The dilemma faced by progressive Muslim Americans

A huge amount of media attention has been given to the short speech by Khizr Khan, with his wife Ghazal Khan by his side, on the last night of the Democratic convention.

Khan, whose son, Army Capt. Humayun Khan, 27, died from a suicide bombing in Baghdad 12 years ago, said Trump’s shifting proposals to ban Muslims from entering the country would have prevented his late son from serving in the military. The Khans, originally from Pakistan, immigrated to the United States in the 1970s from the United Arab Emirates.

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Stephen Colbert supports my idea for voting

In order to deal with the problem of people voting against a candidate rather than for him or her, as seems to be the case with the Clinton/Trump match up where majorities say that their vote is driven by their dislike for the opponent, in a segment he adopts an idea that I suggested back in 2014, but which I don’t claim to be original. He had also apparently resurrected his old Comedy Central persona during the conventions and ran into some trouble with the corporate lawyers
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Sanders’s religion

The revelations that emerged from the WikiLeaks release of DNC emails merely confirmed what many of us already strongly suspected, and that was that Debbie Wasserman Schultz and the Democratic National Committee were lying when they said that they were staying neutral during the primary race between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. They were actively tilting the playing field in her favor.
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Fighting one prejudice while perpetuating another

A group of African Americans had an enjoyable meal at a restaurant in Murfeesboro, Tennessee and were treated well by the waitress. Or at least they thought so. But later a friend told one of them Chelsea Mayes that their waitress had posted a photo of the group on Snapchat and used a racist slur to describe the group. The management was alerted to this and after an investigation, fired the waitress.
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Donald Trump’s post-modern politics

ProPublica has closely examined the record of Tim Kaine over the years. It is a mixed bag with some serious concerns, especially on trade deals, big banks, and labor issues, folded in with some good views on social issues, such as abortion rights (though he is a Catholic) and opposition to the death penalty. Kaine’s main claim to fame is that he has no skeletons in his closet and is a proven successful political campaigner and is thus unlikely to say or do anything ridiculous and thus harm the ticket.
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Cleveland had a good week, especially on the transgender front

There has been a lot of praise for the way Cleveland handled the Republican National Convention. Everything seemed to go smoothly and many of the visitors, either first timers to the city or people whose last visit was decades ago, seemed surprised to find that it was not the gritty, crime-filled scene that they anticipated to see but was instead a pleasant place with friendly and helpful people and many things for visitors to do and see. There have been long-standing plans to improve the downtown and all those efforts were pushed to completion because of the convention. The city had put its best face forward and it showed.
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