The problem with pushing the “big tent” spin is that some people aren’t always welcome, and forcing people to get along doesn’t always produce the desired response.
But for Obama the inclusion of Dr. Ingrid Mattson, president of the Islamic Society of North America — or any Muslim — in close proximity to the convention isn’t without consequence. Despite Obama’s frequent statements about his Christian faith and the controversy over Obama’s former pastor, one in 10 Americans still believes Obama is a Muslim, according to a recent poll by the Pew Research Center.
Along with the appearance by Mattson and a Denver imam today, the Democrats will hold a meeting Monday afternoon of the American Muslim Democratic Caucus, which is expected to include more than 40 Muslim delegates, one of them U.S. Rep. Andre Carson, D-Indianapolis.
We all understand the political need to reach out, but there are hundreds of thousands of Muslims in America. Good, law-abiding Muslims.
Can he not find Muslims without issues?
As an umbrella for various Muslim organizations, ISNA is affiliated with more than 300 mosques and Islamic centers around the country. Its annual Labor Day convention, to be held this year in Columbus, Ohio, draws more than 30,000 Muslims.
But ISNA isn’t without its detractors. It has been a frequent target of attacks from bloggers and authors who specialize in criticizing Muslim groups.
Last month, author and frequent ISNA critic Steven Emerson testified before a House subcommittee that FBI investigations in the 1980s linked ISNA to members of the Muslim Brotherhood, a fundamentalist group with a violent past. Last year, federal prosecutors in a Texas terrorism case referred to ISNA in court documents as an unindicted co-conspirator.
It may be part of the ongoing Barack Obama lack-of-judgment stain, but why does he repeatedly bring forth people who have controversial backgrounds and/or positions?
Then again, maybe Muslims are the one group he will not throw under the bus, seeing how some around the world tend to blow them up.
Dr. Ingrid Mattson is an excellent selection for an interfaith meeting at the DNC. Islamophobes have been trying to discredit her and here organization – ISNA. They’ve failed miserably.
The simple fact is this – there are people who hate Islam and they will work hard to destroy it. One tactic is to delegitimize it and its adherents in the U.S. so as to marginalize them in society.
That will not work for two reasons. First, Muslims are too focused to allow bigots to derail them from becoming truly integrated, productive citizens in the U.S. Second, there are too many good people of other faiths in the U.S. who simply will not buy into the Islamophobia that is peddled on the blogosphere.
We don’t do guilt by association in this country.
Intelligent people think through the issues, parse the information, separate the facts from the fiction and reach reasoned conclusions.
That’s too complicated for Islamophobes. They just like the “shoot first, ask questions later” approach. I’m assuming it is cathartic for them – but its still wrong.
The Muslim Brotherhood has a violent past, true. They also have a violent Present.
UuuhBama is not a Christian and he’s not a Muslim, either.
Worse.
He is a Secular Humanist.
Back when the words of men were taken seriously, we called ‘em Pagans.