NYT: Tamerlan Tsarnaev Radicalized Because He Couldn't Box

The New York Times has finally given us the root cause behind the Boston Marathon bombing. Tamerlan Tsarnaev was barred from the national Tournament of Champions because he was not a United States citizen. After that it was all downhill.

From one year to the next, though, the tournament rules had changed, disqualifying legal permanent residents — not only Mr. Tsarnaev, who was Soviet-born, but several other New England contenders, too. His aspirations frustrated, he dropped out of boxing competition entirely, and his life took a completely different direction.

Mr. Tsarnaev portrayed his quitting as a reflection of the sport’s incompatibility with his growing devotion to Islam. But as dozens of interviews with friends, acquaintances and relatives from Cambridge to Dagestan showed, that devotion, and the suspected radicalization that accompanied it, was a path he followed most avidly only after his more secular dreams were dashed in 2010 and he was left adrift.

Gee, and I thought it was because they cut off his food stamps. One hopes comprehensive immigration reform will deal with discriminatory boxing rules. Boxers Without Borders! I like that.