Day: April 13, 2004

So we’ve moved past the idea that Islam is a monolith and into the realm of Islam beings a series of monoliths. In the case of this Boston Globe editorial, moderate Muslims and others. I know the work of the American Islamic Congress, and I believe it is good and fundamental to creating a more moderate space for Islamic thought and inter-faith interaction. (Please sign their tolerance petition). Their work is committed to creating an on-going dialogue and gradual transformation. However, they are lumped together with Irshad Manji who has been receiving a lot of negative publicity within the Muslim…

Myself, and several other members of the islamicate Collective, have been getting lots of requests for books. Specifically, if we were choose a selection of books to represent the highest ideals of liberal democracy, what would they be? In addition, what are some of the key texts representing the richness of Islamic thought that we would include. The work has been proposed for both Iraq and Afghanistan. The endeavor is separate from Juan Cole’s Americana Translation Project (more details here and here), another worthwhile effort. Many of the requests we’ve received so far have been time sensitive. However, going through…

The following op-ed by Brooks in today’s NYTimes gives some interesting perspective on past views in America about combatting terrorism. Seems to make a convincing case that the dumbing down of American politics continues on.

Via today’s Mother Jones: Number of U.S. service members killed in Iraq since Operation Iraqi Freedom began on March 19, 2003: 671 Number killed since George W. Bush declared an end to “major combat” on May 1, 2003: 533 Number killed this month: 83 Source: U.S. Department of Defense