The GOP's Deeply Bigoted Week

[struggle4progress]

Submitted by Brian Tashman
Monday, 9/21/2015 12:35 pm

... one Republican presidential candidate’s refusal last week to correct a town hall questioner who claimed that President Obama is a Muslim led to another candidate insisting that no Muslim should ever become president of the United States ...

No one seems to have batted an eye during the CNN debate when Ted Cruz touted the endorsement of a far-right gun activist group whose leader has ties to the white supremacist movement ... In saying that he was “honored” to have received the support of Gun Owners of America, Cruz put himself to the right of Pat Buchanan, who got so much flak for his ties to GOA head Larry Pratt during his 1996 presidential campaign that he dropped him from his campaign leadership team ...

Sarah Palin ... attacked Obama for inviting the “potential bomb-imitator” to the White House ...

http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/gops-deeply-bigoted-week

[Skittles]

1. like they cannot anticipate these questions from their racist base

shows how prepared they are

[struggle4progress]

2. Nothing's unanticipated: they dog-whistle and their dogs come barking

[Skittles]

4. I honestly no longer see dog whistling

they are pretty much blow-horning their racism now

[pampango]

3. Trump: "'Some people say' we have already had a Muslim president." Hard to out-Islamophobe this guy

though Carson and others are giving it their best shots.

Such rhetoric is par for the course for Carson, possibly the most conspiracy-theory-minded candidate in the race, who is campaigning on his belief that America is turning into Nazi Germany as a result of a Marxist-Leninist-Alinskyite plot to literally enslave Americans.

Despite his suggestion that millions of Americans are disloyal and sinister members of society who should never hold high office because they do not share his faith, Carson nonetheless considers himself to be a staunch defender of religious freedom … but only for the followers of certain religions.

Carson later told The Hill that he believes presidents should be “sworn in on a stack of Bibles, not a Koran,” adding that Muslims believe that their faith “encourages you to lie to achieve your goals.” He also warned of the prospect of a Muslim president imposing Sharia law because “Muslims feel that their religion is very much a part of your public life and what you do as a public official, and that’s inconsistent with our principles and our Constitution.”

Apparently 'religious freedom' applies only to Christians - particularly the fundamentalist variety - and not to religions, like Islam, that do not meet with the approval of the government and its politicians. (Is that "Animal Farm" 'religious freedom'?)

Carson fails to note that many fundamentalist Christians also "feel that their religion is very much a part of your public life and what you do as a public official ..." Indeed he endorses their 'religious freedom' to do exactly what he accuses Muslims of doing.