The left's miscalculation: the moral equivalency argument.

Cribbed entirely from today's Best of the Web Today

«Until those in the mainstream media are willing to acknowledge that it is this crusading impulse that has led them astray, we are unlikely to see the end of such journalistic scandals.

Reuters reports:

"They should understand the sentiments of Muslims and think 101
times before publishing news which hurt feelings of Muslims."

And then this:

"Disrespect for the holy Koran is something the United States will never tolerate," Secretary of State Rice said last week. . . .

In fairness to Rice, she presumably was referring to government policy, not the actions or opinions of private individuals. Still, by way of comparison, recall that three years ago Palestinian Arab terrorists occupied the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Priests reported that "gunmen tore up Bibles for toilet paper," according to The Daily Camera of Boulder, Colorado and The Chicago Tribune noted after the siege that "altars had been turned into cooking and eating tables, a sacrilege to the religious faithful."

Christians in the U.S. responded by declining to riot and refraining from killing anyone. They had the same response 15 or so years ago when the National Endowment for the Arts was subsidizing the scatological desecration of a crucifix and other Christian symbols. Indeed. This should also put to rest the oft-heard calumny that America's "religious right" is somehow a Christian equivalent of our jihadi enemies.»