The Quiet American: How the World Sees Obama (Joe Klein, Time)

[Jackeens]

At this year's U.S.-Islamic World Forum in Doha, Qatar, speaker after Muslim speaker had nothing particularly awful to say about the United States. The Muslims were, in fact, hopeful about, and slightly amazed by, the new American President. Some even wondered aloud what they could do to help him succeed. Anwar Ibrahim, the Malaysian opposition leader, listed the significant gestures that Obama had made toward the Islamic world, from the President's interview with al-Arabiya television network to the appointment of George Mitchell as Middle East negotiator. Obama had even made reference to "a hadith, which is something not many Islamic leaders do!" Ibrahim added, referring to the sayings of the Prophet that are not included in the Koran. Then Ibrahim went further: "But will the U.S. find credible partners in the Muslim world? ... How do we expect the President of the United States to solve our problems when we do nothing?"


http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1880379,00.html

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Heartening news

Now perhaps the moderate and progressive Muslims will be encouraged to have a louder voice.

[grantcart]

2. I was absolutely astonished to see that Anwar Ibrahim was outside of the country

He was once the brightest light in the UMNO (Malaysian Establishment), moved quickly to become Finance Minister at the age of 44 and then Deputy Prime Minister.

Because he wanted to eliminate corruptiona and cronyism the Prime Minister manufactured charges of Sodomy and he has been persecuted charged and imprisoned released and charged with new charges.

To read more about him go here;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_Ibrahim

[Jennicut]

3. Thanks grantcart. I did hear about this man and his being perscuted twice.

Al Gore came to his defense over the allegations. Looks like there is cracks in the "case" against him so that is good news.

[grantcart]

5. I lived in Malaysia at the time that he first broke onto the national scene.

At the time he was perceived as a Muslim fanatic. It turned out that he was a very clever progressive politician who frightened the beejeezus out of the establishement.

The most surprising news in that Wikipedia account is that Anwar wanted to end Malaysia's New Economic Policy which has given ethnic Malay's structural advantages over the last 35 years. The situation in Malaysia is very complex but at the time of independence ethnic Malays owned only about 15% of the assets of the country. Anwar's signalling that it is time to end this policy seems to be an effort to reach over to Chinese and Indian Malays (40% and 10% respectively) to build a new majority government, and overthrowing UMNO, something that has only happened once and then with violent results.


More about the New Economic Policy here; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysian_New_Economic_Policy

[Jennicut]

6. Thanks for the info, I hope Anwar is totally cleared of these charges.

[Cha]

4. This is what

we hoping for when we wanted Obama for Prez.

[EraOfResponsibility]

7. A President who understands Islamic culture

that's change I can believe in.