The Decade in Politics
1995

In 1995 we learned, if only for a brief moment, that not all terrorists are dark-skinned foreigners. In fact, the worst domestic terrorist attack on U.S. soil took place in April of that year, perpetrated not by the PLO but by a blond-haired ex-Army grunt and his militant buddies.

The Oklahoma City bombing was a tragedy, and one that will not soon be forgotten. But another tragedy almost certainly has already been left out of the history books — namely, the way in which, during those first few days after the attack, politicians, wonks and most everyone else were so sure that the attack had come from the outside. Every Arab within 200 miles was questioned. Arrests were made.

This reaction wasn't without context. A key part of the Contract with America, the escrit de guerre of the Republican Revolution, was the Omnibus Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, passed in 1996 with virtually no opposition. The act allowed police and federal agencies to incarcerate suspects for indefinite periods of time without even the opportunity to see the evidence against them. In 1997, Prof. Dr. Mazen Al-Najjar of the University of South Florida was held without charge under the Act; he was released in December. This last December.

In short, we were looking for a post-Cold War enemy, and, having exhausted drug dealers, the Japanese and even nasty-looking Germans, we turned back to an old standard, the Arab.

The nation's collective racist knee jerk is especially disturbing in light of the almost immediate amnesia that enveloped it. After a week or so, when it became clear that the perpetrator was one of our own, there was no reaction to the reaction — that is, we missed our opportunity to ask "just what the hell were we thinking?" Instead, it is as if it had never happened. Once again, the country allowed itself to forget an inconvenient episode — and then we wonder just why some folks out there don't like us.

— Clay Risen (clay@flakmag.com)