Asymmetrical Information

Let's have some testimony under oath before drawing any conclusions about the legitimacy or wisdom of removing these guys from the plane. From news accounts I've read (which I don't know how much credibility to lend) these guys were also asking for seat belt extenders for no apparent reason, making loud hostile remarks about the U.S. involvement in Iraq, and switching seats, in different rows, for some reason.

It certainly is within the realm of possibility that these guys were trying to provoke a response. They could be doing it in hopes of getting a settlement, or for ideological reasons, like wishing to establish that the U.S. is anti-muslim, or simply because they are jerks, a quality not bounded by race or creed.

Maybe they were wholly unsuspecting devout muslims who were unfairly singled out due to bigotry. I hope US Airways and the other named defendents go all the way to establish what exactly happened, with people under penalty for perjury.

From the “John Doe” manifesto:

I will resist the imposition of sharia principles and sharia law in my taxi cab, my restaurant, my community pool, the halls of Congress, our national monuments, the radio and television airwaves, and all public spaces.

Well certainly if you’re the one who actually owns the taxi cab or the restaurant, you ought to resist attempts by government to impose those sorts of restrictions on what you do with your own property. By the same token if someone else owns the taxi cab or the restaurant and decides that they want follow those restrictions, they have the same right to do so.

Somehow I doubt that Malkin would agree with that.

switching seats, in different rows, for some reason

I think the specific allegation is that they fanned out in pairs to the front and rear like the 9/11 hijackers. If they were also non-obese individuals who asked for seatbelt extenders and did not use them, it would have been negligent to ignore them.

CAIR responds to questions about their support of the lawsuit (click on my name for the link):

We trust that the Becket Fund and CAIR share the same objective of upholding the Constitution and preventing violations of religious and civil rights.

Unfortunately, your letter was misleading and mischaracterized the lawsuit brought against US Airways by the six imams. It appears you believe the false allegations promoted by irresponsible and unaccountable parties on the Internet that the imams and their lawyers intend to target "ordinary citizens" who were simply reporting suspicious activity.

Mr. Omar Mohammedi, the attorney representing the imams, has repeatedly asserted that this is not the case. The only individuals against whom suit may be raised in this litigation are those who may have knowingly made false reports against the imams with the intent to discriminate against them.

The imams will not sue any passengers who reported suspicious activity in good faith, even when the "suspicious" behavior included the imams' constitutionally-protected right to practice their religion without fear or intimidation.

When a person makes a false report with the intent to discriminate, he or she is not acting in good faith.

Since March 19, 2007, several days prior to your letter, the imams' attorney has repeatedly clarified this position in media outlets including the Star Tribune (Minnesota) Fox News and The Nation. He has also amended the complaint to reflect this clarification. (Footnote 1)

We stand by the principle that when anyone's rights are diminished, the rights of all Americans are threatened and we do recognize this works both ways.

I believe we can both agree that Americans do not have the right to make false reports with the intent to discriminate. It is a criminal offense that disturbs public order and creates unnecessary fear, suspicion and division in any society. (Footnote 2)

Making false reports of suspicious behavior with the intent to discriminate during a time of war is doubly harmful. It not only harms the persons against whom false reports are made, but wastes urgently-needed law enforcement resources.

Read the whole thing. I haven’t read the complaint and I’m not sure how you can distinguish between the two - how do you prove that someone “ma[de} a false report with the intent to discriminate” and distinguish them from someone who just reported what they thought was suspicious behavior?

My natural inclination though is that when someone looks like they’re trying to whip up hysteria over a perceived slight and the target says “no, that’s not what we said or meant” is to give the benefit of the doubt to the latter.

Since all of these stories originate out of Minneapolis/St Paul, I'd recommend searching out the posts on Powerline.com about the imam's detention, the taxi-cab alcohol issue, and the chasier's who are bacon refusniks.

Yhere is way way more to this story than these men, er, acting religious.

There is a precedent for removing passengers for disruptive praying.

The very name of the organization implies that it is impossible to be an American Muslim; that there are two separate parties here, and to be "Islamic" is to be foreign from "American".

With that as their basic principle, why any surprise that their involvement stirs up trouble? CAIR holds up Islam in opposition to America; of course the result of their activities is opposition from supporters of America.

If all that the six imams did was pray loudly, they would be guilty of no more than being annoying. I can pray quietly by myself without demonstrating my incredibly poor ability with Gregorian chant. Loud demonstrations are strictly for an audience, not for any spiritual benefit.

But they acted in an extremely suspicious manner. A single person who moved around the cabin, took an exit row seat he wasn't assigned to, ignored flight crew instruction, and asked for an unneeded and unused seat extender would be ejected and likely arrested. Even a freckle faced red-haired scout leader in uniform. A group of six acting in such a fashion, in concert, deserved to be carted off in cuffs.

I'm sure that being conspicuously Muslim didn't help, but that was just a detail on top of the other perfectly reasonable reasons for the group to be tossed off the flight. If anything, their "protected victim" status kept them out of the jail cells that they really warranted. White southern evangelicals would have spent the night in prison waiting for charges to be filed.

I love Michelle Malkin. You just have to respect someone who proudly defends the internment of her own ancestors. One day she'll eventually turn to vigilantism and justify it as defending America from terrorists, illegal immigrants, and seditious leftist traitors. And it will be sexy hot.

I would do everything to that woman.

Filipinos were interned?

Uh, immoralist, all people with narrow eyes do not have the same ancestors, unless you are going back hundreds of thousands of years.

Malkin defended the internment of early homo sapiens? Who knew!?

Filipinos were interned?

Yes, by the Japanese.

Filipinos were interned?

Whoops. Sorry about the ethnic confusion, Michelle. Don't worry, I still think you're hot.

This incident strikes me as like the double bind that Britain is being offered this evening. That deal: the Brish should admit that they had violated Iranian space and their sailors will be released. You can have peace but only on condition of violating your perception of reality. The upshot of that is though that you have now acceded to the mullahs as they who specify what is real. As described above, the imams decided they would stage mock plans for takeover of an airplane. I am willing to accept that those plans were mock but what is demanded of us is that the Muslims alone now get to decide when they are mock and when they are real. And, no doubt, they will be letting us know. In the meantime we can vent our anger by having safe complaints like 'Bush lied; people died.'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Imams_controversy#Lawsuit

Wikipedia page on the incident

Per this article, it sounds like a little more than "[dressing] like religious Muslims" and praying. Not America's finest hour, but (if the DHS guy's report is even close to accurate) hardly blind panic at the sight of an Arab, either.

If they were also non-obese individuals who asked for seatbelt extenders and did not use them, it would have been negligent to ignore them.

I agree that this behavior is suspicious, but... what would someone do with a seatbelt extender? Is an extender something that might have been removed from their carry on luggage? Where is this pointing?

what would someone do with a seatbelt extender?

It's a not-terrible weapon: a chunk of metal on the end of a string that can be swung around to strike someone.

Not lethal by any means, but potentially painful. And very weird regardless.

I agree that this behavior is suspicious, but... what would someone do with a seatbelt extender?

See Star Trek, episode "Amok Time," after the lirpa.

Remember, after 9/11, when the airlines and the talking heads explained to people how to fight back agaisnt hijackers, and said seatbelt buckles would work?

Jane, you really need to inform yourself on this incident. They were not removed from the plane for praying. In fact, I think that the passengers should file a countersuit against them for delaying their flight and terrorizing them.

It has also been suggested that seatbelt extenders could be connected across the aisles to block the sort of "charge" that was used on Flight 93.

My reading on this case has led me to conclude that it was a deliberate provocation intended to produce exactly the result we are seeing.

Seatbelt extenders can also be used as restraints, similar to hand or leg cuffs.

Responding to Thorley's post above, a significant difference between cabs and stores is that cabs are granted licenses in a manner similar to the "common carrier" doctrine. Once a licensed cabs decides he can not transport people for reasons of his interpretation of his religion, then the remedy is to either remove him from the cab or revoke the license. Any other decision violates the common carrier provisions.

This is particularly poor commentary from Jane Galt. I'm disappointed.

The behavior of the people removed from the plane was highly suspicious, if the accounts I've read from other passengers are correct (as several comments above have pointed out). The truth is that America is still a remarkably tolerant country and that Muslims who do not go out of their way to behave like terrorists have nothing to fear.

As for watching Muslims or Arabs more closely--well why wouldn't the government act according to the laws of probability? One needn't think ill of Islam as a faith or Arabs as an ethnic group in order to face the world as it is--the threat of terrorism comes disproportionately from Muslims and Arabs.

When Norwegians and Brazilians start hijacking planes and blowing up buildings in Manhattan, presumably the government would start looking at Norwegians and Brazilians more closely.

Well, heck. Just speakin' hypothetically here, if I were some Islamic jihadist kingpin and wanted to hijack an airliner, sure as s*** rolls downhill from an outhouse I wouldn't choose hijackers who look _remotely_ Arab or South Asian or non-white at all. I'd choose some nice lily-white American converts to Islam or maybe some of those Muslims from Bosnia. And you'd better believe I wouldn't have them carrying Korans or praying in Arabic or doing anything even remotely suspicious.

Nice try Peter. But the the fact remains that when you're sitting around in a cave with a bunch of Arabs, you really don't have the choice to say, "Hey, whitey, go and shave your beard and blow yourself up in the US".

Certainly there could be a handful of white Muslim terrorists willing to blow themselves up, but the supply of brown ones is most definitely greater and of easier access to those doing the planning.

This is nothing against skin color or race, it's just simple probability. It also stands to reason that if just before someone blows themselves up they start to shout praises to Allah, then that should mean whenever someone shouts praises to Allah you should look extra carefully. If they stop behaving that way then we have to adjust. But searching white grannies because some Mullah may eventually find a white granny convert isn't the best course of action don't you think? Afterall, some Mullah may decide to start having their army of white grandmas hiding box cutters rectally...

And if muslims don't like the fact that their religion has been co-opted by terrorists and that terrorists are causing them to be more inconvienenced then perhaps they should start to clean up their own house, rather than heeing and hawing about our own injustices in Iraq, Isreal, etc. etc. every chance they get.

Peter, that would be good too. The CIA and other intelligence agencies have had a hard time infiltrating AQ and other bands of assorted nutjobs the same way the FBI is able to compromise the Klan. This is because of their extremely insular nature and recruitment, just a vague back story and claiming to know a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy won't cut it. Any attempts by the coalition of nutjobs to broaden their recruiting to 'look like America' will make it easier to plant informants among them, making stopping them easier.

Ironic, isn't it?

I admit I wouldn't expect actual terrorists to be dumb enough to make the sort of scene that some of the accounts are describing. On the other hand, if history teaches us anything, it's that statements beginning with "No one could possibly be dumb enough to --" are almost always wrong.

cdub -
To the extent that AQ's still a functioning organization, it probably has enough American converts and Bosnian Muslims around to come up with a group of white terrorists. As a matter of fact, some Arabs from Lebanon and Syria might be able to pass for white.

This is because of their extremely insular nature and recruitment, just a vague back story and claiming to know a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy won't cut it.

No, but apparently "Hi, I'm from Marin County and my dad's gay" will work.

This crazy, unwonted behaviour? The muslim clerics were . . . dressed like religious muslims. And praying to Mecca, as devout muslims are commanded to do five times a day. Needless to say, this is not exactly America's proudest hour.

Here's a story -- I'm curious to hear what people think:

A few years ago, we got escalated to Homeland Security Orange (or whatever the second-highest is) because of threats to municipal infrastructure. The next day, I dropped my wife off at Logan Airport, and as it was a beautiful winter day and I had left work anyway, I went for a walk on Deer Island, near the sewage plant.

A car parks, and out jump two Muslim couples (beards, hijabs), who start taking photos of the sewage plant and planes taking off from the airport. This is, to put it mildly, not the usual demographic on winter afternoons there.

So, what should I have done? If I call the police, is that "intent to discriminate"?

Jane -

I have not always agreed with you - but this is the first time I have felt that you are completely off-base, making an unfounded, snarky comment without informing yourself of the situation.

Do all my blogging heroes have keyboards of clay?

Rob, if by "Hello, I'm from Marin County" you really mean spending the better part of 3 years travelling and obtaining religious instruction in Yemen, Pakistan and Afghanistan you would have a point.

Joe, if some dumbass teenager can manage it, then presumably so can a CIA officer. I don't know why they haven't, but the notion that it's just impossible is patently false.

What alternative does Jane propose? Ignore suspicious behavior for fear of offending?

Sorry, but the bit about the seat belt extenders, and the non-assigned seating make this a non-issue to me. CAIR and the imans are wrong.

The imans should be prosecuted for failure to obey a flight crew and placed on the Federal no-fly list. I'm encouraged to see that Congress is already moving to strike the ability to file these "John Doe" lawsuits.

If they don't like it, there is no impediment to leaving this country for someplace more to their liking.

'Michelle Malkin is ratcheting up the whole sordid business one more hysterical notch'-hysterical is right! -please stay away from such maniacs that justify internment or lose sleep over a bunch of aspiring busboys and gardeners crossing the border

I can't get to the blog usually like to read, and this one is a mediocre alternative. Whoever writes this blog sounds like they need a nap. In the long run, of course, natural selection is a sufficient mechanism for addressing people who are prone to putting "suspicious activity" in quotes, but natural selection will fail to note that it takes a very special kind of twat to do so under the banner of "asymmetrical information."

Hmmmm.

1. A very disappointing post by Galt that shows a particular lack of information.

2. Odd how people will take any opportunity to attack Michelle Malkin. I might not agree with her on every subject, but I don't attack her for giggles.

3. There have been a number of situations since 9/11 where muslims have acted in extremely odd and intimidating ways.

One theory is that these are "dry runs" where muslims are trying to figure out what patterns of behavior will not trigger a security reflex.

Another theory, applicable to the imams case perhaps, is that these actions are designed to force a form of "lawfare" against internal security mechanisms. I.e. by instigating specific scenarios and then using the court system to severely punish those that respond to the potential security crisis, it can turn out that in the future people will actively avoid responding because if the deterrent effect of negative court decisions.

So if the imams are successful in suing the passengers who reported them, and then financially punish those passengers severely then in the future more airline passengers will be more likely to not report suspicious behavior and thus make future airline hijackings more likely to succeed.

4. What's really curious about this imam case is that imams were flying after having completed a conference that included Keith Ellison the newest Representative in the House of Representatives and numerous other Islamic religious and political figures. What was discussed I personally don't know but the timing is rather odd that the imams would precipitate something like this so soon after the conference. Because in order for something like this to happen it must be precipitated as it would otherwise not happen on it's own.

5. While the passengers reported the suspicious behavior to the flight crew it was in fact the *flight crew* who reported the imams and requested their removal. This is a very important fact IMHO because flight crews are trained to respond to passenger issues in as non-confrontational way as possible. For the flight crew to request removal tells me that they were clearly frightened by the behavior of the imams.

Which is a curious thing really. The imams were flying away from the conference so that shows they weren't local. And not being local they had to have flown in to the conference on airplanes so they clearly knew the procedures and behavior required of passengers on domestic flights.

6. I really expected something a bit more informed of you Galt.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I've modified some of my moral beliefs (basically prison rape and industrial farming) because of Jane Galt's writing, so I am crestfallen at the tone deafness of part of this post. Either she is being "Stockolmed" by her new career in New York City journalism, and, therefore, is utterly unaware that there even is another side to this story, or she has actual reasons for dismissing the reports of extremely odd and frightening behavior on the part of the imams. If the former, I'm sad. If the latter, I'm ready to hear it.

Immoralist - your attempt to belittle and sexually threaten a woman you disagree with makes me want to sodomize you with a broomstick.

But not in a gay way.

Oh, heck, another week, another in the increasing number of politically-correct entries in Jane Galt's weblog. At this rate, the name of this blog is going to have to be changed...

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