I love when the religious ones talk shit, I remind them that Jesus was a liberal which is why he got killed.

Are these the values they are looking to go back to?

I suppose I'm just a little confused on the whole issue, but it seems to me that if these tea party people really want to cut our debt and keep everything constitutional, they should be focusing more on the big issues than the petty ones they keep bitching about.

I saw a tea party ad the other day about the whole healthcare thing, with the (paraphrased) tag line that we already have enough debt, and we don't need to add to it with this whole healthcare nonsense. As far as I can figure, the quickest and easiest route to cutting our deficit is to cut our trillion-dollar-annually war and 'defense' spending, rather than denying a bunch of our own citizens things we desperately need. Call me naive, but being able to go to the doctor or dentist when I need to without having to consider whether it will mean the bills don't get paid is a lot more important to me than Saddam Hussein ever was, and means a lot more to me than whether or not Israeli soldiers are getting the proper training, since we pay for all that too. Perhaps I'm just not getting the real big picture here, but I see no reason we should have to spend more a year on guns and bombs than most of the rest of the world combined.

Maybe it would be easier for me to take the whole thing seriously if they actually seemed to walk the walk, but for all the ruckus they make about the constitutionality of this, that, and the other, they don't seem overly open to that if it conflicts with what they believe. We should all have freedom of speech, peaceful assembly, and religion, but not if that means building a Muslim community center in lower Manhattan. We should all have equal rights, but not if two men (or women), want to get married.

I have a lot of issues with what the tea party supposedly wants to accomplish. I see no way electing a bunch of confused and closed-minded people dressed up in three cornered hats and breeches who can't decide what it is they really believe in will bring good things to this country. I have a hard time supporting any group where the majority doesn't believe in the importance of making people and corporations accountable for their environmental impact, endorses racist laws like the one in Arizona, doesn't support equal rights for people who aren't like them, and, perhaps most importantly, makes sure to be in church on Sunday. As far as I can tell, on a practical, issue to issue level, tea partiers and I disagree on just about everything.

An Islamic Community Center is a good thing for Americans because it will show them that the "evil Islamic people" that so many Americans demonize are no different than the Christian majority. They want a chance to pursue "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" as well as the rest of us.

Like Christians, Islamic people have a fundamentalist minority as well. Deep down all Abrahamic religions are violent and filled with hatefulness – most people don't take it seriously. To the defense of the tea partiers, Islam has not made much effort to modernize like Christianity has, but at the same time the vast majority of Muslims in America are moderate or liberal.

It is not the religion of Islam that attacked America and blew up our buildings, like you said it was a small minority of radical fundamentalists. It's a shame that so many Americans hold the entire culture responsible rather than a few radicals.

I've talked to my Mom about this issue and she is one of those on the bandwagon with the tea partiers who think that the so-called "mosque" shouldn't be built. She doesn't really have a good reason other than saying we liberals are "naive" but she nonetheless feels strongly against it.

As I said in my article there is no way to prevent the center from being built. They have the civil and constitutional freedoms to do what they want on private property and in the name of religion. The sad part is how many other Islamic centers have been vandalized, looted and even burnt down as the controversy continues. It shouldn't even be an issue much less a national issue. But with the midterm election coming up, I don't see this going away until at least November.

I just hope it doesn't turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy and cause another attack. From several news reports I've heard, the Al Queda and Taliban radicals are using this as propaganda to show that the September 11th attackers were right in what they did, that America is unfriendly (even hateful) toward Islam and that they should attack again. If there was another attack, of course, there would be no hope for tolerance toward Islamic people. The far-right would run with this, trying to pass laws incriminating Islam and causing a reign of chaos which would then upset the radicals further into a vicious cycle.

Why can't we just live and let live and all be friends?