Bin Laden talks about Obama's Muslim message

Reuters/NY Post:

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Shortly after Obama arrived Al Jazeera television aired a recording by al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in which he said the U.S. president had planted seeds for "revenge and hatred" towards the United States in the Muslim world.

Bin Laden said Obama was continuing in the steps of his predecessor George W. Bush and told Americans to be prepared for the consequences of the White House's policies.

Obama, whose father was a Muslim and who lived in Indonesia as a boy, is trying to repair a U.S. image badly damaged by Bush's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the treatment of U.S. military detainees.

He was due to spend the night at the Saudi king's farm before heading on to Cairo for his speech to the Muslim world, which will fulfill a campaign promise last year to deliver an address from a Muslim capital early in his administration.

"I am confident that we're in a moment where in Islamic countries, I think there's a recognition that the path of extremism is not actually going to deliver a better life for people," Obama told NBC News before he left Washington

"I think there's a recognition that simply being anti-American is not going to solve their problems. The steps we're taking now to leave Iraq takes that issue and diffuses it a little bit," he said.

Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said earlier the speech was "about resetting our relations with the Muslim world".

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I question the premise that blames Bush for the problems in the Muslim world. It is most illogical. Al Qaeda was responsible for more deaths in Iraq than the US was so a logical Muslim would blame them for the carnage. One of the weird things about Muslims is their double standard score card on Muslims deaths. If killed by another Muslim it does not seem to be a very big deal. If they die trying to kill American or Israeli troops it is an atrocity, massacre or some other such hyperbole. Going on an apology tour is not going to change this weird perspective.

When bin Laden talks about revenge an hatred he is talking about the emotions that he and other feel because we are resisting his weird religious beliefs and his attempts to impose them through a mass murder for Allah campaign. It comes from the perspective of his religious bigotry and that of his followers. Until you understand that the war being waged against is one waged by and for religious bigots you will not understand the context of the fighting. Al Qaeda is the one that owes the world an apology for the atrocities they have imposed on us and Muslims who do not follow al Qaeda's weird beliefs.