OBAMA STRUGGLES TO KEEP ANOTHER PROMISE -- THIS ONE ON CHEMICAL ATTACKS IN SYRIA

 


Verne Strickland / September 1, 2013

Our fearless dictator is afraid – very afraid. He should be. Following his usual pattern of resorting to political dodge ball, he has frantically sought out every opportunity to avoid making a decision on punishing Syria for the murderous gas attack on its own citizens. 

He has said he will consult Congress to get the legislative body’s take on this whole debacle. Is he being magnanimous? Obama magnanimous? Au contraire, friends.

His intent will be to use Congress not only to share the blame when things go wrong -- which they will -- but to totally shift all responsibility into the lap the legislative branch. We wanted him to be transparent? Believe me, he is. We can all see straight through him. 

The “president” rarely finds himself painted into a corner like this – one of his own making. He used only a daub or two of paint to lay down the infamous “red line”, which he has boastfully used for tough talk on the evening news – until his worst fears were realized.

The unthinkable happened, as it often does, as a devastating  chemical attack killed an estimated 144,000 innocent Syrian civilians. The world – at least the non-Muslim part of it – reacted with horror and revulsion.  

And Obama? Well, between cheating his ball out of the rough on some golf course, and getting brief briefs on his Boysenberry phone about the shocking mass murder in Syria, has stayed up on the latest developments in the crisis zone.

Like he did as the situation in Benghazi  reached its zenith, ultimately resulting in the maiming and murder of our U.S. Ambassador, and the killing of four other heroic Americans left alone in a seemingly preventable emergency.

I would feel a lot better if our Preventer in Chief, and his Lady in Waiting, Hillary Clinton, had acted on their obligation to immediately tend to that gruesome attack by radical muslim terrorists, investigate it without delay, identify the first team jihadists and kill them, while finding out who in the Administration lied, and clean house.

Unfortunately for him, there is abundant evidence that the President himself was among the insiders who cloaked the facts in secrecy, and his record of complicity in this type of dirty dealings, like a boomerang, is swooping back to the hand that launched it in the first place.

Obama apparently hopes that a tempered response will mean less trouble for him. It is a half-measure which will satisfy no one. After which the President will move on to the next challenge – deeper confusion, less control over the outcome, no recovery of the declining American reputation as a world leader, unknown consequences of retaliation from rabid muslim aggressors, as well as from others who want the worst possible outcome for the U.S. – and, sadly, Israel as well.

As Obama scrambled for explanations for all of his multiple miscues and delays, he went before the cameras and microphones to try to buy time – not for Syria, not for America – but for the sake of his own personal political reputation, which he likes to call his “legacy”. 

This excerpt from an NBC News report summarizes some of the most recent activity in Washington:

Obama condemned Assad's regime, describing the alleged chemical attack as "an assault on human dignity" that "presents a serious danger to our national security." He had previously characterized the use of chemical weapons as a "red line" Assad should not be permitted to cross.
Obama pledged that any military involvement would be of "limited duration and scope."
"This would not be an open-ended intervention," he said. "We would not put boots on the ground."
Before revealing he would seek approval from Congress, the President made clear that "we are prepared to strike whenever we choose." 
Strikes would be "effective tomorrow or next week or one month from now," Obama said, adding that he is "prepared to give that order."
And yet many rebel groups aligned with the opposition to Assad expressed dismay with the apparent postponement of military intervention. One rebel spokesman told NBC News: “President Obama is sending contradictory messages. He promised to help, and now promises delays.”
“If Congress votes against a military action,” the spokesman said, “it will mean the American people don’t want to help the Syrian people.”

Oh, what a tangled web we weave .  .  .  and I think you know the rest.