Abu Hatem أبو حاتم

On foreign policy, the democrats and the GOP are two sides of the same coin.  Sure, there are a few pro-peace international law abiding democrats like Dennis Kucinich in the House, and sure there are noninterventionists and realist republicans - like Chuck Hagel and Ron Paul.  But, for the most part, the interventionist strand of both parties is inherent in their every being.  Of course, some are more interventionist than others, such as Bush’s hyperinterventionism, but in the end it is all alike.

Case-in-point: For contemporary presidential standards, the average is that president-elect Obama is going to start at least one war.  Bush started two main military interventions - Iraq and Afghanistan.  His predecessor, Clinton, bombed Iraq, intervened in Bosnia and Kossovo, and against Somalia.  Before that Bush I went into Panama to get Manuel Noriega, and started Gulf War I.

For those of us who fell for his rhetoric, especially in the primaries, like “I will talk to countries who do not like us,” Obama’s actions don’t match his words.

His first appointment to government, Senator Joe Biden for VP, was a disaster.  Biden is one of the biggest democratic hawks in the senate.  Although the man voted agianst the first Gulf War, he has supported almost every American intervention since, and is in bed with foreign lobbyists from Georgia to Israel.  As his second major appointment, Obama picked Rahm Emmanuel, a foul mouthed war hawk democrat who strongly supported the Iraq war.  For his third major appointment, it looks like Obama is picking Hillary Clinton - the same Clinton who wanted to bomb Iran, promising, ahem… “obliteration,” if they touched Israel during the primaries - and the same Clinton which former New York Times neoconservative columnist Bill Safire praised saying that in a Clinton-Emmanuel ticket the slogan would be “Invade and bomb - with Hillary and Rahm.”

And to top off the cake, the absolute worst war hawk in the entire senate - other than John McCain - Mr. Joe Liberman, was given chairmanship of the Homeland Security committee by Senate democrats today, a move supported by Obama.  What?  Joe Liberman!  Didn’t he campaign for the OTHER guy’s foreign policy?  A lot of change…

Obama is picking the same old people, like Eric Holder for Attorney General, from the Clinton White House, there is no change.  These people are all two sides of the same coin.  While the GOP will certainly never be my home, neither will the horrible democrats.

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