{"id":4052,"date":"2003-02-22T16:02:15","date_gmt":"2003-02-22T21:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=4052"},"modified":"2003-02-22T16:02:15","modified_gmt":"2003-02-22T21:02:15","slug":"comparisons_2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/02\/22\/comparisons_2.html","title":{"rendered":"Comparisons"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lileks comments on a videotaped viewing of a Moslem sermon in Iraq<\/a>:<\/p>\n

I just saw a video of one of the sermons, carried on prime-time TV in Iraq. Same old same old, with a twist: Usually the text says that the very trees will cry out there is a Jew behind me, kill him<\/i>. This video had a new version: even the stone will say “a Jew is hiding behind me. Come and cut off his head.”<\/i>
\nAnd then the mullah pulled out a sword<\/b><\/i>. That’s the detail you don’t get in the transcripts: these men of God are packing heat – granted, it’s medieval-style slicy heat, but heat nonetheless.
\n“And we shall cut off his head!” he shouted, waving the sword. “By Allah, we shall cut it off! Oh Jews! Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Jihad for the sake of Allah! Jihad for the sake of Allah!”
\nPlaywright Harold Pinter, speaking at last weekend’s rally, said “The US is a nation out of control,” and “unless we stop it, it will bring barbarism to the entire world.” He said America was “a country run by a bunch of criminal lunatics with Tony Blair as a hired Christian thug.”
\nWhen Blair shows up in the pulpit cleaving the air with a scimitar, let me know. When US television broadcasts a speech with Billy Graham hosting an Excalibur replica from the Franklin Mint Collection, demanding the decapitation of Muslims, let me know. When George Bush grips the podium and beseeches American rock formations to give up the location of non-Christians so we can slit their throats, and it\u2019s carried live on national TV by presidential order, drop me a line.<\/p>\n

I haven’t been, and remain not, someone who considers the Islamic world, per se,<\/i> the Enemy. I know perfectly peaceful Moslems, and I’ve read plenty of translated passages from the Koran that make it clear that it’s no more intrinsically violent a religion than, say, Christianity.<\/p>\n

But there are strains of Islam that clearly are dangerous to non-believers. And the comparison here is worth noting, and it puts folks like Pinter and his ilk in a particularly bad (and deservedly so) light. <\/p>\n

Is it that Pinter doesn’t believe that these folks are dangerous? How patronizing. Is it that he doesn’t believe in the power of language? How ironic. Or is it that he believes in what they say? How … well, I’ll let you come up with an adjective.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lileks comments on a videotaped viewing of a Moslem sermon in Iraq: I just saw a video of one of the sermons, carried on prime-time TV in Iraq. Same old…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geopolitical-brouhaha"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11989,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/12\/17\/e_mails_that_irk.html","url_meta":{"origin":4052,"position":0},"title":"E-mails that irk","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 17-Dec-07 8:47pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Chain letter passed on to me: We need to show more sympathy for these people. * They travel miles in the heat. * They risk their lives crossing a border....","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":21345,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/06\/22\/unblogged-bits-wed-22-jun-11-2330.html","url_meta":{"origin":4052,"position":1},"title":"Unblogged Bits (Wed. 22-Jun-11 2330)","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 22-Jun-11 11:30pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries .... OH NO, Gay People Exist! IFI Freaks Out - \"Remember: conservative Christians love gay people. They just don\u2019t want children finding out they exist.\" When PolitiFact falls short of its name - PolitiFact sometimes\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Potpourri"","block_context":{"text":"Potpourri","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/potpourri"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7703,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/01\/16\/red_sonja.html","url_meta":{"origin":4052,"position":2},"title":"Red Sonja","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 16-Jan-05 5:11pm","format":false,"excerpt":"From the Top5 Little Fivers Comics list ... CBR is reporting that after 10 years, Red Sonja is being resurrected as a comic book. The She Devil with a Sword...","rel":"","context":"In "Comics & Comic Books"","block_context":{"text":"Comics & Comic Books","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/media-comics"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12292,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/06\/07\/i_believe_2.html","url_meta":{"origin":4052,"position":3},"title":"“I Believe”","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 7-Jun-08 11:11pm","format":false,"excerpt":"It appears that South Carolina will be putting out an \"I Believe\" specialty license plate, similar to the one that was shot down in Florida (pictured), including the cross...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/images\/i-believe.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9643,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/05\/19\/switch_4.html","url_meta":{"origin":4052,"position":4},"title":"Switch!","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 19-May-06 10:23am","format":false,"excerpt":"Cut the thermostat over from Heat to Cool. While we had frosty weather last week, we're beginning to get warm in the day, and stuffy at night. On a similar...","rel":"","context":"In "Home Improvement"","block_context":{"text":"Home Improvement","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/home-improvement"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11972,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/12\/19\/poor_science.html","url_meta":{"origin":4052,"position":5},"title":"Poor science","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 19-Dec-07 9:32pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Whilst on the subject of pretty star pictures, the Bad Astronomy blog also notes a few gems from the omnibus spending bill Congress just passed. The House and Senate passed...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4052"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4052\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}