Moment of Political Genius
So remember back when Mr. Virgil H. Goode Jr., GOP Representative from Virginia, caused a kafuffle, because Mr. Ellison (first ever Muslim congressperson) wanted to use a Koran in his swearing in ceremony?
Well, as it turns out, Thomas Jefferson, traditional nation builder himself, actually owned a Koran...So, in a moment of political brillance, Mr. Ellison used Jefferson's copy for his swearing in ceremony... promptly putting to rest Mr. Goode's concerns that using the Koran would be a "serious threat to the nation's traditional values"...
posted by JJ @ 2:45 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
That was a brilliant move on Mr. Ellison's part, whether he intended that to be a counter-statement to Goode or whether he thought it up on his own.
I've seen a lot of sarcastic US liberal blogs as a result going at their right-wing counterparts asking if this means Thomas Jefferson is a terrorist sympathizer or hated America. Not much other then some spluttering about "he had slaves too" in response, as if that somehow is the rebuttal to that.
I would agree, a stroke of genius.
It would seem to me that Mr. Ellison's family has been in the US, longer than many, yet, to still painted with that very wide brush of ignorance by Goode, was astounding.
I love it when truth shows rhetoric and bigotry for what it is.
So if Democratic-idolized 20th century President (FDR, perhaps, who certainly lived at the right time) happened to buy a copy of this book about struggle some obscure German politician wrote in the 20s, it would free the door for future skinheads to use it for legitimate "nation building" purposes?
After all, the gist of this message here seems to be "former respected President owns a book" equals "former respected President holds dear to the values of that book" or even "former respected President owns book therefore respected the book".
Dear Lord, if I ever end up influential and famous, I shudder to think what will happen if 100 years after I die my ownership of At Twilight in the Country: Memoirs of a Canadian Nationalist by Mel Hurtig makes people believe it is anything other than a Satanic work (as the Koran is).
to feynman and coulter's love child,
from JJ's dem political operative friend, it is almost hard to reply to your post since the logic stream does not make a whole lot of sense.
Comparing the Koran to Hitler's Mein Kampf is absurd, so as far as I can tell you are largely reading off some right wing set of talking points that have been widely distributed. I heard this comparison constantly on Fox News.
The US was founded on the fundamental right to religious freedom, check out the First Amendment to US Constitution.
We need to separate the issues the West has with Islam and particularly with its extremists, it is the extremists who are mis-interpreting the Koran for their political purposes. Similar to many other religions from Christianity to Judiaism that has also been perversed by different extremists political factions for their own purposes.
So what was the significance of the usage of the Thomas Jefferson Koran, well it promotes the notion of how educated the Founding Fathers were and reinforces the notion of religious tolerance which the US was built on.
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