Thursday, October 19, 2006

Uninformed and in power

This does not bode well- if those in positions of power don't even understand the basics of the people we're dealing with, how can they ever hope to effectively combat the threat?

FOR the past several months, I’ve been wrapping up lengthy interviews with Washington counterterrorism officials with a fundamental question: “Do you know the difference between a Sunni and a Shiite?”

But so far, most American officials I’ve interviewed don’t have a clue. That includes not just intelligence and law enforcement officials, but also members of Congress who have important roles overseeing our spy agencies.

Charles Johnson sums it up best- Clueless in Washington.

Maybe this explains all of the badly informed pronouncements coming out of D.C. And also the "tiny minority of extremists hijacking a peaceful religion meme". Is they can't tell a Sunni from a Shi'ite do they know anything about the exhortations to jihad in Islam?

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