Stop SOPA and PIPA

Dang! Josh Marshall puts the Kerbala attacks in an interesting perspective. Dang!

From today’s Thomas Friedman op-ed: What is going on in Iraq today is not only a war between radical Islam and America, it is, more importantly, a war within Islam — between those who want an Islam with a human and progressive face that can meld with the world and those who want an Islam that is exclusivist and hostile to the world. So, yes, we need all the Arab and Muslim support we can get to see Iraq through to some decent outcome. But the Arab-Muslim world needs a decent outcome in Iraq just as much — if not…

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…