Jim

We all need that little voice in our head that keeps us from making an ass out of ourselves; still, policy by a government or a discussion board which chills free expression on perhaps the most important issue of our day, is not necessarily healthy.

Yes, but your job was to squelch what someone said. That raises issues of free expression by its very nature. Maybe it's justified in some cases but I do not believe so here. Two strawmen in a row, at least w.r.t. my p.o.v. Well, you might start with the actual arguments I've made rather than a characterization of "judging all of Islam based on the radicals." I was sorry to see my answer to the "gang" question didn't make it over here. I would have liked to have had answers to that hypothetical. My point has been that in large part we have a meaningless debate over semantics when we say the problem is, or is not, Islam. What the heck does this even mean? If I had my druthers, we'd have a much more secular world. I'm willing to tolerate religious beliefs so long as the members of the various faiths keep it from landing in the form of a bomb in my lap. Here we have a religion that was founded and expanded through mliitary conquest, has historically not been an advocate of the separation of church and state, speaks of "infidels" and "jihads" and, at least in Britain (kind of funny how that poll isn't mentioned much in this discussion), the present day attitude does not respect liberal western democatic traditions as much as other groups. When you say a problem is, or is not, with the religion, how is that analyzed? I don't think we're limited to the actual words of the founder, although that is not entirely comforting in this case. I think we can look to what the founder actually did when he was alive and what has happened since then with respect to the traditions on which this species is, or is not, going to survive. So the policy is what again? I appreciate your doing so. I think this is a very important issue in terms of the value I derive from this board. I need to know where the lines are with respect to what can and cannot be said about Islam.

Heh, yeah, Colmes just doesn't have the horsepower to compete. Mathews continually stacks the deck on his shows. IMO, he's less obvious than Hanity but no less of an advocate. I wouldn't vote for Buchanan either but I think his latest efforts on illegal immigration are a great service to the country.

You were asked to leave???

All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men and women do nothing. That said, if they will not let me say what I believe, I would leave. I'm searching here for the line they have drawn with you because I do not understand it at all. I hate to see you leave but I do not blame you at all at this point. I know you said not to defend you, but that is not my nature. Court's deplore the chilling self-censorship effects of vague prior restraints of speech. This is not a free speech area because it is controlled not by the government but by private individuals somehow convinced that they can have liability for allowing free expression. However, the value of this forum is directly related to the free speech allowed even as I appreciate the high-tone that is often insisted upon. Sev, you are a prince. Here's some salt. Why don't you find some more wounds to rub it in? Bettina is offensive? I respect your intellect but irony is completely lost on you.

Well and timely said, Miss Kelly.

I thought I would leave once but only because of what I perceived as a censorship of ideas. That is the most offensive thing that can happen on this board and your leaving over Bettina expressing her opinions is an attempt to muzzle opposing points of view. You may even succeed. We'll see.

Sounds like a results oriented philosophy. We are afraid of the 1.6 billion Muslims so, for god's sake, let's not be critical. Maybe it will take a few Bill Cosby type Muslims who have the courage to address the problems. In the mean time, our self censorship is going to keep us from winning any war of ideas. Yes, I think we can all agree that we should not sacrifice our ideals, our traditions of dissent, free expression or our belief in the separation of church and state. I think I'll throw in here a healthy respect for the truth. When we sacrifice that, we lose quite a bit of ourselves. I think this discussion should be open, not in private between "Admins." We all have a stake in this community and if this topic is going to be censored, we all need to know.

One reason why we don't think of abortion as a moral question is that the US Supreme Court has taken the subject away from the democratic process.

If someone says, "I believe in the absolute sanctity of human life without any qualification whatsoever," then obviously they really can't have a reasoned position in support of war or the death penalty. OTOH, if someone merely says human life is precious, we should err on the side of protecting human life, even that human life is sacred to their God, it is a strawman to morph those statements into "human life can never be taken under any circumstances." If someone says that human life is precious but that they also support a war, then obviously they do not believe in an absolute value. I think there is a liberal strawman going on here which seeks to dismiss conservative thought as hypocrisy. Not that this doesn't happen from the other side, but there is an all too easy tempation shared by Hanity and his ilk to villify first and listen later. Incidentally, do you think that Colmes and Chris Mathews are lowbrow demagogues?

I don't think such people really believe in the absolute sanctity of life. I wouldn't call them hypocritical just imprecise in their language. It would be helpful if we had an example of a credible pro-life advocate who spoke in such terms.

By definition, someone who is both pro-life and pro-death penalty does not believe in the absolute sanctity of human life.

The question was meant to be a bit rhetorical. I can never understand those who say it is somehow hypocritical to want to protect innocent human life and, at the same time, want to punish those adjudicated of committing heinous crimes to death. This is apples and orangutans. I do not agree with the prolife position but it seems perfectly consistent to be prolife and pro-death penalty.

I'll go out on a limb and say you can also be prolife and pro-death penality.

If it is hypocritical to be pro-life while favoring the death penalty is it likewise hypocritical to be pro choice while disfavoring the death penalty?

I moved my office to the outskirts of my residential neighborhood so I don't have to drive downtown every day. Do I get credit even if my motivation was to save time and money?

I like George S. He seems completely fair even if I disagree with him sometimes. I've never forgiven George W for coining the term the "wimp factor" to describe George H.

I don't speak any other languages so I'm impressed beyond measure that you can more than hold your own. I genuinely want to read what you write but my eyes just slide right over the words without punctuation. I'm not trying to make you comform but it is very likely that I won't go back and forth with you in an exchange in this mode. No hard feelings but I don't particuarly feel like comforming either. I'm not threatened anymore than I would be by someone who wrote posts in pig-latin. However, if you want to open my narrow Okie mind, I'd much rather you recommend a good author. Hold on.... ack, I just see you punctuated! I read the substance of that post so easily that I didn't notice the form.

Whoops! Sorry... er, Bud.

Here's something new: Pfft! Just kidding.

Pangloss, I'm not speculating. I was only saying that we can't make judgments based on numbers of rocket attacks compared to zero. That is really a meaningless point. Yes, once war broke out, rocket attacks were up. Way up. Big suprise. Bull, if you don't think terrorists like Hezbollah hide amongst civilians, I really don't think I"m going to convince you of anything.