US restrictions on Muslims

A few days ago, the US Supreme Court upheld President Donald Trump’s administration’s travel restrictions on citizens from five Muslim countries; and for good measure, N. Korea and Venezuela. The 5-4 split decision handed a victory to Trump to enforce one of his most controversial policies. The Court ruled that the president has the constitutional authority under US immigration laws to limit travel from the identified foreign countries over national security concerns, as his administration has argued.
Trump is now vindicated in his strategy of articulating an archetypal view of what has been called the “silent majority” in the closing decades of 20th century USA, following the victory of the conservative Ronald Reagan.
One of the objections of that “silent majority” was that the “Liberal establishment” had developed superciliousness to their world view, viewing them as “unsophisticated yahoos”. This was illustrated in the aftermath of the US elections and the subsequent “Women’s Protest against Trump”, when the establishment-dominated media harped on the factoid that the vast majority of white women who voted for him were “not college graduates”. In the American narrative, egalitarianism was supposed to be the most privileged virtue: one man (or woman), one vote.
But, from one perspective, the establishment’s scepticism of “the masses” — which was earliest expressed by Plato when he rejected democratic governance as “mob rule” — was also shared by the ‘Founding Fathers’ of the American Republic, who were obviously all male, but also conservative land and slave owners. They introduced the “Electoral College” as a device to mediate the gullible “raw” votes of the people who would be enticed by “populist” demagogues. But ironically, the device served to elect Donald Trump, who seized the populist mantle even though he is a billionaire, a circumstance that sets him far above the masses economically. It is quite possible that, as an outsider to the political establishment, he resonates with the masses on issues.
And he certainly did on what he defined as the “Radical Islamist threat”. By and large, Americans are in general agreement that they face from “Islamist terrorists” an existential threat to their way of life. While some of the more liberal members of the establishment may make nuanced arguments that the terrorism may be “blowback” against US military actions in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Middle East — all Islamic countries — these do not resonate with the ordinary Americans, who, at the most mundane level, have seen at least a trillion dollars spent on new security features at airports.
One of the complaints made by the “silent majority” was that the radicalisation of Muslims in the US was being facilitated by new immigrants, who would have been exposed to more militant approaches in the conflicts in their homelands. From this perspective, one can understand then White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer’s explanation of Trump’s initial Executive Order, halting all immigration from seven Islamic-majority countries, as a “necessary step” for dealing with people from countries that have “a propensity to do us harm”.
Arguments that there are countries, such as Saudi Arabia, which have produced far more radicals who have harmed the US than the blacklisted seven countries will not cut any ice with Trump or his base. He is shaking the tree to show he “means business” on the “Islamic Threat”.
In his Inauguration Speech, we heard him emphasis his promise in reference to Muslims: “We will reinforce old alliances and form new ones — and unite the civilised world against radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the earth.”
As we said in our editorial at the time, “The word ‘eradicate’ is very strong, and implies a total war that will take this battle even into the home – both within and without America.” This ban on Muslim immigrants, now reaffirmed by the Supreme Court, is just the beginning. We can expect that Muslims even from countries such as Guyana will be scrutinised. Not to mention all Muslims living in the US.