This is not the change we hoped for. President Obama rose to power on the basis of his early opposition to the Iraq war and his promise to end it. But after a year in the White House he has made both of George Bush’s wars his wars.
Speaking of Iraq in February 2008, candidate Barack Obama said, “I opposed this war in 2002. I will bring this war to an end in 2009. It is time to bring our troops home.” The following month, under fire from Hillary Clinton, he reiterated, ”I was opposed to this war in 2002….I have been against it in 2002, 2003, 2004, 5, 6, 7, 8 and I will bring this war to an end in 2009. So don’t be confused.”
Indeed, in his famous “the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow” speech on the night he clinched the Democratic nomination, he also proclaimed, “I am absolutely certain that generations from now we will be able to look back and tell our children that . . . this was the moment when we ended a war.”
Now he has doubled down on the war in Afghanistan and has promised to keep the war in Iraq going for another 19 months, after which we will have 50,000 American troops in Iraq for as far as the eye can see. If McCain had proposed this sort of minor tweaking of the Bush policy, I think we’d see antiwar rallies in 300 cities. Calling the antiwar movement!
Calling all Democrats! Calling the left! Where art thou? Only the libertarians left standing against the war? Don't want to ruffle your seat at the table? What good is having power for change if you aren't going to use it?
I'm not confused. Obama lied. People die. Sound familiar?
4 comments:
Just like most Republicans, most Democrats are more interested in power and incremental policy improvement (from their perspective) than principle.
Posers...
I'm not sure they're even getting incremental improvement. Iraq really is the poster child in that regard.
But the indignation was great when it was Bush's war. Now that it is Obama's? The silence is deafening. The left are the posers to me. Their elected officials are what they are, I guess.
Given how many Catoites voted for the big O, it's hard to feel sorry for them. Then, given an election where a Democrat ran as a Republican, and a Republican as a Libertarian, they might as well have stayed home.
Well, I for one did not vote for the Big "O," (didn't vote for McCain either) although since I am black I am told that I was supposed to.
But I tried to tell everyone who would listen - Republicans who believed the "Democrats are against the war (no Democrats are against Republicans) and Democrats who believed in miracles. Democrats love war - While Clinton tried to avoid ground troops, he sure did not mind conducting his own illegal wars and drop bombs all over the Balkans and Iraq on occasion. Of course, throw in the illegal Korean Conflict and the Vietnam (Truman and LBJ and it seems like the Democrats have a monopoly on war. Eisenhower was accused by Democrats of being weak on defense. Yet despite historic evidence to the contrary, they really expected something different from a Democratic president. I knew no matter who was elected, we would continue our insane foreign occupation and empire expansion strategies and keep scaring people.
Somehow, we don't seem to care that thousands of Americans are dying and tens of thousands are being physically and mentally injured or maimed. Our countrymen don't deserve what our leaders are doing to them. It is criminal. Before I wanted Bush and Cheney arrested. Now, I want Obama to join them with his illegal bombing of Pakistan and Yemen and wherever else he is ordering the killing of people.
Where are war protesters? Why are they silent? Because most of them are hypocrites and frauds who don't care a hoot about the victims of these illegal wars.
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