Obama speaks out for Muslims

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The Hill:

Obama speaks out for Muslims
By Sam Youngman - 09/10/10 01:05 PM ET

In a press conference designed to defend his economic policies, President Obama waded deeper into religious tensions gripping the nation by speaking out forcefully in defense of religious pluralism.

Speaking a day before the ninth anniversary of 9/11, Obama made a passionate plea to Americans to differentiate between terrorists and Muslims.

“We have to make sure that we don't start turning on each other,” Obama said at his first full press conference since May. “And I will do everything that I can as long as I'm president of the United States to remind the American people that we are one nation under God. And we may call that God different names, but we remain one nation.”
While the president spent a great deal of time discussing the “painfully slow” economic recovery and the midterm elections, the majority of the press conference centered on a discussion about U.S. relations with the Muslim world. The summer congressional recess has been dominated by debates surrounding the plans of a New York group to build an Islamic center blocks from Ground Zero and a Florida pastor’s plan, now suspended, to burn copies of the Quran.

While Obama sounded professorial and rehearsed as he repeated his talking points on the economy and the midterms, the president projected a solemn and somewhat impatient tone as he discussed the divide between the U.S. and the Muslim world.

“I've got Muslims who are fighting in Afghanistan in the uniform of the United States armed services,” Obama said. “They're out there putting their lives on the line for us, and we've got to make sure that we are crystal clear, for our sakes and their sakes, they are Americans, and we honor their service.”