This is the first time I have watched Obama speak in all these years that he seemed to not believe in what he was saying. Many times he has said things I disagree with but his sincerity was never an issue. I always felt his spirit and enthusiasm. Not tonight.
I have a hard time knowing if it is my perception being clouded because of the strength of my disagreement or if he really was different. I was not alone : Obama’s ISIS speech: Our ugly national security politics, laid bare
President Barack Obama delivered an odd and ungainly speech Wednesday night, one that briskly laid out his case for using U.S. bombs, intelligence, allies and probably money to “degrade and destroy” ISIS (or “ISIL,” as he insists on calling it).
Read on below for more reactions.
Here's from Mother Jones: The ISIS Speech: Obama and the Dogs of War
Here is President Barack Obama's challenge: how to unleash the dogs of war without having them run wild.
Yes that is a big question. Kennedy and Johnson failed at this and I see no great hope that it will be different this time.
In 2003, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney sold a war on a simple premise: Saddam Hussein was a threat to the survival of the United States, and the only option was a full-scale invasion. Obama is presenting the public a military action that is not based on a black-and-white view (ISIS is evil, we will destroy it any way we can) but one predicated on grays. If US air strikes can make a difference, if other nations join in, if the Iraqi government gets it acts together, if the Iraqi military can do its job, then the United States will use its military might in a limited way to vanquish ISIS. A conditional case for war does not easily sync up with the stark nature of such an enterprise. If any of these ifs don't come to be, will Obama be cornered and forced by his rhetoric to do something? After depicting ISIS as a peril warranting a US military response—and with much of the American public convinced of that—can he then shrug his shoulders and say never mind? Will he provide the hawks an opening for political attacks and demands for greater military intervention? In his speech, the man who ran for president with the pledge to end the Iraq war declared, "we will not get dragged into another ground war in Iraq." But what if all else fails? He vowed to eradicate the ISIS "cancer," noting it will take time to do so. Can he stop if his non-war counter-terrorism campaign does not defeat the disease? It is hard to put the case for war back in the box.
There are so many unknowns here it boggles the mind. Not the least is the November election. I can not help but wonder what it will change in all this mess. They go on to say:
There's an old cliché: no battle plan survives contact with the enemy. The same might be true for a case for war. Once a war is started, the narrative of that war, like the events themselves, can be hard to control.
Predictions at this moment are not worth the time it takes to make them. I have a very bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. I hope it was dinner.