He was an American citizen with a three-bedroom suburban home, a wife and two kids. He shopped at Macy’s and ate Oreos. His picture was on Facebook. He had an MBA and a job as a financial analyst. His wife liked to watch “Friends.” And then, authorities contend, Faisal Shahzad tried to set off a bomb in Times Square.<\/p>\n
A decade after 9\/11, it increasingly seems to have come to this: We have met the enemy — and he is carrying an American passport.<\/p>\n
For generations, assimilation has been the story told by the United States — the recipe for making Americans. Irish and Italians, Catholics and blacks, Japanese and Jews joined the mainstream even as they maintained their unique cultures and traditions.<\/p>\n
But today, with the world a mouse click away and most every country in the world accessible in little more than a day, globalization is competing fiercely with assimilation. People who have a foot in two strikingly different cultures no longer leave one behind for the other. Now they can move between them easily, fluidly, quickly.<\/p>\n