The Romney Controversy

Andrew McCarthy hits the nail on the head regarding Mitt Romney and radical mosques:

In short mosques have been safe havens — even today, even after all that has happened — because the terrorists and those who share their utopian, universalist vision know full well that if someone like Gov. Romney sensibly suggests that we should be paying more attention to them, he will be pilloried with far more vigor than the press has for examining militant Islam and than the civil-rights lobby has for defending the right of innocent Americans to live.

Romney, it should be noted, was not saying that every mosque should be scrutinized. He instead asserted that we should not shrink from wiretapping mosques out of "political correctness."

To a responsible adult, that ought to be unassailable. The government cannot get a wiretap authorization without showing a federal judge probable cause that the place on which it wants to eavesdrop is being used either for the commission of crimes or by agents of a foreign power (such as a global terrorist organization). If that kind of evidence exists, does any rational person really think we should not use wiretaps because it might upset CAIR or the ACLU?

It seems blatantly obvious that we should be monitoring possible centers of incitement - as every nation has always done. If anyone else should be monitored, a good place to start would be the people who were at the protests against Romney's statement. Also, if Romney made this statement with an eye to the 2008 campaign, it is quite frankly a refreshing alternative to the pandering towards groups like CAIR performed by Grover Norquist.

However, I believe Romney made a mistake when he mentioned that he isn't interested in having students from countries such as Yemen and Saudi Arabia study here. During my travels in the Arab world and my work on Capitol Hill, I observed that the most intelligent and usually most pro-American officials were by and large those that had studied in the U.S. Since 9/11, their numbers have gone down due to increased security restrictions - and other countries are capitalizing on the opportunity to generate good will in that part of the world. So yes, we should thoroughly vet all potential students from Arab countries, and yes, we should keep tabs on them, but by all means qualified students should be welcomed here, subject to necessary restrictions.