Mike, that's an excellent essay. Who wrote it, and where'd you find it?
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I am, for my part, quite convinced that Europe and America have developed relatively successful democratic political cultures largely because of the heritage of the Protestant Reformation; what the Islamic analogue would be there, I've not a clue. This is not the space to explore Islam's compatability with democracy -- it is enough to note that Islamic-majority nations have a mostly sad, fruitless history when it comes to the democratic experiment. (We have to hope Islam is compatible with democracy, and with classical notions of liberty, because the alternative is too awful to contemplate.)
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This assessment is dead-on. One of the reasons I'm pessimistic about any "peace" in the Middle East is because there has been no Reformation of Islam, and in light of that, there's not much chance of success in fostering democracy as we know it. But that's not to say that I don't HOPE it could happen one day. I'm just not anticipating it happening in our lifetime, unfortunately.
Believe me, I sincerely *wish* with all my heart that the world's people could ALL live in peace -- I just don't see it happening until every nation is a secular one. Even our own. Nothing brings out the worst in people like religious fervor, and the conviction that their god's better than everyone else's. Some of the most tragic stories in world history have come about because of one group or another's religious fanaticism. We need look no further than our own American missionaries conversions of the "savages" here in the US, or in the Hawaiian Islands.
"They came to do good, and instead did well."
It's depressing.
