When political correctness endangers national security

An April 26 headline on the front page of the New York Times reads: "MILITANTS IN EUROPE OPENLY CALL/ FOR JIHAD AND THE RULE OF ISLAM." The lengthy dispatch speaks of young Arab militants, beginning with one representative group in Luton, England. Some of its members are quoted: "They say they would like to see Prime Minister Tony Blair dead or deposed and an Islamic flag hanging outside No. 10 Downing Street." They go on, like other Muslim militants quoted in the story, to "swear allegiance to Osama bin Laden and his goal of toppling Western democracies to establish an Islamic superstate under Shariah law.... They call the Sept. 11 hijackers the 'Magnificent 19.'" These are not playboys of the kind who merely talk about terrorism. One of the Muslim clerics quoted in the story is accused of having coached Richard Reid, the Brit who boarded a trans-Atlantic flight carrying explosives in one of his shoes. One knot of Muslim extremists, last March, was intercepted with 1,200 pounds of ammonium nitrate. Five of these Pakistani-Britons have been charged with trying to build a terrorist bomb. When organizations such as ACLU, anti-profiling laws, and liberal public sentiment--all motivated by misguided goodwil--protect such groups as these, they fail to protect the very people who defend their freedoms. (Source.)