Was Barack Obama a Muslim?

NewsMax ^ | January 13, 2008

[processing please hold]

1. Was Barack Obama a Muslim?

The issue of Barack Obama's possible Muslim past has re-emerged with conflicting reports about the presidential candidate's childhood in Islamic Indonesia.

The controversy was initially touched off in early 2007 when several media outlets reported that Obama had attended a radical madrasa, or Islamic school, when he lived in Indonesia.

Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs quickly countered with a statement: "Senator Obama has never been a Muslim, was not raised a Muslim, and is a committed Christian."

The reports about the radical madrasa turned out to be false. But in March 2007, Gibbs amended his previous statement, telling the Los Angeles Times: "Obama has never been a practicing Muslim," the key word being "practicing."

Obama, his Kansas-born mother and Muslim stepfather moved to Jakarta, Indonesia's capital, in 1967, and Obama lived there from ages 6 to 10.

The Times sent a reporter to Jakarta to investigate Obama's childhood years there, and published an article on March 16 that included these details:

* A close boyhood friend of Obama, Zulfin Adi, said Barack "was a Muslim. He went to the mosque." * Obama's first-grade teacher at a Catholic school, Israella Dharmawan, said: "Barry (Barack's nickname) was Muslim. He was registered as a Muslim because his father was Muslim."

* In the third grade, Obama transferred to a public school, where he was also registered as a Muslim. At the school, Muslim students attended weekly religion lessons about Islam.

* In his autobiography, "Dreams From My Father," Obama mentions studying the Koran and describes the public school as "a Muslim school."

More recently, Middle East Forum director Daniel Pipes wrote on FrontPageMag.com that his research led him to conclude that "Obama was born a Muslim to a non-practicing Muslim father and for some years had a reasonably Muslim upbringing under the auspices of his Indonesian stepfather."

But on Jan. 2, the liberal organization Media Matters for America (MMfA) took issue with Pipes' report, criticized him for relying too heavily on the Times article, which it claimed was "disputed," in an effort to "revive Obama-Muslim falsehood."

Media Matters cited a March 25 article by Kim Baker in the Chicago Tribune that challenged several assertions in the Times story. Barker wrote that boyhood friend Adi "was not certain" about his statements regarding Obama's childhood and that he "only knew Obama for a few months."

The Media Matters Web posting stated: "Additionally, the Tribune reported that 'interviews with dozens of former classmates, teachers, neighbors and friends show that Obama was not a regular practicing Muslim when he was in Indonesia.'"

Media Matters also said that "Pipes did not note that Obama's Indonesian stepfather, Lolo Soetoro, has been described in the Tribune as 'much more of a free spirit than a devout Muslim.'"

Pipes fired back with a FrontPageMag.com article on Jan. 7, titled "Confirmed: Barack Obama Practiced Islam."

Pipes asked if any of the information from the Chicago Tribune article refutes "my analysis, as MMfA contends. It raises questions about two details in the Los Angeles Times account — the accuracy of the Catholic school's registration form and the reliability of Zulfin Adi as a source on Obama. But on the larger issue of Obama's religious practices during his Jakarta years, it confirms the Times account."

Pipes concludes: "Therefore, what MMfA calls the 'Obama-Muslim' falsehood' is in fact confirmed by both articles as truthful and accurate."

And he adds: "All this matters, for if Obama once was a Muslim, he is now what Islamic law calls a murtadd (apostate), an ex-Muslim converted to another religion who must be executed. Were he elected president of the Untied States, this status, clearly, would have large potential implications for his relationship with the Muslim world."

[Candor7]

I wonder why he doesn’t hold one of his rallies in that garb. lol>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Your words may be more prophetic than you now know.

Hillery could not top that.

[processing please hold]

I have Beckwith’s, obama files bookmarked. Good info there.

[processing please hold]

“The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.”

True more so today, than when he said it.

[processing please hold]

I'm relieved. I was stunned when I saw Israeli neo-nazis.

I believe they widely support the dem's here, which is illogical. Another puzzle I can never figure out is why?

[processing please hold]

I can’t think of anything she could do to top that. :)

[forkinsocket]

I believe they widely support the dem's here

You mean Jews?

[processing please hold]

Yes, sorry I wasn’t more clear. *slaps forehead*

[forkinsocket]

Well, to keep it as simple as possible, Jews (in the West) have been outsiders & generally support anti-establishment (meaning traditional) positions.

[processing please hold]

How the dems get both the Jews and blacks to support them is an enigma.

[Candor7]

"All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing" - Edmund Burke

"An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last."-Winston Churchill

"Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."-Winston Churchill ( which seems to be a continuing theme in the grand experiment, that is America.)

“Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say 'what should be the reward of such sacrifices?' Bid us and our posterity bow the knee, supplicate the friendship and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let loose on us the dogs of war to riot in our blood and hunt us from the face of the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!”-Samual Adams

"Some minds remain open long enough for the truth not only to enter but to pass on through by way of a ready exit without pausing anywhere along the route." -Elizabeth Kenny, Famous Australian bush nurse.

*************************************************

Staff Nurse Elizabeth Kenny, better known as Sister Kenny. Born in Warialda, NSW, Kenny began her career as a bush nurse in rural Australia, where she encountered her first cases of infantile paralysis or polio, and developed her own treatment methods by stimulating and re-educating the affected muscles, rather than immobilizing patients with splints and casts.

During the First World War she enlisted as a nurse in the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS), serving on hospital ships that brought home the wounded.

In 1917 she was promoted to the rank of Sister, a title she used for the rest of her life.

Returning to civilian nursing after the war, Kenny established four clinics to treat polio and cerebral palsy patients using her own methods.

Despite her success, the conservative medical profession in Australia would not support her treatments. In 1940 she travelled to the United States, where she demonstrated her techniques during the height of the polio epidemic, and eventually gained widespread recognition.

The Elizabeth Kenny Institute in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was set up in 1943 to train nurses and physiotherapists in her methods. Her celebrity status was confirmed in 1946, when a movie was made of Sister Kenny's life. After decades of tireless medical work, fundraising and lobbying, Kenny returned to Australia.

She developed Parkinson's disease in 1952 and died in Toowoomba the same year. Her book 'My Battle and Victory' was published posthumously.

********************************************

[forkinsocket]

Both feel like outsiders.

[Fred Nerks]

"Some minds remain open long enough for the truth not only to enter but to pass on through by way of a ready exit without pausing anywhere along the route."

now that's FAIR DINKUM!

[processing please hold]

Every one of those phrases are timeless and accurate.

Sister Kenny. I haven't seen the movie, don't know how I've missed it. I googled her up and saw Rosalind Russell played her in '46.

[Fred Nerks]

A quote from an 1899 book by Winston Churchill, “The River War”, in which he describes Muslims he apparently observed during Kitchener’s campaign in the Sudan

---

How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property - either as a child, a wife, or a concubine - must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.

Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen; all know how to die; but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science - the science against which it had vainly struggled - the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.

[processing please hold]

Both feel like outsiders.

Maybe if they both broke free of the dems they wouldn't feel that way.

[Candor7]

LOL. I thought she might be from some where near the bend in your river.

[Candor7]

What a great , almost prescient summary of Islam.

Winnie was a very special man.

[forkinsocket]

Western Jews have a long history of supporting leftist causes since they were in Europe. Israel itself was founded as a socialist state. So I don’t see Jews & leftists getting a divorce in the forseeable future unless Jewish leftists simply die out due to low rates of childbirth.

[processing please hold]

One would think that the Jews of today would have learned a valuable lesson from liberal Europe during the 30’s and 40’s and washed their hands of them.

[Fred Nerks]

http://www.hotkey.net.au/~krool/photos/nsw/Warialda-Hope%20St2.jpg

a busy day in the main street of Warialda.