Treason

I keep getting questioned about my referring to people like Pastor Terry Jones, and others who go out of their way to take antagonistic stances toward Muslims as a whole, of treasonous behavior.

The term “treason” is defined by the Random House Dictionary as follows:

1. the offense of acting to overthrow one’s government or to harm or kill its sovereign.
2. a violation of allegiance to one’s sovereign or to one’s state.
3. the betrayal of a trust or confidence; breach of faith; treachery.

The U.S. Constitution states the following:

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.

The Constitution says a few more things, but otherwise leaves it up to Congress to define it. So far as I know, Congress has never declared that treasonous speech as a crime, unless it involves an overt act like blowing national security secrets.

In a strict legal sense, then, it would seem that under American law you probably can’t try someone for treason for giving aid and comfort to the enemy by non-overt acts like speech and protests; the First Amendment is still in force, for goodness sakes. But you can judge people as morally guilty of treason, in my view, such as by outright endorsing our enemies. Or, just about as bad, giving propaganda gifts to our enemies (like Pastor Terry Jones is doing). Or, by making our armed forces’ jobs harder when they’re busy fighting our enemies.

Arrest people for burning books? No. Censure them? You bet.

There are Muslims buried in military graves around the United States. There are Muslims who’ve given their lives fighting in our armed forces, or shoulder-to-shoulder in parts of the world where we desperately need help from the locals. P*ssing all over American Muslim service members, some of whom have fought and died for this country, and p*ssing on our allies who’ve done the same, because of some religious or anti-religious axe you have to grind, or some misplaced sense of guilt-by-association, should be called morally treasonous in my view. Would I put you in jail? No. But condemn you in very strong terms? You bet. We don’t need to lose the War on Terror by making enemies out of people who want to be our friends, and who show that they’re willing to be our friends in very tangible ways.

It is a subject that makes me very angry, no question about it. It always has. It always will. Our troops and our allies deserve better than this.