A Matter of Faith

 By Florida Bill

A political groupie at a recent Donald Trump rally accused President Obama of being a Muslim. He complained of all the problems Muslims are creating in the United States and asked the candidate when we can get rid of them.

“We have a problem in this country,” the questioner stated.  “It’s called Muslims.  You know our current president is one.  You know he is not even an American.…There are training camps where they want to kill us.  That’s my question…when can we get rid of them?”

Trump responded: “We are going to be looking at a lot of different things,” he answered.  “You know a lot of people are saying that and a lot are saying that bad things are happening.  We are going to be looking at this and a lot of other things.”

Obviously unprepared for such a question, Trump tried to duck it with a rather innocuous response.   His answer, however, set off the liberal fringe and the lunatic media which blasted Trump as an Islamophobe and a racist. 

            The question of President Obama’s religion continues, and pollsters have reported that nearly 20 per cent of Americans believe that the President is a Muslim, given his upbringing and attendance at a Muslim school (Madrassa) in Indonesia;  the religion of his father and stepfather and siblings, and his praise of the religion and reverence towards the holy month of Ramadan since becoming president.  

Just what answer should Trump have given to this loaded, unanticipated question?   Should he have immediately put down the questioner by stating: “How dare you ask such an Islam-hating question, when we know Mr. Obama is a Christian?”  Should he have gone with the accepted public response to this frequently raised issue by saying “President Obama has said he is a Christian and I take him at his word,” as other politicians, including Senate President Mitch McConnell, have said?

            In one report Mrs. Clinton had been quoted as saying in response to a question put to her during her 2008 campaign on whether Obama was of the Islamic faith, that there is no evidence of that, “so far as I know.”

            No matter how you look at it, it is a delicate question.  When Gov. Walker, currently a Republican candidate, was asked if Obama was a Christian, he replied he did not know because he had never talked to him about it.  

            Gov. Chris Christi, who is a straight shooter, has said he would not allow any one at a news conference or rally of his to say Obama is a Muslim.  I would tell him emphatically that he is wrong in saying so, he is Christian, Christi has said.

            Hillary Clinton, who must now kowtow to Democratic leadership, recently stated she was "appalled," that Trump did not call out the man asking the question, and that the question "was not only out of bounds, it was untrue." No one at one of her rallies would have even asked such a question, she insisted.  And we all know that Hillary never lies!!!                  

            Before becoming president, Mr. Obama attended a Christian church in Chicago headed by his friend and mentor, the controversial Rev. Jeremiah Wright.  In 2008, as a candidate for President, he joined his opponent Sen. McCain at a Q and A session sponsored by the Rev. Rick Warren,  where he expressed the Christian belief that marriage is a union between one man and one woman;  and in other public statements has said that he is a Christian and a follower of  Jesus Christ.  

            If some one asked me, a lawyer and former Chicago Tribune reporter for nearly a quarter of a century, if the President was a Muslim,  I would have to join the ranks of those saying they honestly don’t know. I believe unless he declares otherwise, we must take him at his word that he is a Christian. 

            Yet it is still true that he has said and done things which raise legitimate questions as to his religion. He "evolved" from his Christian philosophy about marriage a few years ago. He refuses to blame Islamic terrorists for the savagery and beheading of Christians, and has refrained from ever uttering the words "radical Islamic terrorists." 

             It is a very touchy subject, to say the least.  Just talking about it causes accusations of prejudice and hate, as Trump recently found out.