He Could Care Less About Obama's Story

[DeepModem Mom]

WP op-ed: He Could Care Less About Obama's Story
By Reza Aslan
Sunday, December 30, 2007; B03

Every time I hear about how Sen. Barack Obama is going to "re-brand" America's image in the Middle East, I can't help but think about Jimmy Carter's toast.

When the idealistic Democrat came to Iran in 1977 to ring in the new year with Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the country's much-despised despot, throngs of young, hopeful Iranians lined the streets to welcome the new American president. After eight years of the Nixon and Ford administrations' blind support for the shah's brutal regime, Iranians thrilled to Carter's promise to re-brand America's image abroad by focusing on human rights. That call even let many moderate, middle-class Iranians dare to hope that they might ward off the popular revolution everyone knew was coming. But at that historic New Year's dinner, Carter surprised everyone. In a shocking display of ignorance about the precarious political situation in Iran, he toasted the shah for transforming the country into "an island of stability in one of the more troubled areas of the world." With those words, Carter unwittingly lit the match of revolution.

It's just this sort of blunder -- naive, well-meaning, amateurish, convinced that everyone understands the goodness of U.S. intentions -- that worries me again these days. That's because a curious and dangerous consensus seems to be forming among the chattering classes, on both the left and the right, that what the United States needs in these troubling times is not knowledge and experience but a "fresh face" with an "intuitive sense of the world," and that the mere act of electing Obama will put us on the path to winning the so-called war on terror.

The argument usually goes something like this: Imagine that a young Muslim boy in, say, Egypt, is watching television when suddenly he sees this black man -- the grandson of a Kenyan Muslim, no less! -- who spent a small part of his childhood in Indonesia, taking the oath of office as president of the United States. Suddenly, the boy realizes that the United States is not the demonic, anti-Islamic place he's always been told it was. Meanwhile, all around the Muslim world, other young would-be jihadists have a similar epiphany. "Maybe Osama bin Laden is wrong," they think. "Maybe America is not so bad after all."...As someone who once was that young Muslim boy everyone seems to be imagining (albeit in Iran rather than Egypt), I'll let you in on a secret: He could not care less who the president of the United States is. He is totally unconcerned with whatever barriers a black (or female, for that matter) president would be breaking. He couldn't name three U.S. presidents if he tried. He cares only about one thing: what the United States will do. That boy is angry at the United States not because its presidents have all been white. He is angry because of Washington's unconditional support for Israel; because the United States has more than 150,000 troops in Iraq; because the United States gives the dictator of his country some $2 billion a year in aid, the vast majority of which goes toward supporting a police state. He is angry at the United States because he thinks it has hegemony over almost every aspect of his world.


Edited to 3-4 paragraphs to conform to DU's policy concerning fair use of copyrighted material

Lithos
DU Moderator

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/28/AR2007122801899_pf.html

[maximusveritas]

1. He's really oversimplying what those Obama backers have said

No one is saying "the mere act of electing Obama will put us on the path to winning the so-called war on terror." That's a strawman.
And his description of the argument that follows is just as insulting.

That's just the first sign that he's not here to seriously make an argument. He's here to push a political agenda.

[David Dunham]

2. I've got news for the author: the US isn't selling out Israel or Mubarak.

[sandnsea]

3. He must not care about reading either

I don't know where people get their crazy ideas about Obama.

"When we end this war in Iraq, we can more effectively tackle the twin demons of extremism and hopelessness that threaten the peace of the world and the security of America. That is why I have proposed a program to spread hope - not hate - in the Islamic world, to build schools that teach young people to build and not destroy, to support the rule of law and economic development, and to launch a program of outreach to the Islamic world that I will lead as President.

When we end this war in Iraq, we can once again lead the world against the common challenges of the 21st century. Against the spread of nuclear weapons and climate change. Against genocide in Darfur. Against ignorance and intolerance. Corruption and greed. Poverty and despair. When we end this war, we can reclaim the cause of freedom and democracy. We can be that beacon of hope, that light to all the world."


http://www.barackobama.com/2007/09/12/remarks_of_senator_barack_obam_23.php

[Tactical Progressive]

4. No way!! He doesn't know anything! Obama is for *change*

He's for hope. The audacity of hope!

He's "tired of the old politics".



Oh, and those Iranian kids are hungry for leadership. Which is what Obama is!

[Colobo]

5. Mr. Aslan doesn't understand Obama's message.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

6. Okay, this settles it. Reza Aslan is an idiot.

If he thinks he's going to get a better deal for Muslims throughout the world with Hillary Clinton or one of the Republicans in charge, I'd like to have some of what he's smoking.