[DEBATE] : (Fwd) Dubious Obama

[Patrick Bond]

Obama's False Hope: Why I will not Vote for Obama

by Remi Kanazi

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0802/S00053.htm

At what point does an individual stop supporting the lesser of two 
evils? The question became particularly important this primary race, as 
one man ascended to political stardom ostensibly breaking free from the 
evils of mainstream politics and creating a platform based on hope and 
change. This transcendent figure is presidential hopeful Barack Obama.

Searching for substantive policy, I began to chip away at Obama’s 
political posturing, and came to a daunting conclusion: there are a 
multitude of reasons one shouldn’t vote for Barack Obama, especially 
those within the Arab-American community.

Senator Obama is not anti-war, nor does he genuinely seek appropriate 
alternatives to militarism in the Middle East. Arab-Americans and 
putative leftists naively, and sometimes willfully, overlook the fact 
that he is an ardent supporter of the invasion, bombing, and ongoing 
occupation of Afghanistan.

One also cannot dismiss that his views are consistent with the 
Democratic Party platform, which aspires to refocus on Afghanistan. Such 
views bode well with Obama’s plan to deploy additional troops and 
increase funding, but as with the case in Iraq, it will only intensify 
the struggles of the civilian population of Afghanistan. Obama fully 
supported the Lebanon war (even as the Israeli military killed hundreds 
of Lebanese civilians and leveled civilian infrastructure with tens of 
thousands of US-shipped cluster bombs), and played up his pro-Israel 
rhetoric nearly as much as his current democratic opponent, Hilary 
Clinton. As with nearly every other candidate, Obama fully supports 
Israel’s 40 year occupation of Palestinian land and dutifully endorsed 
the besiegement of Gaza. Surprisingly, this is a politician who once 
curried favor with prominent members of the Palestinian community, 
attending a community fundraiser in which Edward Said was the keynote 
speaker, dining with
Rashid Khalidi in Chicago, and receiving praise from Ali Abuminah during 
his time as a state senator. Domestically, his shift to the right is 
glaringly apparent, reflecting weaker stances on undocumented residents, 
the patriot act, gay rights, and a host of other domestic issues.

Obama may have voiced opposition to the Iraq war five years ago, but his 
“courage” came at a time when it minimally affected his political 
aspirations. Since entering the senate, he has voted in favor of nearly 
300 billion dollars in war appropriations and will continue to 
appropriate billions more if elected president. Obama is already playing 
up his ability to be hawkish on foreign policy (e.g. his illustrious 
declaration that he’d bomb Pakistan on “actionable intelligence”) and 
has tried to validate himself as a “tough when necessary” type of leader.

Post-911, inexperience with foreign affairs has been a sore point for 
all democrats. There is nothing more troubling than a field of 
candidates trying to prove themselves to their opposition. One only 
needs to look at the rise of Amir Peretz as Defense Minister in Israel. 
He was a well-known leftist against the Israeli occupation before coming 
into office. In an attempt to demonstrate his intestinal fortitude and 
establish himself among the Israeli public, he championed the 
destruction of Lebanon, and defended the decision as fervently as any 
right-wing activist. At best, Obama’s inexperience will limit his 
capacity to control the military occupation of Iraq, as it would every 
democrat and most republicans during the inaugural year. Additionally, 
expectation for his vaguely outlined phased withdrawal, which creeps 
well into midterm election campaigning, further denies the mechanics of 
mainstream American politics and Congressional trepidation. No democrat 
or republican
can afford to lose seats in the house and senate; it’s precisely why 
little is achieved during election years. Potential voters may find it 
useful to recall the excitement engendered after the 2006 midterm 
elections when a pullout was “imminent;” assurances were given that mass 
hearings would take place on Capitol Hill, and accountability was 
declared to be the wave of the future. Predictably, campaigning 
supplanted accountability, while the people of Iraq were left hanging in 
the balance. Ultimately, no viable political candidate will be able to 
pull out of Iraq before the 2010 elections.

Contrary to public perception, Obama is not a humanitarian. He 
consistently places the onus of solving the conflict in Iraq on the 
Iraqi people alone, absolving the US of its responsibility for an 
illegal invasion and occupation. Nor does he support a sustainable 
future for the Iraqi people or their right to reparations; rather, he 
supports an eventual end to the war primarily to alleviate America’s 
financial and militaristic burden. His position illustrates a profound 
difference between a humanistic and militaristic approach to Iraq, the 
latter of which will have a dramatic negative effect on Iraq’s civilian 
population. Moreover, Obama squarely blames Iraqis for their own misery, 
focusing little attention on the US campaign. The incessant mantra that 
Iraqis refuse to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and accept 
democracy ignores a simple reality: it was never presented to them in 
the first place, nor has there been a serious attempt to rebuild Iraq 
infrastructurally
or economically.

Arab-Americans should not be confused. No matter how appetizing the 
Bobby Kennedy-style rhetoric and charismatic speeches may be, if our 
community keeps acquiescing to the status quo, it will never change. We 
must begin building solid coalitions with other groups that face similar 
challenges (i.e. the Latino and African-American community), or our 
small vote will amount to little more than election-time pandering. 
Unfortunately, organizational work and outreach is in its infancy 
stages. Many of the organizations that purportedly speak for us have 
become part of the system, consequently stripping away their 
constituents of their legitimate demands. Furthermore, our community has 
become enthralled with general election politics, but it isn’t 
sufficiently focused on working at the state and local levels, where we 
can have the most impact. Barack Obama may lend more support to our 
issues than Mike Huckabee, but if our community starts supporting 
candidates who do not
recognize our plight (as well as the plight of other minority groups) 
our community at home and our families abroad will suffer for endorsing him.

One question still remains: which viable candidate is left to vote for? 
Unfortunately, in its existing capacity, our vote isn’t strong enough to 
make a viable impact. Reaching out to prospective candidates can be 
effective, but it must be coupled with a plan to comprehensively inform 
the field of where we stand on the issues. Enthusiastically endorsing 
candidates who refuse to appreciate our concerns is a fundamentally 
flawed approach. If the system is broken and the game of Washington 
politics is corrupt, then playing it with a weak hand only strengthens 
that system. The naysayer will proclaim that our votes count in swing 
states. Yet, if this was truly the case, our vote would be coveted, not 
ignored. No viable candidate on either side of the aisle even bothered 
to show up to the Arab-American Institute's National Leadership 
Conference in Michigan, where the largest portion of our constituency 
resides.

Our current predicament underscores the limitation of the two-party 
system: small voices have no voices. The only way to build a better 
future for the Arab-American community and positively impact policy 
toward the Arab world is to invest in ourselves, and begin to build 
coalitions, where smaller voices can come together to effectively change 
society. This method will legitimately allow us to empower ourselves 
without acceding to a blind principled stance. We can’t just hope for a 
better future; we have to work for it, and sadly, the empty rhetoric 
spewed by Barack Obama, and the rest of the mainstream candidates, only 
serve to solidify our problems in perpetuity. So, Yalla Vote! But do it 
in good conscience, and in a way that makes sense for our community.

Remi Kanazi is a Palestinian-American poet and writer based in New York 
City. He is the co-founder of www.PoeticInjustice.net and the editor of 
the forthcoming anthology of poetry, Poets for Palestine. He can be 
contacted at remroum at gmail.com.