If the Obama is being told that there are multiple threats being mounted against America, we must first ask, are these threats of weapons of mass destruction? If so, anyone would be sobered fast. What if Obama being told that the threats against America are inchoate, conventional in nature, and, so far, relatively easily interdicted. Then, no doubt, Obama will have quite another reaction.
In addition to the moving targets of the character of the threats, we must speculate on the Obama's predilections. You will argue that he will react as a normal man or a conventional president if only to preserve his own legacy. But there are other factors to be considered both by us and by Obama. I quite agree that Obama is undoubtedly motivated to preserve his legacy and promote his reelection and will be quite vigilant, at least according to his own lights, in warding off a terrorist attack on the homeland.
Let us consider Obama's predilections. His party has made for itself a cause célèbre and an election issue in belittling the terrorist threat, seeing it as a main prop to the Bush administration. Will they now consider it an important prop to the Obama administration? Or are the Democrats and Obama himself so stuck in their own dogma (how easy it would be to play on words here) that they cannot exploit the war on terrorism for political purposes?
One is reminded of the anecdote about the newly minted Clinton administration functionaries reacting to a flyover of the United States Air Force after Clinton's inauguration. The first expressed disgust at the militarism, but the second reminded the first that, "it is our Air Force now." One must understand that the rat party is an amalgam of special-interest groups and genuine kooks. The party's view of the Iraq war was co-opted by Governor Dean and the fruits of his coup fell into the lap of Barak Obama. So we must consider how far Obama dares proceed in conducting intelligently the war against terrorism while he knows the character of his own party, aw potential monster lurking over his shoulder.
It is quite possible that Barak Obama will stick with his pre-election expressed predilection that it is mostly a function of intelligence rather than conventional military operations which will best defeat terrorism. In that case, you will feel free to promptly withdraw the troops from Iraq and rely on operations along the Pakistani border with Afghanistan and worldwide intelligence resources which he no doubt expects to amplify by virtue of securing a better cooperation from world leaders than George Bush enjoyed. Obama might believe that his special status as the anointed one will bring him this intelligence bonus.
You might be very inclined to rely heavily on diplomacy as a substitute for conventional military operations believing again that his charisma will work the miracle denied the cloddish George Bush.
Obama might have quite cynically concluded that the odds are fair that in the next four to eight years terrorists will achieve some sort of strike in the homeland. Fearing that, Obama might well have decided to leave Gates at Defense to take the fall and to put Hillary at state to catch spears. Beyond all of these considerations of personality which are today unfathomable and will remain so until we better know the man, there is the overwhelming factor of how Obama and committed leftists see America and see the world. This factor cannot be emphasized too strongly. There is a reason why the left blames America first and, yes, it is true that many of them actually hate America. I have experienced this numerous times here in Germany among people I count as friends. The polls tell the same story: America is the most dangerous threat to the world. Why does the left instinctively hate America?
In 2006 I posted a comment to another Dennis Prager article dealing with the impact of faith, or the absence of faith, one one' s patriotism. I submit two or three paragraphs:
When it comes to faith, we all are as binary as computers, it is either yes or no, on or off, we either have it or we do not. If we do not have it, then we have not God and that leaves us lots of space to play God. Once you feel good and comfy playing God, there is virtually no end to the good you can do so you become a political activist. One sees quickly that he could leverage the good he does by manipulating the levers of the state. Hence, one quickly becomes a statist.
Prager's sixth reason, leftist Jews abhorrence of nationalism, is worth special mention. It is also paralleled in the Christian tradition by those who do not actually confess the faith. You will hear them say that nationalism (they will often blame religion as well) is the cause of wars and unnecessary human suffering. This observation is really relevant in these times in which we are dismayed to discover a fifth column operating against the United States in its own CIA, the State Department, and the Pentagon. These institutions, together with the establishment media and academia, have long despised United States of America and decried it as the font of all evil. I have posted my belief that the hatred against United States is generated by the recognition among these leftists that the United States presents the greatest obstacle to their goal of ending nationalism and instituting oneworldism.
Can you imagine the good these people can do when the levers they manipulate govern the whole world?
This is my thesis and I am sticking with it. This explains why leftists are so enamored of multilateral treaties that undermine American sovereignty. Why they have such a purblind face in the feckless and corrupt United Nations. As their egos swell to, appropriately enough, godlike proportions, liberals seek grander stages upon which to play their leading part. No greater stage exists then the whole world and America constitutes the greatest impediment to their successfully dominating that stage.
Leftists, like those who undermine George Bush at the CIA, the State Department and the Pentagon, do not see themselves as traitors but as patriots. After all, they will be bringing America to a better place when it participates as an equal partner in the family of nations.
How much does Barak Obama share this view? How eager is he to undermine American sovereignty with foreign treaties which have the very great attraction of possibly undermining basic tenets of our Constitution while needing only Senate ratification? How many risks in the war on terrorism is Obama willing to court in order to achieve oneworldism? What risks will he take with respect to China, Venezuela, and Russia toward this end?
These imponderables further complicate our analysis with yet more targets that interact with each other like bouncing electrons and it is impossible for us to know which one exerts the greatest force field.
A couple of other quibbles about your very insightful vanity so felicitously phrased:
I've never understood the logic of the argument which says that a war on the ground in Iraq ties down terrorists who would otherwise strike our homeland. It took only 19 men with box cutters to bring down the twin towers. There are approximately 1.4 billion Muslims in the world and a shockingly high percentage, no doubt, are willing to trade their lives in exchange for a humiliation of America and 72 virgins. Surely, Mohammed can find among his 1.4 billion another 19 for a strike even if the rest are tied down in Iraq. After skin color, Barak Obama has the Iraq war to thank for his victory. Now he is in a bind: If he withdraws the troops precipitously he courts a disastrous rekindling of civil war in Iraq. If he procrastinates his base will desert him. Let us see whether Obama chooses self or country. It has always been my conviction that the war against terrorism ultimately will be won (if it is to be won at all) by our Muslim, repeat, Muslim allies who come to realize that they will be the first victims of the medieval crazies who murder in the name of their religion. Ultimately, they will act to save themselves or we are lost. We Americans and the Western world can supply intelligence, airpower, and logistics, but when we put boots on the ground we fight the terrorists' war. We must get the Mohammedens to die in our place killing other Mohammedens. The destruction of the Republican Party in the last two elections demonstrates what happens to a democracy when it engages in a war of attrition.
Apply this if you would to your paper- scissors -rock analogy. The Arab mind, to paraphrase George Patton, loves a winner and despises a loser. It will never ally itself with an America it sees as weak and vacillating. Like Mussolini, it will seek to feast at the kill with the winners. That means that wherever we do put boots on the ground we must do so ruthlessly so that there can be no question of our martial superiority. This is how you win the Arab street; one wins the Arab street by winning. I doubt Barak Obama truly understands that this is the only kind of diplomacy which will persuade the Mohammeden.
There are many other factors which should be considered at another time. Primarily, they include the role of petrodollars and potential energy wars which might well come to pass, waged by Russia and/or Venezuela or even by China in places of opportunity like Africa. Collateral to those considerations is the frightening possibility that a resurgence of oil prices might enable Russia to form dangerous alliances with Venezuela and other countries of Latin America and turn the Caribbean into a very dangerous lake. Who knows what mischief a Russia/Iranian axis might produce?
To respond to all of the challenges and imponderables requires a president of the United States with, above all, a patriotic commitment to this country. I have no reason to believe that there is anything in Obama's history which suggests that he will measure up.
