The BBC is reporting on a prolonged standoff in The Hague. What started with the Islamist assassination of Theo van Gogh last week is quickly becoming a more wide-spread culture war. (Please, when we talk about “culture wars” in America in reference disagreements over offensive artwork or views of gay marriage, let’s remember that there is an actual culture war going on where people want to kill Westerners because of their culture.)

After the van Gogh killing, a series of Muslim and Christian buildings were targets of violence. Now Islamist radicals are engaged in pitched battles with Dutch police and using weapons such as hand-grenades. So what’s next?

The European response to Islamist radicalism is by no means set in stone. Europeans may dislike America and they may make a fetish of multiculturalism and moral relativism. But it would be a mistake to underestimate the power of European cultural chauvinism: Once it becomes clear that Islamists are intent on destroying their way of life, too, Europeans may well decide on a hard line. Let’s not forget, European pacifism is a relatively new phenomenon. Historically speaking, this is not a group of cultures which shy away from confrontation.

So when will they turn? Who knows. The French became highly agitated a short while ago with Bernard Lewis observed that by the end of the century, France could be a Muslim nation. Tolerance only goes so far.

The good news today is that the Dutch seem to be waking up. The BBC report explains: “Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende told parliament that extremism was undermining democracy. ‘We cannot let ourselves be blinded by people who seek to drag us into a spiral of violence,’ he said, according to the Associated Press news agency. . . .

“The Dutch Immigration Minister, Rita Verdonk, has warned that EU countries are at risk, because of an increasing radicalism among young Muslims. She said member states must act urgently to improve the integration of foreigners. The minister, whose nation holds the EU presidency, said countries must ensure that immigrants learn the local language and accept Western values . . .”

The Europeans may not be serious about integration yet. But it’s a start.

Galley Friend J.E. writes in about Matt Continetti’s civil war post:

“[Smiley] points to Quantrill’s raid as an example to bolster her argument that the red states are evil and ignorant. Yet her assignation of “red” to the Confederacy is completely invented. One could much more easily conclude that the South was comprised of blue states; after all, abolitionists were likely to be Republican and religious. And abolition was a religious concept.”

Good point.

Peter Byrnes joins the chorus of those who expect Michael Moore to win an Oscar for Fahrenheit 9/11. I wonder . . .

My initial inclination is to agree. But it’s not show friends, it’s show business. Hollywood understands winning and losing and, as Hollywood screenwriter and Galley Friend E.H. said almost a year ago, “They’re really spooked by the Dixie Chicks.” We’ll see.

I used to listen to NPR, but they lost me about two years ago. It wasn’t their politics that turned me off–it was my discovery of sports-talk radio in DC. During my morning drive, the local sports-talk network carried an ESPN radio show hosted by Tony Kornheiser which was the best radio program I’ve ever heard. Bar none.

Then something happened between Kornheiser and ESPN. They cancelled his radio show, he left the judges panel on the ESPN TV program Dream Job–it seemed as though they had turned on him.

But this morning Kornheiser is back. If you find yourself driving around the DC metro area in the mornings, do yourself a favor and click over to 980 AM. (You can also listen to Kornheiser’s show online.)

Matt Continetti–who is, so far as I can tell, the only “rising-young-star journalist” in America who actually does reporting–finally lets go with a rant today. And it’s a good one!

Matt does a survey of the crazy left’s newest wacky idea: Secession. The new liberal meme is that America is on the brink of civil war. Right. Again, I’ll point out that liberal and conservative America are much, much, much closer than the left seems to think. The ideological distance between an average American liberal and an average American conservative can be measured in feet: Should homosexuals be allowed to have marriage, or civil unions? Should city hall be allowed to have a crèche and a menorah on its front lawn, or should those displays be reserved for private property?

What liberals should worry about is the ideological distance between Americans (liberal and conservative) and Islamist radicals, which has to be measured in parsecs. The differing sides in this debate ask: Should homosexuals be allowed civil unions, or should they be jailed and/or executed? Should various religious symbols be allowed civic public expression, or should all non-Muslims be forced to convert and all faiths save Islam be outlawed?

The other key difference: Islamists have demonstrated not only a desire, but an ability to mass-murder American liberals and conservatives.

Why is it that the liberal fringe seems more worried about Red America than they do the Islamist Middle East?

I recently attended a press breakfast with Otto Schily, Germany’s interior minister and, as I’ve written earlier, a good friend of Attorney General John Ashcroft. It’s a friendship that surprises many on the left and right since Schily is a former Green lawyer who once defended terrorists in court while Ashcroft is a conservative Christian fundamentalist. But the two see eye-to-eye on fighting the war on terror. (Could he possibly be the Ron Silver of Germany?) During the breakfast, Schily expressed his annoyance at some of the press coverage of Iraq. “Some of the press’s wording I find irritating,” he said. Asked to elaborate, Schily went on, “They talk about these ‘insurgents’ but they should really be called terrorists. It doesn’t matter if they are Iraqis or foreigners. They [inflict] brutal attacks on innocent people, mostly Iraqi people. These are terrorists.”

Some German Greens I’ve spoken to chafe at such pronouncements and are horrified that he could be friends with Ashcroft (the two recently attended a concert at the Kennedy Center). What with Schily’s proposals for more stringent security measures, including fingerprinting, facial recognition technology, and retinal scans, I can’t imagine they’ll have much else to like about the man. But for the Bush administration, Schily may be their best ally in the Schröder government.

Popping around looking for info on the DC baseball stadium, I came to this excellent blog on sports and economics: The Sports Economist. I heartily recommend it.

And while we’re at it, another Galley Friend has started a truly excellent blog. Go check out the Law Jedi at Liberty Files. Hurry, before the Clone Wars start.

So it falls to me to help Hillary Clinton’s cause. Okay, quick question: How helpful was John Edwards in helping Democrats down south? Granted, Kerry lost every Southern state, but Edwards must have helped in the precincts that know him best, right? Not so fast. Galley Friend P.C. sends along this interesting data:

Edwards’s home precinct, Precinct 111, Raleigh:

Kerry-Edwards 362 – Bush-Cheney 847

Edwards’s home county, Wake County:

Kerry-Edwards 162,750 – Bush-Cheney 172,563

Edwards’s home state, North Carolina:

Kerry-Edwards 1,488,278 – Bush-Cheney 1,919,903

Edwards’s boyhood home, Robbins, N.C.:

Kerry-Edwards 13,360 – Bush-Cheney 24,420

Edwards’s birthplace, Oconee Cty, S.C.:

Kerry-Edwards 8,326 – Bush-Cheney 18,715

Edwards’s state of birth, South Carolina:

Kerry-Edwards 648,443 – Bush-Cheney 920,072

A few caveats: This data is changing because the provisional ballots are still not all counted; these numbers are as of last weekend. Also, as George Will points out running mates don’t often influence elections or even carry their home states.

But surely running mates who want to make a claim on their party’s nomination in the future have to do better than this.