We have a Constitutional right to be vicious and foolish ...

... all the more reason not to exercise it.

Most of us don't have to see this kind of crap day in and day out -- or perhaps worse, hear about it continually from families and far-flung communities.

U.S. Muslims do. There's nothing extraordinary about this newscast, except that the presenter acts as if it's substance is all in a day's work. [2:13]



Many communities would not leave their Muslim members to face this desecration without protest. I don't know if that will be true in the Florida town. Certainly there are Christians and people of no faith in the Florida Panhandle who know better.

It is past time to make September 11, not a mournful observance of the failures of our government to see looming dangers, but a celebration of the civil liberties and religious toleration that make this country so different from the world's theocracies. A terrible trauma happened. But it is time to stop wallowing in it, to stop celebrating victimization, and look to what sometimes makes this country great.