http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2007/08/10/gop_islam If you think they hate us now
A Republican victory in 2008 could sink America's reputation in the world even lower.By Joe Conason
Aug. 10, 2007 | Even if George W. Bush is the most awful American president in modern times, as many historians believe, and even though he has brought the United States into unprecedented disrepute around the world, as opinion polls indicate, the bombastic tone of the candidates seeking to succeed him from his own party raises a disturbing possibility.
If the next president is a Republican, this truly bad situation could become still worse.
Concerning the Iraq war, of course, there is no discernible difference between the current president and his would-be Republican successors (with the exception of Ron Paul, the libertarian antiwar candidate from Bush's home state of Texas). The leading GOP contenders have all endorsed the current escalation of U.S. forces. They all share the president's determination to keep our troops there indefinitely. They all insistently echo Bush by linking the invasion and occupation of Iraq with the attacks of 9/11.
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Perhaps Bush's efforts deserve to be dismissed as little more than lip service, but semantics matter. The Republicans most likely to win their party's presidential nomination constantly use language that is meant to inflame anger against Muslims for political advantage.
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Like many other Republican candidates, Giuliani has a limited understanding of Islam and Islamist movements, despite his claims to expertise. Not long ago, he told Charlie Rose that the West must be on guard against the "Islamic Brotherhood," which doesn't exist. (The PBS host noted that Giuliani probably meant the Muslim Brotherhood, a relatively moderate Islamic party that isn't much of a problem compared with al-Qaida or Hezbollah.)
Mitt Romney, his most formidable rival at the moment, uttered a similar gaffe during a debate last May, when he jammed all of Islam into a single hostile juggernaut. "There is a global jihadist movement," said the former Massachusetts governor. "And they've come together as Shi'a and Sunni and Hezbollah and Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and al Qaeda with that intent." A more ignorant description of the Islamic political and theological dispensation is difficult to imagine, but Romney's clumsy conglomeration reflected fears that are common on the Republican right.
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