That is fucked up. Almost like the US supporting mideast terrorists and corrupt dictators in the 1980's because they were anti-communist. Look how well that worked out.

This is very old news indeed. I think it a shame too, but it has been this way for a long time. She left Holland because she didn't feel safe there after Theo Van Gogh was murdered, which one can hardly blame her.

But she was also annoyed with the Dutch society's lack of conviction in condemning Islam, and felt that their agenda of Multiculturalism was playing into the extremist's hands. So she went to America, hopping to find somewhere where it was more acceptable to openly condemn Islam.

And wher will she find that, other than in the neocon camp?

It's a shame, and I think she is now herself playing into some other extremist's hands, but one can understand her motivations to a large extent, and she has done a fairly good job of defending her choice. I don't think we have to worry about her being born again any time soon at least. And remember that some of her best friends, like Sam Harris, has publicly expressed concern for her choice of allies, so we can only hope that she is confronted, in private conversation, with the potential dangers of allying with the neocons. She is a smart women, after all. I think her choice of allies, in this context is a political choice, not an ideological one.

And if I'm wrong, then we can console ourselves with the knowledge, that unlike fundies, we don't blindly worship "our" spokespeople, and if she says and does things I don't support, then it's no stone off my back; I don't have to agree with her.

One can only hope Kevin.

She certainly seems to be very outspoken and un-appoligetic (sometimes you can really tell I'm a foreigner from my spelling can't you?) about her atheism, so if any of her new "friends" in the whatcha-ma-call-it-institute have tried talking religion about their religion with her, I don't think she has been holding back.

But I think they have been smart enough to avoid that. She doesn't seem very concerned with western religiousity at all. Her first experience with people who call themselves Christians have been from the University community of Holland. And my impression is, that it is like here in Denmark. People don't concern themselves with religious dogma at all, but many of us (yes us, myself included) call ourselves christians for cultural reasons. We are babtised and get married and burried in churches, and we celebrate Christmas, but we don't believe any of the historical or scientific things that the bible talks about, and we certainly don't think God is real. It's just a word. A metaphor.

Perhaps she naively believes that the people she knows in the US are the same. They just call themselves Christians, the same way they call themselves US citizens: as a cultural marker, but they don't actually believe anything supernatural.

Well from reading her books and interviews she is definityle now a politican . There is nothing wrong with that in itself but her prime concern is fighting Islam and its associated culture everything else seems pretty secondary. So she has choosen allies that she thinks will help her do this

and she is obviously a very brave and intelligent woman but a very poor role model for atheism. It really wouldnt suprise me if she came out as a Christian one of these days.

Has she taken part in any anti christian fundamentalist organisatations or solely concentrating on Islam. The national Dutch christian churches are not a threat to science or human progress the Americans ones are in my opinion a far bigger threat than islam.

Christopher Hitchens a neo con, hmm probably a bit more complicated than that I pretty sure he still considers himself to be on the 'left'while his brother a religious nut who openly far right is also very against the Iraq and Iran wars

perhaps that would be good.  I think I will.