Muslims drift, not run, towards Kerry

Tue Sep 7,10:24 AM ET  


CHICAGO (AFP) - They may not face the segregation that once defined the lives of black Americans, but many Muslim Americans feel that they are fighting the civil rights battles of the 1950s and 60s all over again.

 

The discrimination has changed with the times -- indefinite detentions, closed hearings, secret evidence, and racial profiling have replaced segregated schools, diners, and beaches -- but the sense of being a second-class citizen is the same.


Or at least that's the contention of the leaders of the US Muslim community, who are fighting to make Muslim civil rights an issue in this November's US presidential elections.


"There is a crisis of civil rights for Muslims in this country," said Agha Saeed, chairman of the American Muslim Alliance, (AMA) at a national gathering of US Muslims this weekend.


"Today, Muslims and Arabs are second-class citizens in the United States."


The parallels between the experiences of black Americans and Muslim Americans have not been lost on ordinary Muslims like computer engineers Suhl Kahn and Badar Hussain.


"Blacks weren't really Americans until 9/11," noted Kahn, in a wry observation on mainstream America's shifting perceptions of "us and them" in the wake of the terror attacks on New York and Washington.


Like many of his Islamic brethern, the 36-year-old computer engineer from Chicago supported the Republican presidential nominee in 2000 -- part of a Muslim bloc vote that boosted George W. Bush.


But this year, Muslims like Kahn and Hussain are leaning towards voting for the Democratic contender, Senator John Kerry (news - web sites) of Massachusetts.


"We are left with very little choice," explained Badar Hussain, a 46-year-old computer engineer, originally from Pakistan. "One of the reasons we came to America was because of the freedoms it offered ... but everything changed after 9/11."


While many Muslims say they are in tune with the Republican party's conservative social policies and pro-business positions, polls show a majority are unwilling to support a Republican administration that has -- in their view -- trampled on their civil liberties in the name of the war on terror.


In many cases, support for Kerry is far from enthusiastic -- a case of "anybody but Bush."


"I don't like Kerry," admitted Fatima Nawaz, 23, of Boulder, Colorado, "but I am really, really disgusted by Bush.


"He has made it hard for Muslim students to come here, and fostered a negative view of our faith."


More importantly for Feras Mousilli, a 26-year-old Syrian-born attorney, the administration has ridden roughshod over the rights of Arab and Muslim immigrants in its efforts to fight terrorism at home.


"This is a country that was founded on a Bill of Rights, where we are all supposed to have certain inalienable rights," fumed the Texas resident who is also planning to back Kerry.


But the community's leaders have so far refused to endorse either Kerry, or the longshot third-party candidate Ralph Nader (news - web sites), even as one of the closest presidential contests on record goes down to the wire.

 



"John Kerry has not given Muslim voters any reason to support him ... except for the fact that he is running against Bush," said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, (CAIR).

More specifically, the Kerry campaign has refused to make the public commitments on the abolition of secret evidence and the repeal of parts of the Patriot Act that the Muslim leadership is seeking.

And that is simply not good enough in an election year when Muslims feel they can deliver large numbers of votes in battleground states such as Ohio, Michigan, and Florida, where the margin of victory will be wafer-thin, according to the polls.

"We want to be in the political mainstream," said AMA's Saeed this weekend, "but not at the expense of our civil rights."

The American Muslim Task Force on Elections, an umbrella group that brings together nine US Muslim groups, representing most of the three to six million American Muslims, has not ruled out an endorsement for Nader.

The Lebanese-American consumer advocate has been vilified as a potential spoiler by Democrats, who fear he could siphon off critical votes in swing states.

But a Muslim bloc vote for Nader could serve as a wake-up call for the Democrats, one senior Muslim official suggeted this weekend on the sidelines of the convention of the Islamic Society of North America.

At the same time, the task force is reaching out to greens, independents, libertarians, and African Americans to build a broad-based civil rights coalition to push for stronger civil rights protections -- among them the abolition of secret evidence in immigration hearings and the "sneak and peek" searches authorised by the Patriot Act.

If he's good enough for Allah, then he's good enough for ME!  

Muslims are evil.  Islam is evil  Feel free to lock this thread.

Quoted: Muslims are evil.  Islam is evil  Feel free to lock this thread.

+1

K.T.A.!!!

"There is a crisis of civil rights for Muslims in this country," said Agha Saeed, chairman of the American Muslim Alliance, (AMA) at a national gathering of US Muslims this weekend.

Maybe if they stopped financing those that try to kill us this wouldn't be an ISSUE!

"Today, Muslims and Arabs are second-class citizens in the United States."

Fuck them.  If I had my way they wouldn't even be here.

I have a solution:  Muslim Casinos.

Quoted: "There is a crisis of civil rights for Muslims in this country," said Agha Saeed, chairman of the American Muslim Alliance, (AMA) at a national gathering of US Muslims this weekend. Maybe if they stopped financing those that try to kill us this wouldn't be an ISSUE! "Today, Muslims and Arabs are second-class citizens in the United States." Fuck them.  If I had my way they wouldn't even be here. I have a solution:  Muslim Casinos.

I have a better 'solution'. Seriously ramp up .223 production and use it on anything muslim.

Quoted: I have a better 'solution'. Seriously ramp up .223 production and use it on anything muslim.

That would kill them all and then I would be considered a radical Catholic because I wiped evil from the face of the earth.

SGatr15

Quoted: Quoted: I have a better 'solution'. Seriously ramp up .223 production and use it on anything muslim. That would kill them all and then I would be considered a radical Catholic because I wiped evil from the face of the earth. SGatr15

Better to be a live 'radical catholic" than a dead victim of the Religion of Peace.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: I have a better 'solution'. Seriously ramp up .223 production and use it on anything muslim. That would kill them all and then I would be considered a radical Catholic because I wiped evil from the face of the earth. SGatr15 Better to be a live 'radical catholic" than a dead victim of the Religion of Peace.

+1

Quoted: Muslims are evil.  Islam is evil  Feel free to lock this thread.

I'm sensing that you too have had enough of these fucking cock roaches.

God hates those who dont provide links or sources to their news posts. He hates plagerism and fake news.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: I have a better 'solution'. Seriously ramp up .223 production and use it on anything muslim. That would kill them all and then I would be considered a radical Catholic because I wiped evil from the face of the earth. SGatr15 Better to be a live 'radical catholic" than a dead victim of the Religion of Peace.

+1

I dunno, if my religion advocated wiping out all non-believers, I would have a choice: agree with it & stay in that religion or leave it and find another. Seems to me that all the whiners are blaming everyone else (Bush, the Patriot act, America, Jews, Christians, Britain, Blair, Quakers, the Amish and probably the Salvation Army) for the woes created by what their religion created.

Not surprised they find Kerry their kind of guy.

Quoted: Quoted: Muslims are evil.  Islam is evil  Feel free to lock this thread. I'm sensing that you too have had enough of these fucking cock roaches.

Yup, and I have also had just about enough of the PC bullshit that we find in all parts of our society, including here on AR15.com.   It iwll be one of the things that get good Americans killed.  

<sigh>.

link for the whiners

Quoted: Yup, and I have also had just about enough of the PC bullshit that we find in all parts of our society, including here on AR15.com.   It iwll be one of the things that get good Americans killed.   <sigh>.

I'm with you.  It sickens me to have to deal with PC here too!

But we must continue to REFUSE TO ACCEPT THE SITUATION!