Senator Barack Obama has formally announced his candidacy for president. He is charming, charismatic, fascinating and the fair-haired child for the media and hollywood. In this world of instant communication and televised lives, he has everything necessary for a successful candidacy.
It’s too bad that his politics are nothing if not socialist. He is open about his politics. He will institute socialized medicine (look at Canada to know how well that works). He will raise taxes and redistribute wealth. The money you work so hard for will be redistributed to people who don’t want to work that hard.
He opposes what he calls a ‘war we shouldn’t have waged to begin with’. We didn’t wage this war, it was waged on us. He tells us that his solution to the War on Terror is to pull all of our Troops out of Iraq and put them into Afghanistan. This gives us a glimpse into his inability to think globally. Should he do that, than the enemy we are fighting in Iraq will meet us in Afghanistan and we will lose the strategic advantage of having troops surrounding Iran.
His party has been merciless on our president for not coddling foreign leaders who threaten to destroy us. Apparently in their view the only way to get respect in the world is to coddle. Meanwhile, he has ripped into the Austrailian Prime Minister who dared to criticize Obama’s stance on the War on Jihadist.
“If Prime Minister Howard truly believes what he says, perhaps his country should find its way to contribute more than just 1,400 troops so some American troops can come home,” he said. “It’s easy to talk tough when it’s not your country or your troops making the sacrifices”
So much for the democratic/socialist assertions that Bush should coddle the leaders of other nations. Maybe they mean we should coddle our enemies, not our friends?
During his formal announcement he invoked the image of two beloved former presidents.
Barack Obama is rallying the youth of the nation with an implied promise of a new era of Camelot. Unfortunately for Obama, this is not the time for Camelot. We are at war and there are dangerous people and nations in this world that will destroy us if given half the chance. Feel-good politics and policies are dangerous right now.
We might also do well to remember that it was during John F. Kennedy’s ‘Camelot’ administration that the United States made a fateful commitment to Vietnam. It was during this administration that America was shamed by Kennedy’s lack of response to the Bay of Pigs.
Obama made a more overt comparison of himself with President Abraham Lincoln. There are some superficial similarities between the two men. As Obama points out, they came to D.C. through the same Senate seat. Lincoln had a similar amount of experience with Washington politics when he became president as Obama has now.
Another similarity is that if Obama were to be elected, they would both have come to the office of the presidency in the midst of a lethally dangerous time for the nation. They would both have to make decisions during a national crisis that impact whether or not this nation shall long endure or perish from the earth.
As it was in 1860, in 2007 we are engaged in a war for our very survival.
Lincoln knew that, Obama doesn’t.
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William Teach has a few thoughts on this subject.
Lone Star Pundit notes that you have to go halfway around the world to find a politician brave enough to speak the truth about the democrats’ intentions regarding the War on Terror.
The Median Sib notices that Obama certainly understands the importance of symbolism.
Hot Air has video, of course. Hot Air also has the video of Obama and his wife on 60 minutes.
Kennedy at least served in the military, old Abe was one helluva war time President, and how Mr. Hussein became so suddenly an expert on things he previously spoke not about is truly amazing.
Australia has 18 million people. A small armed services. To send ANY troops means they are good friends indeed.
BSC: You got that right. Turning against our loyal allies - allies basically forever - is very unwise, imho. I don’t see how that serves any good purpose. Apparently, when he talks about improving our relationships with other countries, he only means our enemies.
Obama Makes First Gaffe, Misuses “Waste”…
Democratic Presidential candidate and Illinois Senator Barack Obama is rapidly backing away from a comment he made over the weekend in which he implied that the the lives of American soldiers killed in Iraq were “wasted”. Naturally, if we succeed……
i wish you didn’t have the inalienable freedom of speech
BSC: So, you would quiet opinions that are different than yours?
your words are bitter and distasteful. you write of the war as if our exsistence is based solely on our successes there. a president must be concerened with much more than a dwindling, lingering war. The Senator’s brash comments to australia showed that he will be assertive.
As for quieting opinions different than mine- just those that are half-baked, unfounded, and a waste of caloric conversion to useable energy.
Yeah I’ve heard some good things about Barack Obama. I heard he had an Iraq de-escalation act. Even people who supported the Iraq war when it began, would probably now agree that it resulted badly, with civil unrest and violence still occurring in Iraq: so probably Obama’s policy is favourable, there. I heard he also wanted to improve the schools, and increase literacy rates, and all of that. I guess I’ll have to read what some of his detractors have to say, to learn the negative side. I’m trying to decide whom it would be best to vote for!