9-11 and School Shootings

Giuliani rebuked Ron Paul for blaming 9/11 on U.S. foreign policy "blowback."

The chairman of the Michigan Republican Party said Wednesday that "he will try to bar Ron Paul from future GOP presidential debates because of remarks the Texas congressman made that suggested the Sept. 11 attacks were the fault of U.S. foreign policy."

Did Ron Paul commit a strategic campaign blunder by saying we should "listen" to Al Queda?

FOXNews moderator Wendell Goler asked Paul, "Are you suggesting we invited the 9/11 attacks?" and Giuliani called Paul's answer "absurd."

When Ron Paul suggested Moslems view our intervention in the middle east the same way we would view intervention by China in our hemisphere, there was hesitant applause from people who were warned at the beginning of the evening not to applaud. Perhaps they thought they might get in trouble if they signaled their approval of Paul's analysis. When Giuliani gave his vacuous emotional rebuke of Dr. Paul, the patriots in the audience knew they wouldn't get in trouble for goosestepping with their hands.



Here's the analogy I'm thinking of using in a congressional campaign.

The perpetrators of 9/11 committed an evil, wicked, and sinful act. (I can use those words because I'm an out-of-the-closet theocrat.) If they thought they were going to be rewarded with 72 virgins, they now know they were wrong. Their action cannot be justified, excused, exculpated, or legitimized. They had no right to do what they did.

But wise leadership will analyze our foreign policy to see if this is a case of "blowback" -- the unanticipated domestic consequences of U.S. foreign intervention.

Let's draw an analogy to school shootings. A student walks into class and starts gunning down fellow students. He does not commit suicide when he's done, but surrenders to authorities. When asked why he did it, he says the other students were "always picking on me." Should this get him a not-guilty verdict at his trial? In no way.

But as a Christian, I would examine myself, following Biblical commands: was I one of those who taunted, mocked, insulted, ignored, shunned, and "picked on" this unloveable student, or did I befriend him, defend him, include him, and encourage him, even if he repeatedly ignored my overtures?

My failure to be Christlike, of course, would not justify his mass-murders. But now that the crime has been committed, what can I learn about myself?

What can the U.S. federal government learn from 9-11? That is not an "absurd" question, and Giuliani shows himself to be a propagandist, not a wise statesman. Washington D.C. needlessly nurtured and provoked radical Islamo-fascism, and New York City paid the price. Giuliani shows that if elected he will repeat the same mistakes Washington has been making since at least the CIA overthrow of the Iranian government in 1953.

"Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall" applies to nations as well as to individuals.

Our nation can learn a lot by listening to Osama.