Notes on an “Extremist”

Charles Krauthammer has no patience with Obama for calling Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab an “extremist” instead of a terrorist (see video below). I don’t know why Obama refuses to call Abdulmutallab a terrorist except that it may be too incendiary a term for the dainty leftist law professor we have as an erstwhile president-when-not-playing-golf.* [See more images of Obama's swanky Hawaii digs.]

By the way, Obama has been complaining that he is tired. Oh. Poor president Obama, all tuckered out. (Well, actually, I can see why he’s so tired. It requires a great deal of stamina and intense concentration to assume an identity and pretend to have experience that one does not possess. Obama also must feign an interest in the job, when in actuality he cares little for its endless and varied demands. He tries mightily to avoid the “buck stops here” aspect of the job. He just wants the title and inclusion in history books, and could care less about all that silly work that, sigh, is necessary at times.)

In the meantime, the ever-working Charles Krauthammer is his typical incisive self on The O’Reilly Factor (with guest host):

I was just listening to John Batchelor’s radio program — it’s on seven days a week — and Batchelor pointed listeners to reports from the UK that Abdulmutallab was no innocent, wide-eyed, hapless juvenile caught up in a web of Jihadism. Instead, Abdulmutallub was a leader in the spread of radical islam and jihadism, and was the fourth president of the islamic group at the exclusive University College London to be tied to terrorist activities. Curious, I went looking. The UK Times has this article that shows how steeped Abdulmutallab was in jihadism and was a LEADER in prosyletizing jihadism: “Al-Qaeda ‘groomed Abdulmutallab in London’“:

The Christmas Day airline bomb plot suspect organised a conference under the banner “War on Terror Week” as he immersed himself in radical politics while a student in London, The Times has learnt.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, a former president of the Islamic Society at University College London, advertised speakers including political figures, human rights lawyers and former Guantánamo detainees.

One lecture, Jihad v Terrorism, was billed as “a lecture on the Islamic position with respect to jihad”.

Security sources are concerned that the picture emerging of his undergraduate years suggests that he was recruited by al-Qaeda in London. Security sources said that Islamist radicalisation was rife on university campuses, especially in London, and that college authorities had “a patchy record in facing up to the problem”. Previous anti-terrorist inquiries have uncovered evidence of extremists using political meetings and religious study circles to identify potential recruits. …

The Times UK has another backgrounder article worth your while, “Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab organised ‘War on Terror Week’ while studying at UCL [University College London].”

It’s obvious that Abdulmatallab was no innocent juvenile plucked for recruitment by manipulative jihadists. He was part of the apparatus spreading jihadism on the UK’s college campuses:

According to isocnews.com, an online magazine for Muslim students, War on Terror Week at University College London was one of the events of the year in 2007. There was a slick video advertisement for the event, an eye-catching poster and packed lecture theatres for five days of discussions about Guantánamo Bay, allegations of torture and the subject of “Jihad v Terrorism”.

The website reported the week of talks as “informative, relevant and always entertaining — the audience got involved with a good mixture of Muslim and non-Muslim attendees asking tough questions of the speakers”. In a corner of the poster, the event is declared to have been “approved by Umar Farook, president of UCLU Islamic Society”. The speakers advertised included George Galloway, the Respect MP; Geoffrey Bindman, the human rights lawyer; and former Guantánamo Bay detainees.

The Nigerian student who organised “War on Terror Week” in January 2007 is now better known as Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the would-be suicide bomber who tried to blow up a transatlantic airliner last week.

[...]

UCL has confirmed that Mr Abdulmutallab was a mechanical engineering student on its Central London campus in 2005-08 and in the academic year 2006-07 was president of the student union’s Islamic Society.

His role in organising War on Terror Week is the first indication that during his years in London he was heavily involved in radical political activity. Experts believe that this would have put him at risk of being groomed by al-Qaeda recruiters who routinely prey on such radical religious and political gatherings. “Before someone goes off for explosives training they have to be converted to the cause of al-Qaeda,” said Professor Anthony Glees, of the University of Buckingham.

“I think that happened in London in the case of Abdulmutallab, as has happened to many others. He is one of a considerable number of people who have turned to al-Qaeda after being recruited in the UK. This recruitment often goes on where political events take place. Those who speak at such events are not terrorists, but they are being irresponsible if they do not realise that what they say could contribute to the radicalisation of people who could then be recruited into terror.”

The emerging picture of Mr Abdulmutallab is of a lonely young man who arrived in London as a devout, sometimes angry, figure and became increasingly radicalised while here.

He had previously joined discussions on an internet message board that revealed a confused and alienated personality. Writing in January 2005 under the name Farouk1986, he said: “I feel depressed and lonely. I do not know what to do. And then I think this loneliness leads me to other problems.” He talked of wrestling with liberalism and extremism and striving to live according to the Koran’s teaching.

And he confessed to having “jihad fantasies”, writing: “I imagine how the great jihad will take place, how the Muslims will win (Allah willing) and rule the whole world, and establish the greatest empire once again.” But many more of his posts were about football, suggesting that he was far from being the finished article as a mujahidin.

Within a year of arriving in London Mr Abdulmutallab started to adopt a more formal religious dress code, including a white robe and skullcap.

He is reported to have attended some of the radical meetings held at London colleges and mosques. He is understood to have attended talks given by the extremist US-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki at East London Mosque. Awlaki, who was later banned from Britain and is believed to be in hiding with al-Qaeda in Yemen, where Mr Abdulmutallab spent months.

[...]

* Obama did turn in something of a performance today [December 29th], but only after his indifferent, read-off-the-teleprompter, bored and boring announcements of yesterday that left me astonished.

I say I was astonished because I was struck by the perfunctory, disengaged tone of Obama’s performance that suggests strongly that he doesn’t view this act of terrorism with any of the concern felt by most U.S. citizens.

Rather, Obama seemed vexed to have his golfing break interrupted by an inconvenient event of terrorism that he won’t call terrorism, and he seemed most interested in returning to his golf game, which is exactly what he did via limousine caravan.

I fully concur with Charles Krauthammer’s acerbic commentaries on Obama’s failures to communicate the gravity of the situation, as well as his devastating assessment of Janet Napolitano who, as K. says, is clearly in over her head and not qualified for her significant duties.