Let's Not do this Again, Please.

Guilt by innuendo is not an American ideal, although it may qualify as a bad and somewhat chronic habit.

I really do not think that New York's Rep. Peter King is another Joe McCarthy, though it might be assumed that he holds to the adage of "keeping your friends close and your enemies closer." I really want to be wrong here because this is a path we've taken before with some devastating results for individuals that were no more of a threat to this country than...what? The Beatles?

Yeah odd, yet not so odd a comparison when you begin to vilify 'groups,' (never mind religious affiliation) you're really out duck hunting with a machine gun. Far too many moderate Muslims in the world already feel that powers in this nation are on a witch hunt -- and further, that the Islamic faith is somehow a 'politicized' religion, assuming quite illogically that the Christian right isn't? Geez, I'm basically an atheist, but I always figured that God wasn't planning a run for the White House (at least in my life time) and that this was a country that separated church from state -- if for nothing else, to preserve our collective sanity. Or better yet, how would this conversation go forward if a wayward band of Bedouins had stumbled upon Plymouth Rock? Or the Indians defeated us at Wounded Knee? I could go on here, but the point is that this country has a bad habit of slamming the door on any new re-invention of its own mongrelism. That's a lot of arrogance and assumption for a country that hasn't had that many birthdays.

I really want to ask this country, "Just what in the hell are we so scared of?" Is this the bad old days of the 1950's where communists were supposedly hiding under every bush? Has everyone forgotten that the appeal of both communism and socialism in this country was a direct result of the Depression and the Dust Bowl? That a weak fed and rampant greed on Wall Street turned this country into one mass beggar's camp? The appeal wasn't wrapped up in the tenets of communism, socialism or fascism for that matter, as a political alternative, but rather some form of government that offered social justice and a job. People sought out these organizations because they found themselves living in a country with a failed system of government and nowhere to turn for help. Fear was everywhere and consumed in quantity by everyone.

That same fear is back home to roost, only since 9/11 it has become pretty selective. It's so prevalent and insidious that we managed to not only undermine our own constitution, but our ideals and sense of reason as well. Yes, serious threats do exist -- in fact, they have always existed. Somewhere in that notion of individual freedom and democratic ideals, the very core of what we try so hard to sell ourselves and the world, is a fundamental caveat: the risks inherent to an open and tolerant society. And perhaps one other overlooked virtue: integrity. We're supposed to do the right thing at our own peril. That's how you earn the 'white hat' and the affirmation to wear it with pride.

So if we are that 'open and tolerant' society we cannot allow ourselves to be selective in the application of a high and lofty ideal. If congress wants to interrogate Islam and those that practice an alternative faith on the broad basis of affiliation and innuendo, then maybe next week we can haul in a few geriatric commies and what's left of the Beatles. Then we'll go after the Baptists, the born agains and those damn atheists...oh.

"First they came after my neighbor and I did not raise my voice. Then they came after my other neighbor and again, my voice was silent. Then, they came for me."