{"id":1789,"date":"2011-04-04T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-04-04T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/?p=1789"},"modified":"2011-04-04T05:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-04-04T11:00:00","slug":"gen-patraeus-koran-burning-redux","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/?p=1789","title":{"rendered":"Gen. Patraeus & Koran Burning Redux"},"content":{"rendered":"

“No reasonable person would dispute that burning Korans is idiotic and highly offensive, not to mention counter-productive for Christian dialogue with our Muslim friends and neighbors.\u00a0 However, what disturbs me about General Patraeus stepping into it, is the mindset that it reveals when it comes to how we as a country will deal with Islam.\u00a0 President Bush, who I generally agreed with, said that \u201cIslam is a religion of peace.\u201d\u00a0 I believe many Americans \u2014 rightly or wrongly \u2014 have grave doubts about the truthfulness of that statement.” (Burning the Koran: Gen. Patraeus Speaks<\/a>)<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

You just have to love the “religion of peace.”\u00a0 When the burning of a Koran by a clearly unstable and publicity-hungry “pastor” of a small “church” in central Florida can cause three days of rioting (and counting)\u00a0and\u00a0killing in the streets of Afghanistan<\/a>, maybe it’s time to bring the troops home.\u00a0 If Afghanistan, which is not even living in the 20th century — much less the 21st century — is so unstable and prone to violence by\u00a0mobs of radicalized Muslims, then we must ask ourselves the question:\u00a0 “Why\u00a0are\u00a0our men and women of the United States Armed Forces being placed in harm’s way for a country that will never leave the stone ages?”<\/p>\n

How many more fallen American heroes\u00a0will\u00a0be laid to rest <\/a>who have died for a people who do not want us there and who will never — I\u00a0repeat, never — understand the\u00a0most basic concepts of a democratic society?\u00a0 Such is Afghanistan.\u00a0 While I\u00a0wholeheartedly supported President Bush’s decision to take the war on terror to Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, I have come to believe that\u00a0political correctness and the rules of engagement\u00a0are making it near impossible to win in Afghanistan, whatever winning might look like.\u00a0 If\u00a0winning\u00a0looks anything like\u00a0the corrupt\u00a0government led by President Hamid Karzai, then we need to get out as quickly as possible so that no more American\u00a0military personnel are\u00a0killed or injured.<\/p>\n

I’m sure that Gen. David Patraeus is a fine\u00a0soldier and person (as we both share the same middle name — Howell — would’t he have to be), but when will he stop making excuses for radical Islam?\u00a0 In responding yet again to a kook in Florida<\/a>, Gen. Patraeus\u00a0lets\u00a0violent Muslim extremists off the hook in the streets of Kandahar:<\/p>\n

“Every security force leader’s worst nightmare is being confronted by essentially a mob, if you will, especially one that can be influenced by individuals that want to incite violence, who want to try to hijack passions, in this case, perhaps understandable passions<\/strong>,” (emphasis added)<\/strong>\u00a0Gen. Petraeus said in the Sunday interview. “Obviously it’s an additional serious security challenge in a country that faces considerable security challenges.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And, just\u00a0who are the “individuals that (sic<\/em>)\u00a0want to incite violence?”\u00a0 I’m not sure if Gen. Patraeus\u00a0means Terry Jones of the World Dove Outreach Center or the government-paid clerics in Mazar-e-Sharif’s (home of\u00a0the U.N. headquarters) main mosques who sermons were literally inciting the mob to violence this past Friday.\u00a0 Somehow I think he blames the American-born cleric for the rioting and killing in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

And, what are all the causes of additional serious security challenges in Afghanistan?\u00a0 On second thought, what doesn’t cause additional serious security challenges among a huge population of\u00a0radicalized Muslims who are responding to their “perhaps understandable passions?”\u00a0 <\/em>Why Gen. Patraeus and others\u00a0use this\u00a0reasoning to excuse the vicious attacks by radical Muslims in Afghanistan is simply amazing.\u00a0 It’s\u00a0like the\u00a0now discredited defense that a rapist’s attorney would use when trying to create reasonable doubt in the mind of the jurors:\u00a0\u00a0“Ladies and gentlemen\u00a0of the jury,\u00a0my client should not be convicted of the violent and heinous crime of rape.\u00a0 After all, when he saw how scantily-clad the alleged victim was, his understandable passions took over.\u00a0 It’s really her fault for dressing the way she did.\u00a0 My client cannot be held responsible for his own actions.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Enough\u00a0 with the excuses.\u00a0 When will our government learn that no matter what we do in Afghanistan, it will not make a difference?\u00a0 When young,\u00a0Afghan religious\u00a0students\u00a0like 25 year-old Karimullah say:\u00a0<\/p>\n

“<\/em>We cannot see the difference between that man in Florida and the American soldiers here.\u00a0 They are killing our people here while in the U.S. they burn the Holy Quran.\u00a0 America just wants to humiliate the Muslim world.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

maybe it’s time to get out of Afghanistan.\u00a0 Maybe it’s time to realize that it doesn’t take much to humiliate the radicalized Muslim world — cartoons, South Park, words, feelings (here<\/a> and here<\/a>).\u00a0 If CAIR and other radicalized Muslims had their way, we would be at the end of the slippery slope that may have\u00a0started with banning Koran burnings but will not end until all opposition to Islam is completely silenced.\u00a0 Passing laws, rioting mobs or beheadings are all apparently acceptable ways to enforce that code of silence.<\/p>\n

If our American military commanders and politicians are going to continue to excuse the inexcusable violence perpetrated by a small, but growing group of extremist elements within Islam — particularly in Afghanistan, then maybe we need to rethink our strategy of boots on the ground.\u00a0 After all, I hear that UAVs\u00a0— unmanned aerial vehicles, otherwise known as drones — can\u00a0be pretty effective.\u00a0\u00a0Something that Gen. Patraeus might want\u00a0to consider the next time riots break out.\u00a0 And, there will be a next time.\u00a0 Hopefully, by that time,\u00a0American troops will be long gone from the wilderness known as Afghanistan!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“No reasonable person would dispute that burning Korans is idiotic and highly offensive, not to mention counter-productive for Christian dialogue with our Muslim friends and neighbors.\u00a0 However, what disturbs me about General Patraeus stepping into it, is the mindset that it reveals when it comes to how we as a country will deal with Islam.\u00a0…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[29],"tags":[67,75,102,324,333,435,472,3388,587,657,668,687,760,814,820,821,846,954,1017],"class_list":["post-1789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-islam","tag-afghanistan","tag-al-qaeda","tag-armed-forces","tag-dove-world-outreach-center","tag-drones","tag-gen-david-patraeus","tag-hamid-karzai","tag-islam","tag-koran","tag-military","tag-mobs","tag-muslims","tag-pastor-terry-jones","tag-quran","tag-radical-islam","tag-radical-muslims","tag-rioting","tag-taliban","tag-uav"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1LP7G-sR","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1789\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlaw2grace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}