True "Liberals" Awake! Stand Up and be Counted.

Christopher Hitchens has been one of the most passionate and eloquent advocates for “regime change” in Iraq. I differ with him and other war supporters, ultimately, on the manner and timing with which Bush chose to fight and justify this war. Hitchens & co. are at their least persuasive when they allege, for example, real and substantive ties between Saddam’s regime and radical Islamist terrorists. That aside, they are at their most persuasive when arguing from sheer moral force against the pernicious ideologies, social pathologies, and illiberal violence that sadly permeate much of the Islamic world, as Hitchens does again today, when discussing the “Danish cartoon violence.” It is hard to find much fault with his essay. (Except, perhaps, an apparent call for forcibly defunding madrasahs in the U.S. When and if these "schools" explicitly advocate violence, by all means shut them down! But if they successfully weasel around or tiptoe up to the edge without going that far... well again I must stand with the First Amendment on principle. I cannot restrict peaceful speech, however offensive I may find it.)

I’d like to point out that my critique of my own culture and country, printed in this space a little while back, was in no way a defense of the hideous and inexcusable violence we have seen, or even some sort of call for greater “understanding.” I don’t think there is much to “understand” about the violence—it is, I repeat, hideous and inexcusable. I merely wanted to make the point that we need to defend freedom of expression as passionately and consistently as its enemies attack it. I’m fully with Hitchens on this one. Let me also pass on a quote, which comes from a friend of a friend (thanks D.C.):

"This is only the beginning of the reckoning. This is only the first sip, the first foretaste, of a bitter cup which will be proffered year by year - unless by a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigor, we rise again and take our stand for freedom." -Winston Churchill

Let us hope that the fight is more about moral health than martial vigor. We certainly need more of the former... ultimately it may prevent more of the latter.