Shannon wrote:
The moderates usually stay out of the debate.

The ones I quoted are visible moderates. Unfortunately, the Canadian has been subjected to physical violence for taking the stand he has taken.

This reminds me of the violence faced by people in the south who stood up against segregation a generation ago. The KKK did not use the democratic process. The ideas they promoted were marginalized within an environment in which they could be freely expressed. We don't need to censor these people. We cannot lower ourselves to their level and begin using force to attack the expression of ideas that we do not like!

The whole problem with the way that Conservatives are going about this is that they are targeting muslims - they are targeting islam. Muslims are not the problem. Islam is not the problem. You can worship Allah and be perfectly peaceful.

The problem is religious statism. The whole purpose of a state is to maintain a monopoly on the use of force. The state is inherently about violence. A religious state is inherently about religious violence. If violence has no place in religion than the state can have no place in religion either.

At this point it ought to be just as clear to us that the idea of religious statism is wrong as it is that racism is wrong. Unfortunately, it isn't. Republicans are unclear on this point, and they have cultivated this idea within their community, so they are ill equipped to go after it, and the left doesn't seem to have the guts to call a spade a spade anymore.

If the problem is religious statism we must, as a first principal, uphold the right to freedom of religion. We cannot use the government to shut this mosque down. Doing so compromises the core of our argument. It would be totally hypocritical, and they would not hesitate to call us on it.

RE: At Ramadan Iftar dinner, Obama supports new mosque on private property near Ground Zero | Top of the Ticket | Los Angeles Times