Open Letter to President Obama

 I've edited out some of the prose in this letter so I can argue with the meat of it. This was stolen from a facebook friend's wall. (The best thing about having a blog: being able to shred someone's argument and not be yelled at for it.) I've edited out the formalities as well. Basically, it's from a WWII vet that lives within view of the Pearl Harbor Memorial.

"Dear President Obama,

I am amazed, angry and determined not to see my country die before I do, but you seem hell bent not to grant me that wish."


I'm sorry. President Obama is equally determined to not let the country die. He just has a different approach to it than your's. If you would kindly source where you got the information that Obama is purposely trying to drive our nation into the ground, then I will kindly show you an example of some very bad research.

"I can’t figure out what country you are the president of. You fly around the world telling our friends and enemies despicable lies like:

'We're no longer a Christian nation'
'America is arrogant'
Your wife even announced to the world 'America is mean-spirited.' Please tell her to try preaching that nonsense to 23 generations of our war dead buried all over the globe who died for no other reason than to free a whole lot of strangers from tyranny and hopelessness."

Duh: He's the president of the United States. But I'll be nice because I can see the rhetoric merit in that statement. Second, please source. Third, do you disagree with any of those? How can America claim to be a nation that is free of religious intolerance and be the melting pot of the world--ethnically, culturally and religiously--AND claim to be a Christian nation? We don't exclude Hindus, Wiccans, Atheists, Baha'i and others--although we're having problems accepting Muslims--because of their faith. Yes, most of America might claim Christianity. That doesn't make us a "Christian nation." Yes, America is arrogant. Anyone who says otherwise hasn't looked around their 4th of July picnic for a while with a critical approach. America is very arrogant. And mean-spirited? Have you heard the calls to disembowel that Chechnyan kid that bombed Boston?

"After 9/11 you said, 'America hasn’t lived up to her ideals.'

Which ones did you mean? Was it the notion of personal liberty that 11,000 farmers and shopkeepers died for to win independence from the British? Or maybe the ideal that no man should be a slave to another man, that 500,000 men died for in the Civil War? I hope you didn’t mean the ideal 470,000 fathers, brothers, husbands, and a lot of fellas I knew personally died for in WWII, because we felt real strongly about not letting any nation push us around, because we stand for freedom.

I don’t think you mean the ideal that says equality is better than discrimination. You know the one that a whole lot of white people understood when they helped to get you elected."


Context and citation, please. But even besides that: What are you talking about? First, America never has lived up perfectly to any of those ideals. Just spend ten minutes in a high school history classroom. Second, could he have possibly been referring to the ideal of religious tolerance? Because that was one time that America was not even close to the ideal. And where the heck did that argument about white people voting for him come from?

"Take a little advice from a very old geezer, young man."

And you dared say that 'Murica isn't arrogant. Since that wasn't condescending at all.

"Shape up and start acting like an American."

Democratically running for office isn't "acting like an American"? Attempting diplomacy before going to war isn't "acting like an American"? Trying to increase the amount of money towards education isn't "acting like an American"? If not then I don't want anything to do with being "American". Luckily, I can be "American" and vote for Obama and agree with his ideas.

"And just who do you think you are telling the American people not to jump to conclusions and condemn that Muslim major who killed 13 of his fellow soldiers and wounded dozens more. You mean you don’t want us to do what you did when that white cop used force to subdue that black college professor in Massachusetts who was putting up a fight? You don’t mind offending the police calling them stupid but you don’t want us to offend Muslim fanatics by calling them what they are, terrorists."

Would you rather we did jump to conclusions about that? Bad things happen when a populace jumps to conclusions about people that do crimes. They start generalizing, they start villainizing, they start sensationalizing, they start hating. Here's some citation for you: French Revolution, KKK and Jim Crow-type "trials", Bolsheviks and--oh, you'll LOVE being compared to this one--jihadists. As for the others: citation AND context, please.

"Do your job. When your battle-hardened field General asks you for 40,000 more troops to complete the mission, give them to him. But if you’re not in this fight to win, then get out. The life of one American soldier is not worth the best political strategy you’re thinking of."

"The life of one American soldier is not worth [your political strategy]?" I'll give you the benefit of the doubt on this one that you meant that it's worth more instead of what you did say. But to give "your general" not one but forty thousand more troops when he asks for them?! You terrify me, sir, both with your logic and your principles. The lives of Americans to me is worth more than any of your "honor" and "courage" and "phallic fulfillment" or whatever you're hoping to achieve.

"You could be our greatest president because you face the greatest challenge ever presented to any president. ...Losing the heart and soul of who we are as Americans is our big fight now. And I sure as hell don’t want to think my president is the enemy in this final battle…"

And then he salutates (which, by the way is not a word but definitely should be). 

Every president has the opportunity to be the greatest president, Obama is no different. And what do you mean by "Americans"? Because I'm betting that your definition of "American" is very different than my definition of "American". And are you saying that Obama has no heart and soul and isn't inspiring to Americans? Well, it appears as though over 50% of America disagrees with you and thus you are in the minority. And this is by no means going to be "the final battle" of the American people.

Post coming soon as a follow-up debate topic: What is the definition of "America"?