[Rhodes22-list] what is list etiquette? Ignore That!

Wed May 18 12:22:49 EDT 2005

Brad,

Thanks for that. An excellent piece IMHO, I couldn't agree more.

So, you getting any sailing done??

Rik

-----Original Message-----
From: brad haslett <flybrad at yahoo.com>
Sent: May 18, 2005 11:01 AM
To: The Rhodes 22 mail list <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] what is list etiquette? Ignore That!

Ric,

I was responding to your post when my daughter put her
elbow on the keyboard (I'm home all week playing Mr.
Mom.)  Ignore that first post.  At least she didn't
call 911 like she did when she was 1 1/2.  Those cops
still think I'm lying.

Anyway, I've been too busy to make any pithy political
comments but not to busy to read.  Here's an article
from today's Chicago Tribune.  Not only is it funny in
its own way but dead on the money correct.  This is
neither left nor right folks, just a fastball straight
down the middle.

Brad
"CoraShen"

Seeking sanity in the asylum

By Kathleen Parker

May 18, 2005

Reaction to an inaccurate Newsweek report that led
recently to rioting and death in Afghanistan suggests
that hysteria is, indeed, contagious.

To briefly recap, Newsweek reported in a small blurb
May 9 that American interrogators at Guantanamo Bay
had flushed a Koran down a toilet in attempts to get
Muslim terror suspects to talk. Once the Newsweek
story was broadcast abroad, the usually reticent
hate-America crowd erupted in mass pique. Havoc
ensued. At least 15 Afghans died and many more were
injured.

All because of a story that may not have been true.
The "knowledgeable U.S. government source" who told
Newsweek's Michael Isikoff and John Barry about the
flushing apparently wasn't so knowledgeable. At the
risk of seeming insensitive, may I suggest that c'est
la guerre and urge everyone to follow Dr. Lamaze's
always-useful advice: Breathe deeply and focus.

What we need here is a little perspective.

First, we all can agree that flushing a Koran down a
toilet, if physically possible, would be both
insensitive and rude, though Westerners generally have
a higher tolerance threshold for such offenses. Put it
this way: You could flush a Bible down the toilet in
front of Goober in Kabul, and it's unlikely that
Mayberry suddenly would be awash in blood.

Without disrespecting true believers of Islam, one
also could debate the relative miseries of seeing our
favorite scripture disappear into the plumbing versus,
say, watching airplanes fly into buildings, killing
thousands of innocents. Remember, these are terrorist
suspects captured after 9/11, not kidnapped members of
an Afghan boys choir.

The apparent Newsweek mistake was regrettable, but we
should beware of allowing ourselves to mirror the
emotional reactions of people who were by no measure
justified in their response--even if the story had
been proven true.

The same people foaming over a reported act of
blasphemy didn't flinch while executing women for
stepping outside sans burqa. I'm afraid my moral
outrage in favor of the morally outrageous is tapped
out.

While the world was reacting in righteous indignation
to the Newsweek report, another story was circulating
about Turkish women in Germany being executed by
family members in "honor killings" sanctioned by
certain interpretations of the Koran. Their offense?
Acting like Western women. Or, in the pithy words of a
14-year-old Turkish boy who was justifying an
execution: "The whore lived like a German."

Before the good Muslim world objects, let me assert
what shouldn't need saying: Islam isn't the problem
here. The problem is ignorance and the right-wing
Islamist faction that will use the Koran for its
purposes, whether to incite a riot or murder a woman
who refuses to wear her headscarf. The enemy is
extremism.

I have no interest either in defending Newsweek or in
justifying interrogators' methods, but let's be blunt:
Those rampaging in Afghanistan didn't need a reason to
riot; they needed an excuse. That the media provided
one is regrettable, but that regret needs to be
tempered by perspective and objectivity.

Instead, much of the anger the past several days has
been directed not at the Islamist extremists who went
berserk, but at the reporters who apparently got the
story wrong. What if they'd been right? Should
Newsweek not have reported it? Would the riots have
been justified if someone had flushed a Koran?

We might debate those questions, but meanwhile we
should resist the urge to overreact as some have in
suggesting that the press should be restricted or
stifled. Although imperfect, a free press is one of
our nation's highest expressions of freedom and the
thing that separates us from the same right-wing,
authoritarian, extremist forces that we condemn. Yet,
an alarming number of Americans, their faith in
journalists damaged by recent scandals, have lost
sight of the meaning and importance of a free press.

A recent University of Connecticut survey found, for
example, that only 14 percent of respondents knew that
freedom of the press was part of the 1st Amendment.
Only 55 percent of those surveyed strongly agreed that
newspapers should be allowed "to publish freely
without government approval of a story." Now there's a
finding to warm the cockles of a Taliban heart.

Once we start asking the government for permission to
publish, we become partners in propaganda and cohorts
of authoritarianism. Far better to risk mistakes--and
even riots from the lunatic fringe--than to forfeit
the right to question authority.

Mistakes will be made, but freedom means living to
say, "I'm sorry."

Kathleen Parker is a syndicated columnist for the
Orlando Sentinel, a Tribune newspaper. ----------

E-mail: kparker at kparker.com 
Copyright ï¿½ 2005, Chicago Tribune 

--- brad haslett <flybrad at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> --- Rik Sandberg <sanderico at earthlink.net> wrote:
> > Cheryl,
> > 
> > Somehow, I don't think that "political screed" was
> > all there was to that message, was it? Wasn't it
> > just one of Ed's little signature addendums? I
> think
> > I'd do my best to get over it if you want to hang
> > out on the Rhodes list, because, we talk about
> most
> > anything here, sometimes even politics. Maybe it
> > would be good if you went to 
> > 
> > www.rhodes22.org/list
> > 
> > and read the charter. Then you can decide what is
> > appropriate .... or not and and decide whether you
> > want to stay .... or not.
> > 
> > Rik
> > 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Cheryl O'Grady <cheryl.ogrady at mail.com>
> > Sent: May 18, 2005 8:49 AM
> > To: The Rhodes 22 mail list
> > <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
> > Subject: [Rhodes22-list] what is list etiquette?
> > 
> > I don't think it is kosher for someone to use my
> > email address from the list to send political
> > screed.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is
> > that good men do nothing."  Edmund Burke, Irish
> > philosopher
> > 
> > __________________________________________________
> > Use Rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org, Help?
> > www.rhodes22.org/list
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > __________________________________________________
> > Use Rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org, Help?
> > www.rhodes22.org/list
> > 
> 
> 
> 		
> Yahoo! Mail
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> 

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