Barack Obama is different. He's change, but change with a dire price perhaps. You see President Obama's new "vision" for America in the world is a far cry from George Bush's strident war on terror and his vision to spread democracy throughout a region in the world that has historically rejected all forms of civilized society and the rule of law. And if you compare Obama to the late Ronald Reagan then you're left with a lifetime of grasping for straws; because the similarities just aren't there. Reagan, despite what you thought of the guy understood the difference between an evil entity(Soviet Union), and a noble one(United States of America) and in that struggle for peace and freedom throughout the 20th century Reagan knew that one could not remain; the Soviet Union had to go, period. It was that strident and concrete conviction that made many conservative friends of mine idolize President Reagan, and many on the left despise him even now; five years after his death.


When you look at the fast track olive branches thrown at the feet of Europe, the Middle East, and the left in America Obama has all but thrown in the towel on American leadership in the world. His idea of American leadership is America as what the Russian Prime Minister calls a "first among equals" America cannot last as a first among equal superpowers because those other superpowers would be a communist state(China) and an authoritarian state(Russia). You can't stand beside nor work with governments and leaders who deep down envy your very existence. Not that China or Russia want to obliterate the US but they would rather see America as a marginalized power forced to play on their unbalanced field. Obama is doing exactly that when he seeks these overzealous measures to "mend" broken relationships with Russia. Look, we don't need to act first when it comes to the Russians and their aggressive Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. When you invade a former soviet territory unprovoked, use energy to manipulate an entire continent, and implement anti-human rights measures upon your media and people, all the while trying to provoke a country that is ten times stronger militarily than you are by placing broken down soviet era nuclear warships in that country's backyard then no, America shouldn't be the one to make the first move toward a relationship where we are the first among equals. I say Obama should realize that a moral superior and militarily superior US is in a much better position to negotiate than an America that is going out of its way to appease, I uh er uh I mean please adversarial nations like Russia.


When the the world sees Obama trying to cut nuclear arms down from 5,000 to 1,000, giving orders to the Pentagon to seek out budget cuts by 10% in the overall defense spending, while Russia tries to resurrect what they had in their days as a communist superpower, closing Guantanamo Bay, dropping charges against one of the men behind the USS Cole bombing, all of this may seem like a great step toward change to the untrained and wide liberal eye, but to those in the world and here in America who operate on a platform of reason and realism it looks like Obama is sending the message that Jimmy Carter sent. The message is that America can no longer stand first as the last foremost defender of freedom and justice. That America as Ronald Reagan and my hero Dwight Eisenhower saw it, as my other hero George Washington saw America, as a force for good in a world filled with evil men who do not respond to flowery rhetoric or pathetic gestures of appeasement and weakness. Yes, whomever said Obama was Jimmy Carter part two, well give that person a standing ovation because Obama is Jimmy Carter in a Gary Hart Halloween costume. By the way with that tan Gary had back in the eighties it's a wonder he wasn't mistaken as the first black presidential candidate with a serious shot at the White House. "Follow me" he used to say. Well twenty some odd years later the country decided to follow the first prize winner of a Gary Hart lookalike contest.

This time instead of finding a docked boat and Donna Rice we're going to follow Obama and find terrorists living in our communities because the "He who walks behind the rows" declared that America all of the sudden provides due process and constitutional rights to non-citizen terrorists. What an oxymoron from the mouth of a plain old liberal moron. Yes I said it, I can't give naive governance a chance because I'm smart enough to know that it will fail us all in the end. If someone from this so called "cabinet of powerhouses and superstars" doesn't stand up and be Ronald Reagan to Obama's Jimmy Carter then America will shrink not only in Gross Domestic Product but also military might and deterrent influence in the world. It's no coincidence that the Iranian leadership is openly mocking Obama's call for direct talks as a sign of America's declining ability to project firm principles when it came to our enemies. I suspect the Russians are saying the same when they hear Obama trying to "extend a hand" to shake a fist that will remain clinched for a long while.