See the WSJ editorial below.
Pull-out quote: "By distancing himself from his party's pacifist wing, Mr. Obama is growing up as a candidate."
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My two cents:
Wall Street Journal, the key mouthpiece of corporate America (and its war-profiteer wing), is happy that Obama, a leading Democratic candidate, is not renouncing violence altogether. Now, he's even talking about using military force against "terrorist" countries. Of course, it's them, and not the people, who'll decide who the terrorists are: Pakistan, Iran, Syria or Venezuela.
To corporate media like the Journal, based on their new editorial, apparently it doesn't matter who the candidate is, or who eventually becomes the president, Democrat or Republican. They are happy as long as the next president actively endorses U.S. multinationals and their global aggression -- political or economic. To them, if Iraq fails (which is the case now), the next killing field could be Pakistan, Iran, Syria, North Korea, Venezuela, or ... (you fill in the blank). The war- and profit-drumbeat will be on. They'll make sure the next president of U.S. is the cheerleader of that game. If Obama is the top cheerleader, so be it: he's the chosen one. There's absolutely no room for "pacifists" like Howard Dean or Dennis Kucinich.
One can only wonder what "better" ideas Hillary comes up with next to please the Journal, now under war-hawk Murdoch's management.
August 4, 2007
http://www.geocities.com/chokmoki
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Editorial from The Wall Street Journal.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
REVIEW & OUTLOOK
Barack Obama, Neocon
August 3, 2007; Page A8
Democratic Presidential hopeful Barack Obama is taking heat from
liberals and conservatives alike for his comment that he wouldn't hesitate to
send U.S. troops into Pakistan to capture or kill al Qaeda leaders.
Actually, it's the best thing we've heard yet from the junior U.S.
Senator from Illinois.
"I understand that [Pakistan President Pervez] Musharraf has his own
challenges," Mr. Obama said in a speech Wednesday at the Woodrow Wilson
International Center for Scholars, in Washington, D.C. "But let me make
this clear. There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who
murdered 3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again. . . . If we have
actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and
President Musharraf will not act, we will."
As a candidate recently pilloried by fellow Democrats as a foreign
policy naif, Mr. Obama's remarks may be no more than an effort to don a
Mike Dukakis helmet. And given the Senator's consistent opposition to the
war in Iraq, it may seem peculiar that he should now propose invading a
nuclear-armed Muslim country -- all the more so since Mr. Obama let
slip yesterday in an interview that as President he would rule out the
use of nuclear weapons "in any circumstance."
But in a primary contest where Democrats seem to vie with one another
for the title of who will pull out of Iraq the fastest, Mr. Obama's
speech is at least a recognition that he'd be willing to use military force
somewhere. It's also a reminder to antiwar Democratic voters that the
terror threat won't vanish when the Bush Administration does, and that
U.S. soldiers will have to be put in harm's way again.
Sometimes the easiest -- but worst -- decision for a President is not
to take military action. This was part of President Clinton's failure
against al Qaeda in the 1990s, which his wife and Presidential candidate
Hillary Clinton now wants to bathe in nostalgia as a simpler time when
life wasn't so hard. But no one should forget that throughout the 1990s
Mr. Clinton was storing up trouble with his failure to react
forcefully to the first World Trade Center bombing, and to the al Qaeda attacks
against U.S. embassies in East Africa in 1998 and the USS Cole in 2000.
Mr. Obama's comments also showed some welcome realism about the problem
that confronts the U.S. in Pakistan. Following Mr. Musharraf's
ill-conceived truce last September with Taliban-connected warlords in the
Pakistani province of Waziristan, terrorist raids into neighboring
Afghanistan rose threefold. Al Qaeda has also been able to substantially
reconstitute itself in the area, according to the latest U.S. National
Intelligence Estimate. If Pakistan is unwilling or unable to police its own
territory, then no prudent U.S. President can afford to rule out special
forces raids or Predator strikes, or more.
Incidentally, Mr. Obama's words -- assuming they are sincere --
indicate that as President he would have overruled former Secretary of Defense
Donald Rumsfeld, who in 2005 is reported to have vetoed a U.S.
commando raid into Waziristan on grounds that it might have destabilized Mr.
Musharraf's government. The Senator describes that decision as "a
terrible mistake," and anyone who wants to run to the right of Rummy on
counterterrorism can't be all bad.
Too bad, then, that Mr. Obama instantly squandered an opportunity for
seriousness by insisting that Iraq is "the wrong battlefield" in the war
on terror. In case he hasn't noticed, Iraq today is the main
battlefield where U.S. forces are confronting, and killing, al Qaeda on a daily
basis. And GIs don't have to invade another country to do it.
The Senator is also misguided to say that the struggle in Afghanistan
and Pakistan is "the war that has to be won," as if fleeing Iraq in
defeat would make that easier. If we let al Qaeda emerge victorious in Iraq
-- or even allow it to claim a partial victory -- we will contribute a
chapter to its mythology of Islamist invincibility, help it gain new
recruits, and encourage further assaults. The best way to defeat al
Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan is first to demonstrate the national will
to stay and win in Iraq.
Still, Mr. Obama's willingness to draw appropriate conclusions from
realities in Pakistan stands in refreshing contrast to his Democratic
opponents. Tragic as a premature withdrawal from Iraq would be, it would be
compounded if Democrats draw the lesson never again to use or threaten
force abroad. By distancing himself from his party's pacifist wing,
Mr. Obama is growing up as a candidate.
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Saturday, August 4, 2007
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