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YOU CAN'T STOP MOSLEM TERRORISTS IF YOU DENY THEY EXIST |
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Written by Jack Kelly
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Thursday, 06 May 2010 |
MSNBC anchor Contessa Brewer is bummed the man who
put a car bomb in Times Square isn't a right-winger with white skin.
"There was part of me that was hoping that this
was not going to be anybody with ties to any kind of Islamic country because
there are a lot of people who want to use this terrorist intent to justify
writing off people who believe in a certain way or who come from certain
countries or whose skin color is a certain way," she said on a radio show
Tuesday (5/04).
Presumably, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg also
was bummed to learn the bomber was Faisal Shahzad, 30, a naturalized citizen of Pakistani extraction who is a
registered Democrat in Connecticut.
On Monday (5/03), Mr. Bloomberg had told Katie
Couric of CBS he thought the bomber was "homegrown, maybe a mentally deranged
person or someone with a political agenda who doesn't like the health care bill
or something."
When he learned the truth, Mayor Bloomberg did not
apologize for his smear of people who don't like Obamacare. Instead, he
smeared the people of New
York City.
"We are not going to tolerate any backlash against
Middle Easterners or Moslems in New York City," he said.
There was no indication there would be such a
backlash. And if there wasn't one after 9/11, it is insulting to New
Yorkers to assume there would be after Mr. Shahzad's botched attempt.
We've seen this before. When Maj. Nidal
Hasan murdered 13 and injured 32 at Fort Hood last November, the concern expressed by the Army's chief
of staff wasn't for the safety of his soldiers.
"I'm concerned that this increased speculation
(about Maj. Hasan's motive) could cause a backlash against some of our Moslem
soldiers," Gen. George Casey told CNN.
Maj. Hasan's motive soon became clear. He's
a Islamic Jihadi with ties to al Qaeda.
The Associated Press is confused about why Mr.
Shahzad planted his bomb. A story Wednesday (5/05) was headlined: "NY car
bomb suspect cooperates, but motive mystery."
Mr. Shahzad has confessed to authorities he
attended a terrorist training camp during a five month visit to Pakistan last year. His motive is abundantly clear to anyone
willing to see it.
Little has changed since December, when Umar
Abdulmutallab, the "underwear bomber," was permitted to board a U.S.-bound
flight in the Netherlands. Mr. Abdulmuttalab wasn't on the "no-fly" list,
despite the fact the British government and his own father had warned U.S. authorities about him.
Mr. Shahzad was arrested on an airplane bound for Dubai. The plane had already left the gate, and had to be
called back.
"Authorities said that despite the manhunt, his
passport had not been flagged and he was able to buy a ticket with cash and
clear airport security," reported ABC's Brian Ross.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who
famously said "the system worked" in the case of the underwear bomber, was
clueless once again.
"Right now, we have no evidence that it is
anything other than a one-off," Ms. Napolitano told Jake Tapper of ABC Sunday
(5/02).
It would have been convenient for the
administration if it had been a one-off. It's very difficult to identify
a lone nut before he or she acts, so no reasonable person could blame the
administration for failing to stop him or her. But inability to detect as
large a plot as that Mr. Shahzad was involved in -- especially with a
conspirator as inept as Mr. Shahzad seems to have been -- smacks of
intelligence failure.
This is especially so in light of a report in the
New York Times Wednesday (5/05) that a
man who had bought a condominium from Mr. Shahzad had been interviewed about
him in 2004 by investigators for the Joint Terrorism Task Force.
We were spared from disaster by Mr. Shahzad's
deficiencies as a bomb maker, not by any action of the federal government.
Ms. Napolitano has banned the use of the word
"terror" in her department. But calling an act of terror a "man-caused
disaster" doesn't make it go away. It's hard to stop a terrorist if you
deny his existence.
None of the four acts of Moslem terror in America since Barack Obama became president have been followed by
vigilantism. Americans are able to distinguish between the vast majority of Moslems
here who are law abiding, and the few who want to kill us.
The reluctance of the administration and many
journalists to acknowledge there are some who want to kill us is an invitation
to catastrophe.
Jack Kelly is a former Marine and Green Beret and a
former deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan
administration. He is national security writer for the Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette.
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