Posted on 08/16/2006 4:50:55 PM PDT by Molly Pitcher
In the wake of last week's foiled terrorist plot to blow up 10 U.S. jetliners flying between Britain and the United States, sensible people are reconsidering our government's stubborn opposition to profiling.
Among the sensible elsewhere are officials of the British Department for Transport, who are proposing ethnic profiling as a means of more effectively identifying potential terrorists. The predictable chorus of opposition has chimed in on cue.
The Muslim Council of Britain has warned the government to think ``very carefully,'' saying that including ``behavioral pattern recognition'' in passenger profiling would lead to discrimination. A spokesman for the council said, ``Before some kind of religious profiling is introduced, a case has to be made.'' Challenge accepted.
Most terrorist acts of the past several decades have been perpetrated by Muslim men between the ages of 17 and 40. A complete list would fill this space, but following is a partial Islamic terrorist resume:
Eleven Israeli athletes murdered at the Munich Olympics (1972); U.S. Marine barracks blown up in Beirut (1983), Achille Lauro cruise ship hijacked and elderly, disabled American passenger killed (1985); TWA Flight 847 hijacked (1985); Pan Am Flight 103 bombed (1988); World Trade Center bombed (1993); U.S. embassies bombed in Kenya and Tanzania (1998); USS Cole bombed (2000); Sept. 11, 2001; Madrid and London train bombings (2004 and 2005).
Yet we are torn. Profiling seems both un-American and dangerous in an era of slippery slopes. The paranoid leap is that detention camps are just around the bend. Thus, instead of deciding to closely scrutinize airline passengers who fit the description of a likely perpetrator -- based not on bigotry, but on evidence, history and common sense -- we frisk the elderly and confiscate toddlers' sippy cups.
Critics of profiling insist that focusing on one group will distract us from other possible terrorists -- presumably all those Baptist grandmothers recently converted to Islam. They also invariably point to Timothy McVeigh, our own homegrown terrorist who blew up a federal office building in Oklahoma City. As if one white-bred misfit -- or the occasional Caucasian Muslim -- cancels out 35 years of Middle Eastern terrorists invoking Muhammad.
For a nation that laments its lapse in dot-connecting before 9/11, we are curiously blind when it comes to dealing honestly with certain people of a certain sort. Profiling isn't aimed at demonizing Muslims; it's aimed at saving lives, including Muslims.
We learned from investigators of the foiled London-based plot that Muslims played a key role in busting the conspirators, for which the world is grateful. But the idea that profiling young males of Asian or Middle Eastern descent now would alienate those who heretofore had been helpful, as some have argued, presumes that Muslims have no interest in self-preservation.
Or that they're all so belligerently ethnocentric that they'll cease cooperating if airport security officials suddenly start behaving competently.
Identifying potential terrorists is complicated by their sheer numbers in places like Britain, where between 16,000 and 18,000 Muslims are suspected to be Islamic extremists, according to Britain's MI5 counterterrorism unit. How do you track 15,000 people? You don't.
But we can focus energies and resources where plausible, including at airports where profilers are invited to be polite and discreet. And we can listen to sensible Muslims like Abdel Rahman al-Rashed, general manager of the al-Arabiya news channel, who wrote in the Arab News two years ago what our own officials struggle to say:
``It is a certain fact that not all Muslims are terrorists, but it is equally certain, and exceptionally painful, that almost all terrorists are Muslims. ... We cannot clear our names unless we own up to the shameful fact that terrorism has become an Islamic enterprise; an almost exclusive monopoly, implemented by Muslim men and women.''
And the West cannot survive if we continue to avert our eyes from the obvious. On the legal questions, profiling has at least one notable defender -- John Banzhaf, the George Washington University public interest law professor best known for taking on tobacco and fast food.
Banzhaf argues that racial profiling is constitutional if done in accordance with U.S. Supreme Court guidelines that ethnicity not be the sole criteria. Other considerations for potential hijackers might be age, gender, behavior or clothing. He also notes that courts have upheld using race/ethnicity to further ``compelling state interest," as in considering race for college admissions.
``Obviously, the government's interest in protecting the lives of thousands of citizens from a major terrorist attack is at least as 'compelling' as a better college education," he says.
For the past several years, Banzhaf has been a pain in the neck to the tobacco and fast food industries. Let's hope he proves equally troublesome to the terrorists among us.
Really?
I wasnt aware that Kazhkstan was a major proponent of terror. And I certainly wasnt aware that India was a terror factory of any sort.
It isn't the countries themselves as supporters of terror, but rather the likelihood that their citizens might be involved.
Somalia doesn't even have a government, so they couldn't be listed as a "supporter of terror" either.
Let's face it, we need to profile based on what people's names are, their age and their appearance.
It wouldn't even be a freakin' debate if it hadn't been for the use of profiling to pull over drug dealers travelling between New York and New Jersey.
I had an employee who is French, but dark-skinned of Algerian origin. Whenever he travelled alone, he would always have problems. When he travelled with me, never. The reason why? - No one who looks like me would be travelling with a terrorist. Him travelling alone, however was suspicious. Less when he was wearing a suit though. Europeans profile. It makes sense.
?
Again, however, I can count on my fingers the number of citizens of the CIS republics and India have been involved in international terror plots of any sort. None. Primarily because most of these people arent moslems (India has as a percentage as many muslims as france). Well the CIS citizens are, but I think theyve been effectively communistized, and arent of a radical bent of mind.
Pakistanis, yes, in fact I read just yesterday an article on FR from the Australian times detailing how every plot involving terror since 9/11 has had a pakistan connection according to the FBI.
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/opinion/story/0,22049,20114041-5001031,00.html
Probably those who wrote about profiling certain behavior were on the right track...
We know that eventually, the terrorists will adapt to OUR adapting to their tactics...so whatever we do, we have to think and plan ahead, like a chess game.
Great point to throw in a liberal's face the next time I hear one squawking about profiling. They have NO PROBLEM profiling by race for college admissions, but not for national security?
Some good commentary from Muslims in this column.
Is "behaved suspiciously" going to be shortened to BS?
I like it!
I included Cuba because of the lovefest with Castro, Chavez, Assad and the Iranian Nutjob. They all want our destruction and are very vocal about it. Unfortunately, this country seems to be deaf.
So what, in absolute numbers they are the world's second largest Muslim country. And their muzzies are radical too.
Not sure what your point is actually.
Bill Bennett is interviewing Kathleen Parker now about this issue...what about teen-age boys & car insurance???
Until the leaders of that religion start telling these nut-cases that,,,not only will they NOT go to heaven to get their 72 virgins--they will actually ROT IN HELL--nothing will change.
It's up to the clerics/leaders of that religion to step up--or every muslim deserves everything they get.
As you said, WHY ARE WE EVEN LETTING MUSLIMS ON AIRPLANES until that happens?
?
Whats the basis or evidence for your terming Indian muslims as "radical", and terror abetting?
Last I recall, they havent been out burning cars, for an extended period of weeks. Noone in India would let them, and they pretty much know it.
The evidence in terms of Indian muslims being involved in international terror, is also underwhelming, in fact nonexistent. More muslims from germany were involved in 9/11 than from India. So I dont see how you can make such an accusation.
My point is that youre making an unfair accusation, and terming entire countries as suspect, when their record has not shown them to be.
For more on the Timothy McVeigh angle, read "Others Unknown." It was written by McVeigh's former lawyer before 9/11. Very eye-opening on how the Clinton government blocked McVeigh's lawyers from pursueing the AlQaida angle tied to Nichols.
Sincerely
So you didn't hear about the bombings in Mumbai then right?
Also, there were no German citizens involved in the terrorist attacks. So "Muslims from Germany" is a complete falsehood. Indeed they lived in Germany. And, we were talking about profiling people who "visited" a certain country. Thus, my point is absolutely correct about India and you are full of it.
That's actually a thinly veiled threat. We darned well BETTER start being more discriminating.
And if Muslims ever get their priorities straight (not holding my breath here) and stop trying to annihilate the rest of the world taking many Muslims along in the process, then they wouldn't have to worry about possibly being discriminated against, now would they.
It's up to the clerics of that religion to spell out LOUDLY and CLEARLY to ALL Muslims--what type of behavior is acceptable, and what type of behavior is ABSOLUTELY NOT.
Actually I really love India.
Walk into my house and you are greeted by Ganesha and the smell of cumin and coriander.
But your Muslims are problems too. Especially in the north.
Well, I really dont disagree with you...
Especially now.. with the emergence of SIMI, Darul-Uloom, and other such, and with the weak and appeasement minded government at the center, muslims in India are being increasingly radicalised.
Indeed, unchecked inflow of immigrants from bangladesh, money from Saudi, and agents from pakistan are doing all sorts of things to turn Indian muslims into a dangerous mix, which occasionally explodes, such as in mumbai.
I find this argument, well, compelling.
I wonder if Sandra Day O'Connor -- squarely heist on her petard -- would, as well...
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