Posts filed under 'War on Terror'
While Obama whines about mythical attacks on his patriotism, John McCain speaks the blunt truth:
Though victory in Iraq is finally in sight, a great deal still depends on the decisions and good judgment of the next president. The hard-won gains of our troops hang in the balance. The lasting advantage of a peaceful and democratic ally in the heart of the Middle East could still be squandered by hasty withdrawal and arbitrary timelines. And this is one of many problems in the shifting positions of my opponent, Senator Obama.
With less than three months to go before the election, a lot of people are still trying to square Senator Obama’s varying positions on the surge in Iraq. First, he opposed the surge and confidently predicted that it would fail. Then he tried to prevent funding for the troops who carried out the surge. Not content to merely predict failure in Iraq, my opponent tried to legislate failure. This was back when supporting America’s efforts in Iraq entailed serious political risk. It was a clarifying moment. It was a moment when political self-interest and the national interest parted ways. For my part, with so much in the balance, it was an easy call. As I said at the time, I would rather lose an election than lose a war.
Thanks to the courage and sacrifice of our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines and to brave Iraqi fighters the surge has succeeded. And yet Senator Obama still cannot quite bring himself to admit his own failure in judgment. Nor has he been willing to heed the guidance of General Petraeus, or to listen to our troops on the ground when they say — as they have said to me on my trips to Iraq: “Let us win, just let us win.” Instead, Senator Obama commits the greater error of insisting that even in hindsight, he would oppose the surge. Even in retrospect, he would choose the path of retreat and failure for America over the path of success and victory. In short, both candidates in this election pledge to end this war and bring our troops home. The great difference is that I intend to win it first.
Once we got into Iraq, the fundamental question for each American to answer was, “do you want to win, or do you want to lose?”. There is no “end” to a war - a war is won or a war is lost. Vietnam didn’t “end” - we lost. The enemy won. Those who relied upon us to keep our word were coldly betrayed and subjected to a horrific fate because the controlling powers in the United States decided to lose the war. John McCain answered the question: he wants to win. Barack Obama answered the question: he wants to lose.
Oh, to be sure, Obama will never say it that way - in fact, he might not even be aware he’s advocating the defeat of the United States, the country he proposes to lead. So disconnected is the left from reality and so ignorant are most leftists of the way the world works, it is very possible that Obama really thinks you can “end” a war, no harm and no foul, and go forward without any consequences of your defeat. He may think, that is, that after he scuttles Iraq that the enemy will take him seriously about Afghanistan and that Iran would be ready to meet us on the square after we cut and ran from Iraq. Its an absurd way to view the world, but Obama just might think like that - and there’s the really frightening thing about the prospect of a President Obama.
As noted earlier regarding Afghanistan, there is still plenty of fight left in the enemy and the curious nature of the War on Terrorism is that no matter how bad off the enemy is, as long as he can preserve any part of his power, he can rebuild. We must keep battling in this war until the enemy - which is really the States who sponsor and shield terrorist groups - become convinced that terrorism is a losing prospect and that America will never quit until every last terrorist is dead or taken. When President Bush said at the start of this war that it was a generational fight, he was dead on - and McCain also understands the long term nature of this war; Obama seems to think that we can fiddle around with a little battle here, a little diplomacy there and leave it to the cops and regular legal procedure and all will be well. The folly of Obama would eventually be writ large in the number of dead as a revived terrorist enemy strikes hard at a United States perceived as weak and divided.
McCain is the man who can lead us through the next four years of war - the man we can rely on to keep fighting, and never lost faith. He’s proven this by word and deed throughout his life, and we’d be worse than fools to choose Obama over McCain this November.
Tags: Afghan Campaign, Global War on Terrorism, Iraq Campaign, liberal lies
August 20th, 2008
We give the French a lot of grief, but lets not forget that they are with us in Afghanistan, and under President Sarkozy they are getting ever more aggressive in fighting the enemy:
KABUL, Afghanistan - Ten French ISAF soldiers were killed and 21 injured when about 100 insurgents attacked a patrol in Kabul Province on Aug. 18. Afghan security forces were also involved in the patrol.
Fighting began in the late afternoon 18 Aug. and continued into Tuesday, 19 August. The initial patrol was reinforced with quick reaction forces, close air support, and mobile medical teams. During the engagement a large number of insurgents were killed.
“This is a difficult time right now for the families and friends of those who died or were injured, and we offer them our sincere condolences and sympathies,” said Brigadier-General Richard Blanchette, ISAF spokesperson. “The lives of these soldiers are irreplaceable, but this loss does not deter ISAF from supporting the people of Afghanistan in their fight against the enemies of peace and stability.”
The enemy also attacked a US base with a force of suicide bombers - the enemy, defeated in Iraq, seems to making a stand in Afghanistan. This really is a long war, and while Obama says he will fight it out in Afghanistan, the plain fact of the matter is that he’s an untried quantity, and for the long war we need a President who has proven he can take the worst and carry on - John McCain is that man, and lets hope we make the right choice in November.
Tags: Afghan Campaign, France, Global War on Terrorism, ISAF, Sarkozy
August 20th, 2008
Just a bit amazing that such a person could be exposed enough to the Christian message to become a convert:
Masab-Joseph Yousef, a son of prominent West Bank MP Sheikh Hassan Yousef, has discussed his conversion to Christianity in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. Praying that his family will “open their eyes to Jesus,” he expressed love for his enemies and claimed Muslims’ conversion to Christianity is the only way to have a chance for peace in the Holy Land.
Yousef, 30, said his first exposure to Christianity came in Jerusalem about eight years ago, when he was invited to learn about the faith. He converted four years ago, but did not tell his father. “For years I helped my father, the Hamas leader, and he didn’t know that I had converted, only that I had Christian friends,” he said to Haaretz.
His father, Sheikh Yousef, was a founder of the extremist group Hamas in the West Bank and was imprisoned for several years for his membership in the organization.
Masab-Joseph Yousef, the oldest of eight siblings, was expected to take an active role assisting in the political work of his father, whom he claimed is opposed to killing civilians. He characterized the Israelis’ arrests of his father as very influential events in his life.
“I only knew that the Israeli army had arrested my father repeatedly, and for me he was everything: a good, loving man who would do anything for me. He took care of us, bought us gifts, gave of himself, whereas the soldiers entered our house and took him away from me.”
Arrested at the age of 18 for his leadership role in his high school Islamic society, Yousef told Haaretz he discovered in prison that most Hamas members were not as admirable as his father.
“Their leaders in prison received better conditions, such as the best food, as well as more family visits and towels for the shower. These people have no morals, they have no integrity,” he said, alleging Hamas leaders also embezzle money meant for widowed families.
Yousef, who now lives in California, described how an invitation to learn more about Christianity led him to convert.
“I was very enthusiastic about what I heard. I began to read the Bible every day and I continued with religion lessons. I did it in secret, of course. I used to travel to the Ramallah hills, to places like the Al Tira neighborhood, and to sit there quietly with the amazing landscape and read the Bible.”
“A verse like ‘Love thine enemy’ had a great influence on me,” he continued. “At this stage I was still a Muslim and I thought that I would remain one. But every day I saw the terrible things done in the name of religion by those who considered themselves ‘great believers.’”
I am reminded of St. Francis’ project to end the Crusades by converting the Islamic world to Christianity, on the theory that it is better to make Christians than destroy Moslems - it didn’t work, of course, but not for lack of trying on St. Francis’ part. A very different world would it be had success crowned his efforts…
Aside from that, the story here is important because it shows that cross-cultural understanding between Islam and Christianity is possible. Someone looked past Yousef’s background and decided to introduce to him a new idea, and the courage that person showed has been rewarded by the development of a man who not only doesn’t kill for his religion, but can’t even comprehend the concept any longer. We need not fight each other forever, provided we recognise our common humanity and see in the other person another glorious creation of God, and not an enemy.
Tags: Christianity, Global War on Terrorism, Islam, Israel/Judaism, Masab-Joseph Yousef
August 16th, 2008
Still waiting for the liberal, Bush-hating, anti-war left to admit that we’ve won:
After traveling more than 7,000 miles, two Bengal tiger cubs have finally settled into their new home in Iraq. Amid much fanfare and excitement, Hope and Riley were introduced to the Baghdad Zoo on Aug. 8.
The tigers were a goodwill gesture from the North Carolina Conservators’ Center, a breeding sanctuary for endangered species.
“We are building trust with America,” said Dr. Adel Salman Mousa, the zoo’s director. “We’re building trust with a society that trusted us to care for these animals.”
The cubs are just under 2 years old and weigh more than 150 pounds each. The Bengal tiger is an endangered species, with less than 3,000 worldwide.
“We hope to bring smiles back to the people and the children,” Mousa said. “We want to put smiles back on their faces after years of misery. In addition to the enjoyment people will get from watching them, they will present opportunities for students and the public to learn about this and other endangered species.”
Iraq is still not a bed of roses and there remains fighting to be done - but given all the news we’ve seen out of Iraq over the past month or two, it is incontrovertible that we - and the Iraqis - have won this fight…and that President Bush’s vision for a liberated Iraq building up an alternative worldview in the Arab/Moslem world has been vindicated…and, of course, that McCain’s courageous advocacy of the surge has proven far more valid than Obama’s “cut and run” approach from 2007.
Tags: Global War on Terrorism, Iraq Campaign, liberal lies
August 13th, 2008
I guess if you know nothing, then its ok to have someone who also knows nothing giving you advice - from the Daily Mail via Hot Air Blog:
George Clooney once famously declared he could never run for public office because he’d ‘slept with too many women, done too many drugs and been to too many parties’.
But now the Hollywood heart-throb has entered the political arena at the highest level – by becoming an unofficial adviser to US Presidential front-runner Barack Obama.
Oscar-winner Clooney, 47, is said to be helping the Democratic candidate to polish his image at home and abroad.
But he is also sharing with Obama his strong opinions on Iraq and the Middle East.
A self-admitted philanderer and drug user to advise on polishing an image? Only in modern America would a Presidential candidate get within 10 miles of Clooney…
Sources say the actor has tried to hide the pair’s friendship for fear his Left-wing views and playboy image would hurt the Presidential hopeful’s bid for the White House.
But Democratic Party insiders have revealed that Clooney and Obama regularly send texts and emails to each other and speak by phone at least twice a week.
One said last night: ‘They are extremely close. A number of members of the Hollywood community, including Brad Pitt, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, offered to help raise funds for Barack but it was with George that he struck up this amazing affinity.
‘George has been giving him advice on things such as presentation, public speaking and body language and he also emails him constantly about policy, especially the Middle East.
‘George is pushing him to be more “balanced” on issues such as US relations with Israel.
‘George is pro-Palestinian. And he is also urging Barack to withdraw unconditionally from Iraq if he wins.
‘It’s a very risky relationship. His hope of becoming America’s first black President depends heavily on winning over conservative voters and it would be suicidal for him to be perceived as a tool of a Hollywood Leftie, which is how they regard George.
‘But they text and email each other almost every day and speak on the phone at least a couple of times a week, often more.’
Its not so much Clooney’s leftism (after all, it’d be hard to out-lefty Obama, anyways), but the fact that he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He’s yet another of those Hollywood liberals who latch on to fashionable causes and right now the fashion is to be pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel and, of course, opposed to victory in Iraq. Among the many people I would expect a President to get advice from on foreign policy, Clooney never makes that list - in fact, he wouldn’t make the list of people to advise on the color of the drapes in the Oval Office. Somehow, being an actor doesn’t seem to be the best training for figuring out whether Hamas is a partner for peace or a bloodthirsty terrorist organization. Perhaps Clooney has been doing some studying, but if he has he’s yet to register as someone who has offered his own opinion in a forum where criticism of same is possible. What we don’t need is a star-struck President going along with ill-informed advice simply for fear of offending a glittering pal.
Tags: George Clooney
August 12th, 2008
Europeans Moslems can’t seem to decide if gays should be executed, or not; rather run of the mill stuff for Moslems these days, but the real problem is how the government of Norway reacts:
For a case in point, I will refer the reader to an episode I’ve mentioned previously in this space — an Oslo debate last November at which the deputy chairman of Norway’s Islamic Council, Asghar Ali, refused to reject the death penalty for gays. When Senaid Kobilica, the head of the Islamic Council (which represents 60,000 Muslims), was asked where he stood on the question, he replied that he couldn’t give a definitive answer until he got a ruling from the European Fatwa Council. This week it was reported that he’s still waiting…
…What’s most chilling about all this, however, is not the positions of these Muslim leaders but the reactions of the Norwegian establishment. Or, one should say, the lack of reaction.
Consider this. After last November’s debate, it emerged that Asghar Ali not only was deputy chairman of the Islamic Council but was also on the board of the Oslo Arbeidersamfunn, the largest and most influential association within Norway’s ruling Labor Party. Asked about Ali’s views, the head of the Oslo Arbeidersamfunn, Anne Cathrine Berger, lamented that some people “can’t see the difference between a board member’s views and the organization’s views.” Despite scattered calls for his dismissal, Ali remained on the board. (When a new board election was held in February, Ali chose not to run again.)
That’s not all: Ali is, in addition, secretary of the 37,000-member Electricians’ and IT Workers’ Union…
…As for the Norwegian government, there has been no serious effort, as far as I know, to rescind from the Islamic Council its half million kroner a year in state support.
Does anyone in Europe realise that these peoples’ intentions are serious? They do propose to out-breed and out-immigrate non-Moslems and eventually take over and force through Islamic law. While European governments put the final touches on gay marriage the Islamists look forward to the day when they can hang all the gay people - the decision Europe made after World War Two to entirely secularise and welfarise Europe has proven disasterous on all levels, but the worst part of it seems to be that the will to live has gone out of the European population (or is it that during two world wars the best and bravest sacrificed themselves so much that there wasn’t enough physical strength to continue?).
There still is a living remnant in Europe - that small segment of the population which refused to surrender its Christian European identity. What remains to be seen is whether this remnant will be able to take over from dying secularism before the Islamists do. And we’ll also find out whether the United States will have to come to Europe’s rescue, again.
Tags: Europe, Islam
August 10th, 2008
Interesting, to say the least - American Thinker brings this to our attention from a March, 2008 NPR report (of all things):
Even in this era of YouTube and camera phones, a recording of Obama’s speech is all but impossible to find. The Obama campaign has gone so far as to re-create portions of the speech for a television ad, with the candidate re-reading the text, with audience sound effects…
Obama says he risked his career to go out on a limb for the anti-war cause…but is this really the case? From the same story:
…So, just how much attention did the speech attract?
Bill Glauber, who covered the rally for the Chicago Tribune, says he didn’t even quote Obama.
“I guess other media was there,” Glauber says, “but we didn’t quote Barack Obama at his famous anti-war speech. He was not the main guy.”
Glauber says that he did not even mention Obama in his newspaper article on the rally and instead focused on the rally’s other speaker, the Rev. Jesse Jackson.(emphasis added)
An un-reported speech in a very blue State - hardly the high risk endevour Obama says it was…and given that he also trimmed towards a more pro-war stance during his 2004 Senate run, the whole story of Obama’s anti-war speech now has a large question mark about it. Certainly, Obama comes from the anti-war left of his party…but one wonders just how much of that speech as we know it today was re-crafted to appeal to leftwing primary voters in 2008? Anyone who would fake a speech for an ad is not someone to whom “scrupulously honest” can be applied to - Obama seeks to deceive if he believes such deception will help him win, and if a man will deceive once, he’ll do it again and again.
It just could be that the whole Obama story is a fraud from start to finish - a con job designed to advance only one thing, Obama. Any of you lefties feeling like suckers, yet?
Tags: Iraq Campaign, liberal lies, Obama Deceptions
August 8th, 2008
This is what gets serious discussion on the left, as NRO’s The Corner points out:
At the Netroots Nation gathering in Austin, Texas last month — that is the successor to YearlyKos — Dahlia Lithwick, of the Washington-Post-owned website Slate, did an interview with the Talking Points Memo site in which she described a panel discussion she had just taken part in on what is known as the “first 100 days of accountability.” Among Lithwick’s observations:
We’re already falling into this trap of either positing Nuremberg-style war crimes tribunals, or nothing, immunizing everyone from John Yoo up and down…but everybody says there’s a lot of gray area in between that, and that accountability doesn’t necessarily mean Nuremberg, it doesn’t necessarily mean nothing, it means possibly a truth commission, possibly appointing a special prosecutor to look at it…
Lithwick recommended a massive retrospective investigation of the Bush administration, going through every piece of paper, before moving forward:
Certainly long before we make a decision to do what Stuart Taylor suggested this week, which was immunize everybody in advance, or alternatively make a decision to trot them out before a war crimes tribunal before the whole world, we should really find out what happened…
But Lithwick recognized that there are those who argue such an action might be divisive:
We talked a lot about this notion that it’s bad for America, that it will rip America apart if we have hearings or we have criminal trials or if we have war crimes tribunals. And I think it’s really worse for America if we don’t…
The level of insanity here is breathtaking - and while one can attempt to dismiss this as the paranoid ravings of screwball lefties, the problem is that these screwball lefties will have a large say in any potential Obama Administration. These people appear to be quite serious in thinking of President Bush and his Administration (a moderate, center-right, constitutional American government) as akin to Nazi Germany. And do keep in mind that by implication those of us who support President Bush are criminals, too - at least in the minds of the left. These are not people who view me as a fellow American - they view me as a pestilence to be at least thwarted, and destroyed if possible.
It is imposisble for us to reach these people, but we can rest completely assured that we must stop them from gaining power - the plans they have, the lunatic assumptions they hold, are the stuff with which civil wars are made. Essentially, the left wishes to criminalise non-leftist actions and ideas, and as we on the right won’t ever agree to that, push may very well come to shove if the left gains power and seeks to prosecute us for what they consider to be crimes. I wish never to see anyone who is a fellow citizen of the United States as an enemy - but anyone who thinks putting President Bush et al up on war crimes charges - or even attempting to set up a truth commission - is someone who has definitively set themselves up as my enemy. Not a fellow citizen with ideas I think wrong, but an enemy I’ll fight.
Tags: Afghan Campaign, conservative truth, FISA, Global War on Terrorism, Iraq Campaign, liberal lies, political ideology
August 7th, 2008
From The Hill:
Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain on Sunday asserted that his Democratic rival’s positions on Iraq were politically motivated.
“Sen. Obama doesn’t understand,” the Arizona senator said regarding Barack Obama’s (D-Ill.) opposition to the troop surge. “He doesn’t understand what’s at stake here, and he chose to take a political path that would have helped him get the nomination of his party.”
McCain added that, if the path that the Illinois senator advocated had been pursued, there “would have been chaos, genocide, increased Iranian influence, perhaps al Qaeda establishing a base again” in Iraq.
The GOP standard-bearer hopes that his foreign policy and military experience and support for the surge will help convince voters in November that he is the right choice to lead the country.
McCain, in an interview with ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos,” consistently hammered Obama on security-related issues and defended a remark he made earlier in which he said that the Democrat is willing to lose a war to win a political campaign.
The Arizona senator argued that, while he broke with President Bush and his party to demand that more troops should be sent to Iraq, Obama “made the decision [to oppose the surge], which was political, in order to help him get the nomination of his party.”
Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), who went on the trip to the Middle East with Obama, criticized the attacks on the Democrat and said McCain is “treading on some very thin ground here when he impugns motives and when we start to get into, ‘You’re less patriotic than me. I’m more patriotic’.”
Hagel, true to form for the anti-war people, is trying to say that any criticism of war criticism is an accusation of being unpatriotic, and thus beyond the pale. This bit of nonsense, I think, will not fly anymore - its clear that McCain does not impugn Obama’s patriotism - just his motivation and his judgement, both of which are highly questionable. For all we know Obama is deep down inside the most Yankee Doodle of all Dandies - what is at issue here is his manifestly wrong position on the troop surge and how that relates to his prospective ability to be President of the United States of America.
The anti-war point of view has been proven wrong from start to finish - it is wrong because it believes that war is just a misunderstanding which can be resolved by patient diplomacy. War, though, is usually the result of a very good understanding - especially on the part of the aggressor, who is usually convinced that his more aggressive nature is the result of inherent superiority. The so-called “peace movement” nearly added another charnel house to its record (for a more complete list of the peace movement’s victims, see my “20th Century Victims of Peace“) - but at the urging of Senator McCain, the calls for surrender by Obama and his Democrats were ignored, and victory has now been secured. And now it is Senator Obama who is seeking maximum personal advantage out of this.
First he used Iraq to wow the left, now he’s trying to use the victory in Iraq as a support for his withdrawal plan (updated, again and again as Obama needs to shift here and there on the political landscape) - he’s trying to have it both ways. Obama wants lefty support due to his anti-war rhetoric, and he wants center support for his call to move troops from Iraq to Afghanistan…he’s a peaceful warmonger, I guess.
We can’t afford four years of a President who adjusts his views to his personal, political needs - we need a President who will take an action even when assured it will be unpopular and may, indeed, cost him the White House. Senator McCain is that man; lets keep Obama in the Senate where for the next four to eight years (or ten, if you ask Obama) he can learn from President McCain what it takes to hold the most powerful office in the world.
Tags: Defeaticrats, Iraq Campaign
July 27th, 2008
The Christians of Iraq have suffered doubly - from Saddamit tyranny, and then as the easy target of terrorists and criminals. Things have improved remarkably in Iraq, and now we’re starting to see some signs of life in the Iraqi Christian community:
Christians in the southern Iraq have begun a campaign to restore churches which have been rendered unusable due to war and neglect.
Father Imad Aziz Al Banna of the Chaldean Archeparchy of Basra told Iraqlaan News Agency that the local Christian community has requested government funding for the restorations and is collaborating with the Ministry of Planning and the Basra Governorate Council, BaghdadHope.com reports.
Built in 1880, one of the oldest churches in southern Iraq, the Chaldean Church of Um Al Ahzan (Our Lady of Sorrows), recently reopened. Father Al Banna celebrated a special Mass and baptism there on June 29, Ankawa.com reports.
It presently serves only 18 Christian families. In the whole Archeparchy of Basra there are reportedly only one priest, two permanent deacons, and two religious sisters among 2,500 of the faithful.
Father Al Banna said there is confidence among Christians that the government can preserve the Christian religious heritage in the area. Some families who fled the region have even returned because of the new security situation.
The Christian community in southern Iraq dates back to the fourth century and reportedly was the launching pad for the spread of Christianity to the territories of the Persian Gulf.
The final test for the new Iraq is whether or not the Christian minority will be allowed to flourish - elsewhere in the Moslem world, under pressure from tyrannical regimes, the Christian communities, already small, have shrunk rapidly over the past few decades. Much has justifiably been made of the way Iraq’s Christians have suffered - but in Lebanon, Egypt and elsewhere in the Moslem world, it has been a long, dark night of persecution.
There are stirrings of change, however - this news story about Iraq is one of them, but I have it on first-hand account that Mass is celebrated in Moslem countries thought to be 100% Moslem, and I recently read a story where the Catholic Church is, very quietly, negotiating with the Saudi government to construct a church for Saudi Arabia’s large Christian community, mostly made up of foreign laborers imported to Arabia to do the work Saudis simply won’t do. The real end of the War on Terrorism is when Christians and Jews can live and work in the Moslem world without let or hindrance ffrom the Moslem governments, so let us take this small sign as an idicator of a much brighter future.
Tags: Freedom of Religion, Iraq Campaign
July 26th, 2008
Interesting opinion piece over at Opinion Journal:
A cry for help goes out from a city beleaguered by violence and fear: A beam of light flashed into the night sky, the dark symbol of a bat projected onto the surface of the racing clouds . . .
Oh, wait a minute. That’s not a bat, actually. In fact, when you trace the outline with your finger, it looks kind of like . . . a “W.”
There seems to me no question that the Batman film “The Dark Knight,” currently breaking every box office record in history, is at some level a paean of praise to the fortitude and moral courage that has been shown by George W. Bush in this time of terror and war. Like W, Batman is vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand. Like W, Batman sometimes has to push the boundaries of civil rights to deal with an emergency, certain that he will re-establish those boundaries when the emergency is past.
And like W, Batman understands that there is no moral equivalence between a free society — in which people sometimes make the wrong choices — and a criminal sect bent on destruction. The former must be cherished even in its moments of folly; the latter must be hounded to the gates of Hell…
…Why is it then that left-wingers feel free to make their films direct and realistic, whereas Hollywood conservatives have to put on a mask in order to speak what they know to be the truth? Why is it, indeed, that the conservative values that power our defense — values like morality, faith, self-sacrifice and the nobility of fighting for the right — only appear in fantasy or comic-inspired films like “300,” “Lord of the Rings,” “Narnia,” “Spiderman 3″ and now “The Dark Knight”?
The moment filmmakers take on the problem of Islamic terrorism in realistic films, suddenly those values vanish. The good guys become indistinguishable from the bad guys, and we end up denigrating the very heroes who defend us. Why should this be?
The answers to these questions seem to me to be embedded in the story of “The Dark Knight” itself: Doing what’s right is hard, and speaking the truth is dangerous. Many have been abhorred for it, some killed, one crucified…
…When heroes arise who take those difficult duties on themselves, it is tempting for the rest of us to turn our backs on them, to vilify them in order to protect our own appearance of righteousness. We prosecute and execrate the violent soldier or the cruel interrogator in order to parade ourselves as paragons of the peaceful values they preserve. As Gary Oldman’s Commissioner Gordon says of the hated and hunted Batman, “He has to run away — because we have to chase him.”
Being a coward is, pro-tempore, easier than being a hero - being a coward only requires that one do nothing; being a hero requires that one act. Of course, failure to act can land you, eventually, in much worse trouble than the immediate risk of acting, but a coward can always rationalise away future risks if it gets him out of the particular spot he’s in. While those who act are those who make things happen (good or bad, depending on the actor), it is only those who act nobly who are subjected to the calumny of the cowards. To insult the efforts of a wicked man, you see, is to take a brave stance - so much easier to call Marines in Haditha cold-blooded killers than to take on the cold-blooded killers the Marines are fighting.
The dichotomy between President Bush and the man who wants to replace him cannot be more stark - Obama is lauded for doing nothing; Bush is condemned for doing something. What did Obama do to garner support which eventually awarded him the Democratic nomination? He spoke out against liberating Iraq before the liberation was attempted. What did President Bush do to earn the hatred of the left? He ordered the liberation not of Iraq, but of Afghanistan. Oh, I know - we’ve spent so much time on Iraq that it seems that Iraq triggered leftwing hatred of Bush…but if you think back on it, you’ll remember that the first “anti-war” campaign post-9/11 was to keep us out of Afghanistan…because the Taliban hadn’t attacked us, because we shouldn’t get into the middle of a civil war, because it is impossible to defeat a terrorist enemy on his own ground, because it would be a humanitarian catastrophe. It wasn’t Iraq; it was the fact that President Bush proposed to do something - that is the source of the hatred.
Had President Bush made a few heart-rending speeches and merely promised the full weight of American law enforcement, he would still be disliked on the left for various reasons, but the hatred wouldn’t be there because in such a response there is no challenge to the cowardly. The coward, being able to look at a mere indictment of Osama bin Laden, can take all sorts of exception with what President Bush did…heck, the coward could even say that invading would be better…but there is no challenge; no forcing of a choice. No contrast between right and wrong. Obama doesn’t challenge - he tells the cowards that they were right, that we shouldn’t have acted - that being afraid to confront evil is the smart thing to do. He tells the coward that he never has to shoulder a heavy burden - that the UN, EU and everyone else on God’s earth will take care of it, but he’ll never be asked to sacrifice, save perhaps in a higher tax bill.
President Bush looked at the rubble of the Pentagon and WTC and was filled with a terrible resolve - that this shall not stand, and that those who did it will be made incapable of doing it again. For a while there, the overwhelming majority was with him - but as hard decision followed hard decision the siren song of defeatism and cowardice took its toll until, now, President Bush is in many ways the most unpopular man in the United States. All too many just wish he’d go away and stop demanding of us a hard courage to face the difficult tasks. Millions who hate President Bush will want him again, if we’re ever attacked like 9/11 again…but for now, they just want him get out, and allow a coward to stroke the ego of cowards.
And the only thing which may prevent this unhappy outcome? Another man of courage - John McCain. We’ll see in November if there is a majority of Americans still in favor of doing what is right, rather than talking about what is right and acting like talking is doing.
Tags: Afghan Campaign, Defeaticrats, Iraq Campaign, liberal lies
July 25th, 2008
Might as well just mark down each Obama position and flip it over - from Byron York over at NRO’s The Corner:
The McCain campaign is pointing out that it was one year ago today, during a Democratic debate, that Barack Obama was asked the famous would-you-meet-Ahmadinejad-without-preconditions question. This was it:
QUESTION: In the spirit of…bold leadership, 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?
OBAMA: I would. And the reason is this, that the notion that somehow not talking to countries is punishment to them — which has been the guiding diplomatic principle of this administration - is ridiculous.
This morning, in Israel, Obama was asked whether he would still give the same answer. His response:
I think that what I said in response was that I would at my time and choosing be willing to meet with any leader if I thought it would promote the national security interests of the United States of America. And that continues to be my position. That if I think that I can get a deal that is going to advance our cause, then I would consider that opportunity. But what I also said was that there is a difference between meeting without preconditions and meeting without preparation.
You can check out the transcript of the whole 2007 debate here. Obama just didn’t talk about preparation.
The official word is still that Obama is a sure-thing to win…but he’s still only barely up in the polls and shows no signs of breaking out of his 45-47% range of support. The reason Obama isn’t walking away with this election? Because he’s proving himself ever more dishonest and nakedly ambitious for personal glory. People still don’t like the GOP and still aren’t sure about McCain, but outside the left and, naturally, African-Americans, the Obama myth has worn thin. None of this, in and of itself, means that McCain will win - McCain has a very hard fight in front of him and only a four in ten chance (at best) of winning it in the end - but Obama’s vulnerabilities are massive, glaring and growing…and one wonders just how long adulatory MSM coverage will keep the shine on the Obama apple?
Tags: Defeaticrats, Iran, Obama Deceptions
July 24th, 2008
Interesting recent poll from Rasmussen:
Nearly half of Americans (48%) now believe the United States and its allies are winning the War on Terror, as opposed to 20% who give the nod to the terrorists, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national survey. These figures reflect a dramatic improvement from a year ago—in July 2007, only 36% thought the U.S. and its allies were winning. An equal number thought the terrorists held the advantage.
The 28-point difference is the most favorable margin recorded by Rasmussen Reports since tracking began in January 2004 and seems to reflect a growing confidence among adults that the tide is turning in Iraq and in the war on terror in general. The previous high was established on September 6, 2004 when 52% thought the U.S. and its allies were winning but 26% thought the terrorists were winning at that time for a 26-point favorable margin.
Thirty-seven percent (37%) now think the situation in Iraq will get better over the coming six months while only 25% expect it to get worse. A year ago, the assessment was far more pessimistic—just 23% said that things would get better while 49% offered the more pessimistic response. Another recent poll showed that 40% now believe it is possible for the U.S. to win the War in Iraq.
The new findings also show 45% now believe the United States is safer today than it was before the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, while 37% believe otherwise. Those figures are also the most optimistic on record.
The standard line about the end of the Cold War is that by putting the fear of nuclear war to bed, it allowed for a foreign policy lightweight - Bill Clinton- to win the White House. Its a great theory, but it forgets that 57% of the American people voted against Bill Clinton in 1992…hardly a ringing endorsement of Clinton’s policy prescriptions. But, today, the same idea is alive and well - heck, over at NRO’s The Corner some people seem to think that the mis-reported story of Maliki on Obama’s Iraq plan has pretty much wrecked McCain’s chances for November. The word is out - the American people really, really want to vote for a Democrat in November and McCain’s only shot was to convince the American people that with a war going on, placing our bets on the inexperienced Obama was too dangerous. And now that victory is breaking out in Iraq, that line is gone for good.
While there are a couple of third party candidates out there on the left and the right, my view is that for Obama to win he’s going to have to do something that no Democrat has managed in 32 years - score an outright majority of the vote in November. He can do it, but thus far the polling shows him consistently falling short and never showing any movement which would indicate he’s on his way to a majority. McCain seems stuck in the electoral doldrums, too - hardly ever breaking 45% in polling (though Rasmussen has recently showed Obama and McCain tied at 46%). What it seems to me is that while Obama has wowed his base, he’s not doing much with anyone else - meanwhile, McCain is doing remarkably well amongst independent voters, but has yet to enthuse the GOP base for November. Key to victory for McCain is energising the base, key for Obama is appealing outside the left.
In this McCain has an advantage. Obama is pretty much locked in to very leftwing positions - he’s tried to triangulate himself out of them, but he can’t stray too far towards the center lest he alienate too much of his base. McCain, on the other hand, has plenty of chances to make the argument to the GOP base that they’d better get excited about him - on taxes, spending, judges and the war, McCain is just what the GOP doctor ordered. McCain has two ways to do his job - propose conservative ideas, and point out Obama’s ultra liberal ideas, and what they’ll mean for America. In both cases, McCain can make a strong pitch for enthused GOP support.
So, while Obama and his Democrats might be thinking that the victory in Iraq gets them off the hook and they can just say “Afghanistan” from time to time and allow domestic issues to carry them to victory, in my view the victory in Iraq gives McCain the chance to force Obama on the defensive initially on just war issues, but eventually on the worthiness of his whole program. A man who can be so wrong about Iraq can also be wrong about other things - like whether or not he’ll be able to stick it out in Afghanistan; whether or not his health care plan is good for America; whether or not his energy policy has what it takes…on issue after issue, Obama’s manifestly bad judgement on Iraq can be used to question his fitness on other issues. And while doing this, McCain can continually point out his correctness on Iraq and how this courageous and right decision lays the groundwork for him to have the courage and wisdom to tackle judicial issues, Afghanistan, taxation, government waste, etc, etc, etc.
If attitudes about the war are improving as Rasmussen’s survey shows, then there may soon come a time when McCain’s pro-victory stance from 2007 switches from liability to asset, while Obama’s 2007 defeatism (already being shoved down the memory hole as far as Obama can manage it) will show through more and more as the foolhardy opinion of a man who hasn’t the knowledge, guts or wisdom to be President.
Tags: Defeaticrats, Iraq Campaign, liberal lies
July 23rd, 2008
This counts as “What Media Bias? Part 117″.
The New York Times rejects a McCain Op-Ed responding to Obama - the offending document, via Drudge:
In January 2007, when General David Petraeus took command in Iraq, he called the situation “hard” but not “hopeless.” Today, 18 months later, violence has fallen by up to 80% to the lowest levels in four years, and Sunni and Shiite terrorists are reeling from a string of defeats. The situation now is full of hope, but considerable hard work remains to consolidate our fragile gains.
Progress has been due primarily to an increase in the number of troops and a change in their strategy. I was an early advocate of the surge at a time when it had few supporters in Washington. Senator Barack Obama was an equally vocal opponent. “I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there,” he said on January 10, 2007. “In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”
Now Senator Obama has been forced to acknowledge that “our troops have performed brilliantly in lowering the level of violence.” But he still denies that any political progress has resulted.
Perhaps he is unaware that the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad has recently certified that, as one news article put it, “Iraq has met all but three of 18 original benchmarks set by Congress last year to measure security, political and economic progress.” Even more heartening has been progress that’s not measured by the benchmarks. More than 90,000 Iraqis, many of them Sunnis who once fought against the government, have signed up as Sons of Iraq to fight against the terrorists. Nor do they measure Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki’s new-found willingness to crack down on Shiite extremists in Basra and Sadr City—actions that have done much to dispel suspicions of sectarianism.
The success of the surge has not changed Senator Obama’s determination to pull out all of our combat troops. All that has changed is his rationale. In a New York Times op-ed and a speech this week, he offered his “plan for Iraq” in advance of his first “fact finding” trip to that country in more than three years. It consisted of the same old proposal to pull all of our troops out within 16 months. In 2007 he wanted to withdraw because he thought the war was lost. If we had taken his advice, it would have been. Now he wants to withdraw because he thinks Iraqis no longer need our assistance…
…Senator Obama has said that he would consult our commanders on the ground and Iraqi leaders, but he did no such thing before releasing his “plan for Iraq.” Perhaps that’s because he doesn’t want to hear what they have to say. During the course of eight visits to Iraq, I have heard many times from our troops what Major General Jeffrey Hammond, commander of coalition forces in Baghdad, recently said: that leaving based on a timetable would be “very dangerous.”
The danger is that extremists supported by Al Qaeda and Iran could stage a comeback, as they have in the past when we’ve had too few troops in Iraq. Senator Obama seems to have learned nothing from recent history. I find it ironic that he is emulating the worst mistake of the Bush administration by waving the “Mission Accomplished” banner prematurely.
I am also dismayed that he never talks about winning the war—only of ending it. But if we don’t win the war, our enemies will. A triumph for the terrorists would be a disaster for us. That is something I will not allow to happen as president. Instead I will continue implementing a proven counterinsurgency strategy not only in Iraq but also in Afghanistan with the goal of creating stable, secure, self-sustaining democratic allies.
The Iraq issue will be, I think, key for McCain - not in the sense that a majority will vote based just on that issue, but that it is the easiest issue for McCain to question Obama’s judgement and further question Obama’s fitness to carry Afghanistan to victory. Obama is staking his foreign/military policy meme on a “get out of Iraq, win in Afghanistan” proposal - the narrative will be that Obama will “end” the war in Iraq so that we can, finally, win in Afghanistan and thus repair all the damage President Bush has done and McCain proposes to continue. But this is a two-edged sword Obama is wielding - McCain can point out that Obama’s defeatism when the going got tough in Iraq indicates that Obama will also flunk the test when things get rough in Afghanistan. Obama ran up the white flag once entirely un-necessarily, what can he say to demonstrate to us that he won’t surrender, again, in Afghanistan?
Obama is nothing but a story - a fraud wrapped up in an illusion. As long as no one points out the nakedness of this would-be Emperor, he’ll be fine. McCain’s job is to force people to see what Obama really is - an ambitious non-entity with no requisite experience justifying installing him in the most powerful position in the world. If the election revolves around which man has the better story, then Obama will be our next President - if the election revolves around who is best able to be President, McCain will be sworn in on January 20th. We’ll have to see if Obama can hide in plain sight until November, or if McCain will force him, naked, into the public view.
