The Contest Everyone Has Been Waiting For: Obama v. O'Reilly, Head-to-Head
September 4th 2008 22:47
Last night something happened that no one thought would ever be in the realm of possibilities. Last night in York, Pennsylvania, Barack Obama sat down with a commentator to discuss issues of the economy, national security and other pressing issues affecting the election. That in and of itself is not surprising, but what is surprising is who he sat down with. After years of dodging direct appeals to come on his show, Barack Obama finally sat down for a two part interview with the Papa Bear of the vocal right-wing: Bill O’Reilly. It couldn’t be more perfectly timed for Obama, really. In a week that Obama had already promised would be left to the Republicans to celebrate their nominees, Obama will take some of the spotlight away from the GOP with the legions of loyal O’Reilly viewers directing their attention to The O’Reilly Factor to watch the first part of the Obama interview tonight. While on the last night of the Democratic National Convention, McCain popped his head in to congratulate Obama on his historic nomination, Obama pops his head in on the last night of the Republican Convention to cut into the attentions of the right-wing Fox News viewers only hours before McCain is due to speak. And not to congratulate his opponent either.
But it was a catch-22 for O’Reilly. He has been railing against Obama for over a year, pointing out that the Democratic candidate has been too weak to come on the show to prove his credentials. When Obama finally agrees, it’s not like O’Reilly can say no. And so the first half of Obama’s interview airs tonight. From the sneak peeks that have already been leaked, it seems like Obama has a lot to say to Bill about national security, including some things that are sure to fire up the man known for his latent rage. Then there are other things he is supposedly to say that will come as a bit of a surprise to his own loyalists. According to reports, Obama is due to say that the troop surge in Iraq “succeeded in ways no one anticipated” and that it “succeeded beyond our wildest dreams”. It’s a pretty big concession. Obama and the Democratic Party in general were amongst the biggest detractors from the surge. They said it wouldn’t work, that the war was “already lost” and that pouring more troops into the situation would do nothing to help. To turn around on the heels of the Republican National Convention and agree that the surge worked is particularly poignant considering that the biggest advocate of the move, bigger even than Bush himself, was Obama’s opponent John McCain. McCain’s support for the surge at an unpopular time was thought to have been the death knell for his campaign and the source of his often quoted statement “I’d rather lose an election than lose a war”. Obama’s concession will inevitably be picked up by the McCain campaign and they will run it to death as their way to prove “we were right”. That is, if anyone is watching in the run-up to the McCain speech. Let’s just hope someone set the VCR.
Obama also relents with O’Reilly that Iran cannot be allowed to have a nuclear weapon and that it would be a “game changer”. He also says he would never take military action off the table. He admits that Iran has funded and supported terrorism against the United States, but also warns of lumping all Islamic extremists into the same basket in saying:
“They have fuelled a whole host of terrorist organizations but we have to have the ability to distinguish between groups. … They may not all be part and parcel of the same ideology.”
So what Obama is fundamentally saying here is that Iran may fund and support terrorist groups but we have to be careful not to assume they have the same ideology as those they support that take the lives of Western “infidels”. I’m not sure I follow that line of thought. If a state supports terrorism then it is, by definition, a state-sponsor of terrorism. If a state-sponsored terrorist group intentionally goes out to take lives then those states must be held accountable as part of the problem. It is not enough to acknowledge a state’s sponsorship of terrorism and to then to turn around and say you will give them the benefit of the doubt because their “ideology may not be the same” as the groups they support. I don’t disagree with Obama’s plan to talk with Iran to at least get a sense of the relationship and the opportunities that exist between the two nations at the beginning of the presidential term. But what I don’t agree with is to go into that meeting with your eyes blinded to the truth of the matter. If you are going to meet with terrorists, at least acknowledge that they are terrorists. Obama needs to take a lesson from his Veep Joe Biden on this one. Biden went to Yugoslavia during the Balkans conflict and he told Slobodan Milosevic to his face that he was a war criminal. That kind of courage and integrity is absolutely commendable and if Obama insists on meeting with the Iranians he has to acknowledge the truth. Without doing so he only feeds into Iran’s desire to be an international player. The McCain campaign will undoubtedly seize on Obama’s seemingly ‘soft stance’ on terrorist sponsors as a way to point out that Obama might be a bit naive to be walking into negotiations representing the rest of the free world.
That is, if someone from the McCain campaign remembered to set the VCR.
But it was a catch-22 for O’Reilly. He has been railing against Obama for over a year, pointing out that the Democratic candidate has been too weak to come on the show to prove his credentials. When Obama finally agrees, it’s not like O’Reilly can say no. And so the first half of Obama’s interview airs tonight. From the sneak peeks that have already been leaked, it seems like Obama has a lot to say to Bill about national security, including some things that are sure to fire up the man known for his latent rage. Then there are other things he is supposedly to say that will come as a bit of a surprise to his own loyalists. According to reports, Obama is due to say that the troop surge in Iraq “succeeded in ways no one anticipated” and that it “succeeded beyond our wildest dreams”. It’s a pretty big concession. Obama and the Democratic Party in general were amongst the biggest detractors from the surge. They said it wouldn’t work, that the war was “already lost” and that pouring more troops into the situation would do nothing to help. To turn around on the heels of the Republican National Convention and agree that the surge worked is particularly poignant considering that the biggest advocate of the move, bigger even than Bush himself, was Obama’s opponent John McCain. McCain’s support for the surge at an unpopular time was thought to have been the death knell for his campaign and the source of his often quoted statement “I’d rather lose an election than lose a war”. Obama’s concession will inevitably be picked up by the McCain campaign and they will run it to death as their way to prove “we were right”. That is, if anyone is watching in the run-up to the McCain speech. Let’s just hope someone set the VCR.
Obama also relents with O’Reilly that Iran cannot be allowed to have a nuclear weapon and that it would be a “game changer”. He also says he would never take military action off the table. He admits that Iran has funded and supported terrorism against the United States, but also warns of lumping all Islamic extremists into the same basket in saying:
“They have fuelled a whole host of terrorist organizations but we have to have the ability to distinguish between groups. … They may not all be part and parcel of the same ideology.”
So what Obama is fundamentally saying here is that Iran may fund and support terrorist groups but we have to be careful not to assume they have the same ideology as those they support that take the lives of Western “infidels”. I’m not sure I follow that line of thought. If a state supports terrorism then it is, by definition, a state-sponsor of terrorism. If a state-sponsored terrorist group intentionally goes out to take lives then those states must be held accountable as part of the problem. It is not enough to acknowledge a state’s sponsorship of terrorism and to then to turn around and say you will give them the benefit of the doubt because their “ideology may not be the same” as the groups they support. I don’t disagree with Obama’s plan to talk with Iran to at least get a sense of the relationship and the opportunities that exist between the two nations at the beginning of the presidential term. But what I don’t agree with is to go into that meeting with your eyes blinded to the truth of the matter. If you are going to meet with terrorists, at least acknowledge that they are terrorists. Obama needs to take a lesson from his Veep Joe Biden on this one. Biden went to Yugoslavia during the Balkans conflict and he told Slobodan Milosevic to his face that he was a war criminal. That kind of courage and integrity is absolutely commendable and if Obama insists on meeting with the Iranians he has to acknowledge the truth. Without doing so he only feeds into Iran’s desire to be an international player. The McCain campaign will undoubtedly seize on Obama’s seemingly ‘soft stance’ on terrorist sponsors as a way to point out that Obama might be a bit naive to be walking into negotiations representing the rest of the free world.
That is, if someone from the McCain campaign remembered to set the VCR.
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