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Home Patriotism is the Last Refuge of a Liberal

Patriotism is the Last Refuge of a Liberal

The man who came into office promising multilateral engagement, no more torture and a civilian justice system for terrorists, now has only one accomplishment to his name. A unilateral invasion and assassination based on intelligence gained through enhanced interrogation, carried out by men whom his supporters had once condemned as a secret assassination squad. What a failure Obama is that even the one success to his name is a testament to the failure of his own ideas.

Liberals joyfully proclaimed that the One would redeem America's reputation. No longer would we torture terrorists, detain them in prison camps and try them with military tribunals. A shining new golden age was here. Two lawyers to every Al-Qaeda terrorist and a national apology for going outside the civilian justice system. Now three years later, the only thing they have to celebrate is that their man trashed every one of their hopes and dreams just to keep his head above water in the polls.

Samuel Johnson opined that, "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel". And now the scoundrels are flocking to the red, white and blue as a a failed leader and his gaggle of supporters eagerly trade in their counterculture cred for apple pie and the Fourth of July. News stories are reinventing Obama as the Rambo of the Monitor, fitting moniker for the JFK of the Teleprompter, the man who courageously authorized a decision that would have been a no brainer for any American. A failure on every other front, his last refuge is also the thing he hates the most.  

Smart power? Try stupid power. Obama wasn't willing to set aside his ideals for the sake of national security. Instead he did it because his ideals were too unpopular. The man who wouldn't sacrifice his politics for the sake of American lives, sacrificed them for his own popularity. It's not just that Obama suffers from the wrong ideas, but that he values his ideas more than America, but less than himself.

It wasn't smart power that took down Bin Laden. It wasn't the multilateral cooperation that Obama turned into his trademark when running for office. Instead it was an old fashioned unilateral operation that didn't even notify the Pakistanis ahead of time and even jammed their radar. An operation that assumed we couldn't trust our Muslim allies because they sympathize more with Al-Qaeda than they do with us. A unilateral assault that Pakistan would never have approved and that could even be considered an act of war.

Torture, Gitmo, Rendition and all those dirty words that stood for the dumb old war. The one where we grabbed terrorists and shook the truth out of them. Where we seized them wherever they were, without regard for jurisdiction or civil rights, got them into a room and dunked their heads until they talked. Where brave men went out into the night to get things done and it was best not to ask too many questions about how it got done or count the collateral damage when they were finished. That dumb old war is the one that scored a victory here.

And liberals have suddenly learned to love that dumb old war. The same one that not so long ago made them want to be Canadians. No more quibbles about waterboarding or giving Osama a trial. Now all you need is a kill order and a lot of stories about Obama heroically risking his life by watching it happen from thousands of miles away. Where Bush went to the trouble of getting Saddam alive and turning him over for trial, this administration decided it would be easier and more convenient to shoot Bin Laden full of holes the first chance they got. (Though it's anyone's guess if the decision was made at the top or really determined by the men in the field who weren't up for another round of debates on where to hold the trial.) Not better for America, better for themselves.

Obama's smart war died along with Bin Laden. The only thing his multilateralism has gotten us into is an entirely new war in Libya. The 'smart war' that ended up looking exactly like the dumb war he denounced in his widely circulated 2002 speech, a rash war, a cynical attempt to shove an ideological agenda down our throats, against a man who was no imminent or direct threat to the United States or to his neighbors. But now Bush's dumb war looks smart and Obama's smart war looks stupid.


Taking down Bin Laden didn't begin with Obama looking at a monitor, but with invading Afghanistan to capture and interrogate terrorists, beginning the long process of unraveling Al-Qaeda. All that Obama deserves credit for is that unlike Bill Clinton, when the word came up from the men in the field that they had a chance to get Bin Laden, he eventually went along. Which he might not have done without an election breathing down his neck.

Obama inherited a War on Terror that he never wanted, and after doing his best to scuttle it, he was forced to carry it on anyway. His administration has sabotaged terrorist prosecutions, but it was forced to back away from civilian trials or closing Gitmo. And by virtue of having his ass in the chair at the right time, he now takes credit for a victory that belongs to the men who were fighting and dying in the field, while he was yawning his way through Illinois State Senate sessions.

Truman didn't claim credit for defeating Hitler, even though the German surrender came while he was in office. It's just as ridiculous for Obama and his supporters to do cartwheels because a prolonged campaign against Islamic terrorists happened to bear fruit on his watch. He might as well claim credit for the highway system and the continuing implementation of every single law and safety regulation predating his administration.

The Bush Administration did the heavy lifting here, and the Obama Administration is taking the credit. That's nothing new in politics, where the policies of one administration carry over to the next, but the one most associated with a positive outcome gets the credit. It's cynical, but not extraordinarily so. What is cynical is how many media mouthpieces insist on hanging up a "Mission Accomplished" banner, as if we went into Afghanistan to get one man. And only that one man. As if thousands of lives had been lost just to kill that one man. 

Now we're told that security measures can be dismantled and the troops can go home. There's no more need to worry about terrorism. It was all taken care of when Obama watched a satellite pay per view execution.

Bin Laden was the public face of Al-Qaeda, but if he hadn't been, it would have been someone else. It didn't have to be Bin Laden or Al-Qaeda. We think of Islamic terrorism in terms of organizations, but the organizations are only functional executions of an idea. The idea is that for Islam to triumph, its followers must wage an armed conflict of terror around the world. Al-Qaeda was one projection of that idea. There were and are many others.

You don't need a Bin Laden to have an Al-Qaeda, and you don't need an Al-Qaeda to have terrorism. Bin Laden's death fulfilled the cycle of an Islamic terrorist's life as a martyr. In the short term, our enemies have been reminded that we can and will get to them no matter where they hide. But in the long term, Bin Laden's death is a canonization that completes his place in the Islamist narrative. Now his story is told and will be retold over and over again.

The problem was never one man in a cave in Afghanistan or an estate in Pakistan. Islamic terror derives from a culture of supremacy. And Obama has spent enough time in the Muslim world to know that. Osama's death allows him and us to count coup, but the problem is getting worse, not better. Afghanistan and Pakistan were the homeland of terror, but the road that Bin Laden's butchers followed lies through Europe and America. Muslim immigrants and students moving out into the West mark the trail of terror. That road is a dagger pointed at the heart of the free world.

The interoperability of Pakistan's intelligence service and military with Al-Qaeda is not some unique phenomenon, it reflects the will of the Pakistani people, only 3 percent of whom think Bin Laden was a terrorist. Muslim terrorists work hand in glove with Muslim countries, even when they fight and quarrel with them. Because they have more in common with each other, than they do with us. Just as we support people who share our culture and values, so do they. Muslims may have different views on Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda, but they still like them more than they do us. Which is why Bin Laden was able to live comfortably not far from the capitol without any worries that he would be turned in.

The problem was never Al-Qaeda. The problem is Islam. While the SEALS were off putting an end to Bin Laden, the growth of Islam in the free world continues to pose a dire threat to the survival of the free world. Osama's quick burial showed that we were still cowed by his religion's demands even in death. Killing one man did not end that regime of terror. Not so long as it remains lodged inside the heads of our leaders. Patriotism is the first resort of patriots and the last resort of men who have already sold out their country.

Comments

  1. Anonymous3/5/11

    This is a fantastic read and one of which I wholeheartedly agree.

    Thanks,

    Andy

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  2. Jill4/5/11

    ~Didn't Obama win the Nobel prize, for being a man of "peace"? He seems to be more militarily active than Bush, yet Bush was reviled for it. Not that i'm a fan of Bush, but Obama is no peace maker. He is a warrior in sheeps clothing.

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  3. Anonymous4/5/11

    this is some lame bullshit....both of the essays by "Sultan Knish" are basically retarded.

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  4. Anonymous4/5/11

    Great post, except it appears that your opening sentence is missing a word, possibly the word "one," before the word "accomplishment.

    The man who came into office promising multilateral engagement, no more torture and a civilian justice system for terrorists, now has only accomplishment to his name.

    Without such a correction, it sounds like your praising Obummer to the heavens!

    kol tuv, yitz

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  5. Daniel writes: "The problem was never Al-Qaeda. The problem is Islam." I disagree. Islam is merely the disease, and a problem to be solved. The core problem is our policymakers, who refuse to identify the disease and call it that. Bush started that, when, soon after 9/11, he declared that Islam was not the enemy, only its "hijackers." Liberals and conservatives have been repeating that ever since. It’s a religion, don’t you know, and we can’t criticize or mock a religion, after all, that would be making fun of people’s security blankets. So, Islam is insulated from criticism. Obama merely cashed in on that notion by blatantly sucking up to Muslims.

    The problem is a refusal to acknowledge that Islam is a viral, and vitriolic, ideology hell-bent on conquest, or, barring that, then on destruction. Its agenda is: We mean to rule the world, but if we can’t rule the world, you’re not going to live in it, either, we’ll take you with us. If our foreign policy was in any sense rational – and I’m talking about the last sixty or so years – Islam would be just another bizarre creed followed by near-zombies in the piss-holes of the world, and not the nemesis it is today. And we wouldn’t need to worry about stealth jihad in this country, either. I haven’t noticed our judicial system making any concessions to the Amish or the Quakers or Scientologists to render their moral codes coequal with objective law (what is left of it), and obliging other Americans to “adapt.” The problem is the comfortable and reassuring daftness of our policymakers, Left and Right, who refuse to acknowledge the evidence of Islam’s inherent evil.

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  6. @Edward Cline, I think that's what he's saying.

    "Muslim terrorists work hand in glove with Muslim countries, even when they fight and quarrel with them. Because they have more in common with each other, than they do with us."

    Muslims are Muslims first before anything else, a trait sorely lacking in our society, otherwise this war would have successfully ended a long time ago. Instead we take time to bury a "homicidal maniac" in the Islamic tradition fully realizing that if the shoe were on the other foot he would bury anyone of us in the Islamic tradition as well; which amounts to our body being tossed along side the road somewhere in the vicinity of where he threw our head.

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  7. I find it interesting that the assassination of Bin Laden comes on the heels of Obama releasing his long form birth certificate.

    It's a pathetic attempt to show Americans that he's just as patriotic as the rest of us. Polls have shown that many people believe he is a Muslim.

    Or to paraphrase Hannibal Lector in Silence of the Lambs--Obama's actions are like the eleborations of a bad liar.


    I'm not sure what to make of the reports that Bin Laden was hiding in plain sight in a large Pakistani city rather than a cave. The CIA is too good to have missed something that glaring. All of which makes me wonder if the CIA and military felt it was better to keep an eye on Bin Laden and gather intelligence information about about terrorism.

    Bin Laden has become a figure head when it comes to Islamic terrorism and most other Islamic terrorist organizations hardly need him stir things up. So perhaps the CIA or the military meant to use him as an unintentional decoy.

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  8. Anonymous4/5/11

    "he values his ideas more than America, but less than himself."

    This is a sign of his Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). Ali Sina wrote about this before the his election, drawing heavily on Sam Vaknin's work at a time when Vaknin was not certain of his diagnosis:

    http://www.faithfreedom.org/obama.html

    Since then Vaknin gave an interview to LaRouche PAC in which he confirmed the diagnosis and expands on his prognosis for an America led by a narcissist:

    http://www.larouchepac.com/node/16344

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  9. Irwin Ruff4/5/11

    First, the Sultan is right on, as usual.
    2nd, Keliata states "I find it interesting that the assassination of Bin Laden comes on the heels of Obama releasing his long form birth certificate." I hadn't thought of it before, but it's just what would be expected of Obama. Killing Osama just after releasing the long form guarantees that little attention will be paid to the validity of the birth certificate.

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  10. Anonymous4/5/11

    I've noticed that while Photoshop demos of the forged birth certificate were out immediately, it has not hit the news at all.

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  11. Daniel,

    You wrote, "...that same war that not so long ago made them want to be Canadians....".

    I have been a long time follower of yours Daniel, just started doing so on twitter. However, the liberal jab at Canada shows a pathological ignorance about the current government, recent political events in Canada, and Canada's role in "The old war".

    Other than the US, which Western country has maintained as long a consistent military presence in this war, other than Canada? The Highway of Heroes, the route that the repatriated fallen take as part of their last trip home, which runs from a CFB base just outside of Toronto into Toronto; has seen more traffic over the last decade than can be appreciated.

    Which is the only western government ( and I include your "glorious leader" in such a survey), and specifically Western Leader - does the name Stephen Harper ring any bells? - to offer continuous "unconditional" support to Israel? Publicly? Regardless of the political consequences. In particular, I am reminded of a recent regular review/re-election for the open member of the UN Security Council. Canada has never lost that seat in the time it has been involved at the UN. It's recent loss was not due to the Canadian delegation being less fashion conscious, unless the fashion we are talking about is unwavering support for a strong unflinching military response to terrorism, with an unabashed and vocal support of Israel in the Middle East.The opposite of which is most emphatically " de rigeuer" at the UN, and most certainly why Canada lost that seat!

    Which recent federal election -as in two days ago- just saw the crystalization and polarization of Canadian political opinion and the election of an overwhelming majority Conservative mandate under the aforementioned PM Stephen Harper. In doing so, the electorate overwhelmingly rejected the center left policies of the Liberal party. Granted we have also seen the rise of a new far left opposition,but that was a result of Quebec which is a discussion for another time. Ultimately though, but it will be a Conservative government which sets policy and agenda.

    American right pundits are always very heavy handed in pointing to canada (re. Universal health care, etc.), and decrying Canada as this huge "liberal" monster to the north, without looking at the bigger picture.

    Maybe Daniel, just maybe, you might want to check your fascts before using the "Canadian liberal" canard again!! You might be in for a suprise.

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  12. michael,

    it's not a jab at Canada. During the 2004 election, a number of prominent liberals said that they would move to Canada.

    I like Canada, I'm quoting people who wanted to abandon their country for what they thought was a more liberal place.

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  13. "The problem was never one man in a cave in Afghanistan or an estate in Pakistan. Islamic terror derives from a culture of supremacy... Osama's death allows him and us to count coup, but the problem is getting worse, not better... Muslim immigrants and students moving out into the West mark the trail of terror... a dagger pointed at the heart of the free world."

    That, in a nutshell, is the entire story, and why I, personally, didn't experience any moments of joy following the assassination.

    The military forces (and intelligence corps) have done a wonderful job, but it changes absolutely nothing.

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  14. Anonymous4/5/11

    A review of Sam Solomon's latest book, "Modern Day Trojan Horse: The Islamic Doctrine of Immigration",
    Sam Solomon & Elias Al Maqdisi ANM Publishers, 2009, 139 pp., $14.95
    By Henrik R. Clausen

    The profound problem of Muslim immigration

    The subversion against our societies is executed by relatively few immigrants. Most immigrants from Islamic countries do not come to the West in order tor transform free Western countries into semblances of the autocracies or theocracies they have fled from. They seek better living conditions, employment, a better future – but they do so without the intention to change their religion, and this is where things get complicated.

    Retaining faith in Islam and Islamic scholars will lead the immigrants to tacitly support the subversive aims of Islamists who have also come to the West, initially as a relatively small fraction of millions of Islamic immigrants. These Islamic leaders and scholars use the Islamic teachings to destroy confidence in Western democracies, and they are astonishingly effective in achieving that aim.

    Explaining how this seemingly irrational development can take place requires some history. This first and foremost means the life and conduct of Muhammad, the perfect example for the pious Muslim even today. The authority of Muhammad is absolute in Islam, be it in form of Quranic commands or the examples of conduct recorded in hadith collections, known in Islam as the 'Sunna'. Hijra, immigration, was a key element in Muhammads takeover of Yathrib, today known as Medina.

    Unfortunately, the concept of Hijra is not limited in time or space to 7th century Arabia. The command as given is absolute, and remains an obligation on Muslims. One of many hadith quotes Muhammad for this:

    I charge you with five of what Allah has charged me with: to assemble, to listen, to obey, to immigrate and to wage Jihad for the sake of Allah.

    Thus, immigration is step four out of a five step plan. Sam Solomon elaborates:

    So Hijra or migration is binding on all Muslims for numerous reasons; the most important being that migration is preparatory to jihad with an aim and objective of securing victory for Islam and Muslims either in another country or generally as a community.

    http://europenews.dk/en/node/38496

    In the end it will be demographics that decide our fate. The question remains - how do we prevent that fate without recourse to force?

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  15. Anonymous4/5/11

    LiveLeak reports an interesting story(posted on Vlad’s site as well)

    Death of Osama bin Laden (current event)

    http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=137_1304467155

    Given the known indecision of Obama, and his extreme reluctance to do any harm to the Umma, this is a possible scenario.

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  16. Keliata noted: “I find it interesting that the assassination of Bin Laden comes on the heels of Obama releasing his long form birth certificate.” Well you should find it interesting, because the bin Laden raid was, among other things, intended to be a distraction from the growing realization that the long-form is as bogus as a seven-cent nickel (thanks to Groucho Marx for the line). A friend made this observation about Obama and provided these very interesting links, in which a “geek” shows how that long-form is counterfeit.

    “No wonder Obama had to take out Osama 3 days after the birth certificate was released. The SOB was going down if he couldn't distract the public and build his image. There is NO good explanation for all the flaws described here. They even combined features of different forms separated by two decades.”

    Perhaps readers have already seen these.

    Parts 1 - 4:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7s9StxsFllY

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JT0Tpf1IhxA&NR=1

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eJx7jsPV44

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW_PWzhgvDs&NR=1

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  17. I love Canada and wouldn't mind having dual citizenship myself:)

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  18. noboat1,

    With regard to your remarks, "Muslims are Muslims first before anything else", what is always forgotten is that when is that when comes to interacting with us "taquiya" always comes into play.
    Walid Shoebat has a piece in Pajamas media about the son of the founder of Hamas who apparently converted to Christianity:
    http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/the-mosab-yousef-saga-did-hamas-%E2%80%98defector%E2%80%99-dupe-all-of-us/

    But his tale has since been revealed to be a “long con,” the evidence coming from when he speaks publicly in Arabic.
    Mosab did not convert to what the West would recognize as Christianity, but to a fiery, Palestinian brand of the faith that is vehemently anti-Israel.

    ReplyDelete

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