Hussein: What's in a Name?

When I was in South Africa recently, there was great hysteria amongst the Jewish community (ok, my family), brought on by an e-mail that was being sent around on the Internet claiming that Barack Hussein Obama was a Muslim. I tried to explain to my mother that even if Obama was a Muslim (which he isn't), it didn't make him a militant suicide bomber. She regarded me suspiciously, wanting to believe. In Vanity Fair's Hollywood Issue a profile on Obama addresses these accusations thus: Todd S. Purdum writes that Obama told me [him] that he could only laugh at the false press accounts that portray Soetoro [Obama's stepfather] as some kind of radical Muslim who had sent him to an Islamic school. "I mean, you know, his big thing was Johnny Walker Black, Andy Williams records," Obama said. "I still remember 'Moon River.' He'd be playing it, sipping, and playing tennis at the country club. That was his whole thing."
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And today on Salon.com, there is a longer discussion. Take a look: http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/02/28/hussein/