Republicans: Playing Politics, Stupid Or Both With Obama Middle Name Issue

Iowa Congressman Steve King, who said some hateful things toward President-elect Barack Obama during the campaign for the presidency (including proclaiming that terrorists would be “dancing in the streets” if Obama was elected), now has shifted focus (as politicians so often do) to start to criticize Obama for the plan to use his middle name during his swearing in on Jan. 20. 

This is from a Politico story:
After telling the Associated Press last year that Obama’s middle name was among the reasons Islamic terrorists would rejoice over his election, King says he’s since been careful to avoid using it. Thus he found Obama’s decision to allow it be mentioned on the steps of the Capitol “bizarre” and “a double-standard.”

“Is that reserved just for him, not his critics?” King asked.

The congressman says he doubts Obama’s sincerity when he explained that he chose to use his middle name so as to be historically consistent with past inaugurations, when America has heard the full names of its presidents echo from the inaugural stand.

“Whatever his reasons are,” King said, “the one he gave us could not be the reason.”

He continued: “The society is a little strange about this. If you’re speaking the truth and in an effort to be objective, there should be nothing off limits in a free society, [but] there are many biases building and clearly a double-standard.”

It is not “clearly a double standard” as King puts it. In fact, I would ask Rep. King how many times he has used the middle name of Sen. John McCain? I would ask all Republicans how many times they used the middle name of McCain throughout the presidential campaign. As a matter of fact, I don’t even know what McCain’s middle name is or whether or not he has a middle name. I can guarantee you this, not a single Republican would be trying to use his middle name if it was Harry or Howard. But, because it is Hussein, it was seen as a way to use anti-Arab and anti-Muslim racism as a weapon against Obama. When Obama has his middle name used, when he takes the oath of office on Jan. 20, I doubt he will be using it as many conservatives were using it (to try and scare Americans with racism).

Politico:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0109/17506.html