Christopher Hitchens is at his best in this essay on the student at Pace University who was arrested for the "hate crime" of tossing a Koran into the toilet. His anti-theistic predilections notwithstanding, Hitch says many things in this piece that need to be said. On the matter of the arrest of the Pace student, for example, he writes:
This has to stop, and it has to stop right now. There can be no concession to sharia in the United States. When will we see someone detained, or even cautioned, for advocating the burning of books in the name of God? If the police are honestly interested in this sort of "hate crime," I can help them identify those who spent much of last year uttering physical threats against the republication in this country of some Danish cartoons. In default of impartial prosecution, we have to insist that Muslims take their chance of being upset, just as we who do not subscribe to their arrogant certainties are revolted every day by the hideous behavior of the parties of God.
Read the whole thing.
RLC
