The Terrorist Next Door

By Alan Caruba

The June 16 news from NBC was headlined “Possible Al-Qaeda Hit List Targets Specific Americans.”

The list included the names and photos of “U.S. officials and business leaders” and the call was to kill them in their homes, all the better to spread their stock-in-trade, terror. The individuals have been notified by the FBI. The list includes Wall Street firms, political leaders, think tank influentials, and contractors who do business with the military.

While the U.S. government is now using its drone fleet to whack al-Qaeda folk in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Yemen these days, according to Catherine Herridge, a Fox News correspondent, al-Qaeda has morphed from being a top-down organization to a more generalized movement and these days it is busy recruiting American-born Muslims to continue the jihad.

In her new book, “The Next Wave: On the Hunt for Al Qaeda’s American Recruits”, Herridge spells out a chilling scenario. To understand the next phase of terror, it should be the next book on your summer reading list.

Herridge knows the terrorism scene courtesy of reporting on it for years and having an extraordinary number of contacts within the U.S. counterterrorism network that was put together after al Qaeda’s wake-up call on 9/11. The flaws in the system that existed before then were exposed and steps were taken to get better coordination among the FBI, CIA, NSA, and its other elements.

These days the National Counterterrorism Center must process a daily volume of information “between eight thousand and ten thousand reports.” The threat made “sharing data a matter of survival,” says Herridge. They include “at least forty threats and distinct plots.”

Perhaps the worst part of what an army of intelligence analysts determined was that the jihad and the terrorist’s mind set was that “it’s not a generational issue, it’s a forever issue.”

What too many Americans have yet to come to grips with is that the inherent message and duty of Islam is a never-ending war on “infidels”—and in particular the West—is jihad. While Christianity seeks to convert by the power of its message, Islam seeks to convert by virtue of its ability to apply terror to populations that resist it. It seeks out those who feel alienated from American and Western values, recruiting them in the greater jihad—war—to dominate whole nations and peoples.

It is the antithesis of its claim that it is “a religion of peace.”

As one old CIA hand put it, jihad is “not a personal struggle for someone’s soul, but (is) a global movement.” Its primary target these days is America and its success is increasingly the use of the Internet to spread its message.

Constantly learning from its mistakes and constantly evolving, it should come as no surprise that one of its leading figures these days is Anwar al-Awlaki, American born and bred, and currently said to be hiding out in Yemen. With the elimination of Osama bin Laden his mastery of the Internet and his insider’s knowledge of American culture has elevated him.

He has been a major recruiter and one of his most famous was Major Nidal Halik Hasan, the Fort Hood shooter. If there is one thing that will get Americans killed it is the political correctness that permitted Major Hasan to remain in the Army despite clear, obvious indications that he was drifting into the jihadist’s orbit. His exchange of emails with al-Awlaki should have put him on a short list for interrogation and further action to sever him from military service.

Herridge rarely strays from straight reporting in her book, but it is also clear that she regards the Obama administration as a virtual facilitator of homeland terrorism, noting at one point that “It took the Obama administration nine weeks to publicly acknowledge the Fort Hood massacre as an act of terrorism.”

Her warning is clear. “In a growing number of cases, al Qaeda’s followers are just like us. They are educated here, sometimes born here. The radicalization process is compressed, An offbeat loner can reach out and become a dedicated killer in a matter of months.”

As one former weapons inspector put it, “Terrorism is like water. It takes the path of least resistance. You move one way and it moves another. It is a thinking enemy.”

It is inherent on everyone to be especially watchful and, sadly, to be less attached to traditional legal protections that prohibit law enforcement and counterterrorism personnel from infiltrating the many mosques throughout the nation until this cancer can be isolated and eradicated.

Americans have got to come to a fundamental conclusion and understanding that Islam is a religion of people who want to kill as many Americans as possible by way of destroying the nation and spreading this murderous cult worldwide.

One need only look at the way Muslim nations today are engaged in insurrections and conflicts that, as often as not, kill other Muslims. It is a very different “religion” than Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism or Hinduism.

And now it has a list of American leaders it specifically wants to kill before it gets to you.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

The Swirl of Conspiracy Theories

By Alan Caruba

It is testimony to how little Barack Hussein Obama and the government he heads is trusted when one considers the swirl of conspiracy theories that filled the forums on the Internet, the comments attached to articles analyzing the killing of Osama bin Laden, and the general discourse of the chatteratti on radio and television.

Soon enough, photographic evidence will be offered as proof and, even then, the conspiracy theories will question them.

This occurred to me as I searched foreign news websites for information that was not directly generated by the White House. To my surprise, Al Jazeera had a remarkably comprehensive round-up of statements and quotes by leaders from around the world, all welcoming news of Osama’s death.

It also struck me that many commentators took note of the fact that Obama had actually fulfilled former President G.W. Bush’s promise to find Osama and bring him to justice “dead or alive.” The fact that Obama has been, willingly or not, pursuing the objectives of his predecessor did not go unnoticed. In the end, Obama may not get all the credit he craves from the event.

The same Internet that invented and elevated Obama to the Oval Office has been dissecting and disputing virtually everything he has had to say, officially or not, over the past two years or so. He has not come off well.

While all presidents have had to circumvent the truth from time to time, Obama quickly earned a reputation as a serial liar, a 24/7 dissembler, and a thoroughly unreliable source for information about everything from his birth certificate, his two memoirs, and other pronouncements.

Little wonder that spinners of conspiracy theories immediately seized on the news of Osama’s death to wonder out loud about its timing. Was that intended to disrupt the airing of Donald Trump’s “The Apprentice”? Why was Osama buried at sea? Why was he living in a private compound just outside of Islamabad, Pakistan near a military facility? Et cetera!

I was reminded of Occam’s Razor. “The 14th century philosopher William of Occam had a keen eye for plausibility. We know his approach to problem solving by the label "Occam's Razor," an axiom often stated in shorthand as, "The simplest explanation is usually the best."


And then I thought of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Theory. The more closely you study the subject, the less clearly defined it becomes.

There are useful lessons to be drawn from both. The first is that the basic facts that have been released by the White House and reported widely are probably true. A Navy Seal Team, acting on intelligence gathered by the CIA, Pentagon, and other U.S. sources, identified where Osama was staying and killed him. This is the simplest explanation.

Beyond that, the speculation regarding the event only serves to obscure it.

Writing at the Middle East Forum, Raymond Ibrahim offered a very useful reminder.

“Years ago, Ayman al-Zawahiri, now al-Qaeda's undisputed leader, placed it all in context. After he was asked about the status of bin Laden and the Taliban's Mullah Omar, he confidently replied:

‘Jihad in the path of Allah is greater than any individual or organization. It is a struggle between Truth and Falsehood, until Allah Almighty inherits the earth and those who live in it. Mullah Muhammad Omar and Sheikh Osama bin Laden—may Allah protect them from all evil—are merely two soldiers of Islam in the journey of jihad, while the struggle between Truth [Islam] and Falsehood [non-Islam] transcends time.’”

Jihad does transcend time. In a dispatch published in The New York Times on May 20, 1876, “The Disturbances in Constantinople”, the reporter noted that “Our readers, not familiar with Oriental countries can hardly appreciate the passion of fanaticism which at times burns in the breast of the lower classes among the Mohammedans. The majority of these have no idea of the progress made by the Western races, or of the inferiority of their country to other modern states.”

Given 9/11 and modern communications, those in the West do better understand the fanaticism of Islam. Constantinople is now called Istanbul. And Turkey, a bridge between the East and West, has been sliding back into the fantasies and fanaticism of the past.

America, the apotheosis of the modern world, reached out to kill its avowed enemy. That is what great powers have always done and must always do.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Just Because You're Paranoid

By Alan Caruba

“Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean someone isn’t watching you,” goes the adage and in America where there’s a television camera just about everywhere, as well as folks with phones that can record live action and transmit the video, it’s probably more true today than ever.

My paranoia tends to focus on politicians and, in particular, those of the liberal stripe. The reason for this is simple enough. They promise not to raise taxes and then they raise taxes.

They promise to reduce the national debt and then increase it by $3 trillion in under two years.

They promise to “reform” Medicare and then they destroy it.

They promise to create and “save” jobs, and the unemployment rate just keeps climbing.

The lies are endless and highly destructive of my beloved nation.

My levels of paranoia have been off the meter since Obama was elected and on their way to the Moon ever since he took the oath of office to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Even though Obama briefly taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago, he does not give much evidence of liking the Constitution. In an early interview he said that the Constitution “is a charter of negative liberties. (It) says what the states can’t do to you, says what the federal government can’t do to you, but it doesn’t say what the federal government or the state government must do on your account.”

Well, the government, for example, can’t search your home or office without a warrant, must provide a speedy trail, and importantly cannot restrain your right to free speech, deny a free press, or the right to peacefully assemble to protest. It cannot “establish” a national religion, but it cannot forbid the practice of religion even though cities and towns across America are afflicted with demented people who would deny you the right to celebrate Christmas in any fashion.

No where in the Constitution is there a provision for the Department of Education, the Department of Housing and Human Services, the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, and much of the rest of the alphabet zoo that comprises our present government.

It surely does not say you have to buy something you don’t want!

The whole object of the Constitution is to limit the size of government, make the process of passing legislation difficult, and to distribute political power via its “checks and balances” to ensure no one branch can do too much damage.

As we close in on the November 2nd midterm elections, I am again impressed with the way the Founding Fathers created a document that allows Americans to engage in corrective measures by ridding themselves of truly bad politicians and replacing them with those who promise to do a better job.

We do this every two and four years, weeding out Senators, Representatives, and Presidents who are too stupid or criminal to be allowed the power we grant them.

If it were not for paranoia the Tea Party movement would not exist. The power of the Constitution has permitted this leaderless movement to coalesce around the single idea of ridding the Republic of people whom we deem dangerous to its future.

The current U.S. President is rapidly approaching levels of disapproval not seen since the days of Jimmy Carter.

It’s hard not to feel paranoid about a President who wrote to the Secretary of State asking that 80,000 more Muslim “refugees” be allowed into the United States where we have already witnessed 9/11, the Fort Hood murder spree by U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, and the trial of Faisal Shashad, a Pakistani granted citizenship who demonstrated his appreciation by trying to kill Americans in Times Square.

Do we really need 80,000 more potential jihadists? And why does Obama want to encourage this?

In the interest of brevity, let me add a distinct sense of paranoia about Bill Clinton traveling all over to endorse Democrat candidates. It is testimony to the short attention span of Democrats that they do not recall Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Hillary’s abortive healthcare reforms, Monica Lewinsky, his lies under oath, his impeachment trial, nor that the things he gets credit for occurred after Republicans gained control of Congress.

I am just paranoid enough to think that Bill is collecting political favors Hillary may use if she decides to run for president. One President Clinton was more than enough. One President Obama is one too many.

© Alan Caruba, 2010