Via Glenn Greenwald, we get the story of a protest rally outside an Orange County fundraising dinner for a local Muslim organization. Among the many speakers were two members of congress, Gary Miller and Ed Royce, as well Villa Park City Councilwoman Deborah Pauly, who said some of the most vile things I have ever heard come from the mouth of an elected official. Apparently Muslims meeting is "pure, unadulterated evil" and she has a son who is in the Marines who wants to "speed up their meeting in Paradise" for doing so.
Now, that is not to say that we shouldn't be able to protests, as there were two pretty controversial speakers at the event. But the level of invective that you can see in the video below is simply jaw-dropping. For example how about this line (about two and a half minutes in the video)
We are patriotic Americans and we love our Constitution, and it's going to stay that way. One Nation Under God, not Allah
Now, somebody should probably tell that nice woman that God is not, in fact, in our Constitution, and oh yeah, it does protect the freedom of religion. This sort of hate is not all the norm, but it is clearly on the rise. It turns out that there is always going to be a group to hate. Anti-semitism was all the rage last century, but now we have moved on. Here's hoping that one day we'll find it within ourselves that we can just respect each other.
