Two Faces of Obama

[howeird]

First he invokes the 1st Amendment to support the building of a controversial mosque. Then he urges a  preacher to not exercise his 1st Amendment rights.

You can't have it both ways, Barak Hussein. You either support the 1st Amendment or you don't.

And as for your ridiculous statement that the Koran burning will be a major El Qiada recruitment tool, your supporting the mosque was a major Tea Party recruiting tool.

Comments

[howeird]

Ah, but you see IMHO both the building of the mosque and the burning of the books are provocative acts protected by the First Amendment.

[gil-liant.livejournal.com]

And neither the President, nor myself is suggesting in any way that both acts are not protected under the First Amendment. (At least, so far as I know.)

The President, and many other notables, have suggested that burning the Koran is a hate-filled, small-minded, inflammatory, anti-Christian, anti-American, anti-social, unintelligent, and needlessly provocative act which would not even be considered by those in possession of functional brain cells -- but it is "protected speech".

There are other notables who, sadly, have argued that it is not. And, sadly (but not unfortunately) even those arguments are "protected speech". Liberty remains the Freedom to do Evil.

But, in my opinion, those arguments do not reflect well on them.

[howeird]

I think where we differ is I see as much evil behind the choice of the mosque site as I see in the Koran burning. Both, I think, deserved the same response from the President - none.

[gil-liant.livejournal.com]

Well, in my opinion, if the President saw evil in both choices, he should speak out against both. The right of Free Speech, after all, does extend even to our elected officials. One needs to be careful not to confuse the responsibilities and dignity of the Office, with that of the man, but even in the Office, it is not unreasonable for the President to issue an opinion or a plea for people to conduct themselves wisely -- even when there is no pretext for coercion to transform that plea into a demand. If Obama believes the Koran burning will increase unrest in America, he should speak against it, as long as he doesn't threaten to use legal force to prevent it. Similarly, if he believes the building of the community center will increase unrest in America, he should speak against it -- again, stopping short of threatening any sort of legal interdiction. However, it seems likely to me that the President, only seeing evil in one, chose only to speak out against that one. Which is, of course, his right. It certainly isn't "trying to have it both ways".

As it happens, I suspect you are right in that we (you and I) don't view the building of the community center with the same degree of concern and/or alarm. I do think that some bad choices went into making that decision, by any number of parties. But the culture battle was lost to the terrorists the moment that the monied interests decided [u]not[/u] to replace the World Trade Center with another shrine to Rampant Secularism and Crass Greed in its most materialistic of forms. The fact that any religious or fundamentalist entities attempted to define that ground as 'sacred' meant the terrorists had won that battle. The only way to win that scenario after the massive and tragic loss of life was to bulldoze it, build on it, slap up a memorial plaque and get back to business as usual in 12-24 months. The real crime is that the ground was allowed to sit idle for so long while ideologues wrangled about who had 'rights' to the site. The owners have rights to the site. The Muslim Mosques are exercising existing property rights in accordance with the current laws of the land, for reasons that seem good to them. If they think this will actually promote peace, harmony, and an inclusive sense of community I think they have badly misread the situation and grossly failed in their efforts to socialize the plan among the community. On the other hand, if they think this will significantly advance the fundamentalist muslim agenda, I think they are grossly mistaken there as well. Any victory along those lines (it is my personal belief) will be superficial and transitory as best -- not worth the financial investment they will expend to achieve it.

Now, getting us to change or abrogate our own laws and Constitution in such a way as to prevent them from building it ... that would be a major victory for the terrorists!

[howeird]

Excellent point about rebuilding the site.

The "trying to have it both ways" claim stems from my belief that both the mosque and the Koran burning defy common sense, but the President chose to encourage the one and discourage the other.

Now, getting us to change or abrogate our own laws and Constitution in such a way as to prevent them from building it ... that would be a major victory for the terrorists!
I totally agree.