Atlanta, Georgia (CNN) — The optimism once held by many Americans has been “beaten out” of them amid a lagging economy, threat of terrorism and two ongoing wars, according to a professor at Emory University.

“All of those things … have made people start to be much more doubtful than they used to be,” says Patrick Allitt, a British citizen who teaches American history.

Allitt recently wrote about what he describes as “America the miserable” — the mood swing he has seen in his 30 years in the U.S. — for The Spectator, a British magazine.

Read the professor’s full essay

Allitt spoke with CNN about his perspective. Below is a transcript of that conversation, which has been edited:

CNN: How would you describe the change in America since you first came to America?

Allitt: The change is this: I don’t get the same sense of intense self confidence as I used to feel when I first came to America, even though that was a period that’s usually remembered as a pretty grim time — the Jimmy Carter years when there was a lot of stagnation and inflation and a general feeling of malaise. Even so, to me, it seemed incredibly energetic here. People in America worked much, much harder than they did in Britain. They seemed more upbeat. They had faith in progress. And there was this feeling of being intensely wide awake for the first time. But now, I think some of that optimism has been beaten out.

Counter: Why there’s reason for optimism

It’s been a very tough 10 years since 2001, hasn’t it? The attack on the World Trade Center, the growing fear of terrorism, the difficulty of prevailing in the wars, obviously, more recently the recession. All of those things, collectively, have made people start to be much more doubtful than they used to be.

CNN: Do you attribute it to a change in American mentality or are we exposed to an array of different beliefs through the ever-expanding media landscape?

Allitt: It’s certainly true there are far more media than there used to be … that devote a lot of time to people who are dissatisfied. In other words, if somebody’s happy, that isn’t news. It’s certainly news when they become dissatisfied in some way or they have some kind of problem to deal with. In that sense, I suppose there’s an inherent bias in favor of bad news.

But I think it’s more than that. I’ve spent most of the last 30 years in the company of academics, who also tend to be pessimistic people. They tend to have very high ideals for America. When they see it doesn’t live up to its ideals, it makes them disappointed and sometimes embittered. So it may be that, if I spent more time with less educated people, I wouldn’t have this sense quite so acutely.

I think that’s quite possible.

CNN: You write: “The decline of American confidence isn’t just a temporary blip on the screen brought on by the recession.” Elaborate on that for me.

Allitt: Even before this recession began, I guess it was in October and November 2008 when things really started to go bad. Already by then, I was having a feeling that the general national optimism was less emphatic than it used to be.

In the first five or six years of the last decade, there was this feeling that things were going wrong, particularly that the wars were grinding on interminably and that it was very difficult to prevail. It wasn’t the same kind of decisive conflict as World War II where you’re fighting against a nation-state and you can clearly detect when you’re winning. The dispersal of the enemy and the very shadowy character of terrorism tends to be very depressing to confront. You have to maintain a high degree of vigilance and sometimes you have to take comfort in thinking what’s extraordinary is what didn’t happen; there wasn’t another major attack.

That doesn’t feel like a victory. … That kind of thing is what I was attentive to when I was writing this story.

CNN: If we are in this funk as you describe, is there anything wrong with that? And how do we emerge from it?

Allitt: The one thing I’ve always admired about Americans is their willingness to be self-critical. I do think you could take the view that the very fact that so many Americans are willing to scrutinize their own behavior and their nation’s behavior is a sign that they do have these high ideals and they want to live up to them.

So in that sense, you can take an optimistic view, even of pessimism — that sooner or later, the sheer attention to it is going to cause people to recover.

But I do think there are generational trends in American life. People who were brought up in the 1930s during the Great Depression — the image of it stayed with them for a lifetime. … In the same way, I expect the kids who have grown up in the last few years are also going to carry the marks of this with them through life. They’ll come into conflict with their own children who have different generational experiences. It’s impossible at this stage to say what’s going to happen next. …

But it certainly is true studying the American past, you can see how various traumatic events through the nation’s history leave a long-term impression on the people themselves.

CNN: You kind of hint about this in your piece: Maybe you’re just going through a midlife crisis and that’s why you might have this view.

Allitt: I think that’s possible, but I think I’m describing something more real than that. My job is to study the American people in the past; but also to some extent in the present. I really do feel this kind of change has come about. But you can’t quantify it. You can’t say 8 out of 10 people are optimistic — or at least if you try to you’re really giving a false sense of definiteness. So what I’m trying to do is capture a mood and compare it to a mood that I saw previously.

… I still feel there’s an enormous amount of hope and potential and capability here, so I don’t share the feeling of gloom, which I see in the people around me.

CNN: Describe the “Avatar” analogy for me?

Allitt: The plot [of "Avatar"] is kind of incredibly depressing. The corporation is at the center of this planet. First of all, they have invaded the planet. And now they’re sort of stomping on the homeland of the blue people who live there. And really the picture it gives you of America is incredibly depressing.

It shows Americans to be greedy and incredibly violent and intolerant, and they haven’t got time for this anthropological experiment that’s going on.

But obviously, the hero is one of the Americans. He’s clearly an outsider. … The main part of the story is a condemnation of America and its values. I was surprised how few reviewers said this picture is a grotesque distortion of what we’re really like.

CNN: Have you started receiving hate mail yet: Hey, Brit, get the hell out of our country?

Allitt: No, not at all.

… It certainly isn’t meant to be an attack on America; quite the opposite. As I say, I’m very, very pro-American.

CNN: Any final thoughts?

Allitt: To me, coming from Britain, one thing that is so inspiring about the United States is people really believe in human equality and they really take it seriously and they try to make it a reality.

When I was growing up in Britain, nobody talked about equality. It’s a very hierarchical society in Britain, and everyone has their own place within the hierarchy and others are below them — and then, what you’ve got to do is stay in your place.

So it felt very liberating for me to come to America. Although obviously, this isn’t a society where everybody is equal in practice. But at least this is a place where everybody tries hard to make sure that every kid really does have the opportunities to make the most of their own abilities.

And that’s a great thing. There haven’t been many societies in the entire history of the world that have been like that.

To read more click…
‘America the miserable’ prof: U.S. isn’t the same

PUNE, India (Reuters) – A bomb ripped through a packed restaurant in the Indian city of Pune on Saturday, killing at least eight people including four foreign women in the country’s first big attack since the 2008 Mumbai massacre.

The explosion comes only a day after India and Pakistan agreed to meet for high-level talks in New Delhi on February 25. New Delhi suspended a four-year-old peace process with Islamabad after the Mumbai attacks, blamed on Pakistani-based militants.

At least 33 people were wounded on Saturday, police said. No-one has claimed responsibility for the attack.

“There has been a bomb blast,” senior police official Rajendra Sonawane told reporters. “There was an abandoned bag which seems to have contained some IED. (improvised explosive device).”

The explosion at German Bakery occurred in the evening, when the restaurant was packed with tourists and foreigners. “Four women foreigners were killed. Their nationality is not known.” Dilip Band, a senior police official, told CNN-IBN television.

Debris was strewn all around the bakery, located near Osho ashram, which is also frequented by foreigners, and also near a Jewish center. The impact of the blast knocked the bakery’s sign off, blew out windows and left a large crater inside the restaurant.

“It (the bomb) was under one of the tables … We transferred lots of people to the ambulances … there is no German bakery any more,” one foreigner, short of breath and resting against a wall, told local CNN-IBN television.

“There are eight dead and 33 injured in the blast at the German Bakery,” said Sonawane, a joint commissioner of police.

“We heard a big noise and we all rushed out. The impact was so much that there were tiny body parts everywhere,” said Vinod Dhale, an employee at the bakery.

Militants killed 166 people during a three-day rampage through the financial hub of Mumbai in November 2008, which raised tensions between nuclear rivals Pakistan and India.

Before Mumbai, a wave of bombs hit Indian cities in 2008, killing more than 100 people. Police blamed most of those attacks on home-grown Muslim militants, although some Hindu militants have also been suspected of carrying out several attacks.

Authorities have warned of renewed threats of attacks on Indian soil and have in recent months stepped up security across the country of 1.2 billion people.

To read more click…
Eight die in Pune, India’s first big attack since Mumbai

Islamic terrorism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Islamic terrorism is the common term for violence,^[1] rooted in Islamism, and aimed at propagating Islamic culture, society, and values in opposition to the political, allegedly imperialistic, and cultural influences of non-Muslims, and the Western world in particular (cf. “Dar al-Harb“).^[2]

There are also political dimensions to the ideology, and the history of Western influence and control after the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1918, is the common stated reason used within the ideology to justify and explain its use of violence as resistive and retributive against western influences.

The term, (or discourses using the term), have been attacked as “counter-productive”, “unhelpful”, “highly politicized, intellectually contestable” and “damaging to community relations”.^[3]

Terrorism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Terrorism, despite considerable disagreement about a precise definition,^[1][2][3][4] is often considered to be deliberate^[5] violence^[6] or the threat of violence^[7] directed at innocent^[8][9] non-combatants^[8] and governments^[7] to cause fear^[6] systematically^[10] to attract media attention^[11] for causes which may be political^[5][3][6] or ideological^[7] or religious^[7] and which are viewed as coercive.^[7][10][12] An act which meets many or all of these criteria is often considered to be terrorism. There is considerable disagreement about whether the term can describe government or religious leaders and whether the term should be extended to include wartime acts. Further, the distinction between terrorism and crime is hard to specify.^[13][14]

The term is charged politically and emotionally and has strong negative connotations.^[15] Its meaning often depends on the ideology of the user and the context of its use. Studies have found more than one hundred definitions of the term.^[16][17] At present, there is no internationally agreed-upon definition. Governments have described opponents as terrorists to delegitimize them.^[18][19] Some suggest that the term terrorist is so fraught with conceptual problems that a better term would be violent non-state actor.^{[20][5][citation needed]} Terrorism has a long history and has been practiced by both right-wing and left-wing political parties, nationalistic groups, religious groups, revolutionaries, criminals, and others.^[21]

A Pakistan army offensive against al-Qaeda and Taliban strongholds in South Waziristan has entered its second day with dozens of casualties reported.

A BBC correspondent in the region says there is a stalemate as 30,000 Pakistani troops, backed by tanks and artillery, encounter stiff resistance.

The army operation – the biggest for six years – comes after weeks of air strikes against militant targets.

Thousands of refugees are streaming into camps just outside the area.

There have been several co-ordinated Taliban attacks in recent days, killing more than 150 people in cities across Pakistan.

Dozens of casualties have already been reported by local officials as both sides used heavy weapons.

The bodies of three Pakistan soldiers were taken to the northern town of Razmak. There have also been unconfirmed reports of militant deaths.

Nearly all communications in the region were down after the Taliban destroyed a telecommunications tower at Tiarza, local officials said.

Reports from the area are sketchy as it is difficult and dangerous for foreign or Pakistani journalists to operate inside South Waziristan.

Aerial bombardments in the the Makeen area, a stronghold of the Mehsud tribe and a key army target, were also reported by local officials and witnesses.

The ground operation comes after weeks of air and artillery strikes against militant targets in the region, which lies close to the Afghan border.
To read more click below…
Pakistan army continues assault

By Kamran Pasha

Today I had to refute yet again the Big Lie that hounds the Muslim community — that we fail to speak out and condemn terrorism.

I was being interviewed by the wonderful radio host Dr. Alvin Augustus Jones about my new novel Mother of the Believers. Dr. Jones is a deeply spiritual man whose show always features uplifting themes and speakers. And he went out of his way to make me feel welcome.

But as a good journalist, he had to ask the question he felt his audience wanted answered — “Why do mainstream Muslims fail to speak out against terrorism?

It is a question that I get almost every single day, and it leaves me flabbergasted. I often respond to that question with one of my own — “Why does the media fail to report on Muslims who condemn terrorism?”

Since before 2001, every single major Muslim group in the United States has been outspoken in their condemnation of terrorism and the murder of innocent people in the name of Islam. And yet the media ignores it. Every single time.

Don’t believe me?

Go to http://www.muhajabah.com/otherscondemn.php

That site lists links to dozens of major Muslims group and Islamic scholars who have condemned terrorism as a violation of the fundamental moral precepts of Islam.

Want more?

Here’s a compilation of Islamic fatwas against terrorism by Juan Cole, scholar of the Middle East and author of Engaging the Muslim World.

http://www.juancole.com/2005/07/friedman-wrong-about-muslims-again-and.html

Cole’s list was compiled after Thomas Friedman wrote an outrageous column in The New York Times claiming that “no major Muslim cleric or religious body has ever issued a fatwa condemning Osama Bin Laden.”

Friedman knew (or should have known as an alleged Middle East expert) that what he was saying was a lie. But he chose to publish this garbage anyway, giving it the full credibility of the Times.

What was so shocking was that Friedman’s column was published on July 8, 2005. But three months before, on March 11, 2005, a group of Spanish imams issued a fatwa against Osama Bin Laden:

http://www.int-review.org/terr42a.html

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0314/p06s01-woeu.html

So what is going on here?

As one of the few Muslims who has worked inside Hollywood for the past 7 years as a writer and producer, I can only explain this shocking lie that has become a national meme as the product of an intentional media agenda.

There is a real political agenda inside the media itself to keep Islam as the enemy, and to portray mainstream Muslims as a fifth column inside America. The idea that your Muslim neighbors are silently supporting Bin Laden sells newspapers. It captures the attention of viewers of the nightly news. And it furthers the ambitions of politicians who need a rallying point to get votes.

As a Muslim and a patriot I don’t know what more to do except to keep telling the truth every time I get the opportunity.

But I ask my non-Muslim friends this question. How would you feel if your community was being falsely portrayed as being sympathetic to murderers by the media? How would you feel if every single thing you do to condemn and fight such criminals is intentionally ignored? What would you conclude about the character and motivation of people that continue to spread a lie against millions of your fellow human beings?

If you can take a moment to consider, you might get a sense of the true burden your Muslim neighbors carry. The world wants us to be the monsters. When we condemn and fight the monsters, no one notices or cares. It’s like the army telling a soldier who has just survived a hellish firefight that he was never in the war in the first place, and condemning him for his cowardice.

It would be a formula for despair for most people. And yet what is remarkable is that Muslim groups continue to patiently work against terrorism in accordance with their faith, even though they receive no credit for their deeds. They are secure that everything is in the hands of God. And, as the Holy Qur’an says, that the light of truth will never be put out by the mouths of liars.

Last year, I attended the Pilgrimage to Mecca, a powerful, life-changing event that I chronicled on my personal blog at blog.kamranpasha.com

One of the most remarkable stories that I heard when I was there was the tale of Abraham, who Muslims believe founded the first settlement at Mecca with his son Ishmael. The Angel Gabriel appeared to him and told Abraham to climb a mountain and call mankind to God.

Abraham was incredulous, and responded that there was no one in the barren desert valley except him and his family. Who would hear the call?

And Gabriel smiled and said: “Just call mankind to the truth. God will make sure it is heard.”

Author : Kamran Pasha
Kamran Pasha is a writer and producer for NBC’s highly anticipated new television series Kings, which is a modern day retelling of the Biblical tale of King David. Previously he served as a writer on NBC’s remake of Bionic Woman, and on Showtime Network’s Golden Globe nominated series Sleeper Cell, about a Muslim FBI agent who infiltrates a terrorist group.
http://www.kamranpasha.com/index.phpAuthor : Kamran Pasha

RALEIGH, N.C. — Federal authorities searched overseas Tuesday for a U.S. citizen charged with plotting “violent jihad” as part of a North Carolina-based group of aspiring international terrorists.

Authorities think the eighth suspect is in Pakistan, according to a law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the investigation. U.S. Attorney George E.B. Holding declined to discuss the suspect’s whereabouts but said the public should not be worried.

“Federal authorities hope to have him apprehended shortly,” Holding said. Holding wouldn’t identify the person, and the defendant’s name is redacted from court papers.

The indictment said the person went to Pakistan in October to “engage in violent jihad.”

Investigators arrested seven men involved in the group Monday, accusing them of military-style training at home and plotting terror attacks abroad. The men purchased several weapons over the past year, and in June and July, three of them went to private land in north-central North Carolina to practice “military tactics,” according to the indictment.

“It’s clear from the indictment that the overt acts in the conspiracy were escalating,” Holding said.

NC terror suspect may be in Pakistan

By Kamran Pasha
Filmmaker and author of Mother of the Believers- USA

The evil of suicide bombings must be defeated by Muslims, as it violates every tenet of Islam. In the past week, at least 150 people were killed in Iraq in a wave of suicide bombings which have torn apart any illusion of security in that tragic country.

As a Muslim, as a human begin, I am filled with horror at images of men, women and children torn to shreds by the madness of people who turn themselves into incendiary devices. And I am filled with outrage and fury at the diabolic forces that seek to present this monstrous, murderous, terrorist activity as somehow sanctioned by my faith.

Let me put this in as simple terms as possible. Suicide bombings, indeed all forms of terrorism, are rejected by mainstream Islam, and always have been.

The Holy Qur’an says it in very clear, without any ambiguity:

“Do not kill yourselves, for truly God is merciful. And if any do that in rancor and injustice, soon shall We cast them in the Fire. ” (Surah 4:29-30)

The Qur’an makes it clear that there are rules to human conflict and limits that must be followed:

“And fight in the way of God against those who fight you. But do not transgress the limits. Truly God does not love transgressors.” (Surah 2:190)

As I discuss in my new novel Mother of the Believers, traditional Islamic law established very clear rules of war based on the practice of Prophet Muhammad and his early followers: Do not kill civilians. Do not kill women and children. Do not harm priests of of other religions. Do not destroy the environment.

Abu Bakr, the first leader of Islam after Prophet Muhammad, gave these commandments when Muslims were fighting the forces of the Byzantine Empire, which had sought to destroy the new religion and killed the Prophet’s ambassador:

“Stop, O people, that I may give you ten rules to keep by heart: Do not commit treachery, nor depart from the right path. You must not mutilate, neither kill a child or aged man or woman. Do not destroy a palm tree, nor burn it with fire and do not cut any fruitful tree. You must not slay any of the flock or herds or the camels, save for your subsistence. You are likely to pass by people who have devoted their lives to monastic services; leave them to that to which they have devoted their lives. You are likely, likewise, to find people who will present to you meals of many kinds. You may eat; but do no forget to mention the name of God.”

Muslims always took great pride in the fact that they acted honorably, even in war. They looked with contempt upon the warriors of Europe, who slaughtered civilians mercilessly during the Crusades. When Saladin defeated the Christian kingdom of Jerusalem and took the holy city, he spared its Christian populace and pointedly said: “We will not do to you what you did to us.”

His comment was in reference to the First Crusade, where Christian “holy warriors” massacred tens of thousands of civilians upon taking Jerusalem in 1099. Muslims were slaughtered en masse, the Jews of Jerusalem were locked into its main synagogue and set on fire. And Arab Christians were murdered by their co-religionists for the sin of having dark skin and looking like the enemy. The Gesta Francorum, a Crusader chronicle of their activities, proudly notes that the “the slaughter was so great that our men waded in blood up to their ankles.”

In the town of Ma’arra in Syria, the Crusaders committed the ultimate atrocity — cannibalism. As Crusader chronicler Radulph of Caen wrote: “In Ma’arra, our troops boiled pagan adults in cooking-pots; they impaled children on spits and devoured them grilled.”

To this day, the Crusaders are referred to in the Muslim world as “the cannibals of Ma’arra.”

The Muslims looked at this kind of atrocity committed in the name of God as unworthy of any great religion, and held themselves above such monstrous behavior.

So how is it possible that its modern equivalent, the mass murder of civilians through suicide bombings, should now be done in the name of Islam?

In Dying to Win, Robert Pape, a scholar at the University of Chicago, analyzes the history and motivation of suicide bombers. Many people who read the book will be surprised to learn that suicide bombing was a tactic that was first used regularly by Hindu terrorists known as the Tamil Tigers. One of the most prominent victims of this tactic, Rajiv Gandhi, the Prime Minister of India, was killed on May 21, 1999 by a female suicide bomber from the Tamil Tigers. According to Pape, Gandhi’s murder marks the first use of the “suicide vest” which has become the tool of suicide bombers throughout the world today.

A full chronology of the history of suicide bombing among Tamil extremists can be found at:

http://www.spur.asn.au/chronology_of_suicide_bomb_attacks_by_Tamil_Tigers_in_sri_Lanka.htm

(A warning that the link contains graphic photos of the carnage caused by suicide bombers.)

One of the greatest tragedies of modern Islam is that Muslim extremists began to adopt this horrific tactic of suicide bombing over the past two decades. Palestinian militants, arguing that they had no other effective way to combat Israeli oppression, began to adopt these tactics, and the image of the “Muslim suicide bomber” began to take hold in the media .

I remember at the time most Muslims I spoke with expressed disgust at these horrific acts, but some added the caveat — “What else can these poor people do? They have no tanks or jets to take on Israeli tanks and jets. This is their only way to fight.”

My response then and now is that Islam is a religion that has established rules of war for a reason. Human conflict is perhaps inevitable, but unless there is a sense of morality among warriors, even among the warriors of the oppressed, human beings will descend into monstrosity. The nobility of a cause is forever tainted when dipped in the blood of innocents. The argument that Israeli military activities kill countless Palestinian civilians, so Muslims are free to target their civilians in response, is not an argument that is supported by the noble spirit of Islam. As Saladin pointed out, the Muslims would not inflict on the Christians the atrocities that the Crusaders had inflicted on their victims, simple because we as Muslims were better than that.

And I warned those who would excuse the suicide bombers as long as they targeted “the enemy,” that in Islam all human beings are brothers and sisters and have rights before God and man. I predicted that once some Muslims turned their back on Islam’s strict rules of war and went beneath themselves in order “to win,” the wrath of Allah would be unleashed upon us. If we allowed suicide bombings against non-Muslims, then soon would God punish our sins by unleashing the same horror on Muslims.

Tragically, my prediction came true. Suicide bombers in Iraq and Afghanistan now kill thousands of Muslims a year, innocent people going to pray or shop in the marketplace. Their only crime being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

This kind of monstrous behavior is not Islam. It never has been Islam. And it will never be Islam, no matter what kind of self-serving justifications the terrorists use.

For those who wish to learn more about mainstream Muslim positions about war, terrorism and suicide bombing, I refer you here:

http://islam.about.com/cs/currentevents/a/suicide_bomb.htm

http://www.harunyahya.com/terrorism3.php

It is time for Muslims and people of all faiths to stand together in love and justice and end this horrific scourge of terrorism and suicide bombing on humanity.

I look forward to the day that the world will no longer associate such monstrosity with my beloved faith. And that one day, mankind will believe that Islam represents what its name stands for: “Peace.”

Author : Kamran Pasha
Kamran Pasha is a writer and producer for NBC’s highly anticipated new television series Kings, which is a modern day retelling of the Biblical tale of King David. Previously he served as a writer on NBC’s remake of Bionic Woman, and on Showtime Network’s Golden Globe nominated series Sleeper Cell, about a Muslim FBI agent who infiltrates a terrorist group.
http://www.kamranpasha.com/index.php