Al Jazeera Quotes Dean's Anti-Bush Rhetoric

QATAR (Talon News) -- Democrat presidential candidate Howard Dean has links on his campaign website to the various news stories that cover his campaign. He does not, however, have a link to a story that ran in the September 11th copy of Aljazeera.net where the candidate is quoted attacking President George W. Bush.

During debates and on the stump, Dean has been an outspoken and unapologetic critic of Bush and his policies and his unrelenting attacks have now caught the attention of the Arab world's leading newspaper: Al Jazeera.

In a story that ran in the paper's online English language edition on 9/11, reporter Shaheen Chughtai writes, "Howard Dean ... has blamed the president for transforming the 'tidal wave of support and goodwill that engulfed us after the tragedy of 9/11' into "distrust, scepticism, and hostility".

The article (web link), "Two years later: A more dangerous world," examines whether America's actions following the 9/11 attacks have made the world safer or given rise to more violence.

Dean's comments are the only ones coming from the field of nine Democrat presidential challengers.

Shaheen Chugtai writes, "After the United States overthrew the Taliban in Afghanistan and then ousted Saddam Hussein in Iraq, President George Bush assured his compatriots the world was a safer place. But two years and two foreign wars after 9/11 triggered Bush's War on Terror, Americans do not feel safer, according to a US survey. While US troops are busy fighting "terror" abroad, their compatriots are often terrified back home."

The article continues, "Worse still, Bush's so-called War on Terror is creating more hostility, thus raising the risk of attacks against the US - a catastrophic policy failure."

Quote: "According to a John Zogby poll (see p. 95), 46 percent of Muslims say they are Democrats, compared with 39 percent of all Americans, and 16 percent say they are Republicans, compared to 34 percent of all Americans. ..."

Those statistics were taken before the 2000 election.

CAIR Chairman Omar M. Ahmad told a crowd of California Muslims in July 1998, "Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran . . . should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth." ~

"While American authorities are trying to stop terrorism, groups such as CAIR are attempting to delay and sabotage the process. They are not partners, not patriots, not allies; they are a significant fifth column in the War on Islamofascist Terror." ~
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=9455

"...American Muslims, he says, have been watching with alarm and concern, efforts of Islamists in the US. "Organizations like CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations ) and MPAC (Muslim Public Affairs Council) have deliberately been trying to poison the hearts and minds of American Muslims against America. By subtly suggesting that American policies are controlled by Zionists, they exploit the anti-Semitism that prevails in Islamist - dominated communities," said Dr. Khalid Duran, a renowned scholar and authority on Islamic history. ....

...Dr. Younus Mansour, an Egyptian scholar and author, said that Daniel Pipes is doing a service for the Muslims by warning America against the designs of CAIR, MPAC, and their ilk. These organizations want to divide American society. Any country that supports freedoms and democratic values is our friend and all those who work against the American interests are the enemies of American Muslims.

These American Muslims were reacting to comments by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a supporter for HAMAS and Hezbollah, which has called Pipes' nomination "insensitive". ...." ~ http://www.paktoday.com/pipes.htm

More here:
In Defense of Daniel Pipes: A New Jihad - by Thomas J. Haidon Pakistan Today May 16, 2003
http://www.supportingdanielpipes.org/article/30

Walk down memory lane - before the 2000 election:

Arab- and Muslim-American Presence Felt at Democratic National Convention — Pat McDonnell Twair
http://www.washington-report.org/backissues/101100/0010011.html

*

Washington Report on middle eastern affairs
http://www.washington-report.org/backissues/101100/0010021.html

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2000, pages 21-22

Year 2000 Elections

Muslims Can Swing the Election—But Will We?

By Mahjabeen Islam-Husain

My small-town paper gives four lines to news of paramount importance, and half a page to the life of a 20-year-old beauty queen, definitely on her way to becoming Miss America and Miss Universe. So when my local paper ran a half-page article entitled, “Increasing Muslim Population Expected to be a Force in Election,” my pulse zoomed from a staid sixty beats per minute to tachycardic proportions.

The introductory paragraph is even more exciting. It describes a poll which shows that Muslims are deeply conservative on some issues and very liberal on others, making Muslims a possible “swing” group in such close “battleground” states as Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

The importance of Muslims in the U.S. was very well articulated by the Archbishop of Chicago, Cardinal George, who said, “Islam is now a public religion in the United States.”

America’s 6.7 million Muslims can be divided into three groups, explained Omar Ahmed, chairman of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

Speaking at the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) convention held in Chicago Labor Day weekend, he identified the three groups as the indigenous Muslims, the immigrant Muslims and the second-generation Muslims.

This classification is very helpful in understanding the American Muslim psyche, and the potential role Muslims can play in the upcoming elections.

The composition of the American Muslim community, Ahmed said, is 25 percent Arab, 25 percent African, 10 percent Indian/Pakistani and 10 percent from Iran, Afghanistan and Turkey, for a total of 70 percent immigrant Muslims.

The remaining 30 percent of American Muslims fall into the indigenous and second-generation categories.

It is the fact that America’s 6.7 million Muslims are concentrated in such key voting areas as Toledo, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Detroit, Dearborn, Chicago, Philadelphia, Dallas, Houston, northern Virginia, Hoboken and Jersey City that makes them so important this fall.

According to a John Zogby poll (see p. 95), 46 percent of Muslims say they are Democrats, compared with 39 percent of all Americans, and 16 percent say they are Republicans, compared to 34 percent of all Americans. ..."

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