The campaign of Barack Obama, who many Americans think is Muslim, took on a volunteer Muslim lawyer, Mazen Asbahi, to help the presumptive Democratic Presidential nominee improve his election support among Muslim American voters.
It's not that Muslims don't support Obama. Let's face it, a guy whom most Americans think is Muslim is probably going to be more understanding of Muslim and Arab concerns than a candidate like John McCain, whose entire existence has been a lap-dog-like association with a political party that routinely trashes Muslims. Rather than fight the absurdity of the attacks, Asbahi decided to resign as an Obama volunteer.
But, Obama has been waffling back and forth on issues of importance to Arabs, who are mostly Muslim so some outreach is necessary to that voter bloc.
Well, last week, the Wall Street Journal decided to investigate (I would call it defaming and mud-raking, which is what the Wall Street Journal seems to do best when it comes to Arabs and Muslims) through Asbahi's background. And low-and-behold, they discovered he has many Muslim friends.
I would say that Asbahi is like every Arab and Muslim in the United States. If you dig far enough in, you will find at least one person - probably more - who they are associated with, related to, work with and know, who is on the Federal "No Fly List."
I would even say that you will also find that they are some how related to or attend a Mosque - an Islamic church - which also has one or more people that have been slandered, defamed, attacked and demonized in the hateful anti-Arab anti-Muslim mainstream American news media.
In fact, you might in find that many Arabs and Muslims, through the principle of "Six Degrees of Separation," can be linked to someone who has been accused of either being a terrorist, knowing a terrorist, or who knows someone who knows a terrorist, or who knows someone who knows someone who knows a terrorist.
You get my drift.
What's really remarkable is that ALL that the Wall Street Journal discovered in their smear campaign -- err, investigation -- is that Asbahi once worked or served on a board that also had another board member who is mildly controversial, Imam Jamal Said.
Jamal Said is the Imam of the very controversial Palestinian mosque in Bridgeview, Illinois, a southwest suburb of Chicago. He has some tough views against Israel, but not against America.
It's the same mosque where Mohammed Salah prayed. You remember Salah? He was the guy the Justice Department and former U.S. Justice Department vigilante John Ashcroft alleged, on the morning after Sept. 11, 2001, was directly involved in terrorist activity against the United States.
But after years of persecution, and after Ashcroft was replaced with a fellow vigilante, Alberto Gonzales, who was succeeded, also, by Michael Mukasey, the "terrorism charges" were dropped. They had a tough time even proving Salah was associated with a terrorist organization. A jury later convicted Salah on the sole, un-terrorism related charge of "perjury."
Come to think of it, many of the alleged terrorism cases have ended the same way, exposed as exaggerated, politically motivated harassment of individuals whose only "crime" was to have unpopular views critical of Israel -- not the United States.
The Bridgeview Mosque has several other shady characters in its midst, but far more who are not so controversial, from the founder of the extremist Islamic Association for Palestine to Ali Ata, who in the face of corruption charges flipped to become the Justice Department's chief witness against Tony Rezko, Obama's pal and a chief fundraiser for Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
But the worst you can say about all of those controversial folks is that they do not like Israel. Despite all the lawsuits, the unending media slander, and the incessant political attacks, no one at the Birdgeview mosque HAS EVER been convicted or proven to be anti-American or supportive of any anti-American violent groups or religious zealots.
The real tragedy here is that Asbahi is most likely a very decent person who is very American, opposes the Islamic terrorists and just wants to see Muslims and Arabs become more active in American politics. Instead of being able to do that, he has now been forced to quit as one of Obama's volunteers because of the Wall Street Journal's and the other media's smear campaign.
So the next time you hear some typical American ask, "Hows come Moosleems and Ay-rabs dint denounce da terrorists and da extremists? Hows come? Hows come?"
You might respond by explaining Muslims and Arabs want to spend their time denouncing extremists like Osama Bin Laden, but they are TOO BUSY defending themselves against media defamation, slander, name calling and stupid attacks.