Ben Shapiro
Early Sunday morning, a radical Muslim born in the United States murdered at least 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando. President Obama, as he always does, downplayed the terrorist attacker’s connections to Islam, instead vaguely ascribing the attacker’s radicalization to “various extremist information.”
The next day, Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, went on Fox and Friends to discuss President Obama’s statement. And there, as he always does, Trump stuck his foot all the way down his throat. “Look,” said Trump, “we’re led by a man that either is not tough, not smart, or he’s got something else in mind.” He could have left it there — but once Trump has his teeth in something, he must continue chomping:
And the something else in mind — you know, people can’t believe it. People cannot, they cannot believe that President Obama is acting the way he acts and can’t even mention the words “radical Islamic terrorism.” There’s something going on. It’s inconceivable. There’s something going on. He doesn’t get it or he gets it better than anybody understands — it’s one or the other and either one is unacceptable.
The implication, given Trump’s context, is that Obama is a covert Muslim.
This would not be the first time Trump has made such a suggestion. In 2011, as Trump called for Obama’s birth certificate (he said Obama was probably ineligible and born in Kenya), he stated, “Maybe [his birth certificate] says he is a Muslim.” In 2012, Trump tweeted, “Does Madonna know something we all don’t about Barack? At a concert she said, ‘we have a black Muslim in the White House.’” A significant number of Republicans agree with this theory by polling data.
On Tuesday, President Obama retaliated. Obama, who appeared visibly upset — far more upset than he was in his original statement discussing the murder of 49 Americans by a radical Muslim terrorist in Orlando — went after Trump directly. He explained that there was no need to use the term “radical Islam” — that would simply make things worse:
That’s the key, they tell us. We can’t get ISIL unless we call them “radical Islamists”’ What exactly would using this label accomplish? What exactly would it change? Would it make ISIL less committed to trying to kill Americans? Would it bring in more allies? Is there a military strategy that is served by this? The answer is, none of the above. Calling a threat by a different name does not make it go away. This is a political distraction. There is no magic to the phrase “radical Islam.” It’s a political talking point; it’s not a strategy.
Ironically, this argument — “Would not terrorism by any other name smell as sweet?” — is itself a political talking point, not a strategy. Nevertheless, Obama’s not reticent to talk about radical Islam because he’s Muslim. He’s reticent to talk about radical Islam because he’s a leftist.
Obama believes, as doctrinaire leftists do, that human beings do not derive meaning from ancient religious superstitions and deep-seated ideas about how the universe ought to operate. Given relief from material want and prevention of emotional distress, Obama believes, all human beings would get along just fine — and would then be free to cultivate themselves as they see fit.
Karl Marx wrote that “life involves before everything else eating and drinking, a habitation, clothing, and many other things.” In this view, unhappiness derives from scarcity in these resources or from social relationships created to guarantee these primary needs for some at the expense of others. Religion, meanwhile, exists only to misdirect such unhappiness toward the cosmic rather than toward one’s fellow man. Hence Marx’s belief that abolition of religion is “the demand for their real happiness.”
He can’t (won’t) say it because that would interfere with using the tragedy to promote political agendas.
Why won’t republicans drop drop this worse-than-useless stupidity and focus instead on actually dealing with the threat of ISIS, as President Obama has been doing for nearly 2 years now?
And why won’t they deal with the fact that their presumptive nominee is a complete idiot before it’s too late? At the very least, this guy is going to do their party serious damage that it likely won’t recover from for years.
I think Obama gave a rather coherent explanation just yesterday.
When Robert Lewis Dear killed 3 wounded 9 at the Planned Parenthood mass shooting, Obama also did not call the is a Christian terrorist incident. Should he have?
@Greg:
Oh… you mean like Obama makes an ISIS-inspired and motivated terror attack about gun control and homophobia? Where is it that Obama has stated what he is going to do against ISIS? He has no plan, no strategy and he wants illogical restraints that would impede future administrations when someone that cares about national security gets into office.
@Ajay42302: Obama lied and misdirected just as he always does.
@john: Well let’s see… did Dear yell “Jesus is Lord” as he fired? Perhaps thee was no connection to religion.
@Bill:
What we are doing right now is regaining territory that Obama lost to ISIS to begin with through his inaction. It’s kind of like the deficits. Run them up over a trillion dollars and then when they get back under a trillion, brag about how much you cut the deficits even though they are still far higher than before you took office. There is a pattern. Don’t expect any of the sheep to recognize or acknowledge it.
Following Obama’s standard, from here on out when talking about Pearl Harbor we shouldn’t make any mention of Japan because everyone knows who bombed it. We also should make no reference to the NAZI’s when talking about the Holocaust because everyone knows who did it. When discussing the millions that were butchered in Russia/the USSR, we shouldn’t make any reference to the Communists because everyone knows who did it (well at least everyone but their apologists on the left). We are witnessing real time historical revisionism with regards to Radical Islamic terrorism.
@another vet: “If you like your ISIS controlled territory, you can KEEP your ISIS controlled territory.”