From: Ryan M Gill (rmgill@mindspring.com)
Date: Thu Aug 14 2003 - 10:13:43 PDT
At 9:35 AM -0700 8/14/03, Vadim Kogan wrote:
>
>No, hold on there... Let's be fair, OK? I think we in fact should be hating
>christians much more. After all, over the last couple thousand years
Go light on the hyperbole ok? :-P
>Any religion is bad, especially in its extremes. However, I seriously doubt
>that Iraq residents just have nothing else to do, but watch TV and hate
>"american way life" because "their religion tells them so". Nah, they have
>much more practical reasons to hate europeans and americans. After all, it's
>europe and US who stuck their noses in the middle east first, not other way
>around.
I suspect its more complex than that. Radical islam works in that
region of the world where you have a disenfranchised youth. Just like
it worked in areas where Communism or Fascism took deep root.
Of course, I'm also familiar with the flip side of the coin where a
corporation spends large amounts of money on a project in a nation
and the political direction goes south leaving their agreements with
the previous ruler's all dust to the winds. The new rulers decide to
nationalize the assets and now you've got more than a few companies
crying to their parent nation's governments.
The Islamic world has some growing up to do. They need to drop the
radical mulla's like hot grenades and get with the program of
modernizing. Some have done so but are still very dependant on the
west that they hate to buy their oil. One that seems to be going the
right direction is Dubai. Of course it doesn't help that much of the
Islamic world is still stuck in the mind-set of strong tribal leaders
as the best form of government. The long tenure of Arafat has
demonstrated that quite well.
I'll not call all Musliums out on the carpet as a problem to be deal
with across with harsh measures across the board however the radical
elements in the mid-east need to realize what side of their bread it
is buttered on. The west is a huge boon to their portion of the world
Allah help them if we solve our energy problems and stop needing
petroleum in such large quantities.
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