Obama's Zakat Reference

Thursday, June 04, 2009

http://joshuapundit.blogspot.com/

Obama's Zakat Reference

One thing about Obama's speech in Cairo that sort of slipped through the cracks was his reference to zakat, Islamic charity:

For instance, in the United States, rules on charitable giving have made it harder for Muslims to fulfill their religious obligation. That is why I am committed to working with American Muslims to ensure that they can fulfill zakat.

That leads to some interesting questions.

Zakat, as I understand it, is charity given to a mosque to be used for the poor as a general fund the way the mosque sees fit. What possible rules is Obama talking about that stop it from being a tax deduction?

Is he just making things up? oR MAYBE IT'S the the section of 18USC that makes it a crime to give money to known terrorist organizations?

All jokes aside, what Islam's American Defender of the Faith may be talking about are the IRS rules that say that contributions to foreign governments, foreign charities, and certain private foundations are not deductible.

Considering how many Islamic 'charities' have been shut down for raising funds for terrorism like the Holy Land Foundation, this could be exactly what he had in mind. Perhaps he's going to change the rules so that American Muslims can now simply write a check to Hamas directly, instead of having to go through intermediaries like the Holy Land Foundation.

But that of course,leads to another question. What in hell is the president of the United States doing concerning himself with the religious duties of a minority? And is it just Muslims who are going to get special rules passed for their benefit?

I guarantee you not one reporter is going to ask Elmer-Gantry-With -A -Tan this question. 

Not one.

Live In Cairo - The Lap Dance Of The Seven Veils

President Obama gave his long anticipated speech today in Cairo. The video is above, should you feel the need to watch almost an hour's worth of the president's head swiveling back and forth to catch his stereo teleprompters like a man at a tennis match while he delivers some of the most embarrassing and inane nonsense imaginable.

If this doesn't appeal to you,I've already subjected myself to it so you don't have to. Here's the gist of it.

Obama is so used to abasing himself in front of Muslims that by now it's second nature. The President endorses the typical view of Left wing academia that all of Islam's problems have to do with Western colonialism, and maybe a handful of extremists.

President Obama was more than willing to massage his audience by rhapsodizing on the glories of Islamic civilization. Aside from giving it credit for a number of innovations that Islam either absorbed by conquest or that it simply didn't originate, Obama embraced the myth of Islam's tolerance for other religions and what he termed its `centuries of co-existence and cooperation' with the West. In his remarks, President Obama may have claimed that he was a student of history, but I'm beginning to see why his college transcripts and papers are locked away where no one can see them.

He apparently never learned about the ethnic cleansing of the Arabian Peninsula of all other religions, the jihad and genocide against India, the massive Arab control of the slave trade, Islam's bloody record in Europe or the Ommayad caliphs who codified and enforced the sharia laws regulating non-Muslims to dhimmi status, an existence that made the old Jim Crow South look positively benign.Many of those laws persist to this day in Muslim countries.

Nor did he address except obliquely the 'tolerance' with which Muslims treat non-Muslims in Pakistan, Nigeria, Aceh, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and just about everywhere else where they're a significant percentage of the population.

In case anyone had any doubts, Obama let his audience know that he sees Islam as a major and integral part of American culture, and that he considers "it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear."

Somehow, I don't recall him mentioning that in his oath of office, but I'm sure CAIR, the Organization of Islamic Conference and the Muslim Brotherhood just loved it.

To Barack Hussein Obama, traditional American values and Muslim values are one and the same:

I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world; one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect; and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive, and need not be in competition. Instead, they overlap, and share common principles - principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.

I don't know what planet President Obama lives on, but it's apparently a different one than most of us inhabit. Sharia law and most of what's in the Qu'ran are simply incompatible with our Constitution, but not in ObamaWorld. Credit where credit is due, however - the President did mention equality for women in his remarks,although how he squares a culture where honor killings, female genital mutilation and wife beatings have a religious basis with his fantasy view of an Islam of peace and tolerance compatible with American society is beyond me.

After thoroughly fellating his audience on how wonderful he thought Islamic civilization and culture was and how he was going to be Islam's Defender of the Faith in America, our president moved on to what he referred to as issues between Islam and America.

He apologized for Gitmo and our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, providing another gratuitous slap at his predecessor. Nothing new there, and he let his audience know that we were on our way out as soon as possible.He again sounded the mantra of a peaceful, tolerant Islam spoiled by a mere handful of extremists:

Make no mistake: we do not want to keep our troops in Afghanistan. We seek no military bases there. It is agonizing for America to lose our young men and women. It is costly and politically difficult to continue this conflict. We would gladly bring every single one of our troops home if we could be confident that there were not violent extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan determined to kill as many Americans as they possibly can. But that is not yet the case.{...}

The Holy Koran teaches that whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind; and whoever saves a person, it is as if he has saved all mankind. The enduring faith of over a billion people is so much bigger than the narrow hatred of a few. Islam is not part of the problem in combating violent extremism - it is an important part of promoting peace.

What Obama chooses to ignore here is the simple truth that al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Pakistan's Deobandis, the Mullahs of Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Wahhabi's in Saudi Arabia and the Muslim Brotherhood may have a few differences in doctrine and methods of operation, but they are a mainstream in Islam rather than just a few 'extremists.' They all endorse Islamist triumphalism and conduct jihad against the West in their own ways, and they all have a solid basis in Islamic religious doctrine.

The Prevaricator-in-Chief then moved on to the two issues the Islamic world was really waiting for, the Arab-Israeli conflict and Iran's nuclear power.

Obama made the usual noises about America's bond with Israel and the suffering and persecution of the Jewish people throughout the centuries, and then gratuitously insulted that suffering by equating it with the suffering of the Palestinians, thus adding the weight of his endorsement to the lies told by people like Yasir Arafat and his ilk for years and endorsing the modern anti-Semitic meme that modern Israel consists of Nazis colonizing Arab Land. Obama actually referred to 'Palestine' in his speech, called for an end to Jewish settlements and implied that Jerusalem, Israel's capital, would be divided with the Palestinians.

He opened the way for the legitimization of Hamas,provided they agreed to put an end to violence, recognize past agreements, and recognize Israel's right to exist. This is exactly how the PLO was legitimized in the past, and how well that worked out for Israel is a matter of record.

Obama also uttered some boilerplate kumbayah rhetoric about phasing out violence and terrorism and how the Arab world should begin to normalize its ties with Israel,but the clear emphasis was on Israeli concessions and Arab rights.

It's worth noting that several sources in Israel reported that the content of this speech was not discussed with Israel's leadership beforehand, which is normally how allies operate with each other. From what I've been able to gather from my sources, the Israelis are under no illusions about what that meant, or what the speech represents, given as it was in one of the few Arab countries that has diplomatic relations with Israel.

On Iran, the president endorsed an extremely dangerous course, saying once again that in his view, Iran is fully entitled to nuclear power, provided Iran complies with the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty it signed. Anyone who's been listening to what Iran's leaders have been saying for months knows that once again, our president is living in fantasy land.

What Obama is actually telling the mullahs is that they are perfectly free to develop nuclear weapons without US interference and that America is prepared to live with a nuclear armed Iran.The consequences are going to be enormous if this is allowed to continue.

The president ended with the remarks on women's equality I mentioned above, some more kumbayah rhetoric on democracy and a laundry list on how the US is going to fund social programs in the Islamic world.

I never saw it personally, but I had been told as a child that it was once common for small travelling carnivals to feature 'geek shows', where men bit the heads off of chickens and otherwise abased themselves in front of audiences for a few coins, applause and maybe a bottle of Night Train.

When I watched President Obama's speech, it occurred to me that maybe I was getting a chance to witness that fine spectacle after all.

Watcher's Council Nominations, June3rd, 2009

The Watcher's Council is a group of some of the most incisive blogs in the`sphere. Every week, the members nominate two posts each, one of their own and one from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council.

So, let's see what we have this week....and do check out the Watcher'stake on the first six months of the Obama Administration...


COUNCIL

Joshuapundit - Race Carding Sotomayor - Is the prospective SCOTUS Justice a racist? If she is, does it matter? And given that she's likely to be confirmed anyway, why is this a rare opportunity for conservatives to take advantage of?

For the answers, inquire within.

The Provocateur - Wade Rathke’s Management Council - Another fine piece on the ACORN mafia from Mike Volpe.

The Glittering Eye - Progressives Aren’t Liberals - I couldn't agree with Dave Schuler more on this one.

Rhymes With Right - Sonia Sotomayor: Free Speech Douchebag - Greg unearths an interesting decision that may highlight how the prospective justice views the first amendment.

The Colossus of Rhodey - Yet another reason why the News Journal is sinking Hube points out how his local paper is drowning in a puddle of political correctness.

Bookworm Room - Murderer or Martyr — the George Tiller killer - Ms. Bookworm explores the George Tiller murder case and its implications for the pro-life movement.

Right Truth - Know The Enemy and Destroy Him - Proof that great minds think alike, Debbie has a take on the Tiller murder similar to my own,focusing on how the media and the Federal government treated this as compared with a jihad murder of a US soldier here on American soil the same day...well done, Deb!

Soccer Dad - Where hugo’s huge - Soccer Dad clues us in - it's not just in Latin America.

Wolf Howling - A Bit Of Honesty From Speaker Pelosi - Be still my beating heart! GW caught Granny Botox in a moment of honesty on climate change and cap and trade....

Mere Rhetoric - Abbas: Olmert Offered Us The West Bank And The Right Of Return, But It Wasn’t Good Enough - As Omri points out, these days the 'Palestinians' don't feel any actual negotiations are necessary. They feel they can just wait for Obama to force whatever solution they want on Israel.


NON-COUNCIL


Submitted By: The Provocateur - Real Clear Politics - What’s Keeping Obama Up

Submitted By: Joshuapundit - Michelle Malkin - Crunching the numbers: Dealergate & cronyism continued

Submitted By: The Glittering Eye - Commentary Magazine–Michael J. Totten - The Mother of All Myths

Submitted By: Rhymes With Right - Power Line - Sotomayor’s 60 Percent Reversal Rate

Submitted By: The Colossus of Rhodey - Reason Online - Nostalgianomics

Submitted By: Bookworm Room - Day by Day Cartoon - Obama World

Submitted By: Right Truth - Asia Times Online - Wrong venue for Obama’s Muslim speech

Submitted By: Soccer Dad - Day by Day Cartoon - Amusement Park

Submitted By: Wolf Howling - Megan McArdle - The War On The War On Abortion

Submitted By: Mere Rhetoric - Gawker - Oh, Keith