My state's newspapers come in two flavors: Extremely right of center, and just slightly less right of center. Despite being a Democratic state, the state of the media is deplorable as demonstrated by this editorial published Thursday before last.
In his editorial this Roebuck figure said some pretty bad stuff. (The full article is available at the link.)
Obama's lack of condemnation of these men is like one who will sit by and let people be denied certain rights because of their race.
Does Obama think that by being friends with these men, his messianic charisma will convince them to free political prisoners and allow a legitimate free press to operate within their borders? In other words, the Obama doctrine says, "Obama is so cool, all the other world leaders will want to be like him."
Frankly, I am worried about the opposite happening. I'm worried about these leaders rubbing off on Obama. What do Putin, Castro and Chavez have in common with Obama? They all represent some version of leftist ideology. It's no crime to be a leftist, and certainly the political left has made significant positive contributions to various political systems.
I responded quite simply with aletter to the editor that was published today.
Lucas Roebuck thinks that negotiating with people like Chavez and Castro [Times, April 30] is somehow scary all of a sudden. This despite our history of seeing figures like Nixon shake hands with Mao, Rumsfeld shake hands with Saddam, and even George W. Bush shake hands with Vietnam's Nguyen.
Obama never lacked condemnation for these men, and he stated in his interview in Trinidad that he disagreed with Chavez. What more do you expect him to do? Spit in Chavez's face? Frankly, I think that's the only kind of thing that Roebuck would settle for. He fears these people's political positions rubbing off on Obama, but that has never been a problem for any of our prior presidents who shook the hands of men who were just as tyrannical. What makes Mr. Roebuck think so poorly of our president that he thinks Obama would easily be swayed by these types?
After the past eight years of Bush and Cheney's affront on basic human rights not only for foreigners but Americans, Roebuck is somehow complaining about Obama's obvious shift towards tyranny. This just as our president exits his 100th day in office. Well, excuse me for saying so, but I'm afraid that Mr. Roebuck is one of those Glen Beck's of the world - one who will never be happy with a Democratic president simply because of his party affiliation. They will most likely criticize Obama for the most hypocritical of reasons; ignoring all evidence and fact. The only fact they need is that big D.
Meanwhile, in the real world, cops are getting killed by people who buy into that line of thought; they are afraid of their guns being taken away. Now who's responsible for that? For some of these people, this paranoia can be a mental disorder, just as it can be for liberals; evidenced equally by the Weathermen Underground and the Oklahoma City bombing.
But, ultimately, all this false rhetoric dissolves to nothing. Despite whining and crying about it, the fact is Roebuck's criticism of Obama comes from a political position that was tried for the past eight years and put our country on the brink of depression. It's exactly the same as what the voters completely rejected back in the election, and continues to find not only wrong but downright dangerous to the stability of our nation.
I still find it a bit odd that Roebuck thinks Obama will somehow use the end to justify his means. The previous president used the ends to justify the means when ordering systematic torture on American and foreign citizens alike, in a case of criminal conspiracy that was committed by every level of government.
Now Mr. Roebuck can whine all he wants about Obama; that's his right. But his kind of thinking was one the voter's unequivocally rejected in the 2008 election, and the change Obama has brought about is exactly the kind of change they want and the Republican Party cannot provide.
Wesley Useche
Springdale
In any case, hopefully my letter will be a light in the darkness to this poor community. But most likely it will be ignored, as Teabaggers go on and on about 'Barry.'