Holding us back

Not Guilty Verdicts in Florida Terror Trial Are Setback for U.S.

Actually, I'd say it's a victory for U.S.

The article begins:

In a major defeat for law enforcement officials, a jury in Florida failed to return guilty verdicts Tuesday on any of 51 criminal counts against a former Florida professor and three co-defendants accused of operating a North American front for Palestinian terrorists.

0 for 51--ouch! Particularly galling when you read:

The trial, lasting more than five months, hinged on the question of whether Mr. Arian's years of work in the Tampa area in support of Palestinian independence crossed the threshold from protected free speech and political advocacy to illegal support for terrorists. Prosecutors, who had been building a case against Mr. Arian for 10 years, relied on some 20,000 hours of taped conversations culled from wiretaps on Mr. Arian and his associates.

I think at some point in this country we have to look at how cases like are hurting our ability to fight terrorism.

It's extremely unlikely that the next terrorist attack in the U.S. that involves Muslims will feature Americans carrying out the attacks. In this country we settle our disputes at the ballot boxes, and the American Muslim community is as committed to democracy as any other group--perhaps more so, given that many of them are here because they fled oppression in their homelands.

Instead, the next attack is likely to, again, involve foreigners in this country illegally.

But when Muslim Americans like Mr. Arian's only contact with law enforcement and the criminal justice system comes when they're being prosecuted, does that help or hurt our ability to get tips and information from this community?

Would you go out of your way to flag down a cop who's been harassing you? Because many Muslims right now feel that the entire law enforcement and criminal justice apparatus is systematically harassing them.

Aside from the fact that it's illegal and morally wrong and a waste of resources, in this day and age racism on the part of these government employees is making this country unsafe.

A racist cop or official is about as unpatriotic a person as I can conceive of. A racist person in these positions of authority is in essence willing to indulge in their personal animosities on the backs of our public safety.

He or she does more real harm to this country than all the flag-burners in history combined. His or her failure to keep their private lives off the job has the potential to not just hurt the morale of our troops, but to cost them their lives, not to mention the lives of civilians.

I think if the South Florida prosecutors had spent the past 10 years working to build relationships with local Muslims, I'd feel a lot safer than I would even if Mr. Arian had been found guilty and was behind bars.

As it is, I feel tremendous sorrow for Mr. Arian, and for all of us.

AP Photo of Sami al-Arian by Chris O'Meara.