There’s been a lot of speculation about whether Obama will keep all his promises, usually from the perspective of those who are afraid that Obama won’t do what he has promised to do, e.g, end torture or exit from Iraq. After all, Obama is a politician, and although he appears to be an extraordinarily honorable politician, the fact is that all politicians fudge at least a little to get themselves elected.
But, let’s face it, for every thinking Obama supporter, there were at least a few of his promises that one hoped he wouldn’t keep, or some part of his campaign image that one hoped he would jettison.
There’s at least a glimmer of hope on one front. Obama is an apostate from the cause of secular humanism. He was raised by a good honest atheist, but somewhere along the line he lost his way. He repeatedly professed his faith in Jesus Christ, etc. For those of us who can’t quite understand belief in fairy tales, this was disappointing, but where else could we go? At least it seemed clear that he didn’t believe in burning the non-faith based among us. And, as Bill Maher said, we could always hope he was lying about his religious convictions. So it was with some pleasure that I learned today that Obama has not gone to church a single time since election day. Now, that’s change we can believe in.
More seriously, at least in the short term, we can only hope that Obama’s campaign season sabre rattling about Afghanistan will be tempered now that he has the election safely won. Juan Cole, who knows of what he speaks (and is therefore universally ignored) cautions against ratcheting up our military presence in Afghanistan. Obama’s macho posturing on Afghanistan always made me cringe during election season. I hoped, but dared not believe, that he was just saying that stuff in order to establish his credentials as an American politician who, like all other red blooded American politicians, was willing to go to war somewhere to prove his, and by extension, our manhood. The truth is that the war on terror (a stupid phrase, by the way; one does not declare war on a strategy) cannot be won with military force. In fact, it’s far easier to lose such a war with force than to win it that way. If Obama doubles down in Afghanistan it will become his Iraq. Better to find a way to gracefully withdraw. Again, we can only hope he was lying.
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