A traitor is a traitor is a traitor----
Reader comment on item: The FBI Fumbles [on Gamal Abdel-Hafiz]

Submitted by Richard K. (United States), Mar 16, 2003 at 11:05

In the mid 1960's, when I enlisted in the U.S. Army, I revealed during in-processing testing that I spoke Slavic, learned from my grandparents who were born in Eastern Europe. I was offered a chance to enter a Military Occupational Specialty where I could use these language skills. However, it was made clear up front that I'd probably never get a high enough security clearance to base any sort of post military government job as an interpreter or security operative.

The reason given was that I was only a second generation American whose family came from a now Communist country, and as such, was considered a high security risk because we still had family in Eastern Europe, even though I stated unequivocally that I would have no problem whatsoever fighting in any way against an army and political system which might contain distant relatives whom I didn't even know.

It mattered not that my grandparents fled Bolshevik oppression in the early 1900s, hated Communism and loved America with a fervor most Americans don't even display today. Nor did it matter that my father landed at Omaha Beach in Normandy on D Day and fought for democracy until he was wounded six months later. The bottom line was, we were willing to fight and die for the country that offered us freedom and opportunity beyond that of any other country in the world. Yet, we were still considered a high security risk.

And now, we embrace agents like this "Johnnie Come Lately" Abel-Hafiz character who was more than willing to accept all the trappings of an FBI agent, yet when called upon to "stand up" and do his job, he conveniently ducks behind his religion to hide the fact that he's nothing but a phony who, like other terrorists, has simply learned how to use our own Disney World stupidity in embracing anyone who washes up on our shores against us.

In my day behind the gun (I went on to a long and honorable law enforcement career after six years of honorable service in the military) guys like this were called what they were--"traitors"--and were dealt with accordingly. But, of course, they couldn't play the "religion" card and claim religious oppression as justification for their treason.

We Americans need to wake up before our idiotic sense of sensitivity and fair play becomes our epitaph.

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