There's been some good blogger commentary on Representative Howard Coble's (R - N.C.) recent radio call-in show appearance, in which he defended the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII. Read, for example, the comments on Is That Legal? here. The latest development (as a newsobserver.com article notes) is that Coble claims that he was "just stating historical fact" when he claimed that internment was justified for security reasons and also as protection for Japanese-Americans themselves.

One problem with Coble's account is that the federal government itself repudiated such justifications about twenty years ago. You can read excerpts from Personal Justice Denied: the Report of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, here. Note the Report's title. It is also published by the University of Washington Press. Also check out the NCRR (Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress) home page.

To his credit, Coble was expressing his disagreement with a caller who argued that Arab-Americans should be interned. Still, the smart course for him now is simply to apologize and admit that he hasn't really studied the issue. His position as Chair of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security makes his comments, and his ignorance, all the more frightening.