The Works of Fareed Zakaria

If you have heard of Fareed Zakaria, you may want to follow his analysis on his show called “Foreign Exchange”. This is a weekly, half-hour international affairs series, that Farid hosts and can be viewed at http://foreignexchange.tv/index.php. These shows are also aired on other TV stations – see list here http://foreignexchange.tv/?q=node/135

Based on my discussions and reviews of his work by people, he enjoys a love-hate relationship within the Muslim public. His fans are proud to have a person of a Muslim background reach such a popularity while his bashers accuse him of being very liberal. Whatever, the case may be, his analysis is always intelligent and based on sound facts. Let me know what do you think?

TheMuslimBlogger

American Muslims or Muslim Americans?

Over the past couple of weeks, I have heard two different terms about Muslims living in America and I wondered which one of those suited us the best. So, are we "American Muslims" or "Muslim Americans"? As I pondered over this not so deep topic, I started thinking about the difference between the terms "Indian American" and "American Indian". Well, we all know that Indian Americans are those Indians that now live in America, whereas American Indians are those Americans that looked like Indians. Big difference between those two for sure. The former term implies "immigrants" whereas the second term implies "natives". Along, the same lines is there a difference between American Muslims and Muslim Americans? May be and many be not but I thought we as Muslims we don't and shouldn't really care because that is what being a Muslim is supposed to be – We are simply "Muslims"!

Barack Obama for Muslims?

Today, Barack Obama, a US Senator from Illinois, has setup an exploratory committee to run for the office of the President of the United States. To us Muslims, just like any other such time, the pressing question will be about his position when it comes to civil rights in general, and specifically about his stance in dealing with issues that pertain to Muslims. What has struck me special about this candidate (and what has sparked the nation’s interest in him as well) is about his new approach in dealing with political issues. On his site, Barack mentions about himself as

“a potential candidate who has long championed the notion of an independent office of public integrity that would take over some of the self-policing duties of the Senate ethics committee.”

On another note, a "rumor" or story (whatever you want to call it) about Barack’s background needs to be mentioned here. The story is that his middle initial “H” stands for Hussein and that his father was a Muslim from Ethiopia. Whether true or not and the significance of such will remain to be seen in the weeks and months.