Understanding Obama on Iran (Andy McCarthy - NRO)

National Review ^ | June 22, 2009 | Andy McCarthy

[greyfoxx39]

Monday, June 22, 2009

Understanding Obama on Iran   [Andy McCarthy]

Call me thick, but I continue to be baffled by a lot of the commentary, cited by Rich and others, which gives as the rationale for President Obama's diffidence his purported determination to preserve the opportunity to negotiate with the mullahs on their nuclear program. Obama is resigned to Iran getting nukes (perhaps even having them already) and has no intention of doing anything meaningful about it. 

The fact is that, as a man of the hard Left, Obama is more comfortable with a totalitarian Islamic regime than he would be with a free Iranian society. In this he is no different from his allies like the Congressional Black Caucus and Bill Ayers, who have shown themselves perfectly comfortable with Castro and Chàvez.  Indeed, he is the product of a hard-Left tradition that apologized for Stalin and was more comfortable with the Soviets than the anti-Communists (and that, in Soros parlance, saw George Bush as a bigger terrorist than bin Laden).

Because of obvious divergences (inequality for women and non-Muslims, hatred of homosexuals) radical Islam and radical Leftism are commonly mistaken to be incompatible. In fact, they have much more in common than not, especially when it comes to suppression of freedom, intrusiveness in all aspects of life, notions of "social justice," and their economic programs. (On this, as in so many other things, Anthony Daniels should be required reading — see his incisive New English Review essay, "There Is No God but Politics", comparing Marx and Muslim Brotherhood theorist Sayyid Qutb.) The divergences between radical Islam and radical Leftism are much overrated — "equal rights" and "social justice" are always more rally-cry propaganda than real goals for totalitarians, and hatred of certain groups is always a feature of their societies.

The key to understanding Obama, on Iran as on other matters, is that he is a power-politician of the hard Left : He is steeped in Leftist ideology, fueled in anger and resentment over what he chooses to see in America's history, but a "pragmatist" in the sense that where ideology and power collide (as they are apt to do when your ideology becomes less popular the more people understand it), Obama will always give ground on ideology (as little as circumstances allow) in order to maintain his grip on power.

It would have been political suicide to issue a statement supportive of the mullahs, so Obama's instinct was to do the next best thing: to say nothing supportive of the freedom fighters. As this position became increasingly untenable politically, and as Democrats became nervous that his silence would become a winning political round for Republicans, he was moved grudgingly to burble a mild censure of the mullah's "unjust" repression — on the order of describing a maiming as a regrettable "assault," though enough for the Obamedia to give him cover.  But expect him to remain restrained and to continue grossly understating the Iranian regime's deadly response. That will change only if, unexpectedly, it appears that the freedom-fighters may win, at which point he'll scoot over to the right side of history and take all conceivable credit.

I think Victor had this right on Saturday: "Obama is almost more at ease with virulent anti-Westerners, whose grievances Obama has long studied (and perhaps in large part entertained)," (though I'd have omitted the "almost"). Mark Steyn made the same point in a post last week (about a Robert Kagan column that Pete Wehner also discussed). 

It's a mistake to perceive this as "weakness" in Obama. It would have been weakness for him to flit over to the freedom fighters' side the minute it seemed politically expedient. He hasn't done that, and he won't. Obama has a preferred outcome here, one that is more in line with his worldview, and it is not victory for the freedom fighters. He is hanging as tough as political pragmatism allows, and by doing so he is making his preferred outcome more likely.  That's not weakness, it's strength — and strength of the sort that ought to frighten us.

06/22 10:05 AMShare

[greyfoxx39]

Ping

[Redbob]

"Indeed, he is the product of a hard-Left tradition that apologized for Stalin..."

Read "made excuses for Stalin..."

[Honorary Serb]

Some of Barack Hussein Obama’s favorites—the “Palestinians” of Hamas and their close allies Hezbollah—are in Iran bashing and killing Iranian pro-democracy protestors!!!!

Some “Palestinians” call Obama “Abu Hussein”, which is supposed to be an honor. But it is a disgrace with us. Obama is on the side of the world’s islamic supremacists (including also the KLA, the “Bosnian” islamists, the ruling Iranian mullahs and the Chechen bandits), NOT on the side of Americans. We should call Obama “Abu Hussein”, too!!!!

When the Iranian uprising happened, it threw a monkey-wrench into Abu Hussein’s precious schedule for negotiating with the Iranian mullahs. So he doesn’t know what to make of it. All he can do is to play golf, eat ice cream, and issue a few toothless, Carter-like comments.

Free Iran!!!! Iran Azadi!!!! Remember Neda!!!!

[Loyal Buckeye]

Whatever the problem is, it's not good for us.

I think he just doesn't like confrontation. He likes to work in a setting where he is in total control, such as he has w/ the Dem-controlled Congress.

[Cowboy Bob]

Obama is waiting for a resolution of the crisis, and then he'll side with the winner.

[okie01]

The fact is that, as a man of the hard Left, Obama is more comfortable with a totalitarian Islamic regime than he would be with a free Iranian society.

That's called cutting thru to the quick.

[Logical me]

Cutting through the BS, King Obama was trained a Muslim and he is a Muslim. The BS stops here.

[Juan Medén]

The world has lost leadership on the issue of freedom. There is now no one on the world stage who is the advocate of the oppressed and enslaved peoples of the world. The American president, who has been a beacon of hope for the huddling masses around the world has become a friend of dictators and thugs. Goodbye freedom. The world is in for a new age of totalitarianism.

[Nathan Zachary]

""Indeed, he is the product of a hard-Left tradition that apologized for Stalin..."

The left doesn't make excuses for Stalin, they outright deny the atrocities he committed, and attempt to bury or otherwise hide the truth as the NYT's did when it hid Stalin's attempted genocide of the entire Ukraine in which he starved to death at gunpoint well over ten million people- men women and children- possibly as much as 24 million people. Stalin's own words claim "tens of millions".

But he never stopped there. The expansion of the Soviet Union and cold war years took the lives of over 100 million people, mostly Christians.

It's obvious, and confirmed by the NYT's continued refusal to return an award received for the story which denied and hid the genocide- holocaust if you will- of the Ukrainian people committed by Stalin, that the NYT's has not moved away from their Marxist/communist fundamental core beliefs, which is way it continues to hide the truth about hard left Marxist/communist politicians who are destroying this nation from within.

Obama is the NYT's Stalin reincarnate, and this is why not a word of the truth of who Obama really is, the people who make up his inner circle of friends and like minded soldiers in his army of Marxist fundamentalists hell bend on destroy the USA as we know it and turning it into another socialist dictatorship with an enslaved citizenship.

[greyfoxx39]

the NYT's continued refusal to return an award received for the story which denied and hid the genocide- holocaust if you will- of the Ukrainian people committed by Stalin, that the NYT's has not moved away from their Marxist/communist fundamental core beliefs, which is way it continues to hide the truth about hard left Marxist/communist politicians who are destroying this nation from within.

I would be interested in seeing some links to the above info posted on this thread if you have the time.

[Ulysse]

HUSSEIN O. is waiting to see what’s coming out from IRANIANS’ unrests.
No one knows if the protesters are “pro-democracy”!
Most of them are muslims BTW...

The Abu HUSSEIN is clever and then dangerous!
If democracy prevails in IRAN i guess he will claim to be the ONE who inspired the “CHANGE”...

That kind of multicultural libtard-fascist could be more dangerous for freedom than the old tyrans