The transcript of my CNN appearance with Max Kellerman and Reihan Salam is now up.
Reihan makes the useful point that he, like lots of other Muslim New Yorkers, isn’t especially thrilled about the Cordoba House project. That’s his, and their, right, which is why the President was right to distinguish between affirming the right of the orgnizers to build and expressing a view about whether that particular project ought to be built on that particular site.
My argument - for which I am willing to wage “culture war,” not on behalf of Muslims but on behalf of Thomas Jefferson and his “eternal hostility to every form of tyranny over the mind of man” - is that whether, what, and where to build is for the New York Islamic community to decide, with no need to ask permission of anyone else. Since building a community center with a prayer space isn’t objectionable except to those who find al-Islam itself offensive, there’s nothing to “compromise” about.
Let us give Jefferson’s opinions their due:
“I have a view of the subject which ought to displease neither the rational Christian nor Deists, and would reconcile many to a character they have too hastily rejected. I do not know that it would reconcile the _genus irritabile vatum_ who are all in arms against me. Their hostility is on too interesting ground to be softened. The delusion into which the X. Y. Z. plot shewed it possible to push the people; the successful experiment made under the prevalence of that delusion on the clause of the constitution, which, while it secured the freedom of the press, covered also the freedom of religion, had given to the clergy a very favorite hope of obtaining an establishment of a particular form of Christianity thro’ the U. S.; and as every sect believes its own form the true one, every one perhaps hoped for his own, but especially the Episcopalians & Congregationalists. The returning good sense of our country threatens abortion to their hopes, & they believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly; for I have sworn upon the altar of god, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”
Mark, you write:
//Reihan makes the useful point that he, like lots of other Muslim New Yorkers, isn’t especially thrilled about the Cordoba House project. //
This might leave a misleading impression. Here’s what I said:
//But, interestingly, Muslim New Yorkers are a lot less ideological and a lot less kind of furious about this as a cultural war issue than folks seem to be on cable news shows like this one.
So, I think that as a Muslim New Yorker I’m broadly sympathetic to that view. Maybe there’s some room for negotiation here, but I certainly don’t it suddenly means that Americans have become horribly xenophobic and intolerant. There’s a lot of misunderstanding here because again people don’t have very good information. //
That is, I’m not furious about the fact that some Americans are asking questions about Cordoba House.
Discussion? Sure. If people think that a terrorist-supporting imam plans to build a victory mosque at Ground Zero, and that upsets them, then telling them the truth is useful.
But negotiation? About what? What is the legitimate interest of the non-Muslims who don’t want an Islamic community center with a prayer space on the Burlington Coat Factory site?
I agree that this doesn’t mean that “Americans have become horribly xenophobic and intolerant.” It means that demagogues can always find an audience if decent people don’t oppose them, and that right now Muslims and al-Islam can be made to represent scariness to the rubes.
Curiously, the notion that a minority religion has to negotiate where it can build worship sites is largely consistent with the practice in most Muslim-majority countries. So it may be that Muslim-Americans as a group are less put off by the concept of arguing about this than, for example, I am.
Reihan: “And what was really striking is that a lot of these Muslim New Yorkers said, heck, we absolutely have a right to build this community center. On the other hand, you know, maybe it should be somewhere else. ”
But I imagine this is for quite different reasons than the non-Muslims who think it ought to be somewhere else.
Kleiman: “What is the legitimate interest of the non-Muslims who don’t want an Islamic community center with a prayer space on the Burlington Coat Factory site?”
I’m still waiting for an answer to this.
Mark, thank you for doing the Lord’s work on this.
Hilary Clinton’s plans for peace talks.. Between Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas. While, Hamas’s Aziz Duwaik is the democratically-elected President. It’d be more logical for the peace talks to be between Netanyahu and Duwaik since Duwaik probably holds more influence over the Palestinians than Mahmoud Abbas (who, apparently, a majority of the Palestinians do not like).
Disclaimer for all the wingnuts: I’m not saying condone terrorism/terrorists, I’m saying speak to the key, more influential leaders.