5 months ago a cartoonist from denmark put a silly picture of mohammed with a tubine that looked like a bomb in the paper. now the rest of europe is getting in on the action it seems. the whole muslim world is in an uproar, rioting and the like. rioters burn the danish consulate in lebanon. violent protests evrywere. protesters are shown holding signs like "freedom go to hell", and " europe take some lessons from 9/11."
people are calling for the danish cartoonist to be beheaded and for osama bin laden to reak havok and for the streets to run red with blood, all praise allah. these are the same peacful people the rioted after the false story of their holy book being flushed down the toilet at guantonimo (?). is europe finally going to wake up or will they do nothing like they did in the forties when hitler steamedrolled over the country, and then do something. these are the peacful people that if you become a christain you are killed. are we going to do something? or do the tree loving hippies have to much of a grip on us. lets all get in a big circle and hug and rationalize with each other.
someone said this was a clash between civlilazations. wrong. a clash between cultures but not cilvilazations. it is not civil when people cry out for the blood of europeans because of a cartoon.
everyone says 90% of muslims ARE good. maybe so but when the other 10% is 102 mill. people that wants to kill everyone that isnt muslim and wants the whole world a muslim state, we need to do something.

go here for a news article.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/02/06/cartoon.protests/index.html

What would you suggest we do?

Something does need to be done about this. It just goes to show what animals these people are to kill people over a freakin cartoon.Nothing will be done though, people will just sit back as usual and let things get worse in this world and do nothing about it, then before ya know it the whole world will be muslim and people will be asking them selves what happend.More and more I am hating these people cuz I have to live with it everyday around here...again...press 1 for english...bite me.Sorry but I am not one of those people to sit back and watch, I speak my mind.

What choices do we have besides a prolonged 'hearts and minds' type of campaign (which is doomed) and genocide?

And also, these militants are kind of like their Christian counterparts -- small in numbers, but unfortunately, very loud.

I'm absolutely astonished by the backlash from these cartoons. And while I know the majority of Muslims are peaceful, the violence from the minority is sickening! I'm all for the boycotts and demonstrations they're having, but burning embassies?

The people doing violence are not loud, they're vicious. I'm probably wrong, but I don't recall hearing of "militant" Christians burning embassies and demanding the execution of someone who offended them.

Unfortunately, what can be done to curb this tirade? Nothing...although I read some sort of "compensation" is being recommended. I guess money will solve the problem?

I think our little war in Iraq is making that minority larger and larger all the time. Is it really still a minority when 47% of Iraqis support insurgent attacks on American Soldiers, especially when those attack make where they live so dangerous?

Maybe the number of outraged and violent muslims is now closer to 470 million?

What would you suggest we do?

i dont know how much the us can do right now. we have our hands tied with so many diffrent things. europe on the other hand could do something and im not talking appeasing them. that never works. france and hitler come to mind.

I personally think we should just stay out of it. At least for now. Let Europe deal with it for a change. Not 1 single US newspaper has reprinted the cartoons. Just EU papers. Why don't we just see how they handle things for a while, with out the US's help. And if they need help. They can go through the UN and ask for it. We can send humanitarian aid workers through the UN. Surely they wouldn't need our military man power to help the UN (Lord willing it doesn't come to that) in order to take care of something they started right?

Not 1 single US newspaper has reprinted the cartoons. Just EU papers.

Actually, the Philadelphia Inquirer has reprinted it along with an article. It ran in their Saturday edition. However, here is the link to their website version of it. http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/news/13788640.htm

Untrue, The Philadelphia Enquirer has published one of them. We are western so we are in this. It was a NATO base in Afghanistan that was attacked, we are in NATO and it's our war in Iraq.

swake... You are correct and I failed to mention that they did publish only one cartoon.

However, they did publish the cartoon of Muhammed with a bomb like turban.

I stand corrected.

What can we do about issues like those stereotypical Danish cartoons?

Pretty much nothing. Moderate Muslims are the only people who can reason with any of these extremists -if they would bother to do so. Right now they're probably just too scared to do it. The extremists sure won't listen to any of us. So we just need to look after our own best interests.

It's pretty clear we need to wean ourselves off foreign oil. Lots of approaches and technology are already available. Sugar beets, sugar cane and corn can all be grown and used to make alcohol and ethanol to fuel vehicles. The hydrogen fuel cell thing is a longer term initiative. Add electric batteries into the combination.

We're customers of Middle East oil, but the shop keeper has a vengeful hatred of us. Normally if I encounter a store with really negative customer service I take my business elsewhere.

I could be wrong, but I happen to think these riots and other acts of violence are gasps of a dying culture. Many are aware of the freedoms which exist elsewhere, despite the lack of free speech and a free press. Militant clerics have to do their best to malign our character and describe us as devils. Deviantly perverted acts, such as beheading bound and defenseless prisoners in front of video cameras, are very hateful. But at the same time very desperate. Such blasphemous acts make me think this really has little to do with religion and a lot more to do with some powerful people trying to keep control on a huge number of impoverished people.