Mosque Madness

"There should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York as long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia."
Newt Gingrich on his website

And there should be no women drivers in NYC as long as there are no women drivers in Riyadh. Moreover, there should no elections for President of the United States as long as there are no elections for the head of state in Saudi Arabia. After all, what's good for the Saudi goose is good for the American gander, right?

Unlike former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R, Georgia), I am not inspired by the Saudi example of human rights or principles of governance. Instead, I want the controversy over the erection of an Islamic Center, including a mosque, at 51 Park Place, about two blocks from the former site of the World Trade Center, to be decided on the basis of American legal principles.

Whether you like Islam or not (and I don't like it much), the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the US Constitution prohibit local governments from treating Islam any differently from any other religion practiced in America. Local governments may restrict the building of churches and other houses of worship by zoning and building codes, but they cannot discriminate on the basis of religion. The fact is that the area of the proposed mosque is zoned commercial, and there are churches nearby. As both Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City and President Obama have noted publicly, the Muslims have the right to build a mosque in that location.

But in the toxic atmosphere of contemporary American politics, if you are not on the side of the "9/11 Families" who are outraged by the proposed mosque, you are on the side of the Muslims, the very group whose members destroyed the World Trade Center in the name of "jihad" (holy war). And didn't the leader of the Muslims behind the project say that US policies "were an accessory to 9/11?" (1) And won't the new building be named "Cordoba House" after the city in Spain in which Muslims converted a church into a mosque?

Osama Bin Laden, whose terrorist group carried-out the 9/11 attacks, is by no means the acknowledged leader or spokesman for Islam. In fact, no one is. Rather he is the charismatic leader of a religious homicidal/suicidal cult, an Arab Jim Jones or David Koresh. He issued a fatwa (psak) in 1996 declaring America the enemy of Islam, and called upon all Muslims to commit jihad against this nation. Although millions of Muslims admire Bin Laden, only a few actually put his words into action. And those who seek to build the Cordoba Mosque are not among them.

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin implored peace-loving Muslims to "refudiate" (sic) the proposed mosque because it would "stab hearts." But even the peace-loving Muslims (if she can find them) know their rights and intend to exercise them.

About 70% of Americans are against a mosque on Park Place, so the politically popular stance is to oppose it. I do not endorse or support building a mosque there either. But on matters of religious expression in a free country, the majority does not rule, and so the Cordoba Mosque will be built, even though most Americans find it insensitive or even offensive.

The Cordoba Mosque will not loom over Ground Zero, no matter what is ultimately built there. The Cordoba Mosque will be on the other side of West Broadway and two blocks north of Vesey Street, the northern border of the World Trade Center site; aerial photos of the area show numerous multi-story buildings between the two more than two blocks to find it.
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(1)AssociatedContent, Aug. 17, 2010.

Reject McCain-Palin

John McCain is unquestionably a man of patriotism and personal courage. However, his political record and current positions indicate that he should not be the next President of the United States. Here is why:

Court Appointments: The next President will appoint many federal judges, probably including at least one Justice of the US Supreme Court. On his campaign website, John McCain asserts that the Roe v Wade decision should be overturned, and promised to appoint judges who share his view. (1) To me, abortion is like idol-worship: I would not do it, don't like others to do it, but still believe that it should be legal in America.
Justices (and judges) who do not support the right of a pregnant woman to choose abortion are also most likely to hold other authoritarian, Christian-Right views. I would not trust such jurists to protect the civil liberties of Americans against the efforts of government to control them. In particular, the executive branch of the federal government has grown more powerful during the past eight years, and I would prefer judges more concerned about the rights of the people than about the powers of government. Moreover, judges with Christian-Right viewpoints cannot be trusted to defend the separation of Church and State .

Tax Policy: As noted in September 21 Glazerbeam ("Deeper in Debt"), McCain proposes a huge tax-cut for all Americans that would guarantee big deficits for the foreseeable future. A policy of always borrowing and never reducing the National Debt is not sustainable over the long run. The deficit is over $400 billion right now, without the McCain tax-cuts.

Social Security: John McCain has proposed the partial privatization of Social Security for younger workers. (2) This would reduce the revenues needed to pay benefits to current and future retirees.

Immigration: Senator McCain co-sponsored a bill (with Senator Edward M Kennedy) to allow illegal immigrants to remain in the US while applying for citizenship. (2)

Vice-President: Governor Sarah Palin loves Israel, has a perky personality, has some uncommon skills, and has achieved remarkable success. However, her responses to questions in interviews and in the Vice Presidential Debate indicate that she often did not even understand the questions, let alone provide cogent answers. I do not believe she is smart enough to be Vice President, let alone President.
She also has been dishonest about her past support for the notorious Alaska "Bridge to Nowhere" and about $400 billion in earmarks for other projects in her state. (She favored these projects before she opposed them, but gives the false impression in her speeches that she was always against them.)
The fact that McCain chose her as his successor in the presidency shows his own poor judgment of the suitability of people for high-level positions in government.

Dishonest Campaign: The McCain campaign has claimed that Barack Obama is responsible for high gasoline prices, favors raising the taxes of most Americans, favors sex-education for kindergarten children and opposes nuclear power. None of this is true. (3)

Obama is not an ideal alternative candidate: some of his past associations are troubling, and some of his campaign ads have also contained distortions. (3) Yet, he is an intelligent and thoughtful young man with a strong grasp of the issues facing America and the world. A former Lecturer in Constitutional Law at the prestigious University of Chicago, Obama is seriously committed to the civil liberties of ordinary Americans, and his court appointees will be too.
He had the wisdom to choose Joseph Biden, a respected senior member of the Senate, as his running-mate; unlike Gov. Palin, Biden will be ready to assume the presidency at any time, should the occasion arise. As Vice President, Joe Biden will provide valuable advice and assistance, particularly in dealing with Congress.
On balance, the Obama-Biden team is the one that offers the best prospects of dealing successfully with the many problems that now confront our country.

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(1) The New Republic, Aug. 27, 2008, page 19.

(2) McCain may no longer hold this position. He switches without much notice.

(3) "War of Half Truths" by Craig Gilbert, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, page 1A.

Why We Were Attacked on Sept. 11

Charlie Gibson of ABC news interviewed Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin, and asked her this question: "We talk on the anniversary of 9/11. Why do you think those hijackers attacked? Why did they want to hurt us?"

The Alaska Governor responded, "You know, there is a very small percentage of Islamic believers who are extreme and they are violent, and they do not believe American ideals, and they attacked us......they see that the only option for them is to become a suicide bomber, to get caught up in this evil, this terror....."

Although Gov. Palin correctly noted that the hijackers were suicidal Islamic terrorists, she failed to identify the particular motivation for attacking the United States, rather than other countries. Neither Gibson nor Palin addressed the specific targets: The World Trade Center and the Pentagon. (The hijacked plane that crashed in Pennsylvania was probably intended for the US Capitol.)

Shortly after the attacks, President George W Bush opined that the terrorists hated our freedom. Maybe they did, but neither Bush nor Palin grasped the real motive for the crime.

From the perspective of Al Qaida Al-Jihad (The Base for Holy War), Islam is locked in an epic struggle against the forces of Christianity, Judaism and other non-Muslim ideologies. Al Qaida seeks the triumph of Islam over these forces through jihad. Although the ultimate goal is the victory of Islam in the entire world, jihadis are most determined to first rid the Arabian Peninsula of all non-Islamic power: Christian and Jewish. The idea of a sovereign Jewish state of any size whatsoever in the Gate of Islam (Dar-al-Islam), especially in Jerusalem (al-Quds), is particularly abhorrent.

Although the United States is barred by its Constitution from establishing a religion, the Islamic fanatics consider the US a Christian nation, and its soldiers are often characterized as Crusaders. The presence of these soldiers in Saudi Arabia (1) and Iraq, together with US support for Israel and non-Islamic Arab regimes in the Middle East are an affront to Islam. For these reasons, Sheik Osama bin Laden issued a fatwa (religious decree or psak) calling on all Muslims to attack Americans. After Bin Laden and his followers moved into Afghanistan in the 1990's, the US directed airstrikes at Al Qaida training camps in that country in co-ordination with the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance.

Just as the Pentagon is the center of American military power, the World Trade Center was a symbol of American financial power. Located in New York, the office complex also served as an icon for Jewish financial power within the United States economy. Another group of jihadists tried to blow it up in 1993. It remained an inviting target in 2001.

No, the Al Qaida terrorists did not "give a fig" about American freedom or democracy; many countries are just as free (take Sweden, for example), but do nothing to thwart the establishment of Islamic hegemony in the Middle East, and are not targets of Islamic terror.

We cannot effectively resist Islamic terror until we first understand that it is directed against our power, not our freedom.
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(1) In 2001 there were US armed forces based in Saudi Arabia, but they were withdrawn in 2003 after Sadam Hussein was deposed.

The Female Factor

"After John McCain, Sarah Palin is the Republican best qualified to become president."



Read this sentence aloud with a straight face. How far did you get? Even if you can say it now, could you have spontaneously said it a week ago? If not, what has changed?



Substitute "Barack Obama", " Joe Biden" and "Democrat" for the proper nouns in this sentence, and the only problem would be saying that Mr O is somehow more qualified than Mr B. (Reread the last Glazerbeam on this point.) Still, the choice of Governor Palin undercuts the Republican claim that Obama is "not ready" to become president.



Of the myriads of people who have praised this choice as brilliant (or better), how many of them would have been this elated if McCain had nominated a male Republican with an equally thin resume?



It is obvious that Governor Palin got the nod because McCain wanted a female running-mate, and of the handful of Republican women holding statewide office, Sarah Palin does stand out as more attractive and feisty than the others. It helps that her political positions are even more standard Republican than McCain's. Many Republicans favor drilling in ANWR even though it could hurt the caribou herd; Sarah Palin actually hunts caribou. I can picture her warning one of the beasts, " Go ahead, antlerhead, make my day!" before pulling the trigger.



Although governor for less than two years of a sparsely-populated state, and previously the mayor of a very small (pop. 6,715) town called Wasilla, her qualifications to serve as vice-president are actually about even with some vice-presidential nominees : Franklin Roosevelt, (*) William Miller (1) and Spiro Agnew, for example. Even the boyish-looking Dan Quayle had served in both the House and Senate before being chosen for VP, although he was a very junior member of both chambers. Richard Nixon, although a senator for only two years when tapped by General Eisenhower in 1952, had won national fame in the Alger Hiss case while a congressman.



Most nominees for vice president had been experienced senators (such as Harry Truman, John Bricker (2), Alben Barkley, Estes Kefauver, Henry Cabot Lodge (3), Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Ed Muskie, Bob Dole, Lloyd Bentsen, Al Gore, Walter Mondale and Joe Lieberman) or had served in either the president's cabinet (such as Henry Wallace , Jack Kemp and Dick Cheney) or in other important positions (such as George H W Bush, former Director of Central Intelligence and Ambassador to the UN and China, and Sargent Shriver, who had organized both the Peace Corps and the War on Poverty.)

But will Sarah Palin draw lots of votes from disappointed Hillary-backers who want a woman on the ticket? The feminist base of Hillary Clinton's support will never vote for McCain, because he is strongly anti-abortion; the choice of VP will make no difference. On the other hand, millions of voters in the later primaries backed Hillary Clinton as the Great White Hope against Barack Obama, not because they wanted a female candidate. These voters, for whom race trumps gender, rejected Obama in the primaries and will reject him again in November, also regardless of the VP nominees. McCain had them at "hello." The trouble for the GOP is that for every voter who doesn't want an African-American to become president, there is another one who doesn't a woman in line for the presidency.

The more fair-minded voters will judge Sarah Palin on how she performs in the campaign, especially at the crucial debate with Joe Biden. If she can avoid any blunders or gaffes, she will be a net asset to the Republican ticket.

If the McCain-Palin ticket wins, and Vice President Palin can avoid misspelling "potato" and blowing any other grade-school questions, she will outshine Dan Quayle. Even if she does not have the big time policy-making influence of Dick Cheney, she will be adequate for the largely ceremonial duties of the vice president.

But in the unlikely event that John McCain (at 72, the oldest person to become president (4)) is unable to complete his term of office, we will all learn the hard way if Sarah Palin is really prepared to become the 45th President of the United States.

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(*) At the time Franklin D Roosevelt was nominated for vice president by the Democrats in 1920, he had been a state senator and Assistant Secretary of the Navy. The fact that he was the eponomous cousin and nephew (by marriage) of President Theodore Roosevelt may have helped secure the nomination.

(1) Rep. William E Miller of Lockport, NY, was the running-mate of Senator Barry Goldwater in 1964. After losing the election, Miller became a spokesman for a credit-card company.

(2) The Ohio senator who ran with NY Governor Thomas E Dewey in 1944, Bricker is best known for his proposal to amend the Constitution to give the states the right to vote on treaties.
(3) Lodge, who lost his Massachusetts senate seat in 1952 to John F Kennedy, served as US Ambassador to the United Nations before being picked for VP by Richard Nixon in 1960.

(4) Ronald Reagan became president at 69 and was 73 when re-elected. If McCain serves two terms, he will be 80 years old when he leaves office.