Did you even read the essay? Because the mish-mash of platitudes you slop together is exactly the kind of thinking and rationalizing that the writer is criticizing. On top of that, you don’t respond to his points, and then change the subject to topics he specifically disavows.

I can’t stand Bush (neither can the writer, although he puts it more diplomatically), and I’m not going to rush to defend his or America’s policies, nor do I give a pass to those who ineptly try to shill for this administration. But I detest and am much more worried about Islamism, and you’ll never find me making excuses for it. I don’t think such rationalizing in this context produces more insight, only more evasions and denial, and incentives and encouragements. Look back to the French liberals of the 1930s, or the American intellectuals who defended Stalin in the 1950s and you’ll hear how your words sound to me, and, I’m confident, will sound to the world in thirty years.

I don’t know who exactly you think deserves my or “our” respect, but if you’re talking about the Islamists, I disrespectfully disagree, and I am proud to offer them the “downright lack of respect” they deserve. If you’re talking about the oppressed women and those who fight against totalitarianism and die for liberalism and democracy, respect is exactly what I have for them, and I’m not going to feign respect for those who enforce Sharia and intentionally bomb innocents in the name of the voiceless majority that the terrorists and tyrants are oppressing. Nor will I take the easy, masochistic, and voguish way out by spewing incoherent banalities that belong on a t-shirt. Freedom does indeed happen when you make a choice, and I know exactly where I stand on women’s rights, democracy, freedom of religion, gay rights, racism, apostasy, and freedom of speech: I stand firmly opposed to those for whom you demand respect.

While liberals should be the ones pointing the way beyond this Iron Age madness, they are rendering themselves increasingly irrelevant. Being generally reasonable and tolerant of diversity, liberals should be especially sensitive to the dangers of religious literalism. But they aren’t.

Given what the Islamists believe, I couldn’t be prouder of the label “infidel;” I embrace it, and will answer if so called. The apologists should be doing more to earn the name.

Here’s a quote for you, by one of Israel’s strongest critics, and one of the Palestinians’ strongest defenders (co-author with Edward Said of “Blaming the Victims: Spurious Scholarship and the Palestinian Question”), who also, as much as he fights for Palestinian rights, doesn’t allow excuses for them to be made when they blow up kindergartens.

Good luck with your art.

It’s an exact equivalent of the evil nonsense taught by [such people], who say the suicide bombers in Palestine are driven to it by despair. Have you read the manifestos of these suicide bombers? Have you seen the videos they make? Have you seen the manifestos they put out? The propaganda that they generate? These are not people in despair. These are people in a state of religious exultation. Who are promised everything. Who are in a state of hope. Who are in a state of adoration for their evil mullahs. And for their filthy religion. It’s this that makes them think they have the right to kill others while taking their own lives. If despair among Palestinians was enough to create psychopathic criminal behavior, there’s been enough despair for a long time, and enough misery to go around. It is to excuse the vicious, filthy forces of Islamic jihad to offer any other explanation but that it is their own evil preaching, their own vile religion, their own racism, their own apocalyptic ideology that makes them think they have the right to kill everyone in this room, and go to paradise as a reward. I won’t listen, nor should you, to anyone who euphemizes or excuses this evil wicked thing.

We are the ones with all the big bombs and artillery and the ability and power to blow up the planet. Maybe they are trying to defend themselves against our thievery and our murderous ways. I think we may have brought this real and present danger upon ourselves not only because of our own behavior, but also because of our lack of diligence when it comes to keeping track of what our so called “leaders” have been up to in the pursuit of profit.