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Here’s another in a long line of Muslim fear-mongering emails intended to discredit Barack, probably because he’s not white. There are two components to this email, the first being a comment obviously written by someone OTHER than the author of the column that immediately follows. We should note that the author of the column did NOT write this little header bit of information. I don’t want to imply that Ken Blackwell had anything to do with the initial beginning of the email.

You’ll notice how the author of this essay claims that Obama has “Hollywood, San Francisco” values rather than “Middle American” values, which we can only assume to mean “white values.” After all, aren’t people in Hollywood and San Francisco just as American as everyone else? I mean, they do hold citizenship, don’t they?

I’m constantly offended that somehow having populist values gets you discredited by calling your values “liberal Hollywood” values, as if Mel Gibson, Arnold, and Bruce Willis didn’t also come from Hollywood, all noted conservatives. So liberals like me who live in a city of more than a million people, we aren’t Americans too? Strange because I feel American. They keep letting me vote like an American. I’m pretty sure I was born in this country which, under The Constitution, gives me American citizenship. Strange.

Here’s the most interesting bit of the whole email:

Subject: Kind of scary, wouldn’t you think?
Remember–God is good, and is in time, on time–every time.
According to The Book of Revelation the anti-christ is:
The anti-christ will be a man, in his 40s, of MUSLIM descent, who will deceive the nations with persuasive language, and have a MASSIVE Christ-like appeal….the prophecy says that people will flock to him and he will promise false hope and world peace, and when he is in power, will destroy everything. Is it OBAMA??
I STRONGLY URGE each one of you to repost this as many times as you can! Each opportunity that you have to send it to a friend or media outlet…do it!
If you think I am crazy..I’m sorry but I refuse to take a chance on the “unknown”

First off, let’s get one thing straight about the book of Revelations. It was written a long time ago and was meant to be a cautionary tale about the fall of Rome, or at least that’s how I’ve heard the  literary interpretation. Sorry to disappoint you, but Revelations didn’t predict the Kennedy assassination, nor did it predict that the twin towers would fall or that Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston would break up. Instead, all of that obfuscated language is really supposed to be a tale about the fall of Rome and Roman society, once the mightiest empire on the planet. I’m no biblical scholar, but I feel I can safely predict that the “Antichrist” isn’t Barack Obama because the “Antichrist” is also an allegory.

Of course, I don’t put a whole lot of faith in the idea that God is going to terrorize the living crap out of us with this fire and brimstone stuff anyway. Literal interpreters just scare me because anybody could be the Antichrist, and it always seems like the Antichrist is right here, right now. How many hundreds of years have people been crying wolf about the existence of an Antichrist? When are we all going to stop freaking out about such hateful speech and ignore nuts who claim these things?

If someone is powerful or hated enough, he (or she) could be the Antichrist. And who hasn’t been called the Antichrist? Saddam Hussein, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and more have all been called the incarnate of Satan. Frankly I’m a little tired of all this hate-mongering speech. And you thought the things Obama’s pastor said were bad. Sorry to disappoint, but everything in Revelations already happened. Stop worrying about the end of the world and go get yourself some ice cream.

Now, onto the accompanying editorial which was NOT written by the same person who wrote the inflammatory statement above. As it says, this column did, in fact, appear in the New York Sun which, by all accounts, is way inferior to other newspapers in New York. But I digress. This column was published February 14–yes, Valentine’s Day–of this year. Enjoy.

Ken Blackwell – Columnist for the New York Sun

It’s an amazing time to be alive in America. We’re in a year of firsts in this presidential election: the first viable woman candidate; the first viable African-American candidate; and, a candidate who is the first front-running freedom fighter over 70. The next president of America will be a first.

We won’t truly be in an election of firsts, however, until we judge every candidate by where they stand. We won’t arrive where we should be until we no longer talk about skin color or gender. Now that Barack Obama steps to the front of the Democratic field, we need to stop talking about his race, and start talking about his policies and his politics.

The reality is this: Though the Democrats will not have a nominee until August, unless Hillary Clinton drops out, Mr. Obama is now the frontrunner, and its time America takes a closer and deeper look at him. Some pundits are calling him the next John F. Kennedy. He’s not. He’s the next George McGovern. And it’s time people learned the facts.

Because the truth is that Mr. Obama is the single most liberal senator in the entire U.S. Senate. He is more liberal than Ted Kennedy, Bernie Sanders, or Mrs. Clinton. Never in my life have I seen a presidential frontrunner whose rhetoric is so far removed from his record. Walter Mondale promised to raise our taxes, and he lost. George McGovern promised military weakness, and he lost. Michael Dukakis promised a liberal domestic agenda, and he lost.

Yet Mr. Obama is promising all those things, and he’s not behind in the polls. Why? Because the press has dealt with him as if he were in a beauty pageant. Mr. Obama talks about getting past party, getting past red and blue, to lead the United States of America. But let’s look at the more defined strokes of who he is underneath this superficial “beauty.”

I realize this column was written before the pastor at Obama’s church came into some pretty hot water, but I must protest this point. If this election was really being treated like a beauty pageant, then why would the media focus on clearly embarrassing issues like this one?

Start with national security, since the president’s most important duties are as commander-in-chief. Over the summer, Mr. Obama talked about invading Pakistan, a nation armed with nuclear weapons; meeting without preconditions with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who vows to destroy Israel and create another Holocaust; and Kim Jong II, who is murdering and starving his people, but emphasized that the nuclear option was off the table against terrorists – something no president has ever taken off the table since w e created nuclear weapons in the 1940s. Even Democrats who have worked in national security condemned all of those remarks. Mr. Obama is a foreign-policy novice who would put our national security at risk.

Here’s an important point to make about the president of Iran. I realize that Ahmadinejad is a scary guy. He says scary things and makes scary threats. Here’s the problem: he doesn’t have any actual authority. It’s true. The president of Iran has a diplomatic role only, but has no authority or power to change things. In fact, this rests with a rather scary-sounding position called the “Supreme Leader.” Ahmadinejad is the one we’re scared of, but we don’t even know the name or face of the Supreme Leader, the one actually mankind decisions. But let’s move on…

Next, consider economic policy. For all its faults, our health care system is the strongest in the world. And free trade agreements, created by Bill Clinton as well as President Bush, have made more goods more affordable so that even people of modest means can live a life that no one imagined a generation ago. Yet Mr. Obama promises to raise taxes on “the rich.” How to fix Social Security? Raise taxes. How to fix Medicare? Raise taxes. Prescription drugs? Raise taxes. Free college? Raise taxes. Socialize medicine? Raise taxes. His solution to everything is to have government take it over. Big Brother on steroids, funded by your paycheck.

Finally, look at the social issues. Mr. Obama had the audacity to open a stadium rally by saying, “All praise and glory to God!” but says that Christian leaders speaking for life and marriage have “hijacked” – hijacked – Christianity. He is pro-partial birth abortion, and promises to appoint Supreme Court justices who will rule any restriction on it unconstitutional. He espouses the abortion views of Margaret Sanger, one of the early advocates of racial cleansing. His spiritual leaders endorse homosexual marriage, and he is moving in that direction. In Illinois, he refused to vote against a statewide ban – ban – on all handguns in the state. These are radical left, Hollywood, and San Francisco values, not Middle America values.

The real Mr. Obama is an easy target for the general election. Mrs. Clinton is a far tougher opponent. But Mr. Obama could win if people don’t start looking behind his veneer and flowery speeches. His vision of “bringing America together” means saying that those who disagree with his agenda for America are hijackers or warmongers. Uniting the country means adopting his liberal agenda and abandoning any conflicting beliefs.

But right now everyone is talking about how eloquent of a speaker he is and – yes – they’re talking about his race. Those should never be the factors on which we base our choice for president. Mr. Obama’s radical agenda sets him far outside the American mainstream, to the left of Mrs. Clinton.

It’s time to talk about the real Barack Obama. In an election of firsts, let’s first make sure we elect the person who is qualified to be our president in a nuclear age during a global civilizational war.

Now the points made in this article are all rather ridiculous and I’ll save those arguments for another time. The point is that people are needlessly afraid of Barack Obama. This is why the point of this column is flawed. Blackwell claims we should forget the issue of race in this election, yet this email arrived with a header claiming that Obama isn’t worth voting for because he’s not white and therefore is somehow the Antichrist. He’s not just a bad leader, he’s the incarnate of evil.

See, race is an issue. There is still racism to battle, unfortunately. Until then, remember your critical thinking skills. Don’t let religious zealotry cloud you from the real issue. This is an election, not a religious war. Let’s treat it accordingly.