Profiles in Cowardice

IN late September, M. Ahsan Baig was kept off United Flight 288 from San Francisco to Philadelphia because the pilot didn’t like the way he seemed to be furtively talking to another passenger in the waiting area. Baig, a California computer specialist who is from Pakistan, got on another flight 90 minutes later after apologies from a ticket agent. An hour-and-a-half delay, for many fliers, might be considered a good day at the airport. For Baig, it was the occasion for a civil-rights lawsuit.

So it goes at the nation’s airports. An Arab-American Secret Service agent’s recent difficulty boarding a flight with his gun has become a national scandal. Meanwhile, discrimination lawsuits filed by Arab-American men have become the latest cause of aspiring Erin Brockoviches. September 11 may have changed the world, but grievance politics is one corner of it that has been serenely untouched. Arab-American groups still scream at any suggestion of commonsense security at airports, while the Bush administration still cowers at any association with “racial profiling.” It has become clear in recent weeks that the pieties of American racial politics will remain unchanged—even after contributing to a mass murder.

About the Author

Rich Lowry

Rich Lowry is the editor in chief of National Review.

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IN late September, M. Ahsan Baig was kept off United Flight 288 from San Francisco to Philadelphia because the pilot didn’t like the way he seemed to be furtively talking to another passenger in the waiting area. Baig, a California computer specialist who is from Pakistan, got on another flight 90 minutes later after apologies from a ticket agent. An hour-and-a-half delay, for many fliers, might be considered a good day at the airport. For Baig, it was the occasion for a civil-rights lawsuit.

So it goes at the nation’s airports. An Arab-American Secret Service agent’s recent difficulty boarding a flight with his gun has become a national scandal. Meanwhile, discrimination lawsuits filed by Arab-American men have become the latest cause of aspiring Erin Brockoviches. September 11 may have changed the world, but grievance politics is one corner of it that has been serenely untouched. Arab-American groups still scream at any suggestion of commonsense security at airports, while the Bush administration still cowers at any association with “racial profiling.” It has become clear in recent weeks that the pieties of American racial politics will remain unchanged—even after contributing to a mass murder.