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3/28/06

Newsday.com: How does the present US Administration view multiculturalism? "Lets be honest - Multiculturalism can kill a nation"-by James P. Pinkerton

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How does the present US Administration view multiculturalism? "Lets be honest: Multiculturalism can kill a nation"- by *James P.Pinkerton

"The lesson of the Muhammad cartoon controversy is: Multiculturalism between nations is inevitable, but multiculturalism within nations is disastrous. Protests, many of them violent, have erupted across the world - including Europe, Australia and New Zealand - after the appearance of cartoons depicting the Muslim prophet Muhammad in unflattering ways.It's time for all of us to recognize that different cultures have different values. For the West, broadly speaking, the highest value is freedom, including freedom of religious expression. But for the Muslim world, the highest value seems to be Islamic piety. To draw such a distinction between West and East is not to endorse cultural relativism; it's simply to take note of cultural reality. Not everyone thirsts for liberty. Plenty of people around the world, maybe most, thirst instead to restrict liberty. And so, if Muslim crowds can't kill the Muhammad-mocking Danish cartoonists for "blasphemy," they will settle for burning Western embassies, at least for now.

It should be obvious that our effort to influence Muslim public opinion in a positive way has reached a dead end. That is, we advocate democratization but get Islamization. That process empowers the likes of Hamas in Palestine and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran. Even Turkey, commonly regarded as the most democratic and pro-American Muslim country, is changing its stance. The hot movie for Turks is titled "Valley of Wolves: Iraq." It depicts American GIs as blood-crazed war criminals. And, as UPI reported, the actor Gary Busey plays a "Jewish-American doctor at Abu Ghraib prison who disembowels innocent Iraqis so their organs can be sold to rich people in New York, London and Tel Aviv." These Turks are our friends? And, oh, by the way, another piece of news concerning Western-Muslim relations is worth noting: Jamal Badawi, a leader in the bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen, back in 2000, has "escaped" from his Yemeni prison. We shouldn't hold our breath waiting for his recapture."

*James P. Pinkerton has been a columnist for Newsday since 1993. Prior to that, he worked in the White House under presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, and also in the 1980, 1984, 1988, and 1992 Republican presidential campaigns. Pinkerton is the author of What Comes Next: The End of Big Government--And the New Paradigm Ahead (Hyperion: 1995). He is also a contributor to the Fox News Channel and a Fellow at the New America Foundation in Washington DC. He is a graduate of Stanford University.

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