Obama: I Am Opposed to a Dumb War

Obama Photo: Library of Congress

 

© Miri WTPOTUS 2011

Yesterday, I ran across a speech that Barack Obama made to an anti-war rally in Chicago on October 2, 2002.  Here is the speech in its entirety for the purpose of comparison to what he will say tonight, as a public service, when he tries to explain to the American people why he went to war in Libya (with my emphasis and some comments added):

Good afternoon. Let me begin by saying that although this has been billed as an anti-war rally, I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances.

The Civil War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes, that we could begin to perfect this union, and drive the scourge of slavery from our soil. I don’t oppose all wars.

My grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor [He enlisted 1/18/1942; Pearl Harbor was 12/7/41] was bombed, fought in Patton’s army. He saw the dead and dying across the fields of Europe; he heard the stories of fellow troops who first entered Auschwitz and Treblinka. He fought in the name of a larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed over evil, and he did not fight in vain.

I don’t oppose all wars.

After September 11th, after witnessing the carnage and destruction, the dust and the tears, I supported this Administration’s pledge to hunt down and root out those who would slaughter innocents in the name of intolerance, and I would willingly take up arms myself to prevent such a tragedy from happening again.

I don’t oppose all wars. And I know that in this crowd today, there is no shortage of patriots, or of patriotism. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other arm-chair, weekend warriors in this Administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.

What I am opposed to is the attempt by political hacks like Karl Rove to distract us from a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the median income — to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock market that has just gone through the worst month since the Great Depression.

That’s what I’m opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics.

Now let me be clear — I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers his own people to secure his own power. He has repeatedly defied UN resolutions, thwarted UN inspection teams, developed chemical and biological weapons, and coveted nuclear capacity.

He’s a bad guy. The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him.

But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history.

I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaeda.

I am not opposed to all wars. I’m opposed to dumb wars.

So for those of us who seek a more just and secure world for our children, let us send a clear message to the president today. You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s finish the fight with Bin Laden and al-Qaeda, through effective, coordinated intelligence, and a shutting down of the financial networks that support terrorism, and a homeland security program that involves more than color-coded warnings.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s fight to make sure that the UN inspectors can do their work, and that we vigorously enforce a non-proliferation treaty, and that former enemies and current allies like Russia safeguard and ultimately eliminate their stores of nuclear material, and that nations like Pakistan and India never use the terrible weapons already in their possession, and that the arms merchants in our own country stop feeding the countless wars that rage across the globe.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s fight to make sure our so-called allies in the Middle East, the Saudis and the Egyptians, stop oppressing their own people, and suppressing dissent, and tolerating corruption and inequality, and mismanaging their economies so that their youth grow up without education, without prospects, without hope, the ready recruits of terrorist cells.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s fight to wean ourselves off Middle East oil, through an energy policy that doesn’t simply serve the interests of Exxon and Mobil.

Those are the battles that we need to fight. Those are the battles that we willingly join. The battles against ignorance and intolerance, corruption and greed, poverty and despair.

The consequences of war are dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. We may have occasion in our lifetime to once again rise up in defense of our freedom, and pay the wages of war. But we ought not — we will not — travel down that hellish path blindly. Nor should we allow those who would march off and pay the ultimate sacrifice, who would prove the full measure of devotion with their blood, to make such an awful sacrifice in vain.

The sheer hypocrisy of this speech, made when Obama was but an Illinois senator, is mind boggling in its audacity.  Do note in particular his phrase about the need to “begin to perfect this union.” That is one of the clearest examples we have to prove that, in his mind, this union is far from perfect and that ending slavery was only the beginning of the task.  He means to perfect it according to his personal bible–America As It Should Be, by Barack Hussein Obama.  Written by a person who does not believe in American exceptionalism, who was not raised to love America but rather to hate her by focusing upon her perceived flaws–a view filtered through the red lens of communist mentors, Muslim radical relatives, and far-left progressive, domestic terrorists.

I happened upon this speech yesterday, after reading an article on The Black Commentator that excoriated Obama for removing the speech from his website after The Black Commentator published an article and sent Obama a letter, both of which asked, in effect, whether Obama fights for black progressives or is a tool of the Democratic Leadership Council.  Their testy exchange is well worth reading in its entirety.

Yesterday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Sunday morning television programs that this Libyan kinetic military action is “a watershed moment in international decision making.”   In apparent disagreement with his Commander in Chief, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said about Libya, “No, I don’t think it’s a vital interest for the United States, but we clearly have interests there and it’s a part of the region, which is a vital interest for the United States.”

Senator Joseph Lieberman of CT said, “it’s very important for everybody to understand that what we’re doing with the world community in Libya is what the Arab world wants to us do. What the Arab street wants to us do. So, finally, we are on the side of the mass of people yearning to be free within the Arab world.”

Let me get this straight: we are doing “what the Arab Street wants” by throwing cruise missiles into Libya; bombing buildings, tanks, and Libyan troops from 30,000 feet; spending our quickly diminishing treasure, and of utmost importance, risking the lives of our brave troops?

So what can we make of this insane comment?  What the ARAB STREET wants?  The Arab Street wants women as second class citizens, little more than herd animals that exist for the pleasure of the men who own them. The Arab Street wants women covered from head to toe, chaperoned by males at all times when allowed out of the house, unable to drive, unable to receive a decent education, unable to practice self-determination, and in some cases even subject to genital mutilation.  The Arab Street wants Sharia law, which means stoning of adulterers, chopping off the hands of thieves, four male witnesses to rape or else the woman is stoned as a slut, killings at the hands of her family any female who “dishonors” the family.

In Egypt, the Arab Street decided by over 70%, in the recent referendum, that they want RELIGION (Islam) to be part of their government.  The secular students who began the democratic revolution have been pushed aside by the imams and the Muslim Brotherhood.  The election is being rushed; the result will doubtless be an Islamic state in Egypt because haste benefits the most organized, meaning the Muslim Brotherhood, which are allied, inexplicably, with the Egyptian military that formerly supported the students.

Lieberman also said of Syria, “If Assad does what Qaddafi was doing, which is to threaten and go house-to-house and kill anybody who’s not on his side. There’s a precedent now that the world community has set in Libya. And it’s the right one. We’re not going to stand by and allow this Assad to slaughter his people like his father did years ago.”

In advance of his speech this evening, Obama reports that he’s drawing down our naval presence off Libya. Obama is proud that his dumb war in Libya has prevented Qaddafi from killing thousands.  Prevented “atrocities,” he says.  So now, like with jobs created or saved, we have the new standard that can justify ANY war:  Unknown, uncounted, impossible to verify lives “saved.”

I’ve said before that our military treasure matters little to Obama because spending it in any way serves his goal of diminishing the USA military.  Every war, every day of this kinetic military action, reduces our assets, depletes our stores of missiles, adds to the wear and tear on our aging fleets (tanks, planes and ships, all assets).  As his policies continue to destroy our economy, we have fewer and fewer resources with which to rebuild.

This is unilateral disarmament by attrition.  And now Joe Lieberman is on board?

Note:  As I composed this post this morning, Glenn Beck’s show came on the radio;  he also has apparently turned up this same speech from 2002, although he hasn’t yet talked about it.  Synchronicity.