Shady12

Bill is absolutely right and that moron Levin is absolutely wrong. It isn't a peaceful religion no matter how many Muslim and liberal apologists say it is. Sure a majority of Muslims probably have their own version of it that is peaceful, like most Christians ignore most of the stupid BS in their own religion due to secular progress. But some people still take things more literally. It comes down to this: If someone strictly adheres to the literal teaching of religion, then Islam is the most dangerous. For example, kill or subjugate infidels. Not all religions are the same. An extremely radical Jain is going to be the most harmless person imaginable. An extremely radical Muslim is going to be very dangerous. Being tolerant towards dangerous bullshit isn't a good thing.

WWEFan

This right here is the point. Some people, in fact about 0.1% of total Muslims. I don't understnad how some can't understand the disconnect between admitting it's only a small number of Muslims who commit these horrible acts, yet try to paint the entire relgion as evil. Is it fair to say evey Catholic is a pedophile because of what that slim minority did?

slop101

With over a billion people, that percentage is more than enough - and not only is it a lot more than that, there's more still that condone it.

Shady12

You missed the point. What percentage of Muslims carry out horrible acts has no bearing on whether the religion itself is evil. Even if there wasn't a recorded violent act by a Muslim ever, the tenets of the religion would be evil. It's just that no one would care because nobody would be enacting any of it. Problem is, a lot of Muslims are. Calling the religion evil has validity. Besides saying you should kill non-believers, you should also kill someone that renounces Islam. It also treats women beyond terribly. While a majority of Muslims aren't cool with that(the killing parts at least), a scary percentage do think that's Okay (10-20% IIRC in polls say they agree that apostates should be killed..which is an insanely high number), even if a much smaller % of that subset would actually do it (like racist rednecks who boast of lynching "n****" but few would follow through with it it if given the opportunity). From a Christian perspective, the South was on a the right and moral side of the Civil War in regard to slavery.

Most Muslims aren't evil at all because they don't follow the evil religion to the letter and see and use the 'good' parts. Like there's horrible stuff in the bible but Christians magically ignore it somehow or rationalize it. The danger of Islam is when people do follow it to the letter. A "good" Muslim (by good I mean most dedicated and faithful to the sacred texts of the religion) should kill a lot of people. Even a small % who go by this valid interpretation is what makes Islam so dangerous. They aren't any less of a good Muslim than one who lives peacefully. Heck they are probably more pious than the peaceful one.

You can say most Muslims are good people and peaceful and I'm sure it's true. But the religion itself is in no way good.

The Catholic analogy isn't a good one because the bible(far as I know) doesn't say to rape kids. I guess it also doesn't say to have Catholicism or Catholic priests for that matter. Texts of Islam do say to kill ME, Shady12.

By the way, I do have some family that are Muslims so I think I have a decent perspective. My great grandparents immigrated from Lebanon in the 1910s.

WWEFan

So you'd agree that Christianity is evil as well by those standards? The Bible says much of the same things about killing non-believers.

van der graaf

Chances are very, very, very high that if you had family that left Lebanon in the 1910s, they were Christian...

MikahC

If you hate to do so for your own personal reason, I can respect that, but there's nothing wrong with providing the reader (us) with information to help assign credibility and context to your opinions.

This is your way of pointing out Christianity is better than Islam, right?

Is raping kids the deal breaker? I was going to list some of the things the bible says but then I came across a web site and didn't want to research and retype everything.

Murder In The Bible

I'm just trying to follow. You say the actions in the name aren't the issue. I'll accept that at face value for the purpose of discussion. You say that what matters are the tenets and/or instructions of the holy words. You say the Quran tells people to do evil things. I'm trying to understand if you believe the bible does as well? If so, why is Islam magically more evil in your mind?

There are many positions I consider valid on these issues even if I don't agree with them. They at least have truth in them. But I'm having a hard time understanding the position the Islam is evil because the Quron has passages which apparently tell followers to do evil things, but Christianity isn't evil even though the bible has passages which apparently tells followers to do evil things.

Evan Meadow

Well when that slim minority is unfortunately running the Catholic church...........

Shady12

They were Muslim and I still have living relatives that are. They lived in Beirut which I believe at the time it was part of Syria. They lived in Michigan and South Dakota at some point. My grandfather was stationed in the military here in Texas in the late 40's where he met my grandmother. He was never religious, I know late in life would say he was Christian if you asked, probably to avoid discussion because all of my family in Texas are devout Christians but me, but I don't think he believed. His brothers and sisters stayed up north as did most of their kids/grand kids and most of the offspring are still Muslim.

I think all religions are bad. I wasn't trying to defend it in any way, just that there were better examples you could have used. Priests molesting kids has nothing to do with religion tenets. It has something to do with them making up that priests couldn't marry or touch women, something that Catholicism decided to change a thousand years ago or so and something humans aren't designed for..Which is going to create some sexually f'd up people.

MikahC

That's the clarification I was looking for.

For the record, I'm pretty sure you're referring to someone else here.

Shady12

Yeah sorry that's what I get for posting so late I guess. Think I intended to also add one more person into the multi-quote.

van der graaf

Interesting, the vast majority of Lebanese who left at that time (yes, it was part of "Greater Syria" and under the Control of the Ottoman's for most of the 1910s) were Christian. I am assuming they are Sunni?

dhmac

There used to be the Caliphate which was the closest thing to a central authority figure (called the "Caliph") in Islam. However, the Caliphate was ended in 1924 in Turkey as a part of the reforms by Ataturk to try to secularize Turkish society.

Houyhnhnm

Good episode. Rushdie, as ever, was a delight. Always loved when he was on with Hitchens.

Maher covered the Boston tragedy very well, but afterwards, as always, was extremely funny. The imagined Michele Bachmann tribute to Margaret Thatcher was side-splitting.

dex14

Throwing Copper

Love that Marc Maron is an interview guest. Good to see him doing well.

Astrofan

I hate this format. Just as the conversation between the panelist gets interesting we have to bring out the "comic" relief. And Marc Maron (whoever he is) is worst than most who get that job.

dhmac

I think Marc Maron would've been better as a panelist for the entire panel part of the show. He really didn't shine in his appearance until the Overtime segment.

MikahC

5/10 show:

I enjoyed the show.

Joy Reid didn't have much to say on many of the topics, but I generally liked the panel. All sides were well-spoken and mostly reasonable -- even when expressing opinions I disagreed with.

I don't think the need for a national healthcare system can be compared with the need for national gun laws (as Bill suggested). When Charles Cooke suggested the Senate model has some utility, and suggested that gun laws in Wyoming may not need to be as restrictive as gun laws in New York (especially New York city), I can see logic in that position. I do wish Bill would at least look into why we have 2 senators per state before deciding to trash that system. I'd take it a little more seriously coming from someone in a sparsely populated state. Otherwise it just comes off as the hostess with the mostest (Big State Bill) wanting even more domineering representation for his state. The house of representatives and the electoral college already give California a pretty big voice in the political process.

Glenn Greenwald struck me as reasoned and not straight party line for either side.

Zachary Quinto was a breath of fresh air. I haven't seen him speak publicly before, and it's always a good experience when someone whose work I enjoy ends up being reasonable and well spoken, not just passionate. No wonder Sylar was so popular. It makes me feel even better about him playing Spock.

Not the best/strongest show, but decent.

Philly30

I thought the first interview could have been better, maher is so right about all the crap food we eat but the interview seemed disjointed, no good flow to it, after it i still had no desire to read that book

georgec

Greenwald slapped Bill around left and right on the need to investigate Benghazi as well as foreign policy and intervention.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MB-itn_LJuM

dhmac

I disagree. Bill Maher was correct in asking "What's the scandal?" which no one (including Glenn Greenwald) could answer in a factual way.

I'll add that there were over a dozen terrorist attacks on American Embassies with over 50 American deaths during George W. Bush's presidency. Yet a terrorist attack during Barack Obama's presidency that kills 4 Americans, including an Ambassador, is a "scandal". Until someone can show verifiable evidence that there really is a scandal, it's just Republican propaganda and another example of why the current Republicans are so much worse than the current Democrats (who at least had the decency - which current Republicans seem to completely lack - to not once try to manufacture a "scandal" around the dozen attacks on embassies on Bush's watch).

(BTW, if simply calling something an "attack" instead of a "terrorist attack" is a scandal, then the Republicans are a sad, sad lot.)

Astrofan

Bill mostly wanted to speak and speechify during the interview. The guest barely got to speak. As for Bill's food rants--no I don't think diary is poison.

I did think Bill got beat up pretty good in that exchange.

Evan Meadow

Yeah he did. Which is why he kept wanting to end it as quickly as he kept trying. The Greenwalt was definitely right about how this country is still doing the whole "Our religion is better than yours" mantra. And pointed out how Maher was doing it just as much even though he generally doesn't like any religion.

Neil M.

I thought they answered it pretty well actually. Bill was focused on the legal aspect of it but it's clear that lies were told for political reasons. There's probably no illegalities but it should be investigated for that reason alone. The Republicans are a bunch of assholes and they are overzealous which doesn't help matters at all.