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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Stevefoder who wrote (391604)	4/14/2003 12:23:11 AM
From: Graystone	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

Infidels or unbelievers Turks who are Muslims consider Christians infidels, just as Christians consider Muslims infidels. Muslims clerics can and do exercise political power, Christian clerics do so to a much lesser degree. Moderate countries will always have difficulty dealing with radical elements, it becomes more difficult when politics and religion are inextricably linked in countries like Iraq and Iran. Turkey has to deal with the Kurds and they are very willing to set aside the niceties of western civilization (human rights) to do so. Even Sodamn Insane was forced to acknowledge the power of the Shiite clergy in Iraq, sentencing those he dared not kill to house arrest.

To: Stevefoder who wrote (391604)	4/14/2003 4:29:02 PM
From: zonder	Respond to of 769670

why have the Turks managed to have a modern secular state? Because it is possible to have a secular state in a country with 99+% Muslim population. Religion is not a major part of their lives. They don't arrange their daily routines according to prayer times. They are tolerant of other religions, as evidenced by the numerous churches and synagogues in Turkey, and in fact the Greek Orthodox church that is to this day based in Istanbul. How and why? Because immediately after the fall of the Ottoman Empire, they had a strong leader who turned the country towards a secular democracy while he could have a dictatorship/monarchy a l'Arab.