PrintMay 19, 2008
Obama Tells 75,000 Oregonians Iran is "not a threat" to US
Note to Obama: Your mask is slipping.
Barack Obama has tried his best to conceal the fact that underneath all the soothing rhetoric about "change" and being a new kind of politican, he is nothing but a 1960's style liberal with some incredibly naive views about American foreign policy.
Yesterday in front of 75,000 adoring fans, Obama really let his inner liberal take over and made one of the most outrageously stupid comment of the campaign to date. If the GOP were smart, they would take this comment and run it from now until November.
Jennifer Rubin at Commentary:
Barack Obama has tried his best to conceal the fact that underneath all the soothing rhetoric about "change" and being a new kind of politican, he is nothing but a 1960's style liberal with some incredibly naive views about American foreign policy.
Yesterday in front of 75,000 adoring fans, Obama really let his inner liberal take over and made one of the most outrageously stupid comment of the campaign to date. If the GOP were smart, they would take this comment and run it from now until November.
Jennifer Rubin at Commentary:
This remarkable bit of footage from Barack Obama's appearance in Oregon last night is now floating around on YouTube. It might be useful as an undergraduate course exam: how many errors can you spot? Obama apparently believes that Iran and other rogues states (he lists Iran, Cuba and Venezuela) "don't pose a serious threat to the U.S." Iran, specifically, he tells us spends so little on defense relative to us that if Iran "tried to pose a serious threat to us they wouldn't . . . they wouldn't stand a chance."So, taken literally, he seems not much concerned about Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons, its sponsorship of terrorist organizations, its commitment to eradicate Israel, its current actions in supplying weapons that have killed hundreds of Americans in Iraq, and its role in eroding Lebanon's sovereignty through its client Hezbollah.
Echoes of the '60's to be sure. At that time, even the Soviets weren''t considered a threat because they would never start a war due to their losing 20 million in World War II. Of course, it is never brought up that the Soviets were perfectly willing to assist Hitler in starting the war by making a secret pact with the Nazi dictator that carved up Poland and deliniated spheres of influence for the two powers.
And we know now that the period from 1983-85, Soviet leaders were actively contemplating a first strike against the United States before our conventional military build up was complete.
So it should come as no surprise that Obama - a man whose associations with 1960's radicals is documented and who has immersed himself in liberal dogma his entire adult life - should come out and say something so ridiculous that it is going to cost him considerably at the polls.
How many more gaffes like this does the candidate have in him? Let's hope there are several between now and the election.
Ed Lasky adds:
Going beyond Jennifer Rubin's valuable comments about Barack Obam's benign view of Iran, why are we just hearing these views said so explicitly now? Could it be that Barack Obama, on the cusp of securing the Democratic Party nomination, no longer has to cover his true views?
Furthermore, there has been a spate of articles the last week speculating that he feels secure in being able to capture enough of the Jewish vote (whcih is not necessarily pro-Israel) in key states that he feels he can dismiss concerns about Iran and Israel. How does that relate to his early supporters who all but shilled for him regarding his "love for Israel", the steadfastness of his support for the nation? Will he be as dismissive towards them going forward as he has been towards Israel?
He seems all but ready to ignore the entire region-including regional allies-whose views towards America may be less than perfect but whose cooperation going forward will depend on their feelings that America will be alert to the threat posed by Iran and form in resisting, if not rolling back, Iranian imperialism run amok. Beyond these concerns, his naivete is remarkable. Pollyanish attitudes are perilous for a President to have; Hope is not a foreign policy. It is a Hallmark Card sentiment and a campaign slogan.
Rich Baehr agrees that "this is exactly what is going on- he has won,and is now basking in the love of his partisans on the left, who have won control of the Democratic Party."
If so, it will be interesting to see how the press plays this dramatic shift leftward.
