The day after Obama presented his Iftar remarks, in a statement made in passing to a reporter, he “clarified” his position. He was not specifically endorsing the project, he maintained, but was standing on principle and trying to emphasize what the stakes are. (link)

“I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding. That’s what our country is about.”

This statement was interpreted as a reversal of position by the center’s opponents and by those who are critical of Obama’s every move, but also by relatively objective media reports.  And some of those who had most passionately celebrated Obama’s remarks were dismayed by his apparent change of position.  They all paid attention to the first sentence of his second statement and not to the second two sentences, which, I think, were more central.  They paid attention to the apparent implications of the statement, but not to its meaning.

As the controversies about the center have raged, Obama’s fundamental position has been lost to the political noise. While the politics around the controversy always revolved around the question, for or against the “Ground Zero Mosque,” he at all points emphasized that free and diverse religious practices are an American right and definitive of American identity.
We have paid attention to the politics of the moment.

Will it hurt the Democrats and help the Republicans? Will Rick Lazio’s bid to be the Senator from New York sink or swim on this? Will this episode confirm the suspicions about Obama coming from the left and the right?  But we have not considered seriously the broader politics, beyond the obsessions of the here and now, beyond our national borders.  In his second statement, Obama wanted to emphasize his concern with such broader issues, as he has tried to distance himself from the immediate controversy.  The condensed nature of the passing comment led to confusion.  He was trying to thread a needle, but the sensibility of public discussion was too coarse for this to be successful.

For immediate political reasons he may have wished to stay away from the controversy.  He does not have public opinion behind him.  But given his long term commitments and his principled position, I think, he needs to return to the issue and clarify his position.

The issue is not whether there should be an Islamic community center on the “hallowed ground” of lower Manhattan.  The President must address further the emerging problem for our identity and security – how do we marginalize the growing xenophobia among Americans directed against Muslims, how do we retreat from a clash of civilizations, which many on the loony right are provoking.  Or else, we will have met the enemy and it will be us, to paraphrase Walter Kelly in his Pogo comic strip.