Monday, May 12, 2008

Barack Hussein Obama, Cont'd   [Byron York]

Rich — just for people who don't have time to go through the entire Atlantic interview, the section in which Obama brings up his middle name is this:

Look, we don’t do nuance well in politics and especially don’t do it well on Middle East policy. We look at things as black and white, and not gray. It’s conceivable that there are those in the Arab world who say to themselves, “This is a guy who spent some time in the Muslim world, has a middle name of Hussein, and appears more worldly and has called for talks with people, and so he’s not going to be engaging in the same sort of cowboy diplomacy as George Bush,” and that’s something they’re hopeful about.  I think that’s a perfectly legitimate perception as long as they’re not confused about my unyielding support for Israel’s security.

Putting aside the foreign policy analysis, one obvious result of this, I think, is that it will make it more difficult for the Obama campaign, or the McCain campaign, for that matter, to try to shush people who, for whatever reason, refer to Obama by his full name.

05/12 06:24 PMShare