David Brooks seems to understand the real Barack Hussein Obama better than most people:
This guy is the whole Chicago package: an idealistic, lakefront liberal fronting a sharp-elbowed machine operator. He’s the only politician of our lifetime who is underestimated because he’s too intelligent. He speaks so calmly and polysyllabically that people fail to appreciate the Machiavellian ambition inside.
But he’s been giving us an education, for anybody who cares to pay attention. Just try to imagine Mister Rogers playing the agent Ari in “Entourage” and it all falls into place.
Back when he was in the Illinois State Senate, Dr. Barack could have taken positions on politically uncomfortable issues. But Fast Eddie Obama voted “present” nearly 130 times. From time to time, he threw his voting power under the truck.
Dr. Barack said he could no more disown the Rev. Jeremiah Wright than disown his own grandmother. Then the political costs of Rev. Wright escalated and Fast Eddie Obama threw Wright under the truck.
Dr. Barack could have been a workhorse senator. But primary candidates don’t do tough votes, so Fast Eddie Obama threw the workhorse duties under the truck.
Dr. Barack could have changed the way presidential campaigning works. John McCain offered to have a series of extended town-hall meetings around the country. But favored candidates don’t go in for unscripted free-range conversations. Fast Eddie Obama threw the new-politics mantra under the truck.
Brooks concludes, "all I know for sure is that this guy is no liberal goo-goo. Republicans keep calling him naïve. But naïve is the last word I’d use to describe Barack Obama."
BrooksWhile the MSM/DNC fawns over Obama and his wife's fashion sense, the Republicans criticize Obama's "judgment" or lack of experience (as if he would make a better President in 4 or 8 years).
Obama's second face revealed itself again last week when, in speaking about the campaign, he said the following in Philadelphia:
If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.
This type of talk is another example of how Obama's mantra of "change" is meaningless. He brings to politics the same confrontational style that has dominated elections (and the intervening periods) for more than a generation.
"See-dubya" at Michelle Malkin.com spends a great deal of time speculating on how Obama might better apply this attitude to our foreign enemies than to domestic politics.
David Brooks concludes his column by missing the same point:
On the other hand, global affairs ain’t beanbag. If we’re going to have a president who is going to go toe to toe with the likes of Vladimir Putin, maybe it is better that he should have a ruthlessly opportunist Fast Eddie Obama lurking inside.
Why do I think that Brooks has missed the point? Primarily because Obama and the Democrats have no intention of using any kind of toughness with U.S. opponents overseas. They never do.
For Democrats, toughness is reserved only for domestic opponents - not foreign enemies. The domestic enemy (capitalists, homeschoolers, Christians, crime victims, taxpayers, boy scouts, heterosexuals, flag wavers, etc.) must be fought "on the beaches," "in the fields," "in the streets" and "in the hills." The left "shall never surrender."
But with foreign opponents, all such toughness disappears. Obama wants only to meet with foreign dictators and terror supporters, no matter how odious and no matter how counterproductive such meetings will be. To Chavez, Ahmedinejad and Kim Jong Il, Obama offers neither a knife fight nor a gun fight. The knives and guns are reserved solely for Americans. In response to Kim Jong Il's endorsement of Obama, Obama supporters in this country - instead of pausing to rethink their positions in light of such foul company - immediately prayed for the death of Michelle Malkin. Such policy is not unique to Obama or to 2008.
Aside from the examples here, we saw the spectacle of abortion supporters, in the wake of 9-11, demanding that America's anti-terror efforts be devoted to fighting abortion protesters instead of foreign terrorists. We have seen repeated calls for tax increases since 9-11. I recall an Albert Hunt column in the immediate aftermath of 9-11, in which he celebrated the return of big government as a result of the attacks (as if big government had ever left). The left repeatedly makes comparisons between the Taliban and the "Christian right" in America. In 2002, Senator Patty Murray (D. Wa) praised bin Laden's policies on education and day care.
So in the wake of this generation's Pearl Harbor, leftists trained their sites, inter alia, on (1) taxpayers (2) Christians and (3) abortion protesters while using bin Laden as support for their domestic programs and using the attacks as a long awaited excuse to expand big government even further. The terrorist attacks of 9-11 provided, at worst, a distraction for the left from its war against its real enemy (the rest of us), and, at best, a new ally for the left in its crusade to expand the federal government. Senator Murray's speech showed that expanding federal day care and education are more important to the left than fighting the world's number one terrorist.
That the left would automatically question whether the "world's number one terrorist" is bin Laden or Bush is also noteworthy. Remember that Dennis Miller had to remind Jay Leno's TV audience that as between Hussein and Bush - "Hussein is the bad guy." Most leftists would not admit this fact and would go to great lengths to avoid making a public choice between the two.
More recently, the left has plotted to shut down an entire city so as to attack its real opponents - Republicans - in a series of military style maneuvers that the left would never use against Al-Qaeda.
The fact remains that the same left that supported the Soviets during the cold war now supports the terrorists. This policy makes no sense. While the leftists at least shared an ideology with the Soviets, they have nothing in common with Islam, except for the shared goal of destroying America. As I wrote three years ago:
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, there is no point to the left's anti-Americanism or to the left's destructive foreign policy. The Soviet Union, the chief beneficiary of the left's policies for so many decades, is gone. There remains no leftist ally for the MSM/DNC to aid. While it was plausible to imagine the left in bed with its Soviet co-ideologues during the cold war, the left has nothing in common with our current enemies, the Islamists. The left has nothing to gain from helping the Islamists except its own destruction alongside the rest of us.
The left views terrorists, criminals, illegal aliens, foreign enemies, etc. as little more than cannon fodder to use against its real enemy - average, taxpaying Americans. If we change our outlook and stop thinking of leftists as well-meaning or merely naive, we will no longer be surprised by each new leftist absurdity. We must get used to the idea that with each challenge that confronts America, we will face two enemies instead of one. The obvious enemy in front of us will be different in each conflict, but the second enemy standing behind us will always be the same.
- (1) Terrorists attack us while (2) the western left excuses and enables the terrorists and demoralizes and undermines us as we try to fight back.
- (1) Criminals tear at the fabric of society while (2) the left plays the race card and inhibits law enforcement efforts.
- (1) Illegal aliens colonize America and undermine the very nature of American culture while (2) the left plays the race card and prevents us from securing our borders.
- (1) Foreign dictators threaten to incinerate the earth while (2) the left seeks to bolster the foreign dictators' image and standing with their own people.
- (1) Foreign terrorists attacked the World Trade Center in 1993 and (2) leftist politicians immediately responded by attacking a compound in Waco, ultimately burning dozens of people to death (while the Islamic terrorists plotted to finish the job at the WTC).
- (1) Energy prices threaten our economy while (2) leftists pursue policies designed to increase fuel prices.
- (1) Foreign countries surpass our declining industrial capacity while (2) the left seeks to destroy what is left of our industry through massive hoaxes.
Alien forces strike at our front while the left strikes at our back. (While high energy prices are not an "alien force," the left welcomes them as if they were gift wrapped in a turban or Che Guevara flag.) In every one of these examples, there is one element in common. The left works against the rest of us - no matter who the nominal enemy is. The left need not agree with, be coordinated with or make formal arrangements with our nominal enemy. The left supports our enemies anyway. Prior to 9-11, the left knew nothing of Islam except that Islam was yet another anti-abortion religion and that muslim countries had served as a convenient whipping boy whenever Bill Clinton got into trouble. Only on 9-11 did the left realize the potential of Islamic terrorism as a new found ally in the eternal war against the U.S.
It is time for the rest of us to stop talking about leftists as "well-meaning" or "well-intentioned" or "naive" or even "inexperienced." The left has plenty of experience. The left has more than enough experience to know better. The left is not naive. No one, no matter how naive, stupid or stubborn could be this consistently wrong for so long - especially where their positions just happen to be the anti-American position on each issue. As Ayn Rand wrote in December, 1962:
Fifty years ago, there might have been some excuse (though not justification) for the widespread belief that socialism is a political theory motivated by benevolence and aimed at the achievement of men's well-being. Today, that belief can no longer be regarded as an innocent error. Socialism has been tried on every continent of the globe. In the light of its results, it is time to question the motives of socialism's advocates.
It is time that we recognize the left for what it is - a willing partner with whatever enemy or problem confronts the U.S. It is time we treat the left that way. Otherwise, we shall never learn what is killing us. Barack Obama's opportunism, dishonesty, threats and other cynical activities do not translate into a tough foreign policy. They will translate into a foreign policy in which Obama and his administration are aligned with foreign enemies against the rest of us.
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