Thursday, August 31, 2006

Dem Senators on Islamofascism   [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

From a conference call Tuesday, via Congressional Quarterly:

QUESTION: Senator, I was wondering if you could respond to the earlier note of the use of the phrase Islamo-fascism, if you think that is an accurate term for what's going on.

 

REED: Well, I'll just say I don't think it's particularly accurate. You know, I think if one carefully has looked at the history of fascism, which was a political movement in western Europe that actually, in the two principal cases, came to power through democratic elections — at least in Germany it did — I think the analogy is very, very weak.

 

And what they're looking for is a kind of a connection, a symbolic connection, between the struggle against Nazism and fascism in Italy. And I think, again, it misperceives the nature of the threats we face today.

 

This is not a nationalistic organization that is trying to seize control of a particular government. It is a religious movement. It is motivated by apocalyptic visions. It is something that is distributed. Most of these terrorist cells seem to be evolving through imitation, rather than being organized.

 

And again, I think it goes to the point of that their first response is, you know, come up with a catchy slogan, and then they forget to do the hard work of digging into the facts and coming up with a strategy and resources that will counter the actual threats we face.

 

And so, you know, I think it's imprecise. It's meant, I think, more for political consumption in the United States than to adequately describe what's going on in the world.

 

SCHUMER: I basically agree with Jack on that. There are extreme religious fanatics — Islamic religious fanatics who want to hurt us, and we have to fight them. But you got to have a real policy to do it.

 

08/31 07:41 AMShare