Heard two stories on NPR‘s All Things Considered the other day which seemed related. The first was coverage of John Ashcroft’s brazen bid for further power to erode our civil liberties in the name of The Wars on Abstract Nouns. The second had to do with homegrown terrorism.
Not satisfied with his gutting of the Bill of Rights using the blunt blade of the Patriot Act, Ashcroft wants more, more, more. Because, he says
Right. I can see those sneaky, swarthy terrorists, slithering around, hidden from sight because of the weaknesses in… our “material support” statutes? And I can see the fear in the suicide bombers’ eyes when they hear their action may subject them to… the death penalty? And look at the great secrets we uncovered by holding 762 illegal immigrants for up to eight months: we found the roommate of one of the 9/11 bombers and another with “‘jihad material’ and more than 30 pictures of the World Trade Center.” (Could be a copy of the Qu’ran and one of those fold-out postcard books that you can buy at any gift shop…)
And what have these expanded federal law enforcement powers given us so far? Can’t count John Walker Lindh or Yaser Hamdi, who were captured on the battlefield. Nor can we count two North Africans in Detroit who were caught (before the Patriot Act was law) with fake passports, cash and a videotape of Disneyland. We also have to leave out the shoe bomber, who was actually caught by fellow passengers who tied him up with belts and headphone cords. Zacarias Moussaoui doesn’t count either, since he was actually arrested before the September 11 attacks even took place.
That leaves us with seven Muslims in Portland, Oregon who may have been planning to go to Afghanistan, possibly to hook up with al-Qaeda — no trial or convictions here, yet. Also, six Yemenis in Buffalo who trained at a Taliban camp in Afghanistan — all of whom have pled guilty to charges of supporting a terrorist organization. And Jose Padilla, the so-called “dirty bomber” who has been held incommunicado for more than a year now without charges and without the opportunity to speak with a lawyer.
That makes 14 men and women in nearly 18 months of free rein — not a terribly impressive record, considering the resources and dirty tricks placed at Mr. Ashcroft’s disposal. And how many people’s rights have been trampled on in the process? How many libraries have the FBI visited? Whose e-mail have they read? How many people have had their phones wiretapped? We don’t know because Mr. Ashcroft refuses to answer. He believes he is already above the law — or answering to a higher law — and yet he wants the blessing of the Congress to legitimize him going even further.
Meanwhile, there’s plenty going on at home: terrorist acts perpetrated by all-American Christian boys with apple-pie complexions. Eric Rudolph, the Olympic Park and abortion clinic bomber, was captured this week after 5 years of being pursued by the FBI. Funny, isn’t it, that, although his attacks have injured or killed more than 150 people, the word terrorist isn’t generally used to describe this fundamentalist religious zealot. (While I don’t doubt the sincerity of the many federal agents who’ve spent years tracking Rudolph, I can’t help but wonder whether their boss, the Attorney General himself, isn’t just a little bit disappointed in the downfall of his brother-in-arms in the fight against godless heretics.)
How did Rudolph evade capture for so long, with agents hot on his trail in the woods of North Carolina? He was likely aided and hidden by some local followers of the Christian Identity movement, which has historic ties to rural North Carolina. And how was he captured? Was it through wiretaps? Examination of credit reports? Searches through library records? Nope. he was caught by a 21-year-old police officer who found him scrounging for food behind a supermarket.
That brings me to the second story on All Things Considered, about another terrorism case broken recently, due to good old-fashioned policework. This one got significantly less coverage. John Noster, an accountant serving time for vehicle theft in a California prison, is now linked to the discovery of
Although, at a news conference, the Los Angeles County Sheriff said his officers stopped a case of ‘potential terrorism…’”, Bernard J. Zapor, assistant special agent in charge of the Los Angeles field division of the ATF, doesn’t agree. He
Of course, since he isn’t Muslim or Middle Eastern or swarthy-skinned, this isn’t terrorism, right? And since it’s not international, it’s not terrorism. And since he may have worked alone, it’s not terrorism.
What Mr. Ashcroft needs to do, instead of begging for further disembowelment of the Constitution, is use the extraordinary resources and people of the Justice Dept, the FBI and the ATF to work — within the law as it stands — to seek out and capture those who do harm to this country, regardless of skin color, religion, or country of origin. Justice is blind and throwing a curtain across her statue doesn’t blind the rest of us…
