Obama the Pragmatist
Still, I find it troubling that Secretary Clinton is seeking to make her boss hawkish on Libya during a time in which the most pertinent issue for most Americans remains the economy. Congressional Republicans are split on how best to reduce the deficit, with Tea Party adherents wanting deep cuts in spending while House Speaker John Boehner and his Republican ilk more willing to compromise, now is the time for President Obama to prove his critics wrong by showing focused and decisive leadership on job creation and lowering the deficit.
Fighting in Libya accomplishes neither of these tasks. Should our sympathy go with rebels throughout the Middle East who are seeking to overthrow decades of tyrannical leadership? Yes! But if we remember back to the end of the Cold War, when the Iron Curtain crumbled across Europe it was not because of American military intervention, it was because of the ideals that fueled our Founding Fathers: “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.” Those concepts took root among the rank-and-file in Communist Europe and the rest was history. The same holds true in Libya.
The president must ignore the war-hawks and the chicken hawks like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh and stay out of Libya. This is their burden to bear—not ours.