The Dawn Treader

Want to learn about the single-most important U.S. foreign policy concern of the 21st century?  Then read this transcript.  It is 23 pages long and worth every minute you read it.  It is a transcript of a talk that Professor Bernard Lewis gave in April of this year (prior to the war in Lebanon).  Lewis is the Cleveland E. Dodge Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University.  For more than 60 years, he has specialized in the history of Islam, particularly in the Middle East, and the relationship between Islam and the West.  It was Professor Lewis who coined the term "clash of civilizations," three years before Samuel Huntington used that phrase in his famous article in Foreign Affairs, setting the stage for a vigorous debate about the relationship between Islam and the West.

Chuck Colson calls this transcript "one of the most helpful pieces I've read."  I have read it twice to absorb the information.  Take a look.
 

Is this really about cartoons?

I don't think so.  This anger is about worldviews.  In particular, it is about the lack of respect for a worldview that reached its pinnacle of power in the middle ages.

The situation in France worsens with each passing night.  The latest count as of this morning?  Nearly five thousand vehicles burned.  Violence has been reported in an astounding 300 towns across France.  One man was beaten to death.  A handicapped woman, who tried to escape from a bus that was getting fire bombed, was doused with a flammable liquid and set ablaze.

Amazingly, the story of the Intifada in France is gaining little traction in the U.S. press.  Perhaps that is a sign of the overall irrelevance of France on the world scene these days.