Another excellent offering from “change” therapist Robin of Berkeley at American Thinker.
Stripping an American terrorist of citizenship
The Lieberman proposal to strip terrorists who are Americans of citizenship rights has a great many critics. That is not surprising, since the idea appears at first glance to be a fairly radical one.
Here’s a typical critique, taken from our very own comments section:
[Shahzad] is an American citizen, and he was caught on American soil (i.e. not taken as a prisoner on a foreign battlefield, like John Walker Lindh.) That means, regretfully, he deserves the full panoply of rights we would extend to any other American citizen suspected of committing a crime. To me, that’s a bright line that you don’t want to mess with.
That argument makes sense—except for one thing: that bright line has already been messed with. The relevant statute is quite explicit about the conditions under which an American may lose his or her citizenship, and you will see if you study it that the Lieberman suggestion could easily be considered a logical extension of the older statute to the present circumstances of a terror war.
I can’t find a date for when the stature was passed, but it appears to have been quite some time ago, since the last section (on page 2 of the link) involves a 1978 repeal of a certain rule that had been in place since 1952. There are quite a few conditions currently listed that would cause forfeiture of citizenship; some of them having to do with formal renunciation by the party involved, and/or accepting posts in foreign governments. The most relevant sections for our purposes, however, are the following:
(3) entering, or serving in, the armed forces of a foreign state if
(A) such armed forces are engaged in hostilities against the United States, or…(7) committing any act of treason against, or attempting by force to overthrow, or bearing arms against, the United States, violating or conspiring to violate any of the provisions of section 2383 of title 18, or willfully performing any act in violation of section 2385 of title 18, or violating section 2384 of title 18 by engaging in a conspiracy to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, if and when he is convicted thereof by a court martial or by a court of competent jurisdiction.
Lieberman is apparently proposing that the act be amended in order to encompass the modern realities of terrorism and jihad. One may certainly disagree with his suggestion, but not on the grounds that this represents something completely new and different.
Currently, it’s the State Department that makes decisions as to whether to attempt to apply the law already on the books in any individual case. The same would be true with the proposed Lieberman extension. Here’s more:
You would still have the right to contest this in court. And if you did, the burden of proof would be on State — not on you — to persuade the court that your involvement with a terror organization is sufficient to justify taking away your citizen status.
It doesn’t seem all that revolutionary to me. If a person is opposed to Lieberman’s idea, perhaps he/she ought to oppose the earlier manifestation of the statute as well. Should it make any difference if a person joins the regular military of an enemy versus a group such as al Qaeda? In my opinion, it should not.
[ADDENDUM: The original statute is from the 1940’s. The Greatest Generation.]
Spam of the day
This spammer doth protest too much, methinks. To begin with, the name “TNT Courier Service” does not inspire confidence. And then there are the disclaimers I have bolded:
I am Mr.David White , i have been waiting for you since to contact me for your Confirm able Bank Draft of $850.000.00 United States Dollars, but I did not hear from you since that time.
Then I went and deposited the Draft with TNT COURIER SERVICE, West Africa, I Traveled out of the country for a 3 Months Course and I will not come back till end of July.What you have to do now is to contact the TNT COURIER SERVICE as soon as possible to know when they will deliver your package to you because of the expiring date.
For your information, I have paid for the delivering Charge, Insurance premium and Clearance Certificate Fee of the cheque showing that it is not a Drug Money or meant to sponsor Terrorist attack in your Country. The only money you will send to the TNT COURIER SERVICE to deliver your Draft direct to your postal Address in your country is ($150.00US) Dollars only being Security Keeping Fee of the Courier Company so far.
Again, don’t be deceived by anybody to pay any other money except $150.00US Dollars. I would have paid that but they said no because they don’t know when you will contact them…
Etc., etc., and so forth…
On Mirandizing Shahzad: there’s good news and bad
First, the good news:
[Shahzan was initially] interrogated “pursuant to the public-safety exception of the Miranda Rule,” says the GOP aide. That exception allows officials to question a suspect for a period of time without reading him his rights if officials believe there is an imminent threat of other attacks. “They said he provided important and actionable information,” the aide continues.
The bad news:
He was then Mirandized.
The good news:
…[H]e then waived his right to remain silent and to counsel and to be brought before a magistrate.
The bad news:
he could assert his right to remain silent at any time. And that is a result of the administration’s decision, similar to one made in the Abdulmutallab case, to read Shahzad his rights early in the process.
Here’s more:
Administration officials point out that Shahzad is a naturalized American citizen and thus is entitled to the full range of U.S. constitutional rights. That’s not entirely accurate. While being an American citizen means that Shahzad will ultimately be tried in civilian court ”” the Military Commissions Act applies only to aliens ”” there is no reason that Shahzad could not be declared an enemy combatant, held indefinitely and questioned at length during that period without Miranda rights…
So in the case of Shahzad, authorities are holding a Pakistani man who has been a naturalized citizen for the last year, much of which he spent in Pakistan apparently training for an attack on the U.S., who returned to this country to attempt to set off a bomb in the most heavily populated location imaginable, and who was headed back to Pakistan when he was caught. The courts have said such a man, a U.S. citizen, can be designated an enemy combatant. But so far, the Obama administration ”” just as it did in Detroit ”” has declined to take that course.
I’ve been wondering about Shahzad’s citizenship and when and how he obtained it. This is the first article I’ve seen that indicates it might have been very recently indeed—perhaps even after he had decided to return to Pakistan and train as a terrorist. This brings up the question of whether his becoming a citizen might have been intended expressly for the purpose of being tried as a civilian in our regular court system, should he be caught. After all, Shahzad had no plan to become a suicide bomber. He intended to survive, and he must have known he might be linked to the bombing. Did he want to make sure his legal circumstances would be the most favorable possible?
[ADDENDUM: Apparently, Shahzad become a citizen about a year ago because he married an American.]
Making excuses for Shahzad
The meme is shaping up: poor pitiful Faisal Shahzad, helpless hapless victim of the economic crisis (i.e. Bush, capitalism, Wall Street, fat cats…).
If it’s not said outright, it’s implied: the capitalist devils made him do it. After all, when you fall on economic hard times, don’t you want to go out and bomb a bunch of tourists and theatergoers in Times Square? Doesn’t everybody?
Here’s a typical article in the press, entitled, “Times Square bombing suspect’s life had unraveled.”
This concept as described in the article—a life unraveling—does not take into account personal responsibility. But although it is most certainly true that people can fall on hard times through no fault of their own, sometimes a person is in fact the cause of his/her difficulties. What’s more, even if that is not the case and the person is completely a victim of circumstance, it is still up to that person to react in a way that shows (dare I say use this archaic word?) character. Shahzad showed his—a bad one.
We don’t really know the cause of Shahzad’s hard times. We are told he “left” a good job, “lost” a home to foreclosure, and moved into a rundown apartment in Bridgeport, Connecticut. No explanation of why these things happened. For example, was he fired or did he quit? Was his job performance poor? Spokespeople for the company where he had worked, Affinion Group, say he “left on good terms.” This is ambiguous, but it certainly doesn’t immediately conjure up the idea that Shahzad was fired.
What’s more, he and his wife left their home very precipitously. According to neighbors, “”It was like they just picked up everything they wanted and just left one day.” They “moved out abruptly and left behind a mess of food, broken dishes and baby formula in the cabinets.” In addition, Shahzad told a broker trying to sell his home that the bank should be allowed take it, and that he intended to return to Pakistan. Sounds like a plan—and one that Shahzad proceeded to implement. When returned to this country (apparently minus his wife and kids), he rented the seedy Bridgeport apartment, which came equipped with a private garage. The latter seems to have been the major draw, because that was where he stored his bomb-making materials.
Just an average Joe driven mad by a combination of Bush’s Iraq War and Bush’s recession, right? Wrong. Not only do we not know which came first, Shahzad’s terrorist choices or his hard luck, we don’t even know whether his financial reversals were of his own doing or not. Either way, however, it does not matter. If he’d been Joe Schmo from Connecticut, rather than Faisal Shahzad from Connecticut via Pakistan, it would have been highly unlikely (despite the left’s desire to equate the right with Islamic terrorists—if Timothy McVeigh had not existed they would have had to invent him) that he would have dealt with whatever reversals he’d had by loading a van with explosives and trying to light it in Times Square.
That almost always requires a mindset formed by Islamic terrorism and macerated in its beliefs. Nor was Shahzad any sort of lone wolf; he had help in Pakistan (although fortunately, not enough to enable him to get his bomb to work properly). The significance of Pakistan in all of this should not be lost. Although it is nominally our ally, Pakistan has been a breeding ground for Islamic terrorism for quite some time.
Pakistan’s history of pan-Islamism does not mean that all Pakistanis, much less everyone of Pakistani origin, hold extremist views. But it does explain why a larger percentage of Pakistanis than, say, Indonesians or Tunisians, are likely to see the world through the narrow prism of their faith. The ISI’s reluctance to dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism””training camps, a web of ultra-orthodox madrassas that preach violence, and terrorist groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba””ensure that Pakistan remains a magnet for any Muslim with a grudge against the world and the urge to do something violent about it.
These are the factors that created a Faisal Shahzad—and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. We ignore them at our peril.
[ADDENDUM: Shahzad is reported to have resigned from his job at Affinion Group in mid-2009.]
The missing booms: the best laid schemes o’ government an’ men…
…gang aft agley
An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain, For promis’d joy!
What is the moral to this story?:
If U.S. officials had followed up on a 1994 response plan for a major Gulf oil spill, it is possible that the spill could have been kept under control and far from land.
The problem: The federal government did not have a single fire boom on hand.
But in order to conduct a successful test burn eight days after the Deepwater Horizon well began releasing massive amounts of oil into the Gulf, officials had to purchase one from a company in Illinois.
When federal officials called, Elastec/American Marine, shipped the only boom it had in stock, Jeff Bohleber, chief financial officer for Elastec, said today.
At federal officials’ behest, the company began calling customers in other countries and asking if the U.S. government could borrow their fire booms for a few days, he said.
A single fire boom being towed by two boats can burn up to 1,800 barrels of oil an hour, Bohleber said. That translates to 75,000 gallons an hour, raising the possibility that the spill could have been contained at the accident scene 100 miles from shore.
“They said this was the tool of last resort. No, this is absolutely the asset of first use. Get in there and start burning oil before the spill gets out of hand,” Bohleber said. “If they had six or seven of these systems in place when this happened and got out there and started burning, it would have significantly lessened the amount of oil that got loose.”
Who’s to blame? Well, the plan without follow-through was hatched during the Clinton administration. But since then there’ve been both the Bush and Obama administrations, although neither president was probably aware of the deficiency in a scheme that called for the use of equipment that was never acquired.
If Bush had been president, however, you can be sure he would be the one most people and the MSM would blame. But I don’t see Obama getting off all that easy, either, when even the New York Times is criticizing him for his delay in reacting to the seriousness of the emergency.
Is the main problem here compartmentalization? Government grown so unwieldy and disconnected that a plan can be hatched with no attempt at actually following through? Is it also the elevation of words over actions—if the report is written and the study done, that is considered enough, without a thought as to what might be needed to actually implement it?
Here’s more:
…[F]ormer National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration oil spill response coordinator Ron Gouguet — who helped craft the 1994 plan — told the Press-Register that officials had pre-approval for burning. “The whole reason the plan was created was so we could pull the trigger right away.”
What use is a trigger without a gun?
(But I’m sure the government will do just fine managing health care…)
Times Square terror suspect in custody
And surprise surprise, he’s a naturalized American citizen of Pakistani descent, arrested at JFK Airport while trying to flee to Dubai.
No doubt, however, he’s also a right-wing Tea Partying extremist who’s against the health care bill. And of course he’s a lone wolf, too.
McCain has come out against Mirandizing suspect Shahzad. But this case is distinguished by the fact that the suspected bomber is a US citizen, which means that he is entitled to Miranda warnings (and probably has already received them). This advantage is one of the many reasons terrorists are eager to recruit citizens rather than foreign nationals for operations in this country.
Those who argue that this arrest is a vindication for the law enforcement approach to terrorism are confusing apples with oranges. Of course that system will often—and rightly—be involved in the apprehension of a terrorist who is in this country. Those who argue (as I have) that the law enforcement approach is not a good way to deal with terrorism in general are talking especially about a later part of the process, the criminal trial and sentencing. It is especially inappropriate for the trial of foreign nationals picked up outside this country as well as certain selected terrorists in this country. The arguments against using this system for such terrorists have to do, among other things, with the rules of discovery in our criminal justice system and the advantage it gives terrorists in finding out what we know and how we know it.
[ADDENDUM: Turns out that the investigation wasn’t quite the well-oiled machine we’d like to see, although in the end they got their man. But Shahzad came close to getting away:
Shahzad, who had been the subject of a huge manhunt, almost made it out of the country on a Emirates flight to Dubai, with a planned connection onward to Pakistan, according to officials.
“He appeared real close to getting away,” one federal official said. “The plane was buttoned up. Backed away from the jetway.”
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.
Wow.
(Hat tip: DrewM at Ace’s.)]
[ADDENDUM II: This is more reassuring, although it’s difficult to tell what’s true at this point:
This is NOT what they were saying on Fox in the early hours this morning. An LEO representative said they were behind him all the way and had agents on the plane.
They said they allowed him to board on purpose so as to see if he had accomplices on board as well.
They said there was never any danger of the plane leaving or him getting away.]
“The Fantasticks” was a fantastic investment
The musical “The Fantasticks” is fifty years old, and the backers are still making money from what were originally very small stakes. “The Fantasticks” is a perennial favorite that’s easy to put on, requiring minimal sets and a small cast, but full of verve and fey charm—not to mention beautiful, beautiful music.
It holds a very warm and special place in my heart; I saw it as a child not too long after it opened, and remembered it always as a magical event. I’ve seen it many times since, and no matter how out of the way the venue or tiny the theater it has always been a joy (in fact, sometimes, the tinier the theater, the better).
Alas, I could find no videos of the original production. But here’s one that features the original cast recording of the most famous song of all from the musical, “Try to Remember,” sung by Jerry Orbach. Those of you who only knew him in his more elderly manifestation in “Law and Order” may not even realize that he starred in quite a few Broadway musicals in his earlier days. Some of the stills that accompany the song are from “The Fantasticks;” he’s the one wearing the black hat:
Fifty years is a long time. Try to remember.
On being called a bigot and/or racist
I’ve been writing about the recent Harvard Law School flap, in which third-year student Stephanie Grace was excoriated for daring to suggest in a private email that there might even be a possibility that some of the gap in intelligence scores between whites and blacks could have some sort of genetic basis.
Which got me to thinking—it seems to me that cries of “racist” and “bigot” are coming faster and more furiously these days, despite (or perhaps because of?) the election of a black man to the presidency. But I can’t really blame this on Obama, although I think he’s done plenty to fan the flames and nothing to douse them—because he can hardly be held responsible for Gordon Brown’s big mouth.
Here’s the full transcript of the now-famous exchange between Brown and 65-year-old grandma (and previous lifelong Labour voter) Gillian Duffy. It was meant to be a run-of-the-mill photo-op. Brown was wired for sound, and had a seemingly cordial exchange with Duffy which included the following:
Duffy: But what I can’t understand is why I am still being taxed at 66 years old because my husband’s died and I have some of his pension tagged onto my pension?
Brown: Well we’re raising the threshold at which people start paying tax as pensioners, but yes if you’ve got an occupational pension you may have to pay some tax but you may be eligible for the pension credit as well, you should check ”“
Duffy: No, no, I’m not, I’ve checked and checked and they said I’m not
Brown: Well you should check it again just to be sure, to be absolutely sure…
Duffy: But how are you going to get us out of all this debt, Gordon?
Brown: We’ve got a deficit reduction plan, cut the debt by half over the next four years, we’ve got the plans that have been set out to do it – look, I was the person who came in and said –
Duffy: Look, the three main things that I had drummed in when I was a child was education, health service and looking after people who are vulnerable. There are too many people now who aren’t vulnerable but they can claim and people who are vulnerable can’t get claim.
Brown: But they shouldn’t be doing that, there is no life for people on the dole anymore, if you’re unemployed you’ve got to go back to work. At six months ”“
Duffy: You can’t say anything about the immigrants because you’re saying you’re ”“ but all these eastern Europeans coming in, where are they flocking from?
Brown: A million people come in from Europe, but a million British people have gone into Europe, you do know there’s a lot of British people staying in Europe as well. So education, health and helping people, that’s what I’m about.
Duffy: I hope you keep to it.
So we have a woman who’s been a liberal all her life but is concerned because (a) she isn’t getting the money she feels she’s entitled to, while at the same time (b) others she feels aren’t entitled (such as, for example, recent immigrants from Eastern Europe who are now allowed into Britain with few or no restrictions because of the EU) are getting benefits ahead of her, and (c) the deficit is out of control. The entire discussion is about money and how to distribute it.
Brown still had a live mic on when he got into his car, where he was heard to say the following about Ms. Duffy, to whom he’d been so pleasant just a moment earlier:
[In car] That was a disaster. Should never have put me with that woman. Whose idea was that?
Aide: I don’t know, I didn’t see.
Brown: Sue’s, I think. Just ridiculous.
Aide: Not sure if they’ll go with that one.
Brown: Oh they will.
Aide: What did she say?
Brown: Everything. She’s just this sort of bigoted woman who said she used to be a Labour voter. Ridiculous.
One can almost feel a certain sympathy for the hapless Mr. Brown. Who among us can say that he/she has never been polite to someone and then complained about them behind their back? But few of us are caught in the act, and then broadcast for all to see.
Anyone who thinks all politicians don’t do some version of this is hopelessly naive. But Brown was especially vulnerable because he was not the most likable guy to begin with, and this made it harder for people to ignore the evidence of his blatant two-faced hypocrisy recorded on tape. But I think it’s also interesting that Brown’s charge was that Duffy was a bigot.
I didn’t even know that Eastern Europeans immigrants now qualify as a race; when last I checked they were as white as Duffy herself. To me, her remarks read as a combination of Tea Party-like concerns about fiscal restraint, and an echo of the same sentiment that’s behind our own recent Arizona immigration law—only in her case the immigrants are legal, whom she sees as getting in line ahead of her in order to get benefits from a welfare system that she feels is unresponsive to her own needs.
All of these recent “racist/bigot” brouhahas (Harvard Law and Minow, the Arizona illegal immigrants bill, and Brown v. Duffy) demonstrate the new liberal definition of bigot: anyone who says anything non-PC about any ethnic group or national group that liberals consider disadvantaged.
Note that it’s not bigotry of racism if someone says something negative about an advantaged ethnic or national group. And truth is not a defense when you’re expressing concern about the actions of a disadvantaged group. One must be utterly racial-, national-, and color-blind, willing to give over every advantage to others, and not remark on it but be happy for it. The only people who can even take note of racial and/or national differences are those who do so in order to confer benefits on underprivileged racial and/or ethnic and/or national groups.
The readiness of Gordon Brown to call Ms. Duffy a bigot when he thought he was off-mic made me wonder whether it dovetailed with the Minow flap in still another way: does Brown have a background in academia, where this sort of kneejerk name-calling is not only prevalent but meets with approval? When I looked Brown up I discovered—somewhat to my surprise, I must say—that indeed he does, and a history as a journalist as well (another group where using the racist/bigot accusation is favored):
Brown graduated from Edinburgh with First Class Honours MA in 1972, and stayed on to complete his PhD (which he gained ten years later in 1982), titled The Labour Party and Political Change in Scotland 1918”“29. In 1972, while still a student, Brown was elected Rector of the University of Edinburgh, the convener of the University Court…
From 1976 to 1980 Brown was employed as a lecturer in Politics at Glasgow College of Technology. In the 1979 general election, he stood for the Edinburgh South constituency, losing to the Conservative candidate, Michael Ancram. From 1980 he worked as a journalist at Scottish Television, later serving as current affairs editor until his election to parliament in 1983. He also worked as a tutor for the Open University.
Decades of relentless PC hammering on the evils of bigotry and racism have not only corrected many of the actual racist offenses that used to occur more frequently, but have sometimes over-corrected to the point of absurdity. It used to be that, in order to be a racist, you had to actually advocate discriminating against racial and/or ethnic groups. Now bigotry and racism are thought-crimes that are defined by the eye of the offended beholder: simply put, you’re a racist if a liberal says you are.
Those “incompetent” terrorists
The Times Square bomb was a dud as terrorist bombs go. But police say it might have had a significant death toll if it had not been spotted so early and rendered harmless.
So there’s no reason to be lulled into a false sense of security by the incompetence of the bomber[s] involved (see this for an earlier discussion of general terrorist ineptitude). Terrorists can learn from their mistakes, as they did from the failure of the first WTC bombing in 1993, which killed six people but was meant to bring down the building—and probably would have had it been placed just a bit differently. And note that this recent incident indicates some learning from earlier bombings, because apparently the serial number of the vehicle was removed.
Steve Coll at the New Yorker is of the opinion that such terrorist acts will remain minor and are merely attempts to frighten. I hope so, but I happen to think not. Coll also appeals to President Obama to talk tougher to terrorists in response to this bombing attempt. But I believe that Coll is showing how little he understands Obama’s nature and agenda; our president is only interested in talking tough to Israel, Tea Partiers, Honduran constitutionalists, and Republicans.
GM’s Place tours the psych-bloggers
Or is it the psycho bloggers? He reports, you decide.
More on Minow and Harvard Law School’s treatment of Stephanie Grace
Eugene Volokh, who was born in the Soviet Union and came to the United States as a child, reminicises about thought control in the country of his youth and relates the atmosphere there to what happened at Harvard Law School recently in the pursuit of PC thought about race:
Now I hasten to say that the controversy at Harvard is only a pale echo of Soviet Communism. With luck, this student won’t have her career ruined, or even much affected. I’ve seen a public call for her to be expelled (a call made by a professor at a different university), but I doubt that this will happen. And even if some of the best future jobs are closed off to her, at least for a while, a Harvard Law diploma will get you to plenty of places. She doesn’t have to worry, I suspect, about not being able to feed herself or her future family.
Yet the public revelation of a private conversation; the public condemnation by management; the obvious danger of serious career ramifications; the apology, which I take it came out of a fear of those ramifications ”” all for daring to say to friends something that simply represents a basic scientific principle (the need to be open to the possibility that there are racial differences in intelligence, as one is open to other possibilities on other scientific questions) ”” that just sounded a little too familiar to me.
It’s a pale echo, but of something so bad that we should be wary even of pale echoes.
i agree with his analysis, except for the fact that I’m not sure the echo is quite as pale as all that. Harvard’s action was not a governmental policy, it’s true, as it was in the USSR (nor was the penalty for Grace death, or exile to Siberia—except perhaps in the metaphoric sense). But it has become way too prevalent in this country that, to advance in academia or journalism or any number of professions, one must toe the party liberal line, with ostracism the penalty for violations.