Reply #8: Buchanon is right. [View All]

[Grins]

He didn't say it so well, but he's kinda right.

Said better is E.J. Dionne's comments in today's Wash. Post:
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A26881-2003Oct27.html>

"For the administration, it's not just that Boykin presents a political problem, because the most loyal part of Bush's base is made up of evangelical Christians, many of whom share Boykin's views... The larger problem is that the very idea of religious liberty is theologically difficult for many believers. Nonbelievers and theological liberals have trouble getting their minds around the idea that Boykin and his Muslim counterpart in the story are both convinced, intellectually as well as emotionally, that theirs is the true conception of God. For fundamentalist Christians and Muslims alike, it makes sense to proclaim their countries, respectively, "Christian" or "Islamic" nations, because doing so is an affirmation of what they see as right and good...But when someone like Boykin comes along, he is an embarrassment to our pragmatic arrangements. He is explaining to us that it is very hard for many religious people to buy into the liberal consensus -- to put their religious convictions on the shelf when asked -- to embrace a system in which "truth" and "error" get equal time and equal rights.

Boykin has moved the issue of religious toleration front and center. Simply transferring him would not answer the challenge he has presented. It falls to Bush, who understands better than most where Boykin is coming from, to make the case for religious liberty to his political base in order to make it to Muslims too.


One more. From Paul Krugman in today's NY Times:
"Why won't the administration mollify Muslims by firing Lt. Gen. William Boykin, ... Why won't it give moderate Muslims a better argument against the radicals by opposing Ariel Sharon's settlement policy, ...? The answer is that in these cases politics takes priority over the war on terror. , the administration doesn't want "to make a martyr of a man who depicts himself as a Christian Soldier, marching off to war." Muslims are completely wrong to think that the U.S. is engaged in a war against Islam. But that misperception flourishes in part because the domestic political strategy of the Bush administration ... "Election Boils Down to a Culture War" was the title of Mr. Fineman's column. But the analysis was all about abortion and euthanasia, and now we hear that opposition to gay marriage will be a major campaign theme. This isn't a culture war - it's a religious war.
<http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/28/opinion/28KRUG.html>