'This Week' Transcript: God and Government

ROBERTS,S.: But history tells us that that will change. For 250 years that each new group America says we're now perfect, we're going to pull up the drawbridge, because the next group - the Germans, the French, the Italians, the Irish, the Jews, the Chinese, the Japanese, they're going to degrade our culture. All of the rhetoric, all of the hate, all of the nativism that is being focused on Muslims and to some extent on Latinos today, we've heard periodically throughout our entire history.

PATEL: So as Reverend King said, "History does nothing. The pendulum sometime doesn't swing naturally. We push it."

ROBERTS, C.: That's right.

PATEL: And that in America the great battle has always been between the forces of inclusiveness, and the forces of hate.

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AMANPOUR: Let me just ask...

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ROBERTS, S.: And they always win.

PATEL: But only if we stand up.

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AMANPOUR: OK. Well, let me ask you this.

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SHARPTON: The problem is what happens to those of us...

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AMANPOUR: All right. We have a very real case study here to test this out. President Obama and the matter of his faith. There are according to a poll some 18 percent of the country which believes he's a Muslim. He said he's not. He's not. He's a Christian. And much of it frankly comes from the right. What should people be doing? Do you support people who say - and question his faith?

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LAND: No. I think they're irrational, and a little imbalanced. I - I have no doubt whatsoever that Barrack Obama is a very typical 21st century main line Protestant. He comes - he was converted to the Christian faith as he says by Reverend Wright. He's a member as far as I know of the United Church of Christ. And - and he - you know, I - he doesn't sound any different to me than...

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AMANPOUR: But so -- so - so shouldn't he...

SHARPTON: The problem though with that is that the 18 percent that believe it, believe it and believe it's a bad thing. I mean, it's not that they just believe it. But they believe it as a bad thing. And that's the problem. And - and a lot of them I would - I would argue probably were the same ones...

(UNIDENTIFIED MALE): Right.

SHARPTON: ... that were denouncing him for being a - a member of Reverend Wright's church. How do you one election see that you're in the wrong Christian church, and the next election sees you and you're not a Christian...

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LAND: ... may have the cart before the horse. They may...

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ROBERTS, C.: It's a code word.

AMANPOUR: Are you saying he's racist?

LAND: They may think that Islam is evil.

SHARPTON: I'm saying that it's biased. I - I - I think it's - it's certainly against Islam. I - I don't...

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AMANPOUR: So since (inaudible) - since a lot of people have brought this up, and you've just said it's irrational, do you think people like yourself and others should just go out and say enough already everybody...

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LAND: I do. I do all the time. I say the idea that he wasn't born in Hawaii, and the idea that he's a Muslim is just flat nuts.

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SHARPTON: Amen. Amen.

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ROBERTS, S.: The word Muslim is a code word, and it's a metaphor. It's a metaphor for racism. It's a metaphor for he's different from us, he's not like us, he's got this funny name, which he says all the time. And it is - and he's an alien on some level. But this goes back to our earlier discussion, that there has always been a strain of America that wants to exclude the other. Exclude someone who's different...

(CROSSTALK)