And Holocaust denial. The invaluable Oliver Kamm is on the case again.
QUOTE OF THE DAY: “Overstated though the dichotomy is between red and blue America, it does mean that no one who is at all well informed can believe that America is Bush and Bush is America. If the west is divided, the dividing line runs slap-bang through the middle of America.
And, on the other side of the pond, through Europe. We don’t have so many Christian fundamentalists any more… But we do have Islamic fundamentalists, in growing numbers. And, I would say, we have secular fundamentalists: people who believe that to live by the tenets of Islam, or other religions, is incompatible with what it is to be fully human, and want citizens to be educated and the state to legislate accordingly. While I have been in America, the possible consequences have been played out on the streets of prosperous, pacific, tolerant Holland, with the murder of the filmmaker Theo van Gogh, and the counter-attack on an Islamic school. If America has its culture wars, its Kulturkampf, so do we. And ours could be bloodier.
So the expressions of European solidarity after the September 11 2001 terrorist attacks (“Nous sommes tous Américains”) should acquire a new meaning and a new context after the November 2 2004 elections. Hands need to be joined across the sea in an old cause: the defence of the Enlightenment. We are all blue Americans now.” – Timothy Garton Ash, in the Guardian today.
NOW, A SHARK’S TALE: A cartoon feature meets the religious right. Money quote:
The film does not come right out and say that we should all accept homosexuality. And, naturally, children should be taught to be accepting of others. But as Plugged In’s Steven Isaac notes, “Had this movie been released 20 years ago, nobody would have been calling attention to this subject.” Two decades ago, accepting differences meant accepting a person who might have a different skin color, or be from a different ethnic background. Such differences are immutable characteristics, however, and not sexual choices. In this respect, Shark Tale comes far too close to taking a bite out of traditional moral and spiritual beliefs.
Yep. They’re talking about a cartoon vegetarian shark.
The Dish 