Alex Halavais quotes Thomas Jefferson

"One day the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in the United States will tear down the artificial scaffolding of Christianity. And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as His father, in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."

According to http://www.deism.org/foundingfathers.htm, this is from Jefferson's letter to John Adams of April 11, 1823.

Halavais was responding to a poll conducted by Cornell University and reported in Newsday.com that found that

Nearly one in two Americans believe the U.S. government should restrict civil liberties for Muslim-Americans ….

The survey also found respondents who identified themselves as highly religious supported restrictions on Muslim-Americans more strongly than those less religious.