Terrorism

Funny, but this smacks of exactly the kind of semantics-based argument that you are repeatedly beating me up over... but I see your point. In fact, it ties in rather nicely with a point I wanted to bring up.

To your point... does the fact that so many are avoiding using the term in Hasan's case mean that the "politically correct" police are subverting and marginalizing a greater threat than simply an unbalanced Army officer with a religious agenda and a gun?

There is the typical liberal hypocrisy at work, of course. No one hesitated to refer to Eric Rudolph (the Olympic Park Bomber) as a terrorist, even though no direct link to an outside organization or conspiracy could be made, based (seemingly) only on the fact that he was acting from an extremely radical Christian position (i.e. anti-abortion and a hatred of the "homosexual agenda"), while John Mohammed (the recently executed DC Sniper) was a "spree killer" and not a terrorist, even though he had specific and measurable ties to such "radical" groups as the Nation of Islam and at least twice voiced support and admiration of bin Laden and the 9-11 attacks.

In all these examples (and there are lots of them, unfortunately), murder and terror go hand-in-hand. Did Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold (the Columbine High School shooters) employ terror in their rampage? Of course. Did Charles Whitman utilize terror as part of his murderous acts in 1966 on top of the University of Texas clock tower? Without question. On the other side of the coin, did Timothy McVeigh commit murder when he utilized "terrorism" in blowing up the Murrough Federal Building? Absolutely, as did anyone involved in the 9-11 attacks, the WTC bombing, or any act of suicide-murder in a Tel Aviv market or Belfast pub.

I don't feel the label we, as a society, place on an act to prosecute it in a court of law is all that important, as long as a mean approximation of justice is being meted out at the end of the process. The greater failing in regards to this latest example of terror/mass murder at Fort Hood is that we are failing to recognize where the mind-set for such an act is being generated, and that leads me to the point I wanted to make.

I heard Dick Durbin (D-IL) damn near apologize for the acts committed (allegedly) by Hasan at Ft Hood on the floor of the Senate yesterday, and it very nearly made me want to vomit. He was so obviously "tip-toeing" around the fact that the alleged murderer was a radical Muslim that he couldn't have done more to point it out if he openly used the terms himself. As the investigation goes deeper, it is becoming more and more obvious that the alleged murderer showed sign after sign that he was nearing a breaking point in his "struggle" (the root of the word jihad in Arabic) between his Islamic faith and his sense of duty to his country... yet no one thought to do anything about it. I find it very ironic that the portion of our Government that is so strongly advocating greater federal regulation and oversight of every facet of daily life in these United States is so hesitant to admit that someone should have acted on the fact that this man was exhibiting numerous signs of violence and anti-American sentiment as the months and years of his service went by, for the SOLE reason that they don't want to offend the less than 6% of the Armed Forces that claim Muslim beliefs or Middle Eastern heritage.

Don't get me wrong, I am NOT advocating the use of a new (or even the old) Alien and Sedition Acts, which was what was used to detain and inter Japanese, German and Italian Americans without charge or trial for as long as four years after 1942. I understand and fully believe that this was a gross travesty of justice and a crime perpetrated by the American government on its citizenry that has never been fully addressed.

My question is how best do we, as a nation (and especially our Armed Forces and security and law enforcement personnel), make sure that the elements of radical Islam do not have the means to commit any future acts of violence against the US domestically without impeding or suspending the rights of Muslim Americans? How do we best address the growing number of Muslims who hold the religious belief that the US is evil and must be destroyed? How do we deal with the religious belief that murder and terror are acceptable means to reach a religious goal? Most importantly, how do we do all this without violating the First Amendment?