OK, Occam’s Razor would indicate that Barack Obama has a maternal great uncle (i.e., his mother’s mother’s brother), named Charles Payne (middle initial unclear) who served with the 355th Infantry that liberated one of the camps in the Buchenwald complex, despite previous concerns on that score.
It seems very unlikely that he would have a great uncle by that name, and that someone by that name would have had that service record, who also was an Obama political supporter, and he would put forth such a story, and that they are not the same person, despite the confusion about the middle initial. So, if we ignore the “Auschwitz” reference, and the fact that he calls his great uncle his uncle (understandable, given that he had no actual uncles, at least on his mother’s side), the story is accurate.
But it’s not that easy to ignore Auschwitz.
That’s because “Auschwitz” has become one of the most emotionally charged words in the English (well, OK, it’s not English–it’s German) language. It’s one of the most emotionally charged words in any language, for anyone who is aware of what happened there, and few educated people aren’t, regardless of their native language.
The word is significant in the context of the Obama campaign for two reasons.
First, because it has such emotional connotations, particularly for Jews, with whom Obama has had trouble closing the deal, it looks like he’s pandering to them. I’m not saying that he is, but it has that appearance.
Auschwitz was the site of the deliberate extermination of many of them (as well as Catholics, Gypsies, homosexuals, and others deemed “unworthy of life” by the National Socialists aka Nazis) and one might cynically think that an attempt to say that one of his family members was responsible for the liberation of the camp would give that constituency a warmer feeling for him, despite his many foreign policy advisors who clearly are not fans of the state of Israel (e.g., Zbig).
Buchenwald, on the other hand, while atrocious beyond normal human understanding, was merely a slave labor camp, and not historically abnormal in a time of war. The people who died there did so under the stress of work and disease, rather than as a deliberate attempt to wipe them off the planet. Which, of course, says much more about human nature and history than it does about the Nazis.
But beyond that, it is of concern because it reveals a profound ignorance of history and/or geography.
Anyone familiar with the history of World War II knows that Auschwitz (despite its Germanic name, which like Dansk to Danzig after the conquest in 1939, was a rename–the Polish name is Oswiecim), was in the occupied country of Poland, which before the war had hundreds of thousands of Jews, and after the war had…virtually none.
Furthermore, anyone familiar with that history knows that American troops never advanced past the River Elbe, in Germany, and that the Soviet forces advanced all the way across Poland and into eastern Germany, raping and pillaging as they went. Which is why there was an East Germany. Has Barack never heard of that “country,” which was a colony of the Soviet Union, of which his mother was not obviously unfond (to understate the issue)?
No one, in other words, familiar with that history, would imagine that an American soldier, under Patton, had contributed to the “liberation” (scare quotes because the Soviets never liberated anyone–they only enslaved them) of Auschwitz.
Obama didn’t know this. Nor, apparently, did anyone on his staff, since he had been spouting the same fable since 2002 and no one had bothered to correct him. Or if they had, they were ignored. I’m not sure which is worse.
Given his unfamiliarity with Jack Kennedy’s less-than-successful negotiations with Khrushchev, it makes one wonder what else he doesn’t know.
[Late evening update]
Some have taken issue of my characterization of Buchenwald as “merely a slave labor camp.”
This has to be taken in context. I’m not sure what part of “atrocious beyond human understanding” with regard to that camp the commenters don’t understand.
I wasn’t excusing it in any way. I was simply pointing out that in the historical context of war, in which civilians were generally enslaved or killed, and disposed of when they could no longer work, it was hardly abnormal. Auschwitz (and Treblinka, and Sobibor, and Chelmo, and Betzec, and Majdenek) were in a separate class, previously unknown, which gave rise to the term “genocide,” in which the intent was to wipe out an entire people. I’m sorry that some don’t get the point.
[Thursday morning update]
Well, I certainly seem to have stirred up a hornet’s nest among some. Let me pick up the remains of the straw men that were strewn around and kicked apart here overnight.
For the record, I did not say, or imply, that Buchenwald was a summer camp. I did not say, or imply, that the leftist Hitler’s crimes were a “drop in the bucket” compared to the leftist Stalin’s. I did not say, or imply, that working people to death is not murdering them. I did not say, or imply, that anyone’s death (including Anne Frank’s) was less tragic because it occurred at Bergen-Belsen than at Auschitz. I did not say, or imply, that I would “smile with satisfaction” if I were at Buchenwald instead of Auschwitz.
I’m not sure how to have a rational discussion with anyone nutty enough to have managed to infer any of the above from what I actually wrote.
Also, for the record, I am not now, and have never been a Republican, or (AFAIK) a “right winger,” unless by that phrase one means a classical liberal. As for “sitting down with my Jewish friends and discussing this,” I not only have Jewish friends, but Jewish relatives by blood, or perhaps I should say had, because they include many who doubtless died in both types of camps.
[Update a few minutes later]
One other straw man. I did not say, or imply, that because of this single incident Barack Obama was unfit to be president of the United States. But it is part, albeit a small one, of a much larger tapestry.
[One more update]
To the people in comments asking me what I meant by this, or why I wrote it, I don’t know how to better explain my points than I already have. If after having actually read it carefully, for comprehension, you still don’t get it, or willfully choose to misinterpret it, I can’t help you.
[Update again]
OK, I’ll make one attempt, for those who think that I am somehow “minimizing” what happened at Buchenwald. Perhaps they don’t understand the true meaning of the word “atrocious,” as in the phrase I used, “atrocious beyond human understanding.”
I wasn’t using it in perhaps a more popular (and trivial) sense as “that movie or meal was atrocious.” I was using it in its most literal sense, as in a place where actual atrocities occurred. The two words are related, you know?
[Update about 9:30]
If I change the phrase “merely a slave labor camp,” which is what seems to be generating such irrational fury and umbrage, to “not a site for the extermination of a people on an industrial scale,” will that mollify people? Probably not, but I’ll do it anyway.
[Afternoon update]
I’m wondering how much of the rampant insanity, straw mannery and outrage in comments would have been avoided had I merely omitted the word “merely”.
[Friday morning update]
I have one final (I hope) follow up post on this subject.
So your theory is that Obama said Auschwitz over Buchenwald because he is either ignorant of history or because he thought it would ring iconically with the jewish base he is courting.
The fact that you think like this says more about you than Obama. You have the soul of a right wing hack.
Most rational people would listen to what Obama said, assume it was a mistake and move on. A right wing hack on the other hand would churn out a Ph.D thesis on the subject. I think you are hoping for a gig on a wingnut welfare programme. That is my theory.
You know how it’s not “global warming denial,” but “global warming skepticism,” because they don’t totally deny the existence of the warming trend anymore?
It’s not “Holocaust denial,” it’s “Holocaust revisionism,” because Mr. Simberg doesn’t deny that the Holocaust happened.
You find it offensive to be compared to a Holocaust denier, chief? I find it offensive that you would call Buchenwald “merely a slave labor camp.”
Merely my ass. Fifty thousand dead people, bodies stacked like cord wood. There was nothing “mere” about the evil done there.
And the straw men keep marching onward.
Denigrating what those soldiers and the survivors went through to try and score political points is disgusting. And sadly also par for the course with Republicans.
I did not denigrate either soldiers or survivors. And I am not now, and have never been a Republican.
It’s not surprising that you would say elsewhere things that contradict your deeply held belief that the holocaust was “not historically abnormal.”
I have neither a shallow, nor a “deeply-held” belief that the Holocaust was not historically abnormal. What was different about the Holocaust was the industrial-like efficiency with which it was carried out (what distinguished Auschwitz from Buchenwald).
But the mass killings of civilians, and slave labor, is hardly unprecedented in human history. For instance, you might read up on this fellow Genghis Khan sometime.
Or Tamarlane:
You find it offensive to be compared to a Holocaust denier, chief? I find it offensive that you would call Buchenwald “merely a slave labor camp.”
Then apparently we’re both going to be offended, though I will be with much greater justification.
The logic in this article is so tortured it’s worthy of the Bush administration. There’s just so much that’s so wrong with everything written, both in the main article and in your bleatings defending it, that there is no point going thru them all.
You should be ashamed.
There’s just so much that’s so wrong with everything written, both in the main article and in your bleatings defending it, that there is no point going thru them all.
Ummm…OK.
What a persuasive argument.
joe from Lowell wrote:
You know how it’s not “global warming denial,” but “global warming skepticism,” because they don’t totally deny the existence of the warming trend anymore?
You mean the warming trend that ended in 1998? That one? I also love how you mentioned the term “global warming denial”. Now, let’s see, who invented that term so that it would sound similar to Holocaust denial? Who’s using the Nazis for political points again? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? Lefties are such hypocrites.
“I have neither a shallow, nor a “deeply-held” belief that the Holocaust was not historically abnormal.”
Of course you would say that when pressed. You know it is the right thing to say. But I have to say, your saying that “Buchenwald . . . was merely a slave labor camp, and not historically abnormal in a time of war” is pretty revealing.
Had one of your friends reviewed the post before you put it up, they might have pointed out how bad that sentance sounded and to avoid looking like a fascist you probably would have taken it out. But they didn’t notice it because deep down they all agree with you that the holocaust was just business as usual during war.
Why, it seems to me that your true beliefs just shine through in spite of all your efforts to cover them up by saying the opposite.
What was different about the Holocaust was the industrial-like efficiency with which it was carried out (what distinguished Auschwitz from Buchenwald). But the mass killings of civilians, and slave labor, is hardly unprecedented in human history.
I think you just went off message. (Maybe you are tired from the onslaught).
I thought you were focusing on genocide, rather than on brutality, efficiency, or the sheer number of killings, when you made your distinction between the two kinds of camps. You focused on genocide in the original post, and later when you made the “moral midget” comment. My rebuttal was that moral judgments about genocide don’t depend on fast the killing takes place, particularly when the time difference is usefully measured in months (rather than, say, generations), but I accepted your basic premise that genocide is different from a mass killing without genocidal intent. (That distinction is painful to make as well, but it gets made all the time when discussing Rwanda, Darfur, and other hellish situations.)
But they didn’t notice it because deep down they all agree with you that the holocaust was just business as usual during war.
Hey Leo, since you’re a psychic that can read everyone’s minds and stuff, I was wondering if you could give me the winning Powerball numbers for the next drawing. Thanks in advance!
Irony, thy name is sigh.
Leo wrote:
Irony, thy name is sigh.
Now, with you being a psychic and all, you probably forget that it doesn’t work in reverse and people are not able to read your mind. So, either you are totally ignorant of the definition of irony, or you’re going to have to provide my source quote so we non-psychics can judge the merits of your charge for ourselves. Again, thanks in advance!
Merely???
sigh: Read my exchange with Sally and Rand. If you are having trouble following it, read it again.
My point throughout has been that it is totally specious to claim to know what Obama thinks about the military and veterans based on cherry-picked quotes and mind-reading. The quote you pulled from my last quote was a direct parady of Rand’s comment regarding Obama’s commencement speech:
“Had one of his staffers reviewed the speech and noticed the absence, they might have pointed out that he ought to include it [military service], for political purposes, and he probably would have. But no one bothered, because like him, they don’t value military service . . ..”
Here’s what I wrote:
“Had one of your friends reviewed the post before you put it up, they might have pointed out how bad that sentance sounded and to avoid looking like a fascist you probably would have taken it out. But they didn’t notice it because deep down they all agree with you that the holocaust was just business as usual during war.”
My point is, and remains, that ascribing beliefs to someone based on nothing more than your own assumptions and out-of-context quotes is totally illegitimate. You, apparently, agree. Which is ironic because you thought you were defending Rand’s position, but really you were attacking it.
I’m wondering how much of the rampant insanity, straw mannery and outrage in comments would have been avoided had I merely omitted the word “merely”.
Lots. Which is why you should be very very careful to make your meaning crystal clear.
Look. I know you think you do. But as a lot of people have pointed out down the years, you don’t.
You’re sickening.
If you want to attack Obama’s policies, do so. Attacking Obama because his great-uncle “only” liberated a camp where 30k+ people died is sickening.
Borrow some morals.
I’m wondering how much of the rampant insanity, straw mannery and outrage in comments would have been avoided had I merely omitted the word “merely”.
Maybe Daveon is right – lots – but you still would have been wrong. You still would have been asserting that 1) Buchenwald wasn’t part of a genocide, and 2) it is possible that Obama might have actually known the correct camp was Buchenwald but he said “Auschwitz” because he figured Jews wouldn’t be as upset about Buchenwald. Assertion 1 is wrong, and assertion 2 is bordering on derangement. You did say that Assertion 2 was unlikely to be true, so maybe complete derangement hasn’t set in.
Attacking Obama because his great-uncle “only” liberated a camp where 30k+ people died is sickening.
You are sickening yourself over something I didn’t do.
You still would have been asserting that 1) Buchenwald wasn’t part of a genocide
I never made such an assertion, though at least in this case I can see how it could have been mistakenly inferred. I was saying that Auschwitz had that as its sole purpose. (And I continue to be amazed that anyone can think that I am either apologizing for, or denying, or revising the history of the Holocaust.)
2) it is possible that Obama might have actually known the correct camp was Buchenwald but he said “Auschwitz” because he figured Jews wouldn’t be as upset about Buchenwald.
I have never posited that Obama actually knew the correct camp, but lied about it for political purposes. I don’t believe that he’s that stupid, because there’s no way that he could get away with such a thing (as all the commentary about it proves). I was simply saying that all he knew was Auschwitz, but that he also knew that Auschwitz had special meaning to Jews (not, of course to imply that they are unaware of Buchenwald).
Somewhere, somewhen, he learned to utter the word Auschwitz (and in the case of the Iraq speech, Treblinka) as a talisman to give him street cred about his World War II/Holocaust knowledge. And I find it interesting that he could have believed that his great uncle liberated Auschwitz for all these years without anyone correcting him on the matter, unless this is the first time he has revealed it to anyone knowledgeable. Why didn’t anyone call him on it in the Iraq speech six years ago?
Wow, no wonder Obama has so many followers. They seem to be zombies that respond in virtual outrage to perceived atrocities, none of which were ever actually suffered by them.
The sad part lost on all this is that Obama himself didn’t liberate anything. His great uncle, I think brother to the grand-mother he couldn’t disown; liberated Buchenwald. What is outrageous is Obama using the atrocity that happened in Buchenwald in the 1940’s, and the actions of his great uncle, as a means to bolster his campaign and his image.
At the same time, Obama wants to inact policies reminiscent of Mussolini.
Rand and Sally: How do you feel about sigh calling you out? He seems to think your “psychic” approach to determining what people think is pretty funny. Are you just going to take that?
I was simply saying that all he knew was Auschwitz, but that he also knew that Auschwitz had special meaning to Jews (not, of course to imply that they are unaware of Buchenwald).
In that case, you didn’t need to explain any possible distinction between the two camps. Instead of just leaving out the word “merely”, you could have omitted your entire paragraph about Buchenwald. Then you would have just been criticizing Obama the same way lots of people do, and you would have avoided all the hubbub. It wouldn’t have been nearly as interesting, of course. This way, maybe you’ll get lots of new readers! 🙂
Aw, Leo the Psychic is trying to be cute but fails miserably. Let’s look at Leo’s psychic assertion:
I’d say that’s pretty revealing. It’s not surprising that you would say elsewhere things that contradict your deeply held belief that the holocaust was “not historically abnormal.” After all, you know that’s not a politically correct thing to say. But your true feelings are amply demonstrated by this quote.
Oh great Psychic Leo, please show us how you divined the OP’s “deeply held belief that the holocaust was not historically abnormal.”
My point is, and remains, that ascribing beliefs to someone based on nothing more than your own assumptions and out-of-context quotes is totally illegitimate. You, apparently, agree.
And based on your first quote above, you’re apparently now arguing with yourself.
Oops, missed this little gem from the psychic Leo:
The notion that we should not provide care to veterans because it turns them into victims is faily disgusting.
Um, what point are you arguing against here? Oh, that’s right, another strawman. Because Sally that you’re responding to, never even came close to alluding to such a thing. Your debating tactics are juvenile.
sigh: Again, the first quote is a parody of Rand, who finds it incredibly “revealing” that Obama chose to omit military service from a particular speech, and says that when he does mention the military it he is just “pay[ing] lip service” because it is “politically necessary.”
In other words, another direct hit on Rand. If you are having trouble keeping up with the conversation you might want to sit this one out for a while. Friendly fire can be devestating.
Leo, we continue to await your alternate explanation for why, in a prepared speech focused on service, military service was not mentioned, and why it’s unreasonable to conclude from this that he is at best indifferent to it.
Leo, perhaps you should write more clearly if you want to be understood correctly. And that’s a direct hit on your writing ability along with your noted strawman tactic in my last quote. You have no room to speak on the OP’s writing as long as your “parodies” need a secret decoder ring.
Perhaps because, with Memorial Day just around the corner, he knew he would be spending much of the next few days focusing on military service, and wanted to focus this speach on civil and community service. Perhaps because he was drawing from Kennedy’s speech or from the history of the Kennedy family, and so took the Peace Corps as his point of departure. Perhaps because a large part of the speech focused on his personal experience of service, and, as has been well established, he came of age in the period between Vietnam and the Gulf War and was not called upon to defend his country.
I don’t know what he or his speechwriter was thinking of. And neither do you. So why don’t you drop the assumption of bad faith and try to evaluate what the man says rather than what you think he thinks.
As one with a relative who was present at the surrender of a camp, I’d never confuse Dachau with any other camp., The two stories he told made waaay too strong an impression on me, though nothing like Auschwitz did when I visited there (yep, it was still in Poland when I left it, if someone moved it, they didn’t tell me)
I think O’s a straphanger trying to score points late in the game by associating himself with someone who really was there and got the tee-shirt.
What a poseur.
Leo, Leo, Leo: the entire point of your argument here is that we aren’t supposed to assume anything about Obama and what he really believes or thinks even when he addresses the questions openly. And yet you’ve done the same thing in your post above, speculating about possible explanations for Obama’s failure to encourage the Wesleyan grads to enlist in the military, none of which is supported by anything Obama himself has actually said.
You were challenged to find a speech, a statement, anything where Obama did encourage people to serve in the military. You haven’t done that.
You’ve now been given several examples of where he diminished or omitted military service or mentioned it only the context of pushing for a new or expanded government program for traumatized and sexually harrassed vets in the hopes of winning votes.
I think it’s acceptable for Obama to disdain military service. Many of my lefty friends feel the same way. They see it as a loser’s game and they would never ever encourage their children to go into the military.
Obama should just be open about it and allow us voters the right to weigh how important we consider his attitude about it to be. For some, it might not be important at all. For others, it might actually be a reason to vote for him. To the extent he chooses to wrap himself in gauze on this (as he does so many other issues), then he leaves us no choice but to deduce, induce, imply and infer from the things he actually does say.
It is sad to consider just how many of you, including the author of this piece, have forgotten the adage:
It is better to be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.
You have descended to the point of comparison among Nazi camps, and speculation as to which is worse, as though it has some relevance to the man’s character or that of his nephew. The mind reels at the pathos necessary to take that route, while marvelling at the sheer mendacity required to utter such things as “Well, I had a relative who was there, and his stories make me confident that I have a firm grasp of what it was like there….”
I encourage you to carry what you laughingly call arguments far and wide. Expose as many people as you can, like an innoulation. Recognizing the your insanity will aid us in combatting it.
Sally: I was asked for alternative explanations by Rand, and I gave them. Perhaps I should just have left it with my last paragraph:
“I don’t know what he or his speechwriter was thinking of. And neither do you. So why don’t you drop the assumption of bad faith and try to evaluate what the man says rather than what you think he thinks.”
I would add one more possible explanation, one which I think should resonate with Rand. Maybe he just made a mistake. People do. Perhaps, just as Rand apparently did with the “merely” sentence, he made a mistake that has no deep and abiding psychological significance.
I have no investment in any of these explanations. They may all be wrong.
Regarding examples of honoring military service, this is from his memorial day speech:
“You see, America has the greatest military in the history of the world. We have the best training, the most advanced technology, the most sophisticated planning, and the most powerful weapons. And yet, in the end, though each of these things is absolutely critical, the true strength of our military lies someplace else.
It lies in the spirit of America
What was different about the Holocaust was the industrial-like efficiency with which it was carried out (what distinguished Auschwitz from Buchenwald).
Killing at Buchenwald wasn’t carried out with industrial efficiency?
Um.
OK.
Killing at Buchenwald wasn’t carried out with industrial efficiency?
No. Not compared to Auschwitz-Birkenau, which was not a concentration camp, but an extermination camp, with Zyklon B gas chambers, each of which was capable of killing 2500 at once. There was a debate among the Allies about whether to divert some bombing missions from strategic targets to the rail lines going into the place, to try to slow down the carnage, but it was decided that the best way to help the Jews was to win the war as quickly as possible, particularly given how difficult a target a rail line is.
Leo wins! He provides a quote where Obama encourages military service.
It is generally true that people read things into what other people say and write that aren’t there.
Rand hates it when people do that to him. And yet this piece was all about reading things into Obama’s speeches that aren’t there.
It’s really hard to avoid doing this, especially when we really want to know what someone as important as Senator Obama really thinks.
That said, I think it’s abundantly clear from his speeches and his policies that Obama is overwhemingly dove. Maybe 75% dove and 25% hawk. Yet Obama does plan on keeping the war going in Afghanistan.
Why would we want someone as dovish as Obama as Commander in Chief while we have difficult, long running war going on in Afghanistan? It’s one of the most unfavorable places in the world for anyone to engage in warfare.
Yours,
Wince
Well Wince, as a run of the mill lib-tard my knee jerks with responses to your final two paragraphs. But I think I will save that fight for another day.
Why would we want someone as dovish as Obama as Commander in Chief while we have difficult, long running war going on in Afghanistan?
Because that’s the right place to have the fight and the right place to win it in. It’s a place where they actually want us there. It’s a place that has been and has the potential to be stable again. It was the home of a breed of fanaticism that the world is well rid of. A stable Afghanistan also helps with a serious problem we have with a Nuclear Islamic power next door who are one coups away from a fundamentalist regime with nukes.
It makes a lot of strategic sense and its what we should have been doing earlier.
You can win there. We did it once before we just screwed up the end game and have paid the price.
Of course, in my opinion, we’re in a “we broke it, we own it” situation with Iraq. But that’s a different story.
Leo wins? There’s absolutely nothing in that statement by Obama where he encourages anyone to join the military. He said in the statement I quoted on why he didn’t join the military that he “honors and reveres” soldiers. We already had those words from him. Easy to say, apparently not something he ever thought worthwhile to do himself, though, or anyone else either.
If he thinks our military is so valuable and important, why does he not want to see the Wesleyan grads in dress blues? Why is he so proud that they’re off to Kenya to serve in the peace corps but not to Fort Bragg or Ramstein or Seoul?
As I’ve said a few times now, Obama is not alone is disdaining the military as an acceptable career or job choice. Other Americans share that as well.
Obama should just own up to it. There’s nothing wrong with being the candidate who thinks that a life spent teaching Kenyans about alternative sources of energy and serving meals at the local food kitchen is of more value than picking up a weapon and standing a post.
He is who he is. Not who you all wish he would be.
I’m wondering how much of the rampant insanity, straw mannery and outrage in comments would have been avoided had I merely omitted the word “merely”.
It took you until sometime this afternoon to wonder about something I made clear just after 7pm last night in one of the first comments?
Fascinating.
Ah well, better late than never, I suppose.
Ah well, better late than never, I suppose.
So, you think that a single word justified all the rampant insanity, straw mannery and outrage? It seems to me like a reasonable interpretation of your comment.
Wow Simberg, you’re a real dick aren’t you?
Ummmm…no, “Tim O.” But you seem to be a real moron.
And I find it interesting that he could have believed that his great uncle liberated Auschwitz for all these years without anyone correcting him on the matter, unless this is the first time he has revealed it to anyone knowledgeable. Why didn’t anyone call him on it in the Iraq speech six years ago?
And why aren’t you outraged that J McCain, your candidate for POTUS, doesn’t know the difference between Shia and Sunnis? Let’s see the long blog post on that? It’s all about who knows relevant things to today’s foreign policy situation, right?
why aren’t you outraged that J McCain, your candidate for POTUS
“J McCain” is not my candidate for POTUS, Voice of Idiocy.
Never before have I seen somebody so determined to make a wanker of himself. Well done Rand!
Did you mean to leave an intelligent comment, Mr. Wisse? If so, you seem to have failed.
Has anyone found out what happened to this great uncle after he left the attic. Where did he go? What did he do. Anyone else who knew him who had stories to tell of the old warrior’s experiences? Hungry, I am, for more info about this man who had such trauma from his war experiences. Can anyone help me? Please.
“J McCain” is not my candidate for POTUS, Voice of Idiocy.
*Sigh* Okay, will you be as obsessed with the Republican candidate’s gaffes on the more relevant topics of the day?
Leo,
Don’t know whether you are liberal by my definition (you sound center left maybe), but you seem to be far better than run of the mill and far smarter about politics than that insulting word I won’t repeat.
Daveon,
Good answer to a question I didn’t ask. I asked why we would want Obama in charge if we are fighting Afghanistan. I think we should fight in Afghanistan for nearly all the reasons you mentioned, plus a few more. But I think Obama has shown he would be a poor choice to lead that effort, because (in general) doves don’t do long difficult wars in remote backward places well.
Anonymous,
I considered a preeemptive sentence or two against your argument but thought they weren’t needed, since your argument was obviously flawed. Those two paragraphs Obama said were highly complimentary to our military. When you honor and revere an institution that way you are encouraging people to join it, even if you don’t explicitly say so. That’s obvious. In fact, you probably knew I’d say that.
Yours,
Wince
I find it humorous that the same drooling, booger-eating, rightwing androids who slavishly supported a President who couldn’t spell “Germany” if you spotted him the “-e-r-m-a-n-y” are outraged about Obama’s mistatements in this case.
And Buchenwald is “only” a slave labor camp in the same sense that Mount Everest is “only” a big rock that people climb on. Idiot.
The following is admittedly irrelevant to the Obama “fellow soldiers” issue, but I thought it was an interesting historical footnote: Sgt Joseph Beyrle fought in WWII for both the Americans and the Soviets. He was an American soldier captured by the Nazis, tortured by the Gestapo in a POW camp, escaped on his third attempt, encountered a Soviet tank crew, and succesfully convinced them to give him a gun so he could stay and kill Nazis with them. Considered a hero by both armies, received medals from US and Soviet leaders. You can google him for more.