The imbroglio illustrates a big problem concerning free speech, caused by how one person's free speech can cause other people to become violent. One can criticize or even smear the Catholic Churchall one wants. The worse that can happen is an angry letter from Catholic bishops or from William Donohue, the president of the Catholic League. Criticize Islam or Sharia law in any way and one runs the very real risk of being killed.

From the murder of Theo Van Gogh to the censoring of a depiction of Mohammed on the show "South Park," recent history is replete with what can only be considered suppression of free speech by terrorism. Catholics don't kill for attacks on the church. Attack Islam, and some extreme Muslims will not react well. On the other hand, some prominent Muslims such as Tahirul Qadri, who heads thePakistani Awami Tehrik Party, have spoken out against violence in the name of Islam.

The excuse the New York Times makes that running an anti-Islamic would endanger our soldiers in Afghanistan is not a frivolous one. Riots and murders are happening every day in that unhappy country due to an ill-advised burning of some copies of the Quran, Islam's holy book, due to them being defiled by terrorist prisoners writing messages to one another in their pages. Of course, the editors of the Times are not unmindful of the possibility of someone planting a car bomb next to its offices or people shooting and kidnapping its employees. It would take a lot of courage to run the anti-Islamic ad, declare that free speech is for everyone, and then assume a watchful stance for the consequences.

Unfortunately the tendency when faced with threats of violence is to take the path of least resistance. The New York Times may be, in theory at least, in favor of free speech and freedom of the press. But those in charge of the old Gray Lady, as the Times is called, love their lives even more. That is what the terrorists are counting on.