The Real Obama
| Tue Jan. 27, 2009 1:48 PM PST
THE REAL OBAMA....Bruce Falconer notes today that Predator attacks over Pakistani territory are continuing unabated:
Obama approved a continuation of the strikes last Friday at his first meeting of the National Security Council. That same day, a missile fired from a drone in Waziristan killed at least 20 people — powerful evidence indeed of Obama's decision.
Given the new president's quick break with many of his predecessor's policies, Obama's decision represents a rare point of continuity — and comes not without criticism. UAV attacks in the region, numbering at least 30 according to a Reuters estimate, have ignited protest from the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and provided a handy propaganda tool and recruiting engine for insurgents. Indeed, for all of the top leaders reportedly killed in air strikes over the years, Al Qaeda and the Taliban have only grown stronger.
This is yet another case of Obama doing what he said he'd do during the campaign, and it's what I meant a few days ago when I said that he seemed to be taking campaign promises unusually seriously "both for good and ill." Some progressives may not like the continued bombing campaign over Pakistan, but it's not as if we weren't warned. Likewise, on an issue like nuclear power plants, where he waffled, we should expect that he'll probably continue to take something of a mixed position.
Real life will make Obama's life much more difficult before long, when speeches and executive orders are no longer enough. Still, when all's said and done, I suspect his administration will turn out to be almost eerily foreshadowed by what he said on the campaign trail in 2008. At this point, anyone who claims not to know what Obama "really" believes just hasn't been paying attention.
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Comments
> Bruce Falconer
Who is this moron? Obama has NOT "broken with many of his predecessor's policies". This is not a "rare point of continuity".
Ah, I see that this moron is a writer for Mother Jones. Well there you go.
Could I suggest that you spend at least a little of your time using reality-based sources?
As I stated when the first Preditor strike happened that killed 7 people shortly after he took office, didn't the One committed a war crime by having those people executed without due process of law? Especially, since if those people had been captured by U.S. Forces, they would be entitled to file habeas petitions in federal court claiming that they were innocent civilians.
Can't wait for you guys to call for his impeachment or for him being shipped off to the World Court in the Hauge. lol
I thought I knew what he stood for last year. That's why I voted for Hillary. Now I'm just praying I was wrong, cuz as that old adage goes "you don't go to war with the army you want, you go to war with the army you have." Or something like that.
I suspect his administration will turn out to be almost eerily foreshadowed by what he said on the campaign trail in 2008.
This gives him too much credit. This puts the blame on me and others who voted for him -- I, we, have it coming, in other words.
But something happened between the campaign trail and the election. Something BIG. The economy collapsed. Aren't the campaign promises affected at all by that? I mean, can't the ones that don't make sense anymore at least be postponed?
If America had been attacked again, would all of his promises remain intact? Even the tax cuts that are bad public policy and were nothing but a campaign tactic used to defeat McCain/Palin?
Sorry, I, make that we, are not to blame. I voted for a leader who would do what was necessary in a crisis. Not one who would go on a listening tour among the clowns that led this country to crisis over the last 8 years.
Submitted by anticontrarian (not verified) on Tue Jan. 27, 2009 4:27 PM PST.
i'd just like to point out that not only did obama say he would approve such attacks while on the campaign trail, it was actually his idea in the first place. one of the reasons i knew he was going to win, even before he'd officially beaten hillary, was when the bush administration started adopting his national security ideas.
obama mentioned using uavs to attack militants around the afghan/pakistani border, and, lo and behold, bush ordered same shortly thereafter. obama said he'd talk with rogue regimes, and suddenly we had a guy sitting in with the europeans while they negotiated with iran over their nuclear weapons program. so i don't think anybody should be surprised. anybody who didn't think this sort of thing was going to happen wasn't paying attention or was too busy looking to their own personal therapeutic needs during the campaign to notice what was actually being said.
as for the tactic itself, i have mixed feelings. while it does provide the other side with a recruiting tool, we do actually have to kill these guys. these are not guys that'll negotiate. they're dedicated. they'll never stop coming for us. and while they are not representative of the general populations that they hide among (and behind), they're there and they have to be dealt with.
that said, it would probably be best if we killed them more elegantly and cleanly. which means boots on the ground, most especially special forces type boots. which means drawing down in iraq and drawing up in afghanistan. fortunately this seems to be happening.
as for obama, i'd say that it's probably on balance a good thing that he's living up to his promises to us (however we might feel about the substance of said promises), at least after the guy we had before.
that guy was a dick, and fucking stupid to boot.
The United States should lease Waziristan for 10 years. That way, we can exercise complete sovereignty without anyone else complaining.
I'm sure we have the cash for it somewhere, just as I'm sure Pakistan would be delighted to hand over a mountainous border area.
The breaking of international law by sending drones into sovereign territory would be bad enough even if actual terrorists had been killed. The fact that a whole innocent family was wiped out makes it crazily stupid. Also, the terrorists who were 'supposedly' killed were just a short time ago our good Taliban buddies with whom we were trying to make a deal on an oil pipeline. Such hypocrisy. The upshot will be a strengthening of fundamentalism in Pakistan.
Obama appealed to liberals and progressives with his 'change' themed campaign while at the same time making promises to continue the militant policies of the establishment. The liberals and progressives who voted for Obama now find themselves in a double bind. They supported Obama and Obama is keeping his promises to illegally bomb targets in Pakistan, threaten Iran and continue to arm Israel's civilian killing war machine. Obama's supporters find it difficult to hold their candidate responsible for the same crimes they accused W. Bush of committing because they voted for Obama.
The choice is between taking responsibility for America's crimes or hiding behind Obama's audacity of hope. The clever Obama knows which option most Americans who voted for him will choose, and that provides the establishment all the cover it needs to continue its world military hegemony.
tpx,
You're unfortunately correct, as evidenced by Juan Cole's long rebuttal to Taylor Marsh's criticism of his Pakistan article in Salon. Her criticism basically consisted of "Hush. Obama is our Dem president now. We must all support his every move."
I had hoped against hope that Obama's Afghanistan/Pakistan bluster and seemingly one-sided view on Israel/Palestine on the campaign trail was just that and nothing more. Still, I hold on to some hope that his obvious intelligence and moral integrity will eventually have a positive effect on US military posture. Anyway, Dennis Kucinich could never have been elected, right?
The support of Obama by anti-war advocates has compromised their opposition to militant policies. Whether that was planned or an unintended consequence does not matter. What matters is the meager oppositions to the Afghan occupation, the illegal bombings in Pakistan and the the continued harassment of Iran have been greatly diminished because a great many individuals have compromised their own integrity by knowingly supporting a candidate who promised to do these things. To oppose Obama now means repudiating that support, which many will be unable to do. The consolation that a real liberal could not have been elected is what Obama and his establishment war council expect will be the prevailing sentiment about his presidency. Disappoint them.
tpx,
No problem criticizing Obama's policies where warranted for me, despite the fact that I voted for him. I don't think that anti-war people with integrity or even rational advocates of sane foreign policy will have any problem with vehement criticism either. I agree with you that things don't look hopeful at the moment for an enlightened Obama foreign policy, but I still want to give him a bit more time to maneuver before coming to some sort of final judgment.
Next week the Obama and the
Submitted by jewelry stores (not verified) on Sat Aug. 15, 2009 2:12 AM PDT.
Next week the Obama and the Dems get the national stage pretty much all to themselves. I'll wait till then to make up my mind about whether this is going to be a good thing in the long run. But I have to admit, the timing couldn't have been better for Obama. Now lets see if he can run with it
