UK Times: Obama 'dangerous' for America.

[jayhawk]

I am very surprised...

For most ordinary Americans, those not encumbered with an expensive education or infected by prolonged exposure to cosmopolitan heterodoxy, patriotism is a consequence of birth.

Their chests swell with pride every time they hear the national anthem at sporting events. They fill up with understandable emotion whenever they see a report on television about the tragic heroics of some soldier or Marine who gave his life in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Foreigners don't have to like America - and they've certainly exercised that freedom in the past few years. But most Americans can distinguish between the transience of policy failure and the permanence of the national ideal.

And surely even critics of the US could scarcely deny that there have been real causes for American pride in the past 25 years: the fall of the Berlin Wall; the victory in the first Gulf War in 1991; the nation's unity in grief and resolve after September 11. Heck, I suspect most Americans got a small buzz of patriotic pride this week when they heard that one of their multimillion-dollar missiles had shot a dead but dangerous satellite travelling at 17,000 miles per hour out of the sky so that it fell harmlessly to Earth.

But not, apparently, Michelle Obama, wife of the man who is now the putative Democratic candidate for US president, and at this point favourite to succeed to that job. In what might be the most revealing statement made by any political figure so far in this campaign season, Mrs Obama caused a stir this week. She said that the success of her husband Barack's campaign had marked the first time in her adult life that she had felt pride in her country. (the fuck? )

This, even by the astonishingly self-absorbed standards of politicians and their families, is a remarkably narrow view of what makes a country great. And though she later half-heartedly tried to retract the remark it was a statement pregnant with meaning for the presidential election campaign.

Now, to be fair to Mrs Obama, she would surely have a point if she had said that it was a source of incomparable pride to her and all African-Americans that in a country with a long and baleful history of racial discrimination, one of their own was within serious range of becoming president. All but the most irredeemably racist Americans would surely agree with that.

But that was not what she said. She said this was the only time in her adult life that she had felt pride in America.

It was instructive for two reasons. First, it reinforced the growing sense of unease that even some Obama supporters have felt about the increasingly messianic nature of the candidate's campaign. There's always been a Second Coming quality about Mr Obama's rhetoric. The claim that his electoral successes in places like Nebraska and Wisconsin might transcend all that America has achieved in its history can only add to that worry.

Secondly, and more importantly, I suspect it reveals much about what the Obama family really thinks about the kind of nation that America is. Mrs Obama is surely not alone in thinking not very much about what America has been or done in the past quarter century or more. In fact, it is a trope of the left wing of the Democratic party that America has been a pretty wretched sort of place.

There is a caste of left-wing Americans who wish essentially and in all honesty that their country was much more like France. They wish it had much higher levels of taxation and government intervention, that it had much higher levels of welfare, that it did not have such a “militaristic” approach to foreign policy. Above all, that its national goals were dictated, not by the dreadful halfwits who inhabit godforsaken places like Kansas and Mississippi, but by the counsels of the United Nations.

Though Mr Obama has done a good job, as all recent serious Democrats have done, of emphasising his belief in American virtues, his record and his programme suggest he is firmly in line with this wing of his party.

This, I think, not his inexperience in public office, is the principal threat to Mr Obama's campaign. His increasingly desperate opponent, Hillary Clinton, keeps hammering away that his message is all talk and no substance - and she was joined this week by Mr Obama's likely Republican opponent in the November general election, John McCain.

But if you listen to Mr Obama's speeches, it is not the lack of substance but the quality of it that ought to worry Americans. His victory speech after his latest primary win in Wisconsin this week was a case in point.

There was no shortage of proposals. He plans large increases in government spending on health and education. He wants to tax the rich more to pay for it. He is against companies using the opportunities of free markets to restructure their operations in the US. He is vehemently protectionist. He continues to insist, despite the growing evidence that this left-wing nostrum would be lunacy, that the US must pull its troops out of Iraq with the utmost dispatch.

While he speaks of the need for Americans to move beyond partisanship (“We are not blue states or red states, but the United States” is a campaign meme), when you cut through the verbiage there is nothing to suggest he believes anything that is seriously at odds with the far Left of his party. If you think about it for a second, it's not really an accident that he has been endorsed by the likes of Ted Kennedy and Jesse Jackson.

Though he talks with great eloquence about the future, he sounds for all the world like one of the long line of Democrats from George McGovern to Walter Mondale to Michael Dukakis, who became history by espousing policies and striking a rhetorical pose that was well out of the mainstream of American politics.

America is certainly moving left in the post-George Bush era. The long period of conservative ascendancy is clearly over, buried by a Republican Party of recent years that has preached intolerance and practised incompetence. That a new era in American politics is beginning is not in doubt. But are Americans really ready to leap all the way across in one go to embrace a European-style Left?

Source.

[Crazyjeeper]

But are Americans really ready to leap all the way across in one go to embrace a European-style Left?

NO

Great article Jay, very interesting.

[Peter3hg]

I was trying to post this the other day but couldn't find it on the Times site.

[teeb]

It's a very interesting article. I'd like to point out that, despite the slightly misleading thread title, this isn't the opinion of the Times as a whole - merely that of one opinion writer. (In contrast there have been opinion columns in the Times vocalising numerous other views, too)

Yes, I think the article raises a lot of interesting questions. As a European, the 'European-style left' is what I hope America reaches. However, it's a long, hard journey, and I don't know if it's one America is ready or willing to take.

We will see.

[starfox07]

Originally Posted by teeb

It's a very interesting article. I'd like to point out that, despite the slightly misleading thread title, this isn't the opinion of the Times as a whole - merely that of one opinion writer. (In contrast there have been opinion columns in the Times vocalising numerous other views, too)

Yes, I think the article raises a lot of interesting questions. As a European, the 'European-style left' is what I hope America reaches. However, it's a long, hard journey, and I don't know if it's one America is ready or willing to take.

We will see.

As an American...I don't I don't feel as though everybody has to do everything the same way. European countries are much more homogeneous then the USA, so many things would not work here that work there.

[jetsetter]

95% of the time the columnists of the UK Times are retarded. It's a newspaper even more biased than the BBC and that is saying something.

[jayhawk]

Originally Posted by teeb

As a European, the 'European-style left' is what I hope America reaches.
We will see.

I hope not. What is good for you isn't always good for us. Unlike our democrats, I do not want to be burdened with high taxes and be an indentured servant to any government. I do want an America with a protectionist attitude; Had we continued that through the 1940's, what would Europe be like now? I do not want a monarchy that the Clinton's envision, nor a socialist regime that Obama has in store.

Also, is it not Europeans who are annoyed that Europe is being "Americanized"? So, with your thinking (if I may), your way is the right way? We should be like you?

Immigrants from Europe did not one day decide they were bored and wanted to live somewhere else. They left in droves for a country that promised nothing but this: that with hard work and determination, all people can make a better future for themselves. That the individual spirit is praised, and all castes and sects and other stupid, archaic divisions that made them nameless and worthless in their native country is stripped away, that all people who live in these United States are equal under the law, that everyone in America is free to do what they want, not by the determination of man, but by the will of God. Or in other words,

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

That is the America I want back again!

[Crazyjeeper]

[jetsetter]

Yes, I think the article raises a lot of interesting questions. As a European, the 'European-style left' is what I hope America reaches.

Jesus, that would be terrible.

And trust me in saying that your 'European-style left' has not produced any better results than the American system. In a few fleeting cases it is better and all in all the 'European-style left' is just terrible.

[starfox07]

Originally Posted by jayhawk

I hope not. What is good for you isn't always good for us. Unlike our democrats, I do not want to be burdened with high taxes and be an indentured servant to any government. I do want an America with a protectionist attitude; Had we continued that through the 1940's, what would Europe be like now? I do not want a monarchy that the Clinton's envision, nor a socialist regime that Obama has in store.

Also, is it not Europeans who are annoyed that Europe is being "Americanized"? So, with your thinking (if I may), your way is the right way? We should be like you?

Immigrants from Europe did not one day decide they were bored and wanted to live somewhere else. They left in droves for a country that promised nothing but this: that with hard work and determination, all people can make a better future for themselves. That the individual spirit is praised, and all castes and sects and other stupid, archaic divisions that made them nameless and worthless in their native country is stripped away, that all people who live in these United States are equal under the law, that everyone in America is free to do what they want, not by the determination of man, but by the will of God. Or in other words,



That is the America I want back again!

AMEN!

[avanti]

Originally Posted by teeb

As a European, the 'European-style left' is what I hope America reaches.

As a European that is the last thing I want, touch wood!

I would like to point out that the democrat party in the US is nothing like the European left. In my opinion the democrats are like the center-right, and the republicans are a bit more to the right...

The center leftist coalition that ran Italy until very recently consisted of among others the Italian communist party!! Communists, can you imagine...

To go back on topic, Mrs Obamas comments were probably not very smart, but it doesn't really make any difference to me with regards to my views on him.

It seems like there are a few republicans in this thread, according to you how would America change for the worse if Obama was elected? And please remember, I am probably more "patriotic" than the average American, and would give my left nut to be one. The USA will always be the land of opportunity, the land of the free and the home of the brave in my mind, and I don't really see how that is gonna change, but please educate me.

[MattD1zzl3]

As an american, i can only hope and pray for a european-style left. (Hey, it was just me and we have a complete set of every combonation of opinion and geography )

[argatoga]

Originally Posted by avanti

It seems like there are a few republicans in this thread, according to you how would America change for the worse if Obama was elected? And please remember, I am probably more "patriotic" than the average American, and would give my left nut to be one. The USA will always be the land of opportunity, the land of the free and the home of the brave in my mind, and I don't really see how that is gonna change, but please educate me.

I am not sure if I am a typical Republican (I was against the Iraq war, don't like Bush, and pretty much disagree with most everything the NeoCons promote). I am for a smaller federal government, but I do realize that things like the FDA and FCC (before they become censors) are needed. I say let the states themselves do things like Medicare and Social Security, then I can just move to another state which is more in-line with my politics.

Obama and most Democrats (and Republicans for that matter) want more social programs, which while sounding noble, we can't afford. Our head federal accountant has been saying for years that the federal government WILL go bankrupt at our current spending rate. We can't afford these programs, by creating them we hurt more people.

Look at Social Security, baby boomers have been paying into it for their entire working lives, yet they will not receive any of it. Social Security has done a lot of damage to these people by taking away money they could have used for their own retirement, and by giving them false hope into thinking they don't need to save up themselves because they will be taken care of by the government (which won't happen because Social Security needs continual exponential population growth to function).

This is why I tend to vote Republican, although I am very disfranchised by the NeoCons who have taken the party over.

[phuckingduck]

Shocking, a Murdoch paper writing a anti-Lefty piece.

But I will say, I found Mrs. Obama's statement in very poor taste. I'm damn proud to be American, and I'm proud of my nation. Does this hurt the chance that I'd vote for her husband though? Nope. Not one bit. First Ladies only have control over the cleaning staff and the Daughters of the American Revolution dinners.

[jeffy777]

Originally Posted by jayhawk

I hope not. What is good for you isn't always good for us. Unlike our democrats, I do not want to be burdened with high taxes and be an indentured servant to any government. I do want an America with a protectionist attitude; Had we continued that through the 1940's, what would Europe be like now? I do not want a monarchy that the Clinton's envision, nor a socialist regime that Obama has in store.

Also, is it not Europeans who are annoyed that Europe is being "Americanized"? So, with your thinking (if I may), your way is the right way? We should be like you?

Immigrants from Europe did not one day decide they were bored and wanted to live somewhere else. They left in droves for a country that promised nothing but this: that with hard work and determination, all people can make a better future for themselves. That the individual spirit is praised, and all castes and sects and other stupid, archaic divisions that made them nameless and worthless in their native country is stripped away, that all people who live in these United States are equal under the law, that everyone in America is free to do what they want, not by the determination of man, but by the will of God. Or in other words,



That is the America I want back again!

Great post Jay

[MattD1zzl3]

Originally Posted by argatoga

Obama and most Democrats (and Republicans for that matter) want more social programs, which while sounding noble, we can't afford.

Simple, we cut the shit out of the military and defence industry. Or do you think bill clinton just did that to piss the right off?

I'd rather see 9/11 happen 100 times more then see a single child (or adult for that matter) die of a disease when the government could have footed the bill to pay for his hospital bills. This Jingoism and 1800's economic theory is in the past, the left wing is clearly forming the blueprint for the future.

[jetsetter]

I'd rather see 9/11 happen 100 times more then see a single child (or adult for that matter) die of a disease when the government could have footed the bill to pay for his hospital bills.

2,998 x 100 = 299,800

Hmmmmm.......Get over yourself.

Simple, we cut the shit out of the military and defence industry. Or do you think bill clinton just did that to piss the right off?

So, be European basically? That hasn't worked out terribly well for them.

[argatoga]

Originally Posted by MattD1zzl3

Simple, we cut the shit out of the military and defence industry. Or do you think bill clinton just did that to piss the right off?

I actually liked Clinton, he was in many ways a fiscal conservative. We could save a lot of money by scaling our military a bit back. Unfortunately Bush jr. has committed us in Iraq so it isn't that easy.

Originally Posted by MattD1zzl3

I'd rather see 9/11 happen 100 times more then see a single child (or adult for that matter) die of a disease when the government could have footed the bill to pay for his hospital bills. This Jingoism and 1800's economic theory is in the past, the left wing is clearly forming the blueprint for the future.

Where is the money going to come from? If we can't afford it a lot more children are going to die of disease because we will be in a depression.

Social Security and Medicare only help people by SCREWING MORE PEOPLE OVER. All those baby boomers, and those after, will not receive any of it. I'm sorry, but the world sucks and you can't just do everything for everyone. The best we can do is help the most people we can, Social Security does not help more than it hurts.

[MattD1zzl3]

Originally Posted by jetsetter

Hmmmmm.......Get over yourself.

Its not about me, welcome to selfless politics.

Some people cant understand the concept of sacrifice on a national level, the phrase "for the greater good" is just too horrible to contemplate, as long as they get to keep all their money and get that EXTRA big HDTV.

[argatoga]

Originally Posted by MattD1zzl3

Its not about me, welcome to selfless politics.

Some people cant understand the concept of sacrifice on a national level, the phrase "for the greater good" is just too horrible to contemplate, as long as they get to keep all their money and get that EXTRA big HDTV.

So people should stop buying those "EXTRA big HDTV"s? Why the fuck did you buy a second car? You utter monster you could have donated that money to a charity. Hell why are you here? You should be in [insert third-world nation] and helping the people there right now!