Barack O Bombs
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama seems to be mounting an offensive against his own candidacy by carpet bombing the campaign trail striking friend, foe and occasionally his own foot in the process. While those attending the highly anticipated “YouTube Debate” thought Obama won the day it was here the groundwork for a succession of miss-statements was laid. What seemed an innocuous question allowing Barack to reaffirm his “not responsible for Iraq” credentials blossomed to not responsible at all.
The popular Democratic policy is to pull out of Iraq now. Obama has called for the troops to be home by March 31st of next year and reiterated that policy to much applause at the debate. In the aftermath it seems viewers paid head to the realities expressed by Joe Biden: “Anderson [moderator], you’ve been there. You know we can’t just pull out now. Let’s get something straight. It’s time to start to tell the truth. The truth of the matter is: If we started today, it would take one year, one year to get 160,000 troops physically out of Iraq, logistically.”
The questions submitted by YouTube subscribers seemed carefully selected to avoid questioning the integrity of Democrats in favor of those that cast dispersions on the Republicans and the administration such as questions about the recent immigration bill battle; politics as usual despite the technical oddity. But the question of meeting with belligerents around the world resulted in subtle differences that would grow to major chasms following the debate: “…would you be willing to meet separately, without precondition, during the first year of your administration, in Washington or anywhere else, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea, in order to bridge the gap that divides our countries?”
Barack replied “I would…” When the question passed to Clinton she replied “: Well, I will not promise to meet with the leaders of these countries during my first year. ” Then she continued “I don’t want to be used for propaganda purposes. ” The question passed to John Edward rephrased as “would you meet with Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, Kim Jong Il?” He replied “Yes, and I think actually Senator Clinton’s right though. Before that meeting takes place, we need to do the work, the diplomacy, to make sure that that meeting’s not going to be used for propaganda purposes, will not be used to just beat down the United States of America in the world community.”
The day following Monday’s debate Clinton would offer an Iowa newspaper her assessment of Obama’s response as “naive” and “irresponsible.” Known to have been above the fray until now, shortly thereafter Obama would describe Clinton’s foreign policy, with the vote supporting the Iraq invasion, as “Bush-Cheney Lite.” Only hours latter the Clinton camp insinuated Obama’s willingness to talk to a “Holocaust denier” referring to Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Presenting a strong national security posture Obama pledged to send 7,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan where the real war against al-Quada and Islamic terrorists is being waged. Trying to clarify and elaborate on his foreign policy Obama would stumble into yet another quagmire. He continued saying if Pakistan wouldn’t go after al-Qaida in its provinces he would cut U.S. aid and send U.S. forces to do the job thus offending the Musharraf government which is conducting the delicate balancing act of trying to cooperate in the war on terror in a nation of 170 million Muslims with nuclear weapons.
Thursday the maladies would continue during a Q&A with Associated Press:
AP: “Is there any circumstances where you’d be prepared or willing to use nuclear weapons to defeat terrorism and Osama bin Laden?”
Obama: “No, I’m not, uh, there has been no discussion of using nuclear weapons and that’s not a hypothetical I’m gong to discuss.”
AP: “Not even tactical?”
Obama: “No. I think it would be a profound mistake for us to use nuclear weapons in any circumstance. Uh, if involving you know, civilians… Let me scratch all that. There’s been no discussion of nuclear weapons. That’s not on the table so…”
Since the concept of mutual assured destruction ( M.A.D.) became the cornerstone of U.S. / Soviet arms negotiations there has been a policy, under both Democratic and Republican administrations to avoid the term “never” in reference to the possible use of the nuclear option. Hilary was quick to point this out: “Presidents should be very careful at all times in discussing the use or nonuse of nuclear weapons.” She continued “Presidents since the Cold War have used nuclear deterrence to keep the peace.” Obama now has the weekend to reconsider his stance on bombing; nuclear, conventional and political. [ro_5]
December 17th, 2007 at 10:36 pm
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May 22nd, 2008 at 8:33 am
[...] state he would meet with the regimes of state sponsored terrorism without precondition during the highly publicized YouTube Debates where he was asked “…would you be willing to meet separately, without precondition, during the [...]