Posted on 12/13/2015 7:05:40 PM PST by Kaslin
Donald Trump, the leading Republican presidential candidate, called on Dec. 7 for "a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on." Replace one word in this formulation and it goes from outrageous to brilliant.
Reacting to massacres by Muslims in Paris and San Bernardino, Trump pointed to a Muslim hatred "beyond comprehension" for the West. Therefore, he concluded, "Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad."
The negative responses, domestic and international, Muslim and non-Muslim, came in fast and furious and rightly so, as Trump's crude blast is unconstitutional, unacceptable, unworkable, and unstrategic.
Unconstitutional: Every Western basic law is secular, disallowing a religious test for immigration, rendering Trump's statement less an exercise in practical policy making than a gadfly provocation.
Unacceptable: Beyond legalities, secularism represents a Western core value, up there with freedom of speech, a value hardly anyone accepts gutting for reasons of momentary expediency.
Unworkable: Islam is not a permanent identity like skin color. Nothing prevents Muslims from renouncing Islam or converting to another religion. Unless Trump extends his "total and complete shutdown" to former Muslims which is even more unconstitutional he just encourages the already-existing phenomenon of Muslim conversions of convenience (as symbolized by a church in Berlin).
Unstrategic: Trump's presidential campaign once again is counterproductive; he simultaneously makes conservatives look like idiots and brings adoring attention to those who oppose his views, in this case radical Muslim groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations (widely known as CAIR), which has enjoyed an unprecedented cornucopia of media coverage to spread its deceitful message.
That said, Trump has raised a critical and urgent issue that all Westerners must face, as symbolized by the recent tsunami of illegal immigration to Europe and the huge strains it has created. Simply put, Muslims present a disproportionately large source of problems, as becomes clear when they are compared with Hindu immigrants, who are roughly the same in number but generally fit quietly into the West.
Violence is the headline topic relating to Muslims, whether large-scale plots (Paris) or sudden jihad syndrome lone wolves (San Bernardino), but violence is hardly the whole problem. Muslim hostility toward non-Muslims takes many other forms, such as teaching Islamic supremacism in mosques, spewing antisemitism in the streets, and threatening anyone who dares publicly to criticize Islam. Issues concerning women include female genital mutilation, honor killings, polygyny, and forced marriages. Islamic mores lead to strong antipathies against seeing-eye dogs, mixed swimming pool usage, and homosexuals.
Polls show widespread and legitimate concern about these issues as well as growing impatience with governmental dismissal of those concerns. When Germany's Angela Merkel welcomes an unlimited number of illegal immigrants or Barack Obama ridicules concerns about Syrian immigrants, populist voices like that of Donald Trump inevitably find followers.
Indeed, he is just the latest anti-immigrant figure to find a message that increasingly resonates.Geert Wilders' PVV in the Netherlands wins 39 out of 150 seats in parliament in a recent survey, up from his current 15 and almost twice that of any other party. In the French regional elections a week ago, Marine le Pen's National Front led in 6 out of 13 districts. This upward trend will continue until one of these ostracized insurgent parties gains over 50 percent of the vote and enters office. In this sense, Trump stands at the cutting edge.
How to deal with Muslim immigration in a responsible and uncontroversial manner? I offer two suggestions. First, replace the "Muslims entering the United States" in Trump's formulation with "Islamists entering the United States." Islamists are those Muslims who seek to apply Islamic law, oppress women and non-Muslims, and establish a worldwide caliphate. They make up about 10-15 percent of the Muslim population; they, not Muslims in general, are the barbarians who "believe only in Jihad."
Second, engage in serious research intoallwould-be visitors and immigrants, not the pro-formareview that prevails these days. Doing so requires money and time, as well as creative inquiries to smoke out ideological proclivities, but each person entering the country must be checked to make sure no Islamists are allowed in, ever, at all, even for brief visits, thereby increasing our common security.
Muslims ARE Islamists.
So Trump hasn’t changed his position.
Not a bit of difference
The Koran demands that infidels convert or be killed. I am sure as hell not converting. They can “try” to kill me, but I sure plan to send plenty of them to judgement if they try.
Indeed, he is just the latest anti-immigrant figure …The language of the left is really tiresome.
Throw it back in their face. The left is pro-terrorist.
Dear Mr. Pipes. you are usually a very smart fellow indeed....
but
we are tired of this Krap
and
we do NOT want to be blown up anymore!
Given that The Koran and Hadiths teach all Moslems to infiltrate, invade, attack, subjugate, and murder Christians and Jews and other ‘infidels’ —— just how do you propose to tell the “peaceable” (non-Koran-following) Moslems from the regular, dangerous kind?
Until you can do that well... and provide good assurance your plan will really work... the only logical safe thing to do is to remove the ones who’ve already gotten in ... send them back to the 57 countries they’ve already infiltrated in precisely the way they’ve been coming into USA
Headline is misleading, though it’s what the author used. It seems to put a quote in Trump’s mouth, but it seems to be the author telling Trump that he should ban Islamists not Muslims. Didn’t read the entire article, but scanned for any quotes and saw none.
... (A) complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.”
It’s not that hard. Don’t understand why he thinks its difficult. Just open up a copy of the Satanic Koran. ‘Kill the
unbeliever wherever you find him. It’s in 111 verses.
That sums it up. And, yet to hear a Muslim deny that fact. Have you?
Oh, so it's different than yesterday, again? What's the difference?
They are indeed sir.
Let me see. 3,000 killed on 9/11. 14 killed in California. A future nuclear attack. Will the people ever wake up? I am not sure, but slime sucking scum bag liberals, and other assorted POSs never will. They REALLY do consider the constitution to be a suicide pact. They are perfectly willing to accept casualties, in favor of the EVIL idea of PC. What a$$ holes.
Peeing semantics. I always thought Pipes was better than that.
They always have been.
Mr. Pipes has gone down the tubes.
Trump's not changing his position BUT Daniel Pipes NEVER could have written the above truths IF Trump hadn't taken the position he took. Trump's made it possible for people to openly discuss problems Islam inflicts on the world. That wasn't happening until Trump had the courage to speak up. Daniel Pipes should be thanking Trump...
The best, most peaceful most non-Jihadist Muslim immigrants can and do end up having Jihadist children. The Garland Texas terrorists were all U.S. -born. Fort Hood mass murder Jihadist Major Nidal came here as a toddler. The muslims behind the various atrocities in France included many born in France.
Islam cannot be screened. How do you screen toddlers or a generation not yet born?
The only way to prevent Islamic terrorism and intimidation is to keep out Islam entirely. No muslims should be allowed to immigrate. None. Period.
Ban Greek warriors but giant wooden horses are fine.
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