Obama’s Kenyan Roots

NY Slimes ^ | 2/24/2008 | Nicholas Kristoff

[markomalley]

A barefoot old woman in a ripped dress is sitting on a log in front of her tin-roof bungalow in this remote village in western Kenya, jovially greeting visitors.

Mama Sarah, as she is known around here, lives without electricity or running water. She is illiterate and doesn’t know when she was born. Yet she may have a seat of honor at the next presidential inauguration in Washington — depending on what happens to her stepgrandson, Barack Obama.

Mama Sarah cannot communicate with Mr. Obama, who calls her his grandmother, because she speaks only her Luo tribal language and a little Swahili. Senator Obama’s Luo is pretty much limited to “musawa,” meaning “how are you?”

People around here are giddy at the prospect of a President Obama.

“I’m up at 4 a.m. or 5 a.m. to listen to BBC news and get the latest on the campaign,” said Nicholas Rajula, who describes himself as a cousin of the senator. “By the way, what’s the latest news about the superdelegates?”

You might think that all Kenyans would be vigorously supporting Mr. Obama. But Kenya has been fractured along ethnic lines in the last two months, so now Mr. Obama draws frenzied support from the Luo ethnic group of his ancestors, while many members of the rival Kikuyu group fervently support Hillary Rodham Clinton.

[Mikey_1962]

Interesting that Obama has no slaves as American ancestors... explains the lack of chip on the shoulder?

[sageb1]

Much more on this:

Barack Obama and His Support for Islamic Sharia Law and al Qaeda

[sageb1]

Then what explains his affilation with a church that espouses black liberation theology?

[Cicero]

Nothing about his church-burning cousin Odinga here, I see. Would that be too embarrassing?

[VOA]

bump

[LibFreeOrDie]

The race baiters like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton won’t like Kristof’s last, positive paragraph.

[Mikey_1962]

He is no more responsible for the ravings of that lunatic than I am for the ravings Father Berrigan... or Father Coughlin for that matter.

[Yorlik803]

Dont really care where he came from...just where he is going to take us if elected.

[pandoraou812]

Thanks for that link. I wish more people would read it! It is going in my saved file. Pandy

[John Jorsett]

Frankly, I worry that enemies of Senator Obama will seize upon details like his grandfather’s Islamic faith or his father’s polygamy to portray him as an alien or a threat to American values. But snobbishness and paranoia ill-become a nation of immigrants, where one of our truest values is to judge people by their own merits, not their pedigrees. If we call ourselves a land of opportunity, then Mr. Obama’s heritage doesn’t threaten American values but showcases them.

I see the "let's move on" rhetoric of ignoring the past is still alive and well.

[9YearLurker]

Is this right, that Obama’s father was converted to Catholicism and only Obama’s grandfather was Muslim?

How about his stepfather? Is that his connection to this step-grandmother, and did he have more to do with raising Obama than his birth father?

Thanks.

[Heatseeker]

Is this right, that Obama’s father was converted to Catholicism and only Obama’s grandfather was Muslim?

I have been trying to research Senator Obama's background and this is the first I've heard of it, though much has been written of his father. I wonder if the writer didn't make assumptions based on the senior Barak Obama's attendance at a Catholic school.

[sageb1]

Obama has stated that he has learned much from the Pastor of that church. He could always leave. It doesn’t look good for Obama at all.

[9YearLurker]

Thanks; it will be interesting to hear if others have a bead on this.

[sageb1]

http://www.freedomsenemies.com/_more/obama.htm

[Verginius Rufus]

Senator Obama attended a Catholic school in Indonesia (where his religion was listed as Muslim). This is the first I’ve heard that his father had attended a Catholic school...it’s not impossible.

[Sonny M]

I know there was a rumor early on (either last year or right after talk started that Obama might run for president) from some of the clinton folks that Obama's ancestors (ironically on both his father and mothers side) may have been involved with the slave trade.

The only follow up I ever read was that his mothers side, some of her ancestors did own slaves, but on his fathers side, the story just disappeared.

Since it was coming from the Clinton supporters camp, I was never sure if that was true, or just total b.s. in a whispering campaign.

Does anyone remember this?

[MinorityRepublican]

I never thought of it until you brought it up. Obama is not black in the American sense because he is not descendant of former slaves in this country.

[ansel12]

“He is no more responsible for the ravings of that lunatic than I am for the ravings Father Berrigan... or Father Coughlin for that matter.”

---

That doesn’t even make sense,

“Obama says he found religion and Jesus Christ through Wright, whom he met in the mid-1980s. He has been attending Wright’s church regularly since 1988.”

“In 1991, Obama joined the church and walked down the aisle in a formal commitment of faith. Wright later married Obama and Michelle Robinson and baptized their two daughters.

The title of Obama’s bestseller “The Audacity of Hope” comes from one of Wright’s sermons. Wright is one of the first people Obama thanked after his election to the Senate in 2004.”