![\"foxfuxfax\"](\"https:\/\/objects-us-west-1.dream.io\/racefiles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/foxfuxfax-e1411674021148.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nYeah, you read that headline right. Over the weekend, Eric Bolling<\/a>, the host of Fox News’ Cashin’ In\u00a0<\/em>went to Michelle Malkin<\/a>-land and justified criminal profiling of Muslims<\/a> based upon the notion that sending pretty near every Japanese American on the U.S. mainland (120,000+ people) and not a few in Hawai’i to prison camps in WWII contributed to the success of the U.S. war effort. According to Bolling, “we know how to find terrorists among us: profile, profile, profile.”<\/p>\n Doubling down on that sentiment, panelist Jonathan Hoenig said:<\/p>\n …Let’s take a trip down memory lane here: the last war this country won, we put Japanese-Americans in internment camps, we dropped nuclear bombs on residential city centers. So yes, profiling would at least be a good start…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I know this view of Japanese American internment (not to mention killing at least 80,000 civilians with atomic bombs that also poisoned tens of thousands more for years afterward) is meant to drum up controversy; to lift ratings. But for the sake of those of you who, like me, have friends and family members who take the info-tainment on Fox seriously, here are a few facts to consider.<\/p>\n Imprisoning Japanese Americans had nothing to do with the success of the U.S. in WWII. In fact, this obvious violation of human rights cost the U.S. dearly, both financially and in terms of public opinion. We should not forget that the U.S. government built support for involvement in WWII among the American public and international allies by casting the war effort as a fight against fascism and intolerance. The fact that it did so while simultaneously sweeping up approximately 120,000 residents of the U.S. for no crime but ethnicity was a contradiction in terms that was not missed by many in the American public and the international community.<\/p>\n In order to make internment palatable, Roosevelt justified it by claiming that imprisonment was ordered, in part, in order to protect Japanese Americans. Photographers like dustbowl documentarian Dorothea Lange were commissioned by the government to go to the camps in order to take happy pictures that would reassure America and the world that internees were just fine with being held captive, thank you. But Lange\u00a0joined the ranks of skeptics<\/a>\u00a0upon visiting the camps and many of her photos were censored.<\/p>\n The necessity of trying to clean up the image of the American government in the wake of the decision to intern its own citizens without evidence of espionage, and in spite of the fact that many were born on American soil, is indisputable. Internment was a propaganda liability undertaken at great expense for no good reason.\u00a0Cases of genuine disloyalty, much less espionage, were virtually non-existent.<\/p>\n Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act into law in 1988. The Act provided each surviving internee $20,000 in “compensation” for government actions the federal government has admitted via this Act were taken for no legitimate security reason.<\/p>\n While $20,000 is a paltry sum relative to what Japanese Americans lost as a result of internment, the Civil Liberties Act is significant, particularly when you consider Reagan is the president whose signature is on the Act. Reagan\u00a0used Asian American model minority stereotyping<\/a>\u00a0as a justification for civil rights opposition. Reagan understood that in order to justify opposition to civil rights for Blacks while positioning the U.S. as a champion of democracy and liberty at home and abroad in the context of the Cold War, he would need use the model minority as a shield against accusations of racism.<\/p>\n On matters of international public opinion, the civil liberties of Americans matter. We empower the recruitment efforts of anti-U.S. forces abroad when we arbitrarily act against the civil liberties and human rights of American citizens and residents.<\/p>\n