{"id":11536,"date":"2007-07-20T15:10:45","date_gmt":"2007-07-20T19:10:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/11536.html"},"modified":"2007-07-20T15:10:45","modified_gmt":"2007-07-20T19:10:45","slug":"obama-is-not-okay-with-genocide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/obama-is-not-okay-with-genocide\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama is not okay with genocide"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, ABC News ran<\/a> a very misleading<\/a> report about Barack Obama, sex-ed, and young children. Today, the AP is equally irresponsible, running this headline: “Obama: Don’t stay in Iraq over genocide<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

The far-right quickly went apoplectic<\/a>, suggesting that the senator is indifferent to genocide. One conservative called<\/a> Obama an “idiot,” adding, “So Genocide is OK? Intervention – even military – is not an option even when it may save thousands of lives? What of Dafur [sic<\/i>]?”<\/p>\n

The misleading headline certainly led a lot of people to draw the wrong impression, but if one actually reads the article, and considers what Obama actually<\/i> said, the criticism is entirely misplaced.<\/p>\n

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said Thursday the United States cannot use its military to solve humanitarian problems and that preventing a potential genocide in Iraq isn’t a good enough reason to keep U.S. forces there.<\/p>\n

“Well, look, if that’s the criteria by which we are making decisions on the deployment of U.S. forces, then by that argument you would have 300,000 troops in the Congo right now — where millions have been slaughtered as a consequence of ethnic strife — which we haven’t done,” Obama said in an interview with The Associated Press.<\/p>\n

“We would be deploying unilaterally and occupying the Sudan, which we haven’t done. Those of us who care about Darfur don’t think it would be a good idea,” he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s not that complicated. Obama wasn’t suggesting genocide is tolerable, and he wasn’t advocating indifference for murder on a grand scale. He was simply making the point that if genocidal attacks alone were the basis for a massive military deployment, we’d have deployed thousands of U.S. troops to central Africa right now. That we haven’t suggests that genocide — or in the case of Iraq, speculative potential for genocide — does not drive U.S. military deployments.<\/p>\n

The problem with the story was compounded when it suggested that Obama expects significant bloodshed to accompany a withdrawal.
\n<\/p>\n

“Nobody is proposing we leave precipitously. There are still going to be U.S. forces in the region that could intercede, with an international force, on an emergency basis,” Obama said between stops on the first of two days scheduled on the New Hampshire campaign trail. “There’s no doubt there are risks of increased bloodshed in Iraq without a continuing U.S. presence there.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“See?” conservatives said, “Obama is unconcerned about genocide, and now he’s lackadaisical about Iraqi deaths.”<\/p>\n

Except that’s still not what he said. Obama told the AP that the costs associated with a withdrawal are less than those with the status quo.<\/p>\n

“It is my assessment that those risks are even greater if we continue to occupy Iraq and serve as a magnet for not only terrorist activity but also irresponsible behavior by Iraqi factions,” he said.<\/p>\n

So, to wrap up: Obama is not indifferent to genocide, he is not apathetic about Iraqi deaths, the AP’s headline writers need to be more careful, and dozens of prominent conservative bloggers have managed to once again get confused about a series of rather straightforward quotes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, ABC News ran a very misleading report about Barack Obama, sex-ed, and young children. Today, the AP is equally irresponsible, running this headline: “Obama: Don’t stay in Iraq over genocide.” The far-right quickly went apoplectic, suggesting that the senator is indifferent to genocide. One conservative called Obama an “idiot,” adding, “So Genocide is OK? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11536"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11536\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}