Just How Free Are We?

A nation's power is usually divided into two categories: hard and soft. Hard power covers the military and economic capacities while soft power refers to the cultural, social and political appeals of a country.

For the US a substantial portion of our "soft" power is held in the First Amendment to the Federal Constitution. The freedoms seemingly guaranteed by it--those of religion, speech, the press, and peaceful assembly--have a high, universal appeal.

In one tension filled area covered by the Glorious First, we may be a lot less free than ought to be the case.

The area?

The open presence of faith based speech in the public square--all the public square, not just some segregated sections,

The reason?

If you're expecting the Geek to say something warm and fuzzy such as, "It's the right thing to do," you're both correct and wrong. It may be the right thing to do, but, far more importantly, it's the proper thing to do if the soft power of the First Amendment is going to have real utility in defeating the Islamists.

Defeating Islamists, you mean, like Osama bin Ladin? Geek, you've lost it for sure!

No. At least I don't think so. In fighting any form of irregular war whether a nice straight ahead guerrilla war or a mixed state insurgency with truck bombs, IEDs and the other aircraft used as cruise missiles, the most critical aspect of successful war fighting is to turn the uncommitted majority against the hard core militants.

Right now, despite all the "hard" and "soft" power at our disposal, the US is not succeeding fast enough nor completely enough to marginalize the Islamists, to make them isolated pariahs in traditional Muslim society, in short to deprive them of recruits, support, intelligence, assistance, and sanctuary.

A major reason for our relative failure to convince traditional Muslims to shun the Islamist demands for support, concealment, and recruits is the widespread belief in the Islamic world that the US is an atheistic nation.

Get a grip on that: The US is widely perceived by traditional, non-violent Muslims as an atheistic nation.

With that perception governing many, many minds in the vast crescent from Morocco to Indonesia, it is easy to understand why with every passing month the legend of bin Ladin grows and the appeal of the US shrinks.

If you want to view the question of atheism versus religion through the flinty eyes of a realpolitiker, what matters is not self-perception, but how others perceive us. The objective truth is not important. All that matters is the subjective truth in the minds of others--in this case the minds of traditional Muslims.

The Geek wants to be clear on a couple of dangerously misleading but commonly held beliefs in the US (and the EU for that matter) concerning why bin Ladin and his ilk not only want above all else to force the US to withdraw from the world (or at least a good sized chunk of it) and why bin Ladin and his fellow Islamists have such appeal for Muslims generally.

The first wrong belief is that Islamists are motivated in whole or major part by US support for Israel as well as the fate of the Palestinians. Reinforcing that motivator is the continued presence of US forces in the Persian Gulf where they "prop up" dictatorships such as those in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

Get a grip!

While US foreign policy and its presence in the region (to say nothing of the invasion of Iraq) might have made it easier for the Islamists to sell their message of jihad, it is not the motivator nor is it the primary attractor of new recruits.

(If Palestine mattered a bit, then why is it that most of the jihadists are non-Palestinians and not from the packed refugee camps of the Mideast? Why are the majority younger members of the privileged class, such as bin Ladin himself or Mohamed Atta of 9/11 infamy or the physicians of the failed bombings in London and Glasgow?)

The other wrong belief is the "clash of cultures" hypothesis, particularly the form which argues that Islam is a lethal belief system combining the "will of God" with all features of political, social, and economic life, and the end goal of Islam is subjugation of the world.

While the Geek has no problem seeing Islam as a warriors' religion, he maintains that the typical Muslim is no more interested in world domination than is the person on the street in any other religo-cultural environment. Even the most submissively inclined authoritarian personality needs more than sermons, more than fatwas, more than examples to risk life in a quest for something so remote, so abstract as forcing the world to submit to Islam.

However, the subjective and pervasive image of the US as an atheistic nation gives Muslims a target that is not so abstract as well as a more powerful motivation than mere global conquest--it gives him a duty.

The duty to confront and destroy atheists and those apostates who dance to the atheistic Uncle Sam's band.

This brings us back to the United States and the First Amendment. It brings us back to the question of just how free are we?

The First Amendment states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press; or of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for redress of grievances."

Seems simple, doesn't it? Congress shall make no law. Extended by the Fourteenth Amendment, the seemingly simple and straightforward wording of the First applies to the states and lesser governments as well.

Hooray! Freedom for everyone. Let the speech--faith derived and secular alike--flow! The pubic square should be a ringing cacophony of voices as God Squader takes on Secular Humanist.

It isn't. The public square is quiet. The God Squaders stand over in their carefully circumscribed areas preaching to the choir as the Secular Warriors turn their backs and get on with the real work of policy and politics.

What went wrong?

The First Amendment states that Congress shall make no law. It doesn't mention the Federal Courts.

And, get a grip on this, it was the Supreme Court that screwed the pooch. It was the Supreme Court which invoked the Law of Unintended Consequences. It was the Supreme Court which kicked the snowball down the slippery slope with the result that we are seen as an atheistic nation.

As a Turkish Army officer once asked me, "How could your court have banned God from your public life?'

The man had it part right. The Court has made religiously based speech illegitimate in most of the public square.

That implies only the Supreme Court can bring back legitimacy to religiously predicated speech. Only the Court can repeal this particular application of the Law of Unintended Consequences.

Get a grip on this. The Supreme Court is now a vital part of America's soft power.

Scary thought, isn't it?