In the wild, ostriches make a “booming” sound to ward off predators. They also don’t bury their heads in the sand. An ostrich’s kick can break a lion’s jaw, causing it to starve to death. These facts separate the American Left from real ostriches. American liberals (Ignavus Americanus), unlike ostriches (Struthio camelus), do bury their heads in the sand, and emit a rather high-pitched danger call, which in fact attracts predators rather than warns them.
Obama sees himself as the hero in a 1980’s John Hughes teen angst movie, giving the climactic “can’t we all just get along” speech that melts the bully’s heart. And the world responds with a slow clap. Such noble goals and dreams he has, and anyone who intrudes with the reality of the bankrupt human heart is written off as a hater, an unbeliever, a dream killer. This is our main problem: we don’t have a commander-in-chief, we have a dreamer-in-chief.
Worse, we have the Left with its head firmly in the sand, choosing to believe the dream rather than wake the dreamer. We had this coming to us because we allowed it to happen. The Left bought in to an impossible dream, while Obama did what he had the power to do: take America off the world’s stage as a moral agent, and believe that the world would stand up to bullies, death-lovers, and tyrants on its own. And the world, completely predictably, wobbled.
The collective Left is now calling for the destruction of ISIS. Only not by American boots on the ground. And not by American leadership. The world is being called upon to gather together, solve the regional instability problems in Iraq and Syria, and collectively decapitate and eliminate the Islamic State. Oh, yeah, we all know how that will work out.
Secretary of State John Kerry: “[ISIS] and the wickedness it represents must be destroyed, and those responsible for this heinous, vicious atrocity will be held accountable.” And this from the New York Times (via HuffPost):
With a united response led by the United States and the broadest possible coalition of nations, the cancer of ISIS will not be allowed to spread to other countries. The world can confront this scourge, and ultimately defeat it. ISIS is odious, but not omnipotent.
Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA): “We need to be working now, full-speed ahead, with other countries, to destroy ISIS. That should be our No. 1 priority,” followed by “We can’t get pulled into another war in the Middle East…We need to be working with others to close ISIS down.”
Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD): “It’s not just the United States. We can’t be sheriff for the whole world. It’s France. It’s — it’s the Brits. It’s — it’s the other countries that need to work with us, including countries like Saudi Arabia and that region, who also need to stop…”
Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA): “[H]opefully, those plans will coalesce into a strategy that can encourage that coalition from Arab nations. Jordan’s at jeopardy, Lebanon’s at jeopardy … other countries are in jeopardy.”
In fact, the HuffPost article citing many of these quotes claims is entitled “The Debate Over What To Do About ISIS Isn’t Much Of A Debate”. Feinstein might be the most consistent hawk in this crowd, having called for action in Iraq and voted for the war over ten years ago. Less than a month ago, Warren declared that the country doesn’t want war in Iraq.
Obama celebrated in March 2013 about “Promises Kept” in ending the Iraq War. In August, he authorized airstrikes on ISIS, while saying (paraphrasing) “I really mean it, I said I’d end the war in Iraq and I did, I really did!”. The Left then collectively placed its head in the sand in 2013. This degree of reality-denial makes Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln look like a bunch of thirteen year-olds playing D&D. Bush might have been wrong about the “mission” but he faced facts when troops kept dying and Iraq failed to become a paragon of democratic freedoms.
Swept into office in 2008 with his promise to end wars, stop torture, and bring America into the global fold of peaceful, advanced nations, we’re now faced with the conflicting reality we all knew was coming. Erick Erickson wrote in his article “The President Is Not Checked Out”:
Barack Obama is the first American President who, through his upbringing, writings, and actions, conveys a deep sense of grievance toward the American experiment. The idea that we are the last best hope for mankind is anathema to him. Barack Obama thinks the world, if the American imperial aggressor would just sit on the sidelines, could work out its problems and would be better off.
Of course he is. We knew this is 2008. In fact, Obama ran on these beliefs. We knew this in 2012. Dinesh D’Souza documented it in his movie 2016: Obama’s America. It’s no secret that Obama believes deeply in the global brotherhood of nations, guided by their common belief in the goodness of humanity. It’s no secret that he believes that no nation can claim itself as the moral compass for the world, or as the exceptional leader. It’s no secret that he believes what he said in his 2009 speech to Cairo University:
[W]e have a responsibility to join together on behalf of the world we seek – a world where extremists no longer threaten our people, and American troops have come home; a world where Israelis and Palestinians are each secure in a state of their own, and nuclear energy is used for peaceful purposes; a world where governments serve their citizens, and the rights of all God’s children are respected. Those are mutual interests. That is the world we seek. But we can only achieve it together.
That’s it: the bully-heart-melting speech. Only there’s no slow clap. Only the bully hasn’t backed down. And the dreamer-hero has left the room. If the bully is to be removed, it will be by our fist. That means boots on the ground in Iraq again. That means American blood spilled. It means re-taking ground we gave up. It means sacrifice refighting a war that most agree was a mistake. Honestly, I don’t see it happening. I see more of the same duck and cover, selective airstrikes, and sitting back to watch the Islamic State go from a proclamation to a real de facto Caliphate.
At some point, the heads will need to come out of the sand, and instead of shrill calls, the boom of America’s moral voice will need to be heard once again. But not by this president. He never had that voice to begin with, and we’ve known it all along.
