So wait, inclusion is now a bad thing?
It’s so tough to keep up!
Last night, Sean Hannity of Fox News Channel accused President Obama of saying that the United States “does not consider itself a Christian nation.” As this was reportedly said to residents of “a Muslim country”, Hannity treated this as the worst form of heresy imaginable.
Of course, what the president said and what Hannity reported him as having said were two different things. In reality, what Obama said was that “one of the great strengths of the United States is — although as I mentioned, we have a very large Christian population — we do not consider ourselves a Christian nation, or a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation. We consider ourselves a nation of citizens who are bound by ideals and a set of values.”
"Don't make me have the big guy kick your butt, Hannity."
In other words, we are a nation of peole who have differing beliefs. This is something we have always prided ourselves on. What fascinated me about Hannity’s comments was that he opened the segment — and, indeed, his broadcast, by saying, “The president of the United States — your president — told an audience…”
Back up a second, sir. Unless I’m mistaken, you just proved my point. Because I, Mr. Hannity, am an athiest, and yet Barack Obama is my president as well as yours. Even if this country were made up of 95 percent Christians, that would not make us an exclusively Christian nation. And that, Mr. Hannity, is the point Obama was making. The fact that your network choses to run a banner across the bottom of the screen declaring the United States to be “The Fox Nation” does not mean that those who opt to get their news from other sources are not Americans, does it? (Then again, this is Fox News Channel we’re talking about, so they might actually try and claim that to be true.)
If you're judged by the company you keep, I'm not sure which one is in bigger trouble.
We are the United States and, as that name implies, we come together as a people despite our differences. It’s precisely this type of talk that creates an environment of separatism. And given the many crises facing our country, the last thing we need is to be torn apart by such ridiculousness when we should, in fact, be rallying as one to prove exactly what it is that makes us the greatest country in the world.
