Cheap Seats 2016
Khan Con
By Rich Trzupek
There is no doubt that the most powerful moment of the Democrat National Convention featured Khizr Khan, the father of Captain Humayun Khan who died in Iraq in 2004. Khan rebuked Trump, saying that if Trump was President his son would never have been allowed to be an American, much less be in a position to save the lives of ten of his comrades while sacrificing his own.
Left unsaid was the equally relevant fact that denying entry, or at least doing a better job of vetting, people raised in Muslim-dominated countries could very well have prevented a few thousand additional deaths: in the Twin Towers, Fort Hood, Orlando, Boston, etc., etc.
I am willing to say that Captain Humayun Khan assimilated into American society and believed that our secular democratic institutions trump (pardon the pun) all religions, including his own. You don’t join up and serve a nation that you don’t believe in. On the other hand, I very much doubt that his dad feels the same way.
Yeah, yeah, get the hate-mail machines fired up. I’m a cold, unfeeling SOB – I know. But here’s the thing: Khizr Khan, in a nicely choreographed dramatic moment, pulled out a copy of the United States Constitution and challenged Donald Trump to read it.
The implication was clear. Khizr honored the Constitution and a Trump administration would be its ruin. But one cannot help but wonder how deeply Khizr Khan’s reverence for the Constitution lies.
Because you know what would have made that moment truly powerful? Picture this: Khan pulls out his copy of the Constitution and makes his challenge to the Donald. Then, he produces a Bible and, still holding the Constitution aloft declares that “in America, this (waving the Constitution) is the law, not this” – and he places the Bible on a table. He then produces a Torah and goes through the same routine. Finally (you guessed it) he produces a Quran and goes through the routine one more time. Then, he symbolically lays the Constitution atop all three holy books, demonstrating that he believes government is about the rule of law, not religious rules – including those of his own religion.
I don’t think Khizr Khan would do anything approaching what I just described. I believe that for a couple of reasons.
One is that I assume Khizr Khan has a desire to keep living for a while. He knows, as well as you and I, that while some Jews and Christians might be a little turned off by the spectacle I just described, most would not and those who would be upset would be unlikely to want to separate his head from his body.
On the other hand, Khizr Khan seems to be a smart guy and he knows damn well that publicly “disrespecting” the Quran would put him on a hit list faster than you can say “fatwah”.
Second, knowing his culture, it’s very likely that Khan’s supposed devotion to the Constitution is a bunch of crap. No, I can’t know that for certain, but few Americans who haven’t spent time in Muslim nations understand how deeply deception, particularly to non-Muslims, is an accepted, even encouraged, feature of society. Lies told to infidels don’t count as lies and if you’re an American working in that part of the world, you don’t believe anything unless you have tangible proof.
As a sidebar, there’s a trailer for the movie War Dogs playing these days. It looks like a silly movie and I don’t plan to see it, but one part of that trailer struck me as ludicrous, as I’m sure it did to anyone else who has spent time in the Middle East. It shows the two stars of the film pushing their way through a line of natives in whatever Middle Eastern nation they are in, justifying their boorish behavior by announcing “we’re Americans”.
Not only would that never, ever happen in that part of the world, reality is exactly the opposite. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve stood in a line in that part of the world only to have some native dude in a white robe push – and I do mean push – his way past me because infidels don’t deserve courtesy. Hell, we barely deserve to live. No not everybody treats you that way, but you get treated that way a hell of a lot. You learn to live with it, or you just don’t do business there.
Anyway, if Khizr Khan were to do what I suggested I would gladly eat a copy of this column. And, if Hillary were to praise Khan for doing so, I might actually vote for her.
Well, not really, but I’d feel a hell of lot better about having her lying-ass resting on a chair in the Oval Office.
E-mail: rich@examinerpublications.com
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