Hope can be a tricky creature.
After nearly 130 people were senselessly slaughtered last week in Paris, it was hoped that our leaders would wake up to the threat posed by radical Islam, and a weariness would settle in about accepting more refugees.
Instead, many of our leaders and public figures have elected to bury their heads in the sand.
On Monday morning, President Obama gave one of the most tone-deaf speeches in recent history on the subject of the Paris attacks. When it came to the strategy for combating ISIS, Obama said Friday’s terror was just a mere “setback.” He fired off more vitriol at Republican governors than he did against Islamic extremists. And the president naturally warned his listeners to not make any connections between the attacks and the refugee exodus — as well as with Islam in general.
Obama said that such a backlash against refugees would be “shameful.” (RELATED: Obama Takes Harsher Tone With Republicans Than ISIS At G20)
Rather than an affirmative statement of resolve in the face of terror, Obama’s speech came off as a shrill defense of his failed policies against political opponents. It in no way showed any comprehension of the enemies America and her allies face, nor what allows these terrorists to strike at the heart of our very way of life.
Most troubling of all was the president’s arrogant dismissal of concerns that terrorists reside among refugees, and his doubling-down on the cliche that the Islamic State is un-Islamic. Even though two of the attackers were refugees and ISIS is, in fact, Islamic, leading liberals would prefer to carry on with their feel-good beliefs in spite of the facts. (RELATED: Ignore The Apologists — ISIS Is Islamic)
They would rather vociferously denounce “Islamophobia” than even admit there is a thing called radical Islam. They also think “better ideas” and “more love” are the secret weapons against extremism.
And Obama is not alone in embracing this naivete. Several celebrities have indulged in this flawed thinking since the attacks, as evidenced by the idiotic comments of Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers and Madonna. According to the world-renowned counter-terrorism expert Madonna, the only way to defeat the violence is with “unconditional love.” (RELATED: ‘Open Hearts’ Let The Terrorists Strike Again)
More surprising is the opinion of the denizens of the Paris neighborhood targeted by last week’s terror who refuse to admit that radical Islam had any involvement in the attack and blamed France for “failing” these young men. These are the very people who could’ve been killed by the attacks — and they’d rather think of it as some kind of accident for which their country is responsible.
Look no further for an example of the power of left-wing delusion.
Europe’s biggest cheerleader for welcoming the refugee flood also offered her defense of the status quo. German Chancellor Angela Merkel — who was “very shocked” the attacks occured — called for more “tolerance” towards migrants in the wake of the devastation, saying that living “free” is stronger than any form of terror.
Over the past few months, Merkel has been very vocal in her support of refugee resettlement. She has said that it’s Germany’s “damned duty to help the refugees” and has further declared that there is no way for the country she leads to close its borders. The chancellor’s refugee advocacy has earned her the title of “compassionate mother” of these individuals, and her promotion of their cause prompted talk of a Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts.
While Merkel may have sounded like a fervent supporter of tolerance and freedom when it comes to migrants, she doesn’t apply those principles to any German who dares criticize her government’s open-arms refugee policy. On the day before the Paris attacks, police raided the homes of several “right-wingers” in Berlin for the crime of spreading “xenophobia” on the Internet. Merkel has been emphatic in saying her country will have zero tolerance for anyone who doesn’t like her championing the resettlement of a million migrants in the nation.
The chancellor has said that those Germans who are worried about the prospect of increased immigration have “hatred in their hearts.”
Unfortunately for the chancellor, her people are just as opposed to her refugee policies as Americans are to Obama’s. Initially, the majority of Germans welcomed the idea of taking in refugees. Then they arrived, and opinions quickly changed. Entire villages have been transformed by resettlement, people have been forced out of their homes and vicious crimes committed by migrants are catching the public eye. (RELATED: Majority Of Germans Turn Against Country’s Open-Door Migrant Policy)
Additionally, it is going to cost Germany billions of dollars to take care of these asylum seekers — a price many Germans don’t want to pay.
With the news of refugee involvement in the Paris attacks and the growing concern that the influx of migrants will inflame domestic Islamic extremism in Europe, many citizens throughout the European Union have had enough of the pleasant talk concerning the continent’s multicultural future.
But the leaders still have the hope that unrestricted Muslim mass migration and large-scale refugee resettlement will have positive results. Everything will be great, everybody will love everybody and Islam will easily assimilate into western civilization.
That’s not happening, yet the leaders persist in that hope despite all contrary evidence. The sad reality is that Merkel and Obama seem more concerned with serving their own ideological vision than the interests of their citizens. To admit that taking in thousands of unvetted refugees isn’t a good idea would shatter their worldview and diminish the prospect of any future Nobel Prize. They want to believe that the best will happen, and those who think otherwise are disgusting racists.
The popular Internet quote wrongly attributed to Aristotle, “Tolerance and apathy are the virtues of a dying civilization” is a very apt summary of how our political elite treat issues that require politically incorrect solutions. It is far easier to denounce Islamophobia to the applause of the chattering class than to close your borders to Muslim migrants. It is far easier to ignore the disturbing sermons of radical imams than to denounce them in public.
French President Francois Hollande is no longer getting away with these shenanigans after blood was spilt in his capital, and he has promised to do more to stymie the danger of Islamic terror.
However for the time, our political elite has not been shocked out of their multicultural delusions by the terror in Paris. Obama will likely fight tooth and claw against the state governors refusing to accept Syrian refugees and Merkel will continue to hunt down migrant critics.
The only thing that can change these policies is the election of new political leaders who are willing to tackle problems without any concern for political correctness.
One can certainly hope that change happens soon.