He could at least stop playing golf
President-elect Barack Obama plays a little golf during his vacation last week in Hawaii. Al Jazeera contrasted footage of Obama on vacation with scenes of the carnage in Gaza, noting what it called "the deafening silence of the Obama team." (Tim Sloan / Getty-AFP / December 29, 2008)Readers of mine will know that I am no fan of Barack Obama's, but I confess that I never expected him to prove me right by defining himself so quickly... even before being sworn in as President.
Israeli ground troops have started to enter the Gaza Strip, Israeli military officials have confirmed, a week after the offensive against Hamas began.(...) Earlier, Israel intensified air and artillery attacks on the territory. (...) The UN has warned of a worsening humanitarian crisis, and believes 25% of more than 400 Palestinians killed by Israel so far were civilians.(...) there are said to be some 10,000 Israeli troops and hundreds of tanks massed on the border with Gaza. The office of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has also announced that the government has ordered the urgent call-up of "tens of thousands" of extra military reservists. BBC News
"We want him to say something at least to stop the bloodshed," said Suhail Natour, a Palestinian activist who lives in the Mar Elias Palestinian refugee camp in Beirut. "Waiting until the 20th, with the bloodshed continuing, I don't think is an acceptable way of confirming a new policy in the Middle East. Silence on this means complicity." Chicago Tribune
What is happening in Gaza is huge, grotesquely tragic... It is like watching a cat play with a small animal before killing it... endlessly mauling it... warming to its work.
People all over the world have placed great hopes in Barack Obama and his "yes we can - change we can believe in" and they are waiting for a word... only a word... and while people are dying horribly, he is playing golf. Being photographed playing golf at a moment like this is as tone deaf as Bush looking out of plane at the ruins of New Orleans was... much more tone deaf in my opinion.
I'm sorry, but the "one president at a time" thing is not good enough. He had a lot to say about the Mumbai attacks:
"President-Elect Obama strongly condemns today's terrorist attacks in Mumbai, and his thoughts and prayers are with the victims, their families, and the people of India. These coordinated attacks on innocent civilians demonstrate the grave and urgent threat of terrorism." Brooke Anderson, Obama's Chief National Security SpokespersonAnd positively loquacious when it come to the economy:
President-elect Barack Obama on Saturday said the struggling U.S. economy could face more challenges and urged lawmakers to act quickly on recovery proposals even as some Republicans expressed concerns about plans for a huge stimulus package. "As we mark the beginning of a new year, we also know that America faces great and growing challenges -- challenges that threaten our nation's economy and our dreams for the future," Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address. ReutersBut, when in their moment of agony, the Palestinians waited for a word from Obama and the word finally was:
FORE!
http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com/
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It is gratifying to be, for once, in 100% agreement with you David. Israel has been engaged in an extended, barbarous campaign to commit politicide-by-siege against Gazan society, culminating in this savage onslaught against the slum-dwelling Gazan wrethches, and now including a ground invasion. It will be a bloodbath. Obama is now fully complicit in these outrages.
I've lost a tremendous amount of respect for Obama. I can't say I expected much better once he selected people like Rahm Emmanuel, Hillary Clinton and Robert Gates to head his team. But this confirms the worst fears.
But it goes beyond Bush and Obama. America itself is missing in action. Where are they? Watching college football it seems.
January 3, 2009 4:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
For the sake of accuracy, it is "FORE!"
January 3, 2009 5:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not so sure. When it comes to this eternal waste of American time and treasure, maybe it would be best if the American President continued to play golf. When in the last 50 years have we come anywhere near solving the problem? Maybe if both sides knew they were going to be totally ignored, they'd have to stop acting like 2 year olds armed with lethal weapons, grow up, and start solving their own problems.
January 3, 2009 5:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Bluebell, I can't accept your implicit moral equivalence between the Gazans and the Israelis. The Israelis are a major military power, armed with nuclear weapons and state of the art hardware. They have been engaged in a decades-long campaign to impoverish, confine, control and ultimately destroy the Palestinian Arab community. Gaza is in effect a large internment camp filled with the impoverished masses that Israel has dispossessed and confined there. For months now, Israel has been attempting to pulverize and subjugate Gazan society by shutting down its interaction with the outside world, including keeping media out so that the world won't see the devastation. The two parties are not equally to blame.
Obama doesn't have to solve the problem. Maybe no one can. But he should at least take a stand against oppression and savagery.
January 3, 2009 5:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
Dan, I have to admit that I don't care very much. We routinely ignore the deaths of uncounted millions in Africa and Asia from various savage regimes. The decades of useless concern for the Palestinians has always struck me as hypocritical. For that matter, the obsessive concern about the loss of relatively few Israeli lives is also totally excessive. If you are a Jew with family in Israel, I understand the obsession, but for the rest of us to pretend that we really care is pointless and I think counterproductive. I care more about our own actions in Iraq and Afghanistan for which we are entirely responsible.
January 3, 2009 6:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree for the most part... although I think that a president should NEVER be able to play golf (or 8-bit video games, for that matter) while she's in office. If the job is horrible enough, then maybe we'll only get presidents who really want to do the right thing.
January 4, 2009 3:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey David. Would you like it better if he was playing pool? Give it a rest.
All those fine comments and blogs over the holidays and now you go back to being an Obama Basher.
HE IS NOT PRESIDENT YET.
January 3, 2009 5:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
He should be acting like he's President. These issues are not "above his paygrade"
January 3, 2009 6:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
You'd complain if he did. So would David. Then he'd be undermining Bush's authority. Right? An egotistical jerk, right?
You both can put a sock in it. If I was interested in a sockpuppet's opinion, I'd listen to Rush Limbaugh.
How utterly predictable to see this. Perhaps you should both quit blogging to show your solidarity instead of cheaply exploiting the suffering of people you don't know and hardly care about.
January 3, 2009 8:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wow, that's helpful.
January 4, 2009 3:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Homeaux
January 14, 2009 10:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
His title is PRESIDENT ELECT OBAMA.
He is NOT president, yet.
He has NO power, yet.
If he did do something, then everyone would criticize him for stepping on our present President's illustrious toes.
BTW, is he ( BUSH ) still on vacation also ? - which I do not understand since he is leaving office in what 16 days ? ? ?
What about Condi, too ? ? ? I heard she is not headed out to the area ( Israel or thereabouts ) to try to do something - nice to see her not breaking her ass as she leaves office to attempt to get something of substance accomplished.
JJJJJJJJEEEEEEEZZZZZZZZZZZZZ ! ! ! ! !
January 3, 2009 10:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
You tell em Tex. w took the first six months off during his first eight months in office.
And Barack, who was supposed to have 'lost' his bb dropped his blackberry the other day on the course.
If Obama is not putting in sixteen hours on the new term, I will eat my computer. And its a Dell. And its old. And its dusty.
January 3, 2009 11:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
David, where's good ole truck cowboy these days? Well I'll be, gosh darnit, Dubya's clearin' brush in Crawford.
""As my time in office comes to a close, I thank the American people for trusting me with the honor of serving our great country," he said.
Silly David, I guess Bushie is already done serving this country huh, 17 days before he actually concludes being the president.
January 3, 2009 10:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
One word from Obama at this point could save thousands of lives... quibbling aside, this silence is unforgivably callous and adds to the late-Roman, Satyricon, quality of today's America.
January 4, 2009 3:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Which word?
January 4, 2009 8:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
January 4, 2009 10:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Karl, the word as David *originally* wrote it would be: FOUR!
Heh, isn't the edit function great? thanks to stillidealistic above... Good grief, "four"??? lol
January 4, 2009 10:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
Dear Dog,
I was always taught that correcting errors, even typographical ones, when they were pointed out to you, was a sign of intelligence. Perhaps we can agree to disagree?
January 4, 2009 12:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for screaming *stop* spelled correctly though!
On that note, we all know Obama is the Messiah but seriously, as if him saying that one word will end how many years of this conflict?
The only thing "unforgivably callous" is continued harping on the man who is P-EOTUS. Any chance the cowboy who is still POTUS might catch any he-l-l because he's trucking around on the ranch? Yeah, didn't think so.
January 4, 2009 12:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think that Barack Obama can bring peace to the Middle East, it's too late for that, but he might be able to save the lives of a few hundred Palestinians that live in Gaza. That would have to do for now.
January 4, 2009 12:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
On that note, we all know Obama is the Messiah but seriously, as if him saying that one word will end how many years of this conflict?
This is a somewhat obtuse comment. Nobody has claimed that Obama can stop the entire Israeli-Palestinian conflict with one word. But the fact is that he has an enormous amount of influence right now, and the Israelis are extremely dependent on the US, and have a particular need to stay in his good graces and make a good start to the next four years. If Obama signals that he is in favor of an immediate cease-fire, the international pressure on Israel to stop the ground operation will become enormous.
Obama's words don't just carry international weight, but domestic weight. If he speaks in favor of a cease-fire, that will put pressure on the Bush administration to drop its obstructionist tactics at the UN, and help move the cease-fire forward.
And aside from all this, even if Obama is unable to do anything at all to slow down and stop the violence, his speaking out will help put him on the right side of global opinion, take steps to repair the US relationship with the rest of the world, and prepare the way for rhetorically for official policy changes after the inauguration.
Here is a view from abroad of the problem of Obama's silence.
January 4, 2009 12:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hear hear. And I can't believe that playing golf is some sort of long-term foreign relations strategy with Israel. Which is the only justification *I* can think up for his not stepping in yet.
So much for all his wise men.
January 4, 2009 3:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, I hope you didn't ruin your Sunday breakfast hearing Harry Reid endorse Israel and the Bush administration 100%.
January 4, 2009 10:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
Chicken - No I wouldn't complain one bit if he said something. He wouldn't be undermining Bush's authority. He's had press conferences about the economic crisis in depth but haven't heard much about the current Israel crisis.
And last time I checked this website encouraged free speech. So please stop with the accusations of "cheaply exploiting the suffering of people I don't know and hardly care about". You have no basis to make that statement (and by the way it's completely wrong) and it's completely over the top
January 4, 2009 7:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
Although a long time severe critic of Israeli policies I don't think that after nearly six years of the destruction, the bombing, the torture and the carnage this country has inflicted on Iraq that Americans like many commenters on this thread, have any grounds to sit on their high horses and criticize Israel. Israel hasn't even bombed one wedding party.
What the US did to Iraq pales in comparison to any Israeli operation since their invasion of Lebanon during the Reagan administration.
At least there were rockets falling on Israel from Gaza, the US was not being attacked by Iraq. Clearly what the US has done in the past has not brought peace or stability. Hopefully with support from Obama, and those who seek peace, one day the conflict will end.
January 4, 2009 10:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
How many of us blogging here do you think supported the Iraq War? I certainly did not. It does concern me that many in Israel were pushing for the Iraq War and that many of their supporters in the US were among the neo-cons. It becomes difficult to separate US policy in the middle east from Israeli policy. I don't object to Israel defending herself and taking actions that are not in the interest of US if those actions are in Israel's self-interest. I just wonder if the American government is capable of separating what is good for Israel from what is good for the American people.
January 4, 2009 10:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Given that Obama has been working hard to set up the administration, and getting involved in some financial rescue stuff, and preparing to move a family with young children, and grieving for his recently deceased grandmother, and that no one knows what the hell to do anyway, could you give him a break?
Sure, let's all yell stop. Good luck achieving anything with platitudes. If you wish for peace, seek justice.
January 4, 2009 11:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
Tom,
You can't seriously think that grieving over grandmothers and finding a new school for the kiddies is an excuse for not commenting on what is happening in Gaza.
January 4, 2009 12:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
You can't seriously think there is anything anyone can say that means crap by now. The two sides are way past coherent thought. It will proceed to exhaustion, my guess. Israel will run out of targets, Hamas will survive but make enemies as well as friends, and there is no political leader with a decent mandate, who can take any risks.
France tried, was rebuffed. Obama is probably aware he would lose face if he did the same, and was ignored. Is it just barely possible there is quiet and forceful diplomacy being considered? You are always quick to find a fault, and have not been proven right on any item yet. Try letting it ride.
Have you asked yourself why Hamas and/or freelance rocket-launchers are such screaming idiots? They surely know their little bottle rockets are only effective at calling don cluster bombs and inviting tanks into their neighborhoods. There is only one explanation---they are so enraged they are beyond rationality. But Israel has to view them as rational actors, and responsive to punishment. The alternatives would be extermination, or simply laying back and taking the harassing fire. Neither is politically viable.
Got any ideas what Obama should say, except the adolescent hope for instant peace?
January 5, 2009 2:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
You can't seriously think there is anything anyone can say that means crap by now.
Well, I must admit I found it kinda ironic seeing this come from David Seaton, since believing so sort of requires a belief in American Exceptionalism, if not outright recognition of a sort of worldwide "Obama is the one" worship?
January 5, 2009 4:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't want my next President to die of hypertension before the 2nd year of his first term.
January 4, 2009 11:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Tom, do you think it's going to get any easier for him once he's inaugurated. I have plenty of issues going on in my personal life too. There are family issues, plus a full-time work load with little time for golf and workouts. But I still have time to present my views on a major humanitarian issue like Gaza, on this blog and others. Are you saying Obama doesn't have that time.
I suspect Obama is spending a great deal of time discussing this issue with his advisors. His failure to speak out is a decision. It has nothing to do with being too busy picking out new White House wallpaper or crying over his grandmother.
January 4, 2009 1:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
You have a point, but I wanted to let the man alone.
Mostly I'm putty's corner.
January 5, 2009 8:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
For all the bitching going on about Obama not "speaking out", you can't know what you don't know. Who's to say the current administration hasn't signaled or told the *next* administration to cool their heels? Who's to say Obama isn't working behind the scenes on the situation but we'd never know, since there really is only one president at a time.
Damned if he does speak out: "there's only one president, that arrogant jerk!" Damned if he doesn't: "that arrogant jerk is the next president, he better say something."
Oh, but one word is all we're looking for, right? *STOP*! And if Obama says just that, then he'd be hammered for not saying more and the circu would just continue...
January 4, 2009 1:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well according to this "damned if he does and damned if he doesn't" logic, Obama should just never say anything about anything.
And if he does say nothing about anything, we should all just go along and say, "Who's to say that he is not doing some secret awesome magic behind the scenes."
January 4, 2009 2:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
He is the Messiah after all so I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt that he's working his magic! lol
BTW, where's Waldo, I mean Shrub? What's he saying these days? "Well, I wanna thank ya'll for an awesome 8 years! heheheh"
January 4, 2009 2:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
This post is UTTER RUBBISH and is nothing but an excuse to take cheap shots at Obama. Seaton, if you weren't focused on attacking Obama, you would have addressed your complaint to the current administration and Bush's dithering, impotent response to Gaza. Place the blame and responsibility where it belongs. Laying this at the feet of a man who is not yet in office is absurd.
January 4, 2009 2:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Bush is completely known quantity as far as Israel is concerned... nobody has any hope placed on him whatsoever except, perhaps, those who are going to receive executive pardons from him in the next few days.
On the other hand Obama, for millions of people, not only in America, but all over the world, is a symbol of hope and change... for the moment.
What is happening in Gaza is one of the most horrible events since the Balkan ethnic cleansing and the siege of Sarajevo and it is all being done with US approval, weapons, money and diplomatic cover... This blood is on our hands too. If Obama said he was in favor of a ceasefire it would surely save hundreds of lives and raise America's tattered standing in world opinion. By not saying anything he is giving his approval to the operation and sending the message to much of the world that they can not expect any "change" from him that they "can believe in".
January 4, 2009 3:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
What is happening in Gaza is one of the most horrible events since the Balkan ethnic cleansing and the siege of Sarajevo
Must disagree Seaton. You seem to discount what your government (whether you supported it or not) has done to Iraq the last six years. Your government killed tens of thousands of Iraqi's defending their country. Look at what the US did to Fallujah, no one there even fired a bottle rocket at us.
Israel has been doing this stuff for decades, it radicalizes both sides, just leads to more deaths, and doesn't work but it is frankly nothing new. There is nothing Obama can say that will magically stop the conflict.
Your anger at Obama might be more legitimate if you directed some of your outrage at the rich and powerful Arab governments in the region who are more concerned with repressing their own people and arguing amongst themselves than they are in seeking peace and defending Palestinian rights.
January 4, 2009 5:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
You have zero basis for arguing Obama can save lives by speaking. That is the sort of blind optimism you derided in Obama supporters. That empty suit has awesome powers, I guess.
January 5, 2009 10:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Putty is right.
Obama is on vacation and a Senator from Illinois has no portfolio in the mideast.
Also, golf is good fun.
January 4, 2009 3:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
After reading all these comments -- and making some of my own before finishing -- I am suddenly reminded of all those so-called morons who kept supporting bush through the bitter end, even after he was so obviously wrong for so long. Folks like us roll our eyes at them. Or shudder. Or grumble expletives. So...How long are we willing to hang in there for our new president? Certainly at least until he's had *some* time in office. I don't know how long I'll wait, but not forever. Nor, I suspect, will all of you. I hope Obama's not doomed to fail..but it is a well-established American tradition to tear down all our heroes, right? Our sadistic voyeurism is not confined to Britney alone.
And it's fine to criticize. Isn't that our "patriotic duty as Americans?" Or was all that just for when Bush is in power?
January 4, 2009 3:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
One measure of success I will not be making is the creation of comprehensive peace, fraternity and goodwill in the Israel/Palestinian/Hamas/Hezbollah/Lebanon/Gaza/Syria conflict(s) in Obama's first term.
January 4, 2009 5:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Opinion on this Israeli thing seems to be pretty polarized. I don't consider myself uninformed, I probably read about as much on it as everyone else, but can't seem to gather enough real info on it to take a side. There's just so much crap out there on the subject masquerading as news.
The only way I'm left to look at it is, if those Gazans have been steadily lobbing rockets over into Israel, and actually killing Israleis, then the Israleis may be justified in what they're doing.
If not, the world should look aside as the Israleis are pushed into the sea for a horrible unprovoked attack. I have to confess to finding this second possibility attractive though, as this ongoing squabble would be over once and for all.
January 14, 2009 10:06 AM | Reply | Permalink