Yes, Radical Islam Is a Serious Threat to America

[Valin]

National Review:

Contra the Washington Post’s Michael Gerson, we must pull no punches in responding to it.

Bobby Jindal

Feb. 4 2015

 

Two weeks ago, I made a speech in London insisting that America and our European allies deal forthrightly with the threat posed by the rise of radical Islam. It was to be expected that this call for candor and strength would be met with derision from the relativists on the left. This unfortunate criticism has also come from a few in the soft middle of professional American politics, most prominently on the pages of the Washington Post by columnist Michael Gerson.

 

(Snip)

 

A decade prior, this same Mr. Gerson spared no rhetorical edge in describing the existential threat of radical Islam and other rogue totalitarian regimes. In fact, that was his full-time job as a speech-writer in the war-time administration for President George W. Bush. Mr. Gerson, now a self-appointed ambassador for verbal restraint, actually coined the phrase “axis of evil” to describe our most dangerous enemies

 

(Snip)

 

To borrow a slur from his column about me, I have to conclude that based on Mr. Gerson’s own old “apocalyptic” rhetoric regarding the same threat, he has either changed his mind about the threat we face, or he is now appeasing the communal standards of Washington’s salons.

 

Mr. Gerson is too smart to have changed his mind given the fact that Islamic radicals continue to behead innocents, denigrate women, flog civilians, sacrifice children — just as they did when he was willing to speak more honestly. Too many self-styled radical Islamic groups and even strongmen in Middle Eastern nations still want to wipe Israel off the map. Too many governments in the region still pursue the world’s most dangerous weaponry. Too many Islamic militants intentionally threaten civil society in Europe’s largest cities. Mr. Gerson, a learned man, knows well that these are facts and not merely rhetoric, apocalyptic or otherwise.

 

(Snip)

 

 

[Valin]