Obama’s Failure of Moral Courage

“Courage,” according to Merriam-Webster, means “mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty.” Courage was considered the prime virtue through most of recorded history among virtually all peoples on the Earth, and has only recently been displaced by liberal Western concepts such as tolerance and comity. Children are no longer instilled with the desire to express courage — moral or otherwise — but instead are taught to value “openness,” “diversity,” “conflict resolution,” and other liberal forms of pacifism designed to create a drab and dreary conflict-free wilderness, a land where no one can be offended, no one holds any strong or difficult positions, a place without danger and fear — in short, a world without the need for courage. To liberals, courage is a horribly antiquated concept, akin to notions of honor — things best left in the seventh century.

But, of course, there are many in this world who still reside in the seventh century and they have declared violent war against us (the brutes!). They understand the meaning of courage and intend to prove their own particular brand of this virtue by lopping off our heads and flying aircraft into our buildings. Americans, the product of a long, protracted struggle to settle and tame the wilds of North America, still retain a residue of their ancestral courage, that mettle forged in the white-hot furnace of suffering, struggle, and death as our forefathers fought, bled, and died to bequeath us a better place. The expression of American courage is tempered with mercy and kindness, thus making it difficult for many foreigners to see. Unfortunately, many of our leaders have not only lost this virtue, but actively despise it. A prime example is our current fearless leader Barack Hussein Obama.

Obama, a strange product of the union between a pampered American leftist and a quite randy son of a Kenyan [1] Mau Mau revolutionary (who seems to have sired children all over the world), lived extensively abroad and was educated not in a setting designed to pass along American cultural attitudes. The fundamental view that Barry Soetero developed was not uniquely American but internationalist; he views himself as part of a brotherhood of man, a citizen of the world. Having roots everywhere, he has them nowhere — the perfect recruit for the new man of the left!

Which explains Obama’s bizarre foreign policy of apologism; as a child he got along well with others of every race, creed, and background — in fact, he had to diligently labor to avoid fitting in — and he expects this to translate into foreign affairs. His is the antithesis of courage; he believes in the inherent goodness of man and thus the troubles in the world are caused by an unjust social order. Since he sympathizes with the third world, the troubles must be caused by exploitation of the big bullies of America and Europe — and thus if he apologizes enough those troubles will go away as the exploited come to trust in our contrition. This is a bit different than pure appeasement in that it does not simply offer a bully what he wants; it is about a fundamental change in our way of viewing the world — particularly in regard to that antiquated concept of courage.

On any playground in the world bullies beat children who hold Obama’s viewpoint into insensibility; this moral high ground gives the courage-deprived black eyes and bloody noses.

But apologism appeals to liberals (perhaps because they were weak and cowardly as children?) precisely because they think that America is the bully and they want to humble the ugly brute. By apologizing for our very existence, we make ourselves subservient to an international order, voluntarily placing ourselves under “wiser” and “more moral” institutions designed to create one big happy playground. The majority of liberals believe that there is a purpose to history (Karl Marx certainly did) and that a world with nation-states is a world in the process of evolution; antiquated notions of courage and independence must be removed if we are to progress to a world without borders — both personal and international.

Which brings us to Iran. George W. Bush, for all of his flaws, understood the importance of taking some sort of decisive action in the Mideast at large, and he wisely chose not to invade Iran (the terror masters) but to invade Afghanistan and Iraq. Wisely, because Iran would have been very difficult to attack. Moreover, the attack would have lacked any international support, would have antagonized Russia, and would have antagonized an increasingly pro-American Iranian populace. Our invasion of Afghanistan was logical, as was our invasion of Iraq insofar as there were UN resolutions in place and President Bill Clinton was already authorized by Congress to remove Saddam Hussein. Iraq is a flat plain, ideal for mechanized warfare, and would physically split Iran and Syria — the two major supporters of terrorism. It also put U.S. forces on either side of the Islamic Republic. Once in place, America was positioned to strangle the regime economically and isolate it in other ways. It was the hope of the Bush administration that such proximity — and the flow of information into Iran — would lead to precisely what we are witnessing today with the public rising against the government.

This should have been fostered by special ops and by a Contra-style solution: train, arm, and supply enemies of the regime to foment revolution. Unfortunately, Bush and Donald Rumsfeld wanted a smaller “footprint,” which made it impossible to stabilize Iraq, so the revolutionary government in Iran did to us what we should have done to them, sending jihadists across the border and training and arming the “insurgents.”

Lukewarm support of Musharraf’s government has now destabilized Afghanistan, even while we have largely won in Iraq.

Still, it was Bush’s surge that ultimately stabilized Iraq (the collapse of oil prices didn’t hurt either, a result of [2] Bush policy) and the collapse of the insurgency has emboldened the Iranian people, who are being [3] shot in the streets not in opposition to Ahmadinejad but in opposition to the theocracy in general. The lynchpin may have been a stolen election, but the underlying cause is the strict Sharia imposed by the mullahs. These people — once educated, Westernized, and prosperous — have tired of living under the thumbs of the clerics. They have been waiting a long time for their moment of truth.

American moral support at this moment could well turn a kindled flame into a conflagration.

Obama, contemptuous of such moral courage and imbibed with his visions of worldwide apologism and conflict resolution, cannot bring himself to mount such moral support. Perhaps his easy friendship and Islamic roots (his father being Muslim and his being educated in an Islamic school in Indonesia) are a factor, but the core of this is the sense of moral relativism that comes from a disdain for the concept of courage; in a world full of shades of gray it is unseemly to take black-and-white stands. In his view, we have no right to interfere because we are guilty of plenty ourselves.

In short, Obama is a coward, at least as far as moral concepts are concerned. He cannot be otherwise and hold the beliefs that he does.

Remember during the campaign when he spoke of Pakistan, suggesting we invade to chase down the Taliban? Strong words, but why hasn’t he backed this up? He was trying to show himself strong, but now that he is presented with this very scenario, he hides because he cannot justify such actions as a result of his worldview. No, his answer is to bow to the Saudi king, to apologize for everything America has done, and to hope that by making nice the world will understand we mean them no harm and will make nice back. In short, his entire foreign policy is based on [4] All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. This is the Barney the Dinosaur presidency.

And as a result of this failure of moral courage, the Iranian revolution will likely fizzle and the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan will be for naught. There was a real chance to make permanent changes in this powder keg part of the world, but the feckless fear of the current administration, the refusal to see the world for what it is, condemns the Iranians — and by extension the rest of the region — to the iron boot of fundamentalist Islam. We have missed our chance through lack of moral courage.

But what did Americans expect when we knowingly elected a man who promised to end the war? This failure is ultimately on the part of the American people, a result of people growing tired of war. In the final analysis, who are the cowards here?

I don’t think it’s a failure of courage on his part. He simply doesn’t see anything wrong with what’s going on in Iran. The most recent statements of “outrage” were demanded by his teleprompter for domestic consumption. He probably sent a back channel communique to Achmadenijab explaining it’s all just politics.

Courage,... it's above his paygrade!

Silly State Run Media.
No D.O. can cover the stench of my B.O.!

4 posted on 06/27/2009 6:14:35 PM PDT by rawcatslyentist (<P>Oh Yeah<P><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajsov1M4h50"> Thank You Satan 1:50</a>)

I agree with you. Obama is just another tribal man. He has the same instincts as say, Mugabe of Zim, Idi Imin of Uganda, and Mandela of Sud Africa, et al.

Not only, I believe, Obama don't see anything wrong with what is going on in Iran..... it is what he believes should be going on there and in America. Maybe not a hard islam theocracy here, but repression and oppression should be used to further his ends of managing every thing that Americans do...and to bring comfort and security to his family, friends and rabid supporters.

The only thing that makes Obama different from Idi Imin is that Obama hasn't eaten any of his opponents yet (that we know of).

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