I just watched the video, and while I agree it's very scary, I question some of the statistics. The rate of Christianity in China is growing at 1% every year (that's a LOT of people). I read numerous studies that suggested in 20 years, China will be overwhelmingly Christian.

There IS a crisis in Europe though... I am eagerly awaiting the parlimentary elections in Holland. If Geert Wilders (maker of the movie "Fitna") wins the election, we may see a major reversal in Dutch immigration. He wants to COMPLETELY CLOSE the immigration boarders in Holland. He wants to outlaw baruqas in all publicly subsidized situations (schools, etc)...

I hope the guy wins...

Europe is definitely experiencing a crisis and some countries are beginning to elect more conservative leaders. For instance, in Switzerland, they just passed a law to ban minarets.  Minarets are a common feature on mosques.  That being said, if Europenas don't start having more kids - fast - it doesn't really matter. 

Yeah, Holland is in the process of passing that as well. Scary stuff...

so conservatism is equated to reducing religious freedom; yikes

If you're referring to the ban on minarets, I'm not sure why you would consider that "conservatism." I consider it a populist-inspired panic move, one that was ill-considered and will have little effect on the overall problem.  Instead of restricting the specific brand of Wahabi Islam and Muslim immigration the Swiss passed a boneheaded ban on architecture. 

That being said, I do not believe all restrictions on religious liberty are inherently bad. We wouldn't allow human sacrifice in this country in the name of "religious freedom" and there are several restrictions on animal sacrifices as well.  Restricting Wahabi Islam makes sense. It is this sect of Islam that preaches and promotes jihad, the kind where Muslims decide to fly planes into buildings and blow themselves up in the middle of crowded malls and train stations.  Europe and America would do well to severely restrict Mosques, imams and organizations that are Wahabi. 

Why?  Because I read what you said about it: Europe is definitely experiencing a crisis and some countries are beginning to elect more conservative leaders. For instance, in Switzerland, they just passed a law to ban minarets.

and: severely restrict Mosques....Wahabi

that sounds reactionary as well; fortunately, most of the conservatives I know don't think like you

Ha! You're right, poor choice of words on my part.  Reactionary works much better. I'm not sure why I wrote it that way.  It hink I was trying to say the leaders who passed those laws were "more conservative" but not necessarily "conservative," at least, how we would understand that term.  Definitely wrote that out poorly. 

As for severely restricting Wahabi Muslims and ideology, it is not my idea, it is Steyn's.  He discusses it at length in his bestselling book and I agree with him 100%. 

I am not sure, though, why anyone would want to admit people into our country who openly admit they want to kill us.  Doesn't make sense. If that's reactionary put me down as, uh, a reactionist? Reactionaryist? Someone who is reactionary?

As a policeman, how do you intend to enforce the law?  Do you arrest someone who is overheard saying, "I am going to kill John Doe" while not in the presence of John Doe?

If you can enact a law that expires before it can get to the Supreme Court, btw, you could do it, but it wouldn't last very long and the lawmakers would likely fail any re-election bids.  See John Adams era Federalists' Alien and Sedition Acts.

Also, a constitutional conservative's blog:

http://www.rightcommentary.com/2009/11/a-global-war-on-islam/

We need to put everything into perspective. Does anyone have a problem with over a billion Hindus populating? No, not at all... it's a fascinating and rich cultural religion. Does anyone have any problem with Buddhists, or Jewish, or anyone else spreading their religion? No, of course not.

Honestly, I don't have a problem with Islam either in it's cultural sense, or it's religious sense. It should go without saying, but there are many Muslims who we would consider "normal" to our western views. These are people who live just like us, have children, send them off to college, and they become doctors, lawyers, police officers, etc...

However, these are not the people having 8 children...

The families responsible for having 8 children are the more radical Islamic groups. They create as many children as they possibly can for the sole purpose of spreading the religion... out of fenaticism. They don't really "care" per-se about the children over and above what their personal goal is to just spread the religion. These children almost all grow up in radical households, who then become radicals themselves. They are often poor, and end up forming a lot of the slums that exist in Europe.

The historical culture of Islam is rich, and it's a fascinating one. There are many historical and technological developments that society owes to the Muslims.

The sad thing is... there are metropolis cities that are totally Islam, and they are just like us, but they are often repressed themselves. Even Iran has large cities where young adults, wear jeans, talk on their cell phone, surf the internet, and do all the same things we do, but their ideological rulers take advantage of a majority poor area and force the radical Islamic message on them.

This is what we have to stop... radical Islam. It's not good for anyone... it's not good for Muslims, and it's certainly not good for the rest of the world. Islam shares many of the same pieces of the bible as the Jews and the Christians do. I'm somewhat unfamiliar with it, but I believe they also revere Elijah, and the majority of the Old Testament.

Todd,

The Quranic (sp?) position on the OT is that the original Jewish Bible was corrupted and the Quran includes the corrected version.  How do you propose going about stopping radical Islam?

Well, for one, I do not agree the Jewish bible was corrupted.

As far as resolving radical Islam. I think what's needed is encouragement from within the ranks of Muslims who do NOT support radical Islam. This isn't a cop-out, but I don't think there's one single answer, but perhaps many solutions which must all be implemented.

First and foremost, I think we need to eliminate political correctness. A Jihadist is a jihadist. We need to re-affirm our commitment to fighting "terrorism". At the same time, we need to encourage talks, peace agreements, etc... with peaceful Muslim countries, but continue the fight against radical Islam in lawless areas of the world. Political correctness is often a means to ignore and suppress truth in fear of upsetting a small minority.

Who's losing their lives in this radical Islamist agenda? Muslims. Certainly the allied forces are losing their lives, but the numbers (although just as important) are small compared to the number of Muslim people who die every year because they don't agree with the radical agenda. This includes everything from Honor killings to mass genocide.

There's no simple answer, but perhaps a combination of several solutions that need to be addressed simultaneously to combat this growing fenaticism.

It's interesting that first use of the political correctness term was by the Supreme Court according to wikipedia and that it's sometimes used by the left and sometimes by the right.  Wikipedia now attributes it to the right in reference to the culture wars.

You haven't said anything that I have issue with, Todd and i think it's a good point that the casualties are mostly amongst Muslims.  It's a shame that can't get out from under the oppression.  Whether the Army major would have met the definition of a radical or jihadist before his killing spree is an interesting but probably futile debate.  It seems the Army did not exercise options open to them and one wonders especially why he was promoted ahead of his peers.  What were his peers like and how do they feel about it now? 

Call it pc, but there are a lot of groups that would not get promoted simply because their dialect of English isn't a strong as those who grew up speaking something close to the Standard American English used on advancement tests as seen on the SATs for example.  The military is one place that tries to make adjustments for this disparity and sometimes tough calls get made that are later considered mistakes.  Sotomayor sure came down on the wrong side on that debate.

It would be interesting to consider ways to confront political correctness.  How, when, etc.  The writing format for my masters program is in accordance with the American Psychologist Association's guidlines for publication.  The publication manual has a chapter on writing clearly and concisely.  In that chapter is a section about reducting bias by topic.  It discusses gender, sexual orientation (not sexual preference), race and ethnic identity, disabilities, age, and historic and interpretive inaccuracies.  I hate it when I'm referred to as Anglo instead of White because I'm not Anglo-Saxon so i can see some logic in being clear and concise.

As always I'd have to refer back to the Constitution.  Free speech, free press, right to peaceably assemble, right to bear arms, due process, equal protection, due process for non-citizens (but a military tribunal qualifies in accordance with SCOTUS guidelines).  So PC is free speech and non-PC is free speech, too.  As a conservative myself, it appears to me that the left makes issues when it serves their agenda.  Maybe the left thinks the right does that, too, but personally I don't see it.

And, I agree. Sound scholarship shows that the Judeo-Christian concept of the Bible is pretty sound.

Thanks for clarifying.

It's also important to note that restricting Wahabi Islam can be done in several different ways.  For instance, we obviously cannot simply ban the religion or bar its adherents from entering this country.  However desirable this would seem on paper it is not constitutional, as C pointed out.  That's not what Steyn advocates.

What we can do, however, and what Steyn suggests, is severely restrict the funding it receives from foreign sources.  We already do this with religious organizations sponsored by Iran as last month's raids reminded us.  So it's not a question of being unconstitutional. 

Saudis bankroll these tyes of Mosques across our country.  These Mosques then become recruiting centers for jihadists.  It's not a coincidence that Hasan had ties to the same Mosque in Virginia that many other terrorists have had ties to. 

Take a look at the Sharia Law requirements regarding investments and where the payments on a "no interest" loan go to.  You are onto something there.

Well, again, I wish I could take credit for it but it is Steyn's idea.  It really is an amazing book.  It converted me from a paleoconservative with hawkish tendencies to a full-fledged neoconservative on foreign policy.  Indeed, I read it twice in a row, something I rarely do with books.

Yeah, I know in the Koran it basically states that banks (or people) are not allowed to charge "interest" on a loan. However, they get around that though... it's not as noble as people make it sound. The banks charge a lending "fee".

I think of myself as a TRUE conservative, and I'm serious about this. I want to conserve the environment, I want to conserve heritage and culture. I don't want to see cultures whiped out... that goes for Native American Indians, to the Aboriginies. Europe has such a diverse culture, and they're quickly becoming one nation with little, if any culture. The Jihadist would prefer to see the entire world look like down-town Bahgdad. Which of course, has it's own culture too, which should be preserved, but I don't want to see Europe turned into it...