Fort Dix Six clerk: “Should I call someone or is that being racist?”
posted at 9:05 pm on May 13, 2007 by Allahpundit
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Perfection. As a summation of counterterrorism in a multicultural age, it simply can’t be improved upon — right down to the glaring misuse of the word “racist” to describe a terror plot in which five of the six principals are non-Arab. Not even Steyn and Lileks, as brilliant as they’ve been in mocking the absurdities of western “sensitivity” in the teeth of jihad, have hit the target so squarely. It reads like a punchline, which is exactly what it is.
But let’s concede this much to Olby and the nutroots denialists: however potentially lethal these guys might have been, they were indeed decidedly JV.
It all began on a frigid January day with 10 bearded Muslim men huddled in the parking lot of a Circuit City debating who would go inside to have a copy made of a tape showing them firing guns and praising jihad.
Eventually, the group - who’d been seen standing outside earlier that January 2006 week - selected two men to go inside while the rest waited in the parking lot, an employee who was outside smoking at the time recalled.
I’m no expert, but I’m guessing a semipro jihadist outfit could manage to make a copy of a videotape without the whole cell needing to take a day trip down to the local outlet store. Geez.
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Unfortunately, I don’t think this mistake gets made again. That’s one unavoidable downside to all the press coverage. Terrorists will learn from this. I just hope the teen clerk hero stays safe.
tdau1997 on May 13, 2007 at 9:15 PM
Know your enemy. Since our side has nothing like these fellows, the intelligence community had better be building a new anti-terrorist group to combat them. I think I know the perfect guy to lead the effort. That’s right. You guessed it. His name is Forrest Gump.
CyberCipher on May 13, 2007 at 9:18 PM
I think George Tenet should give that young man his Medal of Freedom. The kid deserves it. Tenet does not.
Zorro on May 13, 2007 at 9:22 PM
I do think we should consider cutting the clerk for some slack given his age, and it’s also unclear to me that he understood much from the tape other than middle eastern men with beards shooting guns and shouting. I agree that it’s madness if our knee jerk reaction is to think about racism before we dial 911, but it was obviously overwhelming for the guy. He did the right thing.
I was in a photo store in Indonesia in 2004 and saw what I first thought was Osama Bin Laden in a packet of photos the guy next to me was looking at. Shocked, I didn’t do a good job of not staring, and the guy noticed and reacted pretty defensively, which played right into the whole scenario. I got online and convinced myself that it wasn’t really the big fish, but it took three days for my heart rate to return to normal.
The head bomb maker for J.I was killed that December in a police raid on a house 15 miles from mine. Which is to say that there were indeed interesting people visiting my town. In retrospect I should probably have called the U.S. consulate. I’m sooo glad that clerk got good advice from his co-workers.
TexasDan on May 13, 2007 at 9:25 PM
Finally…
JaHerer22 on May 13, 2007 at 9:29 PM
I’m not ragging on the clerk; I’m saying that the fact that he paused with such alarming evidence in front of him — men with beards in “fundamentalist attire” shooting guns and screaming “God is great” — shows how enfeebled people’s instincts in this area have been by undue concerns about “sensitivity.”
Allahpundit on May 13, 2007 at 9:29 PM
So you’re agreeing with me, then, that these guys were potentially lethal, yes, JA?
Allahpundit on May 13, 2007 at 9:30 PM
Right now this kid is in hiding. Afraid of being sued, afraid of being pursued by members of the Religion of Peace™ and afraid of being a teenager in America. You have to know he is wondering the same things. Why is he the one having to go into hiding and needing security instead of the ones who want to do him harm.
Remember folks, liberals think this whole war on terrorism is a sham and should be handled legally. Well before any legal procedings can be brought a crime has to be committed. You know like blowing up a bus, a building or your childs’ school.
LakeRuins on May 13, 2007 at 9:30 PM
I feel that too much info has been given about the store clerk already, it seems every time I read an article on this subject there’s a little more info on this guy.
4shoes on May 13, 2007 at 9:34 PM
The thing to keep in mind with the Fort Dix Six (well, ten) is that they were dumb as bags of hammers. How many have not been caught because they know how to keep a low profile? On top of which, these morons were caught by a video store clerk.
Which means, painting with the broadest brush possible, that the various American intelligence agencies can’t catch those in plain sight. I’d almost say they’ve become worse since 1993.
Krydor on May 13, 2007 at 9:37 PM
LakeRuins, it’s like fighting a war where we hae to wait for them to shoot first .
Utter insanity , when it is they who need to be hunted down.
bbz123 on May 13, 2007 at 9:38 PM
AP, I very much agree. But I don’t think we even know that the clerk understood “Allah Akhbar” necessarily.
Given that, he may have felt that he was making his decision based on race(beards and the get up=Arab to lots of folks), not on having discovered a terrorist plot, so I’m nit-picking this line, I guess. But I get you’re not ragging on the guy.
TexasDan on May 13, 2007 at 9:39 PM
they were indeed decidedly JV.
I don’t think this shows they were jv. There have been a lot of money laundering laws enacted to prevent people like this from getting funding and they probably didn’t have the $200-$300 minimum to get a dvd recorder or cheap pc equipment to make copies. So they went with the cheap alternative, probably thinking that America’s pc attitude would prevent anybody from saying anything. Which is what almost happened.
forged rite on May 13, 2007 at 9:40 PM
If the feds had announced on 9/10/01 that they had arrested 19 men that were going to take over four airliners and destroy the World Trade Center, The Pentagon and perhaps the WHite House or Capitol, Jaherer and his leftist bretheren would be saying the same thing they are saying now.
If the issue is security, the Dems won’t win, so they always change the subject or try to diminish the incident.
Let me be clear, if a cell in America with people illegally presenty in America are planning to attack and kill US soldiers, there is nothing JV or funny about it.
Think about if we were reading about this and 37 Dead Soldiers at the same time.
Throw the book at these scum and vote the Dems out of office and lets get back to the business of defending civilization from the barbarian hordes.
JayHaw Phrenzie on May 13, 2007 at 9:55 PM
Yes, I’ve never denied that and said it several times in several posts…I think Cho proved that any moron with a gun is potentially lethal. But just suggesting the idea they were Bush-league meant I was denying there was a terrorist threat, sympathizing with them, refusing to take terrorism seriously, etc etc etc.
What’s wrong with acknowledging that some of the terrorists are semi-retarded? This is a good thing for us. And we could even use it to our advantage from a propaganda standpoint: it could work change the image in the Muslim world of terrorists as incompetent JV losers instead of noble martyrs.
JaHerer22 on May 13, 2007 at 9:56 PM
True, but aren’t a lot of Jihadist recruits lowlife idiots? Isn’t that how they get them? And it sounds like these people are total f-ups to begin with. Didn’t they have something like 50 or 60 traffic violations and the brothers each had their licenses suspended numerous times. It sounds like they were just really stupid, but it doesn’t take a big brain to be deadly.
RightWinged on May 13, 2007 at 9:56 PM
The problem is that you guys on the left immediately run out to tell us how JV they are JaHerer22. Like we don’t already see that or something? You guys have to come out and say “I know they were bad… but how bad were they?”. Why say it at all? Are you bringing something to the debate that we didn’t already know? And JV losers and noble (in their mind) martyrs are not mutually exclusive.
As for Bush League, take this!
RightWinged on May 13, 2007 at 10:02 PM
Flying pig alert!!
I agree with JaHerer. (I’m scared….)
omnipotent on May 13, 2007 at 10:02 PM
Hey, JaHeyDere, you missed “taking it up the a$$ for Al Qaeda”; I’m sure someone threw that in there…
Jaibones on May 13, 2007 at 10:02 PM
Exactly! The overall climate of liberal PC multiculturalist hypersensitivity to anything that could be remotely considered racist is what had this clerk questioning what he knew in his conscience to be true. Thank God he didn’t give in to the indoctrination.
infidel4life on May 13, 2007 at 10:05 PM
Yes it is a shame that the kid had to think twice about turning the tape over to the FBI, it must have been going against his training as an employee and what he learned in school. That is a hard thing to do especially when you are trying to do the right thing,like a religion of the multi-culti. I think with the national coverage of the incident people will be more willing to expose any plot to hurt fellow citizens, I know I will. I have a nephew on the NJ State SWAT team and I doubt if he would hesitate to investigate suspicious activity like these guys were doing.
sonnyspats1 on May 13, 2007 at 10:17 PM
Why put terrorists here illegally on trial at all. They’re not citizens, they’re enemy combatants same as if they were planning attacks on forces in theatre. One way ticket to Gitmo, the lot of em…more mercy than they deserve.
Buck Turgidson on May 13, 2007 at 10:31 PM
Dude, you’re getting Re-Ed.
Attila (Pillage Idiot) on May 13, 2007 at 10:50 PM
As several have mentioned in this thread it’s a real shame that when someone faced with such a situation that their first thought is not “call the police” but instead is “is that being racist.”
It’s just further proof how the PC police, the pacifists, and the liberal left have obliterated the line between “profiling” and “racism.” Profiling is a very common (and common sense) technique used around the world by law enforcement and the military to identify potential “bad people” and has nothing to do with being racist!
I’d say it’s not just “American Sensitivity” but European sensitivity as well, I read a story on the Fox news ticker that a Muslim Imam in Italy was upset at the news that all of Europe was going to increase its monitoring of Mosques to identify radical hate speech and jihadi elements, the Imam called it “religious discrimination.”
This is a common tactic being used by our enemy, whenever we make any of efforts to protect our nation and people they scream “discrimination” or “racial profiling” and unfortunately for us (and fortunate for our enemy) this tactic has been quite successful thanks to the groups I previously mentioned.
However, what’s absolutely absurd and scary about this is the fact these very same elements within our nation and government somehow think the radical Islamist Jihadi’s and their Sharia law would give a rats-a** about our rights, civil liberties, or religion should they come to power over us and succeed in their quest for world domination!
Liberty or Death on May 13, 2007 at 11:11 PM
So I’m a “racist” for staring down the burka clad losers at my local Food Lion grocery store who insist on staring at me through the slits?
SouthernGent on May 13, 2007 at 11:34 PM
At most schools, the JV players have a shot at the varsity team next season, after seniors graduate, or players get injured, move out of the district, etc. Even the JV squad at, say, Florida, could probably score a few points on the varsity at a Div. III school.
Given the sheer number of Muslims living in the US, there are bound to be quite a few of them sufficiently unhinged as to try something. What I fear is the ones who, instead of trying to gain entry to Ft. Dix and kill soldiers, instead target <I’m not going to give them any ideas, but suffice to say that if one jihadi has half my imagination, and shares his plans with the other cells, we’ve got a lot of work to do >.
The Monster on May 13, 2007 at 11:39 PM
Where is the outcry?!?! This snitch was a SMOKER!!! He was endangering his own life AND the lives of SEVERAL bearded men. I think we need to know everything we can about this SMOKER and give him the most terrible mark of social stigma available. He’s a bad bad man.
askheaves on May 14, 2007 at 12:02 AM
The enemy being JV is no justification for Congress making our All-Pro team forfeit by not coming out for the second half…..metaphorically speaking….
TBinSTL on May 14, 2007 at 12:02 AM
What “race” are Muslims again?
Are Black Muslims and Malaysian Muslims and Thai Muslims and Turkish Muslims and Arab Muslims altogether a new “race”?
If they want to be considered a race, how about calling them the Disg Race?
The only one that the charge of “bigotry” and “racism” will no long apply.
profitsbeard on May 14, 2007 at 12:11 AM
What I want to know is how the same leftist tools who tell us that Arabs “can’t be anti-semites because they are semites too”* will refer to Arabs as “people of color” while simultaneously asserting that Jews enjoy “white privilege”.
*putting aside the arrant nonsense of applying to a non-Jewish ethnic group a linguistic term appropriated by a Jew hater to give his Jew hatred a veneer of respectability.
rokemronnie on May 14, 2007 at 1:22 AM
The Dix Ten are enemy combatants that should have been executed at dawn and shipped back to the respective country of origin.
Live with us, plot against us, seek to commit harm on our citizens, … Go say hi to the virgins.
AZ_Redneck on May 14, 2007 at 1:51 AM
Didn’t some of the 911 hijackers admit to their flight instructors that they weren’t interested in learning how to land the plane? That sounds pretty JV, doesn’t it?
Not everyone is a criminal mastermind.
And Allah, I love you, but I think this is too harsh:
I know you say “people”, but you’re talking about this kid, and he did the right thing. Wondering if you are over- reacting to something when you don’t know for sure what you are seeing is very human.
MayBee on May 14, 2007 at 2:12 AM
Maybee, respectfully, I call BS. It isn’t just kids who are kowtowed by PCness. Adults (look at the libs in congress etc) are just as bad. I submit they are worse because they should know better. Our forefathers built internment camps for the japanese (Which was terrible) because they didn’t give a rats a$$ about sensitivities when it came to national security. Now we have let the pendulem swing to the point where we consider ignoring behavior that is a potentially serious threat to this country and it’s people.
Now, my general rant…..
This teen IS a hero and needs to be recognized as such. Not just for him, but for all the other potential witnesses of terrorists activity. There are ABSOLUTE rights and wrongs and what this kid did was right and the pressure to minumize his courageous action is wrong. We need to get back to encouraging and praising those who do the right thing and we need to stop enabling people to get all a$$broke when they are accidentally suspected of something because they fit a profile. If you’re a Muslim, you need to toughen up. You are, because of others, going to be looked at suspiciously until we defeat the islamo-fascists. It’s a case of the needs of the many outweigh the wants of a few.
csdeven on May 14, 2007 at 7:53 AM
All any Mooslam terrorist needs to do is get a Dummiecrat to make a DVD for them. I’m sure the left would be thrilled.
lynnv on May 14, 2007 at 8:34 AM
It’s bad in this country when you are in fear of reporting a potential attack on your own countrymen because of fear you might be labeled as a racist by the unhinged left. He did the right thing as I would have. Labels shambels…the PC brigade needs to tone down their rhetoric and groups such as the ACLU need to check what they say, because some day there will be someone who won’t report something out of fear of being labeled a bigot…then dozens if not hundreds of Americans will die.
bentman78 on May 14, 2007 at 9:01 AM
I’ve got a “circuit city” for them. Only there’s no HDTV there. Booosh.
Buck Turgidson on May 14, 2007 at 10:17 AM
That’s true. It’s just that when you see something crazy like this, it would be normal to doubt you really see what you think you’re seeing. That’s separate from the PCness.
Mostly, I don’t like ragging on the kid for misusing the term racist or saying his mind has been enfeebled. Sure, Allah’s talking about “people”, but he’s using this kid as an example.
The kid did the right thing.
MayBee on May 14, 2007 at 10:42 AM
I absolutely agree. I cannot speak for AP, but my take on what he said was the kid actually considered NOT reporting it. But, I’ll let him explain himself if he sees fit.
csdeven on May 14, 2007 at 1:23 PM
The whole thing reads like something from the Simpsons. I’m astounded that there is even any debate on the issue. If you come across a video of Muslims training with guns and yelling Allah Akbar, THAT’S A BIG CLUE THAT YOU HAVE A TERROR CELL IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD! The debate is over at that point. Go to the FBI!
This hesitation shows how much Political Correctness has rotted the brains of the population, especially the kids.
Tantor on May 14, 2007 at 1:40 PM