Tag Archives: obama

The Quotable Gail Collins

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I continue to love Gail Collins:

Unfortunately, [Mississippi governor Haley Barbour] followed up his bow to tolerance by suggesting that the public’s confusion over Barack Obama’s religion is because of the fact that “this is a president that we know less about than any other president in history.” The governor claimed that Americans had been particularly deprived of information on Obama’s youth, while they knew a great deal about the formative years of the other chief executives all the way back to the way the youthful George Washington “chopped down a cherry tree.”

Let us reconsider the above paragraph in light of the fact that while Obama wrote an entire book about his childhood, Washington never chopped down the cherry tree.

The First Amendment

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Not that I want to discuss the Islamic community center in lower Manhattan again, but I’ve been bothered by the idea that Obama somehow contradicted himself the other day when he clarified his comments regarding it.

Here’s what he said in his first remarks:

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.

Here’s what he said the next day:

My intention was simply to let people know what I thought. Which was that in this country we treat everybody equally and in accordance with the law, regardless of race, regardless of religion. I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding. That’s what our country is about.

A bit wishy-washy? Maybe. Contradictory? No.

The First Amendment is about the powers of the government. It begins:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…

The First Amendment restricts the power of Congress (and, through incorporation, the power of state governments). It says nothing at all about the actions or opinions of citizens. I think the creators of Park51 are completely justified in building the cultural center on the site they’ve chosen, and at this point I think they would be caving in to disgusting bigotry to build it elsewhere. On the basis of stubborn principle, they should build it wherever the hell they want.

But I also think it’s possible to disagree with this while still supporting the First Amendment.

Simply put, it’s impossible for a citizen to violate the First Amendment. The First Amendment is about the power of government. Just because you think there should be no law preventing the cultural center from being built in lower Manhattan doesn’t mean you can’t oppose it personally. Now, don’t get me wrong: I think those who oppose it are completely misguided, or uninformed, or opportunistic. But are they contradicting or violating the First Amendment? No.

In fact, on Rachel Maddow’s show the other night, Chris Hayes was the guest host, and he made hay out of some Republicans’ apparently contradictory statements that “yes, yes, we support the First Amendment but come on, it’s a really bad idea to build this cultural center in lower Manhattan.” How is this a contradiction?

I can see how it could be perceived as such. Yes, the First Amendment’s religion clauses are about the power of government, but read more broadly, they are a national declaration of principle, a declaration of an American ideal; they proclaim our obligation to collectively tolerate the rights of religious minorities to freely practice their religion wherever they wish.

So I understand where this is coming from. Some people are disappointed in Obama because they wanted a ringing, unambiguous declaration of religious freedom. Hell, Democrats want a ringing, unambiguous declaration from Obama about something. Meanwhile, the yahoos in the media love harping on any misstatement or apparent contradiction they can find, because it makes for a story.

So yes. Once again, our ploddingly professorial president has overestimated the intelligence of the American people and muddled his message. But did he contradict himself?

… sort of.

The “Ground Zero” “Mosque”

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I’m so tired of hearing about this “mosque” (in reality: Islamic community center that contains a mosque, among other things) two blocks from Ground Zero. It’s a building that nobody who visits Ground Zero will even see, since it’s not at Ground Zero. It’s two blocks away.

And it’s great and all that Obama spent some political capital supporting religious freedom. I completely agree with him that an Islamic group has every right to build a community center wherever the hell it wants. But it would be nice if he spent some political capital on things that most Americans care about: jobs and the economy. When was the last time he gave a major White House speech on the economy and job creation? It’s not like there’s nothing he can do about it. If he grew some balls and proposed a job creation program, at least we’d have something constructive to talk about. Because the country will talk about whatever the president wants to talk about, as we can see.

And apparently what the president wants to talk about are these wonderful intellectual ideals instead of the meat-and-potatoes issues that are important to most people.

Bob Herbert is right:

President Obama missed his opportunity early last year to rally the public behind a call for shared sacrifice and a great national mission to rebuild the United States in a way that would create employment for millions and establish a gleaming new industrial platform for the great advances of the 21st century.

It would have taken fire and imagination, but the public was poised to respond to bold leadership. If the Republicans had balked, and they would have, the president had the option of taking his case to the people, as Truman did in his great underdog campaign of 1948.

Obama sucks as a leader. I am so tired of his inaction and timidity.

Be a fucking leader, god dammit.

Maybe we would have been better off with Hillary Clinton after all.