Mehta on Mumbai

A friend is travelling through Afghanistan as part of a circus (yes, a circus). One of his more recent emails: Salaam from Karte Seh, Kabul, I hope this finds you safe and in good spirits. I have a new telephone number and mailing address in the U.S., noted at the bottom of this email. Nearly one month ago, what little I knew of Afghanistan I knew by pictures and words, maybe a couple good books, like “Kite Runner” or “An Unexpected Light,” and sound bites from the Boston Globe or Washington Post. Even if I knew better, I still had…

On Burning Qur’ans – avari | haroon moghul. I don’t think the overwhelming majority of Muslims ever cared.  Other than sad, annoying facebook campaigns which are so clueless as to not know that one cannot campaign for a restriction of a constitutional right.  Even now, the pictures of violent protest we see, with crowds of angry demonstrators stupidly retaliating against one fringe pastor’s insensitivities by burning American flags (can hypocrisy become any more absurd?), are restricted to Afghanistan — where we are at war.  Almost nobody in the media is talking through this, at all.  Clearly, the anger at the…