It's Time to Support Muslim Republicans: George Bush, the American Muslim

We Muslims keep getting hints (from Above) that we have a part to play; too many obvious signs that we are in the world's eye no matter what -- from negative events to positive events, there are clear indications that we are being given opportunities to explain ourselves and to give ourselves and to make our agenda a better one.  Certainly we as a community are too small here, and too disorganized globally, to be a part of the great conversations of this age, but somehow we always manage to end up in them, for better and worse.  (With hardship, God says, comes ease.)  Perhaps we can take lessons from this and energize our own communities to accept and work past our great divides when now more than ever we need those lessons learned; locally, between immigrants and African Americans, and globally, between Sunnah and Shi'i, modernist and traditionalist, conservative and moderate, practicing and non-practicing.  But there is another element to this, which includes the political relationships within the American Muslim Ummah.

This is the time for a Muslim Republican core to emerge.  Right now.  As the Republican Party, shattered, tries to pick up the pieces of itself and decide in which direction to move.  Not that I would want to be part of that core; I am sympathetic to some elements of a Republican philosophy, especially of an old school, paleo-con variety, but not much else.  I am arguing that American Muslims, who as far as I can tell overwhelmingly threw considerable time, energy and passion behind Obama, must especially now reach out to and embrace those in our community who want to work with the Republican Party and who see themselves on that side of the aisle.  Right now, they will be part of a conversation within that party of what went wrong, why, how, when -- and how to get past that.  They need to be in the rooms where those heated discussions take place.  We must remember to do this as we move forward, because we as a community can still find ourselves with yet another short end of a many-ended stick.

We saw ourselves and our religion become the nationalized, socialized American punching bag, in the last seven years but especially after the Iraq War and in this election climate.  Obama's election has shown that many Americans were not going to buy the racist garbage pumped out by the loser Islamophobes of Islamofascism Invention; take your Third Jihad and shove it.  That's so amazing; I too was initially freaked by Obsession and then warmed up when I realized that, the more you cry wolf, the less people vote for you.  But the fact lingers unlike a wudu broken in the wind: They tried to win by using us as an insult.  He's bad because he's Muslim.  Time and time again, association with us was association with some form of evil, from McCain's unwillingness to defend Arabs and Muslims to Obama's distancing himself from Arabs and Muslims.  Yes, today America has reached a stunningly positive outcome, a great leap towards overcoming the very fundamental flaw and hypocrisy that has marked this country's claims to equality during its very independence and since then -- and that not by a radical agenda, it must be pointed out (though it built on that agenda's achievements), but by an insistent emphasis on our basic goodness, our national character and strength.  That must be remembered, as we must remember that the battles to heal a divided nation are not nearly over, and can be drowned out in a sense of self-congratulation.  This is where Muslim Republicans come in. 

This is where we don't go George Bush, bragging about "political capital" and then squandering it, and the country's wealth, till he is a complete non-factor, except that association with him is like but worse than association with America's Muslims.  He got no bailout himself.  What delicious irony: I mean, at least Colin Powell defended us.

But will we remain the shunned minority?  How do we make sure one party -- I'm not going to say which one -- doesn't become our committed nemesis, if not in words then in deeds (or song).

Unfortunately for African Americans, they were largely excluded from the G.O.P., leaving that community beholden to one party, and leaving that community outside and alone whenever their party was not in power (which has been too often.)  In fact, from the Civil Rights era onward, increasingly it has been engines of social change, activism, engagement, entertainment and local-qua-community work that has pushed integration; the federal government helped, but since the 1980's has chipped away at that agenda.  We Muslims cannot allow ourselves to become a one-party population; not because the other party deserves our support but because we are too small to be beholden to one party and then left out to dry when the other party's in charge.  Both parties must know that to insult us, to revile us, to be embarrassed of us, will in consequence lose them our considerable education, wealth and activism.  We are not blue, or red, we are Americans with a profound moral mission and a deep desire to contribute spiritually and socially, whether on the right or the left.  But not necessarily one or the other, so that we remain the bogeyman.

We cannot allow the Republican Party to become the party of the bitter minority, if only because that bitterness will become constitutional and will be turned on us when they return to power, as one day they certainly will -- all trends are cyclical of course.  The Jewish community has done a good job of making sure both parties respect their community and its interests, in different ways of course -- but we find Jews in both parties.  We rarely, if ever, find African Americans in both parties.  This is important because the G.O.P. will either implode, or it will become aware of why it lost -- America is changing, demographically.  It cannot rely on a supposedly homogeneous white, non-coastal chunk of red meat America to deliver it into power, time and again.  If the Republicans are humble enough and wise enough to see how their politics of exclusion hurt their party this year -- i.e., Palin's narrow appeal to the old base with the constant smearing of Obama, which disgusted most Americans -- then they will rebuild quickly.  It is important that in our communities we accept that there are Muslim Republicans, and give them the support necessary to make sure the Republican Party acknowledges minorities (in its midst, and then more generally) as it goes through this process of rebuilding.  Firstly because religion transcends party; being a Republican does not violate a religious command or code; secondly because it is, for the health of our community, the smarter thing to do.  We can't let ourselves get booted out of the House and then savaged in the press, as we often are. 

But that's for the coming months and years. 

Now, let me just end by saying how stunned I was, in disbelief as our Muslim community sat around watching on the edge of our seats, cheering and calculating and then celebrating, till late at night and it was time to get out.  Walking home, across Morningside Drive, I could hear from blocks away the cheers pouring forth from central Harlem, though I must say, nothing moved me as much as seeing Jesse Jackson, crying.  That's what it's all about.  The fulfillment of a community's drive to be accepted; there are many battles ahead and we should not in exuberance believe that Obama will necessarily solve them, or even that he can, especially if we too do not step up and do our part to help this country.  He rode a wave of disaffected Americans certain we could, and will, do a lot better.  He was and is at the top of that wave.  But it must not be allowed to peter out.  The challenges ahead are too great. 

We have a black President-elect.  A Barack Hussein Obama.

Comments

[Yusuf Smith]

As-Salaamu 'alaikum,

A couple of years ago I did something similar by joining the Conservative party, at a time just after Michael Howard had resigned as leader and David Cameron was just about to come along (I did not join in time to get a vote). I did not bother renewing my membership after a year, because I found them moving in an increasingly anti-Muslim direction, cosying up to think tanks who pushed "social cohesion" by attacking concessions to Muslim religious rights. I do think it's unhealthy for Muslims to be too attached to one party, and perhaps Muslims could vote for Tories (or Republicans) at more local levels, but if a party trades on public bigotry towards us, there's simply no way we can vote for it, even if we join it.

[Haroon Moghul]

I entirely agree with you, which is why I found Muslim support of Republicans so galling this time around. I disagree with their economic agenda, but it is not in and of itself grounds for refusing the Party. Yet I feel like in the last few months, a number of moderate Republicans crossed over to vote for Obama in part because they didn't like what had happened to their Party.

I hope that as the GOP rethinks itself, it doesn't give in to Muslim-bashing; in a sense, perhaps they have the very obvious lesson that Muslim bashing failed and failed miserably, and Obsession-like campaigns did nothing. I might be too optimistic, as you point out w/ respect to the Tories, but at the least I hope Muslim Republicans do make some effort... and that we as a community can help them try to steer that conversation in a better direction...

For now, I'm just happy to be on the left side. Which is the right side. Etc.

[sophister]

So on what possible grounds would you propose we ally ourselves with republicans? Because their social values align with ours? I agree we should not be attached to one party, but I think there is no way the republican party would want us. That would just hurt their base way too much. Even if a few people left now, to vote for Obama, if muslims start filling their ranks, who knows what would happen to them. Is that what you are proposing? That we destroy the repubs from the inside?

[Susu]

A Muslim Republican core? We already have the Gull-Hasan family, and many other well to do Muslim families who quietly support the Republicans. If the Gull-Hasans are any indication, they're all a bunch of wealthy disconnected knuckleheads too. Oh well, I suppose the Gull-Hasans are like our Muslim version of comic relief. Stewart, Leno, and Colbert have W. and Cheney. We have Seeme, Muhammad Ali, and Asma. Unfortunately, our buddy Muhamamd Ali lost in his bid to become part of the Colorado State Senate last night, which makes me want to shout "Yes we can!"

[svend]

Salaams,

Quite unusually, I disagree with much of what you've said in this post.

Doesn't seem to me that it's the responsibility of Muslims to be reaching out to hypocrites who've trampled on rule of law and essentially made Muslim-baiting part of patriotism (or "just" passively watched as it happened before their eyes).

Also, I'm not sure we'll even need to try. After this PR fiasco, the proverbial mountain just may come to...umm...you know. The GOP's going to need to reach out to us, even more out of a desire to to combat the new popular link between them and Islamophobia than a sincere change of heart.

But if you can stomach Voodoo Economics and the GOP's various ideological obsessions, it's probably a great time to be a Muslim Republican. They're going to be eager to highlight what little Muslim involvement they have. If you're Muslim and have a pulse, you'll probably find yourself suddenly promoted soon.

As for the supposed need to saving the Republican Party, if it can't evolve its thinking after this painful reckoning, good riddance for all our sakes. Better for these zealots to be raging out in the wilderness for a while than back in control of the agenda again.

What's more, a schism between the neos, theos, libs and paleos might even be a good thing for American democracy; one step closer to a multi-party system with a real spectrum of policy positions instead of these almost identical platforms on so many pressing issues.

[Haroon Moghul]

As a social conservative, with strong sympathies for some of the ideas of the paleo-con movement, I don't identify the Republican Party as solely the party of the rich, nor do I see it as the neo-con party. It became those things increasingly, at the expense of a system of conservative, anti-imperial sentiments and preference for local government, local institutions and a sense that government cannot always pose the best solution. These ideas need to be sorted out, thought through, evolved and modified, but cannot so long as the party was the party of big business + neo-con crazies.

Now is precisely that time. When the G.O.P. is freaking out in the wilderness, debating what it represents, Muslims should be a part of that debate, pointing out the flaws of the direction the party took, against the Constitution and the Republic, not from a position of hubris but of participation. What this means practically is not allowing Muslim institutions to become so caught up in the wave of Obama's election that we essentially conclude that we are now and forever democratic bastions.

Now is the time for Muslim institutions, including mosques, to reach out to local government and to try to get both sides to notice them and this can only be done if we remain, at some level, pragmatically Democratic or functionally Independent: The G.O.P. should know that it still has a chance of reaching Muslim voters, and the Democrats should know that they can still lose us; namely, Obama cannot continue his rightward ideological lurch, esp. on foreign policy, in a post-election environment with no consequences.

This also mean we not promote a discourse whereby any type of political conservatism is inherently un-Islamic; we may disagree or agree, but religion and politics are two different things, and religiosity can lead us to different interpretations.