Va. GOP Official Resigns After Controversial Facebook Post About Muslims
[su_dropcap style=”default” size=”3″ class=””]A[/su_dropcap] Virginia GOP official resigned after posting a controversial message on his Facebook page which questioned whether Muslim Americans have made positive contributions to U.S. society.
Bob FitzSimmonds, treasurer of the state Republican Party, distributed his unapologetic resignation letter to party officials Wednesday night, The Washington Post reports.
“It seems that no matter how careful I might be, I will periodically give occasion for others to portray the party in a bad light, so long as I am a party official,” he wrote. “After discussion with several party leaders it seems clear that I will either need to stop posting on social media or step down from my party office.”
FitzSimmonds said his resignation will not take effect until his position has been filled, which he said will likely occur after a state GOP meeting on Aug. 16th.
After President Obama marked the end of Ramadan and praised Muslims for helping to build “the very fabric of our nation and strengthening the core of our democracy,” FitzSimmonds responded on Facebook.
He wrote, “Exactly what part of our nation’s fabric was woven by Muslims? What about Sikhs, Animists, and Jainists? Should we be thanking them too?”
According to the Post, Pat Mullins and Michael E. Thomas, the chairman and vice chairman of the state GOP, later called on FitzSimmonds to resign.
Images: Huffington Post, Blue Virginia
Eric Trommater August 7th, 2014 at 10:45 am
Oh those zany right wingers and their Facebook posts. It’s almost as if social media allows us to look into their soul for a brief moment and it’s a very dark place.
William August 7th, 2014 at 10:59 am
He wrote, “Exactly what part of our nation’s fabric was woven by Muslims?
Always Right August 7th, 2014 at 11:34 am
It is when you see Muslims killing people only because they are Christians that brings into question their claim as the religion of peace. This is graphic, so be warned before you view it. http://www.asgraphic.org/videos/video382/index.htm
This site brings into question what contributions President Obama claimed Muslims made to America. It is not to question those who served in the military, but their overall contributions to American culture.
http://maddmedic.wordpress.com/2014/04/24/muslims-my-ass/
arc99 August 7th, 2014 at 11:42 am
very convenient for you to dismiss the contributions and ultimate sacrifice of Muslims who served in uniform.
in any event, Catholics and Protestants were murdering each other for decades in northern Ireland. Christians virtually exterminated native American people right here in north America. Christians have as much blood on their hands as anyone.
you have the first amendment right to be a religious bigot. fortunately your prejudices do not govern this country. Islam and all religious beliefs have the same constitutional protections as Christianity, including the first amendment and article 6.
personally, I have absolutely zero tolerance for religious bigotry so you can take your links and shove them. the only link I need is the United States Constitution.
http://constitutioncenter.org/constitution/full-text
ARTICLE VI
………..
but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
Eric Trommater August 7th, 2014 at 11:50 am
My doctor is a Muslim and he saved my life. My daughter has a Mulim teacher who enriched her life beyonf mesure. The willingness to stand up and defend out country is an important contribution but even more important are the everyday people who make life in this country worth defending and, at least in the places I have lived, a large portion of those people are Muslims.
jasperjava August 7th, 2014 at 2:45 pm
Excellent point. I also have Muslim friends, neighbors, co-workers, and they enrich my life and that of my family. Religious bigots like “Always Right” don’t know what they’re missing from cutting themselves off from people just because of racial, religious, ethnic differences. How empty their lives must be.
DetroitSam August 7th, 2014 at 9:35 pm
I also have physicians who are Muslims. In fact, the physician who save my life by performing a heart procedure on me IS A MUSLIM.
Always Right, IGNORANCE IS NOT ATTRACTIVE.
Always Right August 7th, 2014 at 11:51 am
Reread my post, I specifically mentioned those who served in the military.
RioBravoHombre August 7th, 2014 at 12:27 pm
Only to cover your sorry ass.
mea_mark August 7th, 2014 at 1:49 pm
It is easier to justify banning trolls when we don’t stoop to their level of name calling. If you can keep it toned down a little bit it would help to keep the site clean. Your comments are welcome and any effort to help would be appreciated.
Eric Trommater August 7th, 2014 at 11:44 am
I didn’t realize that Syria was now considered part of the United States. I also know for the a fact that American Muslim hate crimes against Christians are far lower than the reverse.
Go to Deerborn, MI and see what American culture looks like after generations of Muslim have lived there. It’s quite rich and not violent at all. In fact South East Michigan is dotted with places where Muslims have enriched out culture. Every major city in America that has a large Muslim population has a uniquely American culture. Also who doesn’t love falaphals?
Always Right August 7th, 2014 at 11:53 am
Is this the Dearborn you’re referencing? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gHMgJp9olo
greenfloyd August 8th, 2014 at 5:00 am
A powerful and disturbing video from July 2011. Over 3500 YouTube comments, dripping with hate, from Christians and Muslims alike. I wonder how things are in Dearborn today?
Was it just me, or did the documenter seem hostile to everyone he spoke to? This video would have been even more compelling without his commentary and also filming across the street, in the Christian camp.
RioBravoHombre August 7th, 2014 at 12:29 pm
If you and this assplug are so proud of his post, why was it taken down? Cowards like you make this country sick. Haven’t you figured out yet that YOU and YOUR hatred are why the GOP loses national elections. Your hatred, lies and racism have doomed you politically. Keep it up, thumbdicks!
M D Reese August 7th, 2014 at 2:22 pm
Don’t you just love their minority outreach pogrom?
Always Right August 7th, 2014 at 6:52 pm
I’m not GOP. Are you not paying attention to world events? Name any ongoing conflict that has not been started by Islamic radicals. Radical Islamics are killing all non-Muslims throughout the middle east. Unless you are a Muslim, why do you think you will be exempted? Definitely not because you’re nice to those terrorists. What did Bob FitzSimmonds write that was untrue? He asked “what part of our nations’s fabric was woven by Muslims?” President Obama made the claim that they did and he asked for evidence?
If you know, please post a list of examples.
Many people criticize Christians for repeating many of the same things our founding fathers said, yet never say a word about Muslims. Atheists are quick to complain if a moral ruling favors someone with Judeo-Christian religious beliefs, but they ignore the fact that when Islam grows in numbers and they began demanding that Sharia law be applied for their communities. See England’s problem with being accepting regarding the infusion of Sharia law into their legal system. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/03/23/sharia-law-enshrined-in-uk-legal-system_n_5016396.html
Islam’s claim to be purely religious is false as it leans more towards a political form of government. Our founding fathers were very careful to include in the Constitution a 1st Amendment that forbids the state from establishing a religion. I don’t see Christians or Jews petitioning the government to change that law because they see what happens when a country operates under a stated religion. Iran and Saudi Arabia are prime examples.
A CIA: The World Fact Book (2007) tells a pretty grim tale of what happens when the Muslim population grows in open society nations like ours. http://stevescomments.wordpress.com/2012/09/13/what-happens-to-a-country-as-muslims-population-grows/
Carla Akins August 7th, 2014 at 7:41 pm
One of our readers put this partial list together. Perhaps you should re-think your position. Thanks Old lefty:
Ahmed Hassan Zewail, a pioneer
of femtochemistry
Dr. Muhammad Yunus , economist,
Dr. Aafia Siddiqui ,cognitive neuroscientist, Arif , Intelligent Design and
Neurosciences, Professor Shahid H. Bokhari, parallel and distributed computing,
Prof. Abdullah Sadiq Mathematics
and Solid State Physics, Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy; mathematics, solid state physics and
nuclear physics
Mohamed A. El-Erian – CEO
of PIMCO, manager of over $1 trillion in global assets
Fuad El-Hibri – CEO of
Emergent BioSolutions
Jawed Karim – Co-founder of
YouTube
Salman Khan – Entrepreneur,
former hedge fund analyst and founder of the Khan Academy.[
Shahid Khan – owner of the
Jacksonville Jaguars of the National Football League (NFL), the English Premier
League team Fulham F.C., and automobile parts manufacturer Flex-N-Gate in Urbana,
Illinois.[
Farooq Kathwari – CEO of
Ethan Allen Global, Inc.[
Abdul Malik Mujahid –
President of Sound Vision and community activist[
Safi Qureshey –
Pakistani-American entrepreneur and philanthropist. He is the co-founder and
former CEO of AST Research.
Always Right August 7th, 2014 at 8:02 pm
Reread the article. We’re talking about contributing to the nations fabric. Not much fabric production in your list.
Carla Akins August 7th, 2014 at 8:44 pm
Right, these folks contributed nothing. Racist.
Always Right August 7th, 2014 at 9:33 pm
Why call me a racist? We were discussing their contributions to the nations fabric and you listed personal accomplishments, not those that formed the cultural of America.
Btw, a racist doesn’t have an Indian as a primary care physician and an Arab as a surgeon, unless maybe the are racist against white people. ☺
Carla Akins August 7th, 2014 at 10:16 pm
I provide a list of accomplished Muslim Americans and you dismiss them out of hand – what other reason would you have to do so?
m2old4bs August 7th, 2014 at 12:21 pm
I know what part of our nation’s fabric was woven by people like FitzSimmonds, and it ain’t pretty nor pleasant nor good for our nation at all. Now, that you don’t have a job, you can keep posting your hatred, your vitriolic commentary, your xenophobic crap. More and more of us are beyond tired of you and your ilk’s utter and complete nonsense. Get over yourself. Your arrogance is disgusting.
Michael August 7th, 2014 at 1:14 pm
I think we have to be careful, In the USA, Muslims need to adapt to American law, not Sharia law. They need to understand, when you are here in the USA, we speak out against the evil doings of other Christians and Muslims. Therefore, I condemn Israel, and I condemn Hamas. There is a better way other than murder.
M D Reese August 7th, 2014 at 2:19 pm
Christians need to adapt to American law, not old testament crap from the buybull.
DetroitSam August 7th, 2014 at 9:29 pm
Michael: What the heck are you talking about?
There are millions of Muslims living in the USA who WERE BORN IN THE USA. Who follow American law. There is no Sharia law in the USA.
Please, before you expose you abject ignorance to many other people, stop watching Fox Noise. And get yourself to a library, or a book store or even learn to use the google.
mrsgunka August 7th, 2014 at 1:23 pm
Tell me again why we are exceptional? Our hatred of others is no different than Israel and Palestine, except we haven’t used rockets on each other….yet! But won’t be long as we now think we have to parade around with guns hung over our shoulders waiting for something to happen. The most obnoxious haven’t served a day in the armed forces to protect our country. Think this country needs a crash-course in Tolerance! “Do onto others”!
John David Peer August 8th, 2014 at 12:11 am
Why, there are myriad reasons why Amur’ca is exceptional!
1) Even narrowly beating out Turkey, you have the most people in any developed nation that disbelieve evolution.
2) America. amongst the G32 has the greatest inequality AND the lowest upward mobility…by far (source, The Spirit level, 2010 meta study)..hooray!
3) Amongst the signatories, the US came the furthest (again, by far) from meeting its MDG goal of 1.5% GDP towards alleviating world hunger and poverty. I think you hover around 0.2% or so. If it makes you feel any better, Canada didn’t do much better, at around 0.5%. Only those ‘commies” in Scandinavia came through. (That’s an area north of Europe.) (Europe’s that big blue place on the Risk board.)
4) The US has the highest number of citizens languishing in its prisons, around 1/100 Americans lives in a jail cell at any given time. Well done. “we’re number one!”. This is mostly down to institutional racism and your failed drug “war”.
5) The US has the fewest citizens that have passports in then G32. Hey, why go anywhere else, when you have Dino-land and Las Vegas, eh? Besides, who wants to learn to speak English slow enough that foreigners can understand, eh?
And finally, my favorite: The US spends, by FAR, the most on its military, but hasn’t won a war in 70 years. And THAT one, WW2, it only entered when it started to look doubtful that your treasury was going to be able to recover the billions lent to China, the UK and the Soviets.
But “y’all” DID liberate what was left of the Jewish people. Too bad you turned so many refugees from your shores BEFORE the war, and in the early days.
Oh yeah, you’re number one for THAT as well…exceptional indeed.
greenfloyd August 7th, 2014 at 11:12 pm
As for FitzSimmonds fb post, I’m not sure you could actually call it “racist,” although I certainly see how that could be inferred.
Nonetheless, I think it’s improper for any President to select people by specific religion for any contribution to America. Its obvious everyday Muslims (Moslems) contribute, just as Christians, Jews and all the others with or without a religion. It’s also obvious there are millions of Muslims abroad, and some here at home, bent on destruction of the “fabric” and “core of our democracy.” That might explain, not excuse, FitSimmons’ post. It does not explain why Obama made this statement, although I suspect it might have something to do with all that money now flowing in from Doha?
TerryW August 7th, 2014 at 11:58 pm
And one could also say that many in the GOP are bent on destruction of the fabric and core of our democracy.
And it doesn’t matter what Obama says, the GOP will attack it, period.
greenfloyd August 8th, 2014 at 12:26 am
So, are you suggesting that “many in the GOP” are equivalent with Muslim terrorists?
tiredoftea August 8th, 2014 at 2:11 am
Not equivalent, much more dangerous.
majii August 8th, 2014 at 3:12 am
You can’t bear hearing the truth? If the president had lied, I could see you objecting to him lauding Muslim Americans in an event at the WH commemorating the end of Ramadan. It doesn’t offend me that he gave props to Muslim Americans because I know that they’re just as American as I am. Imho, only a divisive person who is unwilling to acknowledge that America is a multicultural nation would even entertain the idea of depriving another of his/her contributions to a society and would object to what President Obama said. When I’m exposed to the thinking of individuals like you, greenfloyd, I often wonder how you’d feel if someone repeatedly attempted to deprive you of your accomplishments and tied to marginalize you in every way, in every instance. I can imagine you’d be mad as hell. The fact that those you denigrate haven’t risen up in anger against you is a testament to their strength in the face of the adversity they deal with on a daily basis from you and others like yourself.
greenfloyd August 8th, 2014 at 4:31 am
Well, we agree the truth can be hard to accept.
I am not trying to be “divisive” and I am fully cognizant America is made up of many religions. However I am against my government endorsing any religion. That would be very divisive.
I see Obama as a very good President, compared to the previous administration. He handles the press very well, including those who do “denigrate” him. That’s not me though, and on that we disagree.
Debbie Pineau August 8th, 2014 at 6:08 am
If the shoe fits, they can wear it. What have the muslims contributed, an attack on Christianity in the west?? That’s what I’ve been seeing.
Nawa Taipan August 8th, 2014 at 9:40 pm
Tell the truth and get canned