"I think broadly labeling 'Muslims' & suggesting they should be banned, feeds ISIL propaganda."
You went straight for it: "This is what ISIS wants."
I might as well say ISIS wants no religious tests. It suits them wonderfully. It wants nice people to invoke their righteous anger to preclude doing much of anything.
By presuming ISIS' propaganda intentions, you protect ISIS' murderous intentions.
Whereas for me, it's what folks think works for themselves that matters. While considering a variety of factors, including the safety of people living in the US.
If ISIS wants to make propaganda out of US decisions to do something, then the US government might try to fight against that. It's an easier problem than dead people in Times Square.
While you are determined to avoid the "shame" of breaching your chosen highest principle, you must therefore be willing to accept the blame for any deaths caused by being so benign.
You have decided no religious tests and the sensitivities of immigrants and visitors rises above the public safety of Americans. For many people, safety comes first.
We know only one thing about Islamist terrorists. They believe in Islam. So the set of risky people is less than everyone. The trick is to find a way to winnow the population you test/exclude to a minimum. The difficulty is that the population of Moslems sympathetic to ISIS runs around 15% (or so we are told). But if you refuse to try to define bad actors using the tools we have, you must absorb the consequences of failing to do so.
For myself, I think it may be possible to develop tests to distinguish Islamists from other Moslems. But Islamists (such as Wahhabis) are folks I want to be living far away. Even if they don't want to become jihadis, they bring with them all the social issues you see in Europe right now. Such people cannot honestly adopt a secular, constitutional model of governance.
You shouldn't judge the decisions of the folks defending America in WW2. It's a luxury to make decisions in hindsight.
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