Why Can’t a Muslim be a U.S President

Are Muslims the new Negroes?

Gone are the days of cartoons like “The Coon” that presented powerful and damaging images of African Americans as lazy, stupid and even dangerous, to advance the anti-freedom movement.

Now we are faced with the controversial New Yorker cover, which portrays the new “Black Messiah” and his wife as Anti-American Muslim terrorists.

To many people the term “Muslim Terrorists” is redundant. The two have been synonymous ever since 9/11.

Yet while the Obama camp has exhausted its efforts to quell the controversy over his denomination, not until now has Obama alluded to the blatant bigotry in the accusations.

Why can’t a Muslim be President?

Is it that 9/11 has destroyed all chances for a Muslim-American to hold political office?

What are they going to do, wear a suicide bomb as soon as they get in so that they can destroy the White House?

I am almost certain that a lot of people would answer yes to that rhetorical question.

The difference between the anti-negro cartoons of the pre-abolitionist era and the New Yorker cover, is that the magazine may just have done a public service to Muslims by bringing Americans face to face with their own prejudice.

This prejudice spurred by 9/11, has made Muslim-Americans the victims of increasing civil rights abuses according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

In a 2007 report aptly sub-titled “Presumption of Guilt,” the council documented receipt of a 2,476 complaints of civil rights abuses in 2006, 36.32 percent of which occurred at government agencies.

These abuses include refusal of employment unless the hijab (scarf) is removed, wrongful dismissal for Islamic related reasons, unreasonable arrests, assault of those in traditional wear accompanied by hateful remarks and vandalism of places of worship and other meeting places.

One of the many examples given in the report is the vandalism of a Texas Islamic center on October 26. The vandals revealed their “Islamophobia” by spray painting “Redemption” on the center’s newly painted walls to complete their damage.

If you think making crude comments about Muslims especially those in headwear or cringing when you see a Muslim in an airport does not do any damage think again.

Would you like someone to cringe at you?

What is the solution?

The council recommends exactly what most Americans fear, more representation in government by Muslim-Americans to provide a stronger voice to their concerns.

This cry is not different from the cry of African-Americans today.

While Obama says he has grown a thick skin to attacks of this nature, victimization grows and should not be tolerated.

As an African-American whose ability to reach as far as he has, is largely due to the struggle for civil rights in America, Obama must acknowledge the struggle of the Muslim-American population, because as Martin Luther King said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere