Free Republic

In 2002, the spokesman for FBI director Robert Mueller memorably described the American Muslim Council (AMC) as the "the most mainstream Muslim group in the United States." A year later, the Catholic bishops called the AMC "the premier, mainstream Muslim group in Washington." Its founder and long-time chief, Abdurahman Alamoudi, was a Washington fixture. He had many meetings with both Clintons in the White House and once joined George W. Bush at a prayer service dedicated to victims of the 9/11 attacks. Alamoudi arranged a Ramadan fast-breaking dinner for congressional leaders. He six times lectured abroad for the State Department...

A Muslim lobby group has filed a $2 million defamation suit against a U.S. Congressman who asserted in a newspaper interview the Washington, D.C.-based group is tied to terrorism. The Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, charges Rep. Cass Ballenger, R-N.C., falsely claimed the group raised funds for terrorists and did so "with actual malice, wrongful and willful intent to injure and with reckless disregard for its truth or falsity."

American Muslims need to get their priorities straight. Synagogues and consulates are being attacked in Turkey. U.S. troops are fighting an Iraqifada. And Palestinian Arabs continue to blow themselves up in suicide-homicide attacks on Israeli citizens.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations once again is demanding an apology for an alleged slur of Muslims, this time asserting a veteran cartoonist has cryptically defamed Islam. The Washington, D.C.-based group sent out a dispatch to its e-mail list after a "B.C." cartoon last week by Johnny Hart was publicly questioned on a Washington Post Web chat page. The cartoon shows a caveman entering an outhouse at night, and then saying, from inside, "Is it just me, or does it stink in here?"