Saturday, September 11, 2010

PolitiCliff Notes for Confused Masses
It might be a nice idea if people could start posting some one page "CliffsNote" (not affiliated with the publishers of Cliffs Notes ) style short summaries of political issues, to help sum up some issue for those who remain confused about it.
Here is an example of what I'm talking about:

Take the issues of a “Ground Zero Mosque”....


which is now strangely intertwined with Koran burning (note how much easier and less snobby it is to spell Koran with a ‘K’ instead of a “Qu’….you’re welcome). Here are the political cliffsnotes:

1. It is not at ground zero. (game)
2. It is not a mosque (set)
3. There is already a mosque closer than this proposed community center (match)

…..But just for the heck of it:

4. Under what specific principle of law would you forbid muslims building a mosque (or a community center) on their own property, next to other churches and community centers, without the courts immediately overturning it as blatant religious discrimination and awarding monetary damages?
5. If you think the law and Constitution should be changed to veto muslims building a mosque (or community center) on their own property then you have just admitted that

(a) there is no current principle of law under which you can stop it

(b) your current advocacy of stopping it is illegal (and unconstitutional)

(c) you don’t really believe in small government if you want to pass special, new, convoluted laws designed only to take rights away from people you don’t like.

6. Touche, biacche.


See that cleared up all the confusion in short order. Of course I could have added


7. Pastard Terry Jones and his intention to burn Korans (which he has clearly never read) has absolutely, positively, nothing (at all!) to do with this issue (whatsoever), except in Jones's own mind.
1. He tried to link his actions (in Florida) to something going on in New York
2. As a consequence he completely discredited the MosKowards (read it slow) by associating them with bigots who burn books, and endanger our soldier in wartime
3. Bravo, Terry. Nicely played.
4. (Bonus point) Terry doesn't even know the word is "Imam" not "Iman", and no you can't defend him by saying "shucks, I don't know that either".

Of course, as far as Obama is concerned

8. He should immediately fire his PR and speechwriting people because they absolutely screwed the pooch on this one
9. They decided to have him give a speech defending the right to build the Mosque
10. This played right into the hands of his opponents, who gleefully framed it as confirmation of their talking point: "That (Barack Hussein) Obama is a (closet) Muslim."
11. This forced Obama's desperate backpedal that he “questioned the wisdom” of building it, but not their right to do it. That made him about as popular as the ACLU defending kiddie porn.
12. Hint to dumbsh**s on the presidential staff: He never should have mentioned the mosque specifically, and then only referred to it as a “church”, in general.
13. In other words, if you’re going to take the high road then be abstract and say things like “we don’t discriminate against anyone’s religion in this country”.