The U.S. government is withholding documents that could show whether immigration laws have been used to bar foreign scholars from entering the country for ideological reasons, the American Civil Liberties Union said Wednesday.
Among the documents the ACLU has sought are records showing the use of a section of the Patriot Act that allows the government to block people who have used their positions "to endorse or espouse terrorist activity or to persuade others to support terrorist activity."
ACLU attorney Melissa Goodman said the statute was constitutionally problematic, "especially if it's being used in a way to prevent Americans from hearing ideas ... that they have a right to hear under the First Amendment."
The ACLU, the American Association of University Professors and the PEN American Center planned to file a lawsuit in federal court in Manhattan on Thursday seeking release of the documents.
More info at Newsday.com
This is inspired by the visa revocation of Tariq Ramadan. Just who is the ACLU defending this time? Mr. Ramadan's grandfather, Hasan al-Banna, founded the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. The motto of this group is "Allah is our goal. The Prophet is our leader. The Qur'an is our law. Holy war is our way. To die for Allah is our highest expectation."
Tariq is a Swiss citizen because his father, Sa‘id Ramadan, also a leading Islamist, fled from Egypt in 1954 following a crackdown on the brotherhood.
What this brief little history leads up to is the "Gentle Jihadist"by Lee Smith at The American Prospect. He introduces his article with this: "Tariq Ramadan touched off a firestorm with a charged accusation against French Jewish intellectuals. But the problems hardly stop there."
This piece not only will give you insight into Mr.Ramadan but also into some of the causes for the presnt Muslim problems in France. Please, take the time to read it. There is also a lot of very good information at danielpipes.org.
The ACLU also cited the visa denial of Dora Maria Tellez, a former Nicaraguan Sandinista leader who was scheduled to teach a course at Harvard Divinity School, in Cambridge, Mass. A letter to Tellez from the US Department of State quoted a section of the law that bans visas for anybody who "has, under circumstances indicating an intention to cause death or serious bodily injury, incited terrorist activity".
I'm sure we're all missing out on the pearls of wisdom these two would have strewn about our colleges and universities. Weren't you all miffed to find out your "right to hear" radical Islamic and Communist revolutionary ideas was being infringed upon? Well don't worry brothers and comrades, the ACLU is here to bring all the subversive, anti American, anti Christian news right to your doorstep and into your kids' classrooms. Isn't that special?
Join us at Stop The ACLU.
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