The Right Manipulates Muslims - and Boy Scouts

I was never a Boy Scout but I was a helluva Cub Scout.

Pack 30, First Congregational Church. I rose through the ranks: Bobcat, Wolf, Bear, Lion.I
accumulated Gold and Silver Arrow Points, the Cubs' junior varsity
version of merit badges. My mom was a Cub Scout den mother and spent a
lot of time teaching fake Indian campfire songs and decorating various
arts and crafts with poster paint.

But
when the time came to transfer to the big guys, the Boy Scouts, I saw
years of knot tying and helping little old ladies across the street
ahead of me and opted not to re-up. Nonetheless, I feel my time served
qualifies me to have an opinion about President Obama not appearing in
person at this week's National Scout Jamboree in Caroline County,
Virginia.

The
Jamboree is a gathering of the clans that takes place every five years
or so and this year's is especially significant as 2010 marks the
centennial of the scouting movement in the United States.
Congratulations. The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) is a wonderful
organization. Truly.

But
the right wing of this country, with the aid of Fox News and other
media outlets, has opted to ignore many of the qualities one usually
associates with a good scout -- trustworthiness, honesty and especially
cleanliness -- to sling mud at the president for not making a personal
appearance at the Jamboree. Instead, he videotaped a message for the
lads.

Not
exactly a sin on the order of massive oil spills or ethnic
purification. But to hear conservative commentators you'd think he had
at the very least used the flag to buff Air Force One. All of this
complicated by the fact that the president came to New York instead for
some fundraisers and an appearance on "The View."

"It's
unfortunate that President Obama didn't take the time to promote the
Boy Scouts this week, but they should be able to thrive, as they have
for the past 100 years, without him." So sniffed Eagle Scout Nik Nelson,
writing in The Weekly Standard, where he's an intern.

What
these folks fail to mention is that President Obama met with a group of
scouts and their leaders just a little more than two weeks ago. In the
Oval Office. In fact, the president does so every year, but this year, special attention was given to the centennial.

As Scouting Magazine's
official blog reported, "During the White House meeting, the president
and the BSA delegation shared their mutual goals for addressing key
concerns for our nation's youth: healthy living, service to the
community, and environmental stewardship."

Admitting
this, of course, would mess with the conservative narrative. Nor, it
turns out, is this the first time that elements of the right have
shamelessly tried to use the Boy Scouts, of all organizations, to impugn
the Obama White House. A whispering campaign via e-mail (in cyberspace,
no one can hear you scream) alleged that unlike his predecessors the
president has refused to sign Eagle Scout certificates. As it turns out,
there was a gap between the Bush and Obama presidencies when blank
certificates were sent out.

But, as the debunking website www.snopes.com
reports, "Production of new Eagle Scout certificates bearing President
Obama's signature... got underway in late 2009 for distribution to Scouts
who obtained Eagle rank in Spring 2010. President Obama has also mailed
over 13,000 personal letters of congratulation to individual Eagle
Scouts, including a September 2009 case in which every single one of the
five most senior members of Troop 182 in Palatine, Illinois, earned
eagle rank."

Now
all of this would be simply silly if not for the fact that this is the
pattern: find a bright, shining lie, an often trivial issue, reshape it
to your agenda of attack and fear, distort and dissemble, bang it like a
drum to rouse the media circus and distract the public -- and its public
servants -- from the critical work necessary to survive as a republic.

The
Shirley Sherrod debacle at the Department of Agriculture last week is
just one example. The current fight over building an Islamic "mosque"
near (not "at") Ground Zero here in Manhattan is another and perhaps the
loudest.

Once again, downtown New Yorkers are faced with outsiders telling us our business. Newt Gingrich: "There
should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York so long as there are
no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia. The time for double standards
that allow Islamists to behave aggressively toward us while they demand
our weakness and submission is over." Sarah Palin: "Many
Americans, myself included, feel it would be an intolerable and tragic
mistake to allow such a project sponsored by such an individual to go
forward on such hallowed ground. This is nothing close to 'religious
intolerance.' It's just common decency."

But as developer Sharif El-Gamal told Jordana Horn of The Jerusalem Post,
"Those aren't my neighbors, my friends or my New Yorkers. A vocal
minority have come out to amplify their own agendas of hate and bigotry
that have nothing to do with my project." He notes, too, as have many
others, that calling it a mosque is an exaggeration. "There will be a
mosque component, which will be a separate not-for-profit component of
the project," Gamal said. "It's going to be a small component in a
community center, just like the 92nd Street Y has a synagogue."

This is not to deny the emotions
that always will be stirred by 9/11, especially by the friends and
families of those who died there, but as Padraic O'Hare, director of the
Merrimack College's Center for the Study of Jewish-Christian-Muslim
Relations at Merrimack College, wrote in The Washington Post.
"Build a house which nurtures and cultivates less wounded, less
ego-driven and more just and peaceful Muslims, people of real and
healthy prayerfulness? Hand me the shovel."

Meanwhile,
as the citizenry has its attention diverted by xenophobic anti-Muslim
harangues, on Thursday night, Republicans in Congress killed the Zadroga
9/11 Health and Compensation Act to help emergency workers and others
near Ground Zero. As the New York Daily News reported, the bill "would
spend $3.2 billion on health care over the next 10 years for people
sickened from their exposure to the toxic smoke and debris of the
shattered World Trade Center. It would
spend another $4.2 billion to compensate victims over that span, and
make another $4.2 billion in compensation available for the next 11
years."

GOP members called it a "slush fund." Is there a merit badge for classy?