When given Yemens, make Yemenade!

President Obama doesn't bluster, and blather, and bloviate like the right wing wants him to, but he is taking several fights to those who would blow our airplanes out of the sky. He said during his campaign that our focus should have been Al Quaeda terrorists and it has been since he was elected. Getting out of Iraq appears to be possible and is proceeding. More troops are in Afghanistan now trying to figure out what to do in that far away strange failed drug state. And more are on their way. I continue to believe we should buy up all the Afghan opium crop as a way to weaken the Taliban and its Al Quaeda allies. And maybe use the plants to make ethanol.......or I don't know what else.

So now, Al Quaeda, having been defeated in Iraq has moved heavily into Somalia and Yemen. And remember it was Al Quaeda that rushed into Iraq after we took out Saddam Hussein and disbanded the Iraqi army and mismanaged the post war period so egregiously. By bombing a mosque, Al Quaeda triggered the civil war that turned that poor country into a killing zone. And it appears that President Obama is intent on following and engaging them in Yemen and Somalia with our arsenal of drone directed cruise missiles and possibly escalating the military action which may include US troops. Our soldiers won the Iraq war in about three weeks, and then the Bush W administration so badly bungled the aftermath in that poor country that we are still there seven years later. Same thing in Afghanistan only nine years.

The Republican Right appears to want a President who talks loud and tough and spits in the dirt while scratching his nuts and makes bold, if wrong, decisions. Shoot first and ask questions later. Or don't even bother to ask the questions. President Obama appears to gather facts, deliberate with his military experts and diplomatic corps, and then act carefully. The gathering facts part is something new to the Republican Right and I can understand their confusion regarding this step in the President's planning.

So I've got my fingers crossed that this President will do a better job in routing out Al Quaeda and that far right version of Islam that is responsible for so much bloodshed in recent history. When given Yemens, make Yemenade.

I had to write this tonight because I finally got tired of reading and hearing about Dick Cheney and all the right wing radio and Tea Party crazies who criticize President Obama on a 24/7 basis about his response to that stupid kid who set himself on fire trying ignite a bomb in his underwear on that flight to Detroit. The intelligence apparatus failed and I believe President Obama will take steps to fix it.

President Obama was presented with two wars, an economy in shambles, a collapsing banking system, a country divided by eight years of bumbling, bungling, bombast, and in his first year our President has helped avoid a world wide depression, is getting us out of one of those ill-advised wars, is responsible for helping bring the US economy out of its doldrums, and has even accomplished several good things in the health insurance reform bills that may pass soon. When given Yemens, make Yemenade.


Regards,
Bud