Happened a few days ago, but went under the DKos radar. Just before wiping the floor with the entire GOP House caucus, Obama got stumped in Tampa by a student:
OMG, she made him sound like Dubya. But it’s not about Obama.
It’s about Leila Abdelaziz and the magic of speaking truth to power. Hopefully, this decade Palestinians won’t let us shove them into the racist caricature we developed to justify the outrage of Occupation.
American politicians lecturing Arabs on human rights and democracy, is obscene. The US Middle East role has been extremely negative (even outside of I-P). Will we get this basic fact into our heads?
The US discourse on I-P is so divorced from reality, that it is now a big part of the problem itself. (UPDATE->)
Update:
For some reason I wanted to keep this to an intro-only... bad idea. The thread seems all over the place, very little of it - just like Obama's answer - related to the main points.
But first, a delayed h/t to Mondoweiss where I saw this story first. They also provide a transcript from a local radio station.
Here's what she said in full:
Laila Abdelaziz: "Hello Mr. President, my name is Laila Abdelaziz. I'm a student at the University of South Florida."
President Barack Obama: "Hey Laila"
[crowd boos]
President Barack Obama: "Uh oh, Uh oh, Uh oh. We can all get along here. Tampa, behave yourselves."
Laila Abdelaziz: "First of all I'd like to say I did work on your campaign. I think it's great what you did for the community, because you involved us, as the youth, to understand the grassroots movement and the impact it can make."
President Barack Obama: "That's right. Thank you."
Laila Abdelaziz: "My question is, um- Last night you spoke in your State of the Union address you spoke of America's support for human rights."
President Barack Obama: "Mm, hmm"
Laila Abdelaziz: "Then, why have we not condemned Israel and Egypt's human rights violations against the occupied Palestinian people? And yet we continue supporting them financially with billions of dollars from our tax dollars?"
[commotion]
You can read Obama's response there as well. In a nutshell, he didn't answer her at all. She asks why the US is complicit in major ongoing human-rights violations even as its President extolls human rights in his SOTU. He answers - when he finally puts an answer together - how he plans to resume negotiations and why it is so difficult.
That's not at all the same thing. In fact, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, drafted over 60 years ago in a unique international effort led by an American (Eleanor Roosevelt), specifies this up front.
Article 2.
* Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.
Human rights are not supposed to wait for any negotiations or convenient political environment. That is exactly the point of even bothering to define the concept of human rights. I'm pretty sure that Obama, a constitutional-law scholar, knows this.
You might say, well, everything in I-P is so intertwined that it's impossible to begin anything. Besides being in direct contradiction with Article 2, this is also a wrong analysis. In fact, it is arguable that the continued denial of human rights is a major engine driving the escalation of conflict. A few months ago I posted here a blueprint for a quick and drastic human-rights driven change on the ground. Perhaps not a perfect blueprint, but just as realistic as all the other negotiation ideas floating around. So it's possible and imperative to address human rights in I-P now, not later. But the Israeli and American discourse don't even have human rights on the horizon. Correction: the present Israeli discourse sees the very concept of human rights as a plot to undermine Israel's existence.
Here's what Ms. Abdelaziz said after the event (from the same radio-station link):
Of course we love a two state solution, but there has to be trust and dialogue between two sides. The Palestinian people are ready for a two state solution, but the Palestinian people are the ones being occupied by Israelis. How are the Palestinian people supposed to do anything if they're the ones being occupied? The occupiers have to allow for something to happen which they have not yet allowed to happen. I asked President Obama why he says America as a nation supports human rights, but at the same time, one of our greatest allies is Israel, a country that does not support human rights, and has many human rights violations. President Obama did not really answer my question or address it, so I'm really disappointed right now.
Again, this is not just about Obama. The disappointment Leila expresses is not any different from the disappointment many of us feel about healthcare, economic policies, etc. Obama is an extremely eloquent politician whose heart is in the right place on most issues, but who - as we have all discovered by now, I think - is also a bit too risk-averse for the taste of most progressives.
The problem is not with Obama himself, but with the mainstream American discourse, with the perception of American media and politicians of what is "safe" to say or promote vis-a-vis I-P (basically: not anything that is remotely related to the reality on the ground). And this is where the progressive blogosphere can play an educational role.