Why Obama Sticks in my Craw
By Bruce Johnson
AmericanThinker.com
It seems that politicians rely on the short-lived memories of the general public. But I am tortured by a good memory. Maybe it is just that I remember being misled like cattle recall the hot iron. Here is an array of instances that stick in my craw.
The Cairo Initiative
Obama's Cairo Initiative and the June 2009 speech in which Obama scurried over to Cairo and spoke to the Muslim world and the specially invited Muslim Brotherhood. He promised a new era in relations between the Muslims and the United States. At the time, Obama's priorities seemed curious. Now we witness the murder of our ambassador, the invasion of several of our embassies, and the hoisting of the al-Qaeda flag where ours once flew, torn from our own sovereign embassy soil. We find ourselves funding Muslim Brotherhood-operated countries with our foreign aid. It has been quite a four years of resetting. A new era indeed.
Hey Dude, where's my space program?
Despite the Mars landing, which gave the impression of a vibrant and active space program, NASA funding has been cut. Of all the activities of the federal government, the Obama administration selects our space program as one which could be more efficiently conducted by private enterprise. X Space, the private-sector partner of NASA, will make an October 7 launch of space station resupply atop the new Falcon 9 rocket engine. The optics of a failure actually could have political considerations.
Our military in the past has relied on missile technologies provided by NASA. Certainly American industry and the United States military heavily rely on GPS technology. Can private enterprise provide the missile technology input and GPS support, both of which are clearly national security issues? Should they be entrusted with these responsibilities?
We can find comfort in the fact that a new mandate for NASA involves a Muslim outreach, as per instructions from Obama. Maybe the Muslim Brotherhood nations can use our foreign aid to enter the Space Age.
Compare and contrast how Reagan and Obama have utilized our pre-eminence in space technology. Reagan's Star Wars program raised the space bar so high as to help finesse the collapse of the Soviet Union. Today, if we want to put a man in space, we must hire the Russians.
And Obama whispers to Russians.
This episode might have been grounds for impeachment in a previous era. When Obama leaned over and said to Medvedev that he, Obama, would have more flexibility after the election regarding missile defense, what were his designs? Was he revealing that upon re-election, he would make a move that in the pre-election world would be unpalatable or politically damaging? The Democrats already controlled the treaty-ratifying Senate. The referred-to "flexibility" most assuredly involves something that many Americans might consider damaging to the country and its security. Let's not find out.
"Resetting" with the Russians and New START
It seems that the resetting was unilateral. Russia appears to be continually engaged in endeavors not aligned with our view of the world. Russians have sent helicopters to Syria to fight the insurrection. One can surmise that Russians supplied the pilots as well. The Russians have supplied the Iranians with a submarine to swim in the waters shared by our 7th fleet. Recently the Russians have stepped up missile capabilities on their nuclear submarines. "No other country has missiles with similar performance characteristics." They consider these missiles "defensive" in nature.
This brings us to
the New START, a treaty that was much heralded by
Obama but seems to be flimsy ephemera rather than a
watertight agreement. The Russian foreign minister,
Sergey Lavrov, "has repeatedly noted that Moscow
reserves the right to
withdraw from the treaty should missile defense
impair Russia's nuclear deterrent and argued that
this is permitted by the treaty's preamble."
Then there is the seemingly trivial.
"Special Pictures" was the reason given back in 2009 when Air Force One buzzed New York City on a Sunday morning. New Yorkers were alarmed. It seemed an indelicate aeronautic act to pull on the city still smarting from the effects of previous low-flying large jets.
Not to worry...and please disregard. We were told that these pictures were for a special documentary or something, therefore the flight was necessary. Forget that any off-the-shelf photo-editing program could put Air Force One into a New York City skyline without the fuel, escort, or citizen alarm.
I must have missed the documentary or any other use of Air Force One pictures with New York City as a background. Certainly it was not as some suggest. There is no way a power-hungry narcissist would be so egocentric as to order Air Force One into the air for a joyride with the family. Nor could we imagine a first lady so power-crazy, or even a Napoleonic chief of staff.
We seem to have been told one thing, and time has proven it untrue. Is this not emblematic of this entire Obama administration and the past four years?
And one more final untruth. Bill Daley suddenly leaves his chief of staff position after a short stint and apparently a shocking "peek" behind the curtain. But not to worry; Daley will chair Obama's campaign. But as time made us forget the NYC Air Force One story, we seem to not notice that Bill Daley is not Obama's campaign manager. Perhaps the exit from chief of staff was not as it was pretended to be. Perhaps the NYC flyby was indeed "megalomaniacal recreation." Maybe that phrase best describes the past four years. Megalomaniacal recreation.