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Monday 21 May 2012

Only War Can Save Obama

Thursday, 4th February 2010

Still, if we want to talk about cynicism I offer you, as Exhibit A, Daniel Pipes who believes, apparently seriously, that Obama can rescue his Presidency by going to war with Iran:

He needs a dramatic gesture to change the public perception of him as a light-weight, bumbling ideologue, preferably in an arena where the stakes are high, where he can take charge, and where he can trump expectations.

Such an opportunity does exist: Obama can give orders for the U.S. military to destroy Iran’s nuclear-weapon capacity.

[...]Just as 9/11 caused voters to forget George W. Bush’s meandering early months, a strike on Iranian facilities would dispatch Obama’s feckless first year down the memory hole and transform the domestic political scene. It would sideline health care, prompt Republicans to work with Democrats, and make the netroots squeal, independents reconsider, and conservatives swoon.

Happily this matches Pipes's own preferences but even if one were to share his analysis of the Iranian conundrum (and I don't) one might think the political rationale he advances for Obama following his advice is, shall we say, distasteful. Actually, it's disgraceful.

Mind you, it's amazing how many people seem to think war is always the answer to any or every problem. Pipes achieves the near impossible - he makes Richard Cohen seem almost respectable.

Filed under: Hackery (218 more articles) , Iran (144 more articles) , Obama (365 more articles) , War (156 more articles)

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James Strong

February 4th, 2010 2:54am Report this comment

So are you predicting no attack on Iran?
Perhaps you're right,perhaps Israel will do it instead.
Or perhaps the attack will be on another enemy.

But would you also like to predict no terror attacks, or terror scares that will serve to unite the American people behind the President who will keep them safe?

I will predict that something, I don't know what, will happen that

a) will frighten the American people and be talked up by the MSM

b)will allow the President to be 'strong' and 'resolute' to protect the American people in the face of the threat

c) will allow new legislation or regulations that limit the freedom of ordinary people to get on with their daily lives and to continue their lives without increased control or monitoring.

It might be a genuine attack, it might not. Either will serve.

Please diary this item for 4th February 2012 and come back to us.
See if you were right or I was right.

It might not take that long.

Ronnie

February 4th, 2010 11:00am Report this comment

What was it that guy said about history repeating itself?

Nilsson

February 4th, 2010 2:33pm Report this comment

Yep, just what America needs to pull it out of recession. Another pre-emptive war (against a peaceable country three times the size of Iraq, certified by the IEAE and sizteen US intel agencies not to be pursuing nukes) which is friends with the USA's biggest creditor, China.

With any luck that'll lead to a blockade of the Straits of Hormuz, rocketing oil shortages and prices and the collateral deaths of thousands of innocent Iranians, to burnish Obama's image as Bush Jr's follow-up act and finish off the economy.

Daniel Pipes as neocon cheerleader, like William Kristol and John Podhoretz, is a burlesque sequel to his poppa.

mostly harmless

February 4th, 2010 3:15pm Report this comment

Daniel Pipes is a fruit cake - surely you can find better subject for your post.

Beefeater

February 4th, 2010 4:51pm Report this comment

Can a tin ear hear a tin drum?
Pipes' facetiousness - offering a serious policy for Iraq (taking out its nuke facilities), in terms that Obama would find meaningful (political expediency to save his failing presidency) - is not subtle. The cynicism is that Obama might be prevailed upon to do the right thing for the wrong reason. Pipes, obviously, is not serious about saving the Presidency by bombing Iran's nukes. He is serious about the bombing.

YA

February 4th, 2010 8:36pm Report this comment

The place where I live, the West, enslaved by theocratic fascists. Terror bases, militias, arms smuggling, missiles and nuclear bombs - serving people with mentality of hostage-taking cavemen, slave-owners.

That is what is distasteful and disgraceful, - even if Daniel Pipes agrees with it.

Obama should do what is right. If by doing that, he will show how beautiful and elegant and electable he is - I will forgive him.

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