Mehdi Hasan: In theory, the filibuster helps whichever party is in the...

You cannot appease fascism by meeting it in the middle; you cannot beat racism by indulging or excusing it.

Mehdi Hasan

meeting beat you racism

As a supporter of secularism, I am willing to accept same-sex weddings in a state-sanctioned register office, on grounds of equity. As a believer in Islam, however, I insist that no mosque be forced to hold one against its wishes.

Mehdi Hasan

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Bigotry and demonisation of difference are usually the hallmark of immature and childish minds.

Mehdi Hasan

childish minds difference immature

It isn't only Republicans, it seems, who traffic in alternative facts. Since Donald Trump's shock election victory, leading Democrats have worked hard to convince themselves, and the rest of us, that his triumph had less to do with racism and much more to do with economic anxiety - despite almost all of the available evidence suggesting otherwise.

Mehdi Hasan

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Every morning, I take a deep breath and then go online to discover what new insult or smear has been thrown in my direction. Whether it's tweets, blogposts or comment threads, the abuse is as relentless as it is vicious.

Mehdi Hasan

direction deep new morning

Are we willing and able to stand up to Islamophobia on days when there are not brutal terrorist attacks on Muslims in mosques?

Mehdi Hasan

stand-up days stand up

It is worth noting that Steve King of Iowa is far from the only Republican member of Congress to offer cover to white nationalists.

Mehdi Hasan

king worth congress white

The state exists to serve and protect every citizen, regardless of colour, creed, race or religion - and the welfare state should exist to and protect the populace in the same non-discriminatory and universal manner.

Mehdi Hasan

welfare colour race religion

Religion is simply one of a multitude of factors - economic political, cultural, social, tribal, racial - which shape and drive human action and reaction and often is the least important of those factors.

Mehdi Hasan

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The reality is that religion, across the board, and in and of itself, neither provokes war nor promotes peace - and it is childish and naive, not to mention utopian, to believe otherwise.

Mehdi Hasan

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It is man - whether believer or non-believer - who is responsible for global unrest. And it is human beings who have to learn to co-exist in the 21st century, outside of divisive social constructs, religious or otherwise.

Mehdi Hasan

learn outside human man

To pretend that there is no such thing as the Muslim world is specious, self-deluding, and - frankly - plain silly.

Mehdi Hasan

muslim pretend silly world

To speak of the Muslim world is not to endorse a totalitarian project, nor to bolster an Islamist narrative, nor to suggest that variety, plurality, and diversity are lacking in what Muslims think, believe, speak, and do as Muslims.

Mehdi Hasan

diversity speak believe world

The reality is that far-right extremism is no longer dominated by loners.

Mehdi Hasan

dominated longer extremism reality

Let's be clear: There is no doubt that the citizens of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea both fear and loathe the United States. Paranoia, resentment, and a crude anti-Americanism have been nurtured inside the Hermit Kingdom for decades.

Mehdi Hasan

inside doubt fear people

How many Americans, for example, are aware of the fact that U.S. planes dropped on the Korean peninsula more bombs - 635,000 tons - and napalm - 32,557 tons - than during the entire Pacific campaign against the Japanese during World War II?

Mehdi Hasan

more how war world

Millions of ordinary Americans may suffer from a toxic combination of ignorance and amnesia, but the victims of U.S. coups, invasions, and bombing campaigns across the globe tend not to. Ask the Iraqis or the Iranians, ask the Cubans or the Chileans. And, yes, ask the North Koreans.

Mehdi Hasan

suffer ask toxic ignorance

Perhaps the biggest boost to the LePenization of French politics came from Nicolas Sarkozy. As president of France between 2007 and 2012, he actively courted FN voters and helped dismantle the 'Republican pact,' under which the two main parties had pledged to work together to defeat the FN at a national and local level.

Mehdi Hasan

defeat politics together work

The French elites' strategy of trying to defeat the Le Pens by aping their rhetoric, stealing their policies, and pandering to their voters has been a political and moral failure.

Mehdi Hasan

defeat failure political trying

To be clear, no one is saying there weren't any legitimate economic grievances in Trumpland, nor is anyone claiming that the economy played no role whatsoever. The point, however, is that it wasn't the major motivating factor for most Trump voters - or, at least, that's what we learn when we bother to study those voters. Race trumped economics.

Mehdi Hasan

saying economics study race

In theory, the filibuster helps whichever party is in the minority in the Senate. In practice, it is the Republicans who have disproportionately used it to engage in cynical and anti-democratic obstructionism whenever they find themselves in the minority.