Okay, so I’ve been pretty scarce lately. Not that there hasn’t been tons of stuff to comment about, but I’ve had this cold that has literally knocked me on my posterior for the last 2 weeks. I went to the doctor hoping I had something curable like Strep Throat, but no dice. Just a “common cold” that kicked like an uncommonly ornery army mule. I still have a lingering cough but my head and chest are substantially less congested than they were last week.
On top of that, the spouse and I are in the midst of potty training. Oh what fun it is to talk about pee-pee and poo-poo all day. I feel my IQ swirling down the toilet with every flush. But hey, it’ll all be worth it when I don’t have to wake up in the morning to diapers so full of crap that they remind me of John Kerry.
So I’ve been thinking about this whole deal about the UAE-owned company buying operations on a number of east coast ports as part of their takeover of a British company. Although I agree with the opponents of the takeover, none of them have expressed what I think is really at issue here: we are simply now conditioned to be leery of Muslims and their intentions because of their practices. Not that we are against Muslims or Islam in particular. It’s things in their religion such as it being okay to lie and make your enemy think he’s your friend before you stab him in the back. It’s things like Usama bin-Laden tried to pull where you are allowed to offer a truce in order to regroup before you restart hostilities.
When you have a country like the UAE that is similar to Saudi Arabia (i.e., Wahhabism, no rights for women, Shari’a law, intolerance for non-Muslims, state-controlled media, no democracy, members of the ruling class openly supporting the destruction of Israel/the US, members of the ruling class openly financing al-Qaeda and its offshoots, etc.) one can’t help but wonder if there is an ulterior motive to this purchase.
A couple of weeks ago, my spouse and I were sitting down to a fine dinner of sandwiches purchased from our local Subway franchise. It had recently changed hands and an obviously Muslim Arab family had purchased it from the Indian owner. As we got to talking, my spouse guiltily admitted to having reservations about patronizing a Muslim business. I could definitely empathize because it had crossed my mind as well. Okay, so more than likely they were probably very nice, hard-working people that wanted to live the American dream. But then one can’t help but ask themselves:
Do they want to see Israel and all Jews destroyed?
Do they want the blood of the Danish artists who did the Mohammed cartoons to flow in the streets?
Have they really bought into America or do they want to derive the benefits of our country but remain separate and disavow our melting pot?
Is their little Subway sandwich shop just a front for funding terrorism?
Are they themselves terrorists?
Do they teach their children tolerance and acceptance of “infidels” or do they poison their minds with hatred and rejection of non-Muslims?
I wonder how our parents and grandparents felt in WWII when they came across a German, Japanese or Italian immigrant. We know what happened to the Japanese and I’m not advocating that. But I must admit that it’s difficult to keep my perspective in dealing with Muslims in general. That’s my rub with the UAE-ports deal.
