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| From 2008: Andrew Sullivan Predicts Good Muslim Relations Once Obama Elected |
| 2012-09-12 |
| The next president has to create a sophisticated and supple blend of soft and hard power to isolate the enemy, to fight where necessary, but also to create an ideological template that works to the West’s advantage over the long haul. There is simply no other candidate with the potential of Obama to do this. Which is where his face comes in. 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. |
| Posted by:Unuque Angegum6185 |
| #4 We have good Muslim relations. You should see bad relations! |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2012-09-12 20:21 |
| #3 Unless you are a practising muslim they hate you because they have been taught that from a young age. Non Muslim=going to hell |
| Posted by: Paul D 2012-09-12 12:29 |
| #2 Rather than call Sully an ideological ass-hat, let's just say he is charmingly naive and overlooks some fundamental facts as to why B-HOs supposed advantages aren't. To wit: Black people don't seem to get much respect in the ME, likely a result of centuries of Muslim slave raiding in Africa. Second, being born a Muslim (his father's religion), but ostensibly now a Christian, B-HO is an apostate. The punishment for that under Sharia law is death. Not exactly the guy you would pick to redeem the Great Satan in the eyes of the Islamic world, eh? |
| Posted by: SteveS 2012-09-12 11:25 |
| #1 Does anyone pay attention to Sully? He went bonkers before LGF. Not long before but then both were mainly playing conservative and not actually believers. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2012-09-12 10:46 |