That’s the problem facing the Progressive/Liberal/Democrat pundits today, in the aftermath of the Restoring Honor Rally, held on the Washington Mall, in front on the Lincoln Memorial, yesterday.

Obama’s name was not mentioned once in the whole event.  There were no threatening speeches (unless you have something against God).  However, according to the Libs:

…political overtones were unmistakable, and the rally drew an enormous crowd – including many who said they were new to activism – that was energized and motivated to act – washingtonpost.com

With Glenn Beck organizing the event  and Sarah Palin playing a role, Liberal heads are exploding.

For instance, Rev. Al Sharpton and others marched in a separate and much smaller event, to the Mall from Dunbar High School in Northwest Washington, to commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King’s speech 47 years ago.

Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) said at the Sharpton rally, referring to King’s speech:

The ‘March on Washington’ changed America.  Our country reached to overcome the low points of our racial history. Glenn Beck’s march will change nothing.

That was very weak, Eleanor.  You obviously were not paying attention.

The simultaneous rallies rendered the country’s political and racial divisions in stark relief.

Sharpton drew a mostly black crowd of union members (think SEIU), church-goers, college students, and civil rights activists.  The Obama administration weighed in, too, with Education Secretary Arne Duncan speaking of education as the “civil rights issue of this generation.”   Extremely generous people have estimated the crown size at 3,000 (including pets, probably).

The Beck crowd, meanwhile, was anywhere between 300,000 and 1 million.  We won’t know until Beck releases the official total.

The mood was peaceful and calm at both events.  By the time the Sharpton march arrived on the Mall, the crowd from Beck’s rally had largely dispersed. The events appeared to produce none of the politically damaging imagery that emerged from some earlier tea party rallies, although there were tweets from the event that some Left-wing whackos tried to start trouble on the periphery of the Restoring Honor Rally.

The attendance at Beck’s gathering is sure to be underestimated by the Main Stream Media.  They are already using the excuse that crowd sizes on the Mall are often controversial and notoriously difficult to estimate, so much so that law enforcement agencies have stopped providing numbers.

Beck knows this.  When he came on stage to being the rally, Beck joked that he had “just gotten word from the media that there are over a thousand people here today.” Later, he told the crowd he heard it was “between 300,000 and 500,000.”

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), speaking soon after the Beck rally at her own impromptu event nearby, said:

We’re not going to let anyone get away with saying there were less than a million here today – because we were witnesses.

Beck, warned Saturday that “our children could be slaves to debt.”  However, during the rally, he kept repeating that the event:

…has nothing to do with politics. It has everything to do with God, turning our faith back to the values and principles that made us great.

Martin Luther King’s niece Alveda King, an anti-abortion activist, addressed the rally with a plea for prayer “in the public squares of America and in our schools.” Referencing her “Uncle Martin,” King called for national unity by repeatedly declaring “I have a dream.”

Many in the audience said they had come because they fear that the country is at a perilous moment.

By the way, the Washington Post is begging for pictures of political t-shirts from the rally, to try to denigrate the message somehow.  Even they realize that their arguments are weak.

Others said they were motivated more by their deep appreciation of Beck, whose talk-radio show is the third-most popular in the country and who heavily promoted “Restoring Honor” on radio and on his television program on Fox News.

You will start hearing that Beck has a “Messianic Complex”.  I guarantee it.

Some came because they are frustrated at what they call the “ruling class,” at the health-care bill they say few supported, at schools that no longer require that students say the Pledge of Allegiance, and at elected officials who run on one platform and govern on another.

Linda Adams, 52, a university administrator who said her ancestors were on the Mayflower and fought in the American Revolution, said:

We want our country to get back to its original roots. 

John Sawyers, 47, an engineer who grew up on a farm in Virginia, said:

It’s not anger.  It’s more, ‘Guys, why are we going this way?’ It’s time for the silent majority to say it’s wrong.

Sawyers, a registered Republican, and Adams, an independent, said they were moved to attend by Beck’s theme of honor:

Both of us are unhappy with the perception Obama is apologizing for everything we ever did.

 Adams added:

And we felt we had to do something.

Democrats have desperately attempted to launch an offensive designed to link it to the Republican Party, trying to portray Republicans as extremists beholden to the tea party agenda.   Rep. Chris Van Hollen (Md.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, assailed Republicans for pursuing a “destructive agenda” and called out the tea party movement for pushing the GOP to the “extreme right.”

Unfortunately for the Democrats, the  reverent tone of Beck’s Rally will make this attack about as effective as a water balloon fight.

The event had a strong military theme, (another reason Libs’ heads were exploding) with Beck paying tribute to three soldiers. Beck asked for donations to the Special Operations Warrior Foundation, which funds scholarships for children of service members killed in action. During the rally, Beck announced that the foundation had raised $5.5 million for the event.

The idiots at the Washington Post intimated that Beck took money from this Foundation to hold the event.  He did not.  Epic fail.

Sarah Palin said she was at the rally speaking not as a politician but as the mother of a combat veteran.

She said the military is “a force for good in this country, and that is nothing to apologize for.” She honored three military veterans, hugging them onstage, and told people to look to them as inspiration, even when the nation’s challenges might sometimes seem “insurmountable.”

She added:

But here today, at the crossroads of our history, may this day be the change point.  Look around you. You’re not alone. You are Americans! You have the same steel spine and the moral courage of Washington and Lincoln and Martin Luther King. It is in you. It will sustain you as it sustained them.

The crowd responded with chants of “USA! USA! USA!”

In the short hours since the rally, it has been both amusing and baffling to watch the Liberals try to spin this event.  The Democrats know that they cannot attack God.  They cannot attack those who watched it on C-Span or the 130,00 that watched live stream on the Facebook page effectively either.  They can and will attack Beck and Palin.  However, that’s getting old and increasingly ineffective.  The appearance of professional race-baiter Rev. Al Sharpton on Fox News’ Geraldo at Large last night was an exercise in watching someone who does not realize that they are irrelevant.  Every argument he brought up was ineffective.  Even Geraldo was forced to say complimentary things about the event.  I know that killed his Progressive soul.

Once again, the Libs face a crisis that they have brought upon themselves.  75 % of Americans identify as Christians.  21 % of Americans claim to be staunch Liberals.  Did Obama and his Far Left Base really expect to impose their ideology upon Americans without awakening a Sleeping Giant?

Even as I compose this blog, the Lincoln Memorial grounds are awash with a sea of humanity, gathering for The Restoring Honor Rally, to be held from 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. Central today, August 28th.

Glenn Beck, Fox News/Conservative Radio Host will be joined on stage by Former Alaskan Governor and Fox News Contributor Sarah Palin, among others.  Beck says that  the event, on the same steps where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech exactly 47 years earlier, isn’t a political rally.  Instead, it’s going to be a celebration of the military, patriotism and American heritage.

Over 300,000 are expected to attend.   Beck has been cautious about not overestimating attendance:

It’s going to be a little overwhelming as we see tens of thousands of people standing together, locked arm-in-arm, peaceful, happy.  This event is bigger than any single one person; it is not about one person.

Rev. Al Sharpton , he of the less-than-honorable Tawana Brawley fiasco and noted race-baiter, is of the opinion that Beck is offering a very different message from the one offered by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his “I Have a Dream” speech there 43 years earlier.  I’m shocked.

Beck’s statement that he is reclaiming the civil rights movement, Sharpton told CBS News’ Wyatt Andrews, reminds him of earlier claims that King was a communist: 

When Dr. King and others came here in ’63 to ask the government to protect the civil rights of people and the economic rights of people, they came to ask government to protect them from local states that were robbing them of economic and civil rights.

…Glenn Beck is coming here to ask government to leave us alone, so he’s trying to reverse what King did and there are those of us who are not going to allow that to happen.

Gosh, Al.  You’re having a hard time coping with being irrelevant, aren’t you?

They’re saying ‘we’re talking about the honor of America,’ they’re saying ‘we’re talking about restoring dignity,’ there is nothing more dignified than our country coming together and making sure that everyone has equal opportunity.  That’s not communism, that’s really what this country is supposed to stand for and what Dr. King gave his life for.

You’ve correct.  Equal rights isn’t communism, Al.  The Government controlling our lives is, though.

Beck has said that  the fact that his rally is being held on the anniversary of King’s speech is a coincidence.   He has gone on to say that King’s legacy does not only belong to African-Americans.   And that is what is getting professional race-baiters like Sharpton’s goat.

Sharpton went on to say that while King stood for the government helping poor Americans, Beck deems that “socialism” and “government ruling our lives.”

Actually, I have heard Beck say the same thing most Americans say.  Charity begins with community:  families, neighbors, and churches…a hand up, not a handout. 

Duct tape your head, here it comes:

It couldn’t have been more of a contradiction.  When government stayed out of people’s lives women and blacks couldn’t vote,   When government stayed out of people’s lives we were in the back of the bus. We need government to do what Dr. King came and asked government to do in ’63 and we need government to do that now.

When you start saying you’re going to reclaim the civil rights movement that’s not even coded, that’s a blatant attempt the hijack a movement that changed America.

You’re right, Al.  America is such a Raaaciiist nation.  Why, a black man could never become president.  Hey!   Waitaminute….

A Facebook friend of mine has a different viewpoint.

Dr. Alveda King is the director of African-American outreach for Priests for Life, and the founder of King for America.  Here is an excerpt from an article she wrote about today’s event:

Delineating ourselves as red state or blue, liberal or conservative, minority or majority, we have not quite reached the day when men and women are “judged not by the color of their skin but on the content of their character.” We are still marching toward that day. As Uncle Martin said, “we cannot turn back.”

The rally will also give America another chance to honor and thank the men and women in our armed forces for the dangers they face every day in our stead. Unless you have a loved one in Iraq or Afghanistan, it’s too easy to forget that tens of thousands of Americans are far from the comforts of home, are directly in harm’s way, facing an enemy who hates us precisely because we are free. And coming just days before the ninth anniversary of 9/11, the day that roused us from our complacency, we could use another wakeup call, one of our own devising.

When I join Beck and all gathered at the Lincoln Memorial this weekend, I will talk about my Uncle Martin and the America he envisioned. I will talk about honor and character and sacrifice. I will be joined by those who represent the diversity of the human race.

On Saturday, Uncle Martin’s dream of personhood and human dignity will resound across America. And the Park Police should consider themselves forewarned: As we stand in the symbolic shadow of the great American who signed the Emancipation Proclamation, we just might sing.

Dr. Alveda King is a leader in the Pro-life Movement.  She has received all sorts of accusations and insults for her involvement in today’s event.

Whether you like Glenn Beck and/or Sarah Palin does not matter today.  Today is about recognizing that we live in the greatest country on God’s green earth and it is time to reclaim our heritage.  As President John Adams said:

[I]t is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue.

[W]e have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

It is time for Americans to remember our heritage and to realize the role that God and His Divine Providence played in the establishment of this country as the greatest on Earth.  It is time to restore honor.

On June 14th, 2010, Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, an agnostic, said in an interview with Andy Ferguson of The Weekly Standard: 

… the next president, whoever he is, “would have to call a truce on the so-called social issues. We’re going to just have to agree to get along for a little while,” until the economic issues are resolved. 

Little did Governor Daniels know that social issues would soon rival, if not overshadow economic issues, in the eye of the American public.

Over the last several days, the buzz around the water coolers in America has been about:

The Ground Zero mosque. Gay marriage in California. The president’s religion. 

Granted, these issues have nothing  to do with the economy.  Obama’s failed economic policy has dominated the political scene in 2010 and caused a panic among incumbents up for re-election in November.   However, with a little over two months to go until the midterm elections, the three aforementioned social concerns have created a hurricane of political buzz,with the tornadoes of illegal immigration and health care swirling within the atmosphere. 

The all-knowing pundits (just ask them) say the economy is still the number one issue and that politicians need to stay away from the sticky issues revolving around morality, ethics, and, God forbid, religion, or else they will drive away independent voters who, the pundits assume, vote with their wallets.

Evidently, their parents never told these all-knowing pundits what assuming does.

In Florida, site of  primary elections this Tuesday, the top Republican candidates for governor are both echoing each other’s outrage over the Islamic center proposed near Ground Zero in lower Manhattan. 

Billionaire Rick Scott immediately put out a campaign ad after President Obama launched the New York issue into the national spotlight by saying the developers had the right to build there. 

Scott’s campaign ad, to the backdrop of moody guitar music, declared that Obama was “wrong” and the mosque should not be erected “just yards” from where “Muslim fanatics murdered thousands of innocent Americans.” 

Opponent Bill McCollum, Florida’s attorney general, repeated the outrage: 

We’re still at war with Al Qaeda. They see this as a sign of weakness.  This is not just an insult to the families of the victims of September 11. It’s also a problem for our soldiers that are still fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq. 

In Missouri, GOP Rep. Roy Blunt’s Senate campaign posted a web video that had audio of Democratic opponent Robin Carnahan saying New Yorkers should decide the mosque issue for themselves — with a photo in the background of smoldering World Trade Center rubble.  Blunt eventually pulled the ad, but Carnahan said it went too far. 

Senate Majority Leader “Dinghy” Harry Reid, who faces a conservative challenge from Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle, shocked  Washington by coming out against the mosque Monday. 

He had to protect his phony baloney job.

Political candidates in states thousands of miles from Ground Zero are publically expressing their opinions on the mosque debate. The hottest part of this political firestorm is in New York, where Republicans are blasting Democrats who have either sided with the proposed center or kept their mouth shut, trying to fly below the radar.

Rick Lazio, challenger to Democratic Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in the general election, has released an ad through the New York State Conservative Party slamming Cuomo for defending the Cordoba Initiative.

In the ad, Rubio says:

New Yorkers have been through enough.  Andrew Cuomo is very, very wrong. 

Republicans think that they have found a political hot button issue.   A Fox News poll released last Friday found 64 percent of voters think it’s wrong to put a mosque near Ground Zero. 

However, there are Republicans who seem to be preaching Moderation.  Oh, squish.   New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie has warned lawmakers against getting too caught up in the debate.  Republican strategist Kevin Madden, former spokesman for ex-presidential candidate Mitt Romney (Has anybody heard where he stands on the issue, by the way?), said candidates should beware the mosque:

What happens is candidates run the risk of looking like they are focusing on the trivial at the expense of the urgent — the urgent being the economy.

Trivial?  Not according to other Republican candidates.

According to Georgia Republican Rep. Phil Gingrey, the recent debate over whether the 14th amendment should be altered so that children of illegal immigrants are not granted automatic citizenship will be a “huge issue” come November. 

Hearkening back to the campaign of 2004, gay marriage was also tossed into the campaign season mix when a federal judge earlier this month ruled that California’s Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional. The decision is being appealed. 

Republican gubernatorial nominee Meg Whitman on Friday seized the opportunity to blast California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown, her Democratic opponent, for not defending the law in court. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, she promised to defend the law as governor. 

The hottest social issue of the week was a poll released Wednesday by the Pew Research Center which showed voters’ views on the president’s religion are either murkier, or possibly clearer, than ever.  The poll showed 18 percent of Americans believe the president, who claims to be a practicing Christian, is a Muslim — that’s up from 11 percent in March 2009.  A third  identified him as a Christian and 43 percent said they don’t know what religion the president practices. 

 Director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics, Larry Sabato, told Fox News that in light of the numbers the White House will probably be more “persistent” in letting reporters know when he’s attending services or consulting with pastors. He said that may help “moderate” the false impression about his religion. 

It has been very interesting this week to observe the MSM, the Progressives, and the Northeast Moderates all trying to spin these social issues that are so upsetting to the American public.  Just as Beltway Republicans have been trying to steer their party away from Reagan Conservatism, saying that it was a failed model, so are these elements in our society trying to tell the American people that right and wrong are relative things, and that traditional American values are passe’.

Reality check, people:  75 % of Americans proclaim their Christianity.  The overwhelming majority of Americans were raised with traditional values.  They believe in the concept of right and wrong.  They have been working hard all of their lives and now, a bunch of clowns in Washington are trying to tell them that they need to give more of their money to them, just so this Regime can destroy what it took over 200 years to build.  At the same time, they see a president, currently on his 6th vacation of the year, who has said that we no longer consider ourselves a Christian nation and that the Muslim call to prayer is one of “the prettiest sounds on Earth at sunset”.  Not only that, but he can recite the Call to Prayer in perfect Arabic.  Funny, I’ve never heard him recite The Lord’s Prayer.  What are Americans supposed to believe about this man?

Yes.  We are all struggling to survive due to the worst economic policy in the history of America.  However, strictly campaigning on the issue of economics alone, with no ethical and moral stance to back it up, will not win an election for the Republicans.  After all, Mussolini made the trains run on time.

On Friday night, during his monumental announcement of support for the planned Muslim symbol of victory at the scene of the worst Islamic Terrorist attack on American soil in history, President Barack Hussein Obama (Peace be unto him) championed the building of the mosque as an exercise in Religious Freedom, in the spirit of our Founding Fathers.  These remarks came from the same man who cancelled the National Day of Prayer White House Breakfast each of the 2 years since his ascension to the presidency.

Obama has been supportive of Muslims in America since his Presidency began.  In a speech he delivered to the Muslim world on June 4, 2009 at Cairo University, Obama said:

I know, too, that Islam has always been a part of America’s story. The first nation to recognize my country was Morocco. In signing the Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, our second President John Adams wrote, “The United States has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Muslims.”

Time out, Scooter.  John Adams also said:

The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity. I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God.

Now, back to the Cairo Speech.

And since our founding, American Muslims have enriched the United States. They have fought in our wars, served in government, stood for civil rights, started businesses, taught at our Universities, excelled in our sports arenas, won Nobel Prizes, built our tallest building, and lit the Olympic Torch. And when the first Muslim-American was recently elected to Congress, he took the oath to defend our Constitution using the same Holy Koran that one of our Founding Fathers – Thomas Jefferson – kept in his personal library.

However, what the Liberal Main Stream Media never reported, was the fact that Thomas Jefferson kept a Koran in his library in order to gain a better insight into the way Muslims think, because of the War with the Barbary Pirates.

Obama and his minions are trying desperately to rewrite history , by trying to somehow subliminally imply that Muslims go all the way back in our nation to the Founding Fathers.  That is not the case.

From adherents.com:

There were 95 Senators and Representatives in the First Federal Congress. If one combines the total number of signatures on the Declaration, the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution with the non-signing Constitutional Convention delegates, and then adds to that sum the number of congressmen in the First Federal Congress, one obtains a total of 238 “slots” or “positions” in these groups which one can classify as “Founding Fathers” of the United States. Because 40 individuals had multiple roles (they signed multiple documents and/or also served in the First Federal Congress), there are 204 unique individuals in this group of “Founding Fathers.” These are the people who did one or more of the following:

– signed the Declaration of Independence
– signed the Articles of Confederation
– attended the Constitutional Convention of 1787
– signed the Constitution of the United States of America
– served as Senators in the First Federal Congress (1789-1791)
– served as U.S. Representatives in the First Federal Congress

The religious affiliations of these individuals are summarized below. Obviously this is a very restrictive set of names, and does not include everyone who could be considered an “American Founding Father.” But most of the major figures that people generally think of in this context are included using these criteria, including George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Samuel Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, John Hancock, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and more. 

<!–

–>

Religious Affiliation of U.S. Founding Fathers	# of Founding Fathers	% of Founding Fathers
Episcopalian/Anglican	88	54.7%
Presbyterian	30	18.6%
Congregationalist	27	16.8%
Quaker	7	4.3%
Dutch Reformed/German Reformed	6	3.7%
Lutheran	5	3.1%
Catholic	3	1.9%
Huguenot	3	1.9%
Unitarian	3	1.9%
Methodist	2	1.2%
Calvinist	1	0.6%
unknown	43	%
TOTAL	204

Here are some quotes about God and Christianity from 3 Presidents of the United States whom you might recognize:

John Quincy Adams

My hopes of a future life are all founded upon the Gospel of Christ and I cannot cavil or quibble away [evade or object to]. . . . the whole tenor of His conduct by which He sometimes positively asserted and at others countenances [permits] His disciples in asserting that He was God.

The hope of a Christian is inseparable from his faith. Whoever believes in the Divine inspiration of the Holy Scriptures must hope that the religion of Jesus shall prevail throughout the earth. Never since the foundation of the world have the prospects of mankind been more encouraging to that hope than they appear to be at the present time. And may the associated distribution of the Bible proceed and prosper till the Lord shall have made “bare His holy arm in the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God” [Isaiah 52:10].

In the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior. The Declaration of Independence laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity.

Thomas Jefferson

The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of man.

The practice of morality being necessary for the well being of society, He [God] has taken care to impress its precepts so indelibly on our hearts that they shall not be effaced by the subtleties of our brain. We all agree in the obligation of the moral principles of Jesus and nowhere will they be found delivered in greater purity than in His discourses.

I am a Christian in the only sense in which He wished anyone to be: sincerely attached to His doctrines in preference to all others.

I am a real Christian – that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus Christ.

George Washington

You do well to wish to learn our arts and ways of life, and above all, the religion of Jesus Christ. These will make you a greater and happier people than you are.

While we are zealously performing the duties of good citizens and soldiers, we certainly ought not to be inattentive to the higher duties of religion. To the distinguished character of Patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian.

The blessing and protection of Heaven are at all times necessary but especially so in times of public distress and danger. The General hopes and trusts that every officer and man will endeavor to live and act as becomes a Christian soldier, defending the dearest rights and liberties of his country.

I now make it my earnest prayer that God would… most graciously be pleased to dispose us all to do justice, to love mercy, and to demean ourselves with that charity, humility, and pacific temper of the mind which were the characteristics of the Divine Author of our blessed religion.

Mr. President, this is not an issue of Religious Freedom.  There are a lot of mosques in New York City.  This is nothing but an opportunity for the enemies of American Freedom to spit in our eye and gloat over the murder of 3,00o on our soil.  This is political propaganda of the most blatant kind.  You said a while back, that we are no longer “just” a Christian nation  and through your actions, you have tried to back that up.  The problem you face is the fact that 75% of this nation proclaim Christianity and only a little over 1 % claim to be Muslim.  Those of us belonging to the 75% percent believe as Founding Father and President John Adams did when he said:

The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity. I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God.

All sources for the preceding post are embedded.

Matthew 6:21

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

President Obama hosted an iftar, the special evening meal observed during Ramadan, last night in the White House dining room.

Obama participated in a similar gathering last year.

Obama wrote in a statement Wednesday:

Celebrations like iftar dinners “remind us of the principles that we hold in common, and Islam’s role in advancing justice, progress, tolerance and the dignity of all human beings,” .

Ramadan is a celebration of a faith known for great diversity and racial equality … a reminder that Islam has always been part of America and that American Muslims have made extraordinary contributions to our country.

At the dinner Friday night, President Barack Hussein Obama (Peace be upon him) dispelled all doubt as to where he stood on one of the hottest subjects in America as he forcefully endorsed building a mosque near ground zero, saying the country’s founding principles demanded no less:

As a citizen, and as president, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as anyone else in this country.

That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances.  This is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable.

Republicans responded quickly to the president’s remarks.   Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y said:

President Obama is wrong.  It is insensitive and uncaring for the Muslim community to build a mosque in the shadow of ground zero. While the Muslim community has the right to build the mosque they are abusing that right by needlessly offending so many people who have suffered so much.

The White House had been silent on the subject of the mosque, which would be part of a $100 million Islamic center to be built next to the site where nearly 3,000 people were murdered when hijacked jetliners slammed into the World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001. Press secretary Robert Gibbs had deflected the subject as a local matter.

It was already a national issue, sparking debate around the country as top Republicans including Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich spoke out against it.   So did the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group.

Obama made it a presidential issue Friday in no uncertain terms.

While insisting that the place where the twin towers once stood was indeed “hallowed ground,” Obama said that the proper way to honor it was to apply American values:

Our capacity to show not merely tolerance, but respect to those who are different from us — a way of life that stands in stark contrast to the nihilism of those who attacked us on that September morning, and who continue to plot against us today.

On the precipice of a Mid-term Election political massacre of Democratic politicians , Obama surely knew that his words would not only make U.S. headlines but would reach Muslims worldwide. The president has made it his mission to reach out to the global Muslim community, and guests at Friday’s dinner included ambassadors and officials from numerous Muslim nations, including Saudi Arabia and Indonesia.

While his pronouncement concerning the mosque may win him some new friends in the Muslim world, Obama, once again, holds a view contrary to the view of the majority of the people that he is supposed to be the leader of.   A CNN/Opinion Research poll released this week found that nearly 70 percent of Americans opposed the mosque plan while just 29 percent approved.

A number of Democratic politicians have run away from the mosque controversy like bachelors on Sadie Hawkins Day.  New York’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg, has been a strong supporter of the mosque, which has won approval from Liberal-stacked local planning boards.

The group behind the $100 million project, the Cordoba Initiative, describes it as a Muslim-themed community center.  Announced plans call not only for prayer space but for a swimming pool, culinary school, art studios and other features. The mosque group claims it will be a hub for interfaith interaction, as well as a place for Muslims to bridge some of their faith’s own schisms.

As I reported on Wednesday, the imam behind the proposed Islamic Victory Monument known as the Ground Zero Mosque Ground Zero is going on a multi-country jaunt to the Middle East funded by taxpayer dollars through the State Department.  Americans are rightly concerned that he will be using our money to raise the money he needs to build the $100,000,000 mosque. 

According to a State Department announcement that was given on Monday, Feisal Abdul Rauf is taking the publicly funded trip to foster “greater understanding” about Islam and Muslim communities in the United States.  Yeah, right. 

When asked about the trip, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said:

He is a distinguished Muslim cleric.  I think we are in the process of arranging for him to travel as part of this program, and it is to foster a greater understanding about the region around the world among Muslim-majority communities.

Crowley said no fund-raising for the mosque and cultural center during the trip would be permitted:

That would not be something he could do as part of our program.

However, Rauf is scheduled to make stops in Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain and Qatar, Islamic countries with deep pockets.

And now we know why Obama sent him.

The mask is off now.  Remember when Scooter slipped and said:

All the Liberals defended him by saying that he was being sarcastic in that interview.  I wonder what their defense of last night will be?  And how quickly will all the Democratic politicians seeking office in the Mid-terms distance themselves from their President?  Is Obama really so naive as to not realize that Islam is not just a faith, but a political ideology as well?

Most importantly, given the documented history of this Imam and the group behind this mosque, has this 60’s Radical excuse for a president just publicly supported and emboldened the enemies of America?

All sources of information in the preceding blog are embedded.

 

Americans all over the country are protesting Islamic mosques being built in their neighborhoods.

Members of a local Tea Party group in Temecula, Calif., in late June ,protested outside Friday prayers at a mosque that is seeking to build a new worship center on a vacant lot nearby.

In Sheboygan, Wis., some Christian ministers led opposition to a Muslim group that wanted to open a mosque in a former health food store bought by a Muslim doctor.

These protestors have said their problem is Islam itself. They quote passages from the Koran and argue that even the most Americanized Muslim secretly wants to replace the Constitution with Islamic Sharia law.

These Americans are making the point that while Islam may be a religion, it also masks a violent political ideology.

However, Ihsan Bagby, associate professor of Islamic studies at the University of Kentucky, is disturbed that Americans are speaking out:

What’s different is the heat, the volume, the level of hostility.  It’s one thing to oppose a mosque because traffic might increase, but it’s different when you say these mosques are going to be nurturing terrorist bombers, that Islam is invading, that civilization is being undermined by Muslims.

The professor, along with other clueless Liberals, are upset about the growing number of authors and bloggers, some of them former Muslims, who are invited to speak at rallies, sell their books and testify in churches. Their message is that Islam is inherently violent and poses a threat to America.

Attempts have been made by Liberals to counteract this message. In each community, interfaith groups led by Protestant ministers, Catholic priests, rabbis and clergy members of other faiths have defended the mosques.

The Ground Zero Mosque cleared a final hurdle last week before the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg erroneously equated this monument to Islamic victory on 9/11 to the cause of religious freedom.  Liberals and the usual “religious” social justice groups supported the Cordoba Initiative.  Opponents included the Anti-Defamation League, an influential Jewish group, prominent Republicans like Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker and the overwhelming majority of the citizens of New York City and the rest of America.

There a smaller dust-up going on in Temecula, about 60 miles north of San Diego.  Muslims have been there for about 12 years.  They comprise around 150 families who meet in a warehouse.  Their imam is Mahmoud Harmoush,  a lecturer at California State University, San Bernardino.  The group wants to build a 25,000-square-foot center, with space for classrooms and a playground, on a lot it bought in 2000.

According to Mr. Harmoush, the Muslim families had contributed to the local food bank, sent truckloads of supplies to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, and participated in music nights and Thanksgiving events with the local interfaith council.  He’s upset because they haven’t gotten any recognition for their good works:

We do all these activities and nobody notices.  Now that we have to build our center, everybody jumps to make it an issue.

That’s interesting.  Christians perform works like this for His glory, not ours.

A group of Americans have voiced their concerns about the mosque.  Diana Serafin, a grandmother who lost her job in tech support this year, contacted people she knew from attending Tea Party events and anti-immigration rallies.  They did their homework.  They read books by critics of Islam, including former Muslims like Walid Shoebat, Wafa Sultan and Manoucher Bakh.   She also went to a meeting of the local chapter of ACT! for America, a Florida-based group that says its purpose is to defend Western civilization against Islam.

Ms. Serafin said:

As a mother and a grandmother, I worry.   I learned that in 20 years with the rate of the birth population, we will be overtaken by Islam, and their goal is to get people in Congress and the Supreme Court to see that Sharia is implemented. My children and grandchildren will have to live under that.

 I do believe everybody has a right to freedom of religion.  But Islam is not about a religion. It’s a political government, and it’s 100 percent against our Constitution.”

Ms. Serafin was among 20 to 30 people who turned out to protest the mosque, including some who brought dogs along to offend those Muslims who consider dogs to be ritually unclean.  But they were outnumbered by at least 75 supporters. As a result of citizens’ concerns, the City of Temecula recently postponed a hearing on whether to grant the mosque a permit.

There are about 1,900 mosques in the United States, their meeting places vary from makeshift prayer rooms in storefronts and houses to large buildings with adjoining community centers, according to a preliminary survey by Mr. Bagby, the California professor mentioned earler.

A two-year study by a group of Liberal academics on American Muslims and terrorism came to the conclusion that contemporary mosques are actually a deterrent to the spread of militant Islam and terrorism.  I’m shocked.

The study was the product of professors with Duke’s Sanford School of Public Policy and the University of North Carolina.   They claimed that many mosque leaders had put significant effort into countering extremism by building youth programs, sponsoring antiviolence forums and scrutinizing teachers and texts.

Radicalization of alienated Muslim youths is a real threat, Mr. Bagby said:

But the youth we worry about are not the youth that come to the mosque.

In central Tennessee, the mosque in Murfreesboro is the third one in the last year to encounter resistance.

A group by the name of Former Muslims United put up a billboard saying “Stop the Murfreesboro Mosque.” The group’s president is Nonie Darwish, also the founder of Arabs for Israel, who spoke against Islam in Murfreesboro at a fund-raising dinner for Christians United for Israel, an evangelical organization led by the Rev. John Hagee.

Ms. Darwish said in an interview:

A mosque is not just a place for worship  It’s a place where war is started, where commandments to do jihad start, where incitements against non-Muslims occur. It’s a place where ammunition was stored.

 A spokeswoman for the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro,Camie Ayash, was upset that people were listening to what she claimed was “total disinformation” on Islam.

According to her, her group was stunned when what began as one person raising zoning questions about the new mosque grew into mass protests with marchers waving signs about Sharia:

A lot of Muslims came to the U.S. because they respect the Constitution. There’s no conflict with the U.S. Constitution in Sharia law. If there were, Muslims wouldn’t be living here.

Ma’am, I do believe your burqa’s on fire.

Here’s an example of the difference in Sharia Law as opposed to our American system, found at theamerican-catholic.com:

Instead of precedents and codes, Sharia relies on medieval jurist’s manuals and collections of non-binding legal opinions, or fatwas, issued by religious scholars (ulama, particularly a mufti); these can be made binding for a particular case at the discretion of a judge.

In Wisconsin, the Town Executive Council voted unanimously to give the Islamic Society of Sheboygan a permit to use the former health food store as a prayer space.

Dr. Mansoor Mirza, the physician who owns the property, said he was trying to take the long view of the controversy.

Dr. Mirza said:

Every new group coming to this country — Jews, Catholics, Irish, Germans, Japanese — has gone through this.  Now I think it’s our turn to pay the price, and eventually we will be coming out of this, too.

Gosh, Dr. Mirza, I did not realize that those other groups you mentioned had issued fatwas against the United States, too.

Unfortunately for those Muslims seeking to build a new life for themselves in America as one percent of our population, the deafening silence by their leadership around the world toward Islamic Terrorism has indicated to Americans that these horrible acts of  barbarism are not abhorred, but condoned.  So, therefore, Muslims should not be surprised as all when Americans are less than welcoming to the proposed building of Islamic Mosques and Community Centers in their communities.

Sources:  nytimes.com, theamerican-catholic.com

10 missionaries, including 6 Americans were brutally murdered after having what was to be their last meal at a picnic in the forest in the Sharrun Valley, high in the Hindu Kush mountains of northern Afghanistan.

The aid workers, six Americans, a Briton, a German and four Afghans, coming home from a three-week journey on foot to deliver free medical care to the remotest regions of the country,  had just finished eating when they were raided by gunmen with long dyed-red beards, the police said.

The gunmen marched them into the forest, stood them in a line and mercilessly shot 10 of them, one by one.

The Badakhshan Province police chief, Gen. Aqa Noor Kentoz said Saturday that the police found their bodies, seven men and three women, on Friday.

This slaughter, the largest massacre in years of aid workers in Afghanistan, offered chilling evidence of the increasing insecurity in the northern part of the country and added to fears that the insurgency has turned even more in vicious in recent months.

The Taliban proudly claimed responsibility for the killings, accusing the group of being spies and Christian missionaries.  Because of pressure in their traditional strongholds in the south and east by NATO forces, the Taliban have become more active in areas once relatively quiet, like Badakhshan Province.

They have recently begun using women and children as suicide bombers, and assassinating tribal elders. Now it appears they have the murdering of defenseless aid workers to their holy war in the name of Allah.   Aid workers in the past have often been free to work in both government and Taliban-dominated areas.

The police identified the group of doctors, nurses and technicians as working for the International Assistance Mission, a Christian aid group that has operated in Afghanistan since 1966.

Dirk Frans, the group’s executive director said:

All indications are this is probably our team.  They were on an optometric expedition, running an eye camp.

Mr. Frans confirmed that an Afghan man who survived the attack and later told his story to the police was the group’s driver.  And the local police identified the mission’s team leader, Dr. Tom Little of Delmar, N.Y., as one of the dead.

A Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, claimed that the aid workers had ignored orders from a Taliban patrol to stop and were shot as they tried to flee. He said they discovered among their belongings a Bible in the Dari language widely spoken in Afghanistan, and maps showing Taliban positions in northern Afghanistan.

This weasel proclaimed:

They were not actually here to provide medication for people, but were here for spying.  The punishment for spying is death.

Mr. Frans originally said that he doubted the Taliban claim of responsibility, and said the police had told him the probable motive was robbery. However, the police proved his assumption wrong after interviewing witnesses and on Saturday were saying that the Taliban were responsible.

The accusations of spying or proselytizing, Mr. Frans said, were “out of the question.”

That would be against the laws of this country and the rules of our organization.  Although we are a Christian-supported charity, we would absolutely not proselytize.

He said all aid workers signed agreements not to divulge any information to governments or outside parties.

Mr. Frans said Dr. Little, a 61-year-old optometrist, had been working in Afghanistan for the past four decades and spoke fluent Dari.

Friends and family members said that Dr. Little and his wife, Libby, had reared three daughters in Afghanistan, weathered the Russian occupation and the civil war that followed, hid in his basement for months during Taliban rule, but kept on serving the people of Afghanistan, even after a rocket attack flattened one of his hospitals so he could not provide eye care for impoverished Afghans.

He was even thrown out of Afghanistan by the Taliban in 2001 during a crackdown on Christian aid organizations,but returned after the Taliban were overthrown later that year.

A British surgeon, Dr. Karen Woo, 36, was also among the dead, according to by her organization, Bridge Afghanistan.

Dr. Woo wrote on a fund-raising blog:

The expedition will require a lot of physical and mental resolve and will not be without risk.  The effort is worth it in order to assist those that need it most.

Dr. Woo was engaged to be married.  She recently had an Afghan tailor make her a ball gown out of raw silk.

Sadly,  she wrote in the last entry on her personal blog before she left on the latest mission:

I hear what you’re saying about priorities, and seriously, I probably shouldn’t be worrying about a ball gown right now, but still, what’s a girl to do?

The police commander said that the other women were an American and a German.  The International Assistance Mission is withholding their names until positive identification can be made.

Two of the Afghans were killed. A third, the driver, saved himself by reciting the famous verses from the Koran, “There is no god but God and Muhammad is his prophet,” He later told the police that the Taliban released him. The fate of the fourth Afghan remains unknown.

The missionaries set out three weeks ago to reach the northern corner of Nuristan Province, traveling by foot with pack horses to carry their medical equipment and hiking over a 16,000-foot pass into the roadless Parun Valley.

With the exception of the driver, retained for the group’s final leg by four-wheel drive, the personnel were medically trained, and there were three doctors among them, including a dental surgeon.

In addition to treating cataracts and other eye problems, they planned to conduct maternal and infant health and dental clinics in the valley, where about 50,000 people live.

According to the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief, an umbrella group for aid organizations, abductions and assassinations of aid workers have been mounting quickly in recent years. Five Doctors Without Borders workers were killed in 2004, and four International Rescue Committee workers were shot to death in a Taliban ambush in 2008.

According to Mr. Frans, his group had run many such expeditions, as recently as 2009, always at the invitation of local communities, with a local guide. Even so, four of its workers have been killed in three separate episodes.

He said the mission to Nuristan was told that there were no active Taliban in the area, although Afghan officials said the Taliban and other insurgent groups had been active in northern Nuristan and even across the border in Badakhshan.

The governor of Nuristan Province, Jamaluddin Badar, said the local police had escorted the expedition members as they left the province, but when they crossed into Badakhshan, they told the authorities they no longer wanted armed guards in their midst.

General Kentoz, the provincial police chief said:

They said we’re doctors and civilians and no one will bother us.

 According to local residents, the red-bearded gunmen spoke the Nuristani dialect, which indicates that they probably were tracking the group. It is common in some parts of Afghanistan for older men to dye their beards with henna.

Ms. Little told family members in an e-mail that she last heard from the group on Thursday morning.  Her husband told her that their caravan of Land Rovers had been delayed trying to ford a flooded river.

Despite the slaughter of these missionaries, Mr. Frans said the organization would not be deterred from its work in Afghanistan:

We have worked here under the king, under the Russians, under the Communists, under the warlords and the Taliban.  Is it time to quit now?

The White House reaction?  **crickets**  The Obamas are too busy taking their four vacations in one month and, after all, Islam is the religion of peace.

What kind of faith does it take to serve the people of a foreign land for 30 years?

I want to leave you this Sunday with this promise: 

 1 John 2:1

…And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:

Talk to Him.  He’ll listen.  Here’s some information you need to hear.  It’s the world’s shortest sermon.  God bless you and may God bless America…again.

Sources:  nytimes.com, bible.com, youtube.com