Silly Season
Barack Obama calls it the silly season. Others call it gutter politics or Swiftboating. Regardless how serious you view it, there's no denying that the 2008 presidential election campaign has entered that stage where smears, slurs and slanders begin to drown out serious discussion of the issues.
One false rumor that just won't die surrounds Barack Obama's faith. He's a Christian, but the rumor suggests otherwise. In its most malevolent form, the rumor is that he is actually a secret Muslim terrorist. In its mildest form, it's that he used to be a Muslim and is hiding that fact for political purposes. Even Hillary Clinton nurtures the rumor, saying in a debate that Obama is not a Muslim, "as far as I know."
An example of the rumor at work can be found in The Dallas Morning News Opinion blog. Below is an exchange I had with one spreader of the rumor:
Posted by Howard Richman @ 2:35 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008The main thing that you have to understand is that Senator Obama's own campaign views his political positions as tactics.
1. He came out as a strong Christian in South Carolina while at the same time his campaign was assuring secularlist supporters that he was just doing so to counteract the perception that he is Muslim.
2. He took a strong anti-NAFTA position in the Ohio debate, while at the same time his campaign was assuring Canada that it was just campaign rhetoric.
3. As you pointed out, he takes positions on Iraq in public to win votes, while his campaign assures the British press that he will not follow positions "he's crafted as a presidential candidate or a U.S. Senator."
How can you trust what a candidate says when his own campaign views his statements as tactics?
Howard Richman -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Ed Cognoski @ 3:41 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008
Howard Richman, Obama is a Christian. He favors renegotiating NAFTA. He plans to pull US combat troops out of Iraq. Call these positions tactical or strategic or just setting the record straight. It doesn't matter. Democrats are showing they trust Obama. On the other hand, you're entitled to your own minority opinion. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Howard Richman @ 5:09 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008
Ed,
You may be correct. His campaign may view these positions as tactics, even though he is sincere about them. I've also noticed another pattern, he has a tendency to hide things:
1. He was a secret smoker.
2. He expresses his pro-Palestinian sympathies in private, but not in public.
3. When speaking to the Cleveland Jewish leadership, he hid the fact that he was raised as a Muslim until age 10.
4. Events keep coming out in the Rezko corruption trial in Chicago that he has hidden.
5. In "Dreams From My Father" he hid the last name of his mentor Frank Marshall Davis, a prominent Communst party member.
Howard Richman -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Ed Cognoski @ 5:40 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008
Howard Richman, Obama is a Christian. He was not "raised as a Muslim." You are spreading lies. Obama's popularity derives from his disavowal of the politics of slurs and smears that you practice. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Howard Richman @ 6:24 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008
Ed,
I certainly agree with you that Senator Obama is a Christian, not a Muslim, and I wish to thank you for making my point that he has hidden from you the fact that he was raised as a Muslim until he was 10.
When he lived in Jakarta Indonesia with his mother and his Muslim stepfather, he attended first a Catholic school for two years and than a majority Muslim public school for two years where he took 2 hours a week of Koranic studies. My source here is a pro-Obama biography.
Howard Richman -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Ed Cognoski @ 7:36 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008
Howard Richman, Obama hasn't hidden his background. The facts that you twist and spin into falsehood are well known. The truth is that Obama was no more raised a Muslim than he was raised a Catholic. You continue to practice the politics of personal destruction. Obama is attracting voters who are sick and disgusted with your old-style smear politics. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Howard Richman @ 10:26 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008
Ed,
Obama hid his two-hours-per-week study of the Koran at the public school in Jakarta when he spoke to the leaders of the Cleveland Jewish community. This is what he said:
"If anyone is still puzzled about the facts, in fact I have never been a Muslim. We had to send CNN to look at the school that I attended in Indonesia where kids were wearing short pants and listening to ipods to indicate that this was not a madrassa but was a secular school in Indonesia. Where I attended for two year prior to coming back to Hawaii. If you look at Nicholas Kristof’s article today it gives you an indication of where I got my name. My grandfather who was Kenyan converted to Christianity then converted to Islam, my father never practiced he was basically agnostic and so other than my name and the fact that I lived in a populous Muslim country for 4 years when I was a child I have very little connection to the Islamic religion."
Howard Richman -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Ed Cognoski @ 11:07 PM Sun, Mar 09, 2008
Howard Richman, whether or not your quote is accurate, it's entirely consistent with what Obama has said elsewhere. He never hides the fact that he attended a Catholic school and later a public school when he was a child in Indonesia. Public schools in Indonesia are unlike public schools in the US in that they have religion classes. Obama has never hidden this. It's in his own book.
CNN went to Indonesia to investigate the elementary school Obama attended there. CNN reported, "There are religion classes once a week - most of the 450 students are Muslim, and are taught about Islam. The handful who are Christians, learn that Jesus is the Son of God. The deputy headmaster tells me he's unaware that his school has been labeled an Islamic Madrassa by some in United States, and bristles at the thought."
So, quit lying. Obama is a Christian. He has never been a Muslim. He wasn't raised a Muslim. And he isn't hiding anything. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Howard Richman @ 12:25 AM Mon, Mar 10, 2008
Ed Cognoski,
Thanks for the information that Obama's mother and stepfather had a choice as to which religious classes Obama would attend. The fact that they chose the Islamic classes, rather than the Christian classes, confirms that they were raising him as a Muslim.
So you see, you have proven me to be accurate in every particular. The irony is that at the same time you were proving me to be correct you were calling me a liar.
Howard Richman -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Ed Cognoski @ 7:52 AM Mon, Mar 10, 2008
Howard Richman, you are a proven liar. Obama was not raised as a Muslim. Obama has not hidden his background in Indonesia. Readers can find the whole story in his book.
"During the five years that we would live with my stepfather in Indonesia, I was sent first to a neighborhood Catholic school and then to a predominantly Muslim school; in both cases, my mother was less concerned with me learning the catechism or puzzling out the meaning of the muezzin's call to evening prayer than she was with whether I was properly learning my multiplication tables."
-- Barack Obama, The Audacity of Hope
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