Obama, Goldilocks, and American Exceptionalism

Our Goldilocks president – I call him that because he supports things like the war in Afghanistan but then undercuts himself by saying he still wants to get out of Dodge ASAP and can never find a cause that is “just right” – is going to cause a lot of problems for himself, our soldiers deployed overseas, and for America in general by his constant rhetorical lukewarm statements on American Exceptionalism.

al Qaeda and the Taliban definitely want us to leave Afghanistan.  Currently, these two groups are fighting a war on two fronts – Pakistan and Afghanistan – and would love to free up one of their flanks, especially if that means humbling America in the process.

One look at the headlines will show what their strategy is – 75 killed in a market bombing in Pakistan and 7 CIA employees killed in Afghanistan – bomb, kill, and sow terror until the populace breaks down, the occupying force loses its political will, then sweep back into power and impose their version of Sharia Law on the land.

There has already been too much written about the odd duality of President Obama’s statement that he was going to prosecute war while setting a timetable for withdraw in the same breath.  But when this speech is taken together with other speeches he has made such as the one in Copenhagen a dangerous trend has become evident: In the first stroke he does what should be done (Surge troops into Afghanistan) but in the second stroke wink to his base saying he will follow their wishes and that whole first part was just, you know, to get people off his back (We’ll be withdrawing troops in 18 months).  For a finale, just to cover all bases, Obama will throw in some bit about the “International Community” to suggest that people should not worry about his two earlier contradictory statements because we won’t be in it alone in whatever we will be doing.

Mr President, we will be in it alone because, despite what you say other countries do not have the political or social will to put their money and lives where their mouth is… they will expect America to do it for them.  That is why our “allies” in Afghanistan (except, as always, for the Brits) aren’t increasing their numbers and aren’t doing any fighting.

And this is where American Exceptionalism comes into play.

Obama has always sought to tie the United States into as many treaties and obligations with the rest of the world as possible so as to reduce our rouge tendancies like freeing enslaved peoples or imposing ceasefires on other countries (think Iraq after they invaded Kuwait or think Serbia and Bosnia).  By tying the U.S. down Obama can succeed in making it impossible for us to go it alone (because Liberals think if you do something by yourself it’s because you’re wrong and that’s why nobody else is with you) and instead, through some endless series of meetings and speeches, reason and truth will somehow emerge and this will reduce dictators to nothing.  Ridiculous.

Obama can try to tie our economy down with Cap and Trade (or Obamakare) under the assumption that reducing the possibility for going it alone (not having heavy tax rates as in Europe, for example) will somehow improve our lives.  The problem with this thinking is that is is simply wrong.  It would be impossible to fine one example during the 20th Century as to when a collective decision making process resulted in a success and decisive action.  The United Nations has not produced any great success story.  NATO was a success during the Cold War but it was led by America.  Even the Allies in WWII were led by America (before that they were getting creamed by Hitler).

The more Obama tries to tie down America, thereby surpressing what made this such a great country, the more harm he does to his nation, its people, and, ironically, the world from which he seeks to “protect.”

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