In Barack Obama’s statement on the uprising in Libya Wednesday, he asserted somewhat counterfactually that “throughout this period of unrest and upheaval across the region the United States has maintained a set of core principles which guide our approach.” He added that “these principles apply to the situation in Libya” – and as he delineated them further, it became clear that he was siding strongly with the Libyan people and other Middle Eastern protesters, and that he was assuming that the recent Middle Eastern uprisings were all idealistic, humanistic pro-democracy movements. In reality, they’re anything but.
Obama condemned “the use of violence in Libya,” declaring that “the suffering and bloodshed is outrageous and it is unacceptable. So are threats and orders to shoot peaceful protesters and further punish the people of Libya.” He affirmed that “the United States also strongly supports the universal rights of the Libyan people,” and enumerated several of those rights: “That includes the rights of peaceful assembly, free speech, and the ability of the Libyan people to determine their own destiny.”
That phrasing itself suggested that Obama envisioned the crowds thronging the streets of Tripoli, crying out for Gaddafi’s blood and holding up pictures of him with Stars of David drawn on his forehead, as something akin to the Founding Fathers of the United States of America in Congress assembled. He saw Jefferson and Madison elsewhere, also, as he added that “even as we are focused on the urgent situation in Libya,” his Administration was working to determine “how the international community can most effectively support the peaceful transition to democracy in both Tunisia and in Egypt.”
Obama expressed satisfaction that “the change that is taking place across the region is being driven by the people of the region. This change doesn’t represent the work of the United States or any foreign power. It represents the aspirations of people who are seeking a better life.” And he quoted a Libyan who said: “We just want to be able to live like human beings.” In conclusion, he vowed that “throughout this time of transition, the United States will continue to stand up for freedom, stand up for justice, and stand up for the dignity of all people.”
The one thing the President didn’t explain was on what basis he believed that the Libyan (and Tunisian and Egyptian) people themselves were interested in principles and rights such as the freedom of speech and the dignity of all people, or held an understanding of freedom and justice remotely comparable to that of the American Constitutional system.
Unfortunately for him, there are numerous signs that they don’t. It is not insignificant vandalism that protesters in Libya have marked Gaddafi’s picture with the Star of David; rather, it is an indication of the protesters’ worldview, and of the pervasiveness of Islamic anti-Semitism. When Muslim protesters want to portray someone as a demon, they paint a Star of David on his picture. This also shows the naivete of Obama and others who insist that the demonstrators in Libya, Egypt (where the Star of David was drawn on Mubarak’s picture also) and elsewhere in the Middle East are pro-democracy secularists. They may be pro-democracy insofar as they want the will of the people to be heard, but given their worldview, their frame of reference, and their core assumptions about the world, if that popular will is heard, it will likely result in huge victories for the Muslim Brotherhood and similar pro-Sharia groups. Hence the ubiquitous chant of the Libyan protesters: not “Give me liberty or give me death,” but “No god but Allah!”
Barak Obama will not take any steps to condemn Gadaffi because of Gadaffi's strong ties with Jeremiah Wright and Louis Farakan. Those friendships mean more to Obama than America matters to him.
Obama has repeatedly demonstrated that he has no moral principles, or rather has many, but all subjected to the overriding principle of "throw under the bus when inconvenient". He would, AND DID, throw his grandmother under the bus, so there is no reason to expect he will make an exception for Gadaffi. The man stinks.
Yeah. He's not a stand up guy like George Bush was. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz threw the entire USA under the bus. Our ties to Libya go back to when it first discover it had oil and we supported them just as we continue to support all of the dictators over there.
While the world is breaking apart into anarchy, Obama is more interested in Civil Uniions and SEIU Unions! OBAMA'S "Blame Tea baggers" preaching on "CIVILITY" are now speeches supporting UNCIVILITY with some of his supporters now screaming Nazi chants, crosshairs, lynching, and some calling for "blood!"
He can't order AWOL SENATORS to go home to do their job because he's never completed a full day on the job himself! If the Republicans and the Tea Baggers were doing the same, he'd call out the National Guard and give endless speeches on "the Democratic process!"
SEVEN DOLLARS a gallon fits right in with his War On Oil as he wants us to switch to an electric car that only goes sixty miles per charge! What if a hundred years ago, he banned the Horse and Buggy and ordered them to switch to a Model-T? You could still only go sixty miles since there are no gas stations beyond that and who could afford one?
He's hoping there are mass firings and higher unemployment, caused by the "Republican's who hate the workers" so he can fill the ranks of his army of Democrat voters!
"Tea Baggers". It's great to see them called that since that's what they are.
Republicans have done more to ruin this country in the past 10 years. They really should be ashamed of themselves but they feel no shame. They are on their own Holy War on everyone who doesn't think like they do or on people who just "think".
Robert's analysis is astute as usual. But let's make no mistake here; unlike Egypt, where American aid actually gave us leverage, there is little or nothing we can tangibly do about events in Libya.
Even in the conservative fold, there is a range of opinion that encompasses 180 degrees. Some are advocating air-strikes against Qaddafi on behalf of the Libyan "revolution". Robert is taking a completely opposite tack, insisting that the devil you know may be preferable to the one you don't.
The events in the Middle-East have their own volition and momentum. Let's be realistic about the limits of American power….direct intervention would be highly unlikely, even under a Republican administration. The world has changed a helluva lot since Ike sent in the Marines to Lebanon in '58.
Obama is clueless, to be sure, but NO ONE can be absolutely certain about just how to proceed as history unfolds before our eyes.
OBAMA'S NOBEL "PEACE" PRIZE is holding him back from taking real and concrete action around the world and the dictators and thugs of the world know that and will take advantage of it are taking advantage of it!
That's why I think it was a Nobel Prize COMMITTEE CONSPIRACY to give it to Obama in the first place for doing nothing but for "hope" that he would be a Man of Peace so the Progressive World Agenda could move forward without threat of U.S. intervention!
It's an insult to the Prize itself to give it to Al Gore and to Barack Obama when a this year's recipient, a Chinese, is sitting in jail! A bigger INSULT is that Barack Obama was silent on this fellow Prize winner from China while he was dining with the leader of China! THAT'S AN INSULT TO ALL PRIZE WINNERS, except Al!
Don't look for OBAMA to take any military action ever! To the reasoning of the Prize Committee, Iraq and Afghanistan didn't count against him because those were not his wars!
So Obama hasn't done anything militarily in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Somali pirates?
Generally, he’s continued with Bush policy. But he’s recently dropped the ball with the Somali pirates. US Naval ships have shadowed pirate vessels, but that didn’t save the lives of four Americans.
Excellent points Mr. Chavez! He did campaign on ending "Bush's wars" and troops are being removed although he did send in thousands more into Afghanistan and drones into Pakistan so maybe the Prize committee can ask for it back! What's even more ironic, is that Obama spit on General Betray Us and now he is depending on him for a victory!
In Obama's view, all citizen rights come from the Government and not from being "Endowed by Their Creator"….so how can he say that the Libyan people deserve these "universal rights" if their Government does not want to endow them with such? Seriously.
Just wondering, who's creator would you be referring to? Every group has their own.
Obama will not acknowledge that Gadaffi is a criminal because Obama would then have to extradite Gadaffi for the murder and bombing of the jet he had blown up over Lockerbie Scotland. The problem is, it is against Islamic law for Obama to sign a death warrant on his brethren. http://www.therepublicrevealed.com/forums/index.p…
Will we never learn? What do we think the Muslim Brotherhood meant in their manifest about destroying us (the West, particularly the U.S.) by our own hands? The global jihad knows our history and uses it against us. They liken their loosely connected (to the source) jihad cells as early U.S. Rangers, popping up and striking and disappearing (or being martyred). They orchestrate "peaceful" demonstrations and marches and movements, pretending to imitate U.S. demonstrations/marches/movements for freedom. Only, the Islamic Ummah is like cattle being herded in the cause of Islamic domination, in so doing merely their Islamic duty to support Islamic causes for the benefits (including plunder and subjugation of non-Muslims) promised to Muslims under Sharia. The crowds of Islamic protesters are rallying for their "freedom" to vote in Sharia.
Of course, the Islamic demonstrators will not have to fight for their "liberation" any more than the people in Iraq and Afghanistan have. U.S. and small groups of their allies have been picked off and weakened in Iraq and Afghanistan for ten years in order to put in power an Islamic democracy (Islamic Constitution). Have the people there even yet stood up on their own and taken on their own protection?
President Obama is supporting the Islamic red herring coups because he is part of the global jihad. He is finishing the job of taking out the U.S. military so that in the next major attack against a U.S. city (nuclear, chemical, or biological) he will be politically able to sign a dhimmi contract with the "Muslim world" represented by the Muslim Brotherhood.
This would be a good time to start pulling out of all the countries in which we have our noses and U.S. taxpayer money. Cut off the funds we give them, reinforce our defenses here at home, get busy drilling for oil and natural gas, produce more coal, and strive for more renewable energy(with no taxpayer subsidies)! To a man, all countries of the world hate us!! So I say, let them go on their own and let's take care of our own people. We are now being held hostage by the Islamists!!
Damn straight Sneed! Then use all the money saved in not helping out people who hate the US anyway to develop weapons systems that can take the eye out a gnat at 100 miles. Screw them all until they come up with governments that want to deal with the US up front instead of taking the cash and badmouthing. At the very least, get drilling now!
Goldman sachs=unions
"…a Libyan who said: 'We just want to be able to live like human beings.'”
The only chance they have of that is if they all stop being Moslems. In Islam there are only slaves of Allah, no human beings.
From where I sit,a lot of President Obama's policies seem to be based on wishful thinking.
Agreed! He reminds me of a boy scout!
Obama is a child pretending to be an adult. He is also a real enemy of America, Israel and the West. And this person is the POTUS?
Wake me up and tell me it is just a bad dream.
When will the west learn that there is no democracy in any muslim country. Elections, when they are held, only offer different candidates from the ulima (clerical theocraftic tyrants or their approved cronnies) similar to the way in which elections were held in communist controlled USSR and eastern Europe. Stop living in a 'Alice in Wonderland' fantasy. Whoever takes over in these countries will be no friend of the west. One consolation is that our enemies will at least be out in the open and not hiding in the shadows. Perhaps then will our leaders be forced to face the reality of the Islamic objective of world domination!!
I'm beginning to really miss Cheney and Rumsfeld! These two have been in the government circle for decades. If Bush Sr. would have won against Clinton, we wouldn't be in half the messes, leading to more messes, that we are in today! What would Bush Sr. done if the first bombing of the Twins were on his watch? Bush Jr. had professionals in his circle and those in turn, had career professionals too surrounding them!
Today, all we have are inexperienced Leftist activists whose only experience in international affairs who protested the wars in Vietnam and Iraq and who in the 80's, were Sandalistas who supported the Communist takeover of Central America with the help of their masters, the Soviet KGB! The only person in the administration with any experience in anything is Joe "Gaffy Duck" Biden who puts his foot in his mouth at every public event!
Yes, me too. Also Hitler and Stalin. Ah, the good old days…
Cheney and Rumsfeld may have had experience but at what? They were so corrupt and had little if any regard for the US Constitution. They did, and still do, think they are above the law.
You people are so clueless it’s frightening.
Cheney and Rumsfeld had experience at screwing the American people. They had little, if any, regard for the US Constitution. Them, and Bush, did more to set back the US than any other administration. They continued to support corrupt dictators just so we could liberate the oil and they even screwed that up. Why would they even have plans to invade Iraq BEFORE 9/11? If it was just sand (like Darfur) we wouldn't give a rat's you-know-what.
Oh…. You really like Barak Hussein Obama ! ?
Yes. What never fails to amaze me is how the majority of people who knock him forget that he inherited a country with an enormous deficit, two wars, unemployment and the economy in the tank. That stuff was happening in 2007-2008 yet somehow it's overlooked.
The only thing worse than Bush in the White House would be Palin in there which will NEVER happen because she's even too wacky for the Republicans. She's not a loose-cannon, she just has some screws loose.
Why on earth does people even believe that the protesters in the Middle East are liberal democrats? The mass media, practically all people and politicians all over the political spectrum will tell you this. The only politicians with common sense when it comes to these protests are the Russians and the Israelis.
You are right !
The protesters in the Middle East are muslims !
And Islam can´t accept democracy because Allah says, that NO man-made law ect. can be accepted to stand over the islamic laws = the Sharia!
Vivi Andersen, Denmark
I could not hit the "Like" button for this story. Robert knows his stuff like no other, but maybe he doesn't want to come right out and say Obama is a Muslim, since the liberal left kind of mocks this stand. But Obama's actions and reactions to world events is exactly like a Muslim would react given that he is president over a non-Muslim nation. That is my opinion and I'm sticking to it.
It's not the "liberal left" who mocks this story, it's people who have brains that mock this story. You certainly can have your opinion. Opinions are one thing, facts are another. I know they are not popular on this website but I do like to visit and see what the loonies are up to. I'm never disappointed.