Hussein Rashid makes a similar point to the one I made yesterday about conservatives portraying Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf's pedestrian liberal views on some American foreign-policy matters as evidence of terrorist sympathies:
While I may criticize Abdul-Rauf's leadership of Park51, it is important to understand that he does have a following in the United States. In fact, I find myself sympathetic to many of his points regarding the future of Islam in America. The reason he has this following is that he tries to be thoughtful and knowledgeable about things he is asked to speak about. He has said things that have been controversial, not for their content, but for their inelegance. In many ways his thoughts and criticisms of US foreign policy are very much in line with liberal critiques. And Abdul-Rauf's opinions on our engagement in Iraq are even shared by Ron Paul, a libertarian/conservative politician.
[...]
While the immediate goal is to discredit Abdul-Rauf, the long-term goal is to link liberal thought in this country to terrorism. If a Muslim has politically liberal thoughts, he or she can be made out to support radical jihadism, therefore liberal politics must support jihadism. It is a faulty logic based on the politics of destruction. The assault on President Obama's Christianity is also another manifestation of this phenomenon. If the President is speaking from a liberal and Christian position, then the expression of liberal thought by Muslims becomes harder to attack. Therefore, Obama's Christianity must be attacked as well.
As for the latter point, I don't know that there's that much thought behind it. There's a long tradition of painting critics of militaristic foreign policy as subversive or treasonous, even pro-terrorist, but Rauf is Muslim, so with him, the accusation ignites all kinds of internalized fears about Islam and terrorism.
