by Ken Sanders

In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, America naively asked in its stunned stupor, "Why do they hate us?" In consoling us, our fearless leaders appealed to our collective sense of superiority and self-righteousness by explaining that the Muslim world (a.k.a. "they") hate us because of what we stand for: freedom, democracy, Mom, baseball, and apple pie. Comforted, we patted ourselves on our collective back for being so gosh-darn wonderful and condemned the savage heathens who wanted nothing less than to destroy all that is right and good in the world -- us. Thanks to a recent confluence of events involving our interaction with the Muslim world, it is clear that "they" do hate us for what we stand for. Unfortunately, what we stand for is not freedom, democracy, nor any other high-minded ideal. Rather, we stand for arrogance, barbarism, and violence....

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/May05/Sanders0521.htm