Howard Kurtz reports this morning on the Newsweek case: “The intensity of the anti-American riots, fueled in part by outraged Muslim clerics and radio broadcasts by elements of the ousted Taliban regime, took many Western analysts by surprise.” What’s the surprise? As Freedom House’s Paul Marshall asks in a piece that will be up on NRO in a little bit: Remember Salman Rushdie? One only needs a cocktail knowledge of these things to have an idea American officials desecrating a Koran would be huge. And one would hope someone at Newsweek would be slightly more plugged in. These Western analysts need to get out more. I don’t know what sand their heads are in, but apparently its very far away from anywhere Muslim.