It’s all downhill from there, with President Obama later implying that the United States hasn’t been respectful in its treatment of the Muslim world: “Now, my job is to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the well-being of the Muslim world, that the language we use has to be a language of respect.”
He also implied that the American people have a prejudiced view of Muslims, owing to the attacks of September 11, and therefore do not understand the Muslim world: “My job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives.”
But what should be of utmost concern to Americans is the way Obama redefined the priorities of the president:
And I think that what you will see over the next several years is that I’m not going to agree with everything that some Muslim leader may say, or what’s on a television station in the Arab world—but I think that what you'll see is somebody who is listening, who is respectful, and who is trying to promote the interests not just of the United States, but also ordinary people who right now are suffering from poverty and a lack of opportunity. I want to make sure that I’m speaking to them, as well.
Obama believes that equal to the interests of the United States, the president must also promote the interests of “ordinary people” in the Muslim world. This is a radical departure from the president’s oath to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.” The president isn’t the president of the world, or even limited constituencies within the world. He is President of the United States—and nothing is equal to his constitutional responsibilities to the people of this country.
President Obama seems to think himself uniquely qualified to address the Muslim world because he has lived among them: “I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries … the largest one, Indonesia.”
Some have even questioned whether or not he is—or at least was—one of them. When his Muslim father enrolled him in school in Indonesia he recorded Barack’s religion as “Islam.” In an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos during the campaign Obama referred to “my Muslim faith.” The media wrote it off as “a slip of the tongue.”
Throughout his campaign for president Obama insisted that he was a Christian, and the American people took him at his word. But so what if President Obama really is a Muslim? America is a pluralistic society that guarantees the freedom of religion as a fundamental right. The “so what” may have just been answered in this interview.
After hearing the American president speak in negative tones about his country to the largest Arab television audience in the world, it is fair to ask whether or not this president really sees protecting the interests of his country as his first priority.
Is it possible that Obama’s haste to speak with the Muslim world has more to do with his affinity with them than it does America’s supposed marred image among them? The Al Arabiya interview leaves one wondering if Obama’s foreign policy isn’t influenced by a view that it is somehow he and Muslims against the United States.