Good the Bad and the Ugly.
Reader comment on item: Convicting [Ali al-Timimi,] the "Paintball Sheikh"

Submitted by Mike (United States), Sep 16, 2006 at 08:16

I stumbled across this site quite by accident but have enjoyed reading the quips and quotes of the posters.

I, like many of my fellow Americans, would like to believe that this is not an "Us against Them" conflict when it comes to Muslims and the rest of the world. I do, however, struggle with the notion that it is not.

"Muslim extremists" we are told, but I fail to hear or see evidence of "good" Muslim outrage. I come in contact with many every week and I make an effort to engage them in conversation about the world situation and it most always ends in an abrupt changing of the subject. I have even asked where their loyalties lie now that they are a successful hotelier, or service station owner here in the beautiful United States of America.

Some have proudly proclaimed, "I am not a citizen". Some announced the fact that they are Muslims and that the world will see that it is a peaceful teaching. (Yes, peaceful as long as you subscribe.) Knowing that it could mean an instant end to their Comfort Inn or whatever the name, none have openly admitted to me that they believe in the methods of extremists. They will not even comment when pressed into conversation about a recent terrorist event.

I always get the impression they are smiling at me from the inside as they stare at me with a darn good poker face. But I am trapped. Odd and ironic as it may seem, I and several tens of thousands of my brothers and sisters in arms who work for the government, either as contractors or directly, are faced with a limited per diem that forces us to stay at hotels in a price range predetermined by the US of A. The irony is that the hotels in this price range are almost without exception, owned by Arabs and practicing Muslims. Arabs being a general term to include Pakistanis, Indians, Afghanis and God knows who else.

No one has ever seen fit to question the connection of these people to the militant Arab word. They have been loosely tied to some former convicted Arabs, but never directly. Should this connection ever be proven, it would turn out that the US of A is thereby supporting the Arab Terrorists.

I don't know about you, but it tees me off every time I have to walk into a gas station to pay 2.50 a gal. To a little guy standing behind a register who is too cheap to refill the receipt machine on a gas pump because he is bleeding this country of its wealth and sending it "back home" to "support his family". Ever wonder where in heck this guy got 5 million to buy that BP station in the first place? Or is it just me?

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