Pandering to Muslims at Taxpayer Expense

Western governments may be swimming in red ink, but there has been no slowdown in public resources being devoted to placating Muslims and conducting comical exercises in multicultural outreach. A few recent lowlights spanning three countries:

• Netherlands. “Nijmegen municipality sees no reason to withdraw its subsidy to an ultra-orthodox Islam website,” begins an article from NIS News. Apparently the local government bankrolls a Shari’a-promoting organization to the tune of €3,500. Yet there is no cause for alarm, the mayor asserts, as the “unacceptable” Islamist content previously featured on the site has been removed. Well, some of it, at least:
  

  In fact, the website remains a patchwork of controversial texts. For example, the visitor can still read that men and women should only speak to each other if it is strictly necessary. The site also says that Western dress invites rape and that Islam “takes strong action” to effect the rule of the laws of the Koran.

  Furthermore, Geert Wilders’ party is demanding answers about claims that the Dutch government awarded $1 million to the American Society for Muslim Advancement, one of the groups behind the mosque near Ground Zero planned by Feisal Abdul Rauf.

• United Kingdom. The district council of High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, is earmarking £150,000 to extend the local cemetery for graves oriented toward Mecca. Why not just modify existing space? The Telegraph cites “fears that mixing Muslim and Christian graves could lead to a backlash in public opinion.” But from whom exactly?

  Meanwhile, at a Birmingham art gallery, money from the government’s much-maligned Preventing Violent Extremism program is supporting an exhibit that urges visitors to get their pictures taken in burqas or headscarves, the Telegraph reports. “There isn’t enough communication between Islamic and non-Islamic communities,” an artist lamented. But what does this show have to do with preventing violent extremism? And how does encouraging people to cover themselves facilitate communication?

• United States. Needless to say, one finds no shortage of cases demonstrating the Obama administration’s misuse of funds to mollify Muslims, from leasing office space owned by a terror-infested mosque, to giving NASA the mission of bolstering Muslim self-esteem, to paying the salary of Obama’s haplessly PC counterterrorism advisor John Brennan.

  Then there is the odd and little-noticed story of the State Department sending Muslim-American country music singer Kareem Salama on a “very expensive” tour of the Middle East. No word yet on whether the wail of slide guitars can soothe an Islamist heart.

To quote another country crooner, despite the repeated failures of pandering, governments never “know when to fold ‘em.” Instead, they keep doubling down with the taxpayers’ chips.