My father loved this country and proudly served in the U.S. Military Intelligence Service. Yet when I was a young child during World War II, we were confined for several years at Camp Amache, an internment camp in southeast Colorado, simply because we were of Japanese ancestry. Hundreds of thousands of innocent Japanese Americans were unjustly placed under scrutiny and suspicion because few in Washington were brave enough to say "no." The decision to incarcerate, according to a report by the congressionally-mandated Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, was based on "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership."
Now, decades later, something similarly sinister is returning to our country. Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., is organizing congressional hearings on Muslim Americans. These hearings are scheduled to take place within the House Homeland Security Committee.
Rep. King's intent seems clear: To cast suspicion upon all Muslim Americans and to stoke the fires of anti-Muslim prejudice and Islamophobia. By framing his hearings as an investigation of the American Muslim community, the implication is that we should be suspicious of our Muslim neighbors, coworkers or classmates solely on the basis of their religion.
This should be deeply troubling to Americans of all races and religions. An investigation specifically targeting a single religion implies, erroneously, a dangerous disloyalty, with one broad sweep of the discriminatory brush.
In building the pretext for the hearings, King has repeatedly said that American Muslim community leaders have failed to cooperate with law enforcement officials in the effort to disrupt terrorism plots -- a claim that has been refuted by U.S. counter-terrorism experts and top law enforcement officials. Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, for example, who works with a large Muslim-American population, has countered King's allegation by asserting, unequivocally, that cooperation with the community is active and aggressive. (Incidentally, Rep. King will not be calling any law enforcement professionals to testify during his hearings.)
While protecting our homeland from acts of violence should be a top priority for policymakers, we must remember that no entire community can be held responsible for the acts of a few people. A "presumption of guilt" should never be applied collectively. We must aggressively investigate criminal behavior, watch for patterns that point to emerging threats, and stay constantly vigilant as citizens, but we must also not divide or target Americans simply on the basis of their faith or ancestry.
Rep. Mike Honda, D-San Jose, serves as House Democratic senior whip, member of both House Budget and Appropriations committees, co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus's Peace and Security Taskforce, and is the former chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus. Follow Rep Honda on Facebook and Twitter. This article first ran in San Francisco Chronicle.
James Zogby: Peter King Note: Islamophobia Can Create Radicalization
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1927690_1927684_1927666,00.html
Hellooo? Joseph McCarthy?? Anyone remember him?
I have here in my hand,a list of.........
King,like Joe has a lot of insinuations and nothing more.
How did you ever get elected???
LOL
I had several friends back in CA whose parents were interred at Manzanaras (sp?) during WW2.
Let's just hope we as humans can find a little more compassion regarding the Muslims.
I myself am an athiest. I think religion is wrong for humanity but humanity doesn't see it that way. Too bad. We do not need more hate in this country, we need more love, tolerance, open-mindedness.
Instead of calling those who want to have hearings racists, come up with your plan on how to deal with it. Just ignoring it is what we did pre 9/11 and seems to be what you want to do now. It is not acceptable to most Americans. And group hugs wont work either!!
If we see a disproportionate number of Muslims with violent tendencies, we can look for a root cause, rather than blaming it on the mere fact that they are Muslim. Perhaps it has to do with the perponderance of undemocratic rule in the Middle East, making people there feel powerless and unable to act on their dreams. Perhaps they see the U.S. and other Western countries as supporting these despotic regimes, of supporting commercial gain over the rights of individuals, and hence complicitors in that tyranny. So whereas they feel unable to strike out at their own despotic ruler, they can strike out at us.
Possibly the uprisings in the Middle East will go a long way towards correcting the inequalities in these countries, and lessening the violent tendencies of individuals there. I can do what I can to support these uprisings, through moral support if nothing else, so that these revolutionaries will know that they are not alone in their struggles, and that people the world over have the same desires and dreams. That I can do.
Remember the outcry from the right wing when the justice dept. released findings that showed a sharp increase in right-wing domestic terrorist activity?
If we truly care about terrorism, we should be prepared to "lift the veil" and see the many different threats in our midst. Unfortunately, Rep. King has rejected efforts to include a discussion of this topic in his hearings.... now why would he do that? Politics of course!
King doesn't want an Islamic Taliban in the US, he wants a Christian Taliban...
The same flag waving, freedom loving Americans do not either realize or care that they step on the rights of their fellow Americans with their prejudices.
People should go back and read about the way Japanese Americans were treated during (and before) WWII. Then, they might understand how counter-productive this treatment is. It's really hard for anyone to justify helping the US government while it's holding their family in an internment camp!