Do You Love Al-Queda Or Not?
Posted: Sunday, May 03, 2009
by Michael Ramzy
delusionthread.com
Another beautiful day in America and it seems those who wanted Gitmo closed have a problem: What to do with the detainees? Actually, they are either 'enemy combatants' or 'innocent civilians', depending on who you ask. I always wondered how an 'innocent civilian' can be found on a battlefield with a gun or rocket launcher in his hand, but that's just me. Of course, not all of the detainees were found there. I'm sure some were found in their houses minding their own business and were just rounded up. I believe that only because when you say 'Al-Queda' everyone goes nuts and people are rounded up. If I call the cops here in Texas and say there are three 'suspicious Arab-looking men' loading fertilizer and ammonia into the back of their (American-made, of course) pickup, you can bet there would be a quick and violent response. I understand that, and unfortunate as it sounds, that is probably the way it's going to be for awhile.
The right needs these guys because they are a visible (to an extent) enemy, and we as a country need visible enemies. These are the guys responsible for 9/11, the USS Cole, embassy bombings, and a whole host of other crimes. Although Mr. Bush proclaimed a 'crusade', he probably didn't mean it in the historical sense. And yet, what if he did? Does no one remember history? Does no one remember the butchery during the Crusades? How about during the Persian Empire's expansion under Darius I? How about the Romans? The bottom line is that any crusade, or any cause taken as such, will be bloody. The right needs Al-Queda for the simple reason this is an external enemy threatening America and the right believes they should be exterminated.
The left, on the other hand, sees no threat. They hardly remember 9/11, or if they do they believe the terrorists on those planes acted in response to American expansionism. In other words, Al-Queda was reacting. If we had never done any number of things, Al-Queda would have stayed in the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan and we would hardly hear of them. In other words, it's all our fault. This is something no one (or few people) will admit out loud, yet the actions of those on the left show this is truly how they think. The torture hearings will be interesting until one person says, 'They cut off people's heads, and we do waterboarding, and we're the bad guys?"
So. The problem seems to be Mr. Obama closing of Gitmo. This was a political ploy, of course, to appease those on the left (and far-left), and yet this obviously wasn't thought through. Where are these detainees going to go? No country (except France) will take any, and France will take only one. The senators from Kansas are beside themselves with horror at the prospect of them being shipped to the federal prison at Fort Leavenworth, something that's been discussed. A senator from Wyoming, a Democrat, refuses to allow them into his state even though there is a brand new, state-of-the-art prison just waiting for them. Even Extra-liberal California refuses to consider them. And why? They were reacting, remember? They are innocent civilians, remember? Do you love Al-Queda or not? What is the problem here?
No matter where you stand, right or left, or even somewhere in the middle (where I believe most of us stand), you have to ask yourself this: If you truly believe these detainees, who are so terrible even their own countries don't want them, are guilty, then where are you going to put them? Why did you close Gitmo?
And if they are innocent, as many on the left believe, do you want them in your country, on your highways, at your malls? In your neighborhood? And if not, why not?
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)Michael,You know what I love about your article? You are looking at the situation from somewhere in the middle. The more I hear and the more I see, the more wary I become of both the extreme right and the extreme left. Both sides see only black or white with issues that will have a profound effect on this country when indeed there is always some gray.It is called compromise, a word that is becoming rarer and rarer.Thank you,NancyI agree. This is yet another thing we as a country have to wonder what those in Washington are up to: do they really have our best interest in mind, or are we now so concerned with how we look?Thanks for reading and commenting.
And then we have partisanship, which is akin to the warlords defending their village, or whatever they have. Our new knee-jerk policies give me cause for concern.Great article, Michael.Thanks very much Ken. The partisanship reigns supreme, and you are right about knee-jerk reactions. This was one of them, and while closing Gitmo might be a nice 'gesture' in theory, in fact it seems to create a whole host of problems.
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