Obama: It is weakness not to talk to our enemies...

[Judge]

This is a good summary of obama's stupidity in foreign policy.... but what else do you expect from a libtard? From Powerline:



Jack Kelly looks at the same passage in Obama's North Carolina victory speech that we touched on in "Obama's improbable history." Obama said:

I trust the American people to understand that it is not weakness, but wisdom to talk not just to our friends, but to our enemies, like Roosevelt did, and Kennedy did, and Truman did.

Kelly provides a refresher course:

Our enemies in World War II were Nazi Germany, headed by Adolf Hitler; fascist Italy, headed by Benito Mussolini, and militarist Japan, headed by Hideki Tojo. FDR talked directly with none of them before the outbreak of hostilities, and his policy once war began was unconditional surrender. FDR died before victory was achieved, and was succeeded by Harry Truman. Truman did not modify the policy of unconditional surrender. He ended that war not with negotiation, but with the atomic bomb.
Harry Truman also was president when North Korea invaded South Korea in June, 1950. President Truman's response was not to call up North Korean dictator Kim Il Sung for a chat. It was to send troops.
Perhaps Sen. Obama is thinking of the meeting FDR and Churchill had with Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in Tehran in December, 1943, and the meetings Truman and Roosevelt had with Stalin at Yalta and Potsdam in February and July, 1945. But Stalin was then a U.S. ally, though one of whom we should have been more wary than FDR and Truman were. Few historians think the agreements reached at Yalta and Potsdam, which in effect consigned Eastern Europe to slavery, are diplomatic models we ought to follow. Even fewer Eastern Europeans think so.
When Stalin's designs became unmistakably clear, President Truman's response wasn't to seek a summit meeting. He sent military aid to Greece, ordered the Berlin airlift and the Marshall Plan, and sent troops to South Korea.

Kelly contrasts Kenendy's pre-presidential military and politcal experience with Obama's paper-thin resume, but only refers glancingly to Kennedy's 1961 summit with Khrushchev in Vienna. That summit was a disaster for resasons that bear intense scrutiny. I think Vienna is actually a fair comparison and warning against Obama's potted history, but Kelly is harsher:

The closest historical analogue to Sen. Obama's expressed desire to meet with no preconditions with anti-American dictators such as Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is the trip British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and French premier Eduoard Daladier took to Munich in September of 1938 to negotiate "peace in our time" with Adolf Hitler. That didn't work out so well.

It is amazing that reporters haven't pursued Obama on this subject, or challenged him on his repeated assertion that we're not talking or haven't talked with Iran.

[yeahYeah]

this man is a Jimmy Carter.... only the democrats can support such a human being.

[jmichna]

Originally Posted by yeahYeah

this man is a Jimmy Carter....

Sir, you insult peanut farmers everywhere in this great land of ours! Shame on you.

Know why Ms. Lilly had Jimmy run for president instead of Billy? She knew Billy could run the tavern.

[trik396]

Hamas supports Obama. Farrakhan supports Obama. Just saw a bunch of young Palestinians supporting Obama. What do they all have in common?

Their hatred of Jews. You don't garner this type of support without similar ideologies. My opinion is that anyone who supports Obama is a terrorist sympathizer. And that goes for many of the libs who post on this website as well. I'm tired of listening to Obama this and Obama that... I'm taking a hard line stance. I truly hate the man and all he stands for...

[AZXD]

Originally Posted by Judge

This is a good summary of obama's stupidity in foreign policy.... but what else do you expect from a libtard? From Powerline:

Great choice of words

Obama Needs a History Lesson

By Jack Kelly

In his victory speech after the North Carolina primary, Sen. Barack Obama said something that is all the more remarkable for how little it has been remarked upon.

In defending his stated intent to meet with America's enemies without preconditions, Sen. Obama said: "I trust the American people to understand that it is not weakness, but wisdom to talk not just to our friends, but to our enemies, like Roosevelt did, and Kennedy did, and Truman did."

That he made this statement, and that it passed without comment by the journalists covering his speech indicates either breathtaking ignorance of history on the part of both, or deceit.

I assume the Roosevelt to whom Sen. Obama referred is Franklin D. Roosevelt. Our enemies in World War II were Nazi Germany, headed by Adolf Hitler; fascist Italy, headed by Benito Mussolini, and militarist Japan, headed by Hideki Tojo. FDR talked directly with none of them before the outbreak of hostilities, and his policy once war began was unconditional surrender.

FDR died before victory was achieved, and was succeeded by Harry Truman. Truman did not modify the policy of unconditional surrender. He ended that war not with negotiation, but with the atomic bomb.

Harry Truman also was president when North Korea invaded South Korea in June, 1950. President Truman's response was not to call up North Korean dictator Kim Il Sung for a chat. It was to send troops.

Perhaps Sen. Obama is thinking of the meeting FDR and Churchill had with Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in Tehran in December, 1943, and the meetings Truman and Roosevelt had with Stalin at Yalta and Potsdam in February and July, 1945. But Stalin was then a U.S. ally, though one of whom we should have been more wary than FDR and Truman were. Few historians think the agreements reached at Yalta and Potsdam, which in effect consigned Eastern Europe to slavery, are diplomatic models we ought to follow. Even fewer Eastern Europeans think so.

When Stalin's designs became unmistakably clear, President Truman's response wasn't to seek a summit meeting. He sent military aid to Greece, ordered the Berlin airlift and the Marshall Plan, and sent troops to South Korea.

Sen. Obama is on both sounder and softer ground with regard to John F. Kennedy. The new president held a summit meeting with Soviet leader Nikita Khruschev in Vienna in June, 1961.

Elie Abel, who wrote a history of the Cuban missile crisis (The Missiles of October), said the crisis had its genesis in that summit.

"There is reason to believe that Khrushchev took Kennedy's measure in June 1961 and decided this was a young man who would shrink from hard decisions," Mr. Abel wrote. "There is no evidence to support the belief that Khrushchev ever questioned America's power. He questioned only the president's readiness to use it. As he once told Robert Frost, he came to believe that Americans are 'too liberal to fight.'"

That view was supported by New York Times columnist James Reston, who traveled to Vienna with President Kennedy: "Khrushchev had studied the events of the Bay of Pigs," Mr. Reston wrote. "He would have understood if Kennedy had left Castro alone or destroyed him, but when Kennedy was rash enough to strike at Cuba but not bold enough to finish the job, Khrushchev decided he was dealing with an inexperienced young leader who could be intimidated and blackmailed."

It's worth noting that Kennedy then was vastly more experienced than Sen. Obama is now. A combat veteran of World War II, Jack Kennedy served 14 years in Congress before becoming president. Sen. Obama has no military and little work experience, and has been in Congress for less than four years.

The closest historical analogue to Sen. Obama's expressed desire to meet with no preconditions with anti-American dictators such as Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is the trip British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and French premier Eduoard Daladier took to Munich in September of 1938 to negotiate "peace in our time" with Adolf Hitler. That didn't work out so well.

History is an elective few liberals choose to take these days, noted a poster on the Web log "Hot Air." The lack of historical knowledge among journalists is merely appalling. But in a presidential candidate it's dangerous. As Sir Winston Churchill said:

"Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

May 7, 2008
Obama's improbable history

Senator Obama's victory speech last night turned impressively to the general election campaign. He all but clinched the Democratic nomination last night. His speech sounded very much like a nomination acceptance speech. I expect that the themes he sounded in his speech last night will reappear in his speech this summer in Denver.



Tom Maguire caught this passage:

I trust the American people to understand that it is not weakness, but wisdom to talk not just to our friends, but to our enemies, like Roosevelt did, and Kennedy did, and Truman did.

Maguire comments:

Obama's supporters are too young to know any of this, but Roosevelt led the United States in the war against Hitler; the Allied policy was unconditional surrender, so there was very little for Roosevelt and Hitler to discuss, and in fact, the two did not meet at all (but they did exchange correspondence before the war).

So my guess is that Obama is thinking of the Yalta Conference with Churchill and Stalin as talking to "our enemies," although of course we were still allied with the Soviet Union against Germany and Japan at that point. Beyond that, is the Yalta Conference something Obama and his advisers view as a success worthy of emulation? Puzzling.

And the United States has been talking with Iran right along in any event. It's not for lack of communication that Iran has been conducting its war on the United States.


When Obama invoked past Democratic presidents in his speech last night, he started with Roosevelt but omitted Johnson, Carter, and Clinton. Moving on from the Clinton era is part of the thesis of Obama's candidacy, so the omission is understandable. Of past Democratic presidents, none has set a better example of the pitfalls of "talking to our enemies" than Jimmy Carter, both in his presidency and his travels since (though Carter probably would not acknowledge that his interlocutors are our enemies).

Obama may not be knowledgeable enough to know he doesn't want to emulate Roosevelt at Yalta. Perhaps he believes that Roosevelt's name sanctions whatever action he can attach to it. But Obama is smart enough to know that he doesn't want to profess a desire to emulate Jimmy Carter, if only on political grounds. In substance, however, it seems to me that the president Obama most closely resembles on this point is Carter.

A review of .... Two articles becoming one .... Classic

[AZXD]

More from McGuire

May 06, 2008

Don't Know Much About History...

Obama wins North Carolina, concedes Indiana, calls for unity.
Here is a transcript of his speech: this detail struck me:

I trust the American people to understand that it is not weakness, but wisdom to talk not just to our friends, but to our enemies, like Roosevelt did, and Kennedy did, and Truman did.

Obama's supporters are too young to know any of this, but Roosevelt led the United States in the war against Hitler; the Allied policy was unconditional surrender, so there was very little for Roosevelt and Hitler to discuss, and in fact, the two did not meet at all (but they did exchange correspondence before the war).

So my guess is that Obama is thinking of the Yalta Conference with Churchill and Stalin as talking to "our enemies", although of course we were still allied with the Soviet Union against Germany and Japan at that point. Beyond that, is the Yalta Conference something Obama and his advisers view as a success worthy of emulation? Puzzling.

HE'S KIDDING? Maybe Obama's team is finally realizing they have a Michelle problem;from Obama's speech:

I believe in our ability to perfect this nation, because it's the only reason I'm standing here today. I know the promise of America, because I've lived it. Michelle has lived it; you have lived it.

It is the light of opportunity that led my father across an ocean. It's the founding ideals that the flag draped over my father's coffin stand for. It is life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

It's the simple truth I learned all those years ago when I worked in the shadow of all those shuttered steel mills on the south side of the Chicago, that, in this country, justice can be won against the greatest odds, hope can find its way back from the darkest of corners.

And when we are told that we cannot bring about the change that we seek, we answer with one voice: Yes, we can.

"Michelle has lived it"? Any reasonable person would say that Michelle has lived the American dream, but I am not talking about a reasonable person - I am talking about the woman who whines about loneliness and crushing college loans every time she speaks. Well, maybe they will gently ask her to go to re-write and try to find something to smile about.

ERRATA: "It's the founding ideals that the flag draped over my father's coffin stand for" - shouldn't that be "grandfather"? Presumably granddad was entitled to a military funeral; dad was off in Kenya IIRC, probably not with an American flag.



Posted by Tom Maguire on May 06, 2008

[Son of Norway]

Political Radar: Obama, Contrary to Carter, Draws the Line at Meeting with Hamas

Obama won't talk to Hamas. Allegedly.

[one-eyed-fatman]

Originally Posted by Freedom1911
Yah know. This forum is being overtaken by Liberal Ron Paul wackos and fracken nut balls.

I'm thinking Ron may jump off the band wagon just before the big election.