Obama Will Now Use His Middle Name!

From those tireless defenders of the faith at the Associated Press:

Obama wants to ‘reboot America’s image’

By JENNIFER LOVEN AP White House Correspondent

12/10/2008

WASHINGTON—President-elect Barack Obama says he will try to “reboot America’s image” among the world’s Muslims and will follow tradition by using his entire name—Barack Hussein Obama—in his swearing-in ceremony.

The U.S. image globally has taken a deep hit during President George W. Bush’s two terms in office, primarily because of opposition to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, harsh interrogation of prisoners, the indefinite detention of terrorist suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and mistreatment of inmates at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

Obama promised during his campaign that one of his top priorities would be to work to repair America’s reputation worldwide, and that one element of that effort would be a speech delivered in a Muslim capital.

He pledged anew to give such a speech, though he declined to say whether it would happen during his first year in office.

“It’s something I intend to follow through on,” Obama said in an interview published Wednesday in the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times. “We’ve got a unique opportunity to reboot America’s image around the world and also in the Muslim world in particular. So we need to take advantage of that.”

Obama said his message would be twofold: that his administration will be unyielding in stamping out terrorist extremism but also “unrelenting in our desire to create a relationship of mutual respect and partnership with countries.”

“I think the world is ready for that message,” he said in the interview, conducted Tuesday.

During the campaign, Obama repeatedly faced questions about whether he is a Muslim, particularly in whisper campaigns that noted his middle name, that his father is Kenyan, and that he lived for a time as a child in Indonesia. Obama is a practicing Christian.

Asked if he would drop his middle name during his inauguration on Jan. 20, the president-elect said he would not.

“The tradition is that they use all three names and I will follow the tradition, not trying to make a statement on [sic] way or another,” he said.

Obama also talked about the spiritual support he sought during his White House bid, particularly since he and his family left Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ after inflammatory comments by its pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, became a campaign issue.

Obama said he set up a “sort of prayer circle across the country” of pastors who would pray for him every morning on a conference call. Obama said he sometimes joined the call, which involved leaders from various Christian denominations and other religious faiths.

“I’m not even sure that all of them voted for me,” Obama said. “But they were willing to pray for me, and that’s something that was wonderful.” …

Which is it, Ms. Loven? Is Mr. Obama trying “to make a statement” by using his middle name or not?

The article strongly implies that he is, despite the quote from Mr. Obama himself. 

Anyway, lest we forget, this is not quite the tune the Obama camp and the media (but we repeat ourselves) played during the campaign.

Indeed, as we noted back in February, via the Islamophobes at the Chicago Tribune:

Michelle Obama campaigning in Chillicothe, Ohio for her husband, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., Thursday Feb. 28, 2008.

Michelle Obama: name Hussein is ‘the fear bomb’

by Mark Silva

Michelle Obama, who often has decried “the fear bomb” that opponents have used against her husband for his middle name — Barack Hussein Obama — said in Canton, Ohio, today that it is happening again and shows why it’s so important that he wins election as president.

“They threw in the obvious, ultimate fear bomb,” Obama said today of her husband’s 2004 Senate race. “We’re even hearing [that] now. … ‘When all else fails, be afraid of his name, and what that could stand for, because it’s different.’”

The senator’s wife said that rivals use innuendo to play on fears. “Just as they’re saying it now,” she said.

But, she told about 200 supporters this morning at a restored theater in Canton, Obama won despite that “climate of negativity and doubt” in 2004. “We learned, number one, that when power is threatened by real change they will say anything to stop it,” she said. “But we also learned that the American people can handle the truth.”

What America needs, she added, is a “fundamentally different kind of leadership,” one that challenges people to be different, and better to one another. And that, she said to critics who say it is not his time, cannot wait.

“Barack Obama will be the kind of leader we need right now, not in four years or eight years or 12 years,” she said. “We can’t wait to get this right. We need it to happen today.”

But suddenly now Mr. Obama’s middle name is no longer a “fear bomb.”

By the way, President Bush freed more than 50 million Muslims from the most abject tyrannies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

How will Mr. Barack Hussein Obama top that?