Obama Wrongly Brags

Dear editor:

Even though the state of the U.S. economy, in importance, has overtaken the Bush war in Iraq in the race for the presidency, Barak Obama has continued to press his position as the only Democratic candidate who voted against the original Iraq war authorization in the Senate. Very true, but very questionable as a ‘positive’ when examined closely.

Let’s see. As a lead-up to the war, the President of the United States, the leader of the free world, the most powerful man in the world, from the most trusted nation on earth, the man who promised to protect us from a repetition of the death and destruction of 9/11, informed us that if we didn’t attack Iraq that our freedom and way of life was threatened. He sited instance after instance that supported this viewpoint, and America was convinced of the danger. This was our president speaking.

We were told by him, his Vice-President, his Secretary of Defense, his Secretary of State, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the neo-cons in the administration, how Iraq was building and stockpiling ‘weapons of mass destruction’ (WMDs). America and the world were told how the Iraqi government, thru its ruthless ruler, was part of the conspiracy of the tragedy of 9/11. The President, and the Secretary of State with a convincing slide presentation and speech at the United Nations, spoke of tubing and yellow cake and mobile vans and mushroom clouds.

To say the least, all Americans, Democrats and Republicans, were scared. We had to back the president against this threat to our very democracy and survival. And so, Congressmen and Senators of all political stripes voted to support the president and give him authority to destroy this twentieth century oil rich pariah and save not only America, but the whole world.

But not Barak Obama. Without any information to the contrary, without any intelligence suggesting the president was wrong (and boy was he wrong,) without any knowledge gained from reliable sources that the president’s position was loaded with half-truths, lies, assumptions, bad intelligence, power grabbing, and arrogance; this brand new, uninformed, freshman member of the Illinois Senate spoke against the authorization.

Did he decide on this position at the time based upon a flip of the coin? Did he figure it was ‘politically correct’ even though America was overwhelmingly in favor of Mr. Bush’s actions? We’ll never know, even though he now proudly boasts of this uninformed, ridiculous position (at the time.) He may have been right, but for all the wrong reasons. And boasting of it now is not a plus for his campaign.

Talk Radio vs. Print Media

Letter to Newsweek Magazine

Dear editor:

In his story on the political situation in America today, “The Closing of the American Mind,” (Dec. 31/Jan. 7) Evan Thomas points out the major differences between the two political parties and how it has caused a complete breakdown in cooperation between the Democratic controlled Congress, their Republican counterparts and the Executive Branch. He points out that this antagonism is quite often fueled by conservative commentators on talk radio and liberal editorialists in the print media. Perhaps this points out the fact that Democrats, unlike their Republican opposites, are able to read and write.