Donald, I’ve also begun Harris’ book. Based on the early part his thesis seems rather abstract. I’d agree with Grimmy, there are Americans who can and will face up to the Law of the Jungle that Harris talks about. Conversely, there are people in what he calls tribal societies who want modern ideas, and sill more (many more) who want what rational society produces, wealth, prosperity and power. Omar Fadhil comes to mind immediately. One of the problems is that guys like Osama and Ahmedinejad think they can raid the civilized people and steal that wealth and power from them.

Look at WWII and Germany. There was a case of what had been enlightened people falling into the tribal mentality Harris writes of. After much irrational lack of reasoning about the subject the remaining enlightened societies resoved to fight them and did so with remarkable and necessary savagery. There are people in our society who will revert to the tribal mentality (in Harris’ taxonomy), temporarily, when necessary. One of the reasons for the distrust between the military and the lefty nutcases is the latters’ lack of understanding of precisely that temperament, and the use of rationality and reason of the enlightenment to achieve tribal-style goals of societal survival in warfare. That is the sort of thing that Victor Davis Hanson means when he writes of the Western Way of Warfare.

Perhaps Harris is more sophisticated and less abstract later in the book, and understands these things. These are my first impressions.

Love the totty, but the screed is too much. Leave it to a True Conservative to wax apocalyptic when your side is beginning to kick ass!

The liberation of Iraq, and the belated recognition by the US of its duty to do so, is a liberal agenda. Always was. That’s why the Dems have been so impotent in the face of its implemenation by GWB, and why they are approaching 2008 with an empty hand.

Next month I predict you’ll see the emergence of the next Democratic President of the US. Never fear; his name is David Petraeus, and his time a few years hence. Then you’ll know the system is working.

Peace.

Do not despair. There are sufficient numbers of Americans that understand and are well adept at gutter level conflict.

When addressing the weakness of America and/or Americans, the liberal left gets accepted as the template to display the rest of us as weak.

It’s the quiet, hard folk, the real “American Street” that such authors have zero understanding of.

A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.

It is no use saying, ‘We are doing our best.’ You have got to succeed in doing what is necessary.

I never worry about action, but only about inaction.

I like a man who grins when he fights.

But don’t leave out America from those nations of the West who might be doomed!

I’ve been reading Lee Harris’ new book, “The Suicide of Reason: Radical Islam’s Threat to the West.” Harris’ basic premise is that the Islamists’ barbarism and fanaticism is so foreign to our sensibilities, that we dismiss their methods as unthinkable and irrational. The terrorists are stuck in law of the jungle, and we – who are so enlightened – would never ourselves resort to such fanaticism. We just can’t comprehend it, as a society.

And that’s the problem, because we need to be more fanatical ourselves about the rightness of a values and the legitimacy of our cause. Forget moral equivalence! Man the barricades and annihilate the barbarian hordes!

Actually, I’ve only read about 3-4 chapters so far. But it’s a great book, and I’m actually not too far off the mark in my synopsis.

Here’s my brief overview of the book:

http://burkeanreflections.blogspot.com/2007/08/suicide-of-reason-radical-islam-and.html

Keep it up over here!

the silly name you give your link

Remove the question marks, but nothing else, and you have your link.