Why burn Qurans when you can move a mosque?

Firebrand Pastor Jones now says he won’t be burning Qurans on Saturday because he claims he extracted a deal to get the Cordoba House project moved to a different site.

“Americans don’t want the mosque there and of course Muslims don’t want us to burn Qurans,” Jones said.

The problem is, Jones appears to have cut his deal with someone who has no say in the location of the mosque: Florida Imam Muhammad al-Masri.

In an interview on CNN on Wednesday, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf reiterated his commitment to open the Islamic center in Lower Manhattan.

“I am glad that Pastor Jones has decided not to burn any Qurans,” Rauf told ABC News on Thursday. “However, I have not spoken with Pastor Jones or Imam Musri. I am surprised by their announcement.”

The likely political effect of Jones’ Quran burning stunt is that it will strengthen mainstream opposition to Cordoba House. In response to Jones’ antics, many opponents of the Islamic center have taken the opportunity to paint themselves as moderates in tune with popular opinion.

As the Washington Post reports:

Most Americans say the planned Muslim community center and place of worship should not be built in Lower Manhattan, with the sensitive locale being their overwhelming objection, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Two-thirds of those polled object to the prospective Cordoba House complex near the site of the former twin towers, including a slim majority who express strongly negative views. Eighty-two percent of those who oppose the construction say it’s because of the location, although 14 percent (9 percent of all Americans) say they would oppose such building anywhere in the country.

The new results come alongside increasingly critical public views of Islam: 49 percent of all Americans say they have generally unfavorable opinions of Islam, compared with 37 percent who say they have favorable ones. That’s the most negative split on the question in Post-ABC polls dating to October 2001.

Furthermore, the poll makes it clear that while America remains at war, economic recovery is nowhere near in sight, and tackling climate change has yet to be treated as a national and global imperative, the focus of the upcoming midterm elections is likely to be a minor construction project in New York.

Regardless of their rationale, most voters who firmly oppose the center’s construction in Lower Manhattan say they feel strongly enough about the issue that it would influence their congressional vote in November. These voters side by a wide margin with Republican over Democratic candidates.

Overall, 83 percent of Republicans oppose the Muslim center, as do 65 percent of independents and 53 percent of Democrats. Among Republicans, generally negative views have spiked higher: 67 percent of those who identify as Republican say they have unfavorable views of Islam, up from 42 percent in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Big majorities of Protestants and Catholics are against it, with opposition peaking among white evangelical Protestants. By contrast, most people with no professed religion support the construction.

As the issue reveals, rarely is there a discernible difference between piety and pettiness — at least in America.

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6 thoughts on “Why burn Qurans when you can move a mosque?

  1. foolmeoverandoverandover

    if it was jewish synagogue, theyd have a legitimate reason to complain, but theyd probably even volunteer to help build it out of “respect” for the people who died that day.

  2. dickerson3870

    RE: “As the issue reveals, rarely is there a discernible difference between piety and pettiness — at least in America.” – Woodward
    MY COMMENT: Well stated, with some outstanding alliteration to boot!

  3. DE Teodoru

    Where were all the “righteous” Jews like loud mouth ADL leader Foxman who ring their hands in theatrical panic every time a menorah is defaced or a synagogue undergoes vandalism crying out that the new Holocaust is biting at our heels? Imagine what that thug-in-print Geller—the “ground-zero-mosque killer”– must be thinking now: next time she won’t just spill ink and may resort to gasoline. Imagine that: every time they want to prove their mensch-hood henceforth neocons will set fire to a Koran….or threaten to unless Muslims stand on their heads in praise of Israel as the master power in the Middle East. At least this screwy pastor thinks only the Koran is evil but neocons think ALL Muslims are evil, though publicly they pretend otherwise when pressed. So now they won’t threaten to burn books but will revive the JEWISH DEFENCE LEAGUE of gangsters that declared war on Muslims decades ago. Jews were so disgusted it atrophied like a tumor without vascularization. At least JDL did its thing locally, the neocons did it globally declaring “WORLD WAR IV” against Islam. Just as 9/11 was a challenge to Jihadis: TOP THAT, this Koran burning is a TOP THAT challenge to all Muslim haters. And you can be sure, what with all the publicity this got one shepherd with just 50 sheep, the lone haters of Islam seeking some free media time sure got the message. It’s getting harder and harder to be an American as your silence in the face of such teapartians is making this nation look like a threat to humanity. Those who love that Lady holding the lamp of welcome in NY Harbor ought to be going out of their way to make known that we Americans are NOT neocons nor their “Christian” (sic) stooges. Do more than comment on Mr. Woodward’s always wise posts. Go to that pastor’s so called “church”, encircle it and shoot all day: OUT DAMNED SPOT on the American flag!

  4. Eleonora

    I commented on the previous “Qur’an burning” article the following before seeing the new one:

    Well – there seems to be a change of plan … I read this morning on “7 days” (an Arabic online newspaper) that the (Muslim) owner of the ground zero real estate went to Jones and offered not to build the mosque there if he calls off the Qur’an burning.

    According to the news Jones agreed. Blackmailing apparently brought one more time results.

    I would not have offered this to Jones out of principle but would have let the world realize what today’s political landscape is made of. Especially to whom (onluy) applies “national security and security risk”. Let them burn as many Qur’an as they wish. Why should this bother the Muslims? It wouldn’t bother me. After all, it’s only paper with some letters in it. The content doesn’t get harmed by the burning.

    But then … maybe … it’s better after all.

    to DE Teodoru – well written again! Thanks!

  5. Ian Arbuckle

    All this proves is that democracy would be a travesty in a country dominated by a majority of “dumbed down” ignorant self-righteous idiots. Oh, and I forgot the most important attributes of all, “bigoted” and above all conditioned to be self delusional.

    The fact that most Americans believe they are a democracy and not a “police state” and that their opinions and votes count for anything, and the fact that they for the most part believe that their “government” is effectively protecting their interests under a Constitution, while in fact their country is run by a hand full of bankers and a military industrial complex with appropriate quislings to front them, is proof absolute to me at least that “you cannot fool all of the people, all of the time” but that Abe didn’t recon on those few who are left, who realise the game and speak the truth to fools can be easily discredited and ignored in a society where the media is well managed and curiosity for truth sufficiently dulled.

    I wonder when the masses finally find out how and who brought down the WTC 1, 2 & 7, and attacked the Pentagon, on 9-11-2001, will they try and limit the building of Synagogues and Baptist churches?

    If you are one of those who has not figured it out yet, watch:
    Zero-an investigation into 9–11
    http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2296490368603788739#

    Then if your problem is the question “why?”, you should spend the time to see:
    America ; Freedom From Fascism
    http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1656880303867390173#

    Those who, after being faced by such questions, still accept without a doubt that which they are expected to believe by their “government” (big brother) must face the consequences, be they debt slavery, endless war, or another form modern “serfdom” in a tyrannical New World Order, but at least they are already fully conditioned by self delusion.

    To take reality on board in its full dimension and its implications is a shocker, no doubt. Many prefer the comfort of the warm sand around their heads. Eric Arthur Blair AKA George Orwell would be killing himself laughing if he was not dead already or maybe he would just hang his head weep for the sheeple and the thousands, no millions, who died and have suffered to prevent just such an outcome for humanity.

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