Within a six month period in 2009 we've had the Fort Hood shooting by a devout Muslim, the Nation of Islam-affiliated cop shooter near Seattle, and the "angelic" Muslim from Nigeria in a miraculous failure to blow up a Detroit-bound plane.
These terrorist attacks all have one thing in common. Our failure of acknowledging the root cause of the terrorist threat. No, the root cause is not "poverty" or "the haves vs. the have nots" or "racial discrimination" or "religious discrimination." It is not the "evil US suppression" of other peoples or nations, although this is a popular "blame-America-first" belief.
The root cause is our failure to understand the basic historical teaching and goals of Islam, and the motivation of those who become devout in its practice.
Instead we have leaders who believe Islam must be respected and dealt with benevolently. We have sympathizers who continue to insist that Islam is a "religion of peace." We have national security leaders who confusedly profess that "the system worked really, really smoothly." We have a President who rewards Islamic nations while snumbbing our allies - who has the Islamic threat totally off his radar of national concerns. Heck, he doesn't even recognize any "terror threat" as a high priority, never mind admitting that 99% is Islamic motivated.
We have been "reactive" and not "proactive." We are being severely manipulated by our failure to acknowledge the root problem. After 9-11, we had cockpit doors fortified and searches of passengers for box cutters. After the shoe bomber, we all had to remove our shoes in the security line-up. After the Eurporean plot to carry small vials of liquid explosives onto planes, no one can bring perfume, aftershave, or liquid medications in our carry-ons. Literally tons of these were confiscated at the gates. As a result of the underwear bomber, we will either have full body scans revealing every mole or be subject to pat downs up to our crotch. When the devout Islamist conceal their explosive of choice in their body cavities, we may be induced to accept body cavity searches as well.
Don't you think we are missing something here? Instead of punishing Americans who love our freedoms, why don't we focus on those whose ideology promotes the terror? Instead of reducing the freedoms of those who respect freedom, why not reduce the freedoms of those who want to destroy our freedom? Is this approach too logical? Yes, it involves profiling. Before the Islamic cancer spreads further, every individual who claims Islam as their faith, and every individual from an Islamic-dominated nation must receive special attention. This special attention must be carried out at the airport gates as well as in our selection of individuals for sensitive positions in our government and defense organizations and industries. This is the least we should do. Others may soon be calling for the deportation of all who profess a devout belief in Islam, or worse, especially if we experience another successful attack of 9-11 proportions or worse. We need to stop our demeaning harassment of the innocent majority out of our insane desire to not offend those who profess their offense toward us.
We know our President is not with us when he declares in his book "Audacity of Hope" that he promises to “stand with them [Muslim immigrants] if the political winds became ugly.” I take that to mean that he will defend Islam and Muslims in this nation no matter how severe the political backlash might be as a result of future Muslim atrocities. Stunning. But Obama the is the President we now have, one who is "standing with them", making it a practice of shielding Muslim terrorists from interrogation and accusation.
Daniel Pipes, in this pointed article about our security failures, asked "What size disaster must occur to inspire a serious approach to counterterrorism?"
I would add "What size disaster must occur and how much of our culture and freedom must we sacrifice to inspire a serious approach to Islam?"