Anti-War Activists Worried Obama Betraying Them With Hawkish Cabinet

LA Times:

Antiwar groups and other liberal activists are increasingly concerned at signs that Barack Obama's national security team will be dominated by appointees who favored the Iraq invasion and hold hawkish views on other important foreign policy issues.

The activists are uneasy not only about signs that both Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates could be in the Obama Cabinet, but at reports suggesting that several other short-list candidates for top security posts backed the decision to go to war.

Read the whole story: LA Times

Comments

[robeson]

I'm not worried. The war supporters now have a chance at redemption, plus the military and treasury are both busted. Even the Bush WH is drawing 'arbitrary' time lines. I think Obama sees the problem very clearly. There were around 200 al-Qaeda at 9-11. Maybe after a trillion dollars and a million lives there are still 100 al-Qaeda. Obama and I say, what the f... How could anyone be so incompetent? Barbara Bush knew and warned us that we got the wrong one.

[wdw102]

"a million lives" what?

[sixx]

BBC, "A survey published by a UK-based polling agency Opinion Research Business in September 2007 suggested up to 1.2m people might have died because of the conflict."

WHAT!

[ajax2]

When you have some facts return.

[wdw102]

it's only just over 4000 dead..........give me a break please "a million lives".......swim back from the deep end it is too deep there for you

[ajax2]

This ain't the south wdw. Iraqi lives count as a whole person. Jump back in your cesspool of bigotry.

[zepfan81]

If you think any Commander-in-Chief is going to be able to tow an anti-war line you must have been dropped on your head as a child.

[oobatzcattlecall]

So true, What are we to do but deal with the wars we are unfortunately involved in and sustain a viable military? His choices wouldn't be so overtly "hawkish" appearing if the stakes he's inheriting weren't so high.

[blood1]

There is there a relevant question that could be asked/answered, now, such as: "Knowing now that the facts presented by the GOP were "manufactured", would you change your vote on the Iraq War? Gee, what would any sane person answer?

When selecting individuals to place in the cabinet, I am confident that there are numerous criteria that are evaluated, but the position on the Iraq war would be low, as it is now moot.

As this parlor game of second guessing and criticizing president-elect Obama cabinet continues, mostly through MSM, all those who voted for Obama should take a deep breath. We will all have 4 years in which to voice our opinion. The pre-emptive rallies of protest may give you something to do...I suggest an alternative action: Review the Plum Book and research one of the agencies to identify an opportunity to reduce cost...so that plans to improve our country can move forward. For example - l looked at some of the Agencies / Foundations and reported my findings on the Obama.gov website. This endeavor identified several that have had no action or are duplicate actions of other agencies, which if combined could reduce the annual budget. That as I see it is Positive Action. Just a thought!

[wdw102]

no, i see more negative things in bo's policies even on his website...obstruction is the way......why not start now

[canucklivinginUSA]

Dude, drugs are bad, mkay

[Hawka]

Been taking too many medications I see, need to lay of that stuff man, you're becoming delusional now.

[mcantwell]

The last I read, the Iraq's have already set a timetable for the U.S. to withdraw from Iraq. They don't want us there, and if some of the factions have it their way, we will be booted out much sooner.

[Kerris]

Riiiight. Folks, my fellow Americans.... can we actually wait until he appoints a cabinet and (dare I say it?) see what they do, before we start wringing our hands and crying out woe-is-me-what-have-we-done?

I mean, jeesh. It's not even Thanksgiving yet... the Inauguration's still months away.

[wdw102]

no, undermining him is good

[teron678]

you folks lost in a landslide ...

go join your GOP comrades in their soul searching ...

[Jethro13]

Undermining Him is a way of undermining the entire country, Including yourself. He isn't the Student council President that you just don't like because he's the good looking popular guy and you were the geek in High School. He is the leader of the free world and can make this world a better place. We have seen the effect our leader has on the world with George Bush. he has weakened our nation and the entire global economy is collapsing. All why he shrugged it off and didn't care because he was proped up by the King of Saudi Arabia.

[sepiasiren]

How patriotic of you wdw102 -- not traitorous at all...good lord * rolls eyes*

[AndrewInToronto]

While waiting in a sense is good, I received an automated email from being on the Obama campaign's list talking about how the organizations and networks which have been created, can now be mobilized post-election for community organizing. Almost 16 years ago I remember reading two Marxist economists who were addressing the possibility of the then-blossoming internet becoming a tool for direct democracy; I think we are seeing the beginnings of that now thank goodness. Expressing one's views on potential appointees to the cabinet for me fits into that message: a participatory democracy on the move. Were this to exist in Canada, I would be ecstatic. Alas, I can only live vicariously through my American neighbours.

[CAPlatt]

If anyone voted for Obama thinking he was going to veer the MIC one iota from control of this country, they were foolish. He stated time and again that he was for war as long as it was in the right location. Let's face it folks - Big O was merely the lesser of two evils. It is great to see a black man take the reins, but this horse is still going down the wrong track. In the end, we are eventually going to realize that the persistent thing that is screwed up about this country is the MIC and that war isn't, in the long run, good for business or anything else.

[AndrewInToronto]

An interesting metaphor and one which I sincerely hope is proved wrong in time. I too have my fears, though. My dilemma is: trying to decipher whether that which was said was done so because he had to do so, lest he be tainted with an even wider "liberal" brush and so discredited OR he truly meant it. I'm hoping it is the former and that the community-organizer and organized-labour supporter will shine through. Similarly, I'm hoping that having potentially more strident politicians which GOP supporters may have respected now offering a different line may be one of Obama's tools to change the direction of foreign policy from belligerence and militarism to use of international institutions and cooperative dialogue.

[wdw102]

we can hope he gets no cooperation........then beat on the republicans to obstruct

[jcwtts1]

People, Obama is doing what he has to in order to end the war in Iraq. You can't end the war with light-weight. You need to bring in the heaviest of the heavy weights. Further you need continuity of leadership for the first year. Bush dumped everyone in some kind of holy GOP purge and we got 9/11. You ease people out who hold sensitive positions. Powell was head of the JCOS for over a year for Clinton.

[FilthyHarry]

Unfortunately Obama's stance against the Iraq war has been interpreted as meaning he is anti-war in general. As far as I know there is no reason to believe this.

[Kerris]

Precisely. Especially since his reasoning behind ending the war in Iraq is, in part, so we can focus more forces where they will count more -- Afghanistan.

He's got a lot of sensitive work to do. Waging war(s) is part and parcel of our near and mid future.... waging them coherently and with an eye towards ending them without a hundred-year occupation is the point.

[AndrewInToronto]

I would agree in part given that he constantly referenced his opposition to invading and occupying Iraq as taking the eye off of Afghanistan. Having said that, there were encouraging words in an otherwise mixed message during his speech before the Siegessäule (although his historical synopsis of central European post-WWII politics for me was highly skewed as viewed through an almost Reagan-like lense). Again, though, that could have been for selective GOP consumption at home.

[mirage2008]

Let the guy actually start the job and give him a few months. If THEN it doesn't look like the pull out he promised is at least in progress, you can start pissing at him. But he hasn't even been sworn in yet!

[wdw102]

no, i'm ready to help him fail in putting his policies in play now

[zippitydoo]

just little old you......smallness begets smallness

[sepiasiren]

then you are a traitor and not an American because you are not putting COUNTRY FIRST idiot

[MossyOak]

I don't know how anyone who listened to Obama came away thinking he was a dove. He's quite the opposite. This is a perpetuation of the conservative lie that liberals are soft and cannot keep us safe.

[hapiday]

The current administration is a good example to not follow for PE Obama. There were too many yes men and women who has helped to leave the country in disarray. PE Obama didn't vote for the war and he stands by that decision. By selecting the same people who voted for the war will now have to see the damage they have caused. They will now have to have hands on experience to clean up the mess they helped to create. It's a good move on PE Obama's part.

[canucklivinginUSA]

Oh man, you are absolutely right! That is brilliant.

[kimhoulian]

my goodness people can't these people be allowed to redeem themselves by undoing what they have done under Bush by following Obama policies. Just because they screwed things up under Bush doesn't mean they will under Obama.

[KickerBoard]

Here's a thought - appoint other, equally qualified people, who didn't screw anything up - or cause the current, unnecessary U.S. military body count on an illegal, unnecessary war.

[x004Ronin]

Jeez, Obama had not even been sworn in and already people are freaking out about him disappointing you. If Obama goes on a rampage and starts another war or two, then yes, anti-war folks, you should feel disappointed. If he does his best to end the two current wars and has diplomatic success, then anti-war folks should feel happy. However, since he has done neither of those (seeing as he's not President yet), I suggest they chill out for now....

[darlos]

I'm not ready to jump all over Obama, but I'm starting to get just a little concerned that we
are seeing so much of the Clinton people on his team. He talked about real change in Washington, fresh ideas, a new way of governing. Where are the fresh faces with fresh ideas? The Clinton era was not a change in any respect. Remember it was his economic team that recommended removing regulation from the financial markets, and Bill signed the bill. It's up to us to hold Obama's feet to the fire. He's not immune from the the principle that power corrupts.

[wdw102]

he is just clinton jr.

[MossyOak]

Better strap on that parachute. You're falling fast.

[canucklivinginUSA]

yawn

[iPolitics]

Obama was very clear during the campaign. I think people hear what they want to hear.

He said: timeline to get out of Iraq likely by 2011. Shift troops to Afghanistan to stabilize things there where the t*rrorists are really based along with using special forces to go after Osam* in Pakistan.