Former Bush administration Solicitor General and Conservative Republican Ted Olson has voiced support for President Obama's statement regarding the proposed Cordoba House near Ground Zero. Ted Olson's wife, the late conservative author, television personality and activist Barbara Olson, was a passenger aboard the plane that was hijacked and flown into the Pentagon.
This afternoon, Olson appeared on Andrea Mitchell's MSNBC show and she asked Olson for his opinion about the Cordoba House issue.
"Well it may not make me hap-- popular with some people, but I think probably the president was right about this," Olson responded.
I do believe that people of all religions have a right to build edifices, or structures, or places of religious worship or study, where the community allows them to do it under zoning laws and that sort of thing, and that we don't want to turn an act of hate against us by extremists into an act of intolerance for people of religious faith. And I don't think it should be a political issue. It shouldn't be a Republican or Democratic issue, either. I believe Gov. Christie from New Jersey said it well -- that this should not be in that political, partisan marketplace."
Ted Olson is still a very conservative man with whom Democrats and or Progressives would most likely disagree on many issues of the day. However, on this Mosque controversy and on the legality of gay marriage, he is actually making a constitutional as well as what should be the (real) conservative argument in support of both. Mr. Olson knows the Constitution of the United States very well. Most of the Republican politicians today are not really conservatives - rather they are fire-breathing and hypocritical opportunists who use fear mongering, racism and bigotry for electoral advantage.
President Obama's statement:
As a citizen, and as President, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country. And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in Lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances. This is America. And our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakeable. The principle that people of all faiths are welcome in this country and that they will not be treated differently by their government is essential to who we are. The writ of the Founders must endure.
Obama's core declaration here is as simple and clear a statement about what's really at stake in this fight as one could have asked for. Obama argued that an "unshakable" devotion to the notion that all faiths are "welcome" is "essential to who we are," thus casting this as a larger argument over the bedrock moral principles that are the foundation of American identity.
Thanks to TPM for the assist.