How might Ali’s case speak to these sentiments? Is it a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy?
Well, I think Ali’s case is very much a demonstration of where we as a culture, we as a government, have gotten sucked in the vortex created by 9/11. Ali was not treated as an individual in our society. Every person who is accused of a crime, or every person who walks the streets, has the right to a presumption of innocence. But Ali was treated as a member of a suspect segment of society, and wound up, incomprehensibly, with a life sentence. We played very loosely with American process and American tradition. Ali received some of his Islamic education in Medina, where Saudi-brand Wahabbism prevails. Do you believe that this exposure determined his life’s course? We’d probably need a psychiatrist to answer such questions. Clearly, the Ali I knew when he was a kid, friendly with my son Nicholas, showed, in my judgment, no signs of extremism. I was certainly surprised by the course Ali’s life took—but then, I sometimes wonder about the course my own life ended up taking, and I have been a
