Grover Norquist: the can of worms is open, fully open

Some of you are asking who is Grover Norquist.  If you don’t know, good for you.  He is your typical power grabbing, Bush/Rove buddy, Washington insider, supposed defender of your tax dollars, and much (much) more.   He has for many years been the head of Americans for Tax Reform (maybe you know the name now). 

And…. he may be a trojan horse for Islamic supremacism in the US.   Before you think I’ve gone completely off the deep end, see how the can of worms opened over the last few days first at Michelle Malkin’s Hot Air where Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch made the following comment to an article praising Norquist’s tax work.  Read all of the comments that followed Spencer’s, including Debbie Schlussel’s.  Here is Spencer’s:

Grover Norquist has been responsible, more than any other individual, for the infiltration of Islamic supremacists into the highest levels of the U.S. government. See here the seminal expose by Frank Gaffney of the immense damage Norquist has done.

The continuing general ignorance among conservatives of the political aspects of Islam, and of the efforts by Islamic jihadists to impose political Islam, piece by piece, over the West, can largely be attributed to the baneful influence of Norquist. He has energetically aided and abetted the branding by CAIR and others of critics of Islamic supremacism and of those who tell the truth about this Islamic political and societal agenda as “bigots” — such that frank discussion of the full nature and magnitude of this issue has been generally unwelcome even in conservative gatherings and on conservative media outlets.

Then read the Jihad Watch post on the issue here (with comments).   Note that Grover Norquist is married to a Muslim woman, Samah Norquist.

It is all coming together.  We wrote about Norquist for the first time last summer because he was promoting the Kennedy bill to bring more Iraqi refugees to the US.  See our posts here, here and here.

Frankly, I didn’t understand it.  For the life of me I didn’t see how a conservative crusader for lower taxes could be actively promoting bringing more refugees to the US—and more Muslims.   I am very discouraged, disgusted, you name it.  

Please read all the links I’ve provided and digest this information.   For me, it is further confirmation that our country is in serious trouble.  It confirms what we all know, that Washington and the power brokers (left and right) are not putting America first.   So, it is more important than ever that all of you get involved in whatever way your talents lead you to halt the creep of Islamic supremacism into each minute fiber of our society. 

This is a big deal—Spencer’s statement above—he was very brave to comment with such straightforward honesty.    Please all of you be as brave.  The worst they can do right now is call you a bigot and racist.  If they get more power, what they will do will be worse, much worse.

Refugees loaded with health problems

This morning I have a couple of articles about refugee health in my alerts.  The first is from Utah.   It is a lengthy article well worth reading in its entirety.   Be sure to look at the interesting graph depicting health problems of refugees arriving in Utah.

In 2007, 889 refugees arriving in Utah had health screenings.    219 were found to have Tuberculosis, 182 parasites, 28 Hept. B, 11 lead, 8 HIV, and 6 STDs.    The article discusses problems with language barriers and other things that keep refugees from regularly visiting medical professionals.  The first thing I wondered was how many are not sticking with a medical treatment such as the lengthy one required of those with TB.

Here is a portion of the Salt Lake Tribune article:

Tropical infectious diseases, which some American doctors have never treated, are commonplace. Schistosomiasis, a waterborne parasite that burrows into the skin and migrates to the lungs and liver, is frequently seen in southeast Asians, Swoboda said. So is Strongyloides, a roundworm that lives in the tunnels of the small intestines.

Tougher to identify are refugees’ mental health problems, among them depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder.

While up to 35 percent of refugees are victims of torture – for Somalis, that number can be as high as 90 percent – the symptoms of PTSD may not appear until months after a refugee has been seen by a doctor, said Rabin, who is also the medical director of the Utah Health and Human Rights Project.

A car accident or a troubling encounter with an authority figure can send a person who has been “white knuckling it” for years reeling. “One pin drops out and the trauma comes flooding back,” she said.

I had to laugh over that last statement above.  I shouldn’t be giving hints, but I see the legal defense being crafted for all the Somalis who commit crimes in the US.   You know that Somali guy from Tennessee the other day, the one who tried to rape a woman, stole two trucks and almost ran over a sheriff’s deputy.  It’s all about Post Traumatic Stress of course.   No one will raise the issue of a hate crime.  Did the Somali guy attend a ‘religious conference’, get fired up at the mosque, and then go after a white Christian woman in a Baptist church,  or did a “pin drop out?”

Somalis and autism?   Another health story involving Somalis is being reported from the Somali capital of America, Minneapolis.  Turns out that a large number of Somali children, larger than those in the normal American population, are developing autism and the school system in that city is having a real challenge with special classes filled with Somali children.  

Read the whole article about a possible link between autism and sunshine.    A study is being planned.  However, one would have to include in any such study some information from Somalia.   I’m wondering if toddlers in Somalia who might have autism-like symptoms just don’t survive there.

We have posted on many occasions about refugee problems in Utah here.