Toastmaster Harpoon Party

There's something you gotta understand about Ramadan -- all fasters think about is food. F-O-O-D. All day long. "What am I going to eat tonight at 7:13PM?" When something sounds like a good idea, you cling to it for dear life. Like this concoction yesterday: pasta with garlic, fake bacon, peas, smoked cheese, and a fried egg. It was actually alright, somehow. Probably because I hadn't eaten in 14 hours.

This Ramadan has been pretty odd, probably because of the rampant Muslim-bashing, the railing about a Muslim community center, and the potential hours-long Quran burning fest -- all discussed non-stop this month it seems. The month Muslims are trying to be especially peaceful and positive. I don't think I've ever seen so much blatant bigotry in the media and from political and news talking heads in the US...ever. Not that people aren't blatant talking-head bigots in this country, don't even get me started. But I'm talking consistency here. A person can say that a "Mosque" near Ground Zero is like putting a Nazi center near Auschwitz and no one really seems to bat an eyelash. At least not a serious eyelash. Maybe a few little ones. You get what I'm saying (hopefully).

Do the crazy Westboro Baptist Church group that pickets soldier funerals because they think their deaths are a sign from God about the US being slightly (though not legally) accepting of gay people represent all Baptists? Should no Baptists have cemeteries where soldiers are buried? That's the basic logic I've been seeing. And then our president seems too scared to seriously dispute all this, because apparently an ignorant 20% of the nation thinks he is a Muslim (and that's bad) and any real support for the community center will probably make that percentage rise (and that's bad). He can't seem to feel comfortable doing what Bush did in saying this is a mostly peaceful religion. Nine years after 9/11, and people seem to be more intolerant than ever. I can't think of a worse time, when 20 million people are affected by a natural disaster in a Muslim country and so few people are focusing on their need. 20 million.

Today, for the first time since 2008 (and probably the last time ever in my life) I thought "Thank God Sarah Palin said something." It was all crickets from the right until ol' S.P. got on her soap box and spoke out against the Quran burning. I was thankful, because it needed to be said from someone in that camp, and seeing as Palin seems to be living off of crazy juice ("Dr. Laura: don't retreat...reload!") it was a surprise.

Anyway, I hope things calm down in the coming weeks and no holy books of any religion are burned by any crazies, and we all just take a breath together and try to maybe do more things that way.