GUNS OR MUSLIMS; BLOG # 2010 ; DECEMBER 11, 2015

THE MESSAGE:

The USA leaders and lawmakers need to decide which are more dangerous, Guns or Muslim Immigrants. There is absolutely no need for private citizens to purchase or possess guns of war with excessive ammo clips. Nor is there a need to persecute innocent people because of their religious beliefs. Taking the dilemma one step further, requires one to examine the extremist Muslim faction known as ISIS. How do they recruit? What precautions are needed? Why are they such a threat? 

GUNS AND GUN OWNERSHIP

All decent people feel sorrow and righteous fury about the latest slaughter of innocents, in California. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies are searching for motivations, including the vital question of how the murderers might have been connected to international terrorism. 

GUNS OF WAR

But motives do not matter to the dead and their families who grieve because of the actions of terrorists in Montreal, Ottawa, California, Colorado, Oregon, South Carolina, Virginia, Connecticut and far too many other places. Where is the outrage and anger from  citizens? Surely it must be directed at  leaders who covet  the money and political power of an industry dedicated to profiting from the  spread of powerful semi-automatic firearms and large ammo clips.



A series of shootings occurred on October 22, 2014, at Parliament Hill in Ottawa. At the Canadian National War Memorial, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau fatally shot Corporal Nathan Cirillo, a Canadian soldier on ceremonial sentry duty. 









In the case of the soldier, deliberately struck by a car in Quebec, the perpetrator was known to police as having become radicalized. Where did the authorities fail?

The control of firearms in Canada is predominantly governed by the Firearms Act, the Criminal Code, and their subordinate regulations. The Criminal Code defines the main categories of firearms, which include restricted, prohibited (semi automatic weapons), and non-restricted firearms. 



The Firearms Act regulates the possession, transport, and storage of firearms.  Canadians are required to pass safety tests before they can be eligible for a firearms license. Applicants are also subject to background checks, which take into account criminal, mental health, addiction, and domestic violence records.

It is surely a moral outrage and  disgrace that civilians can legally purchase weapons designed specifically to kill people with brutal speed and efficiency.  Or, if they are restricted, get someone who is not restricted to obtain them for their use.




In the USA, the National Rifle Association, NRA, rejects the most basic restrictions on weapons of mass killing. These opponents of gun control  say,  after every mass killing, that no law can absolutely forestall a specific criminal, or that guns do not kill people; people kill people.

The NRA references  determined killers who obtained weapons illegally in places like Canada, France, England and Norway; all of which  have strict gun laws.  The U.S., needs to eliminate some large categories of weapons and ammunition. Reference to the Second Amendment is a common and 'red herring' excuse.  Can any 'Constitutional' or 'Charter' right be unlimited and immune from reasonable and responsible regulation? Certain  weapons and kinds of ammunition, must be outlawed. Civilians do not need them.  

The US Supreme Court took a step in the right direction recently by refusing to hear a Second Amendment challenge to a Chicago suburb’s ordinance that banned semi automatic assault weapons and large-capacity magazines. The decision  gives tacit approval to even strict gun control laws in states and localities that choose to enact them. 


Many citizens are eliminating the securities and stock options of gun makers from their investment portfolios.


THE DONALD PIPES UP ON MASS KILLINGS

Following the terrorist attacks in San Bernardino, California, Trump recently called for the United States to bar all Muslims from entering the country until the nation’s leaders can “figure out what is going on”.




Hillary, chastises him by saying, "He just does't get it; barring Muslims would make us more susceptible to dangers." A prohibition of Muslims by a leading American presidential candidate, is an ideology more typically associated with hate groups.

Mr. Trump, who has declared, “I love the Muslims,” now calls for a database to track Muslims in America.  He emphasized that “hatred” among many Muslims for Americans is “beyond comprehension,” and said that the United States needed to confront, “where this hatred comes from and why”.  "Our country cannot continue to be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in jihad, and have no sense of reason or respect for human life”.

ISIS, EXTREMISTS OF THE ISLAMIC BELIEFS 

As the debate on how best to contain the Islamic State continues to rage in Western capitals, the militants themselves have made one point patently clear: They want the United States and its allies to be dragged into a ground war.  

In fact, when the United States first invaded Iraq, one of the most enthusiastic proponents of the move was the man who founded the terrorist cell that would one day become the Islamic State, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. He excitedly called the Americans’ 2003 intervention “the Blessed Invasion.”

Isis bases its ideology on prophetic texts stating that Islam will be victorious after an apocalyptic battle that will take place when Western armies come to the region.

ONE MAN'S RANT



Robert A. Hall is a Marine Veteran who served five terms in the Massachusetts State Senate. This is an excerpt (edited slightly) from his blog.

......Muslims who tortured and beheaded Daniel Pearl in Pakistan, or the Muslims who tortured and murdered Marine Lt. Col. William Higgins in Lebanon, or the Muslims who ran the blood-spattered Al Qaeda torture rooms our troops found in Iraq, or the Muslims who cut off the heads of schoolgirls in Indonesia, because the girls were Christian. I'm tired of hearing that Islam is a 'Religion of Peace', when every day I can read dozens of stories of Muslim men killing their sisters, wives and daughters in the name of restoring their family honour, or Muslims rioting over some slight offence, or Muslims murdering Christians and Jews because they aren't believers', or Muslims burning schools for girls, or Muslims stoning teenage victims of rape to death for their 'adultery', or Muslims mutilating the genitals of little girls. All done in the name of Allah because the Qur'an and Sharia law demands it.

ON BECOMING RADICALIZED

After the terrorist attack in San Bernardino, some people justifiably concentrated on the guns that were used in the killing. We should also examine  how the Islamic State is able to radicalize a couple living in Redlands, California? How can it  cause people to negate their own reality  for the Isis cause?

Often  our  segmented, individualized society, results in some people finding themselves totally cut off. I believe that people who become radicalized are not revolting against any actual oppression. 




Perhaps they are frustrated by their lack of success, their low self-respect or their inability to fully believe in the goals presented by their society. Their lives may be filled with constant  boredom and much jealousy. The reality of free choice may cause some form of self guilt exacerbated by their own perceived mediocrity. 

Recruiters preach to these candidates,  that the only way to alter their personal situation is to transform the world in some radical way










SOCIAL MEDIA 

The social media of sympathizers in the United States deserves a close  inspection. Apparently these people number in the hundreds, and fit no common profile. Consider some examples that led to criminal charges. Included are a trio of teenage siblings from Chicago

They have little in common except all had spent an inordinate  number of on line hours  digesting  the rhetoric and symbolism of the Islamic State. Many end up in unforeseen circumstances. 


Ali Amin, a lonely Virginia teenager   became curious about the Islamic State  and went online to learn more.  His life came to a crashing halt. In late August, he was sentenced to 11 years in prison after pleading guilty to material support for a terrorist group. Mr. Amin raised his concerns about Syria with several adults, including two Imams and a Christian minister, his lawyer, Joseph Flood, said. None gave him much time or took his questions about Islam seriously. But on his laptop, alone in his bedroom in Manassas, he found powerful emotional support for his militant pronouncements.

“He’s being told, ‘Not only are you smart and wise, you’re a leader,’ ” Mr. Flood said. "Ali’s involvement in these activities came as a complete shock to everybody who knew him as  a kind and gentle person”.American recruits who managed to reach Syria have suffered the still grimmer fate of dying on distant battlefields. 



George Washington University reported on   the diversity of the 71 people in the United States charged with crimes related to the Islamic State since March 2014.  Forty percent were converts to Islam, without any common ethnic profile. They were all young, with an average age of 26. Most were overwhelmingly American citizens or legal residents and 14 percent were women. But all, or nearly all, had spent hours on the Internet trumpeting their feelings about the Islamic State and engaging with English speakers from many other countries. In fact, nearly all were arrested after their online posts drew the attention of the F.B.I.  

Three Brooklyn men, Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, Akhror Saidakhmetov and Abror Habibov face charges of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists.  Juraboev posted on a pro-Isis website, "Greetings! We too wanted to pledge our allegiance and commit ourselves while not present there. I am in USA now but we don’t have any arms. But is it possible to commit ourselves as dedicated martyrs anyway while here? What I’m saying is, to shoot Obama then get shot ourselves, will it do? That will strike fear in the hearts of infidels."

Tai rod Nathan Webster Pugh, in his late forties, is a former US Air Force mechanic charged with trying to join Isis in Syria.  Pugh, who is from New Jersey but had been living overseas for years. A federal grand jury in Brooklyn, N.Y. indicted Pugh Monday on two charges; attempting to provide material support to terror organization and obstruction and attempted obstruction of an official proceeding.

A Kansas man, John T. Booker Jr., 20,  posted last year on Facebook: “I will soon be leaving you forever so goodbye! I’m going to wage jihad and hopes that i die.” He went on to say, “Getting ready to be killed in jihad is a HUGE adrenaline rush!!” he wrote, according to court documents. “I am so nervous. NOT because I’m scared to die but I am eager to meet my lord.” He was arrested outside an Army base as he connected wires to what he thought was a bomb; it was a fake provided by an F.B.I. informant.



Ms. Humera Khan, an expert on countering extremism claims, "The network of ISIS supporters is getting smaller, but tighter and more inward looking,”  Ms. Khan added that the San Bernardino attack may accelerate that inward trend by intensifying government scrutiny. It may shrink the Islamic State’s propaganda profile, but it will also make the group’s circles harder to penetrate and its supporters more difficult for law enforcement to track.

THE QUESTION:

Is there a correlation between too much liberty, easy access to semi automatic weapons, multi-cultural societies,  extremism on both sides (Isis and Trump) and radicalization?

THE QUOTE:

"FANATICS fear liberty more than they fear persecution."-French philosopher Ernest Renan

THE LEMON:

To Saudi Arabia for  a 'sitting in the weeds' approach to a 'just solution' to the Middle East reality.

GET ON IT!

THE CLIP: