The FBI is saying Bruce Ivins sent the anthrax that wound up killing five and terrorizing the whole country. The deadly attack was aimed at some of our top politicians and media figures. If ever there was a terrorist attack, this was it. So, how come no one is calling Ivins a terrorist?

Let's get real. You know what the answer is. It's because he is white. It's also because he is Christian and right-wing, but I'll get to that in a second. Now, if you don't believe that they're not calling him a terrorist because he's white, let me ask you this question: What if his name was Sheik al-Abdullah Muhammad?

The Headline: A plant in Shelbyville, Tennessee, has replaced the paid holiday of Labor Day with a vacation day for Eid al-Fitr to accomadate the plant's many Somali workers.

According to a news release from the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, a new five-year contract at the plant included the change to accommodate Muslim workers at the plant.  

Tyson's director of media relations Gary Mickelson said the contract includes eight paid holidays -- the same number as the old contract.

Eid al-Fitr -- which falls on Oct. 1 this year -- marks the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting.

Union leaders said implementing the holiday was important for the nearly 700 Muslims, many of them Somalis, who work at the plant that employs a total of 1,200 people.

(cross-posted, with fun editorial cartoons, at CampaignSilo.com):

So thirteen percent of people think Barack Obama is a Muslim. An unprecedented crisis in public ignorance? "Not so," said my dad, because Will Gorenfeld is a Civil War buff, or rather a pre-Civil War buff, who knows everything about the year 1856, and believes nothing is new under the sun. "There were rumors," he said, "that John C. Frémont was secretly a Catholic."

Look, we all know he's a radical black Muslim, with a long history of hating America and what we stand for. Need proof? I saw an interview on Fox that showed an Iraqi being questions about Obama, and the guy said, "Of course, he's a Muslim. His middle name is Hussein."

But, Obama is very clever at hiding this well known fact. He even went so far as to put bacon on his breakfast tray when he ate with the troops in Iraq this week.

Much more...

We ll see a lot of weird stuff in the run-up to the election. One is an attempt to link Obama to Muslim terrorists through Kenya.

Obama did appear with Raila Odinga when the latter was running for President in Kenya; Odinga was running against the obviously corrupt and potentially authoritarian government of Pres. Kibaka. Odinga did sign an understanding with the Muslim minority, however. See what the right-wing made of it, below.

It was great seeing so many of you in Austin last week!

At least one major right-wing smear attack on Obama may be gearing up.  I'll call it the "Who Sent You" campaign.  As weird as it sounds -- and it is weird stuff -- the gist of it is that Obama's birth was part of a secret plan by communists, Jews and one-worlders to take over the world.   As you read this it is going to sound so fanatically wingnut/John Birch Society/black helicopter/precious bodily fluids weird that you are likely to dismiss it as the rantings of crazy people.  But I have learned over the years that this stuff resonates with a certain crowd, and they are remarkably effective at tapping the fears of Americans.  

Keep in mind how weird and unbelievable the Swift Boat accusations seemed -- and remember the powerful effect they had on the public and election results.  In The Swiftboaters Are Back in the Water I wrote about the effectiveness of the dishonest accusations,

...wherein we find out that there's something going off in McCain's brain.

and sometimes it's just racist. As I watched the Larry King interview last night I couldn’t help but feel a little bit of air slip out of the balloon. "He just wasn’t Presidential" said my wife, next to me on the couch, and while I agreed, I forgave him that, he wanted to be one of us, to connect with middle America, whatever that meant. No, it was more than that... it was what could have happened in that interview that deflated my balloon just a bit. I’m nowhere near walking away from Barack, the best candidate the Dems have had in years! But eventually, as my hero Billy Bragg has said, the shine is gonna wear off and we’re all gonna see that he’s just a regular person with faults too, lol! And last night, yeah... he could have really zapped us with some brilliant anti-racism, some real sock-it-to-me anti-discrimination rhetoric, some tell-it-like-it-is American melting pot discourse! But not once did he give us any hint that the New Yorker cartoon cover is even racist! Wow.

On last night's edition of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart took the time to go over the biggest Obama controversy to hit the airwaves since... well, at least a week or so. I'm talking of course about the New Yorker's satirical cover of Obama smears and mis perceptions.

I was glad to find that Jon & his writers feel the same way about this issue that I do - that its really blown totally out of proportion and that it's just a satirical cartoon. The incredible "outrage" that people in the media are displaying over such a clearly satirical spoof also comes across as disingenuous because it is people in their profession that have allowed these rumors and smears to go on without seriously being debunked. If there is no merit to these accusations why lend weight to them or treat them as serious concerns?

Here is the Daily Show clip to watch and then feel free to weigh in with your own reactions to it and/or the New Yorker cartoon:

Politico provided a partial Larry King interview of Obama.

Updated w/video

The MSM is once again wringing its hands, asking how can Obama introduce himself to the American population because 12% still believe he is a Muslim.  The talking heads then describe Obama’s failure to connect and explain who he is.  As Ben Smith pointed out, this is a part of a much larger problem in the society.  Americans believe stupid things.  It is not Obama’s problem – it is our problem.

I think this whole "he's a Muslim" whisper has been mistakenly decoded.  C'mon, even those white guys Rendell and Hillary banked on in Western Pennsylvania knew Obama wasn't some bearded terrorist kinda Muslim.  Frankly, to think people are merely calling Obama a "Muslim" would be as dumb as thinking they were merely calling Willie Horton a "rapist."  Willie Horton wasn't sold to us as a rapist, he was sold to us as the white guy's biggest nightmare - a black man defiling our white women.  If you read the fine print at the bottom of that shameful ad it said "Vote for Dukakis and your daughter will be dating a large colored man before you can say 'republican.' You don't want liberals letting these people near our women!"  Likewise, they aren't merely calling Obama a "Muslim."  They are talking about that white guy's other biggest nightmare - an angry negro who just happens to be the new sheriff in town.

This is what I'm waiting for.  The "I'm not a Muslim, but so what if I was?" speech.  We have examined race, now it's time to defuse the rumors and celebrate the faith.  This is an opportunity to remove the elitist stink from the sanctimonious suggestion of "Christianity" as the only acceptable faith tradition for our leaders.  It is time to end the disenfranchisement of Muslim-Americans, who are by all accounts http://pewforum.org/...), as productive, educated, and "...are decidely American in their outlook, values, and attitudes" as the rest of us.

A diarist at the (irony deleted) Daily Kos has already noted the cover of the 7/13/08 issue of the New Yorker, which depicts Barack & Michelle Obama as terrorists fist-poundin' in the oval office.

http://www.dailykos.com/...

The story inside, "Making It" by Ryan Lizza, makes a (UPDATE) unusual, and IMO intellectually dishonest effort to link Barack Obama to John Mearsheimer (a scholar I admire, but who has been widely denounced as an "anti-semite" due to his criticism of AIPAC)

I don't know what's going on at the New Yorker, a magazine I read and admire.

I don't know if, or how much, this has been covered here in the past few weeks, but I thought I would let you know that the hateful and quite viral "A man will come form the east" email is still circulating, though long repudiated by the alleged author.

A friend of mine received it just this week from a close (rightwing) relative.   It's cute that it cites Snopes as a source -- since Snopes mocks it.

I will reprint most of it here and then the denial from the "author"  and church (in Florida).

The "he's a Muslim" smear is pernicious and seems like it will drag on for the rest of the campaign.  And the media is dutifully recycling every attack angle: "no, he's not Muslim, he follows that scary Rev. Wright," "he keeps saying he's not a Muslim - what's he got against Muslims," "OK, he might not be a Muslim now, but he was one as a kid."  Rinse and repeat over and over.

I think Obama needs to break the media out of their comfort zone.  To do it, I suggest his campaign should set up another big speech event on religion.  Do it in such a way that the media will want to cover it.  Then do a speech where he starts out talking in vague, general terms about rumours regarding his religion.  Don't say what religion the rumours say, just that they're out there.  At that point he should deliver this line, "These rumours are not true.  While I have the greatest respect for Mormons, I am not now and never have been a member of their church.  Mormons are good people and they contribute greatly to our nation."  From there go on to suggest ways various religions play a role in America.

When my daughter was about 18 months old, I was entertaining the idea of moving to the lower-48 in the Southern regions (yes, it was February in Anchorage).  For the heck of it, I was checking out some "live-in" positions where high-powered, type-A folks were looking for personal assistants to be at their beck-and-call.  I started talking to a nice, older couple...a retired oil exec and his wife who were heavily involved in foundations, fundraising and event planning.  The position would have been perfect!  I sent them my resume, samples of my writing and made sure they knew I had an 18-month-old daughter.

They were impressed with my abilities and tickled at the thought of having a child in the house again.  It really looked like this was going somewhere.  As a proud mama, I decided to send them a picture of Morrigan and I together.

That evening, I received a curt (at first) phone call saying they were no longer interested in my services.  

Originally posted on Citizen Orange.

"I think Obama would be a disaster, and there's a lot of
reasons," said [Leroy] Pollard, explaining the rumors he had heard about the candidate from friends he goes camping with. "I understand he's from Africa, and that the first thing he's going to do if he gets into office is bring his family over here, illegally. He's got that racist [pastor] who practically raised him, and then there's the Muslim thing. He's just not presidential material, if you ask me."

Eli Saslow - Washington Post (30 June 2008)