Those who believe Barack Obama would avoid wars after withdrawing from Iraq are not paying attention. He has laid out a coherent strategy for fighting wars.

"I'll stop spending $9 billion a month in Iraq.  I'm the only major candidate who opposed this war from the beginning -- and as president, I will end it.  Second, I will cut tens of billions of dollars in wasteful spending. I will cut investments in unproven missile defense systems. I will not weaponize space. I will slow our development of future combat systems, and I will institute an independent defense priorities board to ensure that the Quadrennial Defense Review is not used to justify unnecessary spending.  Third, I will set a goal of a world without nuclear weapons.  To seek that goal, I will not develop new nuclear weapons; I will seek a global ban on the production of fissile material, and I will negotiate with Russia to take our ICBMs off hair-trigger alert and to achieve deep cuts in our nuclear arsenals."

"The gringos called for a meeting with the minister to ask him to tell us they are interested in talking about several topics. They claim they new president in their country will be Obama and that these people are interested in their fellow citizens. Obama will support neither Plan Colombia nor the signature of the Free Trade Agreement. In this regard, we replied we are interested in relations with the governments that are on equal grounds and that in the case of the United States, a public statement voicing their interest in talking to the FARC is needed, given their eternal war against us."

"...Kennedy's one presidential meeting with Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet premier, suggests that there are legitimate reasons to fear negotiating with one's adversaries. Although Kennedy was keenly aware of some of the risks of such meetings - his Harvard thesis was titled ‘Appeasement at Munich' - he embarked on a summit meeting with Khrushchev in Vienna in June 1961, a move that would be recorded as one of the more self-destructive American actions of the cold war, and one that contributed to the most dangerous crisis of the nuclear age.

"...Only a few minutes after parting with Khrushchev, Kennedy, a World War II veteran, told James Reston of The New York Times that the summit meeting had been the ‘roughest thing in my life.' Kennedy went on: ‘He just beat the hell out of me. I've got a terrible problem if he thinks I'm inexperienced and have no guts. Until we remove those ideas we won't get anywhere with him.'

"A little more than two months later, Khrushchev gave the go-ahead to begin erecting what would become the Berlin Wall.... The following spring, Khrushchev made plans to ‘throw a hedgehog at Uncle Sam's pants': nuclear missiles in Cuba. And while there were many factors that led to the missile crisis, it is no exaggeration to say that the impression Khrushchev formed at Vienna - of Kennedy as ineffective - was among them."

"... in the long run, the reaction of the Bush administration may prove more harmful to the national interest than even these horrific attacks."  

"The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not ‘insurgents' or ‘terrorists' or ‘The Enemy.' They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win. ...the majority of Americans supported this war once it began and, sadly, that majority must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let that maybe -- just maybe -- God and the Iraqi people will forgive us in the end." 

"After 9/11, our calling was to devise new strategies and build new alliances, to secure our homeland and safeguard our values, and to serve a just cause abroad.  Just because the President misrepresents our enemies does not mean we do not have them.  When I am President, we will wage the war that has to be won."

"As President, I will lead this effort. In the first 100 days of my Administration, I will travel to a major Islamic forum and deliver an address to redefine our struggle. I will make clear that we are not at war with Islam, that we will stand with those who are willing to stand up for their future, and that we need their effort to defeat the prophets of hate and violence."

"The terror attack that took place on September 11, 2001 was an aberration in more ways than one. Muslims were the perpetrators, but that is usually not the case. The purveyors of hate and violence in America are almost always Christians."

"Malcolm X's autobiography seemed to offer something different.  His repeated acts of self-creation spoke to me; the blunt poetry of his words, his unadorned insistence on respect, promised a new and uncompromising order, martial in its discipline, forged through sheer force of will."

"Malcolm's discovery toward the end of his life, that some whites might live beside him as brothers in Islam, seemed to offer some hope of eventual reconciliation."

"The person who made me proudest of all was (my brother) Roy. Actually, now we call him Abongo, his Luo name, for two years ago he decided to reassert his African heritage. He converted to Islam, and has sworn off pork and tobacco and alcohol."

Meanwhile, Obama remained sharply critical of what he called 'the religious absolutism of the Christian right." . . .

In "Audacity," the senator wrote that such believers insist "not only that Christianity is America's dominant faith, but that a particular, fundamentalist brand of that faith should drive public policy, overriding any alternative source of understanding, whether the writings of liberal theologians, the findings of the National Academy of Sciences, or the words of Thomas Jefferson."

As for the Democratic Party, Obama observed that "a core segment of our constituency remains stubbornly secular in orientation, and fears - rightly, no doubt - that the agenda of an assertively Christian nation may not make room for them or their life choices."

Although the overwhelming majority of Americans describe themselves as Christians, Obama does not believe that any one religion should define the United States.

"We are no longer just a Christian nation," he argues in "Audacity," which was published last year. "We are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers."

Obama calls the Iraq war "a botched and ill-advised U.S. military incursion into a Muslim country." He is also protective of civil rights for Muslims in the U.S.

"In the wake of 9/11, my meetings with Arab and Pakistani Americans ... have a more urgent quality, for the stories of detentions and FBI questioning and hard stares from neighbors have shaken their sense of security and belonging," he laments. "I will stand with them should the political winds shift in an ugly direction."

"...One of the first things that I would do ... is to send a signal that we need to talk to Iran and Syria because they are going to have responsibilities if Iraq collapses.  They have been acting irresponsibility up until this point.  But if we tell them we are not going to be a permanent occupying force we are in a position to say that they are going to have to carry some weight in terms of stabilizing the region."

"As commander in chief, I will always reserve the right to make sure that we are looking out for American interests. And if al-Qaeda is forming a base in Iraq, then we will have to act in a way that secures the American homeland and our interests abroad."

"...I strongly support the expansion of our ground forces by adding 65,000 soldiers to the Army and 27,000 Marines."

"According to the Defense Department, the program's short three-year service requirement for full benefits would cause servicemen and women to leave the armed forces too soon at a time when they are vitally needed."   

"...the majority of Americans supported this war once it began and, sadly, that majority must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let...."