For Obama the Road to Reelection Runs Through Kabul - Or So He Thinks

[laststeamtrain]

Christian Parenti
Contributing editor at The Nation and Playboy
Posted: December 4, 2009 01:58 PM


For Obama the Road to Reelection Runs Through Kabul - Or So He Thinks

The real goals of the Afghanistan escalation are domestic and electoral. Like Lyndon Johnson who escalated in Vietnam, Obama lives in mortal fear of being called a wimp by Republicans.

To cover his flank and look tough in the next US elections, Obama is expanding the war in Afghanistan. To look strong in front of swing voters he will sacrifice the lives of hundreds of US soldiers; allow many more to be horribly maimed; waste a minimum of $30 billion in public money; and in the process kill many thousands of Afghan civilians.

<snip>

Then came the US presidential elections of 2008. Obama promised to end the Iraq war. But living in fear of being called a wimp, he too used Afghanistan. It became a rhetorical charm, a political mojo in his masculine war dance: He promised to lose Iraq (withdrawal or redeploy if you prefer), but do so while salvaging our national honor by winning the "necessary" war in Afghanistan. In short - he used Afghanistan to show that we was not the soft, meek, scared, pussified, little Democrat portrayed in GOP spin.

<snip>

US Presidential Elections are not decided by the majority of voters but rather by swing voters, in swing states. By "Reagan Democrats" and "Clinton Conservatives." By a sliver of older, whiter, middle and working-class men and (less so) women, in rural and suburban Ohio, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Tennessee, Michigan, etc.

This demographic has a strong sense of national honor, a fondness for the military, a traditional sense of masculinity and the role of violence in ordering the world, and perhaps a too simple view of international politics. Obama feels he must go to the polls able to tell them he was not afraid to fight, that he made a good effort in Afghanistan.

Never mind the reality of the war. What matter is what it will it look like. Nay, what it will feel like to swing voters. Will they believe the young Black President with the funny Muslim name cut and run?

<more>

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christian-parenti/for-obama-the-road-to-ree_b_380459.html
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If true, to any extent, this is tremendously sad. Our (ha) future is held hostage by "Reagan Democrats" and "Clinton Conservatives" with their "sense of national honor, a fondness for the military, a traditional sense of masculinity and the role of violence in ordering the world, and perhaps a too simple view of international politics."

What if all the death & destruction is just part of a story to tell all-American idiocrats? People who live in the United States of TV rather than a real world?

Sometimes I think it's so.

[mike_c]

1. murder for profit and politics....

:puke:

[bluestateguy]

2. Parenti sounds just like his Stalin loving father

nt

[DJ13]

3. I would think a Stalin lover would be in favor of the surge

:shrug:

[scarletwoman]

4. "Stalin loving father"? Care to provide some context for that assertion?

[jgraz]

5. The 1950s called, they want their red-baiting back.

:eyes:

[Duende azul]

6. Withdrawal delayed?

We're past Tuesday.