Obama Slams Bush/McCain for "Political Attack on Foreign Soil"
By SilentPatriot Thursday May 15, 2008 2:20pm
Steve Benen: Yesterday, the president, with not-so-subtle language, suggested to the Israeli Knesset that Barack Democrats are Chamberlain-like appeasers because Obama is willing to talk to Iran (just as Bush’s own Defense Secretary and Secretary of State have recommended). As it turns out, Obama had taken the day off from the campaign trail, but the entire party had his back, and quickly and aggressively pushed back against Bush — and against John McCain for applauding Bush’s smear.
Silent Patriot: At a town hall meeting in South Dakota today, Barack Obama absolutely laced into President Bush and John McCain, challenging them to a debate on foreign policy that he knows Democrats will win. Forcefully declaring that they have things to "answer for," Obama laid out the case as to why it's George Bush's policies, embraced entirely by John McCain, that have actually strengthened Iran and enabled Hamas to take control of Gaza.
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"I want to be perfectly clear with George and John McCain....If George Bush and John McCain want to have a debate about protecting the United States of America, that is a debate I'm willing to have anytime, anywhere because that is a debate that I will win because George Bush and John McCain have a lot to answer for."
This is a debate that we should all be eager to have. There is no question that American foreign policy over the past eight years has done nothing to secure America, and has had the adverse effect of (a) strengthening Iran and (b) allowing other conflicts to fester as they go unaddressed. What's more, this policy is not just George Bush's; it's also John McCain's. The American people are smart enough to recognize this, and they have rejected it.
It kinda makes you wonder why John McCain would seek to tether himself to George Bush's sinking ship, doesn't it?
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Glad Obama et al are responding fervently!
McCain siding with Bush on foreign policy has to be all that Obama could ever want. It probably makes his mouth water.
Wait, is that gross?
-The Political Jerk
Man, I'd love to see who'd they'd get to moderate such a debate. Hopefully nobody from a major news network...
As they say in the south, Senator Obama ain't takin' no shit. I'm from the south so I can say that.
He didn't sit back and hope bush's remarks would go away. He stepped up and fired right back. I loved it when he said something about Senator McCain "embracing" bush's ideas or plans or something. It brought to mind that photo of bush and McCain embracing one another. I don't know if he did it on purpose but whatever, it worked that way for me.
I would pay to see any debate between Senator Obama and McCain. They could do a pay pre view and get filthy rich.
The only hope McCain would have is the sympathy factor.
Oliver @ 3:
How about Hillary?
The reason Bush cannot speak to foreign leaders is that the man cannot speak! Just one example:
We invaded a sovereign nation on manufactured data, spin, lies and a compliant media. We bombed the crap out of innocent people - for what? To free them (from what? Their oil, water, electricity, food and other sundry items.)
Sometimes, the only thing that keeps me going is knowing that many Bush Administration officials have been charged with war crimes. And I eagerly await their trial for crimes against humanity, for that is the only thing that will return our nation to its once greatness and worthiness of world respect.
Obama will be a great leader in that he can and will talk with people. Talking is what keeps us out of war. If we ever have to go to war it should not be preemptively for made up reasons. Obama has the smarts to not put Americans in harms way for personal reasons and greed.
Give me an elite with a great mind and the ability to use it any day - not a doddering old man who thinks that Bush is the shits.
mcfuckhead = mcstupider than bush,
if that is possible.
McCain/Bush talk like Americans are for this war or something...
Thanks to Bush, our ports are still not secure.
Our ports are our most vulnerable spots.
And Bush has done nothing to secure them.
Nothing.
Republicans are frauds.
Bush is an asshole.
McCain is an asshole hugger.
Excuse me, I'm dealing with a migraine. I will attempt to be coherent.
One should never allow stupidity on the level of Bush's to go unanswered. It seems that Obama now feels that he is a position to respond in the manner to which our current administration should have become accustomed six years (or more) ago. I say bully for him.
However, when someone whose greatest successes were all failures likens you to a major tactical error, should you laugh first? or just swat him aside like the pest he has been?
@ Political Jerk: Yes, that is gross. It is also undignified. I believe dignity to be Obama's most useful asset in this affair. It should also mark all of our responses to flagrant displays of ineptitude.
Bush and McCain just gave Obama a huge gift!!! Oh, that's a debate I'd relish.
I bet inside McCain's head he is scared shit-less of Obama. He thought he was going up against his friend, Hillary, but instead he's heading toward dealing with a guy who is way smarter than most people he knows and one who is not in awe of him. Obama can give as good as he gets, he just does it in a genteel way that takes his opponent off guard. That's what happens when you believe in what you are talking about and are not pandering for votes.
Why? Because McSame is just as dumb and clueless as his mentor, George W. Bush. This should be an easy victory for Obama, childs play.
pissed off patricia @ 12:
We had a taste when Ron Paul was on stage with him. Eye rolling can get him only so far.
Remember at press conferences bush made a big deal at least a couple of times about how he was not going to get involved in this campaign season? Guess he was not exactly telling the truth. So he goes into another country and fires across the bow at Obama. Was he too much of a coward to make his comments here in this country? Will these types of attacks continue from bush once he is back on US soil? We'll see.
Foreign soil? I thought we have all but declared Israel as the 51st state.
go get em 'Bama!!
the guy's the political equivalent of a battle MC... like Eminem, knocking moral and artistic inferiors like Britney Spears off the charts and out of conversations.
patricia's right. if McCain isn't scared, he oughta be! Obama should be as nervous of McCain as the Viet Cong were. ya, ya, I just said that...
obama would pwn those biches in a debate!!!
Senator Obama has a kind of cool that you don't see very often in politics. He doesn't talk up or down to anyone. He listens to questions and hears them before he states his reply. Often pols seem to be thinking of their pat answer before the questioner has even completed their question.
If McShit on himself has any brain cells left in that dementia saturated, tormented skull of his, he should go to Bush and tell him to fuck off and eat shit. And there's dopes out there who actually believe McWar will outdebate Obama with baggage like this. George Bush has become a Democratic operative.
McCain will not debate Obama because McCain is a chicken.
I like tougher Obama better...
Barack Obama's response to the offensive, divisive, and wrong Bush comments was awesome. The GOP is out now denying Bush meant Obama in the kennesit speech, lol. Way to go, Gobama!
I am reading Samantha Power's Chasing the Flaime (about Sergio Vieira de Mello - you know, the UN humanitarian who was killed in 03 Baghdad, and when he heard that GWB gave up golf?). Remember Power, of 'Clinton is a monster'? I read her book on genocide also. I SO want her back on the Obama team. I cannot wait to do debate party drinking games when it it McBush v. president Obama.
"Down goes Frasier! Down goes Frasier!"
pissed off patricia @ 15:
Bush, lie? No, really?
If this man had a clue, a modicum of indication that he knew how to do anything but lie, I would be thoroughly and completely amazed.
How can you tell a gooper is lying? They are breathing.
Would anybody be kind enough to explain the whole "you can't attack anyone on foreign soil" thing? I first heard this when people were complaining about the Dixie Chicks attacking Mr. Bush from (I think) England.
I understand the overall gist of why people are upset at the whole "appeasers" line, but don't get the "foreign soil" bit. Any info would be appreciated. My thanks in advance.
Moderator: First Question, Mr. Obama, where's your lapel pin? Why do you hate America?
I agreed with most of what Obama said in this speech, but... is anyone else bothered by Obama's flagrant support for Israel, one of the largest terrorist nations in the Middle East?
What a dilemma . As much as i hate dirty politics , i want Obama to tear Chimp and MC Same rather large new assholes. They deserve it. I hope this is a trend. Folks like Biden and Obama calling BushCo out for the traitorous liars they are. Make both of Bushes and MC Cains little pin heads pop like zits. Dems can go back to being nice after the Bushies are back in the shithouse of history where they belong. Its that important. Go get em Barack.
I can't help but think that John McCain doesn't really want to be President. Crazier things have happened.
Kevin Holsinger @ 27:
I think it has something to do with respect. You don't go to another country and berate someone from your own country. If you want to criticize someone in America you should have the guts to do it here, not take our dirty laundry to a foreign house to air it.
I'm not saying I necessarily agree with this in all instances, just what I believe it means.
phantom @ 29:
I know what you mean but sadly it would probably be political suicide to do anything else. I'll cut him some slack on this since Israel is our "ally".
The phrase, "foreign soil" is so stupid and out of date, I can't imagine anybody with any brains using it.
I understand that Obama is now sporting the flag pin - and he sounds like it.
Bush has a problem with Obama talking to the leaders of Iran, who have said bad things about Israel. Then, Bush goes to talk with the leaders of Saudi Arabia. Remember Saudi Arabia on 9/11/2001? When a couple dozen of their citizens physically attacked us. killing nearly 3,000 people in NYC, many more Saudi Arabians danced in the streets.
Bush should take a look in the mirror before he begins to accuse others... Oh, wait, that's right - no reflection!
SP said:
It kinda makes you wonder why John McCain would seek to tether himself to George Bush’s sinking ship, doesn’t it?
I'm of a mind that McCain, in addition to being a Bushbot of the most clone-worthy stripe, is a confused clod who is barely masking the fact that his faculties are deteriorating quickly. He doesn't get it! Any of it! People suspect that Reagan was an absentee-president towards the end? They ain't seen nothin' yet.
Don't get me wrong, I have sympathy for anybody who's brain is going-going-gone, no matter what age they are (look at Ozzy Osbourne. Heh!), but my sympathy ends at letting that same person running the country. Jeepers.
phantom Says:
I agreed with most of what Obama said in this speech, but… is anyone else bothered by Obama’s flagrant support for Israel, one of the largest terrorist nations in the Middle East?
Yes. If it weren't for the Christians who believe Israel and it's people are "chosen", and therefore allowed to behave as badly as they wish without reprimand, we probably wouldn't given them the time of day much less fifty-first state status.
I'll be happy when grown adults stop relying on fairytales to set foreign policy in this country. But, aside from this issue, I still think Obama is the best choice we have for President (aside from Al Gore of course).
pissed off patricia @ 32:
Regarding, respectfully, the first part, Kevin:
Dixie Chicks; POTUS
Dixie Chicks; POTUS
Dixie Chicks (entertainers)......President of the United States of America
Pissed off Patricia,
Thanks for the explanation. As I said, that concept's been bugging me since the Dixie Chicks thing, and that was years ago.
In reading bush's comments, I don't see where he specifically "served obama". Of course, obama would take the stance he did, because he so loves playing the victim. Several dems came to his defense, not sure why, and issued statements off the cuff. Of course, obama had to wait a day, so he could write a speech and get the teleprompters in place. obama is so much like bush, it hurts to watch.
I don't see any comments to this effect in my quick perusal of the blog, but I was actually at the event today.
What he really went after McCain for, and rightly so, was how earlier yesterday McCain gave a speech and talked about increasing the civility and raising the tone and then later agrees w/ Bush's most uncivil and inappropriate attacks on him.
This was Obama's version of "Bring it on" to Bush and McCain, enjoy it GOP.
A bit, but not totally off-topic. Shocking (or maybe not), nonetheless:
Huckabee quips about gun aimed at Obama
(from the Associated Press)
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Republican Mike Huckabee responded to an offstage noise during his speech to the National Rifle Association by suggesting it was Barack Obama diving to the floor because someone had aimed a gun at him.
Hearing a loud noise and interrupting his speech, Huckabee said: "That was Barack Obama. He just tripped off a chair. He's getting ready to speak and somebody aimed a gun at him and he — he dove for the floor."
There were only a few murmurs in the crowd after the remark.
The Obama campaign had no comment.
Huckabee, who sought the GOP presidential nomination, won the leadoff Iowa caucuses and seven other states. But he dropped out after Sen. John McCain, the likely nominee, piled up a series of big victories. An ordained Baptist minister, Huckabee attracted strong support among religious conservatives.
He and former GOP candidate Mitt Romney addressed the NRA convention Friday as did McCain.
If Obama actually garners the Democratic nomination then there will be a debate between the two. Whether or not this subject comes up will likely depend on the moderator.
Can I nominate Olberman for the job?
Obama knows in order to change anything he has to first win.
Ot but is anybody else having problems with he way the page is loading?
Yes!! Finally, a Democrat who knows how to leverage the Umbrage Effect. The Right is perfectly happy puffing up in umbrage because a Democrat makes a joke on "a Tuesday, which is the same day of the week as 9/11 happened on." Finally, Obama turns it around on them. Was the President wrong and classless to air American political laundry in front of the Knesset? Of course! It's tacky. But Obama realizes we can puff up "tacky" into a full-blown "UnAmerican" umbrage!
Keep going! Let's accuse the President of being a coward, because he goes halfway around the world to criticize the presumptive Democratic candidate. Too chicken to face Obama man to man, eh?
PssttCmere @ 40:
Indeed, it is hard to see the differences between the illiterate heir apparent of one of the most powerful and reactionary white families in this nation, and a somewhat liberal and intelligent self made man of mixed racial heritage and raised by a single mother.
it seems at last we have a candidate who will NOT take
the bullshit from bush/cheney and any of the gop reichwingneocons.
good for you obama
You're all not reading this right. McCain is winning this debate in the public eye.
By denouncing these comments as "attacks", Obama is essentially just reinforcing the idea that he can't take the heat; like sobbing: "MEANIE!" at the playground bully. In all the chattering, the average American only hears: Obama wants to talk all touchy-feely with terrorists=wuss; McCain wants to kill terrorists=war hero. Now if Obama and the Dems would hammer on the proven FAILURE of Bush/McCain policies: Republicans=incompetent, they'd have a chance. But they're trying to clarify details of who and why they want to talk to whom, and that justs gets dumbed down to they want to talk to terrorists. Obama is not fighting this in the right way.
-Scott
I think that maybe Bush talked about appeasement because his own policy is firm: Attack Iran, no talking require. I think that Bush might have been encouraging the Saudies to increase oil production to compensate for a drop in oil production in the event Iran is bombed.
Although we have the "adults" in charge, they didn't remember their history, which was, during the 8 year war between Iraq and Iran, the U.S. won. Now, so far, in the U.S.-Iraq war, Shiite Iran has won. Iran's president can come into Iraq with a red carpet rollout. Bush has to sneak in unanounced, and leave with the use of decoy aircraft. Sunni control of Iraq has been eliminated, and Shiites are in charge.
Privately, I suspect that the neocon sees the Iraq war as a bigger debacle that the public in general sees, because of the benefit of the war so far to Iran, (soft-peddled by the corporate media), and that the way to fix that is bomb Iran and set them back. So, the appeasement argument may have been political, but then again, it may be a defense of a policy already decided on, and about to ensue. Maybe a way to kill two birds with one stone.
pissed off patricia @ 4:
NOW that you mention it!....that would be the greatest subliminal diss EVER if he meant it that way!
http://z.about.com/d/politicalhumor/1/0/X/e/1/mccain_bush_brokeback.jpg
Scott @ 50:
I can't help but disagree. By this point, the American people have gotten to the point where they will listen to what Bush says and believe the exact opposite. Anything that Bush is against is automatically seen as positive in the eyes of the American people. If anything, they see Bush as the playground bully who can't even say the words correctly in his condemning speeches.
Kevin Holsinger @ 27:
It's not so much foreign soil as it is that particular soil, the occasion, and the audience. This was no flippant anti-war statement by a musician. This was a carefully-crafted and calculated political attack, using that location, occasion, and audience for added effect.
Citing Hitler, in Israel, in front of Jewish-Israeli politicians, on Israeli TV, during the 60th Anniversary of Israel celebrations to attack your domestic opponents is out of line and deeply shameful.
Unfortunately for Bush, it has backfired. McCain and the GOP will pay for this in November.
Ladies and Gents,
What you witnessed was a Chicago Beatdown. It was swift, accurate, justified and to the point. I don't think they realized they are fucking with a Chicagoan.
Well Done Brother Barack
Scott @ 50:
I disagree. Obama did cite Bush and McCain's policy failures in his South Dakota speeches today. He hit them with a vicious 1-2 punch, and handled it beautifully.
Bush is the schoolyard bully, but Obama didn't cry "Meanie". He punched him in the nose.
That's how you handle a bully and that's how you handle the GOP. Make them pay dearly for every shitty attack.
It's time to take the gloves off. Expect more of this from Obama.
yakfitguy @ 54:
Bingo
That man is far to eloquent and educated to ever be President. Just look at the last two people who lost that race in this country. Both of them were well spoken, well reasoned highly educated men. This country has no respect for sane ballenced judgement. This country wants to be the bully on the block. Every democracy must suffer its choices. This democracy forces the rest of the world to suffer our choices. Just how long do you think they are going to put up with this shit?
while he was listing bush's resume on protecting america, he left out allowing the worst attack EVER on american soil while he was busy setting the record for vacation time taken by a president and ignoring memos.
Scott @ 50:
================================
McSame might be winning the debate amongst you and your friends, but not the larger public.
yakfitguy @ 56:
=====================================
He's got it in him. If the GOP continues to piss him off, he'll "fight" back. Wait and see. He's just getting riled up now. He doesn't "fire off" blanks, just to make noise.
Could you please also post his Q&A with reporters today? (MSNBC has the Q&A video, but that does not have the initial opening remarks he seems to have made.) The Q&A section was superbly aggressive and ridiculing!
Thank you.
Our dog will fight!!
The more truth there is, the more it stings, and the more they douth protest
I'm floating a new campaign slogan:
Obama '08: It's On!
The more I see and hear of Sen Obama, the more I like this guy as the Democratic nominee. McCain is either a bloody fool, for getting into bed with Bush and agreeing with him on of all things foreign policy, or just a dickhead whose brain is ceasing to operate. I relish the thought of Obama debating McCain on all manner of topics. The more the old fellah agrees with Bush policy, the bigger hiding he will get from Obama. His advisers must be out to lunch for allowing him to even discuss the policies of penis features Bush. Yep although will be sad to see Hillary go, as she now must, the prospect of Sen Obama decimating McCain has me drooling :-)
Scott @ 50:
Exactly.
Obama is not attacking the Bush policies because he is either afraid to, or he is planning to continue them.
I suggest both.
So he makes a big deal about Bush saying his BS on "foreign soil". What a crock.
The only change we are in store for is the change with which Oblather will line his pockets.
Actually this Bush dumbass rhetoric might even help Obama more. If it's true that the dumb chimpanzee in office is much hated anything he says will have the opposite on the people.
I wouldn't worry if I were Obama. I think American people learn that if they based their vote based on gossip and smear this is what happen to them they are rewarded with asshats in office.
And what exactly happened to Natalie Maines when she criticized Bush in England? I do love the smell of hypocrisy in the morning . . .
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