Laura Bush Blows Off Conservatives Who Attacked Her For Wearing Muslim Headscarf

This morning on Fox News Sunday, Laura Bush forcefully dismissed conservatives who attacked her for wearing a Muslim headscarf during her visit last wek to the Middle East. "Oh, you've got to be kidding me," she said, before disagreeing with one Weekly Standard columnist's claim that she had given "a tacit endorsement of Islam's subjugation of women."

"[T]hey saw this as giving me a gift from their culture," Bush said. "And it was the scarf with the pink ribbons and the pink edging on it, the breast cancer scarf, that I put on." She added later, "I think we all have these stereotypes of each other, Americans and Arabs, and it's a really good thing to be able to break those stereotypes down and get to know each other."

Watch it:

Full transcript:

WALLACE: Of course, Mrs. Bush, with a higher profile almost inevitably comes criticism. And some conservatives in this country are upset with you -- and we have a picture up there on the screen...

BUSH: Oh, you've got to be kidding.

WALLACE: ... for putting on a scarf given to you...

BUSH: Oh, really?

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WALLACE: ... by a Saudi doctor. And let me put up a blast, if you will, from The Weekly Standard. That she would oblige her hosts by wearing a shmata, which is Yiddish for a scarf, on her head is a tacit endorsement of Islam's subjugation of women.

BUSH: Well, I did not see it that way at all. In fact, I'd had the meeting with them totally uncovered. I mean, you saw other photographs, obviously.

WALLACE: Right.

BUSH: And they saw this as giving me a gift from their culture. And it was the scarf with the pink ribbons and the pink edging on it, the breast cancer scarf, that I put on.

I will say that I told them that I had always felt like they were closed to me, that I wouldn't be able to reach them because of the way they're covered, and one of the women said to me -- she said, You know, I may be all dressed in black, but I am transparent.

And what they were saying to me is they want to reach out. They want American women to know what they're like. And these women do not see covering as some sort of subjugation of women, this group of women that I was with.

That's their culture. That's their tradition. That's a religious choice of theirs.

Now, I did meet, on the other hand, in Kuwait, where women just got the vote in 2005, with a group of women activists, several of them who had run for office the first parliamentary election after women got the vote -- didn't win, any of them, but they made the first step, certainly, by getting in the political process.

And in that meeting, very few women were covered. And they don't feel like they have to be. But you know, I think we all have these stereotypes of each other, Americans and Arabs, and it's a really good thing to be able to break those stereotypes down and get to know each other.

Comments

[exile]

In Muslim countries, they must wonder why we make our women wear no panties

we make our women starve themselves

inject stuff in their lips to make them puffy

don't make our women do that, officially

Something is making them do it

i told you it was me
i make them do it

btw are you limited in english
or
just kinda freakin dumb ?

[Boobaloo]

...and slice their chest cavity open, insert balloons under their muscle tissue and sow themselves back up for a lifetime of loss of feeling, immune deficiences and possible death.

Exactly right exile.

[Ihadjellotoday]

"...and _sow_ themselves back up..."

Huh? They _pig_ themselves back up? (Do you not just love the innocently ironic difference a misplaced vowel can make?)

[godlessclif]

Schmata, Schmata, Shamata.
Laura should wear it in Israel.

[Daisytoo]

I don't think 'wondering' is much of a past-time in Muslim countries. Then again, you sound as if you have personal experience w/Muslim 'thought', exile.

Here's a clue from the land of the free, the USA, founded by Infidels: We don't 'make' "our" women do anything. First of all, women are not 'ours' and secondly, we have and we practice free choice.

[Boobaloo]

Daisy, STFU.

[DietrichMoody]

There appears to be a slippery slope occurring in this Country that tacitly is equating some "conservative" anti arab block with primarily jewish people. i.e, look how the host using a conservative AND yiddish term to illustrate the criticism in some circles against Mrs. Bush. This is very dangerous. Maybe its the WASP community trying to tell Jews , primarily the men, in the US to chill out and stop fearing - hell can you blame them, looks what's happened over the centuries. BUT

Nonetheless, this shows either anti-semitism , consceince or not. This can go either way, is its worrisome....???

[Boobaloo]

Let me get this straight: a jewish writer makes a racist, anti arab, anti muslim comment in his own piece and its the 'anti-semites' who are to blame? wow.

The jewish writers who made these remarks and others similiar on this incident and many other issues about Arabs and Muslims, dont you think its possible that they're responsible for their own writings, hate and bigotry? I think that they are and the hatred they express has been there for decades but, everytime anyone mentions it, someone like you comes along and starts squawking about 'anti-semitism' and now here we are with perpetual wars for Israel and campuses,p­rofessors, citizens, politicans across America are under daily attacks by pro-Israeli groups.

Each person is responsible for their own words and their own hatred, even jews. The same rules apply to jews as to everyone else.

[godlessclif]

"The same rules apply to Jews as to everyone else."...Booboo

Does that means I get December 5th off from work, or that the Jews don't get the day off?

Jews make their own rules. They don't follow our rules. They make the Schmata's in Jewish factories.
The arabs just wear them.

[HaveFun]

Good respectful answer.

[NotaBeliever]

Gee golly. This is about the only thing I respect Mrs. Bush for doing. Wearing a scarf out of respect for the women she was trying to reach out to. I don't care what anyone says ... left ... right ... liberal ... conservative ... wingnut. It was a gracious thing for her to do, and given the sheer numbers of people on every angle of the political spectrum who just love to jump on and blast the woman for any particular reason, it was a *brave* thing for her to do.

[TimmySlagle]

"it was a *brave* thing for her to do."

A scarf brave? Naw, if she really wanted to prove her bravery and respect for the culture, she would have gotten herself circumcised.

[Daisytoo]

If she REALLY wanted to be respectful, after she got a cliterodectomy, she could have asked to be beheaded for the crime of saying a Christian prayer.

Wonder if Mrs. Bush was taken to see the public beheading (known locally as chop chop) square where Saudi Arabia's inhabitants publicly loose their heads for everything from having freely chosen sex to being caught practicing an infidel religious rite?

[ethnobotanist]

TS - what is the matter with you?
Do you see what you are writing?

If you really feel something was wrong with what Laura did, then you would make a valid point...which you do not...so please don't dribble this over-the-top garbage to us. It brings everyone down. That is an ignorant reply and you know it.

[shhhhhhh]

Typical right-wing paranoia reaction. ZThe right wing in this country thinks we are the only thing that matters. They need to take a look at a globe and understand what a small part of the world we are and quit being such bed-wetting, scaredy-cat, afraid of al-qaida bitches.

The saying is not, "when in rome, do as americans do !!"

Some of these folks make me want to eat a can full of vienna franks and then perform the paris hilton heimlick on myself.

Insert finger and watch all of the ring-wing fanatics come from my stomach into my toilet. The best part is 1 flush, makes them all go away.

[NotGuilty]

Just don't make Laura mad when she's behind the wheel of a car.

[godlessclif]

That is why the arabs don't let them drive.

[kcgeezer]

I love it when they eat their own. The GOPtards are truly to be pitied. Even the first lady doesn't get a pass.

[Colmore]

The Bush divorce will be 6 months after he leaves office. Then he has a ranch in Paraguay, which has no extradition treaty. He already has a US base close by, with US troops to protect him. Someone should tell him that there are rebels there, just in case he thinks it will be paradise. My hope is that he never gets a decent night's sleep for the remainder of his miserable life. Where has Laura been for the last 7 years, why the high profile now? Maybe she wants to sell the book she is writing with brainiac Jenna.

[Honza]

Hey if Laura wore it, she had it on backwards, best coverup that mug.

[UtahLiberal435]

They say even a stopped clock is right twice a day. And in this case Pickles Stepford was r-r-r-ight. (Shit, I'm going to need therapy for saying that). Just because some Yiddish neocon hack columnist for the Weekly Standard called the breast cancer scarf a schmata, why should anyone - aside from Chris "the professional asshole" Wallace and a couple other psychotic foaming wingers, give a damn?

She still looks like Jack Nicholson as The Joker though.

[apogee2perogee]

I agree. I'd add that she was as gracious as one might wish and factually supported too. Yet her last name is Bush. On the other hand...Twice-a-day, I'm not holding my breath for that frequency....

[thgy]

I didn't see any pink breast cancer border on that think she had on her head. Laura: It had the pink border, I wore it for breast cancer - ha ha ... lame.

[BWonka]

"Laura blows off conservatives."

Sooo... Larry Craig was busy? Got Laura to 'do it' for him?

[OckhamsElectricRazor]

Those guys are SO insecure about strong women. The haze them like six graders pull pigtails. There is not complete set of balls among the entire Fox news team.

[HermioneGranger]

I don't have a problem with the Bhurka per se, but I think Muslim men should wear it, not Muslim women. That seems fair. After all, its the men who can't control themselves. Or have you ever heard of a Muslim woman molesting a man?

[robotfog]

I kind of like the idea of everyone crossdressing.

[OckhamsElectricRazor]

She's a witch! Burn her at the stake!!