Not long ago, a Texas native named Shamsud-Din Jabbar pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group on Facebook. Now, perhaps if he had been an election-denying vaccine skeptic, Jabbar might have gotten himself noticed by law enforcement. Instead, Jabbar was free to ram his rented Ford pickup truck into a crowd on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, murdering 15 people. Jabbar, who had guns and explosive devices in his truck, was killed in a shootout in which he wounded two police officers.

Law enforcement officials and media, as is their wont, reflexively downplayed the Islamic aspects of mass murder. The lead agent in the investigation initially declared that the FBI did not consider the attack a “terrorist event.” There was a small problem, however, as Jabbar had flown not an Appeal to Heaven or Gadsden flag, but one of those black ones favored by Sunni terrorist groups such as al Qaeda and the Islamic State group on his truck. The FBI was quickly compelled to walk back its claim.