Morons Smear Obama

Wingnuts fabricate tales that appeal to the voter’s fears
and prejudices. Refuting these lies involves some mental effort.

Barack Obama had no religion until he became a Christian.

Obama never was a Muslim.

Ali Eteraz, HuffPost
“Luttwack, NYTimes, says:

As the son of the Muslim father, Senator Obama was born a
Muslim under Muslim law as it is universally understood. It makes no difference
that, as Senator Obama has written, his father said he renounced his religion.
Likewise, under Muslim law based on the Koran his mother's Christian background
is irrelevant.
With few exceptions, the jurists of all Sunni and Shiite schools prescribe
execution for all adults who leave the faith not under duress; the recommended
punishment is beheading at the hands of a cleric, although in recent years
there have been both stonings and hangings.
There are fundamental problems with views like Luttwack's.
First of all, under orthodox Islamic law, the punishment for apostasy can
only be carried out by the state. Luttwack, with his facile understanding of
Sharia, clearly doesn't understand this. The clerics Luttwack is talking about
can't just stroll up to Obama and stick him in the sand. They have to go
through the established procedural norms of Islamic criminal law which is
inherently tied to the functioning of a state apparatus. This means that a
country like Saudi Arabia or
Iran or Pakistan would
have to indict Obama on apostasy charges in their courts. Obviously this is not
going to happen, because none of these countries have jurisdiction over Obama.
Not only is it asinine for any of these countries to make such an indictment,
it doesn't make sense under international law -- which, in case Mr. Luttwack
has forgotten, is what the world is suppose to abide by. Luttwack's affirmation
of Islamic law over and above international law should raise concerns, not only
about his expertise, but also his allegiances.
Second, it may be true that there will be fanatics who believe that they can
flout the rules of Islamic law and try to assassinate Obama without permission
from a state. However, these people probably want to assassinate American
presidents regardless -- so considering their opinion is a bit farcical. Is
there a functional difference between a fanatic that wants to kill our
president because he is a Western Cowboy and a fanatic that wants to kill our
president because he is a Western Apostate? Luttwack's article is solid
fear-mongering.
Third, people that appear to be Muslims, but don't follow Islam and choose
another religion, are permitted under Islamic law to leave Islam without
penalty. A major
case in Malaysia
recently handed down -- a woman who was Muslim for some time in order to marry
an Iranian was permitted to go back to Buddhism -- is an example. Obama, unlike
the Malaysian woman, didn't even make a profession of faith to Islam, so it
makes even less sense for him to be considered an apostate.
Fourth, Islamic law recognizes abandonment by the biological father. Obama's
Kenyan father abandoned Obama. As such, any religious imprimatur he may have
had over Obama -- which is already a stretch since the man was an atheist -- is
null and void. In such a situation, Obama's mother's religion is controlling.
She was not Muslim. Even if someone makes the argument from patriarchy: that
Obama's paternal grandparents were his rightful guardians, that would fail
since they also constructively abandoned him.
There is a corollary issue here: what about the fact that Obama's second
father, the Indonesian, was a "non-practicing Muslim." Doesn't his
faith transfer over to Obama? The answer is no. Under Islamic law, step-fathers
do not acquire ownership over the child. Their relationship to the child
emanates from their relationship to the child's mother. Again, Obama's mother
was not Muslim. If a practicing Muslim man marries a Christian woman with
children from a previous marriage, her children wouldn't automatically become
Muslim. Here, the new father wasn't even practicing.
Luttwack and the other fake experts promoting this new smear do not
understand Islam. Religion is not hereditary as it is in Judaism. Islam is not
a race. Just because a child has a Muslim father -- which, again, Obama didn't
-- doesn't mean anything unless the child is being raised as a Muslim. At the
time of birth, Muslims engage in a symbolic act -- of saying the Call to Prayer
in the child's ear -- that renders a child Muslim. If Obama's father was
agnostic/atheist, then he wouldn't have done such a thing.
No call to prayer in the ear, not raised as a Muslim, born to an atheist
father, and then abandoned to a Christian mother both by father and his family,
equals not Muslim. Obama is right to say he had no religion until he became a
Christian.”