Bring On the Burqas

Earlier this month, the citizens of Minnesota's 5th Congressional District elected Keith Ellison to be their Representative, and in doing so sent the first Muslim to Congress. This has caused some of the wiggier elements of America's right wing to go completely nuts. Good Lord, you'd think Ellison demanded that Nancy Pelosi be required to wear a burqa on the House floor. But he is actually quite moderate and not at all like the hate-crazed, suicide-bombing, honor-killing stereotype stamped into our national psyche.

But to the real fruitcakes, Islam itself is the enemy. And any American Muslims are traitors.

For example, take Glenn Beck, a O'Reilly-esque right-wing blowhard given a nightly talk show on CNN Headline News to counter the America-haters who otherwise dominate the network's talking-head lineup. (What's that? There aren't any? Oh well, maybe it'll draw some viewers from Fox.) When Beck had Ellison on his show, he showed off his inability to tell one Muslim from another, challenging the Representative-elect to "prove to me that you are not working with our enemies."

Now Dennis Prager, a columnist who moonlights as the religious right's token Jew, has gotten into the act as well. In his latest column for the TownHall website, he worked himself into a fine snit over Ellison's request to take his ceremonial oath of office on a copy of the Koran instead of the Bible. This request should be denied, he froths, "because the act undermines American civilization," and wonders what would happen if a racist asks to take the oath on Hitler's Mein Kampf. (Why not ask Trent Lott?) And if that weren't enough, he darkly warns that Ellison's request "will embolden Islamic extremists and make new ones."

Prager and Beck, and others like them, expose themselves as pure idiots whose bigoted rantings should embarrass thinking Americans everywhere. All Muslims are not the enemy, no matter what they think.