I’m not an agent from any government, even if some of you may not believe it. I’m not. I’m a peacemaker.

I have never made a threat. I’ve never made a threat, never expressed a threat, never – I’ve never – I would never threaten violence ever, because I am a man of peace, dedicated to peace.

What’s right with America and what’s right with Islam have a lot in common. At their highest levels, both worldviews reflect an enlightened recognition that all of humankind shares a common Creator – that we are, indeed, brothers and sisters.

We are Americans. We – we – we are – we are doctors. We are investment bankers. We are taxi drivers. We are store keepers. We are lawyers. We are – we are part of the fabric of America. And the way that America today treats its Muslims is being watched by over a billion Muslims worldwide.

I worked as a teacher in the public school system in New York City for several years, and I was a victim of the layoffs, you know, in the mid-’70s. And then I worked as a sales engineer for a company in New Jersey that was selling industrial filtration equipment.

The thing about the Islamic situation is we don’t have a church. We don’t have an ordained priesthood, which makes it a little complicated. But we do have a tradition of scholarship, and rules of scholarship. It’s very much like any field of knowledge.

Americans must outgrow the unbecoming arrogance that leads us to assert that America somehow owns a monopoly on goodness and truth – a belief that leads some to view the world as but a stage on which to play out the great historical drama: the United States of America versus the Powers of Evil.

I’ve spoken with friends who are rabbis and priests and we’ve agreed that most people have an emotional attachment to their faith, a desire to fulfill their spiritual longings, but they are not experts in understanding the history of their religion.

What’s brilliant about the United States system of government is separation of power. Not only the executive, legislative, judicial branches, but also the independence of the military from civilians, an independent media and press, an independent central bank.

There are always people who will – who will do peculiar things and think that they are doing things in the name of their religion.