Editorial
Principles vs. Pragmatism viz. the Mosque
It's not my preference to beat a dead horse but this topic goes to the heart of certain features of our current political and legal climate.
When one is in some doubt about what to do – and there can be many situations that one isn't well prepared for – a way to act is to consider one's basic principles. Take someone married who is suddenly strongly attracted to someone other than a spouse. It happens but if those marriage vows matter at all, such a situation would be when they would come in most clearly. One is pulled toward breaching an oath but since it is an oath, presumably taken in earnest, one will refuse to yield to the temptation. Or if one is tempted to do a bit of shoplifting or prevaricating. This is when one's principles come into play, however strongly one may feel like circumventing them.
If it is true that men and women in human communities ought not to intrude on their fellow citizens' liberties, then that idea would come in full strength just when it is most tempting to butt in. So, given how strongly millions of Americans feel that those planning to build a Mosque near Ground Zero are misguided, the upright thing for them to do is to refuse to yield to such a feeling and go with the principle that everyone has a right to freedom of religion even when that religion leads one astray. Yes, it is difficult and very tempting to toss such a principle and ban the plan but so are numerous other principles very difficult to abide by. That's just what makes them principles – they must not be treated lightly, they must apply even when one is really tempted to ignore them.
Now all this applies when one sees human beings guided by moral and political principles but not if one sees them as pragmatists for whom principles do not apply. As the joke goes with traffic lights, if they are only suggestions, not firm rules of the road, then by all means dodge them as you wish, if you can get away with doing so.
The famous American pragmatist philosopher and psychologist William James argued once that if breaching the truth gives one serious satisfaction, then one should breach it. As he put it in his famous essay, "The Meaning of Truth," "The suspicion is in the air nowadays that the superiority of one of our formulas to another may not consist so much in its literal 'objectivity,' as in subjective qualities like its usefulness, its 'elegance,' or its congruity with our residual beliefs" (p. 41). So it isn't what's objectively true that counts for us but what is subjectively useful. When it comes to dealing with such matters as whether to incarcerate Japanese Americans, regardless of whether they have been proven guilty of anything, or to ban a mosque near Ground Zero, never mind that no one has shown that anyone's rights are being violated, the pragmatist can always go around the principle and say, but do it if it feels good.
I am not here going to attempt to show the superiority of the principled as distinct from the pragmatic approach to human conduct or public policies in a human community. What I want to call attention to is how addressing issues pragmatically differs from how someone with principles would address them. Pragmatists distrust principles, thinking them to be a result of loose, ideological, and dogmatic thinking, while those who stress principles insist that what they rely upon for guidance has gone through centuries of trial and error and by now deserve to be heeded even when they appear to be inconvenient.
Most of the American founders were convinced that certain well considered principles apply to how a human community must be governed, how citizens ought to deal with one another, no matter what. Many today seem to scoff at such an attitude. Of course they usually make exceptions, for example, when they oppose torture or rape or child molestation, and it is unclear how can they square these exceptions with their avowed pragmatism in other areas. But they do try. We are witnessing how this drama plays out about something many Americans feel strongly about.
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Posted by Peacenik on 08/25/10 10:54 PM
I was listening to Fox news interview the comedian Dennis Miller . The newscaster asked Mr. Miller if the mosque should be built on the 9/11 site . To paraphrase , he replied that , " No , this would be offensive to many Americans , and added that Americans support freedom of religion and would not mind a mosque being built in another location in NYC .
He was then asked " How do you respond when asked if you are an Islamophobe ? " He had a brilliant answer . To paraphrase , he replied " Well , I am confused . I read Time magazine last week , and on the cover is a picture of a beautiful Muslim girl with her nose and ears cut off ." ( Dominant social theme--- what savages these Muslims are ! We have to have a military presence in Iraq for years to westernize them and save the women ! ) "
This week , Time has a cover that asks " Is America Islamophobic ? Gee I guess if you don't support a mosque built on the 9/11 site , that makes you Islamophobic ! "
He added that nowadays in America , if you had a difference of opinion with someone you were labelled __________phobic .This is kind of crazy . Now that a rich sheik has applied the green poultice to a lot of politicians and global elite , all of us " small people " are Islamophobes if we disagree . Maybe Dennis Miller should run for president !
Reply from The Daily Bell
Well, we disagree with you. Miller is a funny man but also a kind of apologist for the powers-that-be and instead of dealing with where the mosque is receiving its funding he is talking about Islamophobia.
The funding is coming from Saudi Arabia and America's top non profits. In other words funding for the mosque is coming from workaday Americans. It is this fundamental discussion that remains off limits.
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Posted by Peacenik on 08/25/10 12:08 PM
America values freedom of religion . The Imam in charge of this proposed 9/11 mosque values better relations between East and West . Building a mosque upon the 9/11 site will fuel more anti-Islamic sentiment . The Imam will no doubt receive millions in donations from Islamic nations , because the towering 13 story mosque figuratively represents the conquest of Islam over the West.
I am sure some of the politicians have received money in exchange for support for the mosque . I feel that this represents another Western elite promotion . "We all have to learn to accept one another to prepare for global governance . " Even the prominent Jewish politician/milionaire mayor Bloomberg supports the mosque . There is more behind this than what appears on the surface .
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Posted by JQ on 08/25/10 12:13 AM
Just found the mother lode of the latest on the mosque and monies involved. I can't find any links to non profits in this article, but lots of arab/bush/baker, et al connections. After reading this I can't help but feel there is more slimy stuff here than could be found down in Louisiana with the oil spill lapping at the seashore.
Just when you think you've heard it all, you find yet more pieces of the puzzle which makes the entire picture ever so clearer as to the major players and their most slimy motives. The money is NOT coming from american non profits....'The Saudi prince whose post-9/11 relief check was rejected by former New York Mayor Rudy Guiliani has found a more willing recipient in the city for his millions: the head of the Ground Zero mosque project'.
Unless you think of CAIR as an american non profit, it is anything but lily white..the implications of all of this are nothing more than seditious, malicious and destructive to american interests.
I would not call Rudolph Murdock a non profit organization, nor is GW Bush part of any non profit. Read this and weep to see how the american citizenry are being duped by their own fellow americans.
Click to view link
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Posted by Jeannie Queenie on 08/24/10 05:05 PM
"In 1996 the U.N. set up the "oil-for-food program" which, in a bid to ease hardships faced by ordinary Iraqis, allowed the regime to sell specified quantities of oil in return for food and medicines. The program was later found to have been riddled with FRAUD and corruption." Remember the keyword here-UNITED NATION.
And so it says in this article about the muslim cleric/Rauf, he, the let's-build-a-mosque-in-manhatten-Malaysian manipulating man.
When this man was interviewed by Katie Couric after 9/11, he said,
"I have a friend of mine, for example, an American friend working for a center, an American center funded by the MacArthur and Ford Foundations, that believes sanctions against Iraq are wrong because many innocent victims are dying."
Smell something in Denmark here folks?...he has friends in elitist foundations? Do you really think they put a gun to his forehead and forced him to be friends? Hell no, they are on the same page together.
So in one fell swoop he blames the US for what the UN did, making us look like the bad guys, when even the village idiot knows that the UN loves to do their dirty work and willingly uses anyone who will be on their side. So when the imam claims to be friends with elites in american foundations and quotes the UN as uber good, what are we to believe about this corrupt and cunning character.
Click to view link
If this imam says what he means and means what hs says about a part of islam causing all the problems why isn't he standing and sceaming from the roof tops to all the youth in Islamic countries.
He has the power to change islamic history as a force of good, so why is hiding behind falsehoods and acting like a sheep in wolve's clothing. Proof of this is....his love for the UN and his friends in high elite places...american foundations.
This video is so telling it's hard not to laugh at him here at
Click to view link
He goes on to cleverly claim that the US has more islamic blood on their hands, whilst that originated from the UN that upholds much in the arab/muslim world. How deceptive and cunning is this man to make the US the bogeyman while elitists in concert with islamic figures such as iman Rauf have no problems with the intra-fighting within muslim populations and the UN gives their imprimator over all while asking the US to bolster/$$ all their corrupt schemes.
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Posted by JQ on 08/24/10 04:02 PM
Reply from the Daily Bell:
My question to DB is this...will this Faisal Abdul Rauf step up to the plate and promise that muslim women will never suffer honor killings on american soil, as we see them happening with greater frequency.
America's largest non profits, a who's who of the elite, are funding this Iman's operation. Why? Will they step up as well? Wife-beating is despicable. Hurting another human being physically to enforce one's will, rather than negotiating is a destructive path. If what you write is true why does this man continue to receive funding?
He receives funding from the elite for they have no morals or standards on which to base human civilized behavior. Do you really think for a moment that they care for family life, for protection of women and children? They back this man for one simple reason. Both share the common denominator of nazisociopathism. Their modus operandi is greed. The proof is found in their backing a character like Rauf, as they are both on the same page....create discord, violence and raid when possible from the little people paid to do their devious, devastating dirty work.
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Posted by Sandy on 08/24/10 03:41 AM
Reality is that the Mosque issue is a zoning issue the same as building an industrial plant, a school or a medical pot store. A panel holds a hearing and the issue is almost always settled on the numbers of people supporting or objecting and rarely on the arguments. The emotional charges and arguments are really bad for all parties involved. Winning here can take many forms for both sides and charges that those that object are spreading hate and those that support are aiding terrorists are both lies that only can be stopped by some form of compromise. Are there no political or religious leaders in New York that have access to wisdom?
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Posted by Jirka on 08/24/10 12:59 AM
Dear DB.
if you can find a single hint of possible suspect motives behind the mosque issue, your list would be it.
At least a half of your "nonprofit corporations" represent CFR/financial/political elite interests that have been manipulating world events over the last 100 years. Your meme(how I hate that word)detection skills seem to have abadoned you somehow.
As many have suggested before, the mosque issue itself is absolutely irrelevant. It is the intelectual gymnastics and dishonesty of those who are trying to defend a basic lack of decency and courtesy that is so fascinating.
Reply from The Daily Bell
What?
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Posted by Martin Kessler on 08/23/10 10:01 PM
There is only problem with commentators defending the Ground Zero Mosque on the theory of religious freedom is the failure to define "religion." If one cannot with logical precision define what we mean when we say X is or is not a religion our only recourse is to say religion is only known intuitively, it is personal not transferable knowledge; that is to say, not known at all for making provable propositions. Religion then is only marginally different from political action by another name.
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Posted by Daniel on 08/23/10 09:30 PM
The list of USA leftist-masonic (humanity is some sort of atheististic humanist brotherhood) promoters of the NYC Mosque is quite happy to see the breakdown of Natural Organic Society in the USA.
It wishes to deliberately promote destructive social division to destroy the cohesion of our civil society, and to demoralize cohesive society principles & morality so that "anything goes" type of society is implemented. This way, these groups can easily rule society because it has conquered by division.
These same leftist-masonic groups hate the Tea Party cohesion, hate national unity through a sense of patriotic (love of neighbor) cohesion, and therefore hate that 9/11 causes national unity against their socialistic international atheistic brotherhood of nations. They hate genuine patriotism and they hate the reaction of a united America, something they see as "reactionary".
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Posted by Bluebird on 08/23/10 08:45 PM
DB "In all fairness, the list has found wide dispersal on the internet."
Perhaps, but you have to know where to look. I don't. I come here and am never disappointed. I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciate what you do.
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Posted by Joseph on 08/23/10 08:34 PM
Yes, the Imam and the Islamic group do have a "legal" right to build the mosque... that is not the central or core issue here... if they are so intent on building this mosque for peaceful and bridging purpose, then they should either reconsider building at another location, or including a synagogue and a church along side this wonderful mosque... since the ground zero area was the site of the murder and terroristic act of Islamic jihaddists in the name of their religion and God of 3,000 Americans.
If they would actually do either suggestion mentioned above, then that would at least give most Americans like myself, a more open minded and welcoming viewpoint. It is beyond belief, rational/logical, and common sense thinking how the left and politically correct people fall prey to such potentially sinister and bold,"in your face" actions by certain groups of people, notably seveal Imams and Islam... The thoughts and words of Mayor Bloomberg and President Obama are misguided and quite frankly, demonsrate cowardness, weakness and appeasement.
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Posted by Bluebird on 08/23/10 08:27 PM
I only had to read the list and the "purpose" to understand perfectly. Staff of the Daily Bell are the best super sleuths ever.
Those are not your every day non-profits. They are the Who's Who.
Reply from The Daily Bell
In all fairness, the list has found wide dispersal on the Internet. But thank you for the kind words.
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Posted by John Danforth on 08/23/10 08:13 PM
OK, point taken.
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Posted by John Danforth on 08/23/10 08:03 PM
I can't tell if that's sarcasm or not. I actually thought most of those foundations finance leftist causes. Was I mistaken?
Reply from The Daily Bell
Not sarcasm. They fund leftist causes but those who run them and configure them are anything but leftist in our view. These very large funds are tools of elite power and their agendas are set by the powers-that-be with an eye toward aiding the ultimate goal of world governance.
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Posted by John Danforth on 08/23/10 07:13 PM
It is amusing and not at all surprising to find that leftist trusts are funding this Victory Mosque to further the dhimmification of America. I'm sure they're roaring with laughter right now. To those who are so emotional about this, again I ask: HOW do you propose to stop it? Please be specific.
Reply from The Daily Bell
"Leftist trust." C'mon. You really think the ideology at the top is "leftist?"
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Posted by Ingo Bischoff on 08/23/10 04:37 PM
DB writes:....
"Of course this was our point, too " though we disagree with you a little bit. We don't believe that the elite cares much about orthodox Islam; in fact they want to Westernize it, just as they want to "Orientalize" Western culture. The whole idea is to create a malleable mish-mosh for purposes of world governance. The tools are cultural tension, hate and war."
I had the suspicion that you wanted a reaction. You got it from me. I have your response, and I fully agree with the point you make in your response. Thanks.
Reply from The Daily Bell
Thank you for your feedbacks.
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Posted by Leonid on 08/23/10 04:06 PM
@ BischofF " good for you, I could not say better.
@ DB " you need to be clearer when mentioning elite's foundation. Explain your position, otherwise people will get wrong ideas about DB standing.
You are probably right that these days left or right elites' interests intersect with one agenda " to keep us, the People, under control. But I think in certain statements your positions "smell" sort of a conspiracy theory.
Reply from The Daily Bell
Ha, if we "stink" it is because we specifically endorse the idea that there is generational and familial power elite, banking based, that is engaged in driving the West toward increasing centralization and "world" government. We have been clear about this. That is, perhaps, our stench!
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Posted by Ingo Bischoff on 08/23/10 03:36 PM
The DB keep asking the question, "Why are prominent American non-profits funding Imam Rauf's "Cordoba Initiative"?
Which prominent American non-profits? The Ford Foundation, the Tides Foundation......??? These foundation have funded causes contrary to the idea of limited government and maximum freedom and liberty for the American people for decades.
With that history, why should it be a suprise to the DB that prominent American non-profits will also support an effort by a radical Imam to limit the freedom of Muslims to practice their "religion" under the U.S. Constitution as they see fit? Does anyone doubt that the "Cordoba Mosque" will stand as the supreme symbol to warn all American Muslims not to stray, unless they should be judged by Sharia?
The prominent American non-profits have not supported individual freedom and liberty of Americans for decades. They feel perfectly comfortable to engratiate themselves with radical Islam under the guise of supporting religous freedom by helping to fund the "Cordoba Mosque".
If the DB was looking for an explanation of "why the funding?", here it is.....The elites who run the prominent American non-profits have more in common with the supporters of orthodox Islam than with the American people who seek to live free and in liberty promised them by the U.S. Constitution.
Reply from The Daily Bell
The prominent American non-profits have not supported individual freedom and liberty of Americans for decades. They feel perfectly comfortable to engratiate themselves with radical Islam under the guise of supporting religous freedom by helping to fund the "Cordoba Mosque".
Very good. Of course this was our point, too - though we disagree with you a little bit. We don't believe that the elite cares much about orthodox Islam; in fact they want to Westernize it, just as they want to "Orientalize" Western culture. The whole idea is to create a malleable mish-mosh for purposes of world governance. The tools are cultural tension, hate and war.
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Posted by Leonid on 08/23/10 03:29 PM
@ DB
You are listing all non-for profit organizations funding Cordoba. Have you ever asked what these organizations represent? Most of them are leftist foundations funding a lot of causes that are hurting and will hurt America as a free nation with right guaranteed by the Constitution.
You in Switzerland actually prohibited Muslims to build minarets. We do not this in America and we do not prohibit Muslims to build mosques. The only thing we are asking to be sensitive to the rest of community and move the mosque further away from the 9/11 site. I am beginning to think that libertarians at DB are liberal socialists, really.
Reply from The Daily Bell
Here is the response we just sent to Jeannie Queenie. We would suggest that you make a distinction between America's ruling elite and its "citizens" - on whose behalf you speak.
Reply from the Daily Bell to Jeannie Queenie ...
"... Given the confusion of interests and alliances swirling at the top, one could be forgiven for speculating that the mosque "controversy" is nothing more than a distraction cooked up by the a power elite that wants to keep Americans at each others throats for a variety of reasons, including, perhaps, to ensure that the 9/11 controversy itself is not revisited."
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Posted by Jeannie Queenie on 08/23/10 03:28 PM
@ DB
The Oil Connection...my bad. Your point is well taken. I've known for years that the Bushes were in bed with the Saudi's..not a good thing. Then recently her highness, Ms Pelosi, gave full accord to the mosque..go figure...in this country you can't tell the right from the left anymore. Considering Pelosi is so far left, no way in hell she could ever be right!
As for the Saudi's, I had experience when living and working in Boston, to witness these spoiled arab kids sitting in cafes on Newbury street with their rolls royces parked close by. The upscale stores had no great love for them despite their money,as some of those kids had no problems pilfering, but got off so easily on this mutually agreed thing called immunity....better known as 'rip them off' and let them 'eat it'Click to view linkke our govt too!
Reply from The Daily Bell
There. Question answered. Given the confusion of interests and alliances swirling at the top, one could be forgiven for speculating that the mosque "controversy" is nothing more than a distraction cooked up by the a power elite that wants to keep Americans at each others throats for a variety of reasons, including, perhaps, to ensure that the 9/11 controversy itself is not revisited.
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