One risk of liberalization is that Islamists can come to power

* One risk of liberalization is that Islamists can come to power. Look at Holland. Two Dutch members of parliament, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somalian-born feminist, and Geert Wilders, a conservative immigration restrictionist, are essentially in jail thanks to the threats of local jihadists. Ali sleeps in a naval base, or in ever-changing hotels protected by bodyguards; Wilders has to live in a high-security prison ("like a bad B-movie," he says).

Their incarceration follows the murder last November of filmmaker Theo van Gogh, who dared to criticize the treatment of women in Islam. Holland is not yet under sharia law--Ali and Wilders have not been killed (only van Gogh has)--but, on the margin, Holland enjoys a bigoted Islamic regime: Think of the constraints upon Copts in Egypt. The last free man to leave Holland won't have to turn out the lights; the lights are going off all over the country.

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