Jerk! I think it’s going to get very annoying if our enemies use racial slurs to taunt us. One president’s called a cowboy and the other a “house negro” iit’s interesting how al-Qaida knows enough about our culture to mimic our insults and to use a piece of Malcolm X footage to explain the insult:
The message appeared chiefly aimed at persuading Muslims and Arabs that Obama does not represent a change in U.S. policies. Ayman al-Zawahri said in the message, which appeared on militant Web sites, that Obama is “the direct opposite of honorable black Americans” like Malcolm X, the 1960s African-American rights leader.
In al-Qaida’s first response to Obama’s victory, al-Zawahri also called the president-elect — along with secretaries of state Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice — “house negroes.”
Speaking in Arabic, al-Zawahri uses the term “abeed al-beit,” which literally translates as “house slaves.” But al-Qaida supplied English subtitles of his speech that included the translation as “house negroes.”
What’s even more interesting about this taunt is that it reflects what the left have been saying about Powell and Rice for the last eight years (yes they did, you might not have said it but plenty of lefties have — google it yourself to see what the left has been calling Rice throughout the Bush administration). It always amazing me how much al-Qaida sounds like the left when they taunt us.
AFP and Reuters don’t even mention the racial slur in their report.
I think this insult will backfire for them. Bush was an easy target, he’s pretty unpopular abroad and here at home but Obama is much more popular among Muslims given that they believe he’ll be much more sympathetic to the Palestinians.
posted November 19, 2008 at 1:12 pm
“The great irony is that, if they could but see it, Christian and Islamic Fundamentalists are the same people. Their vision of life and how to live it is driven by the same needs and neuroses. What they hate in each other is a projection of what they hate in themselves… It is Literalists who fight wars of religion with Literalists from other traditions, each claiming God is on their side.” – Timothy Freke
It’s easy to see that the right wing Christian fundamentalists and the Muslim fundamentalists agree on their view of Barak Obama. That’s because they are cut from the same cloth. The real difference between Muslims and Christians is that Muslims KNOW their God is the real God and Christians only wish they could know their God is real. Fundamentalist Christians are therefore just wannabe Muslims.
posted November 19, 2008 at 1:59 pm
Al-Qaeda is going to have a heck of a time with their anti-American “spin” now that a U.S. President who is wildly popular in the rest of the world has been elected. I would imagine Al-Zahawahri is acting on the advice of the American Al-Qaeda member, Adam Gadahn.
My feeling is that we won’t ever be able to stop a terrorist group like Al-Qaeda from attacking and inflicting death on innocent people, but we can make them so irrelevant that they are much less likely to have the capacity to carry out anything catastrophic.
posted November 19, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Hmmm….the speech sounds a lot like a GOP talking points memo from a few weeks ago in the campaign. It also sounds a lot like something from Michelle Malkin, Ann Coulter, or even this blog.
I guess you can finally consider yourself in good company, Michele.
posted November 19, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Well, Michelle, we agree on this one.____I think Al-Qaeda is on the ropes and knows it. If that gives some credit to Bush for doing the right thing after he did a lot of wrong things, so be it. But if the man on that tape was hateful enough of the USA to cross several of the lines drawn by Islam itself, and he was, he’s desperate.
posted November 19, 2008 at 10:07 pm
Considering that Al-Qaeda is run by psychopaths, being insulted and disliked by them should be considered a badge of honor.
posted November 20, 2008 at 7:15 am
I did as you suggested, and, in the first 19 pages of listings I checked, it sounds like “the left” now comprises Harry Belafonte in 2003 and Al Sharpton, responding to Mr. Belafonte’s slur.
posted November 20, 2008 at 3:42 pm
This piece has been featured at THEWEEK.com as Best Opinion – We really enjoyed your take on the subject.
posted November 20, 2008 at 4:41 pm
It seems they “cared enough” to start insulting even before President-elect Obama has taken the oath of office. How “kind”.
)
posted November 20, 2008 at 5:22 pm
So Michele is saying that Al-Quaeda, when it uses racist terms, sounds like the left…..
And what would you call those people at the McCain/Palin speeches who called Obama every name in the book? The right wing has not exactly been setting a good example, and this goes back a long time.
Reagan, after all, started his presidential campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, with a speech on states’ rights. That town is most famous for the murder of civil rights activists.
This is Al-Quaeda showing that they are scared . The election of Obama has really shown the lie to their portrayal of American values, and it is making it harder for them to get recruits.
This shows that that there are other kinds of power in the world.
posted November 21, 2008 at 1:32 pm
surely they will not like obama. unlike bush, who let bin laden go free, obama plans to capture or kill him and the rest of al qaeda.
as for “sounding like the left”, i think that you’re projecting, michele. how dare he speak badly of our next president! he’s obviously encroaching upon your territory! clearly zawahri was watching the mccain/palin campaign speeches for talking points. fundamentalists are cut from the same cloth.