Erica wrote in an email to me today:

Last night, I went on Hardball with Chris Matthews (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ounAMOZB5Mk&feature) to talk about how politicians of both parties are fostering a dangerous environment of prejudice against Muslims – and furthering their personal ambitions in the process. The appearance was the result of a video released yesterday by the Agenda Project which connects the leading politicians from both parties to the attack on a Muslim taxicab driver in New York on Tuesday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFlfIQD22Ys

We created "Hate Begets Hate" as a response to the harrowing events of the past few weeks in order to call out the politicians who have behaved at best irresponsibly and at worst maliciously. We hope to bring a spotlight onto the actions of these self-interested actors so that all Americans from both sides of the aisle might immediately call a stop to it. We believe that a strong message connecting their recklessness with its direct results was necessary to raise the very relevant question as to their contribution to this increasingly volatile and dangerous environment.

The video was produced with the help of movie producer Avram Ludwig and star editor Ron Len. It has received a fantastic response – and seems to be sparking an important conversation about political leaders’ responsibility in times of national anxiety. It is worth noting that when people are divided, both politicians and terrorists win.

Since launching the video early yesterday morning:

The video was played in full on MSNBC.

Sam Stein of the Huffington Post wrote about the video which as of this morning had 3,200+ comments.

To be clear, I don’t have an opinion about whether this particular project comes to fruition or not. If I had anything to do with it – which I do not - I would be deeply concerned about the obvious lack of management expertise which the events of the last several months have brought to light. But at this point, the public conversation has ceased to be – if it ever was one - about a building. It could have been a constructive conversation about faith in America and the continuing challenge of building a thriving plurality. However, because of the utter lack of integrity exhibited by politicians from both parties, it has now ceased to be a conversation at all – instead it is a powder keg at which these irresponsible individuals continue to throw matches.

www.agendaproject.org