Religious Witness Against Torture

I’m starting coverage of the Islam in America Conference. Will try to highlight points by various speakers at the end of each panel.

So Bush was in Beantown for a fundraiser, and his Chief of Staff, Andrew Card, was asked about Richard Clarke’s book. Card was honest and said he had not read the whole book. He did say that he thought Clarke’s proposition that Al-Qaeda operatives were in Boston and looking at using liquid natural gas (LNG) was untrue. I got all of the above from an op-ed in the Globe. The funny thing is that one of the front pieces on the Globe, on the same day, was a former counter-terrorism agent talking about the intelligence that has him convinced Al-Qaeda…

If this is a testing time, then some have passed with flying colors. Hats off to a rabbinical student in Massachusetts, Rachel Barenblat, who raised money to replace prayer rugs that a drunken intruder had urinated on at a mosque. She told me that she quickly raised more than $1,100 from Jews and Christians alike. via www.nytimes.com Yay Rachel!