Tuesday, July 13, 2010

"Al Qaeda is a racist organization" says......President Obama?!

No worries about being politically correct any longer. It's on.

Speaking about the Uganda bombings, the president said, “What you’ve seen in some of the statements that have been made by these terrorist organizations is that they do not regard African life as valuable in and of itself. They see it as a potential place where you can carry out ideological battles that kill innocents without regard to long-term consequences for their short-term tactical gains.”…
Explaining the president’s comment, an administration official said Mr. Obama “references the fact that both U.S. intelligence and past al Qaeda actions make clear that al Qaeda — and the groups like al Shabaab that they inspire — do not value African life. The actions of al Qaeda and the groups that it has inspired show a willingness to sacrifice innocent African life to reach their targets.”…
“Additionally, U.S. intelligence has indicated that al Qaeda leadership specifically targets and recruits black Africans to become suicide bombers because they believe that poor economic and social conditions make them more susceptible to recruitment than Arabs,” the official said. “Al Qaeda recruits have said that al Qaeda is racist against black members from West Africa because they are only used in lower level operations.”
“In short,” the official said, “al Qaeda is a racist organization that treats black Africans like cannon fodder and does not value human life.”

I question the timing, given today's low support numbers from CBS and WaPo on the President.  It seems like a ploy to cater to the center-right who were tired of the refusals to label terrorist organizations from the Middle East as "radical muslim" factions.  Easiest way to demonize them (as it has been for any opposition)?  Play the race card.  It stirs emotion and support pretty quickly. 
At the same time, it seems uneccessary, given that Al Qaeda has been seen as a terrorist group (bad guys) by the American public as a whole.....so why go there?

NAACP makes themselves even more irrelevant

After the embarassment over the Hallmark cards, Today, the NAACP has passed a resolution condemning racism within the Tea Parties. At least they didn't generalize the entire movement!
Other important resolutions by the relevant group:
  1. a resolution “supporting Native Americans” (which one member objected to because Native Americans were “slaveholders”)
  2. a resolution enshrining “DIVERSITY” as the NAACP’s top educational goal (not education?!)
  3. a resolution banning the use of Tasers by police (which one member, a black female police officer, objected to because it would result in a blanket ban that takes away law enforcement alternatives…but whose objection was met with dead silence)
My take on this, if you call fire when there isn't one, you end up in trouble. The same applies to calling racism. The overall message of the Tea Party has always been a smaller and more responsible government, responsible spending, and safeguarding the pillars of our Constitution. If opponents can only restort to namecalling instead of rebutting my philosophical ideology, then I'm more than likely winning the argument.
So look out for these signs to know you're winning a debate.  If your opponent:
  • resorts to  making it personal or namecalling (racism, physical appearance, etc)
  • changes the subject
  • curses
  • will no longer listen after you've presented legitimate data (facts)
Then, there's no reason to continue debate.  The NAACP has just shut themselves out.

Recap

For a few years (since November or 2007) I've grown to be interested in politics; So for the next few postings, I'll re-post some of the topics I've covered since then. Kind of leads you on a journey through my thought process and showing how I came to my present way of thinking about everything. Bear with me, and leave comments!