The caveat of can't do.
Let Obama stand on his own sans Bush. Or Republicans.
He can't do it. And you know it.
The only pathetic merit a Liberal has to stand on is that a Liberal is not a Conservative.
Mighty fine credentials there.
Go find another game.
I'm not saying everything which has happened since Jan. 20, 2009 is still George Bushs' fault. It's not. Obama has made a mess of some things and did well in others, just like any President.
But, the condition of the Armed Forces right now is directly attributable to Bushs' decision not to seek more manpower at the beginning of the so-called "War on Terror." Worse, they actually downsized the Navy and Air Force during the midst of two wars! The repeated deployment of the same people and same equipment over and over and over again was, and is, a tragedy of the first magnitude and one which it will take decades to overcome.
And, it's NOT Obama's fault. He's shut down one pointless war and will soon remove us from another and the economy Bush left him won't allow the Armed Forces to be re-built to an efficient level for many more years now. Given the realities of the moment, Obama's shift in focus from the Middle East to Asia and his re-strategizing of the military to rely more and more on unconventional forces is not only prudent given the circumstances, but will pay huge dividends in the future as warfare transitions from a human undertaking to a mechanical one.
What this President is doing to our Armed Forces is a good thing.
Then why do so many in the military hate him?
My son wasn't political at all (he's in Psy Ops) when Obama was first elected. He really didn't care, although he did like Bush. Now he and many others wish they had Bush back! Some of the things my son has said the last couple years really surprised me, he's not the type to bash someone else unless they really deserve it. And he HATES Obama now.
You'd have to ask them, but if I had to render an opinion, I'd say there are probably several factors at play.
First, I'd ask why so other people hate the man, not just in the military. He's been a polarizing President like we haven't seen in decades and it's not because of anything he's deliberately done, but because that's how the opposition has painted him. Is it his race? I'm sure that's part of it. There are more bigoted troglodytes out there than we perhaps like to admit and now they have a focus.
But, in terms of the Armed Forces particularly, I'd suggest that a big part of the problem is that the forces have been highly politicized since the 1980's, and especially the Army, which has been targeted by Evangelical Republican's for about 30 years now. That means that the senior leadership today came up through the organization during a time when military service is spoken of in almost religious terms and politics played a huge part in moving up the chain of command.
Secondly, I suspect you'd find that right wing hate media is a significant factor too. Yes, much of it truly is hate media because it's a relentless drumbeat of negativity, emotional outrage and conspiracy theories directed at the person of the President, not so much his policies. Since we entered the era of the internet and 24 hour opinion making, there is no time to process and think because the next "story" is hot off the wires right now. That's true outside the Armed Forces too. There's no time for reflection and evaluation for the "reporters" because they're under the gun to fill all that time with something.
Thirdly, it's a soldier's right to ***** about his leadership. They always have and they always will. During my time in the Army, most of us despised Richard Nixon, and LBJ before him. We didn't think too much of Jimmy Carter either, and the farther we got into the Reagan administration, the less popular he became. It's sort of just the natural order of things.
Fourth, most American's know nothing of their history. Each generation believes what they're experiencing is The Worst Ever because they don't know any better. Obama is not the worst President we've ever had in terms of the military, but most people don't know that. So, viewing it all from the perspective of no knowledge about the past, they think the current situation is unique. It's not. A good case in point is Abraham Lincoln. Today, he's seen as one of our greatest President's and the winner of the Civil War. At the time, though, a good bit of our army, it's senior leadership and politician's in Washington couldn't stand the man. They called him names like "the original Gorilla" behind his back. Today, that would be on Facebook and thousand of blog sites. Another example was Dwight Eisenhower. As a former General, the Army counted on him to make all things better and when he cut back on the Army and handed the primary responsibility for defending the nation to the Air Force, he was just about universally hated within the Army.
Whatever the reason, though, it's nothing to worry about until, or unless, the Armed Forces begin to act out that hatred. They haven't yet and aren't likely to, so don't let it worry you. Nearly every President has been hated and despised by at least one part of the Armed Forces throughout our history, but they still did their job and obeyed orders. Today's Armed Forces are doing the same and I'm sure that if any soldier took it upon himself to resist the lawful authority of the President, he'd quickly find himself in very deep water. In fact, that's already happened to several of them.
And by the way....that war you say Obama shut down was already planned to shut down by Bush back in '08. Obama wanted the military to stay longer, but the leaders in Iraq wouldn't give them immunity to their laws and Obama had no choice but to get them out in the timeline Bush set. Obama gets no credit for this....
He doesn't get credit of resisting the Iraqi's insistence that US forces be subject to Iraqi law either and he should. That would have been a catastrophe for our remaining soldiers and I, for one, am thrilled that he told the Iraqi government WE BOUGHT AND PAID FOR WITH THE LIVES OF OUR SOLDIERS to take a hike.
