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Last night, Obama was asked about using the United States military for humanitarian issues, like genocide. Obama was quick to give a hawkish answer, and to use WWII as an example. Apparently, we joined the fight against Nazi Germany solely to stop the Holocaust.
My very first thought was, “How did this guy go to Harvard without even an elementary understanding of the largest war this country has ever fought?”
I’m going to let Jay Tea give you a little history lesson before we move forward:
First up, the United States did NOT enter World War II because of the Holocaust. Knowledge of what Nazi Germany was doing to the Jews was very limited, and even those who had access to such information simply couldn’t bring themselves to believe it to be true. The United States entered the war because Japan attacked us; we declared war on Germany because they declared war on us first.
Next, the US did very little to directly to stop or even slow down the Holocaust as it ramped up. This was because there was very little we could do. Not only did we not have anywhere near the technology we have now, but we were being opposed by one of the mightiest military forces in the world. Our strategic goal was to stop German aggression, and the best way we could think of to do just that was to utterly destroy the German nation. That would have the effect of ending the Holocaust, but that was a mere fortunate happenstance. Nobody went to war to save the Jews and the Gypsies and the others being exterminated by the Nazis; it was to stop the Nazis from conquering Europe and threatening the rest of the world.
While you’re over there, read his argument for why going into Darfur is not just an exercize in futility, but also an exercize in stupidity.
Anyway… back to Obama’s insipid statement. He said that we have a “moral responsibility” to stop genocide and the murder of innocents. To not exercize that responsibility would diminish us, he said.
Yet somehow, Obama’s beacon of moral responsibility was missing when it came to overthrowing a tyrant who murdered hundreds of thousands of innocent people in Iraq. Hmm. He said that stopping genocide wasn’t a good enough reason to stay in Iraq, remember?
Though most of the debate dealt with domestic issues, it was a foreign-policy question that sent me flying to my files. Moderator Tom Brokaw asked the candidates what their “doctrine” would be “in situations where there’s a humanitarian crisis, but it does not affect our national security,” such as “the Congo, where 4.5 million people have died since 1998,” or Rwanda or Somalia.
In such cases, answered Obama, “we have moral issues at stake.” Of course the United States must act to stop genocide, he said. “When genocide is happening, when ethnic cleansing is happening . . . and we stand idly by, that diminishes us.”
But that wasn’t how Obama sounded last year, when he was competing for the Democratic nomination and was unbending in his demand for an American retreat from Iraq. Back then, he dismissed fears that a US withdrawal would unleash a massive Iraqi bloodbath. “Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said Thursday the United States cannot use its military to solve humanitarian problems and that preventing a potential genocide in Iraq isn’t a good enough reason to keep US forces there,” the AP reported on July 20, 2007 (my italics).
What kind of candidate is it whose moral response to genocide – genocide – can reverse itself 180 degrees in a matter of months? Is that the kind of candidate who ought to be the leader of the free world?
No, Jeff, that’s not the kind of candidate who ought to be leader of the free world.
Amy Holmes thinks Obama just doesn’t know when he would use military force.
He said that we have a moral responsibility to use force to save innocents. How does that apply to Iraq? Saddam Hussein was a mass murderer and gassed his own people. Obama opposed military intervention. Obama also opposed the surge and advocated withdrawal despite the warnings that it would lead to a bloodbath and possible genocide. And now that the surge is helping to quell violence and save lives, Obama says that he would still oppose that action. What does that mean? What about our moral responsibility to the Iraqis? Obama says he’s against the Holocaust. Well, for goodness sakes, who isn’t? The question is: When would a President Obama order military action? Based on what criteria? Do we know? Does he know?
Is it possible that Obama’s just flexing his moral relativism muscles? It sure sounds like it to me.
Look, we can’t be invading every single country that murders its people. I’ll be honest, I wish we could. I’m not heartless. What’s happening in the Congo and in Darfur is horrible, and it would be great if we could make it stop. But we can’t be everywhere at once. And there are real threats to our national security, and while it’s very nice to want to stop genocide in Darfur, our safety comes first. And unfortunately, that’s just the way it has to be. And when it comes to Obama, which is it? Is genocide reprehensible and something that Americans have a moral duty to stop? Or does that only apply to liberal pet causes like Darfur, and not so much to ones that liberals don’t like, like Iraq?
I’d imagine that in the real world, with Obama as President, we wouldn’t see much military action. Our troops would come home and funding for the military would be slashed, and the military will likely be downsized. We wouldn’t be the world’s largest superpower anymore. Why would we need to be? For liberals like Obama, there’s nothing that is worth fighting for. He can talk the hawkish talk, but when has he ever shown that he’s willing to walk the hawkish walk?
Hat Tip: Hot Air
Mat says: Unfortunately, this is the type of thing that conservative bloggers are stating, but not the politicians. To be honest, what you just wrote is exactly the thing that McCain should hammer away at Obama with. I have yet to see anything remotely like this happening and when McCain really could have gone off on Obama in the first debate, he pulled back. The Republican party is not listening to its conservative base at all. It’s gone into autopilot and it’ll be a good four years before they recover. You see it, I see it, others see it, but apparently McCain doesn’t.
I can’t even imagine the nonsense the military will have to go through in the next four years. Well, I can, but I don’t want to think about it. It’s too depressing.
erica says: Mat,
McCain was soft, but did fine. Obama hammered himself by lying again. No clue on foreign policy, and yes, if he’s elected, there will be a lot of nonsense forced on the military. Stop trying to make any particular party irrelevant in your own mind, they are part of the reason we have the freedoms we do. And by saying irrelevant, you sound like a communist.
Knott Buyinit says: What amazes me is that Obama flip-flops on every issue when his initial position starts losing him votes, and his followers don’t care. They know that he doesn’t meant it, that he is just saying these things to get a few more bitter, religion-clinging rubes to vote for him. That’s why the MSM Greek chorus won’t investigate his ne’er-do-well friends and mysterious personal background either – they don’t care, they wouldn’t care if he were Jeffrey Dahmer, just so as long as the guy who wins has that little ‘D’ after his name and doesn’t remind them of BushChimpHitler.
Honestly, as much as I would like to see McCain in the White House – oh, OK, you caught me, I really am more enthusiastic about seeing Governor Palin spend a pleasant 4 years at the Naval Observatory as a prelude to *her* moving into the White House – you have to admit it would be a hoot a minute if Obama were to win. I know it’s selfish to consider it when our country might not survive it, but can you imagine the Paul Shanklin parodies on Rush with Obama living on Pennslyvania Boulevard? Yeehaw!
Knott Buyinit says: What amazes me is that Obama flip-flops on every issue when his initial position starts losing him votes, and his followers don’t care. They know that he doesn’t meant it, that he is just saying these things to get a few more bitter, religion-clinging rubes to vote for him. That’s why the MSM Greek chorus won’t investigate his ne’er-do-well friends and mysterious personal background either – they don’t care, they wouldn’t care if he were Jeffrey Dahmer, just so as long as the guy who wins has that little ‘D’ after his name and doesn’t remind them of BushChimpHitler.
Honestly, as much as I would like to see McCain in the White House – oh, OK, you caught me, I really am more enthusiastic about seeing Governor Palin spend a pleasant 4 years at the Naval Observatory as a prelude to *her* moving into the White House – you have to admit it would be a hoot a minute if Obama were to win. I know it’s selfish to consider it when our country might not survive it, but can you imagine the Paul Shanklin parodies on Rush with Obama living on Pennslyvania Boulevard? Yeehaw!
Ironwolf32 says: Jay Tea is right. The USA didn’t know about the death camps until after those areas were occupied. Yes, even then our intel ops didn’t know everything….
President Obama leading the USA in WWII, that is nightmare what if scenario..
I can hear him now, “I plan to sit down and negotiate with Adolf Hitler and Mussolini. It is obvious that the failed policies of Woodrow Wilson during WWI’s victory caused this current situation. Hitler seems to be a reasonable man that I should be able to find common ground with. It is obvious we can’t beat them in a war as the failed policies of Coolidge, Hoover and Wilson left us without a standing army. I do not support the war-mongering from Winston Churchill and I plead for him to join us at the negotiating table at the League of Nations. Together we can solve this crisis.”
Hitler of course pledged to not attack his “brothers in the Rhineland” (meaning Brussels, Belgium, Holland, France) shortly before he invaded. He also broke the non-aggression pact with Russia. That is not much of a track record for honor agreements.
Now here is the million dollar question, Had Barack Obama been President during WWII, which language would we be speaking today? Would it be German or Russian? Because we most certainly would have been controlled by one of them.
Mat says: Erica,
I don’t know what debate you watched, but McCain did, in fact, look awful. At least in the first debate he looked halfway decent even though he didn’t hammer Obama as much as he could and should have (there were several opportunities for him to do so and he backed off every time).
Obama’s lying through his teeth, but that’s besides the point. Debates are as much about presence as issues, and when you have one person giving clear answers (even though they are full of crap and totally wrong) as well as looking confident and the other is just hemming and hawing (and wandering around aimlessly in the background while Obama’s talking) and not giving clear cut answers, guess who the undecided are going to lean to? You’ve got to look at this with a larger perspective than just the conservative (we’ve already made up our minds). Heck, I’m conservative, I know what this party will do to the country, but it’s not about the conservatives at this point. It’s the independents who still need to make up their minds, even at this late hour.
Oh yeah, and Republicans will be irrelevant. Here’s why: Right now, the Republicans have a little less than 200 seats in the House. I can guarantee you they will lose a lot of seats this time around, making their presence even weaker. That means the Democrats will pretty much rule the House (though looking at the way Republicans have acted since 2006, the Dems already do). As far as the Senate goes, the only thing the Republicans have is the filibuster (there is no filibuster in the House). The Dems will gain about 15 seats in the Senate and will totally control that. So let me reiterate, you will have a leftist Democratic president, a House commanded by Pelosi Democrats and a Senate headed by Reid where the Republicans can’t even filibuster. What part of irrelevant didn’t you get??? That’s hardly communist (what did that mean anyway), it’s reality.
NVJoJo says: First of all, I doubt you watched the debate because this is what Barak said:
“If we could have intervened effectively in the Holocaust, who among us would say that we had a moral obligation not to go in?”
Doesn’t look like he said that we engaged in WWII because of the Holocaust to me, does it to you? Maybe if you are using the letters to make an anagram.
Second, this is what Barak said in July:
“Well, look, if that’s the criteria by which we are making decisions on the deployment of U.S. forces, then by that argument you would have 300,000 troops in the Congo right now—where millions have been slaughtered as a consequence of ethnic strife—which we haven’t done”.
“We would be deploying unilaterally and occupying the Sudan, which we haven’t done. Those of us who care about Darfur don’t think it would be a good idea,” he said.
And this is what was said in the debate:
“So when genocide is happening, when ethnic cleansing is happening somewhere around the world and we stand idly by, that diminishes us.
And so I do believe that we have to consider it as part of our interests, our national interests, in intervening where possible.
But understand that there’s a lot of cruelty around the world. We’re not going to be able to be everywhere all the time. That’s why it’s so important for us to be able to work in concert with our allies.”
In both instances he says that yes, we can not stand by while genocide happens but invading every country who commits these atrocities is not a workable solution.
erica says: “I don’t know what debate you watched, but McCain did, in fact, look awful.”
Compared to Obama, he sounded a lot more knowledgeable, regardless of what he looked like. In a campaign speech, his presentation is light years different, much more forceful. The only thing I can think of is the difference in the venue and his ability to project in a smaller enclosure. McCain is starting to come out with questions about Obama’s plans and who is associates are. It’s more of what Obama won’t do then what he will do. I know he won’t make an honest effort in keeping Iran from having a nuclear weapon, that is not a priority for him.
As far as trying to make the republican party irrelevant, you are nullifying the importance of this country’s foundation. Part of the communist agenda is to influence the two largest parties into imploding each other so the socialist thought will transition to communism.
Mat says: NVJoJo,
Actually, yes, I did watch it while I was at work. I was watching from the Fox website. But whatever…
Erica,
I have no idea where you are coming from. We have three weeks left until the election and McCain won’t say exactly what he’s going to do. This isn’t merely my opinion. Read other conservative blogs and listen to people. They’re saying the same thing. As far as this communist thing you keep harping on, I really have no idea where you’re going with this. It’s coming out of left field.
Nullifying the importance?
Um, did you actually read what I wrote?
Ok, let me try again. I’ll try to make this really simple so you can understand. We have two years between election cycles, which are congressional. We have four years between presidents. Ok, 2008…presidential and congressional. 2010….congressional…2012…presidential and congressional. Are you getting this?
Great! If things go the way they probably will (i.e. large Republican losses in this years election in both houses), then the Republicans cannot regain any seats until at least 2010. That means for at least two years, the Democrats will essentially run the country almost unopposed. That is what I mean by irrelevant. Unless there’s a magical election between those periods that you’re aware of. So where does this fit in with some “communist agenda”?
Last time I checked, the Democrats aren’t imploding. They’re simply becoming more leftist. There are schisms in that party that may erupt soon, hence the whole issue between Hillary and Obama in the primary. As far as the Republicans are concerned, they have lost their Conservative message, which is why they’re in this mess right now. The battle is more subtle than the Democrats, but no less real. The issue there is between the moderate Rockefeller Republicans (McCain’s group) and the Conservative base. This defeat will hopefully get the real conservatives back in so the Republicans can regain some ground by 2012. I hope this helps to clear things up.
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