An Argument For Obama
I’m voting for Obama, even despite his last few pushes towards the middle. And here’s why.
What America and the rest of the world needs right now is not a warrior. We do not need another cowboy safe in the White House acting tough as he sends young men and women to die for oil. We do not need someone who knows more about killing and taking down his enemies. We need a diplomat.
The key difference between McCain and Obama is that McCain is a warrior and Obama is a diplomat. We can all see it. Obama’s real strength lies in speaking, and that is what we need–because when it comes down to it, protecting America really means keeping it from being attacked by speaking to our enemies and allies and swaying them to our side. Obama as president will seek peace and diplomacy wherever possible, instead of putting on his little cowboy hat and ordering more troops.
I doubt McCain will move from Bush’s policy of not speaking to the ‘enemy’, which would only hurt America more and further endanger it. Obama, on the other hand, I expect will have the bravery and diplomatic skill to speak to both enemies and allies.
How do you think Iran, North Korea, and other nations will respond to being threatened? How well will they take America’s shutting them out? Not well. Bush has proved himself to be in my opinion the worst diplomat in recent history, and McCain doesn’t seem to want to improve upon that. So far he’s come off as an ornery old man who lashes out at anyone who criticizes him, insults his wife, doesn’t pay his taxes, advocates torture when he himself experienced torture and flip flops. He is obviously not a stable man, perhaps because of his time spent under torture, which is known to cause Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Do we really need an unstable, angry man who’s experience will lead him to focus on war over diplomacy?
No, we really don’t.
And that’s not to mention the issues. You can blast Obama all you want about his lack of experience and his campaign to bring the moderates to his side, but I don’t see how it makes him a worse candidate than McCain. Bush had loads of experience, and look how well he did! Obama is young and even with his less amount of experience, he has united the nation in ways we haven’t seen for a long time thanks to the GOP’s campaign to demonize liberals. He’s pulling all sorts of people into a nationwide movement for change–blacks, whites, women, young, old, liberals, moderates, disenchanted conservatives, Christians, atheists, Muslims, gays…
He is more internet and computer savvy than McCain, that much is obvious, and hopefully as a movement for more internet communication between politicians and the people spreads, he will be possibly our first president to communicate directly to the people using the internet, bringing more voice to the people. It certainly won’t be McCain.
He has used a grassroots movement of the people, by the people and for the people to fund his campaign, keeping himself out of the pockets of the corporations controlling our country and in the pockets of the people of America.
He has stayed on the left’s side on key issues like same sex marriage and separation of church and state while pushing for representation of more than the left–of the moderates, too.
I could go on and on, but you get the point. I know Obama isn’t perfect, and I definitely don’t agree with him on some important points, like FISA and allowing religious organizations to stay. But a president shouldn’t just represent one side of the country. He or she should represent the entire country, while remaining loyal on key issues. He or she should protect our nation through diplomacy first and war second. He or she should be Obama.
Diplomacy only works if the other people in the conversation WANT to listen and work things out. Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, Al Qaida, Hezbolla, and others have shown (even before “W” entered the White House) that they are not willing to talk and work things out. They are totalitarian regimes that want it their way, only their way, all the time, everyplace. When dealing with nations whose leaders fit that description, your idealized diplomat (no matter how talented or suave he speaks) will be handed his hat and sent packing – EVERY TIME. The “Obama” approach didn’t work for Carter with Iran, it didn’t work for Chaimberlain with Germany, it won’t work with Iran or North Korea, or Venezuela or any terrorist group now. We have to learn from history’s mistakes, not repeat them. To think differently is to be embarrasingly naive about the world we live in.
At least you were polite until the end.
You’re saying the problem with these nations is that they refuse to talk–while saying that we should do the same and not talk to them. That only worsens the problem. North Korea has tried to be diplomatic with the U.S., agreeing to destroy their nuclear missile facilities while Bush weaseled out on his side of the deal. That sort of “your the enemy, we don’t have to give you respect, talk to you or think about your side” point of view you’re preaching is exactly what is causing all of these messes.
You’re acting like diplomacy is only supposed to be used with countries that are already your friends, and it’s not. Diplomacy is also a strategy to keep our people safe and to ease tensions between enemies. You’re saying that we shouldn’t try diplomacy on these countries, we should just attack. If I’m embarassingly naive, so are you–to think that we can just ignore other countries and not try diplomacy is to think that it has and never will work, and that is completely false. Diplomacy has worked over and over, from Ghandi to Martin Luther King Jr, from every day protesters to the unspoken heroic diplomats who work every day to keep international relations going well.
Bushwack just finally realized he needed to use a little more DIPLOMACY. But it’s too little too late for him. His tough guy stance only made the Middle East a lot less safe, not to mention how it’s ruined us here in America. Our National Guard is not even ready to respond because he’s shipped them all there. So Carey, you think we’re “naive” but you’re approach has been disastrous. Most of Europe recognizes the fact.
As for Obama: I too am for him, but thinks he needs to be careful on his shifting postions:
http://thebruceblog.wordpress.com/2008/07/02/arianna-seven-things-obama-should-do-to-keep-from-blowing-it/
Blue…
I apologize for seeming impolite at the end… I just feel strongly about this.
I’m also sorry that you seem to have misunderstood me… I’m in no way saying that we should “just attack” as you assumed I meant. I’m only saying that Diplomacy is not always the workable and simple solution that it is often characterized to be. Aggressive, totalitarian don’t typically respond to it at all.
It’s fine Carey. ;)
I just feel that our first line of defense should always, always be diplomacy, because a hell of a lot more problems will come if we refuse to talk to our enemies (or like McCain are just not diplomatic types) and instead resort to war. Obama is a diplomat, he has a great ability to bring together different sorts of people and he is an amazing speaker, and if anyone can do it, he can.