Posted on 07/06/2008 2:10:11 AM PDT by Coffee200am
Vanessa Alikhan was at a Democratic ''unity party'' when she overheard another guest indignantly refute the rumor that Barack Obama is Muslim, as if it was a racial slur. She later recounted the conversation to a friend.
''She told me that this is politics and that I should just deal with it,'' said Alikhan, a Fort Lauderdale graphic artist who converted to Islam about five years ago. ``To me this is the same as telling an African American or a Jewish person they should deal with discrimination because people aren't ready to embrace them as a group.''
She and other American Muslims are speaking out, as the Obama campaign pushes back on widely e-mailed and patently false claims that he is tied to Islamic terrorists. The rumor could be particularly damaging in a must-win state like Florida, which has a large Jewish population.
Determined not to be ''swift-boated'' the way 2004 nominee John Kerry was buried by attacks on his military record, the Obama campaign has set up the website www.fightthesmears.com. While Muslim leaders understand the campaign's responsibility to counter misinformation, they say the classification of being Muslim as a ''smear'' goes too far.
Their outrage peaked when the Obama campaign asked two women wearing head scarves to move away from the candidate -- and the television cameras -- at a rally last month in Detroit. Obama personally apologized to the women, but the incident reflected the difficulties of balancing hard-nosed political calculations with the campaign's overall message of change and unity.
''The truth is Obama has both set the record straight about his religious upbringing, background and faith -- and spoken out against efforts to marginalize Muslims,'' said Obama campaign spokesman Josh Earnest.
`I'M NOT A MUSLIM'
He pointed to Obama's interview with CBS' 60 Minutes, in which he said, ``I have never been a Muslim. I'm not a Muslim. These e-mails are obviously not just offensive to me, somebody who is a devout Christian, who's been going to the same church for the last 20 years, but it's also offensive to Muslims, because it plays into, obviously, a certain fear-mongering there.''
But some Muslim leaders said Obama needs to do more to make it clear that he welcomes their support in his campaign. Though he's spoken at many churches and synagogues -- including a conservative congregation in Boca Raton -- he has never visited a mosque, said Altaf Ali, executive director of the South Florida chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. There are between 200,000 and 400,000 Muslims in Florida and about seven million nationwide.
The Muslim community saw little outreach from presidential candidates until 2000, when Republican George Bush successfully enlisted Muslim donors and included mosques in his proposal for government partnering with religious institutions. But since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, many American Muslims say they are treated with suspicion.
''Since 9/11, our community has been portrayed as inherently evil, and what Obama is doing is adding to the negative stereotype,'' Ali said. ``His message is about change, and he has to appeal to every minority group.''
That's a tall order for the first African-American presidential nominee as he tries to broaden his appeal for the general election. Ali said that Obama, who spent part of his childhood in Indonesia, the largest Muslim country in the world, is uniquely suited ``to be a bridge between America and the Muslim world.''
Saif Ishoof, president of the Center for Voter Advocacy, a nonpartisan group that educates Muslims about the political process, said Republican John McCain also needs to show more sensitivity.
Ishoof, a lifelong Republican, said he bristles when McCain consistently refers to ``Islamic terrorists.''
''By using that phraseology, he is giving credence to a world view that 99 percent of Muslims do not consider their own,'' said Ishoof, an attorney who runs a Miami engineering firm.
Though the Muslim community pales in comparison to other religious voting blocs in Florida, Ishoof noted that it is concentrated in central Florida, the battleground region of the state.
CRITICAL VOTE
Muslim voters could make the difference in several states crucial to winning the White House, including Michigan, Ohio and Virginia.
''Every vote is going to be critical,'' Ishoof said.
Alikhan said she will continue to volunteer for the Obama campaign but vowed that she will also try to educate voters about Islam. She described her recent experience with anti-Muslim bias in an e-mail to about 1,500 friends and Democratic activists.
The e-mail began ''Hello and Salaams'' and ended with, ``The photos are of me and my husband so that you can see what a Muslim American looks like.''
They are an attractive, well-dressed couple in their 30s who look like they belong in a South Beach club -- except that they heed their religion's prohibition on drinking.
''I am an American, and I felt all of the pain that Americans felt for the 9/11 victims,'' Alikhan said. ``Yet I've had fingers pointed at me and been asked the most ridiculous questions you can imagine. . . . I'm not asking Obama to go to a mosque or call me on the phone, but I'd like to see him show some more sensitivity.''
If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.” -Joseph Goebbels
This is what happens when trying to make yourself appealing to a particular group of people by chanting, in perfectly accented Arabic, the call to prayer used 5-times a day to all practising Muslims. It just so happens to be a declaration of submission to Islam, proving that one is a devout Muslim.
Was Senator Obama stupid to do that, or what?
yawn
"Alikhan said she will continue to volunteer for the Obama campaign but vowed that she will also try to educate voters about Islam."
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Is there video of him doing this?
RECAP:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2041119/posts
“Exclusive: Islamism and the So-called ‘Muslim Voting Bloc’: Shades of Theocracy”
Family Security Matters ^ | July 4, 2008 | M. Zuhdi Jasser
Posted on July 5, 2008 9:00:56 AM PDT by nuconvert
“Exclusive: Islamism and the So-called ‘Muslim Voting Bloc’: Shades of Theocracy”
M. Zuhdi Jasser
July 4, 2008
ARTICLE SNIPPET: “The modus operandi for the political empowerment of Islamists in America is in full public display during every election cycle. The sad part is few realize how central “Islamic politics” is to the driving force of transnational Islamism and its threat to American security. The incessant attempts by American Islamist groups (like the MAS, CAIR, MPAC, ISNA, ICNA to name a few) to collectivize Muslims in the body politic - from voter registrations to their ideological grievance mill - point to their goals.”
In a free-ranging interview with the New York Times, Obama described the Muslim call to prayer as “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth at sunset.”
The Times’ Nicholos Kristof wrote Obama recited, “with a first-class [Arabic] accent,” the opening lines of the Muslim call to prayer.
The first few lines of the call to prayer state:
“Allah is Supreme! Allah is Supreme!
Allah is Supreme! Allah is Supreme!
I witness that there is no god but Allah
I witness that there is no god but Allah
I witness that Muhammad is his prophet... “
Some attention also has been paid to Obama’s paternal side of the family. His father, described in some reports as an atheist, polygamist and alcoholic, was buried in Kenya as a Muslim. Obama Sr., also named Barack Obama, had three sons with another woman who reportedly all are Muslim.
Obama’s brother Roy is described as a practicing Muslim.
Writing in a chapter of his book describing his 1992 wedding, the presidential candidate stated: “The person who made me proudest of all was Roy. Actually, now we call him Abongo, his Luo name, for two years ago he decided to reassert his African heritage. He converted to Islam, and has sworn off pork and tobacco and alcohol.”
Exactly what fear-mongering occurs within the Muslim community?
The more Obama speaks of Islam and Christianity, the more he convinces me he doesn't understand faith in Christ. Even if they were false, such e-mails wouldn't be offensive to a believer, but to a non-believer attempting to counterfeit his appearance as belonging to a religious group, such a statement is consistent with the lack of grasp of basic Christian faith and manifests the perspective of a non-believer. Quotes such as the above do more to convince me of his arrogance and probable affiliation with Islam.
I believe there is, though I’ve only read about it and not actually seen any video.
I wonder when we will seen Obamanation eating a pork chop and petting a dog?
Why do you think Barry hated his Christian name so much he changed it?
The evidence is overwhelming:
http://theobamafile.com/ObamaIslam.htm
Frankly they should be angry. His campaign has treated Muslim as if it were a dirty word, yet expects them to support him because he was raised by Muslims and lived a Muslim life as a child.
What we are seeing in this election is what happens when you have a party based on currying favor from numerous groups who frequently have conflicting interests. It’s just taken this long for members of many of the groups to realize they can’t all have what they want.
He recited it in an interview:
“...an earlier article by the highly-respected New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof says more to me and, I believe, most common sense, clear-thinking adults: Obama admitted to Kristof that Obama was in ‘Koran study classes.’ More critically, forty years later, i.e. almost forty years after leaving Jakarta, ‘Mr. Obama recalled the opening lines of the Arabic call to prayer, reciting them with a first-rate accent.’ “
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2041050/posts
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