William Kristol doesn’t believe President Obama is a Muslim. But Kristol outlines in a new Weekly Standard column the reasons why mainstream media outlets ought to cut some slack to those Americans who believe Obama does practice Islam.
Kristol also points to an important part of the president’s system of beliefs that’s less confusing:
But Americans aren?t all mixed up in their judgment of President
Obama?s policies. Obama said last week, at a Hollywood fundraiser, that
he and congressional Democrats ?have been able to deliver the most
progressive legislative agenda?one that helps working families?not just
in one generation, maybe two, maybe three.?…
Today?s progressives are multiculturalists. They?re inclined to make
grand claims about the positive merits of a multicultural,
non-judgmental mosaic replacing our old, uniculturalist melting-pot view
of America. But when political realities force them to retreat, as
Obama has done in the mosque controversy, from a proud multiculturalism
to a narrow defense of the right to the free exercise of religion and
the right to build on private property, they?re in trouble. The free
exercise of religion and respect for private property are not a
promising agenda for progressives.Progressivism is in retreat. Obama?s problem isn?t that people
falsely think he?s a Muslim. It?s that the public is correctly
concluding he?s a garden-variety multiculturalist progressive. So
November?s election won?t just be a repudiation of one non-Muslim
president. It will be a repudiation of a multiculturalist progressive
worldview?and of the bitter elites who cling desperately to that
worldview and are consumed by antipathy to most Americans, who don?t.
