How you win matters
June 18, 2008
What’s up fam,
I went to the Obama rally that was held in Detroit and it was a great event. My homegirl Monique Perry (a fellow Detroit native I have known since high school and went to the University of Michigan with me) pumped up the crowd and encouraged folks to register and organize. Obama thanked her on national television. Let’s get em’ Mo and GO BLUE! Obama gave a relatively standard stump speech but it surely didn’t sound like one. The brother has conviction and I am happy to see him as the Democratic nominee.
However, I was grieved to learn that someone from Obama’s team “barred two Muslim women from sitting behind the podium by campaign volunteers seeking to prevent the women’s headscarves from appearing in photographs or on television with the candidate.” For context, the city of Dearborn which borders Detroit is home to the largest concentration of Arab Americans in the country so you really can’t be in Detroit and avoid the Arab-American community. And can we way hijjab instead of headscarves? Ok, thanks.
Now if Obama personally called the Detroit reporter and apologized for calling her sweetie the same day the incident happened, his staff needs to find these women’s numbers and make sure Obama himself apologizes. I say that because anybody who knows me, knows that I am all about process and how you win is very important.
I actually think that Obama should have over-indulged himself in the Arab-American community to demonstrate that he is secure enough in himself to be photographed with Arab-Americans. Doing so would not only send a strong message to Arabs across the globe that we are all deserving of respect and it would help end the post-911 classification of the Arab community as “them”. This is a moment where the Obama campaign can continue to do the right thing and not what is politically expedient. How you win matters.
Stay up fam,
Brandon Q.
