The Sticky Wicket of Muslim Immigration

Abdul Razak Ali Artan, 20, a recent Somali immigrant, was shot dead on Monday by a campus police officer on Ohio State University in Columbus, after running down with his car and then stabbing 11 persons on the campus.

A little over two months ago, on Sept. 17, Dahir Adan, 20, another recent Somali immigrant, was shot dead by an off-duty officer after stabbing 10 people in a mall in St. Cloud, Minnesota.

Abdul Razak Ali Artan

And who can forget the bombs set off by Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, in New Jersey and Manhattan that injured 32 people the very same day as Dahir Adan above, viz. Sept. 17.  Rahami immigrated from Afghanistan in 2000.

That's 53 victims, including three police officers.

Notice any pattern here?  The attackers were all young men, and all were recent immigrants from Islamic societies.

And I haven't even mentioned the Orlando slaughter in July perpetrated by Omar Mir Seddique Mateen, where 49 were killed and 53 injured, and the San Bernadino attack last December, where Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik killed 14 and injured 22.

Which, added to the above victims, comes to a grand total of 128 injured and 63 killed in just four incidents.  And frankly, it's amazing that there weren't more killed.

And that's just in America, in the last year.  When you add in the recent attacks in France and Belgium, the number rises rapidly into the many hundreds of victims.  Attacks like this have been going on all over the world now for decades.

Houston, we have a problem.

Is it any wonder that a majority of Americans support some kind of limitation on immigrants from Muslim societies?  Is it crazy to think that Donald Trump's call for such a limitation could have helped him win the 2016 election for President?  I think not.

Americans are not especially prejudiced against people of other religions than their own.  Indeed, we in the United States have one of the most diverse populations, religiously speaking, in the entire world.

But Americans are also not stupid (despite what some liberals may think).  They can see what's happening around them, both here and in Europe.  And they find it hard to believe that it's just an odd coincidence that so many recent multiple-victim, violent attacks are being perpetrated by young Muslim men.

Why import more trouble from abroad when we've got enough home-grown problems already? After all, nobody has a 'right' to immigrate to America.  It is a privilege and opportunity given to a select few (relatively speaking) people around the world.  And it is our right as US citizens, through our elected representatives, to choose who can come and who cannot.

Caution and security would seem to be the order of the day in this matter.  My guess is that the Trump administration is going to be making changes in our immigration policies and processes very quickly in the new year.