sorry Hillary, it's a feature, not a bug

violence is at the core of all Abrahamic religions

The Mindanao Examiner: Speaking in Washington September 13, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the Islamic faith “respects the fundamental dignity of human beings,” and that it is “a violation of that fundamental dignity to wage attacks on innocents.”

yet more Christian terrorism?

Increased security needed after mosque burning, says Muslim civil rights group:

A Muslim civil rights group is calling for stepped-up security around the nation's mosques after a suspicious fire burned down the Joplin, Mo., Islamic Cener early Monday morning.
Ibrahim Hooper, director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), says that the Joplin mosque fire and the shooting attack at a Sikh temple near Milwaukee on Sunday have him worried for the safety of those attending services at local mosques during the holy week of Ramadan. On Tuesday, an unknown vandal also smashed the sign of a mosque in Rhode Island, says Hooper. His organization has called for increased police presence around mosques, though it's unclear if any departments will oblige.
The most recent fire came only five weeks after the Joplin mosque's security camera recorded an unidentified man setting fire to the mosque in the middle of the night. That blaze was stopped before it caused too much damage, though the FBI has not found the culprit. The mosque, which now lies in ashes, served about 50 families in the area.

Four charged over Danish newspaper 'massacre plot' - InterAksyon.com

Four charged over Danish newspaper 'massacre plot' - InterAksyon.com: COPENHAGEN -- Danish prosecutors have charged four men for "attempted terrorism" over plans to kill the staff of a newspaper that carried controversial cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, a judicial statement said Friday.

The four men, all residents of Sweden and arrested on December 29, 2010, had planned to "kill a large number of people" at the Jyllands-Posten daily, it said.

is the occupation a "moral abomination"?

Let's hear from an Israeli veteran

Live-Blogging The Fox SC Debate

The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan - The Daily Beast: 10.26 pm.

A reader writes:

I tuned in for only one minute, then had to turn it off immediately. This is all I saw, and it was enough for this recovering Evangelical: They cheered Newt for his simplistic rule of "killing America's enemies," and they booed Ron Paul for his rational and Christian-minded rule of doing to our enemies nothing worse than what we would want done to us. What a sick, sad thing for Christians to ignore Jesus' most basic and essential teaching.

Jesus was far more radical than the Golden Rule. He told us to love our enemies. These people would kill all of them, a declared war or not.

The religion of peace, indeed.

Deadly Nigeria bomb attacks condemned by world leaders

BBC News - Deadly Nigeria bomb attacks condemned by world leaders: The first attack, outside St Theresa's Church in Madalla, near Abuja, killed 35 and wounded more than 50.


The church and surrounding homes were badly damaged.

Father Christopher Barde told AFP news agency the blast occurred as the Christmas morning service was ending.

"It was really terrible," he said. "Some [wounded] people ran towards me [saying] 'Father anoint me'."

Crowds grew angry over the attack and the slow response of the emergency services.

Reuters reports that thousands of youths have erected roadblocks on the road from the capital to the largely Muslim north, and are being tackled by security forces firing tear gas.

In Jos, a blast close to the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Church was followed by gunfire that left one officer dead, government spokesman Pam Ayuba told the Associated Press news agency.

Two explosive devices found in a nearby building were disarmed as military were deployed to the site.

Afghan woman being forced to marry her rapist

RAWA News: Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Afghan prosecutors announced Wednesday that a young rape victim, jailed for adultery after reporting the crime and pushed into marrying her attacker, would have her sentence reduced from twelve to three years. The prosecutor said she would, for now, remain in jail -- with her child -- for not reporting her attack fast enough.

Gulnaz is in Kabul's Badam Bagh jail, serving out her sentence with her rapist's child. (Photo: CNN)
In a remarkable case that is all too common in Afghanistan but has drawn international attention, 21-year-old Gulnaz was attacked by a relative two years ago, but sentenced to 12 years in jail for adultery.
She has since given birth to a girl from the attack. Because of the dishonor of sex outside of wedlock, she had been given the choice of marrying her attacker to get out of jail and legitimize her infant daughter in the eyes of Afghanistan's conservative society.
The child is imprisoned with her at Badambagh Prison on the outskirts of Kabul.

barbarism

unfit for the presidency

rick perry threatens a jew with lynching:

To my mind, the following statement disqualifies Perry from the race:

If this guy prints more money between now and the election, I dunno what y’all would do to him in Iowa but we would treat him pretty ugly down in Texas. Printing more money to play politics at this particular time in American history is almost treasonous in my opinion.

Yes, as Talk Progress notes, treason is a capital offense. And there is no doubt what a bully means when he says someone should be treated "pretty ugly" in Texas. There you have the mindset of a man who could issue a death warrant for an innocent man and who would bring back the most brutal torture techniques he could get away with.

More death threats from religious folks

at Why Evolution Is True:

Yesterday Blair Scott, communications director for American Atheists, was on the FOX News show America Live with Megyn Kelly. You can see the show here; sadly, I can’t watch it in Russia.

As soon as Scott returned home after the show, his inbox began filling up with hate mail and threats. Equally distressing, the Fox News Facebook page was soon inundated with death threats aimed at Scott and atheists in general, comments that are being taken down rapidly (see the report by William Hamby in the Atlanta Examiner).

here is the screenshot of the FB comments:

 ahh the religion of peace

The Teen Suicide Epidemic in Michele Bachmann's District

110% absolutely guaranteed hetero 

Is Michelle Bachmann fomenting teen suicide ? Via Pharyngula:

Mother Jones: "The first was TJ. Then came Samantha, Aaron, Nick, and Kevin. Over the past two years, a total of nine teenagers have committed suicide in a Minnesota school district represented by Rep. Michele Bachmann—the latest in May—and many more students have attempted to take their lives. State public health officials have labeled the area a 'suicide contagion area' because of the unusually high death rate.

Some of the victims were gay, or perceived to be by their classmates, and many were reportedly bullied. And the anti-gay activists who are some of the congresswoman's closest allies stand accused of blocking an effective response to the crisis and fostering a climate of intolerance that allowed bullying to flourish. Bachmann, meanwhile, has been uncharacteristically silent on the tragic deaths that have roiled her district—including the high school that she attended.

Bachmann, who began her political career as an education activist, has described gay rights as an 'earthquake issue,' and she and her allies have made public schools the front lines of their fight against the 'homosexual agenda.' They have opposed efforts in the state to promote tolerance for gays and lesbians in the classroom, seeing such initiatives as a way of allowing gays to recruit impressionable youths into an unhealthy and un-Christian lifestyle."

Horrible people.

Norway Massacre: Anders Breivik’s Deadly Attack Fueled by Hatred of Women - The Daily Beast

Michelle Goldberg - The Daily Beast:

"Conservatives worried about the Islamization of Europe often blame feminism for weakening Western societies and opening them up to a Muslim demographic invasion. Mark Steyn’s bestselling America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It predicted the demise of “European races too self-absorbed to breed,” leading to the transformation of Europe into Eurabia. “In their bizarre prioritization of ‘a woman’s right to choose,’” he argued, “feminists have helped ensure that European women will end their days in a culture that doesn’t accord women the right to choose anything.”

This neat rhetorical trick—an attack on feminism coupled with purported concern about Muslim fundamentalist misogyny—is repeated again and again in Islamophobic literature. Now it’s reached its apogee in mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik’s 1,500-page manifesto, “2083: A European Declaration of Independence.” Rarely has the connection between sexual anxiety and right-wing nationalism been made quite so clear. Indeed, Breivik’s hatred of women rivals his hatred of Islam, and is intimately linked to it. Some reports have suggested that during his rampage on Utoya, he targeted the most beautiful girl first. This was about sex even more than religion."

"Nevertheless, the right clings to the idea that feminism is destroying Western societies from the inside, creating space for Islamism to take cover. This politics of emasculation gave shape to Breivik’s rage. Thus, while he pretends to abhor Muslim subjugation of women, he writes that the “fate of European civilisation depends on European men steadfastly resisting Politically Correct feminism.” When cultural conservatives seize control of Europe, he promises, “we will re-establish the patriarchal structures.” Eventually, women “conditioned” to this new order “will know her place in society.” His mad act was in the service of male superiority as well as Christian nationalism. Those two things, of course, almost always go together."

was he a Christian?

He was a much a Christian as most hard right conservatives, with a willingness to take direct action one of the only differences. from Sullivan:

What does "practice" Christianity mean? Are the only Christians church-goers? Do you have to go once? Or weekly? Is O'Reilly himself a Christian by his own definition? And, of course, the "Christian angle" did not just come from a cop. It came from the manifesto of the mass murderer himself. And here is the mass murderer's own definition of Christianity, also from yesterday's Dish:

"As this is a cultural war, our definition of being a Christian does not necessarily constitute that you are required to have a personal relationship with God or Jesus ... Being a Christian can mean many things; That you believe in and want to protect Europe's Christian cultural heritage. The European cultural heritage, our norms (moral codes and social structures included), our traditions and our modern political systems are based on Christianity – Protestantism, Catholicism, Orthodox Christianity and the legacy of the European enlightenment (reason is the primary source and legitimacy for authority). It is not required that you have a personal relationship with God or Jesus in order to fight for our Christian cultural heritage and the European way."

This, to point out the obvious, this is straight out of the Fox News playbook. It is orthodoxy in the current GOP. It is in no way more extreme than what Hannity and O'Reilly and Beck argue day after day after day. Indeed, the killer's obsession with the "war on Christmas" is less intense than Bill O'Reilly's. And here is O'Reilly's definition of Christianity in the same segment, a definition so close to Breivik's it could almost be the same person writing:

The second reason the liberal media is pushing the Christian angle is they don't like Christians very much because we are too judgmental. Many Christians oppose abortion. Gay marriage and legalized narcotics, secular left causes. The media understands the opposition is often based on religion. So they want to diminish Christianity and highlighting so-called Christian-based terror is a way to do that.

Notice that O'Reilly defines Christianity in entirely political terms related to the control of other people's lives and bodies. i.e. being judgmental in passing laws to restrict the freedoms of others for the greater good. It is straight out of the school of thought I described at length in "The Conservative Soul." In other words, O'Reilly's definition of Christianity is very close to Breivik's. Both are best understood as Christianists, who see Christianity primarily as a way to change or mold civil society and the lives of others for what they see as the greater good, but O'Reilly is a non-violent one who deplores violence, while Breivik takes his own rhetoric so seriously he felt obliged to destroy Norway's civil order in order to save it.
The difference is not in ideology, but in the move to violence. That move is, of course, a central, profound and vital one, and O'Reilly's views of the world are in no way responsible for what just happened in Norway. But it is hard to see where O'Reilly would disagree with vast tracts of Breivik's ideology - except the resort to violence. Ideologically, there is scarcely any difference at all.

The Oslo Terrorist's 'Counter-Jihad' Ideology

Charles Johnson: "The Oslo Terrorist's 'Counter-Jihad' Ideology":

Among people who truly believe this paranoid world view, is it any wonder that one of them finally took the next step?
Unlike Jared Loughner (the shooter of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords), with Anders Behring Breivik there’s no doubt whatsoever where he got the inspiration and the ideology that led inexorably to the horror in Oslo.
When Gabrielle Giffords and several others were shot, I was critical of the right wing blogs and Sarah Palin in particular, for encouraging a climate of violent rhetoric. But in the Norway atrocities, the responsibility is far more evident and direct.
People like Fjordman and Pamela Geller and the right wing blogosphere who spew apocalyptic rhetoric and refuse to denounce the extremists among them now have the very real blood of children on their hands.

Christian Terrorism

William Saletan on the hypocrisy among America's neo fascists:

Geller is outraged. "Attempts to link us to these murders on the basis of alleged postings by the murderer mentioning us are absurd and offensive," she writes. Breivik "is responsible for his actions. He and only he." She adds: "Watching CNN and BBC coverage about Norway, I found very disturbing to hear the number of times they use the word 'Christian.' They would never dare refer to religion when it is jihad, and this attack had nothing to do with Christianity."

Now you know how it feels, Ms. Geller. When the terrorist is a Christian—in his own words, a "Crusader" for "Christendom"—and when the preacher to whom he has been linked is you, you suddenly discover the injustice of group blame and guilt by association. The citations you didn't create, the intermediaries you didn't recognize, the transactions you didn't know about, the violent interpretations you didn't condone—these exonerating facts suddenly matter. And the hypocrisy doesn't end with Geller. It permeates the Republican presidential field. Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, and Newt Gingrich agree with Geller that no mosque should be built near Ground Zero. Herman Cain, in the style of George Wallace, just went to Murfreesboro, Tenn., to support local bigots who want to stop the construction of a mosque there. Rick Santorum told a Christian school audience: "The idea that the Crusades and the fight of Christendom against Islam is somehow an aggression on our part is absolutely anti-historical." And Michele Bachmann defended a congressional inquiry into Muslim violence by pointing out that recently,

Two of our soldiers were gunned down in Germany, and the fellow who shot them shouted "Allah Akhbar" before he did that. And just the week before that, we had a 20-year-old from Saudi Arabia, here on a student visa in Dallas, who had accumulated all of the chemicals necessary to create a bomb on the order of the Oklahoma City federal building bombing. … If we don't understand that there are Sharia-compliant terrorists in our midst … we will make ourselves more vulnerable.

Well, now we have a Crusade-compliant terrorist who has accumulated explosive chemicals, blown up a federal building with a bomb on the order of Oklahoma City, and gunned down scores of civilians. Don't hold your breath waiting for Bachmann or anyone else in Congress to investigate the Christian angle.

Death Threat for a Palin Critic | Mother Jones

"Responding to criticism she received after the January 8 Tucson shootings, Sarah Palin referred to death threats she and her children have received, suggesting that the Palin clan have been victims of heated political rhetoric. And an aide noted that the Palin team was consulting with security professionals. Andree McLeod, a prominent Palin critic in Alaska, could also use such help, for she has been publicly threatened with assassination—just for requesting, under Alaska's open records act, the work-related emails Palin sent and received while governor."

there will be blood

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' blood is on Sarah Palin's hands after putting cross hair over district

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' blood is on Sarah Palin's hands after putting cross hair over district: "Here is what Sarah Palin said on the Facebook page where she depicted Gabrielle Giffords in the cross hairs of a rifle scope: 'Don't retreat! Instead - RELOAD!'

Well, the guy who shot Giffords yesterday managed to keep firing until he killed six, including a child, and wounded 13 .

Palin would no doubt say that she was only speaking in metaphor, that she only meant her followers should work to unseat Giffords and 19 other Democrats who had roused her ire by voting for health care.

But anyone with any sense at all knows that violent language can incite actual violence, that metaphor can incite murder. At the very least, Palin added to a climate of violence."

Palin put a bullseye her political future and a loon pulled the trigger.

religion poisons Mel Gibson

By Christopher Hitchens - Slate Magazine:

This is extraordinary. We live in a culture where the terms fascistand racist are thrown about, if anything, too easily and too frequently. Yet here is a man whose every word and deed is easily explicable once you know the single essential thing about him: He is a member of a fascist splinter group that believes it is the salvation of the Catholic Church.....

..........."Yet I still saw a report the other day about a fan site where the members were just beginning to ask, 'What's with him?' Why is there this reluctance to call something by its right name? It's not as if Gibson was issuing a cry for help. On the contrary, what he is issuing is the distilled violence, cruelty, and bigotry—and sexual hypocrisy—that stretches from the Crusades through the Inquisition to the 'concordats' between the church and Hitler and Mussolini. Yet he's still reporting for work. When will Hollywood, and the wider society, finally decide to shun and spurn him utterly, both for what he is and for what he represents?"

Hitler was a Christian

Hitler's religious beliefs and fanaticism:

My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, God's truth! was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders. How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison. To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow myself to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice... And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows. For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people.

-Adolf Hitler, in a speech on 12 April 1922 (Norman H. Baynes, ed. The Speeches of Adolf Hitler, April 1922-August 1939, Vol. 1 of 2, pp. 19-20, Oxford University Press, 1942)"

Miss Beverly Hills Lauren Ashley: God wants gays "put to death"

Christian beauty queen wants to kill gay people.

Feministing:

"'The Bible says that marriage is between a man and a woman,' Ashley told FOX News. 'In Leviticus it says, 'If man lies with mankind as he would lie with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death and their blood shall be upon them.' The Bible is pretty black and white."

Someone ship this nazi to Uganda.