[Peace-discuss] Bush-Obama terrorism???

[C. G. Estabrook]

  CNN's "THIS WEEK IN POLITICS," Aired September 14, 2008

[...]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: What President Bush and Senator McCain don't understand is that the
central front on the war on terror is not in Iraq, it never was. The central
front is in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the terrorists who hit us on 9/11
are still plotting attacks seven years later.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Campaign slogans are one thing, if Barack Obama is elected president he
will face tough decisions unlike he has ever faced before. To help us clarify
where he stands on the issues of national security I'm joined by Susan Rice,
former top official at the White House during the Clinton administration, now a
senior foreign policy advisor to the Obama campaign.

Thanks for joining us.

Let me start with a threshold question. In the news this week and confirmed by
CNN President Bush's decision to authorize special forces to operate inside
Pakistan along that tribal area, the Pakistan/Afghanistan border. Senator Obama
has talked in the past about going in to get the terrorists if you know where
they are. Does he support the president in this policy and would he continue it
if elected?

SUSAN RICE, OBAMA CAMPAIGN ADVISER: Well, *President Bush and the
administration, indeed, are doing what Senator Obama said we must, well over a
year ago.* If we have actionable intelligence about a high-value terrorist
target inside of Pakistan and Pakistan is unwilling or unable to take that
target out, such as Osama bin Laden, Senator Obama's view is we should act. Not
to invade. Not to take over Pakistan's sovereignty, but to take out that target
as an act of self-defense.

*The Bush administration has come to that point of view. It's been doing it with
predators and drones in just this past few days. Did so with some boots on the
ground. So that's the kind of policy we have to pursue and continue. It's
strange to me, John, that John McCain opposes that view.* He's talked about
bombing an ally. He was very critical of Senator Obama when he made that
statement. Raises the question if Osama bin Laden were in our sights and John
McCain had the opportunity, but he was on the Pakistani side of the border,
would John McCain just let him sit there?

We'll get to the McCain camp's perspective and I'll ask that question in just a
few minutes. Let me ask you about something else the president did this past
week. And let's listen to the president first. He announced some troops coming
home from Iraq, but some of them, or at least replacements, will end up in
Afghanistan. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: I'm announcing today additional American troop deployments to Afghanistan.
In November a Marine battalion that was scheduled to deploy to Iraq will instead
deploy to Afghanistan and will be followed in January by an Army combat brigade.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Now, this is something Senator Obama has talked about, sending more troops
to Afghanistan. You just said the president was doing the right thing in
Pakistan. Does he deserve credit for this, as well? Is this enough?

RICE: *This is a baby step, but it's a baby step in the right direction. Yet
again Senator Obama has been saying for well over a year, in fact, has been
saying frankly since before the invasion of Iraq that the central front in the
war on terror is Afghanistan and Pakistan. And we need to invest there.* We got
diverted by Iraq. He's been calling for putting additional U.S. combat brigades,
at least two additional combat brigades, into Afghanistan, coupling that with
increased economic assistance, political support for rooting out corruption and
dealing with the poppy problem.

Today, or this week, President Bush acknowledged the logic there and took a baby
step in the right direction. We need to do much more in terms of drawing down
from Iraq than President Bush announced this week. And we need to do more than
he announced with respect to Afghanistan. But it was a step in the right
direction and, again, something that John McCain hasn't been willing to
acknowledge...

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0809/14/twip.01.html


Bob Illyes wrote:
> I've skimmed through the comments, including Mort's recent response to Neil. 
> Perhaps the most amazing is Carl's "With Obama in charge, there will be even 
> more babies who will take no more steps. I'm not sure how his apologists can 
> sleep." Carl claimed at a recent AWARE meeting that it was hard to tell the 
> difference between theories and facts, so I guess his statement should be no 
> surprise.
> 
> We have a retired fighter pilot from a military family (like Carl in the 
> latter respect) running against Obama, who spent part of his youth working on
>  social justice instead of doing God-knows-what in the skies over North 
> Vietnam. The list of differences is much longer than this, Neil's statement 
> to the contrary.
> 
> In addition to a fondness for big sticks, McCain believes that the invisible 
> hand of the free market will do the right thing, if we get rid of a few bad 
> apples. This is the sort of thinking that Soros points out has a lot in 
> common with Marxism, which represents that the hidden hand of Hegel's 
> dialectic will enable the Revolution to mysteriously make things right.
> 
> It astonishes me that some people on this list keep trying to paint Obama as 
> authoritarian left. This makes it easy to refute him, since it does not 
> describe him. His views are explicitly and deliberately centrist.
> 
> If you think that nearly unrestrained neoliberalism and always being tough 
> are the way to go, McCain is your man. If you have your doubts about both of 
> these and think that we should be paying more attention to the middle class, 
> Obama is your man. If you can't tell the difference, please check your 
> owner's manual for the location of your reset button.
> 
> Incidentally, Krugman got the Nobel Prize today!
>