… give or take
// Religion generally claims absolute and exclusive truth. Yet most religions were created long before modern notions of freedom, justice, fairness, science, reason or logic. So it should come as no surprise when hilarious and ludicrous outcomes result from religious encounters with the changing circumstances of the modern world. Authorities in Thailand recently indicated they [...]
// The death of terrorist leader Osama bin Laden is one of the most important accomplishments in recent American history. It is certainly significant in its own right as a testament to the superior military and intelligence work the US is capable of. Yet when one recalls the fact that Osama bin Laden was trained and [...]
Bret Stephens opined recently in the Wall Street Journal that the cause of Islamic terrorism is not so much Israeli settlements or the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine as it is… Lady Gaga. Specifically, Stephens points to Said Qutb, widely regarded as the intellectual father of modern Al Qaeda and other Islamist groups: In his [...]
// The recent actions of the Benjamin Netanyahu government can be characterized with a good Yiddish word: chutzpah. Admittedly, the Israelis have little reason to believe that any consequences are in store, given the history of their relations with the US. And cautious optimism is still very much warranted when it comes to any analysis [...]
// The idea of many is that Israel “has a right to exist,” which really means it “has a right to continue to exist” (since something that doesn’t exist cannot possibly have any rights, logically). On what basis? At bottom, the thinking goes, it is on the basis that the Jews constitute a distinctive ethnic [...]
