Taylor Marsh – TaylorMarsh.com – News, Opinion and Weblog on Progressive Politics

Obama Celebrates 2002 Speech updated

With Ted Sorensen, who worked closely with John F. Kennedy, by his side, Barack
Obama gave a speech today that was designed to compete with Clinton on all fronts,
while hoping to make some news on nukes and show he was a serious foreign policy
player. Here’s how Swampland’s
Ana Marie Cox saw it.

Meanwhile, Obama’s speech was a true break from traditional presidential politics. While bipartisan support for nuclear disarmament has been growing, Obama’s the first candidate to come out for the plan outlined by Kissinger, Perry, et al. I’m certain that the Hillary team will try to portray his advocacy for disarmament as somehow naive (because naivete is what Kissinger was known for). It’s a break with traditional politics beyond nuclear policy, too: Obama’s embracing the idea that global politics is no longer a game of Us versus Them (Communists/Terrorists/Evildoers) … ..

Um, no. Edwards hit this months ago, then hit it again in September during
his terrorism speech at Pace University.

Well, let me say first, I think I would want to associate myself with the concepts that are conveyed by Kissinger, Sam Nunn and others in the op-ed piece. I thought it was very thoughtful. And I think essentially what they said if I remember — I don’t remember the precise language — was that we should aspire to a nuclear-free world. I agree with that. Now, there are a lot of steps that have to go between here and there. Some of them are pretty obvious, which is America should not be building new nuclear weapons. And then I think America should be doing things like leading an international effort to close the holes in the NPT. There are clearly serious flaws in the NPT. And I think America, leading an international effort to reduce the supplies nuclear sense in the world — all aimed at the general goal that’s described in that piece that you just spoke about. John Edwards– Abolitionist

The RNC predictably called
Obama “fringe.” Sam Nunn fringe? Who knew?

The other thing is that with Mr. Sorensen by his side, did anyone else (who
knows history) sense a bit of irony? There isn’t one progressive foreign policy
student or expert who hasn’t used this same language, though considering world
insanity few use it these days. A nuclear-free world is a given utopian philosophy
for all Democrats, ever since John F. Kennedy set foot on the international
scene. But it’s hardly the main issue when we’re facing neocons on the right
and far right, with Democrats in Congress not even able to end the Iraq war,
while the number one terrorist is running loose in Pakistan, where training
camps for jihadists thrive.

In fact, I’d say Obama’s speech today wasn’t anything new as much as it was
harkening back to yesterday, including language of old. Counterterrorism or cyberterrorism were not even a part of the global picture, along with the optimism of getting to a nuclear-free world. When he began focusing
on Iraq things got really confusing, but I’ll get to that in a minute.

But Obama’s speech was really meant to mark his 2002 speech against the war,
before he was in Congress, though I’ve already weighed in on that pr concept.
He wanted to state again today that he was against the war from the beginning.
Forgive me if his ducking the Kyl-Lieberman vote just amplifies my opinion that
there is no evidence whatsoever that he would have voted against the Iraq war
resolution.

There was something else in the speech that really jumped out when I read it.

The first thing we have to do is end this war. And the right person to end it is someone who had the judgment to oppose it from the beginning. There is no military solution in Iraq, and there never was. I will begin to remove our troops from Iraq immediately. I will remove one or two brigades a month, and get all of our combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama’s Full Anti-Nukes Speech: Blasts Beltway Establishment

Sorry to be technical, but what
happened since last week?

RUSSERT: Will you pledge that by January 2013, the end of your first term, more than five years from now, there will be no U.S. troops in Iraq? OBAMA: I think it’s hard to project four years from now, and I think it would be irresponsible. We don’t know what contingency will be out there. What I can promise is that if there are still troops in Iraq when I take office — which it appears there may be, unless we can get some of our Republican colleagues to change their mind and cut off funding without a timetable — if there’s no timetable — then I will drastically reduce our presence there to the mission of protecting our embassy, protecting our civilians, and making sure that we’re carrying out counterterrorism activities there. I believe that we should have all our troops out by 2013, but I don’t want to make promises, not knowing what the situation’s going to be three or four years out.

Last week he couldn’t pledge he’d get all troops out of Iraq by 2013. Today
he said he’d “get all of our combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months.”
Which is it? It’s not a minor point.

UPDATE (10.3.07): First it was Reagan, now J.F.K., someone I know a lot about. As I outline above, I strongly disagree. But you can’t blame camp Obama for trying.

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