The recent assault on the National Security Five is only the most recent example of the fear our elites have about discussing and understanding radical Islamists. 
 
 When an orchestrated assault is launched on the right to ask questions in an effort to stop members of Congress from even inquiring about a topic — you know the fix is in. 
 
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 The intensity of the attack on Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) as well as Republican Reps. Trent Franks of Arizona, Louie Gohmert of Texas, Tom Rooney of Florida and Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia is a reminder of how desperate our elites are to avoid this discussion. Yet consider this rush to silence questions in light of our history of unpleasant surprises during the Cold War. 
 
 Given all the painful things we learn about people every day and the surprises that shock even the experts (the head of the FBI anti-spy effort was a Russian spy, for example), you have to wonder why people would aggressively assert we shouldn’t ask about national security concerns. 
 
 Remember the shock in 2001 when we learned that FBI agent Robert Hanssen had been spying for 22 years — first for the Soviet Union and then the Russian Federation. This disaster came just seven years after the 1994 arrest of Aldrich Ames, a CIA counterintelligence officer who was a Soviet spy for eight years. 
 
 Why should we assume we’re in better shape today, when political correctness is passionately opposed to tough counterintelligence screening? It’s as though our leaders have forgotten every lesson of the 1930s about fascism, Nazism and communism and every lesson from 1945 to 1991 about communism. 
 
 We have replaced tough mindedness about national security with a refusal to think seriously and substituted political correctness and a “solid” assurance that people must be OK because they are “nice” and “hard working” for the systematic, intense investigations of the past. 
 
 I’m not suggesting that our primary threat is espionage. Our greatest problem is getting the wrong analysis, advice and policy proposals. It is the bias of the advisers and the disastrous policies they propose that are our gravest danger at this stage of the long struggle with radical Islamists. 
 
 Our elites refuse to even consider that the advice they are getting is biased, tainted, distorted — or just plain wrong. 
 
 The underlying driving force behind this desperate desire to stop unpleasant questions is the elite’s fear that an honest discussion of radical Islamism will spin out of control. They fear if Americans fully understood how serious radical Islamists are, they would demand a more confrontational strategy. ||||| When Politico first began spewing its pollution back in 2007, I wrote a series of posts examining its ownership and management, its heavy reliance on Drudge links, its biases, and its tawdry methods, and had a lengthy exchange with its Editor, John Harris, about those critiques. I long ago stopped doing that: aside from the handful of genuinely good reporters they have, it is widely recognized that Politico is little more than a glorified gossip rag, the belly of the media beast, the embodiment of everything vapid, reckless, and petty that drives America's media rot. Pointing out the latest examples is pointless and redundant. 
 
 But today Politico descended into territory so toxic that one would be remiss to ignore it. They gave Newt Gingrich almost 5,000 words to warn America of the grave danger posed by Muslims, to condemn "elites" for covering up the threat, and to defend the recent McCarthyite attack by GOP Rep. Michele Bachmann and four other members of Congress on Huma Abedin, the long-time Muslim aide to Hillary Clinton and wife of former Rep. Anthony Weiner, whom Bachmann essentially accused -- with zero evidence -- of being a secret agent for the Muslim Brotherhood (Politico gave Gingrich 2,500 words for the Op-Ed itself -- headlined: "In defense of Michele Bachmann, Muslim Brotherhood probes" -- and then another 1,800 words for an "appendix" prepared by the neocon-funded, Muslim-obsessed Foundation for the Defense of Democracies). This was the crux of the Bachmann accusations which Gingrich is defending: 
 
 "It appears that there has been deep penetration in the halls of our United States government by the Muslim Brotherhood," Bachmann told radio host Sandy Rios in June. "It appears that there are individuals who are associated with the Muslim Brotherhood who have positions, very sensitive positions, in our Department of Justice, our Department of Homeland Security, potentially even in the National Intelligence Agency." 
 
 Then, "Bachmann singled out Huma Abedin" and "question[ed] why Abedin . . . was able to receive a security clearance despite having family members that Bachmann believes are connected to the Brotherhood." Bachmann wrote: "I am particularly interested in exactly how, given what we know from the international media about Ms. Abedin’s documented family connections with the extremist Muslim Brotherhood, she was able to avoid being disqualified for a security clearance." Bachmann was joined in her crusade by four other House members (Gingirch calls them "The National Security Five," because nobody does self-victimizing, self-martyring melodrama like neocon Tough Guys). 
 
 So noxious was this attack that even people like John McCain and Wolf Blitzer -- along with Catholic bishops and other religious groups -- harshly condemned it (though it seems clear that the anger in official Washington was due more to Abedin's being deeply ensconced in Beltway power circles than it was due to revulsion over the rank Islamophobia underlying the attack; said Blitzer: "I have been very upset about a McCarthy-like attempt to smear one of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's closest aides, Huma Abedin, someone I have known for years"). Let me know when Islamophobic law enforcement and Surveillance State practices aimed at marginalized, powerless Muslims provoke similar rage in those circles. ||||| Prepared by staff at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies 
 
 1)Global Counterterrorism Conference Without Israel 
 
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 The Global Counterterrorism Forum was founded on Sept. 22, 2011, by Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. It brings together 29 countries and the European Union to discuss ways to strengthen security and limit extremism. The forum meets with experts, as well as representatives from international organizations, including the United Nations. Israel is not a member. 
 
 In May 2010, the Israeli Defense Forces boarded the Mavi Marmara, part of a Turkish sponsored flotilla to Gaza. Fighting broke out, and nine Turkish activists were killed. The Turkish government has since demanded an apology from the Israeli government, compensation for the victims’ families, and an end to the blockade of Gaza. 
 
 When these stipulations were not realized, despite U.S. pressure, the Turkish government indicted four influential Israeli military officials in May 2012. 
 
 Sen. Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), as well as others in Congress, say this fractured relationship prevented Israel from attending the forum’s meeting on June 7. Some Israeli officials said this as well. They contend that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pressured the U.S. to keep Israel out. 
 
 But other Israeli Foreign Ministry officials denied this. “We did not plan on going to that meeting anyway,” the officials said, “…We will take part in working groups on different issues of this forum; that’s confirmed. We’re not estranged.” 
 
 The meeting was sponsored by the United States and held in Turkey. The U.S. sponsorship led Lieberman, Kirk and other members of Congress, to condemn the U.S. government on June 10 for its acquiescence to Turkey’s demands. The State Department’s official response stated, “Our idea with the GCTF was to bring together a limited number of traditional donors, front line states, and emerging powers develop a more robust, yet representative, counterterrorism capacity-building platform. A number of our close partners with considerable experience countering and preventing terrorism are not included among the GCTF’s founding members.” 
 
 Lieberman and Kirk, however, argued that Israel’s unparalleled experience with countering terrorism, especially when compared to forum members like Switzerland, should have merited an invitation. 
 
 Israel had been specifically excluded, according to a July 10, Washington Free Beacon story, which cited a congressional source. 
 
 Meanwhile, Maria Otero, undersecretary for civilian security, democracy and Human Rights, in a speech at the Global Counterterrorism Forum High-Level Conference on Victims of Terrorism, in Madrid, Spain, did not mention Israel and Israelis as victims of terrorism. 
 
 Reporters who asked the State Department about this were first stonewalled. Finally, on July 12, State officials said, “We believe that Israel would make a valuable contribution to the Global Counterterrorism Forum. We have raised the issue of Israeli participation in relevant GCTF activities with a number of GCTF partners at very senior levels. We will continue to do so as we move forward. Our discussion with Israel concerning the GCTF – our discussions have focused on Israeli participation and relevant activities to allow Israel to share its counterterrorism expertise with CT practitioners from GCTF-member and other countries… So Israel is one potential member….” 
 
 2) Engagement with Taliban 
 
 For more than a year, U.S. officials have attempted to engage with the Taliban. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the talks with the Taliban were “not a pleasant business, but a necessary one.” 
 
 In December 2011, the United States was reportedly considering transferring a group of Guantanamo detainees to Afghan authorities in exchange for confidence-building measures from the Taliban. On the same day as the cited Reuters story, Vice President Joe Biden said that “the Taliban per se is not our enemy…There is not a single statement that the president has ever made in any of our policy assertions that the Taliban is our enemy because it threatens U.S. interests.”
– In a six-page, 2,500-word Politico op-ed (with an attached three-page, 1,800-word appendix), Newt Gingrich makes it crystal clear that he is on the side of Michele Bachmann and her four fellow members of Congress who want an inquiry into whether the government is being infiltrated by Islamic extremists. (He refers to the group as "the National Security Five.") According to Gingrich, the quick and plentiful denouncements of Bachmann's theory are simply examples "of the fear our elites have about discussing and understanding radical Islamists," he writes. "You have to wonder why people would aggressively assert we shouldn’t ask about national security concerns." "It’s as though our leaders have forgotten every lesson of the 1930s about fascism, Nazism, and communism and every lesson from 1945 to 1991 about communism," Gingrich writes, noting that "political correctness" has taken precedence over security and that the "elites" worry that "if Americans fully understood how serious radical Islamists are, they would demand a more confrontational strategy." He quotes Tony Blair and JFK (and Wikipedia, notes The Blaze incredulously), and notes the Fort Hood shootings and the Times Square car bomb as evidence that we must be more vigilant. On Salon, Glenn Greenwald decries Politico ("a glorified gossip rag") in general and Gingrich's piece in particular, calling it a "bigoted, McCarthyite screed." Click for Gingrich's full piece, or Greenwald's response.