Grievance Theater
Debra Burlingame is the sister of Charles F. "Chic" Burlingame III, the pilot of American Airlines flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. She is also extremely upset with the behavior of the six imams at the Minneapolis airport a short while ago. She calls their behavior "grievance theater".
Given that Islamic terrorists continue their obsession with turning airplanes into weapons of mass destruction, it is nothing short of obscene that these six religious leaders–fresh from attending a conference of the North American Imams Federation, featuring discussions on "Imams and Politics" and "Imams and the Media"–chose to turn that airport into a stage and that airplane into a prop in the service of their need for grievance theater. The reality is, these passengers endured a frightening 3 1/2-hour ordeal, which included a front-to-back sweep of the aircraft with a bomb-sniffing dog, in order to advance the provocative agenda of these imams in, of all the inappropriate places after 9/11, U.S. airports.
"Allahu Akbar" was just the opening act. After boarding, they did not take their assigned seats but dispersed to seats in the first row of first class, in the midcabin exit rows and in the rear–the exact configuration of the 9/11 execution teams. The head of the group, seated closest to the cockpit, and two others asked for a seatbelt extension, kept on board for obese people. A heavy metal buckle at the end of a long strap, it can easily be used as a lethal weapon. The three men rolled them up and placed them on the floor under their seats. And lest this entire incident be written off as simple cultural ignorance, a frightened Arabic-speaking passenger pulled aside a crew member and translated the imams' suspicious conversations, which included angry denunciations of Americans, furious grumblings about U.S. foreign policy, Osama Bin Laden and "killing Saddam."
Predictably, these imams and their attorneys now suggest that another passenger who penned a frantic note of warning and slipped it to a flight attendant was somehow a hysterical Islamophobe. Let us remember that but for their performance at the gate this passenger might never have noticed these men or their behavior on board, much less have the slightest clue as to their religion or political passions. Of course, that was the point of the shouting. According to the police report, yet another alarmed passenger who frequently travels to the Middle East described a conversation with one of the imams. The 31-year-old Egyptian expressed fundamentalist Muslim views, and stated the he would go to whatever measures necessary to obey all the tenets set out in the Koran.
I've already said that I believe that this was a deliberate attempt at provoking an incident. The fact is that the behavior that the imams engaged in is not at all normal. The detail that they asked for seat belt extenders then put them under their seats is chilling. That alone disqualifies them from any sympathy. Taken together with all their other actions that day, frankly, they should have been arrested outright.
UPDATE: More tragic news for the Burlingame family came this morning. The daughter of Charles F. "Chic" Burlingame, was found dead following a fire in her apartment. The fire is being called suspicious. This poor family has been through far too much tragedy already. My deepest condolences.
Other Links to this Post
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Sister Toldjah — Wednesday, 6 December , 2006 @ 9:16 am
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Leaning Straight Up — Wednesday, 6 December , 2006 @ 12:05 pm
By lawhawk, Wednesday, 6 December , 2006 @ 1:31 pm
Sad to say, tragedy struck the Burlingame family again, as Chuck Burlingame’s daughter Wendy was killed in a fire under suspicious circumstances yesterday.
By Gaius, Wednesday, 6 December , 2006 @ 1:34 pm
Yeah, I was just going to update this, thanks for the link to the story.