Byron York says that Obama has a “Muslim problem.”

Why is the fact that about one-quarter of the American people believe that Obama is a Muslim a problem? As Seinfeld said of homosexuality: “… not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

The American leadership – from Bush after 9-11 on – has been at pains to tell us that virtually all Muslims are peaceful and moderate. We have two Muslims in Congress. Why is the White House upset that a growing number of people believe he’s Muslim?

We note two things about references to Obama as a Muslim. The Left vehemently denies it and calls it a slur. The Right also denies it and tries to explain the (mis)perception of so many Americans.

Obama supporters point to his professed Christianity from his books. The problems with Obama’s professed Christianity is that he was “converted” by a racist, anti-Semitic bigot named Jeremiah Wright whose congregation was harangued with Liberation Theology rants that had more to do with racial hatred than with Christianity. Wright is a Christian like Fred Phelps is a Christian. In other words, they are bigots disguised as clergy.

The Right also states that Obama is a Christian based on exactly the same evidence … taking Obama’s word for it.

People in both camps suggest that Obama joined Wright’s church more for political reasons than religious reasons. I concur.

I am of the opinion that Obama has no personal faith in God. I also believe that in his youth he was culturally influenced by Islam. From York’ article…
As Obama said, his grandfather was a Muslim. His father was raised a Muslim before becoming, by Obama’s account, “a confirmed atheist.” Obama’s stepfather was a Muslim. His half-sister Maya told the New York Times that her “whole family was Muslim.”

Obama spent two years in a Muslim school in Indonesia and later, in a conversation with the Times’ Nicholas Kristof, described the Arabic call to prayer, the beginning of which he recited by heart, as “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth at sunset.”
Most people are imprinted at a very early age into the religion that surrounds them. Many people will tell you they are Christians who never go to church. These people are “cultural Christians” but not people of faith. Obama’s personal antipathy toward Country America, his political radicalism and his childhood immersion in a Muslim culture, may not make him an adherent of the Muslim faith, but it may make him more of a cultural Muslim than a cultural Christian.
In the polls we are reading, that may be the driving force behind the way that people are responding to the question about his religion.