OPINION: Don't believe Internet smears about Obama's religion

Mark Suppelsa’s letter of Jan. 1, 2016, certainly caused quite a stir, as evidenced by the letters to the editor published in the Jan. 8 Inter Lake.

First, there was the letter from Monte Weaver. Mr. Weaver states that, “in (his) opinion” President Obama “is not a Christian.” Mr. Weaver opined, “Mr. Obama, Muslims and the Clintons and all other who deny Jesus are what I would consider to be antichrists who do the will of Satan by attacking Christians.” Although I, personally, always thought that there was to be only one “anti-Christ,” I suppose that is a matter of opinion. Therefore, I concede that possibility.

That being the case, it is only fair that both President G.W. Bush, and V.P. Dick Cheney, be included on what must be a horrendously long list of anti-Christs, since they were responsible for manufacturing false evidence that resulted in the unjustifiable overthrow of Iraq, which resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent non-combatants.

While no verifiable facts were cited for Mr. Weaver’s view that “Obama, Muslims and the Clintons” have “denied” Jesus, at least Mr. Weaver is honest enough to characterize that particular view as “opinion.” Kudos to you on that, Monte. However, I don’t understand what is meant by the term “denying Jesus.” If it means anyone who denies that Jesus is the Son of God, then all Jews must also be considered “anti-Christs.” If Mr. Weaver does not consider Jews to be “anti-Christ” because of their belief that Jesus was merely a prophet of God, but not the Son of God, then why should those who follow Islam, which I understand holds Jesus at a similar status, be deemed “anti-Christs?” I’m sorry, Monte, but there is a serious disconnect on that point, depending on how you define “denying Jesus.”

Mr. Weaver then departs from opinion, to what he proclaims as fact, by asserting that President Obama’s views on “same-sex marriage, gun laws, global warming, the economy, radical Islamist extremism, Obamacare” all demonstrate as “fact” that President Obama is not Christian.

Although Mr. Weaver claims that position to be fact, it is inconceivable, in my opinion, that a majority of Christians, including Pope Francis himself, would consider President Obama’s actions to provide universal health care and Medicaid to the underprivileged masses of this great country, and to minimize the likelihood of future deaths of innocent people, including schoolchildren, to be “anti-Christian.” And what do gun laws, global warming and the economy have to do with religion anyway? Again, Mr. Weaver, facts simply do not support such claims.

Even more disturbing was the letter from Richard Hagen, also criticizing Mr. Suppelsa’s letter, and claiming that, President Obama, in a 2008 interview on ABC’s “This Week,” seemingly as much as admitted that he is a Muslim. Please understand, I do not claim that Mr. Hagen had any malicious intent when he related what he had read on the internet about the 2008 interview. To the contrary, Mr. Hagen simply has been duped by the false propaganda that is consistently propagated on right-wing blogs, or FAUX News, as have millions of others.

The truth about President Obama’s “Muslim faith” comment is that it was taken out-of-context, and twisted by the right-wing bloggers/propagandists to support the unsupportable, i.e., that President Obama is a Muslim. To check the true facts, I ask that readers refer to factcheck.org, as well as snopes.com, non-partisan fact-checkers, both of which debunked Mr. Hagen’s claim years ago. On those sites, it is accurately reported that the quote cited by Mr. Hagen was taken out-of-context, and that in addition snippets of various interviews and speeches have been compiled into a deliberate lie that President Obama admitted to be Muslim.

Although several such snippets are entitled “Obama Admits He Is A Muslim,” factcheck.com accurately reports, “The president in fact has admitted no such thing. The right-wing videos to be found on the Internet edit and twist his actual words, sometimes turning what were denials into false confessions. For example, it edits out the words ‘I’m a Christian’ from one quote and ‘my Christian faith’ from another. It shows him quoting from the Quran, but snips out his quotes from the Bible and the Talmud.”

The fact that both Mr. Weaver and Mr. Hagen have fallen prey to the unsupportable propaganda disseminated by the right-wing Obama-haters is nothing for them to be ashamed of. Seemingly, nearly a full one-third of all U.S. citizens have been brain-washed by the subversive right-wing bloggers and FAUX News commentators to believe that President Obama and all “liberals” are “anti-God,” anti-democracy” and “anti-Constitution,” while in reality nothing could be further from the truth.

Mr. Hagen’s parting words, when paraphrased, offer the best possible advice to all who would proclaim, in published statements, matters to be “fact” without verification by an independent, non-partisan source. Such advice would read as follows: “So, [contributors to the Inter Lake opinion page] try to be a little more thoughtful when you [write letters to the editor], and more truthful when you make a statement.”

Ironically, that advice is much more applicable to the “right-wingers” (in Mr. Hagen’s parlance) than it is to the dreaded “liberal socialists” who, according to Mr. Weaver’s baseless and outlandish accusations, would “... throw the whole Bible, God’s word and the U.S. Constitution in the trash.”

Al Weed is a resident of Kalispell.