A Voice in the Wilderness In Defense of "Mere Conservatism"

My Kind of Town (for jihad) Chicago Is…

Apparently my hometown was the most attractive spot for an Al Qaeda-linked group to hold their national "Fall of Capitalism & Rise of Islam" conference this weekend.

"Hizb ut-Tahrir is one of the oldest, largest indoctrinating organizations for the ideology known as jihadism," Walid Phares, director of the Future of Terrorism Project at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told FOXNews.com.

Phares said that Hizb ut-Tahrir, rather than training members to carry out terrorist acts like Al Qaeda, focuses instead on indoctrinating youths between ages of 9 and 18 to absorb the ideology that calls for the formation of an empire — or "khilafah" — that will rule according to Islamic law and condones any means to achieve it, including militant jihad.

Hizb ut-Tahrir often says that its indoctrination "prepares the infantry" that groups like Al Qaeda take into battle, Phares said.

"It's like a middle school that prepares them to be recruited by the high school, which is Al Qaeda," he said. "One would compare them to Hitler youth. ... It's an extremely dangerous organization."

Phares said Hizb ut-Tahrir has strongholds in Western countries, including Britain, France and Spain, and clearly is looking to strengthen its base in the U.S.

"The aim of this conference is to recruit within the Muslim community in America," he said. "The Middle East governments go after them, but in the U.S. they are protected, so having a base here is going to help their cells around the world."

Representatives of Hizb ut-Tahrir declined to comment when contacted by FOXNews.com

I have no problem with groups from various religions or worldviews congregating on our free shores to discuss their beliefs. But what I do have a problem with, where we all should logically draw the line, is when those groups are promoting, or in any way linked to, groups and ideologies that would not return the same favor should me and my band of merry conservative evangelical free-market advocates decide to hold our next "Capitalism Rules, Islam Drools" conference in Tehran or the West Bank.

The radical, irreconcilable wing of Islam has no interest in liberty, the dignity of human life, or religious tolerance. There will always be a tension between freedom of speech and security. We can't ignore the latter, or we'll lose the former.

Tolerance for Intolerance

I know I post many of Mark Steyn's columns/articles/blogs, but apart from the fact that the guy writes a lot every week in publications around the world, he is also very good. Here is a piece he wrote for National Review regarding the recent indictment of a member of the Dutch Parliament named Geert Wilders for "inciting intolerance" towards Muslims who have threatened to kill the man.

"If you’ve been following recent developments in the Netherlands, you’ll know that Geert Wilders, a Dutch Member of Parliament, is to be put on trial for offending Muslims. “Look at what you’re doing,” the sardonic Brit Pat Condell pointed out. “You’re prosecuting a man who is under 24-hour protection from attack by violent Muslims. Yet he’s the criminal for expressing an opinion.”

Quite. But, while Europe has a high degree of tolerance for intolerant imams, it won’t tolerate anyone pointing out that intolerance. It is not necessary for Minheer Wilders to be either jailed or forced into exile to conclude that the Netherlands, like many of its neighbors, has already conceded the key point - that Muslims now have the exclusive right to set the parameters of public debate on Islam. And, given that they don’t regard it as debatable at all, that means that the remorseless Islamization of Europe will continue and accelerate while the deWildered political establishment stands mute."

As a follow-up, here is a short YouTube clip of Steyn discussing the inherent problems with the Left's obsession with multiculturalism.

Six Degrees of Accommodation

From Pakistan to Britain's Parliament, the irreconcilable wing of Islam is claiming moral victory after moral victory as cowardly politicians and "leaders" cave in to their increasingly bizarre and hostile demands. Mark Steyn fills us in on the most recent string of capitulations.

An excerpt: "Among that growing population of Yorkshire Pakistanis is a fellow called Lord Ahmed, a Muslim member of Parliament. He was in the news the other day for threatening (as the columnist Melanie Phillips put it) “to bring a force of 10,000 Muslims to lay siege to the House of Lords” if it went ahead with an event at which the Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders would have introduced a screening of his controversial film Fitna. Britain’s Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, reacted to this by declaring Minheer Wilders persona non grata and having him arrested at Heathrow and returned to the Netherlands.

The Home Secretary is best known for an inspired change of terminology: Last year she announced that henceforth Muslim terrorism (an unhelpful phrase) would be reclassified as “anti-Islamic activity.” Seriously. The logic being that Muslims blowing stuff up tends not to do much for Islam’s reputation — i.e., it’s an “anti-Islamic activity” in the same sense that Pearl Harbor was an anti-Japanese activity."