Our friend Roger L. Simon, over at Pajamas Media, notes that Yusuf Islam — né Cat Stevens — performed at
Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert’s now absurdly named “Rally to Restore Sanity.” As the world well knows, Islam/Stevens is the man who endorsed the fatwa on Salman Rushdie and on more than one occasion said he wished he could carry it out and murder Rushdie himself. …
Roger’s full explanation is here.
This falls under the category of "Because you'll believe anything" The left is justifying Cat Stevens being included in the "Rally to Restore Sanity" because he now claims his comments were taken out of context. Maybe they should have called it the "Rally to Suspend Disbelief!"
The Left is always willing to accept whining denials from Islamists when they stumble and tell it like it really is.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAfter getting into bed with the Communists and then making environmentalism their religion, the Liberal Progressives are ready to hook up with the Muslims.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLiberalism is the antithesis of Islam. The blind hatred of America and the endorsement of anything that is against this country by Progressive Liberals are driving them to their doom.
Cat Stevens presents sort of a Roman Polanski problem. Cat Stevens wrote some really great songs about peace but he thinks people who he disagrees with should be killed. Roman Polanski should be in jail for rape, but he's a really great director. There's a really strong desire to take what you like from someone (Polanski's "Ghostwriter" was really good) and leave the rest.
It works if you want to put Peace Train on your iPod, but actually having Stevens at your rally is probably a bad idea.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRe: Peace Train
Get those guys with scimitars and explosives out of the caboose.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'm with Jason. Cat Stevens was there purely because they could do the "peace"/"crazy"/"love" train act with Ozzie and the O' Jays. A significant inconvenience -- though not one I think even *occurred* to the organizers -- is that in contrast with legitimately moderate Muslims (like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) Yusuf Islam is out there.
And Slayer, I was there, and you're just wrong about Stewart and his crowd. They really, really, really don't hate America. I think our President does, or at least, is embarrassed by and uncomfortable about it. But Stewart's whole closing monologue was about how much BETTER America is than how it's portrayed on cable news. How effectively we work together, every day, accomplishing the *actual* greatness of the country. If there's any one single word to describe the rally, it is, "positive." Relentlessly so. When we've got the Lecturer-in-Chief giving us somber lessons about how terrible we are, it was really a delightful contrast.
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