The debt hawks are to economics as the creationists are to biology. Those, who do not understand Monetary Sovereignty, do not understand economics. If you understand the following, simple statement, you are ahead of most economists, politicians and media writers in America: Our government, being Monetarily Sovereign, has the unlimited ability to create the dollars to pay its bills.
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In the previous post ( We already have lost the war), I reprinted excerpts from an article written by John Mauldin, in which he asked, “When would a wise Jew have begun making plans to leave Germany?”
He reminds the reader about a series of events occurring in pre-World War II Germany that presaged the holocaust, events each of which would have given the “wise Jew” a clue about what was to happen. In each case, Mauldin asks whether this is the point at which the “wise Jew” should have seen the handwriting on the wall, and left. You might wish to read that post before continuing with this one.
The point of today’s post is that some of the same events occurring in pre-war Germany are occurring now in America, and this time, the main target is Islam. So the question is: When would the wise Muslim begin to make plans to leave America?
Here is one parallel with yesteryear:
Americans’ bias against Jews, Muslims linked, poll says
By Michelle Boorstein, Washington Post Staff Writer, Thursday, January 21, 2010A (Gallup) poll about Americans’ views on Islam concludes that the strongest predictor of prejudice against Muslims is whether a person holds similar feelings about Jews.
The poll, conducted in the fall (of 2009), is the latest large-scale survey to find a high level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the United States. . . The Gallup poll asked Americans about their views of Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Buddhism and found that 53 percent see Islam unfavorably.
And here is another hint for the “wise Muslim.”
Ground Zero:Exaggerating the Jihadist Threat
by Romesh Ratnesar, Time, August 18, 2010President Obama’s statement on Aug. 13 endorsing “the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan” has unleashed another storm of partisan bloviation. Obama is “pandering to radical Islam,” says Newt Gingrich; John Boehner finds Obama’s comments “deeply troubling.” On this issue, the President’s critics have public opinion on their side: nearly 70% of Americans in a CNN–Opinion Research Corporation poll say they oppose a Ground Zero mosque.”
And yet another hint for the “wise Muslim”
Growing Bias Against Muslims In America
Posted in Liberaland by Alan, 9/13/2010“There is a hatred, an open hatred, and a lack of tolerance for people who are Muslim,” said Mary Jo O’Neill, regional attorney for the Phoenix district office of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. She said she has seen an uptick in discrimination complaints among Muslim workers in her region, which includes Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New Mexico.
Claims of bias against Muslims in the workplace rose to 1,490 last year (2009) from 1,304 in 2008 and just 697 in 2004, according to EEOC figures. Last year’s total was even higher than in the year after the 9/11 attacks, when bias claims hit 1,463. Figures from this year are not yet available.
No, I am NOT suggesting that Muslims should leave America. On the contrary, my fervent prayer is that the anti-Muslim demigogs and the hate-mongering bigots will quit America and the Muslims will stay with us to enrich our multi-faceted society. But if you read the previous post and think about what happened in Germany and now is happening in America, you will see disturbing parallels.
We have not gone so far as a “Crystal Night” in America, yet. We like to think we are the compassionate land of the free – we like to think it couldn’t happen here — but in truth, no nation is immune from the bigotry disease. Perhaps the killing of bin Laden will reduce the heat, but I suspect that one more 9/11 tragedy will unleash the dogs of hatred, perhaps far worse than anything we have seen.
What do you think the wise Muslim should do?
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com
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No nation can tax itself into prosperity, nor grow without money growth. It’s been 40 years since the U.S. became Monetary Sovereign, , and neither Congress, nor the President, nor the Fed, nor the vast majority of economists and economics bloggers, nor the preponderance of the media, nor the most famous educational institutions, nor the Nobel committee, nor the International Monetary Fund have yet acquired even the slightest notion of what that means.
Remember that the next time you’re tempted to ask a dopey teenager, “What were you thinking?” He’s liable to respond, “Pretty much what your generation was thinking when it screwed up my future.”
MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY
#Monetary Sovereignty - Mitchell 
“Claims of bias” are not proven incidents of bias. One hears charges of racism so often it makes your head spin. Simply disagreeing with someone is now apparently grounds for the “racism” charge.
How many substantiated cases of anti-Muslim violence are there in the U.S? How many in Congress are blaming the economic woes of the US on Muslims? Has our President past or present called for eliminating Muslims from the country? How many mosques have been defaced? Do most American favor the banning of all mosque construction or just one near Ground Zero?
I think you’re blowing this all out of proportion.
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Jason,
1. I hope you’re right
2. I hope we don’t have another 9/11, which surely will bring the crazies out from under the rocks and prove you’re wrong.
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell.
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If they deny evolution, they will never be wise.
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Mr. Mitchell,
If you get some time, please view these speech excerpts by Sam Harris:
While I’d love to agree with you about Islam, the facts lead me not to. Islam, in it’s present state, forces us to treat it differently. It’s sad, but true.
Thanks,
Nathan
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Mr. Harris is wrong for singling out Islam. He should study the history of pogroms, the Inquisition and the Holocaust, all of which were created by Christians. Worldwide, millions killed, tortured and evicted from their homes, all in the name of Christianity. It was good people, both religious and athiest like him, who justified the Holocaust. It could happen here. So the question posed in the post remains to be answered.
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
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Mr. Mitchell,
I wasn’t so much trying to answer your post’s question as I was addressing the implied assumptions of the article (that we should treat Muslims and Islam the same as everyone else). I think you’ve asked is the wrong question. This may sound coarse, but I don’t care about the feelings of Muslims. This has nothing to do with any preconceived notion; I base my feelings on simple evidence of how a vast number of Muslims, a majority in many cases, feel towards us; feelings of which are almost entirely based on religion.
And I have to disagree with you about Sam Harris being wrong. How is he wrong? In the videos, Sam Harris does in fact talk about the Inquisition and the Bible. The reason he “singles” out Islam is because of where it is in its history. At this point in time, we’d be stupid not to single them out. To not would be to ignore what’s going on around us.
Nathan Goss
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Naively, I harbor the hope that the tit-for-tat endless series of hate rationales will cease.
Christianity and Islam have been at war for 1500 years. Both have plenty of evidence the other is at fault. Isn’t it time to end the bloody feud? Or do you enjoy the hatred?
This is as stupid as Hatfields vs. McCoys, times a billion.
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Mr. Mitchell,
Just like in economics, we have to deal with the world as it is, not how we’d like it to be. I don’t enjoy it at all, but how do we end it in the real world? Nothing has worked so far. We have to accept that Islam is in a bad place right now and deal with it accordingly. Hopefully, Muslims in the future will look back on Islam’s pubescent years with horror as Christians do now.
You’re right about one thing, it’s a little naive….for now.
Nathan
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So when Christians killed 6 million people in Europe, should Christians in America be blamed?
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I was going through your old posts and I guess I didn’t see your reply here. Hate to bring up old debates but, given the recent news and the fact that I just found your reply, I thought why not….
Are you really suggesting that Christianity, as opposed to Nazism, was responsible for the Holocaust? I thought that one was settled history, which is why one ideology didn’t survive the test of time.
Look, Harris asked a really simple question in one of these videos, and its implications have gone unanswered for too long. I’ll go ahead and ask it, but this time I will use your reasoning to rephrase it appropriately:
Where are the Jewish suicide bombers today? Do you see them setting themselves off in the middle of Berlin because of something that happened over a half century ago?
There will always be psychos in every religion, but when a vast majority of them come from one specific religion, and you don’t recognize that, you are simply not recognizing fact. The facts are that, even given the Norwegian psycho, over 99% of religious violence is coming from Muslims. And there’s a point when something stops becoming an exception and starts becoming the rule. At this point, still, religiously based Muslim violence is the rule, and all other religions are the exception.
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My opposition to Islam in the UK is not based on bigotry. It is based on facts. If I was bigoted or biased against other cultures, how come I’m quite happy having Bhuddists, Jews and Hindus in the UK?
Here are a few facts. Muslims (like Hitler) believe in killing and threatening to kill the authors and publishers they don’t like. Muslims have got a minute fraction the number of Nobel prizes per head of population compared to Jews. The number of books translated in the entire Arab world over the last thousand years is less than the number translated ANNUALLY in Spain. Around 20% of Muslims in the UK think that anyone leaving their religion should be killed. Their attitude to democracy is ambivalent. I’ll supply sources of the above info if needed.
With this sort of record, I’d like to see Muslims stay in Muslim countries till they fully accept liberal, democratic Western values.
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Ordinarily, I wouldn’t post a comment like yours, but it makes the perfect point: Bigotry always has a rationale.
Jews want to take over the world. Blacks are criminals. Irish are drunks. French are supercilious. Germans are overbearing. Americans are boors. Italians are Mafioso. Gays are bad parents. Catholics want to convert everyone. And Russians? Well everyone knows about Russians.
There always are bits of data to support any generalization about “them” being inferior to, and/or a danger to, “us.”
People are individuals, not generalizations. Each person is different. But that is lost in the hysteria generated by war or recession.
I feel afraid that the next 9/11 type of incident in America or the UK will bring out the haters and their “info.”
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
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Ralph is right; at a macro level, Muslims deserve all the contempt they have worked hard to earn. When their faith evolves so will my opinions, but until then, this atheist will side with the “bigots”.
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Um, at a macro level, all organized religions are ridiculous.
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Depends on your definition of ridiculous. Many people need some type of God in their life for various reasons; us atheist need to accept that. If you add both the positives and negatives, you should find that on net, some religions do add value. My simple opinion is that the Muslim faith takes much more from humanity than it gives. If that makes me a bigot, so be it; but I prefer to always be on the side of truth regardless of how misguided others are.
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Oh, I accept that. The problem is, at a macro level, they don’t accept non-believers.
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Nor do the more pious of most religions. Piety and tolerance are rare bedfellows, though tolerance often is given lip service by the pious.
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That’s what I meant. I didn’t single out anyone.
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Now go back through all the above comments and see if you can imagine how the Holocaust became possible. As religious differences bred “we vs them,” the “them” became more believably alien, until they hardly seemed human at all. It became easier and easier to eject them until killing became almost mandatory.
It has happened to all religions at the hands of all religions, and the question is: At what point are we now, in America, with Muslims?
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
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I don’t know, I’m tired of religions.
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How is criticism of religious thought much different than political or economic thought? People need to be accountable for their beliefs especially when those beliefs bring real pain and misery to others whom do not derive any/many benefits from those beliefs.
Rodger, it’s the Muslims who believe in spreading the belief by the sword and practiced daily. You concerns for humanity is what motivates my contempt for the faith.
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Steve, you just made my point. See comment #8. What’s the answer to the question?
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell.
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I am saddened by the comments here. Every organized religions purpose is to spread everywhere in the world. If one really believes they have the true word of god, then they must tell everyone the good word “gospel.” Those who refuse are then refusing god.
To say that Islam is “different” and so billions of people should be treated negatively because of how they choose to worship is the definition of bigotry. Generalizations about any group of people based on the actions of others are wrong and ruled by ignorance.
That some here argue its ok to do this is exactly what the Author is talking about. Rationalizing hate shows lack of insight into the human experience. Perspective is everything.
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I didn’t single out Islam, but monotheists are the ones who “rationalize hate” if you are skeptical about their nonsenses.
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