That’s very insightful Chris. Too bad your colleagues didn’t realize that and decided to leave the troll alone. It’s ironic it takes (or would take, he can’t seem to make up his mind) the conscientious objection of the f**king crackpot who started this mess to give the media an excuse to find some other story to cover.

And the anti-Quran-burning advocates also need to give it a bit of a rest. Many of them are the same people who would argue (rightfully, in my opinon) that the vast majority of Islam is composed of moderate, well-meaning and intelligent people, just as is the case for the other world religions. Thinking that Quran burning is ignorant is fine. But throwing up a fit risks a certain condescension, as if you secretly think that Muslims really are a bunch of uncontrollable extremists and that they aren’t yet ready to deal with criticism (just as Christians have had to deal with Piss Christ, for example).

Nonetheless, there are reports of violent protests in Afghanistan about the Quran burning. I don’t blame them. First of all, the protests are happening in Afghanistan, a country that has plenty of non-religious reasons to be angry. Gen. Petraeus is right that any story that fits the mold of American antagonism against Muslims will hurt the mission to win the hearts and minds of Afghans. But so will any story detailing the abuses of, say, Blackwater contractors.

But those kinds of stories are unlikely to get wall-to-wall live coverage from network and cable news or make the covers of 50+ newspapers. Assuming that the average Afghan has just a basic understanding of American media culture, I wouldn’t blame them not being able to tell the difference between our apparent obsession with this Quran-burning pastor and an obsession with Koran-burning itself.