Reality checks: Obama’s unreal initiatives meet the real world
Two images last week contrasted sharply with President and Mrs. Obamas’ otherwise adulatory treatment in Europe and Turkey. The images show how out of touch with reality Team Obama is on two of the most important national security threats of our time: 1) the totalitarian theo-political-legal program authoritative Islam calls “Shariah” and 2) the proliferating danger of nuclear weapons and the ballistic missiles that will deliver them.
The first image was reportedly captured by a cellphone camera in the Swat Valley of Pakistan’s Northwest Territories. According to Saturday’s New York Times, a two-minute video recorded the agony of a seventeen year-old girl being flogged by a “Taliban commander.”
The Times could not ascertain the exact “crime” that precipitated this brutal beating. One source said that it could have been that the girl “stepped out of her house without being escorted by a male family member.” Another said that “a local Taliban commander had falsely accused the teenager of violating Islamic law after she refused his marriage proposal.”
The video is inconvenient as it provides a vivid insight into the repressive, totalitarian and misogynistic nature of Shariah at the very moment that President Obama has been aggressively promoting the idea that the Islamic world must be “respected.” To do so, he insists that non-Muslim Americans must use “respectful language” with regard to Islam and its followers. He went beyond words to demonstrate his submission to the King of Saudi Arabia by deeply bowing before him (something he did not do for the Queen of England).
The trouble is that any criticism of Shariah and of those – including the Taliban – who practice it as authoritative Islam dictates is not simply seen as disrespectful. It amounts to blasphemy, a capital offense according to Islamic law.
Among those promoting the application of Shariah blasphemy laws worldwide are: the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), a kind of international mafia enterprise made up of 57 Muslim-majority countries around the world; the so-called “Alliance of Civilizations,” which met in Turkey during Mr. Obama’s visit there; and the United Nations Human Rights Council and General Assembly, which are – like the Alliance –increasingly dominated by the OIC.
Non-Muslims’ obligation to “respect” Islam is also high on the agenda of the seditious Muslim Brotherhood and scores of groups in the United States that operate as fronts for it. (Worryingly, some of the latter claim the Obama administration has expressed a desire to pursue the hiring of 45 Muslim Americans the Brotherhood types have vetted for the purpose.)
The New York Times reports, however, that the video from the Swat Valley (perhaps it should be called the “Flog Valley” from now on) has precipitated an intense controversy in Pakistan. After all, this evidence of the Talibans’ application of Shariah law is offending many Pakistanis who, like large numbers of Muslims around the world, do not practice their faith as Shariah prescribes and have no more interest in living under this barbaric code than do the rest of us. They are questioning the wisdom of their government’s recent decision to surrender the valley to the Taliban, and to agree to the latter’s demand that it be allowed to impose Shariah in the region.
This development is of particular relevance as the Obama administration recasts its policy towards Afghanistan. Notwithstanding the beefing up of U.S. forces there, the United States in the person of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has signaled an openness towards accepting the sort of deal for the Afghans that the Pakistanis have now acquiesced to in the Swat Valley.
Moreover, on Monday in Turkey, President Obama went so far as to declare that “the United States is not and never will be at war with Islam. In fact, our partnership with the Muslim world is critical…in rolling back a fringe ideology that people of all faiths reject.” Unfortunately, the “fringe ideology” to which he refers is really Shariah. And those who endorse it include the recognized, “mainstream” institutions, traditions, scholars and texts of the faith – not just those like al Qaeda, the Taliban and the Muslim Brotherhood who engage in jihad, whether of the violent or stealthy kind, in the name of Shariah.
The second discordant image of the week was of a ballistic missile fired by North Korea over Japan and in the general direction of the United States. It comes as Mr. Obama was grandiosely declaring his commitment to rid the world of nuclear weapons and his administration was gutting the funding required to develop and deploy effective anti-missile defenses and scuppering the NATO-agreed plan for emplacing radars and interceptors in Poland and the Czech Republic. (This reckless act of unrealism will be discussed at greater length in next week’s column.)
Suffice it to say for the moment that the two images of trouble ahead should be borne in mind even as they conflict with the dominant motif of the week: a President accorded the Euro-equivalent of Jesus’ palm frond-graced entrance into Jerusalem. Let us pray that the folly being perpetrated by the object of such misplaced veneration today will not bring his country great grief tomorrow.
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. is the President of the Center for Security Policy and a columnist for the Washington Times.
Mr. Gaffney is the host of Secure Freedom Radio, a nationally-syndicated radio program heard weeknights throughout the country. He is an associate author of highly acclaimed Shariah: The Threat to America and the publisher of over a dozen other books and monographs from the Center for Security Policy Press.
In April 1987, Mr. Gaffney was nominated by President Reagan to become the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy, the senior position in the Defense Department with responsibility for policies involving U.S.-USSR relations, nuclear forces, arms control, missile defense policy and U.S.-European defense ties. He acted in that capacity for seven months during which time, he was the Chairman of the prestigious High Level Group, NATO’s senior politico-military committee. He also represented the Secretary of Defense in key U.S.-Soviet negotiations and ministerial meetings.
From August 1983 until November 1987, Mr. Gaffney was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear Forces and Arms Control Policy under Assistant Secretary Richard Perle.
From February 1981 to August 1983, Mr. Gaffney was a Professional Staff Member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, chaired by the late Senator John Tower (R-Texas). And, in the latter 1970’s, Mr. Gaffney served as an aide to the late Senator Henry M. “Scoop” Jackson (D-Washington) in the areas of defense and foreign policy.
Mr. Gaffney holds a Master of Arts degree in International Studies from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and a Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service from the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service.
Mr. Gaffney’s leadership has been recognized by numerous organizations including: the Department of Defense Distinguished Public Service Award (1987), the U.S. Business and Industry Council’s Defender of the National Interest Award (1994), the Navy League of the United States’ Alfred Thayer Mahan Literary Achievement Award (1999), and the Zionist Organization of America’s “Louis Brandeis Award” (2003), the Western Conservative Summit’s Stephen H. Long Award (2015), the Council for National Policy’s George Washington Military Leadership Award (2016) and the IMPACT Award from Ginni Thomas and United in Purpose (2017).
Mr. Gaffney was born in 1953 and resides in the Washington, D.C. area.
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