Leon Wieseltier can't be the only one worried that Barack Obama might not be up to the challenges facing the next president:
What you think of a presidential candidate is in large measure determined by what you think of the world. Different circumstances call for different talents, different sensibilities, different approaches to power. "Leadership" comes in many forms. A sterling individual may be historically inappropriate; and a person whom it is impossible to admire may accomplish significant things. The question of whether Barack Obama will make a fine commander-in chief finally depends on your view of the direction of history in the coming years. I cannot escape the foreboding that we are heading into an era of conflict, not an era of conciliation. I do not mean that there will be many wars, though I cannot imagine that the threat to American security from Al Qaeda and its many associates can be met without a massive and sustained military operation in western Pakistan, and I cannot imagine any Pakistani government ordering such an operation. It is not "the politics of fear" to remind Obama's legions of the blissful that, while they are watching Scarlett Johansson sway to the beat, somewhere deep inside a quasi independent territory we might call Islamistan people are making plans to blow them to bits. (Yes, they can.)
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Besides the very real (or maybe sort of real, at least at this point) possibility that Barack Obama might be elected President, it's kind of ironic that we may be on the verge of not only electing a Black American for President, but one whose name this soon after 9/11 is not Smith or Jones or Anderson or Hudspeth or Witherspoon or Campbell, etc., but Obama - and not just Obama, but Barack Hussein Obama, whose name copies or closely imitates both Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.
You can't make this stuff up.
Wieseltier evidently believes in McCain's "Hundred Years War."
BTW, do neocons ever realize that the United States has DOMESTIC as well as FOREIGN problems? And that they often interact in complicated ways (trade, immigration)?
It's this attitude that we're already in Shangri-La, and so we can descend down to save the rest of the world, that got us into this nightmare in the first place -- kind of the reverse of "One Tin Soldier."
do neocons ever realize that the United States has DOMESTIC as well as FOREIGN problems? And that they often interact in complicated ways (trade, immigration)?
Well, this one does (after a fashion):
www.armedforcesjournal.com/2007/03/2552879
Solve both illegal immigration and military manpower shortages...by recruiting an American Foreign Legion.
At least Max Boot is being consistent: It's certainly easier to wage perpetual war for perpetual peace when the blood price thereof is borne by aliens who can't vote, instead of citizens who can. Now all he needs to do is buy off the voters with (more) bread & circuses; perhaps an expanded welfare state would do the trick.
Of course, a system wherein military service is viewed as being "beneath" most American citizens' dignity would certainly make for, um, interesting civil-military relations. One also wonders whether our foreign legionnaires, in a pinch, would support the Constitution over the commanders who'd shown them the backs of their enemies.
DavidTC, what you call "screwing around" in Iraq others might consider "preventing genocide" on a Congo-like scale. There is also the fact that the U.S. cannot get permission from Musharraf in Pakistan to cross the border to go after Bin Laden. Why does Obama think Musharraf will give him permission?
I don't hear much from Obama that suggests he cares about the complexity of these issues, since everytime he talks about a solution, it sounds like something virtually everyone would like to see happen, like bringing our troops home from Iraq, or "getting" Bin Laden.
DavidTC, what you call "screwing around" in Iraq others might consider "preventing genocide" on a Congo-like scale.
Really? Well, that's a damn stupid way to prevent genocide. It's akin to crashing a firetruck into a fireworks factory to stop a fire that doesn't exist yet.
There is also the fact that the U.S. cannot get permission from Musharraf in Pakistan to cross the border to go after Bin Laden. Why does Obama think Musharraf will give him permission?
The reason Musharraf will not give permission is exactly what I said: The hardliners' would paint it as a sign of weakness and attempt to seize power. The situation is completely unstable.
We need to fix this independently of the problem of bin Laden, as Pakistan is a coin toss away from turning into a nuclear-armed much-richer Afghanistan. It could be very bad. Plus, we want bin Laden.
Obama appears to understand this, and thinks there is some way to fix Pakistan. I do not know what the plan is, I do not know if there is a plan at this point, I don't know if there could be a workable plan at all, but I'm also not assuming he's just going to attack Pakistan.
I know everyone's level of expectations in foreign policy has been dulled by the Bush administration, and now we're at the point we're just basically hoping he won't give backrubs to leaders of other countries or call them 'Skippy McGoo' or bomb Taiwan because his TV remote stopped working.
But we used to be able to actually accomplish things with a carrot and a stick. First we threaten Pakistan with invasion, then we bribe Pakistan with regaining control over its own territory which it surely wants, then we say a few things about our respect for Pakistan and Islam to disarm the hardliners, and then we go get bin Laden when we can. You know, actual foreign policy.
His statement wouldn't even be an issue if we weren't used to Bush doing idiotic things.
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