave.

Metaphors and thought experiments are fun, but they ought ultimately to be grounded in reality; and genocide on that scale is not a realistic proposition.

By the way, isn't it interesting that in Canada you couldn't say anything to the contrary, unless you were speaking under duress?

Metaphors and thought experiments are fun, but they ought ultimately to be grounded in reality; and genocide on that scale is not a realistic proposition.

Not unless you're an environmental extremist trying to save mother Earth from the human disease. Then 5 billon is the number to eliminate. How long before that currently unthinkable idea moves into the mainstream of modern liberalism?

The US tried countering violence with targeted violence in Afghanistan and Iraq, and that would work in time, but even that's too much of an emotional burden for liberals to bear. What tool will free people who want to stay free use then against followers of an inherently violent religion?

Like I said in post 8, what is Islam without violence? If the west could neutralize the violence of Islam then the ideas of Islam can be tolerated within a free society. Apart from that the two cannot exist in peace, at least not in the same place. A common sense ideas is to then separate the groups, but even that measure is too much of an emotional burden for liberals to bear. In the end Islam protected by liberalism will destroy liberalism. That makes liberals useful idiots.

I don't support restrictions on freedom of speech in Canada, Clay, though for a lot of other reasons, I prefer living here. Ever visited Toronto or Montréal? Most of the amenities of New York at half the cost. But yeah, you can't say the n-word. It's not perfect, but it's perfectly fine.

So, we stop buying OPEC's oil. They start selling it to China. While there would be no reason to maintain bases in the Middle East anymore, that's only one reason the jihadists want to kill you (and me--not that they could find Canada on a map). They continue to recruit, train, and kill. Then what?

Mac Lorry, grant for the sake of argument that liberals will never have any influence on foreign policy ever again because all of a sudden the entire free world realized that people like me are too stupid and naive to contribute anything to any serious discussion.

So, what would the conservatives do? Targeted violence? Yeah, that's working really well in Iraq. People there are totally keen on the United States, and there are far less terrorists there than there were when a relatively secular autocratic psychopath was running the show. It's a great place to live! Nobody there would ever become so frustrated and alienated that they might consider joining Al-Qaeda!

I don't know if you can do better than "Blow up the bad guys!", but you should at least try.