WHAT'S IN A NAME???

Is pronouncing a man's middle name tantamount to insulting him?
In Sen. Barack Obama's case, the answer appears to be yes.

The name in question is "Hussein," Obama's middle name and the name of his Kenyan Muslim father.
Obama has accepted apologies from those who dared utter his middle name as if using his father's name was, indeed, an insult. Why?

The name Hussein means "most benign" or "very beautiful" in Arabic but that isn't enough to persuade Obama to treat it more kindly. (Hussein is also one of the most popular names for Muslims, especially Shiites.)

BUT Obama's problems do not end there because.......
"Barack" is also Arabic, from "barakah," meaning "blessing."

"Obama," meanwhile, is a word in Swahili - a language based on Arabic and it refers to members of his father's tribe who converted to Islam.

In other words, "Barack Hussein Obama" is a perfectly common identifier for someone with an ethnic East African Muslim background.

Barack denys that he was ever a muzzie, however in Islam of course, anyone born of a Muslim father is automatically regarded as Muslim.

What's troubling about Obama's approach to the mini-storm stirred up by his political enemies over his name is that it looks like an attempt to hide something.
He HAS behaved as if he does have a family secret, and as if the name Hussein is something to be ashamed of.
So it is not the fact that others have called him Hussien, but rather the fact that he himself has such a problem with it that should be raising the red flags!!!

It should be noted though that Obama's efforts to distance himself from Islam contrasts greatly with his innovative approach to US relations with its Islamist challengers.

Obama offers a policy of dialogue and accommodation.
He has opposed listing Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization and proposed a grand bargain with Syria's rulers.
He is even prepared to ignore two UN Security Council resolutions that require Iran to stop its uranium-enrichment program as a precondition for talks at the highest level.
He has campaigned for a formal congressional move to prevent Bush from taking any military action against Iran.

In an important symbolic move designed to signal an end of the special relationship between Israel and America, Obama has become the FIRST major presidential candidate in 25 years not to commit himself to transferring the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Last but not least, Obama has promised to withdraw from Iraq in his first year in office - meeting a key demand of all radical Islamist forces, both Sunni and Shiite.

The message is clear:
Obama wants a new relationship with radical forces in the Islamic world while distancing America from its traditional regional allies.
In other words, he proposes to reverse policies that have taken shape over more than six decades under 12 successive American presidents.
Obama plans to give Islam everything it wants, but as we all know once they get that they will come up with a new set of demands and enough will NEVER be enough for them!!!
The more we give the weaker Islam will see us as being and the more they will try to bring us down!!!

These ideas from Obama are what deserves to be very closely examined and debated, much more so than the origin and meaning of his middle name.