Joe Doe Sheild Rebuffed by Democrats

Geez, can the Democrats get anything right in Congress. Their latest gaffe is sure to come back to haunt them in a big way.

Congressional Democrats yesterday declined to protect tipsters who report suspicious behavior from nuisance lawsuits.

"This is a slap in the face of good citizens who do their patriotic duty and come forward, and it caves in to radical Islamists," said Rep. Peter T. King, New York Republican and ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee.

Republicans tried to write the protection provision included in final homeland security legislation, crafted yesterday by a House and Senate conference committee, to implement final recommendations from the September 11 commission.

Mr. King and Rep. Steve Pearce, New Mexico Republican, sponsored the provision after a group of Muslim imams filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against US Airways and unknown "John Doe" passengers. The imams were removed from US Airways Flight 300 on Nov. 20 after fellow passengers on the Minneapolis-to-Phoenix flight complained about the imams' suspicious behavior.

So far, I have not seen anyone from the Democratic side of the aisle defending this move, but I am left with two real possibilities as to the reason why the provision was stripped out.

First, Democrats have always decried racial profiling and might, not without some basis, feat that such a blanket protection would lead to racial profiling by common citizens. Here is the problem, you can't legislate out common sense and personal beliefs. Would some people abuse this provision and name names without any basis? Yes it could happen. But such instances are based upon personal prejudices, not official policy. Racial profiling is essentially government based, it is the law enforcement community using race as a proxy for suspicions. We can argue about racial profiling by law enforcment, but private citizens, almost by definition, cannot be racially profiling.

Second, I am wondering if the Trial Lawyers, a generally liberal interest group, didn't lean on the Democrats to strip the provision out, giving the trial bar an additional cause of action to pursue.

I am not sure what is gained by stripping this provision out. The admendment passed the House overwhelmingly. The government and the police cannot watch everywhere, all the time. Having citizens keeping an eye out to protect other citizens just makes good sense. I am hopeful that the provision can get reinserted or brought back in another fashion.