I am not a Muslim. And I am not a public sector worker.
In fact, most Americans are not Muslim. And most Americans do not work for our government.
So, like any minority, they're easy to pick on.
Who's gonna mind?
Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe would. It was Jefferson who said the Constitution needed a bill of rights; and it was Monroe who wrote it.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievance"
That original Tea Party? Colonists were protesting that, without their say-so, a tax was being levied on them to bail out the British East India Corporation. They spoke out, they peaceably assembled, they petitioned Government for a redress of grievance -- the same American tradition carried on by public school teachers and firefighters protesting in Wisconsin today. Protesting, just like the first Americans, not because they want to destroy the country but because they want to make it better.
The same reason the vast majority of American Muslims call this nation their home. Not only because they seek the religious freedom promised by the Bill of Rights but because they believe in the uniquely American idea that what forges a nation isn't skin color or religion or even national origin but a shared love of opportunity and a commitment to make that opportunity as equally accessible as possible.
Stripping public workers of their right to peaceably assemble as a union and conducting Congressional hearings that tarnish all American Muslims as potential extremists is fundamentally and obscenely un-America.
I am not a Muslim. And I am not a public sector worker. But I am an American and I stand with Jefferson, Monroe and all my countrymen and women who have come after them seeking and sustaining freedom and justice.
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"...or the right of the people peaceably to assemble..."
"...Stripping public workers of their right to peaceably assemble as a union..."
I suppose I'm taking the words too literally, but very few protests, no matter the political persuasion, are peaceable, with all the chanting, speakers with bullhorns or p.a. systems and the screaming at those protesting with an opposite view point.
"..Colonists were protesting that, without their say-so, a tax was being levied on them to bail out the British East India Corporation..."
Isn't a union demanding higher and higher compensation packages for their members effectively levying a tax (increase) on the tax-payers, without their say so?