Uncle Sam Is No Imam – NYTimes.com

The best investigative reporting of 2011 worthy of a Pulitizer | Talking Points Memo. Let’s be honest: Most investigative reporting doesn’t get widely read because it’s dense, inaccessible and not very compelling. It lands with a thud and isn’t heard from again. That’s why I was rooting for a couple of guys this time around for Pulitzers whose work was doggedly reported, widely read, and forced the powers that be to react.

Political Islam is here to stay — US must accept and adjust – CSMonitor.com. 2. Political Islam is not hostile to the West, but to its policies. Many Westerners assume that Muslims “hate our freedoms,” but reliable surveys paint a different picture. Drawing sweeping inferences from sound bites or selective “alarming” data isn’t valid, because political Islam is less a monolithic ideology than an outgrowth of each nation’s society. Years of regular polling in the Islamic world suggest that the majority of Muslims hold in high regard core American values such as religious tolerance, meritocracy, individual liberty, freedom of the…