Remember How Liberals Said Every Aggressive Move Against Terrorists Was ‘A Provocation’? Why Is It A Good Thing Now?

I remember how Obama and the rest of the left decried every agressive move President George W. Bush made as being a provocation that would only result in more violence and make the new wave of terrorism being waged against America even worse.

The war on terror was a provocation.  The Iraq War was a provocation.  The terrorist prison facility at Guantanamo Bay was a provocation.  The surge strategy was a provocation.  And “provoking” the terrorists was the worst possible way to react, we were constantly told.

On the surge strategy that won the Iraq War, Obama had said:

“I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”

Sending more troops to win the fight will increase the violence.  And that is a bad, bad thing. 

On the Iraq War as provocation (and therefore a bad thing), a critique of Obama’s apology in his Cairo Speech says it all:

On “violent extremism” Obama clung to the meme of “Afghanistan War good/Iraq War bad.” Obama said, “Unlike Afghanistan, Iraq was a war of choice that provoked strong differences in my country and around the world. Although I believe that the Iraqi people are ultimately better off without the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, I also believe that events in Iraq have reminded America of the need to use diplomacy and build international consensus to resolve our problems whenever possible.”

This does not make sense. Iraq was not a “war of choice.” Saddam Hussein, for a variety of reasons (not just on WMDs, which everyone believed Hussein had and which he was certainly pursuing) had made himself intolerable. And Saddam was certainly not responding to diplomacy; that was the main reason the coalition forces marched.

Obama also made his first cringing apology. “The fear and anger that it provoked was understandable, but in some cases, it led us to act contrary to our ideals.” Well, no we did not. That is a flat out lie and a pander not only to liberal opponents of the war on terror but to the Muslim extremists Obama says he abhors.

It doesn’t matter that because of the very surge strategy that Obama personally demonized that Obama’s vice president was able to actually say the following about the Iraq War that Obama also demonized:

“I am very optimistic about — about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration.”

I would point out that George Bush won his “war of choice” that “provoked strong differences.”  And Obama – even after eventually abandoning his own demqgoguery on the “surge” to implement a surge of his own in Afghanistan, and even after using Bush’s own general which the left demonized to implement that surge – is floundering badly in “the good war” of Afghanistan.  Which is why Afghanistan sure won’t be “one of the great achievements of the Obama administration.”

George Bush “stupidly’ chose to fight a war against a tyrant in a terrain that the United States could actually win.  The vastly more brilliant Obama chose to put all his marbles in an Afghanistan that has been the graveyard of empires for a thousand years.  Afghanistan also happens to feature a terrain that almost entirely nullifies our vast tactical and strategic advantages.  But that’s what you do when you think you’re too damn smart for your own good, I guess.

On Guantanamo Bay as a provocation, Obama said:

“Guantanamo is probably the No. 1 recruitment tool that is used by these jihadist organizations,” Obama said. “And we see it in the websites that they put up. We see it in the messages that they’re delivering.”

It didn’t matter that Guantanamo Bay was absolutely necessary, no matter how much it provoked people who were determined to be provoked.  That is just a fact, and facts don’t matter to demagogues.  It’s just an “inconvenient truth” that Gitmo is still open, and WILL REMAIN OPEN as long as Obama is president.

Then there was that nasty rhetorical phrase “war on terror” that was clearly too provocative, so Obama rebranded it as an “overseas contingency operation.”

The one thing that couldn’t be more clear: don’t you dare provoke these people.  It’s bad to provoke.  The mainstream media would crawl all over you if you dared to provoke.

So I’m left sitting here wondering how provocation suddenly went from a bad thing to a good thing just because the guy doing all the provoking was a Democrat.

Obama’s Middle East policies have resulted in dramatically escalated increases in violence throughout the Arab world.  Which would have been terrible if Bush had had anything to do with it, but which is okay because a liberal did it.  So the mainstream media has refused to harangue Obama on that unintended consequence of his budding Utopia.

In Libya, you’ve got a lot more of this “untended consequence” regarding Obama’s nearlty forgotten little third war he started in Libya:

TRIPOLI, Libya – Libyans shouting for revenge buried Moammar Gadhafi’s second youngest son to the thundering sound of anti-aircraft fire Monday, as South Africa warned that the NATO bombing that killed him would only bring more violence.

Libya’s leader did not attend the tumultuous funeral of 29-year-old Seif al-Arab, but older brothers Seif al-Islam and Mohammed paid their respects, thronged by a crowd of several thousand. Jostling to get closer to the coffin, draped with a green Libyan flag, mourners flashed victory signs and chanted “Revenge, revenge for you, Libya.”

Three of Gadhafi’s grandchildren, an infant and two toddlers, also died in Saturday’s attack, which NATO says targeted one of the regime’s command and control centers. Gadhafi and his wife were in the compound at the time, but escaped unharmed, Libyan officials said, accusing the alliance of trying to assassinate the Libyan leader.

NATO officials have denied they are hunting Gadhafi to break the battlefield stalemate between Gadhafi’s troops and rebels trying for the past 10 weeks to depose him. Rebels largely control eastern Libya, while Gadhafi has clung to much of the west, including the capital, Tripoli.

But of course NATO is denying that we’re hunting Gadafi in violation of United Nations policies against targeting political leaders.  After all, we’ve even denied we’re at war at all, preferring the nicer-sounding euphamism of “kinetic military action.”  “War” sounds so mean, and hardly something a brilliant liberal would do, after all.  The far more erudite liberals launch wave after wave of “kinetic military actions” instead.  And no matter how many of Gaddafi’s compounds somehow accidentally get targeted and blown up, that’s clearly all it is.

Now we’ve got Obama (almost as though Obama were himself one of the machine-gun toting SEALs) killing Osama bin Laden.  That clearly won’t provoke anybody.

America’s relationship with Pakistan was already at an all-time low due to Obama incessantly flying Predators over their country and launching rocket attacks on them.  But so what?  Provocation is a good thing now, because Obama is doing it instead of George Bush.  And if you’re brilliant, you don’t have to kowtow to such trivialities as consistency.

And so what if Obama ordered American troops to launch a military attack on Pakistani soil without bothering to even inform the Pakistanis?  No harm, no foul.  So what if we violated their sovereignty?  Obama is the leader of the world, and the sooner the world recognized that he is an imperial president, the better.  If you don’t like Obama pursuing “cowboy” tactics, or engaging in “you’re either with us or you’re against us” policies, well, you’re just not very enlightened.  Because it’s not fascist unless Republicans do it.

And al Qaeda, whom the left was so worried about provoking when George Bush was the guy doing the provoking?  They’ll get over it.  So we can ignore the little threat they just made less than a week ago about unleashing a “nuclear hellstorm” upon America if we killed or captured Osama bin Laden.

You think of Gitmo, the surge strategy, rendition, domestic eavesdropping, the Patriot Act, indefinite detentions, military tribunals and a host of other things Obama demonized George Bush and Dick Cheney over, and not only are they doing the same things, but they’re doing even worse.  But the same mainstream media that tore into George Bush like pitbulls going after raw bloody meat don’t seem to have time to dwell on Obama’s blatant hypocrisies.

Nor does Bush get any credit for having been right when Obama and the Democrats were so completely wrong by their own massive reversals to the Bush policies now.

We are watching a level of propaganda and fundamental hypocrisy overtake the United States of America by both the media and the White House that ought to simply stun you.

Great General Leaving Afghanistan So Fool President Can Be The Weakling His Leftist Base Demands

Here’s a stunner: did you think Afghanistan was going badly?  It’s about to get a LOT worse.  Because yet another top general under Obama – and probably the greatest field commander of this generation – is on his way out:

Gen. David Petraeus, the most celebrated American soldier of his generation, is to leave his post as commander of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan, The (London) Times reported Tuesday.

The Times reported that the Pentagon aims to replace Petraeus, who was appointed less than eight months ago, by the end of the year.

Sources have confirmed that the search for a new commander in Kabul is under way. It forms part of a sweeping reorganization of top American officials in Afghanistan, which the Obama administration hopes to present as proof that its strategy does not depend on the towering reputation of one man.

[…]

Many of the moves are expected to coincide with a reduction in US troop numbers, which Obama has promised will start this summer, despite General Petraeus’s objections.

The news that the general himself would be leaving Kabul stunned close observers of US strategy, but the Pentagon insisted Tuesday it was a natural development, given the demands of running the war and Washington’s need for fresh blood in a crucial role.

“This is a heck of a demanding job,” Morrell said of General Petraeus’s central task of driving the Taliban from its strongholds in southern Afghanistan, which US commanders now claim is almost complete. “He will have to be rotated out at some point.”

Nothing to see here, folks.  Please return to your hovels at once.

You remember General Patton, of course, and how he was always whining about the all the stress and how he didn’t want to fight and all he wanted to do was go home.  Happens all the time.

You get to see the REAL REASON for this departure via Reuters:

The question is what this move, if confirmed, would mean for policy.  Petraeus, more than anyone else, has been identified with the intensified military campaign in Afghanistan which, according to critics of the policy,  has reduced prospects of a political settlement by alienating Taliban leaders who might otherwise be coaxed into peace talks. 

Petraeus has been a towering figure in Washington and difficult to challenge politically. He had what was seen in the United States as a good track record in Iraq. And he was backed by Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton — making it very hard for those within the U.S. administration who disagreed with his assessment to win President Barack Obama over to their point of view. 

Moreover, Obama had already sacked two generals — Generals David McKiernan and Stanley McChrystal — and could hardly dismiss a third. (If I remember rightly — and no doubt someone will correct me if I am wrong — no president since Abraham Lincoln has changed his generals so frequently in wartime.) Promoting Petraeus would be far easier.

His departure, especially with Gates on his way out, could create the space for Obama to recalibrate Afghan strategy, backing away from the military surge and focusing more on a political settlement – if he wants to do so.

Appeasement will work.  It has always worked before.  The best thing you can do is ignore the fact of history that weakness is a provocation and appease, appease, appease your enemy.

If it hadn’t been for Neville Chamberlain and his highly succesful policy of appeasement, it’s difficult to imagine how the world would not have erupted into war in 1939.  Thank the all powerful state that we listened to weakness and gave up Poland and Czechoslovakia to Hitler and gave up Manchuria and China to Tojo.  Strengthening our enemies by giving them land and materials while becoming weaker ourselves is invariably a certain path to peace and prosperity.

I’ll stop.  Pathetically ignorant and naive weakling moral idiot liberals will probably actually think I’m being serious.

It is stunning what an embarassment and what a disgrace the first community agitator ever to become president has been for this country.

Remember how Obama predicted Iraq would be a failure and said the surge strategy wouldn’t work?

The Fool-in-Chief said back when he was just another fool liberal US Senator:

January 10, 2007, on MSNBC:

“I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”

But, of course, George Bush was right about Iraq and about the surge; Obama was the totally wrong moron he still is.  And in fact Iraq went so well that soon after Bush left office the Obama administration was crowing:

“I am very optimistic about — about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration.”

You can see those and other statements from Obama in article documenting just what a cynical and manipulative liar this appeasing weakling truly is.

One of the many ways you can see how loathsome liberals are is their hypocritical turnabout on General David Petraeus himself.  Or should I say, “General Betray Us?”

As we get ready for Obama to show his liberal spots and cut-and-run as anyone not a moron always said Obama would do, consider that the same heroic General Petraeus who had previously been lambasted as General Betray Us simply because he commanded troops and fought for his country while a Republican was president essentially said that Obama’s 2011 cut-and-run timetable was merely a political decision.

And let’s not forget how Obama not only demonized the war in Iraq that Bush won only to claim credit for Bush’s victory, but also how Obama made Afghanistan “the good war.”  And allow me at the same time to take a trip down “I told you so” lane:

Charles Krauthammer pointed out the sheer cynical depravity of Barack Obama and the Democrat Party as regards Iraq and Afghanistan by pointing to what the Democrats themselves said:

Bob Shrum, who was a high political operative who worked on the Kerry campaign in ’04, wrote a very interesting article in December of last year in which he talked about that campaign, and he said, at the time, the Democrats raised the issue of Afghanistan — and they made it into “the right war” and “the good war” as a way to attack Bush on Iraq.  In retrospect, he writes, that it was, perhaps, he said, misleading. Certainly it was not very wise.

What he really meant to say — or at least I would interpret it — it was utterly cynical. In other words, he’s confessing, in a way, that the Democrats never really supported the Afghan war. It was simply a club with which to bash the [Bush] administration on the Iraq war and pretend that Democrats aren’t anti-war in general, just against the wrong war.

Well, now they are in power, and they are trapped in a box as a result of that, pretending [when] in opposition that Afghanistan is the good war, the war you have to win, the central war in the war on terror. And obviously [they are] now not terribly interested in it, but stuck.

And that’s why Obama has this dilemma. He said explicitly on ABC a few weeks ago that he wouldn’t even use the word “victory” in conjunction with Afghanistan.

And Democrats in Congress have said: If you don’t win this in one year, we’re out of here. He can’t win the war in a year. Everybody knows that, which means he [Obama] has no way out.

Afghanistan was just a way to demagogue Bush in Iraq by describing Afghanistan – where Obama is failing so badly – as “the good war” and Iraq – where Bush won so triumphantly – as “the bad war.”  It was beyond cynical; it was flat-out treasonous.

George Bush selected Iraq as his central front for sound strategic reason.  Iraq had a despotic tyrant who supported terrorism.  Saddam Hussein needed to be removed to mount any kind of successful peace effort in the Middle East.  Iraq is located in the heart of the Arab/Islamic world.  It has an educated population relative to the rest of the region.  It also offered precisely the type of terrain that would allow American forces to implement their massive military superiority in a way that mountainous, cave-ridden Afghanistan would not.

Bush was determined to fight a war where he could win.  Obama foolishly trapped us in a war that would bleed us.  Why?  For no other reason than pure political demagoguery.  And he needs to be held accountable.

And where are we now under Obama’s failed leadership???

An article entitled, “Pentagon worried about Obama’s commitment to Afghanistan” ended with this assessment from a senior Pentagon official:

“I think they (the Obama administration) thought this would be more popular and easier.  We are not getting a Bush-like commitment to this war.”

See my piece from last year predicting this failure.  Read that article and explain to me where I was wrong, liberals.  I dare you.

I’m still waiting, you pathetic liberal vermin.

Bush won in Iraq; he changed the entire dynamic in the Middle East.  And if anything is contributing toward the movement toward democracy in the Middle East, it is the fact that George W. Bush built a democracy in the very heart of the Arab and Muslim world.  Barack Obama demanded that we fight in Afghanistan – where Bush had essentially mounted a containing operation because Afghanistan is and always has been the grave yard of empires.  And he has been losing there miserably ever since he dramatically and massively escalated the war there.

Obama insisted that we cut-and-run where we could win; and he demanded that we fight to the bitter end where we would bog down.

I’ve tried to explain that to liberals.  But better to teach physics to my dog than common sense to a liberal.  Iraq was perfect terrain for the US to mount a successful military operation; and Afghanistan is the worst terrain imaginable for our tactics while serving as the best terrain imaginable for the guerrila tactics of the Taliban.  You ever try to drive a tank up a mountain or fly a gunship into a cave?  Bush succeeded in Iraq largely because he wasn’t a fool and fought in the right geography.  Obama is losing in Afganistan because he’s a fool.  Plain and simple.

Look at the casualties in Afghanistan: Obama more than doubled the 2008 casualties in Afghanistan under Bush in his first year.  And then he took that figure that he doubled from Bush and increased it by over 57% his next year as Failure-in-Chief.

And now here we are in “preparation-t0-cut-and-run” mode after Obama utterly failed.

And we now already know that the whole war fiasco was nothing but cynical politics from the get-go for Obama:

… the president decided to set a timetable for withdrawing troops from Afghanistan because, he said, “I can’t lose the whole Democratic Party.”

And liberals are the kind of scum – and “scum” is if anything to weak of a word – who continue to denounce Bush’s victory even as they cheer Obama for first losing and then cutting and running in defeat and disgrace.

Cynicism piled on top of more cynicism.  A sauce of weakness poured over that.  And then – like the cherry – appeasement on top.

Obama will almost certainly offer General Petraeus the Chairman of the JCS position.  I hope General Petraeus turns him down and resigns.  But General Petraeus will likely believe that he’s better serving his country by taking the top military position.

Here’s why I believe he’s wrong to do so, and NOT serving the country’s interests at all.  Suppose you are a master mechanic and you take a job at a repair shop.  I’m the owner of the shop, and I am a total disgrace who is determined to screw the customers and ruin their cars.  You take the job because you think you can at least mitigate the disaster I create.  But can you, if you’re carrying out my orders?  You’re going to end up doing nothing more than assisting me while I screw the customers and ruin their cars.  If you REALLY want to help the customers, your best bet is to quit and then blow the whistle on all the harm I’m causing.

And that’s what General Petraeus should do.

Most generals don’t want to do that.  They don’t want to make that unfamiliar transition from military strategy to political policy.  But as long as General Petraeus continues to serve a fool, he’s only going to end up implementing foolish and unworkable policies.

A Review Of Obama’s Lies, Incompetence As He Gives His Iraq Speech

National Review has a record of Obama’s pretzel twisting flat-out LIES.  We should review them as Obama gives his speech celebrating the troops coming home.

First, let’s listen to Obama administration spokesman Vice President Joe Biden:

I am very optimistic about — about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration. You’re going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the end of the summer. You’re going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government.

Now first see how Obama massively contradicted himself, all while assuring us that he’d been predicting the surge would control violence all along:

Rush noted Obama’s position in January 2007:

OBAMA: We cannot impose a military solution on what has effectively become a civil war. And until we acknowledge that reality, uh, we can send 15,000 more troops; 20,000 more troops; 30,000 more troops. Uh, I don’t know any, uh, expert on the region or any military officer that I’ve spoken to, uh, privately that believes that that is gonna make a substantial difference on the situation on the ground.

And then there was this:

January 10, 2007, on MSNBC:

“I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”

And:

On November 11, 2007, two months after General David Petraeus told Congress that the surge was working, Obama doubled down, saying that the administration’s new strategy was making the situation in Iraq worse:

“Finally, in 2006-2007, we started to see that, even after an election, George Bush continued to want to pursue a course that didn’t withdraw troops from Iraq but actually doubled them and initiated a surge and at that stage I said very clearly, not only have we not seen improvements, but we’re actually worsening, potentially, a situation there.”

Contrasted with this statement after the surge worked:

Democratic debate, January 5, 2008:

I had no doubt, and I said when I opposed the surge, that given how wonderfully our troops perform, if we place 30,000 more troops in there, then we would see an improvement in the security situation and we would see a reduction in the violence.

No you didn’t, you LIAR, Obama.

The mainstream media – the official propaganda arm of the Democrat Party – have repeatedly refused to hold Obama accountable for his lies and his contradictions.

Now let’s go back, remembering that Joe Biden said Iraq would literally be “one of the great achievements of this administration,” and see how Obama did everything he could as candidate to make it a failure, to cause the United States to lose in Iraq so that we would be forced to withdraw in humiliation and defeat.

Dan Riehl notes Obama’s position in July 2007:

“Here’s what we know. The surge has not worked. And they said today, ‘Well, even in September, we’re going to need more time.’ So we’re going to kick this can all the way down to the next president, under the president’s plan.”

A Democratic debate in September 13, 2007:

After putting an additional 30,000 troops in, far longer & more troops than the president had initially said, we have gone from a horrendous situation of violence in Iraq to the same intolerable levels of violence that we had back in June of 2006. So, essentially, after all this we’re back where we were 15 months ago. And what has not happened is any movement with respect to the sort of political accommodations among the various factions, the Shia, the Sunni, and Kurds that were the rationale for surge and that ultimately is going to be what stabilizes Iraq. So, I think it is fair to say that the president has simply tried to gain another six months to continue on the same course that he’s been on for several years now.  It is a course that will not succeed. It is a course that is exacting an enormous toll on the American people & our troops.

“It is a course that will not succeed.”

Versus:

“I am very optimistic about — about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration.”

And, of course, there is the all-time statement of treason from Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, quoted in an MSNBC article titled, “Reid: Iraq War lost, U.S. can’t win”:

“I believe myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense and – you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows – (know) this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday,” said Reid, D-Nev.

What we’re going to see tonight in Obama’s speech is “an enormous demonstration of lack of class and grace,” predicts Sean Hannity.  That because Obama has a despicable tendency to blame everything that goes wrong on his predecessor, rather than taking personal responsibility for his presidency.  We already know that Obama will not give Bush or the surge credit for the success in Iraq.  A success which is documented in the Obama’s claiming credit for “one of the great achievements of this administration” and a success which is documented in our soldiers coming home in victory rather than in defeat.

Barack Obama is a liar, a demagogue, and a truly classless human being.

Let’s not forget that Obama will be congratulating our soldiers for their participation in what he called “a dumb, rash war”:

Barack Obama: “What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other armchair, weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.”

“You soldiers were so wonderful and so heroic in your dumb, rash victory that I did everything I could to undermine.  I want to personally thank you for your useless sacrifice.”

When the only ideologue who is ramming an ideological agenda down our throats – judging from the enormous American disapproval of first his stimulus boondoggle and then his ObamaCare boondoggle – is YOU, Hussein.

Which is to say, it’s a shame that we got rid of one lying despot Hussein in Iraq, but now must suffer an even worse one here.

For the record, our military disapproves of Obama and his handling of Afghanistan and Iraq at a far higher margin than the overall American people.

Iraq War veterans are saying:

“It’s frustrating to see both the president and vice president jumping up and down saying, ‘Look what we did, look what we did,’ when if we actually followed the policies they were calling for … we would have left early and we would have left in shame,” Mr. Hegseth said, noting their opposition to the surge of forces in Iraq.

.

Question: Should Democrats Confirm ‘General Betray Us’?

General David Petraeus earned the legitimate title of “hero” for his incredible work in leading the surge-based turnaround in Iraq.

A work that Democrats did everything they possibly could to undermine and destroy.

When General Petraeus came to Washington to appear before Congress to defend the progress he’d made in Iraq, the leftist MoveOn.org greeted him with the title, “General Betray Us,” which ran at a vastly discounted rate by fellow liberal attack dog The New York Slimes.

Hillary Clinton told General Petraeus that his progress report on Iraq required “a willing suspension of disbelief,” all but calling Petraeus a liar.

The Senate voted to condemn the “General Betray Us” sliming of David Petraeus.  None of the Democrat presidential candidates supported it.  Obama had voted on another bill half an hour earlier, but didn’t have the courage or integrity to vote to condemn those who attacked a great general at war.  He essentially voted “present” yet again.  And Hillary Clinton literally voted in agreement with MoveOn.org.

And, of course, how did Barack Hussein analyze the Iraq strategy that Petraeus championed?

“I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there,” he told MSNBC. “In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”

What did Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid have to say about General David Petraeus’ competence to turn around a difficult situation in Iraq?

“Now I believe myself … that this war is lost, and that the surge is not accomplishing anything”

Obama spent his entire seven minutes at the Petraeus hearing whining about how awful everything Petraeus was doing was, in basic agreement with Harry Reid’s words of surrender:

It is to suggest that if the American people and the Congress had understood then that after devoting $1 trillion, which is what this thing optimistically will end up having cost, thousands of American lives, the creation of an environment in which Al Qaida in Iraq could operate because it didn’t exist prior to our invasion, that we have increased terrorist recruitment around the world, that Iran has been strengthened, that bin Laden and Al Qaida are stronger than at any time since 2001, and that the process of Iraqi reconstruction and their standard of living would continue to be lower than it was pre- invasion, that if that had been the deal, I think most people would have said that’s a bad deal, that does not make sense, that does not serve the United States’ strategic interests.

And so I think that some of the frustration you hear from some of the questioners is that we have now set the bar so low that modest improvement in what was a completely chaotic situation, to the point where now we just have the levels of intolerable violence that existed in June of 2006 is considered success, and it’s not.

I mean, Petraeus didn’t accomplish anything in Iraq, and actually added to the needless violence, according to now-President Barry Hussein; he’s a flat-out dishonest liar, according to now-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton; we actually lost the Iraq War during Petraeus’ leadership, according to Harry Reid; and he betrayed this country, according to the leftwing machine that largely got this administration elected. And now this same general is all of a sudden the go-to-guy for these very same Democrats? I mean, excuse me?

History has proven that it was Hillary Rodham Clinton, and the entire liberal establishment who demagogued and demonized the Iraq War, who were the liars. The surge strategy and the Iraq war that General David Petraues led was such a monumental success that Joe Biden (rather appropriately nicknamed Joe “Bite Me” by General Stanley McChyrstal’s staff) tried to claim credit for it, saying:

[Iraq] “could be one of the great achievements of this administration. You’re going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the end of the summer. You’re going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government.”

Democrats never admit how terribly wrong and in fact shockingly immoral they were when they did everything they possibly could to undermine General Petraeus and the Iraq War. But that doesn’t mean they won’t cynically and hypocritically take credit for both Iraq and Petraeus now. That’s just the kind of weasels Democrats are.

David Petraeus was the general that Democrats and their leftist allies despised.  Petraeus was Bush’s general.  Petraeus was “the surge general.”  And the fact that the same liberals who hated Petraeus are now cheering Obama’s selection of him makes me want to barf.

All I’m doing here is pointing out that by the twisted, vile, hypocritical, loathsome standards by which Democrats evaluated General Petraues, there is no way they should confirm him now.

They should find someone like the Pied Piper of fairy tale lore and confirm him instead.

And if Democrats do in fact now vote to confirm the man they attacked, it will be an open acknowledgment that they were rabid little treasonous vermin back in 2007.

Update, June 30, 2010: Democrats unanimously voted today to confirm as a matter of fact that they were treasonous liars in 2007.

How’s Obama Doing In Afghanistan, Iran, and Iraq? Not So Good

Let’s take them in alphabetical order.  First, How’s Obama doing in Afghanistan?

Not so good.  Our foreign policy is so deteriorated there that Obama is refusing to even acknowledge whether or not the leader of the country we are fighting in is an ally:

White House won’t say if Karzai is still an ally
By Jordan Fabian & Sam Youngman – 04/06/10 02:00 PM ET

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs would not say Tuesday if the Obama administration considers Afghan President Hamid Karzai an ally.

Gibbs criticized the Afghan president after Karzai took a shot at Western leaders and the United Nations for election fraud in his country during last year’s presidential contest.

Administration officials said Tuesday that they will continue to “evaluate” remarks made by  Karzai, and that the evaluation could result in Karzai’s May invitation to the White House being revoked.

President Barack Obama extended an invitation for Karzai to visit the White House on May 12, but that could be in jeopardy if Karzai continues to make “troubling and untruthful” comments.

Asked at the daily press briefing if the U.S. considers Karzai an ally, Gibbs said “Karzai is the democratically elected leader of Afghanistan.”

Pressed on the issue, Gibbs said that “the remarks he’s made I can’t imagine that anyone in this country found them anything other than troubling…when the Afghan leaders take steps to improve governance and root out corruption, then the president will say kind words.”

Gibbs added that the administration will continue to use “stern language” with Karzai if it doesn’t take steps to root out corruption and questioned the rationale behind Karzai’s controversial statements.

“Whether there’s some domestic political benefit that he’s trying to gain, I can’t say,” Gibbs said.

So Karzai defends his country’s elections, and his own political credibility, from foreign attacks and demagoguery, and as a result Obama snubs him in what seems like a rather petty emotional response.

Maybe Karzai should start meddling in Obama’s election-status by pointing out that Obama’s own wife strongly suggested Obama was not born in the United States when she remarked that she and Obama visited “his home country in Kenya.”  Which of course is what the birthers who say Obama was not an American-born U.S. citizen have been saying all along.  Even the Associated Press at one point described Obama as “Kenyan-born” before it became inconvenient to so-describe him.

Given that Obama is becoming unglued over Karzai defending himself over attacks regarding the legitimacy of his election, it would be interesting if we could see how Obama would handle attacks over the legitimacy of his election.

In any event, things aren’t going so well when we have hundreds of thousands of troops fighting in a country while our president openly doubts whether the leader of said country is an ally.

That was the first thing that went truly, truly wrong in Vietnam, you know.

How’s Obama doing in Iran?  Really, really bad.  It has become abundantly obvious that Iran WILL have nuclear weapons under Obama’s watch.

How does this Washington Times headline grab you?

CIA: Iran capable of producing nukes

And what is Obama’s reaction to this intolerable and incredibly dangerous development?  Try acceptance.

I know, I know.  Iran was supposed to reflect upon the sheer, transcendent wonderfulness of Obama, and agree that Obama’s empty words really were more important than reality, and abandon it’s nuclear weapons program.  But somehow something went wrong in Obama’s calculation that Iran and the ayatollahs would decide to embrace Obama’s narcissism.

Who would have ever thunk it?

Oh, wait.  I would have.  I wrote an article in August, 2008 patiently explaining why a vote for Obama was tantamount to a vote for a nuclear-armed Iran.

In another August 2008 article predicting that “President Obama” equaled “nuclear Iran,” I wrote:

This is the question that will effect – and possibly haunt – American foreign policy for generations to come.

If we elect Barack Obama, we are tacitly choosing to allow Iran to develop the bomb. Any of his tough-sounding rhetoric aside, you need to realize that Barack Obama has already repeatedly philosophically condemned the very same sort of preemptive attack that would be necessary to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

Heck, I can go back to April 2008, when I was already explaining why electing either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton over John McCain guaranteed a nuclear-armed Iran.

When Iran obtains nuclear weapons, the world will dramatically change.  We will not be able to control this rogue terrorist nation – a nation with a radically apocalyptic view of the world – which has repeatedly threatened to “wipe Israel off the map.”  When Iran develops the bomb, they will be able to block the Strait of Hormuz and shut off the oil supply, skyrocketing gasoline prices to over $14 a gallon.  When Iran gets nukes, it will be able to launch a global terrorist jihad without fear of being attacked.  When Iran has the bomb, it will result in a nuclear-arms race in the craziest region in the history of the world.

Ultimate Armageddon will be guaranteed when Iran gets the bomb.  And it will get the bomb because of Barack Hussein Obama.

How about Iraq?  Well, things are hardly looking up there under Obama, either.

A few weeks ago, Joe Biden was ridiculously asserting that Iraq “could be one of the great achievements of this administration.”  What was asinine about that statement was that it utterly ignored the Bush administration, that deserves all the credit, and instead assign credit to two men who foolishly tried to undercut everything that Bush did which led to the success we attained in Iraq.

But things were clearly going well in Iraq, such that Joe Biden tried to steal credit for it.

Not so much now.

From the New York Times:

Baghdad Bombing Streak Stokes Fear of New Round of Sectarian Violence
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS and YASMINE MOUSA
Published: April 6, 2010

BAGHDAD — Deadly blasts shook Baghdad for the second time in three days on Tuesday, deepening fears of a new outbreak of insurgent and sectarian violence.

At least seven bombings of residential areas of the Iraqi capital, both Shiite and Sunni, killed 35 people and wounded more than 140. The violence came against a backdrop of continuing political instability after March 7 parliamentary elections left no single group able to form a government, forcing a scramble to form coalitions.

A similar political void after the 2005 parliamentary vote preceded Iraq’s bloody sectarian warfare of 2006 and 2007, from which the country has only begun to emerge.

There are also new concerns that Iraq’s army and police may drift back into sectarianism.

It’s logically impossible for the Obama administration to one day say Iraq will be one of their “greatest achievements,” and the next day blame Bush for the failure of Iraq.  That said, I guarantee you that that is precisely what Obama will try to do if Iraq turns sour on him.

Ayad Allawi, the likely next prime minister of Iraq, had this to say only yesterday:

ALLAWI: The process of democracy where you would have a stable Iraq is being hijacked.  And because it’s being hijacked, it’s going to throw this country into violence. And once this country is thrown again into violence as before, then this will spill over to the region and vice versa. Problems around the region will be transferred here also.

I bold and red-font the statements that it is “being” hijacked.  It is something that is beginning to happen just now.  And Iraq is being “thrown again into violence as before.”  Obama can’t blame Bush for this increasing violence.  He can only blame himself (not that he ever actually WILL blame himself).

We are beginning to escalate our withdrawal out of Iraq, and lo and behold, the Islamic jihadists are determined to make it appear as though we are withdrawing with our tails between our legs.  They are also making it rather obvious that when we leave, they will be present to fill the newly created vacuum with their poisonous presence.

Allawi is pleading with the United States to discontinue the timetable for withdrawal and remain through this difficult period.  But the report by correspondent Dominic Di-Natale concludes by saying, “Ayad Allawi’s call for a troop withdrawal suspension will fall on deaf ears for the time being even if it is a serious plea for help. ”

One of the fears is that Obama is tunnel-vision focused on getting the hell out of Iraq, and is ignoring the delicate state-of-affairs there.

So how’s Obama doing in Afghanistan, in Iran, and in Iraq?  Pretty darn horrendously.

An article that encapsulates the Obama disaster of a foreign policy is “The Karzai Fiasco” by the Wall Street Journal.