In The Art of War, the ancient Chinese philosopher, Sun Tzu, wrote "If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles."

I wish Republicans would learn this valuable lesson when it comes to Barack Obama. How many times since Obama surfaced on the American scene haven't we heard some Republican politician assert he's "a nice guy"?

Two Republicans who have said this, or something like it, come to mind: John McCain and Mitt Romney. A funny thing happened on their way to the presidency.

I don't know if Republicans know themselves, but until they "know" Obama they can expect a steady diet of defeat.

Obama is not a nice guy. He's a gutter pol from Chicago; a devotee of Saul Alinsky's school of "community organizing"; a youthful disciple of the Communist Frank Marshall Davis; an admitted alcohol and drug user; a pal of unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayres; a 20-year parishioner of radical Black Liberation preacher Jeremiah Wright; and the comrade of ultra-left-wing extremists such as Bernadine Dohrn, Valerie Jarrett, David Axelrod, Susan Rice, Carol Browner, Elizabeth Warren, Van Jones, and Cass Sunstein, just to name a few.

Despite a record that suggests otherwise, the meme on Obama is that he's "a nice guy." As at least partial proof, Obama's acolytes point to his marriage and his apparent loving relationship with his daughters.

Some of history's worst tyrants had at least a few enduring qualities. Adolf Hitler, for example, is said to have adored little children and liked dogs.

I am not comparing Obama to Hitler. (I leave comparisons to der Führer to the leftists who used to make that allegation about George W. Bush.) I merely call attention to the fact that one or two admirable qualities do not make one "a nice guy."

What evidence buttresses the claim that Obama is not the reincarnation of George Bailey? Let's leave aside his alcohol and drug besotted youth, his days in leftist hothouses of Academe, even his time as a "community organizer" on Chicago's south side. Never mind that, as he launched his political career, he hobnobbed with left-wing extremists Bill Ayres and Bernadine Dohrn.

Let's just look at how Obama has conducted himself in politics since 1996.

During his 1996 campaign for the Illinois senate, and again in his 2004 race for the U.S. Senate, Obama benefitted when his opponents were driven from the political arena. (Ever heard of Alice Palmer or Jack Ryan?) Rush Limbaugh is right; Obama doesn't just want to level the playing field; he wants to empty the playing field.
Think back to the event during the New Hampshire campaign for the Democrats' presidential nomination in January, 2008, when Hillary Clinton wondered aloud if she were a likeable person. Obama's response was a sardonic, "You're likeable enough, Hillary."

Get a tape of that incident and look at Obama's face. The scarcely hidden contempt showed clearly for anyone who cares to look.

Obama will not accept responsibility for problems confronting the country. Everything bad is laid at George W. Bush's door. Does "a nice guy" continually avoid taking responsibility and blame another person?

Fast-forward to the presidential campaign of 2012. Would "a nice guy" stand mute while his goons "killed" Romney? Would "a nice guy" remain silent after a feminazi assaulted Ann Romney's right to speak about women's issues because she "had never worked a day in her life"? More generally, would "a nice guy" have run the most vicious, negative campaign in American history?

Get tapes from any recent White House Correspondents' Dinner and watch Obama's one-liners, dripping with hostility toward those he perceives as enemies. (Make no mistake: Obama does not have political opponents; he has enemies who must be destroyed.)

While you're at it, go on the Internet and watch how Obama reacted when Dr. Ben Carson, speaking at this year's National Prayer Breakfast, criticized Obamacare and Obama's health care nostrums. This was not the reaction of "a nice guy"; it was the reaction of a thin-skinned ideologue who can brook no criticism.

What we have in Barack Hussein Obama stands in stark contrast to the president Obama claims to admire most: Abraham Lincoln. Many qualities would describe Lincoln's character, but malice toward his foes was not one. Sadly, that is precisely what comes out in Obama.

I'm sure there are "nice guys" -- figuratively speaking -- among today's leftists. All too many, however, are vicious, mean-spirited totalitarians evidently out to politicize every aspect of human life. How long did it take for leftists like Barney Frank, David Sirota, or Jim Moran to politicize the Boston Marathon bombings?

Obama's true character shows up again and again. Consider how, for example, he has exploited the parents of kids murdered at Newtown, CT to forward his agenda on gun control. Think about his diatribe when members of his own party didn't back his gun control bill in the Senate.

If images of this petulant man-child, bloviating about how "shameful" senators who did not toe his line on guns were, does not awaken Republican elites to Obama's true personality, what will?

Do they want more evidence? Would "a nice guy" remain aloof -- and lie about it -- as his administration orders survivors of the attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi last fall to keep quiet, and threatens them if they don't?

How about his administration's decision to close White House tours for kids and blame it on the sequester, while spending freely on the Obamas' lavish lifestyle?

Would "a nice guy" permit his administration to inflict the kind of punishment on the travelling public that Americans experienced last week when air traffic controllers were furloughed, allegedly because of the sequester, a plan originally proposed by Obama?

Would "a nice guy" lie about being the originator of the sequester idea?

Sun Tzu also wrote, "Know not your enemy or yourself and you will lose very battle." So long as GOP elites refuse to know Obama, they will continue to experience the kind of disasters they (and the country) endured on November 6, 2012.