Miscellaneous Beck

Just wanted to post a couple links to things that Glenn Beck has covered recently. I hoped to spend some time reading through them myself and writing more about them, but I haven't yet taken the time and wanted to be sure to at least point you in the direction if you're interested.

First, last Friday (May 18) Glenn's CNN Headline News show aired a "Spotlight on Immigration Reform" that featured interviews with Congressman Ted Poe & Dana Rohrabacher regarding the imprisonment of former U.S. Border Patrol Agents Jose Compean and Ignacio Ramos. Beck also spoke with "U.S. attorney for the western district of Texas and the man behind the prosecution of the border agents, Ramos and Compean, Johnny Sutton." The interview with Sutton (about halfway down the transcript) is interesting.

Second, Glenn broke down some of the numbers from the Pew Research Center's report on Muslim-Americans. Luis Lugo, director of the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, says the report shows that "Muslim Americans are very much like the rest of the country. They do not see a conflict between being a devout Muslim and living in a modern society." Among some of the interesting facts & figures:

• U.S. Muslims have only a 2% higher rate of low income than the general public - while the average of Britain, France, Germany, and Spain is more than 10 times as high.
• 76% of US Muslims are either very or somewhat concerned about the rise of Islamic extremism around the world, including 85% of long term immigrants (came here before 1990).
• 61% of US Muslims are either very or somewhat concerned about the rise of Islamic extremism in America.
• 71% of Muslims believe most can get ahead with hard work (including 76% of young Muslims), compared to 64% in the general public.
• Muslims here believe Jews and Palestinians can coexist---only 16% say no---in comparison in Morocco 90% say no.
• Only 1% of US Muslims say suicide bombings are "often" justified.
• 7% say suicide bombings are "sometimes" justified.
• 5% say suicide bombings are "rarely" justified.

What's shocking about the justified suicide bombing numbers are that this wasn't just about suicide bombings in general but "suicide bombings against civilian targets ... to defend Islam." So 13% of U.S. Muslims think there's justification for killing "innocent" civilians to defend their religion.