His name is not Abdul Ibrahim, it is Andrew Scott Boguslawski. He was caught with weapons, ammo, dozens of bombs, and other tools of the terrorist trade in Ohio a few weeks ago. He looks to be an average American on the surface. The media has been pretty restrained in their reporting, treating it like a normal criminal case. No one is freaking out.

His name is not Muhammed Bin Arjara, it is Mark Kulis. He is one of those “sovereign citizen” nutbars, and was also busted for having illegal weapons and explosives. The media has been pretty restrained in their reporting, treating it like a normal criminal case. No one is freaking out.

His name is not Abou Ben Adhem, it is Chris Christie. His administration put millions of Americans at risk by shutting down part of the George Washington Bridge (a known terrorist target) on 9/11 of last year. The media has been pretty restrained in their reporting, hardly even mentioning the al-Quaida connection at all. No one is freaking out.

But just imagine the hue and cry and universal brouhaha had any of these three mutts been swarthy males with “foreign-sounding” names. The “news” media would be in 24/7 panic-inducing, fear-mongering, hair-on-fire, freakout mode. The cops would be deploying all manner of special weaponry. Americans would be told to use extra caution, to look under our beds, to be “vigilant”.

But since these are honkie dudes with “normal” names, America pretty much yawns.

Gentle Reader, this is nonsense. The skin color of someone who does you harm makes no difference whatsoever when you are lying in an ambulance or morgue. And paying undue attention to someone’s skin color or religious background when trying to decide if they are a threat makes it far more likely that somebody else you aren’t looking at will blow you to Kingdom come.

Or, of course, the whole “Global War on Terror” schtick could just be a con job, a cynical manipulation of the public so as to enrich the rich and gull the gullible; and maybe we should just calm down and treat all terrorists as common criminals, like we are those two lily-white curs in Ohio… Naah. Couldn’t be.

Mr. Blunt and Cranky