Chicago: Two Misunderstanders of Islam get jail for jihad plots

Earlier today a reporter contacted me to remonstrate with me for my treatment of the reporter in this video. However, I am finished with playing along with the grand pretense that reporters are objective, neutral observers of events, and not the relentless and viciously unfair ideologues that they are. This story, a minor AP piece about some minor jihadists in Toledo, Ohio, is a case in point as to why they deserve no professional respect whatsoever.

Look first at the headline: two "terror plotters" were sentenced. So far they could be anyone. Islamic jihadists? Maybe? Could also be "Christian extremists" (who will surely be along in a minute to bear out every Bronx schoolgirl's desperate and paranoid fear of them). Or maybe Tamil Tigers. Maoist fanatics. You never know. So let's read on.

"Federal judge in Toledo sentences 2 terror plotters," from AP, July 12 (thanks to Block Ness):

TOLEDO -- Two Chicago-area cousins who pleaded guilty to taking part in a plot to attack American soldiers overseas have been sentenced to prison terms by a federal judge in Ohio.

Ah. Now we're getting somewhere. They were "Chicago-area cousins." That seems to be the most important bit of information about them, because that's what the AP reporter chose as the lead identifier for them. So did they take part in a "plot to attack American soldiers overseas" -- maybe lazy recruits in a sleepy, outmoded, and no longer necessary Cold War outpost in Germany, for all we know from the story so far -- because they were from the Chicago area? Is Chicago in rebellion against the United States government? Or is it that this is some sort of weird cousins' plot, a Manson-family type thing?

Prosecutors say the two men were training to kill soldiers and had ties to three men in Toledo who were convicted of organizing the plot.

Ah. They were "men." And they had ties to three other "men." So maybe the problem here is males, the source testosterone. Extra screening for men in airports! Now!

Toledo federal Judge James Carr today sentenced Khaleel Ahmed of Chicago, to 8 years, four months, and Zubair Ahmed of suburban North Chicago to 10 years.

Both pleaded guilty in January 2009 to conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists.

Hmmm. Khaleel Ahmed and Zubair Ahmed. What an odd coincidence: both names strongly suggest that these two are adherents of the Religion of Peace™! Yet Obama and Brennan tell us that Islam has nothing to do with terrorism, and so AP doesn't even come close to mentioning the possibility that it could have had anything to do with their motivations.

Authorities say the men once traveled to Egypt with the intent to commit violence and that they met with an FBI informant and talked about learning to shoot machine guns and sniper rifles.

Egypt, eh? How odd. One would think that one of the many peaceful adherents of Islam in Egypt would have stopped them there.

In any case, the AP story, like all other mainstream media stories, leaves the reader thoroughly unequipped to understand why the Ahmed cousins got involved in this plot, and what they hoped to accomplish. No wonder the state of awareness about the jihad threat in America is so abysmally low today.