Hugh Hewitt writes:

So, did the cartoons and their aftermath make it easier or more diffcult for Musharraf of Pakistan to continue to guide his country away from the lure of the jihadists? Easier or more difficult for Turkey to remain a friend of the West's? Easier or more difficult for the pro-Western people of Iran to summon the courage to change their government? Easier or more difficult for Jordan's King Abdullah to continue his course, which has included support for the reconstruction of Iraq even in the face of Zarqawi's murderers?

In a wired world, there aren't any inconsequential actions, and everything is grist for the propagandists among the jihadists.

That doesn't mean censorship, or even self-censorship. Only a bit of reflection before rushing off to start new battles which divert attention from those already underway.

There is a chasm of difference between serious commentary on the Islamic challenge facing Europe and the West (see Mark Steyn's "It's The Demographics Stupid") and crude, sweeping anti-Muslim propaganda. It isn't necessary to defend the latter in order to uphold and praise the former.

He's right. Nonetheless, (sorry, a conjunction of some sort was invevitable at this point, and that seemed the most stylish word to choose from), it's also worth revisiting an August 2005 essay by Cathy Seipp:

Whenever liberals remind us that not all Muslims are terrorists or anti-American rioters, I always think that not everyone in the pre-civil-rights south was a church bomber or member of the Ku Klux Klan. Even then, there was lots to like about the south. Southerners always have been known for charm and hospitality — rather like Palestinians today, whom the foreign press finds much more appealing than brusque and bossy Israeli soldiers.

It's fair to say, however, that despite the existence of many decent people and even the occasional Atticus Finch type, southerners a generation or two ago were not exactly unsympathetic to ideas the Klan had about uppity blacks or busybody federal lawmakers trying to come in and destroy their way of life. But liberals then did not tsk-tsk about the observation that the segregated south was a toxic, racist culture that had to change — nor did they explain to blacks impatient about local traditions like "colored" water fountains that really, this is a different culture after all, and we need to be sensitive and understanding.

Certainly I realize that there are differences between the pre-civil-rights south and Islamists today. The animosity of segregationists was focused on blacks; Islamists especially hate Jews, but also aren't fond of Americans, Christians, women, homosexuals, Buddhist statues, Hindus, irreverent Dutch filmmakers or the entire Western way of life. And even at its worst, the segregated south wasn't expansionist, at least not in the 20th century. When George Wallace stood in that schoolhouse door, he didn't mean that schools across the entire planet should conform to his notions of separate but equal — or watch out for the suicide bombers.

If what Austin Bay and Charles Moore write is corrent, a lot of innocent people have been manipulated from on-high--by the Syrnian government and by imams in Denmark. Of course, any time an angry mob appears, there are a few true believers, and a lot of innocent dupes.

Which is why Dean Esmay condemns a broadside by Neil Boortz against Islam, and is right to do so.

And Dean is spot-on when he writes:

Muslims who want to defeat terrorism are my brothers. They're yours too.

Absolutely.