by Mark Luedtke
When a normal person makes a simple mistake in his or her life, the consequences of that mistake are limited to the individual who made it and the people close to him. Since we're all human, we all make mistakes and suffer the consequences. But when we transfer power over our lives to central planners, and those central planners make the same human mistakes, the consequences are catastrophic. The only way a central planner could be effective is if he was both omniscient and angelic. Humans are neither. Only God could be an effective central planner, and central planners know it. That's why our politicians, especially the president, usurp the role of God and religion by pretending to be all-powerful solvers of all problems. Much like 9/11, the Fort Hood massacre illustrates how the simple, inevitable human mistakes of central planners produce destructive results for others.
Political correctness doesn't seem like a big deal. Everybody understands that the vast majority of Muslims are not terrorists, but some prefer not to acknowledge that the world's terrorists are overwhelmingly Muslim and commit terrorist acts in the name of Islam. Some ignore Muslims who look to radical imams who preach jihad for guidance. That's their prerogative. Their political correctness will probably never be a problem or the consequences will be limited to them and those around them. But when political correctness infects central planners - our politicians and high level security bureaucrats - the result is catastrophic institutional failure like we saw at Fort Hood.
According to early reports, the Fort Hood shooter (whose name I won't mention because sensationalism in the press frequently inspires copycats) was an outspoken advocate of jihad against American troops. He attended a mosque in Washington run by a radical imam who had counseled three of the 9/11 hijackers. He emailed that imam in Yemen seeking guidance. The shooter claimed the Koran took precedence over the Constitution. According to the London Telegraph, instead of delivering a medical lecture to fellow Army psychiatrists, the shooter once delivered an hour long rant on the Koran and told the attendees that non-Muslims were infidels condemned to hell who should be set on fire and that non-believers should be beheaded and have boiling oil poured down their throats. He tried to contact al Qaeda through multiple jihadist websites. He had business cards printed up saying "Soldier of Allah". All of this was known by our military and intelligence services.
And those are just the early reports. We'll find out more. According to NPR, "a key official on a review committee [at Walter Reed] reportedly asked how it might look to terminate a key resident who happened to be a Muslim." Our central planners strip search granny at the airport. They mine data on millions of Americans. But they refuse to investigate radical American Muslim Army officers who try to contact al Qaeda. The shooter did everything but carry a neon sign over his head flashing "Death to America".
But our central planners will never learn the lesson. Prosecutors have charged the shooter with murder but not treason. As a murderer, he's just like any other American who goes postal. He was unhappy with work so he killed his coworkers. Ideology is a non-factor. For prosecutors to charge him with treason, the central planners would have to admit they'd allowed an enemy guerrilla fighter they were aware of to strike behind our lines. Central planners never admit their failure. They always claim the failure of their programs was because they had too little power, not too much.
Political correctness played another role in this massacre. The day of the shooting, Fort Hood commanding General Cone euphemistically reported that soldiers at Fort Hood weren't armed on base because it was their home. Like it was their choice. What he really meant was the Army ordered soldiers to go unarmed on base. When a person volunteers for the military, he surrenders his freedom including the right to keep and bear arms if so ordered, but in what world does it make sense to disarm the people we trust to fight our wars and turn them into victims on their own bases? If those troops had been allowed to carry firearms, the shooter might never have attacked, or soldiers returning fire would have stopped him immediately.
Mark Steyn expressed the opinion of many Americans when he claimed that political correctness was the fatal flaw of the war on terror. He was wrong. An enemy guerrilla fighter shooting up a military base every decade or so would be tragic, but it won't cause us to lose this war. The fatal flaw in the war on terror is our policies. While speaking out one side of his mouth, Tweedledee Bush claimed we weren't fighting a war of civilizations with Islam. Out of the other side of his mouth he claimed he wanted to transform the Middle East into an Americanized society with American-like institutions using tanks and bombs. I wonder if that was an inside joke or if Bush didn't realize those are the same thing. Muslims realized it. Tweedledum Obama escalated the conflict against Muslims and is on the verge of escalating it again. On the one hand, our central planners claim they aren't waging war on Muslims. On the other hand, they're setting fire to half the Middle East.
We ousted al Qaeda from Afghanistan nearly eight years ago, but we're still killing Afghans. Al Qaeda was never in Iraq, but we invaded anyway, and al Qaeda followed us. After years of futility, we finally defeated them, but our troops are still in Iraq. Our wars destabilized Pakistan, and now we're bombing Pakistanis. The Fort Hood shooter wasn't a jihadist when he joined the Army. Our policies invited the Fort Hood shooter and continue to invite Muslims in America and millions of Muslims in the Middle East who never cared about America to become enemies. We're making enemies faster than we can overcome them. To be successful, we must end these counterproductive wars and focus on stopping terrorists who are trying to attack America.
References:
Now we find out that the Fort Hood shooter had attended a radical mosque in Virginia, he had tried to contract al Qaeda,
and intelligence agents knew it. Yet this man was still in the Army
counseling US soldiers. This guy is the poster child for who shouldn't
be in the military, yet nothing was done. This highlights again how
inept our government is. I hope they charge this guy with treason as
well as murder, but government is so stupid, I wouldn't bet on it. The imam who advised the shooter also advised three of the 9/11 terrorists.
Mark Steyn tries to point out a fatal flaw in our terrorism strategy
- turning a blind eye to radical Muslims in our midst, which is a real
problem - but he fails to identify the real fatal flaw: waging war
against entire countries, against people who are not terrorists, and
doing so for years moving into decades at a time, radicalizing Muslims
overseas and at home who would not otherwise be radical and turning
them into enemies.
Here's the quote from the London Telegraph
Fort Hood shooter to be charged with premeditated murder. That's fine as far as it goes, but what about treason?
Fort Hood shooter had business cards printed saying "Solder of Allah", and common term among jihadists, and he accessed multiple jihadi websites under different screen names.
Reason on how foolishly banning guns at Ford Hood enabled the shooter to kill and wound so many people.
Cato on Fort Hood and political correctness. Good point about this being an act of guerrilla warfare, not a terrorist attack.
"It was stated simply in an NPR report
yesterday: “A key official on a [Walter Reed] review committee
reportedly asked how it might look to terminate a key resident who
happened to be a Muslim.” If this isn’t ”political correctness,”
nothing is."
No comments:
Post a Comment