Civilization Watch

What This Election Is Really About

Isn't it funny to watch the Obama administration erupt in outrage (dutifully followed by their media pets) over Romney daring to criticize their astonishingly inept handling of the embassy invasions in Egypt and Libya?

Remember candidate Obama in 2008? Russia invaded the nation of Georgia – once part of its empire – and Obama, far from pursuing a "unified" foreign policy, criticized the Bush administration's handling of the affair.

Said Obama at the time, "This is a matter that should be left to the United Nations."

The press barely mentioned Obama's criticism of Bush's foreign policy. Partly because they were trashing Bush's foreign policy constantly, as were all Democrats, because during Republican administrations nobody talks about a "unified" foreign policy.

But the main reason they didn't make a big deal about Obama's criticism was that it so clearly revealed his complete ignorance of international relations.

Let's see. Russia invaded Georgia. "Let's leave it up to the United Nations." The organ of the UN that handles invasions of one country by another is the Security Council. On the Security Council, Russia has a permanent seat and a veto.

So when Russia invades another country, the UN cannot possibly do anything about it, because Russia will merely veto any proposed action.

The only reason that the UN was able to respond to Communist North Korea's invasion of South Korea in 1950 was that at the time, Joe Stalin's USSR was boycotting the UN in a fit of pique. So Russia wasn't present to veto UN action.

Russia has remembered ever since, and never misses a meeting.

Apparently in 2008 Obama did not know that the Security Council handles international aggression issues, or he did not know that Russia had veto power, or he knew nothing at all.

If a Republican presidential candidate showed such ignorance of foreign affairs it would be trumpeted for the rest of the campaign (if he lost) or his entire term (if he won). (Can you spell "potatoe"?)

But let's keep one thing straight. Obama may have been president for the past four years, but when it comes to foreign policy, he seems to be unsure what country he is president of.

That is, he is supposed to look after the national interest of the United States. Instead, he constantly sets aside our national interest and apologizes for our having provoked the hatred of so many foreign groups.

But which groups hate us? The ones that take violent action against us are the murderous thugs who, in the name of their religion or their ideology, think they have the right to kill anybody, anywhere, any time, while suppressing all political opposition at home.

Of course they hate us. We are the opposite of them. Worse yet, our ideas work, and theirs don't, and everybody can see that. They either have to become like us – or try to destroy us.

The Libyan invasion of our embassy (which by international law is American soil) was not part of any riot or public disturbance. It was a carefully planned attack that took place in the dead of night.

The Egyptian invasion of our embassy took place in a country where the military or the police could have stepped in at any time to suppress the disturbance. (They prove this whenever two Coptic Christians meet on the street and shake hands, whereupon they are arrested for rioting.)

The rioting at our embassy in Cairo went on for days. This could not happen without the approval of the Egyptian government.

There is zero chance that either event was a spontaneous demonstration by an outraged citizenry. Instead, an obscure movie was used as the pretext for attacking the Great Satan.

Iran has shown everybody that as long as you hate the US and Israel loudly and violently enough, you can stay in power without the slightest attention to good government or the will of the people.

If we had a president who understood or cared about the interests of the United States, the response to a government-sponsored attack on our embassy in Egypt would have been, at the very least, an immediate freeze on all Egyptian and Libyan funds in the United States, the cancellation of all shipments of military and nonmilitary aid to Egypt, the recall of our embassies and consulates from both countries, and the announcement that all Americans were to leave both countries at once.

This is what you do when a foreign government attacks your embassy, whether they pretend it's a "spontaneous" public demonstration or not. This is the minimum.

Anything less is an invitation for other nations to treat our embassies likewise.

Those who say we can't do such things lest we "burn bridges" or "alienate the moderates" in the other country don't understand. The embassy attacks burned all bridges. There are no bridges. And a show of weakness from us weakens the moderates in the other country, for, unable to trust in our strength, they dare not speak.

Instead of strength, the Obama administration responded with an apology for ... for what? For America being a free country where any moron can make any movie he wants to make, and the government can't do anything about it and therefore can't be held responsible for it?

This is not the result of incompetence by the Obama administration. Quite the contrary. That apology was precisely the policy Obama feels is right – because he does not conduct foreign policy as the president of the United States.

Instead, he conducts the foreign policy of the American academic/media elite. Which is nearly identical with the elites of Europe (the only difference being that the American elite has not yet completely embraced the anti-Semitism – no, the open Jew-hating – of the European "intellectual" elite).

If the academic/media elite had their way, there would be no such freedom in the United States. They would love nothing better than to eliminate all dissent from traditional, religious, patriotic and/or conservative Americans. They only support the freedom of expression of people who agree with them.

Remember that the main concern of the academic/media elite of the US after 9/11 was never to identify themselves with the American flag if they could help it, never to rerun the footage of the collapsing towers in order not to "inflame" public opinion, and to regard American actions as the "cause" of the "outrage" of the oppressed people of other nations, who were thus completely justified in hating the US.

These are Obama's people. They're faintly embarrassed to admit they're Americans. Mrs. Obama felt that her husband's election was the first time she could be proud of America – and the academic/media elite completely agreed with her.

These people don't like America. They're ashamed of America. And Obama is their creature.

They hate America's tradition as a Christian nation – because they hate Christianity. (Of course, they love the religions of other nations, in a patronizing pat-on-the-head kind of way, so those must be given lots of coverage in American schools, rather like pictures of kittens; it is only Christianity that must be suppressed.)

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They think of America as a horrible cruel bully that pushes around other nations, which is why they thought Obama's "apology tour" of the world after his election was completely appropriate.

But they feel this way only because they remain, as Obama is, completely ignorant of world history.

America, a big bully? Compared to what powerful nation, ever?

What nation has ever behaved as generously or shown so much forbearance in its relations with allies? No other dominant power has ever put up with the defiance and impudence of other nations as America has done since our ascendancy began in World War I.

Don't get me wrong – there have been some real blunders and misdeeds in the American past. I'm glad we learned from most of them and try not to repeat them.

But what nation are they comparing us with when these Americans with tenure at American universities and American media giants talk about how evil and awful America is?

The answer is: There is no nation they can compare us with which has had comparable power, and behaved as well as, let alone better than, we did.

There is no other nation founded, not on ethnicity, but on an ideology that people voluntarily embraced, instead of having it rammed down their throats (as in Communist- and Muslim-ruled countries).

Other peoples have aspired to emulate us – or flocked to our shores – because we were seen, correctly, as the best thing going.

America, as a nation, has nothing to apologize for. The misdeeds of individuals we deal with and punish appropriately. Our recent errors as a nation have usually been errors of omission – not saving lives in Rwanda and Bosnia, because we trusted other powers to intervene.

So in Obama's foreign policy, he speaks for his buddies in the academic/media elite – you know, the ones who despise those icky ordinary Americans who "turn to guns and religion."

He promises Putin that when he's reelected, he can be more helpful to Russia's plans for dominating their portion of the world.

He expresses his envy of the Chinese government, which doesn't have to put up with the interference of an opposition party.

It was candidate Obama in 2008 who briefly called for a national police force – never quite explaining what it would be for. (Remember how Bush was beaten up for years for the Democrat-supported Patriot Act – not for what it actually did, but for what it might do? But candidate Obama got a complete pass on his national police force.)

It is Obama who snubs our staunch ally, democratic Israel, as it faces a struggle for its life against the avowed intention of Iran to blast it off the map with nuclear weapons.

Meanwhile, it is Obama who refuses to support rebels against the Iran-backed Syrian government, which fuels and shelters terrorists of every stripe – including terrorists who attack both Israel and the United States.

It is Obama whose best friend among foreign heads of state is Turkey's Islamist leader, who deliberately provokes Israel.

Obama does have a consistent foreign policy. But it is not American foreign policy. It is anti-American foreign policy.

In case after case, Obama comes down as far from America's national interest as he can, without making it impossible for the lapdog media to disguise or ignore his anti-Americanism.

The media and others of the puritanical Left are outraged when anyone "questions" their "patriotism," but of course when they aren't being outraged, they ridicule the whole idea of American patriotism and express their shame at American actions.

Too bad they don't know any history, or they would be proud of most of America's actions, and would recognize that even with our flaws, there has been no kinder, gentler boss-of-the-world in history.

That's what this election is really about. Everyone talks about the economy, including – especially – Romney. That's because Obama's policies are economically ruinous, and because historically, people vote their pocketbooks.

But those of us who study history, thoroughly enough to learn from it, understand that something much greater is at stake.

Obama's anti-American foreign policy is designed to weaken America's power, to retreat at every possible point, and to cripple any ally that tries to act on its own to protect our, and the world's, interest.

The prosperity of the whole world – including India, China, Russia, Europe and any other place that is prospering – depends on the Pax Americana, the international order that America has maintained since World War II.

What the poor, ignorant, arrogant academic/media elite seem not to know, in their contempt for history, is that nothing America has done wrong since 1945 is anywhere near as terrible as the worldwide economic collapse, chaos and famine that would result from the breakdown in the worldwide system of trade that our military dominance has permitted.

Our "bullying" makes the world safe for trade, and swift, reliable world trade is what makes prosperity possible everywhere. Including, especially, here.

If you like today's high costs and high unemployment under Obama's policies, then you'll love the eventual result of his foreign policy, when we can no longer buy cheap foreign goods, and can no longer sell our goods abroad.

I can just hear the elitists of the Left mock these statements of mine. Alarmist fantasies! The world trade system couldn't collapse!

They believe it can't happen because, of course, they're idiots. It can happen. In fact, it always happens. That's how great empires die. They can no longer maintain their system of free trade.

Archaeologists track the collapse of the Roman economic order in one ancient city after another all over the empire, when suddenly foreign-made goods disappear, replaced by shoddy local manufactures.

China has collapsed more than once in its long history – and when it does, trade breaks down, and famine and mass death ensue.

All during the Cold War, people talked about how the prosperity of the West and the poverty of the Communist world were the result of the superiority of "democracy" over "communism."

What they neglected to point out was that free trade (not democracy) was the source of that prosperity, and it flourished where American guns protected it, and nowhere else.

The radical Muslims of the Middle East, the Communists of China and North Korea, and the wistful ex-Communists in Russia are like the barbarians who, living close enough to the Roman Empire to participate in the Pax Romana and to see and covet Roman prosperity, thought that if they could break Roman power, they could take the wealth.

What they didn't understand is that by breaking down the protection that made it possible, they made the prosperity evaporate.

It's like the poor idiots who think that Palestinians would be rich if only the Israelis left. No – until the Zionist Jews moved into Israel, Palestine was the poorest armpit of the Ottoman Empire. The Zionists made it safe and that made it prosper. Then all those educated "Palestinians" moved in from all over the Arab world.

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Get rid of the "Zionists," and Palestine will have all the prosperity of Yemen.

Get rid of American world dominance, and where will India and China sell their goods and services? What will be the market for Taiwanese, South Korean, Chilean and Brazilian products? Even if there are markets eager to buy, how will they safely and cheaply reach those markets?

This election is, in large historical terms, almost entirely about foreign policy, no matter what the electorate is misled to believe.

And in their responses to the attack on our embassy by Egyptian government-sponsored terrorists (and Islamists the incompetent Libyan government could not control), the two candidates have made our choice very clear.

Obama stands for the continued weakening of American influence everywhere. He stands for dismantling the world order of trade and prosperity that we have sustained for 68 years.

If he prevails, it almost doesn't matter what our internal economic policies are. His foreign policy will wreck the world economy, and ours will fall with it.

Romney, on the other hand, not only promises but shows that he will be president, not of the academic/media elite, with their romantic anti-Americanism, but of the United States of America.

Romney will look after our national interest – which, because we have heretofore been shockingly generous, happens to coincide very closely with the prosperity, peace and happiness of more human beings throughout the world than have ever been prosperous, peaceful, and happy in all of human history.

It is true that America can't maintain this all alone – we require the cooperation of other free nations. But the only reason we require their cooperation is that we didn't conquer them when we could have. We left them free and independent, so they could thumb their noses at us. As long as they helped us maintain the world order.

But when thugs, and nations ruled by thugs, blow up our embassies and kill our ambassadors, we must respond with excommunication from the fellowship of nations – or we invite other nations to behave likewise.

That is the choice this November, even if most Americans don't realize it. I just hope that by voting our pocketbooks, we accidentally elect the candidate who will act in America's, and the world's, best interest.

Meanwhile, the academic/media elite are doing their best to support the Obama campaign's attempt to make us focus on how naughty it was for Romney to speak up for American interest.

Guess what: We need Romney's naughtiness the way that Europe needed Winston Churchill's naughtiness in criticizing the appeasement foreign policy of Britain and France in the 1930s which led directly to Hitler's ruinous wars of conquest.

Obama is Neville Chamberlain tripled or quadrupled, because Chamberlain at least thought he was acting for the benefit of the Britain. Obama doesn't even think he's acting to benefit America, because he doesn't think America deserves any benefits.

Obama is running for President Of The Rest Of The World.

Only Romney is running for President of the United States.

Which is why, though I am not a Republican and have no desire to become such, Romney will have my vote. Not just because of jobs. But because America needs to get rid of this whiny apologizer-in-chief and replace him with a commander-in-chief.