Call him Imam Kenney
Elected mayor, Jim Kenney now becomes the arbiter of what is Islamic and what is not. Pretty good for an Irish kid from South Philly
I know Jim Kenney was elected mayor. I didn't know he was elected iman.
Putting on his progressive goggles – the ones that make it impossible to comprehend reality -- he insisted, more than once, that Edward Archer's attempted assassination of Police Officer Jesse Hartnett had "nothing to do with him being a Muslim or following the Islamic faith."
Now we have the spectacle of the mayor of America's fifth largest city having an argument with a confessed wannabe assassin about the shooter's motives.
On one hand, we have Imam Kenney saying, more than once, the actions were unconnected with Islam. The other hand holds Archer's confession that he did it for Islam and he pledged allegiance to ISIS, which stands for Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
Like a president who prohibited the term "radical Islam" from government language, Kenney can't assimilate facts even when they are screaming in his face.
If a person believes in Allah, follows the teachings of the prophet Muhammad and obeys Sharia law, that person is not a Muslim? Or he is a Muslim until he commits a crime and then he's not a Muslim?
Archer's actions were fostered by his belief, however misguided, in Islam. It did have to do with Islam. The majority of Muslims reject Archer's ideas and one group has stepped up to publicly confront them. http://mobile.philly.com/beta?wss=/philly/columnists/stu_bykofsky&id=364938621
The awful Westboro Baptist Church has "to do with" Christianity. Mainstream Christianity condemns them, but they are Christians. The Mafia has "to do with" Italians, but no one believes most Italians are connected with the Mafia.
The fact that Islamic terrorists are motivated by their beliefs in Islam cannot be wished away just because you don't want to hurt other Muslims' feelings. Kenney foolishly doubled-down – he's slower to learn than Donald Trump sometimes – and denied it was even a terror attack and tried to turn it into a gun crime, also a favorite tactic of the president.
Our hate of guns trumps your fear of terrorism, they seem to be saying. (Both Kenney and Obama are protected by armed guards.)
When we speak of "radicalization," ask yourself, Mr. Mayor, who is being radicalized, by whom, and to what?
The who is (generally young) Muslims, the whom are Islamists and the what is Islamic jihad. When we speak of "radicalization," we are not talking about Jehovah's Witnesses. We are talking about Muslims -- one part of the Muslim community, not all of it.
The Pew Research Center reports 86 percent of U.S. Muslims feel suicide bombing is never or rarely justified, but that leaves 14 percent who feel it is justified. http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-app-a/?beta=true&utm_expid=53098246-2.Lly4CFSVQG2lphsg-KopIg.1&utm_referrer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pewforum.org%2F2013%2F04%2F30%2Fthe-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-overview%2F%3Fbeta%3Dtrue
Are they not Muslims? Trying to ignore facts, or change them, is Orwellian, and that's not intended as compliment.
Sadly for Kenney, almost everyone knows the truth about the shooting and easily saw through his transparent, if well-intended, attempt to alter reality. Most of us understand he was either lying or, more likely, so blinded by his political ideology he can't see, let alone admit to, the plain, simple facts.
Anyone who can deal with the facts knows he made a fool of himself.