Posted on 08/07/2004 11:01:10 PM PDT by SeattleNeedsHelp
The use of profiling — based on race, ethnicity, nationality or religion — is necessary in a time of war, even in such an extreme case as the internment of thousands of Japanese on the West Coast during World War II, author Michelle Malkin told a Bothell crowd last night. Her controversial views, detailed in her book "In Defense of Internment: The Case for 'Racial Profiling' in World War II and the War on Terror," drew some 200 people to Cedar Park Church, many of them supporters.
When naysayers challenged her thinking, many in the crowd applauded to cut them off, or repeatedly shouted "Ask the question!" when critics tried to offer a counterpoint.
Malkin, 33, a former editorial writer for The Seattle Times who now lives near Washington, D.C., said the Japanese internment has been used to block what she describes as the Bush administration's attempts to target terrorists through racial profiling, such as detaining and questioning Muslims.
"I am not advocating that we round up all Arabs and Muslims and throw them into camps," the nationally syndicated columnist said. "What I am saying is you cannot ban the use of profiling in pursuing homeland security and expect to win the war."
Before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Malkin said she was a Libertarian and firmly believed the Japanese internment was wrong. After the attacks, she said, she kept noticing civil libertarians "invoking the internment card" in response to security measures. She did some research and uncovered what she says is the truth about that period.
Malkin argues President Franklin Roosevelt's decision to put 120,000 Japanese in camps wasn't "merely about bigotry; it wasn't about panic." A good portion of her book contains government documents that she says show the decision was based on legitimate security issues. Among the documents are some showing there were Japanese spies on the West Coast, she said.
Her supporters say the book has opened their eyes. "I'm happy Michelle Malkin is finally revealing the true history of the United States," said John Hopper of Redmond, a public-school teacher for 30 years.
But Frank Kitamoto, president of the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community who was in an internment camp at age 2½ , said Malkin's assertions can never excuse the internment.
"Even if it was true, even if there were 100 [spies], there was, by the Bill of Rights, no reason to lock up a hundred thousand people," he said. "When Oklahoma City happened, they should have arrested all Caucasian males by that logic."
Dominic Fleming, an ex-military Ranger from Kenmore, also was outraged by Malkin's claims and her overwhelming support from the crowd. "I think I sacrificed a lot for this country, and it really disturbs me when I see people expounding the idea of concentration camps all over again," he said. "It's a bit ironic that they're preaching for racial profiling and concentration camps in a house of God in the land of the free."
Malkin said in an earlier interview she wanted to come to Seattle because of the area's large Japanese population. "This topic is very relevant to the area — historically significant ... ." This was Malkin's first event related to the book. She didn't visit Seattle when her first book, "Invasion: How America Welcomes Terrorists, Criminals, and Other Foreign Menaces to Our Shores," came out in 2002 because no one would sponsor her, she said. This time, she found a sponsor in AM radio station KVI 570. Malkin worked for The Seattle Times in the mid-'90s and currently writes a column syndicated in nearly 200 newspapers.
But Frank Kitamoto, president of the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community who was in an internment camp at age 2½ , said Malkin's assertions can never excuse the internment.
"Even if it was true, even if there were 100 [spies], there was, by the Bill of Rights, no reason to lock up a hundred thousand people," he said. "When Oklahoma City happened, they should have arrested all Caucasian males by that logic."
Ah, but if you read Jayna Davis's writing you will be led to believe, as I do, that Arabs were involved in the Oklahoma City bombing.
Completely inaccurate. I was there.
Just read the reviews on Amazon. By the response from the Left (who you know haven't read it, and probably can't read) I ordering a copy.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/0895260514/ref=cm_rev_prev/103-0755033-8595813?%5Fencoding=UTF8&customer-reviews.sort%5Fby=-SubmissionDate&n=283155&customer-reviews.start=1&me=ATVPDKIKX0DER
I have to disagree with Michelle on this one.
It is a GREAT book. You won't regret picking it up.
A lot of people feel the way you do.
Interestingly, Malkin herself once found the internment of Japanese in WWII "abhorrent". When she received a flurry of letters from WWII vets asking her to investigate the issue before making up her mind, she did that. She read a book about the MAGIC intercepts.
Her mind was changed.
That is the essence of the book. She doesn't call for the internment of Arabs or Muslims. She is simply saying that we should not be so paralyzed by political correctness in the War on Terror that we put that political correctness before our nation's survival - and that is what is happening out there.
People use the internment of Japanese to make the case that we shouldn't profile our current enemy.
That could be our undoing.
Will it be worth it?
Michelle is an incredibly courageous young woman, and a true patriot. Like her grandfather who marched alongside the Americans he fought with in the Bataan death march, she is willing to endure the most hateful and viscious attacks from the enemy to make a stand for liberty.
Her new book undermines one of the great myths constructed by the left in the past three decades. Needless to say, they're livid.
Her grandfather was on the Bataan peninsula in WWII? Wow.
Sophistry. If Caucasian males declared war on all Americans, had a long history of killing Americans just for being American, and a large network of them crashed passenger jets into buildings in order to kill as many people as possible, that might be an issue. But that's not what's happening.
Yes, we did cut them off because it was not a debate and they were not the featured speaker. It was a Q & A. The author made her presentation and then she stayed to answer a few questions. If they would have presented their objections in a question form they would not have been cut off.
Not to mention that one of the guys who was "cut off" (after preaching a lot of ridiculous comparisons of WWII Japanese to Jesus and his followers) refused to give the microphone back to the host, and tried to physically escape his grasp.
No mention of that little stunt in this piece.
I hate the media.
You say this now. If a repeat of 9/11 or worse happens, you'll be thinking differently.
Her case defending internment rested on the vulnerability of yet-uncommitted civilians to be swayed by the influences of consanguinity and common culture to betray their adopted country, as some demonstably did, her evidence in that regard being, IMHO, persuasive, and consisting of postwar testimony and MAGIC decrypts that were only declassified in 1977. A second theme was that in time of war, where the existence of the state is threatened, civil liberties are not an absolute value, but must be balanced against the survival of the state charged with guaranteeing them. Lincoln's suspension of habeus corpus was one such example.
Where I demur is that the survival of the state is not threatened, or at least not to a credible degree, with respect to radical Islam. Moreover, we are not in a state of declared war, which may be not much more than a legal nicety - 2750 dead New Yorkers would attest to that - but is still, to my mind, a cogent objection. And Malkin recognizes that the parallel is incomplete. She does not recommend the internment of Middle Eastern males, for example, only the use of profiling to increase surveillance of those presenting other reasons for suspicion, such as flight lessons that omit the superfluities of learning to land. Thus far I also agree with her.
In all, a wonderful, thought-provoking presentation. I am definitely going to purchase the book.
Yes. She mentioned it in passing on an entry at her blog site. She's not afraid to take on the sleazy popular culture, either.
I hate that analogy too. It's so incredibly flawed.
Someone should be monitoring that comment board. Most of those comments aren't thoughtful at all.
One of the huge fabrications of the left about internment is the pretense that only the Japanese were interned. This is not true. Germans were also interned. Only the Japanese were paid for the experience..
One thing that is also never mentioned, is the grave concerns posed by the Japanese was dual citizenship. Even though they may have become naturalized citizens, they did not surrender their citizenship to Japan.
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