Will Chickenhawk Joe use Fort Hood to go after Muslim troops?

November 9, 2009 · Posted in News and Current Affairs

Joe Lieberman spent the weekend mired in idle speculation (when he wasn’t threatening to kill healthcare reform by not allowing his Senate colleagues to vote).

Another "Joe" -- Joseph McCarthy, launched the "Army-McCarthy hearings" in 1954.

Sen. Joe Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut who heads the Senate’s Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, said initial evidence suggested that the alleged shooter, Army Major Nidal Hasan, was a “self-radicalized, home-grown terrorist” who had turned to Islamic extremism while under personal stress

… Mr. Lieberman, appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” cautioned that it remained too early to draw any definitive conclusions. He said his comments were based on “reports that we are receiving” about Mr. Hasan’s actions and comments.

… Mr. Lieberman said that if news reports were true that Mr. Hasan had turned to Islamic extremism, “the murder of these 13 people was a terrorist act and, in fact, it was the most-destructive terrorist act to be committed on American soil since 9/11.”

“We don’t know enough to say now, but there are very, very strong warning signs here that Dr. Hasan had become an Islamist extremist and, therefore, that this was a terrorist act,” Mr. Lieberman added.

So … the teevee news told Joe that terrorists may be infiltrating our military, though he can’t say so for sure, but that doesn’t stop him from invoking 9/11 … so now he’s going to have hearings on it? What is Joe going to do? Hold up lists containing the names of every Muslim currently serving in the United States military, and demand that they appear before him and answer as to whether they are now, or have ever been, an Islamic extremist? And … this guy is still chairman of the Homeland Security committee … why, again? Mr. Lieberman may be about to walk down a familiar road for self-important Senators named “Joe,” to whom too much power has been given:

By 1953, Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy had become one of America’s best-known politicians through his campaigns to uncover subversives in government operations. His attacks on the U.S. Army in the fall of 1953 led to the first televised hearings in U.S. history, the Army-McCarthy hearings of 1954. The American public watched McCarthy live in action, and they didn’t much care for what they saw. Popular approval for McCarthy eroded during the hearings and his eventual fall from power became just a matter of time.

In the fall of 1953, McCarthy conducted an investigation of the Army Signal Corps. His announced intent was to locate an alleged espionage ring, but he turned up nothing. However, McCarthy’s treatment of General Ralph W. Zwicker during that investigation angered many. McCarthy insulted Zwicker’s intelligence and commented that he was not fit to wear his uniform.

And no, at long last, Joe — who received multiple draft deferments so he wouldn’t have to fight in Vietnam, like his political doppleganger, Dick Cheney, and just about every other member of the neocon cabal, but who supports sending other people’s sons to die overseas, and who now apparently plans to investigate those wearing the uniform for their religion (rather than , say, letting the Army do its job, and looking into whether there are adequate mental health screenings to keep highly stressed and possibly dangerous individuals away from fellow troops…) has no decency.

Meanwhile, the FBI is said to be investigating whether Hasan is “tied to two of the 9/11 hijackers” because either he or his mother attended a mosque the hijackers also attended … eight years ago. Hasan’s mother’s funeral was held at the mosque, which is said to be one of the largest on the east coast (meaning literally thousands of people attend it, too.) … More relevant is this:

Students on a 2007-2008 master’s programme at a military college revealed yesterday that they had complained to faculty about Major Hasan’s alleged anti-American views.They included him giving a presentation that justified suicide bombing and telling classmates that Islamic law trumped the US Constitution.

Now there’s something to investigate, but it goes to Hasan’s state of mind and fitness to serve our troops — not to his religion. If he had been spouting the kinds of radical ideology that the murderer of George Tiller did, or that the guy who shot down a security guard at the Holocaust Museum in D.C. believed, it would be just as bad, and just as dangerous. I wonder if our friends on the right get that. What we have here is an horrific workplace shooting, by a possibly unhinged person who should have been allowed to leave the military, if not drummed out, based on his state of mind. But it won’t be long before it becomes an excuse for the wingers to launch yet another anti-Muslim jihad. BTW, Fox News reports that Hasan also frequented a local strip club near Killeen, Texas. I guess we’d better start investigating Club Jumblies and other such establishments for their ties to terror. Put it on your subpoena list, Lieberman.

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