So please tell me, how are we supposed to help build something decent and self-sustaining in Afghanistan and Pakistan when jihadists murder other Muslims by the dozens and no one really calls them out?
A corrosive mind-set has taken hold since 9/11. It says that Arabs and Muslims are only objects, never responsible for anything in their world, and we are the only subjects, responsible for everything that happens in their world. We infantilize them.
Arab and Muslims are not just objects. They are subjects. They aspire to, are able to and must be challenged to take responsibility for their world. If we want a peaceful, tolerant region more than they do, they will hold our coats while we fight, and they will hold their tongues against their worst extremists. They will lose, and we will lose — here and there, in the real Afghanistan and in the Virtual Afghanistan.
20091217
N.Y. Times Op-Ed by Tom Friedman acknowledges the Jihad against the West; will the Left finally accept it?
The N.Y. Times Op-Ed page published a Tom Friedman-penned piece entitled www.Jihad.com (although he didn't mention the word Islamism. Will that be enough for the Left to accept that Islamism is a real political threat?
