Don't Put Up with Misinformation and Rumor Mongering by Harvey Yoder

Martha note: It's Civic Soapbox Friday

I was totally dismayed by the tone of an August 26th editorial in the Daily News Record, Harrisonburg’s daily paper, titled "Is Obama a Muslim?” And equally dismayed by a recently released poll that finds that 18% of all Americans, and 46% of Republicans, mistakenly believe he is of that faith.

The editorial page writer implies there is something suspect about a President not affirming an orthodox Christianity (which President Obama actually has, by the way, more than once). The editorial states, "Even Ronald Reagan, whose sparse church attendance following the 1981 attempt on his life generated liberal bile, was a man whose public statements were clearly animated by a deep and thorough going Christian faith," as if this were a necessary qualification for being an American president. And this in spite of the inconvenient fact that the Reagans were never known for being faithful church attendees.

For anyone who believes in a strict application of the constitution, religious observance shouldn’t be an issue anyway in the selection of our president, since Article VI clearly states that "No Religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."

The DNR editor missed a great opportunity to dispel growing ignorance and misinformation on the part of his readers. He could and should have simply phrased his editorial’s headline as a statement such as: “Yes, Virginia, Obama is a Christian.”

Having said that, though I am a practicing Christian myself, to me that’s less important in this conversation than the degree of respect we show toward people of all faiths and cultures, toward our Constitution, and toward the truth itself.

With regard to a previous editorial in the same paper stating that an Islamic Center should never be built anywhere near New York’s Ground Zero, I’m reminded of another simple, stubborn statement in the First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” To me that’s absolutely clear, and it means we either have to support that principle for everyone or it is not secure for anyone.

Our Constitution does not guarantee that our sensitivities will not be offended when such freedoms are exercised in ways we don’t happen to like. But that makes no difference. A right is a right.

As a citizen, I am disturbed by the growing use of misinformation and rumor mongering to vilify the entire Muslim faith – a vilification that’s fueled by nonsensical editorials such as the recent one in our local paper. I would urge all of us to respond with an increased numbers of letters we submit to our newspapers, and to post regular comments on their online editions, as some of you I’m sure are already doing. We cannot afford, by our silence, to give consent to obvious forms of prejudice and ignorance.

                  -- Harvey Yoder lives in Harrisonburg

Posting my own e-mail

Let me make this clear at the top: I'm on e-mail lists created by those across the political spectrum. I don't advocate for either party; what I do advocate for is informed advocacy.

Timothy Jost is a nationally recognized health care expert who's probably familiar to you from his appearances on NPR and on WMRA's Virginia Insight. He is as informed a person on the subject of health care reform as one is likely to come into contact with.

Professor Jost recently wrote a summary of HR 3962, the Affordable Health Care for Americans Act, on the Health Affairs blog. Earlier, he wrote several posts in the same journal on the Senate Bill. If you wish to be an informed contributor to our current reform discussion and haven't read up on what you're talking about, those links are for you!

All that said, at 7:58 this Saturday morning, I got the following e-mail that had been sent from Jost to Lowell Fulk (Chair, Rockingham County Democratic Committee) to Harvey Yoder (of the Family Life Resource Center, who creates "Centerpiece" for WEMC Public Radio). It seems to indicate that those against the current Congressional bills for health care reform are much more active than those who are for them. For what it's worth, and with Professor Jost's permission, I thought I'd pass his e-mail along.

Hi Lowell,

You know how busy I have been all fall on health care reform.  This battle has proven much harder than I ever could have imagined.  With our health care system in shambles, you would think the public would overwhelmingly favor reform.  The bills we have right now are not as good as they could be. But they would cover over 30 million Americans and, I believe, begin to get a handle on costs.  They are facing overwhelming opposition, however.

Ruth [Mr. Jost's wife, Ruth Stoltzfus Jost] called Senator Warner's office today [note from MW: yesterday, by the time I got this e-mail]. The lines to Washington have been busy all day. She finally called Warner's Roanoke office.  When she told them she was in favor of reform, the woman asked her to repeat herself. She said she has gotten hundreds of calls today and they are overwhelmingly against reform. It was so good to hear someone in favor.

We are not doing our job.  This is the signature Democratic issue this year, and it is important. Senators Webb and Warner need to hear from us.  If they don't this will go down, and the Democratic party with it.

Could you please contact local Dems on your email list and ask them to call Webb and Warner?  They desperately need our support.  Thanks for anything you can do,

Tim

Senator Webb, 202-224-4024, 540-772-4236

Senator Warner, 202-224-2023, 540-857-2676

• Addendum to e-mail from Tim Jost:  You can also contact through Warner.senate.gov or webb.senate.gov.

I thought it was an interesting report from the trenches of the health care reform wars. The WMRA listeners with whom I've discussed the issue have been overwhelmingly in support of some kind of reform. My questions for you are:

1. Have you read a good summary of the bill's in question? 
2. If so, what's your view on them? 
3. And have you called your Senators yet to express your views from either side of the debate?

Finally, anyone gotten something from a well-informed opponent of health care reform they'd like me to pass along?

Fueling constructive pesky-ness. . .

Bob Bersson and Mohammed Hijjah both ate lunch at Harrisonburg's Clementine Cafe last Monday. In the basement lounge. In the company of about 25 people.

Mr. Bersson is Jewish and has lived in a Kibbutz in Israel. Mr. Hijjah, who was born in Palestine, was severely beaten by Israeli soldiers who were part of the force that occupied his home in 1967. In a conversation hosted by Harvey Yoder, each man said he was pro-Israel and pro-Palestine. Each man said the two-state solution was the only viable solution.

Bob Bersson attended the controversial inaugural JStreet Conference, held last month in Washington. He said that what has going on in Clementine's lounge was what had gone on there: a group of people had come together to take a stand that being pro-Israel doesn't mean being con-Palestine and vice versa. And then to start figuring out what that means in practical terms. Mr. Hijjah agreed.

Ruth Stoltzfus Jost brought up the House of Representatives' condemnation of the U.N. commissioned Goldstone Report, which found evidence of war crimes by both sides of the Gaza conflict. This was, she suggested, hard evidence of the power over our government of a conservative and entrenched pro-Israel lobby in Washington.

Sandra Rose then pointed out that grass roots forces (among them, those eating lunch with her in Clementine's basement) operate independently of any forces leaning on our lawmakers. "If we want [the two-state solution and peace in Gaza] to become real," Ms. Rose said, "we must make absolute pests of ourselves to our government."

The situation in Gaza, whatever one's politics, needs to heal, for it is generating well-documented crimes against humanity. The government hasn't seen fit to do much; so doesn't that leave it up to the pests?

Over the course of my life, I've taken part in lots of grass-roots pesky-ness; groups of citizens working on changing destructive situations into constructive ones. I started early, taking part in the Woolworth sit-in in Greensboro, North Carolina, when I was twelve. Nothing in my own personal experience has made me feel a force for constructive change in Gaza could not be legitimately energized over lunch in Clementine's lounge.

As long, of course, as that energy fuels some practical pesky-ness.


NOTE: here's what Andrea Seabrook had to say about Going Rogue, Sarah Palin's just-out book:

Going Rogue starts off flowery, with slow descriptions of Alaska's frozen, crystal beauty. The story of her family and childhood is a standard American romance — hardworking, salt-of-the-earth people who raise their children and help their neighbors. But the book very quickly bares its true soul and purpose: It's full of anger as Palin lashes out at everything from the Alaska GOP to John McCain's campaign staff. In the end, Going Rogue comes off as a long (400+ pages), pent-up and resentful tirade from a politician who's angry with the spotlight that (she seems to believe) was forced upon her. — Andrea Seabrook, NPR Congressional Correspondent