|
Letters to the Editor II
Click here to send your letter
Comments on Muqtedar Khan’s article: American Muslims and bloc-voting
African American Muslim Vote
Dr. Muqtedar Khan's article does not address the black (African American) Muslim vote. his 'Muslim' refers to the immigrant bloc. If they have their own reasons for voting in majority for their own particular concerns, this may obviate the immigrant Muslim vote.
Also, the voting history, as far as I know is heavily bloc dependent. This is also written in Fareed Zakaria's book-- illiberal democracy-- and referred to in talks by many political science professors. will we not loose any leverage if we don’t seem to have any chance
of affecting the results?
Fakhiuddin Aahmed
fahmed12000@yahoo.com
March 29, 2004
We need to vote in large numbers
Ahmed Sahib,
You are correct that MK does not mention black Muslim vote but if you notice he further departmentalizes the immigrant vote by throwing Shia factor in this time, which I think is the first as far as I know.
As far the obviating is concerned I think these are very strange times and even the immigrant vote is not going to be a bloc vote. If that is good or bad only time will tell.
Our leadership seems to be struggling this time to come up with a definitive answer.
Going with red, green, blue or any other 3rd party will be a waste of the vote. Majority of common Muslim voters will not vote for Bush, but there are some groups who already seem to support him. Which might be a good thing as if he wins and I think he has a very good chance our bloc vote against him may cause a backlash and he may not even make those Muslim friendly statements which he does time to time.
Because of last elections bloc vote, Muslim vote is getting attention and is being discussed in main stream media and politics. How do we use this for leverage? ..........that is a great question.
Blacks in general and "our cousins" generally vote Democratic as a bloc. But look at the difference in their standing in the political arena. Most of the time Democrats take blacks for granted and the Republicans totally ignore them and hence their issues and concerns.
Jews on the other hand are part of the whole political establishment and part of every election campaign. This factor and the financial support of ALL major candidates and parties makes up if their bloc votes loses and they do not suffer any consequences as the blacks do.
Best thing for us seems if we vote for lesser of the 2 evils. If we look at Kerry's statements on Palestine or Kashmir they are not very friendly to Muslim positions either, so who is the lesser evil?
Many Muslims want to vote against Bush to make a statement, but then there are some who even as a group want to vote for him.
We need to vote in large numbers. Even if our votes get split and cancel each other out, that is what I see happening this time.
In my view a big achievement for us this time will be if we can prove that we are here and WE DO VOTE.
Khalid Saeed
Director for Northern California,
American Muslim Voice
ksaeed@sbcglobal.net
March 30, 2004
Page I Page III Page IV
|
