Politics

TSA Seeks to Expand the Airport Experience Into Everyday Life » Blog of Rights: Official Blog of the American Civil Liberties Union

TSA Seeks to Expand the Airport Experience Into Everyday Life » Blog of Rights: Official Blog of the American Civil Liberties Union. The Los Angeles Times today reports on the TSA’s VIPR program, in which roving teams of security agents bring the joys of the airport security experience into bus and train stations, highways, the subway, and other transportation facilities around the country (a Daily Caller story on the program from earlier this year is here).  This program represents nothing less than a direct assault on the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution. It’s also an exceedingly dumb security measure. But…

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Weblogs

hawgblawg: Robin Wright on Arab/Islamic Hip-Hop

About time MERIP got a blog. Some nice stuff brewing. hawgblawg: Robin Wright on Arab/Islamic Hip-Hop. Merip has a brand new blog, launched today. I intend to contribute posts on a regular basis–but I will not be abandoning hawgblawg by any means. My first was a meditation on how Robin Wright celebrates Arab/Islamic hip-hop in her book, Rock the Casbah: Rage and Rebellion Across the Islamic World. Read it here.

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Inter-faith

Omid Safi: What Would Martin Say Now?

Omid Safi: What Would Martin Say Now?. Prophets don’t come to us to make us feel better about ourselves, to tell us to affirm our inner goodness, or to grant us wishes like a Santa-Clause.  No, prophets come to hold up a mirror to our society and our hearts, and let us see how we have fallen away from God, how we are living unjustly. They tell us that unless we repent now, the judgment of the Lord is upon us.

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Books

Cambridge Digital Library – University of Cambridge

Cambridge Digital Library – University of Cambridge. Cambridge University Library's collection of Islamic manuscripts dates from the origins of Arabic scholarship in Cambridge in the 1630s when the University founded a Professorship in Arabic and William Bedwell donated a Qur'an to the Library. Since that time the collection has grown in size and diversity to over 5,000 works, including the collections of Thomas Erpenius, J.L.Burckhardt, E.H.Palmer and E.G. Browne. These manuscripts shed light on many aspects of the Islamic world, its beliefs and learning. h/t Gary Bunt

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Politics

NY TIMES: “When Will We Stop the Scapegoating of Muslims in America?” | The Crescent Post

NY TIMES: “When Will We Stop the Scapegoating of Muslims in America?” | The Crescent Post. As the 2012 presidential election approaches, it has been difficult for me to listen to the political scapegoating of Muslims and those perceived to be Muslims. A decade ago, as an attorney at the Department of Justice, I worked with colleagues in the civil rights division to address the unprecedented backlash in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. We investigated complaints of brutal hate crimes in neighborhoods, vandalism at places of worship, bullying at schools, and discrimination in the workplace aimed primarily at those…

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Inter-faith

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation Radio: The Sufi Spirit, with Reza Shah-Kazemi « Ismailimail

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation Radio: The Sufi Spirit, with Reza Shah-Kazemi « Ismailimail. Prayer that brings a permanent awareness of the Divine Reality is the aim of Sufism first and foremost, which London based Sufi scholar, Reza Shah-Kazemi, believes is the key to its universality. Sufism’s mystical universalism is what interests Hebrew University scholar, Sara Sviri, who reveals the fascinating phenomenon of ‘Jewish Sufism’.

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