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17 September 2012 By Mahboob A.
Khawaja, PhD. The Obama's presidency was seen a
fantasy to the centuries old white legacy of the White
House. The power and its glorification associated with
the White House have not resulted in any ground
breaking discoveries even after Obama's entry to the
Washington landscape. The crucial challenge Obama
faces is how to cope with change and adaptability to a
New Beginning that he envisaged but betrayed by
conscientious compromise to ensure his own political
survival. Paul Craig Roberts called him "The World's
Least Powerful Man – the Obama Puppet." Obama did not
pave the way to hell for the unwanted wars but found
it already paved by George Bush to keep on solo
walking to entrapment - the Madness of Unthinking.
Politics is a game of new and creative ideas not a
fixed entity or an end to itself. Those who perceive
"points of no return" and scramble "red lines" indulge
in self-geared acts of absurdity and can hardly relate
to the contemporary informed global intellect and
changing priorities of the mankind, open and flexible
to change and futuristic developments. On all of his
major policy statements and strategic intents from the
immediate closing of the Guantanmobay Terrorism
Headquarters, the end of two bogus wars, the lobbyists
dominated politics, re-approaching diplomacy and
outreach to normalization of relations with the Muslim
world, President Obama got glued to the form and
forgot the essence of meaning and purpose for which he
won the election - "Yes We Can." Most politicians do
read Machiavelli's Prince to perform at the political
theatre. On the election night 2008, Obama spoke of
"remaking America" but while accepting the wishful
Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo and argued not for much
needed peacemaking to end the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan, but he defended the Bushism of waging
aggressive wars against the poor and destitute nations
out of the scope of the US animosity radar. George
Bush and his neo-conservatives warmongers invested
heavily to make America morally, politically and
financially bankrupt by waging the bogus wars on
terrorism. There was a strategy in No Strategy after
the 9/11 events to demonstrate to the fearful American
masses that some forceful measures and foreign war
engagements will be on the active Bush's agenda to
protect the US security interests. The ultimate aims
of the wars on terrorism were to create more terrorism
and to destabilize those nations having reservoirs of
untapped oil and gas resources and to crop up new
markets for the American corporations to sell more
arms and weapons. To spotlight the cruelty of the
on-going wars of terrorism for fun and enjoyment,
Gordon Duff ("The Baggage of America Extremism: No
Enemy, No Negotiation, Only the Dead are Real", ICH,
December 16, 2009), outlines the dilemma: "We had
become addicted to the "black and white" version of
Bushitism to the extent that we, as a nation, have
given up thought entirely. We know we can't win. Do
we expect an army of angels to come down from heaven,
the ones Cheney, Bush and Rumsfeld dreamed of, or are
we going to start acting like a world leader again."
Obama's politics does not
generate any creative enthusiasm as was perhaps
anticipated during his first presidential election
campaign. In times of crises and adversity, he appears
confused to face the facts of life and global affairs
but always willing to strike backdoor compromises if
the Israeli lobbyists insist on his role-play. To a
reputable international journalist, Robert Dreyfuss ("Obama:
'I Have Met Israel and It Is "Us"' ICH- the Nation
7/12/2010), Obama will even surrender the White House
to entice the Israeli interest more so in a
presidential election year: -"Israeli Prime
Minister Netanyahu set up another illegal Jewish
settlement, this time on the White House lawn. And, it
appears, President Obama has agreed to serve as its
armed guard. So complete was Obama's identification
with Israel yesterday that he actually referred to
Israel as "us" before correcting himself: "We
strongly believe that, given its size, its history,
the region that it's in, and the threats that are
leveled against us—against it, that Israel has unique
security requirements." It is not the Audacity of Hope
but consequential dictate of history when nations and
leaders violate the Laws of God, and challenge the
limits of reason; they end-up in self defeat and
destruction. If diplomacy was the foremost choice to
search for feasible political accommodation, President
Obama did not bother to use it; instead he continued
the Bush dictum of insanity in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"Negotiations cannot convince al-Qaida's leaders to
lay down their arms," In his Oslo Nobel Peace Prize
speech, President Obama claimed: "to say that force is
sometimes necessary is not a call to cynicism, it is
recognition of history." History offers a learning
role that you could not comprehend it. History shall
judge you Mr Obama by your actions, not claims. With
escalating war efforts and additional troops to kill
more innocent civilians and disturb the Afghan
graveyards, you have kept the insane momentum to
airlift more men and material to Afghanistan and that
does not signal peacemaking at all. After the American
failure in Iraq, You want to conquer Afghanistan and
Pakistan to maintain the Bush contracted gas and oil
pipelines that sound against the Nature of Things and
it is not going to happen in the foreseeable future.
The consequences are yet to come. There is something fundamentally
wrong with the American thought process on the War on
Terrorism and the emerging conflict with Iran. David
Perez ("Imagine", Information Clearing House,
02/2009), attempts to set out the humanistic
concerns: "Imagine being in a room of
maimed, deformed and tortured Iraqis, Afghans and
Palestinians, accompanied by widows and orphans
mourning because their entire family has been
exterminated. I imagine this roomful of walking dead
sitting around while my friends and I discuss how
"realistic" we in the U.S. must be with our electoral
politics, how our expectations need to "practical,"
how peace is just so damn "complicated." …. imagine
these victims looking at us with blank, scarred faces
as we congratulate ourselves for selecting a new
President who talks about "our God-given right to
lead," about our duty to spread U.S.-style democracy
throughout the globe, and how we are now just so
"proud to be American." America could have learnt from
the despotic Europeans who fought and killed millions
during the two world wars before settling in at the EU
tables to define their religious unity and common
economic and political interests. Those who conspired
animosity and conducted the warmongering against the
mankind of which they were a part, are long buried in
graveyards and not available for accountability.
Surely, they knew how to escape the dictate of history
and now the futuristic European generations are
pretending to be civilized after having been in the
dark ages for centuries. Recently, one 111 years old
British soldier - the last remaining WW1 British
veteran made it clear before dying (BBC, 10/2009),
"we don't know why we fought and killed other fellow
human beings. Wars do not seem to solve any problem."
One wonders, why human beings fight with their fellow
human beings. Edward Glover (War, Sadism and
Pacifism) noted: "human beings fight because they are
afraid, afraid that worse will happen to them if they
do not… to pugnacity and hatred, we must add fear." Could we – the rational human
beings, take notice of the continued insanity and help
to stop its overwhelming convergence to safeguard the
future generations from the scourge of wars? This was
the role and responsibility of the creations of the
UNO, the Security Council and other institutionalized
systems to make the humanity safe and secure. Perhaps
the human nature is at least part wicked and in part
foolish, not realizing the consequences of actions of
the few war lords of the world, C.E.M Joad wonders,
"the pacifist's question becomes, how can human beings
be prevented from suffering from the results of their
wickedness and folly?" C.E.M Joad (Guide to Modern
Wickedness), makes the obvious facts abundantly clear
that war diminishes happiness and lowers morality….and
that men simply do not see that war is foolish and
useless and wicked. Now as President Obama claimed
that it is necessary and wise and honorable. The
bigger question may be asked: how can we induce other
leaders to perceive their error of perception and
judgment and to make them realize the truth that wars
are wrong, and those waging the wars are not
peacemakers but wicked enemies of the humanity and
certainly not suitable to be prized for wars but to be
held accountable for the death and destruction of
millions of the fellow human beings. David Perez ("Imagine",
Information Clearing House, 02/2009), attempts to
recall the forgotten consequences – the untold
sufferings and agony of the civilian victim population
of the War on Terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan, and
how do they reason the unreason in a language of
silence: "Imagine these charred
visitors with missing limbs bowing their heads and
wondering if they should somehow envy us for always
finding a way to celebrate and party and bask in our
entertainment-soaked culture – even when it comes to
our "handsome" President being sworn in at the same
time their homes were being incinerated, courtesy of
our state-of-the-art weaponry. Perhaps these
"unfortunate" sufferers will understand that we can't
prosecute our own war criminals, because, you see, we
simply "have to move on." And maybe they'll understand
that not one U.S. leader has ever – ever – called our
bombings and invasions a terrorist act………May be
they'll understand us when we shake our heads and say,
"Well, this is just how politics work here. Sure it's
corrupt but, hell, what can we do?" "I face the world as it is,"
President Obama explained at the Oslo Nobel Peace
Award ceremony (December 10, 2009), but refusing to
renounce the war for his nation or under his
leadership, saying that he is obliged to protect and
defend the United States. But Obama misled the
informed and conscientious global intellect as no
nation is threatening the American people or their
security. "No matter how justified, war promises human
tragedy", he said. Norman Soloman (Commondreams.Org)
"Mr President War is not Peace", Dec 10, 2009),
questions the intent and eloquence of Obama's speech
and strikes a warning note: "War is not peace. It never
has been. It never will be…….in the name of
pragmatism, Obama spoke of "the world as it is" and
threw a cloak of justification over the grisly
escalation in Afghanistan by insisting that "war is
sometimes necessary" -- but generalities do nothing to
mitigate the horrors of war being endured by others." America's political elite so
often remembers Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to fill
the moral and intellectual blanks but neglects his
advice: "The chain reaction of
evil... wars producing more wars... must be broken, or
we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of
annihilation." In a war propelled economy
of the few, and given the US history of wars for more
than 220 battlefield engagements in its two centuries
of evolutionary history and the perpetuated insanity
of the warlords to make more wars, Mike
Prysner ("Amazing speech by an Iraq
war veteran": 12/25/2009),
an Iraqi War veteran has these daring observations to
share with the informed and concerned humanity:
"Our real enemy
is not the ones living in a distant land whose names
or policies we don't understand; The real enemy is a
system that wages war when it's profitable, the CEOs
who lay us off our jobs when it's profitable, the
Insurance Companies who deny us Health care when it's
profitable, the Banks who take away our homes when
it's profitable. Our enemies are not several hundred
thousands away. They are right here in front of us."
To reconstruct a different and
more sustainable future for the besieged humanity, it
is incumbent upon the intellectuals, academics,
visionaries, poets, philosophers and the thinking
people of the Universe to perceive and articulate new
and creative ideas, new political imagination for the
21st century organizations to be functional
for the people, by the people and accountable to the
supremacy of the people's will. Time and encompassing
opportunities warrant New Thinking, New Leaders and
New Visions for change and the future-making. But
change and creativity and new visions will not emerge
out of the obsolete, redundant and failed
authoritarianism of the few insane leaders. A
reflection on the on-going wars and resulting
destructions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Arab
Peninsula, Israel and Palestine clearly demonstrate
leadership madness, insanity and aggression to the
principles and norms of the UNO charter and human
rights values guaranteed for peace, security and
co-existence. The consequences of Man's cruelty to Man
confirm how closely the Western leaders collaborate
with the oil-pumping Arab dictatorial regimes and
others so called democracies to betray the interest of
the global community. The discovery of oil appears to
be a conspiracy to undermine the Arab culture and
civilization. The Arab world without oil were people
of vision, knowledge and civilization but the oil
transitory illusion of prosperity has spoiled and
dehumanized the modern Arab minds and souls. They are
glued to a treacherous sense of materialism that lacks
rational support. The Arab rulers uplifted by the US
led militarization in return for oil supplies are fast
becoming victims of their own greed and tragedies, and
soon they will be gone with the wind as did Ghaddafi,
Hosni Mubarak, Saleh Abdullah and very soon Basahr al-Assad
too, currently the entrenched Syrian authoritarian
bug, making rooms for the US-Britain to assume direct
control of the oil and sovereignty gimmick across the
Arabian landscape. To challenge the deafening silence
of the global warlords for sustainable global peace
and security, the mankind must find ways and means to
look beyond the obvious and dreadful horizons
dominated by the few warlords and continued to be
plagued with massacres, barbarity against human
culture and civilizations, destruction of the habitats
and natural environment as if there were no rational
being and people of Reason populating the God-given
splendid and evolving Universe. The informed and
mature global community looks towards those thinkers,
educated and honest proactive leaders enriched with
coherent unity of moral, spiritual and intellectual
visions and abilities to be instrumental to rescue it
from the planned encroachment of the few Western
warlords. For the sole purpose of winning
another term of office, Obama appears blindfolded by
the political strategists to view the interests of the
masters of military-industrial complex in Washington.
As Robert Dreyfusss observed how Obama is
self-delusional in all of his political imagination:
: "If you look at every public statement that I've
made over the last year and a half, it has been a
constant reaffirmation of the special relationship
between the United States and Israel, that our
commitment to Israel's security has been unwavering.
And in fact, there aren't any concrete policies that
you could point to that would contradict that." President
Obama, you desperately NEED a self- analysis, self
reflection and an inner connection to your conscience,
if you do not feel disturbed by some of the latest
atrocities of your soldiers under your command. The
essence of time and intelligent leadership calls for
RETHINKING to be a President of Conscious and
President of Change, if facts on the ground warrant a
change, you should go for the facts to make a
Navigational Change, not fantasies craved by defeated
strategists and warmongers. You continued to be
encircled by the wrong advisors - warmongers, not by
realist thinkers and intellectuals who can help you to
understand the pain and anguish of the larger mankind.
In global imagery, you are fast becoming a hopeless
person lacking moral and intellectual credibility. You
are the Commander-in-Chief of the USA armed forces,
and if you see the mirror, it is becoming obvious,
America by siding with the warmongers, it has lost
moral identity, intellectual and political strength,
it is exhaustive and broken in all major domains and
moving directions – a candidate to be replaced by the
course of history by another nation or group of new
emerging nations. You are killing people all over the
globe - the large scale massacres of the innocent
civilians in Afghanistan, daily drone strikes and
killing of innocent civilians in Waziristan-Pakistan,
US planned militarized and sectarian divided Iraq,
insanity overtaking rationality, and a war without
rational meaning and purpose, you are a war president,
not a peace president. Time and opportunities lost
are never regained. History will judge you by your
actions, not by your claims.
(Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja specializes in global
security, peace and conflict resolution with keen
interests in Islamic-Western comparative cultures and
civilizations, and author of several publications
including the latest: Global Peace and Conflict
Management: Man and Humanity in Search of New
Thinking. Lambert Publishing Germany-May,2012) |
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