Imam Says Politics Has Stoked Controversy Over Center

[maddezmom]

Source: NYT

The imam behind the proposed Islamic center near ground zero, Feisal Abdul Rauf, told a Middle Eastern newspaper that he believed election-year politics had stoked the debate over the project and blamed a “tiny, vociferous minority” for leading the opposition, in his most expansive comments yet on the controversy.

“There is no doubt that the election season has had a major impact upon the nature of the discourse,” Mr. Abdul Rauf said in an interview published on Sunday on the Web site of The National, an English-language paper in Abu Dhabi.

The imam said he was intent on eliminating the notion that Islam could be equated with extremism. “The radicals feed off each other and need each other to sustain themselves,” he said. “So we need right now to combat the radical voices. That’s the only way we can win this struggle, and establish a peaceful world order, which is what everybody wants and everybody needs.”

The imam has been relatively silent on the controversy since departing on a two-week tour of the Persian Gulf sponsored by the State Department, even as the furor grows over a project that has become the focus of a fierce national debate over the limits of freedom of religion and the legacy of the Sept. 11 attacks.


Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/30/nyregion/30mosque.html

[mia]

1. So it's up to him to help establish a peaceful world order here.

It seems to me that he has more than enough of his own "radical voices" to worry about.

[SpiralHawk]

2. Him and his RepubliCronies at Fox 'news' (R)

eom

[Warren Stupidity]

6. That is exactly what he said he is doing.

He was talking about combating the radical voices within the muslim world.

[Turborama]

8. +1

I think that's his actual job description.

[truthisfreedom]

3. wingers delight in wingerism.

and we'll live with that madness for a good few years.

[zbdent]

4. Why weren't the Reichies all up in arms when George W. Bush was

cozying up with Rauf, if he's so evil?

[SpiralHawk]

5. "We Repubbies are special. Smirk." - xCommander AWOL (R)

[tanyev]

7. “The radicals feed off each other and need each other to sustain themselves"

He said a mouthful right there.

[orbitalman]

9. So, who needs POLITICS to feed this damned frenzy?

Clearly, this is an extra part of our democracy we DO NOT need. What happened to the forthright representation of democracy? That alone should sustain our republic.