Thursday, June 04, 2009

Obama and schwarma

Am I the only one who found the headline, "Obama Calls for Alliances With Muslims", if technically true, somewhat misleading? The headline suggests that Obama has unilaterally decided to change where America stands in the great East and West divide (such as it is). It will also suggest, to whatever loony-right elements remain and read the NYT, that OMG Obama is a Muslim, after all! From reading the article (and as much of his speech as I could, until the call to pizza grew too strong), one learns this is not the case at all, but rather that he's trying to get peace in the Middle East. Is he less pro-Israel than this particular Zionist blogger? Sure. But I don't think his suggestions sounded outrageous. If he were calling for a one-state 'solution' with a Palestinian right-of-return, then there'd be cause for concern, and perhaps a sudden drop in enrollment in French departments, and increased enrollment in the IDF. Jerusalem... will be tough. I'm not Israeli, and perhaps because of this am not sure if turning the city into something like the Vatican but for whichever religions want in would be such a disaster. But NOTHING BETTER HAPPEN TO TEL AVIV. It must remain the mecca (er, so to speak) for top-notch falafel, beautiful gay men, blended iced coffee, and tanned-and-toned non-self-hating Jewry of Muscle it is today.

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