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

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (497951)	11/24/2003 5:37:04 PM
From: PROLIFE	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

the 10th Mountain would disagree with you.

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (497951)	11/25/2003 1:08:03 PM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769667

We are managing to build roads and open schools, and to confine most fighting to the border. We kill more of theirs than they do of ours. It is much better than the situation faced by the Russians........

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (497951)	11/27/2003 7:25:59 AM
From: Hope Praytochange	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

While Europe is slowly moving away from its Christian roots, with church attendance in decline, many of its Muslims cling strongly to their faith and are asserting their right to live openly according to their religious beliefs. For governments that hold that religion and government must be separate, this can bring important policy challenges and accusations of favoritism. In France, which has Europe's largest Muslim population -- more than 5 million -- the government is considering a law that would ban students from wearing head scarves in schools, saying it threatens the foundation of the French secular state. There is no such law banning crosses or other Christian symbols. In Germany, with 3.5 million Muslims, a woman was refused a job as a teacher because she wore a head scarf. When she sued in court and won in September, most German states initiated legislation to ban head scarves from public schools. In Italy, a court stirred controversy in October by ruling in favor of a Muslim father who contended that a small-town school could not display a crucifix in class, a common practice for generations in Italian classrooms. At the same time, concern about crime in cities that have large Muslim populations has helped fuel the rise of anti-immigrant politicians, notably Jean-Marie Le Pen in France and Pim Fortuyn here. Fortuyn was assassinated in 2002, and both his and Le Pen's parties lost national elections that year. But in both countries, left-wing governments that many citizens considered too soft on crime and immigration were replaced with right-of-center ones promising a tougher line. For many practicing Muslim families in Europe, like Fatima Yaakoub's, a parallel clash is the one within -- that is, how to maintain adherence to Islam while living in Europe's open societies. The challenge is particularly acute in the Netherlands, with its tradition of tolerance, whether it is prostitution or use of soft drugs. At the same time, head scarves have become common on the streets of some towns and cities; they are often seen next to bare midriffs or billboards openly using sexuality for advertising. The Netherlands is home to nearly a million Muslims, more than 5.7 percent of the total population, and Muslims now outnumber Calvinists. But the country remains sharply divided. People talk openly of "black schools" and "black zones," meaning schools and neighborhoods where nonwhites are in the majority. Said Brenda Hassell, a social worker who has frequent contact with Muslims in a predominantly immigrant neighborhood of Utrecht, "As much as we are called a multicultural city, we are living next to each other, and not with each other." Now Fatima Yaakoub has made another decision that will change her life; she has become engaged. "I thought, okay, I'm 24 -- I'll marry in about two or three years." She plans to marry a young man she met in Morocco, a Muslim, so they can have a family based on Islam. She had met a young Dutch man at school who was willing to convert to marry her, she said, but "if he wants to be a Muslim, he has to do it for himself." Now she is waiting for her fiance to arrive, which she hopes will happen before the end of this year. She feels most comfortable marrying someone from her homeland, yet at the same time, she is so far removed from Morocco that she would not feel comfortable living there. She feels neither Dutch nor Moroccan, but something in between. "Actually, I don't have an identity," she said. "Because when I'm in Morocco, people say, 'That's the girl who lives in Holland.' And here, I'm not a Dutch girl. So I don't have a place." "At the moment, I'm nothing," she said. "I'm only Fatima." Europe's Muslims Treated as Outsiders Moroccan Family Seeks Acceptance By Keith B. Richburg Washington Post Foreign Service Thursday, November 27, 2003; Page A01