http://www.cbc.ca/world/usvotes/stor...macdonald.html

U.S. VOTES
Neil Macdonald

Obama 'Muslim' rumour: Ugly, false and out in the open

Is the discredited smear campaign backfiring on Republicans?
Last Updated: Thursday, October 16, 2008 | 4:29 PM ET
Neil Macdonald CBC News
Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain takes back the
microphone from Gayle Quinnell who said she read that Senator Barack
Obama 'was an Arab,' during a town hall meeting in Lakeville, Minn., on
Oct. 10. (Jim Mone/Associated Press)

The "moment in Minnesota" appeared last Friday like the white, infected
head of a pimple - impossible to miss, hard not to stare at, and
embarrassing, at least to John McCain, who wants to present an
unblemished face to the voting public.
Wearing her bright red McCain-Palin T-shirt, Gayle Quinnell rose from
the crowd at a rally in Lakeville, Minn. to give her candidate a little
of his signature straight talk.

"I don't trust Obama," she announced, as McCain nodded enthusiastically.
Then she continued: "I have read about him. He's an Arab."

And there it was. Centre stage, on camera, about as public as you can
get. The political pus that's been building for nearly two years under
the surface of this presidential campaign, oozing forth in broad
daylight.

McCain, a politician who's been around long enough to recognize a
"moment" when he sees one, cauterized quickly.

"No. Nope. No, ma'am. No, ma'am," said the candidate, grabbing back the
mike. "He's a decent family man citizen that I just happen to have
disagreements with . . ."

But, setting aside the internal implication of McCain's reply - that
Obama can't be an Arab if he's a decent citizen and family man - and its
impact on the sensibilities of this country's 3.5 million Arab-American
citizens, McCain cannot have been too surprised by what he faced on that
stage. Because his campaign has helped create it.
'Radical'

Gayle Quinnell is in fact the collective voice of hundreds of thousands,
perhaps millions of Americans whose nativist fears Republicans have been
stoking for months. The Americans who have been passing on smear-mails
for years.
"Beware," said the first one I saw, back in January of 2007. "Obama
takes great care to conceal the fact that he is a Muslim."

It went on to reveal that Obama's African father was a "radical Muslim."
and that Obama himself had studied at an extremist school in Jakarta.
Other messages declare Obama refused to be sworn into the Senate on a
Bible. Or that he refuses to recite the pledge of allegiance.

The e-mails are patently false, and have been widely debunked. But
whisper campaigns are as persistent as the flu.

Widespread

Clearly - witness Ms. Quinnell in Minnesota - the message has had an
effect. Any reporter who's covered this campaign has seen it.
I heard it in May, as parishioners gathered outside a Baptist church in
North Carolina. And I've heard it in the highly-educated, genteel
suburbs of Washington.

A colleague says he's encountered the same thing in Indiana,
Pennsylvania and Missouri: "It's usually 'I know he says he isn't, but I
think he's a Muslim.' You hear it everywhere."

The whisper campaign seems particularly directed at Jewish voters,
playing on their fears that Obama might not be pro-Israel enough, or
that he is somehow in league with Muslims, read Arabs, read terrorists.

But Jewish readers of the New York Times might have been surprised this
week by an article that identified where a lot of this stuff originated:
Andy Martin, a conspiracy theorist who once set for himself the goal of
"exterminating Jew power." Martin is apparently fond of filing lawsuits,
some of which use even more pungent anti-Semitic rhetoric. He once filed
a brief calling a judge a "crooked, slimy Jew."

Martin evidently isn't too keen on Muslims, either, and he was one of
the first out of the gate questioning Obama's heritage.

The Times investigation traced the origin of the smear-mail campaign to
Martin's self-published writings. And by the time the presidential race
got under way, the e-mails had laid a foundation for organized
conservative attacks.
Speakers at Republican events began referring to "Barack Hussein Obama,"
with heavy emphasis on their opponent's middle name.

At a McCain rally in Iowa, Rev. Arnold Conrad told the crowd: "There are
millions of people around this world praying to their God - whether it's
Hindu, Buddha, Allah - that [Obama] wins, for a variety of reasons."
Those people, declared the churchman, would think their God bigger than
the Christian God if that were to happen.

McCain's campaign approach

Early on, McCain himself demurred. He chastised a conservative talk-show
host for warming up one of his crowds with the "Barack Hussein Obama"
line, and distanced himself from Rev. Conrad: "I will not tolerate
anything in this campaign that denigrates either Sen. Obama or Sen.
[Hillary] Clinton," said McCain.

But this fall, as Obama's campaign gathered force, McCain evidently
decided to tolerate some mud after all.

Speakers introducing him at rallies again started using the "Barack
Hussein Obama" line, now with the Republican candidate standing nearby
smiling.
And McCain's surrogates, led by his running mate Sarah Palin, began
sharpening a more specific story line.

They seized upon Obama's past association with William Ayers, who, along
with other members of the radical Weathermen group, bombed various
government targets, including the Pentagon, in the early 1970s.

Ayers long ago turned himself in and became a university professor and
community organizer. In those capacities, he met Obama during the
mid-90s. The two served together on a civic project founded by the
Annenberg Foundation, and Ayers's work won him the Chicago Citizen of
the Year Award in 1997.

To Palin, though, what Obama did in the mid-90s was to forge a close and
enduring tie with a "domestic terrorist." In fact, she has told rally
after rally, Obama is even now "palling around with terrorists who would
target their own country." No explanation of how a "domestic terrorist"
became "terrorists." And not even any lip service to Obama's repudiation
of Ayers's past bad acts.

The Republican chairman in Virginia, Jeffrey M. Fredrick, goes further.
He compares Obama to Osama Bin Laden. "Both have friends who bombed the
Pentagon," he says. "That is scary."
And so on. Obama as a terrorist, Obama as a Muslim, Obama as someone
fundamentally different, someone mysterious to Americans, who doesn't
share American values. Obama, who seems to want to lose in Iraq.

Resolute despite contradiction

By last week, the crowds at McCain rallies were turning ugly. Mention of
Obama's name invoked cries of "terrorist!" or "bomb him!" or "traitor!"
or "off with his head!"

And little wonder, given this country's not-so-distant history, that the
Secret Service contingent surrounding Obama is now laying on security
measures rivaling those of the president himself.
McCain has begun trying to tamp down the hostility, telling supporters
at rallies that they have "no reason to be scared" of Obama.

But Gayle Quinnell, for one, remains resolute. Obama, she told reporters
after her moment on stage last week with McCain, is "a Muslim and a
terrorist . . .all the people agree with what I said."
And Fox News Channel, of course, remains hot on the case.

A few days ago, Fox host Sean Hannity broadcast a segment titled: "Obama
and Friends: The History of Radicalism." In it, introduced by Hannity as
an "author and journalist," was none other than Andy Martin, originator
of the anti-Obama e-mails.
Martin helpfully explained to Hannity that Obama spent his early years
"in training for a radical overthrow of the government."
Effective?

All of this, however, may now have actually turned against McCain.

The New York Times published a new poll this week suggesting Obama now
enjoys as much as a 14-point lead over McCain in the polls. And some of
that, said the paper, is directly because of the character attacks.

On Nov 1, 8:39*pm, wrote:
[ObaMao Communist Propapagnda Lies Snipped and Burned in the Ash Heap of The Internet]

Obama's Disturbing Muslim Outreach

Obama's Muslim Outreach Coordinator, Mazen Asbahi, resigned in August
after only ten days in his position, when it was revealed that he had
ties to groups associated with the Muslim Brotherhood.

http://online.wsj.com/public/article...741214995.html
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/g...asp?grpid=6386

The question is no longer about what kind of judgment was used in
bringing Asbahi on a campaign that has been plague with questionable
advisors and mentors, but whether Asbahi has actually left.

Asbahi's official stint on the Obama team ended when it came to light
that he was one of six trustees of Allied Asset Advisors Funds,

http://www.secinfo.com/dR972.59y.c.htm

a subsidiary the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT)

http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/g...asp?grpid=7423

and an advisor to the Dow Jones Islamic Fund. Both NAIT and Dow Jones
Islamic Fund fall under the umbrella of Islamic Society of North
America (ISNA).

http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/g...asp?grpid=6178

NAIT, which owns nearly a third of all U.S. mosques and Muslim
centers,

http://www.religionnewsblog.com/news.php?p=4563&c=1

many funded by the Saudi government, advocates a radical form of
Islam. In fact, a Chicago Tribune investigation revealed that NAIT
played an important role in the takeover of a Chicago-area mosque by
Islamic fundamentalists who replaced the more moderate leaders.
(Struggle for the soul of Islam; Hard-liners won battle for Bridgeview
mosque," Chicago Tribune, February 8, 2004)

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...37,full..story

In a report annotated by almost 500 sources,

http://globalmbreport.com/wpcontent/...m_and_isna.pdf

the Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report concludes that ""ISNA was
created in the matrix of early organizations design to propagate Saudi/
Muslim Brotherhood fundamentalism throughout the world... ISNA and its
key leaders have a disturbing record of association with organizations
and individuals that are accused and/or convicted of providing
assistance to terrorist organizations as defined by the U.S State
Department... The largest body of evidence concerning these
associations relates to ISNA's support of the Palestinian terrorist
groups Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad."

As with his other radical associations (William Ayers, Samantha Power,
Reverend Wright), Mazen Asbahi may be quietly waiting behind the
scenes to resume his place when the election is over.

Investor's Business Daily reports

http://www.investors.com/editorial/I...issue=20080825

that Asbahi "has not stopped working on behalf of Obama." They quote
the "former" coordinator as saying that, "despite his official exit he
was still "110%" behind Obama and that he was participating in
campaign conference calls on Muslim outreach." Leaving the campaign
was a "strategic decision," according to Asbahi.

This "strategic" decision brings to mind other similar strategic
decisions by Obama. In an article How Barack Obama learned to love
Israel, (The Electronic Intifada, 4 March 2007)

his friend Ali Abunimah

http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/i...asp?indid=1426

criticizes Obama's suddenly positive public expressions about Israel.
Abunimah comes to understand Obama's strategy when the two men run
into each other. "As he [Obama] came in from the cold and took off his
coat, I went up to greet him. He responded warmly, and volunteered,
‘Hey, I'm sorry I haven't said more about Palestine right now, but we
are in a tough primary race. I'm hoping when things calm down I can be
more up front.' He referred to my activism, including columns I was
contributing to The Chicago Tribune critical of Israeli and US policy.
"

Associates who unnerve, if not terrify, most Americans may be
temporarily put aside for "strategic" campaign purposes, but who will
be influencing the course of the nation if there is an Obama
Whitehouse and the President is finally up front?

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/...lim_outre.html

The ObaMao - Saudi Connection

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.p...w&pageId=74877

List of "Progressives" for ObaMao

http://www.therealbarackobama.wordpr...ves-for-obama/

A List of ObaMao’s Communist Friends and Terrorist Associates

http://obamawho.wordpress.com/2008/0...nd-associates/

Obama's Sturm Abteilung

After Hitler took power in 1933, the "Sturm Abteilung" (civilian
security force) became increasingly eager for power and saw themselves
as the replacement for the German army. This angered the regular army
(Reichswehr) who already resented the Nazi party. It also led to
tension with other leaders within the party who saw Röhm’s
increasingly powerful Sturm Abteilung as a threat to their own
personal ambitions. Originally an adjunct to the Sturm Abteilung, the
Schutzstaffel (SS) was placed under the direct control of Heinrich
Himmler in part to restrict the power of the Sturm Abteilung and their
leaders.

http://forthardknox.com/2008/10/29/o...sturm-obamung/

Krystallnacht!

wrote:

Krystallnacht!

Krystallnacht? (although I think you mean "Kristallnacht")

Do mean like when all the Bushies started burning the Dixie Chicks CDs
just because they said something mildly negative about W? *THAT*
Kristallnacht?

How hypocritical and forgetful of you . :-(

In article ,
Billy Burpelson wrote:

wrote:

Krystallnacht!

Krystallnacht? (although I think you mean "Kristallnacht")

Do mean like when all the Bushies started burning the Dixie Chicks CDs
just because they said something mildly negative about W? *THAT*
Kristallnacht?

How hypocritical and forgetful of you . :-(

You going to vote for O-bla-ma? How HYPOCRITICAL of you.

--
Telamon
Ventura, California