Open borders, locked-down country

The cost of our nation’s sacred openness to others (which nobody even dreams of questioning) is that our nation becomes closed to itself.

“Thirty-five years ago,” writes Dale McFeatters,

a close British friend arrived for his first visit to the United States, and that night I took him to the U.S. Capitol, luminously white and shining on a hill. We parked on the east side and walked around to the terraces and balconies that overlook the city and its illuminated monuments to the west.

Try doing that now.

The Capitol is off-limits to the casual visitor. The grounds are surrounded by elaborate security barriers. And even just driving by on Independence and Constitution avenues—the thoroughfares defining the Mall—requires stops at police roadblocks. There are 14 around the Capitol grounds, and guards with automatic weapons patrol the subway stop.

Indeed, the security perimeter around the White House has been extended, and officials won’t let trucks park on nearby streets, meaning local stores and restaurants have to receive their supplies by handcarts. [Dale McFeatters, “D.C.: A Tourist Site No More,” New York Post, August 23, 2004.]

The shutdown of our nation’s capital is made necessary by one factor and one factor only: the presence of radical Muslims in this country. If there were no radical Muslims in this country, there would be no threat of Islamic terrorism in this country. Period. Yet the thought, “It doesn’t have to be this way,” doesn’t even flit for a millisecond across the minds of 99.9 percent of Americans.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at August 24, 2004 01:53 AM | Send