Family Politics

Should the exploits of relatives harm the chances of a Presidential candidate? (h/t Gateway Pundit)

Jimmy Carter wasn't responsible for the actions of his brother Billy, and it could hardly be said that Roger Clinton's problems are in any way the fault of brother Bill. Likewise, Hillary isn't to blame for Hugh Rodham's cash-for-pardons scandal.

So would it be fair to hold Barack Obama's feet to the fire for the Kenyan government's claim that his cousin Raila Odinga is behind ethnic cleansing in Kenya that has so far taken 600 lives?

Odinga is having to defend himself and his supporters from charges brought by the Kenyan government of ethnic cleansing following disputed Presidential elections in that African nation. He has condemned one of the most shocking incidents, where his supporters—reputedly Odinga's fellow Luo tribesmen—blocked the doors of a Christian church and burned dozens of Kikuyu men, women, and children alive inside.

Odinga's father led the communist opposition party during the Cold War and he was educated in East Germany. His brother is named after Fidel Castro. Far more troubling than his past, however, is Mr. Odinga's current pact with the National Muslim Leader's Forum, an hardline Islamist organization. Odinga has promised to institute harsh Sharia courts throughout the country if he was elected, and to ban Christian preaching.

But what does this have to do with Obama?

Daniel Johnson had this to say in a recent article in the NY Sun:

In August 2006, Mr. Obama visited Kenya and spoke in support of Mr. Odinga's candidacy at rallies in Nairobi. The Web site Atlas Shrugs has even posted a photograph of the two men side by side. More recently, Mr. Odinga says that Mr. Obama interrupted his campaigning in New Hampshire to have a telephone conversation with his African cousin about the constitutional crisis in Kenya.

What should Americans make of Mr. Obama's Kenyan connection? If he has been putting tribal or family considerations above America's national interest by supporting Mr. Odinga's anti-Western candidacy, it raises serious questions about his judgement.

At the time of his visit in 2006, President Kibaki's spokesman complained that Mr. Obama was behaving like a "stooge" of Mr. Odinga—which was at best undignified for a visiting American senator, and at worst unwarranted interference in the internal politics of another country.

Even more serious are the doubts raised by Mr. Obama's attitude toward Islam, which has so far received much less scrutiny than might be expected in a post-September 11 presidential election.

If Mr. Obama did not know about Mr. Odinga's electoral deal with the Kenyan Islamists when he offered his support, then he should have known. If he did know, then he is guilty of lending the prestige of his office to America's enemies in the global war on terror. We need to know exactly what Mr. Obama knew about Mr. Odinga, and precisely when he knew it.

To be fair to Barack Obama, he has no direct control over Mr. Odinga or the actions of his party or their fellow Luo tribesmen in a country on another continent.

Nor do I think he is putting distant tribal ties ahead of those of his own country, and I find the insinuation about his "attitude toward Islam" a bit much, considering Obama's well-known membership in a Chicago congregation of the Church of Christ (yes, even though Obama's pastor is a fan of racist Muslim leader Louis Farrakhan).

It simply isn't fair to judge Obama on any merits but his own.

But his judgement is part his own merits, and associating with an anti-western political leader, even when that leader is a relative—and perhaps precisely because that leader is a relative—brings up issues that Obama would do well to tamp down now, before another candidate seizes upon the issue.

Bill and Hillary Clinton can only distance themselves from their brothers but so much. They are, after all, brothers.

Obama, however, is not even on the same continent as Odinga, and would do well to let people know that their views are thousands of miles apart, as well.