Amitai Etzioni Notes

Bring Back the Counter Culture

President Obama has a unique talent: He is able to inspire people all over the world to deliberate and dialogue about burning issues. At the top of the agenda for such a global give and take is what makes for a good life. At first, it may seem preposterous for a nation deep in an economic crisis and mired in wars to pay mind to what at first blush seems like a philosophical subject. Actually, there is a profound connection between our multiple crises -- add that of the climate to the mix -- and the characterization of what makes a life good.

As long as those whose basic needs have been well-sated, whose creature comforts have been secured, keep defining the purpose of  life as making more and more dough in order to purchase more and more consumer goods, we will not rein in wild capitalism, protect the environment (climate included), advance social justice, or, arguably, stop killing one another. Only after we come to see that additional goods add precious little to our happiness; that pursuing them is Sisyphean -- the more we gain, the more we seek; and that deep contentment and human flourishing rise out of spiritual projects and bonding with and caring for others, shall we be able to come to terms with much that bedevils us.

These are hardly new thoughts. What is current -- and provides the reason the new President is well advised to keep this topic in mind and in the public eye -- is that the incessant quest for ever more material goods is at the heart of the economic crisis. President Obama correctly mocked President Bush for calling on people to go shopping after the September 11, 2001 attacks on America. However, today Americans and the citizens of many other nations are again urged to go shopping to dig us out of the current economic crisis. (This is what a stimulus package is all about.) Moreover, there is no doubt that given the way the economic system is set up, if people do not buy stuff, there will be more unemployment and more people will lose their homes and empty their retirement funds.

However, the good way out of the crisis does not lead to a return to the old ways of the better-off purchasing ever larger homes, stocking them with ever more appliances, and driving SUVs and Humvees. It does not call for people to save nothing and to go into debt in order to buy still more goods -- many of which those who are better-off do not really need -- nor for people to labor long hours, take work home, delay retirement, send their teenagers to labor at fast food chains, and cut short social and cultural life to make some more money.

The precept of a good life calls for setting ceilings for purchases and for work, for setting fairly modest limits on that which we seek to own and purchase, and on the amount of time we are willing take away from our children, spouses, friends, communities and ourselves, in order to work.

There are a whole slew of public policies that can express, foster, recognize and promote the good life. A steeply progressive income tax will do wonders. Consumption tax (or VAT) on all items that are not defined as basic goods, will help send a message. Limiting government insured or subsidized mortgages to houses of a reasonable size (McMansions are out), a tax on gas guzzlers and on cars by weight, and insuring only one bank account up to 100,000 dollars (rather than the current, unlimited number) are but a few illustrations of setting limits.

Last but not least, there is a deep connection between a life worth living and social justice. To achieve a major reallocation of wealth, those who have more than enough must find sources of contentment other than laying their hands on still more goods. This is what many religions offer. Those who have lost this source of goodness, or have found it twisted, are called upon on to search for other springs of meaning. And nobody is better placed or more equipped than President Obama to return us to this old, but never more current, subject: What makes a good life.

Huntington revisited

After Professor Samuel Huntington passed away on December 24, I held off commenting on his work during the first 30 days of mourning out of respect for the norms that govern such a period.  I believe we are now ready for a balanced review of his work.

The theme that runs throughout Huntington's various works is best characterized as a theory of fear. His books typically identify a mounting threat, such as Mexican immigrants, Islamic civilization, or democratic proclivities, and then point to the need for strong national-unity building measures and mobilization of the people (including militarization) in response to the barbarians at the gates. Sometimes, the argument is formulated in basically analytical terms: If the required vigorous responses to the particular challenge at hand are not forthcoming, various calamities will ensue (e.g., the U.S. will lose a large part of its territory to Mexico and its Anglo-Protestant identity will be undermined) that will implicitly call for stronger countermeasures. In other cases, advocacy for powerful antidotes is quite explicit. As Huntington puts it in the Foreword to Who Are We?, he is writing as a patriot and a scholar, in that order.

Taken on its own, the threat-response thesis is unproblematic, a correlation the validity of which even people without social training can readily discern, and one that has often been repeated in the annals of social analysis. When the Nazis were about to overrun Britain, the country suspended habeas corpus. And few, even among the strongest supporters of Israel, would deny that while continuous threats from armed neighbors and terrorists and the responses to these threats have helped keep the segments of Israeli society together, they have also involved a measure of militarization and have imposed limits on civil rights.

The key issue then is to determine whether a nation truly faces particular threats or whether such concerns are largely drummed up, if not totally manufactured--say, in order to keep a nation under the control of one powerful elite or another and to make its citizens accept various governmental measures that they otherwise would not tolerate. These measures might include the curtailment of rights, economic belt-tightening, and discrimination against foreigners, among others. It is a familiar issue, seen for example in the debates over whether or not Saddam actually possessed nuclear weapons that could pose an imminent threat to the United States. Even more recently, it has been witnessed in the argument over whether or not Social Security is indeed in "crisis." We must ask: If the various threats are real, what is their magnitude? And if the dangers are vastly exaggerated, what purposes are served by such a politics of fear?

In Who Are We?, Huntington argues that immigrants, especially those from Mexico, are undermining the "Anglo-Protestant creed" and destroying the shared identity that makes us Americans. These immigrants do so by refusing to assimilate, learn English, and become American citizens and by maintaining a segregated society centered on un-American values. According to Huntington, it is not entirely the Mexicans' fault; it is also the doing of liberal policies. He writes:

In the late twentieth century, developments occurred that, if continued, could change America into a culturally bifurcated Anglo-Hispanic society with two national languages. This trend was in part the result of the popularity of the doctrines of multiculturalism and diversity among intellectual and political elites, and the government policies on bilingual education and affirmative action that those doctrines promoted and sanctioned.

The driving force behind the trend toward cultural bifurcation, however, has been immigration from Latin America and especially from Mexico.
(Huntington 2004: 221)

Huntington argues that if this development is allowed to continue, it may lead to a profound breakup of the nation, or as he posits, "The possibility of a de facto split between a predominately Spanish-speaking America and English-speaking America ...with...a major potential threat to the cultural and possibly political integrity of the United States" (ibid. p. 243). However, Huntington's concerns go beyond the mere threat of a linguistically, culturally, and politically fractured American society. He ultimately fears that Mexicans might grab a large part of the United States: "No other immigrant group in American history has asserted or has been able to assert a historical claim to American territory. Mexicans and Mexican-Americans can and do make that claim" (ibid. p. 229). He later writes, "Mexican-Americans, in turn, argue that the Southwest was taken from them by military aggression in the 1840s, and that the time for la reconquista has arrived. Demographically, socially, and culturally that is well under way" (ibid.p. 246).

To avoid conflicts between Mexican immigrants the white population, Huntington implies, it is best to curb immigrations. Also, fostering unity and suppressing differences would be greatly helped by putting the nation on war-footing. According to Huntington, the collapse of the Soviet Union removed an external threat through opposition to which America derived a major source of identity: "The end of the Cold War deprived America of the evil empire against which it could define itself" (ibid. p. 11). Al Qaeda, he writes, provides a new threat, filling a void and offering hope for a reinvigorated American nation and Anglo-Protestant creed. Huntington emphasizes that a return to this creed is especially called for because Al Qaeda targeted the United States as a Christian nation.

A PROFOUND MISCONCEPTION

At the very core of Who Are We? lies Huntington's basic misleading conception as to what makes America great. Throughout American history, and again recently, alarms have been sounded when immigrants did not seem to assimilate (or did not do so quickly enough) and appeared to maintain subcultural distinctions. As a result, various coercive measures have been advocated, both to stop immigration and to deal with those immigrants already in the country.

However, I join with those who see no compelling reasons, sociological or other, to assimilate immigrants into one indistinguishable American blend--to apply, as James Bryce put it, the great American solvent to remove all traces of previous color, stripping Americans of their various ethnic or racial hyphens. There is no need for Greek-Americans, Polish-Americans, Mexican-Americans, or any other group to see themselves as plain Americans without any particular distinction, history, or subculture. Similarly, Americans can maintain their separate religions, from Greek-Orthodox to Buddhism, and their distinct tastes in music, dance, and cuisine without constituting a threat to the American whole. Indeed, the American culture is richer for having had an introduction to jazz and classical music, the jig and polka, Cajun and soul food, and so on.

A melting pot is what Huntington has in mind. In contrast, the image of a mosaic, if properly understood, depicts the way in which American society actually functions in these matters, and very well indeed. A mosaic is enriched by a variety of elements of different shapes and colors, but it is held together by a single framework. The mosaic symbolizes a society in which various communities maintain their cultural particularities, proud and knowledgeable about their specific traditions, but they also recognize that they are integral parts of a more encompassing whole. As Americans, we are aware of our different origins but also united by a joint future and fate.

Huntington's profound misunderstanding of, if not contempt for, the genius of American society is revealed in his treatment of language, often used throughout history and in many societies both as a major factor in assessing the integration of immigrants into a society and as a metaphor for their relationship to it. Huntington writes,

If the second generation does not reject Spanish out of hand, the third generation is also likely to be bilingual, and the maintenance and fluency in both languages is likely to become institutionalized in the Mexican-American community.... (Huntington 2004: 232)

That is, Huntington holds that if Mexican-Americans learn English but maintain Spanish as their second language, it is an indication that they are refusing to become good Americans. But there is nothing un-American in maintaining a subculture and with it a command of the homeland language. (I note as an aside that regrettably many third-generation immigrants, Mexicans included, do not maintain such a command of their native tongue.)

Most important, the framework of the mosaic can be, and has been throughout American history, both reinforced and recast by immigrants. This cannot be stressed enough, as often reference is made only to the enrichment that the addition of pieces (or immigrants) brings to the American mosaic (or society) by providing greater diversity through the incorporation of a growing range of cuisine, music, and holidays. Certainly, the mosaic has been made more varied. But of equal importance are the changes made to the framework of the mosaic--to what unites us and makes us Americans. These days you can be a good American without being a Protestant or even a Christian. I am.

According to Huntington, American identity was defined for 200 years by Protestants--in opposition to Catholics. Slowly, over the generations that followed, Catholic immigrants acculturated and either joined Protestant churches or changed their faith to make it Protestant-like by developing community services, adopting lay trustees, and recasting the Church in an American, national way--a truly odd list. I fail to see what is Protestant about community services; lay trusteeism is a minor adaptation of the kind that the Catholic Church (like other religious establishments, Protestant included) made many over the centuries. But most notably, American Catholics chose not to break away from the global, hierarchical Church--a course that has defined Protestants. Instead, they merely increased the local autonomy of the American chapter. This is akin to increasing states' rights, not to seceding from a federation.

Most important, American society's core of shared values (call them a creed if you must) and the social institutions that embody them have changed over the generations and now accommodate different religions as well as secular bodies of belief. Indeed, differences on the key moral and spiritual issues of the day are often between fundamentalist and moderate Americans (found in all belief systems, Protestant included) rather than simply between the practitioners of different belief systems. It then follows that Huntington's concern that Mexicans are not Protestantizing, is a problem not for America but only for his assimilationist approach.

IN PERSPECTIVE: A GLOBAL ISOMETRIC PATTERN?

Huntington's particular slant stands out more clearly when his take on the threats that he claims Anglo-Protestant America is facing is viewed in the context of his previous works. Among these, the best known is his 1996 The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. It has become one of those books that educated people feel they ought to have read, and if they have not, pretend to know its content. Many people outside of the United States view the book as just one more significant piece of evidence as to how hostile the United States is to other belief systems and nations. (In 2002, I was a guest of the reformers in Iran at a meeting that they held at the new Center for the Dialogue of Civilization. And practically all of those who attended, from many different nations, railed against this work of Huntington's).

There is, hence, no need here to rehash the book's main thesis, but it is useful to revisit its main take on the world, which is surprisingly isometric to Huntington's take on the domestic fate of American society--as if he applied the same pattern to both, only on two different scales. In The Clash of Civilizations, the role of the beleaguered and threatened party is played not by the United States but by the West, which is still powerful but, like other previously great civilizations, at its peak and unaware that it is about to be overtaken--unless it heeds Huntington's warnings. The role of the threatening Mexican from Who Are We? is played by Islam in The Clash of Civilizations, and the roles played by other immigrants to the United States are reserved for other civilizations, especially that of the Chinese ("Sinic"). The same fifth column that bores from within the United States, helping the enemies of the state and the creed in Who Are We?, also exists in the West, this time as liberals in general and multiculturalists in particular.

Many scholars fell into the trap of treating The Clash of Civilizations as if it were a standard, scholarly text, questioning Huntington's definition of civilization and arguing that there might be greater or fewer civilizations than the seven that he lists, and so on. Others held that 9/11 validated Huntington (and Bernard Lewis') position. But, as I see it, the particular slant of the book is most evident in its dealing with Islam as if it were one body of belief. Actually, Islam is subject to fundamentalist and moderate interpretations. Thus, some Muslims see jihad as a call to holy war against all nonbelievers (including other Muslims who follow a more moderate line), while others interpret it as a spiritual journey. Seyyed Hossein Nasr describes this second interpretation, that of a softer Islam, as follows: "jihâd is therefore the inner battle to purify the soul of its imperfections, to empty the vessel of the soul of the pungent water of forgetfulness, negligence, and the tendency to evil and to prepare it for the reception of the Divine Elixir of Remembrance, Light, and Knowledge." Generally, Wahhabi Islam calls for a strict interpretation of the texts, but Sufi Islam is much more moderate and accommodating to democratic and modern economic systems. Indeed, there are hundreds of millions of Muslims in Indonesia, Bangladesh, Malaysia, and Kyrgyzstan who are moderate and live peacefully together with people of other creeds. (Although the media has made much of some increase in militant Islam in these countries, most Muslims there continue to remain moderate).

It is not only empirically wrong but also psychologically troubling and strategically counterproductive to approach the world from an "us versus them" perspective and to hold that we bring light to the world through enlightenment, rationality, and democracy, while "they" are the force of darkness, the evil empire. A much more valid and healthier approach is to recognize that there are major moderate and fundamentalist camps in all civilizations and that the West should work with moderates everywhere and be on its guard against fundamentalists--everywhere. The West should also recognize that just as it brings to the world concerns of human rights and liberty, other civilizations also bring to the world valuable concerns that the West has increasingly neglected, for instance those of the common good and community.

The true dangers faced by those who buy into Huntington's world are revealed when one examines both Who Are We? and The Clash of Civilizations in light of his first book, The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations, in which he openly favors militaristic, authoritarian, and homogeneous regimes over democratic and pluralistic ones. Published in 1957, the book set off a furor in Harvard's Department of Government, where Huntington was then a young and untenured professor.

At the time, only a few years had passed since the world had faced the threat of a Fascist regime, and many military-authoritarian regimes still dotted the map. Indeed, The Soldier and the State so infuriated Carl Friedrich, a leading political scientist at Harvard and a refugee of Nazi Europe, that he led a successful campaign to deny Huntington tenure, prompting him to leave Harvard (although he was invited back, a few years later).

The citation of but a few quotes from the last pages of this work in which Huntington compares the military academy of West Point to the nearby town of Highland Falls provides an ample idea of his vision of America. He finds that in the military academy:

There join together the four great pillars of society: Army, Government, College, and Church. Religion subordinates man to God for divine purposes; the military life subordinates man to duty for society's purposes. In its severity, regularity, discipline, the military society shares the characteristics of the religious order. Modern man may well find his monastery in the Army. (Huntington 1957: 465)

Huntington goes on to conclude:

West Point embodies the military ideal at its best; Highland Falls the American spirit at its most commonplace. West Point is a gray island in a many-colored sea, a bit of Sparta in the midst of Babylon. Yet is it possible to deny that the military values-- loyalty, duty, restraint, dedication-- are the ones America most needs today? That the disciplined order of West Point has more to offer than the garish individualism of Main Street? Historically, the virtues of West Point have been America's vices, and the vices of the military, America's virtues. Yet today America can learn more from West Point than West Point from America." (ibid. pp. 465-66)

Few lines in Huntington's work more effective summarize his viewpoint and provide the reader with a clearer insight into his way of thinking and a basis for evaluating his life's project.

The Human Costs of Extending the Recession

For each day that implementation of the stimulus package is delayed, and the longer the deep recession lasts—the greater the human and social cost. Much has been made of the devastating economic costs we are facing. Decade of research show that other costs are equally high.

For example, an increase in the unemployment rate of one percentage point that is sustained, and not reversed, for five years, is brings about an increase in homicides of 5.7 percent, in suicides of 4.1 percent, in state mental hospital admissions of 3.4 percent, in state prison admissions of 4.0 percent, according to an often cited 1976 study by Harvey Brenner which was presented to the US Congress’ Joint Economic Committee. The relation between recession and homicide was again affirmed in a 1984 Report to the Joint Economic Committee.

Additionally, unemployment is the single strongest predictor in cases where men murder their wives. An abuser's lack of a job increases the risk of femicide fourfold, says a 2003 study reported in the American Journal of Public Health and led by Jacquelyn Campbell at the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing.

True, in recent months the number of divorce filings in courts across the country has dropped.   Marriage counselors and divorce lawyers say that many unhappy couples are putting off divorce because the cost of splitting up is just too much in a time of stagnant salaries, falling home values and rising unemployment. People are “putting off the decision to divorce until the economy gets better…That's been my experience over the last 35 years. When you have an economic downturn people are not so quick to change their situation," states Gary Nickelson, President of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers.  You may consider this a silver lining in a nation in which all other measures of social problems are rising, or consider it one reason spousal abuse is increasing. In any case, the longer we allow the recession to drag on, the greater the human and social price people are made to pay, above and beyond the economic costs.

You Read it Here First

If this was part of the print media, the editors would proudly flap their wings when an idea their editorials helped advance ended up becoming public policy. The editorials would be flagged as "scoops"--news they broke first or best predicted. Well, you read it here first that Obama ought to offer Hillary the Sectary of State position (here); that the stimulus package will and ought to grow to a trillion dollars or higher (here - we are almost there); and that public buildings should be greened in short order (here and here-- the House stimulus package includes $6 billion for the greening of federal buildings).

Above all, you read here the wisdom of changing U.S. foreign policy to focus first on security (ours, theirs, and of the globe), and of not starting with the lofty but highly elusive goal of democracy building, especially by the use of force (here, among others). This is clearly where the Obama Administration is heading. It is all folded into the President's masterful statement -speaking to the Muslims world--"we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist."

Frankly, I am reluctant to post these lines because I am painfully aware that most people frown upon those who run around saying "I told you so." However, much more is at issue here than pride of authorship. For a society to function well, those who regularly send us in the wrong direction ought to be retired, and those who get it right should be given more of a hearing in the future. Public leaders can be sent packing during elections. The same should hold for public intellectuals and policy advocates. Indeed, it would be very helpful if every time one made a prediction, one's previous predictions would pop up. Thus, for instance, I found it very useful to read in the Wall Street Journal on December 27th that Goldman Sachs predicts oil at $35 dollars a barrel for the fist half of 2009. The Journal also noted that the same firm predicted that a barrel of oil would cost $200 in 2008. While the Journal did not mean it this way, for me it was a fair warning: why should I pay mind to the predictions of someone who was dead wrong last time?

In other areas, we compile performance records. We can, with a click of the mouse, find out the stats for a quarterback, a basketball star, or a Fortune 500 company, or how often an official running for office has won -or lost. Publications, and those of us who use their spaces to prognosticate, should be subject to the same discipline .

Amitai Etzioni is Professor of International Relations at The George Washington University and author of Security First (Yale, 2007). www.securityfirstbook.com email: icps@gwu.edu

Danger: Creeping Puritanism

Daschle’s resignation should have been accepted; indeed welcomed. However, that of Nancy Killefer should have been refused, if it is true that all her troubles amounted to a few hundred dollars taxes not paid when due. Puritanism long suffered—and inflicted tons of suffering on others—by demanding human perfection and by making a mountain of sin out of every minor transgression. I am not saying that the President, the Senate, or the American people should ignore a violation of the law, even when it’s jaywalking. However, responses must be tailored to the “sin.” Not all imperfections make a person unfit for office.

Obama should take a leaf out of those major religions, such as Catholicism and Judaism, that draw a clear distinction between venial and mortal sins, rather than treating all sins as equally cardinal. And, from the criminal code, which responds to some violations merely by issuing a warning or imposing a small fine and to other violations by incarcerating people for life.

More important, the same religions and codes take into account the way a person deals with his misconduct.  Both consider whether the person shows true remorse, makes amends, and restructures his life, or whether he denies all wrong doing, blames others, and tries to gain more (as Rod Blagojevich recently did).

The trouble with Daschle is not so much his violation of the tax code, but is instead the way he dealt with it, and that it seems like a pattern of abuse rather than an isolated incident. Members of Congress can hardly point their finger at someone who received gifts in kind and did not report them as income. If I had a dollar for every current and former member of Congress who crossed that line, I would have to greatly amend my tax return.

Daschle, however, seems to show a pattern of abuse.  His amended returns also reflected unpaid taxes on consulting work and reduced deductions for charitable contributions.  Moreover, he boasted being pure as the driven snow when he ran a campaign ad touting the fact that he was still using his old, rusty personal car—castigating others in Washington who were running around in chauffeured limousines. Above all, far from showing remorse and making amends— he failed to report his violations to the President’s staff during the vetting process. And, oddly, he delayed acting to correct this wrong doing for six months after it was noted.

Obama should make it clear that minor failings call for a public apology and penalties, but do not disqualify a person from serving in his Administration. Others violations—such as revealing state secrets, say the name of an undercover CIA agent—will send one packing before the day is out.

In other words, introducing higher standards does not mean a quest for human perfection. Otherwise, Obama may have a hard time filing the ranks of his Administration and keeping those already in place. Also, he will set the wrong tone for the country. We need for people to take responsibility, but this includes being able to tell the difference between the minor failings we all have and grievous transgressions, and to judge appropriately the ways we react to both—without ignoring one or the other.

The truth about the stimulus package

It may not be ‘political’ to openly say so, however, the United States has barely enough heft to lift its own boat; to expect it to lift those of all nations, of the global economy, is a noble thought but completely unrealistic. All nations will have to do their share for the worldwide bailout.

And the plain truth is that there is a great difference between the two main parts of the stimulus package in terms of where the funds end up. The money granted to banks and to taxpayers (the part the Republicans want to increase) can flow any old place. The banks can lend money to corporations that open plants overseas and outsource jobs, or they can simply invest in other nations’ economies. The same holds when taxpayers buy goodies with the money they are allotted. 

In contrast, funds allotted to making America greener, shoring up the crumbling infrastructure, improving the education of Americans, and developing new technologies at home—the part the Democrats are trying to protect from Republicans—all initially help the U.S. economy (other nations will benefit in turn). Funds dedicated to fixing a bridge in Minnesota, to the electrical grid that serves the nation from coast to coast, or to local schools from New York to Los Angeles—will not end up in China, India, or any other place.

One may say that all nations are throwing money into the bailout pot, and we should add ours, making for the needed grand global stimulus. However, other nations are dragging their feet. Germany finally decided to cough up some money, but far from enough. China is focusing on protecting its economy by manipulating its currency, and so it goes in other nations. Until they are willing to do their share – given the precarious condition of the U.S. economy and its already over-stretched commitments and shortage of funds—the Obama Administration is right to lift our boat first. That is, rail against even larger tax cuts, and support  investment in America’s future.

Obama greatly changes the litmus test

In Security First, we made the argument at great length and presented data that most Muslims are “illiberal moderates”: they do not support a Westminster form of democracy nor the full plethora of human rights, but do reject violence in general, and terrorism in particular. Moreover, we showed that in this respect, Muslims are not different from the followers of other faiths. Most important, we pointed out that such moderate Muslims make reliable partners in peace, and that regime change need not be forced down their throats. (For the full exposition of this position, go here. For an abbreviated version, go here.)

We are delighted to report that President Obama, in his very first days in office, has made a great deal out of the distinction between moderate and violent Muslims, which is very compatible with the thesis the United States and its allies should focus first on security and then on promotion of other key values. (This is a major departure from the Neocon/Bush position that only democracies make reliable partners in peace and hence the governments of nations that are not democratic must be changed –if need be by force –because otherwise we will not be safe).

During his Jan 26 interview with Al Arabiya, a Dubai-based satellite television station, Obama elaborated:

And so you will, I think see our administration be very clear in distinguishing between organizations like al Qaeda -- that espouse violence, espouse terror and act on it -- and people who may disagree with my administration and certain actions, or may have a particular viewpoint in terms of how their countries should develop. We can have legitimate disagreements but still be respectful. I cannot respect terrorist organizations that would kill innocent civilians and we will hunt them down.

In the same interview, he also stated:

What we need to understand is, is that there are extremist organizations -- whether Muslim or any other faith in the past -- that will use faith as a justification for violence. We cannot paint with a broad brush a faith as a consequence of the violence that is done in that faith's name.

The new approach is neatly summarized in the image President Obama evoked when he stated during his inaugural address:

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict or blame their society's ills on the West — know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

This is indeed good news for all concerned.