Who are these people?

Well, that’s embarrassing! No other way to look at separate polls indicating sizable numbers of Americans think President Obama is a Muslim. A Pew poll found 18 percent think that; a Time magazine poll put the number at an amazing 24 percent — nearly one-quarter of the population! “The president is obviously a Christian,” White House spokesman Bill Burton says. “He prays every day.” It’s likely that mistaken views on Obama’s faith stem from the ground zero Islamic center controversy, with Obama’s defense of the constitutional right of the mosque backers to proceed with their project being conflated with the president’s religious beliefs by some. Let’s hope this red herring doesn’t develop the shelf life of another specious belief — that Obama isn’t a U.S. citizen.

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