Sami Al-Arian not guilty on 8 of 17 counts

me/breaking

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

There it is. Turn on the news it should be on right about now. His co-conspirators too.

[defenderSD]

Sometimes they don't convict mobsters because just one or two jurors is worried about the defendant coming after them. We don't know what happened here yet...admittedly I'm speculating. As D.E.S just noted, a key fact will be whether the votes were 11-1 to convict or 11-1 to acquit.

[defenderSD]

He's talking about the charges where the jury was hung.

[Diddle E. Squat]

He was acquitted of 8 counts but the jury was hung on 9 other counts. Lots and lots of guilty persons in prison who were acquitted on some charges and found guilty on others.

[oceanview]

If I am a juror leaning towards conviction on the charges that ended up being "hung", and I see that there aren't going to be any convictions on those counts - no way I vote to acquit on the other counts. If I am for conviction with 9 or 10 others, and see holdouts blocking it on charges A,B,C - then I vote to hang their acquittals on charges D,E,F.

[Freebird Forever]

no, in this one, the jury put the US on trial, not Al Arian.

Spin it any way you want buddy. The facts speak for themselves.

And they do not bode well for our Republic.

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

Good point.

I wouldn't be surprised if there was at least one jurror-if not several-who were too frightened to vote for the strength of their convictions and convict these pieces of human detritus.

Trust me, not every single Gotti acquittal back during the early 1990s can be chalked up to the matchless legal skills of Gerald Cutler.

[indcons]

Well said.....I agree entirely.

[Montaignes Cat]

The jury believes the Moslem-American assertion that Jihad is a First Amendment Right.

[indcons]

Updated article: Jury clears former Florida professor of terrorism-related charge

[STARWISE]

There seems to have been serious juror conflict

" Al-Arian Juror Says Enough
12/6/05 3:03:03 PM

TAMPA - A juror in the terrorist-support trial of Sami Al-Arian and three other defendants told the judge Tuesday that the pressure to conform with other jurors is too great and that "I’ve had all my nerves can take."

In a note to the judge, the juror stated: "I'm sorry to say at this time I can no longer deliberate under the conditions you put forth. Being that I'm in the minority I feel like I'm being whipped to change and I'm not alone. My nerves and my conscience are being whipped into submission. I'm sorry I've had all my nerves can take."

After receiving the note, U.S. District Judge James Moody recessed the court for a brief time. It's expected the jurors will be issued new verdict forms so they can present verdicts in the charges they agree on.

The judge then, at 2:50 p.m., posed two questions to the jurors: "Do you unanimously agree that you can continue deliberations and make progress without anyone feeling pressure?"

=======================================

What an unmitigated and frightening disaster!! I am sickened. To have this terrorist out and back doing his terror recruiting and fundraising is terrifying! I wanna know who screwed up ... prosecutors, jurors, judge .. what went awry? They had rooms full of documentation in every form .. what in God's name is wrong with these jurors? Odds are high that his terror cells are all over FL, rubbing their hands with glee, awaiting the call from their master, and I'll bet they have extra security at MacDill.

[theFIRMbss]

>This man should have never seen an American courtroom
>this shows the folly of trying to wage war through the court system

America's Compassion in Iraq Is Self-Destructive

By: Yaron Brook and Elan Journo

Fighting a compassionate war is immoral; it is costing the lives of American soldiers in Iraq and emboldening our enemies throughout the Islamic world.

The bloody siege in Fallujah and the standoff against a religious warlord, Moktadr al-Sadr, and his militia indicate that the war in Iraq is worsening. Things are going badly not because--as some, like Sen. John Kerry, claim--the United States is arrogant and lacking in humility, but because it is self-effacing and compassionate.

The Bush Administration's war in Iraq embraces compassion instead of the rational goal of self-defense. Such an immoral approach to war wantonly sacrifices the lives of soldiers and emboldens our enemies throughout the Middle East to mount further attacks against us.

Morally, to fight a war in self-defense requires that one soundly defeat the enemy while safeguarding one's forces and citizens. But America's attention has been diverted to rebuilding Iraqi hospitals, schools, roads and sewers, and on currying favor with the locals (some U.S. soldiers were ordered to grow moustaches in token of their respect for Iraqi culture.) Since the war began, Islamic militants and Saddam loyalists have carried out random abductions, devastating ambushes, and catastrophic bombings throughout the country. That attacks on U.S. forces (including those engaged in reconstruction efforts) have gone unpunished has emboldened the enemy.

Stark evidence of the enemy's growing audacity came in March with the grisly murder and mutilation of four American contractors. America's response to the attack confirmed the militants' expectation that they can get away with murder. Following the attack, U.S. forces entered the city of Fallujah vowing to capture the murderers and punish the town that supports them. But such resolve was supplanted by compassion.

In the midst of the fighting the United States called a unilateral ceasefire to allow humanitarian aid in and to enable the other side to collect and bury its dead. The so-called truce benefited only the enemy. The Iraqis, as one soldier told the Associated Press, were "absolutely taking advantage" of the situation, regrouping and mounting sporadic attacks: as another soldier aptly noted, "It is hard to have a ceasefire when they maneuver against us, they fire at us." As the siege wore on, the goal of capturing the murderers quietly faded--and the enemy's confidence swelled.

Not just in Fallujah, but throughout this war the military (under orders from Washington) has been purposely treading lightly. Soldiers have strict orders to avoid the risk of killing civilians--many of whom aid or are themselves militants--even at the cost of imperiling their own lives. Mosques, which have served as hideouts for terrorists, are kept off the list of allowed targets. Military operations have been timed to avoid alienating Muslim pilgrims on holy days. By confessing doubt about its moral right to defend itself, America has encouraged further aggression.

There is no shortage of aggressors lusting for American blood, and they grow bolder with each display of American compassion.

Consider the shameful tenderness shown toward the Islamic cleric Moktadr al-Sadr, who aspires to be the dictator of an Iranian-style theocracy in Iraq. An admirer of the 9/11 hijackers, Sadr has amassed an armed militia of 10,000 men (right under the noses of our military), and demanded that Coalition forces leave Iraq. On the run for the murder of another cleric, he took refuge with his militia in the holy city of Najaf, which has been surrounded by U.S. troops. Rather than attacking, however, the United States agreed to negotiate. It is as absurd to negotiate with and trust the word of a villain such as Sadr as it would have been to negotiate with Nazis bent on wiping out Allied forces in World War II. It is shockingly dangerous that the United States has allowed a mediator from Iran--part of the "Axis of Evil" and Sadr's ideological ally--to assist in the negotiations.

For the enemies of America, Iraq is like a laboratory where they are testing our mettle, with mounting ferocity. The negotiations with Sadr and now with the leaders of Fallujah; our timid response to the insurrections throughout Iraq; America's outrageously deferential treatment of its enemies--all of these instances of moral weakness reinforce the view of bin Laden and his ilk that America will appease those who seek its destruction.

If we continue to wage a compassionate war, it will be a matter of time before Islamic militants bring suicide-bombings and mass murder (again) to the streets of the United States.

Though Washington may be blinded by the longing to buy the love of Iraqis, our service men know all too well that (as one put it): "When you go to fight, it's time to shoot--not to make friends with people." In its might and courage our military is unequaled; it is the moral responsibility of Washington to issue battle plans that will properly "shock and awe" the enemy. Eschewing self-interest in the name of compassion is immoral. The result is self-destruction.

Dr. Yaron Brook is executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute. Elan Journo is a writer for the Ayn Rand Institute in Irvine, CA.

This Op-Ed was published in Australia's Herald Sun (May 4, 2004)

[veronica]

You have got to be kidding me.

[STARWISE]

Please vote on This TBO Page about this stooooopid and dangerous Al-Arian verdict. The poll is under and to the right of his ugly mugg.

[theFIRMbss]

"For over a decade, there was another guarantee of American impotence: the notion that a terrorist is alone responsible for his actions, and that each, therefore, must be tried as an individual before a court of law."

------------------------------------------------------------------

"End States Who Sponsor Terrorism"

By: Leonard Peikoff

The choice today is mass death in the United States or mass death in the terrorist nations.

Fifty years of increasing American appeasement in the Mideast have led to fifty years of increasing contempt in the Muslim world for the U.S. The climax was September 11, 2001.

Fifty years ago, Truman and Eisenhower surrendered the West's property rights in oil, although that oil rightfully belonged to those in the West whose science, technology, and capital made its discovery and use possible. The first country to nationalize Western oil, in 1951, was Iran. The rest, observing our frightened silence, hurried to grab their piece of the newly available loot.

The cause of the U.S. silence was not practical, but philosophical. The Mideast's dictators were denouncing wealthy egotistical capitalism. They were crying that their poor needed our sacrifice; that oil, like all property, is owned collectively, by virtue of birth; and that they knew their viewpoint was true by means of otherworldly emotion. Our Presidents had no answer. Implicitly, they were ashamed of the Declaration of Independence. They did not dare to answer that Americans, properly, were motivated by the selfish desire to achieve personal happiness in a rich, secular, individualist society.

The Muslim countries embodied in an extreme form every idea--selfless duty, anti-materialism, faith or feeling above science, the supremacy of the group--which our universities, our churches, and our own political Establishment had long been upholding as virtue. When two groups, our leadership and theirs, accept the same basic ideas, the most consistent side wins.

After property came liberty. "The Muslim fundamentalist movement," writes Yale historian Lamin Sanneh, "began in 1979 with the Iranian [theocratic] revolution . . ." (NYT, 9/23/01). During his first year as its leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, urging a Jihad against "the Great Satan," kidnapped 52 U.S. diplomatic personnel and held them hostage; Carter's reaction was fumbling paralysis. About a decade later, Iran topped this evil. Khomeini issued his infamous Fatwa aimed at censoring, even outside his borders, any ideas uncongenial to Muslim sensibility. This was the meaning of his threat to kill British author Rushdie and to destroy his American publisher; their crime was the exercise of their right to express an unpopular intellectual viewpoint. The Fatwa was Iran's attempt, reaffirmed after Khomeini's death, to stifle, anywhere in the world, the very process of thought. Bush Sr. looked the other way.

After liberty came American life itself. The first killers were the Palestinian hijackers of the late 1960s. But the killing spree which has now shattered our soaring landmarks, our daily routine, and our souls, began in earnest only after the license granted by Carter and Bush Sr.

Many nations work to fill our body bags. But Iran, according to a State Department report of 1999, is "the most active state sponsor of terrorism," training and arming groups from all over the Mideast, including Islamic Jihad, Hamas, and Hezbollah. Nor is Iran's government now "moderating." Five months ago, the world's leading terrorist groups resolved to unite in a holy war against the U.S., which they called "a second Israel"; their meeting was held in Teheran. (Fox News, 9/16/01)

What has been the U.S. response to the above? In 1996, nineteen U.S. soldiers were killed in their barracks in Saudi Arabia. According to a front-page story in The New York Times (6/21/98): "Evidence suggesting that Iran sponsored the attack has further complicated the investigation, because the United States and Saudi Arabia have recently sought to improve relations with a new, relatively moderate Government in Teheran." In other words, Clinton evaded Iran's role because he wanted what he called "a genuine reconciliation." In public, of course, he continued to vow that he would find and punish the guilty. This inaction of Clinton's is comparable to his action after bin Laden's attack on U.S. embassies in East Africa; his action was the gingerly bombing of two meaningless targets.

Conservatives are equally responsible for today's crisis, as Reagan's record attests. Reagan not only failed to retaliate after 241 U.S. marines in Lebanon were slaughtered; he did worse. Holding that Islamic guerrillas were our ideological allies because of their fight against the atheistic Soviets, he methodically poured money and expertise into Afghanistan. This put the U.S. wholesale into the business of creating terrorists. Most of them regarded fighting the Soviets as only the beginning; our turn soon came.

For over a decade, there was another guarantee of American impotence: the notion that a terrorist is alone responsible for his actions, and that each, therefore, must be tried as an individual before a court of law. This viewpoint, thankfully, is fading; most people now understand that terrorists exist only through the sanction and support of a government.

We need not prove the identity of any of these creatures, because terrorism is not an issue of personalities. It cannot be stopped by destroying bin Laden and the al-Qaeda army, or even by destroying the destroyers everywhere. If that is all we do, a new army of militants will soon rise up to replace the old one.

The behavior of such militants is that of the regimes which make them possible. Their atrocities are not crimes, but acts of war. The proper response, as the public now understands, is a war in self-defense. In the excellent words of Paul Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defense, we must "end states who sponsor terrorism."

A proper war in self-defense is one fought without self-crippling restrictions placed on our commanders in the field. It must be fought with the most effective weapons we possess (a few weeks ago, Rumsfeld refused, correctly, to rule out nuclear weapons). And it must be fought in a manner that secures victory as quickly as possible and with the fewest U.S. casualties, regardless of the countless innocents caught in the line of fire. These innocents suffer and die because of the action of their own government in sponsoring the initiation of force against America. Their fate, therefore, is their government's moral responsibility. There is no way for our bullets to be aimed only at evil men.

The public understandably demands retaliation against Afghanistan. But in the wider context Afghanistan is insignificant. It is too devastated even to breed many fanatics. Since it is no more these days than a place to hide, its elimination would do little to end terrorism.

Terrorism is a specific disease, which can be treated only by a specific antidote. The nature of the disease (though not of its antidote) has been suggested by Serge Schmemann (NYT, 9/16/01). Our struggle now, he writes, is "not a struggle against a conventional guerrilla force, whose yearning for a national homeland or the satisfaction of some grievance could be satisfied or denied. The terrorists [on Tuesday] . . . issued no demands, no ultimatums. They did it solely out of grievance and hatred--hatred for the values cherished in the West as freedom, tolerance, prosperity, religious pluralism and universal suffrage, but abhorred by religious fundamentalists (and not only Muslim fundamentalists) as licentiousness, corruption, greed and apostasy."

Every word of this is true. The obvious implication is that the struggle against terrorism is not a struggle over Palestine. It is a clash of cultures, and thus a struggle of ideas, which can be dealt with, ultimately, only by intellectual means. But this fact does not depreciate the crucial role of our armed forces. On the contrary, it increases their effectiveness, by pointing them to the right target.

Most of the Mideast is ruled by thugs who would be paralyzed by an American victory over any of their neighbors. Iran, by contrast, is the only major country there ruled by zealots dedicated not to material gain (such as more wealth or territory), but to the triumph by any means, however violent, of the Muslim fundamentalist movement they brought to life. That is why Iran manufactures the most terrorists.

If one were under a Nazi aerial bombardment, it would be senseless to restrict oneself to combatting Nazi satellites while ignoring Germany and the ideological plague it was working to spread. What Germany was to Nazism in the 1940s, Iran is to terrorism today. Whatever else it does, therefore, the U.S. can put an end to the Jihad-mongers only by taking out Iran.

Eliminating Iran's terrorist sanctuaries and military capability is not enough. We must do the equivalent of de-Nazifying the country, by expelling every official and bringing down every branch of its government. This goal cannot be achieved painlessly, by weaponry alone. It requires invasion by ground troops, who will be at serious risk, and perhaps a period of occupation. But nothing less will "end the state" that most cries out to be ended.

The greatest obstacle to U.S. victory is not Iran and its allies, but our own intellectuals. Even now, they are advocating the same ideas that caused our historical paralysis. They are asking a reeling nation to show neighbor-love by shunning "vengeance." The multiculturalists--rejecting the concept of objectivity--are urging us to "understand" the Arabs and avoid "racism" (i.e., any condemnation of any group's culture). The friends of "peace" are reminding us, ever more loudly, to "remember Hiroshima" and beware the sin of pride.

These are the kinds of voices being heard in the universities, the churches, and the media as the country recovers from its first shock, and the professoriate et al. feel emboldened to resume business as usual. These voices are a siren song luring us to untroubled sleep while the fanatics proceed to gut America.

Tragically, Mr. Bush is attempting a compromise between the people's demand for a decisive war and the intellectuals' demand for appeasement.

It is likely that the Bush administration will soon launch an attack on bin Laden's organization in Afghanistan and possibly even attack the Taliban. Despite this, however, every sign indicates that Mr. Bush will repeat the mistakes made by his father in Iraq. As of October 1, the Taliban leadership appears not to be a target. Even worse, the administration refuses to target Iran, or any of the other countries identified by the State Department as terrorist regimes. On the contrary, Powell is seeking to add to the current coalition these very states--which is the equivalent of going into partnership with the Soviet Union in order to fight Communism (under the pretext, say, of proving that we are not anti-Russian). By seeking such a coalition, our President is asserting that he needs the support of terrorist nations in order to fight them. He is stating publicly that the world's only superpower does not have enough self-confidence or moral courage to act unilaterally in its own defense.

For some days now, Mr. Bush has been downplaying the role of our military, while praising the same policies (mainly negotiation and economic pressure) that have failed so spectacularly and for so long. Instead of attacking the roots of global terrorism, he seems to be settling for a "guerrilla war" against al-Qaeda, and a policy of unseating the Taliban passively, by aiding a motley coalition of native tribes. Our battle, he stresses, will be a "lengthy" one.

Mr. Bush's compromise will leave the primary creators of terrorism whole--and unafraid. His approach might satisfy our short-term desire for retribution, but it will guarantee catastrophe in the long term.

As yet, however, no overall policy has been solidified; the administration still seems to be groping. And an angry public still expects our government not merely to hobble terrorism for a while, but to eradicate it. The only hope left is that Mr. Bush will listen to the public, not to the professors and their progeny.

When should we act, if not now? If our appeasement has led to an escalation of disasters in the past, can it do otherwise in the future? Do we wait until our enemies master nuclear, chemical, and biological warfare?

The survival of America is at stake. The risk of a U.S. overreaction, therefore, is negligible. The only risk is underreaction.

Mr. Bush must reverse course. He must send our missiles and troops, in force, where they belong. And he must justify this action by declaring with righteous conviction that we have discarded the clichés of our paper-tiger past and that the U.S. now places America first.

There is still time to demonstrate that we take the war against terrorism seriously--as a sacred obligation to our Founding Fathers, to every victim of the men who hate this country, and to ourselves. There is still time to make the world understand that we will take up arms, anywhere and on principle, to secure an American's right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness on earth.

The choice today is mass death in the United States or mass death in the terrorist nations. Our Commander-In-Chief must decide whether it is his duty to save Americans or the governments who conspire to kill them.

Leonard Peikoff is the founder of the Ayn Rand Institute in Irvine, California.

[jimbo123]

Media is spinning big time for the terrorist. He's still facing retrial on the following important charges:


1. Racketeering

2. Conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization

3. Conspiracy to fund terrorists

4. Mail fraud

5. Money laundering

6. Obtaining US citizenship by fraud

[Rapscallion]

"I'm really in scared for our country, folks.... Satan is alive and working overtime lately. We need to pray VERY hard that these evil tides will turn quickly."

I fear for the future too. We have lost the values we stood for if this evil terrorist can go free. I fear that we will legislate leaving Iraq. If we do, an Islamic super-state will form in our vacuum. The oil fields will then belong to Iran. There will be no gas in America at any price. The inflation will destroy the dollar...you will not even be able to buy bread. It is indeed a nightmare scenario brought to you by democrats seeking a return to power (at any price).There will be nothing for them to govern except the subjugation of America to Islam.

Remember you heard it here first.

[Chieftain]

Well, I guess you told them! You go, girl!

[BurbankKarl]

You should have this misleading post edited.

[wichita_lineman]

This is awful

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

Ayn Rand made one of the most persuasive cases I've ever read for the right-if not the obligation-to disregard the sovereignty of "fear societies," as brave Israeli lawmaker Natan Sharansky dubs them.

Also, the patent illegitimacy of the United Nations as an international institution.

I really don't know what happened to Peikoff.

Endorsing John Kerry?