Obama’s speech on the mosque at “Ground Zero” makes sense for his administration.
It makes sense politically for him to be in favor of building the mosque, because presumably it entails co-opting the “non-violent Muslim majority” and embracing America’s pluralistic tradition instead of yielding to right-wing Judeo-Christian ideologues. To oppose the project would in fact entail that the US is anti-Muslim and follows a double standard on religious tolerance, one for the Judeo-Christian tradition and another for all others. The mosque is all about symbolism and I have no doubt that intelligent US government analysts have looked at this issue from every possible angle. To advise Obama to hold a news conference in favor of the mosque is indicative that they concluded the “positives” outweigh the minuses in this case, namely, the mosque could be presented by the US government as a sort of “apology” and /or reconciliation for what fanatics did on 9/11. Of course, Democrats have no choice but to oppose Newt Gringrich and his crowd who want an open and indiscriminate Judeo-Christian crusade against Islam. Given the US problems with Iran, to say nothing of the rest of the Muslim world, there is no choice before the Obama administration but to give the green light, no matter where the $100 million to build the mosque comes from–and those who follow the trail of money in various extreme Islamic organizations know that the sources are often from well-respected conservative Arabs.
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