Radical Extremists Within 100 Miles of Washington, DC!

In order to reduce the anxieties of the American people, scared to death by the hysteria whipped up by their government, the Pakistan government has been forced to launch a military operation in about as remote a corner of the globe as imaginable, that has led to over 2 million poor people being displaced from their homes. Imagine, if the power realities — and the degree of paranoia — were reversed, how the American government may have been forced to deal with the people of Crozet, Virginia, on the basis of news like this:

Hate Mail Delivered to Central Virginia

Posted: May 21, 2009 11:52 PM
Updated: May 22, 2009 09:31 AM

Families in Crozet and Waynesboro [Virginia, less than a 100 miles from Washington, DC] woke up Thursday [21 May 2009] morning to find white supremacist flyers outside their homes. Copies of “The Aryan Alternative” were let up and down the streets leaving families on edge.

“Obviously, they’re very sick people. That’s my opinion,” said Toni Conley who lives in Crozet.

Conley found the paper on her driveway. She picked it up, believing it to be a normal paper, but the messages inside were not what she expected.

“I looked at some of the different titles to the different articles and it blew me away,” said Conley.

Although Conley wasn’t the only Crozet resident to receive the delivery, she doesn’t understand why neighborhoods in the small town were a target.

“I couldn’t believe little Crozet. I just feel so sheltered by the mountains,” said Conley.

Papers showing up in Waynesboro left people on both sides of the mountain offended, but the racist papers are entirely legal.

“There is no unprotected category of speech called ‘hate speech,’ it is in fact protected by the first amendment,” said Josh Wheeler, Associate Director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for Protection of Free Expression.

Unless the words are threatening or encourage illegal behavior they’re fair game.

“Government shouldn’t have the ability to punish us just for the thoughts we have,” said Wheeler.

Some say, in a way, the papers are a good way to inform the public of who’s in their backyard.

“It gives you an orientation that there’s a potential nucleus for a cell or group of people in this area or region that believe in this ideology,” said Julio Trigo, a Crozet resident.

Others, including Conley, would rather see people follow the old saying we’ve heard time and time again.

“If you don’t have anything nice to say in a way you know keep to to yourself, have your beliefs,” said Conley.

[END OF QUOTE]

Comments

It isn’t that there aren’t sane voices in the United States, they have just been excluded in the making of US foreign policy. Among his several blogs on the Swat tragedy, Professor Juan Cole of the University of Michigan had written on 26 April 2009:

Readers have written me asking what I think of the rash of almost apocalyptic pronouncements on the security situation in Pakistan issuing from the New York Times, The Telegraph, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in recent days…

… The NYT’s breathless observation that there are Taliban a hundred miles from Islamabad … is like saying that Lynchburg, Va., is close to Washington DC and thereby implying that Jerry Falwell’s movement is about to take over the latter.

The Pakistani Taliban amount to a few thousand fighters who lack tanks, armored vehicles, and an air force.

The Pakistani military is the world’s sixth largest, with 550,000 active duty troops and is well equipped and well-trained…

So what is being alleged? That some rural Pushtun tribesmen turned Taliban are about to sweep into Islamabad and overthrow the government of Pakistan? Frankly ridiculous…

… All the talk about the Pakistani government falling within 6 months, or of a Taliban takeover, flies in the face of everything we know about the character of Pakistani politics and institutions during the past two years.

My guess is that the alarmism is also being promoted from within Pakistan by Pervez Musharraf, who wants to make another military coup; and by civilian politicians in Islamabad, who want to extract more money from the US to fight the Taliban that they are secretly also bribing to attack Afghanistan.

Advice to Obama: Pakistan is being configured for you in ways that benefit some narrow sectional interests. Caveat emptor.

Advice to Americans: Listen to Juan Cole.