Extreme Unction of the West–One Final Question
A few days ago in this space, I lamented that, from the under-reaction and sheer PC nonsense coming from our political leaders and mainstream media in re the Fort Hood shootings, it was clear that modern America had descended into a psychopathology which I will call ‘The Carter Syndrome’ where one mistakes friends for enemies, and cannot see enemies at all. Basically, I asked the question along these lines: if the Jihadists were an international totalitarian political party, like the Communists, and not an international totalitarian political party that calls itself a Church, would we be allowed to take seriously, even (if the war escalated) drastic steps against it? If so, why treat an international totalitarian political party that calls itself a Church like a Church, as sacrosanct, such that we can be attacked, but we are not allowed to name the enemy, discriminate against them, take special precautions against them, or subject them to any particular legal scrutiny.
The consensus of at least two readers, perhaps more, was that to define Islam as being worthy of particular scrutiny, or take any defensive steps, serious or drastic, would be to have a chilling effect on the free exercise of religion, which would be tantamount to the destruction of the First Amendment. Since the First Amendment was the only significant part of the Constitution, this would be tantamount to destroying the Constitution. Since the US Constitution was the only significant part of Western Civilization, this would be tantamount to the destruction of Western Civilization. Therefore, Islam, which has the oft-stated and publicly stated goal of the destruction of Western Civilization, and the imposition of totalitarian Sharia theocratic law on us all, cannot be recognized as an enemy. Only each individual act as it is perpetrated can be punished, but no acts of gathering or training troops, planning suicide bombings, increased security at airports, etc. (unless this is done in as neutral manner as possible, so that Episcopalians are under as much scrutiny as young men named Mohammad.)
The argument, in other words, to define Islam as being worthy of particular scrutiny, or take any defensive steps, was tantamount to the destruction of the Constitution (therefore of the Republic therefore of the West) therefore no steps should or could be taken. The war cannot be fought: our Constitution forbids us to fight anyone shooting at us from the steeple of a church.
Let us grant, for a moment, this stupid interpretation of Constitutional law, which says the US of A may not fight against the Jihadists, so that I may ask a simple question to anyone of this line of thought:
May England?
May France?
What about Russia, China, Spain or India?
None of these nations has our Constitution. Some of them, indeed, have an established Church. They are certainly allowed, by their laws, to discriminate between enemies and non-enemies, and (I assume) enemies and non-enemy churches. May they fight the war against the Jihad? Obviously OUR Constitution will not be affected.