Asymmetrical Information

Abusing the holy books, statues, or other religious paraphenelia of your opponents is what crusaders do.

Even if you aren't disgusted by American soldiers abusing other people's religious objects--after we went to all that trouble amending our constitution to prevent soldiers from doing similar things to our faith ...

While I support the larger argument you posited, the two bits of supporting "evidence" cited above are rather lame ... especially for the quality of argument I've become used to seeing here.

Perhaps it is time for us to quit pretending that these charges are important and ask the question that needs to be asked – what is so incredibly f***ed up with their culture that they can exert more outrage over five alleged incidents of a book being abused than they do over the fact that people are being murdered in the name of their faith?

What astounds me is the lack of historical perspective, usually accompanied by a need to portray this Administration as the worst in American history. Yes, in all likelihood, defacing or abusing Islam's holy book is a very stupid thing to do, although that can only be evaluated in light of what, if any, useful information was gained by doing so. I strongly suspect that such tactics are not useful.

However, to claim that the treatment of captured in this war has been unusually brutal, by American standards, is simply laughable. The desire to view WWII through a fuzzy, glowing, lens has nearly erased for many any knowledge of the exceedingly brutal reality of that conflict, particularly in the Pacific Theater, where a deliberate propaganda campaign designed to attribute the most vile qualities imaginable to the Japanese encouraged such brutality. It should be noted, however, that any propaganda from the era has a hard time matching what the Japanese actually did. The point is that many captured Japanese would have been quite glad to have their mistreatment limited to the abuse of inanimate objects, no matter how revered.

The European Theater, although certainly less harsh in the treatment of captured than the Pacific, also had insatnces of brutality which far exceeded anything that has happened in this conflict. Some American units, after hearing of German atrocities, temporarily adopted a take-no-prisoners policy, and summarily executed Germans who surrendered. No, the Americans didn't come even vaguely close to the behavior of the Soviet Army, but those who think that the Americans in the European Theater were less brutal in the treatment of prisoners that has been experienced in this war are sadly mistaken. The same could be said for the Korean and Viet Nam conflicts as well.

As for the Gitmo prisoners being held without charges as being proof of Bush's uniquely dictatorial approach in a time of war, lemme know when he has U.S. citizens brought before military tribunals and sentenced to death, followed by quitely informing the Supreme Court that the executions will carried out no matter how the Court rules on the appeal, and suggesting to the Court that it best consider it's future legitimacy when considering the appeal. Who did that? Why none other than the lionized, sanitized, FDR. This isn't an argument that FDR was not a great President; in my estimation he was. It merely suggests that war is, indeed, as Sherman asserted, cruelty that cannot be refined, no matter who is President. If one wants to denounce the wrongdoings of this war, or this war itself, or this President, fine. Denounce away. Just don't pretend that there is anything historically unusual about what has happened in this war.

"Umm, because we're not fighting a religious war here." Really? Are you absolutely sure? From Mecca to you, courtesy of Memri.org we have:

Friday Sermons in Saudi Mosques: Review and Analysis
Part I - 'The Christians and the Jews are "Infidels," "Enemies of Allah"'

Part II - 'Jews - The Descendants of Pigs and Apes'

Part III - 'It is Impossible to Make Peace With the Jews'

Part IV - 'Muslims Must Educate Their Children to Jihad… and to Hatred of Jews and Christians'

Part V - 'The Palestinian Struggle Must be An Islamic Jihad'

Part VI - 'Muslim Women's Rights are a Western Ploy to Destroy Islam'

You may want to believe that we are not fighting a religious war, but the Arab Muslim world sure thinks that's what's going on. BTW, the sermons above are from summer of 2002. There are a lot more recent ones in the same vein.

So if war is a cruelty that cannot be refined, then we have no beef with Saddam over the gassing and massacring and stuff, I take it? Also the torture. Iraq was indisputably at war.

Apparently, Jim, you are illiterate, and thus were unable to comprehend where I clearly stated that such actions were legitimate targets of denunciation.

On reflection, I apologize for the hostile tone, but it's damned frustrating when people refuse to read what one actually wrote.

Jane - I guess it's all a question of how you define "big deal". I have no qualms with our insisting US prisoners be treated humanely -- far more humanely than any other nation would treat its prisoners. So, if by "big deal" we mean we should take seriously any improper treatment (as in, the guards responsible should be appropriately punished), I've got no problems with such a policy. If, on the other hand, "big deal" means we need to treat an abuse of a Koran as something significantly more serious than jay walking, than I've got real problems with that policy. It's NOT a huge deal! (The Saudi government destroys "unauthorized versions" of the Koran on an almost daily basis as it enforces its religious laws.) Treating the kicking of a book as a near capital offense is wrong. We need some sort of rational proportionality between the "act" and our reaction. The press' reaction to the abuses at Gitmo plainly fails that test.

That does not make kicking a Koran the right thing to do. But in the scope of human wrongs, this is closer to forgetting to say "please" and "thank you" than it is to anything more serious than that. We have treated the Gitmo detainees with far more respect and courtesy than we show each other on the subway.

Overreacting the way we have is a lot like crying "wolf": it lessens our ability to properly react when something serious does go wrong. It also gives our enemies in this war far too much power over how we fight the war.

Will, rereading what you write, I confess to not glossing "one wants to denounce the wrongdoings of this war, or this war itself, or this President, fine" as "such actions [a]re legitimate targets of denunciation." It seemed to more accurately translate as "Knock yourselves out, you naive fools."

I'm happy to take correction on your actual meaning. But your and my exchange aside, there's been an awful lot of adversion to Sherman et al in comment threads like this one by people who fully intend to excuse any atrocities or abuses the US commits because "it's war." (I don't consider "Koran tinkling" to be an atrocity, BTW, just damned counterproductive to our stated aims.) These are not people making a "We're not as bad as Saddam - or Godwin" argument, but rather a "War is hell" one. Thing is, if "War is hell" excuses anything, then we've got no principled case to make against Saddam or the Janjawid or your villain of choice. If "War is hell" excuses whatever WE happen to do, while somehow yet leaving us with standing to judge the atrocities and abuses of others, well, how convenient.

Is it just me or is the rewritten post just as confusing as the first?

Jim, if you wished to interpret my statement as something other than an acknowledgement that these were legitimate targets of denunciation, well, that was your perogative, but it is contrary to the plain meaning of words. The larger point I was making was that it is a disservice to history to misrepresent the past to simply score rhetorical points today. If one wants to make a point about today's events, one should not be dishonest (which is NOT what I think Jane was doing) about yesterday's. If George Bush is a worse President than FDR, and just about any other wartime President, that may be a fact, but it sure isn't a fact due to how the captured have been treated

I believe the post conflates the actions of a few guards with the policy and intent of the administration.

This reflects a dichotomy that has been becoming more clear to me - the left objects to the strategy of the right because the tactics of the right are not perfectly executed, while presenting as an alternative neither a workable strategy nor reasonable tactics.

It might be helpful to consider our reaction if the shoe were on the other foot. How would the public react if we heard that a modern day John McCain, being held as a POW (a step higher than the non-affiliated irregulars at Gitmo) had his bible flushed down the toilet. I doubt that our modern day hero would even so much as whine about it. We wouldn't acknowledge it, and just point out that under the Geneva Convention (our soldiers wear uniforms for a reason), they're entitled to a PDA with a bible on its flash card or something.

It's not so much that we have a war on Islam going. We have a bunch of children waging war against us. When minor things like this happen, we should just say, "sorry about that, but you children need to grow up and get over yourselves and stop sending airplanes into our buildings and setting off IUDs under our vehicles". I still think the best war we could wage against them would be to send Britney Spears to corrupt their youth and Larry Flynt to jumpstart their publishing industry. Maybe throw in Dr Laura and Jerry Springer for good measure.

Unlike WWII, the WoT is a battle for hearts and minds -- and will be a heck of a lot easier if most of the one billion Muslims are on our side against their own extremists.

If "War is hell" excuses whatever WE happen to do, while somehow yet leaving us with standing to judge the atrocities and abuses of others, well, how convenient.

Considering human existence itself is not a perfected enterprise, it will be even less possible to achieve perfection under distorting and undesirable circumstances (such as war). Using this as an argument against being able to make any moral distinctions about acts committed during a war, however, is moral relativism at its very worst. Especially when the degree of atrocities brought under discussion are so disparate as abused literature and a scattered number of credible torture allegations perpetrated against enemy combatant detainees on one hand, and mass graves and child prisons on the other.

Why is the whole Koran abuse thing front page news? Yeah, it's not a nice thing to do. And it shouldn't be official policy. But he incidents sound like they should be in a list of naughty things done by US soldiers, like drinking too much or stealing uniforms or something equally minor. Anyone who is inflamed to the point of murderous violence by these minor incidents of Koran abuse needs to be flushed out and killed anyway. I don't want anyone who would consider these incidents as any sort of justification for jihad, holy war, bombing, terror, etc... to be living. They are obviously dangerously insane.

Most of the critics of the reporting of these incidents that I've read have been critical of the magnitude of the reporting on this minor incident as opposed to all of the things going on in Iraq and Afghanistan that are much more significant that don't get reported, like any good news.

Bolie IV

Is Jane drunk, or did someone hack into this site?

I agree with the commenter who said we are giving these people way too much power over how we conduct our war. The arab culture is a culture that respects power and despises weakness. And here we are falling over ourselves in lamentations about whether we despoiled their holy book, when they are flying airplanes full of our innocent fellow citizens into our skyscrapers. They can saw off the heads of our citizens, and we are supposed to fight by Marquis of Queensbury rules, approved by the U.N., and we literally are not even allowed to *touch* their holy book without being responsible for their riots? What kind of bull**** is that? Why in the world SHOULD they respect us?

I don't think we will ever win their hearts and minds. They are in my opinion, broadly speaking, a largely illiterate, backward people with a few hundred years of cultural evolution ahead of them before they are ready to conduct themselves in a way that merits our consideration regarding things like their holy books, which, face it, are largely nonsense -- a bunch of superstitious, aggressive, violent medieval babble. So while it isn't in our interest to purposefully alienate them, neither, in my opinion, is there a iota of a chance that by giving a damn about things like these koran abuses are we going to win them over or make any progress.

I believe we are competing peoples in a life-and-death struggle for cultural survival. In a world of satellite t.v., movies, and internet, both of our cultures cannot survive. Our cultures are too different and isolation is not a realistic possibility any more. Ours is the superior culture in every way -- human rights, economic prosperity, technological advance, military advantage, and dignity of the individual. I wish we'd quit apologizing for it.

Why, then, are we allies with Pakistan and Saudi Arabia?

You're right, fling, let's nuke those ragheads 'til they glow.

There is one legitimate reason to deplore such things as Koran-kicking, and fling93 pointed it out. We've got a better chance of accomplishing our goals if we respect the Muslim religion, within reasonable limits. Allowing people fighting us to use mosques as a refuge or safe armory is not reasonable; respecting the Koran and allowing Muslim prisoners to pray according to their religion is. Nor is maltreating a holy book likely to be anything but counterproductive to interrogations.

However, these incidents are trivial even if true. No one reasonable could see such a few incidents as reflecting official policy; rather, we've got a few soldiers that aren't following policy, and need some company punishment. You get some out of control soldiers in every war, and usually they're looting, raping, and murdering - if we've managed to limit the worst of them to kicking a book or forming a human pyramid of naked prisoners, the Army is maintaining remarkable discipline.

Shooting prisoners, or enemy who are trying to surrender, is a somewhat different matter. As I read the Geneva Conventions, troops are not actually obligated to let the enemy surrender, but can't accept a surrender and then shoot the prisoners. (Not that the Conventions apply to an enemy out of uniform and without a command structure, let alone one that saws off prisoners' heads.) In WWII, German soldiers often surrendered en-masse, but mixed in among them would be Nazi fanatics who'd come out shooting. So our troops sometimes shot down men attempting to surrender rather than take a chance. Apparently the terrorists in Iraq are giving our troops a similar problem with making sure surrenders are genuine - and once again, the only safe way of handling it is to shoot them unless they make it clear that they're disarmed and giving up. Also, soldiers in combat can stress out to where they are likely to shoot anything that startles them or looks wrong, and might even accidentally shoot their buddies. Our guys aren't that far gone, but there have been incidents where apparently a prisoner didn't look like a safely-secured prisoner to some nervous American soldier. Too bad, but it doesn't compare to a policy of sawing off prisoner's heads.

I don't advocate serious torture (which Abu Ghraib didn't quite approach even at the worst) or massacring the enemy for two reasons. One is that doing such things demeans ourselves. Second, I don't think we could do it effectively. Genghis Khan ruled a vast empire by terror, but he was willing to massacre millions and leave no survivors. We haven't been willing to massacre even hundreds since the Indian wars petered out, and we can't effectively rule by terror. We have in the past been able to win over enemies by being a little bit nicer than them while still winning, and this seems a better bet than following a course that ultimately requires either killing all the Arabs or harshly ruling an empire of terrified subjects.

Superstition. Period.

I believe the post conflates the actions of a few guards with the policy and intent of the administration.

So Dubya didn't call this his "crusade", Air Force Academy is not forcing a particular brand of Christianity down trainees' throats, USMC website happily features a tank in Iraq called "New Testament" and Ganzales & Yoo & Rumsfeld didn't give the Geneva Convention the bird?

Without tapping a reservoir of anti-arab racism (mostly with nods and winks despite the overt stuff noted above), the administration couldn't have sold the Iraq occupation or regained office in 2004.

American theocracy complaining about Islamic theocracy? Give us a break.

Come one, come all...to the great ammunition sale to Osama and his friends. This isn't the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, Korea or even Vietnam we're involved in now. It is an asymmetric war where actions like the ones in Gitmo and Abu Ghraib tend to lend credence to the most extreme claims of our enemies concerning what America thinks of their culture and religion. When they do these things the claims of Bin Laden that America wants to destroy Islam don't seem as outlandish as they ought to seem. Al Quaida has learned the value of propaganda and just what to say to the Muslim public to make their "case" and abuses in Abu Ghraib and Gitmo are the seeds of truth planted to grow a big lie. The people who provide those seeds are helping the enemy, not us. Those who don't understand it are simply those who are incapable of stepping out of their own cultural cocoon even in their imagination to try and understand the viewpoint of people with a different background than themselves. Frankly, I agree that riots were an over-reaction so extreme that it's difficult to comprehend. I don't particularly care for much of what I see in the prevailing Muslim view of the world. But that doesn't mean that I think that the people in the military and intelligence services who must deal with their culture and worldview shouldn't be capable of allowing for it in every action they take and discussion they have.

So Dubya didn't call this his "crusade", Air Force Academy is not forcing a particular brand of Christianity down trainees' throats, USMC website happily features a tank in Iraq called "New Testament" and Ganzales & Yoo & Rumsfeld didn't give the Geneva Convention the bird?

Yes. For example, people who insist that the Geneva Convention be applied even to fighters who endanger civilians by targeting them, faking surrender, refusing to fight in uniform, and so on, are "giving the Geneva Convention the bird" in a true sense, unlike the Bush Administration. They are willfully and dangerously risking the lives of civilians and ensuring that more innocent civilians will die. People that that disgust me; some of them, of course, are merely misguided and don't understand simple game theory. Hurray for people who save civilian lives by correctly noting that one must not endanger civilians in order to get Geneva Convention protections.

So Jim, tell us... Would we have to appease their stupid, backward, sexist sensitivities and not allow, for example, women soldiers to interrogate them, or not allow unveiled women soldiers to bring them food or drink? If we're all going to live on one planet, at some point that kind of crap, under the auspices of "culture" or "religion" has to stop. The sooner it stops, the sooner those people will be free to live their own lives, enjoy the modern world, trade with us instead of fight with us, etc.

Alandownunder... There isn't a single statement or sentiment above that is racist. Is there a lack of respect for their religion and culture as predominantly practiced in that part of the world today? Yeah. But that's not racism and you ought to be more careful leveling that charge.

Folks, I don't excuse any arabic atrocity any more than I excuse any US one. But I like to think that the US ones are more amenable to fruitful debate than arabic ones - as Jane obviously thought when she penned her post. Even so, I've posted on Al Jazeera against Islamic theocracy in much the same terms I'm posting here about US theocracy.

Brad - I'm perfectly happy to substitute "extreme disrespect for religion and culture" for "racism". - especially when that disrespect's manifestations affect a whole nation's population in much as broad-brush a way as racism affects a whole ethnic group. I see little practical distinction, but I'm happy to be PC about it if it makes you feel better.

I would strongly maintain that the US religious right as pervasively exemplified from President all the way down to grunts and military prison guards is neither Christian nor conservative. As such, it is waging a unilateral war on Iraq instead of a multilateral police effort against Islamic terrorists.

The Iraq quagmire and the 2004 US election result depended on the cancer in the US body politic that is the religious right. It is that cancer which pretty much guarantees the failure of any US attempt at invasive democratisation. How is an apparent theocracy ever going to be able to inculcate democracy?

Alan is apparently ignorant of the definition of "theocracy".

... and Will of the definition of "apparent". The US ain't there just because the President says he's an instrument of God's will.

To quote Alan...

"American theocracy complaining about Islamic theocracy?"

Alan, words have meanings. You may wish to contemplate this.

It's the theocracy where nobody has to go to church and you can't have religious scenes on public property. When I go to the beach on Sunday I'll be quaking in fear of the morality police, or getting sunburned or something.

It appears we should add "unilateral" and "quagmire" to Alan's list of vocabulary-building exercises. Of course, it could simply be an Australian thing.

And the ultimate irony: "I like to think that the US ones are more amenable to fruitful debate than arabic ones."

Precisely.

The US is hardly a theocracy as others have mentioned. We have Christians, Jews, Muslims, Wiccans, Atheists, Unitarians, Mormons, and people who follow many other religions (historical and modern new age made up). They generally practice their religion (or not) free of harrasment. In Muslim countries, practicing other religions can get you killed. In Muslim countries, practicing no religion can get you killed. If you're a woman, getting raped can get you killed in Muslim countries.

I strongly disrespect the religion and culture as practiced in the Middle East. I'm not sure how well they accurately represent Islam or Arab culture, but whatever they are doing, I condemn as evil and inhuman. The people who live that way can't be allowed to continue.

While I would like to see any US soldier (or citizen, for that matter) who tortures prisoners (or anyone for that matter) punished, I do not want to even talk about that in the same conversation as I talk about the atrocities committed by terrorists.

As civilized humans, we have rules for how we behave. These rules include respecting other people and their beliefs. However, these are our rules and we should apply them consistently. If the Arab/Muslim extremists are unhappy with something that is not against our rules, we should not just change our rule to make them happy. We can consider their complaint and decided whether or not we should change our rules based on our own morality or ethics, but we should not just jump at the demands of other cultures, especially cultures that oppress women, kill apostates, kill women who "dishonor" their families, kill children and civilians in militarily useless attacks, etc... The culture that does all of these things is not worthy of respect and is not worthy of toleration.

I don't care what color your skin is or where your ancestors came from. I do care how you act. And if you are part of the insane Arab/Muslim culture that does the things I've listed above, I do not respect your beliefs nor do I have any interest in accomodating them at all. That applies even if you are not an Arab or even not a Muslim.

I know Muslims and I know Arabs. As far as I know, they are not murderers or terrorists. And I have no problem with them. I don't assume that all Muslims or all Arabs are insane or evil, even of a large number seem to be.

The fact that almost 50% of the country voted for John Kerry is a sign of a deeply ill-informed and ignorant population that has difficulty with rational thinking. Bush is not a great man or even a great President. But John Kerry would have been far worse for this country.

I should make this a blog post.

Alan, whatever this bogeyman you call the "religious right" is, and whatever its failings might be, there is a marked difference between, say, a ruler who says "God wants me to be here" and then subjugates all enemies through force and intimidation (not atypical in the Arab world), and a ruler who says "God wants me to be here" after being given power by the normal machinery of a democratic political system (Bush). I think the general Arab-on-the-street is smart enough to make that distinction, even if the propaganda outlets try to hide it using language much like yours.

Earnest, one little nit-pick. What most Arabs do is by definition "Arab culture", so by this time I have no hesitation in saying that oppressing women, killing apostates, and killing women who "dishonor" their families are Arab cultural traits. I also know that it's quite possible for Arabs to put aside those traits by moving to a more civilized locale and adopting the local customs.

I rather doubt that many of the parts of the present-day Arab culture you and I find objectionable were actually part of Islam as preached by Mohammed himself. E.g., he got his money by marrying his boss - so I find it very doubtful that when he said women should be "modest" he meant that they shouldn't work outside the home, shouldn't drive, and should wear burkhas.

Don't get me wrong - Anglo-European culture (Christian post-enlightenment culture) beats Arabic culture hands down. What I'm decrying - and Jane - is a streak that runs through Anglo-European culture, US culture in particular. A streak that most mirrors Islamic antipathy to things western. The streak known as the religious right that bears only lingering resemblance to conservative Christianity and that makes neocon idealism so flawed in practical execution.

"Conservative Christianity is neither conservative nor Christian. Discuss."

Not-too-obscure American pop culture reference. Anyway, this is the danger of moral/cultural relativism. It allows you nowhere to stand. I think I recognize its seductive appeal to the Western mind: we're obsessed with being "fair" and, in good post-Enlightenment style, with the rights of the individual; we know that some of the tactics used by our forerunners to achieve the dominance our culture now enjoys were not honorable. Then, between Einstein and a whole slew of philosophers, we're deeply uncomfortable with declaring absolutes.

So what do we do? If a value we declare absolute clashes with a value of another culture, we're constrained either to state that the other culture's value is only relative to our absolute, or to reformulate our system to acknowledge that the other culture's value is just as absolute as ours, when viewed "in situ." It all becomes about cultural context.

I'm just as uncomfortable as the next guy with imposing Western values on people not born to them. But individual liberty, bedrock of Western culture, is also the principle that permits (or demands) that we view anti-individualist cultures as "equivalent" to ours, because the individuals therein are "free" to choose to subject their liberties to the will of the state. And then you have to define "free." And so it goes.

THIS, not Iraq, is the quagmire, I submit.

AlanDU, don't believe everything you read. (And what are you reading, BTW?) There are probably a few Americans harboring secret Crusader fantasies. But Bush isn't among them, and neither is the "neocon cabal."

As to Koran desecration, if it occurred: At minimum, not smart to do it under circumstances where it could be found out. (Its efficacy as an interrogation tool I doubt, but I'm not Muslim.) But its having been "found out," if it has been, has caused us to go on the defensive, and that's just ridiculous. Holy book or not, it's a book, and if there's one moral semi-absolute I do feel comfortable with, it's that defacing a book is not in the same league as slugging a helpless person in the jaw, much less raping, shocking, or beheading. Acting as if the other side has a right to the kind of moral outrage some on that side are exhibiting is (IMHO) absolutely the wrong tack for us to take: it only gives an appearance of legitimacy to what is clearly an overreaction.

AlanDU et. al. subscribe to my favourite brand of moral relativism: "America does bad things, and America's enemies do bad things, therefore America and its enemies are exactly the same. Except that America is much, much worse because, well, they remind me of my parents. Ew."

Jamie & RMc have a version of moral relativism which goes: "they're much worse than us so forget about us".

Morally absolute reform in one's own backyard never hurts and there's nothing morally relativistic about adverting to the need for it.

I am quite happy to categorically condemn a culture if it systematically does things I consider abhorrent. If Arab culture truly includes killing apostates and rape victims, oppressing women, etc.... then I condemn it and am quite happy to see it destroyed. The culture, that is, not necessarily the people. I would love to see the people brought out of their barbaric culture and into a more enlightened world where individuals are valued. I don't necessarily want to impose my own culture on them wholesale, but there are certain minimum standards of behavior I would like to see.

This is mostly an issue because Arab/Muslim culture keeps violently clashing with the United States. If they kept to their own borders, I would be less interested in changing them.

"I rather doubt that many of the parts of the present-day Arab culture you and I find objectionable were actually part of Islam as preached by Mohammed himself."

markm, Mohammed instructs Muslims to stone women who've dishonored their families or cheated on their wives. He even had sex with a little girl in the Koran. I wish I was making that up. I can't imagine worshipping a religion whose leader was a child molester. I suspect that in this case the fish rots from the head down.

mariana: the OT advises families to return to their fathers and then stone to death non-virgin brides, and Noah had sex with both his daughters, at once, while he was blind drunk. so, y'know, just saying. maybe you better look out for those sketchy Jews and Christians in your neighborhood; who knows what they might be up to. the fish rots from the head down, after all.

also, if Islam countenances gay marriage, as is implied by your "women who've...cheated on their wives" remark, then I judge it to be a very modern-minded religion indeed.

1. There can never be peace with the Islamic world as long as they believe that we, the infidels, are too filthy to touch their book.

2. That the United States government would acquiesce in the notion is apalling. I can't believe my tax dollars are being spent on gloves to protect the book that the terrorists claim inspires them to crash airplanes into skyscrapers, roll crippled wheel-chair bound jews off of cruise ships, self detonate on buses, and decapitate captured Americans, from being "defiled" by our soldiers.

3. "we're not fighting a religious war here" Uhhh, what is the one thing all the al-queda, hezbollah, hamas, and other jihadi types have in common?

4. "Even if you aren't disgusted by American soldiers abusing other people's religious objects" see #'s 1 and 2 above.

5. "maybe you better look out for those sketchy Jews and Christians in your neighborhood"
Oh absolutely! Remember all those riots over Serrano's "Piss Christ" when the Episcopalians and Methodists issued death sentences against the artists and killed all those people in the streets? Or the Jews hanging all those protesters that were holding signs signs showing the star of David painted over with swastikas?

and Noah had sex with both his daughters, at once, while he was blind drunk.

Back to Sunday School. That was actually Lot, after angelic messengers had to forcibly remove his family from Sodom so they wouldn't be destroyed in the hail of fire and brimstone sent to judge the immorality there. Some other context: The activity was in fact contrived by his daughters, Lot was not the premier prophet of a new religious sect, and the scriptural record goes on to record that the future families resulting from that incest (Moab and Ammon, IIRC) became notable stumblingblocks to the Israelites.

There can never be peace with the Islamic world as long as they believe that we, the infidels, are too filthy to touch their book.

Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. Anyone who turns to terrorism (or to supporting terrorists) because somebody else disrespected a *book* is a person we needed to be killing anyway.

We can't both (a) win a war against Islamic terrorism and (b) continue to pretend that the insane religious views of fundamentalist Islam are worthy of respect. We have to pick one or the other. Otherwise you get a situation akin to, say, fighting the Ku Klux Klan while still supporting Jim Crow laws -- at best, you only end up treating the symptoms, not the disease.

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