Gosh, I don't know why anyone would possibly think Obama's a secret Muslim:
Barack Obama threw his mom under the parish van on Tuesday, describing her as formlessly "spiritual" while casting himself as the self-made convert. "I am a Christian by choice," he said at a campaign event in New Mexico this week. In 2007, he said the opposite: that he became a Christian through his mother. "My mother was a Christian from Kansas...I was raised by my mother. So, I've always been a Christian," he told a voter who had inquired about his Islamic background.
The woman at the campaign stop in New Mexico on Tuesday asked him to explain why he is a Christian and coupled it with another one about his support for abortion rights. The sequence of questions proved awkward, with the answer to the latter question rendering his answer to the first one meaningless....
He threw in a few more vague-sounding clichés and a paean to religious relativism for good measure, and reassured the lady that "I think my public service is part of that effort to express my Christian faith."
The American Spectator article goes on to lampoon Obama's attempts at inclusive and tolerant religious freedom, talking about a "ludicrous sermon" in the book The Audacity of Hope where Obama talks about the difficulties with interpreting the Bible. The writer claims that Obama's discussion of his faith is nothing more than an election-year tactic and "campaign-season Christianity".
No doubt, as I write this, email inboxes across the country are being filled up with messages from outraged Tea Party activists, citing this article as proof of what the writer calls "the public's hunch that his Christian faith is phony". The American Spectator derides Obama's pro-choice position on abortion and writes about the horrors of "abortionists" who "hold scalpels over the heads of unborn children". I'm sure that "pro-family" groups are mobilizing together to express their outrage about the evils of religious tolerance and the importance of "restoring our values" by voting for "pro-life" politicians like, say, Christine O'Donnell or Sharron Angle.
This is the same American Spectator magazine that has been calling for war on Muslim countries that didn't attack us. It's the same magazine that has been attacking "Obamacare" for trying to make healthcare more affordable and accessible for millions of Americans in poverty. This is a magazine that claims to exist for the purpose of educating the public about "new ideas, concepts and policies that favor the principles of economic freedom, individual liberty, limited government, and traditional American values."
And yet, when President Obama appeals to individual religious liberty, a government that is limited from imposing the viewpoints of a particular religion on all citizens, and the traditional American values of care for neighbor and respect for differences... when Obama promotes these traditional values, the American Spectator responds by claiming that it's merely a campaign stunt.
It's laughable, except for the fact that it's so tragic and deceptive.
American Christianity has been hijacked by right-wing extremists whose sole purpose is electoral victory. Republicans cherry-pick abortion from Catholic social teaching, and have effectively convinced entire denominations (Southern Baptists, Churches of Christ, Presbyterian Church in America, etc.) that abortion is prohibited in the Bible, despite the fact that there is absolutely no biblical statement about abortion. (Turns out it's in the Hippocratic Oath but not in the Bible.) Meanwhile, when it comes to clear Christian teaching on money, the American Spectator has apparently decided that it's irrelevant. They claim to support more "individual liberty" but instead promote tyranny toward women and government control over women's most deeply personal healthcare decisions.
And yet, they continue to get away with it. It's freedom for "us", and tyranny for everyone else.
Republican lawmakers know full well what's going on. They know that the attacks on Obama's faith are relentless, well-orchestrated, and completely devious. But they allow this to go on because it helps them win elections.
And they will continue to do it until it no longer works for them.
Republicans know that right-wing Christians are willing to "give til it hurts" and literally die for their version of the Christian faith. They know that by continuing to loudly blow the dog whistles of suspicion, fear, and intolerance, they will be able to rally the faithful and destroy religious freedom in this country.
And they will do it until the American people stand up and say, "No more. Enough."
I'm just one guy. But I know I'm not the only one.
No more.
Enough.
Update 4:15 PM CDT: Media Matters reports that Fox News is following the same tack with questions about Obama's faith and "experts" claiming that Obama's faith isn't normal.
Alvin Felzenberg writes in US News and World Report that Obama "bungled the religion question", claiming that he should have been more like JFK in his response.