The World As It Is: A Memoir of the Obama White House

by Ben Rhodes

He wanted to describe a new framework for how we could cooperate with the Muslim world. “The West,” he said, “has to reeducate itself about Islam and the contributions that it has made to the world, and Islam has to recognize the contributions that the West has made to articulate certain principles that are universal.” He ticked through Islam’s contributions to art, science, and mathematics when “we were a backwater”—including himself in what would have been, at the time, Europe. Then, “we need to talk about the contributions that America has made.” The goal, he said, could be shorthanded as “We have to know each other better.” He talked about how religious absolutism ultimately fails as a means of governing, just as imperialism does. He stopped walking when he landed on some language that he wanted to use in the speech: “Any world order that elevates one group of people over another will fail.” He sat down in the chair facing us. “Then I want to talk about how I benefited from experience in both worlds.”