Here we go again, Obama campaign volunteers have managed to insult yet another group of people. First it was the police in Oregon and now, according to Politico.com, two Muslim women were barred from a picture at Barack Obama's rally in Detroit. The women were barred from sitting behind the podium by campaign volunteers seeking to prevent the women's headscarves from appearing in photographs or on television with the candidate. The campaign has apologized to the women, all Obama supporters who said they felt betrayed by their treatment at the rally. "This is of course not the policy of the campaign. It is offensive and counter to Obama's commitment to bring Americans together and simply not the kind of campaign we run," said Obama spokesman Bill Burton. "We sincerely apologize for the behavior of these volunteers."

Since Detroit has a heavy population of Muslims, it was politically correct for the backdrop to be representative of this demographic. For example, when Obama won North Carolina amid questions about his ability to connect with white voters, for instance, he stood in front of a group of middle-aged white women waving small American flags. The incidents in Michigan, which has one of the largest Arab and Muslim populations in the country, also raise an aspect of his campaign that sometimes rubs Muslims the wrong way: The candidate has vigorously denied a false, viral rumor that he himself is Muslim. I guess some may say that the denials seem to some at times to imply that there something wrong with the faith, though Obama occasionally adds that he means no disrespect to Islam.

"I was coming to support him, and I felt like I was discriminated against by the very person who was supposed to be bringing this change, who I could really relate to," said Hebba Aref, a 25-year-old lawyer who lives in the Detroit suburb of Bloomfield Hills. "The message that I thought was delivered to us was that they do not want him associated with Muslims or Muslim supporters."

According to Politico, two different Obama volunteers – in separate incidents– made it clear that headscarves wouldn't be in the picture. The volunteers gave different explanations for excluding the hijabs, one bluntly political and the other less clear. In Aref's case, there was no ambiguity. That incident began when the volunteer asked Aref's friend Ali Koussan and two other friends, Aref's brother Sharif and another young lawyer, Brandon Edward Miller, whether they would like to sit behind the stage. The three young men said they would, but mentioned they were with friends. The men said the volunteer, a twenty-something African American woman in a green shirt, asked if their friends looked and were dressed like the young men, who were all light-skinned and wearing suits. Miller said yes, but mentioned that one of their friends was wearing a headscarf with her suit. The volunteer "explained to me that because of the political climate and what's going on in the world and what's going on with Muslim Americans it's not good for her to be seen on TV or associated with Obama," said Koussan, who is a law student at Wayne State University.

Politico said that both Koussan and Miller said they specifically recalled the volunteer citing the "political climate" in telling them they couldn't sit behind Obama. "I was like, 'You've got to be kidding me. Are you serious?'" Koussan recalled. Shimaa Abdelfadeel's story was different. She'd waited on line outside the Joe Louis Arena for three hours in the sun, and was walking through the giant hall when a volunteer approached two of her non-Muslim friends, a few steps ahead of her, and asked if they'd like to sit in "special seating" behind the stage, said one friend, Brittany Marino, who like Abdelfadeel is a recent University of Michigan graduate who works for the university.

As reported by Politico--When they said they were with Abdelfadeel, the volunteer told them their friend would have to take the headscarf off or stay out of the special section, Marino said. They declined the seats. Abdelfadeel, after recovering from the shock of the incident, went to look for the volunteer and confronted her minutes later, she said in an email interview with Politico. "We're not letting anyone with anything on their heads like baseballs or scarves sit behind the stage," she paraphrased the volunteer as saying, an account Marino confirmed. "It has nothing to do with your religion!"

This is the last thing that the Obama campaign needs. They really need to set some standards for these volunteers to follow because they run the risk of insulting decent people and the right-wing blowing out of proportions. Since when is a hijab a reason for exclusion from a photo op? It shows a real lack of respect for one's religion in a country that prides itself on inclusiveness. Again, I am not blaming Barack Obama for this, but it is imperative that his campaign volunteer staff learn some sensitivity and not perpetuate stereotypes.

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