The following letter is not only racist, but it is filled with errors, confused information, and thinly disguised hatred. It was published today in the Bonners Ferry Herald, although you won't find it in the edited, online version. Many of you may find the mistakes so ridiculous that you laugh the letter off. Please do not do this. I live in this town, this county, and have for almost 20 yrs. I try to be tolerant and objective, and although I don't know the author of this Letter-to-the-Editor, I know others like her who, in other circumstances, would give you the shirt off their backs if they could help you....and if you were white. This kind of racism finds a home in some of the fundamentalist churches in this rural landscape (and there are plenty of them). This letter is not just pathetic in its ignorance but abhorrent in its racism. And what I find even more deplorable is that the Bonners Ferry Herald even decided to publish it! Have their standards sunk as low as those of the person who wrote this letter? I have copied this letter to my blog tonight (and you can all get an original copy by buying the Bonners Ferry Herald print edition) in the hopes that whoever reads it will take offence, call the Herald, write their own LTE to the Herald, and spread the word about this kind of racism in order to bring this problem to the fore and make it a topic of discussion that we cannot ignore.
The letter:
Don’t Elect a Muslim as next U.S. President?
Barak Hussein Obama, a Muslim wants to be our next president.
How can a good Muslim be a “good American,” much less the President of the United States of America?
Politically he can’t because he must submit to the mullah (political leader) who teach annihilation of Israel and destruction of the great satin they refer to as America. Death to all who are not Muslim.
Intellectually he cannot accept the American Constitution since it is based on Biblical principles and he believes as a Muslim that the Bible is corrupt.
Philosophically he cannot because Islam Mohammed and the Iran to not allow freedom of religion. Democracy and Islam cannot co-exist. Every Muslim government is either dictatorial or autocratic.
Spiritually he cannot because when we declare “One Nation Under God,” our Christian God is loving and kind while Allah is never referred to as a Heavenly Father nor is he ever called love in the Iran. Muslims cannot be both a good Muslim and a good American. Their personal preference and allegiance is to Allah and not our Constitution, nor our God.
A state of our nation has already elected a Muslim (Obama) to the House of Representatives.
He is in the current session of Congress 2007 and during his swearing in he used the Muslim Iran instead of our Bible.
How dare we not recognize this as the evil it will bring on our nation if we allow Obama to be our next president.
Also four Senators along with many others voted against English as our official American language, Senators Biden, Clinton, Dodd, Obama, Boxer, Kerry, Kennedy, Lieferman and many more. Where is the loyalty to America?
None of these people should be leaders of our “Great Nation.” In our country people are free to believe anything they want to as well as their religious preference. But they don’t qualify to be the President of the United States of America when they don’t support or believe in our Constitution. They are not loyal Americans and talk out of both sides of their mouth.
Please use your voting privilege to keep these people out of the White House. Please do not elect them to be the President of the United States of America. This may be the most serious election our country has ever faced. Our government isn’t perfect but it’s the best one in the whole world. Let’s help keep it that way. Our vote may be a matter of life or death and liberty for all.
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And this is my letter to the editor:
Dear Editor,
I don’t know which is worse, the vitriol and incredible ignorance in the letter “Don’t Elect a Muslim as next U.S. President?” or the fact that it was even published at all. In a state “too great for hate,” both the author and the paper have failed. The publication of this letter is provocative, inciting citizens towards hatred instead of tolerance. It undermines the integrity of the citizens of Boundary County. And since it purports to list facts, that are, in reality, personal opinion, it should never have been published at all. The egregious opinions in this letter are based on prejudice, hatred, and ignorance. Given that Iran is a country and the sacred Muslim text is the Koran; that it is Senator Obama who is a Christian and it is Representative Ellison from Minnesota who is a Muslim; that the state of Idaho wanted English to be the official state language and that the United States does not have an official language; and that the opinions expressed in this letter about Muslim spiritual, intellectual and political extremism are just as extreme as the author’s description of the Islamic religion, again, this letter should have never been published. Finally, copies of the U.S. Constitution are available at Bonners Books; read it, and you’ll see that it is not based on biblical principles.
The letter actually is on the Bonners Ferry Herald website here. This is the kind of thing that gives Idaho a bad name; thanks for bringing it to our attention.
Senator Obama is a member of the United Church of Christ. The more liberal branch of CofC, perhaps therein lies the confusion for this idiotic letter writer.
I think it's appropriate that both the Statesman and the Herald apologized for printing lies about Senator Obama; however, the damage has been done. Think about this: how did Bill Sali get elected? He has a lot of supporters in fundamentalist churches. These people vote. I see them at the polls. And these people also believe the kind of racist lies printed about Obama. The press has a responsibility towards truth and accuracy in reporting and they have been very remiss when it comes to truth, factual reporting, and wing-nut politicians. Smear campaigns and false rumors are primary weapons for Republicans, e.g., the "swift-boating" of John Kerry, the character asassination of Senator Max Cleland, and even of McCain. Now it's happening with Obama and if the press prints it, the damage is done.
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