I have no idea what Bill Kristol will pontificate about tomorrow in his much-awaited Monday, New York Times column…I can’t wait
But, if it is about Obama’s astoundingly successful overseas tour, I have no doubt that he will join the chorus of nay-saying, right-wing pundits and that he will have at best some sarcastic, sour-grapes observations and, at worse, various disparaging, condescending “analyses.”
But, I could be wrong. I hope so.
You may or may not remember that last week, in anticipation of Obama’s appearance at Berlin’s Siegessäule, Kristol demurely had to admit that Obama would be “well-received.” He said in “No Substitute for Victory”: “I’ll go out on a limb and say that Barack Obama will be well received when he speaks in Berlin on July 24.” and he reluctantly added, “O.K., it’s not exactly a limb. A recent poll shows that the German public prefers Obama to John McCain by 67 percent to 6 percent.”
Kristol’s “limb” turned out to be a massive, indestructible, “old-Europe”, oak tree.
“Well-received?” Talk about an understatement: 200,000 cheering Europeans—two or three more that McCain had when he shared a bratwurst at a German restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, and where he was heard grumbling something about his “Truppenverstärkung.”
Last Monday, Kristol had some advice for Obama:
Perhaps Obama — with the Victory Column at his back — will also challenge those who think it impossible to imagine victory today. Perhaps Obama will also warn of the temptation of assuming we can somehow avoid confronting the terrorists and jihadists, and those who support them.
And,
Surely he will express pride — whatever his judgment as to the prudence of the effort, and whatever his judgment as to whether it has been worth the cost — in the efforts of American servicemen and women, and those from our coalition partners, who have fought and sacrificed, along with countless Afghans and Iraqis, against those who would kill and subjugate their fellow human beings. And surely he will pledge our continued commitment to the cause of victory in this struggle.
In a post earlier this week, (“Obama Will Do Just Fine at the Siegessäule”), responding to Kristol’s advice, I said:
Mr. Kristol ought not to worry. Senator Obama will eloquently and convincingly address victory in the real war on terrorism, just as President Obama will convincingly achieve victory over the “terrorists and jihadists, and those who support them“ by effectively dealing with them where they are and have always been and without taking his eye off the ball
As a matter of fact, in a lead article, on July 25, none other than the Financial Times Deutschland (as translated in Watchingamerica.com) said:
Obama’s speech in Berlin was an advertisement for the cooperative struggle against terrorism. For the German government, that’s a clear sign he expects more German participation. In the long term, the United States won’t accept the fact that it alone is doing the fighting against the Taliban while the Germans play the role of those nice guys helping the reconstruction effort.
And,
A President Obama would not only find military assistance helpful, but a sharing of the financial burden would also go a long way toward helping America, now suffering a financial crisis, to remain capable of action. The German Parliament will decide this fall to increase the number of German troops in Afghanistan by 1,000 to a total of 4,500. Obama will ask for more, including the deployment of German troops to the dangerous southern part of the country.
This doesn’t sound like ignoring terrorism or advocating defeat in the real war on terrorism, or of being afraid to ask our European allies to pitch-in in this struggle.
I believe that Senator Obama more than met the “challenge” posed by Kristol, not only at the Siegessäule, but also in Iraq and Afghanistan, in Israel, Jordan, Paris and London.
Whether Obama’s words will meet Kristol’s “exigent” (i.e. partisan) criteria, remains to be seen. Personally, I doubt it, but I could and would like to be pleasantly surprised.
As I said, I don’t know if Kristol will be addressing Obama’s tour; but if he does, and he decides to showcase his German I hope he comes up with a little more original and a little less personally offensive cliché than his right-wing buddies’ “Ich bin ein hypocriet.”
And I hope that he will not use the flawed, tired intimation that an American politician’s popularity in Europe inevitably results in suspicion and resentment in America’s “heartland.” America and Americans deserve better credit and respect than that.
The author is a retired U.S. Air Force officer and a writer.