I’d like to address the majority of Americans who believe the Islamic center and mosque should not be built anywhere near ground zero. First let me say that I can’t possibly know or feel the depth of emotion that the victims, relatives of victims, survivors, and first responders must have experienced, and in many cases are continuing to experience even today. My heart goes out to everyone suffering and my appreciation goes out to those who stepped up that day. Let me be clear when I say that I do not blame any of the afore mentioned people for being angry or just against the idea of the Islamic center and mosque there. I also realize that there are differing view points about this issue amongst them too.
To this day I too would like nothing more than every single member of Al Qaeda & the Taliban executed. These people have murdered our soldiers & citizens, and have committed unspeakable acts against their own people in the name of fanatical religion and their ideal world governed by that. With that said, I think we all need to stop and think about what is really happening here. We have allowed the people who attacked us to manipulate us into hating each other and fighting amongst ourselves instead of us focusing solely on them, our true enemy. Again, I’ll excuse the people too close to this because I understand their emotions are still raw at this point, especially since the rebuild remains a boondoggle. The rest of us however, have no excuse for trampling on the constitutional rights of loyal American Muslims and lumping them in with the terrorists. I realize not everyone is throwing out bigoted remarks and spewing hate speech, but the rest of us need to realize that there are far bigger repercussions to all of this.
One of the most important functions of the constitution is to protect the rights of the few against the will of the many. In fact I would argue that the more we despise and challenge the building of the Islamic center and mosque, the more it needs to be built. I’m not particularly a fan of Islam, but that’s my problem, not the Imam’s or the other people involved in this project. Now if you were to show me that he was directly tied to terrorism or involved in 911, I would say arrest or deport him. However, that does not appear to be the case here.
This Imam was first appointed by President Bush after 911 to go on a good will tour around the world to help improve America’s image among Muslims. And now he’s working for the Obama Administration doing the same thing. Not to mention he is part of a group within Islam that is despised by, guess who, Al Qaeda. Oh and the majority of Muslims in the world fall within the same philosophy as the Imam, not Al Qaeda, or the Taliban. So basically we are dragging our ally in the war on terror, our bridge to most of the Muslims in the world, through the mud in the name of some political witch hunt that is targeting the wrong people. Just because people like Harry Reid(D) and Newt Gingrich(R) used it for political gain doesn’t mean the rest of us should buy into the propaganda and lies being spread around.
As for the argument that this is somehow an insult against America or those that died on 911, that argument is only valid if you can make the terrorist connection with this Muslim, which you can’t unless you are quoting made up nonsense on the web. It’s like saying all Christians are responsible for Timothy McVeigh and the guy who killed the abortion doctor. When did we start holding an entire group responsible for the actions of people on the fringe of that group?
Do I even need to explain how insulting all of this is to Muslims within our own country. Not to mention those all over the world who are questioning our sincerity towards working with them now and in the future. Whether we like it or not, we are now in a global economy and we do have to learn to get along and respect everyone. Those who do not play nice like North Korea and Iran, should be dealt with accordingly, but we should learn the difference between the different groups. Think about it, Christianity has many different branches that evolved over time and they don’t all agree on everything. Why can’t we acknowledge the same is true of Islam?
And how about the Muslims killed on 911? Among the nearly 2,800 people killed when the World Trade Center was attacked were more than 30 Muslims. What about respecting them too?
I don’t care if you’re a Democrat, a Republican, a Tea Party Member, an Independent, or a non voter! We all need to come together as American’s and admit we went too far with this one and we need to pull it back. NYC Mayor Bloomberg supports building it as do many prominent Republicans like Ron Paul, former Bush speech writer Michael Gerson, and other former Bush aides. Even NJ Governor Chris Christie said we shouldn’t paint all Muslims with the same brush and that both parties were using this as a political football. The Imam and the site also has the support of other religious leaders including a Rabbi.
In closing I would just like to say that we used to be a country of innocent until proven guilty. Now we seem to have reversed that. Again, the second it is shown that someone is a terrorist, they should be arrested or watched to find any accomplices or deported, but lets not assume all Muslims are all guilty until proven innocent. Otherwise the terrorist have already won!
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