Posted on April 13, 2009

by

Daniel Clark

After a week of speculation that 17 Uighur detainees from the Guantanamo prison might be released into the general American population, National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair took things a step further. "If we are to release them in the United States, we need some sort of assistance for them to start a new life," he said. "You can't just put them on the street."

The Uighurs are Islamic Chinese dissidents, and therefore subject to human rights abuses if they are returned home. Despite the fact that these men belong to an al-Qaeda affiliated separatist group called the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, and had trained at a terrorist training camp in Tora Bora, liberals argue that they are no threat to Americans, because they must have been training to carry out attacks against the Chinese.

That's a dangerous assumption, to say the least. Just because the Uighurs want independence from China does not mean that these particular Uighurs don't consider Americans and other so-called infidels to be their enemies as well, in much the same way that many Chechens have engaged in terrorism far beyond the borders of Russia.

Moreover, these 17 men are not part of a legitimate resistance movement. To treat them as if they were is to buy into the canard that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. There very well may be Uighurs who are genuine freedom fighters, but not among those who are trained to kill the innocent, by an outfit that's every bit as hostile toward freedom as the government in Beijing. The presumption that they would only kill innocent Chinese, instead of innocent Americans, Spaniards or Indians, is hardly enough to vouch for their character.

Nevertheless, President Obama proposes not only to harbor these men, but to subsidize them. Now that he's renamed the War on Terror the "Overseas Contingency Operations," he apparently sees no need to worry about what goes on inside our own country. Besides, these Uighurs received their terrorist training eight long years ago. How old was Obama back then, anyway -- 40? He probably just assumes that by now they've been completely rehabilitated. Those of us who are dredging up the past must be a bunch of neoconservative hate-mongers, driven by a deeply ingrained anti-Uighur prejudice.

Still, in our current economic situation, putting the detainees on the dole is likely to cause a greater uproar than releasing them, especially so soon after the administration's suggestion (quickly abandoned) to cut $540 million in veterans' benefits. Although he is loath to look outside the government for a solution, it would behoove the president to find another source of funding.

Luckily for him, a liberal cause can always count on the help of celebrities. Remember how dozens of the world's most popular musicians got together for Live Aid to raise money for the starving people of Ethiopia, but instead gave much of it to the Communist government that was helping to starve them? When it comes to morally vacant activism, the entertainment industry is second to none. Perhaps Bob Dylan said it best in "We Are The World," when he sang, "Ischoo eemayga bennapay, chuss yoooney beeee."

On second thought, most people say things better than that, but you get the idea. If Obama would get the word out that entertainers are needed to raise money for the enemies of civilization, Bruce Springsteen, The Dixie Chicks, and countless other acts could put on a show that would make Woodstock look like a bad piano bar sing-along, which it was. Never mind "assistance"; the Uighurs could have trust funds set up for them, on which they could all live like Kennedys for the rest of their lives.

According to liberal behavioral theory, this should prevent them from ever following through on any acts of terrorism. Obama tells us that terrorism is caused by poverty. To a redistributionist like him, that's just a roundabout way of saying that America is to blame. If we administer "economic justice" by spreading some American wealth around to the detainees, then that, theoretically, ought to reform them.

George W. Bush once said, "either you're with us, or you're with the terrorists." Barack Obama has decided that it's not necessarily an either/or proposition. As a result, receiving weapons training and "religious instruction" at a terrorist training camp is now a resume enhancer on an application for sanctuary.

Has Elian Gonzalez heard about this? If so, he must be busy making plans to inner tube his way to Pakistan.

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