Barack Obama Reaches Out To The Islamic Community

In a way that George Bush never could, Barack Obama set out to reach out to Islamic world yesterday. It was noticeable to everyone that there was a purpose in giving his first interview to Al Arabiya. There has been an incredible amount of tension between the "West" and the "Middle East" from the last eight years of Bush's foreign policy, but now it is time to start to heal the divide.

From McClatchy:

Now, my job is to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the well-being of the Muslim world, that the language we use has to be a language of respect. I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries.

Q The largest one.

THE PRESIDENT: The largest one, Indonesia. And so what I want to communicate is the fact that in all my travels throughout the Muslim world, what I've come to understand is that regardless of your faith -- and America is a country of Muslims, Jews, Christians, non-believers -- regardless of your faith, people all have certain common hopes and common dreams.

And my job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives. My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. We have not been perfect. But if you look at the track record, as you say, America was not born as a colonial power, and that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago, there's no reason why we can't restore that. And that I think is going to be an important task.

It is an enormous task Mr. President and not one that is easily achieved. The rhetoric so far is encouraging, that that can be turned from hope and promise to sound policy and relief for the people's who have been oppressed by their own leaders and the world geopolitical dynamic. Of course, in the next paragraph he stated exactly that it is his actions that will be judged and not anything else.

How Sweet Will This New Year (5769) Be?

In my culture/tradition/religion that is Judaism, we mark the turn of the Jewish (lunar) calendar with High Holiday services, well-wishings for a sweet new year and symbolize it by eating apples dipped in honey. Well I have my apples ready but a sweet new year is going to take much more than a bunch of carbohydrates in my system.

For those that know me (and the thousands that have walked by me in front of coffeeshops with wireless internet here in NYC) I have a 'controversial' bumper sticker on the front of my laptop that reads " Spiritual People Inspire Me -- Religious People Frighten Me." To say the least, it turns heads, amusing me when I look up to see people's reactions, or lack there of. Every once in a while I get some positive responses, people that come up to me and commend me for it. I've never received negative feedback but rarely have I opened this Macbook outside of New York or some other liberal city. In my opinion, I think a lot of people understand it to mean that I'm atheist, agnostic or something of the kind. The reason I put it up though is more of a critique of organized religion and the hate that fostered by too many religious "leaders" no matter what faith they ascribe to. I believe that one can be both religious and spiritual but there are plenty out there that only go with the former.

Over recent millenia, millions upon millions have died while believing that "God was on their side." Leaders, or potential leaders that talk in that manner have no business leading anything but their own narrow minds out the door and far away from public service. The only thing that comes from that divisive language is fear, violence and death.

Fear is what guides Danny Funderburk, the Mayor of Fort Mill when he sent a chain email along questioning if Obama is the anti-Christ. His excuse for peddling these lies was that he was curious about scripture relating to current events. That is the kind of news that makes me pray for the safety and sanity of Fort Mill's residents. The anti-Christ crap was disproved as fast as it was sprung, but the real issue here is the ignorance and hatred for blacks, Muslims and anyone that does not fit the norm of those that hold the majority of power in this country, that was what propagated the email in the first place.

So it's an email, just a bunch of 1's and 0's that come together to form a "question" about a candidate running for office. No big deal right? Wrong. Emails that show people's ignorance is just the beginning, just as Germans were taught to loathe the Jews amongst them in the 1920s. No one back then thought the ideas in the punditry and press of the time would manifest itself into violence, but hindsight shows us the horrific reality that ensued in the late 1930s and 1940s.

Yeah, the holocaust was the most gruesome events of the 20th century but that would never happen in America. We accept all cultures and religions, it even says so in our Constitution. There is no need to worry and no reason to compare the holocaust to the United States in 2008, right?

My answer to that question....is to use that reasoning of "it'll never happen here" to the Muslim community in Dayton, Ohio. On Friday night someone took it upon themselves to spray a toxic gas into a mosque full of congregants celebrating Ramadan. Young and old alike were coughing, wheezing and falling short of breath. Imagine if that happened at your church, synagogue or other house of worship. The pain of the irritant, the fear, the panic of the crowd and the feeling of helpness caused by fellow human beings that were propelled to act in this manner.

That was a religiously-motivated act. It was the result of a deluge of propaganda that tells Americans we are in a holy war against Islam. Listening to Rush, Hannity, Malkin, Prager and other right wing bigots for years on end has the ability to cause events like these. Messages of religion do not just come from priests, ministers, rabbis and Imams. In a country where there are a powerful few that wish to make us into a Christian nation, you do not have to hear the "word of the Lord" by stepping foot in a Church. Sure, you can find spiritual messages, but here in America today, they are drowned out by the cacophony of hate and ignorance that can be found on Fox News, some other cable shows and a multitude of Op-Ed pages around the country. It makes Muslims feel like an oppressed minority of our land of the free.

When I attend services tonight, at an interfaith service with my Protestant girlfriend, my laptop will be staying at home along with the bumper sticker. However, when I bite into that crisp, honey-dipped apple, my thoughts will be with the congregants of that mosque. There should be nothing controversial about that, yet for some strange reason far too many people in the religious right, people of my own faith and the right-wing pundits on TV disagree. So my prayers of a sweet new year will be directed at those who either directly or indirectly perpetrated the attack on them last Friday so that perhaps in the coming year we can reduce the ignorance that exists in our country and our world.

McCain Camp's War On Muslims

While Phil Gramm left the McCain campaign kicking and screaming today, there are still plenty of bad apples on the rotted tree that is the "straight talker's" operation. Take Bud Day for instance. We commend him for his service to our country and respect him for sticking with his fellow POW buddy McCain, when he starts talking out of his ass...then we get to call him on it (of course being associated with McCain, it happens often).

From The Miami Herald:

One of John McCain's fellow POW's in Vietnam defended the war in Iraq, saying, "The Muslims have said either we kneel or they're going to kill us.''

In a phone call with reporters arranged by Republican Party of Florida, Colonel Bud Day added: "I don't intend to kneel and I don't advocate to anybody that we kneel, and John doesn't advocate to anybody that we kneel.''

Bud, if you remember, was also a swiftboater that attacked John Kerry four years ago. So despite his military service, he is political scum, willing to do whatever it takes to elect Republicans, even if it means destroying another soldier's integrity or an entire religion.

Shame On Us Senator Obama

On behalf of America, I apologize for the senseless attacks on you for being called a Muslim....and what that means to Muslims that live in the United States, a place that is supposed to be a symbol of religious tolerance.

Scary Giuliani Supporters

I certainly do not want my Muslim friends going back to any caves. If there is anyone that should be buried in some deep underground chamber, it would be this guy along with his friend Rudy:

Aren't All Muslims Terrorism-Loving, Turban-Wearing Jihadis?

Just in case you didn't know, stereotyping is generally bad:

Mitt Hates Muslims

Uh oh Mitt, looks like you are in trouble again. The Iowa front runner is getting flack for not wanting any Muslims in his potential cabinet. When an article ran in the Christian Science Monitor that an Islamic businessman got a response from Mitt like that, Romney tried to back track and claim the question was phrased a different way. Too bad for Mitt there is earlier evidence that he answered the same question months before.

From TPM:

As you know, Romney is in a bit of a spot because of an account in the Christian Science Monitor by an Islamic businessman who claims Romney said that he "cannot see that a cabinet position would be justified" for a Muslim. Today Romney denied this version of events, saying that he had actually been asked whether he thought he needed a Muslim in his Cabinet to effectively counter Jihad, not whether he opposed the idea of having a Muslim in his Cabinet.

But as we reported earlier today, we located two GOPers in Nevada who say that Romney had in fact been asked a similar question and given a similar answer at another event three months ago. George Harris, a state GOP official, told us that he asked Romney at a private fundraiser if he would have any Muslims in his Cabinet. According to Harris, Romney's reply was "most likely not."

We've now discovered that there's a contemporaneous account of this episode in something called Liberty Watch Magazine, which Harris publishes.

Isn't sad that in this day and age a Presidential candidate of all people has to succumb to this religious bigotry? This is the man that many pundits say can over take Giuliani. Rudy is pretty much the same way, you never know what he'll say when he opens his mouth either.

Isn't This Illegal?

Racial profiling is generally seen by civilized society as a no-no but not so much by the nation's police forces. True to form, the LAPD's "strategy" of documenting the Muslim communities of Los Angeles is sparking outrage while the LAPD Deputy Chief Michael P. Downing sees it as finding terrorist cells. I'm sorry Mr. Downing, but this sh*t just ain't gonna work.

From The Huffington Post:

The LAPD's counterterrorism bureau plans to identify Muslim enclaves in order to determine which might be likely to become isolated and susceptible to "violent, ideologically based extremism," said Deputy Chief Michael P. Downing on Thursday.

"We want to know where the Pakistanis, Iranians and Chechens are so we can reach out to those communities," said Downing, who heads the counterterrorism bureau.

(snip)

On Thursday, several Muslim groups and the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California sent Downing a letter expressing "grave concerns" about the program.

"Singling out individuals for investigation, surveillance, and data-gathering based on their religion constitutes religious profiling that is just as unlawful, ill-advised and deeply offensive as racial profiling," said the letter.

It is unlawful, it is ill-advised and extremely offensive, not to only Muslims but society as a whole. Mr. Downing and the rest of the LAPD should be shamed out of trying to put this into practice, unless they have already started of course. You know, this wouldn't be the first time for the Los Angeles Police Department.

Fox News Is Full Of Blind Hams

Most people can tell when they see a news parody coming a mile away. That isn't the case over that Fox Noise Network. A publication similar to The Onion did a spoof on a minor story up in Maine about a prank pulled on a group of Muslim student and the geniuses at Fox took them seriously. So serious in fact, that the buffoons on Fox and Friends featured it on their broadcast and went so far as to say, "We're not making this up." Not only are they idiots, they are lying idiots.

From ThinkProgress:

The backstory: Last week in the town of Lewiston, Maine, a group of Somalian Muslim middle school students were the subject of a cruel prank when their peers placed a ham steak next to them in order to personally offend the students. School officials filed a report because the students considered the act to be a hate/bias crime.

(snip)

On Tuesday, Fox & Friends reported these parody quotes and details as actual news. Poking fun at the students, hosts asked whether ham was “a hate crime…or lunch?” and showed screen shots of ham sandwiches, starving Somalians, belching, animal noises, and mock “reenactments” of the incident. Ironically, the hosts assured viewers several times, “We’re not making this up!”

In case you think this a harmless goof by Fox you would be wrong. In response to the show, the school in Maine received a deluge of emails and phone calls berating the principal for being too sensitive. The level of hate seen in Fox viewers knows no bounds. So when Fox screws up like they did this morning, it only furthers the hatred and enables it to be thrown around, carelessly hitting it's victims.