Good article by Christopher Hitchens
 

Fascinating with many salient points that undoubtedly will go unheeded.

Thanks for the article. I haven't had a chance to read it but look forward to it.

Hitchins is an interesting fellow. He despises religion in all forms, and the atheist Tom Paine is his hero. He was born and bred in the UK upper class but moved to the United States long ago and recently or is about to become a U.S. Citizen. His first wife and son still live in London. He has relatively young kids by his second wife, an American. He was once one of the stars on the Nation's staff, but the far left has excommunicated him, he left the Nation in an acrimonious split, and he's now a favorite of Neo-Conservatives. This break with his past occurred over his constant and unwavering support for the Iraq war. Meanwhile, many of his former liberal friends deride him as an admitted alcholic, make unfounded claims that he is a closet homosexual, call him a shallow opportunist, etc. It's a real food fight. Great stuff.

Two factors led him to his support for the Iraq war: His loathing for religion, particularly but not exclusively Islam, and his paleo-liberal belief that a super power like America shouldn't abide human rights abuses anywhere and should go police and re-engineer whole societies. He'd have us all over Africa if he had his way. He and Bush are strange bedfellows that's for sure. Which should be instructive in of itself. I've read liberals lamenting the new "pragmatism" among liberals about foreign policy, such pragmatism holding that we should intervene with military force only in America's interest without regard to human rights abuses. THAT was the original liberal doctrine of FDR, however.

From his last column in Nation:

"This is something more than a disagreement of emphasis or tactics. When I began work for The Nation over two decades ago, Victor Navasky described the magazine as a debating ground between liberals and radicals, which was, I thought, well judged. In the past few weeks, though, I have come to realize that the magazine itself takes a side in this argument, and is becoming the voice and the echo chamber of those who truly believe that John Ashcroft is a greater menace than Osama bin Laden. (I too am resolutely opposed to secret imprisonment and terror-hysteria, but not in the same way as I am opposed to those who initiated the aggression, and who are planning future ones.) In these circumstances it seems to me false to continue the association, which is why I have decided to make this "Minority Report" my last one."

Funny from an old-school lefty and former socialist (Trotsky).

He can argue as well as anyone I've ever read.

Good article. In a nutshell, Europe is basically screwed.

I liked the article as well. I liked his ideas on one way multiculturalism.

Okay I read it. I'm not ready to say it's a "good article." Part of the reason is that I don't buy the hysteria. I think these Muslim militants are a bunch of medieval losers who only threaten us at the margins. There has been no terrorism in the U.S. since 9/11. Something like that may happen again but let's put things in perspective. The Nazis killed 20 million Russians and came within a whisker of taking their capital city, of making Russia a Nazi province. 3,000 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq. One of the most distressing things about Iraq is the death toll of Muslims, killed by other Muslims. I'm not scared that the world or even Europe will become a Muslim Empire. Our children or their children or children's children etc. may well descend into totolitarianism; that seems to be the eventual fate of all republics. But it won't happen at the hand of these suicidal home made bomb toters.

It's this kind of talk that leads powerful countries to start putting brown skinned poor people on trains to places like Dachau. Sometimes I think that's what Hitchins wants. But Al Queda and their ilk represent a small minority of Muslims. Most of the Muslims in Europe just want the good life and to live honestly. They really do. I'm sorry that Hitchins finds people in veils and caftans so irritating; I see a lot of the same evils that he does in religion. But he's over the top, in my view. He's gotten himself backed into a corner and his prose is getting more purple. But I aint buying it. I'm not scared that Osama is going to conquer the U.S.

where do you get the view that radical islam is only harbored by a tiny percentage of Muslims? that's just not true.

It may be in the minority, but 20% of one billion is still a lot of people.

I think that number is probably hard to nail down if you're trying to establish how many of them really are part of the terrorism campaign and network as opposed to expressing sympathy for radical Islam. I don't know what the percentage is. But as always the bulk of the people are not the ones doing the kiling. Since a linchpin of his argument is demographics I think that's worth poitning out.

So if they support, finance, and shelter terrorists, that's not a big deal I guess.

I'm afraid that argument will not get you very far.

We are not yet at war with radical Islam. If we ever are, it will approximate a genocide. Because entire nations will be destroyed. Not everyone in all these nations. But lots of people and all the meaningful infrastructure. These countries will become southern Lebanon.

No, we are truly not at war. Knowing they will return to the stone age is the only thing that holds them back. If they had the advantage, trust me, they would press it.

We should support moderate and liberal Muslims. But let's not kid ourselves. We should fight radical Islam with our full might and force.