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Fort Hood Shock: A Reader Weighs In

2 years ago

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The new Politics Daily comment moderators are not yet up to speed, so a few of us writers are filling in. I'm getting a taste of what the moderators will soon face.
A few days ago our fearless leader Melinda Henneberger posted: "From the beginning – that is, six months ago last week – we've said that Politics Daily was going to be a place for civil discourse on civic life. We've done our part, not-always gentle reader, and now we are lookin' at you."

Politics Daily comment moderators will be "rooting out crassness at their discretion, and cracking down on responses they deem profane, racist, sexist or plain old over-the-top mean."

In other words, we want not censorship of comments, but rather a clearing away of the kind of rhetorical debris that makes spirited discussion and good government so elusive.

Since I've been deputized, I find I enjoy the spam, because it requires no thought. Just hit delete! The comments by actual human beings are more troublesome.

Contrary to popular assumption, we here at Politics Daily are not promoting a left-wing or a right-wing political agenda. You could not even call us centrist, if by centrist you mean watered down.

We are in favor of accurate, factual reporting. We favor strong opinions from the left, right and middle. We do not delete comments lightly.

But no intelligent discussion is advanced by wholesale slandering of one religion, race, ethnicity, political party or another. We ask that comments stick to the topic at hand and back up claims with facts.

You'll go nuts if you try to assign me a political affiliation. As a die-hard iconoclast, I'm all over the map. But here's an example of the kind of comment we like to encourage on Politics Daily.

I may or may not agree, but the commenter, Cooper, makes his case in response to David Wood's post 13 Dead at Ft. Hood: Worst Soldier-on-Soldier Violence in U.S. History.

Lest anyone forget, and it hasn't been mentioned yet that I have noticed, another "American-born Muslim" fragged some of his fellow soldiers not more than a couple of years ago. What ever happened in that case?

I lived in Saudi Arabia for 5 years, and I generally found the native-born Muslims there to be very hospitable people. They were pretty much like American christians in the way that they practiced Islam - it was just what they grew up with, it was part of the culture, and most had probably never really studied the Koran or done any in-depth theological research. I got the feeling that, had their society not dictated it, a lot of Arabs would have skipped the 5 prayers a day and never seen the inside of a mosque. In fact, I saw many of them on vacation in other countries and they "lost their religion" as soon as the plane cleared Saudi airspace.

However, I was then and remain today VERY suspicious of anyone born and raised in the West or living in the West as a resident who continues to practice or subsequently converts to Islam. I've just never met anyone who did that whom I would consider "normal." (I'm not counting the people who "converted" back when the Saudi government actually PAID western contractors to convert - most of those promptly un-converted once they got back home with their cash.) While some of the concepts of Islam jive with christianity, the essential tenets of Islam appear to me totally incompatible with western ideals as embodied in our Constitution and Declaration of Independence.

Agreed, we are not at war with Islam. Agreed, many Muslims are fine people who wouldn't kill you or anyone else. Agreed, there have been plenty of friendly fire casualties at the hands of non-Muslims. Nonetheless, I continue to assert that one cannot legitimately swear to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States while also claiming to be a faithful Muslim.

As a military recruiter, I would be extremely suspicious of anyone claiming to be a Muslim who wants to join any branch of our military.

Filed Under: Woman Up

Tagged: american, fort hood, FortHood, islam, military, murder, muslim, psychiatrist, shooting, soldiers

Our New Approach to Comments

In an effort to encourage the same level of civil dialogue among Politics Daily’s readers that we expect of our writers – a “civilogue,” to use the term coined by PD’s Jeffrey Weiss – we are requiring commenters to use their AOL or AIM screen names to submit a comment, and we are reading all comments before publishing them. Personal attacks (on writers, other readers, Nancy Pelosi, George W. Bush, or anyone at all) and comments that are not productive additions to the conversation will not be published, period, to make room for a discussion among those with ideas to kick around. Please read our Help and Feedback section for more info.