Literally days after IASPS ran an Op
Ed exposing the absurdity and dangerousness of the
Olive Tree & Lexus analysis of the New York
Times' Thomas Friedman (see "Terror
in One Nation or Islam and Marxism, Part II"),
Friedman fired off his own op ed (Nov. 20, 2001)
attempting, apparently, to respond. In his response,
Friedman seeks desperately to prove the thesis of
his most recent book and numerous editorials that if
only we could give the poor violent Muslim
terrorists democracy and Lexus luxury sedans (i.e.,
participation in the global economy) we could wean
them from the Olive Tree (i.e., violence and
religious primitivism).
In "Part II" of the essay
IASPS posted on this web site, the point was
carefully made that Friedman's theory is akin to the
Marxist/Victimization line of 30 years ago that has
been carried forward by America's and Europe's
spoiled intelligentsia to this day: violence and
wanton rage against the West is not a product of the
murderers themselves but rather of the West.
Whether attacking capitalism, the US support of
Israel or even of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, the poor
downtrodden victims, meaning the terrorists, act the
way they do because they live in despotic regimes
and often enough the West supports those regimes for
its own selfish interests.
Friedman seeks desperately to make
his point that if you give Muslims freedom and
democracy they will be peaceful. He chooses
India's "noisy democracy" (and Bangladesh) to
make this point and quotes several of India's
leading Muslims to say that the world's second
largest Muslim population demonstrates that terror
is the product of tyranny not Islam.
Friedman seems to ignore one very
basic fact and several others: The Muslims are a
minority in India and don't control that "noisy
democracy." Indeed, when the Indian continent
gained its independence from Britain in 1947, the
first bloody war took place precisely because the
Muslims who dominated in the north chose to
establish their own regime. What was that?
Dictatorship. That country is now Moslem-dominated
Pakistan and it has waged a proxy war against India
in Kashmir since then (in addition to supporting the
Talibans until the US strong-armed it into
submission). It was the non-Muslims of India
who chose to establish and fight for democracy.
Further, ask the non-Moslem population in India how
peaceful the Moslems are (Friedman chose to ask the
Moslems how peaceful they themselves were. Slick.)
The question Friedman must ask
himself is what would become of India's democracy if
it were to be dominated by the Muslims?
Indeed, why does Friedman find it
impossible to point to any free and democratic
Moslem-dominated state (he pathetically refers to
Bangladesh as his "proof" that Islam can
rule and be democratic and non-violent)? Why does
the man who drives a Lexus fail to recognize that
the despotic regime in China doesn't produce
worldwide terrorism, on the one hand, and
Moslems the world over when given the chance to rule
do so by force and by aiding and abetting worldwide
terror, on the other.
The answer is because Thomas Friedman
is not interested in fact. Friedman is interested in
making one point: if the world could but move to a
global democracy we could rid ourselves of terror,
poverty, and all things bad. Islam is not the
enemy here, it is our inability to export our
democratic multiculturalism. What Friedman
fails to understand is that the world's 1 billion
Moslems are just not interested. When necessary,
they will vote. When opportunity knocks, they will
kill and maim to build their own version of a global
economy.
