Tuesday, August 03, 2004

For me, Stephen Emerson (the so-called terrorism expert) is the anti-Arab/Muslim version of Julius Streicher. He is the "brilliant" terrorism expert who guessed on the air (live) that Muslim terrorists were behind the Oklahoma bombing. And don't get me wrong; I am somebody who reads people I despise and detest, and I have read all his books, and can attest to his ignorance and prejudice. He is running with the story about the Syrian musicians on the plane, accusing the government of being lenient with what he apprently thinks are Middle East "terrorists." Emerson is probably like Hitler in Vienna: Hitler in his youth used to walk around the streets of Vienna wondering who is Jewish and who is not, and Emerson probably walks around wondering who is Muslim and who is not. What a miserable existence that must be. The bigot inflicts a punishment on himself/herself without even knowing. A double punishment indeed. I heard Emerson asserts on MSNBC yesterday that there are Al-Qa`idah cells in the US that "we do not know about." And I obviously thought: how do we know that they exist if we do not know about them?