Presumably he bases that solely on his decision to oppose the Iraq war in 2002 when he was a state senator. What else? Surely it can't be his admission in 2004 that leaving Iraq too soon would be a national security nightmare?
Or that chasing a few al Qaeda members into the hills of Pakistan, if we got intel on their whereabouts, would be permissible in his administration with or without Paki permission, setting precedent for unilateral attacks across the world wherever AQ are located (that's change?). Or his self-proclaimed restriction on building national defense while waving goodbye to AQ terrorists already on the ground in Iraq.
Judgment is not confined to one event, certainly not one that might still turn out to be positive for America and the entire Middle East if things are allowed to play out right or vastly negative if we make the wrong move. Hillary has little to show for it either, but Obama's dependence on that one issue to make his case, and the press's willingness to let him do it, are farcical.
MORE 3/11/08
Does Geraldine Ferraro only get away with her comments because she's a woman, even though white? And can she please explain Ralph Nader's excuse?
My take--Ferraro is just another Hillaryshill trying to bait Obama into going full tilt racial and becoming the new Jesse Jackson, which will be painted as a losing prospect against the Johnny Mac show come November. That gives superdelegates, like Eliot Spitzer, a reason to vote against change.
MORE 3/12/08
We know Ferraro's comments were greeted coldly by the candidate of change:
"I don't think Geraldine Ferraro's comments have any place in our politics or in the Democratic Party," Obama told Pennsylvania's Allentown Morning Call newspaper. "They are divisive. I think anybody who understands the history of this country knows they are patently absurd. And I would expect that the same way those comments don't have a place in my campaign they shouldn't have a place in Senator Clinton's either."But the internets are a wonderful thing and tend to preserve all our foibles and such. From Obama's own website:
Obama acknowledges, with no small irony, that he benefits from his race.
If he were white, he once bluntly noted, he would simply be one of nine freshmen senators, almost certainly without a multimillion-dollar book deal and a shred of celebrity. Or would he have been elected at all?
4 comments:
//Presumably he bases that solely on his decision to oppose the Iraq war in 2002 when he was a state senator. What else? Surely it can't be his admission in 2004 that leaving Iraq too soon would be a national security nightmare?//
It amazes me how people are falling for his erroneous assertion as to the Iraq War and its aftermath.
While it may be true that he didn't vote for it, but don't let him kid you. It was only because he wasn't a part of the Senate. He hadn't been elected yet.
How can he prove this? He can't. How does he know how he would have voted? He doesn't.
But that has not stopping him from capitalizing. When he says, "I was the only one that didn't vote for the resolution to go to war", it's not like he had the opportunity to. I call this a half-truth.
He's simply not being upfront about a lot of things, and has the balls to stand there and say he represents change. It's quite stunning, really.
Actually, the entire Democrat party is heading for a meltdown. Not sure whether to enjoy it or not. In some respects we need both parties to remain strong (I'd like conservative ideals to win fair and square).
Excellent commentary, AC — we’ve become accustomed to it. No politician is innocent of the charge of pandering — such is a definition of politics. Personally, I don’t think it should be that way, but then no one ever elected me to anything. Clearly, no one better understands voters than office-seekers, and this explains why political hopefuls narrowly focus their rhetoric on what the voters want to hear, why politicians effectively reduce costly programs to sound bites, and why most politicians have developed a strong sense of selective memory. None of this is likely to change for as long as voters pursue racial/gender or political patrimony.
I suppose I can understand why black voters would vote for Obama for no other reason than his skin color, but I cannot help but wonder how anyone can think that pigmentation will make a difference in foreign or domestic policy. I suspect that it won’t make any difference, other than a black president will achieve a great deal more wiggle room than any white person. As a case in point, given his appalling performance during Katrina, there is no reason why Ray Nagin should be the mayor of New Orleans today—but he was overwhelmingly reelected by predominantly black voters who continue to think the hurricane was Bush’s fault. With this reality, it is difficult to have confidence in the people who walk into the voting booth.
Perception is reality I guess. There may be some truth to the notion that the Muslim world would hate us less with a man from Africa with a familiar name, but what happens when they find out he's also an infidel? Do they turn themselves in on a hypocrisy charge by pretending it doesn't matter because he looks like them, or do they get redder in the face and more determined than ever? Or are we the ones in for the foolin?
Only the shadow knows I suppose. But there are many who couldn't care less.
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