Remembering 9/11 While Condemning America
Campaign politics came to a halt yesterday as Presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama both attended ceremonies at the pit where the World Trade Center proudly stood as a symbol of the American free enterprise system prior to September 11, 2001. Families of victims and dignitaries gathered in Arlington, Virginia in the morning to dedicate a memorial to those who perished in the attack on the Pentagon that day. Others visited the temporary memorial at the crash site of United Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania where valiant Americans charged armed hijackers and thwarted their attack on the United States Capitol. Nearly all Americans regardless of political persuasions honored those who died on that horrible day seven years ago.
Despite this day of perceived unity there are those who continue to condemn America via television news and regularly scheduled programs, on radio shows both public and private, in our educational institutions including our most prestigious, at places of worship, at charities and foundations, and in our court rooms and other government institutions. We have seen long term news anchors for national networks removed for using fabricated documents to condemn the Bush Administration, network shows created for entertainment criticize a standing president, not an imaginary presidential character, and take positions on his policies. We see tenured professors doing the same in classes where the curriculum they are paid to teach is replaced by their personal political opinion though they may have no degree in political science, history or other remotely related field. Worse yet, grade school teachers are trying to ingrain children with their own agenda be they political, sexual or environmental often using fear as motivation, shielded in their devious efforts by the mighty teachers unions.
Preventing another incident of the magnitude of the World Trade Center attacks does require preemptive action as prescribed by what has been described as the “Bush Doctrine.” President Bush garnered the support Bill Clinton felt he didn’t have in 1998 to follow through on his bombing raids in Iraq and go after Bin Laden in the Sudan. Furthermore, it required intelligence to recognize growing threats at home and around the world. The Patriot Act has helped The Department of Homeland Security and the FBI identify and defeat additional attacks on U.S. targets such as the Prudential Building in New Jersey, Sears Tower in Chicago and Los Angeles International Airport to name a few. After Democrats took control of Congress in 2004 the administration came under constant criticism for the National Security Administration’s warantless wiretapping of overseas calls to suspected terrorist. Finally in 2007, the Bush administration gave way to pressure from a Democratic Congress and suspend the warantless wiretapping of overseas calls to suspected terrorists bringing to an end the very program that had allowed them to stay on top of terrorist activities.
The actions against potential threats requires valid intelligence from trusted sources. Yet time and again we have seen current and past intelligence officers and the agencies they work for leak information or bear false witness against the administration both for political purposes and personal gain. Testimony by both Joseph Wilson and Richard Clark in front of the 911 Commission in which they blasted the Bush administration made millions publishing books even though the commission discredited their testimony. In either case the press did little to make to make the public aware of the devious activities of these bad actors. Quite the contrary the press advanced the deceit of both.
The press has it own core of bad actors anxious to please angry progressives and will go to nearly any lengths to do so. In Joe Wilson’s case it was alleged he was sent to Niger to investigate the attempts of Saddam Hussein to purchase nuclear material at the behest of Vice President Cheney. In fact he was sent at the suggestion of his wife, Valery Plame, a C.I.A. employee who was allegedly outed by Cheney’s assistant Scooter Libby. During the investigation of Plame’s outing Maurine Dowd of the New York Times heroically refused to divulge her sources even though that source, Richard Armitage, had given her written permission to do so. So the hopeful heroine marched of to jail in pursuit of, not the truth, but progressive martyrdom. And while the press does have a responsibility to inform the public, the exposure of C.I.A. detention camps for prisoners from Afghanistan operations resulted from leaks from the intelligence agency itself. Is it any wonder Defense Secretary Rumsfeld saw fit to expand the capabilities of Army intelligence rather than trust the word of the agency leaking information and that did such a poor job leading up to the war in Iraq.
The media in general has taken on the mission of discrediting George Bush and making the progressive agendas of a woman’s right to choose, open boarders, anti-war, global warming and political correctness their primary goal in spite of national interest or the facts in a given matter. What could have driven Dan Rather to so aggressively promote a story tarnishing George Bush’s Air National Guard service that would prove to be erroneous and trash a news career spanning 5 decades. A blogger on LittleGreenFootballs discovered that the documents used to support Rather’s allegations that Bush received favorable treatment from his now deceased commander were created using a computer font that didn’t exist until 1998, decades after the document dates. When it came to the war in Iraq they were quite fond of reading the death tolls on the air, exposing any calamities such as Abu Ghraib or corruption in the Iraqi government while denying any successes such as the country’s judicial proceedings against Saddam’s Baathist regime, the military successes such as the surge or the commitment of combat units and individual soldiers to the mission they’ve been charge with. Shortly after Bush announced the new military initiative Chris Mathews would report in melodramatic fashion “A lot of people are going to go to bed tonight terrified.” Meanwhile, reports from the same network with Bob Arnot where he mingled with shop owners and people in the streets of Bhagdad portraying the hopes and dreams of a newly liberated people were abruptly canceled. One could watch his daily reports and see French construction cranes on Saddam’s personal projects, many paid for with corrupt “oil for food” payments, were replaced by satellite dishes and cell towers servicing the public need promoted by proud entrepreneurs.
“Bush Lied People Died” became the mantra of liberal anti-war activists and was supported by the majority of Democratcs in Congress catering to the ever growing mob of MoveOn.org and Daily Kos minions convinced history began after the Clinton impeachment and that the horrors of Iraq begin with the evil of Bush / Cheney stolen election. For the most part they are either unaware or refuse to believe that at the dawn of their history, in 1998, President Bill Clinton signed the Iraq Liberation Act which authorized regime change of the brutal dictatorship. The Senate was unanimous in it’s approval and favored in the House 360 to 38. On October 11, 2002 Congress approved the Iraq War Resolution with a vote of 77 to 23 in the Senate and 296 to 133 in the House, a greater margin than the President’s father garnered when he attacked Iraq after the 1991 invasion of Kuwait. But now congressional Democrats claim they were deceived by Bush even though they were privy to the same intelligence the administration received. During the Democratic Presidential primaries, Hillary Clinton was constantly dogged by the left for her vote in favor of the war while Barrack Obama skated by virtue of the fact that he was yet to hold a federal legislative office.
Much of the youth who will vote in this election have no recollection of the vicious dictator who instructed his troops in Kuwait to torch the oil fields before their retreat. They are also unlikely to know the the events that led up to committing ground forces to Iraq was part of this long and arduous process that included the United Nations and a host of allies that began as an attempt to contain a man who had used weapons of mass destruction against his foes in the war with Iran and his opponents at home culminating in the deaths of nearly two million people. Many would argue that this had nothing to do with the war on terror, that Saddam represented little threat to the United States and that the real war on terror is in Afghanistan. This is partially true but Islamic Extremists considered control of Iraq so important that their militias came from all over the globe only to meet their deaths. Before the Serge and the Anbar Awakening the demise of the terrorists in Iraq was anything but certain. As recently as December 6, 2006, the Iraq Study Group issued by a bipartisan commission released a report stating
“The situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorating. There is no path that can guarantee success, but the prospects can be improved.”
The report included seventy-nine recommendations that only encouraged the terrorists. A leader of the Islamic Jihad, Abu Ayman, as told by Mike Evans in his book The Final Move commented:
“The report proves that this is the era of Islam and of juhad…
The Americans came to the conclusion that Islam is the new giant of the world and it would be clever to reduce hostilities with this giant.
In the Quran the principle of the rotation is clear and according to this principle the end of the Americans and of all non-believers is getting closer…
We hope that after chasing the occupation from Iraq, these jihad efforts and experiences will be transferred to Palestine, and yes, I mean that we expect these fighters will come to Palestine as part of a big Islamic army.”
Evans provides additional comments, but does anyone really need more evidence they are driven to crate a worldwide Calafate with any means their oil revenues will support. Evens summation of the report asks the most important question:
“James Baker and Lee Hamilton couldn’t have said it better had they waved the report before the terrorists as a white flag: America does not have the political will to win the war on terrorism.
Are we really on the edge of retreat?”
If that wasn’t bad enough, here is what Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, had to say in April of last year:
“Now I believe, myself, that the secretary of state, the secretary of defense and you have to make your own decision as to what the president knows: that this war is lost, that the surge is not accomplishing anything.”
While it may appear ethnic and religious divisions make Iraq ripe for civil war and confusion, our relentless pursuit of a military victory over the insurgents coupled with the patient process of building civil institutions that would eventually result in a democratic government make it appear tranquil and comprehensible compared to the chaos existing in Palestine and Pakistan’s frontier regions where appeasement of the terrorists was the policy of the past. Hisbolla, Hamas, Fatah and a host of terrorist organizations have grown unfettered in the Middle East with the financial, military and political support from oil rich states in the region all with the openly stated intent of destroying the state of Israel. As Muslim migrants have grown to be a substantial percentage of the populations of European states that once supported Israel they have bought into the notion that Palestinians are the victims of Israeli injustice turning a blind eye to the treachery of the terrorist groups who claim to champion the Palestinian cause. In spite of the dangers Islamic militants pose for our troops in troubled regions the real threat to Western democracy comes from the infiltration of radical Islam into these countries and their use of our liberal institutions to further their goals. In some instances the threat has come from home grown radicals who have engaged in or used the threat of violence to influence their host country.
Recent events have brought about an awakening in Europe about massive Muslim immigrations and their failure to assimilate and accept the laws and traditions of their new home exemplified by the murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh in 2004 and the French riots in 2005. The brutal treatment of woman in Islamic European enclaves became the topic of van Gogh’s film. He had become a fan of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali born Dutch Feminist who wrote the script for his film “Submission” which brought the ire of the Muslim community and ultimately led to his death at the hands of Mohamed Bouyeri of the Hafstad Group comprised of youth of North African ancestry. In October of 2005 two Muslim youths of North African ancestry were electrocuted while fleeing French police. The incident sparked wide spread riots in 274 towns surrounding Paris in which some 2900 participants were arrested. Nicolas Sarkozy, then the Interior Minister, gained widespread attention with his zero tolerance policy toward urban violence. Only time will tell if his presidency will have an effect on the self esteem of European society.
England would get it’s wake up call on July 7, 2005 when 52 people were killed and more than 200 injured as a result of three bombs that were coordinated to detonate around 8:50am LST in underground train tunnels in central London. In her book “Londonistan” Melanie Phillips offers a frightening portrayal of how Radical Islam has undermined a progressive Western Government using the very institutions that assured it’s citizens freedoms. Of the bombings she writes:
“… [they] revealed a terrible truth about Britain, something even more alarming and dangerous to America’s long-term future than the fact that foreign terrorists had been able to carry out the 9/11 attacks on U.S. soil in 2001. They finally lifted the veil on Britain’s dirty secret in the war on terrorism - that for more than a decade, London had been the epicenter of Islamic militancy in Europe, Under the noses of successive British governments, Britain’s capital had turned into “Londonistan”–a mocking play on the names of such state sponsors of terrorism as Afghanistan–and become the major European center for promotion, recruitment and financing of Islamic terror and extremism.”
Political Correctness has come to suppress Free Speech in Western Culture exemplified by the press’ avoidance of terms such as Radical Islam or Islamic Terrorists yet nothing is done when these groups who portray themselves as victims of their host culture and promote violence to redress their grievances. Phillips points out that
“In February 2006, Muslims demonstrating outside the Danish embassy in London’s exclusive Knightsbridge were allowed to call for bombings and decapitations while the police looked on. ‘Bomb bomb Denmark’ and ‘Nuke nuke Denmark,’ shouted the demonstrators, while their placards read: ‘Exterminate those who slander Islam,’ ‘Behead those who insult Islam,’ ‘Europe you’ll come crawling when mujahideen come roaring, ‘As Muslims unite we are prepared to fight,’ ‘Europe you will pay, fantastic four are on their way’ (a presumed reference to the London suicide bombers the previous year.) And one demonstrator was even dressed in the garb of a suicide bomber.”
Perhaps the events of 9/11 left Americans more reluctant to tolerate the type of religious extremism we find in Europe. On a US Airways flight from Minneapolis to Phoenix in November of 2006, six Imams returning from a conference of Islamic clerics exhibited suspicious behavior and were removed from the plane after nervous passengers reported suspicious behavior that included chanting and preying in Arabic, praising Saddam Husein, and condemning the United States. Subsequently, the Imams would file a lawsuit that, in addition to the airline, included unnamed passengers and and airline workers in an obvious attempt to intimidate future passengers from reporting such suspicious behaviors. Some alarmed lawyers stepped up and offered to defend the passengers free of charge stating they provide a vital public service being able to report such behavior without fear of being taken to court. Representative Peter King of New York was quick to fend off such intimidation stating
“Since 9/11 we’re asking ordinary citizens to be the eyes and ears for law enforcement…” If they’re afraid of coming forward because of fear of being sued, then it would be a huge victory for the terrorists.”
But when King and other legislators sought to enact legislation to ban such litigation they were met with objections from Democrats and Muslim groups claiming the suits would stop bigots from discriminating against law abiding Muslims. But our legal system and the growing victim mentality already work against law abiding Muslims as Evens sites in the efforts of the Moderate Muslim Souleiman Ghali who, raised to hate Shiites, Christians and Jews, began rethinking these prejudices when he migrated to the U.S. and founded a mosque in San Francisco:
“As Mr. Ghali’s website states: ‘Our vision is the emergence of an American Muslim identity founded on compassion, respect, dignity, and love.’ That’s hard work, especially given teh supply of imans. In 2002, Mr. Ghali fired an iman who urged California Muslims to follow the sterling example of Palestinian suicide bombers. Safwat Morsey is Egyptian and speaks barely any English, but he know enough to sue Mr. Ghali’s mosque for wrongful dismissal and was awarded $400,000.”
Back here Tammy Bruce writes in “The Death of Right and Wrong” that “It’s an isolation, an ‘otherness’ that the Left wants its constituencies to feel, and the rest of us to accept. The Left’s success in classifying groups into their own little culture, alone and unto their own private, special worlds, obscures personal responsibility. It serves to pound into you the falsehood that you cannot know that way of life, and so you mustn’t judge it [be it black crime, homosexuality and same sex marriage, illegal immigrants in the shadows, radical Islam, etc]. In these enforced cultural ghettos, none of us are deemed capable of understanding anyone else-making all decisions and all behaviors morally relative and beyond judgment.” In reference to “Alice in Wonderland” she states “We have been led behind the Looking Glass, where everything is the opposite of what it should be.” I think we understand the intentions of radical Islam well enough and need to make distinctions between Wahhabism, a violent puritanical movement that emerged in the 18th century, and peaceful Muslims and not discard our own culture.
Finally, it is not enough to seek out and kill an illusive enemy. We must combat the source of revenues that make their way to the terrorists and the madrassas that indoctrinate those of the future. Saudi oil wealth has been accelerating the expansion Wahhabi madrassas around the world calling for a world wide calafate under strict Shiria Law. Even with increased production and alternative sources, we could expect another generation of well armed assailants to come our way. Despite this reality, the Democratic Congress led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid thought nothing of adjourning without passing energy legislation with gasoline prices exceeding $4 per gallon blaming the high costs on speculators and “Big Oil.” Anything Bush does is attacked by the Democrats as if defeating him would bring a different result in the Florida recount of 2000. Being that Democrats far outnumber Republicans, avoiding the demise of our culture will require they demand their representatives and Party leadership discriminate between the traditional values that brought them to the Democratic party and the Progressives open society and moral relativism that will subject the individual to the dictates of the “victim culture” while we watch radical Islam take out the institutions that made American society the greatest in history.