Being Called "Racist" a Fate Worse Than Death

We've now reached that point where it's put up or shut up. The politically-correct straitjacket that has tied this county in knots is not only turning everyday routine choices in life into crises, but now it's hampering the War on Terror. So people now have a choice: Quiver and quake like jellyfish over being called racist, or possibly face a gruesome death at the hands of Islamofascist monsters.

The latest nonsense from the Flying Imams and their cohorts from CAIR:

Air marshals, pilots and security officials yesterday expressed concern that airline passengers and crews will be reluctant to report suspicious behavior aboard for fear of being called "racists," after several Muslim imams made that charge in a press conference Monday at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

Six imams, or Muslim holy men, accused a US Airways flight crew of inappropriately evicting them from a flight last week in Minneapolis after several passengers said the imams tried to intimidate them by loudly praying and moving around the airplane. The imams urged Congress to enact laws to prohibit ethnic and religious "profiling."

And that's what this whole stunt was all about. Putting pressure on Congress to bow before them. They sense weakness now that the Democrats have regained Congress. Now, will those same Democrats openly risk passenger safety in order to placate this dubious crew?

Federal air marshals and others yesterday urged passengers to remain vigilant to threats.

"The crew and passengers act as our additional eyes and ears on every flight," said a federal air marshal in Las Vegas, who asked that his name not be used. "If [crew and passengers] are afraid of reporting suspicious individuals out of fear of being labeled a racist or bigot, then terrorists will certainly use those fears to their advantage in future aviation attacks."

But Rabiah Ahmed, spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), said Muslims "have to walk around on eggshells in public just because we don't want to be misconstrued as suspicious. You have to strike a balance between legitimate fears which people may have, but not allow passengers to have so much discretion that they can trigger a process that would violate a traveler's basic civil rights."

The imams say they were removed from the Phoenix-bound flight because they were praying quietly in the concourse. They had been in Minnesota for a conference sponsored by the North American Imams Federation.

But other passengers told police and aviation security officials a different version of the incident. They said suspicious behavior of the imams led to their eviction from the flight. The imams, they said, tested the forbearance of the passengers and flight crew in what the air marshal called a "[political correctness] probe."

"The political correctness needs to be left at the boarding gate," the marshal said. "Instilling politically correct fears into the minds of airline passengers is nothing less than psychological terrorism."

OK, so we have two versions of a story in stark contrast. I'm going with the passengers and crew on this one. I'll suffer the slings and arrows. And what's this "walking around on eggshells" jive? They've got to be kidding me. These buffoons parade around intimidating everyone in sight, and we're supposed to believe they really are walking on eggshells?

Meanwhile, fighting the terrorists become just that much more difficult now that a federal judge (a Clinton appointee, naturally), has struck down the President's authority to designate terrorist groups. Which doesn't give much hope the Congress will act in good faith. They may go along with public opinion to cover their tracks, knowing some hack judge will do their dirty work later.

Stop The ACLU was on top of this from the outset.

More details from Power Line this morning.