I was raised in THE CHURCH and am still in the CHURCH. My natural curiosity led me to study Islam many years ago and I have an appreciation for the faith, but not enough to convert or recommend. The Strangest thing about the Right wing's attempts to paint Obama as a Muslim is that Christians spend so much time trying to convert the non-christian world, that they should count it as a victory that the son of a muslim and a half hearted christian would choose and proclaim the Christian faith.
For a couple of thousand years (more or less) Christians have traveled to the far corners of the world to spread the good news of Jesus Christ. He who died for their sins and whose flesh we swallow and blood we drink once a month for communion sent his apostles out into the world to spread HIS teachings and the Gospel of salvation. Outrageously, Christian Republican operatives have commissioned Muslim so-called scholars to put forth the idea that Obama is a muslim because his father was a muslim and therefore, Obama is a muslim regardless of what faith he CHOOSES.
What does this kind of logic say about the countless missionaries who have forsaken the niceties of home to learn strange languages, live(often)in squalor, and face opposition to the point of death to convert little brown boys and girls like Barack Hussein Obama? Are they working in vain? Once a pagan always a pagan? Are they just suckers for believing that they really do what Jesus would do to no effect because people like the McCains and Palins of the world will not accept their converts as "real christians"?
Who in America accepts as legitimate the idea that we ARE what our parents WERE? Self Determination is the cornerstone of Freedom and We Americans love this Freedom that Massa Bush still lets us have.
The Rational Right has a choice to make. If Barack is a Christian, then the Democratic nominee is a shining example of the transforming power of their Faith. If he is not, then Christianity is the world's oldest confidence game and those that convert are not changed, not transformed, not brought into the kingdom. That would make the self sacrificing missionaries and and new converts something other than what they believe. That would make them suckers.