Shard

Not much more than than that. It was ludicrous for the Americans to get as paranoid as they did, and to enter an arms race in the process. Hindsight is 20/20 but plenty of people were saying so at the time.

januarymix

Your tone is fine, Almost Canadian, but you are either having a laugh either with:

1. Such an incomprehensible lack of knowledge about the Israel-US-Middle East triangle where there is so much knowledge and information about this topic

Myself, even as an unacquainted, rather ignorant person re: world affairs can pick it up from the most base of news sources on the web/TV, but you are acting like this is news of a newly discovered moth species in the Amazon

As per above, read on what I provided if you are genuinely interested, or admit you are not sincere about this.

2. No, it is not my premise to clarify for you what is known and you have been pointed to multiple sources. And as you seem to be having considerable issues with it - again, I did not allege it. I referenced what I had read when I was a wee one, can you not accept that people read and remember historical facts and different perspectives?

You might not like it or be open to the same, but many are, I believe. And as world citizens, I think we should be open to learning and empathizing about moderate elements so that our own responses can be better moderated. One would hope there are more such citizens.

As I said, bait elsewhere.

Cheers,
floatsy

iamthecreaturefromuranus

http://casualsunited.files.wordpress...3/05/islam.jpg

No doubt painted by a "world citizen"

januarymix

Yeah saw that a couple of days ago on Le Guardian.

Shard

It's a fine example of culture clash. In one respect it is to be welcomed, as it is wake up call to the many liberals who dismiss extremist muslims as misguided but generally harmless idealists.

It would be good to know what moderate muslims think of seeing their word used as a provocation (if indeed it was Islamists and not, say, the EDL that painted the word).

dbd33

Who are these men of straw?

Shard

Those that, for example, that provide freedoms to Anjem Choudary while he brainwashes youngsters into jihad.

dbd33

I take "provide freedoms" to mean failure to drag away in chains for obnoxious but lawful speech.

That's not the same as dismissing him as a "misguided but generally harmless idealist". Who dismisses him in this way?

caretaker

Even if you don't buy into the ideology, free world vs communist bloc in competition for resources in a colonial sense is a lot bigger than beans. The arms race, (and the whole military-industrial complex cliche) means dollars, votes, a decent slice in a pie chart in the west but not behind the iron curtain, and the space race, while less profitable, really bankrupted the Soviets because they were fooled into thinking America was much further advanced in technology than they really were, and so dedicated disproportionate rubles into rocketry.

Shard

In my view if you don't "drag him away in chains", you're dismissing him as harmless. If he had suicide belt on, he would be dragged away; however, if he influences and persuades vulnerable people, through his freedom of speech, to strap on suicide belts, is he still harmless?

Oink

Its one the few things my American friends do well. Apart from very tiny and precedented situations, freedom of speech should be absolute.

Shard

American friends? You said in earlier post you are a US passport holder?

In any case, I don't think Americans are quite so tolerant of speech freedoms when their national interest is under threat. The Department of Homeland Security comes to mind.

Oink

Culturally I'm British.


There are limits, for instance for specific threats of violence but general and abstract teaching of the necessity to a resort to force and violence, is not the same.

cjones

I doubt it's too much of a stretch to assume that after the cold war petered out certain vested interests were none to pleased about the prospect of the supposed peace dividend. It's probably safe to say that at the time various groups considered essays like S P Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations" more as a business plan of sorts, rather than as a simple rebuttal of Fukuyama's "End of History" theory?

caretaker