Washington Republican Lawmakers Walk Out on Muslim Prayer
Two Republican Washington state legislators walked out on a prayer by Imam Mohamad Joban. Legislator Lois McMahan called Islam the "focal point of the hate-America sentiment," and said, "It's an issue of patriotism."
Cary Condotta says that he "wasn't particularly interested" in the prayer by Joban.
The prayer is arranged by the Associated Ministries of Thurston County who selects the person to give it. Kathy Erlandson of the group expressed her disappointment, saying she was "embarrassed."
It must difficult for the Bush Administratioin to try to paint the War on Terrorism as a war only on Terrorism and not on Islam when you have Republicans acting so disrespectfully towards an American Muslim. It seems to me that these two Republicans don't share the President's opinion.
If it had been a Christian giving the prayer and they had walked out, would it have made the news? I think not. And what if the lawmakers were atheists? They don’t care for ANY religion, so would the press have made a big stink about it? I think not. Just because two people walked out doesn’t mean that America hates Muslims. The lawmakers are free people and have a right to do this, unlike the Muslim countries, which would probably have imprisoned them or worse. Now if they had tried to stop the man from praying, then I could see a problem, but no, all they did was exercise their freedom and walk to the back of the room. This is nothing more than the media trying to grab some headlines.
You people that say this is a embarrassment need to get your blinders off. world terrorist figures state that 94.3% of all terrorist acts are done by people of Muslim faith. if any religion , cult or group in America was responsible for 94.3% of terror. The people themselves would string them, burn them, or simply stop them. BECAUSE a people as a whole do not put up with this kind of open embarrassment done in their name unless they AGREE that it is RIGHT!
So death in Allah's name goes on today, unabated. Muslims while most may be AGAINST this kind of acts. they do nothing to stop it. Is not that what the world held over the German peoples heads after WWII? So to not want to be around when a Muslim prayer is being said, is to thumb your nose at those who do nothing to stop death in Allah's name.
Shaitar & Kaptaincaveman, they have every right, that's for sure. But if Dixiecrats walked out when some black person was speaking in front of the legislature one would definitely understand the meaning. Her actions, coupled with McMahan's statements, indicate to me that she doesn't share the President's views on the war on terror not being a war on Islam.
Kaptaincaveman, please state the source for your statistics on world terrorism. How was this figure determined?
Every religion has it's pack of fanatic followers. Witness Ireland and its countless conflicts between Catholics and Protestants.
I do not know of any place in the Koran that says muslims should single out the US in particular so it is actually unfair to blame the religion per se. I find it much more likely that many Arabic and middle eastern nations are getting fed up with US foreign policy in the region. One moment the US has one policy and supports one group or government, and four years later everything changes. Old friends are left to rot and old enemies are befriended and given weapons, because they now seem to serve some purpose consistant with the current US foreign policy. You do make enemies this way. But not many friends.
And let's not forget the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. More than any other this conflict has hurt the US and laid the foundation for fanatic groups everywhere. Israel is in direct violation of a series of UN resolutions promising territory to Palestinians, yet the US does nothing to raise these issues in the UN security council. Every day civilian palestinians die at the hands of israeli soldiers, yet the US does nothing because israel has so much influence in the US government. This generates a lot of sympathy from extremist groups everywhere who see the US as a tyrant nation with world domination in mind. Osama bin Laden can't make one speech without referring to this conflict. This is not without signifficance.
No, these things we are witnessing have little to do with Islam, and a lots and lots to do with politics.
To bad the good, law-abiding, peaceful Muslims allow these extremists to hijack their religion. If the good ones do not denounce these "bad-apples", then they are allowing their religion to be tainted. As it stands now, their religion is having a terrible image cast upon it and they stand idly by and do nothing to stop it.
"Racist." That's cute....did you come up with that particular stupidity all by yourself, or did the "outraged" media help you, n2n?
These politicians aren't forced to pray in Allah's name or anyone else's. They don't have to participate, and could have avoided doing so for a number of reasons. If they were Christians or Jews, for example, they may have refused to pray in the name of a false god, or for other reasons. If Dems walked out on a Christian or Jew, we'd never hear about it, but the liberal media obviously wants to continue their pitiful bias.
I know, I spelled it wrong. ANYWAY, they can't say that they're open to other people's religions and then walk out and say that Muslims are the source of terrorism. I have great Muslim friends who are against any violence. I may have slept through it with my eyes open, but I would NEVER have walked out. These people are supposed to be professionals. They seem to be acting like children.
If it had been a Christian doing the prayer and they had walked out, would anyone have cared? We would not even have heard about it. I find it Ironic that liberals will do everything in their power to get the Ten Commandments removed from a courthouse because it supposedly pushed Christian religious values, but if a person walked out because they didn't feel like listening to some Muslim prayers, they are suddenly "bad" people. I wish this country would wake up and realize double-standards are a bad thing.
