Why is being a Muslim a smear?

Capital J

By Ami Eden · March 5, 2008

Writing on The Huffington Post, Eve Tahmincioglu complains: "Rumors that Obama may be a Muslim are reported in the press as a 'smear campaign' ... So what if Barack Hussein Obama were indeed a Muslim? (I know he's not but I'm making a point here.) Would you refuse to vote for him?"

It's an interesting point, and a complaint that we've received at JTA. The "smear" is not the claim that he is a Muslim, but the allegation that he's an anti-Israel Muslim, who studied in a radical Madrassah, is trying to conceal his true religion and refuses to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.