Coltrane's Blog

Obama Remarks on Detainees and Afghanistan

June 18, 2008

 As Prepared

Good afternoon. We just finished the first meeting of my new Senior Working Group on National Security. We had a productive discussion about the challenges facing our nation, and I’m grateful that these distinguished men and women will be advising me in the months to come.

As we discussed in the meeting, we face serious challenges to our security. Our nation is fighting two wars. There are terrorists who are determined to kill as many Americans as they can. The world’s most dangerous weapons risk falling into the wrong hands. And that is why the single greatest priority of my presidency will be doing anything and everything that I can to keep the American people safe.

In the face of these real threats, we can’t afford another campaign in which national security issues—and the truth– are distorted and manipulated. So let me take this opportunity to talk about some of the attacks that the McCain campaign has made the last few days. For all his talk about civil debate and bipartisanship, Senator McCain has shown that he’s going to use predictable, petty and divisive attacks to try to score a few political points on national security. If these attacks seem familiar, it’s because they are. It’s the same tired political playbook that George Bush and Karl Rove have used for eight years. And it’s a political strategy that’s been used to prop up policies that have completely failed.

First, let me say a few words about Guantanamo. By any measure, our system of trying detainees has been an enormous failure. Over the course of nearly seven years, there has not been a single conviction for a terrorist act at Guantanamo. There has been just one conviction for material support for terrorism. Meanwhile, this legal black hole has substantially set back America’s ability to lead the world against the threat of terrorism, and undermined our most basic values. Make no mistake: we are less safe because of the way George Bush has handled this.

My approach is guided by a simple premise: I have confidence that our system of justice is strong enough to deal with terrorists; Senator McCain does not. That is not the same as giving these detainees the same full privileges as Americans citizens. I never said that, the Supreme Court never said that, and I would never do that as President of the United States. So either Senator McCain’s campaign doesn’t understand what the Court decided, or they are distorting my position.

I have made the same arguments as Republicans like Arlen Specter, countless Generals and national security experts, and the largely Republican-appointed Supreme Court of the United States of America – which is that we need not throw away 200 years of American jurisprudence while we fight terrorism. We do not need to choose between our most deeply held values, and keeping this nation safe. That’s a false choice, and I completely reject it.

Now in their attempt to distort my position, Senator McCain’s campaign has said I want to pursue a law enforcement approach to terrorism. This is demonstrably false, since I have laid out a comprehensive counter-terrorism strategy that includes military force, intelligence operations, financial sanctions and diplomatic action. But the fact that I want to abide by the United States Constitution, they say, shows that I have a “pre-9/11 mindset.”

Well I refuse to be lectured on national security by people who are responsible for the most disastrous set of foreign policy decisions in the recent history of the United States. The other side likes to use 9/11 as a political bludgeon. Well, let’s talk about 9/11.

The people who were responsible for murdering 3,000 Americans on 9/11 have not been brought to justice. They are Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda and their sponsors – the Taliban. They were in Afghanistan. And yet George Bush and John McCain decided in 2002 that we should take our eye off of Afghanistan so that we could invade and occupy a country that had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11. The case for war in Iraq was so thin that George Bush and John McCain had to hype the threat of Saddam Hussein, and make false promises that we’d be greeted as liberators. They misled the American people, and took us into a misguided war.

Here are the results of their policy. Osama bin Laden and his top leadership – the people who murdered 3000 Americans – have a safe-haven in northwest Pakistan, where they operate with such freedom of action that they can still put out hate-filled audiotapes to the outside world. That’s the result of the Bush-McCain approach to the war on terrorism.

We had al Qaeda and the Taliban on the run back in 2002. But then we diverted military, intelligence, financial, and diplomatic resources to Iraq. And yet Senator McCain has said as recently as this April that, “Afghanistan is not in trouble because of our diversion to Iraq.” I think that just shows a dangerous misjudgment of the facts, and a stubborn determination to ignore the need to finish the fight in Afghanistan.

Our military is overstretched in Iraq. We have nearly 150,000 troops in Iraq, many on their second, third, or fourth tour of duty. Meanwhile, Afghanistan is sliding toward chaos, and risks turning into a narco-terrorist state. The Taliban is on the offensive in the south. A recent Taliban prison break in Kandahar freed hundreds of militants, and underscored the volatile situation on the ground. The coalition casualties in Afghanistan last month were higher than in Iraq. That’s the result of the Bush-McCain approach to the war on terrorism.

We need more resources in Afghanistan. I have been arguing for this since 2002, when I said that we should finish the fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban instead of going into Iraq. I have called for at least two additional combat brigades to support our efforts there. I have also called for at least $1 billion in non-military assistance each year. And I have repeatedly challenged George Bush and John McCain’s refusal to hold the Pakistani government accountable for their inability to crack down on al Qaeda and the Taliban operating within their borders. Because we are not going to get Afghanistan right until we get our Pakistan policy right.

So we have a choice in this election. We can listen to the other side make the same false arguments about why we need to violate our Constitution, stay in Iraq indefinitely, build permanent bases in a country that doesn’t want them, and keep shortchanging our effort in Afghanistan and our ability to deal with nearly every other national security challenge that we face.

We can do that. Or, we can finally end this disastrous approach to national security. Because the record shows that George Bush and John McCain have been weak on terrorism. Their approach has failed. Because of their policies, we are less safe, less respected, and less able to lead the world. It’s time to turn the page. It’s time to end the war in Iraq responsibly. It’s time to stop wasting time, and to start putting away terrorists. It’s time to finally take out al Qaeda’s top leadership, and to finish the fight in Afghanistan. It’s time to restore our standing so that we can once again lead the world. That’s why I’m running for President of the United States.

*You may now return to the petty blogs dealing with porta-potties and head scarfs.*

A blog titled "I want higher gas prices" posted earlier today is a misrepresentation of Obama's quote. The accurate quote can be found at the following URL:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/momocrats/fox-news-sl
y-distortion-o_b_106662.html

Posted June 12, 2008 | 12:59 AM (EST)

MOMocrat Jaelithe throws a wrench into the Fox News spin cycle, reporting on a sly distortion of a statement by Barack Obama regarding the high price of gas.

MOMocrats recently received an interesting email from the McCain campaign, entitled "FOX -- Obama says sky high gas prices a good thing." The email quoted this exchange from the Fox News Channel, between Fox News pundit Shephard Smith and Republican Senator Mitch McConnell.

 SHEPARD SMITH: Could sky high gas prices actually be a good thing? A top Republican is going after Barack Obama saying that he suggested just that. Obama is saying that the problem isn't that prices are too high, just that they shot up too quickly. He told CNBC today "if we take some steps right now to help people make the adjustment than I think ultimately we can come out of this stronger and have a more energy efficient policy than we do right now." Well, the top Republican in the Senate having a field day with that statement.

 SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL: The position outlined by the Democratic nominee shouldn't a surprise to most Americans given that Washington Democrats have repeatedly refused to allow increased energy production here at home - even though as we all know increase supply leads to lower prices.

SMITH: Senator McConnell saying it is like they're going out of their way to keep gas prices from going down. So far, no response from the Obama camp. We'll get it to you when it comes in.

 Sounds like the McCain camp just struck campaign trail gold, right? Obama caught saying that the current record high gas prices are a good thing? When so many hard-working Americans are suffering, struggling to pay their fuel bills?

Trouble is, it's not true. The Obama quote Smith used was edited and taken out of context. And Smith's and McConnell's characterization of what Obama said recently during an interview with CNBC's John Harwood is simplistic and misleading. Here's what Obama actually said:

Sen. OBAMA: I think that I would have preferred a gradual adjustment. The fact that this is such a shock to American pocketbooks is not a good thing. But if we take some steps right now to help people make the adjustment, first of all by putting more money into their pockets, but also by encouraging the market to adapt to these new circumstances more quickly, particularly US automakers, then I think ultimately, we can come out of this stronger and have a more efficient energy policy than we do right now.

 Fight the smears!

http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/fightthesmears
home/

Obama's Anti-Rumor Plan

Thursday, Jun. 12, 2008 By KAREN TUMULTY/WASHINGTON

 ". . .Obama told his top aides it was time for a more aggressive solution to the rumors that have been popping up on the Internet about him and his family for months. And so the Obama campaign has built what might best be described as a Web-based rumor clearinghouse, located at fightthesmears.com, in which it hopes all the shady stories about Obama's faith, his family and his rumored connections with controversial figures can go to die.

Obama is enlisting his millions of supporters to help him hunt down and quash these stories, just as those supporters helped him turn his insurgent campaign into a history-making juggernaut. Says Obama adviser Anita Dunn: "We will not allow Michelle — or, for that matter, Barack—to be defined by rumors."

This will not stop the out of control, hateful, falsehood posts of bloggers like superman, kestral, scotty, char, ivy, etc., but it can serve as a resource to dubunk the silliness they try to pass off as truth.

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