While the vast majority of Americans understand that radical Islam as the most serious threat to our safety and security, the Obama administration continues to deny that reality.
To Obama and his team, terrorism spawned by Islamist jihad is not the problem. Instead, 14 years after 9-11, Obama’s minions insist our real threat comes from something called “violent extremism.” Moreover, to Obama’s team, Americans who see radical Islamism as the root of the problem need to be hauled into court and re-educated.
This willful blindness leads to an epidemic of policy stupidities, like the plan to import 100,000 Syrian refugees. Another stupidity is the new, “Strong Cities Network” program announced at the United Nations on September 28 by Attorney General Loretta Lynch.
This amazing tribute to moral relativism was announced at the UN because it is an “international program” aimed at forging a “partnership” with hundreds of foreign cities all of them dedicated to fighting – guess what. Not Islamist terrorism but “violent extremism.”
Lets’ not be naive: this is more than a semantic difference. In fact, it is a planned distraction and diversion from the war against terrorism into a federal government sponsored campaign to fight discrimination against Muslims.
To Obama and the Americana left — which unfortunately now includes 90 percent of the Democrat party leadership – Islamist terrorism is only a small part of the threat posed by “hate crimes.” And all progressives know that hate crimes are rooted in – racial and religious discrimination. If we can root out racial and religious discrimination, hate crimes will subside and presto, terrorism will go away.
You might think that this simplistic logic contains too many fallacies to form the basis for our government’s anti-terrorism policies, but you would be mistaken. All the evidence suggests this is exactly what is happening.
The Justice Department’s involvement in the international, UN-based “Strong Cities Network” is matched by a new Homeland Security Department program unveiled this past week in congressional testimony by DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson. Johnson revealed that DHS has created a new division titled, Office of Community Partnerships. The new office will be headed by George Selim. You will not be surprised to learn that Mr. Selim began his career in government in Obama’s Office of Civil Rights at — you guessed it, the Department of Justice.
Here again we see the same pattern. In the mind of the Obama administration, all the problems with “violent extremism,” including terrorism, come down to a civil rights problem –racial and religious discrimination. The solution is more resources poured into “community partnerships” – which, of course, means a vast new grant program for more “community organizing.” A civil rights advocate named George Salim will direct that new program.
If you think it is mere coincidence that Attorney General Lynch and Homeland Security chief Johnson both announce new domestic projects this past week, you probably have not read about the third leg of that new stool, the new DHS “intelligence report” on “right wing extremism.” You see, the Department of Homeland Security, the federal agency created after 9-11 to protect the homeland against Islamist terrorism, is equally concerned about protecting us from “white nationalists” and, in the words of the DHS document describing the threat, “extremists who believe they can ignore laws and that their individual rights are under attack in routine daily instances such as a traffic stop or being required to obey a court order.”
There you have it. To our top bureaucrats at DOJ and DHS, Kim Davis’ willingness to go to jail to protest a Supreme Court decision is as much a threat to our safety and survival as the jihadist maniac who wants to kill millions in the name of Allah. We now have two multi-million dollar programs to create “community partnerships” to bring that message to “Strong Cities” across America—and across the globe.
As part of its new campaign, the Department of Justice is suing two cities in Minnesota and Idaho which denied building permits for the construction of new mosques. We can be sure Homeland Security’s new “community partnerships” director will be cheering on the DOJ lawyers, not the local government leaders trying to protect their citizens.
Eighteen large-city mayors have already joined the Orwellian-named “Strong Cities Network,” with New York City and Chicago leading the parade. If this idiocy comes to your city, just say no.
Tom Tancredo is the founder of the Rocky Mountain Foundation and founder and co-chairman of Team America PAC.
Tom represented Colorado’s sixth congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from 1999 to 2009, and he is a former presidential candidate.
He is the author of In Mortal Danger: The Battle for America’s Border and Security.
