It’s time to give up those divisive political fantasies

James Zogby's advice to the GOP is simple. Instead of distorting the past, learn from it.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during the CNN Republican presidential debate in California. Mark J Terrill / AP Photo

Having lived in Washington DC for almost four decades, I thought I was beyond becoming outraged by politicians who made bizarre claims. This week's Republican debate, however, featured a number of whoppers. Unfortunately, they never received the media scrutiny they deserved because an examination of the debate was soon overshadowed by coverage of a question Donald Trump was asked at a New Hampshire rally.

The question was outrageous: “We have a problem in this country. It’s called Muslims. We know our current president is one. You know he’s not even American ... we have training camps growing where they want to kill us ... my question. When can we get rid of them?”.

Mr Trump’s non-answer was unsettling: “We’re going to be looking at a lot of different things ... a lot of people are saying that ... that bad things are happening out there. We’re going to be looking at that and plenty of other things”.

The media focus on this exchange missed an important point and allowed the nonsense of the GOP candidates’ debate to go unexamined. What the media missed in its criticism of Mr Trump’s handling of the question was that the views expressed reflected a mindset that has become mainstream.

We saw it in the 2010 campaign when the GOP launched a campaign against the building of an Islamic centre in south Manhattan. We saw it again in 2012 when five of the Republican presidential aspirants pledged that they would not have a Muslim serve in their administration. And it has been on display in the 27 states where legislators have put forward legislation to ban Sharia. According to a recent poll, 54 per cent of all Republicans and 66 per cent of Mr Trump's supporters believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim.

More than 60 per cent of Mr Trump’s supporters believe that Mr Obama was not born in the US. I should add that the claim that there are “Muslim terror training camps” all over the US, which was initially a staple of fringe Islamophobic groups, has been given a larger audience by being featured on Fox News shows. Given this, why would anyone expect Trump rebuke views held by most of his supporters?

So the shock over the question asked of Mr Trump and the outrage over his failure to condemn it, are somewhat misplaced. The GOP has tolerated and even encouraged this trash for years.

But enough about Mr Trump. I want to get back to several comments made by Jeb Bush, who is considered to be one of the more serious candidates.

The first was in the three-hour CNN debate when Mr Bush claimed: “This administration ... has created insecurity the likes of which we never could have imagined. There’s not a place in the world where we’re better off today than six and a half years ago.” When Mr Trump noted his opposition to the Iraq war, Mr Bush became defensive stating: “You know what? As it relates to my brother, there’s one thing I know for sure. He kept us safe ... He sent a clear signal that the United States would be strong and fight Islamic terrorism, and he did keep us safe.”

Towards the end of the session, Mr Bush returned to his earlier claim: “We need to restore America’s presence and leadership in the world. Name a country where our relationship is better today than it was the day Mr Obama got elected.”

Let me deal with each of Mr Bush’s points separately. Because we have been polling extensively across the Middle East for the past decade and a half, we have hard data that shows quite clearly that the absolute lowest points of American standing in that region were in 2003, after the start of the Iraq war. America’s favourable rating began to rise towards the end of 2008 and spike to their highest levels in 2009 with the election and early promise of the Obama administration. As early expectations were not met, favourable ratings plummeted in 2011, but nowhere near the levels they were at in the Bush years. Our last two polls, 2012 and 2014, showed America’s ratings rising in most Arab countries.

The situation is even more pronounced in Europe. The annual Pew polls show that America’s favourable ratings, in most European countries, have nearly doubled between 2007 and 2015.

Instead of making us safer, George W Bush led us into two failed wars that cost us dearly. The wars emboldened Iran, caused extremist groups to grow, while at the same time weakening our regional allies and causing a breakdown in trust between the US and its European allies. The careless hubris of the George W Bush years took a toll, leaving America not safer but weaker and more isolated in the world. That is reality. Not the dangerous fantasy Jeb is now trying to create.

So my advice to the GOP is simple. Instead of distorting the past, own it and learn from it. And instead of ignoring the dangerous and divisive xenophobia you have helped to spawn, own it and root it out.

James Zogby is the president of the Arab American Institute

On Twitter: @aaiusa