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President Trump has vowed to accomplish what the previous two administrations since 9/11 have not been able to- eradicate radicalism and terrorism from the face of the earth. In order to do so he would have to discover what the previous administrations have overlooked- a strategy addressing the radical ideologies and regimes that suppress the freedom of religion, and the role US foreign policy plays in it.

Terrorism, per se, is an outcome-a symptom of a deeper process of radicalization. The genesis of radicalization spawns in a number places-one of them being be a Saudi-funded madrassa (a religious school) in Pakistan.

In Pakistan, where the poverty line surpasses 1/3 of the population, hordes of 7-year olds are enrolled into these affluent madrassas where they are well-fed and provided for. They will also undergo radical indoctrination- how the West seeks to control Muslim lands and resources (or destroy them with drones), how godless Western entertainment and hedonism has infected Muslims, and how Muslim leadership is too inept and corrupt to deal with any of this. They will be indoctrinated in extreme intolerance-- that apostates and blasphemers should be put to death; the antithetical of the freedom of religion.

And "you"-the nascent minds at the madrassas are told-are the army of God raised to rescue the world from this decadence; you can either pursue a meaningless life of poverty in subjugation to a system rife with nepotism and hedonism. Or, if you're lucky, you will die a martyr's death fighting the enemies of God, resurrecting His law and attaining paradise.

This is the kind of ideology that US foreign policy fanned, and US taxpayers funded, under the geopolitical impulse of defeating the Soviets in Afghanistan. President Reagan even invited the Afghan Mujahideen to the oval office. In fact, the US government spent $50 million from 1986 to 1992 on a jihad literacy project -printing books for Afghan children inciting violence against infidels to prop up resistance against the Soviets.

But, it's even ever deeper than that, and goes further back.
Saudi Arabia And The New World Order
Afghanistan was not the first instance, in the modern era, of geopolitical aims leveraging a radical ideology.

Saudi Arabia, a key relationship in the war-on-terror now frowned upon by media and the public, was born out of the ashes of the First World War. The Saud's genesis to power was fueled by the Wahhabist doctrine as a pan-Islamic movement underwritten by eschatological zeal of an Armageddon-like victory over anyone with a different view of God and religion: Muslim or non-Muslim.

Colonel T.E. Lawrence, romanticized as Lawrence of Arabia, warned that the Wahhabis were 'posing' as reformists, that they hardly 'represented' Islam, and if they prevailed, "we would have in the place of the tolerant, rather comfortable Islam of Mecca and Damascus, the fanaticism of Nejd (birthplace of Wahhabism), intensified and swollen with success".

The Saudi-Wahhabi consortium, fighting their Ottoman occupiers, successfully channeled its zeal into the battlefield and emerged as the new sheriffs of Mecca and Medina. Soon they will reap prolific oil-wealth to propagate their condemnation of the freedom that permitted a multitude of Islamic sects and schools across the Muslim world.

Alastair Crooke, author of 'Resistance: The Essence of Islamic Revolution', wrote, "the West would acquiesce to Saudi Arabia's soft-power wahhabisation of the Islamic world with its concomitant destruction of Islam's intellectual traditions and diversity". And Farah Pandit, the State Department's special representative to Muslim countries, likewise concluded, "the Wahhabi influence was an insidious presence, changing the local sense of identity; displacing historic, culturally vibrant forms of Islamic practice".

Perhaps the ultimate confrontation of the Wahhabist pan-Islamic ideological program was with The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community- also a modern pan-Islamic revivalist-movement, but characterized by missionary outreach with a theological and eschatological interpretation antithetical to the Salafist-Wahhabist doctrine.

Pakistan and The Ahmadiyya
Pakistan has been a major recipient of the Saudi-Wahhabist largesse-- in funds and in ideology. Pakistan's clerical-ideological godfather, Maulana Maududi, in his book, "Jihad in Islam", proclaimed that subjugating states and governments was 'the program and ideology of Islam'. He was a recipient of the Saudi King Faisal award.

Moving smack into the cross-hairs of Maududi and the far-right clergy was The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community that propagated Jihad as essentially a spiritual and moral struggle. The movement's founder, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835-1908), wrote in his book, 'British Government and Jihad', "Today's Islamic scholars completely misunderstand jihad and misrepresent it to the general public, clerics who persist in propagating these blood-spattered doctrine".

In 1953, Maududi and the hard-line clerics published anti-Ahmadiyya hate-literature that led to riots with hundreds reported killed. Martial law was imposed and a military court sentenced Maududi to death for his role in orchestrating the riots. He was subsequently released, reportedly upon Saudi insistence. But in 1974 the hardliners finally succeeded in making the government bend to its demands- Pakistan's parliament amended its constitution to ex-communicate the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, again reportedly under Saudi pressure.

Pakistan then intensified its anti-Ahmadiyya campaign by legislating Ordinance XX in 1984 imposing prison terms for any Ahmadi practicing any emblem of Islam: even saying "As-salaamu-Alaikum" (peace be on you) carries a 3-year prison sentence. As Pak-Saudi plans to destroy the Ahmadiyya movement intensified, its Caliph (leader) migrated to London that same year.

All this occurred as US foreign policy took Saudi Arabia and Pakistan as allies against the Soviets in Afghanistan, while cultivating extremists around the world and transporting them to Afghanistan in what came to be filmed as Charlie Wilson's War.
Combating Radicalism: Freedom of Religion
Finally, in October of 1998, President Bill Clinton signed into law the International Religious Freedom Act mandating the establishment of an office of Religious Freedom in the Department of State.

Though it is encouraging to see official support for the cause, the office simply does not enjoy the needed level of influence. Renowned American diplomat, Thomas Farr, writes, "Recently, a bipartisan group in the House sponsored a bill with amendments that would force the State Department to prioritize religious freedom-putting the ambassador under the Secretary, allocating democracy funding to religious freedom, and mandating training for American diplomats. Unfortunately, neither Senate Democrat nor House Republican leaders appear to see the value of passing these amendments... all State Department language was summarily stripped from the bill, leaving only the reauthorization of an advisory panel called the Commission on International Religious Freedom."

Government policy analysts have long underscored the need for pressing freedom-of-religion to mitigate radicalization abroad. William Inboden, former Senior Director on the National Security Council, emphasized, "there is not a single nation in the world that both respects religious freedom and poses a security threat to the United States...including World War II, every major war the United States has fought over the past 70 years has been against an enemy that also severely violated religious freedom".

Holding up a firm criterion of the freedom-of-religion in foreign policy will scrub our own initiatives of any double-standard with allies. And, as history dictates, it will check against reacting into ideally (and morally) ambiguous alliances under geopolitical impulses.

US foreign policy needs to reflect our commitment to the merit and character of our democracy. It must vet our foreign alliances- that these may not be constitutionally feeding the very doctrines that threaten our national security, and are antithetical to our values-the freedom of religion.

This article was originally published in The Hill. This article is dedicated to Abdul Shakoor Rana, who was arrested in Dec, 2015 in Rabwah, Pakistan under Anti- Terrorism charges for propagating his faith.

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The Greatest Weapon Against Terrorism is Freedom of Religion

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President Trump has vowed to accomplish what the previous two administrations since 9/11 have not been able to- eradicate radicalism and terrorism from the face of the earth. In order to do so he would have to discover what the previous administrations have overlooked- a strategy addressing the radical ideologies and regimes that suppress the freedom of religion, and the role US foreign policy plays in it.

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#AllReligionsWelcome #FreedomToBelieve
The basic definition of the term "Freedom Of Religion" means that one has the right to practice whatever religion one chooses. In the photo the statue of liberty is shown; a symbol of freedom. To the right of the statue is a cluster of symbols of religion, which expresses the whole meaning of Freedom Of Religion.

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Jonathan Boniface makes his latest 'attack' on freedom of speech, or put another way: he explores the power structures that underpin why people exercise their rights with no attention to their responsibilities.

A couple of weeks ago, I had the misfortune to attend an event where I saw privilege writ large in all its ugliness. I should perhaps refrain from using the word 'privilege' because it tends to make educated white liberals roll their eyes. I should refrain, but I won't.

There are few things more uncomfortable than people oblivious of their privilege, acting in a manner conducive to displaying their obliviousness in its entirety. In fairness, the organisers of the event I attended had their hearts in the right place, having created a system where it was possible to object to actions or words that were tantamount to bullying or which made use of slurs or other oppressive rhetoric. Now, before anyone rolls their eyes into another dimension and talks about the 'right to be offended' (white cis people are a big fan of protecting that right) this means that I, for example, would be able to object to someone in the meeting calling me a 'faggot' and that would be upheld as unacceptable, and I'm down with that.

That said, I don't think this system went down particularly well with some other people. Looking across the room, I could see teeth being ground and I could hear more sighing and huffing than Thomas the Tank Engine after smoking a pack of 20 Marlboro Reds. What I'm referring to, of course, are the white cis heterosexuals. There's nothing that warms the cockles of your heart more than hearing a grey haired, educated white man yelling 'freedom of speech' in response to someone objecting to oppressive rhetoric. Even more depressing was the fact that this was in an ostensibly 'liberal' setting.

Freedom of speech is the big thing right now. Go on social media and you can read tweet after tweet of people wringing their hands over the perceived 'threat' to free speech, simply because a handful of universities may have told a handful of idiots that their attention-grabbing, divisive and oppressive rhetoric isn't welcome in their halls. I mean, it's like the whole foundation of civilisation is just unravelling before cis white eyes. You'll see more tweets by powerful white cis people objecting to being prevented from offending others than posts lamenting the systematic and institutional discrimination of trans people, or BME people. Unsurprisingly, you could come to the conclusion that it's more important to those with power and privilege to protect those who already enjoy power and privilege, than it is to fight against oppression. And you'd be right.

There's nothing that warms the cockles of your heart more than hearing a grey haired, educated white man yelling 'freedom of speech' in response to someone objecting to oppressive rhetoric.

In my former life as a teacher of many subjects, including citizenship, one of the big topics of discussion was 'rights and responsibilities'. If you went through the secondary education system in the UK in the last decade or so, this is probably ringing a few bells. No, we're not moving into a situation where people's right to freedom of speech is under threat; rather we are moving towards an even more dangerous situation where people champion the 'right' of freedom of speech above the responsibilities associated with it. I'm sorry, but no-platforming people like Germaine Greer or Julie Bindel is not more dangerous to our society than absolving people like them of their responsibility for what comes out of their mouths, or from their laptop keyboards. Or, to quote Edina Monsoon, 'are we in The Others?'

That's because the argument over freedom of speech is no longer about 'rights'. It's actually the marker of a quite smug and naïve society to believe that. We can pat ourselves on the back and talk about 'equality' in our society because we have enlightened laws that supposedly uphold it (I use the term supposedly advisedly as there are many ways in which the law still fails many groups in our society) but having such legislation does not actually mean that you have created an equal society. Equality is a myth, even in the self-satisfied western world where we think we've got it cracked. Yes, those of us in less privileged groups have the right not to be discriminated against in the workplace, or abused in the streets, or passed over for promotion, but that doesn't mean that these things don't happen. That is because - power.

No, we're not moving into a situation where people's right to freedom of speech is under threat; rather we are moving towards an even more dangerous situation where people champion the 'right' of freedom of speech above the responsibilities associated with it.

Equality legislation does not equal redistribution of power. If you're serious about equality, or about ending oppression, then you have to recognise that, and you need to move power from those who have traditionally enjoyed it to those who find it lacking. It's easy for legislators to change the law to nominally 'achieve' equality because it does not involve them having to give power away. Equality for all before the law = bingo, equality achieved. And it's the same for freedom of speech, or is it?

The premise is that if you have freedom of speech for everyone, that means that you can hear hateful views that seek to oppress others because it gives you the opportunity to take them down in public and expose them for what they are, etcetera, etcetera. Yes, we've heard it all before - it's a very well worn argument. It's also, if you'll forgive the vernacular, an absolute load of guff. To hear the views of powerful oppressors and to be able to neutralise them suggests that everyone has a level playing field to proceed from in order to achieve that. I'm going to show my age but, to quote John Cage from Ally McBeal, 'say it with me - please ...'

Freedom of speech is no longer about rights; it's about power. Just as with equality, we have legal equality but not real equality due to the maintenance of traditional structures of power, so too with freedom of speech we have an unequal distribution of power, and it's certainly not in the favour of those who seek to no-platform. If you need proof of this, just take a look at those who generally end up being no-platformed. The process does not restrict their freedom of speech in any way whatsoever, because they have any number of other ways in which they can express their views. That's because their exercise of the right to freedom of speech comes from a position of power. Put simply, being able to shut down the attempts of oppressed groups to fight your rhetoric is the new marker of power, and feeling 'oppressed' because people are telling you they don't want to give you a forum for your views is the new white cis disease.

What people really mean when they refer to their freedom of speech is their position of power. By saying that we don't want to hear people, we're threatening their power, not their civil rights. This is what alarms the white cis lobby that sees the rest of us as the enemy to freedom of expression. This is unsurprising when you consider what they have to lose. But what this also exposes is some of the fractures within the LGBTQ+ community itself. In terms of serious commentary, I see white cis gay men getting quite angry about freedom of speech, more so than about the struggles of other sections of the community to which we all allegedly belong.

Being able to shut down the attempts of oppressed groups to fight your rhetoric is the new marker of power, and feeling 'oppressed' because people are telling you they don't want to give you a forum for your views in the new white cis disease.

The problem is that, just like their cis heterosexual counterparts, many of these men simply don't understand serious oppression. It'll occasionally rear its ugly head, but generally they don't need to think about oppression as regularly as many of their counterparts because they lead privileged lives. White cis gays knows where the power lies, hence their support of the power structure that lies behind freedom of speech. There's more in it for them to support the position of white cis heterosexual liberals in maintaining a system that upholds the 'rights' of freedom of expression over the responsibility to not use it to treat people like dirt; as with anything wrong in our society, it's easier to put yourself on the side of the status quo than it is to fight for change.

By saying that we don't want to hear people, we're threatening their power, not their civil rights.

If all these people put as much energy into ending oppression as they did into protecting their right to talk trash about people with impunity then they probably could have saved the world ten times over. Instead, it's more important to make sure that we hear the voices of oppressed white cis people.

Say it with me - please ...
Follow Jonathan on Twitter (@gaes_elskhugi)

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Freedom of speech is no longer about 'rights', it's about power

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Jonathan Boniface makes his latest 'attack' on freedom of speech, or put another way: he explores the power structures that underpin why people exercise their rights with no attention to their responsibilities. A couple of weeks ago, I had the misfortune to attend an event where I saw privilege writ large in all its ugliness.

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#FirstAmendment #FreePress
Freedom Of Speech means the right to express any opinions without censorship or restraint. This amendment is important due to the fact that it gives people the right to say whatever they want, hopefully with moral thought in mind of course. This photo represents freedom of speech due to the cluster of words used to describe all things possible with freedom of speech.

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Gadfly: That freedom of the press thing...

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Click here to view this article from nuvo.net.

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#FreedomToPost #SpreadTheWord
Freedom of the Press is the right so circulate opinions in print without censorship by the government. This right goes hand in hand with the freedom of speech amendment. The political cartoon shown represents this amendment due to the statement made by the man next to President Trump. What the statement means is that nobody can take away a right that was given in the bill of rights, no matter who that person is.

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Renewal applications for recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program can be resubmitted, after mail delays caused the rejection of dozens of applications that arrived after the deadline.

DACA recipients who received rejections despite sending applications before the deadline will get the chance to send in another application with a new deadline if they have proof that they mailed the first one on time, according to a Wednesday night statement from the acting director of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. The agency had previously declared that the rejections were final and that it could not be responsible for postal delays.

Around 115 DACA recipients reported that their applications were affected by the mail delays, primarily in Chicago and New York, where the U.S. Postal Service admitted an "unintentional temporary processing delay." Eligible applicants were given until October 5 to reapply for protections for another two years.

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When President Donald Trump announced the cancellation of DACA in September, recipients sent in around 132,000 applications for renewal, but at least 4,000 were rejected because they were late, according to a government official in an October lawsuit. Of those 4,000, it's unclear how many were rejected because of the mail delays.

"We're glad to see USCIS do the right thing by accepting these applications," said Camille Mackler, the director of legal immigration policy at the New York Immigration Coalition, an immigrant advocacy group. "This news will come as a huge relief to DACA recipients who had been living with enormous anxiety for weeks now."

The reversal came on the same day that a group of Democratic Senators penned a letter to the Department of Homeland Security urging the agency to reconsider the rejections. Two dozen lawmakers signed the letter, which encouraged Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke to "weigh the life-changing consequences many will face in the absence of action by the Department."

In New York, lawyers representing the so-called Dreamers looking to extend their protections said that 18 out of 34 applications arrived on time, but the immigration agency didn't accept the mail until the following day. When announcing the chance for resubmission, the agency admitted that this was the case.

"USCIS had discovered certain cases in which the DACA requests were received at the designated filing location (e.g., at the applicable P.O. Box) by the filing deadline, but were rejected," Homeland Security said. "USCIS will proactively reach out to those DACA requestors to inform them that they may resubmit their DACA request."

Trump announced in September that DACA would be coming to an end, phasing out the Obama-era protections for young immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children. Nearly 800,000 people were protected from deportation under the program. Recipients with permits expiring before March 5, 2018 were allowed to submit applications for a two-year renewal.

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Dreamers got a second chance at DACA renewal, after mail delays resulted in rejections

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Renewal applications for recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program can be resubmitted, after mail delays caused the rejection of dozens of applications that arrived after the deadline.

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#FreedomToProtest #FightForRight
Freedom Of Assembly allows people of the United States to hold public meetings and form associations without interferance from the government. Once you click on the article, you will see the first photo that appears is people having a protest for DACA. That protest is a prime example of Freedom of Assembly.

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Hundreds of signatures for the Healthcare Freedom Amendment Petition have been collected at several area events. Members have attended the Moonshine Festival in New Straightsville, held a signature drive-thru and set up a booth at the Washboard Festival in Logan, Ohio. Organizers of the Washboard Festival were kind enough to allow us to set up a booth even though our application was past the deadline. (Thank you Washboard Festival Committee!) Most recently the petition was circulated at the Laurelville Fireman's Festival in Laurelville, were HHTPP members where joined by circulators from Pickaway County as well. Special thanks to Wendy, the Pickaway County Petition Coordinator and Chad Ricketts who was willing to make an announcement at the Fireman's Festival regarding the petition.

Current plans are being made to have a booth at the Rockbridge Flea Market every weekend for the remainder of the summer. If you have not yet signed this vital petition we encourage you to stop by, sign the petition and say hello.

We have had an exciting time this summer, meeting fellow Americans who are willing to take time out of their busy schedules, sign or circulate the petition in order to restore freedom. But, we are far from done. Hocking County is at its halfway mark and needs to submit at 700 more signatures in order to meet the minimum required. Please consider getting involved by going to theohioproject.com and signing up to be a circulator.

Signatures being gathered for the Healthcare Freedom Amendment

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Healthcare Freedom Amendment Petition Drive Underway

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Hundreds of signatures for the Healthcare Freedom Amendment Petition have been collected at several area events. Members have attended the Moonshine Festival in New Straightsville, held a signature drive-thru and set up a booth at the Washboard Festival in Logan, Ohio.

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#FreedomToWrite #AmericansHaveAChance
Freedom of petition means the right to present requests to the government without punishment or reprisal. This is very important and gives citizens the right to petition the government's rights. In the photo the people are signing a petition for healthcare, which is a prime example of freedom of petition.