Two views of Obama and the Islamic world

Consider the following two quotes. Does one strike you as more likely to be true than the other one?

First, these thoughts from U.S. Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa):

“When you think about the optics of a Barack Obama potentially getting elected President of the United States — I mean, what does this look like to the rest of the world? What does it look like to the world of Islam?” …

“I will tell you that, if he is elected president, then the radical Islamists, the al-Qaida, the radical Islamists and their supporters, will be dancing in the streets in greater numbers than they did on September 11 because they will declare victory in this War on Terror.” …

“Additionally, his middle name (Hussein) does matter,” King said. “It matters because they read a meaning into that in the rest of the world. That has a special meaning to them. They will be dancing in the streets because of his middle name.”

Then, from an article by Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic Monthly:

Obama’s candidacy in this sense is a potentially transformational one…What does he offer? First and foremost: his face. Think of it as the most effective potential re-branding of the United States since Reagan…

Consider this hypothetical. It’s November 2008. A young Pakistani Muslim is watching television and sees that this man—Barack Hussein Obama—is the new face of America. In one simple image, America’s soft power has been ratcheted up not a notch, but a logarithm. A brown-skinned man whose father was an African, who grew up in Indonesia and Hawaii, who attended a majority-Muslim school as a boy, is now the alleged enemy. If you wanted the crudest but most effective weapon against the demonization of America that fuels Islamist ideology, Obama’s face gets close. It proves them wrong about what America is in ways no words can.

Personally, I think Sullivan is a lot closer to the truth. Obama’s election wouldn’t magically fix any national security or economic challenges, but it would almost instantly change the world’s image of America. In a positive way.

And in regards to Obama’s name, tell me, if the Senator were named, say, Stanley Armour Dunham, would people like King be so inclined to raise issues about his name? Doubtful. Which just shows the disingenuousness of these ploys. Obama was named after his father and his paternal grandfather, but if he had been named after his maternal grandfather, on the other hand, well – hello, Stanley Armour Dunham.

King’s statements are just another cynical attempt to scare people into voting against one candidate instead of for another one. Oooh, Obama seems like a foreigner (remember how French John Kerry was made out to be in 2004?). Oooh, terrorists are going to dance in the streets because they love Obama.  Oooh, maybe Obama is an Islamic Manchurian candidate. Or, even better, maybe he’s the Antichrist. Give me a break.

Related posts:

1. Obama and America’s image in the world ...
2. Obama and the world ...
3. How multicultural Hawaii shaped Obama ...