The Romney Campaign's Baffling Mistake

For a man who has gone to great lengths to downplay the role of personal religious practice in the selection of an American president, 2008 GOP candidate Mitt Romney may have gotten what he deserved in his recent verbal exchange with Al Sharpton. By that I do not mean that Sharpton was right, or that his comments about Romney’s faith were not bigoted (they were). On the contrary, Sharpton insulted Romney and Romney’s faith in the same manner Sharpton insults nearly all faiths and ethnicities that differ from his narrow world view. Romney deserved the follow-up criticisms of his faith and subsequent media scrutiny because Romney demonstrated poor judgment by acknowledging and commenting on anything spoken by Al Sharpton in the first place. If the decision was made by a campaign advisor, Romney should start seeking new talent in a hurry. Romney and his team should have recognized Sharpton for the race and religious baiter that he is and not given it a second thought.

If Romney’s goal was to run for president on his substantial and impressive record in politics, business, and family life without having to pass a religious “litmus test,” he could not have chosen a worse course of action than publicly complaining about Sharpton's statements. This was a religious debate in New York City between a raving racist self-proclaimed “reverend” (Sharpton), and an avowed Atheist (Christopher Hitchens). If Romney intends to decry every disparaging remark made about his religion by anyone of prominence, he will ultimately spend far more time doing so in his campaign than describing his views and convincing voters he would make a good president.

What did Romney hope to accomplish by entangling himself in a religious tug of war with Sharpton? Why, if he did not want his religion to be a determining factor for voters, did he engage in religious discussions he knew would draw national attention? Some may argue that Romney was shrewd to allow himself to draw fire from a known bigot and an Atheist, as doing so would arouse the sympathy of religious conservatives (and it did, including Ralph Reed, who staunchly defended Romney on Hannity & Colmes last night). While this may seem a plausible explanation in the immediate aftermath of the incident and continuing verbal exchanges between Sharpton and Romney, it is more likely that this questionable decision will harm Romney’s campaign by making religion the defining issue, or at least the issue receiving the most media coverage.

Sharpton will not back down. He will never sincerely apologize. He will only continue to do what he has already done, which is to escalate his rhetoric against Romney’s faith by raising questions about his church’s restriction on blacks receiving the priesthood, which was discontinued in 1978. Simply by acknowledging Sharpton and commenting to the press, Romney opened himself to attacks publicized in the national media questioning whether his faith is truly Christian (which it clearly is) and whether it practiced discrimination (which it did not, if one accepts the LDS Church’s official declaration issued in 1978). Few will remember what Romney’s stances on terrorism and the economy are while the media focuses on his faith and its mysterious or misunderstood past, depending on one’s point of view.

Romney granted extensive media access to his family and addressed his religious views and the role of religion in his life in Hugh Hewitt’s book, A Mormon in the White House?: 10 Things Every American Should Know about Mitt Romney. As I read the book it seemed that Romney was hoping that Hewitt's work, written as it was by a popular radio host, blogger, and Evangelical, would satisfy national curiosity and answer any question as to whether a candidate’s faith should influence his perceived qualifications for the presidency. Instead of letting the book serve that purpose, aided by his low-profile responses to questions about his faith, Romney has now allowed others to frame the debate over his religion and he finds himself responding defensively. If the best defense is a good offense, then Romney made a tactical error by stepping into a defensive role in a national arena.

Romney would have been well served to do what most Americans do: ignore Sharpton’s vitriolic attention seeking. The "reverend" does not represent the beliefs and values of even a tiny fraction of African-Americans, and Romney could have further marginalized Sharpton by refusing to take his bait. Instead, Romney has now become the only GOP candidate who voters will mentally connect with Sharpton. In mudslinging, the innocent party is often splattered but needs not remain in range of further salvos or join his adversary in the mud. Romney can expect more attacks and will deserve them, not because they are fair, but because, like a matador, he could have side-stepped a perpetually charging Sharpton but chose instead to be gored.

"Sanctuary" Nearly Fatal For Fort Dix

At first glance, the plot by six recently converted Islamic terrorists to attack Fort Dix in New Jersey with automatic weapons seemed like a ridiculous idea. Why attack a target that was defended by armed security and had, within the confines of the military base, tactical response teams that could respond with significant force and firepower to repel the attack? How did they decide to target Fort Dix?

Media coverage of the foiled plot has offered a mixture of praise for the FBI and condemnation of everyone from President Clinton (for intervening in the former Yugoslavia and sheltering uprooted ethnic Albanians in New Jersey) to President Bush (for encouraging terrorism by our presence in Iraq). However, three sources offered even-keeled and informative reporting and analysis.

The first was a good general account of the plot and the arrest operation in the Washington Post yesterday that detailed each participant as well as how an alert video store clerk tipped off the FBI in 2006 after the co conspirators requested that a VHS videotape be converted into DVD format. The file contained video of the group training at a firearms range while calling for Jihad and importuning the name of “Allah.” The article also provided links to the criminal complaint and affidavit filed by the U.S. Attorney’s office and the FBI. Those documents present a complete description of the defendants, their actions, and their intentions.

The second source was a blog I read regularly, In From the Cold, the author of which often has unique perspectives, particularly on issues involving the military or military intelligence. In a post Tuesday titled “Terror Plot Thwarted,” the author, Spook86, addressed the knee-jerk question many likely had when they first read that the terrorists intended to attack a “secure” military base. Spook86 described some of the inner workings of military bases like Fort Dix, and focused on the security weaknesses that are common to all such facilities. Food delivery drivers bringing eagerly anticipated meals are a welcome and mundane sight at military bases and federal buildings for that matter, and entering the base under the guise of pizza delivery was a well selected tactic. Taxis, shuttle buses, food delivery, all of these are so common that they are rarely screened properly, especially if the driver is recognized by security guards. If you thought a military base on American soil was too secure to be a viable target for terrorists, you will reconsider that position after reading In From the Cold’s analysis of the plot’s potential success.

The third source, and certainly the most disturbing, was yesterday's Fox News story that reported the immigration/citizenship status of the terrorists. According to Fox News interviews with a federal law enforcement source, three of the terrorists were living illegally in the United States. While it may not be unusual for known terrorists to enter the United States illegally, the immigration pattern of these previously unknown terrorists will sound familiar to those who are concerned about America's porous borders. Three of the terrorists, the Duka brothers, were apparently smuggled into the United States near Brownsville, Texas in 1984, when they were children between ages 1-6, along with other family members. The family settled in New Jersey, and, to fit the hotly debated stereotype of so many illegal immigrants, worked various blue collar jobs into adulthood. Of the six terrorists arrested for plotting to assault Fort Dix, one was a cab driver, three were roofers, one worked as a 7-11 clerk, and one worked at his father's pizza restaurant. It was as a delivery driver that one of the terrorists obtained extensive knowledge of base operations. These blue collar hard working illegal aliens were seemingly assimilating into American society, just trying to find a better life than the one they left behind in their home country. Stop me if this story sounds familiar.

These young, hard working blue collar illegal immigrants, however, became enamored with the ideology and "heroism" of al Qaeda and were inspired by the recorded last "wills" of the 9/11 hijackers and according to the Fox report, the group watched video footage containing terrorist training instructions, including simulated and actual attacks on U.S. military personnel. In time, the group progressed from embracing ideology to actively plotting attacks on a variety of nearby targets, eventually escalating to the point where they attempted to purchase automatic weapons from an FBI informant who had infiltrated this illegal immigrant terrorist cell. That is when the FBI made its move. The outrageous aspect of this story is that these terrorists were known to local law enforcement (not as terrorists of course) long before they mutated into al-Qaeda wannabes, but because of city ordinances prohibiting police officers from questioning an individual's immigration or citizenship status, they continued living, working, and plotting in their neighborhood rather than being arrested, included in illegal immigrant databases, or deported. Fox News reported:

FOX News has also learned that there were 19 traffic citations against the Duka brothers, but according to a federal law enforcement source, because they operated in so-called "sanctuary cites," where law enforcement does not routinely tell the Homeland Security Department about illegal immigrants in their towns, none of the tickets raised red flags.

The terrorists in this case scouted multiple targets before choosing Fort Dix because of their familiarity with and proximity to it. If you live near a military base or government installation, be extra vigilant and report any suspicious activity immediately, because if you live in a "sanctuary" city, your city government has tied the hands of law enforcement and placed you in danger. It is no exaggeration when the President states that we must be right 100% of the time to prevent an attack, while the terrorists only have to get it right once. This group might have gotten it right had it not been for the DVD request and an alert store clerk’s willingness to take action. In this case, a Circuit City store clerk did more to protect homeland security than the local government. Rather than protect its citizens, local governments instead offered "sanctuary" to America-hating illegal immigrants who came alarmingly close to slaughtering many of America's finest at Fort Dix.

Debunking The Deified Lee

I was born with a lifelong passion for history, as reflected by my choice of undergraduate and graduate degree programs. I received my M.A. from a university in Virginia, a state in which General Robert E. Lee is worshipped as the embodiment of Jesus Christ and George Washington combined into one hallowed figure. At times I was convinced Lee ranked above both in the minds of some Virginians. Anyone with even a basic history education has been fed the traditional portrayal of Lee: Reluctant to war against his Union brothers; brilliant tactician; beloved by troops and citizens alike; a deeply religious and righteous man; impeccable integrity and southern honor; considered slavery evil. So revered is Robert E. Lee among historians, southerners, and especially Virginians, that nearly every historical portrayal, fact or fiction, has accepted the Lee myths as gospel truth. To criticize Lee is to criticize southern honor and nobility, and few have attempted the Herculean feat of separating Lee’s actual behavior from the larger-than-life stories told of him through print and film.

Having visited Gettysburg again recently after viewing the Turner production “Gettysburg” (1994), starring Martin Sheen as the "venerable" Lee, I was struck by the portrayal of Lee as a pious, tired general who was to be pitied because of his long sacrifice for what he believed to be a noble cause (states rights versus federalism). This states rights issue was the smokescreen put up by southerners to obscure the real issue of racism and preservation of slavery and its accompanying lifestyle of comfort and affluence for the slaveholder. At long last a historical biography is available that did not intentionally seek to destroy the image of Lee as a reluctant warrior and despiser of slavery, but by publishing his own letters and correspondence from his friends and family, the book reportedly allows his own words to demonstrate that Lee was not as noble or saintly as southern apologists insist.

NY Sun reviewer Eric Ormsby reported in today’s issue that Elizabeth Brown Pryor’s Reading the Man: A Portrait of Robert E. Lee Through His Private Letters sheds light on certain aspects of Lee’s personality and belief structure that Lee worshippers, if they are even aware of them, would prefer to keep in the dark. Two paragraph’s from Ormsby’s review capture effectively where history and reality diverged when it came to casting Lee as one who believed slavery was evil or who valued the lives of his troops:

The most disturbing chapters deal with Lee's views on slavery. He thought slavery an evil system not because it stripped slaves of freedom and dignity but because it was such an awful burden on slave owners. For Lee, slavery formed part of some inscrutable providential design through which slaves might someday rise to a higher condition (though never to the level of whites). He was a brutal slave owner, destroying families to make a quick profit. "By 1860 he had broken up every family but one on the estate," Ms. Pryor writes. Once he had a runaway slave given 50 lashes, urging his constable to "lay it on well," and then had brine poured onto the victim's flayed back — this was a slave who had been manumitted at Lee's father-in-law's death but whom Lee refused to free. Despite Ms. Pryor's best efforts to put all this in context, Lee stands revealed as both cruel and hypocritical.

Lee had wit and grace in abundance, as his letters prove. And they display other unsuspected aspects of his personality. He was a lifelong flirt, indulging in startling sexual innuendo with female friends and relatives. He was a domestic tyrant who adored his children, lavishing them alternately with caresses and commands. But despite his considerable charm, something cold, some abstractly calculating tendency, characterized Lee. His troops regarded him as a father, but he let them be butchered by the thousands without so much as a backward glance; most conspicuously at Gettysburg, when even his own generals stood appalled. As Ms. Pryor shows throughout, Lee was simply unable to imagine the lives of others, whether slaves torn from their families or young soldiers squandered in suicidal charges. In crucial ways, Lee the man was more hollow — and more heartless — than the icon he became.

Ordinarily I am an outspoken critic of “revisionist history," as that genre has produced many volumes tearing down the reputations of the Founding Fathers, Abraham Lincoln, and other historical icons for which it is healthy for Americans to hold high opinions. There is something inherently wrong about debunking men who, though hampered by human weakness or error, wore out their lives in service to righteous ideals such as life, liberty, and constitutional government. I am much more forgiving when historians debunk iconic figures who wore out their lives defending evil practices such as slavery, as Lee did. It is never noble to fight for an evil cause. While many of the Founding Fathers were slaveholders, most of them abandoned the practice within years of constitutional ratification. Further, they laid the foundation for a system of government that could later be amended to eliminate slavery, discrimination, and a host of other inequalities over time. The northern colonial representatives in particular recognized that an accommodation for slavery would be necessary if the United States was to be established, and the mechanisms for future change were incorporated.

Lee, however, was firmly entrenched as a slave owner and was willing to kill other Americans and wage war to preserve his right to white supremacy and a life of luxury at the expense of other humans. The Founders fought a war with Britain to establish a free nation. Lee fought a war to keep other humans permanently enslaved. To revere him on a par with the Founders is to denigrate their ideals and accomplishments. Perhaps Pryor’s new book will help Americans better understand why statues of Lee and other Confederate “heroes” stir sentiments of anger and resentment within local African-American communities. They should stir those same sentiments within each of us regardless of race. Lee should not be considered a historical figure worthy of enshrinement in statue and laudatory biography. If more Americans were aware of Lee’s actual attitudes toward and personal treatment of his slaves, historical justice would be served. The next time you hear someone invoke “southern honor” or “states rights” to describe what the South fought for in the Civil War, you can point to Lee, the ultimate “southern gentleman,” and dispel the historical myths.