Axis of Evil - Connecting the Dots

Pamela over at Atlas Shrugs sinks her teeth into Newsweek's insidious PR work for our enemies with this righteous rant and excellent graphic about China, and its connections to various terrorist havens and Communist holdouts. (Why the Clintons' residence in Chappaqua, NY isn't included on the map is beyond me.)

Meanwhile, Michelle Malkin covers the original Newsweek Koran-flushing 'story', including updates this morning here and here. I just love her phrase: "Newsweek Lied. People Died." The blogosphere smells blood in the water... For flood-the-zone coverage on this one, I'm also liking Don Singleton. His original post is here, on which I commented:

"Try running the exercise in reverse to see the double standard: How many fatal mass riots in Western capitals would be sparked by a report on Al Jazeera that Saudi radicals had desecrated a Christian Bible?"

To which Don replied:

"The number is zero. Some bloggers might complain about it, but that is all. Christians face severe restraints just practicing their faith in Saudia Arabia, and while we pray for them, we don't riot about it."

Bingo.

Anger at Newsweek is proper and overdue, but it's a story that will pass. What interests me more is the fact that in one direction and one direction only, the alleged desecration of a holy book is cause for mindless riot and murder. The left can bray all they want about 'theocracy' and 'empire' and 'Bush is evil', and go on and on about skinheads and abortion clinic bombers and David Koresh and Timothy McVeigh and Ruby Ridge. But when radical Islam and 'radical' Christianity are held up side by side on a wide-scale, grassroots occurrence like this, it sets certain religious and cultural values into sharp relief, e.g., the value of life itself. We will know them by the fruit they bear.

UPDATE: USS Neverdock notes: "Where was Newsweek and the rest of main stream media when The Palestinian gunmen holed up in the Church of the Nativity tore up Bibles for toilet paper?"