The ACLU's Non-Aggression Pact with CAIR

Dawud Walid, Executive Director of CAIR-Michigan, was making the rounds yesterday to WJR, the Detroit News, (“Muslims won't fund footbaths”), and on his own blog. (“Regarding funding of the "footbaths"). He was explaining the ACLU’s position on publicly-funded Muslim foot baths at UM-Dearborn.

Speaking to the Detroit News, he said that at one point CAIR “’was concerned a public outcry would cause the university to back down from the project.

"’If the ACLU had decided to take legal action against the UM-Dearborn, we probably would have called for the university to raise the funds privately, just so that the UM-Dearborn wouldn't have to go through the trouble of having to defend its position against the ACLU,’ Walid said.”

This awfully curious comment raises several other questions for me.

First off, what’s CAIR got to do with any of this? Terry Gallagher, flak catcher for UM-Dearborn on this issue, told Debbie Schlussel that “the foot baths are the result of 'years of ongoing negotiations with the Muslim Student Association.'" In other words, the proposed foot baths are supposed to be a “reasonable accommodation” provided in response to requests for same by actual UM-Dearborn students. The MSA, a shady organization with links to the Muslim Brotherhood, is at least on its face a national student organization with a chapter at UM-Dearborn. But now it is turning out (and we’re all shocked, shocked) that CAIR is the outfit taking ownership for this whole thing. Ever since this received any press in early June, Dawud Walid has been doing almost all the talking.

Which only leads to our next question: Why does Dawud Walid and CAIR-Michigan presume to speak, not for the MSA and the Muslim students at UM-Dearborn, but for “the Muslim community” in its entirety? In addressing a secondary issue of whether or not area Muslims, instead of taxpayers, should be paying for the foot baths, Mr. Walid says on his blog (“Regarding funding of the "footbaths"), quote:

“The Muslim community has not stated that it would not fund the foot washing area. It would if need be.

“Since the school's position is that this is a public safety issue, which is not promoting one religion over others and that civil rights lawyers, Muslim and Non-Muslims, have informed us that the 'footbaths' being built with student activity fees is not unconstitutional, the need to privately fund the 'footbaths' does not appear to be incumbent.”

In spite of last week’s embarrassing revelations that CAIR has dwindled 90% down to only 1,700 paying members, CAIR still doesn't hesitate to speak for the entire Muslim community. (1,700 is CAIR's nation-wide membership, by the way. We don’t even know how few actually belong in Michigan, besides Dawud Walid). No matter. He seems to think there’s enough to entitle him to speak for all Muslims.

Our next question is, Why is it that Mr. Walid, CAIR, and “the Muslim community,” are all so confident of the legality of their demands for foot baths, simply because the ACLU says so? Isn’t it the American judicial system that makes determinations over whether a given action is constitutional or not?

Yes, indeed, but that’s only if someone files a legal action and forces the point, which is not always as easy as it sounds. And as far as Mr. Walid, the MSA, and CAIR seem to be concerned, the only potential party in this country who ever gets to file suits torpedoing other people's religious expressions or accommodations is the ACLU--and for some odd reason they aren’t interested in this one. In fact, their commentary on the matter has been laughable. Kary Moss, director of the Detroit branch of the ACLU, sloughed off the whole question of the foot baths by claiming the ACLU views "it as an attempt to deal with a problem, not an attempt to make it easier for Muslims to pray."

There really isn't any question any more that this is all intended to make it easier for Muslims to pray; Dawud Walid, Tarek Baydoun, and every other advocate of the idea wittingly or unwittingly admits as much every time they comment on the subject.

But it's wondrous to see how the eagle-eyed defenders of the First Amendment at the ACLU can overlook an 800-pound gorilla if they simply choose to "view it as...a problem," rather than "view it...as an attempt to make it easier for Muslims to pray." Imagine if they chose to view intelligent design in public schools as an "attempt to deal with a problem" of inconsistencies within classical Darwinian evolution. You know: intelligent design's not a religious thing, it's an education thing.

For all that, one of Ms. Moss's colleagues in keeping religion out of public space, Hal Downs from the Michigan chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, disagrees with Kary Moss on the legality of the foot baths, telling the Detroit News that the Muslim advocates for the foot baths have "got a problem, because it's public money they're using to pay for this."

Which is only common sense, now, isn't it?

Except that neither CAIR, nor the MSA, nor even UM-Dearborn gives a damn if this is constitutional or not. Their only concern has ever been whether or not, all things considered, they can just get away with it.

All things considered, that is, meaning a University decision made in the shadows without public comment, a compliant press playing see-no-evil, and the most potent civil-rights advocacy group neutralized in advance by a non-aggression pact with CAIR, motivated by who-knows-what collateral advantage the ACLU hopes to obtain in return.

The proof of it is when Mr. Walid admits to the Detroit News:

"If the ACLU had decided to take legal action against the UM-Dearborn, we probably would have called for the university to raise the funds privately, just so that the UM-Dearborn wouldn't have to go through the trouble of having to defend its position against the ACLU.”

In effect saying, "if the ACLU isn’t going to drag us into court on this one, we couldn’t care less who else doesn’t like it."

Are you starting to get the feeling this whole thing has been rigged? Are you starting to feel taken advantage of? (Those questions are for you reading this, not for Dawud Walid).

Still I've got one more for him. The whole point of national CAIR, allegedly, is to “advocate for justice and mutual understanding,” and CAIR-Michigan states its mission is to "promote...the image of Muslims."

So the question is, How is forcing unwilling taxpayers to fund Islamic foot baths going to contribute to mutual understanding and promoting a favorable image of Muslims?

Mr. Walid never claims that the Islamic community, hundreds of thousands strong in this area, and by no means, in the aggregate, impoverished, is too poor to take on this expense themselves. Instead, he just says they're only going to pay for the UM foot baths if they have to. And they will only have to if they can’t get the public to pay the bill for them; and that's going to happen, for all practical purposes, only if the ACLU fights them on this. To wit, Mr. Walid says:

“Since the school's position is that this is a public safety issue, which is not promoting one religion over others and that civil rights lawyers, Muslim and Non-Muslims, have informed us that the 'footbaths' being built with student activity fees is not unconstitutional, the need to privately fund the 'footbaths' does not appear to be incumbent.”

Not incumbent? How about this for an alternative to not incumbent: it is incumbent for PR that the Muslim community doesn't once again stick its finger in the eye of the nonMuslim community CAIR and the rest are always claiming they want to build bridges to. Wouldn't it be a damned sight better for the Muslim community--the same community Mr. Walid and his cohorts at CAIR are endlessly telling us is so misunderstood and unappreciated by America’s nonMuslims--to at least offer to take this on themselves?

But in the end, they won't bother. This was never about building bridges or promoting image. It's about gaining one victory at a time. It's about jihad, inch by inch.

And the arithmetic is all on their side.

One unaccountable public official
minus
one watchful press
minus
zealous legal scrutiny
equals
you and me paying somone else's freight bills to Paradise.

And that's just how easy it is to turn an 800-pound gorilla into a problem solved.