Negotiating with Terrorists

I bow to no one in my admiration for Howard Dean's courage and my gratitude to him for building the party that took back the country in 2006 and 2008.

But he's dead wrong on this one. You can't have a dialogue with people who refuse to discuss facts or reality, who won't listen to anyone who is not inciting their blood-lust.

Digby:

Just some nice folks standing up for American values:

Many protesters held American flags. Many carried signs.

"A Mosque at Ground Zero Spits on the Graves of 9/11," one placard proclaimed. Another sign depicted a toilet, with this message: "This is a Mosque. Do You Want it Built at Ground Zero?"

At one point, a portion of the crowd menacingly surrounded two Egyptian men who were speaking Arabic and were thought to be Muslims.

"Go home," several shouted from the crowd.

"Get out," others shouted.

In fact, the two men – Joseph Nassralla and Karam El Masry — were not Muslims at all. They turned out to be Egyptian Coptic Christians who work for a California-based Christian satellite TV station called "The Way." Both said they had come to protest the mosque.

"I'm a Christian," Nassralla shouted to the crowd, his eyes bulging and beads of sweat rolling down his face.

But it was no use. The protesters had become so angry at what they thought were Muslims that New York City police officers had to rush in and pull Nassralla and El Masry to safety.

"I flew nine hours in an airplane to come here," a frustrated Nassralla said afterward.

That was time and money well spent.

Anti-muslim fury is not confined to "extremists" or "racists" or "idiots"; it is the beating heart of the GOP.

It's the blunt weapon that is felling Democratic politicans by the dozen every day. It's the death wagon they're riding all the way to November.

Sure, a few repugs capable of breathing with their mouths closed will sit down with Dean and politely discuss the First Amendment and the importance of freakazoids of all flavors uniting against facts and reason and science and humanity.

But the hate driving this explosion of islamophobia is entirely the sacred creation of the repugs, and they won't let go of it for any reason.

Cross-posted at They Gave Us A Republic ....