(Not At All) Breaking News: Obama not Muslim; doesn't particularly like them in his backdrops

This is apparently old news but it is news to me, and since I write for myself ever since I got Hooked on Phonics, that's all that matters:

Asma Hasan echoed Rehab's frustration about the occasional fumbles of the candidates toward the Muslim community. She pointed to a June incident at an Obama rally.

Two women were told not to sit behind Obama because they were wearing head scarves. Campaign volunteers thought it would would look bad if the women were seen behind the candidate in a photo or on television.

The Obama campaign quickly apologized, and a campaign spokeswoman said that the incident was not reflective of Obama's message, according to the New York Times.

Who shot who in the what now? Wait, two Muslim women were yanked from behind Obama because they were wearing head scarves? Wow. I don't care that this happened in June. I'm just hearing about it now. I don't care that there was an apology - Obama quietly condoned it by allowing it and then apologizing later. The same article talks about how neither candidate in courting the American religious vote has visited a mosque. Apparently the 2.3 million Muslims in America are invisible. Or don't count as good, religious Americans. Dude, they pray five times a day - you really could have stopped in at least ONCE, guys. And I am talking to both of you.

Listen, I've had it with all of this Muslim talk. Had it with any religious talk of any kind. Had it with crap like McCain's backhanded slap in the mouth when he said that Obama wasn't an Arab or a Muslim but was rather "a good man; a family man." Had it with Obama defending his Christian faith and denying being a Muslim - as if that were a pejorative statement about him.

We talk about how far we've come because the front-runner is a (semi) black guy. We've come nowhere. Our hatred of the "other" has not been smoothed, buffed and polished away; it's been shifted. It's shifted so radically and so quickly that we pat ourselves on the backs, conveniently ignoring that the key issue is now not whether a candidate is black but whether a black candidate is also a black MUSLIM candidate.

In short, I've had it with the Republican attacks against Muslims, and against Obama for being a "secret" Muslim - and I've had it just as much with Obama and his camp swinging at a pitch in the dirt by playing up his lifelong Christianity. Dude, in my eyes you're just praying to a different invisible guy. As Pacino said playing the Big Guy's charming nemesis "Oh, I have so many names." Frankly, I hope you're lying and you believe in nothing but fundamental goodness towards your fellow man - and not because a book tells you to or the Man Behind the Curtain commands it. But because it's just the right way to live. But apparently that isn't how you get elected in this great nation of ours.

The point is, circling back, that someone would care about a woman in a headscarf in the background of an Obama photo-op. Apparently enough people would care that they had to be yanked from the scene. America, pat yourself on your back in two weeks if you vote in a minority candidate. But don't pat too hard... you're still living in ethical squalor.