After last year's summer of discontent, I looked back on America's response to September 11:
A flood of post-September 11 articles asked how the attacks happened, what we would do next, and why terrorists hate us. One savvy pundit asked, Would America keep its head?We invaded Iraq on trumped-up intelligence. We conducted illegal surveillance on our own citizens. We imprisoned people without charge, here and abroad. We rendered prisoners for torture and tortured others ourselves in violation of international law. All the while, millions of staunch, law-and-order conservatives supported and defended it, and still do. Vigorously.
Did America keep its head? Uh, no.
Which brings us to Barack Obama and Cordoba House, the proposed Islamic cultural center planned for lower Manhattan. In the face of a CNN poll showing that nearly 70 percent of Americans oppose construction of a "mosque" a couple of blocks from Ground Zero, Obama defended religious freedom in a speech last week:
As a citizen, and as President, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country. And 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 unshakeable. The principle that people of all faiths are welcome in this country and that they will not be treated differently by their government is essential to who we are. The writ of the Founders must endure.
So this fall, look for a new reality TV series where each week contestants (and the audience at home) choose new scapegoats and the country where they'll be deported. Contestants will be chosen from a melting pot of skin tones and ethnicities to prove to ourselves the game has nothing to do with fear and prejudice. Something like The Running Man with more Latinos.
In a pre-Cordoba House post at Campaign for America's Future, I likened the Tea Party to the newly "born again" -- their faith as unshakable as their insecurity -- only with copies of the U.S. Constitution substituting for the Bible. But with nearly 70 percent of Americans now willing to restrict the free exercise of religion over a mosque in lower Manhattan (and Murfreesboro, Tenn.; Temecula, Calif.; and Sheboygan, Wisconsin?), that critique now extends beyond the far right. How much, really, do we believe in American principles?:
Christian fundamentalists adamantly insist their faith in the unseen is unshakable. But how strong is it, really, when the faith of their fathers is so easily threatened by a fossil? And how strong, really, is the Tea Party's faith in American democracy if it is so easily threatened by losing an election?The answers lie not in what principles people espouse -- even loudly -- in good times, but in what principles they refuse to cut and run from when tested.
And how did the far right flank perform post-September 11? Or in the wake of the 2006 and 2008 elections?
Innocent until proven guilty went out the window. Speedy trials? Out the window. The right to confront your accusers, freedom from unreasonable searches, habeas corpus, the Geneva Conventions, the rule of law, one-man-one-vote, majority rule? All went out the window...
For all the public piety, "Don't Tread On Me" banners, hands-over-hearts patriotism and conspicuous flag waving, the far right's faith in America's founding constitutional and democratic principles is a mile wide and an inch deep.
We now return you to our regularly scheduled immigrant bashing.
With mosque remarks, Obama purposefully walks against the traffic
Gov. Paterson aims to broker mosque relocation deal
House Democrat now politicizing mosque issue
Sestak joins Bloomy in supporting religious freedom on mosque
A real patriot knows the Constitution is for all Americans, not just those with whom we are familiar or feel comfortable around. A real patriotic knows rights are not about popularity. Patriots know that all Americans must have their rights respected and protected, not just tolerated. Patriots know that this applies especially to those with whom we disagree.
Real Patriots believe the Constitution is for all Americans. For real patriots the building of a Mosque anywhere is not opened to question. It is a right they are bound to protect and defend.
If Al Sharpton injected himself into this controversy the way Newtie has, they'd savage him in the conservative press.
You need to distinguish between de jure principles and de facto principles. The Soviet constitution was a wonderful guarantor of freedoms for all, but the practice was far different. So it was, and is, in America. The Founding Fathers were rich, white, Christian racists, and many owned slaves. All minorities had restrictions placed upon them. The history of this country is major struggles by oppressed minorities to try to level the playing field, against the backdrop of fierce resistance by the same white, racist, Christian majority. So, this latest fiasco over the mosque is nothing new, but rather a continuance of the minority struggle against racism. For the racist majority, it also has the dual value of being a powerful electoral issue. So, it follows right in line with American principles as they have been practiced for over the past two millenia.
Look at the polls on the mosque; they're consistently 70% or more opposed. Racism is as American as Apple Pie, and given the slightest opportunity, it rises right to the surface.
History does not lie- this country has a strong history of racism- institutionalized and otherwise. However, as time as gone on in many ways we've changed- we've fought off this history and as a nation we're growing past this. There's still a lot of "change" that needs to occur.
On a more serious note, it might console you to go back to newspaper opinion pages of the 1930's. Most newspapers, being owned by businessmen, were editorially opposed to much if not most of the New Deal, and published their opinions accordingly. There was much vituperation and heated language to be heard from all sides in Congress also and on the radio, most especially when luminaries like Father Coughlin were broadcasting, because we were in a crisis, as we are now. And many people in a crisis say and do extreme things that they otherwise would not. Pressure makes both diamonds and coal dust, but mostly, it makes coal dust, which is just a way of saying that under pressure, few perform well if at all.
Most Americans today, were they presented with the Bill of Rights in petition form, would hesitate to sign their name to such a radical set of proposals. Has much to do with the control of media by plutocrats, and to the tendency to lop off civics classes from the high school curricula whenever money must be cut from schools, which is often.
When times change for the better, we will all behave better than we are amnaging to do just now. At least that's how we've done things before.