What's in a name? That's a common cliche, normally used to denote a lack of relevance to what a certain person, place, or thing is called. You may also know this sentiment under the more common idiom, "Don't judge a book by its cover."

There are many people who adamantly believe that racism is not a significant factor in this presidential campaign. Ok sure, one prominent McCain supporter used Barack Obama's middle name over and over again. And sure, he was accused of doing so in order to imply a certain Arab connection to Obama that doesn't actually exist. But, surely, you can't condemn a person just because he uses someone's middle name, right? And besides, surely, this was just one person who maybe has an unusual fixation on middle names. Sure.

I've got a pop-quiz for ya! It's only two questions, but you cannot cheat and look it up separately or read ahead! Here it is:

1. What is Barack Obama's middle name?

2. What is John McCain's middle name?

So, how'd you do? Lemme guess: 50%, right?

It is hard not to know that Barack Obama's middle name is Hussein. If you listen to right-wing talk radio or read right-wing websites/blogs, just about everywhere you see him referred to as "Barack Hussein Obama."

But they claim it's nothing sinister, or even deliberate! Maybe these people all just like using middle names. However, if that is the case, then you would think that these same people would use John McCain's middle name as well, right? I mean, it's only logical.

So I decided to do a little experiment. I did a Google search for "Barack Obama" (in quotes as a phrase). I got 61,200,000 results. I then did a search for "Barack Hussein Obama". That returned 600,000 results.

I then realized something: I don't even know what John McCain's middle name is! And I follow this shit really closely! In fact, I don't recall ever seeing his middle name in print or hearing it on any news network, national or local. I had to go to Wikipedia to find it.

Once I obtained his middle name, I continued with the experiment and did a search for "John McCain." 40,900,000 results. I then searched for "John Sidney McCain" (now you know) and it returned only 183,000 results!

In other words, a full 1% of websites indexed by Google that mention Barack Obama include his middle name. That's more than twice the rate for John McCain, at a mere 0.4%! In addition, I wanted to know how many of those 0.4% included his middle name because it was being displayed in a full formal context, rather than just mid-sentence.

So, I did another Google search, this time for both of their full legal names. Fortunately, they're both named after their fathers, so that made this extremely easy. I started by searching for John McCain's full legal name, "John Sidney McCain III". That returned 124,000 results, which means that only 59,000 of the more than 40 million results for John McCain, or 42% of the results that use his middle name, use his middle name in a casual/conversational context.

Then I did a Google search for Barack Obama's full legal name, "Barack Hussein Obama, Jr". Wanna guess how many? 46,900 results. That's right! This means that 136,100 results, or 74% of the results that use his middle name, do so in a casual/conversational context.

So, what do all these numbers mean? It all means, simply put, that Barack Obama's middle name, Hussein, is used in this sample more than twice as much as John McCain's middle name, Sidney. And it also means that, of those small few for John McCain, most of them appear to be in the form of a heading or page title intended to show the candidate's full legal name, whereas only about 1 in 4 of Obama's "middle name hits" can be explained away in this fashion.

What's my point? If this isn't a subtle(?) campaign to manufacture a twisted subliminal link between Barack Obama and Saddam Hussein, then what is it? This analysis pretty much shoots down all the "perfectly innocent" explanations I've seen thrown around by pundits and McCain supporters.

That being said, there are a small number of McCain supporters I've actually seen admit that they use his middle name to draw that link, saying that the voters deserve to know about Obama's Islamic roots. There's only one problem: His name is not derived from Islam! It's not even Arabic, it's Swahili! Its etymology appears to link back to an ancient king of Jordan who was known for advocating peace among nations. And on top of that, Barack, in Swahili, means "one who is blessed."

In other words, Barack Obama's name, inherited from his father, traces back to Africa as meaning "blessed" and "peace." Only in America can that be turned into something negative....

--Kristopher Craig

P.S. My middle name is David.

08.16.2008

Hello all,

Kris Craig here. I'd like to quickly let you know about what's on my agenda for this summer before I officially take office in the fall. You've all elected me with a very challenging mandate, and I promise to carry out that mandate to the best of my ability!

First up, the website. I've been told that the site is undergoing a (much-needed!) redesign/overhaul, so I won't be doing a whole lot until I've been briefed on the details of this. In the meantime, I am in the process of transcribing the audio recordings of meetings that were held in the 2007-2008 session. However, I was just today informed that the GSU never bothered to hold a vote on making the meeting minutes/transcripts/audio publicly available to you, and that therefore I cannot post these transcripts absent that consensus vote. I am very troubled by this severe error and have expressed my concern on the GSU listserv. Fortunately, the incumbents appear to be aware of this error on their part and willing to rectify the issue in the fall. Therefore, one of my first tasks when I take office will be to make all these records public, and to mandate that all future open-session meetings be automatically considered a matter of public record, meaning that transcripts can and must be posted as soon as they become available. In the meantime, I will continue to compile these transcripts so that they're ready to be posted in the fall.

Next on my list is sustainability. A recent post I made on the listserv asking voters to send me their ideas/expectations drew quite a response in my inbox! The most common responses I received centered around accessibility to recycle bins on campus, edible landscaping, installing bottle-fillers on the new drinking fountains in the CAB redesign, gardens, and food service reforms. If I can arrange it, I plan to form an informal commission, consisting of all interested parties, to discuss these ideas and form a set of proposals, which I will then take with me and present to the GSU this fall when I take office. There's been a lot of interest expressed already, but summer schedules are tricky things, so it's still up in the air whether or not we'll be able to make it happen. I'll keep y'all updated on any developments with regard to that. And of course, any new/current/former GSU reps are welcome to take part as well. This would be an informal gathering of course; if nothing else, a chance for some of us new reps to get to know each other!

At any rate, those are the primary things I'll be working on over the summer. If you have any other ideas you'd like to propose, or if you're interested in attending this sustainability conference or submit suggestions for us to consider, please email me at Kris.Craig@gmail.com.

Cheers,

--Kris

07.13.2008 @ 3:16 PM PDT