| Instead he is going to call various Muslim Americans and ask them a question along the lines of "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?". He will ask why their community is not cooperating with law enforcement, but I'll be you dollars to doughnuts that he won't be naming specific places or times.
Not that is would matter. Unless the specific witnesses refused to cooperate how can they answer as to why? You can't generalize a whole community by the actions of a couple of people. If we did we'd have to assume that all Irishmen supported the terrorist work of the IRA, as Rep. King did for years and years publicly.
Like everything Republicans do these days there is a grain (one you'd need a scanning, tunneling electron microscope to see, but still a grain) of truth that there is a problem with radicalization in the United States. Where is all goes pear shaped is that the vast majority of dangerous radicalization is not in the Islamic community (though there are some) but rather on the Right wing of American political thought.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, who track extremist and hate groups, has for the very first time more than 1,000 groups on their list. The vast majority of these groups are racist (like the KKK or Neo Nazis) or so called "Patriot" groups like the Oath Keepers.
These are groups that have grown at an incredible rate over the last couple of years, fueled by the likes of the Birthers and Wingnut Talkers like Alex Jones and Rush Limbaugh.
The recent very serious attempted bombing of the Seattle Martian Luther King Day parade was the work of one such White Supremacist group. The terror attack on the IRS building with a small plane was from a right winger and the other Rep. King (R-Iowa) actually said he could "understand" the actions of the man.
The attempted attack on the Tides Foundation and the plot to bring about a revolution by Hutaree militia all came form deranged Wingnuts and devotees of Glenn Beck. These are the same kinds of folks who have been stocking up on ammunition and being fearful that they were going to be rounded up and placed in FEMA detention camps.
This is what real radicalization looks like. They are ideological decedents of Terry Nichols and Tim McVey. The same kind of overheated hate and fear of the Federal government, tacitly aided and abetted by Republican politicians who will use fear to get elected and keep getting reelected.
If Rep. King, in his capacity as Chair of the Homeland Security Committee really is concerned about the radicalization of Americans then why is it that he is not looking into these groups? Well, the obvious answer is that he wants nothing to do with a throwing a spot light on groups that more than not will vote Republican and support their agenda. Just as he could find it acceptable to excuse the IRA and its terrorist activities because of his cultural heritage as an Irishman he looks the other way at our biggest groups of homegrown extremists.
The other reason is that, lets face is, most of the American Muslims has brown skin of one shade or another. It is always easier to make a demon of a group that does not look like white people. You can see that they are different just by looking at them. This is the ultimate intellectual laziness but it is de rigor in the Republican Party.
Growing up just a couple of score miles from Dearborn and having relatives who lived there, I have been around second and third generation Muslim Americans my whole life. I wish I could go testify to Rep. King about these folks. If you could not see them, just heard them talk, you would not be able to tell them from any other kid that grew up in Michigan. They wish the Lions were a better team, they want to go to the University of Michigan or Michigan State and they worry about the economy of their state.
It is tragic that someone who championed the rights of a religious minority in his ancestral homeland, even to the point of being an apologist for terrorism, would be the one to convene such a shameful singling out of a religious minority here in the United States. A more self aware person might be choked to death on the irony of it all, but of course we're talking about a Republican, so that won't happen.
In the end it the fact of the McCarthy hearings and their inevitable descent into a witch hunt that will probably derail Rep. King in his efforts. We have seen where this leads and while there is nothing that can be done to prevent Chair King from calling hearings there is going to be a lot of attention and comparison to those earlier shameful hearings. Hopefully will be able to show that this new McCarthyism is as pointless and ultimately dangerous as the first round.
The floor is yours. |
